Hendrix looked around to see if there was anything his strings could grab on to, but there was nothing but the building within reach.
"Damn it. Is this how I die?" Hendrix thought to himself in a panic. He fired his strings toward the floor above, but they slipped off the concrete edge.
Hendrix looked down at the ground below him. It consisted entirely of concrete. Hendrix settled on the fact that he would die today.
"I wish I could have said goodbye-" Hendrix's train of thought was interrupted by a scream.
"HENDRIX!" Vida screamed from the window. Her eyes welled up with water as her hands began to glow that familiar light green.
Hendrix was pulled out of his defeated thinking as he looked at Vida's face.
Suddenly, branches, leaves, and roots began to climb down the side of the building and towards Hendrix.
Hendrix's eyes widened as his frown turned into a smile. Vida's pseudo tree wall broke glass and split concrete as the branches frantically made their way to Hendrix. The leaves that rapidly sprouted from each and every branch covered the building in natural green.
"I always knew you were great." Hendrix thought to himself. He fired his strings again, grabbing on to one of the branches that stuck out from the building. The branch was thick enough for him to swing off of and back through the window he shot out of.
As Hendrix swung back up, he noticed apples growing from the branches that Vida had created. He smiled.
Hendrix landed his feet back on the carpet as his friends sighed in relief.
"That was amazing, Vida!" Akilah ran over to Vida, who was still crouched over the edge of the window. Vida turned around, giving a slight smile.
"Thank you…" Vida's words slipped into whispers as she gently passed out. Hendrix caught her head before it could hit the broken glass at the edge of the window.
"What? Vida… What happened?" Hendrix was utterly confused.
"Is she okay?" Taro asked from behind Akilah.
Hendrix gently shook Vida to attempt to wake her up. Vida faintly opened her eyes and smiled a weak smile at Hendrix. Hendrix smiled back.
Akilah pondered about the situation until a comment popped into her head from that fight in the street.
"Ran out of Spirit like every other amateur. You rebels make me sick." Officer 1060's words rang through Akilah's head.
"Did she run out of Spirit?" Akilah asked out loud. The group looked at her as they thought over her suggestion.
Akilah channeled Spirit into her brain to check. Through the battle so far, she had learned that she can sense the intensity of someone's Spirit. She checked Vida's. Akilah immediately noticed that her green light had faded significantly, but it was slowly growing back in brightness. Akilah sighed as she realized it wasn't an urgent matter.
"I remember Alex talking about that before we did stamina training." Kai muttered.
"Maybe. That was a new move for her-" Taro's words were cut short by a boxing glove to the side of his abdomen. He was able to catch his footing before he flew any farther.
The group simultaneously came to the realization that they had forgotten the enemy in front of them.
"Shit" Akilah thought to herself. She remembered the plan she had thought of, but it wouldn't work nearly as well without Vida's Mode. She looked over at Vida to see if she was capable of combat, but Hendrix had put Vida on his back, who had slipped back into unconsciousness.
"It would've worked perfectly if I could've used Vida's spores as a Spirit-fueled shroud to attack from. There's gotta be another way." Akilah thought to herself as she looked around the room. She reviewed her teammates one by one to see if they could do anything.
"Hendrix can't take hold of the robot. He'll just get flung out of the building again and Vida won't be there to save him. I doubt Taro has any tricks up his sleeve other than raw strength. Can Kai do anything besides run around it?" Akilah reviewed the tools she had at her disposal, basically none.
"Let's give this one more try, bro." Taro rolled up his sleeves as he and his brother nodded at each other. They both charged at the robot, Kai running around it to try to distract its vision while Taro tried to attack with a flying punch.
"What is with you guys and attacking with no plan?!" Akilah screamed at the brothers.
Taro managed to get one good punch in on the robot's face. He had turned on his Mode, so he was confident that his punch would knock its head off.
Instead, the robot tilted over, which seemed to trigger something in its treadmill-like bottom. A sharp thud was heard as cleat-shaped devices protruded from the bottom of the robot, planting itself in place firmly.
Taro shook his hand as he and his brother retreated in surprise.
"Shit. What can we do?" Kai stared at the robot, who was now dragging himself on the carpet, heading in their direction.
"Just stall. It looks like your girlfriend is up to something." Taro pointed to Akilah, who was thinking to herself until she heard Taro.
"Yeah. She is." Kai gave a sincere yet idiotic smirk.
"Shut up!" Akilah screamed.
The brothers ran towards the robot once again. They kicked and punched with no real purpose, just being cautious to not get hit themselves.
Vida slowly opened her eyes while on Hendrix's back. Her face once again turned red as she came to realize who was carrying her.
"Um… You can put me down now…" Vida whispered.
"Oh, sorry." Hendrix was oblivious to the awkwardness of the situation, once again.
Akilah turned towards Vida and ran towards her.
"Vida! Do you think you have enough Spirit to pull off one more move?" Akilah put her hands on Vida's shoulders.
"Um… I think so. Just tell me what to do." Vida channeled her Spirit into her hands with no problem.
"Alright. I need you to spread your mushroom spores around the robot. That's all I need you to do." Akilah pointed at the robot, who was busy driving Kai and Taro towards fatigue.
"Alright, but everyone needs to cover their mouths and noses. Please." Vida looked around the room to make sure everyone heard her.
The brothers backed off the robot after hearing Akilah and Vida's talk. Everyone in the room put their shirts over the bottom half of their face as Vida held her arms out, channeling Spirit into her hands.
Two mushrooms appeared, one on either side of the robot. They quickly burst with spores, covering the entirety of the enemy.
"Now! Go!" Akilah yelled through her shirt. The three boys went on the offensive.
The robot's screen-face lit up in its entirety, showing no rhyme or reason. The enemy froze in place.
"Just as I thought." Akilah felt proud of herself. She had deduced that the robot tracks Spirit, and Vida's mode concerns living organisms and their seeds, which contain Spirit. So if Vida were to cover the robot with, for the purpose of the situation, a cloud of Spirit, the robot would not be able to track anyone. The robot freezing was a nice touch.
Hendrix spiraled his strings around each other, taking a jab at the robot's face. No visible damage was done.
Taro placed a Mode strengthened punch to the exact same spot that Hendrix had hit, creating a miniscule crack.
The boys nodded to each other. They simultaneously knew to only go for the center of the robot's screen, since they assumed it was the weakest point of the robot.
With their shirts still over their faces, the boys closed in on the robot, attacking the same spot one after the other.
Kai darted in first with a roundhouse kick, Taro followed with a crushing left hook, and Hendrix finished the rhythm with a stab from his spiraling string.
"I'm gonna sit down for a bit." Vida felt faint once again, just not nearly as much as before. She sat down on the thin carpet as the battle continued.
Akilah watched on, making sure the boys' attacks were going to plan.
This went on for about two minutes. A gust of wind came through one of the broken windows, dissipating the cloud.
"Shit. We have to end this quickly." Hendrix thought to himself. The crack on the robot's face had grown significantly, which made Hendrix confident that his next move would work.
"Get back!" Hendrix yelled at the brothers, who jumped back in response.
It took a second, but Hendrix thought up the most violent and fast song that he had memorized.
"Thumbsucker!" Hendrix screamed in his head. Hendrix's strings once again spiraled around each other, but this time they were tightly wound around each other, making a sort of drill aiming straight for the center of the robot's face.
To the surprise of the entire group the strings cracked the screen going straight through the head of the enemy and impaling the robot on Hendrix's steel drill of strings.
The loud crunching and cracking of metal and copper echoed through the hollow office cubicles.
The robot's once stiff arms went limp as oil oozed onto Hendrix's strings. He retracted the strings as he and his friends collapsed in relief.
"You alright, Vida?" Hendrix turned back towards her.
"Yeah. Just tired." Vida smiled.
"Great job, guys." Taro looked around the room.
"It was all thanks to her." Kai made a heart with his hands as he looked at Akilah.
"Shut up." Akilah chuckled as she lifted up her glasses to rub her eyes.
The group sighed collectively.
"We'll take a little rest, then go on to the next floor. We should be able to get to the hostage by the time the sun goes down." Akilah sighed.
"If this was only the fourth floor, what are the others like?" Kai looked around for an answer, but nobody gave him one. They were all thinking the same thing.
The weight of the floors above them seemed to sink onto their chests.