The Count smiled and teased him, "Where is your courage? Who knows? I might be wrong, and this might be the time I die without a heart."
The boy shook his head. He changed the subject. "I bet they already know that we came here. This investigation will be more difficult."
Count nodded. "Only more difficult. Not impossible."
Rewind smiled and said, "I like a challenge."
Kelvin had rigged the fire system of his safe house so that water won't come on to kill it. But the other sensors in the building eventually picked up on the fire and raised the alarm.
People and machines got to work trying to put out the fire. Heroes also joined in and eventually got the job done.
Even so, the fire burned for a good 10 minutes before they began fighting it. By the time they killed it completely, it had burned for almost an hour. By then, everything in the apartment had been incinerated and rendered nearly useless.
It was only nearly useless. The heroes and their technicians didn't give up on the investigation. They found out the identity of the person who owned the apartment. It was a woman who no one had seen for months now.
While they were working to track down the owner of the apartment, some others were tracking everyone that had entered and left the building in the past few days.
They were also trying to identify the things that were left from the fire in hopes that they would be able to find their source and maybe trace it to the shape-shifter.
Count called Thorin for help. He didn't want to but now that things had reached this point, only someone that can track evidence that can't be burned can find their shape shifter.
Abel has become useless after the fire. If there hadn't been a fire, he would have had a wealth of information for them to use to find the target. But the fire had burned and distorted all the information. So now he has to approach a villain for help.
Unfortunately, the cocky villain outright refused him. Thorin said, "No. I am currently busy trying to get my cabal ready to win this upcoming war. I am not going to stop doing that in favor of tracking someone that helped reduce my number of enemies by two. If anything, I should track down the shape-shifter to thank him or her for their good work."
"I might even track them down after the war to recruit them. But I will not track them down for you to kill them."
Count asked, "What do you care about some villain? You don't even care about your people. I will pay you heavily. This is energy stones we are talking about. It will also be a short work."
Thorin said, "If I see you, old man, I will kill you. Take this as your last warning and go home. I will show you no mercy when we meet."
"In fact, I'm going to tell everyone that you're in town. I won't come after you myself, but I am sure that there are some people who would like to have a go at you."
The Count said confidently, "Let them come. I'll take as many heads as they bring to me to cut off."
Then he cut off the call and grumbled, "That cocky boy. I regret calling him for help."
Rewind whispered beside him. He said as he made a slashing sign across his neck. "Maybe we should. You know."
Count laughed. "Kill Thorin? The two of us aren't capable of that, boy. It is best we stay away from him."
Rewind didn't let it go. He asked, "You can't be really scared of him, right? You're the Count. Count Dracula. You're immortal."
Count chuckled and said, "I'm glad you think highly of me, boy. But not every injury can be healed. He is just too dangerous. Even you are not safe from him. You won't even know how or when he attacks, so you won't be able to protect yourself."
"Not that you will be able to protect yourself against him if he attacks. The best you can do is dodge. But even then, you won't see his attack, so you won't be able to dodge. It is best that you stay away from him completely."
"Besides, we can still do this. We have learned that the assassin used some drugs to affect the state of mind of the two women before killing them. The killer probably did it so that they won't be able to fight back."
"The poison has degraded now, so it is difficult to identify. But I'm sure they will find something. When they do, we will nab whoever the killer is."
Rewind smirked. "I thought they were strong before when I thought they killed Stella and Black Widow without them being able to resist. But now they seem more like a rat. A rat scurrying and hiding from cats."
Count flicked his nose with his finger, but Rewind flickered away. He still went ahead to warn the boy. "Shape-shifters aren't to be underestimated. We should take every enemy seriously."
"But you're right. This target seems to be weak. Poison will explain how they were able to kill the two ladies so easily. This is a good thing for us."
While the two of them were chatting, Kelvin had just entered the city. A few minutes ago, he received an alert about the intrusion into one of his safe houses. He also received a picture of the Count's face when he broke into the apartment.
This was a serious matter that put him on edge. He could let things go or try to find out what was going on.
Both held their risks. Being ignorant and choosing to be oblivious while someone is looking for him is clearly a bad idea. But trying to investigate what's going on might make him suspicious or outright send himself into the clutches of whoever is looking for him.