I turned to face them, my arms hanging loosely by my sides. They spread out in a semicircle opposite me, grinning and laughing.
"Gonna teach you a f***ing lesson, pretty boy!" The spiky haired thug grinned, showing a mouthful of yellowed teeth. Potty mouth in more than one way. Charming.
Niceties over, he lunged at me, his right hand balled into a fist and aimed at my belly. I sidestepped lightly, grabbed his fist, and punched him in the ear as I pulled him past my right side. He went down. His friends roared their rage and came at me. I grabbed the first to arrive, twisted his right arm up behind his back until I felt the tissues in his shoulder straining. He screamed in defiance and pain. I increased the pressure until felt his shoulder pop as it dislocated, and then I pushed him at the remaining four. He went down, taking two more with him.
The two remaining on their feet charged at the same time. I charged back, slamming my shoulder into the belly of the one on the right as I reached out with my other hand and snapped the nearest ankle of the one on the left. The one on the right sat down abruptly, obviously winded. I broke his nose.
The last two struggled to their feet, looked at their fallen friends and tried to run. I caught them before they even reached the door. I held them lightly by the throats. They could breathe, but only just. I wondered how many times these young thugs had gotten away with similar attacks. I lined them up in a row against the crumbling wall of the barn, and hurt each one of them just enough to slow and stutter their thoughts, so that I could slam home that silvery cognitive wedge that I had used on Rebecca's hit-and-run driver. It had served me well in the past, and I knew its effects. They wouldn't hurt another living thing ever again, and they would have no memory of what had happened here. I had left the one with the broken nose with two unbroken legs to walk on. He would be able to get help for the others when his brain eventually unscrambled itself.
I left them in the relative shelter of the barn and walked back up to the road. It was deserted. I crossed the bridge, and strolled down the walkway that meandered alongside the other bank of the river. I picked out my target's bungalow, closed my eyes, and reached out carefully into the building with my mind. There were two female minds inside, and they were both thinking about the same thing. The other member of their household, the target I sought, was missing. He had gone out for drinks with some friends tonight and was not yet back. An image flickered in my mind, and I knew that the son and brother that they were worrying about would be home eventually, broken nose and all.