"Kill the bastard."

Fingers wrapped about and squeezed the trigger of a 9mm Beretta semi-automatic pistol. Two shots that punctured the chest and silenced the cries of a poor soul begging and pleading for forgiveness beneath a lead-colored sky.

He smoked the fucker. Clean through the heart. A solitary voice offered a few words before an undisclosed sum of cash was deposited into the other's suitcoat and they parted in opposite directions, no relics of their meeting left behind but the rotting corpse and blood stains that wouldn't ever leave that street. The wailing of a police siren in the distance provided the sole swan song for the murdered mafiosi who lay a bloody mess along an open sidewalk.

Too much irony. What a God-forsaken dump. The thoughts echoed within the recesses of the killer's mind, the same thoughts which had lingered in every single musing he had ever made since first stepping foot in that trash heap which had the sheer audacity to proclaim itself a city, a civilization. Thoughts were all he had, all the man was ever capable of save for the speeches he'd oftentimes deliver via a language that could only be spoken with the ring of gunshots and lead buried in some bastard's chest.

Power, that was the sole component of the Veritas legal system. Who could exert the most power over the other. Sentences were delivered by one's own hand and any soul fortunate enough to arm himself or herself was considered an executioner. And few were more well known in the realm of execution more than that man now striding calmly along the Veritas streets while the echo of some crash in the distance barely reached his ears - it had to be miles away. Nothing he could invest his attention into just yet.

The pattern was consistent along that sidewalk, the repetitive tapping of two well-polished Oxfords bearing down gently while one finger of either hand artfully rotated a 9mm Beretta 90-Two Type F, customized to the hitman's exact specifications - effortless squeeze trigger, personalized grip and reworked barrel and lock mechanism designed for precise recoil absorption, the works. One had to be equipped well if they were to be considered a professional in the human dispatch business.

He spoke no words and kept his vision perpetually in motion, catching any subtle changes in the landscape or around him. Absolutely vigilant. One had to be that way if they were going to survive the Veritas night life. As he proceeded further into the more vivacious section of the city, the overwhelming scent of alcohol smashed into him accordingly, melded together with the traces of gunsmoke, cigarettes, and loose women. Disgusting. Fucking disgusting. His hands rotated those dual Berettas into the loop of his belt at his sides as he rounded the corner and stepped past a defaced and tagged sign. Beneath all the filth that covered it, he knew what it read regardless.
Sector Nine.

The area was so trashed it made the rest of Veritas look like fuckin' Paris in the springtime. Created as the industrial sector, Veritas' infamous City-Sector S9-00 - or simple Sector Nine - quickly became a breeding grounds for the worst kind of scum. Drugs ran rampant throughout the place, with an addict on every street corner, usually whoring themselves out to the low class filth whose idea of a classy meal were moldy lunches left over by the industrial workers and rat shit; maybe a stray dog or two if it was their lucky day. Money didn't exist to these people, and to even be seen with it was to be begging for a mob of street thieves on your ass, armed with poorly constructed makeshift knives and molotovs. The common ilk of Sector Nine didn't need cash. They bartered with the limbs of dead hookers, the personal items of industrial staffers, and lurid sexual favors.

The hitman slowly ambled along the streets looking for nothing in particular. It was on nights like this one that he needed a reminder of why he chose a profession that involved stealing the last breaths of some poor bitch, some wealthy businessman, or some overexcited street thug in cold blood.

This kind of fuckin' trash heap needed a nice sweeping every now and again. But perhaps the bullet holes made by one man alone just wouldn't be enough to get the job done.

"This is control, break off your entry. You're coming in too steep, too fast."

A slight grin flitted across Alex's face, his rough-carved features distorting as he did so. "Ne-ga-tive, my friend. This fucker's going down, and I'm catching the last boat off." In the heavy rumbling of the falling, burning starship, his hand found the cutoff switch to his comm system, effectively disabling the routing system he'd set in place to forward all communications from the starship's cockpit to that of his personal fighter, a prototype XR-400, in which he now sat.

The job had been simple enough. He had been making his way through the system when an incoming transmission had bid him take care an orbiting starship and all aboard. One might have thought a simple XR-model fighter would have been incapable of doing such a feat, and they would have been right, but Alex was nothing if not adaptable. One forged identity, forged emergency transmission and forged command control later, the crew found themselves confined to their quarters, those unlucky few on duty dead, and due to an unfortunate mishap Alex had made in his tampering, the starship now spiraling in its sickening death throes on its way to the planet's surface.

A flashing red light on the fighter's forward-screen told him that the bay doors weren't responding. He had been going at a pretty high speed when the ship entered the atmosphere, and the mechanisms were probably fused, but that was to be expected and dealt with. This man's particular means of "dealing" meant several explosive charges he'd wired to the doors before he'd even climbed into his own fighter, in anticipation of this very problem. He picked the detonator out of his ashtray -- of the many things he was, clean and tidy were not among them -- and hit the switch, the fighter's shielding protecting it from the dull thud of the charges. The instant he thought the fragments of the door to be clear, he punched the ship's throttle to full, leaving a large, scorched bay in his wake and he escaped the flaming chariot like a bat out of hell.

He loved many things about his fighter, but what he enjoyed perhaps most was its hovering quality. As he engaged this function, the ship decelerated of its own accord, leaving him hovering perfectly in place. He twitched the lateral thrusters until he had a clear view of the ship, only now realizing how much it had deteriorated in its plumet through the atmosphere. large chunks of hull were missing, and nearly every one of its armaments had been torn away, many appearing to have exploded and taken bits of the ship with them.

At brought something of a smirk to his face to see various heavy weaponry firing from the surface in an effort to reduce the plummeting ship's potential damage; these men were, in a way, doing the job he was going to be paid for. Their weapons were sufficing to power through the ship's heavy armor and were likely liquidating the remaining crew in the process. He would receive a substantial sum of money, they would receive a reprimand and likely lose their jobs, not because they'd made a mistake in judgment, but because someone had to be blamed for it, and it damn sure wasn't going to be Alex.

Two things happened simultaneously. First, one of the ground based weapons -- a high-frequency laser battery -- misfired and hit the ship's fuel source, causing an almighty explosion that managed to rock Alex's fighter at even this range, and served only to propel the remaining chunks of the ship like hellish missiles into the surface, adding even more sound and force to the preexisting torrent.

Second, Alex's comm chimed, though he did not immediately register the tone over the din outside. After a few seconds, he brought up a simple text message, a transmission from a private bank he dealt with, which informed him of a very large deposit being made to his account. He smiled, activating the atmospheric cycling system in the cockpit and leaning back in his seat, already busy lighting a cigarette. It was only a minute or so later that his comparatively tiny ship fell off the control tower's radar, its cloaking system having been activated, and Alex punched the boosters.

"Another day, another dollar... and a whole lotta people gone stiff."

It was with a song that he began his journey to Veritas.

"We'll sing all night, and drink all day,
and on the girls we'll spend our pay,
and when it's gone, then we'll away,
to dance with Jak o' the Shadows."

He stared ahead, not looking to his left nor his right. He was sitting in his cockpit, a small yet agile starfighter. The console before him was bleeping softly as he played the song, smiling to himself a bit. The zero-g atmosphere outside and inside the cockpit was oddly comforting to him.

"There're some delight in ale and wine,
and some in girls with ankles fine,
but my delight, yes, always mine,
is to dance with Jak o' the Shadows..."

The long brown hair that he usually kept bound back was unbound today. He decided on a whim to allow his hair some free movements. He looked half-insane. In fact, he was more than likely half-insane. The grief and anger, disappointment and resignation all battled with each other for supremacy within himself. All that emotion was seriously fucking him up.

Strangely though, it did not show on his tanned face. His face was smoothness, a blank face. No one could've known that he was battling with himself over many a thing. Indeed, the only thing that could be seen was his dark, stormy blue-grey eyes. So full of emotion held in check, they were.

So. Time to bring myself into this insanity. A soft chuckle passed through the man's lip, a small bleak smile gracing his lips. He'd been to a world that was so far different from what he knew that it changed him permanently. The world's touch that he'd been to was easily seen.

Behind the man rose a 12-ft. wide wings that were currently folded awkwardly just over the seat the man rested in. It had the look of feathers. When one even brought their hands close to it without his permission, or not recognized, the wings' feathers would become razor sharp. It glinted softly now, somewhat visible in the starlight.

The man's outfit gleamed dully in the starlight, hints of silver showing from time to time upon the cuffs, collar and shoulders. Not seen is his black pants which also had strips of silver leading down the sides. He was sitting there, hands on the console, fingers resting upon softly gleaming blue buttons that to him, told what they did.

Pressing one of the blue buttons, he felt the starship surge, felt Time and space change.

"We'll sing all night, and drink all day,
and on the girls we'll spend our pay,
and when it's gone, then we'll away,
to dance with Jak o' the Shadows."

We'll spend our pay indeed. He shook his head slowly as he watched the stars streak by him. Without thought, he maneuvered around heavenly bodies that if he did not do so, would kill him with more than enough force with the speed he was flying at. It was to Veritas he would go.

It was Death he would dance with soon enough. As he listened to the song, he could only smile with pleasure.

"There're some delight in ale and wine,
and some in girls with ankles fine,
but my delight, yes, always mine,
is to dance with Jak o' the Shadows..."

A delight, indeed. he thought to himself.

"We'll toss the dice however they fall,
and snuggle the girls be they short or tall,
then follow Destiny whenever She calls,
to dance with Jak o' the Shadows..."

Then the song that was playing segued into another song. For a moment, he closed his eyes, as he felt the song wash over him. The smile widened into a grin.

When the night falls, the big moon's gonna rise.
You can look right up, see it in the sky.
Makes me feel like I'm going to blow a fuse.
I start to shiver and shake with a strange kind of blues.
... but I like it.

He thought, grinning as he looked slightly to his left at the representation of Veritas floating above another console. Then slightly to the left of Veritas, his starship was rapidly approaching. Slowly, he looked back at the world that was coming into view, albeit distantly.

Another button was pressed. Moments later, the ship began to decelerate slowly, taking its sweet time to decelerate so that during the deceleration, if he was attacked, he could stop the deceleration and use the remaining speed to either escape or attack.

It was time for him to join in. Time for him to atone. He smiled sadly as he watched the world of Veritas approach him.

Time for me to atone for my world. The world he'd visited, he considered his. For it had changed him, permanently and for good or worse, that remained to be seen.

Wind swept through the hatch as it opened, catching the hem of a black velvet cloak and billowing it lightly around the form of the tall man who wore it. He was taken aback as that air entered his lungs, the scent of a terrestrial gust foreign to his senses after so long. A few steps of those neatly polished boots brought him further down the gangway.

Eyes as black as the very depths of space surveyed his surroundings. The port seemed well-kept, as it should have been for how much they were making him pay to dock his ship there, but as soon as his gaze left the edge of the series of platforms, it fell upon nothing pleasing. It seemed as though some nearly-intelligent force had formed piles of ruin and rubble and heaps of twisted metal in a move to give what had previously been an array of trash some meaning. It amused the man to note that in some star systems what he saw here could pass as the highest form of artistic merit. As they said, "One man's trash..."

And yet those same critical eyes betrayed for a moment a tinge of nostalgia as they scanned the horizon, carrying the vague memory of days he would never forget. Then all of that was gone, his dark eyes housed in an expressionless countenance paled from long voyages void of sunlight. He closed the gap quickly between himself and the port's proprietor standing by the entrance to the station.

"Monsieur le Conte," the middle-aged man groveled half-heartedly, bowing his head for a moment in a failed attempt at graciousness. "I am sure your journey to Veritas was enjoyable?" The name of the planet stroked the Count's sense of irony, and he offered the man a smile in the form of the slight curl of his lip.

"The journey was fine," he nodded, though he knew what the proprietor's underlying question would be. "And you will be compensated in full. I'm not the type of customer your port is used to getting." The man's face lit up at this as the Count moved to pass him.

"Is there anything else I can help you with, Monsieur le Conte?" he inquired, following his sweeping path like a starving dog that had just been thrown a bone.

"Merci, non," the Count spoke without stopping or turning around. "All of my preparations were made before I arrived. All I ask is that you look after my ship until I see fit to depart from this world."

"Of course, Monsieur," the man bowed and hung back, "of course." The retreating form of the man they called Il Conte de Île Triste disappeared into the station, leaving behind only the unsettling sense of tragedy.

Richard Vega

A drifter walked into a bar on yellow-lit run-down street. It was a little known bar, not many went there anymore. A sign next to the door covered in a mix of dust and smog said "Sector Nine" and above the doorway was a sign that read "The Customer is Always Wrong." Inside, it was littered with the worst band of characters, but they had made it their home to do their evilest deeds. A murderer was an angel among them; underhanded tricks and shady dealings were a long-practiced past-time. Two members within the bar broke the hushed style of talk in a mixture of grunts, yells, and curses clearly about a dealing gone wrong. They both quickly rose out of their chairs and drew for their guns. The faster draw pulled the trigger and the other man fell - but not a flinch from the other patrons in the bar. A dead man lay fallen with his back arched over the backrest in the same chair he sat seconds ago alive, adding a flavor of iron into the damp disgusting odor of the air. Lead plugged a hole in the man’s chest and blood oozed over his body and pooled around the chair. The man who killed him sat back down across the table from him and sipped from a mug a dark piss yellow beer.

The drifter had unshapely teeth and worn ragged clothes in shades of brown, but an air of confidence and happiness around him – clearly not someone from this part of town. His confidence was shaken momentarily as he witnessed the scene immediately upon entering the bar, but recovered from the initial shock trying to blend in with the rest of the crowd's easiness. He had on heavy brown work boots and was smoking a cigarette. He gazed across the room at the various faces, all lurking with an unwelcome expression. He dropped the cigarette out of his mouth and spent a few extra moments than normal to squish the cigarette out under his boot. By then he had gotten the eyes of all of the patrons of the bar on him, studying him, some preparing to play executioner. The drifter walked over to a bar stool and sat himself down a few seats away from another patron on the bar. He tapped the table a few times to get the bartender’s attention. The bartender looked over his back with an irritated expression, but eventually turned around to deliver a glare. The bartender studied the drifter for a couple moments, and then raised his head towards the man.
Bartender: "Whaddya want?"
Drifter: "A beer please."
Bartender: "All I got is piss warm Bud."
Drifter: "That’s my brand."
The bartender begrudgingly poured some beer into a dirty mug and slid it over to the Drifter. The Drifter looked at the disgusting concoction, and then took a sip.
Drifter: "This is damn good. I’d say this is the best beer I ever had."
The bartender looked at the drifter with a confused expression. The beer was horrid, sour, old and warm. But he kept his mouth shut, he didn’t know what to make of the Drifter.
Drifter: "Actually… I’m just glad to be alive right now. I was up a few towns away, you know Neo Nagasaki? I was at a bar there. Not unlike this one, they serve beer." The Drifter looked at the mug and swirled the beer around. "Not as good as this, but close. And I saw something you wouldn’t believe. I’m sitting there see, small table all by myself. Now, this bar…" He looks around quickly scanning across the room at all the other villainous creatures there, their eyes still fixated on the Drifter. "… was full of lowlifes. I mean, not like this classy joint here. No, I mean bad. Like they were up to no good. So, I’m all by myself… I like it that way… And meanwhile, things are going on. Under-the-table kind of things. You know, not too obvious… But not too secret either."
Drifter: "So… I’m sittin’ there. And in walks the biggest man I have ever seen. I mean BIG as shit. Just walks right in like he owns the place. And nobody knew quite what to make of him... or quite what to think. There he was and in he walked. He was dark too. I don't mean dark-skinned. No, this was different. It was as if he was always walking in a shadow. I mean every step he took toward the light, just when you thought his face was about to be revealed... it wasn't. It was as if the lights dimmed, just for him."
Drifter: "So, this guy walks up to the bar and takes a seat. He orders a whiskey, sits back and says nothing."
Bartender: This news caught his interest and he raised his right eyebrow towards the Drifter. "He ordered a whiskey?"
Drifter: "I wasn’t interested in his drink, I was interested in what he carried. Some sort of rifle, kind of heavy. And he sat the thing beside him on a stool as if it were his girl. Then all of a sudden the bastard grabbed the bartender by the collar and spoke. You know he was talking business because he upset the bartender. Especially when he mentioned… What was it now… Vertsee, or… Veritas." The men in the room glared at the drifter intently and some shifted uneasily. The drifter clearly didn’t know where he was. "Yeah, that’s it… Veritas."
Drifter: "He pissed off the bartender plenty. Oh, and some of those unsavory characters I was tellin’ you about? …Not like the class acts you got here, but real scum, they got pissed too. They started pulling guns and knives and starting some SHIT like you wouldn’t believe. Now, the stranger, he bolts off the stool. He dives into the middle of the room with his gun, just dives right in. I don’t know what he does under his trench coat, but in two shakes he’s standing upright again… And he’s pulled out the biggest hand cannon I’ve ever fucking seen."
Drifter: "But that was just the beginning… He was unloading shell after shell into these guys. People were flying across the room with half their bodies missing."
Bartender: "An’ you jus’ stood there? Din’t run for cover ‘r join in?"
Drifter: "I was frozen stiff. All I could do is watch this… THING tear the place apart. It was amazing. Cutthroat scumbags were coming forward and dying much deserved deaths. Don’t get me wrong, this was no class act group like you got here." He looked around at the shady characters throughout the bar. "Not at all. No, these guys were world-class turds. I’m sorry, but they got what they deserved…" He paused for a moment and took another sip of beer. His voice dropped low and deep and his eyes narrowed in front of him. "…It was Judgment Night in that place."
Drifter: "Oh, but it didn’t end there. He grabbed one of the guys… The only guy left breathing, and he starts getting information out of him. And I knew by the whispering, this guy was giving him the goods… Spilling his guts, confessing the world. He told that stranger everything." The room was listening intently to the Drifters story. It was beginning to make them nervous and the tension was rising. The shady man sitting a few seats down from the Drifter asked quickly “Everything?” The Drifter looked the man square in the eyes. “Everything.”
The Drifter lifted the mug to take another sip, but hesitated a moment and looked at the glass. "Can I get a cleaner mug? This one’s dirty."
Bartender: "Fuck you man, that’s as clean as the mug is getting’ ‘round here."
Despite what he said, he grabbed hold of another cleaner mug and poured the beer from the dirty mug into the clean mug. He then slid it down to the Drifter.
Drifter: He looked at the mug, but didn’t take another drink. "So, anyway…" His voice became dark as he stared at the bartender hard in the eyes. "…Without warning… Without any hint or preview… The stranger whips around, and he sees…Me."
Bartender: "You saw his face?"
Drifter: "His face? No… His eyes. His eyes were angry, I could see the red through his black sunglasses."
Bartender: "And he din’t do not’in’ to ya?"
Drifter: "Not really, he turned back around to the guy on the floor. Even after confessing the world, he was reaching for a gun on the floor... The Stranger shot him."
Bartender: "Then what?"
Drifter: "…Stranger walked over to the bartender next… He just paid, then left."
Bartender: "The bartender lived? Haha, the bartender never gets killed!"
Drifter: "BUT… As the stranger neared the door… The bartender lifted a shotgun from under the counter.
…Naw man, the bartender got it… He got it worse than anybody… Right through the face."
Bartender: The bartender recoiled back in shock for a moment, then poured another glass of beer in another clean mug. "Here, it’s on the house." He moved the beer towards the drifter, but quickly retracted it. "But… Only if you can remember his face."
Drifter: The drifter looked up into the bartender’s eyes. "Thanks… But no thanks. Because I think he’s headed this way." The Drifter lifted himself out of the seat. His dark voice suddenly lifted into a cheery happy voice. "Well! Thank you boys." He began making his way towards the door and patted one of the shady characters nearby on the back. "You all take care now"!

The drifter had left, but the tension in the room was still heated and not a sound was made. Finally one scumbag exclaimed “Ah he’s full of shit, probably was tripping off his ass.” There was a round of uneasy laughter among the crowd that quickly died to a hush. Business as usual carried on, but the story lingered in the back of their minds.

Then he came.

At first, it was the clankity-clack of metal hitting metal that could be heard echoing down the street. Then it was a dark outline with a matching black shadow that almost filled the street, walking away from a grey metallic van than seemed to sit heavier than most. He was as big as the story had told and just as dark. He wore a trench coat and black sunglasses. A skin-tight under armor T-shirt showed off the definition of his muscles. A yellow light glimmered off chunks of chrome fashioned in all forms of modern war from within his trench coat. Every step he took was heavy, but not burdened. Every step forward he took down the street progressed through the conical projection of a yellow street light, and each time the light flickered before dulling to keep him in a shadow. The patrons of the bar saw the man approaching through the front window and it didn’t take them long to realize who it was. If the apparent size of the man didn’t give him away, surely the XM29 OICW rifle he carried in his right hand would. Within seconds the bar had cleared out as the patrons and even the bar tender fled through the back door.

Richard Vega reached into his right trench coat pocket, pulled out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter. He lit one and took a long drag just as a massive explosion ripped through the skies. The fuselage of an apparent crashing ship ruptured sending a wave of wind down the streets and allies. Richard Vega secured his cigarette within a gloved hand and exhaled a plume of smoke that was whisked away by the wind. The entrails of his trench coat fluttered in the wind, but the tidal wave effect didn’t seem to make his mammoth body flinch. In the distance, large fragments of flaming shrapnel were falling upon the city like a rain of fire. At his range only random bolts and the occasional charred limb from a crew member bounced off the ground. His body was covered in a SWAT Cert suit of ballistics armor that rested beneath his trench coat and amplified his weight and size and protected him from whatever may decide to bounce off his body.

Vega’s red-tipped spiked hair twitched for a moment as Melfina awoke from her sleep mode. A dull pulse of electricity traveling through one of three tubes hidden under his armor and blast color, directly connecting Melfina to the back of his neck and into his nerve system made him flinch for a moment. Status-check data flowed down one lens of Vega’s sunglasses and through his earpieces he heard an all too familiar cold objective voice: “Status shows all green. Resuming Symbiosis… Complete. All body functions normal. One psychological anomaly present. Accessing… One morphine dependence found, suppressing now… Complete. Inventory check… Complete. Hello Rich.”

Vega returned the cigarette to his lips and stood in the street gazing across the city from the top of a hill. A smirk crossed his face as he watched the flaming masses pour down on a military compound that was lit up by the wreckage. Melfina began scanning the area and pulling information to compile a map. Another drag on the cigarette followed by a satisfied puff made him feel relaxed. The view from his vantage point was scenic, and the fire lit up the dark sky like it was Hell’s Gate.

“Just like paradise.”

Wearing a blue pair of designer jeans along with a green wife-beater, Renée had her crimson streaked ebony hair pulled up into two matching French braids. Parts of her bangs were draped across her matching eyes, giving her a slight mystery. In a city that was so dilapidated, it seemed odd that her clothing was in exquisite condition, but she took good care of what little she did have. Perhaps the more important question revolved around why she was even in Sector Nine. Her parents certainly wouldn’t appreciate her location, which is exactly why they assumed she was off at a soccer camp. Stepping carefully over decaying bodies, LeBeau wrinkled up her nose while adjusting the black trench coat, that she borrowed from her father so that it covered the majority of her weapons. Her keen sense of hearing seemed to pick up everything, which was helpful because there were a lot of scumbags walking around the sector.

“Alright, time to get what I’ve come for and sneak back on a ship that’s leaving this place.”

Peering from behind a green brick building, she ensured that the coast was clear. The color had been painted on and beneath the peeling layers five different colors could be seen ranging from red to white. Creeping from her hiding place, the eighteen year old moved to what was left of a street and headed down it silently. There was an odd air about the city, almost as if something was about to occur. Turning the corner, the teenager realized that the restaurants were nothing more than decayed foundations. Growling in frustration, the loner wondered where to get food since for the last three weeks she had been scrounging around for scraps in different cities and towns.

“Well, this is just fucking great.”

Slinking behind yet another corner, the teen found herself surrounded by a group of men, crazed by the lack of food and what had happened to the once beautiful city. Clinching her fists against her side while attempting to remain unaffected by the insane look in each of their eyes, Renée wondered how she was going to get out of this situation without drawing attention to what exactly was beneath her innocent-like flesh. Flicking both of her wrists at the same time, she caught the twin daggers that ejected out of the vambrances. Gripping them both tightly, LeBeau narrowed her eyes, letting the potential thugs that they were messing with the wrong person. The seven that were already looking at her like she was a piece of meat was joined by another seven, bringing the group up to fourteen. Her confidence started to wane and as the group crashed into the fighter all hell broke loose. Within seconds the normally goofy female was fighting for her life, which exhilarated her.

“This is not a way to get some food…”

Slicing through the throat of a black haired puny male, Renée ducked down beneath a swinging fist and of course that put her in the range of several other fists and a few knees. Dropping down to her hands and knees, the lithe female cut through a few calves before leaping back up to her feet. Moving as far as possible away from the swinging body parts, a growl slipped out of her pressed lips. Things were getting way out of hand and though a few were on the ground, only one was dead and the others were growing a lot more agitated and before she knew it, they were finding broken bottles and other sharp objects. Slamming a knife into the eye of a bald man, the wanderer turned to cut down a red-haired stinky creep. As the two dropped that meant there were still eleven men, which included the three wrapping up their calves. About to step up her battle, her attention was drawn to something else that caught the gaze of all who was in the vicinity, including the jerks that were attacking her.

“What the hell?!”

An explosion rocked the atmosphere and from what she could see, the sky was birthed fire in the form of blazing ship parts. Using the moment to take off away from the thugs, LeBeau rounded the corner in a full-sprint and didn’t bother looking back. Curiosity had taken hold the minute she saw the detonation of the vessel and that indicated it was time to find the pieces and investigate. Leaping over chunks of rubble, body parts, and overturned vehicles, the outsider covered the ground before realizing that rushing into a situation without proper knowledge of the area might prove detrimental to her health. Slowing down to a stop, she decided to head into a local scum-pool otherwise known as a bar. Well, at one point in time it was a bar, but now it was a disgusting pile of old tables and chairs and housed men that were probably born drinking whiskey out of their mother’s teats.

Delightful…