That Night

After watching the area closely and checking and rechecking his weapons, mentally running through a hundred simulations, it was finally time to move in. Valentine exited the car and moved over to the gate, where a man stood watch, the bulge of a pistol visible under his jacket. Valentine snapped up his ACR and opened fire with a short, suppressed burst of 6.8mm rounds. The man dropped soundlessly.

Slinging the ACR over his back and drawing his handgun, he climbed over the gate, dropping another two members of the cartel who were talking near the front door, one bullet to the skull each. He knew that bypassing the security system was nigh-impossible - especially while retaining a comfortable amount of firepower - so he had decided on the simplest plan of all; going in the front door.

Ahead of him lay a two-story house. He knew that the drug lord would likely be on the top floor in his office, and he'd counted ten cartel members on the premises, plus the lord's wife and possibly his lawyer. He'd have to bring them all down silently; once inside the house, the suppressed gunfire would echo off the walls, alerting everyone to his presence. He lowered his gun and drew his KM2000 knife, holding it backhanded. No moonlight glinted off its carbon-black blade.

Getting inside would be difficult, however, so he took the logical explanation - ringing the doorbell. The man who answered was with the cartel, and was rapidly dispatched as the knife cut his throat. Valentine closed the door behind him and ducked into the kitchen as he heard footsteps from the top floor.

(Tried to handle this as realistically as possible.)

Gracie walked silently over to her room and opened the door. She saw her sister sitting in there ... wait, she was in her room. "May I ask what your doing in here? I like my privacy you know," Gracie said, placing her hands on her hips. Then she noticed somethings were moved arond, though someone made an attempt to hide the fact. "What were you doing in here? I can see that you were doing something! What the helll do you think your doing coming in here anyways!" Gracie didn't wait for her to answer before she ran over to her computer and pulled up the 'job'. The screen was still there, so she typed in a few things, taking her to the next level and one step closer to makeing the security system fail. I'll only be able to keep it down for a few minutes, and I'll still have to get rid of the guards, she thought. Gracie closed the computer and went over to her closet, to grab her weapons. But nothing was there. "I see what you did. Well, its a good thing those weren't my good one's or you would be dead." She walked over to her computer and pulled up another screen, typing in six different passwords. A safe hidden in the back of her closet opened up and showed her revolver and ammo. "You might want to know what I'm doing. Well, I still have the urge to shoot, so I'm going to the shooting range down town," Gracie said, glancing at her sister briefly before changing into her more ... comfy clothes. Combat boots with extra grip, a skirt that allowed more movement, a tank top and jacket, all in her favorite color, black. After strapping her gun holister to her leg and placeing gun in it, she looked at the clock to check the time. "4:30 ... alright, I should leave soon." Finally, she tucked a few knives in her holister and sat back down at the computer.

30 minutes later ...

Gracie finished the computer job and set the time for 9:10 p.m. to shut off for long enough for her to get in and hopefully out. "See you later," she said and silently leapt out the window. She began walking to the meeting point hoping it would waste enough time than driving would have.
By the time she had gotten there, it was almost 6:00 p.m. "So you're the person," a bald man asked. "Yes, I am," she replied and shook his hand. "My men should be here around 9:00, like you asked. We didn't expect you to arrive this early. But I have to ask, don't you think your hair will get in the way?" Gracie looked at the man and smirked. "It never has before. I'm a pro at this stuff, I don't let things get in my way."
It had taken a few more hours of waiting until everone had gathered there. Now they were all ready to go, especially Gracie. "The security system shold be going off in a few minutes. Some of you need to stand watch at the perimeter and others shold follow me in. You men who follow me, you take the men who work for him. I have to get the lord and can't risk losing." That I will, she thought to herself.
"Alright, three .... two .... one!" Gracie ran towards the gate, preparing to take out the guard. But he was already dead. "What the hell ... this must mean," Gracie said as she looked up and saw someone kill a guard that was at the door and enter the house. "Crap! You three! Go in after the other intruder! I'll look for a quick way up to the roof." Gracie ran around to the side of the house and saw a way to climb up. She ran up the side and grabbed the edge of the roof. Gracie fell once, but on the second try made it up. A window that lead into the bathroom was the closest, so she took the opertnity. But she was quickly met by a guard with a rifle. She drew a knife and threw it at his heart, missing and landing it in his throat. "Damn," she said to herself as she climbed through the window. "I told you men to watch for guards," she hissed at the men behind her. They ran ahead of her and looked around. "They better not make me fail this mission." Gracie went over to the stairs, quickly killing another with her other knife. She saw two more going towards the kitchen and shot them down with her revolver. "Alright, check for any more while I look for the lord," she said to the remaining men around her.

Meanwhile, Upstairs, In The Office

The drug lord, a tall, slightly overweight man named Micheal, heard gunfire outside, and ducked slightly. A moment later, he recovered from the shock and turned to two of his men. "We're under attack," he said, making an effort to keep his voice calm. "Load your weapons. Steven, stay in here; get on the phone and call everyone. Tell them to get here on the double. Jason, grab the rest of the men from the flat outside, along with a few of our AKs. Search and destroy."

The two men complied, and Michael sat down at his desk, pulling out his Colt M1911 handgun and looking over it. He jammed a magazine into the underside, then made a decision. Steven hung up the phone, having made the necessary calls, and after he did so, Michael spoke. "Barricade the office door. No-one gets in. Not whoever's attacking us, not our men. No-one."

The Kitchen

Valentine heard gunfire outside, and instinctively hit the deck and dived under the table, checking the area around him for contacts. It seemed clear for a moment, but then he heard footsteps, and saw feet walking along beside the table. He could see the barrels of guns pointing towards the ground in a rest position. He made a decision to attack, and leapt up, diving from under the table to his feet, discharging his suppressed P226 into one of the men's skulls, stabbing the second with a knife and kicking the third to the ground before shooting him in the face. He looked up, and saw a red-haired girl; she couldn't have been any older than he was, and she sure as hell didn't look like one of the drug lord's troops, although the katana at her hip and the revolver in her hand suggested otherwise. He snapped up his P226 and levelled it at her skull. He couldn't miss at this range.

"Alright, you're about to answer a few questions, or I will kill you," he said matter-of-factly. "Who the hell are you, and why are you here?"

(What calibre is Gracie's revolver? For reference, most revolvers are chambered with the powerful .357 round, although some are loaded with the massive .44 cartridge; those ones are typically too heavy and have too much recoil for combat, however.)

A little before the attack on the drug lord

Tina couldn't help herself. After a few hours of practice, she decided to go see the place the odd pair was meeting. After all, it probably wasn't anywhere dangerous if they were talking about it so openly in school. She threw on a track suit (purple) and took off out the door. She had plenty of time before they were supposed to be showing up there.

When she arrived, she saw a van unloading something into the building. Tina couldn't get a good look, but when she got close enough, she gasped. It was white powder, and she doubted that it was flour. She was about to hightail it out of there when something hard and metal contacted the back of her head. She went to one knee before it hit her again in the same spot, sending her from one knee facedown and knocked out.

Current time

Tina woke up in a chair with her hands tied behind her back and a gun pressed against the side of her head. She internally noted that normal people would probably have flipped, but after years of martial arts, she was completely prepared for both the rope and the gun. After all, martial arts were for self defense, and being strapped to a chair with a gun to your head isn't a new situation. The man in front of her looked incredibly sleazy, and definitely looked like he was about to say something. She started to work on loosening the ropes as he gloated, "Well little girl, it is too bad you got caught up in our business. You should know better than to get to close to a drug deal. Now, after we all get done tonight, I am going to have fun with you, and then get rid of you. Look forward to it." He laughed manically as his gun drifted away from her head. Bingo.

She ripped her arms out of the now useless knot and tilted her head to the side. Her legs came up from underneath to catch the man in between his legs and make him a little less of a man. Still in the chair, she used her other leg to knock the gun out of his hand and far off to the side. Then, with one of her leg still between his legs, and one brought back to place on his side, she twisted, taking herself of the chair and slamming him hard into the floor. Before he could react, she had thrown an elbow into his spine, taking him out of the game entirely. She hated to do potentially life-threatening attack, but as of right now, she had absolutely no sympathy for the bastard of a man. He could rot in hell for all she cared, especially if he was that drug lord (which, for reference sake, he was not). She heard movement outside and got ready to fight. He could have had body guards...

Rosalinda only smiled at her sister, waiting for her to figure out what she was doing there. But she froze as she turned to her computer after she realized what she had done. Those weren't her good weapons? She watched her sister entering passwords into her computer, opening a safe, and pulling out another weapon. Why couldn't anything go the way she wanted to? She watched silently as she left the house, mumbling about having to be somewhere soon. Her story about the shooting range was a load of crap, she knew. She bit her lip; her sister was back in business, just like their parents didn't want. It was easy enough to figure out, especially since she was acting more animal than human in keeping herself bottled up.

She stood up, wiping away a few tears she hadn't realized were there. She was going to have to try something else, was all. She stomped back to her room, finding the stash of weapons she had hidden from Gracie. She hated weapons, she hated the idea of fighting, she couldn't stand the thought of what she was going to do...but she would, anyway. She pulled out one of the pistols, unsure of it's power and barely knowing how to use it, and a couple of the knives. She changed out of the clothes she had been in all day, from pajamas to a pair of tight jeans and a low-cut shirt and, just in case, the belt she had been taught to carry around when dealing with animals; mostly it was empty except for the gerber multitool. She use the slots for the safety straps to attach the knives and pistol. Even wearing the weapons made her uneasy. Hell, even wearing a black shirt made her uneasy. She tied her hair back into a braid, glad that she had seen, at least, the general direction her sister had gone in. She made sure to tie a sweatshirt around her waist before she even thought about leaving the house, hiding her gerber, and her sister's pistol and knives.

She wasn't sure, though, that she could use the weapons, even to defend herself. Now, if she had to defend her sister, that was anothing thing entirely. But she was going to try to get used to it. If that was what it took to get her sister to listen, to get a chance to get to know her sister all over again, she would. She stopped long enough to tell her parents that she had a date with a friend, then left. If anything, she was good at hiding her anxiety when necessary. She went to her car, figuring she'd be much faster that way. She headed off the way her sister had gone, being careful to examine every person she passed by to see if she could find her sister. She was confident she'd find her this way, since the care wouldn't get tired and stop until it needed gas, and it wa pretty full at that point, fortunately. "Now...where did you go, Gracie..."

Gracie looked at the person who was aiming his weapon at her, and with no hesitation, aimed her revolver at him. "I'm here on buisness. And unless you work for the drug lord, I have no intention in wasting my time on you," Gracie said. "And thanks for killing my back-up." Thoughts were running through her head on how she was supposed to complete this mission withot the back-up. Maybe I should send the men from outside in here, she thought. "Red Two, this is Red One ... yes, send in the men watching the perimeter in ... what ... what do you mean their all dead? ... Red Two? ... Red Two! Damn it!" Gracie cold hear someone come from behind, so she quickly reacted by drawing her sword and driving backwards into one's chest, straight through his heart. Another came from the side and shot at Gracie, but missed ... unfortunatly for him, because she had drawn her revolver and sent a bllet through his brain. "You thhink they would be better shooters at this range," Gracie bragged, even though she was a little shaken. If you hadn't moved, it would have hit you, her mind kept reminding her.

"Agh," Gracie yelled as she was hit from behind. She quickly twisted so that she was facing the attacker and fired several shots at him. Gracie stood quickly as she loaded her revolver with more ammo and leapt backwards down the stairs as more bullets were fired at her. "Once again, thanks for killing my back-up," she snarled at the boy she was now standing a few feet in front of.

(I'm not sure what it is, but I know that it's light, but accurate and has a 12 inch barrel. When I was looking for guns, I didn't think of looking for anything specific. Sorry! :) )

(Just going to throw it out there that a twelve-inch barrel is freaking massive. Your average pistol barrel is four to six inches, with the longest production handgun barrel being the ten-inch available for the IMI Desert Eagle and the largest handgun ever built being sixteen inches long overall. Also, I think that being shot would have a more serious effect on Gracie, unless she's wearing body armour; she'd still be able to fight while the adrenaline was still in her system, though.)

Valentine dropped another two enemies with his sidearm, killing them instantly. As Gracie kept shooting, he sighed, and after the gunfire stopped, said, "Don't suppose you could have brought a suppressed weapon along? Nobody had any clue what was going on until you and your goons turned up."

He switched to his assault rifle - subtlety was no longer a concern - and held it military-style, pressed tighly to his shoulder, military-style. "Quit your whining," he said. "If I'm correct, they're assassins, as are you. The world is better off without them. Now, if you please, I'm off to go kill the drug lord," he said, and advanced upstairs, checking for targets with his thermal sight.

Tina waited as the movement went away from the door. She had heard gunfire somewhere else in the building, so she hoped that they had gone to check it out. She pressed her ear to the door and counted down slowly from 60. If she didn't hear anything by the time she got to 0, she would try to get out and make a break for it. She held her breath as her heart ticked away the seconds. Then, finally, she reached the end of her count. She opened the door as quietly as she could, then picked her way down the hallway in silence. Maybe she could make it to the stairs without running into anyone who is armed.

Then she saw a man coming up the stairs armed with an assault rifle. Well, there went that hope. If she was closer in, she probably could have taken him out before he could shoot her, but she as at least 15 feet away. She had no chance at this range. So she did the only thing she could think of; she rose her arms over her head in surrender and said, "I'm not armed, so don't shoot me!"

Rosalinda slammed on her brakes as she heard gunshots. Where else was a good place to find her sister? She parked it on the curb, making a mental note of where it was, and started walking. The headlights might warn them that someone was coming, and she wasn't about to scare them off. She moved a hand down to touch one of the knives through the sweatshirt, and silentl scolded herself; the sweatshirt made it harder to reach them if necessary, even if they did hide them rather well. She paused to pull one out and inched closer to where she thought she had heard the gunfire coming from.

She froze as she heard someone else calling out not to shoot; it sounded like a female, too. she held her breath and poked her head into a building. Now, perhaps she was desperate in finding her sister, but she should have known better than to call out herself. "Hello? Little sister? Anyone?" She realized a second too late that it had probably attracted more than just her sister's attention to call out like that and covered her mouth, pressing herself against a wall and hoping to avoid detection. What a mess! She wasn't anywhere near used to this sort of situation.

And her parents! What would they think if they knew what she was doing; what she had just done? She had prided herself on being intelligent sometimes, but that didn't necessarily mean she had enough common sense to keep herself from being noticed in a building where she couldn't see anyone. She could only hope that whoever had been really threatening was already dead, or had fled. Hopefully. Well, the damage was already done; what could she do to make things any worse?

"Come on, now...I know someone's here..."

Gracie glared at Valentine. "Excuse me," Gracie said as she pushed past him, "But this is my kill. And what the hell is wrong with assassins? We actually kill with the purpose, to make the world better. What do you kill for?" Gracie's was listening closely for any signs of movement other than her own. "Freakin' one man show ... think your everything and a bag of chips," she mummbled as she kicked a door open, looking for the drug lord. "He better have called for back-up before they blew his head off. I swear." Gracie kicked down another door before freezing, her foot still slightly up in the air. Something didn't feel right ... like someone was there that wasn't supposed to be. She wasn't sure if it was nerves or if something was really wrong. "Does something ... feel off to you," she asked before shaking her head. "Never mind, don't know why I'm asking the prick."

Valentine gave a cold, cynical laugh. "You 'kill with a purpose'? Do not lie to me. You kill solely for money, or have you fallen even further, and do you kill for fun? I kill with true purpose, to improve the world," he said. "I have seen and done things you could never imagine. I have watched my best friend's head taken off by a sniper bullet as a direct result of my command. I have felt the hot blood of the only girl I ever cared about splashing the side of my face because of my momentary lapse in attention, and felt fear like you have never known. I have had the weight of a whole revolution on my shoulders, with the only way for me to succeed being to order people who trusted me with their lives, my own friends, to their deaths. My mission has cost me everything."

Valentine saw the movement on his thermal scope before he saw the girl, the tell-tale bright white light of a person through the scope. His finger tightened around the trigger and he rapidly adjusted his aim for a centre-of-mass shot, but as she threw her hands up and shouted ‘Don’t shoot!’, he released his finger from the trigger slightly. She appeared unarmed, but he didn’t take chances, and kept his rifle levelled. “Who the hell are you and why in God’s name are you here?” he asked, walking closer, rifle still shouldered but no longer aiming down the sights.

That was when he heard the sirens.

Followed by the squeal of tires outside, and the sound of guns rapidly being loaded. A voice shouted, “This is the police! Lay down your weapons and come out with your hands up!”

Oh, Christ. The Feds. Valentine had intended on being in and out before they could respond, but the delays with the assassin girl, followed by her downright foolish use of an unsuppressed weapon, meant that they’d inevitably turn up.
Valentine advanced upstairs past the civilian, and checked outside through a window. He was correct; a small legion of police stood outside, backed up by two SWAT teams armed with compact assault rifles. “Dammit,” he muttered. He could bring down the Feds – he’d done it before, and he was substantially better equipped than they were – but it wasn’t a guarantee, especially with SWAT around.

He turned back to the girls. “Alright, civilian, get the hell out of here if you want to live. When the Feds start shooting, you can be damn sure I’ll shoot back. Assassin girl, you’re in this with me now. We’ll have to shoot our way out. Do you have any high-powered weapons?” he asked. Her revolver wouldn’t cut it against the Kevlar of the SWAT teams, and his ACR was the only weapon around that would be able to do a whole lot of damage against them. Thankfully, his Dragon Skin body armour was immune to their rifles, but the girls were a different matter…

Tina answered the gun-toting man quickly, saying, "I am Tina Soletta, and I was kidnapped off the street when I accidentally saw a drug deal going down."

Suddenly, a noise came from outside. The law was here, which they probably should have been a long time ago. Then the man she had run into told her to run, because he was going to shoot back at the police. Her brain worked frantically for a moment. How in the hell could she get out of there when there were probably SWAT teams by every door? She would just have to get to a room and hide there and just hope nothing bad happened. With that, she took off.

Around a corner was another man with a gun in hand. Luckily, he was close enough that a swift kick to the head silenced him before any shots rang out. She momentarily debated taking the gun, a pistol (she didn't know what kind), before taking it and putting it in her pocket. She did make sure the safety was on, though (she knew that much)! She glanced down the hall to see people wielding what looked like AKs, or at least that is what they looked like based off movies she had seen. She ducked into a room quickly hid behind a chair as she heard footsteps slowly pass. Once she could no longer here the steps and she bolted silently from the room and farther down the hall. There had to be a way out not covered by police, especially now that she had a gun.

Gracie heard the sirens wailing and sighed heavily in frustration. Then she looked at Valentine. "Does it look like I do? All I have is a revolver, two knives and a katana. But I can do perfectly well against whoever is out there." Gracie looked out and saw the SWAT team unloading and took a deep breath. That's when she heard the all to familiar voice, her sisters voice. "Rosalinda! Is that you! I swear if it is." She rounded the corner and saw her sister standing there with her hand clamped over her mouth. "What do you think your doing here!" Gracie shook her head and looked at Valentine. "Do you have a strategy? Because now that ... now that this," she motioned to her sister, "made it a whole lot harder." Gracie turned back to her sister. "Follow Tina out of here, it looks like she can handle things." I just hope that she doesn't say anything. "Maybe I can talk to them or something. I used to work for the people who commanded them."

"And I am going to inform you that you can't," Valentine said. "That's full-body Kevlar armour, designed to take anything up to a .45-calibre full metal jacket round. You'd probably do more damage punching them than you'd do with your knives or katana, and your revolver isn't going to do much either."

A moment later, Valentine heard footsteps. He spun, only to be assailed by a hail of automatic gunfire. His automatic reflex was to hit the deck, and he returned fire through his thermal scope. One, two, then three targets dropped, and suddenly, the room was silent.

As he lowered his rifle, he saw that his targets were in fact the drug lord's men, not SWAT soldiers, which explained their spray-and-pray policy. He sprinted over, staying low to avoid any sniper bullets that the police might fire through the windows. Bowing down next to the drug soldiers, he grabbed a rifle and tossed it to the assassin girl. "AK-47. Formerly Soviet-issue; loaded in 7.62x39mm hollow-tip ammunition. Fully automatic. Extremely reliable," he said. "I presume that you can operate an assault rifle?"

(The anecdote about punching them is true; kevlar vests are designed to take short, sharp impacts, and are very vulnerable to blunt impact. Hit a SWAT soldier with a lead pipe and you'll break their ribs; far more damage than you'd do with a pistol or blade.)

Tina proceeded onwards through the compound, not really knowing what she was looking for. She had to get out, that was for sure, but she really didn't know how. She had to think that a crime lord like this drug guy had some way to get out when things got hot, and it was probably wherever his quarters were. She heard voices coming from a door, and wondered if that might be the boss's "lair." She tried to open the door, but it was blocked from the other side. That was not good. She moved away from the door as fast as she could right before a number of shots came through were she had been. She was actually hit by some splinters of wood as the bullets burst through the wood of the door. Tina got out of their as soon as possible; after all, she couldn't get into that room without seriously endangering her life. That left her one area to check; the basement. She hurriedly made it back to the stairs and flew down then. Hopefully there would be a way out there.

Gracie had hit the floor and let out a sigh of frustration as she realized the magnitude of the situation. She never had heavy weaponry on her … ever. It was easier to escape, considering she was small, light, and fast. But in this situation, it most likely will get her killed if she tries to run. “Do you have any other weapons I could use? Because I’d rather not die here, and with my weaponry, I’d might as well start writing my will now.” Gracie paced a circle around the floor, trying to think of an escape route. This wasn’t in her plan. She thought that she would be in and out within a few minutes. But the information had been way off, the amount of men the drug lord had, their weapon amount and how good they were. There must have been a fluke, a mole, someone who was telling them what the drug lord wanted them to hear. Why don’t you ask for help, he has more experience than you, her inner voice said. "Like I would, this is easy. We've been in tougher. That means that I can think of an easy way out. Now ..." But another rain of bullets came through the wall, making her drop to the floor like a rock, only two bullets grazing her right shoulder slightly.

(Sorry! I thought you'd disappeared on me, and didn't check this until now!)

Valentine pointed to one of the AK-type assault rifles lying on the ground. "Take one. And clean yourself up. Blood can lead to them getting a DNA sample, and that creates all kinds of awkward problems," he said, and ducked on instinct as another burst of bullets raked the wall from outside. "Alright, here's the plan. They're trying to flush us out. As soon as they realise it's not working, they'll send in the SWAT team. We need to neutralise them and then make a break for it," he said. "I didn't pack any explosives, so we'll be relying on my forty mike-mike for anti-vehicle firepower. If we can grab a police car, we can drive several klicks, then dump the car and go our seperate ways."

------Outside------

The police commander stood among his men. A team of regular police were firing M16 assault rifles into the building, while the SWAT team, fully-armoured and packing compact machine guns, stood around the door to the building.

"Alright, they're not going anywhere," he said with a sigh. "Constable Li, this operation is now under your command," he said to the SWAT leader beside him.

Li nodded. "Understood, sir. They will be terminated immediately," he said, while a breaching charge was placed on the door. "Alright, that's it. First Team, move in."

The soldiers swept inside silently, disappearing, leaving only the tell-tale flashes of their barrel-mounted torches to denote their presence at all. Meanwhile, Li nervously awaited the inevitable gunfire...