City

A girl with long black hair sat on the big city fountain, looking at list full of things to get. Kids ran around without a care in the world playing a game based off of a story they hear growing up. The girl would give a cold side glance after hearing the Hunter had own. Only if they knew their "heroes" real character. Hunters would walk by not giving the girl a look, even if they did they would walk away, she was not who they were looking for. And that is how she wanted it. "Where first?" She asked herself, standing up she looked at the little shops and their vase numbers. Sighing to walked down the road, it was going to be a long day.

The bullet zipped through the air, embedding itself into the stone wall Lucius had planted himself upon. As soon as the gunshot rang out, a smile began growing upon his face, by the time the bullet had hit the wall, he was grinning like a madman. Finally pulling himself from the stone enclave he had been housed on, Lucius opened his eyes.

“About time something happened, I was growing tired of my usual games.”

Taking a quick glance at the sky, Lucius confirmed the time of day. The sky, while gorgeous, had already begun to give off it’s honeyed glow, and the amber orb had begun to take a more downward western path. Dusk was only just beginning though, and that only meant trouble for the black creature that stirred restlessly, hidden away in the shadows not far from Lucius.

Eyes falling back upon the plaza before him, he alighted upon the two hunters, gun still raised, smirking slightly as their eyes followed a girl who had just vanished down an adjacent street. Lucius only caught sight of her long-brown hair, an average trait, contrasting the unaverage dragon that had roosted upon her shoulders. It wasn't hard to follow her movements, as the plaza had already been emptied of pedestrians as they fled from the gunshot that had disturbed their peaceful, pitiful existence.

Lucius whistled, seemingly breaking the Hunters from their trance as they began to give chase to the girl.

‘This,’ He thought, ‘Was going to be fun.’

He calmly walked back into the shadowy corner where his companion lurked, invisibly amongst the darkness. He was in no hurry, why would he be? He knew where they were going, and he knew he could get there first.

"Lovely day for a run." Lyra told her perched dragon like she was not running at all. Another bullet whizzed by her head as she took a sharp turn into the more questionable area of town. "And to get shot at." She could not help but joke to her small dragon. Deeper she ran into darker area of town the streets were a little wet. With very little sun light getting through do to the buildings you would best hope that puddle you ran through was water and not gross things.

Finding a ladder she jumped onto to latching on the fourth bar, it was a little high for an average man's height. Shivers went throughout her body as she gripped the bar tighter. "Gross." She let under her breath, climbing up to the roof her dragon perched made a sweet hissing noise. "Unfortunately you are still a hatchling I cannot put you to battle yet." Lyra's words almost seemed to have depressed the little dragon. "But you can check and see if Sala grabbed the bags I dropped." Happily the little dragon shook it's black head and flew off, using it's magic abilities it disappeared.

The Twin Bullets only chased her so far before for stopping. "I am nor playing this game again." Ryuhwan growled as he looked for the possible path she took. "We need to hurry before she sets a trap." Tasha wiped his white hair out of his face as he looked with Ryuhwan. The something caught his eye. "There she went that way." Tasha pointed to the sky and ran in the direction the black dot came from, towards Lyra.

The Tantabus rolled through the shadows, degrading back into a smoky black breeze that swept behind the two hunters. Lucius casually reached into his pocket, pulling a deck of razor tipped cards from his jacket. Glancing up, he saw Scarlet-Cloak-Girl flying from the rooftop. She landed beside him, brandishing a sword and engaging the snow-haired hunter with not a moment of hesitation.
Lucius felt the Tantabus growl, a low snarling sound that seemed to echo like whisper through the night. The prey was surrounded. Looking up, the shadows had gathered back into The Tantabus, leaning over it’s new catch. The prey in question, immediately shifted their backs towards each other, prepared to counter anything that came at them.
The Tantabus reared, only to stop short. His form grew unstable, and he dropped back into the darkness of the streets, twisting and turning into emptiness like a serpent. Lucius’ eyes flew open, as he registered a sharp, twisting pain resonating from his shoulder. He smiled, and fell into a pool of blood.
”How untimely a demise this is.”

On the other end of the alleyway, a young girl stood, clutching a pistol.

---

Talia rounded the corner, finding herself standing before a large creature, at least several feet tall. It was as black as night, it’s only distinguishing feature the beady amber eyes, and it’s shape. It’s arms were long, and tipped with claws, while it’s legs were double-jointed. It’s head fell forwards in a slouch, leaving them staring down a presumably sharp-toothed maw. It seemed to be made of the shadows themselves, as she could see no distinguishable body within the smoke-like abomination.
Her pistol was in her hand. Pointed at the creature. A loose volley of lead exploded from the end of her gun, ripping tiny holes in the creature’s form. The holes acted like a column of air punched through fog, and grew with the ripples in the breeze, freezing the creature as it shook then dissipated.
She saw a boy, back behind her comrades, fall limply to the ground. Seizing the chance, she rushed forwards. Tasha and Ryuhwan looked dazed, but still they held their ground. Each held a gleaming silver pistol, pointed at the remaining uniques. With one down, the fight had reached a standstill. No one dared attack.

Lyra's eyes widen, she knew that sound well and a fight was the last thing that needs to happen right now. Without taking her eyes off of the Hunters she stepped back to Lucy and the downed Unique. The silvered hair Hunter grinned a greedy grin. "We get a big pay day." He reloaded his gun with tranquilizers darts. "See you in hell." Tasha then fired his gun. Lyra did not flinch she had brought out another dragon made of stone he sat as high as the buildings next them. A loud growl can from the stone wall, he had taken the dart on the back. "Thank you." Lyra said to the dragon tickling one of the feet sticking out. The little black dragon joined Lyra's side as she walked over to the the jester like Unique and Lucy. "Get Tala and get those bags." She told the little dragon. Turning her attention to the boy on the ground she kneeled down to his side. "Can you move?" She asked him.

The Twin Bullets shot a few more darts at the rock wall with wings. "What you just standingthere for?" Ryuhwan barked at Talia. "Guard us." The two pulled back their sleeve showing a few incantation circles on their arm. After a few words spoken Hell Hounds came from the ground growling next to Tasha and Ryuhwan. "Get ready for a fight if you don't wanna die Talia, a cornered Unique is very dangerous." Tasha warned her.



Rex looked puzzled for a moment. "Not much?" He mumbled mostly to himself. "That side of the forest is normally flourishing with all sorts of herbs." Rex heaved a heavy sigh things were starting to dry up and he was running low on herbs needed to heal Uniques. "You would not have seen Lyra would?" He asked Gideon his hand at his chin. Childern ran past without a care in the world. How his wished to go back to days like that, but then again those were every hard days too.

Lucius peeked an eye open. The wind ruffled his hair and his clothes, drying out the darkening red stain that had ruined his clothes. Or, at least some of them, as the red shirt should recover with a simple dunk in a river. Sighing, he quickly checked his arm. A dull ache reached out to touch the rest of his muscles as he stretched. The dart had hit him, right in his shoulder. Still a small metal tip embedded in the clothes, probably. But either the adrenaline in his system had burned through the paralysis, or the dart was just terrible at dispersing its load.

The pressure of the talons gripping his other arm and shoulder brought him out of his thoughts. Maybe the dart did do something to him. He felt oddly introspective. Not that it mattered now. Down there, a group of Uniques were holding off at a group of Hunters, apparently some rather fierce ones as well, not the usual incompetent young-bloods who find it as an easy way to earn some coin. If the fight alone wasn't enough to encourage Lucius to recklessly charge back in, then the knowledge that he now had the element of surprise would.

Wriggling a bit, he glanced up. The harpy looked down at him, with a surprisingly human face.

"I appreciate the ride, but perhaps my part is best played on the ground."

Seconds later resulted with Lucius perched atop another building. The roof of this one was rather dirty, with several pools of collected rainwater from days gone by, and assorted bird droppings. Making a mental note not to breathe, he quickly checked his pockets.

Yep, definitely broken, his hand produced several shards of colored glass. Well, I suppose it could've been worse, I could've been shot and out of some good wine. Tossing the shards aside, Lucius smiled, noting the low hanging golden star in the sky. It was nearly night now, as tendrils of dusk had already begun to creep up in the east, shooting a nice deep purple into the amber and gold sky.

Lucius tore his eyes away from the heavens, reminding himself of the possible bloodbath somewhere below him. He quickly set about looking for the safest way down. Then he stopped himself. Laughed, and carelessly threw himself over the edge.


"What you just standing there for?"

"Get ready for a fight if you don't wanna die Talia, a cornered Unique is very dangerous."

Talia nodded, spotting the incantations stained on either's arm. It was no secret that some of the two twins were also Uniques. Why Talia trusted them, she never really questioned. They seemed to do their jobs well, and that was enough for her. Another lash out from one of the Uniques threatened to take her nose off. She clenched her teeth. She needed to stop thinking and start doing.

Rushing forwards, she dropped to a crouch, narrowly dodging another swipe from a sword. She lashed out with a kick, sending her attacker back a few steps. She pulled a knife from it's sheath and deflected another attack from the sword-girl. The force of the blow sent her recoiling back, and desperate to keep her head attached to her shoulder, she threw herself backwards at Lyra. She accomplished little, only smacking herself into a large, sturdy dragon that hadn't been there moments ago.

Seeing the sword-girl recover and begin to bear down on her again, Talia pointed he weapon at her, and fired. Between the cross-hairs of her gun, she could've sworn she'd seen her smirk.

The moment Talia's dart shot from the gun, she felt the familiar emptiness. She was out of darts. She quickly dropped down and reloaded the weapon. Her movement, though slight as it was, saved her from the projectile made from her own ammunition. The dart whizzed over her head and embedded itself into the large stone behemoth behind her. Talia doubted it broke the scales, but she didn't have time for dragon-wound-inspecting. She hardly had time to react to the attacks being flung at her.

By the time Talia had glanced back upwards, the sword-flailing-girl was upon her. Talia vaulted to the side again, avoiding whatever awkward attack that had been thrown at her. But, as she was moving, her hand caught on something. Something hard. Talia felt the gun being wrenched from her grip. The pain of something pulling her weapon away spasmed through her hand, forcing her to let go as her forward momentum carried her away.

Talia gritted her teeth. She'd gotten that gun on her birthday. Not from her mother of course, she'd bought it herself, but the loss still stung. Her weapon, her lifeline, skittered away from her to some unseen dark corner of the street. Whoever she was fighting was smart. She had used Talia's own instinctive movement against her, and it felt like a slap in the face. She couldn't stand being so open. She wasn't a book, she wasn't readable. Time to use your head, she told herself, Gotta out-think 'em.

Her eyes quickly scanned everything nearby, as she reached for a knife - that wasn't there. Her eyes widened. Another look at the battlefield confirmed her fears. The Twins were having just as much trouble as she was. Uniques or not, they were practically cornered; Lyra's dragons were causing trouble nearly everywhere, and worst of all, the Harpy had pinned down the Hellish-looking canines that the Twins had tried to summon. A gust of wind blew throughout the street as the Harpy beat it's wings furiously, rendering what little control the Twins summoned with their guns useless.

Talia looked down at the blade in her hand, and looked back the the Harpy. Then she made a decision she was afraid would seal her fate. She threw the dagger. It sailed through the air, whipping around like a cruel windmill of pain, until it came into contact with the feathery backside of the Harpy. The blade sunk in, eliciting a scream from the creature.

I lose my fun, you lose yours.

Talia moved. Seemingly fluid, she dodged the furious attacks of her assailant, as she hastily threw herself into the dark corner where her gun was. She landed, hard, cold, and full of adrenaline. She quickly rolled over, gun in hand pointed straight at her newest adversary.

Your move...



Lucius found the alley he was looking for. Not hard, considering the copious amounts of roars, grunts, gunshots, and other assorted noises there was. The air was thick. Not with the usual smoke and smog of compressed homes, but with the smell of rage. It was a hellscape before his eyes; as swords and daggers clashed and as demons rose from the ground, only to be crushed by the hawk-like creature. It was like the gods of war and death were painting a mural, right in front of him.

A passing bullet pulled him from his thoughts. He smiled, and began his own little ritual from the shadows of the conflict.

On the battlefield, the shadows rippled and weaved once more. Darkness filled the air, and the void became whole. A scream of rage erupted from the black creature, newly formed again. The Tantabus was back. It set to work, the nearest creature to it being a previously trapped hellhound, teeth gnashing, eyes staring the darkness down with a look a cat gives a mouse. The inky void stared back, before rearing back a vicious claw, racking the creature into shreds. It howled, and perished, leaving behind a smoldering pile of embers.