Sigil: T.C.o.D - [Walk-In][Modern Fantasy: Cycle 32][O/A]

[Garam Nijashi Hikuro]

Savoki Sanoci

There were many times in seths life where after he knew he shouldn’t have done that. When it came to monsters from the unknown many would keep their distance, stalk from afar and use the distance to their advantage. But not seth he was a close proximity guy. He knew what he wanted to do and how to do it while being close. His small frame gave him Olympic level speed and his reaction times was on par with those of legend. With all his skills he didn’t expect what came next. His jab would connect but it had no effect. He didn’t feel it not even a flinch or acknowledgment.

I see blood….

Even though he knew that the blood meant he was making progress the unsuspecting hooks caught him off guard. The beast’s large fist struck seth right in the jaw.

I just got that left muller replaced ..

The purple eyed beast laughed alittle for at the moment he couldn’t tell but his body was traveling at a rather fast pace away from the large beast. It clicked about a milla second later that he was taking a brief flight. He spun to his right, the loose body ricocheting off the floor letting out a loud thud. Seth landed face down dazed but still functional. In natural reaction his arms pushed out and he began to tremble to his feet. A gash above his right eye was clearly visible. Scuffs on his clothing and a busted lip was all present.

Cmon seth…

Get up…

His mind yelled but his body wasn’t moving fast enough

[The Drippy Sink]

Calixto listened closely to the exchange between his comrade and the demon. Even if he acted primarily as a bodyguard, letting his muscles do the work rather than his tongue, information was always valuable, and Calixto would be the last to let something of value slip past him. One never knew when the smallest detail might tip the scales or provide just the right amount of leverage. It always paid to be in the know when there were deals being made.

Calixto knew when the demoness offered her gamble that Sanre would take her up on it. The drow was hard pressed to resist a gamble, even if it included tossing in Calixto’s soul without request as part of the gambit. Calixto couldn’t help but grin as the rest of the display played out. Having his soul on the line had the bizarre effect of exciting him. Perhaps the moment was amplified with the aspect of the riddle rolling around in Calixto’s head. As physically-oriented as he was, like Sanre and nearly all civilized elvenfolk, he enjoyed music, riddles, and all sorts of mind games.

Alive without breath… he recited in silence, letting the lyrics linger. He worked through the rest of the riddle slowly, every detail falling into place, bit by bit. The answer came to him gradually, as the answers to all good riddles tend to do. He wondered if Sanre had put it together.

Flames engulfed the demoness, a spiral of flame that reached upward and licked and charred the ceiling with its intensity. The fighter didn’t flinch or cover his eyes this time. The shock of the manifestation of fire had lost its touch. He watched as the demoness was born again from the fire, but transformed into a fur-covered beast, impatient and growling her dissatisfaction with the delay of Sanre’s response. The wizard, in response, had begun preparing spells and sending Calixto yet more indications and instructions with the drow sign language as he prepared a slew of spells.

The fool’s lost his nerve. The moment she displays her power he buckles and prepares to destroy her. Disappointing. Wasteful… he thought as he scrutinized the wizard. A response in sign was pointless with their current position, and responding to Sanre in any other way would reveal their intentions. Instead, Calixto took the moment to rise from his seat, draw the half-scabbard from his weapon and approach the circle slowly. He held the b*****d sword ahead of him at arm’s length, the tip pointed toward the fur-covered demoness.

”Stay your tongue, beast! You offer us a riddle then grow impatient as we determine our answer. Forget not who had the power to bring you here, and contemplate, for a moment, that we have the power to destroy you just as easily,” he spoke across the space between them as he advanced, his malicious grin betraying his desire to challenge her power and carve her demonic flesh from her bones. Harbinger’s blade emanated its dull indigo hue, but his actions otherwise spoke little of aggression. He wondered briefly if she could feel in him the desire to test his strength against hers, but narrowed his eyes as he watched her and subdued his own deranged fantasies. Sanre would suddenly find Calixto’s free hand firmly clasped upon his shoulder.

”She’s more use to us alive than dead. You’re often so wasteful, friend, and where’s your sense of adventure” he asked subtly, looking down on the wizard for a brief instant before he turned his gaze back to the eyes of the fox-like demoness.

”I answer your riddle, demon. The answer you seek is ‘a fish’. If it is not, then I answer your temperament with my blade and I challenge your power. Hold to your proposition, or I will banish you back to the abyss!”

Calixto was a madman seeking to assert his dominance over any that threatened his perceived power. He spoke with absolute confidence in his capacity to single-handedly defeat Mierin. Foolish pride often blinded him to the dangers he invited to his door, but fear would never be his bedfellow. If she fought, he would fight. If she honored her offer, and his answer was true, the swordsman would consider her another victory in a long history of triumphs.

The Vansin

Madison Lines

[Red the Ambivalent]

Scalar Warfare

Akako Akari

Deus Ex Aizen

Tres Ecstuffuan

YummyBiscuits

New life.....⋘⋘⋘⋘⋘⋘⋘⋘⋘⋘⋘

╔══════════════════════════════════════╗

яє∂

╚══════════════════════════════════════╝

Currently:"Ilmater's Mercy Hospital"
In the Company of: "A lot of people"

The woman watched as Akako was feeling for wounds, which reminded her that she probably do the same thing. There was a problem though with that, since she was paralyzed and relied on her psionic abilities to move her limbs and get her muscles going, she couldn't feel anything minus slight pressure. Even then she had to concentrate on feeling it. Basically she could have a bone snapped in half and wouldn't have the slightest clue that it was broken. Red would have to rely on others to check her over, typically they were maguc goers and could simply scan her frame for anything out of place.

Another problem? Losing too much blood. Since she was blind as well she couldn't see the crimson liquid unless it was pouring out of her head, and then it was only her being able to feel it, since she was only paralyzed from the neck down. When Ursan had outstretched a hand to help her, she took it without objection. She was still shaken, but that was because her mind had been through such a ******** in that moment that she wasn't sure exactly if she was stable enough to handle carrying her own body weight. A brief nod was given for his help, not wanting to blow him off.

At Tres' observation that they should all have a dinner date since they all seemed to know each other, the woman scowled slightly at the thought. Her attention though had been drawn before that about someone saying Tres shouldn't be here. Something about the face of some hierarchy or company or something or other shouldn't be around such chaos, in fear of being hurt. Who was this man really? When she had known him before he seemed as if he were some normal-ish being, he had this heir of being someone important, but she had only thought of it just being his personality. He was really someone important though. ********.

That made her think twice about their first encounter. When she had pried into his mind and could have easily read him like an open book. Her hand raised, slender fingers pushing gently on the headband over her pale eyes to slide it up onto her forehead. It wasn't like this could help her see or anything, but her orbs studied the man again, a rather intrigued look upon her features.

'Maybe that would be a good idea, I suppose we have some catching up to do.'

Red told him, her voice had a hint of curiosity entwined into it. He could probably put two and two together and figure out why she was studying him so, she wanted to know who he really was now, why he was so important in this City of Doors.

When everyone started to file out of the now destroyed room, Red followed out into the hall, not sure of what to do next. She decided to wait to see what Akako and Tres were going to do. Another thought struck her as well. The General that had told Tres he should probably not be here had stopped and looked at her, recognition had betrayed the general's features in that moment, and Red couldn't help but try to remember where she had known the other from as well.

In the time between when the two had parted ways, Red had gone through a lot. Memories had been erased, her soul ripped from her body just before death and then some odd months later thrown into the one she now called home. In the time she had seemed to retain some of her old features, the blond hair, the crimson eyes, height and such.

'Raven...?'

[Madison Lines]

The Drippy Sink

Calixto was a madman seeking to assert his dominance over any that threatened his perceived power. He spoke with absolute confidence in his capacity to single-handedly defeat Mierin. Foolish pride often blinded him to the dangers he invited to his door, but fear would never be his bedfellow. If she fought, he would fight. If she honored her offer, and his answer was true, the swordsman would consider her another victory in a long history of triumphs.

The Vansin

Madison Lines

If the beast could raise an eyebrow, it probably would have. For a while, Mierin had enjoyed assessing her summoner, carefully looking over his armor, searching for chinks. However, the other elf seemed to have found it's tongue, and his words were like nails scratching on a wall to Mierin's ears. Anger and hunger burned within the demon as the beast drew itself up in full height, looking down at the swordsman. Fangs bared, a thousand voices sung out another verse from one mouth,

" Thou pale little fool,
slit your throat, blood shall pool
thou art uglier than a mule!"

An ugly smile masked the beast's face as Mierin bent, tail wagging, as though amused. Then, in the next moment, Mierin leapt into the air. The air above the summoning circle shimmered, then violently sparked as the huge beast hit an invisible barrier. As the beast struggled to pass through the barrier, Mierin returned back to humanoid form, landing on the ground outside the summoning circle on all fours. Hunger had weakened her and strengthened her at the same time. She remembered the taste of elven flesh, sweet, warm blood that would trickle of the corners of her mouth as she fed, running down her arms. She had to feed. Teeth still bared, her hands were abnormally enlarged, with bits of fur still clinging to her skin. Her fingers were still claw-like. She stood up, one hand holding her head, as though disoriented by the rapid changing of forms, but in the blink of an eye, Mierin ran past Sanre, lunging towards Calixto, clawed hands heading for his neck.

[Shockingcat]

Darkest Silver

He quickly took a mental note of her unfinished sentence, and from simple guessing the unfinished word was 'hurt'. It also made him recall the glow of her tattoos not too long ago, regardless it wasn't something he was interested in, not yet at least. "Well my dear... Continuing his polite speech, "It so happens that I am lost, in both of where I am and my quest to locate a certain figure. Since I was so kind to answer, mind giving me your reason to why a lady such as yourself would be out here, in..whats the appropriate words you humans normally use? Ah, to why would you be here in this 'shithole' to how you described it as."

[Savoki Sanoci]

//The Hive: Streets//


Rampant strikes lacking finesse yet unpredictability in pattern granted him some level of immunity concerning his opponent reading his actions through body language. Absorbed in his unrelenting frenzy of hooks helped shrug off the jabs, granted possessing his frame that combined fat and muscle made peppering the beast with meager punches like jabs mostly ineffective. A clear feat of his strength, he unexpectedly damaged the human where at most he predicted it would leave both in a stalemate at best. Severing his punching barrage once the target no longer posed a threat in his vicinity, he took a glance while recuperating from the rapid offense.

" Suprse yuu stll breting, happy yuu can tak paunch! "

This entire fight was not personal, thus the casualness displayed from the barbaric outsider. Should it be serious or with something on the line Murvoth would spare no time for Seth and go straight for the knockout immediately. Advancing slowly to the man he needed to consider his next actions, knowing reliance on his muscle armor was not an option just yet. Both sides were not giving it their all yet, that much the oaf could interpret.

Garam Nijashi Hikuro

[Darkest Silver]

The Hive- Observing.

The cat stretched and walked out from the shadows as something else appeared nearby, it seemed to be just as interested in the fight as he was. Maybe another fighter? Three in one day? His employer would be very pleased!
The bright eyes searched the scene as one of the two were send flying..the little one, poor guy. While the hulk of an Orc followed on foot... The small creature wandered forth and meowed innocently, the natural noise it would make had the 'Wizard' not taken control of it.

"Now how to get them to follow? The girl wont want them harmed, she might harm me. Nasty girl. Talk to them maybe?"

The babble continued as his thoughts were put into words. Maybe they would hear him, or maybe they would keep fighting until only one remained.

Savoki Sanoci

Garam Nijashi Hikuro

Bishopp Arumat

[Trexasle]

Tres Ecstuffuan

Name: Leontias Métaliene

Leon’s ears twitched up for a second, his ears weren’t exactly elven like but they were hyper-extended like elves But were mostly curved at the end. He clicked his head to the side once he began to stare at the anomaly. He squinted for about a half of second, the various colors of the man’s skin seemed to have an odd effect on his eye, that being that it made them extremely agitated managed to nearly blind him. However, it was quick to adjust and Leon retracted his head back to the standing position. The Image was a bit clearer now, the colors were gone, and the man seemed to be just a regular soldier for what seemed to be Raven’s and Tres’s UWP group. He came to the city knowing partially about the near Civil War that it was obviously caught up in. He wasn’t aware of much anything else really, so seeing this man was a surprise. It didn’t seem escaping would be the best plan as of this moment.

Besides, he still hasn’t eaten yet.

Leon chuckled and put on a smile. The same as he usually did once he began conversation, he put his problems to the backwall, and simply grinned, at least pretend that everything was all good. “Well I guess this is the part that you attempt to interrogate me, Sadly my friend I can’t say I can tell you what you want to hear…” He then began to hum a tune, as a bard his thoughts, his mind revolved around music, his ears, fine tuned to hear even hear heartbeats of others. He was no good at Lying, and at this case he found no need to lie, he’ll tell him exactly what happened, the guy probably wouldn’t believe him, or like it in any general sense, but what was truth was truth. All in All, Leon himself didn’t expect this to go well, and he was prepared for said situation to blow up in his face.

[count_zantara]

Lian Feaorne

Thomas Bravot, Master Librarian

Dark Swan Inn, Ladies Ward

Smirking slightly he replied.

”You have only seen few faces of the Meadia. Like all of those of his lineage, and more basically all sentient creatures he hides that which will be despised. Pain reminds us that we still live. Kalar never could understand that Pain....is Life. And without life, there is no point. Until the day the Pain Stops. And in the end, that's where I am going happily.”

The Librarian lived in a world of non-conflicting paradoxes; where the meaning of a simple word could change the fabric of a conversation and the emphasis on a vowel could muddle the waters. But it was a world of his own making and even in his solitariness, he wouldn't change a thing.

For the simple fact that if he did, his purpose would falture and he'd be no better than Kalar; a lost soul galavanting around picking up and discarding companions. And Thomas Bravot was too much a self-martyr to drag anyone else into the hellish life of a Traveler or a Travelers Companion.

Not anymore....Not Again.

”He only thinks the Paradox is gone. But he's thought so before and will again. But the Mask? Oh,, my dear dear sweet girl...you are still so young. The Mask is Reality, the Reality is a Mask.”

With a chuckle and a wink as she removed the shades, it was as if Bravot could read all the way into the depths of her soul and read her very thoughts; not through magic or slight of mind but by simply knowing. Savoring the kiss that stretched out into the infinite, the Librarian brought his hand up from her cheek as she rested on his shoulder, slowly running his fingers through her hair.

”In another Life on another world... but I will be here whenever you call among me, any of my former or successor selves. And even when this version of me is long gone into the next well....you only have to say my name.”

Laughing brightly as the fireplace brightened up the room, there was a twinkle of childlike glee in those sapphire eyes as if he'd just told the most delicious of jokes that no one would ever get until the day they died bringing a simple smile to their faces as they passed on from this world into the next.

[count_zantara]

Lady Thalia Ravens

Vicious Trinity

Wyvern

Darkest Silver

HonoRaven

Colonel Iyam A Heita

Lucid Red Herring

Count K. Zantara XIII

The Man with a Past

Location: Driving a demon-possessed hearse through the Ladies Ward Plaza

Raising a single eyebrow over his shades as he watched Lucid go through his usual pausing that was probably linked to his schizophrenia, the Count turned his attention to Heita talking out his a**.

”Dude...no. Just think on that a bit. If I'm a God-send then your worshipping the totally wrong patheon.

Shaking his head at the man who was speaking nonsense, Zantara raised his left hand out the window in the universal salute towards Wyvern and began to drive off.

”I'll be seeing you around bitches. Heita...I'm taking sweetcakes here to the Dark Swan across the Ward. Meet up there when your done playing with the boys...I'm gonna go find some lapdances.”

And that's exactly what he had in mind. Locking the doors behind Jay as Heita slammed the door closed, the demonic engine roared out with a scream not unlike a few dozen souls being ripped to shreads, blood red exaust pouring out of the lakepipes. With the probable outcome of Jay being tossed back in the seat, Zantara turned on the radio to a appropriate channel 66.6 DVL and Don't Fear the Reaper began to scream from the speakers a quarter of the way through the song.

”Welcome to Zantara Taxis. Don't mind the bloodstains and try not to drain the scotch in the wetbar. Just scored this trick off some idiot drows who can't play Live Chess worth a damn and I'm not losing her any time soon....heyyyyy....your that chick who owned the warehouse right? Did anyone ever figure out where that scorpion-spider-mechanical thingy come from? Thanks for the use of the rocket launchers though...had a s**t ton of fun with those over the past few days. You still in that biss? I'm in the market for a lightsaber if you know where to get one.”

Laughing as he ran over a few bodies, the tires soaking up the blood and bile to fuel the over-powered engine, Zantara lit himself up a cigarette and cruised down the bolivard nodding to a few ladies who passed who took notice of the classic car and the ever so sweet driver behind the wheel.

”So your hooked up with short and gloomy huh? Rough breaks there...”

Running completely roughshod over any words that Jay S. Bourne might say, Zantara pulled up to the front of the Dark Swan Inn and finally unlocked the doors Climbing out still wearing his violently purple platemail armor, the white haired Count brushed his hair back over his shoulders and headed for the doors. Pushing them open with spiked gauntlet-covered hands, he called out in a loud voice.

Barkeep! Two Redheads, preferably cat females and a bottle of your best tequila!!! I'm seein' ghosts and I'll be damned if they stay around for too long!!!”

Finally looking over his shoulder at Jay, Zantara flashed her his number 2 smile and asked the most important question of an age ignoring the sound of the possibly enraged female demon dragon wolf creature which was following them here the entire way. It really wasn't Zantara's place to get into that sort of situation. To put it bluntly, he wasn't paid enough. All that he hoped for was that his ride was going to come through all of this in one piece.

”You want anything? I'm sure we can get you a doppelganger who'll put on Heita's face for an hour so you can beat the living s**t out of it then screw it into oblivion. You know...if that's your thing.”

((Sorry about the delay....tablet rain out of juice while in the hospital and it's taken me this long to get out))

[count_zantara]

Lady Thalia Ravens

Vicious Trinity

Wyvern

Darkest Silver

HonoRaven

Colonel Iyam A Heita

Lucid Red Herring

Tonro the Dragon of Tomorrow

Ladies Plaza

Wait...what?

Blinking at the chaos below him as his female changed into a wolf of all things, the huge bronze lazily watching over everything sighed and dropped off the building landing beside of Raven.

”Come on little Raven-Girl. I have zero clue what is going on...but the party here has grown stale.

Waiting a few moments for her to climb on or not, he roared out a challenge and watched in bemusement as the crowds parted like Moses and the Red Sea leaving room for the Dragon Train to leave the station. Ucking his wings in against his body, he wondered briefly if Raven found the saddle on his back comfortable as he began to follow Luna down the street, easily keeping up but allowing her some distance to get her frustrations out.

But then the weird shadow demon exploded.

Coming to a quick stop with his claws digging deeply into the asphalt, the Dragon just shook his head wondering if the entire world had gone flippy floppy when he wasn't looking.

Even if Tonro could tell with a Dragon's nose that this wasn't quite the same body that should have been there.

It seems that we had a leaf-shadow ninja demon hanging around.

Where was that typical Kawarimi no Jutsu battlecry though?

He must have missed it.

[Vxce]

The Hive: Streets // Random Bar

Her vision is shaking.

He fills it with his hands on either side of her head. He's screaming her name and holding her cheeks and turning her head to make her look at him. Everything is buffered. There's a warm, raising tide that engulfs her and charges her and traps her in it's existential pleasure. She hangs onto it. Hears nothing, thinks nothing of the red in his face, the purple veins on his neck and tears of rage in his strung out eyes.

She can read his lips though. She tongues the roof of her mouth with a sick little disconnected smile, lost in the high that's raising hairs all over her body and widening her pupils. He knows what she did. They both know.

He slaps her.

She breaths sharply as her head lurches to the side. Her cheek is burning, but it takes her a long time to actually feel it. Her jaw opens and closes slowly. He asks her again where it is, what she did with it, but she's laughing before she even realizes it...a slow cackle at first, then so hard that she actually snorts. He has to hold her up because she's doubling over just laughing, her fur-lined hood falling over her head and covering her eyes when she leans back to breath. He straightens her and shoves her back against the side of the building and she feels her head meet the brick wall.

The initial high is changing from a warm fuzzy hug to a grinding paranoia. He's knocking it right out of her, focusing her bloodshot gaze on one thing.

Him.

DID --- TAKE -- ALL

She shakes her head quickly, breaths through her nose, blinks and opens wide. Can hear him now. Listens.

DID YOU TAKE IT ALL

DID YOU. TAKE IT. ALL.

Her heart feels like it's trying to smash its way out of her rib cage and she....she snaps.

Throws her head forward into his mouth.

Splits her forehead open on his teeth and he reels back in shock, stumbles, holds his jaw as blood runs over his fingers.

She pushes off the wall and feels her palms on his chest, shoving him away while he's still surprised. Under her skin is a current she can't fight. A driving force that moves her, swings her arm for her, drives a battle cry from deep within her stomach. She aims for his bleeding mouth, hits him. He charges her. Tackles her to the ground.

She claws at his face and he tries to gather her wrists in one large hand, but she slips one free and reaches up, holds his face, digs her thumbnail into his eye. She pushes and hooks it in with a scream that she traps behind her teeth, her body twisting under him as he lets go of her and panics, grabs at her hand and tries to save his eye as her nail tears open his eyelid, sinks into his cornea and the whole thing ruptures around her sinking finger.

She doesn't breath the air around her, she huffs it.

He grabs her face. He holds her hairline and starts slamming her head into the pavement, knocking her whole world around until she manages to knee him in the nuts after a few failed attempts. He finally stops, and she's out from under him. She's grabbing a nearby garbage can and throwing it at him with all her strength. She's running. He's chasing her down the street with his gushing eye and broken lip, limping and screaming while she pushes past people dizzily, glancing down allyways and into cars, through windows and open doors until one, a random bar, is open enough for her to dive into.

She searches the new environment desperately for something, anything, and sees a bar stool first. She picks it up and swings it back without even knowing if he's followed her in and sure enough, he's right behind her. He topples over, stands up again and grabs hold of one of the limbs that broke off the stool. Swings it at her and misses. Thrusts the broken end if it towards her and it's sharp enough to tear through her cloths and into her stomach a good inch. She's screaming, but she's been screaming the entire time. She's higher than he is. Much higher. He's trying to use the thing to push her back, like he wants to just push it right through her and skewer her into the drywall, but as she falls back from the force of it she reaches out on either side of her, drags her hand across a lonely table, knocks over a plate and an empty bottle, but catches a highball glass in her fist and swings it, breaks it against his face and half of it sticks in her own trembling hand. She got his other eye and now he can't see a damn thing.

Even with the glass shards in her palm, she grips the stool leg he's lodged into her stomach and pulls it out of herself, then swings it at him without hesitation while he reaches for his own bloodied face. She hits him square in the jaw and sends him reeling, falling into the bartop like a sack of potatoes as she takes a few trembling steps forward and swings again, hits him again, and again, and again in the side of the head.

Over, and over, and over, until he's an unrecognizable pulp.

Until the wooden leg breaks, half lodged in his scull, and she uses what's left of it to keep going, falling to her knees and stabbing him without aiming.

Her eyes wide

and bloodshot

and unseeing.

[Darkest Silver]

Jay's great escape - Ladies Ward.



The woman just about went grey with the savage driving of the Count, her body stiff as she dug her nails into the seat and refused to budge for fear of being sent pinballing around the vehicle. His conversation would be very one sided as Jay barely had time to answer, not that she would of since there was a high chance she would vomit instead.
Finally the car stopped and Jay burst through the back seat door and fell to her hands and knees on the side of the road.

"I prefer the real thing..."

Pulling her no.2 phone form her boot she double checked a few messages on her old sim that she had put in.
It was time...

"Need a ride to the Hive. Wait... s**t.."

The woman moaned as she saw the wolf running up the road, with the damn dragon behind her...They were going to tear the city apart to get to her. But she had work to do, and a lot of it.

"I got this... I got this.... "

Saying it to try hype herself up for what would no doubt be a stupid as hell move on her behalf.

"Thanks for the ride. And uh, don't tell Heita about what I am about to do yeah?"

Simply because he would flip out if he knew... Jay took a deep breath and ran out into the road her enhanced speed carrying her towards Luna and Tonro fast enough for her to clip past the wolf's shoulder before reaching out and grabbing a handful of fur. Thus launching herself onto it's back. From there the brawler would hold on for dear life and wrap her arms around her neck.

"You want to talk...Let's talk. But your gunna take me to the Hive too..."

Why Luna? Well because the last time she jumped on the dragon things didn't end so well for her... And he was more likely to eat her where as Luna would just beat the crap out of her...Logic.

HonoRaven

count_zantara

[Darkest Silver]

Azalea.

The girl felt defeated, alone, her eyes began to water as she slumped in her chair. He wasn't going to let her go? She was to be a pet forever, never able to get home..

"You're a monster."

Whispering the word as her fingers laced through her long brown locks, flower petals shifted about as she began to cry quietly.

"I can fix the clothes... "

Hopeful to the bitter end, Azalea turned away so that he couldn't see her tears, wishing the food would arrive so that he would forget about her for a while. All she wanted was to disappear.

Fitch Buckoff

((Got stuck. Move us along if you want. XD))

[Ekibiyo Drakmord]

Once. Twice. Three times a step he took to make out the mirror on the wall of his life that showed him who he was.

 

This was the 4th step. He’d forgotten all the others. They’d been easy. Admit you’re a tweaked out, drunken, mental cowboy on the hunt for more to drink and the next magnetic horse of a thought to ride until you can’t anymore because your a** is sore and there’s nothing left to drink and you want OFF the ride before it kills you. Call 1800 you have a ******** problem and hang up a few times and call back again and again until the sound of you saying the words echoes in that empty Sigil apartment like so much of a revelatory choir song in some ancient monastic hall.

 

He smokes nothing, because he has nothing. Chews on a blade of grass and flips a silver dollar coin and kicks a stone on his long walk to someplace where he could say ******** you to steps 4 through who cares with a drink to drown out whatever hope he may have had of recovery.

 

Some structure looms in the distance and it says BAR to him. The road is too gravely for his nuclear powered Heelie boots. He’d tinkered and tested and borrowed and stolen and invented the tech to make the things fast and mean and quick and fun on flat, level terrain… Never really thought about the what if’s of any other type of surface being under them… It didn’t help that he’d stuck the workings of the micro-reactors and miniaturized electro-magnetic duritium wheelengines into the heels of probably the oldest, nastiest, most beat up pair of steel-toed motorcycle boots the world had ever known. They we’re uncomfortable in almost every capacity that mattered and… He had never owned a motorcycle.

 

He’s broad of shoulder and tall. Muscled well and dressed for anything but success with his dirty, mostly buttonless, white button down shirt under an old, brown leather hoodie-vest leading down to brown leather pants and the knee-high, reinforced boots he wore in black. His hands are gloved with some semblance of miniaturized power armor, leading up to his elbows with various input surfaces for some sort of touch interface that was hidden beneath layers of carbon-fiber and Kevlar plates. At his waist, there is a holster holding an old Colt Peacemaker in blued steel and a utility belt harboring all manner of gadgets and pockets for holding them. A singular item is strapped to his hip on his left side… A long, cylindrical object, tapering into a circular base and wrapped in brown leather with multiple analog controls along it’s surface.

 

The stone he kick’s keeps rolling back into the path of him. Annoyed, he presses his pinky toe inside the boot on his right foot onto the actuator built into the inside of the shoe that engages the high-pitched whirr of its wheelengine. Hauling back with his leg and letting the heel dig in and kick up a huge stream of gravel off the path and into the air behind him until his foot rockets forward and kicks the stone, sending it disappearing over the distant horizon.

 

He fails to think about the momentum of his foot moving that quickly and doesn’t apply the brakes in time. Hurling his entire body after the direction of his kick and sending him upside down and crashing into a heap back on the path with a resounding thump as his head bounces off the ground.

 

“Well… Doesn’t that just fix my little red wagon…”

 

He speaks as he’s groaning and rolling onto his back to get up again. Brushing the dust and the dirt from his person and rubbing the top of his head through the mess of wavy auburn hair. Eyes that looked like they were cut out of the sky itself and stuck, angrily into his face glared down at the boot on his right foot. As though somehow, in doing exactly what he designed it to do, it had offended him in some great way.

 

“Fixes it real good…”

 

Suddenly, he’s remembering his silver dollar… The one he was going to use to purchase the drink at the end of this line of his life. See’s it sitting where it ended up a foot away from a storm drain in front of him.

 

“That would have been tragic. A goddamn greek trage-“

 

He hears the commotion coming from behind him, but doesn’t see what’s coming until it hits him. Feels the girl brush past and keep running with this horribly mangled man in pursuit of her, who in turn barrels through him where he stands and sends him sprawling back on the ground in a heap.

 

He lands almost on top of his money in the street… But the man who is chasing the woman gets to it first with his stomping foot. Kicking it cleanly down the storm drain with a clink as his hopes for a drink clink away with it.

 

“…”

 

Fury overtakes him in that black, terrible place men go when the thing they want most has been taken from them in some atrocious accident… But for him, now, this is no accident. He doesn’t believe in them anyway, and this is just one more sleight the universe has laid against him on a long list of them. This man. This ******** DEAD man just bought his ticket one way to hell. He’d reap the money from his dead flesh if he had to. Deeply, Personally Wounded by the affront of this stranger… He rises after a moment of shuddering, shaky vengeance builds within him and he leaps from the ground and off towards the bar into which the two went running ahead of him.

 

By the time he gets there, the woman who was being chased has already done his target of hatred a number with enough madness to give him pause at the door. She’s a junkie, hopped up on whatever she’s itching for. He can smell it on her. Doesn’t even need to look to spot it. But it’s all irrelevant to him now. He’s pissed and looking at her sticking the broken leg of a barstool into the guy HE WAS SUPPOSED TO BE KILLING.

 

“********…”

 

He walked up. Looks down at her. Looks at the man with his body still shuddering everytime she impales him with the stake. With his blood still spilling from the mess of a face she left behind. He’s not dead yet. Close, unconscious, but he’s got some dying to do before he goes. She’s not in a state where killing cleanly was on her mind. He’s not sure if much of anything is on it.

 

He decides before he even really knows what’s going on.

 

The Colt comes out and the hammer is back and he aims down between the man’s nonexistent eyes until the thunderous boom of the revolver and the blinding flash of it go off in concert and turn what remains of his head into an exploded half-empty void of skull and brain and tissue that showers across the floor and over the girl and over him in a wet, sloppy eruption of gore that splatters wildly.

 

Mercy wasn’t a factor. This was payback before she could take it from him. Plain and simple… He had business with the bartender and this girl and her dead dealer were going to front the tab. He takes aim at the girl. The Peacemaker is still smoking and the blood from the man is dripping off its barrel in sizzling, heavy drops.

 

“Get up. There’s nothing left of him to kill and I’m thirsty.”

 

He gestures with the revolver towards the bar.

 

“Our dead friend owed me a drink. Take his wallet. Grab whatever money he had and we’ll call it square on a bottle or two.”

 

He’s eyeing the piece of wood she was using to stick it to her previously breathing supplier.

 

“Don’t go sticking that where it don’t belong or I’ll kill you. I don’t care what you’re ******** up off of.”

 

It was simple. Direct. Focused. Nothing is a question. Everything is a promise and the evidence of his ability to keep it is lying underneath her, dead as a doornail. He cocks the hammer. A half-cocked smile comes out from his blood-spattered face.

 

“But I might ask for a taste test on whatever you got stoking that fire a bit later darlin. Provided you and I aren’t made out like this guy by then.”

 

The smile’s still on him. No fear. No regret. Killing was something that obviously came naturally and talking about it even more so. He watched her. Waiting for her to oblige his orders.