A milk run gone right, a good night at the bar, a great early morning dinner with some chums…the perfect reason to walk down an alley and witness a mugging and a beating.  Why not have that person getting beat down a small statured elf?  Why not have the group be a mix of metas all larger?  Why not have them obviously be gangers?  Why not have them all just have a lethal look to them?

Because fate doesn’t give a shit about you.

While he wasn’t drunk, Kyuzo had a few, but those affects were gone the moment he realized what was happening and his body seemed to know what was going to happen before his mind did. 

He couldn’t tell if the elf was male or female, but, you know...elves, right?  It didn’t matter though.  He did note a male troll with a mix match of streetgear on yet seeming to lack any real ‘ware, a human female who had the appearance of a summoner or shaman, and then a male ork who seemed to be shining through the darkness with all his augmentations.  They were cheap in terms of price, but that didn’t mean that they weren’t lethal.  When it comes to ‘ware, you pay to NOT see it, but sometimes seeing it is the point.

The female was kicking the elf while the troll was yelling something akin to ‘give me your shit’ or some such thing.  Kyuzo took a few steps down the alley when the troll noticed him and made a click sound with his tongue.  The two others responded by stepping away and squaring up to Kyuzo and the human quickly said in a calm, measured, and almost believable tone, “hold up citizen, Lone Star.”

“[color=0072bc][b]Good, me like to file report for drunk n’ disorderly[/b][/color].”  He never stopped moving forward.

“Slot off drekhead, you go sleep it off somewhere else,” the ork commanded.  

“[b][color=0072bc]Hoi maybe me n’ you got off on wrong foot, yeah?  Let’s do this.  Me give two options.  Leave.  Don’t.  Either way, me n’ the daisy eater’re walking out the other side’a this alley.  Go easy or go hard[/color][/b].”

In a deep, menacing voice that could almost be felt, the troll stepped in front of the two others, both of whom seemed about to speak, and said “know what [color=00a651][u][b]wenig[/b][/u][/color], you leave or I leave your guts splattered all across dis alley.”

“[b][color=0072bc]Fine.  Me go.[/color][/b]”  He stopped moving forward, instead letting the other three move towards him, allowing them to gain confidence.  In hindsight, his approach was sloppy, but he was drunk and this wasn't planned.  The fact that they didn't pick up on it spoke a lot about their lack of perception.

The ork, now gaining some ganger swagger back, stepped forward and commanded, “leave yer credstick chummer.  On the ground.”

“[b][color=0072bc]Really[/color][/b]?”  Kyuzo sounded somewhat dejected, if not disappointed.  “[b][color=0072bc]You dregs so…predictable[/color][/b].”

The human seemed to finally be picking up on something being off about him, so he knew he had to hurry.

He reached in his outer pocket and tossed the stick on the floor in front of them.  What they didn’t know is that it was a flashpack, smartlinked.  The moment the software recognized that the 3 targets designated by Kyuzo’s smartlink feedback all had their retinas on it, it set off a series of amazingly bright lights aimed directly into each individual eye.  

“The frag?”

“Oi suka….”

The moment after his smartlink fired the flashpack, Kyuzo took off running toward the three.  His initial target was the magic user.  She was small, not armored, and if she was as shaman, she’d call some form of aid.

However, as he whipped his predator around, he noticed that the wared out ork was moving towards him and moving to draw his own weapons.  ‘[i][color=0072bc]Cyber eyes, anti-flash.  Noooiice[/color][/i],’ he thought to himself as he let loose 3 rounds into the chest and face of the ork.

While one hand was subjecting the ork to some lead poisoning, the other reached to the small of his back and in one smooth motion, he grabbed and threw 2 gyroknives.  They were on point enough to have caused damage, but the gyros and smartlink adjusted their paths slightly enough so that they killed on impact.  The human mage was down and the ork fell a moment after.  

Perhaps the troll had some augmented eye.  Perhaps he was hopped up on some combat drug.  Or perhaps Kyuzo just had bad luck.  Either way, not a moment later, the troll drove forward and with speed that most trolls shouldn’t possess, he slapped the gun from Kyuzo’s hand and booted him in the stomach.

‘[i][color=0072bc]Drek.  Nitro[/color][/i],’ he thought to himself.  He stood up shakily and the troll launched a punch kick combo.  While Kyuzo had little trouble deflecting, he couldn’t dodge well in the narrow alley.  Dodging was preferred because blocking punches and kicks from a 7 foot something, 4 or 5 hundred pound troll ganger, nitroed out to his eyes was NOT a good idea.  He could already feel deep bone bruising and his combat HUD was going on about trauma this, trauma that.

Kyuzo decided to dart in and attack, hitting a series of blows and managing to evade any real contact or damage as he did—but also seeming to DEAL no real damage in return.  The troll picked up a discarded piece of rebar and threw it at Kyuzo.  While attempting to move back and away, he didn’t realize he’d moved almost directly back against a dumpster.  

The rebar tore through his clothing and skin, protruding out the back by several inches.  His smartlink flashed a damage assessment on his combat HUD but it was ignored.  There were more pressing matters to focus on, in the form of a charging troll.  He sidestepped at the last moment, actually succeeding in NOT hitting a dumpster this time, and he watched the troll smash headfirst into the dumpster.  To the ganger’s credit, it actually sent the dumpster sliding about 6 feet away, and it was already full of trash.

Moving as quick as he could thanks to an adrenal dump, he pulled his trenchknife and went to work stabbing the troll repeatedly, savagely.  However the troll shook away the affects of running head first into a dumpster, and if he even realized he was being stabbed 20 or so times, he didn’t show it.  He swung around and grabbed the rebar sticking out of Kyuzo’s chest and lifted him into the air.

'[i][color=0072bc]That hurt[/color][/i].'

A lot.

The two stared at one another and the troll roared victoriously while Kyuzo roared back, a mix of pain and defiance as he stabbed one last time into the head of the troll.  He knew it wouldn’t kill the thing, but it would piss him off and give the troll something to remember him by.  The troll’s own roar became one of pain from the knife biting into his head, when there were several bursts of gunfire and the troll slumped to his knees.  He didn’t let go of the rebar and it took a moment for Kyuzo to realize that the elf had picked up the Ares Predator that had been dropped and emptied its contents.

The troll however, refused to die.  He got back up to one knee and Kyuzo just let go of the trench knife as it stuck into the troll’s skull.  For a split second, he stared at the thing in disbelief.  

And for the first time in many, many months, the façade of the dumb ork slipped away.  “[b][color=0072bc]You got to be fragging KIDDING me.  That must have been some primo nitro[/color][/b].”

There was a slight whirring sound, then a metallic clunk.  Out of the internal holster in his synthetic arm appeared a small, compact firearm.  The troll looked at the sound just as Kyuzo’s hand moved towards it, gripping the hilt of the Colt revolver there.  The large caliber revolver was a last resort, but this my friends, this was pretty much textbook definition of a last fragging resort.  One shot and the troll dropped Kyuzo and fell to the floor.  

And...why not have the rebar clip the edge of the wall on the way down, sending jolts of agony through the ork?  Oh yeah, fate doesn’t give a shit about you.

Kyuzo put the pistol back, mouthing to himself, “[color=0072bc]most expensive rounds on the market, capable of piercing inches of armor, and I gotta waste it on some dregged out troll[/color].”  He ripped the rebar out and set the pain suppressor system to MAX, leaning against the wall and letting his gaze fall to the elf who was handing his gun over.

To the small, young elf’s credit, he wasn’t shaking badly.  He was a street kid.  He was small, but mentally, he was tough.

The kid didn’t say anything right away, he just kind of stared at Kyuzo and then said, “sorry.”

“[b][color=0072bc]The frag’re you sorry for kid[/color][/b]?”

He pointed at Kyuzo, his shoulder, and said, “I kind of shot you.”

He looked down, seen the bloody whole.  “[b][color=0072bc]You gotta be fragging kidding me![/color][/b]”

The elf turned and darted away, yelling over his shoulder, “you called me a daisy eater, you smelly trog!”