---

It was cold as shit.

At least those were the words that went through the man's head as he stood against a brick wall, arms folded, chin pulled in, and shivering like he wasn't wearing a tightly fitting trench coat. Moonlight illuminated the buildings around him and frigid breath rose into the air above the brightly lit city. Regalia was another known metropolis that never slept and the cars on the road after midnight proved that saying. Pedestrians dressed in appropriate cold weather clothing lined the sidewalks on either side of the four lane highway and everyone seemed determined to get to some actual destination or another. In fact, they were so caught up with what they were doing that no one seemed to notice when two men escaped the herds by turning into an alleyway and around the corner into a square opening of sorts. One of them was the frozen man hugging his wall and also standing next to a rather large dumpster. The other was a dark-haired fellow in a tailored black suit.

He adjusted his suit jacket as he stood over a whimpering man in a heap on the cold concrete. Brandishing a smartphone, the suited man tapped the screen a couple times and put the receiver to his ear. A few tense moments of silence passed before his call was seemingly answered. "It's done," A deep, yet oddly smooth voice said into the phone. He listened for a bit then spoke once more. "I already know what you think, but sometimes one must move things forward himself. Don't worry, we're doing exactly as ordered after all. Just moving up the timetable a little." He looked down at the whimpering man as if he was admiring his handiwork. The whimpering man was clearly injured and bleeding profusely as blood stained the dress clothes he wore. He was older with wrinkled skin and thin white hair. His body seemed to be on the larger side and his eyes remained closed. The suited man redirected his gaze forward and listened once more.

"Can we hurry this shit up, Cyrus? Fuck, it's cold as hell," The brick wall hugging man complained. Cyrus did not move.

"Yes. With this done, we'll be ahead of schedule. Yes. Yes. Well, you know what they say about cutting off the head. Good, keep me informed then." Cyrus tapped the screen and pocketed his phone before cupping his bare hands over his mouth and blowing into them.

“See? You feel that shit too, right? What did she say?"

"She said nothing of particular importance. We're finished here in any case." Cyrus slowly pulled a handgun from a space inside his suit jacket and began screwing on a silencer. He meticulously tightened the attachment, looked it over, cocked the hammer, and pointed the now silenced barrel at the head of his whimpering target. "The only thing that matters now is this moment. This is what will change everything, my friend," He said before firing two shots. The whimpering stopped immediately and the older man froze in place on the ground. Cyrus returned his weapon to the space inside his suit jacket and pulled out a small pin in tandem. He dropped the tiny ornament on the ground near the dead man's body and turned towards the path that would lead out of the alley.

"So what happens now?" The frozen man asked almost leaping off the wall and following Cyrus out of the alley and back onto the bustling streets. Cyrus maintained a perfect stride through the throngs of bodies. It was almost like people were moving out of his way so he didn't have to navigate around anyone--he walked a straight line down the sidewalk with his shivering companion at his side.

"Now we wait, of course," He replied with a small smirk.



Thin streams of smoke danced into the air followed by what looked like the type of emission you see from car exhaust. Quinn took one more long drag from his dying cigarette butt and gazed over the city. The view from the top of Millennium Tower was always a beautiful one and for Quinn, it was a calming sort of experience as well. He would come up there to think or soothe his frustrations or just enjoy the silence. One constant always remained however; the view always gave him a sense a perspective. It reminded him of where he was and how he had gotten there. All the struggles along the way seemed worth it whenever he would venture to the summit of the tallest building in Regalia and stare out over the horizon. It was almost as if he could see his past, present, and future right there in front of him. That was the power of the view and it was a power that he enjoyed indeed. He suddenly remembered that all good things had to come to an end when a familiar ringing and vibration filled the pocket of his tailored dress pants.

"Gyles," He answered. He listened for a bit while attempting to take a last puff from a clearly drained cigarette butt. "Yeah, I know. I'm getting ready to tell them now. Don't worry, we'll find the fuckers who've been selling that shit in our city." Quinn dropped his cigarette butt, mashing it in with his wingtip dress shoes before returning attention to his large slate of a smartphone. He initiated a group text message and sent out the following:

The job is on. We have find the little shits who've been pushing that whiplash throughout the city. We've been ordered to fan out and gather information for the time being, but not to take any rash actions. My best bet would be going through the prostitutes, they mess with some of the most fucked up johns sometimes. I ain't telling you what to do, and you can find information you're own way, but I'm gonna hit up the rings. In any case, we'll meet back up in six hours and share anything we've found. We gotta put a lid on this shit quick.

Whiplash was the new drug of choice circulating around Regalia. As odd as it sounded for a criminal organization to be against drugs, that's how the Ariella Syndicate--the crime organization that currently controls Regalia behind the scenes--operated. It was the older members who had come to the realization that running drugs was more trouble than it was worth and also found out that stamping out the gangs who peddled the more serious ones garnered them praise from the average citizens. Ever since then the Ariella Syndicate had been firmly against the sale of widespread, hardcore drugs like this and had done everything in their power to quash them. Quinn sent out the text and pocketed his phone. He turned towards the roof access and casually strolled towards the door. The view was beautiful indeed, but it was time to get down to business.

Once back at street level, Quinn's only thought was to gather information and there was only one place he figured he'd need to go. If anyone could point him in the direction of prostitutes, it was a certain gay club owned by a certain member of the Syndicate. That's who Quinn had resolved to go see as he slipped into the driver's seat of a 2010 Chevrolet Camaro and zoomed off into the busy traffic under the midnight sky.

A soft snort permeated the awkward silence that ensued the scene on the HD flat screen television. Its constantly changing, diffused light reflected off the polished surfaces in the living room section of a studio apartment - although in truth, there wasn't really much in the place. A person would have looked around at the studio and thought it was a model for a minimalist magazine. There was hardly any evidence that someone occupied the space, save for the modern-styled coffee table, on which lay a white towel, along with a pair of glasses and a fully assembled, recently meticulously cleaned Glock 17 Gen 4, with silencer. Everything else outside the realm of the living room was dark, save for the fluorescent glow offered by Regalia through the window just a few feet south of the neatly made bed.

The lady of the house was sitting on the couch, bare legs crossed beneath her though barely visible underneath the excess fabric of the extra large shirt she was currently lounging in. Fresh out of a shower, her lion's mane of inky hair was tied up in a damp, flaccid bun that was tipping over the side of her head. Her attention was fully directed at the TV, even as she lifted a few chocolate covered pretzels from the bowl-full sitting in her lap to her mouth. They fell in easily and she crunched on them as the cast delivered their lines to her, eliciting small grins or a quick roll of the eyes every now and then. She kept her slender hand over the bowl, hovering for convenience as well as cleanliness: crumbs were on her long list of pet-peeves.

After a particularly tense moment on screen, the woman dusted off her hands in the bowl and reached over to her side, where a capped bottle of Yoohoo milk was leaning against her hip bone. She swallowed a few short gulps, before screwing the cap back on, setting it down, and throwing another few pretzels into her mouth. She savored their salty-sweetness, unable to stop since she poured them out almost forty-five minutes ago.

And who was going to tell Vivian Hong what she could or couldn't do on her period?

She was just sucking on her teeth to try and get whatever the hell that was stuck in there out when there was a buzzing and a text tone beeping on the cushion to her right. The bright light of her smartphone shone upwards at her, and Vee glanced at its screen as she dusted her hands off once again. She wiped her fingers on the hem of her shirt for extra measure before she picked up the phone and swiped right to read the message.



Well, if anyone was going to tell her to stop, it was going to be Gyles.

Vivian set down the phone and picked up the TV remote instead, pausing the characters mid-sentence. She rose from the grey couch, taking the bowl of pretzels and the Yoohoo with her, and deposited them onto the kitchen counter. Then began the process of getting ready, which only took under twenty minutes. Vivian had put on denim jeans and a loose grey shirt, her custom-made black work boots, and had swiped eyeliner and mascara onto her face. Her hair was taken down from its bun to dry as she slipped into her leather moto jacket, which hid her shoulder holster underneath. The Glock was slipped into its place at her side while the thick-rimmed glasses were placed on top of her head.

She moved around her apartment systematically, having done this plenty of times before. Window locked, television off, cameras on, "alarm" in place. She swung around and gave the apartment a quick once over before making her way to the door, nabbing a few more pretzels from the bowl before exiting to the garage. The plan was to meet Gyles at the bar, maybe get a beer. Or a dessert, if she was lucky. The thought of a warm brownie smothered in ice cream made her crack a smile as she unlocked her old, manual Beamer and settled in, chewing down the last pretzel in her hand before adjusting her mirror and pulling out of the space.

Alexander put his phone down and sighed. He had felt it recently, just walking around the city. It had been cold. Cold and dead still. He lowered his lips over the straw of his iced and very frothy coffee, whose milky beigeness was clearly visible through its transparent, plastic container. On the table in front of him, his phone buzzed again, silent apart from the frantic vibrations driving into the wooden surface. He traced his upper lip with the tip of his tongue, catching flyaway drops of creamy coffee and underlining his thick, neat handlebar moustache.





Alexander rolled his eyes and tousled his hair, and climbed to his feet from the squashy sofa in the entrance hall of the Palace. It was an ironic name for the faux-retro converted ‘70’s warehouse that had, in its time, been a garage, a drug-den, a garage again, an unofficial music venue, a succession of here-today-gone-tomorrow yuppie cafes, before eventually falling into the Syndicate’s hands. It continued to pretend to be a bar, even now under Alexander’s tenure, masking its true nature under the whimsical and exclusionary habits of the similar-looking hipster hangouts in the local area. The organised crime of the new millennium.

He had been resident in the Palace since the Ariellas had acquired it, which they did in much the same way as wolves acquire carcasses. Back then, the helpful, concrete-lined cellar underneath the floor had been of particular use, with Alexander its guardian, but as Alexander had come to receive more and more of his growing family heritage in the past decade, unskilled work had been, rightly, subcontracted to the unskilled. Now, as their predecessors had begun to blaze trails in parts unknown, their old hangouts, favoured by a different generation of men, had come to seem a little old-fashioned, perhaps even a little irrelevant. The Palace now served, in Alexander’s mind, as a renewed and refreshed place to exist, bohemian from the ironic chandeliers to the assorted couches and armchairs strewn across the hard, concrete floor. Alexander had made a point of saving the bar that had been put in in one of the Palace’s previous iterations, and although the pumps were now purely decorative, from a bottle-perspective, he was rather well-stocked.

He rummaged his keys from his pocket and threw the empty plastic coffee cup over his shoulder on the way out, where it lay on the floor among the others. His thumb danced across his phone’s touch-screen as he shimmied out of the door.



There was much to do.

Two sheepish Cal Tech graduates, separated only by a decade in experience and their personal taste in animé shirts, corralled into the 59 degree Fahrenheit den of Alf Zorkybski.

“You wanted to see us, sir,” Dave muttered.

Fred, with legs crossed, hatless, was savoring some dilapidated quinine, in the form of a T&T gin and tonic, attempting to prevent the technocratic malaria from accruing higher on his desk. Pivoting, away from the panorama of endless monitors, before the duo, he took a finalizing swig, sucked on the sliced lemon, licked his bitter lips and motioned a leprous, slender sleeve towards the hearth.

“Bruce. Dave. Each of you, please take a seat by the fire.”

Both junior accountants plopped upon a recliner, in succession. Bruce took to the closest throne by the exit, whilst the slower Dave, wedged himself between the desk of his novel boss and his ghastly body guard, unfortunately still within the firing range of any saliva darting from the clean shaven fifty year old. The occasional ember offered an eerie glow beneath the lintel as Alfred slithered into position.

“What’s this about?” Bruce hissed, impatiently interrupting Parlay's methodical stride.

Alfred hissed back. “Damn, I miss MIT.” A scoff followed. “If Riemann was alive today, he would be a fucking hacker, too.”

“What?” Bruce and David garbled reflexively, as afterthoughts.

“Well, for as long as I have been able to prosper here at Xerxes, our casino has required to deliver our secrets safely and efficiently. Under lock and key, so to speak. To prevent important, costly information, obviously…” He rubbed his palms feverishly, blew an exhaled breath on his Reynaud tainted fingertips, and continued his sigh. “…from falling into the wrong hands, our predecessors developed intriguing ways of disguising the classified contents of our propaganda. Not unlike the Spartans. Their army’s leaders, for instance, over two and half thousand years ago, by way of sender and recipient, possessed, each, a cylinder of exactly the same dimensions, called a scytale. To encode a note, a commander would first wrap a narrow strip of parchment around the baton so that it coiled down the tube. He would then write his letter on the papyrus, along the length of the rod. Once the message was unwound, the text looked meaningless. It was only when it was spiraled around another identical canister that the communiqué would reappear. Do you know what I’m hinting at, Bruce?”

“I have no clue.” Bruce’s eyes dilated further to accommodate for the darkness of his superior’s inquisition.

“On the contrary, I think you just might. Before your birth, in 1977, anyone who wanted to transmit a cipher faced an inherent problem. Even with the mass-produced Enigma machine, Nazi Berlin would still have to dispatch agents to deliver to U-boat officers and tank captains alike, the actual ledgers detailing the settings for encoding each day’s communications. Of course, if an enemy got their grubby thumbs on the code book, the jig would be up. What would Master Juba say to that?” A golden grin widened. “I digress. Imagine the logistics of using such a weak system to do our business!?! But you anticipated that, didn’t you, Dave?”

“What do you mean, Mr. Zorkybski?” The nervous newbie stuttered a retort.

Alfred could not arbitrate the guilty party, just yet. He wanted the reveal to be worth its mettle.

“Hmm… please, call me Parlay.” The middle aged suit bowed slightly, to his unappreciative audience. "Where was I?" He suddenly sensed his pushy parables were wasting precious time.

“Ah, yes. RSA is now, to this very moment, what still safeguards most of our dealings here in Regalia. Remarkably, the mathematics that goes into making possible such a universally accepted scheme of cryptography harks back to the anachronistic clock calculators of Gauss. Fucking ancient shit!”

At the dénouement of this explicative, Al angrily swiped his littered desk onto the floor, searching hastily for the Bicycles. The guard remained stoic, unphased. “Encrypting every casino machine transaction is something like the beginning of this card trick. But this is no ordinary deck. The number of cards in this pack would be so huge, I would need over a hundred digits to scribe it; let’s call it N. Ah, found them!”

After reuniting with his favorite pile of 52 backs, Alfred lifted the Ace of Spades to each person in the room. “Envision one of our customer’s credit card numbers is one of these playing cards. The Syndicate’s digital protocols places the credit card on the top of the bunch, shuffles the packet so that the location of the customer’s card seems to have been completely lost.” While spitting his rant, he illustrates the aforementioned chaos with the stage props, ending with a fanned flurry upon the table, catty-corner to Marc’s perspective. “Any hacker is faced with the impossible task of extracting that single card from the scrambled horde. However, one of you has already cracked the solution to this cunning ploy. I’m referring to the artifice of the Faro.” He seeks out the black Ace once again, chairs it on the pinnacle of the deck, and with mechanical precision, Alfred preserves its foremost position after eight more perfect weaves. “Thanks to a little theorem by Fermat, the credit card can also be forced to resurrect at the crown of the mob after another very specific sequence of shuffles.”

“This isn’t new, Mr. Z. Euler showed that the pattern repeats itself ages ago...” Adopting and drawing on one of the cocktail napkins on the bubble wrapped floor, the much younger Dave tautly crucified the binomial equation, as if holding the chauffeur sign at a baggage claim in a busy airport. "...after (p-1) x (q-1) + 1, where p and q are the prime factorization of that gigantic N, you mentioned earlier.”

“Exactly, and acquisition of these two primes therefore becomes the koan to unlocking the secrets to the House,” applauded Alfred.

“But you said it yourself, that’s impossible! No supercomputer, let alone any N group of elite hackers would ever be able to discriminate p and q, that fast.” Bruce sneered.

“Not unless one controlled which exact N-sized packets were allowed to be transmitted from machine to bank account, reverse engineering the p and q, by selecting the desired N before-hand. Similar to having a confederate in the crowd, you cherry pick the same 'innocent' participant, over and over again, to always go along with the magic show. The computers in our slots and games will blindly keep funneling different N-sized packets with the embedded transactions until a desired N is finally received and processed by the Millennium Tower, and, of course, an intercepting wolf.”

An awkward silence fiercely impregnated the room, only to be cock-blocked by a musical chime, à la Gyles, Quinn:

The job is on. We have to find the little shits who've been pushing that whiplash throughout the city. We've been ordered to fan out and gather information for the time being, but not to take any rash actions. My best bet would be going through the prostitutes, they mess with some of the most fucked up johns sometimes. I ain't telling you what to do, and you can find information your own way, but I'm gonna hit up the rings. In any case, we'll meet back up in six hours and share anything we've found. We gotta put a lid on this shit quick.

The golden grin slowly disappeared, as the thunder was stolen. "I guess you're both worth more alive, after all."

---

Lex tore the white latex glove off her left hand and tossed it toward the garbage can across the room. It hit the back wall and landed squarely in the middle of the basket. Bank, she thought. She looked back at the man sitting on her exam table. He was incredibly tall, easily hitting above 6 foot. His dark skin and equally dark eyes were flawless. It's what made him such a good prostitute. People were drawn in to his smooth complexion and the glisten of his white teeth when he smiled. Lex smiled as she approached her box of gloves, pulling another one on with a snap. She turned back to him; Jackson was his name. She held her smile as she felt the glands around his throat, testing their size. "And what kind of recreational narcotics have you been using?" she asked. Sure, it was part of her job to know what kinds of things those under the Syndicate's employ were using, but she had to be more vigilant than ever after the text she'd received from Quinn. Orders were orders and she wasn't going have anything slip through on her watch, especially since she was on the front lines dealing with this new drug. Jackson maintained a impassive face when he answered.

"I did a line of coke about a week ago with a couple clients. They paid extra for it, but I was given approval ahead of time." Lex nodded, knowing the approval was sent from one of the higher ups. The Ariella Syndicate held a hard line when it came to the sale of the drugs but would often be lenient when it came to letting their prostitutes use with a client, especially when the clients paid heavily for it. However, they always needed permission first. Lex dropped her hands, finishing her exam. "That's it? Just the one line?" She looked directly into his midnight eyes. She had an uncanny ability to be able to detect a liar and it came in handy when questioning those under her care. Jackson held her gaze evenly.

'Yes ma'am. Just the one line." He was telling the truth and she knew it. She smiled even wider this time and took her gloves off again.

"Thanks, Jax. You're free to go. Give this slip to your handler and I hope you have a great week." She signed her name and tore a bright pink paper off her clipboard. The paper would tell Jackson's handler that he had been given a clean bill of health and could continue working. It was an inevitability that the prostitutes under the Syndicate's employ ended up with STDs or pregnancy but as long as they were given medication or the fetus was aborted, they were allowed back to work. It was the patients who contracted more severe illnesses, like HIV, those who came in with beatings from the clients they picked up, or those who came in strung out on something that made the job worth the effort for Lex.

It was a horrible thought, really, for her to get excited about the distress and poor choices of others but she had shut off her negative emotions toward the shady aspects of the business a long time ago. She was raised in this lifestyle by a cold and distant father. He saw no point in sheltering her and she learned to embrace the power that came with it. She was a quick study and realized early on that her family would always need someone to look after their health. And that's what they were to her - family. Her father had been killed when she was just starting her teen years and, having never met her mother, the Ariella Syndicate was the only family she had. She excelled in school and was accepted into one of the top medical schools in the country. She graduated top of her class and headed straight back home when she finished. She walked right into the office of the head of the Syndicate himself and announced that she'd be taking over the position of in house physician. She had busted the windpipe of the man they were currently hiring in to examine their employees so it's not like he could protest. Impressed with her tenacity, he made the job hers that day.

Coming back to the present, Lex's phone chirped with another text. She unlocked the phone and watched the text pop up.



Her heart started beating rapidly. If they were calling her out into the field, it must be something big. These were the days she craved. She glanced at the clock on the wall above her head. She had time to see a couple more patients before she left. She went back to the glove box and pulled out another pair. "Next!" she called out.

Regalia - The Crest

---

these things are sent to try us. will have a look xx

Quinn nodded in silent acknowledgement, illuminating hues highlighting his serious expression before disappearing suddenly to be replaced by the pitch black of the cellular display. A sigh floated into the air and his gaze shifted to the elegantly built business just outside the car on the right. Regalia was a true city through and through and that meant a grid based design and plenty of parallel parking. This particular business was successful enough to have its own parking lot, but whenever a visit was meant to be more professional than leisurely, the Syndicate's head enforcer had, for some inexplicable reason, always opted to parallel park right in front of the entrance. A professional excursion was certainly the agenda on this night as Quinn emerged from his Camaro and strolled around the front and towards the bouncers who guarded the door to The Crest, one of the most popular nightclubs in the downtown district.

A cigarette hung loose and hands were pocketed as the clack of wingtip dress shoes made their way passed the enormous line and right up to club security. Quinn only offered a nod before attempting to enter the establishment and meeting a rather thick forearm that declined entry. He cut his eyes toward the owner of said arm without so much as moving any other part of his own body. "What is this kind of shit?" He questioned nonchalantly. The offending bouncer in question was slightly shorter than Quinn, but much larger. It was clear that creatine and whole chickens were what composed his diet and the smug expression he wore only confirmed what Quinn already knew--the guy had no idea who he was refusing entry to. This was a rare thing amongst the Syndicate members considering most of Regalia knew a lot of them individually. There were always new guys though and this was hiring season after all.

"Ya think you can just waltz up here and cut line? Get to the back."

Quinn didn't move.

The bouncer dropped his arm and replaced the empty space with his puffy stature, staring Quinn straight in the eyes. "Look kid, tonight's not the night to fuck with me. We got a VIP coming through any minute and if he sees this shit, I'm gonna have to rough ya up just on principle,"

Quinn didn't move.

The bouncer motioned his fellow co-worker to move a bit further to the side, but in turning his head the mistake had already been made. In one swift, seamless sequence, Quinn sent a v-shaped strike to the throat followed by a kick to the knee, which brought the bouncer down to waist level, and a knee to the face to finish up. The bouncer slumped over and writhed in pain as Quinn--now only one hand in his pocket--stepped over him and into the club. The other bouncer knelt down after he made sure the Syndicate enforcer was out of earshot. "Dude... That was Quinn Gyles," He whispered. The bouncer in a heap made a noise as if he was trying to speak then groaned louder.

The interior of The Crest was as grand as the exterior made it seem to be. The space was huge and an assortment of brightly colored lights, performers, and club patrons littered the area. Loud music that was a bit too pop for Quinn's liking played over the speakers and the bass literally thumped his heart as he weaved a path through drunk party seekers and ambiguous dancers. He eventually arrived at the bar which denoted itself with a bright fluorescent blue that coated the counter top, the shelving, and even the drinks themselves. The bartender took a few minutes coming over, but when he saw who his newest patron was, his face quickly went from shining example of customer service to 'what the fuck are you even doing here?'. "Relax, damnit. I'm waiting for someone," Quinn said, putting the bartender at ease.

Quinn had never needed to directly contact Vee in order for the woman to understand the two needed to meet. It was an interesting sort of relationship, but one where Quinn always knew what to expect at least. And on this night, having sent out that text earlier, he knew she was on her way. She had to be. In truth, multiple people could have been on their way. The Crest had been a decent meeting spot for months now and with the seriousness of the situation, a rare chance had appeared that all of the Syndicate's members of the Regalia branch could show. With a drink he didn't ask for sitting in front of him, Quinn pulled out his phone and began to play the waiting game.

Vivian Hong | Regalia; The Crest

---

The gunmetal grey BMW slid into a parking spot in the middle of The Crest's lot just as it's previous occupant vacated it. As was expected, the place was packed. Vivian watched some drunk kids stumble past through her rearview mirror as she put the car in park and jerked the handbrake up into position. She clicked her tongue idly out of resignation, tugging the keys from the ignition while simultaneously replacing her glasses on top of her head. Places like these were - predictably - never really her scene; much less so on a night when all she wanted was a heating pad and more chocolate-covered pretzels. Unluckily for her, there had developed some unspoken understanding amongst the group that it had become their spontaneous meeting place of choice. Though despite the sloppy bachelors and sticky surfaces, Vee had come to at least enjoy the abundance of people-watching opportunities it offered to her. Free training to keep polished on the job.

She locked her Beamer behind her as she strode towards the entrance, eyeing the string of bodies trickling from the doors, all waiting their turn to get inside. Without willing it, her mind's camera was taking snapshots of face after face, gesture after body language. Vivian had always had a degree of photographic memory; it had come in handy countless times. Her gaze registered the sight of Quinn's Camaro standing sentry in front of the building before finally settling on the two bouncers of the night, one of whom was whimpering and sporting a bloody nose.

She stepped onto the curb and briefly studied the scene with a bemused expression. The two men watched her with a mixture of indignation and confusion. The usual. "I always try to tell him he should watch his temper. Sorry, guys," she sighed out, though her attitude and somewhat monotonous tone didn't really emphasize remorse. Blaring music came pouring out as she pulled the door open for herself, though her soft alto voice was still perfectly understandable. "One of the girls should have some bandaids in her purse." And with that she submerged herself into the lively club, making a beeline towards the bar, where she knew Gyles would be waiting.

Sure enough, he was there, looking down at his phone. She made her way towards him, slipping through those who were dancing or flirting or generally intoxicated. Within moments she had taken her place beside him, leaning her forearms on the florescent blue. "New guy, huh?" she asked, keeping the shadow of a smirk in check as she ordered herself a lager beer. There was no need to bother with "Hi"s or "Hello"s with him. Probably why they got along so well. Vee nodded her head in greeting at the bartender who dropped her bottle off, gave them both a skeptical look, before returning to his other customers.

Sleek rays of light refracted from the narrow strands of edged hair that bounced from the waitress's face, lightly blushed in the cheekiest of fashions. Pai Ajello, a server at K's Italian Bistro strode the short carpeted floor with a near glide to greet the Edwards family bearing pearly teeth. Jack Edwards sat with his back sloped against the oaken table chair. He was at a table near southern side of the bistro restaurant away from the bustling regulars with his wife Donna and his son Mark.
Donna studied the pages of the Regalia Gazette, fingering the home living section of the newspaper with ginger touch. She enjoyed perusing the food articles. The sight of a roast platter left her agitably hungry. Stained windows in the diner brushed a lit collauge against the table's flat surface where Mark impatiently fiddled with his straw as seen through a tall glass filled with clear water and crushed ice.



"Ciao. Come posso aiutarla?" Pai tightened her dimples, her eyelids tightly creased.
She felt worn given the length of her workday.
"I'm not an Italian speaker..." Jack muttered a bit perplexed. His was in fog.
"No problem." Pai lifted blue-lined notebook from her pocketed waist apron and
pressed a pen to the front page. "What will you be ordering today?"
Donna peered at the waitress away from newspaper folds, "I'll take the Panzanella
salad, please." She straightened her back and watched Mark whirl ice in his glass.
Jack scanned the menu, "I'll take the Chicken Parmesan. My son will have ravioli"
"Thank You!" Pia harped cheerily to quickly end conversation. Donna seemed jealous.
"And also... my compliments to the restaurant owner. Great service!"
Jack attempted to speak after Pai.

Pai had heard Jack, what she'd take as a come on, but she wouldn't give him a moments glance as she turned away from the table. Jack slumped back into his chair. Donna appeared shaken, she clenched her fist stern.
Antuan Gibson, the restaurant host, watched the security monitor before him with drooped eyes as Pai raised him a thumb through the camera lens. He reached a button on his blue-tooth earpiece to alert K, "table 7 sends you it's compliments."
Kathryin Winters opened the kitchen door pulling out a special keycard from her uniform shirt-pocket. She slid the card with slow grace through the payment reader near the bar seating area. She gave Antuan a subtle nod as she returned through kitchen door to the back of the house where Mark Gibson rattled a pan against the stove burners.



"How's my son, K!?" Mark asked thunderous over the sound of the kitchen clattering.
"Good as always... sorry Mark. I've gotta check something in the office."
Kathryne slipped out of the room.
"Whatever you say K." Mark quickly tended to the burbling chicken fryer.

The office door closed behind Kathryn, which she locked turning the brass tab on the doorknob. The computer monitor at her desk blipped a 10 second countdown timer at the upper left hand corner of the screen signaling a short intermission from the Bistro operating system.
The card she slid at the bar gave her admission to dark-net: a secret network for hustlers seeking drug swag across the city, and as it appeared, the bait-sale she posted for whiplash had a hit. A message flashed on-screen as a telling sign she could expect some customers soon.
Antuan watched from the security monitor as properly suited man arose from the passenger seat of a taxi cab at the street corner outside the diner. The suited man walked into the entrance, hands had a grip on the front of his blazer jacket. Antuan perked his back to look at the height of the customer.



"Special greetings to K." The customer leaned forward.
Antuan touched his blue-tooth, "A customer to see you..."
Kathryn's computer shut-down. She spoke loud through her headset
"Send him back." Antuan turned the volume down in his ear.
He lead the customer to the kitchen door where Kathryn greeted him with her overhand held out.
"Richard Pulling, correct..?"
Richard avoided the frosted tips of Kathryn's nails, gripping her hand soft.
"To be assumed. Do you have what I need?"
"Sure." Kathryn loosely pulled her arm away. "Should you choose to follow."

Richard Pulling pocketed his mitts. He followed Kathryn into the walk-in refrigerator. Cool mist permeated the room. Kathryn pushed the temperature configuration panel 2-4-1-5-6-6, and the back wall of the unit rotated, opening a passage. Fluorescent lights blinked on and started to buzz.
Kathryn leads Richard into a brightly lit room with a couple of grounded chairs and suitcase sitting centered upon a long-table. The clack of her shoes against the floor tile broke the silence within the interrogation chamber. She approached the leather-bound suitcase and whipped her head back. Her shoulder length hair swayed hypnotically as Richard followed her steps from close behind.



"Whip-lash is a bargain." Kathryn said in a quiet and seductive tone.
Richard pulled his arm around her throat. "I didn't come to bargain with you dear."
Kathryn's hand bolted beneath her apron as she touched the grip of a Colt pistol.
"Am I... feeling a.. bulge?"

Her fingers slip around the Richard Pullings crotch squeezing his grapes firm until blood dripped like wine from his wettened slacks. Richard strangled her tighter in his forearm sucking in a painful gasp. She quickly shoved the muzzle of her weapon into the hard lumps of Richard's abdomen and fired. Richard's grasp loosened as Kathryn pulled away. He fell to his knees.

Richard grips at his chest. "So what... are you gonna kill me!?"
Kathryn stared down at him, speaking over her gun's barrel.
"That depends on what you squeal pig."
"What the hell do you want to know!?" Richard hunched over pain, nearly fetal.
"Your gang Richard. Where they hiding?"

Richard reaches for a gun hidden beneath his blazer, but before he could point the weapon, Kathryn blasted a smoking hole into his forehead. His brains were blown out. Richard fell forward. His body tremmored in shock as a pool of blood spilled around what was left of him. A cellphone fell from his front pocket. Kathryn picked up the cellular device and scanned Richard's list of contacts filled with possible leads to the next drug bust.
Cellphones have transmitters within them that can be picked up to map and pinpoint location of people given where they leave their device. Pass a text to the rest of the syndicate faction, and they'd have enough information to single out who is worth chasing... perhaps figure out where they are within the city.



A text was sent to everyone in the Syndicate.

Alexander had already had something of a tedious day. He'd left the palace in relatively high spirits, but he could feel his skin begin to overproduce its natural oils, giving him a distracting greasy film across particularly his hairline. It happened every time people came to him with their problems, and he began to chew his own lip in frustration when his phone vibrated from his pocket. Somehow he just knew that it was going to be another mess for him to clear up.



At least it was a micro-mess.





It turned out that the newest bouncer at The Crest and Quinn had had a "disagreement", and Quinn had come off the better. For now. It was a shame, because that bouncer, whoever he had once been, was done, now. He had failed both basic mob sycophancy and, in so doing, also failed at his actual job, being to (successfully) prevent access to a nightclub to the unruly. Anna had apparently since given him a bandage and told him to fuck off home and to stay there. Alexander liked Anna. She knew what she was doing.

“Before I leave for more pressing matters, one of you has much further to fall. Let's find out why. Marc, would you do the honors?”

The grizzly-clad elephant in the darkest elbow of the room jarred from its statuesque hibernation; his syncytial gaze riddled with the light of oblivion, an Egyptian herald to the young accountants, of ten plagues to come towards a briefer lifespan. The objective was torture, slow and beautiful, to demolish the intent of the pawns in order to checkmate the larcenous king. His four hundred pound existence entitled itself to job security by delivering a pyramid of pain to others and eventually ending the very universe of suffering he created. A saucy Sinatra in the field. Classy, popular, and well doted by all, but above most, by Fred.

Slothfully unraveling his crimson scarf from his neck, he gritted, “Who sent you?” Nothing stirred. “One Mississippi.” He paused once more without hesitation. “Two Mississippi.” No answer. “Three.” Swathing the cherry helix around his right fist, Marc tested the mute closest to him.

Boom.

David failed the quiz; his face kissed knuckle.

A rapacious nova tumbled the tax collector downward into a Gehenna of his own blood. Quickly interrupted by the corner of the Acacian desk, his contorted carcass suspended momentarily, only to slide into a lateral decubitus position, with its left orbit oozing several red fractals onto an entangled plastic-laden floor, pooling, rippling, and drowning a human sarcophagus of Schrödinger's cat.

Taking full advantage of the one-sided squabble, the older of the two younger accountants did not ferry a wasted moment for the Stygian exit, but darted straight at Parlay, while his pet behemoth was occupied. Feet up, he bubbled over the middle of the wooden mesa, into Zorkybski's torso, while simultaneously palming a gilded letter opener. Taken aback by the agility and strength of his opponent, Alfred's chest consumed the full force of two viscous heels, sending him retroflexed, shoulder first, into the monitors overseeing the roulette tables in lots N, P and Q.

He weeped and gnashed his teeth, “Who the...”

Directing, now, his attention to the Memnon shadow looming over his fallen comrade, Bruce hazardly speared the colossus, below the xyphoid, while ducking underneath another right hook, perforating his pylorus. Then, with a twist of the wrist, he drove the duodenum further away from its ligament of treitz, into the left hemidiaphragm, desiring to puncture through the pericardial fat guarding the vascular bosom of the beast. Before further damage progressed, Marc grabbed the aggressor's stained hand and handle, while headbutting his antagonist, crippling Bruce's grip from the make-shift dagger. Releasing tension, but placing torsion on the shank, Bruce caused more and more Vesuvian bile to erupt around the blade, while toggling the forward momentum of the giant's gait, leading him astray, to trip and fall over David's body, all the way through the fireplace's grate into the lift out ash tray near the chimney, descending further upon his already embedded Nietzschean sword.

Turning about face, to the altar of the lone Syndicate gangster, the traitor, with terror, paralyzed, responded, “Wait! Cyrus sent me.” Not heeding the hindrance, a hammer cocked plus a loud reagant, resulted in a pierced Brutus, limping, then a graveyard spiral to his sovereign demise, upon the punic bodyguard.

“The original odds were that it was solely David, all this time. Not Bruce. You win some. You lose some. Shit. And, who the fuck is Cyrus?” An overhead intercom squeaked over Alf's trigger finger, “All available personnel. 3 spills upstairs. I repeat. Clean-up on Aisle Z.”

---

Lex shot off a text to Vee:



The jeep she was driving drifted slowly to the outside line of her lane and, in typical fashion, she nearly overreacted when yanking the steering wheel back into place. She knew she shouldn't be texting and driving but she so excited, she had to tell someone. Her relationship with Vivian wasn't exactly a standard friendship but, if Lex was being honest, it was basically the only friendship she had, at least within the Syndicate. So, Vivian was the one she texted.

She arrived at the edge of the docks, a common place for some of the business they encountered. It allowed for easy transportation and have very little oversight by the authorities. She pulled her favorite .45 out from the glove compartment and grabbed the clip she had put in the center console. She loaded the clip and cocked the gun, pulling a shot in place in case it was needed. She stepped out of the jeep, placing her gun in her concealed holster. The breeze blew the smell of stale water and algae in her lungs. She sniffled a bit and headed toward the main docking house, hoping she wouldn't have to look too hard to find the reason for the message.

She stepped inside the dock house. Two of the syndicate's grunt men were sitting in folding chairs, flipping cards between them. The air hung heavy with the smell of marijuana. Lex glanced around for some sort of injured person or strung out prostitute. She saw nothing. One of the grunt men, Dean, looked up from his pile of cards. A slimy grin creeped across his face. Lex's heart sank. They had had a few interactions in the past and none of them were pleasant memories. One particular memory still gave Lex nightmares.

"Hey there, princess." He said. "What brings you out to our side of town?" He looked her up and down in the same fashion a person would pour over a dinner menu.

"I received a text that my services were needed." Her voice came out small and defeated. Dean got up from his seat and made his way over to her. The other man, whose name she didn't know, remained seated but watched the interaction unfold. Dean stepped right up to her, grasping a piece of her loose hanging hair. Her body stiffened as his breath rolled across her neck. She nearly gagged at the scent of alcohol and weed that clung to it.

"Oh. Your services are definitely needed." His hand traced her collarbone, up around her shoulder, across her neck and around to her other shoulder. Lex mustered what should could when she pushed his hand off of her. Her chin tilted up.

"You're looking in the wrong place, I don't offer those services. We have other girls for that, if your needed is so great." She spit out her reply, hoping her voice didn't betray her fear. Dean simply smirked again.

"I don't like easy pickings." He stared into her eyes, his own denim blue eyes looking back, gibing her chills. His voice dropped to a whisper as he leaned into her ear. "I remember how you like it too." Nausea hit Lex full force.

"Sorry," she said, "the answer is still no." She turned to walk out but the man had other ideas. He grabbed her arm roughly, attempting to pull her to him. She whipped back, using her momentum to aid in swinging her fist to his nose. The crack she felt under her knuckles told her that she had hit her mark. It probably wasn't broken, but it incapacitated him enough that he released her. As his hand when to his face, she grabbed a hold of both of his shoulder, dipping him down and bringing her knee into his groin. He let out a loud moan and dropped to the floor. She yanked her pistol out from under shirt and held it toward the other seated man. He held his hand up in submission. "This why you thought I should bring my gun? Hm?" She stared at his face, her expression begging him to lie to her. He remained silent. She kicked at Dean. "I'm letting someone know you guys have weed out here. The higher ups are gonna be pissed. Bye Dean, buddy."

She backed out the door with her gun still pointed toward the offending men. Once she felt the air outside hit her back, she turned, jogging back to her jeep. She hopped inside and burst into tears. Her hands were shaking so badly that she had to try three times before she could get her keys in the ignition. She got the vehicle started and peeled out of the parking lot. She decided to head to The Crest in hopes that someone would be there to act as her fortress of solitude.

Regalia - The Crest

---

Despite the absolutely engrossing media Quinn was currently consuming, he was more than happy to look up when a familiar voice presented him with a familiar question. "Yeah, fucking new guy," He replied to Vee who was, in her tradition, ordering a beer. Quinn never had a problem with alcohol, but beer was a low even he was not willing to stoop to. In his opinion, the cheap buzz came at the expense of the warm piss you had to force down your throat and with the current economy causing successful bars like this to raise their prices, the enforcer saw no reason to ever willingly pay for such a disgusting kind of drink. Quinn's personal choice was always some kind of liquor--vodka, preferably.

"We got problems," Quinn began, sipping the drink the bartender had left for him. He wrinkled his face upon discovering exactly what he was drinking and pushed the small glass to the side. "This whiplash shit. It's getting out of control. If the main branch is calling down here talking about it, we're already close to fucked. I doubt you had time to find anything out, but... What do you know so far?"

Vee had turned around so that her back and the elbow opposite of Gyles were leaning against the counter as she sipped her beer, a rare beverage choice amongst the clubgoers, she knew. It wasn't that she didn't like harder liquor, it's just that she didn't like to drink on the job. Beer was the perfect solution; cheap and convenient. She could see from the corner of her sightline the wrinkled face he'd made upon sipping his own drink, but said nothing as he pushed it aside.

There was a moment's pause, during which she stretched her neck to one side in order for it to crack slightly, before taking another swig from the bottle. Swallowing, she simultaneously shrugged her shoulders and shook her head once, surveying the crowd with a seemingly casual gaze - but Gyles would have known she was on high alert. "Not much, really. You know I came straight here." Another sip. "Besides, it seems like they're keeping this one really tight. If it's gotten this bad, already, they're getting smarter about hiding. Not even the streeties are talking. And you know how persuasive they can be." Obviously she wasn't doubting the Syndicate's abilities to sniff this shit out; she was just speculating honestly. Something he was used to.

Reluctantly, Quinn took a sip of his unwanted drink once more before pushing it away for a second time. Vee knew about as much as he did, but that was not his immediate concern. Quinn Gyles and Vivian Hong had somewhat of an unspoken relationship. Their association could be defined as a friendship, but one that skipped the impromptu hangouts and meetups that normal people were used to entertaining. As business professionals, they were each acutely aware of the other's worth to the organization, but on a personal level, there was an intangible connection that had a habit of betraying feelings and thoughts without the use of oral confirmations. In this case, Quinn noticed the quick scan Vivian took of the crowd before she answered. To most, it probably meant nothing, but to him, he had been thinking the same thing since he entered.

The new bouncer at the door, the wrong drink from the bartender, and the general air of the club at the moment did not add up. Of course, some of this could be explained. Alexander probably sent the new guy since bouncers usually fell to Security. The bartender could have been busy and simply forgot that Quinn drinks the exact same thing every time he made a visit. Though the club was not usually this well ordered, it could have just been a good night. Quinn did not have the luxury of assumption, however. He leaned in a bit closer to Vee. "Smarter about hiding in plain sight, you mean," He said. He stood fully and adjusted his suit jacket. He was preparing himself for a long night.

"If the streeties aren't talking... It means action has already been taken. Please tell me your brought your... Well, your usual,"

Vee inconspicuously clinked the bottom of her beer bottle against the hard edge of the firearm underneath her closed leather jacket. It didn't make much of an audible noise, especially in the inevitably loud environment, but the resistance given against the glass from a point elevated from where the end of her chest should have been would have given him his answer. "Of course I did," she replied, continuing the motion's upward momentum and taking a sip. "'S not my first rodeo, Quinn." And as he straightened himself up, so did she. Vee took a last sip of the beverage and placed it nearly empty back on the counter beside his barely touched one.

The duo turned to face the now empty club. The neon lights were still flickering and dancing around and the music was still playing, but the last few warm bodies were quickly, and quietly, exiting the building at the nearest exits they could find. Quinn did not even have to glance over to know that the bartender was sneaking away as well. In the end, Vivian and Quinn's instincts had been right. It was a set up. Just as quickly as the club patrons left did freshly suited men enter. Seven of them strolled in casually with grins and smirks on their faces. Each one wore the same black suit, but their apparent leader stepped forward in a bright red one.

He was taller than the rest at about six foot five inches though he seemed to be lean in the frame. He smoothed back his already slicked black hair and rubbed the goatee on his face before chuckling. Gloved hands removed ornate sunglasses from his face and one of the seven black suited men rushed forward to grab them as the leader seemed to hand them to the air itself. He cleared his throat before chuckling one more time. "Well fuckin' well. Ain't this a god damn plot twist," He took a few more steps forward into the lights of the neon rainbow which allowed Quinn to finally recognize the man.

"Alfred... " Quinn said out loud, his voice tinged with surprise. A woman pushed through the seven men behind Alfred and took her place beside the brightly suited man. "Mercedes, of course," This time there was no surprise in his voice. "Why in the hell would you two be here? An enforcer from the main branch and an eraser?"

"Ain't you fuckin' brave, just sayin' that shit for all the world ta here?" Alfred borderline shouted. He seemed like a man who naturally spoke loudly.

"Why should I care? There's no one left in here besides us,"

Alfred nodded his head in agreement.

"I guess it don't really matter anyways. You fucks are gonna be dead soon anyway. All of ya,"

Quinn raised an eyebrow.

"Don't give me that shit! We know you guys are the bitches who've been slangin' whiplash all over the city. Smart as hell really considerin' we never woulda thought our own would pull this kinda shit,"

Quinn's eyes widened slightly. "The hell?! You can't honestly believe..."

"Cut the crap!" Mercedes interrupted. Her voice was light, yet mature and her Hispanic accent was still as strong as ever, but her English had finally become perfect. "We're not even here to argue right now. The point is, the top brass sent out squads on each one of you. Me and Alfred came to see you and your cute little eraser, but the other hit squads are probably closing in on the rest of your crew right now,"

"Now seein' as we can't have a shootout right here and now," Alfred began. "We're gonna let these guys behind us take care of ya with their own hands. We only came to look you punks in the face before we missed the opportunity," Alfred and Mercedes stepped back--Mercedes blowing a kiss to Vivian in the process--and turned towards the club exits. The seven men simultaneously began removing their own glasses and tossing them to the side. Quinn took a quick second to think and glanced over to Vivian.

"They're right. We can't fire a single shot in the middle of the city or things could get complicated," He began removing his suit jacket as he spoke. "So... You up for this?"

As Alfred and Mercedes left the club, the Latina pulled out her phone and made a couple taps. She smiled and showed Alfred who laughed as the twosome walked down the street and into the night.

The other hit squads were indeed closing in on the rest of the Regalia branch members of the syndicate.

---

Her nerves had almost completely settled when she turned the corner and saw the streetfront of The Crest about a quarter of a mile down. She glanced down at her phone again, semi disappointed that Vivian hadn't texted her back. It wasn't odd - Vee was always off on some secret mission that Lex never got details for. Of course, in her mind, they were incredible missions that involved daring rescues of other erasers, dressing up in expensive gowns to infiltrate some A-list party, and getting swept of her feet by a black knight mid-operation.

Breaking from her daydream, Lex glanced in her rear view mirror. A blacked out SUV had been trailing behind her since she left the docks. It wasn't out of place to see around a city like this one but the fact that the car was now speeding up to rest right on her bumper was a little disconcerting. She added pressure to the gas pedal, pushing 15 miles over the speed limit. Flying right past the entrance to the club, the SUV matched her in speed. It was obvious now, they were definitely following her for a reason. Maybe Dean followed me? she thought. Fine. If he wants to play this game, I'll play.

Lex circled the block, bringing her jeep back to the street The Crest resided on. The SUV stayed on her. Snapping her belt tightly, she slammed on her breaks. Her tires squealed and the breaks locked, leaving a set of smoking tracks on the pavement. The black vehicle behind her hit her without slowing down. A sharp pain shot through her elbow as the momentum causes it to smack against the door frame. She glanced down at herself, assessing her body for injuries, as both the vehicles came to a standstill. She looked up and realized they had stopped directly in an intersection. She was thankful they hadn't hit any pedestrians. It wasn't a consideration she made when she decided to let the SUV hit her.

She looked in her rearview mirror again. No one had attempted to get out behind her yet. Maybe she had injured him more than she had intended. Like I care, she thought. It's not like he hasn't injured me before.

She unbuckled herself and felt her elbow. There were no apparent protrusions and the pain was already subsiding. She reached over to open the driver's side door right as another SUV came barreling through the intersection and t-boned her jeep in the passenger side rear. She was thrown against her door as the jeep spun in circles over and over, then slowly began tipping on its side. She braced her arms against the door and steering wheel, hoping it would tip slow enough that she wouldn't be thrown. It landed driver's side down, shattering the windshield in the process. Lex squeezed her eyes shut as the glass sprayed around her. Then, everything stopped moving.

Lex opened her eyes. She had fallen against the door as the jeep fell over. Looking out the crushed windshield, she saw a pair of scuffed snakeskin boots. Another pair of black military boots fell into step beside the first. One of the owners of the boots spoke. "See if the bitch is still alive," his voice bit out, rough and deep. "If she is, fix it." The black boots made a few more steps toward the jeep. Lex's heart was pounding wildly. She reached for the center console, praying it would open to get her gun out. She then remembered she hadn't put it away after the incident at the docks, it was still in her holster.

She reached into her shirt and pulled the gun out. She hadn't disarmed it after she left Dean so a bullet was sitting in the chamber, ready to fire. The black boots stopped directly in front of the windshield. The body crouched down. Lex aimed. As soon as the man's face appeared, Lex shot. The bullet hit directly between his eyes, the momentum from such a close shot knocked him backward. His body didn't even twitch. Snakeskin jogged over to the jeep but he was smart enough to not stand in her view.

"Come out here, little girl." He called out to her. She tried to listen for his footsteps but the blood was pounding in her ears so hard, she lost track of him. The passenger door was suddenly yanked opened, spilling light from the surrounding businesses into the shadowed jeep. A shot rang out but Lex felt nothing. The man must have thought he hit her because he peered into the cab. As soon as his head blocked out the streelights streaming into her eyes, Lex shot again, hitting him in the throat. He clutched his throat and his blood sprayed down on Lex's face. She pulled herself into a ball until she was sure he stopped moving.

When no one else made a play to shoot her, Lex crawled out of the windshield. The glass scraped her stomach but it was worth it if she didn't have to crawl next to a dead Snakeskin hanging above her. She got to her feet, still clutching her pistol. The street seemed completely evacuated, which was odd for this part of town, even this late at night. They must have blocked off the roads somewhere. She looked over to The Crest where she knew she'd be safe inside. She started walking over, her elbow still sore from the impact. It was then that she noticed she couldn't feel her right leg. She looked down and saw a bullet wound on the outside of her thigh. "Goddamn, I guess he did hit me." Her sight went black and she dropped to the pavement.

Vivian Hong | Regalia; The Crest

---

Vivian could feel her phone vibrate once in her back jean pocket to indicate having received a text, and she fished it out to find a message from Lex, which elicited a twitch of the corners of her mouth. The pair turned around from the bar counter to find that the neon lights were still dancing around and the music was still playing, but the warm bodies that had vacated every cranny of the space had disappeared. Vivian couldn't help but sigh inwardly as she returned the device to her pocket, making a mental note to reply to Mason later.

Goddammit. The odds that she would be returning home to her chocolate pretzels and Netflix any time soon were looking slim.

As if their cue was the period on her thoughts, their predators finally trickled into their field of vision. Most of the brutish men were wearing the stereotypical "bad man" black suits, except for one, who had donned on a bright red one for the occasion. It was almost enough to make a menstruating Vivian roll her eyeballs at his predictability. "Alfred... " Quinn said out loud, his voice tinged with surprise. A woman pushed through the seven men behind Alfred and took her place beside the brightly suited man. "Mercedes, of course." And this time Vee couldn't help herself - she snorted under her breath, but the careless noise was drowned out by the music. Her distaste was clear in her gaze though, as it lingered on the other female across the room while Gyles and Alfred spoke. And then...

"We know you guys are the bitches who've been slangin' whiplash all over the city."

Simultaneously, as Quinn expressed his own mind-boggled surprise, Vee squinted sharply and finally spoke up to say: "You're shitting me, right?"

"Cut the crap!" Mercedes interrupted, "The other hit squads are probably closing in on the rest of your crew right now." The statement urged Vivian to push through her bubbling hostility and for a moment, panic about the well-being of the rest of the crew, particularly Alexandria.

Alfred and Mercedes stepped back - Mercedes blowing a kiss to Vivian in the process, to which she responded by coolly flipping her off - and turned towards the club exits. The seven men simultaneously began removing their own glasses and tossing them to the side as they left the room. Vee could feel Quinn tense beside her as he glanced over, "So... You up for this?"

She was also removing her own jacket, stripping it from her arms and draping it across a bar stool before removing the pistol and the holster from her torso and carefully placing it on top of the leather. She kept her attention on the advancing men as she cracked her knuckles. It was strange; now that the two mouthy jackasses had left, her anger and aggression was begging to be let out.

"First to four, wins," was her only response before Vivian flashed him a quick, affirming nod and met the first of the offenders halfway. She ducked under his sloppy, right hook and brought her knee up, driving it into his stomach.

Regalia - Lex's Ordeal

---

When no one else made a play to shoot her, Lex crawled out of the windshield. The glass scraped her stomach but it was worth it if she didn't have to crawl next to a dead Snakeskin hanging above her. She got to her feet, still clutching her pistol. The street seemed completely evacuated, which was odd for this part of town, even this late at night. They must have blocked off the roads somewhere. She looked over to The Crest where she knew she'd be safe inside. She started walking over, her elbow still sore from the impact. It was then that she noticed she couldn't feel her right leg. She looked down and saw a bullet wound on the outside of her thigh. "Goddamn, I guess he did hit me." Her sight went black and she dropped to the pavement.

The man across the street watched everything. As Lex lost consciousness and went tumbling to the pavement, his cigarette also fell to the ground lifeless and received a further stomp with wingtip dress shoes. Hand in pocket, the man pushed back his dirty blonde locks with his newly freed other hand and looked both ways before crossing the street. He knew the cops would respond soon considering shots were fired in the open and a huge crash just occurred at an intersection. The few people still out at passed midnight were already beginning to congregate and collectively mumble amongst themselves. "Shit... Better hurry this along," He said to himself. With a brisk walk, he crossed the four lane road and immediately hefted Lex's body and slung her over his shoulder--the man was pretty strong.

About an hour later, Lex sat slumped in a wooden chair in a small room. She finally began to come to.

She took in what she could of her surroundings before she opened her eyes. She vaguely remembered being picked up after she fell but didn't remember anything about the person who helped her...or kidnapped her? She was seated in a chair, not a bed. The room smelled damp. Definitely not a hospital. She cautiously opened her eyes. They felt slightly grainy as if she had been out for days, but she really had no way of knowing. The room was dark. It looked like it was still night so she had only been asleep a short time...or a full day. Her bullet wound still ached like a bitch but she didn't let it draw attention away from her deduction of her surroundings. "Is anyone there?" She called out.

"Obviously," The man replied. He flipped a switch and a single light in the center of the ceiling came to life, slightly illuminating the surroundings. The room was about as big as a typical interrogation room and only contained four grimy and discolored walls, an old wooden table, and the chair that currently seated a groggy Lex. The floor was tile, but seemed like it had not been cleaned in years. In fact, the entire room seemed to be old and abandoned and unused for years. Cigarette smoke filled the air as the man puffed on a longish cancer stick--a Marlboro One Hundred to be exact. Under the dim lighting some of his features could be made out a little better. He was an older, middle-aged man with a worn, rough face under dirty blonde hair. Hazel eyes did not help his weary expression and a scar on his top lip only made the impression worse. He wore a gray suit with no tie and an untucked white collared shirt with brown wingtip shoes; at the very least, it seemed like he tried to dress respectably though he stopped caring about halfway through.

Leaning in a corner where two walls met, he stared at Lex briefly. "Well. Seems like you had an eventful night, huh?"

Lex looked the man up and down. His appearance was disheveled and his voice was gruff but Lex was surprised to realize she didn't feel afraid. It must have been the adrenaline from her wound. She took a breath before responding. "Who are you? Why am I here?" The holster she kept at her back was too light to have her gun in it so her eyes began to scan the room for another weapon. She sighed and wove her fingers together in her lap, waiting for him to reply.

"No appreciation for your own handiwork huh? Shame." The man took a puff, exhaled, and sauntered over to the old table. He took an informal seat and used two fingers to grasp his cigarette. "You can call me Jax. Think of me as an... Independent consultant. So, let's start off with this. You wanna tell me what that car chase was all about?" Jax took another puff of cigarette as he waited for a reply.

Lex cocked her eyebrow, semi amused at the man's casual demeanor. He clearly thought he had the upper hand here. Silly boy. "And why the hell would I tell you anything? You must be new if you think I'll just trust that any information I hand over is information you're entitled to." Her voice slipped slightly at the end, almost betraying a pit of nerves that developed the minute he sat down. Still, she wasn't afraid. She just had to focus on that.

"Interesting. Let me ask you something," Jax stood and pocketed a hand. He casually strolled towards a wall, but he was not really walking anywhere in particular. He made a slow trip around the room as he spoke. "Why do you think you're not tied right now? You know you were unconscious and you know your gun has been confiscated for the moment. Yet, I leave you unbound. You have to be wondering, right?" He paused and glanced over at Lex before continuing without waiting for a response. "I'm not your enemy, obviously. I took your gun as a safety precaution. Can never be too careful these days, especially with the trigger happy. Now, let's try this again," He made his way back to the table and this time leaned against it. "What was with that spectacle on the highway?"

Lex paused for a second. He had an intriguing point. She had been so caught up trying to figure out a method of escape that she hadn't noticed what she was escaping from - nothing. Still, it wasn't like she could trust the guy. Maybe he was doing this to try to warm her up and make her think she was safe. She didn't see a way around it yet. So, she'd play along. For now. "I guess you're right," she acknowledged. "I think those men were sent by a man who...hurt me in the past." She didn't really think they had anything to do with Dean anymore. He was too stupid to hire someone to do his dirty work. But the story was true enough at one point that she was confident she could sell it, even under torture. "I kicked his ass this morning and I think he was looking for payback. He's a douche." She flipped her hair off her shoulder and looked back at the man.

Jax chuckled. "Even if you're lying, I guess it's pretty comical. Do you think your situation had nothing to do with... Well, the drugs you and your group have been selling all over the city?" He looked straight into her eyes awaiting some sort of subconscious confirmation of something.

Lex's eyes opened widely, revealing her surprise. Her mouth went running before she took any time to think. "Drugs we've been selling?! What the hell are you talking about?" She shot up from her chair and got right in Jax's face. "We do not sell drugs and if you believe even a fraction of the information that I assume you've gathered, you'd know that!"

Jax stared into Lex's angry expression for a moment. In truth, he had indeed gathered plenty of information on the Regalia branch of the Ariella Syndicate beforehand, but he needed to confirm the rumors from one of the actual horses. Being the in-house doctor meant that Lex would have the most information regarding any sort of drug sales if there were any. Jax's orders had been simple. He was to follow Alexandria Mason around and find out if there was any truth to the accusations. Seeing her fierce reaction now, even in the face of a complete stranger, gave Jax all the confirmation he needed. He reached into the small of his back and pulled Lex's gun from his belt. He placed the piece on the table and made sure his own was loaded in tandem before putting that one back into his jacket.

"Good. I was hoping the rumors weren't true anyway. Come on then. We have to get to The Crest." Jax turned and made for the door has dropped his burnt out cigarette on the floor.

Lex's head spun at the pace that Jax flipped on her. When he brought out her gun, her heart sped up. He was testing her. He knew all along that she hadn't known about the drugs. His prompt for her to follow him to The Crest solidified her contentment with him. He was on her side. She would have to trust that until she could get to Vee. She leaned over, grabbed her gun and followed him out the door. After all, if he was still playing her, he'd pay with a bullet to his brain.

Regalia - The Crest - Quinn Gyles

---

The last of the goons fell unceremoniously to the ground as Quinn returned to form from a gut punch he had just thrown. He panted a bit and trudged over to the bar counter for support. He stared in awe as Vee finished off the last of her guys. "She won... As per fucking usual... Christ. No wonder I've never beaten her," Quinn muttered to himself half annoyed and half impressed. Erasers were meant to be strong individuals, but most wrote them off because they were not the traditional Enforcer or Security guard. In truth, Erasers had the potential to pack a far more lethal punch than any enforcement simply due to the fact that their job involved making people disappear--cleaning up the messes of others so to speak. Vee had always been one of the better ones and Quinn had even modeled his own style from hers to a degree. It still stung every time she won one of their "contests" though.

Finally catching his breath, Quinn stood fully and made his way over to Vee, grabbing his suit jacket at the same time. "We should probably get out of here. It's better to meet the everybody at the safe house. I'll send out a mass text." He tapped out a message and the twosome made their way to Vee's car; it was nice, admittedly.

Change of plans! Meet at the safe house. You guys know where. ~ Gyles

Regalia - Pursuing the Twins

---

“Damn it Liv, be careful!”

The tires of a jet black Audi A5 screamed as Olivia yanked the steering wheel, whipping the car around the corner and narrowly missing some late night pedestrians. As soon as the road straightened, her foot slammed down on the accelerator and shot the car forward like a bat out of hell. Gunshots pinged off the armoured side panels as a black SUV rounded the corner behind them, the crackling sound of small submachine guns filling the street as the pursuit continued. Liv glanced to her brother, then to her rear-view before whipping around another corner at the last possible second.

“I’m sorry, I don’t feel like getting shot tonight. Now get in the back seat, there’s an MP7 in the center console. Ammo’s in the glove box.”

Oliver nodded to his partner in crime (literally) and grabbed the three magazines from the glovebox before hopping into the back seat and rolling down the window. He pulled down the center console and when greeted with a keypad, entered the only possible combination that Liv would’ve used: the house number of the place their mother had been murdered.

“One-zero-four-nine-nine” he whispered to himself as he punched in the numbers before the panel slid back and revealed the small submachine gun, chambered in 4.6x30mm. The gun felt cold in his hand as he extended it’s stock and flicked up the iron sights on it. He slammed a magazine in and pulled back the charging handle before pulling himself out the side window, sitting on the windowsill and taking aim at the SUV that was still trailing them. Then, he fired. 45 rounds of the small calibre ammunition was unleashed on the now evidently unarmoured truck, riddling it’s body with holes and killing both men in the front seats. The SUV veered off and slammed into oncoming traffic, bringing it to a halt and causing a few people to scream behind them.

“Nice shootin Oli!” Liv piped up, a grin now spread across her face. She loved her job, if you could call it that. The thrill of everyday was something she lived for and she wouldn’t give it up for anything.

“Just watch the road Liv….god damn it. And here I was hoping for a quiet night.”

“A quiet night, in this occupation? Right. Keep dreamin Oli.”

She let back on the throttle a bit, pulling back into normal traffic as if nothing had happened. Because apparently the bullet holes on the car weren’t a dead giveaway.

And then it hit. The windshield crackled into a thousand pieces as designed as bullet after bullet slammed into it.

“Fuck!” Liv slammed on the brakes and slid into the intersection, then hit the gas as she pulled as hard as she could on the steering wheel. The rear tires screeched against the asphalt as she pulled away down a road towards the outskirts of town. If they didn’t get out of there fast, they’d be up to their necks in cops, not something she felt like dealing with.

“Oli, get up here and kick out the windshield for me would you.” she barked, the engine roaring as the Audi shot down the road. Three vehicles were now in pursuit of them, all chock full of your stereotypical “bad guys”, armed with assault rifles.

“Fuck it. Take the wheel.” she said, hopping out of the driver’s seat as her brother got rid of the now useless windshield. The car only veered over for a split second as her brother clambered into the now empty seat.

“Liv, god damn it…” he muttered to himself. He had to admit though, damn his sister could drive.

Olivia grabbed the MP7 and loaded a fresh magazine into it, sliding herself out the opposite side passenger window. She took aim and with three precise shots, blew out the front tires of the first vehicle, sending it flying off of the road.

“One down.”

She took aim for the second one but was interrupted by gunfire rattling the side of the car, letting out a small yelp as she dove back into the car. The second SUV pulled up beside them, big mistake. Liv aimed out the window and held down the trigger, tearing the pursuer’s window apart like it was paper. The vehicle shot forward as the now dead driver’s foot weighed down on the gas pedal, slowly drifting off of the road until hitting gravel at which point it rolled into the ditch with a satisfying crunch of metal.

“That’s two.” she said with a sly smirk. Her eyes danced in the headlights of oncoming vehicles. Something in that woman’s head was not right regardless of her occupation. She was sadistic and cruel, and she loved it.

A loud bang rang out and the Audi’s rear wheel sent sparks up everywhere. Their back tire was gone, a mess of rubber and metal wire covering the road. Oliver slammed on the brakes and steered the uncontrollable vehicle into a farmer’s field where the corn slowly brought them to a halt.

“Liv, run!.” Oliver yelled, drawing his 1911 from it’s holster and flicking off the safety.

Before long, the two were inside an abandoned barn that smelled of rotting hay. Shouting could be heard in the distance as their pursuers approached the building, weapons drawn. Liv slowly screwed on a suppressor onto FNP-45, flicking off the safety. She stood back to back with her brother, both covering an entrance to the barn.

“Just like old times eh sis?” he whispered, his eyes scanning for movement.

“Too much like old times.” she grinned.
Then all hell broke loose.

Six men entered the barn, three per side all armed with Hk416’s. Gunfire light up the barn and hay flew everywhere as 5.56mm rounds flew. But where were the twins? They’d been shooting at where they expected the two to be, and not where they actually were.

“My turn.”

Liv and Oliver almost shot in sync, the bullets leaving their guns with only the slightest whisper, biting into their opponent's flesh like the cold air around them. Thank god for subsonic rounds. The men dropped like flies around them until only one remained. Oliver leveled his gun with the man’s head while Liv brought him to the ground, binding his hands with a ziptie before planting a swift kick into his gut.

Oliver then holstered his pistol and cracked his knuckles, grabbing the man by the collar of his jacket and dragged him over to a chair Liv had found, planting him firmly on it.

Liv sat back in the distance “He’s all yours Oliver. I’ll be back in a second.”

Oliver grinned and looked to the bound man “So, shall we have some fun?” he said, before slamming his fist into the side of the man’s face.

“Let’s start off with something simple, but first you should know something. If I don’t get the information I want, I’m calling Liv in and you really don’t want her to question you. At least I leave you in one piece.”

“Fuck you..” the man spat, blood running down his lip.

“Alrighty, if that’s how it’s going to be.” Another punch landed, this time into the man’s gut.

Meanwhile, Liv was outside clearing the last remaining SUV. She approached with her pistol drawn, leveled at eye height in front of her. She ripped open the door and aimed in quickly but found the vehicle to be empty. Right, time to destroy the evidence. Moving over to their own vehicle, she popped the trunk and grabbed a gas can. Sure it wasn’t as clean as something an eraser would do, but it worked almost as well.

After emptying the canister on the SUV and throughout it’s inside, she grabbed a road flare from inside and lit it, tossing it behind her onto the truck.

Oliver panted, slamming another punch into the now bloodied and battered man’s face. Though it wasn’t particularly evident on his face, he was thoroughly enjoying being in an action filled position, rather than a business one for once, even though it was because they were being hunted.

“Who the hell are you working for?” he barked at the bound man who was barely concious, who of course didn’t respond with anything but a groan and a spit of blood.

“Fine. Liv can have you.” he smirked. His sister certainly wasn’t a powerhouse, but she didn’t need strength to torture someone. Her methods were far more…..inhumane, to put it lightly.

Olivia walked back into the barn with another road flare, a pair of bolt cutters and a knife in her left hand, a gas can in her right.

“So, I here we have a tough guy? We’ll see about that.” she said playfully, her piercing eyes running over her brother’s work.

**Ten minutes later**

Liv stood crouched in front of the man who was now missing two fingers, a tooth and had a knife in his thigh, and yet he’d not given up a single thing that was useful. This had become a waste of time.

“Fine, we’re done here. Enjoy your stay.” she smirked, nodding to her brother.

Oliver walked over with the gas can in hand and removed the cap entirely, before dumping it’s contents all over the man, soaking him in gasoline. Then, to add to the discomfort and humiliation, he tossed hay all over the man, which thanks to the liquid, stuck to him everywhere.

“Liv, care to do the honors? Or shall I?”

“You have fun, I’ll be waiting in the car.”

Screaming filled the air as Oliver left the building and entered the car “I think that went rather well.”

Olivia shot him a grin before starting the car and backing it out onto the road, driving off just as her phone buzzed with the latest text message.

Change of plans! Meet at the safe house. You guys know where. ~ Gyles

She sped off towards the safehouse, sirens wailing in the distance behind them as they heard word of the fire.

They arrived half an hour later in a car that looked like it had come out of a warzone. She sent off a quick text in response to Gyles before approaching the building.

Liv and Oli reporting in. We’re here.

Regalia - Rana's Labyrinth

---

---

Kimberly- Laying low

---

“Ah, Miss Kristen. You’re still alive, then.”

“No thanks to you, you tremendous fuckwhistle.” Kimberly Kristen seethed down the phone, one hand wrapping tightly around her slick black Samsung Galaxy.


“I’ve been more than patient, Miss Kristen,” Kimberly could practically hear the idiotic grin that was undoubtedly plastered across Abraham Horvath’s face as he not-so-subtly mocked her “but your Ariella connections only afford you so much leeway. I have a reputation to uphold, after all.”

“Did it ever occur to you that you’re spending more money on hitmen than I actually owe you?” Kimberly scowled.

“I don’t know what you’re referring to, Miss Kristen. I’m nothing but a legitimate buisnessman. Good day.”

He hung up.

Kimberly sat alone in the small, well-furnished hotel room that she used to lay low in every once in awhile. She wouldn’t have been able to afford such an up-market hideout on her lawyer's salary, but working for the cities largest crime syndicate had its benefits. One of the problems with the role she played in the Ariella Syndicate was that her whole purpose was to get people out of tight situations, so when she herself ended up in a tight situation, there was next to no one she could call on for help.

From out in the hallway, a delicate fist knocked on her door.

“Who is it?” Kimberly called out in her sweetest, most sing-song voice, as she made her way over to the bedside table, and carefully pulled out the silenced 9mm Smith and Wesson she always kept near her person.

“Its Zoey from the hospitality service, ma'am!” chirped a hotel attendant from on the other side of the door “I’ve come to drop off you complimentary welcome basket, and to see if everything’s to you liking.”

Kimberly took several long, calculated strides over to the door, her thighs brushing together, 9mm tucked carefully behind her back. She undid the latch with her free hand, and slowly eased the door open.

She was greeted by a small, unassuming latino women, dressed in a smart blazer, with her dark hair tied back in a stylish yet practical ponytail.

It only took Kimberly a few seconds to notice the imprint of the desert eagle against her breast pocket.

“You could walk away; pretend you never found me. Horvath would be none the wiser.” Kimberly reasoned.

“Not if I wanted to get paid, I can’t.”

‘Zoey’’s hand shot into her blazer, but Kimberly was quicker on the draw. She squeezed the trigger of her 9mm before the hitwoman could grab hold of her own weapon, and blew two holes clean threw her forehead, the silencer muffling the bark of her pistol. A splatter of blotchy red carmine painted the corridor behind her, as the lithe woman’s body went limp and crumpled in a heap on the ground.

Kimberly sighed.I guess that’s the last time I stay here. They did such good battered prawns, as well.

She felt her phone buzz, and looked down to read her messages.

Change of plans! Meet at the safe house. You guys know where. ~ Gyles

She couldn’t help but grin. No rest for the wicked.

"Boom, headshot."

Animated death. Pixelated gore. Imaginary hands ejected a carefully rendered magazine, sliding another one in with the rote memory of a computerized professional.

"Boom, headshot."

A meme in monotone, as devoid of humor as it was meaning. Having made the entire FPS genre his bitch during one particularly unmemorable summer while his classmates were out getting laid or smoking pot or whatever it was college kids did these days, there was little hope for the little shooter that could. Like an endless number of mechanically similar titles it would go into the disorganized stacks that surrounded his digital altar like a blocky halo. The stuff of geeky wet-dreams, a command center worthy of the movies that had inspired it, a dozen and a half monitors ran over with information. Video-feeds, text messages scrolling by in neat little windows, the muted, jagged patterns of phone conversations being zipped, encrypted and archived, it was sensory overload in its purest form.

Which, of course, was just how Mamushi liked it.

Leaning back with a low sigh, he let his digital-self die to some idiot with an AWP waiting for the lucky spawn-kill. Camping fuck. The motion disturbed the inch and a half long pile of ash at the end of his cigarette, toppling it down into what would inevitably become yet another grey smear on his black sweat pants, but who the hell cared? He had more. He could buy more, if it came down to it, he practically owned stock in the damn sweat-shop company that made the stupid things. Somewhere in middle America were dozens of poor children, running around in once-or-twice worn black sweatpants--whoever it was that cleaned the place on the abysmally rare occasions he called for it donated them to some stupid charity or another, so look at that.

He was, he snorted and flicked the butt of his Marlboro into an overflowing ash tray, a veritable philanthropist.

Unlike what seemed like the entire rest of the local Syndicate, Mamushi couldn't give less of a shit about what he looked like. And why, his impeccably organized brain argued rhetorically and saved for witty-retort-fodder later, should he? He spent so little time outside he had a fucking prescription for Vitamin D, who exactly was he supposed to be impressing?

A beep from the kitchen drew him out of his thoughts in the way that only food could. Trader Joe's Baby Backs weren't about to eat themselves.

Another entirely different beep brought him screaming back to the computer faster than he could tear off his oven mitts. Something had just gone dark. Dark was bad.

The Crest cameras were out. It took him less than a second to find that much out--hot keys were his friend--but the question was why. They were all out. A quick check to the parking lot cameras showed people filing out, but another quick check confirmed that there were no alarms sounding. No police, no fire, no nothing.

Though speaking of police…

"The fuck?" He muttered, typing one-handed as he reflexively snagged another cigarette. There was some police chatter on the band, little ants swarming over--something. He moved in nano-expressions, without thought, winding back the recorded stream thirty seconds and playing it at time-and-a-half. Shots fired, squad en route, 43rd and…

"The fuck?!" He demanded, more vehemently this time as he pulled up the traffic camera to watch some old motherfucker dragging the unconscious figure of Lex Mason out of what looked like a crash…involving two dead guys outside their car and what looked like their handguns on the pavement. His fingers were already moving for his VOIP when one of the smaller monitors caught his eye and, incidentally, froze his blood. It was the one connected to the little web-cam he'd installed just across from his apartment door, nestled gently in some trendy planter or another. The man it showed looked like no form of delivery men, utility men, or cleaning service. He could have, in fact, been one of Mamushi's associates considering how hard he was humping Tommy Hilfiger's fashion sense.

He was also screwing a silencer onto a very-efficient looking pistol and leveling it for the deadbolt.

Time stopped for a single, incredulous moment. More than terror, or rage, or any other emotion he could really discern, Mamushi felt on the verge of hysterics. Really? Something inside him seemed to laugh, with a chuckle that almost made its way to a legitimate nervous signal. Seriously?The answer, of course, was forthcoming.

The door was in pieces, a black suited body moving through. Mamushi was running--since when, a moronic part of his brain was already snorting sardonically, did he run?--for the bedroom, scrabbling over empty and full plastic cases, magazines, old pairs of sweat pants. Did he have a gun? He had to have a gun, he was a fucking mobster. Mobsters had guns.

Except he didn’t. Why, really, would he? He wasn't muscle, he didn't do wet work. He was protected, dammit, anyone who knew where he lived wanted him there doing what he did. His apartment wasn't pent-house but it was close--gated community, new place, upscale. This sort of thing didn't happen here. The silenced bullet impacting the wall just to the left of his head, as he dived into the bedroom and scrabbled to his feet across the plush white carpet, said otherwise.

He had seconds. Three, if he was lucky, probably less, and he was already spending one of them stumbling to his feet. The shitty plywood of the door sprouted a trio of holes--Sergeant Asshole was apparently not taking any chances--and Mamushi looked for the first thing that could possibly be interpreted as useful for self-defense.

'twas nerdery that saved the beast.

Mamushi, like any good geek worth his salt, had an unused daisho set sitting on top of his equally unused dresser. He'd gotten them for himself as a present when he was a teenager and had, at the time, been very proud that he'd gone through the trouble of making sure they were full-tang, 'combat ready' implements of murder. That he'd never actually done anything with them was beside the point--having them had instantly given him the sense of cred he'd desired, and they were summarily ignored for the remainder of his live-long days.

There was no reason it should have worked. He was not a trained and lethal fighting machine, some ancient master of his heritage's long-lost samurai traditions. His hours of video-gaming did not prepare him for the probable trajectory or give him any insight as to how the hit-man was going to enter the room. The only thing working in his favor was very likely the fact that said hit-man realized just how stupid an idea it was, and as such was dumb-founded by kicking open the door to a wiry Asian punk with a katana.

The wild swing caught the man's hand at the wrist of his gun hand…and took it off.

Literally.

There was…so much blood. So much more blood than Mamushi was expecting that he actually took a few steps back, shocked and wet from the arterial burst. More than the assassin was expecting as well, from the blank look on his face--he didn't really seem to process it, and for an awkward moment neither of the pair really knew what to do. They stared, dumbly, to the hand on the floor before all of a sudden the bond was broken. The man lunged for him, Mamushi fell backwards with a strangled yell--

It took him a moment to realize several things. One was that he was still alive; how he would have died in that time was anyone's guess, but somehow it was surprising enough on its own. Two, he couldn't breathe; falling backwards with about a hundred and eighty pounds of assassin on top of him seemed to have knocked the wind out of him. Three, he was soaking, and this more than anything else made him realize just how fucked things were.

Somehow he'd managed to put the sword between them, and it was currently lodged surprisingly firmly in the man's solar plexus. Sticking out like a red crescent from his back, the blade itself hung quivering in the air above them as Mamushi struggled to push the weakly shuddering body off of himself. His head was spinning, he could barely get his breath back, he couldn't even think. What the Hell was going on?

The timer went off again. Impossibly, the fact that his ribs were burning did not escape him.

---

One shower, two cigarettes and three text-messages later, Mamushi had the good sense to check his stupid phone.

Hope it's still safe. Omw.