The Portal lead him into an outhouse, unfortunately still in use. In this western venue he had managed to stumble upon a man who had pinned the Sheriff's star to his breast. He scrambled desperately to grasp his iron from the belt partnered with a pair of pants on the floor. His fingers had just found purchase on the leather fasten as a fancy leather shoe struck like a dagger into his knuckles. A gross crack filled the outhouse for a moment after, he screamed and found no sound leaving his mouth. Shin had covered it with his hand and held tight.

Bruises formed quickly on the man's face as his grip was iron. The Sheriff would have cried if he were a lesser man but his constitution was admirable. In a moment he would be dead and in another ten minutes Shin would be adorned with his fancy black duster and broad brimmed black rawhide cap. Not particularly his style but this outfit would shield him from any suspicion, the hat would conceal his mask just enough to blind people from his strange manner of dress.

He'd forgotten to take the Star from his chest, or maybe he willfully neglected this detail. Maybe the symbolism of an evil sheriff hunting a man literally followed by darkness was irresistable.

Maybe he just didn't care if people questioned it.

With the setting he couldn't resist preparing himself before hand, something he hasn't played with in centuries. Literal centuries. The Black Staff formed in his left hand this time, despite his left being dominant he normally formed it in his right. Note, he was doing this as he walked through the dusty road. A black gun grew in his hand, little details were obviously ignored due to their superfluous nature in this particular weapon. After it formed, Shin realized his staff had begun to move against his will.

Not a good sign.

It was an extension of his will, if it moved against him there was an issue somewhere. He'd identify the issue after he got the weapon, but right now he needed to keep it reigned in. After a moment of struggling with it, he managed to get it to stop. It had enveloped his entire left hand and forearm, the gun was fused with the mass on his arm. He flexed his fingers and made sure to check that he could in fact use it to its full ability. After another few moments he found it fully functional, but he could not retract the arm into the body.

Shin would have been panicked if he weren't so dead set on his objective. After his preparations were complete, Shin moved towards the center of town. Sundown was upon him and he was upon the end of the road. The sun beat at his back and he stared down the dusty trail. The Tired Old Gun was here, he was fully aware of his presence. Now all he needed to do was summon him. "Jonah!" His voice echoed in the crimson tinted corridors and streets of the small Western American vista. "I've come for you, I've come to put you in a grave!"

With his challenge still floating in the air, Shin waited.

“Now fella, I reckon it’s only fair for me to warn ya that you ain’ the first to come seekin’ that.” The gravelly voice at first was hard to place, but a closer look revealed it to emanate from an old looking drifter wrapped up in his duster with a hat plonked firmly over his head. He was sat outside the barbers of all places, nestled on a bench watching the world go by. Now however it seemed his lazy day was to be ruined by quite the figure indeed. Dressed as the sheriff no less, which probably meant the worst had befallen him. Never mind that though, people died all the time on the frontier. If it wasn’t to some mad stranger it would have been disease or the wild animals so that was all there was to it. The travel stained old man stood, greyish black hair falling in strands around his lined, weary, face as he brushed some lint from his riding chaps and kicked his boot against the wood of the decking.

“An’ I can’t imagine you’ll be the last neither.” He warned, stepping slowly out into the street, only the closest inspection revealing that he was in actuality playing close attention to his challenger. It was unwise to expect honour in anyone in the west. Hell, he barely had much himself. Just enough to walk into the street and throw back his duster at the waist, revealing an off colour shirt and more importantly the ivory handles of two revolvers strapped to an ammo-belt. At that point the only bystander stupid enough to still be in the way swiftly retreated to the tavern, where onlookers gaped through the wide window, ready to take cover if bullets started flying.

The sun stood before the Tired Gun, or Jonah as he was named by the oriental assassin stood just thirty feet before him. His shadow sat behind him, and it foreshadowed death as his hands stroked the handles of his guns.

“Sure you be wantin’ to walk down this road then mister?”

Behind the mask an evil sneer adorned his face, there wasn't a single thought of retreat or a peaceful solution to his weapon hunt. "A miracle should be your only hope past this point, old man." He almost paused when the realization he was about five times this man's age. "I need this road, this isn't a child's fancy. I'm not looking for some title or status, I need your weapon." The single eye of his darted to the guns on his hip, they were almost perfect mirrors of eachother though one was clearly darker. Again his eye shifted focus towards the shaking left hand and he makeshift pistol he held, he didn't know how well he'd be able to move his arm.

"It's sundown, my back is to the sun. I have the high ground. You should lay your gun down so I may kill you faster." A tumbleweed danced across the ground between them followed by a little dust devil that played in little spinning motions. The three free fingers he had on his left flexed and clutched the grip of his handgun. "Otherwise we'll do this the old fashioned way."

It was obvious that both parties would play this by hand, they would make their count and draw. It was unlikely, however, that either party would fall to the other's first shot. These two men weren't normal men by any stretch. Shin himself was readied, his right foot leading and his left held far behind.Without much else in the way of preparation he began counting in his head.

Ten.

Nine.

Eight.

My weapon?

“You ain’ ready to handle my iron mister, believe me.”

His weathered right hand, gloveless, ran across the brim of his hat, drawing it low so the shade covered his eyes. Those dark green eyes that would have better suited a hawk were swamped by shadow, and the Tired Gun dropped his hand and ran his right finger tenderly over the handle of Mistress. Let the new Sheriff speak what he willed, do what he willed, think what he willed. This was the West, and only one of them belonged here. The West was in his blood, his bones, even his guns. It chewed men up and spat out survivors, wiry cold eyed creatures with the grit one needed to last a day on the frontier. Jonah fucking belonged here, but that didn’t mean he had to like it.

This was just like any other day for the Tired Gun, nothing special, routine even. He wasn’t even particularly bothered yet. Cautious maybe, but everyone worth his salt was cautious. He weren’t scared, his old heart wasn’t pumping sandy blood just yet.

Suddenly, there was iron in his hand. Mistress had leapt into his palm almost as if it had a mind of its own, so quick it didn’t even bare thinking about. It didn’t look like he’d whipped the weapon out, but rather there was a blur and suddenly an explosive sound that heralded a discharged round, fired from the hip, his left hand shooting to the hammer, rocking it back, another shot, and another, and another, and another and one last round. Six shots faster than a man could see, faster than a man could think. Hip to chest, that was what was what, not bad considering he was already moving, strafing on right, his gun half-way back in its holster before the echo of his last round had faded in the empty street. Not a first shot, first shots, six of them. The Tired Gun didn’t do half measures.

Their replies were near the same speed, it was impressive that the old gunslinger had matched his draw. Shin fired off one shot while the old man fired off six, Shin's was a spinning blade that careened from the barrel of his pistol. It tore through the air like a devil in disguise, a crooked path was cut through the dust between them as it made its way towards the gunslinger. Though the first shot had missed, since he had began moving the moment he fired.

So too had Shin began to move, as the guns were thrown up his body had begun with a violent leap to his right. It seemed that they had both had the same idea of strafing to the right, but they both had a disadvantage if they changed their position. Six bullets found their way to Shin's old position and several points to the right of it, but zero bullets found their target. He slammed shoulder first into a tying post nearby and spun around it in a matter of moments. The gun was pressed to his chest and he thought about how he had fired.

It was as though his left arm had been impelled to his chest by a wire, he hadn't noticed that the sleeve of the duster and his own shirt had been torn apart by the motion. The staff had moved of its own accord again, and now in the middle of a gunfight no less. It had drawn a wire between his shoulder and wrist and pulled it upwards. The gun had fired itself as well, this was not good. Shin's staff moved to his conscious thought, but now it was moving to his unconscious. This could have any number of disastrous side effects that he was not willing to deal with right now.

After spinning around the post he extended his left hand again and fired off three more shots from the pistol. Leading on the moving man as he made his sideways strafe, these too were those spinning bladed rounds. Much slower than conventional bullets but still much faster than an average man. They were made to cut a man to ribbons, not to put a hole in him. Hopefully the gun would work in his favor before moving again. He tried to keep his shoulder as loose as possible while matching the man's strafe, he didn't want his left arm to get yanked out of socket by the gun's next motion.

It was less impressive that the Old Gun had taken six shots in the time the Sheriff had taken one, but rather that only three of those shots were at him. With reflex born from untold practice and supernatural power, his barrel tilted and the three follow up rounds took the blade projectile in mid-air, battering it from its course and sending it off to the cowboy’s left. He could have probably moved quick enough to avoid it anyway once he saw the weapon being levelled, but taking it out with his own shots was far easier. As easy as stepping up onto the decking and holstering Mistress, only for Spouse to fly into his hand with that same confusing motion. That one that seemed to the casual eye to show the weapon literally launching itself snugly into his palm. Truth was, he was just that fast.

The Tired Old Gun wasn’t one to deliberate on what he was up against. It wasn’t nothing he’d ever fought before, but it had killed the Sheriff, that was enough in his book. Jonah too had found himself the momentary protection of a post, set on the left side of the short staircase he’d taken up onto the decking that stood along the side of the street. He crouched suddenly as he made his way around it, and his hand flew to his gun. Both of them mirrored each other across the street, reaching their respective post, turning around it. His stature had changed so suddenly and dramatically that only one blade still threatened him, he took it with two rounds and fired two more at the desperado, saving the last two for a special occasion. The blade cut into the wood before him and showered him in shards and splinters, but that was all. He peered across the street and waited for a decent target, or inspiration, whichever came first.

Damn that gunslinger's hands and their supernatural speed! His own hands might be that fast in a punch, but a drawing motion was far from his practical training. Probably because he didn't conventionally use firearms.

Ducking back behind cover he felt the breath of wind from the incoming fire, he reflexively pulled his head away from the bullets even though they had gone past him. The bark of gunfire still rung light in his ears as his weapon arm tensed. He looked down to find that a bullet had found province in his left shoulder, clean through. Missed the bone but blood was pouring from the wound, barely visible behind the black veil of his sleeve. The blood was only sighted down the arm where the sleeve had been torn by the wires sent by the staff.

"Great." He muttered to himself as he turned back around the post, beginning a very brisk sideways walk. Shin kept his left hand totally straight forward as he let off a series of shots down the sight. He wanted to put it between his heart and the Old Gun's bullets. The staff was tough enough to take a shot for him without failing, he didn't want to catch a bullet in the chest and flop.

As he made his sideways advance he kept his right arm down to his body, there was no need for it in this fight. It felt awkward not actually using both hands at the same time, totally against his nature. He fired off shot after shot, numbering a total of eight shots. Every single one of them was a spinning blade, the blade format was best for a lower speed weapon. It gave more coverage than a bullet and had a predictable trajectory. As he moved sideways the projectiles would move closer and closer to Jonah until the post would no longer provide sufficient cover.

Every shot was aimed for center mass to knock him down rather than immediately kill him. His reasoning would make sense much later.

Two more shots rang out from the Tired Old Gun, and then he moved. Or retreated, would be the more accurate term, as both his weapons were spent he kicked his way into a general goods store on his side of the street and retreated from Shin’s view, narrowly avoiding one of his bladed projectiles as it cut through the fabric of his coat. Jonah looked around as the door slammed shut behind him and blades slammed into it, directly in front was the counter and the cowering shop-keeper. To his right was a display window for all sorts of items, but more importantly it saw out into the street. Both his revolvers were in his belt by this point rather than their holsters, the shell casings having skittered onto the floor as he emptied the chambers. Once again making a mundane task look like magic, he reloaded with rounds off his belt, doing both weapons simultaneously with a single hand each.

As he reloaded and looked around, Shin was skirting around his post, likely having stopped firing as his target escaped his view. If he kept firing, those blades could very well cut through the thin wooden wall eventually, so Jonah started moving further into the shop, putting shelves between him and the new Sheriff. He re-holstered both his revolvers as he reached the counter, skittering a dollar coin over to the cringing man on the other side.

“Sorry ‘bout this mister.” He tipped his hat, and kicked his way out the back door. It was time to reconsider his approach, manoeuvring was all important in a fight like this one.

@MelonHead
Tucking and rolling when Jonah's reports rang out, Shin found himself behind another post, though prostrated for a moment. He slapped the ground with his right and shoved himself back to his feet, the man was a deadly threat with his guns.

That disgusting lipless smile of his would have shown if not for his mask, imagining himself with that weapon in his hand was a delicious thought. In that moment the arm viciously whipped upwards and began firing off round after round towards the wall between him and the old gun. A total of seven rounds were fired into that wall, he had very little control over the rate of fire. It was again acting of its own accord, he was not happy about it but at least it was doing its job. Shin moved towards the building and continued firing, seven more shots.

He silenced his firearm for a moment and made a tactical decision. So far, he had not revealed whether or not he needed to reload. Probably easy to assume by this point that he did not need to, but gambling on the slim chance that maybe the old gunman fell for it. Shin reached the edge of the building that Jonah had entered. Hopefully he hadn't blown enough holes to be visible, but it didn't matter.

Once he reached the post he grasped it and hoisted himself up onto the rooftop. He caught himself with his hand and let his weight down softly. Preventing himself from making too much of a noise as he made his tactical advance. He would stay atop the overhang for a moment and then silently creep across the top of the building. If Jonah came back out the same way he had ran, Shin would open fire from above. If not, he would advance across the top of the building.

Shin seemed to know a thing or two about positioning, but this was the West, and Jonah lived and breathed it. He’d turned right just as soon as he’d stepped out into the open air, managing a respectable speed for an old looking weary looking no good looking son of a gun. He jogged along the back row of buildings that ran the length of the street, one, two, three of the sturdy wooden structures he flew past before another right turn took him down a dark alley. It was hard to say where Shin would be by this point. If he had reason to, he might have sprinted to the far end of the roof and spotted Jonah’s coat tail disappearing in his peripheral, but he might just as well have no idea at all. Course, the Tired Old Gun wasn’t no master of stealth, all his masked foe had to do was use his ears. With each footfall there rang a jangle of metal, the spurs adorning each boot shaking and rattling, faint as it may be it made the man traceable.

As did Shin’s own boots, not so thoughtfully adorned perhaps, but the Tired Old Gun knew how to listen. If he ran after him his heavy footfalls on the rooftop ahead would be hard pressed not to give away his position, and if he walked he had no chance of reaching Jonah before he slinked his way back onto the main decking, perhaps disappearing into a nearby house, perhaps setting up some other ambush. They were at a stalemate of sorts, but the Tired Gun could blend, question was, could Shin?

Jonah seemed to know a thing or two about positioning, but this was murder, and Shin lived and breathed it. So many people are unaware of how much of an assassin Shin actually is, and to think he could not move silently and quickly was a fool's folly. Though admittedly his footwear was not so perfectly designed for this task, so he would need to improvise. More likely he was to be spotted before he was heard, Shin's mobility was not in question. After getting onto the rooftop he ran to the edge and caught a glimpse of Jonah retreating down the alley.

Lowering himself to the rooftop, pressing the tips of his fingers against the roofing tile. For a single second he flexed his feet and pushed the leather toe hard against the roof. There was a slight creak, and a snap. By leverage and force he had pushed his feet through the soles of his shoes. The soles of his shoes fell off and onto the rooftop, their weight made the noise they made very subtle. Now he could move silently, he stood slightly and kept his head low before beginning a quick dash across the rooftops. Every footfall was halted just before his toe hit the roof, landing on the ball of his foot and pushing ahead before his heel could follow.

In the time he'd spent to remove the soles from his shoes, he'd managed to lose track of Jonah in the moment. Perhaps stealth wasn't the best tool for this job, but he was an assassin. Finding and killing people was literally what he was paid for, if he couldn't find an old man brandishing a pair of magic guns in a Western American town, what was he even getting paid for?

Wait.

He wasn't getting paid for this at all.

This was a private excursion.

"Shit." He muttered silently as he ran across rooftop after rooftop, demonstrating some particularly impressive agility as he dropped down to look through the various windows. Leaping back and forth from rooftop to ground to peek into different windows, traveling in the vague direction that he had seen Jonah run previously, hoping to catch a glimpse of his target or hear the jingle jangle of his spurs. Strangely enough, he hadn't noticed yet, but Shin himself had been leaving a trail of blood behind himself. His arm was still bleeding pretty decently.

Jonah lurked in the empty clothier just off to the right of the right-most window beside a mannequin. It was the second building down on the left after leaving the alley-way, and Shin would come to it quickly if he followed the logical course of investigation. Jonah, for his part, seemed to be waiting for him. His pistols were both out and trained at the window in front of him, his eyes were staring intently at the ground outside and it seemed like he was waiting for something. In truth, he’d chosen the clothier because it lacked a back door, Shin might break in upstairs but he couldn’t do it silently, there were only solid glass windows up there and they weren’t the opening kind.

Eventually, Shin would do something to give himself away. That was what Jonah believed. He had a feeling neither of them was leaving this town until business was settled so he could afford to be patient and wait it out. The first of them to make a mistake could very well be the loser of this little duel of theirs. So far, gunning it out all fair like hadn’t achieved much, so reverting to the law of the west seemed like a wise course. Shoot the other fella in the back.

It took a moment of standing still for him to hear the subtle wet patting of his blood hitting the dust, it wasn't concerning. Blood loss never was, at least, not since he became what he is these days. It wasn't easy for him to find Jonah, but he did have his methods of bringing him out.

Walking towards the nearest building he politely opened the door, breaking the lock as he pushed it in, and stepped inside quietly. It took about thirty or so seconds of searching but he found what he was looking for, the very same man that Jonah had apologized to a few short moments before. Why did this man matter? Well, how much does a meat shield matter to Jonah?

Shin would soon find out as he snatched the man by his arm and dragged him out the door, the man dropped his weight and tried to resist his pulling. Kicking and screaming as he was torn from his home, it was a totally futile gesture. The assassin silenced him by pulling him up to his chest and wrapping his hand around his mouth.

He put the barrel of his gun against the man's head and shouted, calling out to the Tired Gun. "Look here old man! I've got a hostage, please understand I know how cliche this is, but I've got people to kill and you're only the first on that list! If you don't come out, I'll spray this man's brains across the ground!"

He positioned himself with his back to a wall, putting the man between himself and any potential oncoming fire. The only part left exposed was his face, which was obviously covered by his iron mask. As well as his right hand, which had to be exposed considering it was holding the man's mouth closed.

Was he getting desperate? Maybe, but it didn't matter to the immortal assassin, he didn't care about his image on the battlefield.

Well, that would have been darn unfortunate. Some darn tootin’ outlaw done taken the storekeeper hostage. Shame Jonah had been around too long, gone past caring for the everyday man. Je wasn’t no hero of this story. He was just another bastard in the West. Not above shooting the hell outta both hostage and man if that was the way it played, and not a damn thing would be said about it. The Tired Gun, for his part, had emptied Mistress into his hand, the rounds sequestered away in his palm, keeping her nice and empty for what he had in mind.

He’d emptied those rounds lickety split, the second that crazed bastard outside started talkin’ in fact. It’d only taken him a sec, and the next moment he was levelling it directly through the damn wall right at the voice outside. The words came from the head after all (so to speak), so long as he aimed straight (and he always did) they’d carry on their merry way right into the pretty little bastard he wanted dead. Course, one might question how he, the Tired Gun, planned to fire said bullet through a wood wall reliably with no rounds in his damn gun. The answer was simple, and no, he wasn’t planning to use Spouse instead. It was Mistress, seemingly blurry to the eye, which filled with a black smoke. Shadow, if you will.

He fired, many a time, the shadowy rounds carrying right through the wood wall with nary a moment’s pause and right on through to the thorough-fare, where Shin was just concluding his little speech. Only a couple of the six shots were actually on target, two were wide, two were actually going to slam home in the hostage and spill his guts on the ground, potentially going through. But those two on target were deadly indeed, heading right for the mask, a mask which would find itself offering little protection against the shadowy bullets heading for it. The only saving grace was that they lacked the stopping power of an ordinary bullet, even if they hit the head dead centre death was not an inevitability. It’d still hurt like a son-of-a-bitch though.

That was probably not exactly what he was expecting, to be quite frank. The bullet should have bounced off of his mask, most bullets do. High powered rounds being the exception, but he's generally too close for that to matter in most cases. It was not in fact the case here, where the bullet shot clean through his mask and punched a hole in his face.

Not quite the hole he was expecting, as he had enough time to think about the mistake that he'd made and was pretty much prepared to die for that bullet. When it struck his face he was knocked backwards, either from the punch of the bullet or from reflex. Shin's weight slammed into the wall behind him, and his upper body was pushed through a window. His right arm passed through and his left caught on the edge. Glass cut dangerously through his clothes along his sides and back, blood seeped from them almost immediately.

Even with his high pain tolerance he was half tempted to scream, but he had an idea. Taking the bullet to the face might be a good thing, despite all arguments to the contrary. For now, Shin held himself almost perfectly still, not even breathing. Fortunately for the assassin, his face was inside the building, and the tears of agony that were streaming up his face could drip out of sight.

He’d done shot him down with a shadow round, blasted a hole in his head. The shooter didn’t stop to think if the man was just playing dead, because frankly he’d never seen no one survive a bullet to the head. It didn’t even cross his mind, that was the thing that drew him out of cover and across the street, Mistress pointed casually at the fallen killer as he crossed the thoroughfare. His boots jangled in the dust, and the hostage quivered and cried on the ground, bleeding to death in the usual order of things. Jonah spared him a glance of sympathy, not one of apology though. Bit of a bastard really.

“You good an’ dead there par’ner?” He asked, but he wasn’t expecting no response, this was just a good way to get closure.

The sound of footsteps on wood, the faint tinkle of spurs, and the pathetic whimpering of a man who was probably about to die. The moment was soon, the time of falling. Where either man could kill the other, a single moment between them.

Jonah spoke. "You good an' dead there par'ner?" Shin's mask had loosened from his wound, the skin that held the strap tight had flaked off from its own weight.

Now or never.

Jerking forward, eye wild with fire. Shin's arm extended, his left arm, the arm that carried his deathly tool. "Not quite!" He screamed, his mask flew off to the side as he jerked forward. Revealing the damage done to his face, both previously and currently.

His finger tensed viciously and he unleashed a volley of shots, losing count as he whipped the gun up. Several shots lined with his target's body. One along the fingers holding the Mistress, a couple up his arm, and a few across his chest. With his salvo unleashed, it was now or never. If he didn't get him now, he wouldn't get him ever.

Jonah was fast, but not quite fast enough. One dark round fired from the muzzle of Mistress at Shin, and that was the last shot he ever made with it. It had shocked him, the assassin rising from the dead like that, the mangled mess of his face, he had frozen for just a fraction of a second and it had screwed him. He stumbled backwards, a guttural groan leaving his lips as Mistress fell to the ground, his maimed right hand slumping to his side as his survival instincts took over. Another shot went right through him, and then the shadow leapt to his aid, blanketing the fire for him as he groggily levelled Spouse.

Mistress clunked to the ground, and Spouse let out a barrage of fire, hard calibre rounds hurtling through the air as his shadow ate up the blasts from Shin’s weapon. He fired, one shot after another, slower than before as he manually cocked the weapon with his thumb. His shadow broke down after the third shot and he was hit again, but he gave as good as he got. Bloody holes appeared through his coat and his shirt grew red. He fired until his gun could fire no more, stumbling backwards all the way, even in his death throes every shot was on target.

“Well… sh-” The Tired Gun collapsed to the ground, his eyes staring up into the great blue sky up above, his one whole hand clenched tight around the barrel of Spouse. The wind blew while the world seemed to… settle. Then, his eyes closed.

The gun opposing him barked its response and punched holes in him as he rose, these were real bullets. Carrying force and weight, and they broke the glass that supported his arm and which held him upright in the window. Shin fell backwards as the response still poked holes through him, he'd immediately lost count of how many rounds had filled him.

Slowed perception of time is a real bitch, as he felt the bullets breaking his bones inside his body. He felt everything as they passed through and lodged deep inside. His left arm still tried to raise itself and fire one more shot, but it went high and through the roof. His aim ruined by falling backwards, it caused a rain of splinters to fall on him as he too fell.

The sound of breaking glass and a man falling onto wood and glass filled the room as Shin fell backwards, blood pouring from his wounds. The room was fading slowly to black and he'd lost feeling from the hips down, he groaned as he tried to right himself for the last time. It was pointless as he fell backwards immediately, more crunching of glass was all he heard before he lost vision. "God. . ."He closed his single eye and raised his hand to cover the missing one. "Damn." Was the last word that left his mouth before consciousness slipped.