[center]Solarian, City of Lights[/center] [center][img]https://i.imgur.com/tpD6Bs8.jpeg[/img][/center] The island of Solarian spread out from the central mountain, rivers and lakes surrounding small sections of land. The water flowed naturally away from the idyllic mountain, glittering with the light of the sun falling from the sky above. The people wandered the streets on the upper islands, carefree and filled with the joy of living in such a wonderful place. The city prospered through trade with the outside world, their airships offering quick transport of goods and services. The beauty of it brought in tourists and vacationers, some of the finest word smiths of the world found the beauty a muse to their natural gifts. Painters used it for inspiration, writers for the quiet. The people of the world flocked to the islands for their natural wonder. And where tourism and beauty brings money, so to does it bring criminals. The city proper filled with people early, and spread among them the street rats played. Small children darting to and fro, in and out of the people. Their hands a blur of motion, many of them pocketing something pulled from the pouch of a tourist or local. Most of them, though, only played amongst the others, laughing and smiling with the joy of a child. A dark figure walked among the crowd, his long duster-style coat dragging the ground behind his hard heeled boots, a large-brimmed hat pulled low, obscuring his face enough to hide the long scar down the left side, with a patch covering over that eye. He watched the ground just ahead of himself, trusting his sense of crowds to guide him through the throngs of people. He kept a constant watch on the kids. Others might not see their game, but he saw each pick, each sleight of hand. They weren’t nearly as good as they thought themselves, but they were good enough to get by, he supposed. Smiling, he loosened the strings on a purse hanging off his crossed gun belts. Holstered there were large, pearl handled revolvers, the belts themselves crossing over his groin with the handles angled toward his hands. The loosened pouch jingled with the loud sound of change, and it wasn’t long before he found the kids play bringing them closer and closer to him. Pretending not to notice, he continued walking aimlessly through the crowd - until he felt it. The slight, barely noticeable shift in weight tugging at his belt. His hand, lightning fast, lashed out and wrapped around the wrist of a pale, emaciated child. Her eyes shown with fear beyond fear. So sure she’d been that he wouldn’t notice, she barely stifled a scream that would give away her fear. “Now young’un, what’cher doin’?” His smile broadened, and his one eye softened with kindness as the smile touched a light within. “All ye had to do was ask, ya ken.” Tossing the coin pouch and catching it, he gently sat it in the girl’s hand, letting her down. “Buy yer’selves sumpin nice, girlie girl. Find me later, I might have a job for ye, ya ken.” The child nodded, fear replaced with wonder and excitement, before darting off to rejoin the group trying to hide behind a melon stand. Roija smirked as they darted into the shadows once again, figuring he might not see them again - but keeping a mental note of her for future work. “Joseph, you got the bounty board ready, yeah?” The sound of his voice changed, the backwoods accent disappearing as quickly as it appeared. “I need some work, some poor little thing just stole all my money.” “I bet they did, Roija, as if you wouldn’t have known a day before what they planned and stopped them if you didn’t want them to have it.” Joseph’s grizzled voice laughed aloud. “And yeah, it’s ready. I got one specially picked out for you.” Reaching out, he passed him a piece of rolled up paper. Unfurling it, he looked it over. A good bounty indeed. A huge chunk of money, but a hard to find quarry residing in the darker parts of town, buried in the tunnels running through the mountain. A lot of them were old mining shafts, but with the mines mostly dried up - the gangs and outlaws began using them for hideouts and bases. Roija went in there some, mostly to retrieve bounties, and most of them knew him well - and knew not to fuck with him when he showed up. Still though, the poster showed the dark face of a man Roija wanted to take a piece of anyway. Shifting his weight, the leather of his gun belts creaked against one another. He tossed Joseph a coin from another pouch, and turned toward the mountain - watching the sun begin to descend down the backside of it. “This’ll have to wait till the morning, but I should be back by tomorrow evening, old friend. Have my money ready, ya ken?” Tomorrow wouldn’t be a walk in the park, and a lot of men would end up dead in his pursuit - but tonight, Roija intended to spend his time at the The Wandering Sojourn, drinking and working on a different kind of bounty. It helped that it was nestled just outside the old mining towns, close by the entrance into the mines. Maybe he’d recruit some help in the tavern, actually, being outnumbered - while manageable - didn’t appeal to his sense of fun.