[center][img]http://i.imgur.com/YWqLekM.png[/img][/center] [h2][u][center]Pieces on the Board[/center][/u][/h2] [b]Rook Location: Lost Haven, Chinatown[/b] One set of prying eyes was not so easily dissuaded by the sleepy retreat of an old woman. The boy was barely into his teens, was little Rook. They picked em’ up early in the Syndicate, because sometimes it was the young-uns that were called for. They were quick, they were innocent and they had the energy to run for days. All good qualities in a marking man, someone who tailed people wanted by the gang. Rook was a marking boy really, but he was a damned good one, and when he got the call from one of his many cousins that Racheli had been spotted on the streets by a couple druggies he’d been up in a flash and out there. Didn’t matter that he was out after bedtime, not that he had any parents capable of enforcing it, his nervous excitement was more than enough to keep his peepers open. It wasn’t hard for someone like him to blend into the background, even in the dead of night with no one innocent abound. He was a slumped figure in the gutter, an early morning sweeper, a nobody wandering the streets with a bottle in his hand. He’d actually been half-way up a scaffold when things kicked off in Triad territory, watching the girl get the shit kicked out of her by a gang. Well, that’s what it had looked like, she was doing an awful lot of flailing as far as he could tell. Right up until she casually punched a man’s leg out and pummelled the ground, flashing in the light of a street lamp with a steely glint. Rook swallowed. Meta-humans scared him, and he was following one. Ironic perhaps that he was one himself, unknowingly, his abilities were the weak and subtle kind. For some reason, people just tended not to notice him. He had no idea that Silence had recognised that trait in him and that was why he was out here earning a thousand dollars for a night’s work. If he had, he might have charged a little more. He watched the duo wander off and took stock of the battered group fleeing the other direction. It looked like things had quieted down for a while. He heard the old’un shouting about little Thailand being off limits, seemed like she was some sort of ‘figure’ of sorts in the sub-district. It was unlikely someone like that wouldn’t be well known, he didn’t really have to take any further risk and follow them to their destination. He could just find out where the woman lived tomorrow. Of course, it was hard to say for sure if Rach and the oldie would be sticking together for any length of time. So, against his better judgement, he hopped off the scaffolding and dropped to the ground, creeping after the two of them, muttering under his breath, his phone out and his thumb pressing the buttons casually. “He better pay sharpish yeah…” ------------ Silence carefully placed the phone back down and stepped away from it, his legs catching on the end of his bed. He let his weight carry him down, his back supported by the mattress while his feet remained firmly planted on the carpet. It was against his instincts, but he couldn’t stand right next to the phone and wait for more news. Nor could he sleep, for that matter. So he chose some hybrid middle ground between the two and attempted to meditate while his ears remained open for the tell-tale buzz of a received message. Meditation was not something he found easy, his Father was a great believer in it, always saying it helped him master the debilitating aura. That was what they called it, his family, ‘The Aura.’ Strange that they had no definitive ideas surrounding its origin, only a rough scientific understanding of its effect and an unofficial book recounting the experiences of generations of Antols. They knew it came from the mind, or the brain if you were. They knew that it moved through the air like a wave, continuous waves if you like, pulses of debilitation that in the early days were found to profoundly weaken other humans. As technology advanced, it too fell before the aura, leading some intrepid Antol to discover the true nature of the ability. It destabilised electric currents, or the passage of electrons. Electrical synapses, electrical circuits, machinery and man, both were vulnerable to the aura. But despite all that, few Antols had discovered any way to better it, master it if you will. For many, it became as much a curse as a blessing. Loved ones suffered and friends were few among those most gifted, as their presence became almost toxic. His Father had lamented at ever finding a bride, he had confessed, until Lekh’s mother had come into the picture. She too had ‘abilities’ and it were these that protected her from the aura. The consequence of the mingling of those two's genes was only felt many years after. Lekh still fretted over it now. Biology, meta-human DNA, it could all be incredibly cruel. While he was gifted with great power, not the greatest his family had known but not far off either, others had been born with nothing, or worse. Like his abilities, he reined in his thoughts viciously. It was so very like him to allow his mind to wander down dark roads even as he was supposed to be clearing it of negativity in order to try to relax. Still, he supposed it was this trait of his that made his effective at what he did. Allowed him to carve out a small outfit of his own inside that of a larger whole, not unlike a parasite feasting off the life-blood of the Syndicate. He wondered how long it would be before the host took steps to remove that parasite. A challenge for another day, he supposed. For now, he needed pieces. Chess pieces, he likened it too. Material. The more he gathered, the more material he could afford to lose. At the moment, he was down too many pieces, likely to lose the game if he traded down to his last piece. But for now, he had funding from the Syndicate for jobs he completed with ease. He had the blood of a meta-human which showed great promise in achieving his goals. He had a cursed mark on his hand that hopefully at least did what the Ambassador said it did, although likely among other less favourable things. He had some of her magic salve, though it was of little use to him in the end. And he had the girl, or at least, he had her location. He could sell it cheaply, or he could sell it dearly, or he could choose not to sell it at all. Decisions, decisions.