[center][h2][color=00aeef]Rouges[/color] [color=9e0b0f]Blood and bullets[/color][/h2][/center] I rushed out of the store pulling up my codex and began searching for Akira's signal before I began running in any direction, when I found his signal on my GPS, I began following it as fast as could and each time I turned a corner, I laid my eyes back on the digital map, then soon just had it in front of my face as I kept running, then I slipped on something wet, it was a spot of blood on the ground. Part of me wanted to scan the blood to know who's it was, the spot had a trail in front of it leading into an, I wanted to scan it with my codex to make sure it was Akira's but I didn't think about it and charged down the alley, hoping that I wasn't too late, the piss smelling alley let to a tiny empty lot with Kira's body sprawled out on the ground." Akira!" I shouted his name before a heavy thud landed on the back of my head. The giant brute began slamming their fist into the tiles and roofing materials as I pelted them with burning energy ammunition, I quickly dodged out of the way of her large fist as she smashed an ac unit, I ejected my empty mag before slamming another one in my SMG, smoke was rising off the massive woman as I got ready to empty another magazine into her." Hold up!" Yelled a gruff voice followed by two shots from an Eagle handgun. One of the shots hit the woman in the belt and the other hit her belt buckle making a loud hissing sound, behind me a large man quickly jumped to help me." She's mainlining something in her belt, it makes her the way she is, now that it's broken we need to wait for her to shrink down." He spoke as if he knew the woman, but now wasn't the time question someone coming to my aid. Long almost endless streams of a bright orange substance came from the woman's belt as the hissing noise grew louder, the monster looked to the both of us before ripping out a ventilation duct with her shrinking hands, she hurled the mangled metal at us, and in the heat of the moment, the large man stepped in front of me and let his shields take the blow, his shields crackled and fizzled out taking the blow he stood in for. I quickly got in front of him before I started firing at the slowly shrinking body builder, steam began to rise from her body glove as I emptied the entire magazine into her suit, with each connecting shot more steam began to rise from her and she decided to just jump off the roof and to the street below, I didn't bother chasing after her and looked to the guy. " You won't be a bother too will you?" I asked him, pointing my empty gun at him. He held his hands up before telling me." What! No, I called one of you to help us." He told me. " Well, I expect you and your group to pay me and my partner well for this." I told him before briefly thinking about James. Once the Jap fired, we both shot each other, apparently he wasn't that bad of a shot as I first thought, the two of us got an arm shot on one another and his bullet nearly made me drop my piece, dived and rolled behind a slide and turned on my shields. Whatever bullets he was using made my wound, burn hotter than Ausaril during summertime, I put a hand over the wound before peeking out at the guy and nearly losing my head peeking. I leaned on the slide before saying." You're pretty good." I spun my revolver around my trigger finger, then I rolled out of my playground cover to nobody being there, he just vanished into thin air." Damn, gone already." Suddenly I had a feeling something was behind me, instinct kicked in and I spun with my revolver first only to have my hand stopped. I spotted the well suited guy out the corner of my eye, he put his gun to the side of my head and pulled back on the hammer."Sayōnara, Space cowboy." Before he could send me to the great desert in the sky, he hesitated and pulled out his codex. On the other end there was someone yelling."Damn it!" The Jap yelled before someone else stepped into my execution and shot my would be executioner, the sound of the rifle was none other than Simo, then his voice buzzed in my ear." If the director saw this he'd kick you back to your old ranking, your lucky he's not a target." The Jap held his fresh gunshot wound before he surprisingly turned invisible before my very eyes." What in the Hell?" I heard his footsteps move away from me before hearing his voice once more. " You live today cowboy, if we meet again on my, I'll be sure to show you I'm better than 'pretty good'." He told me before I heard him run off " You got lucky James, this will stay between the three of us." I thanked him over the communicator. " You also should also need to work on shooting from the hip, next time just aim down your sights instead of going for style." He lectured me, I didn't bother trying to explain it's not just style, it's much more than that. When I came to, Mishka kicked one of my legs before walking out of the alley way spitting on the ground." Fucking garbage right where you belong." Once she was gone, I pulled myself together and crawled over to Akira, I laid a fur covered hand on his bloodied face, I wiped some of the blood off his face and he coughed to life. " Kira!" Pulled his head into my lap." Are you okay?" He struggled with his words, breathing them out."I...I can't move." He told me between breaths." My..My neck hurts Ven." Bloodied tears streamed down his face. It took me a while before I could get Ash and Noi to the Van, with Ash clinging to me like a scared child, and having to drag a depressed Noi. When I pried Ash off of me, she curled up into the van with Noi just looking as depressed when I first found her. Personally, I felt like someone slapped me in the face with a dick and I felt like I couldn't do anything about it, then I had that feeling of anger welling up in my stomach that made me just wish I could the entire heist over again but this time know what was coming and handle it or just have us abort the whole thing. I put my hands on my face before taking a deep breath and focusing on the situation, I checked the van noticing Yan was gone, I couldn't leave him behind, plus he had the keys to drive the damn thing, Bates on the other hand just looked pissed." Noi look over Ash." I told her before calling Ven hoping she wasn't dead or was to much of a coward to actually do as I said. When she answered she sounded like she was in the middle of getting her ass kicked and sounded scared, she was babbling too quickly for me to process anything and I told her to."Calm down." Once she took a deep breath, she told me." Gaz Kira's I don't know he's hurt bad, he can't move, I don't know what I should do." " Is Mishka there?" I asked. " No, she's gone." "Okay, when I see Yan we'll make our way." I began hearing sirens." Shit! Alright, we'll meet you when we can." "So now the cops finally get off their fat asses to do something." I reached into the Van and pulled out a Laser shotgun, but before I could do anything, Bates just took the shotgun from me." Gaz I'll lead them away from you guys. Ash isn't in any condition to fight, I'll send them on a goose chase, lose them, then meet back at the hideout." I was about to stop him, but he was already dead set on his idea and ran off towards the sirens. Then, almost as if it was scripted to happen or just fated to, Yan and the small schoolgirl both arrived, when I laid eyes on the blonde body builder, I gave him a 'where the fuck was you!' look and he just crossed his arms and told me."Hand over the loot Gaz." " What?" I told him. " I said, hand over the loot, knowing you, even if this turned into a shit show, I know you snagged some loot, you at least have one bag." Not wanting to argue with him I grabbed the single bag filled with something me and Bates scrapped together before leaving, I gave the bag to him and he handed it to her." It's probably not much, but I think it covers our lives." The school girl un-zipped the duffle bag looking inside of it and zipped it shut." I guess it does." She told us in an almost apathetic tone before walking away. "Yan we have to get to Ven, Akira's badly hurt, we need to go get him." " What about Bates?" He asked. " He went to go distract the cops, he'll meet us at the hideout." The two of us got in the Van and tracked down Ven, when I got to the alley a million things filled my head, I wanted to yell at the fucker for running after Mishka, I wanted to feel sorry for him, I wanted to punch him in the face, but the one thing I wanted most was to just get him out of that alley. I slowly made my way down to the small empty lot and spotted Ven cradling Akira's head, I didn't know what to say to him, I just stared and he looked back at me just coughing up the word."Sorry." "I'm sorry." I grabbed his legs while Yan grabbed his arms and put him in the Van, when Yan started up the engine, Ven asked me."What are we going to do with him?" "We're gonna take him to the hospital, take off his body armor and get rid of anything that will make him look like a criminal." I put a hand on Akira's shoulder and looked down to him." I should've just listened to your brother, told you to get an education be smarter than us, don't be like us. But I was too fucking stupid to listen."