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Torrid and pungent, Olex’s walk to the office was just as stressful and bothersome as it usually was. Prying eyes jutting from the shade of busted in building fronts, hustling streetjacks giving anyone that lingered too long an expecting stare, and all sorts of unsavory and uncouth characters littered across the streets. He always felt on edge in the streets, amongst the cutthroats and urchins, but he still maintained a confident stride, knowing that the closer he got to his office, the more the crowd would thin out. Compared to the surrounding decrepit and dusty shells of buildings, the Courier Office was sparkling clean and well-maintained. Always a few tough-looking types hanging around the entrance to ward off any potential blowhards trying to get their hands on any juicy bits they could.

Giving the group of intimidators a familiar nod, Olex walked past them, gliding through the front door of the office, the cold rush of conditioned air chilling his slightly sweaty skin. Directly inside the entrance was the general cantina, where the different couriers would go to take breaks and socialize with one another, some coming in from working, others waiting for contracts to open up for them. Olex flashed a smirk at a few familiar faces as they waved at him, and he continued along the side of the cantina towards a set of metal stairs leading to a small hallway. The door on the far end of the hallway led to the contractor’s office, a small room with a single desk and window, well-lit but usually hazy with e-cigarette smoke. Lining the walls were various safes and cabinets, with the office’s owner, Choi, sitting with his feet propped up on his desk, with his two heavily armed bodyguards leaning against the wall behind him. 

Even having been an employee in good standing for some time now, the guards still greeted Olex with the same suspicious glares they met everyone else with. As he fully entered the office, the guards stood up off the wall, and stiffened their grips on their weapons. Raising a gleaming metal hand to give a half-hearted salute, Olex greeted the room in his usual bright manner, not paying heed to the presence of the guards.

[color=darkorange]”Morning, gents. How’s the day looking, Mister Choi?”[/color] He said with his signature smirk.

[color=darkorchid]”Oleksandr! Good morning, my boy! Something strange has come up regarding you.”[/color] Olex’s brow furrowed inquisitively, and he stayed silent to allow Choi to continue.[color=darkorchid]”I had two Tinmen pay me a visit earlier, looking for ‘an old comrade’ they said. I didn’t mention your name, of course, but when I asked who they were looking for exactly, it wasn’t you, oddly enough. They instead were looking for a ‘Gerbil’, but when I told them I didn’t know him, they seemed disappointed. Then, all of a sudden, they asked about you. I guess they could tell by the surprise on my face that I knew you, but when I mentioned a price, they got sour quick. You know Tinmen, they hate to haggle, so once I started tossing numbers out, they found their way out fast.”[/color]

Olex’s face had gone pale. His chest rose as he took a shaky breath, in and out. Choi noticed, and took his own heavy sigh himself. Olex remained silent, his mind failing to find the words as it was racing with a thousand thoughts. Choi took the moment to speak back up.

[color=darkorchid]”Look, I don’t know what kind of ghosts you have chasing you, but if you need help, you know you can come to us. You’re one of the best guys we have, and I’d hate to lose you to some asshole headhunters that can’t let go of the past.”[/color] Olex’s gaze just pointed off into space, his tongue still just idly milling about in his mouth, with the silence deafening everyone in the room.

[color=darkorange]”I...I don’t think they’re out for me. They wouldn’t give me hints like this if they were. If it was really headhunters, they wouldn’t be asking my employer questions. That being said, this is all still strange. I don’t know who the other guy they’re looking for is, so I can only hope it’s just chance that they know I’m here. But, I can handle myself. I appreciate the offer but I think this may be a matter I need to handle myself.”[/color]

Choi raised an eyebrow as he mulled over what Olex had just told him. After a few moments, his stare at Olex broke, as he leaned downwards and started opening the safe under his desk. Opening the door and shuffling around a few papers and files, he drew a manila folder with the name “Maia” written across one side.

[color=darkorchid]”Alright, if you don’t want us getting mixed up in this, that’s your choice, but, I still need you to work. This contract is low security, but good pay. Some yuppie stuck in rehab wants to send his prostitute girlfriend a love letter, but they’re monitoring all his communications. Just get this to Reina’s Whorehouse downtown, and I’ll wire you the payment.”[/color]

Olex silently nodded and stepped forward to take the envelope from Choi’s hand, but when he gripped and pulled, the envelope stayed put. It took a moment, but he looked up to meet the concerned look that Choi was giving him as he held tight on the envelope.

[color=darkorchid]”The offer still stands, my boy. Take care of yourself.”[/color]

Olex stared blankly for a moment or two before he gave a weary smile, giving a few weak nods and muttering a few thanks before the envelope was released, and Olex slid the envelope into a larger pocket on the carrier under his shirt. He turned for the door, grabbing the knob, but turned back to the three men and quietly offered one last “Thanks.” before exiting the office.

He rushed down the stairs and out the front door of the office, stopping mid-step, just outside on the front step, looking around the now slightly busier street. People milled about in every direction, and Olex scanned as many as he could, looking for electronic eyes or gleaming new augments, any sign of an undercover Tinman he could find. With every person he eyed, though, it became apparent that none of them were his pursuers. If two Tinmen bounty hunters were after him, Olex couldn’t count out any brazen plan to kill him. He wouldn’t be surprised if there was a sniper team on the rooftops, and he quickly scanned all the surrounding buildings for such as soon as the thought came to him. Taking a deep breath and shaking his head, Olex stepped off the stoop, mixing into the crowd and starting his trip to Reina’s Whorehouse.

Paranoia began to wrap itself around his mind, like a snake around a field mouse, and Olex’s eyes couldn’t help but dart around at all the fellow people in the street, scanning arms and legs, faces and chest for any sort of shiny metal or gleaming insignias. Every few minutes his eyes would float upwards to scan rooftops, but none of it ever amounted to anything. It had been more than a decade since he’d been expelled from the Tinmen, he knew that he had a few ghosts on his trail shortly after he left the Seaboard, but he never believed they could still be pursuing him after so many years had passed. Nor did he believe that they’d even be able to find his trial after all the traveling and aliases over the years. It all came as a head rush, and it overwhelmed him to the point that he nearly didn’t see the two figures standing in the shadows staring at him as he walked down the street. 

Olex froze in place, and like an animal staring into the lights of the vehicle that would shortly kill it, his eyes bore into the small gleam he could see radiating from the blanket of shade over the alley before muttering a series of expletives and reaching inside his shirt for his gun. His fingers wrapped around the grip of his pistol. Whitening his knuckles, he began to pull the gun at the same moment one of the shadows bounded forward. Olex’s eyes caught the glint of a cybernetic arm as it grabbed his wrist and crushed it into his chest. Lit only by a scant beam of light, half of the assailant’s face was revealed to him.

Olex was forced into a wall , away from the crowd that was already drawing to the commotion. It was difficult to breathe as he struggled with the assailant’s brute power, but he responded in kind, his left hand going straight for the assailant’s neck, with his right arm snapping taught as the dueling motors of either augment roared against the other’s force. The whining creak of metal rubbing against metal bounced off the surrounding brick walls. Punctuating the fight with a deafening pang, Olex’s hand was stopped before he could get his vice grip on the assailant’s neck. It was only as he began trying to crank his wrist to point his pistol, even with his arm pinned to stomach, that he slowly became cognizant of the assailant yelling his name, and it slowly became more and more perceivable until he was looking straight up at the half-lit face of the would be assassin.

[color=darkkhaki]”Don’t, Asahi! Don’t shoot! It’s me!”[/color] A woman’s voice rasped as her dark brown, wide eyes stared into Olex’s own blue ones.

Roaring motors and whirring servos continued to whine from Olex’s struggle for a few more moments, but began to quiet down as he started calming down. It took a moment, but the familiar voice combined with the use of an old nickname made him snap out of his craze, and fully observe the details of the face in front of him.

[color=darkorange]”Wha- Who the fuck? Is that you, Grail?”[/color] His voice was incredulous, but he craned his neck backwards to get a more complete look at the woman’s face, and it indeed was one he hadn’t seen in a long time. He recognized the small star tattoo at the corner of her forehead, the shrapnel scar across the left side of her face. It was Grail, coined so after the “Holy Grail”, in reference to her ornate and beautiful engravings with inlaid gold she kept so immaculately clean covering all her augments. Now that his mind was clearer and he was paying attention, Olex could see their resplendent glow. Her eyes looked scared almost but he knew the woman that currently had him pinned to a wall seldom ever felt actual fear. 

[color=darkkhaki]”Yes! Yes, it’s me, Oleksandr. Just calm down, we aren’t here to hurt you. Let go of the gun, and I’ll ease up on you, alright? Put it away.”[/color]

[i][color=darkorange]We?[/color][/i]

A much younger man, with a crazed look in his eyes, one solid black arm of gunmetal and titanium training a gun on Olex’s head from the other side of the alley as Olex. Had the young man’s arm still been made of flesh and bone, it’d be shaking violently, with a look on his face that was that of a fish out of water.

Grail felt the tension in Olex’s arms release, and she relaxed in kind, looking up at his face to see that he still hadn’t looked away from the young man behind them, and she craned her head to look behind her. Light flooded her eyes, and through squinted eyelids, she could make out the form of her partner, who was still pointing his pistol at the man in front of her.

[color=darkkhaki]”Put the gun down, kid!”[/color]

The young man hadn’t broken his stare with Olex either or even moved since the scuffle had begun. Olex began to bring his hand to Grail’s shoulder, and gave her a gentle push away from him, to his side, so that nothing stood between him and the young Tinman. He took a step forward. The young man responded by taking a step backwards. Gunarm still jutting forward, his finger flirted with the trigger. Grail began to protest, but Olex hushed her, and put his arm up to keep her from getting in between.

Another step forward. Another step back. The pair of men maintained their icy cold stares. The young man’s pupils had contracted nearly to the size of pinheads as his eyelids were stuck wide open. With every step, Olex and the man moved forward and backward respectively, until the man was now the one with a back against the wall. All the while, Grail had been more and more aggressively telling the two men to calm down, while also trying to clear the small crowd that was watching from the end of the alley.

Olex finally took a step too close, and the young man’s entire body tensed in reaction. Grail noticed, but in the few scant moments it took for her to begin yelling and bounding forward to try to get between the two men, Olex’s hand flew up from his side, violently and sharply slapping the weapon from the man’s hand. The crash of metal on metal made the few remaining spectator’s jump, and then they further fled as the handgun found it’s flightpath right through the middle of the crowd, crashing into a crimson brick wall across the street, breaking into a few pieces. The last of the crowd finally scattered, leaving Grail to finally jump between the two men. Even as she gave Olex stern shoves to try and create distance, he had gotten a tight grip on the young man’s wrist, who now fought hard to try and wrestle away his one robotic hand.

[color=darkorange]”When you’re this close, you never just keep your hand out! Bring it in close to the body!”[/color] He roard over Grail’s protests. Finally, he let go of the young man’s wrist, and was sent a considerable distance back by the powerful force of Grail’s advanced augments.

[color=darkkhaki]”Asahi, fuck off, and chill out!”[/color] Grail exclaimed as she finally separated the two men, then turned to the young man. Surprisingly, she gave the man a slap across the face, seemingly waking him from his stupor as he finally looked down and acknowledged her.

[color=darkkhaki]”And you! The next time I give you a direct order, you [b]will[/b] listen, you understand that? You fuckin’ hear me?”[/color]

Grail grabbed the young man by his face, and turned his eyes into hers. Olex had finally noticed the difference in size between the two. Not only was the man considerably younger, but he was also of smaller stature, looking almost like a terrified child being disciplined by Grail. 

[color=khaki]”Y-Yes ma’am.”[/color] The young man quietly muttered.

The group all took a deep breath collecting themselves in unison, and before it seemed like the two Tinmen were ready to continue, Olex spoke up.

[color=darkorange]”Alright, what do you two want? Finally come to take me out, or what? I know you’ve been following me for years, how and why did you finally find me?”[/color] Olex demanded, rubbing the sore area on his torso, red and tender from having two metal hands forced into it.

[color=darkkhaki]”No, Olex, look… We’re not here to kill you. We’re looking for one of ours that’s gone AWOL. His last known location was here, in the Reclaim. We’ve been here for almost two weeks, looking for leads wherever we could, damn near a door knocking campaign.”[/color]

[color=darkorange]”Why look for him yourselves? Why not just hire some P.I firm? People around here aren’t exactly eager and willing to help out Tinmen.”[/color]

A tired look on Grail’s face matched the exasperated tone of her voice.[color=darkkhaki]”Look, technically, he’s not supposed to be here. Tight-lip contract, top secret bullshit. APEX-”[/color]

A third voice interjected. [color=khaki]“Ma’am! You can’t just tell hi-”[/color]

Grail simply hushed the young man by putting her hand in front of his face, giving another sigh, giving his protests some thought, and realizing he was probably right.

[color=darkkhaki]”Look. Long story short, it’s a confidential contract, but he stopped responding to communications. He’s been radio silent for too long, and we want to keep this as quiet as possible. We were acting like we were just looking for a lost friend, but once people finally started talking about a man with shiny, fancy cybernetics, it ended up being you they’d seen around, not our man.”[/color] She took a moment to compose herself further before she continued. 

[color=darkkhaki]”The guys have talked about you here and there for a while now, Olex. How you just vanished, how you got cut off by your family. After we heard that they’d sent the Hounds after you, we all figured you were dead. But now, here you are. We go looking for our man and find you instead. For someone on the run, you’re actually not that hard to find after all, pal.”[/color]

Olex scoffed, looking over his wrist for any sort of scuffs or dents, then looked up. [color=darkorange]”Yeah, well, after eleven years, I figured either you guys had given up at this point. Either that or I’d shaken you. Either way, you guys aren’t here to kill me apparently, so I guess it’s worked out this far. What exactly is it that you want from me?”[/color]

It took a few moments before Grail spoke again, as a mixture of weariness and nostalgia washed over her. It felt faintly like when a parent and child had spent some time apart from each other, with both parties having grown older and more distant with the passage of time. Except, up until a few days ago, she assumed the man in front of her was dead. A ghost of a far away past, an important character from a chapter in her life she’d long buried with more memories of battle and death.

Nothing felt nearly as sentimental for Olex. For years, he’d dreaded the next day he’d have to come face to face with another Tinman, the ghosts of his version of the past were much more real and haunting. Always trailing behind him, hiding around corners, observing from just outside his peripheral. No matter how far he ran, or how deeply he hid, the oppressive weight of their presence always overshadowed his own. Just like when he’d first seen an old girlfriend in the Duat, seeing the familiar face of the walking exemplification of everything he hated about the young man he used to be was a harsh and uncomfortable reawakening. 

[color=darkkhaki]”I guess I just wanted to see an old friend, is all. It’s hard to believe it’s really you. You were just a kid the last time I saw you, and I thought for sure you were dead, but yet, here you are. After all these years.”[/color]

[color=darkorange]”Yeah, that’s real nice. Real, real nice. How do I know you aren’t going to go blab to your fucking CO as soon as you get back? I knew you were always a lapdog for command. Yeah, you didn’t find your man this time, but you sure did find something else.”[/color]

[color=darkkhaki]”What, no love for an old war buddy, Asahi? It’s like that?”[/color] Grail smirked, a combination of surprise and disappointment in her voice.

[color=darkorange]”I never liked you in the first place, Grail. You were a cunt, always playing junkyard dog for command over the smallest things. A sniveling little shit who never had the balls to stand up for herself, only brave enough to bully the greenies. Now, here you are, a decade later, and you’re still a pain in my ass.”[/color]

Grail simply sneered, as the younger man walked past her, trying his best to put a look of intimidation on his face as he confronted Olex.

[color=khaki]”What about you, asshole? How do we walk away from this whole thing knowing you won’t tell anyone what happened here?”[/color]

[color=darkorange]”Who the fuck am I gonna tell? I work for a grey market intelligence courier in the middle of shit town. I’m not exactly popular with the enforcers. If you two stop walking around the Reclaim like moron out-of-towners, asking where your big, shiny metalfuck friend is, maybe it’ll all stay under wraps, you ever thought of that? I’ve got more at stake here, tell me why I shouldn’t leave you both dead in this alley.”[/color]

[color=darkkhaki]”Because you can’t.”[/color] Grail pushed the barrel of the pistol she’d drawn in a flash up to Olex’s head.

[color=darkkhaki]”Disregarding the fact that you don’t have the ability nor talent to kill my partner or I, there’s nothing in this for either of us to kill each other. You kill us, that’s the Hounds right on your trail again, and this time they [b]will[/b] find you. We kill you, that’s the Enforcers [i]and[/i] and your little buddies at the office on our asses. Not that it’d be a big deal, but that’s a lot more trouble than it’s worth when we’re trying to find someone in this shithole city. So how’s about we both agree to keep our mouths shut and go on our merry ways, huh?”[/color]

With tense fists and eyes full of hate, Olex stared down Grail, taking everything she’d said into consideration. He didn’t like it, but the two parties seemed to be at an impasse, with neither having anything to gain from violence, even if every impulse in his body screamed for him to kill them, like a crazed group of spectators thirsting for blood. His chest rose and fell, and he finally craned his neck to the side, moving his head out of the way of the gun.

[color=darkorange]”Fine. Fuck off.”[/color]

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