[img]https://i.imgur.com/4uuThLm.jpg[/img] [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8QpUGCXwOks]Over the rooftops of Northbridge[/url], beneath the distant shadows of cranes and the looming darkness of the exterior plates, obscured by fog that had grown thick and stagnant beneath blinded skies. A silhouette perched atop the remains of a lighthouse. Lean of form, with jet-black limbs that reflected no light. He could see it all. The city. His city. This heap of rust and scrap and stagnation, choked in the green haze of industry. Northbridge. The city was always spared from The Hunt, but human predation knew no boundaries; moral, physical, or temporal. Many sleepless nights he had spent here. Sleepless… never bloodless. Waveforms rippled on the low corner of his vision. Waveforms that burst with high peaks and short ends. Again, and again, in tune with a faraway cacophony. Names screamed, shells spent, insides trickled outside. Another sleepless night. The silhouette rose to his feet. His gaze panned across the skyline of crates and wires. He took a few steps back, with motions as even as they were symmetrical. Then he sprinted forward, on the edge of the broken railing, and leapt. The wind rushed against his sensors. Crimson-steeled feet landed upon the rooftop. Silent and breathless, he rushed. Across the edge, over pipes and debris, beneath vents and spotlights. He zipped from roof to roof, towards the heart of Northbridge, always too fast or too dark to be seen. The air grew thicker as he descended. Not just with smog or blood, but… [i]A roar.[/i] An inhuman sound that disrupted his view with static. [i]Impossible![/i] he thought. Those footfalls. Weighty yet light of sound. A biped. A predator. Thresher. His pace hastened. He jumped, straightened, and spun, right through a too-narrow opening between two fallen containers. Time seemed to slow as he plummeted. [i]Ba-thump.[/i] The thresher’s dark shape clawed towards a dead end. [i]Ba-thump.[/i] There was a heartbeat. Not the warring drums of the monster. A murmur. [i]Ba-thump.[/i] Blades of light ignited above his arms. He came lower, closer, until- A sharp hiss. A white-hot flash. The blade went deep, bolstered by the momentum of his fall, into the base of its skull. The creature reared up with a screech; high in pitch and leaking fear. The silhouette vaulted his body over the beast’s sinister side, his blade dragged across its flesh before it tore away, ripping a half-moon wound that glowed with fresh cauterisation. The silhouette landed onto the wall above Umbri, standing upon it as if it was the floor. He braced into a crouch, then bolted right back into danger. The monster swiped - too low - and snapped its jaws - too high - as he darted around it, a blade striking at each distraction, every undefended moment. Bright orange wounds trailed every cut, marking an elbow, a shoulder, an ankle, beneath its neck. The thresher thrashed and whipped, lashing out with every inch of its wounded body. Its tail cracked and struck out at the leaping silhouette. He contorted back, just far enough, so that the spear grazed his armour and cast sparks upon the night sky. The force from the blow rattled him nonetheless. The silhouette fell, flailing his arms in a second of panic, before he held out a palm. [i]Fhwoop![/i] A length of wire shot out. The strand caught light from a sparking sign, then [i]pierced[/i] right through the creature’s eye. The silhouette held the wire tight to steady his landing. He was close to Umbri now, less than a stone’s throw away. And as the sign flickered, she saw him first in the light. A jet-black body, with muscles close to the frame. Scarlet and crimson was bolted into his form. She could neither see nor hear him breathe as he pulled the wire. His widened steps bore no sound, and the blackness in the eyes and mouth of his bone-white mask defied any sign of life. A word was etched onto said mask, between a pair of horns. TEMUJIN. The creature hunched low and backed away, cornered as any animal. Fresh blood seeped down the scales beneath its eye. With claws outstretched, the beast charged at him, the earth shaking beneath its vitriol. Temujin flicked two fingers above his grappling wire, and zipped forward, launching to meet the beast head-on. The distance between them closed in mere seconds, less, and- The thresher swiped inwards, colliding its claws in a shower of sparks. Temujin was shredded before her eyes, torn into scraps of black and red that tumbled beneath its feet, into a white, viscous puddle. Slowly, the monster turned towards her, baring all its teeth. The false flesh of the cyborg stoked only fury, no appetite. Unlike hers. It approached her, its every step louder than her heartbeat. Saliva dangled between its open, hissing jaws, with a mouth laden with a thousand knives… …A shape flickered into view above the beast, shadowed save for the green rings upon his eyes. Green rings that gleamed against a bone-white mask. Temujin landed atop the beast’s neck, unscathed, and plunged his blade into its deepest wound. The beast reared up in shock. Temujin ran down its right side, dragging his blade along the neck, until he [i]ripped[/i] it out, landed, and rolled across the concrete. A low, unholy gurgle came from the beast. Steam rose from its cooked neck-wound, which tore wider, more open, until the entire head dangled loose, then dropped with a thud. The rest of its body followed suit, with a sound that boomed across the alley. The shredded illusion of Temujin disintegrated not far from the beast’s body, just as his own eyes disappeared into the darkness of his mask. Temujin’s blade hummed, a bright green blade that betrayed no trace of the kill… save for the pungence of cooked flesh, swiftly fading beneath the hum. The blade shrunk into its base, and the entire contraption collapsed into a narrow slit within Temujin’s arm.