Arianna looked around as they walked, the warmth of the sun beating down on the pair as they walked through the streets of the middle class sector. The destroyed buildings around them seemed familiar to Arianna, but she could never be too sure. It was hard to tell one building from the other in the crazy mess. The only markers were the street intersections and out of place walls that jutted from the mass of rubble. She sighed, wondering if they would ever find her apartment in this mess, or be able to recognize it. "...but sometimes I wonder why they don't just make it so the can has a bottle-cap-like thing, because that way, if you open it, after it goes 'pshhhh', it doesn't have to be eternally opened. You can close it and reopen it for as long as you want! And..." Kisheto looked to his left. He was walking with his head held in his crossed arms as he stared at the sky and rambled to the girl. "...sorry, I talk a lot, heh." Arianna looked over at Kisheto, having to recall what he'd said before she could register it. She smiled amusedly, "I like hearing your voice instead of your mind. It gives me one more reason to speak aloud." The young woman took a deep breath, pausing at an intersection. "Do you remember any of these street names? They're somewhat familiar to me, but I was only here a day before all hell broke loose." Kisheto smiled and looked around. "Well... I usually just hung out on the roof tops. Maybe I'd have a better idea up there. But down here? I... uh... yeah, no idea, heh," he rubbed the back of his head, embarassed. Arianna looked up at what used to be the rooftops until she found a spot that looked sturdy. "Would you climb up onto that and see if we're anywhere near the old library? My apartment wasn't too far from it. If we find it, we can find my apartment." Kisheto smiled, finally feeling as if he could be of some use. "Sure thing, yo." Kisheto cracked his knuckles and looked up, squinting as he scanned the walls of the structures. He then smiled and took off his jacket, leaving his loose-fitting, baggy cloth garbs to aid him in manuevering. With a quick flick, he tossed his jacket towards Arianna and broke into a sprint towards the wall. Arianna, startled by the sudden jacket flying towards her, flinched and awkwardly grabbed the jacket before it hit her in the face. She blushed, hoping Kisheto hadn't noticed her moment of ungracefulness. It took two steps off the wall to get a huge leap upward, noticably higher than that the average human's. With a quick grasp, Kisheto's fingers found the edge of a window sill and he thrust himself upwards with his left arm, rotating to the left while kicking his right leg up. He stayed suspended in the air long enough to kick up once more, almost as if some force kept him in the air. His movements were fluid and agile, and before long, he found himself rolling over the top of the roof dusting off his hands as he looked around. [i]Wow... I forgot how beautiful it was up here...[/i] he thought as he scanned the area. He crouched and looked around, finally spotting the crumbling structure held up by old fashioned pillars. He cupped his mouth and called out to Arianna, "IS IT THE WHITE ONE WITH THE ROUND TOP? CUZ IF IT IS... IT'S RIGHT THERE!" he shouted naively with a finger pointing towards the direciton of the library. Arianna was watching Kisheto in awe, wondering how many years he had practiced climbing buildings like that. She doubted that she could ever do it as gracefully as he had done. She tensed as he shouted at her, worried that another host would find them. [i]Yes, now get down and don't be so loud,[/i] she half hissed in his mind as she tried to keep a calm demeanor. If another host found them, she was certain that Kisheto would have to do most of the fighting. She didn't know what he could do and it unsettled her. At first, Kisheto flinched as the voice seemingly came from nowhere, but then he chuckled off his foolishness and gave her a thumbs up before shouting, "ALRIGHT, COMIN DOWN!" With a swift somersault, he leapt off the building and thrust his legs into the side of the building. As gravity pulled him downwards, he slid along the wall, leaving a faint golden spark behind him, though he himself didn't notice. It wasn't long before he rolled off the wall and took his place back by Arianna's side. Arianna winced lightly when he shouted again, sighing. [i]We should never have left Iktomi's base,[/i] she thought to herself. Without another word to draw in anymore attention, she turned and began to head in the direction that Kisheto had pointed. ---- Rico and Perry took position at both sides of the entrance to the apartment as Rico leaned in and put his ear to the door. In a matter of minutes, he held up two fingers and motioned for the rest of the Golden Mercenaries in the squad to take position. Right then, Perry nodded and walked back before dashing forward and kicking the door down. The second the door was torn from its hinges, Rico and two of the eight mercenaries burst in with their rifles scanning the area. "Entrance, clear." "Kitchen clear." "Hallway 3'o clock clear. Scout left." The mercenaries scattered as they searched every nook and cranny for any hostiles. It wasn't long before Rico whistled, causing all of the mercenaries to pause. "All clear. Find the communicator," he said, and in response, the mercenaries began rummaging through all of the cabnets, closets, and containers they could get their hands on. Eventually, one of the mercenaries found the device lying on a dresser, behind a picture of a girl and her family. He grabbed the communicator, knocking down the picture before running out. "Retrieved." The item resembled a holopad, but was much smaller and more intricately designed. It functioned using a Data Core and Waveform Core combination found in the central commpak next to the main battery. On the outside, it had a touch screen and a central home button that could be used for a plethora of features, primarily to fold up the communicator into a nice, portable square. Rico nodded and patted the mercenary on the back before whistling and waving his two fingers in a cirle in the air. "We're outtie. Move." --- "So... so.... could you like... carry me with your mind? I could just lie in thin air and watch the sky? Oh shit, imagine the pranks we could pull with that power! I could pretend to be a floating ghost and I-I..." Kisheto broke into a chuckle at his own thought, and sighed as his laughter came to an end. The two had walked quite a bit, and Kisheto had only recently joined Arianna back on the ground. Arianna chuckled, "I might be able to hold you up for a few minutes. I might strain my mind too much if I did it any longer." She held up her hands, wondering how much she could pick up before her mind would give out on her. "Oh... Eh, whatever. Still a pretty neat mutation if yah ask me," Kisheto said naively. Arianna sighed softly. Would he ever realize that he, too, was a host? She stopped, hearing slight whispers of thoughts before they faded away. There was no danger, but she wondered who those thoughts had belonged too. As her eyes scanned their surroundings, she spotted her apartment just down the street. "There it is," she said, pointing. Without another word she walked towards it, her pace quickening in excitement. It wasn't damaged badly. The buildling next to it had collapsed onto the roof a little, but otherwise it was just dusty and cracked. "Thank Aeros," she breathed. During the year Arianna had been stuck inside of Sovereign, she often thought about returning to her apartment. Something within her had held her back, though. Maybe it was fear of the gangs that might roam the middle sector, or just her own need to separate herself from the outside world like the wall had done. Now, though, she was determined to reconnect with her family and the rest of Leginia. The wall wouldn't keep her inside of here to wither away any longer. Without waiting for Kisheto, Arianna stepped through the already open doorway and into the dusty apartment. A year ago it had been clean and ready to be lived in. Now, it resembled an abandoned house. Just looking at it told her that it had been ransacked by others trapped in Sovereign. Arianna moved through, searching for anything of her's that had survived the picking. She frowned lightly as she knelt down in front of an upturned picture on the floor. The glass was cracked, the pieces laying on the floor where it once laid. "This looks like it was recently broken," she murmured, noticing how there was no dust on the back of the frame. Kisheto eventually caught up and walked into the room behind Arianna. He had been sizing up the place, as he didn't get to stay inside a room of his own much often before the apocalypse. His life was always out in the streets, always roaming. "Well... I wouldn't mind living here, I guess," he said half-jokingly. "You find yah thingy?" Arianna stood, pulling the photo from the ruined frame. She looked at the spot where the frame had been and sighed. "No. I hid it behind the photo, but apparently it was found." She put the frame down on the shelf and turned to look at him, holding the photo in her hand. "It's gone." Kisheto squinted and looked at the spot from where she retrieved the picture. He then looked back at Arianna and tilted his head to the side before speaking in a calm tone, "Hm. I honestly think that there was more to coming here than finding some glorious walke talkie." He then smiled and look around, "They didn't take everything, did they? Man, what I wouldn't give to have a picture of my family." Arianna smiled softly, looking down at the photo of her family. She held it out for him, "I almost forgot what they looked like at one point." She took a deep breath and looked around. "I'm going to look around and see if any of my stuff is still here." Kisheto nodded and took the picture as Arianna went off to search through her old home. The picture was beautiful and it successfully captured the happiness within her family. Arianna was younger at the time, and she and her parents were at some sort of beach. Kisheto smiled and called out, "You're gonna have to thank yah parents some time..." Arianna furrowed her brows as she dug through her closet in her never used bedroom. "What do you mean?" She asked Kisheto. Kisheto walked out of the room and smiled as he set the picture down on a nearby counter, "Well good looks don't just grow on trees, y'know." Arianna couldn't help but blush. She was glad that her back was to him. "Thank you," she replied, unsure of what else to say. While she may have been an expert at learning, Arianna wasn't experienced in how to respond to compliments. Especially after a year of near-isolation. Kisheto looked around, "So... I mean, there's gotta be something useful 'round here, right?" He hadn't actually focused in on the clutters of materials, but rather just acknowledged the presence of potentially useful items. "Hell, if it were up to me, I'd just stay here, but y'know, it's still kinda [i]your[/i] home." Arianna turned to look at him. "As much as I'd like to stay, it's too dangerous. There doesn't seem to be many places around here to find food unless you want to take long trips to steal from the military. From experience, I know it's too risky to have only one place to stay if the military thinks of you as threat. The only options I see right now are Iktomi or the Golden Mercenaries. Either of them are questionable." Kisheto nodded, "Yeah, you're right. I'd prefer the mercenaries though. No offense to yah friend." He then chuckled softly and leaned against the wall, "but in all honesty, I'd prefer hittin' the streets myself. Or with a homie like you. No big groups though. That'd slow me down. Digging in and all is safe, but... I don't feel alive. I feel like I'm resting in a grave. Like..." as he began to ramble once more, he looked off into what used to be a window, "... why sign ourselves off when there's so much to be done... to be explored. Sure, there's eminent danger at every corner, but I'd rather die kicking at the bastards than rotting away in a bunker." He then sighed and shook his head, realizing he had gone off in a tangent. Arianna smirked lightly as he rambled. "I understand. To be honest, I don't want to commit to neither Iktomi nor the Golden Mercenaries. All organizations are corrupt in some way, but in order to survive comfortably, you have to join one." She sighed and ran handthrough her hair, kicking at the foot of her bed. "Anyways, we all want to tear that wall down. Everyone is just trying in different ways. The key is to join the ones that do it for everyone else, not just for themselves." Kisheto chuckled, "Yeah... that makes sense. So... if you had to pick right now, I'm assuming you'd choose Iktomi's place, right?" Arianna looked over at him, then away in slight shame. She busied herself by looking through her drawers. She found one of her old button-ups and a necklace. "I don't know, honestly." Kisheto nodded and looked down at his crossed arms. "I think... you should come with me to the Golden Mercenaries' hideout." He looked up and raised a brow, "I mean, well... they have a lot going on there, and I believe they're gonna be leading the charge against the wall." As he looked over to Arianna, he recalled what he had seen at Sector Zero before speaking again, this time in a more gentle tone, "When I saw their base... I felt so stationary. Everyone was moving around and about, working towards [i]something[/i]. Yeah, they're holed up but... if I had to pick, I would choose the side that did a better job convincing me that they wanted to leave. Plus, they have a whole circus full of mutants training to become superheroes, y'know?" he said with a soft chuckle. Arianna held up the shirt and shook out the dust. He had a point. Iktomi seemed a little too comfortable in his little mansion of webs. She felt like a piece in his chess game that he was never going to move. "I want to talk to Iktomi before I make a decision," she said as she smoothed out a year-old wrinkle. "Just to make sure I make the right choice." Kisheto nodded, "That's cool. I guess I..." he then chuckled and shook his head. "Man, Locks was right when he said I was too quick to trust. But hey, I never trusted the wrong person. Whether or not you choose the mercenaries, I think I'll stick with you for now. Not a lot of people seem to be giving off the right vibes, 'nah mean? Plus, everyone needs someone to get their back, y'know," he said with a smile. Arianna smiled back, glad that Kisheto had her back. She was about to agree when thoughts of a group interrupted her own. She also heard the distant hum of a carriage. "The military is here," she murmured, her face paling slightly. --- About a quarter of a mile down the road from where the apratment was located, a squad of ten men marched in front of a M.A.T (Mobile Assault Tank). It was a Military Vanguard Squad, and each member held the same set of weaponry: a large shield attached to their left forearm, and a broadsword powered by a plasma core in the right hand. The squad composition was to ensure a slow and steady forward movement, since it was hard, nearly impossible to kill a [url=http://cache.desktopnexus.com/thumbnails/58816-bigthumbnail.jpg]vanguard[/url]. Their shields were made from Linthium, one of the (if not [i]the[/i]) most durable steels forged from Warshiran elements. Their heavy armor also provided for what became a fort of a man. Their broadswords were sharp enough without the plasma core to give them a deadly after-swing trail powerful enough to burn through many things, human flesh being one of the more easier targets. Not only that, but the sword contained a secondary trigger to launch the trail of plasma that was created by a simple swing, allowing for deadly ranged attacks as well. At the head of the squad, the Captain of the Vanguard marched confidently. "It's about a block or two down. The apartment that has the building collapsed upon it," he said in a deep voice, distorted by his helmet. From behind him, one of the lower ranked officers spoke up, "Can we fire from here? The M.A.T is all set to anchor." The Captain shook his head, "Negative. If we damage the communicator because we suspected hostiles, the baddie's would have our heads." As he finished, he turned around and began marching backwards while lifting his hand and gesturing around him. "I want a clean sweep of the area. Wildhunt is still in effect - they all die. Don't touch any of the others, and if you find anything of use, bring it to me. Move." --- Kisheto raised a brow when Arianna's expression turned to one of worry, "What do you mean 'here'? Like... 'here'-'here' or, 'here' as in Sovereign? Cuz, I mean, they've always bee-" Arianna interjected, having no time to chatter. "They're looking for the communicator, too." She gave Kisheto a worried look, "We need to go. Now."