03-31-2017, 11:04 PM
“And coming down the final stretch in what appears to be an upset for the ages, Stargaze Smoker is your champion for today folks, this young racer has taken the scene by storm and has just cemented herself as a force to be reckoned with!”
The announcer’s voice cut over the cacophony of the erupting crowd. Everything from cheers to screaming to disgruntled “boos” fused together to form a chaotic mess of noise. Charles clapped, shouted, and whooped while Mal sat frozen in his seat. Stargaze Smoker, a young girl in a bright yellow jumpsuit stepped up to the announcer’s stage to accept her prize. She smiled and waved to the crowd and held up her trophy.
A well-dressed man with a microphone walked up to her and asked into the microphone, “congratulations on your victory, anything you want to say to your fans?”
The black-haired racer smiled and leaned closer to the microphone, “yeah, I’d like to thank those of you that believed I could do it, and those of you that didn’t can bite me.”
She brought a finger up to her eye and pulled down her bottom eyelid while sticking her tongue out. The crowd erupted into an equal mix of cheering and disgruntled shouting. Charlie laughed and clapped along with the crowd. Mallory’s overloaded brain came back online and he stood up and shouted triumphantly. After celebrating for a few minutes the duo left the stands and made their way to the teller’s booth. Mal threw his arm around his companion’s shoulder and they both leaned on the teller’s counter. The larger of the two took a puff of his cigar and slid the winning ticket across the table. The girl who was running the counter twirled a lock of her green hair and raised an eyebrow.
“Congratulations,” she said, “lotta people lost a lotta money today, no one really expected Smoker to place, let alone win the whole thing.”
“What can I say,” Charles said and nudged Mallory, “I’ve got a sixth sense for these kind of things.”
“Dumb luck, nothing more and nothing less Charlie,” Mal responded.
“You say dumb luck I say jackpot.”
Mallory rolled his eyes.
The teller slid the ticket into a machine and tapped a few numbers into the touch screen. It took a few moments for verification, but soon enough the machine began to whir. It spit out a plastic bank card which the teller removed and handed over to Charlie. He turned it over in his hand, feeling the warmth of the freshly printed credit chip.
“20,000 credits, good as cash anywhere outside of Camelot,” the green-haired girl said, “you’ll have to take it to your bank to deposit it, we can’t deposit it for you, not sure why, some kinda tax evasion laws or something.”
Charlie exhaled a cloud of smoke and said, “that’s fine, we’re pretty much untouchable.”
Life was good. Charlie kept turning the card over and over between his fingers, his mind swimming with possibilities. They were standing just outside the entrance to the racetrack. Around them the crowd surged outward as the final race for the day came to a close. Mallory checked his phone, sent a message, and then pocketed it.
“So what now?” Mallory asked.
“Well, we’ll split it fifty-fifty, seeing as it was your seed money and I was the one that made the bet, fair’s fair right?”
“Right, but I mean, what about the Ashen Blades?”
“Fuck them,” Charlie said pinching the card between his thumb and forefinger and holding it up in front of Mallory, “this right here is our ticket out of that bullshit.”
“He’ll come and kill us y’know that right?”
“He can try, but if we invest our earnings just right he’ll have a hell of a time finding us.”
Mallory nodded and watched as a street merchant pulled a cart past them. He said, “you really should put that card in your pocket, this place is full of thieves.”
“Now who in their right mind would be dumb enough to-”
He was cut short as the business end of a baseball bat slammed into his back. Falling faster than a chopped tree Charlie collapsed forward onto his hands and knees. Mallory whirled around, his hand already wrapped around the butt of his sawed-off. Where he was expecting a gang of burly street thugs he instead found a teenager holding a wooden bat emblazoned with bright yellow letters that read “SLUGGER”. The bounty hunter froze for a moment as he fought back the urge to draw and fire. There wasn’t even time for him to make up his mind, two metal prongs pierced through his jacket and found their way into the small of his back. A split-second later his world erupted into static as 50,000 volts of electricity ravaged his body. A pink-haired girl, roughly the same age as the boy, stepped over Mallory’s twitching body. Charlie attempted to move but a swift boot to the ribs knocked the wind from him. A third assailant, this one a young boy in an oversized hoodie, scooped up the fallen card. As fast as it started it ended, the three assailants scampered off into the crowd as the two bounty hunters regained their senses.
Charlie growled and jumped to his feet, unholstering his hand cannon and leveling it at Pink-hair’s backside. Mallory clawed at his companion’s arm, lowering the weapon to the ground.
“What the fuck Mal?” Charles demanded.
“She’s a fucking kid,” he answered, “and you’ll wipe out half the crowd with that fuckin’ thing.”
“I don’t give a good God damned about what she is, she stole our money.”
Seeing his clear shot evaporate before his eyes the larger bounty hunter took chase. Mallory groaned and followed behind, his biomechanical components still rebooting from the sudden shock. Charlie was barely able to keep sight of the delinquents, the occasional flash of bright pink hair in an ocean of bodies kept him on their trail. He barreled through whatever was in his path be it human, fruit stand, or small animal. The trio turned down back alley after back alley, leading the bounty hunters through the labyrinth that was Tier 4. As Charlie rounded a corner he came face-to-face with the three thieves, they had led him to a dead-end. He growled and raised his hand cannon and held out his palm.
“You’ve made a very bad man very, very angry today,” he said, his voice a gravel-crusher in low-gear, “hand over the money and I’ll play nice.”
“Ch’yeah right,” the bat-wielder said, “we’ll hand it right up your ass fucko.”
“Wrong answer.”
“STINKY GAS!” shouted the youngest as he revealed a set of akimbo squirt guns.
Charles moved to lower his pistol, but was buffeted in the face by a noxious green gas. Instinctively he shut his eyes and tried not to breath. The caustic gas singed his nostrils and burned the insides of his lungs. He stumbled backwards, trying to escape the miasmatic cloud. Mallory rounded the corner just in time to see the kids peel back a large metal plate in the floor. A metal chute, probably one used to transport garbage once upon a time, was revealed and the youngest jumped in first. Dodging his thrashing partner Mal made a sprint for their quarry. The eldest threw his baseball bat down the chute and jumped in after it. Just as Pink-hair stepped over the gap Mallory’s hand grabbed her wrist. She yelped and tried to jump in, but Mallory pulled her back and threw her to the ground. He retrieved a pair of handcuffs from his belt and threw them around her wrists. She struggled and cussed and thrashed and spit and kicked and bit, but Mallory’s size advantage and training proved to be more than she could handle.
“Got one,” Mallory shouted to his stumbling companion.
The announcer’s voice cut over the cacophony of the erupting crowd. Everything from cheers to screaming to disgruntled “boos” fused together to form a chaotic mess of noise. Charles clapped, shouted, and whooped while Mal sat frozen in his seat. Stargaze Smoker, a young girl in a bright yellow jumpsuit stepped up to the announcer’s stage to accept her prize. She smiled and waved to the crowd and held up her trophy.
A well-dressed man with a microphone walked up to her and asked into the microphone, “congratulations on your victory, anything you want to say to your fans?”
The black-haired racer smiled and leaned closer to the microphone, “yeah, I’d like to thank those of you that believed I could do it, and those of you that didn’t can bite me.”
She brought a finger up to her eye and pulled down her bottom eyelid while sticking her tongue out. The crowd erupted into an equal mix of cheering and disgruntled shouting. Charlie laughed and clapped along with the crowd. Mallory’s overloaded brain came back online and he stood up and shouted triumphantly. After celebrating for a few minutes the duo left the stands and made their way to the teller’s booth. Mal threw his arm around his companion’s shoulder and they both leaned on the teller’s counter. The larger of the two took a puff of his cigar and slid the winning ticket across the table. The girl who was running the counter twirled a lock of her green hair and raised an eyebrow.
“Congratulations,” she said, “lotta people lost a lotta money today, no one really expected Smoker to place, let alone win the whole thing.”
“What can I say,” Charles said and nudged Mallory, “I’ve got a sixth sense for these kind of things.”
“Dumb luck, nothing more and nothing less Charlie,” Mal responded.
“You say dumb luck I say jackpot.”
Mallory rolled his eyes.
The teller slid the ticket into a machine and tapped a few numbers into the touch screen. It took a few moments for verification, but soon enough the machine began to whir. It spit out a plastic bank card which the teller removed and handed over to Charlie. He turned it over in his hand, feeling the warmth of the freshly printed credit chip.
“20,000 credits, good as cash anywhere outside of Camelot,” the green-haired girl said, “you’ll have to take it to your bank to deposit it, we can’t deposit it for you, not sure why, some kinda tax evasion laws or something.”
Charlie exhaled a cloud of smoke and said, “that’s fine, we’re pretty much untouchable.”
Life was good. Charlie kept turning the card over and over between his fingers, his mind swimming with possibilities. They were standing just outside the entrance to the racetrack. Around them the crowd surged outward as the final race for the day came to a close. Mallory checked his phone, sent a message, and then pocketed it.
“So what now?” Mallory asked.
“Well, we’ll split it fifty-fifty, seeing as it was your seed money and I was the one that made the bet, fair’s fair right?”
“Right, but I mean, what about the Ashen Blades?”
“Fuck them,” Charlie said pinching the card between his thumb and forefinger and holding it up in front of Mallory, “this right here is our ticket out of that bullshit.”
“He’ll come and kill us y’know that right?”
“He can try, but if we invest our earnings just right he’ll have a hell of a time finding us.”
Mallory nodded and watched as a street merchant pulled a cart past them. He said, “you really should put that card in your pocket, this place is full of thieves.”
“Now who in their right mind would be dumb enough to-”
He was cut short as the business end of a baseball bat slammed into his back. Falling faster than a chopped tree Charlie collapsed forward onto his hands and knees. Mallory whirled around, his hand already wrapped around the butt of his sawed-off. Where he was expecting a gang of burly street thugs he instead found a teenager holding a wooden bat emblazoned with bright yellow letters that read “SLUGGER”. The bounty hunter froze for a moment as he fought back the urge to draw and fire. There wasn’t even time for him to make up his mind, two metal prongs pierced through his jacket and found their way into the small of his back. A split-second later his world erupted into static as 50,000 volts of electricity ravaged his body. A pink-haired girl, roughly the same age as the boy, stepped over Mallory’s twitching body. Charlie attempted to move but a swift boot to the ribs knocked the wind from him. A third assailant, this one a young boy in an oversized hoodie, scooped up the fallen card. As fast as it started it ended, the three assailants scampered off into the crowd as the two bounty hunters regained their senses.
Charlie growled and jumped to his feet, unholstering his hand cannon and leveling it at Pink-hair’s backside. Mallory clawed at his companion’s arm, lowering the weapon to the ground.
“What the fuck Mal?” Charles demanded.
“She’s a fucking kid,” he answered, “and you’ll wipe out half the crowd with that fuckin’ thing.”
“I don’t give a good God damned about what she is, she stole our money.”
Seeing his clear shot evaporate before his eyes the larger bounty hunter took chase. Mallory groaned and followed behind, his biomechanical components still rebooting from the sudden shock. Charlie was barely able to keep sight of the delinquents, the occasional flash of bright pink hair in an ocean of bodies kept him on their trail. He barreled through whatever was in his path be it human, fruit stand, or small animal. The trio turned down back alley after back alley, leading the bounty hunters through the labyrinth that was Tier 4. As Charlie rounded a corner he came face-to-face with the three thieves, they had led him to a dead-end. He growled and raised his hand cannon and held out his palm.
“You’ve made a very bad man very, very angry today,” he said, his voice a gravel-crusher in low-gear, “hand over the money and I’ll play nice.”
“Ch’yeah right,” the bat-wielder said, “we’ll hand it right up your ass fucko.”
“Wrong answer.”
“STINKY GAS!” shouted the youngest as he revealed a set of akimbo squirt guns.
Charles moved to lower his pistol, but was buffeted in the face by a noxious green gas. Instinctively he shut his eyes and tried not to breath. The caustic gas singed his nostrils and burned the insides of his lungs. He stumbled backwards, trying to escape the miasmatic cloud. Mallory rounded the corner just in time to see the kids peel back a large metal plate in the floor. A metal chute, probably one used to transport garbage once upon a time, was revealed and the youngest jumped in first. Dodging his thrashing partner Mal made a sprint for their quarry. The eldest threw his baseball bat down the chute and jumped in after it. Just as Pink-hair stepped over the gap Mallory’s hand grabbed her wrist. She yelped and tried to jump in, but Mallory pulled her back and threw her to the ground. He retrieved a pair of handcuffs from his belt and threw them around her wrists. She struggled and cussed and thrashed and spit and kicked and bit, but Mallory’s size advantage and training proved to be more than she could handle.
“Got one,” Mallory shouted to his stumbling companion.
![[Image: ZzG0TJ9.png]](http://i.imgur.com/ZzG0TJ9.png)
![[Image: AshenBladeBadge.png]](http://www.cytokineindustries.com/chevereto/images/2017/07/13/AshenBladeBadge.png)