After a short while longer the clothes were finished. Hammond quickly paid the tailor for the clothes and, with the green suit in one arm and the cloak wrapped around him, left in the direction of the inn. It would be easier for Ari to recognise him in a crowd if he wasn't wearing the hood, so he left it down for now on the off-chance that Ari was already on her way back.
His mind's occupant was making the usual complaints. Stuff about his teammates and the apparent lack of hatred. Hammond himself had become somewhat bored of the monotonous complaints by now so he continued to ignore them.
"Thank you, Ari..." He looked around before deciding to hurry them up on the way to buy more things for the journey. He didn't imagine that there would be too much more on the list, "We shouldn't take too long getting the rest of the stuff here. It would be useful for us to leave as soon as possible."
An hour or two later, with Geo's saddlebags full of equipment and provisions for the journey south, Ari and Hammond made their way back to the inn.
With the shopping done, all except for water, the main item on the agenda was planning a route. He couldn't expect a ridiculous pace from the three- uh, four people that would be traveling along with him, but he expected that the trip really would take at least 2 weeks.
But he had no idea about a possible way to get to the destination. Even if he was right with his guess, he would probably spend both weeks wandering in a general direction rather than actually getting anywhere. And Hammond had learned from experience that wandering in one general direction was a thing that usually ended badly for everyone involved.
The only question was who he should ask... He couldn't realistically ask a member of staff, nor could he ask someone who looked like they lived here. Ah, this man would do.
Hammond walked up, "You, hello?"
The man, clad in a suit of enough gadgets and beeping whatzits to power the entire city, looked up from his meal and raised an eyebrow. "Yes? Can I help you?"
"You look like the sort who travels a lot, so I was wondering if you happened to know the best route to the reach the Southern Traders."
"Ah," the man nodded before explaining to Hammond the route that would be best to take. "It follows along a river the whole way, so you won't need too much water for the whole trip and you aren't likely to get lost."
Hammond thanked the man and then went to find a table. It had been a while since he had eaten anything, and even then it was only a piece of toast.
[hr]
After his meal, sadly devoid of his companions but entirely talked through by his inner mind, Hammond took several steps outside. It wouldn't be long now until they left this town.
He let his gaze wander, meeting a couple of people. One woman who dropped her shopping, a group of teenagers who had stupidly managed to get themselves lost, all rather boring events.
"I had to walk across the entire desert region to get here, and you're trying to shortchange me!?" A man screamed, quickly attracting Hammond's attention to him. The man was obviously annoyed. Having drawn so much water across the desert only to be shortchanged, anyone would be. "You know what!? Screw this! Screw you, and screw this job!" The man pulled his lizard-drawn cart away from the second man, who was apparently an employer of some sort, before taking several steps towards Hammond. "Here: you take it!" The man, literally red with rage, shoved the reigns of the lizard into Hammond's grasp and stormed off into the nearest bar.
The second man, with a glance that may well have been anger, looked at Hammond. "Well it's hardly my fault," was Hammond's reply. He would wait outside until the rest of them showed up.
Savannah approached the entrance to the alley he'd arranged to meet his contact at. He'd fobbed off his companions with a vague "I'm going for a walk," which they seemed to believe, or if they didn't, they didn't care. He'd made very sure he hadn't been followed.
He looked down the alley and noticed the familiar metal plate in the side of the building. He slipped into this darker area and rapped a pattern on the plate. After a moment, there was a sharp metallic thunk as one half of the plate slid down to reveal a set of 16 holes.
"Password?" enquired a woman's voice from inside.
Savannah remained silent for seven seconds, cleared his throat, then repeated the process.
Another few moments passed before a different voice, a man's, asked Savannah what he wanted. Savannah asked after the state of the crime in the city to the south. The rest of the conversation was carried out in a complex cant language, which translated thusly:
"There isn't much, not on the surface anyway. Enforcement's well equipped. You'll want to look out for the J.B. Wokky Corporation. They're the reason the enforcement's well equipped. They function as a mafia."
Savannah bid his contact farewell and returned to the inn.
I never did get a replacement hat Savannah thought as he looked over the rack of hats the merchant had on his cart. He selected a fedora. There was something off about its design. He pushed it on and felt the top. He felt his thumb press down on something, after which a metallic snikt sounded and a vibration went through the hat, making Savannah flinch in surprise.
He removed the hat and found that a ring of small but sharp-looking metal blades had slid from the brim of the hat. Savannah raised an eyebrow and looked to the merchant, asking if he had any other special hats in dark green and in this design.
The merchant handed him a trio of hats in turn, outlining each one's speciality. One had a small turret mounted into it, another a recording device, and the third a thermal visor. Savannah handed over the llum for all four eagerly (at least for him) and thanked the merchant, proceeding to look over the hats some distance away.
After the other members of the party had conducted their business with the merchant - Em bought some poisoned darts and Ari one of his carts - they proceeded down the road. After a while it got dark, and so they set up camp. Hammond volunteered to be first on watch. Savannah found himself sharing a tent with Em. Sleep came easily.
After a while something disturbed his rest. He opened one eye slowly, scanning the interior of the tent, and found nothing amiss. Galncing behind him, Savannah could make out a strange silhouette pressed against the tent. He snatched up the hat with a thermal visor. The silhouette had no heat signature. Savannah frowned and leaned over to wake Em, but placed his hand over her mouth to stop her from making any noise first.
By the time night had rolled around, Hammond found himself cold and alone in the blackness... He had hoped to have something to preoccupy him and distract him from the cold, but sadly all there was to use was a silver dinner fork that twirled to and fro between his fingers. It had to do.
It was colder than he'd thought it would be out here, even with the fire raging and his cloak wrapped around him. Still, Ari deserved the tent more because... he didn't know how to logically explain why Ari should have a tent and he couldn't. Ari's a girl? Ari has pets? Ari had a bit of a problem before? None of those sounded like reasons, just excuses.
In fact, why couldn't they share the tent? Em and Savannah were sharing a tent, so why couldn't Ari share the tent with him? That idea crossed his mind and he realised that it had completely bypassed him earlier, not even appearing as an option. He wondered why Ari hadn't thought of it either. He decided that he would ask about that tomorrow once Ari was awake.
Suddenly a noise brought his attention back to reality and he looked from his place to where he had heard the noise. It was like... a scuffling noise, just beyond the edge of his vision. Anticipating trouble he pocketed the fork, pulled a scythe into each hand and stood...
The scuffling quickly went away and he assumed whatever had caused it was gone. Still, as he sat down, he couldn't be quite sure of it. The scythes stayed with him.
Em mumbled a few incoherent noises, before waking up. As her eyes started to focus, she saw Savannah leaning over, covering her mouth with his hand. She blinked at him, and he slowly moved his hand away, before gesturing to a strange silhouette around the back of their tent.
Savannah slowly crept out of the tent, his shadow visible through the canvas. After a few moments, he came back and signalled her to follow.
"It's someone sleeping." Savannah whispered to her. "Watch for any movements."
Em nodded and sneaked around the other side of the tent, making sure not to trip over any of the tent pegs.
She soon spotted the hunched over creature. It looked reptillian from the dim light of the camp fire. Hmmm... Don't some lizards hibernate at night? She wondered. What lizards? A voice in her head replied, trying to push her to remember. Umm... I forget. Em frowned, stopping a few feet away from the creature.
She watched as Savannah gestured to her, making strange hand movements. She tilted her head, confused.
Savannah sighed, and tried a different signal. What is he doing... Tying his shoes? ... OH! Tying stuff, he wants me to fetch rope. I hope... She thought, nodding and sneaking back to the tent for rope.
She returned after a minute, this time around the other side to pass Savannah the rope. Together they managed to tie the creature up without waking it.
They both took a few steps away, talking in low voices.
"What should we do with it?" Em asked, staring at the weird lizard-thing.
"I'm not sure. I suggest we leave it. It's safer fos us if it stays asleep." Savannah replied.
"Okey-doke, I'll keep watch then." Em smiled. She was too full of energy to sleep now. Savannah nodded and returned to the tent.
Em sat on the ground behind the tent, stretching her arms. What should I name this thing? Everything needs a name. She wondered What? Even things that will probably kill you when it wakes up. A snarky voice replied. Yes, even those. Hmmm... Petey? No... George? No... Sa- Wait what's that? A strange leaf had caught Em's eye. It was a deep shade of purple, and seemed to be the only leaf around. What the heck? There aren't any trees here. She wandered over to the leaf, stopping a few feet away and picking up a small pebble from the ground.
She gently tossed the pebble onto the leaf. As the pebble bounced onto the leaf, Em spotted a large figure slumped near Ari's tent. It seemed to be another one of the lizard things.
...Well that doesn't look good. Em frowned again, and made her way to Hammond by the camp fire.
Again there was rustling beyond the edge of the fire's light. Hammond grumbled, standing up once again to meet the potential threat. A roughly humanoid shape became barely visible and then laid down, though it was still too far in the darkness to distinguish anything specific about it.
He paced over, keeping his scythes ready in case of a trap, and looked down at the now sleeping humanoid. It was indeed humanoid in appearance, though it had scales to replace skin. Now that he looked closely at it he thought he remembered seeing something like this before. Scaly, hibernate often. The major thing he remembered was that they could be deadly if startled. He couldn't quite put a name to the species but 'lizard guys' would work for now. All he had to remember to do was not startle this one and he should be fine.
As he started over to his place by the fire he saw Em walking toward him. He discarded a thought about why she was up at this time, "Em, if you see any lizard guys around you should leave them be. They tend to get aggressive if you wake them up."
Em led him to the first lizard she had seen, still tied up and asleep. Hammond wondered whether leaving it like that would be best. If it woke up, it'd be pissed. If they woke it up trying to untie it, it'd still be pissed. He clumsily untied the ropes, expecting to get very hurt when he heard the human-like lizard groan.
As the ropes dropped to the ground Hammond gave a sigh. It was too late, he just wanted to get to sleep. He looked a little way outside the campsite to see a purple leaf. With a pebble on it. He had no idea why that had caught his attention. He must have been sleepy enough to mistake it for something of interest.
He decided that he would go back to the fire now. Em, for some reason or another, followed him. He didn't particularly care that she did, he just sat down and started twirling the silver fork he had again.
Em stared at the fire as Hammond started to snore gently. She was tempted to sleep herself, when she noticed some movement in the bushes nearby. At first it appeared to be another lizard, but there was something mettalic around it's eyes...
Em stretched, and got up slowly. Trying to look nonchalant, she went behind the nearest tent before activating her Dagger's cloaking device.
Right... Let's see what this thing is. Em thought to herself, sneaking back around the other side of the tent and approaching the bush. Another metalllic glint revealed that the figure was holding binoculars.
Definitely not a lizard. Em rooted around in her pockets for some darts, and quickly shot one at the figure. It fell down behind the bushes with a 'thwump'.
"[small]Yes! Direct hit.[/small]" She said quietly, sneaking up on the unconcious figure. As she tried to get closer to search him, there was a strange 'ping' noise, and she felt a sting in her leg. Her legs gave way beneath her and she also fell to the ground with a 'thwump'.
Well this is fun... Em grumbled in her head, trying feebly to lift her arm. She tried again and again, every few minutes, but to no avail. After what seemed like an eternity, she was able to move again, although her limbs still tingled from whatever poison was in the trap.
Cautiously, Em tried again to get near to the unconscious figure, and was able to disarm the trap this time. After making sure it wouldn't go off again, she scampered back over to the tents and went into Savannah's tent.
"Savannah! Wake up! There was a guy in the bushes!" She shook him gently.
Savannah woke and rose, asking what the man was doing. Em told him that she had tranquillized him. After taking a length of rope from the cart, he followed Em. When they got there Savannah noticed the man was wearing an odd suit of light armour, made with scales not unlike those on the lizard creatures from earlier.
He rather boredly told her to tie him up and promptly took him over to the fire once she'd finished.
"I suppose we should keep an eye on him for a while," he said. "Come to think of it, I'm feeling hungry. What do we have?"
Hammond half opened his eyes as he started to wake, both annoyed and glad that it was still dark. Glad because it meant he hadn?t been holding anything up; annoyed because it meant that he still had to wait before they could get moving. It was too dark to travel and he had a feeling that Ari, layabout that she was, had yet to wake up. If she didn?t soon someone would probably have to go kick her awake.
And Kronos would probably wake up at some point too, Hammond guessed. Not that he cared too much.
He looked around, noticing that nothing much had changed. He was still in front of the fire, lizards still laid around in the weird way that they seemed to do. The only thing that was different was when he saw Em and Savannah coming towards the fire with a tied-up man in tow.
He made no witty comments or sarcastic remarks. He didn?t feel up to it after just having spent the night on the cold ground
[hr]
It wasn?t long before Em was making toast, holding it out near the fire with her bare hands. He took a few slices of bread and skewered them upon his fork before pushing them eagerly fire-wards. It only took a minute before the toast was done.
Having finally found a practical use for the fork that had been in his pocket for what may have been several days and gotten something to eat; Hammond felt a damned sight better. He started eating his toast.
While chewing on the last piece of toast, Hammond looked at the person Em and Savannah had dragged over. He wondered why Em and Savannah had him tied up. Not that he had any ideas to untie the man because, let?s face it, if Em and Savannah tied someone up then Hammond isn?t going to overrule that just because he?s a bit curious. He?d much rather jab them in the ribs with a long stick to wake them up and ask them questions.
So this is exactly what he did.
The person rolled slightly and Hammond saw their eyes open up. The man quickly came to his senses, bursting free from the ropes that bound him, and pulled two knives from hidden compartments in his boots. Hammond was on his feet just as the ex-hostage was.
?You might want to rethink this,? Hammond warned, holding his scythes in a defensive stance, ?Or you might end up very dead. So sit yourself back down and I?ll think about not cutting your head off.?
He must have thought Hammond wasn?t being serious, because he didn?t pay attention. In fact, he got angry and charged with the knives.
Not that Hammond was particularly worried. He dodged the attack and swung his scythes, cutting across the man?s chest thanks to their superior reach. Despite this, Hammond cursed; he?d been aiming for the neck and now, instead, all this guy had was a line of blood going across his armour. He?d do way better next time.
The man looked as if he was having a fit, his mouth was foaming and he looked like he was going to explode from rage. He charged again, faster than Hammond had anticipated, and sliced across his side with one of the knives.
Before the berserker could come back from his attack, Hammond was already forcing a sharpened scythe blade through the man?s trachea.
The man?s head landed in the sand with a dull thud. Hammond breathed a sigh of relief and, forgetting all about the man?s existence in roughly half a second, took a seat back at the campfire with Em and Savannah.
?Well that was fun.? He started eating another slice of toast.
"Damnit Hammond! I wanted to know why he was hiding in the bushes." Em sulked as Hammond sat back down, calmly eating more toast. "Now we'll never know."
She discarded her toast, and wandered over to the corpse of the strange man. Hmm... It's a shame. He had really nice armour too. And it was booby trapped..... Em glanced back at Hammond and Savannah, but they weren't paying any attention to her. Avoiding setting off the trap again, she managed to clumsily strip the armour from the deceased attacker.
"Damnit Hammond... There's blood everywhere." Em exploited her new found catchphrase as she tried on a few bits of the armour. Before she knew it she was head to toe in the attackers strangely coloured clothing.
"Hey guys, look! I'm like one of those lizard things." Giggling, Em twirled as she showed off her new outfit.
Savannah raised an eyebrow for a moment, then told everyone to worry about it later, and that they should get moving.
Sometime later...
Something thudded into Savannah's chest, hard. He cried out and looked in the direction it came from. The sun had caught something in the distance - a rifle scope.
"Sniper! Take cover!" he managed to yell before fumbling behind the cart himself, clutching his chest cursing foully from the pain. He could barely see from the water in his eyes.
A sniper? Hammond's gaze swung to meet the glint of a rifle a long way in the distance. He couldn't realistically take on a sniper from this range so, in typical fashion, he had to geta lot closer in almost no time. He armed himself with his scythes and began a dash as fast as he could manage to go. He must have been a lot faster than he thought because in an instant he found himself upon the dune with his back to the sniper.
How...? It didn't matter how. He turned around and, considering how the last captive had reacted, stabbed a scythe into the sniper's arm. It woud be funny seeing him trying to hold a gun now!
Hammon took a step backwards, expecting the helmeted sniper to roll over and attempt to beg for his life. He was happily greeted instead with the snipe drawing a beamsword and standing up, ready to fight. At least this wouldn't be boring.
The sniper attacked, lunging with the blade held at arm's length, and Hammond avoided quickly to the side. The sword managed to hit him, though only enough to graze his arm. A huge surge of light erupted from both Hammond's scythes, proving inneffectual, and the sniper jumped forwards again. This time it sliced across Hammond's stomach.
Fine, that's it! Hammond could not be bothered with this anymore. He jumped backwards and swung his scythe around to implant itself in the sniper's head.
The sniper fell to his knees, head intact, and put his head in his hands. No doubt he was thanking whichever diety it was that he thought had saved him. He was taking off his helmet...?
Wha...? The sniper removed his helmet and she looked up at Hammond, with red hair flowing from her head, rubies hanging from her ears and green eyes filled with tears. "Please don't kill me... I'll tell you anything, do anything... Just don't kill me."
Well this was interesting, to say the very least. "Why should I even think about letting you go after attacking me?"
"I-I was just hired to do it."
"By who?"
She shook her head, "I can't say! If I tell you he'll kill me!"
"Well if you don't tell me," Hammond raised the scythe to her neck, "I'll kill you."
"I can't tell you! I'll tell you anything else but that."
Hammond begrudgingly accepted that he really might not want to know who it was sending snipers. But if she wasn't going to give a 'who', perhaps she could give a 'why'? "Why were you sent to kill us?"
"I was told to kill the ones with the rebel Kronos."
Ah... There was a name he hadn't missed even slightly. It was no wonder he'd managed to piss someone off again. Now that he had this information he ran out of things to say. He thought about killing her and letting her suffer a slow death in bloodsodden sands but, pausing to look over his shoulder, people would start to worry if he was suddenly killing everyone they managed to run across...
Are you sure that's the only reason you're keeping her alive? Heh.
He rolled his eyes and removed the scythe from the woman's throat, "Put your weapons on the ground then get out of my sight."
The woman's look suddenly went sour and she started to drift from reality. Without a single movement from him the woman had disappeared, leaving a bag of money and a single red coin. Huh, weird... He pocketed both and then went to go join the others.
As Hammond returned from where ever he'd disappeared too, they slowly set off again. Em offered to swop with Savannah, seeing as he'd been tagged by the mysterious sniper.
She walked a few paces behind the cart, humming to herself and trying to get rid of some of the dried blood on her new armour. "I wonder who was shooting at us anyway.." She mumbled to herself, glancing behind them every so often just in case another one showed up. Luckily there were no more incidents, and they reached a town within hours.
"Civilasation! Food! We're aliiiiive!" Em cried out dramatically, causing a few people to stare at her and hurry past. She felt a shiver down her spine and saw Hammond glaring at her from the front, as if to say 'Be quiet! We don't need any more attention.' Frowning a little, she looked at all the houses and shops, hoping to spot an inn along the way. As they were passing by an alley, she saw a smart looking business man waving at her. She waved back cheerfully, and he beckoned her to the alley, before stepping back a bit.
Huh, that was strange. Does he want me to follow? Sure looks that way, are you going to? Might as well, maybe Kronos sent him! Em thought cheerfully.
"Be back in a second guys!" She called to Ari and Savannah inside the cart, before weaving through the crowd towards the alley. The man smiled as she joined him behind a pile of crates, and extended his hand to greet her. "
Code:
Welcome, Miss Emilee
." He said with a strange grin. She shook his hand tentitively, and looked confused. "How do you know me? I don't think we've met." Letting go of his hand, Em narrowed her eyes at him and took a step backwards.
"
Code:
Of course not, but your reputation proceeds you. I am in need of a favour that requires your... 'specific skillset'.
" The man replied, choosing his words carefully. "What specific skillset would that be?" This was becoming more confusing by the second. "
Code:
Your more... morally questionable skillset. The one that involves freeing people of their belongings.
" At once Em's face cleared, and she smiled mischievously.
"Ah, that skillset. Well colour me interested." Em said, although the man was already searching through his coat, as if he'd anticipated her answer. Or maybe he was the type who never expected the word 'no.' After gathering together some sheets of paper, he handed them over to her. One was a map, the second was a checklist, and the third a set of directions.
"
Code:
I require three items, the first and second should be no problem...but you'll have to neutralize some gaurds to get the last item. I'll pay you three hundred Llum for each item you can get me. The directions will get you to the building, the map contains a floorplan for the area the items are in. fifth floor. I suggest you wait til night and I suggest you get some climbing equipment.
" He pauses for a moment "
Code:
And you'll have to leave your friends behind. Too many people and you're bound to get caught.
" He adds, then extends a hand again. "
Code:
Do we have a deal?
".
"I'll see what I can do." Em shook his hand again, feeling a lot more friendly towards him this time. "Where should I meet you once I'm done?" She called to him, as he turned to leave. "
Code:
If you succeed... I'll find you.
" He said mysteriously, then walked off as if nothing had happened.
"What a strange man." Em said, stowing the papers carefully inside her vest. She would go through them later, but for now she had to find the others again and think of an excuse. She rushed back down the street, and found them after a few minutes.
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