One nights rest does not a recovery make. Still, Alex is expected to attend her martial duties just the same as everyone else. No rest for the wicked and all that jazz. She’s not even the only one sporting an injury, the most dramatic of which is Dahlia, a short, tanned girl with long curls, who has her right arm in a sling. Alex wonders how she’s going to survive classes like that, but frankly, she’s got her own injury to worry about. There are a few others with obvious bruises and patches but nothing matching the wrap around her head and Dahlia’s sling.
The two dozen or so gathered around the rooftop shuffle awkwardly while they wait for instructor Korin, they’re dressed in matching red tank tops with black shorts, each wears their personal footwear, but they all carry their bokken’s in anticipation for the day's struggles.
“He’s late” Sasha whispers into her ear “Think he got shot?”
“Why’s that your first guess?”
The girl shrugs “He’s a bit of a prick, wouldn’t be surprising”
Alex mulls that over in her mind “well you're not wrong, but if that were the case one of the others would have taken over”
“True” she says “here's to hoping though”
“Yeah”
Eventually, the skeletal form of instructor Korin emerges from the stairwell. His eyes are bloodshot and his skin is a slightly lighter shade than what might be healthy, still, he practically radiates danger. The man is lanky and tall, his greying hair is styled in a topknot, and he scans the gathering of children with a scowl.
“Well” he starts “what are you waiting for? Get into pairs and start swinging.”
He taps the sheath of his katana against the floor “unless, of course, you’d prefer personal instruction.”
With that, Sasha gingerly locks arms with Alex and guides her to a corner where they can beat the shit out of each other without getting in the way of the others.
She’s probably going to go all out despite my injury, she thinks while getting into her stance.
Sasha wastes no time, immediately probing her defence with a series of jabs that Alex deftly parries, and replies to in kind. They’re familiar with each other enough that they don’t need to play the game of gauging and posturing, still, it's a good habit to keep, so they make sure not to skip it. A swipe at her forearm that Alex barely pulls back from signals the end of the introductions.
She retaliates with an overhead strike that feints into a horizontal sweep. It does not touch her of course, but the ferocity makes Sasha hesitate. Alex is a more defensive fighter, but the throbbing headache aching through her skull is clouding her more cautious inclinations.
Alex charges with a flurry of strikes that Sasha struggles to parry and dodge, Alex can almost taste victory. Starting off her day with first-blood would do wonders for her mood.
Eventually she pushes Sasha against the fence, and she commits to a heavy diagonal blow aimed at the shoulder, anticipating the feeling of wood against flesh-
And then she sees stars as her head snaps to the sky.
She wavers for a moment before regaining her footing, then a blow to her knee causes her to topple face first into the floor.
“You okay?” Sasha asks sheepishly
Alex sighs “yeah” she sits up from her spot on the ground “would have preferred if you left my head alone though.”
Sasha shrugs “‘weaknesses are there to be exploited’” she quotes the instructor with mock gravitas.
“Indeed” says a voice to their right that startles them both “That was a pathetic showing Alex, come, we must work on your defence and judgement” instructor Korin all but demands.
-
One session of training with the magnanimous instructor Korin and many, many, bruises later, Alex finds herself on a bench press hitting a new PR as Sasha does more cheering than spotting.
“C’mon girl, those plates don’t got shit on you!”
She whoops in joy, much to the annoyance of the others, when Alex manages to complete the rep. Alex grumbles in mock annoyance at her antics.
“Oh please, you love me and my complements”
Alex does not dignify that with a response.
“Can you be useful and replace the plates with something lighter?”
The girl has the gal to salute before doing just that.
A few exercises and machines later and the two are thoroughly drained. Gym isn’t the same as sparring, Minoru doesn’t care much if you spend the whole hour walking on the treadmill, but those who put in the extra effort are noted. Not that she or Sasha care much, they’re the type of people who actually enjoy exercise.
-
“Yoshifumi Sakamoto is the cornerstone of the Arthas drug trade, and consequently, our rise to power. Because of his mass growing campaigns we’ve managed to push competition away from the upper districts and secured ourselves as a force to be reckoned with amongst the greater gangs” Instructor Talia Hawk drones on “If there is one thing I want to imprint upon your minds, it is that we rise and fall through our finances. With Credits we buy weapons, land, and politicians. Without these things this very institution could not exist. Without these things we would be fighting for scraps amongst the filth”
Alex almost snorts at the term ‘institution’ to describe Lost Hope, that's certainly being generous. She does not enjoy history lectures, as they're mostly just a practice in how hard Instructor Talia can suck off the Sakamoto line.
She finds it funny that Yoshifumi is the only one mentioned in the story, and the many bodies, both laboured and buried, are skimmed over like an afterthought. The rise of a new gang isn’t exactly a peaceful endeavour, especially not in the case of the Crimson Dragons.
But she still writes his name down alongside his ‘accomplishments’, everything is tested after all, and she will not be found lacking.
-
“Yo” says a disturbingly deep voice.
“That's going to take some getting used to” Alex replies
Aki shrugs “not my fault I’m sexy”
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“That’s not the word I’d use, but sure, whatever makes you feel better shortstack”
Akihiro isn’t all that short, all told, he’s pretty standard in height, she’s just unusually tall for her age. Still, it makes for some satisfying proding when he gets a little too big for his britches.
Surprisingly, he doesn’t take the bait.
“Look, as fun as it is to go back and forth, I’ve got a job, and I was wondering if you and Sasha would be willing to come with”
She raises an eyebrow “I’m not exactly looking for a career in retail, thanks”
“Not that” he sighs “I mean an actual job, protection duty”
“There’s a dragon desperate enough to hire a bunch of kids for protection duty?” She says incredulously.
“Not a dragon” he says, which earns him two raised eyebrows “corpo needs to cross through Bastion territory, and hiring proper mercs is out of his price range” he pauses “creds are good though”
“Aki, the Bastions of Truth are fucking insane, why, exactly, would I want to step foot near one of those psychos”
“He’s paying five hundred each” he replies smoothly.
That gets her attention, a grand and a half is nothing to a merc, but for three kids? Yeah, that’s a big chunk of change. Still, can’t spend any of that if she’s dead.
“Where’d you even get this job?” she asks “you’re not exactly a known merc”
“Ellie passed it along, said it would make for a good test”
Well fuck me then, she thinks while bitting her cheek.
“Fine”
-
They meet in front of Lost Hope at eight, each strapped with a katana on one hip and a pistol on the other. She’s wearing her usual red tank top, black cargo pants, and runners. She’d prefer a vest, or a helmet, but she’ll have enough for one of those after the job. If you survive she thinks darkly.
Sasha was surprisingly willing to go on this suicide mission, they said ‘jump’ and all she had to say was ‘how far’. She’d thought the girl possessed some sense in that head of hers, despite all the evidence to the contrary.
“So Mr.corporate slave will just pick us up from here?” Sasha asks
“That’s what he said” replies Aki
“What is he like, I wonder? their type tends to keep their distance like we’re the plague” Sasha giggles
“I’m not exactly chomping at the bit to meet them, corporate connections are the last thing I need right now.” Alex laments.
“Don’t worry, he’s not some hotshot if he’s hiring us”
“That’s not as comforting as you think it is”
“Yeah Aki, that’s a little infantilising”
“Am I the only one who hasn't gone through a dictionary?”
“It’s okay Alex, you’ve got plenty of brain damage, no ones expecting you to know the big words”
“Rude”
They lapse into silence for a bit before a question pops into Alex’s head.
“Say, why does he need to go through Bastion territory anyway?”
“No idea,” Aki replies.
She turns to scowl at the boy “you took a job and you don’t even know what we’re doing?”
“I already told you, we’re protection duty” he replies “anything beyond that is only my business if the client makes it my business. He’s probably doing something at least slightly illegal, and behind his corps back, otherwise he’d just get proper security”
“Do you even know where he works” Alex asks
“Nope” he replies
“Great”
-
Eventually, Aki’s phone chimes with a message informing him that the client had arrived, alongside the details of the car. Apparently he came in a light blue Wayfinder, an interesting choice for where they're going, and by interesting she means idiotic. Wayfinders may not be a popular model, but it’s still a corpos car, and driving through Raisha town basically flaunting your wealth is just asking to get robbed.
She turns to look at her companions, and holds her tongue when she sees that they’ve come to the same conclusion as her. On the bright side, it makes finding the hatchback extremely easy, it’s parked a little ways down the street from Lost Hope.
The windows are tinted completely black.
Great.
Aki taps on the driver side window, and waits as it’s rolled down to reveal the face of the client. The man looks absolutely haggard, black hair a disheveled mess, with deep bags under eyes covered by glasses. Likely an aesthetic choice, his eyes are clearly chrome. So are his hands, and maybe his arms but she can’t tell under the sleeves of his dress shirt. On the passenger seat is a Ramus Mk2 pump action shotgun.
That bodes well for us
“You the guys?” he asks. She expected a hoarse voice to match his appearance, but no, it came out surprisingly smooth.
“One guy, two galls,” Sasha replies, causing him to roll his eyes.
“Are you the ones for the job or is this some petty attempt at a shakedown? I really don’t have time for that, and would prefer not to kill a bunch of kids”
Alex can’t really let that comment slide, it wouldn’t be proper. “On the Dragons turf?” she asks “you’re either stupidly confident or stupidly stupid.”
He clenches his teeth at that “Are.You.The.Guys” he asks again
Before she or Sasha can aggravate him further Aki takes the lead to placate the man.
“Yeah, that’s us. You’ll have to forgive my friends, they’re like sharks to blood when they see a chance to be annoying. I’m Akihiro, that's Alex, and she’s Sasha” he offers, pointing at each of them respectively. Sasha pouts at being interrupted, but Alex notices how he only stopped their fun once it might have lost them the job.
“Max” says the man who’s obviously not a Max “get in.”
-
After about an hour of navigating through traffic, they’ve officially left the safety of Dragon territory. It’s starkly obvious too, while there’s some graffiti littering the Dragons territory, here they practically consider it an artform. Brick, mortar, and concrete are all covered in intricate designs of all kinds. It doesn’t take long for them to see the symbol for the Bastion of Truth. A borg on his knees facing the sky, mouth open wide and arms raised in jubilation, he is not wearing any clothes, putting his cyberware on display for the world to see, not a shred of flesh to be found.
Tensions rise drastically at the sight of it.
“How many of their members do you think break before reaching full borg?” Sasha says trying to alleviate some of the tension, but failing drastically as a hint of fear enters her voice.
“There’s a rumor that all their prophets are borgs, but I find that…unlikely” Aki replies
“I’ve seen one of them” Max says, to the surprise of everyone, he’d been silent the whole ride. “The prophet of Dreams, she’s…a character. Then again they probably all are.”
“You talked with her?” Aki asks, astonished.
“Kind of”
“What did she say?”
“Mostly what you’d expect, doctrine and all that shit,‘The mind can only achieve so much when trapped in a sack of meat’. She wasn’t right in the head, kept going off on tangents before she’d reset herself at random points to the main topic. Hard to follow, but I wasn’t the one doing the talking so I didn’t have to deal with her creepy shit.”
“In what world do you get an audience with a prophet and live?” Aki glares at Sasha for that “What? I’m just saying, most stories involving them fit squarely in the horror genre.”
Max, surprisingly, doesn’t seem all that bothered by the question.
“Business” he replied simply.
“Huh” Sasha starts “I’m surprised they’ve got enough of their brain intact to manage a proper business deal.”
He chuckles at that “Oh, they most certainly don’t, our negotiator had to navigate a metaphorical landmine the whole time. It’d actually be pretty funny if I was watching from the safety of a screen. Up close it’s much less funny.”
“Yeah, I can imagine” Sasha says, tilting her head “actually, no, I can’t. I’d prefer to never have to either.”
“Hope that you never do, kid. Those fucks are-”
“We’re being followed” Alex interrupts, and silence overtakes the car. “Green muscle car, think it's a Falcon. They’ve been on us not long after we crossed the border.” she unstraps her pistol, Sasha does the same, and Aki takes the shotgun, checking to see if it's loaded.
“You couldn’t have said so earlier” Max seethes, knuckles white from gripping the wheel too hard.
“I wasn’t sure, now I am”
“Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck” Max so eloquently descriped before turning into a parkade.
“What are you doing?!?” Aki hisses at him
“If we keep driving, their friends, which they’ve surely called by now, will cut us off, and then we’re truly fucked. No, you three are going to do your jobs” he says as he stops in the middle of a ramp leading to the next floor. “Now get out and deal with them”