"Well I'll fuckin' be. It's Fetter Young. I thought you were dead. Heard the IMB broke up with you. How's life, not being buddy-buddy with the government and all?"

The man in front of Fetter was dressed up rather uniquely, in cargo pants and a Hawaiian shirt, along with an oddly patterned backpack. A rifle was slung over his shoulder, hanging down on his side.

"Nope. Not dead yet. And fuck off with the buddy-buddy shit." Fetter looked behind the man, watching the others scurry off of their ship in the moonlight. "How did you all get that past border control?"

"Trade secret." The man smirked, puffing out his chest with pride.

All the other members were also equipped with rifles, a rare sight in the city. Fetter silently stared at them, waiting for any sign of movement.

"So what brings you out to these parts? District 13 is a long way from your comfy home." His hand slowly slid down towards his gun.

"Business. I heard you had need of an extra hand."

"I wasn't aware that I asked for an extra hand." He tapped one of his feet against the ground, signaling the others. The other men started moving around him.

Fetter spread out his fingers slowly readying them. "It's better than the alternative, I'm sure you're aware. Unless you want to try?"

The man clicked his tongue with a shake of his head. "Men! At ease!" The others went back to what they were doing, offloading duffel bags from the boat. "You're only getting half a share!" he snapped at Fetter. "And carrying the goods."

"Fine by me."

The man cursed to himself while Fetter looked over at the dock, watching the shattered image of the moon pulse in the waves. The pile was only six bags. He walked down the concrete pier, and with a glow of green light, started slinging packs onto himself, two on his back, two on each arm. They were awkward to hold together, but no longer heavy.

"Where are these headed?" he asked, turning back toward the giant wall blotting out the view of the city.

"Right inside the wall. Needless to say, we don't expect IMB intervention. Our time limits an hour."

The group started their trek, thirteen of them in total. Two men with night vision goggles took the lead in front of the others. Fetter took the spot in the middle, surrounded on all sides, with the leader in the Hawaiian shirt following right behind him.

They headed up the massive slope towards the wall, right towards a tunnel through the concrete. The main entrance was blocked by a giant rusted metal gate, shut tight to prevent flooding, but a personnel tunnel branched off, letting them easily through to the inside. On the inside, deep trenches ran back through, under parts of the wall, giving a glimpse of the ocean on the other side.

They continued on for twenty minutes, past the warehouses that hadn't held a product in years. Eventually the buildings were replaced by houses, some collapsed, but many still standing, at least on the outside. The chills of the night got colder.

One of the two guys out front walked back to the group.

"Thermal is malfunctioning, says the temperature is freezing everywhere."

"I know it's a little brisk, but it's the middle of summer. Where's the other guy that was out with you?"

"I don't know."

"Buddy system!" He looked like he was about to smack the man in the goggles, holding back at the last second. He turned towards the rest of the group instead. "High alert, we have someone missing."

Hands quickly reached to rifles, as they formed a circle around Fetter, pointing in all directions outward. A few snowflakes started to fall around them.

The leader took his own goggles out from his pack, holding them up to his face as he looked around. "Shit." He threw them back into his bag. "Goggles are useless!"

Fetter held out his hand, catching one, watching as it melted instantly. There was suddenly a flurry of snow around them, along with the sound of someone landing on the concrete not even ten feet ahead.

Without waiting for a response, that side of the huddle opened fire. Amidst the noise and snow, Fetter saw cracks appear midair, sprawling out from where the bullets were colliding. A riccochet tumbled past his face.

"Hold your fire!" Fetter yelled. "There's a wall!"

After a few seconds, the leader raised his fist, and the others stopped shooting. The flurry soon vanished, revealing a massive wall of ice, now riddled with cracks and bullets. On the other side, no longer so clearly visible, was a man. Fetter started dropping the bags, frantically trying to get his arms out of them.

"Don't drop the goods!" The leader had turned back to glare at Fetter.

"Do you want me to fight or let you all get fucking wasted?" Fetter snapped back, continuing to drop the bags. "Just make sure they don't get hit while I fight."

"Fine! Men! Get the bags and get to cover!" The leader grabbed one, slinging it over his shoulder as he ran towards a door of a nearby building. The others followed after him, the last few keeping their rifles trained on the wall of ice as they retreated.

As soon as they made it inside, the man on the other side of the ice walked up to it. He placed a hand on it, and after a moment, the ice exploded outward, sending glass-like shards flying. Fetter held up his arms over his face as a green light enveloped him. A few chunks made direct hits with him, only to shatter against him.

"Who are you?" the man asked.

Fetter smirked. "I could ask the same." His words were pained, as though something was preventing him from breathing.

"Ricardo Rodriguez. Guess you could say I'm something like a police officer for this district."

The green light around Fetter vanished. "Funny you say that. I don't have a good history with police."

"No introduction yourself? That's quite rude." Not waiting for a response, he held up his hand, forming a giant icicle in front of him, tracking Fetter as he slowly strafed to the side.

It launched forward, a bit slower than Fetter had expected. He moved to the side, reaching forward with his hand to grab around it. It was cold, much colder than Fetter expected, like touching dry ice, even before his fingers made contact. He pulled back at the last moment, letting it fly past, curving behind him to slam into a wall.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

Twelve others had already been formed, much smaller than the original, and were flying through the air at Fetter. Pale green light flashed, and Fetter jumped dozens of feet into the air, slowly floating along.

Ricardo pointed his hand upwards. The air around Fetter chilled rapidly, slowly pulling him down to the ground with a buildup of frost. Dark green light lit up under Fetter's feet as he made footholds midair, sprinting along towards Ricardo. The frost shed off in moments as soon as he moved. As he closed in, he drew his knife from under his jacket.

Ricardo threw up an ice wall in front of him, scowling as Fetter plunged his knife into it, stopping on a dime. Fetter launched himself upwards, leaving the knife behind as he vaulted over the wall. As he came down on the other side, Ricardo lunged at him with a sword made of ice. Fetter however, barely dodged, twisting through the air to connect a kick with a darker green glow to Ricardo's stomach.

He flew backwards, slamming against the brick wall behind him with a deep thud. Fetter slowly moved back, as if in slow motion, doing a full flip and landing on his feet.

"Get lost kid," Fetter said, turning back towards the wall of ice.

"No." Ricardo let out a bloody cough, spitting it up onto the floor.

"You need a doctor. Now. I'm not going to kill you. You got a full life ahead of you." Fetter wrapped his fist with his sleeve, and with a hammering swing, shattered the ice wall.

Ricardo coughed up again, scurrying off into the dark.

"The assailant has been taken care of!" Fetter yelled towards the house the group had sheltered in.

The one who had been out in front with night vision goggles came out first, carefully looking around. The leader followed right behind him.

"Where's the drop location?" Fetter asked, picking up his knife from the cold ground.

"Just a couple blocks from here. Where's the body?"

"I just scared him off after giving him a good beating."

When the leader came out, he put his hand on Fetter's shoulder. "That's good pal. Only a little farther. Don't worry about carrying the bags, we got it from here." He gave Fetter a wink.

Fetter shrugged him off, heading off in the direction they were going before.

"No. This way now." The man pointed left from where they were going before. "You take the lead this time, in case there's more people."

Fetter could only let out a sigh. He changed direction as the others followed along behind him. It wasn't long before the man stopped him again. They were at a rather put together building compared to the other ones nearby, it even had a light coming out of the second floor.

"We're here this time," he said, a smile on his face. "You just wait here while I get the client." He ducked inside a door, slowly shutting it behind himself as he watched Fetter.

The others were already missing. Fetter felt something was wrong and jumped to the side. A knife punched into the ground right where he had been. He prepared to run, lightening his body as much as he could. A woman with purple hair landed right where the knife had, a giant blast of wind exploded around her as she touched the ground.

"Fetter Young! I meet you in combat again!"

"No! Fuck no! Not again! Goddammit!" His heart started racing immediately.

He tried to run, jumping towards the rooftop, only to be swatted out of the sky with a blast of wind. The pale light around him turned dark right before he collided with the building below him, slamming through the roof with a thunderous crash. The woman followed after him, jetting along with gusts of wind billowing through her cloak.

She jumped into the building, quickly glancing around, only to find it empty, with the back wall already busted down. She stepped out through it, looking around with her hand over her brow. Fetter was long gone, blindly flying forward with his eyes tightly shut, hurtling through the freezing sky far faster than he was comfortable with. Ira was long since just a speck of dust in the city below.

He was hyperventilating. Despite the icy wind whipping against his skin, all he could think of were scenes of carnage that that woman had left behind. He tried to shut off his mind as he sprinted through the sky, launching himself as far away as he could before the island itself was surrounded in a blue haze.

The night sky was shining down on him from here, without the light pollution of the city. It even reflected off the water below. When he finally stopped running, he was standing, cold and alone, surrounded by stars.

***

Ricardo tumbled through the door on all fours, spewing a glob of blood from his mouth. In his hazy vision, a man in glasses knelt down beside him with a particularly wide grin. Ricardo passed out.

As Ricardo came to, the familiar purple-haired woman was sitting across from him, flipping through a book.

"You!" he shouted.

"Our corporation would like to issue you a formal apology for the occurrence. We did not expect that man to show up and complicate things, and it was more imperative for us to go after him than to honor our request from you." Ira droned on as she recited the message.

"The hell does that mean? I almost died!"

"You shouldn't have fought when something was different than what we agreed. What if it had been an entirely different group that you tried to fight? What if there was a Level 5 there? The hell were you going to do?"

"You didn't die anyways. I gave you some new lungs." The man with the glasses leaned over the couch, protruding into Ricardo's view. "She stopped me from upgrading you though."

"It's not appropriate to experiment on business partners, Joseph."

"Tch. I swear I get no respect from you. Only you refuse to call me Dr. Mendele. Maybe the new girl will be better. Maybe she'll actually catch your target. Then I can go back to my lab."

"Excuse me," Ricardo said. "I want you to set up another attempt then. This time don't let someone like whoever that was interfere."

"That someone was Fetter Young."

"Fetter... Young. The prince?"

"Prince?! That's what you know him as? Hilarious." The spectacled man laughed. "He's no more a prince than you are a genius."

"That's purely a title, like a nickname. Out here in District 13, some people held his uncle's organization in high regard. I know it's not literal. Not that it fucking matters, they stopped helping us a couple years ago. We've been making it fine on our own since then."

"That's the very same Fetter Young," Ira said. "Don't feel too bad, he slipped away from me too."

"If you hunt him again. Let me help. I have a few ideas on how to hold him down. I promise I'll be useful. Just give me a chance to prove myself."

"Maybe. In the meantime, go report to Sebastian about your success."

"Tomorrow. I still need to rest. I can still feel this burning sensation in my lungs, like somethings wrong."

"That should go away in a few hours," said Dr. Mendele.

***

Fetter gently opened the door, cradling his torso as he did. His feet nearly gave way as he stepped in. Nero stood up from his computer, moving over to him.

"Fetter! What happened?"

"Where's Don? I need Don."

"Don!" Nero went behind Fetter to shut the door. "Fetter's back!"

Don stood up from the floor as his wings fluttered gently. The blanket he had been wrapped up under fell back to the floor. "Fetter? What happened? Where did you go?" He kneeled down next to Fetter, with a golden glow enveloping his hands as he placed them on Fetter's shoulder. "Any broken bones? Potential embedded objects?"

"No. I did take a nasty tumble through a building, but I didn't take it at a bad angle."

"Not at a bad angle doesn't mean you don't have any broken ribs. Here, does this hurt?" Holding his back, Don gently pushed on Fetter's chest, careful not to jab his claws into him.

"No. No. No there too."

"Fine." Don made a rather pouty face as the golden light wrapped around Fetter.

Fetter leaned back taking in the warm feeling from the golden light. "Aah, that feels nice."

"Now how did you 'take a tumble through a building', as you put it? Answer me honestly or I'll make you spend a week in bed. Doctor's orders."

Nero sat back at his desk, this time facing away from his screen.

"I went out to go do a job." His head lulled back

"A job?"

"Yeah a job. You know, something probably illegal. All the way out in District 13."

"Why would you do that? You know we're wanted, not just by the government, but by some shady organization. There's nothing we should be doing right now besides lying low."

"Don. It's because I don't want to be a burden." Fetter motioned towards Nero.

"You are being a burden! You could have gotten yourself a lot more hurt than this, or even worse! What if you got tracked back here? Or died? What would we do then?" Don walked over and sat down on the foot of the bed, crossing his legs.

"I don't know. I just. I feel bad about this. I just-"

"Fetter," Nero said. "It's fine. I owe you one, don't I? I can get a job or something. I'll figure it out. Just- Don't cause more problems."

"I never did this much for you, Nero. I can't just leave it at that."

"You'll just owe me one then, right? Don't bother answering me now. You probably need to rest, there's food in the fridge if you want, and you can use the bed tonight."

"Fine. Just stop yelling at me like you're trying to be nice. I won't be stupid again."