"Don’t talk. Don’t even look at them. Listen to me, and you’ll get to your damn elevator. But that’s as far as I’m taking you," The man said. A sergeant by the name of Joyce, it said so in the name tag he kept underneath his sleeve. He was like the rest of the black-uniformed soldiers, without medals or tags or association to anything, really. They were ghosts.

"Allow me my cane," Ritcher said to the traitor.

"No, no way. That'll give you away in a second." He said. "Just stay near my shoulder, and I'll lead you, even a blind man can do that, right?"

"I need the cane," His voice was low. It felt like the dry wind of a desert, crackled and scraping.

"Shit," Joyce worked the cane into a duffel bag he flung over his shoulders. They both left the black van in the parking lot. He tapped Ritcher on the arm. "Fine, keep your cane. But understand this, I had no association with any of this. The deal is to leave you at the elevator, understand? After that, it’s all on you.”

"I know,"

"What did I say then?"

"You're only to lead me to the elevator," Ritcher took the lead. Joyce had to run to catch up to him, both of them came from one of the garages. Heading towards the rear door of the casino. There, two men waited. And further off from them, two more on the separate levels of the garage. They had sniper rifles against the concrete edges, standing atop folded bipods, their red dots pointed at the two. Friendly or not, did not matter to the unbiased red beams.

"Hold it," One of the guards said. "Show me your ID's."

Joyce unfolded his sleeve. His part was easy because he was actually part of them, familiar with all of them. Not familiar enough to convince himself not to betray them, though.

The man looked at his tag, then Joyce undid his balaclava to sell it.

"Well, I was wondering where you were at sarge." The guard said, he had a jaunty tune to his voice.

"I was going around the perimeter, I saw a couple of hooded figures. Turnus might have been one of them,"

"Did you catch him?"

"Nah, he slipped," Joyce said. "Don't know where to. Wish I put a bullet in him."

"Yeah. I was hoping that was a body bag," The man pointed his rifle on the duffel bag. The cane ruffled underneath. "Bag 'em and tag 'em, am I right?"

"Bag 'em and tag 'em." The nervous twitch of his finger was starting again, he had to press it against his body to stop.

"It’s been boring lately. I feel bad for forensics, they’re not going to get any work. Haven't seen the enemy in weeks. I'm wondering if this old bitch is just senile, it feels like she has us guarding against rumors and lies,"

"Just keep watch," Joyce said and wormed his way between the two men. Ritcher followed. A rifle stopped him.

"ID please," The second of the two riflemen said, less joyous this one. His voice carried that tone of false authority, like an amateur dictator. He must have been newly promoted, must have been desperate to delegate his rule.

"He's with me," Joyce said.

"ID. Those are the rules," The man said. They all stood in awkward pause, Joyce looking around and speculating odds. How quickly he would be shot. The imaginations were sickening, though he did not sweat. He was so anxious that it seemed his body was in pause. There was nothing left to him, not even thought, as they stood underneath the glare of a crooked light. A red beam crossed his face, he saw it scan the circle and fall on Ritcher.

He was scared most of all for Ritcher, wondering if he would break. If there was anything behind those dead, lazy eyes. Maybe he was too blind to see how bad a spot they were in? He hoped. He never wished for stupidity for anyone or anything as much as now.

But Ritcher flipped his hand and rolled up his wrist, without any sort of commotion or awkwardness.

"Barry," The man said. He scanned the bar-coded tag into a steel-cased phone. He tapped a couple of times. "You're new, aren't you?"

It worked. He regained some feeling. It actually worked.

"Yes," Ritcher said.

"Let me get a face picture for you, this will make it easier in the future,"

"Stand down, he's with me," Joyce said.

"That's not protocol,"

"Is disobeying your superiors protocol too?"

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

"W-well," He quieted immediately. As all amateurs do. He had the loudmouth, but no spine to hold it up. If he had spent time thinking, perhaps he would have pressed for a picture. Instead, he pointed his rifle down. And obeyed. And stood.

"I must apologize, I don’t like pictures," Ritcher said. "I'm scarred, you see. I find myself unsightly to show in public."

Ritcher pulled up his visor until the strap slapped against his metal helmet. He flashed one of his eyes, only for a moment. The single eye with the wild cuts and markings slathered against his skin. His eyes were gouged out. It was a look that left them all speechless, even Joyce, who at that moment should have pushed him along. He was quiet too. The deep cuts left his skin multi-shaded between rotten black to diseased-yellow. Infection. Bruises. Scars. His eye had seen it all, must have.

He put back on his visor.

"C-can you see? I mean, can you shoot?" One of the men said it was a question all of them wanted answered.

"Of course," Ritcher said. "I can see very clearly,"

They both walked in. And behind them, in a voice almost stupidly loud, one of them said.

"Sarge sure knows how to pick 'em,"

The doors closed.

"Alright, we're through at least," He said those words but seeing the legion in front of him made them hard to believe, even for himself. They were everywhere, the soldiers. Some had established headquarters on top of poker and roulette and craps tables. Their wires and surveillance equipment and big black boxes, and brightly lit screens throw a top of stools or the bar or the cash-out tables. It was like they were all staring at the same thing too, the same images and the same camera angles on the same screen. That perhaps, even if one pair of eyes failed to see something, then the other twenty would make up for it.

More than the surveillance cameras were the guns racked against the sides of the walls.

Some alcohol off the cabinets to the side was missing. The place as a whole was completely soiled too. Mud footprints, broken glass, and furniture were strewn about.

It looked like a bathroom, to be honest, one that hadn't been cleaned for years.

"What a mess your people have made of my father's legacy,"

"It's the business," Joyce said. "HQ says that as long as we keep to the goal, everything else is disposable. That includes your father's legacy."

"You should be more careful. This is a tomb of my history as much as your playhouse," Ritcher said.

"It's a casino," Joyce said. "Where drunks and addicts go to forget they're drunks and addicts. If your legacy is pretty girls and fast games and even faster fights, then you really need to rethink your what you consider valuable,"

Ritcher turned to him. He could tell he was glaring with those blind eyes of his and imagining the scars again incited a quick shiver.

"Come on, let's try not to make a scene now," Joyce walked forward.

The rest of the trek up the stairs was a nightmare. Really.

Between everyone who tried to talk to them and everything Ritcher stepped over without care or caution, Ritcher seemed to be actively trying to thwart his own secret invasion. Just imagine the thought, of two burglars walking into a family well-awake, in the middle of a party even, and breaking every plate against the floor.

That’s how they were, it was farcical and slightly mad, and all the training in the world really didn’t prepare Joyce for the stupidity of it all. Mostly because of his position, mostly because everyone had seen so little violence and had gotten too comfortable.

Everyone gets bored. Even elite soldiers. Especially them.

They got away with it, walking up the stairs and towards the elevator and finally seeing the lights shining and bright, the sun setting to gloomy dimness behind them. It gave way for the yellow LED light fixtures to turn on, they were at each corner of the large casino room.

Their light was harsh. A judgemental harshness. Joyce was sweating. Finally.

“Now, you gotta understand. There’s not much power going through the casino,” Joyce said. “This is very much a one-way trip up because the minute they find whatever...you're going to do, they're going to hunt you down. Get it?”

“That’s fine, will you be among them?”

“Fuck no, I’m getting out the minute you get in,”

“Smart man,” Ritcher said. “What’s your name again? Your full name?”

“I’m smart enough to know not to tell you,”

“Oh, you're more than smart. You’re wise,” Ritcher’s voice seemed amused. It was a gross sound he didn’t want to hear ever again. “But only a hindrance. Good luck to you, sir,”

“You really have no problem saying any of this shit? Doing any of this shit?”

"Problem?" It was a genuine question by Ritcher.

It was also the answer to something Joyce wondered. If Ritcher was even human.

Joyce took a step down, staring up only for a moment to see where Ritcher would go. He was a massive figure, the biggest in the room. The sinews of his clothes could barely contain him and seemed to stretch out, though they were baggy and loose on every other man and woman here. It was like he wasn’t even made as a human, not designed as one at least at first. It seemed like the afterthought. A consolidation by God. He looked, simply from his silhouette, to be the byproduct of an experiment. Not necessarily the monster of the experiment, but the leftovers all put together into a Frankensteinian creation. Chimera. That was the word for Ritcher. Broad shoulders. A small head. Tender hands. Large biceps. Small, almost crooked feet. By the wide stride of his wide thighs.

He was big. Yet patient. Blind, but omniscient. He was smart but ruthless.

And he didn't seem to care or feel any remorse. Yes, that's what scared Joyce.

Maybe sin wasn’t even on his mind right. Joyce could understand that all killers had that switch.

But the difference between him and Ritcher was one simple fact. Joyce adopted the killers' instinct, activated and deactivated it at will. Ritcher lived it. He had lived his whole life under the impression that it was sinless. That's what he got out of his speech, out of his stride and conviction. A straightforwardness, stubborn and scary.

He watched Ritcher come down the elevators. He watched him head towards the doors where the neon red lights read the number “FLOOR 1”. He watched him press the button and watched him get accosted by two guards. They asked for his ID, at least Joyce figured because Ritcher undid his sleeve.

God damnit.

He was sweating now.

And he watched how the two men looked at the screens of their laptops and turned their heads in thoughts.

“Come with me,” The words were calm, stern.

They made Joyce shake and hold his gun. He noticed a lack of sound in his duffel bag and unzipped it for a moment. The cane was missing. When was it taken? By who?

I know who.

And when he saw Ritcher stand still, amongst the two, without so much as breathing or moving a finger, he realized he didn’t want to stay and watch what happened next.

He jogged. When he hit the big two doors. He ran.

“Where are you going, sarge?” The jovial of the two asked.

Away, far, far away.

The air was cold in his lungs, and the sounds were distant. It almost felt like he was waking up to a nightmare, even though he was stepping into one.