Saila bolted through the door, the makeshift flag of her would-be replacement staff swirling in the air behind her. Flame danced across its edges and between her feet. The soldier fired, shouting in Felisian.

The sewing-machine staccato ripped through the air, pinging off the ground and into the buildings behind her as she ran. She ducked behind a stall of fruit as burst of bullets stopped, breathe sharp and shallow.

With each exhale, a little extra fire.

She took the space of that breath to check for wounds, then dove into a sprint to the nearest source of protection.

Running alongside her, at discordant steps, were flickers of herself. The dancing flames crackled around her feet as she ran, spiraled off her waving flag, and in the process created a hazy dance troupe that followed in her wake.

It wasn’t exactly like a real heat haze- Saila didn’t quite understand the science behind it. Something about heat and air, distance and light. At the point Kenji started talking about ‘superior and inferior mirages’ she’d tuned it out. Koryu’s explanation was sharper, and simpler.

Heat did weird things to the senses, and Saila’s pyromancy was hot.

Hot enough that at some point during those four months he’d started their training sessions on the backfoot.

Hot enough, Saila hoped, to fool a gunman with a notoriously inaccurate weapon.

Another six rounds shot out, seeking blood. Market fresh fruits exploded in a spray that forced Saila’s attention, turning to look back just in time to see one of the flickering figures of herself take two bullets through the face.

Illusion or not, the shimmer distorting almost made her vomit.

She skidded behind a barrel, and caught another sharp breath.

Six bullets in a second.

It felt unreal. Unfair.

It wasn’t the first time Saila had danced with death, but-

She exhaled, and spun up from behind the barrel just as the poor thing was riddled with bullets in her stead.

-but this was a dance she could do. She knew she could.

She had to.

###

Any folk brave enough to look through their window that night saw twin shadows running across the roads and streets. One was singular and pure, a white streak of a cloak, stopping behind the occasional automobile or lamppost. Light sprung up from it, barking like a wild hound- only ever two, always aimed near-perfect at its brother-shade.

The other was chaos incarnate. Leaping through the air like the feathery black thing it was, slamming into buildings and lunging from rooftop to rooftop. Explosions left in its wake, indiscriminate and cackling.

Purpose and Irrelevance. Precision and Carelessness. White and Black.

It struck Noble a curious irony that of the two of them, it was Knave that knew where they were going. He was the one who lead this merry chase, while he was simply doing his best to keep up- and avoid the RPG rounds.

“This way, brotheeer~!” Knave shouted into the air. Above the clamor of gunfire throughout Zarrhdad and their own pitched conflict, Noble doubted anyone could hear it but himself.

“Why are you doing this!” Noble shouted after him, running as fast as his words.

Even at this distance, as Knave tumbled through the air to land on the ornate perch of a lamppost, Noble could see the confusion on his brother’s face.

“Why not? Is this not-” two shots, one skimming his feather cloak and the other pinging off the lamppost itself “- fun, chasing each other through the streets? It’s like old times!”

Noble ducked behind a car, swung his revolver open and thumbed in replacements to what he’d just fired. Leaving himself with only two free might have been a mistake, but… he wanted to see what his brother had to say.

He wanted to see how long it took for an old, forgotten emotion to rise back to the surface.

“I don’t exactly remember ‘old times’ being so full of death and destruction. How many of your ‘toys’ are out there hurting innocents?”

“Oh how you wound me- we were no band of merry miscreants!” He slowly reached into his cloak to draw out what Noble hoped was one final rocket.

“We stole, sure, but not lives.” Noble edged out an inch and took aim. “It was one of our rules- your rules!”

“That was simple mathematics! No one cares about little thefts, so no one cares about little thieves! So, spare me the platitudes, brother!”

Knave laughed, lifting his rocket towards Noble. “Besides, the drachenkind gives better speeches.”

They fired.

Bullet struck rocket. The explosion shattered windows- and the lamppost Knave was standing on. A screech erupted from him as he fell, bounced once, and sprinted on all fours.

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Machine-oil dripped in his path.

A white streak of a cloak followed, a rumble in his iron chest. A creaking in his limbs.

###

Another burst of six needled through the air as Saila dived behind a water trough.

They were getting closer. Her little mirages where working, but each breath came a little more raggedy, a little shallower. Pulling flames up from her lungs while trying to keep enough air in them to dodge bullets wasn’t enough to win.

Exhale.

It didn’t have to be.

Saila rose to her feet, curtain-rod flag waving in the air, and ran- eyes focused on the soldier.

He aimed, pulled the trigger.

Click.

His face jolted in shock.

There it is Salamander!

Saila swiveled on her heels so hard her mirages broke like a wave across her, and trailed like a wildfire as she ran towards the soldier.

Noble had, on occasion, talked a bit about guns. For a man who hated what they did he sure knew a lot about them, and knew what sort of guns suited which people. He’d mumbled something about it being an Exovan thing, and not to worry about it.

Instead, she’d taken notes.

An inaccurate weapon, that fired in bursts, belonged only to someone that needed to cover a wide area- or wanted to enjoy a ruthless slaughter.

Between the men she’d helped bury in Al-Rimal and the fangs in his eyes, Saila knew which he’d be.

Dangle a bit of bait in front of your prey and it’ll wear itself out trying to catch it, be it a hungry sand-lizard or a fang-eyed murderer.

Said murderer’s twitchy hand seemed to fight him as he removed the steel brick from the bottom, reached into his cloak, and drew out another.

Saila’s first strike hit that misbehaving right hand. The flowing curtain shared its flames and wrenched the gun from his hand.

Saila’s second strike planted itself firmly in the man’s chin, the back end of the curtain rod colliding with a crunch that flung his sunglasses into the air.

As she twisted in place to swing the curtain around to hit him once more across the face, to cover his head with the flaming curtain and fend him off… the soldier’s eyes met hers.

Finish up, butcher birdie, I need-

My name is Shrike and I’m TRYING to deal with the-

NOW! Or I’ll-

Shut up, you toothsome wretch I’m about to-

GET OUT OF MY HEAD!!

Screams, like nails digging into her spine, a sick feeling filling up her brain till she almost vomited. The voice of Knave and his half-fanged puppet and herself echoing loud and internal. Saila’s body shivered, and she dropped the curtain rod. The world around her spun.

The soldier- Shrike, her brain clicked into place- grabbed a black-silver rod from his waist with his left hand, and bludgeoned Saila across the face with it. The spinning got worse.

Saila tried to stand, found a hard-leather boot kicked into her gut hard enough to cough out flame. Pain, sharp and hot, pulsed through her body and coalesced in her chest.

He continued kicking, screaming in Felisian, his face twisting and discordant, like the conversation in his mind was still raging. Saila was almost thankful for the pain- she couldn’t hear a thing.

Finally, the kicking stopped. Shrike was panting, patting himself down.

“There! You incompetent bastard. I’ll be coming shortly, just…”

He looked around, spotted his gun, and picked it up.

“Just… going to take this from you. Show you to barge into my head.”

With a snap-click, he slid one of the black rectangles into the gun.

Saila’s blood ran cold. It felt… unfair, to face her end here. To die, because of a shouting match that broke into her own head. She could barely move.

Yet move she did, forcing herself to her feet just as Shrike turned to face her.

He brought his sewing machine of a gun to bare.

Saila felt her chest hitch. A rumbling roar, building in her chest, born from pain and desperation and fire.

And finally, nothing remained to hold it back.

###

The trail brought Noble to what looked to be an open square intended for entertainment and conversation. In the center, a statue of a woman in traveling attire, exiting a cavern. Water flowed forth seemingly from the air around her, hidden fountain-spigots and a genuine garden of grass and flowers and palm trees made it look like she was surrounded by paradise.

Standing on her shoulders was Knave, one hand to his chest, the other gripping the hilt of his blade.

“Found you, brother.”

Noble lowered his gun, but kept his finger on the trigger.

“Indeed you have, brother- and good shot, too. I was afraid you weren’t capable of shooting me.”

Knave was laughing, despite it all. Or because of it. Noble was never sure.

“Why are you doing this, Knave? And don’t give me that nonsense about the old days. This isn’t that, and you know it. Tell me… I want to know.”

Knave leapt down from the statue, landing with a metallic thud and a spurt of oil across the stones.

“Oh, you want to know? Do you really?”

He stalked around him, distant at first. That feathery cloak of his was stained with oil from unseen injuries.

Noble nodded, and tried not to think of his own.

“My answer is the same, brother. The same as the day we left our indentured servitude to those miserable little war-mongers. Boredom. Freedom. A want for something new, something exciting! I’m shocked you’d forgotten that.”

“I didn’t forget, Knave,” Noble said. “I didn’t understand. Then you kicked me off a mountain.”

Knave chuckled, threads of shadows drifting up from the fangs on his mask.

“You DID shove that gun of yours in my mouth. But bygones can be bygones- I’m even willing to forgive you and that little dancer of yours ruining the thing I had with that opera singer.”

Noble felt a certain sort of tremor in his nerves. It’d been a long time since he felt something like it.

“I mean it, brother,” he continued. “Her experiments were glorious, but I’ve… upgraded, in more ways than one. Or did you think this little gang of cards was the limit of my reach here?”

“I know you’ve got weapons- military-grade weapons. That’s more than a pack of outlaws should have. What game are you playing here, Knave?”

Knave stopped. Only thirty paces between him, his back to his brother.

“Well, funny story. ONY? Those little warmongers? They’ve got big plans… and they need knowledge.”

And yet the distance between them seemed vaster than the lengths Noble had taken to get here.

“Ophelia’s little experiments worked, and now I- and after our escape, I alone- know how our bodies work. The methods one must employ.”

He spun, and in the fangs of his eyes Noble saw a strange joy.

“How much power do you think they’d be willing to just, hand over for that knowledge. It took me a while, sure, but the paper’s all inked and the lines are all signed. This time though, ol’ Knave is on top! No more toiling in the trenches, no more moving at the order of some unseen hand. No more dancing on strings- this time I’m in charge. That’s what I’ve always wanted- what we’ve always wanted, right brother?”

And there it was. As clear as day in those ruby eyes and smiling face and cloying words.

What did Noble want? That was a question he’d thought for a long, long time.

He felt the shadows start to churn, a tugging at his neck, a force in the-

… nothing. It didn’t stick the day they escaped, and it wouldn’t stick now. Desire had deadened in him long ago.

The only thing Noble wanted was his brother back, and that was never going to happen.

Noble pulled his gun and fired.

Knave had always been quicker. The bullet pinged off his sword.

“You know what I want, brother?”

He fired again. Knave struck it down.

Noble pulled the hammer back. The cylinder clicked into place.

He squeezed the trigger tight enough to crack his finger.

The first of Kenji’s little beauties roared out.

Knave swung a third time- he did so love to swat bullets out of the sky.

“I want you to burn.”

The bullet exploded in a blaze of amber fire.

######