The group moved in darkness, their cloaks fluttering about their heels as they proceeded across the rooftops like loping, carnivorous cats. Moving like this, it was easy to feel heady with the intoxicating power of secrecy as they moved above the naive city-goers below them. All of the four-person group were highly trained; their footfalls make nary a noise. Or at least none that rises above the din of voices from the Orchard below.

Code Name Chakram, born Danny Finn, tugged at the edges of his hood as he ran. The group moved quickly enough that the top portion of the clothing expanded in its best parachute impression, threatening to fall away from his face and reveal his identity. The possibility gnawed at him, making his stomach release sour notes up through his throat.

Not that my identity is particularly important. He reflected, not a little sullenly. Then he shook himself and made his internal preparations. His Skills hummed, ready to be activated.

Chakram knew why Duskfist insisted on this abrupt operation when usually the Order moved very, very slowly; in the course of pursuing the tail of the Order Patricide, Annie had proved frighteningly capable. She somehow had sniffed out old meeting spots and crept toward the most recent ones, stalking ever closer to their suppliers and allies. Yet just when the tension was highest, a scared-to-death member of the Order Patricide made an observation.

On the days Annie came looking for them, the clouds were low and grey, no matter how much the sun beat down on them. Her pursuit seemed to possess a physical form that could be observed.

Chakram planted his foot on the concrete edge and leapt, following three other Order Patricide members. All kept their images close to their chest, at least for now. They needed to get closer before they set the plan in motion.

For a few weeks, they had used this weather-based observation to stay a few steps ahead of Annie, despite her horrifying proficiency. They cleared out old hideouts and had the few contacts that actually knew what this Order did flee underground when she neared. Then, out of the blue, on a day without any clouds on the sky, a private plane carrying four of the toughest and most determined Cabal Leaders from the Order Patricide was shot out of the sky by a single arrow.

Which left the survivors with the numb realization that Annie had been playing them the entire time. That although she stood in the shadow of Donnyton and the Ghosthound, Annie herself was a monster.

A monster licking its lips and creeping ever closer to them.

Her projectile had ripped straight up from the ground, eviscerating the guts of the plane and killing all the passengers instantly. The pilot somehow survived; he was later found shivering and shellshocked in the cockpit when the plane was eventually lowered to the ground, while the muttering population of the Orchard watched.

Now, at night in the Orchard a few weeks later, Chakram reached up and adjusted his hood. The Order needed to take back the initiative. Which was why this group, without a true Cabal Leader amongst them, was mobilized.

“Here,” Duskfist growled. The other two slowed and closed their eyes, making their individual preparations for the fight that would undoubtedly follow. Chakram walked up to the edge of the roof and looked down at the busy street below, filled with pedestrian and Mana vehicles, honking and shouting, the language of the city. They were in the business district, so most everyone was well dressed and serious as they crossed the street and went about their business.

It was the perfect place for a splashy fight. There would be plenty of casualties. The sort of casualties that would earn media attention.

“Wait until her hearing is over,” Duskfist said. “Then we will move closer. No doubt she will scent us immediately. Remember to be as indiscriminate as possible in your attacks as we flee. The more damage that was caused, the more chaotic the scene, the more we can push the blame onto her.”

Chakram bowed his head. They planned on using her awareness against her. Since it became obvious that the image virus had no effect on truly powerful individuals, they needed to do some damage to the elites of the world in another way to continue with their plan. Turning public opinion against them, when there was already so much malcontent over the constant caravans of refugees, seemed like the best option.

For a better world, Chakram repeated the familiar mantra to himself. To make a world where your worth isn’t determined by power...

Annie currently wasn’t in that much trouble; while she had clearly killed several people, there were enough unsavory items and documents that survived the plane crash to give her plenty of justification for her targeted strike. Those four Cabal Heads had been particularly nasty. In fact, the suit stemmed from the owner of the skyscraper, who wanted compensation for damages to his building.

Chakram suppressed a shiver when he considered the extent of the ‘damage’. She somehow managed to use a second arrow to flash freeze the plane, during its free fall, against the side of the building… and that’s the sort of woman we are going up against.

And if she is this power… how fucking strong is the Ghosthound himself?

...But his power shouldn’t matter. Every individual should have an equal voice-

“A mighty strange place ta’ be havin’ a party.”

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

The four robbed figures whipped around. Chakram choked on his tongue when he found himself face-to-face with a bored-looking horse. It whinnied at him, almost in greeting. Next to the horse, an extremely recognizable man looped his fingers through his leather belt and favored them all with an easy smile. Even in the darkness of the Orchard night, his teeth were very white. “I don’ mean to crash, but y’all stink ta’ high heaven with bad intentions. Couldn’t rightly sleep easy if I did’na check what ya were up to.”

“Hank Howard,” Duskfist growled out the words and fixed the world-famous cowboy with a stare crackling with emotional intensity. The shadows on the roof lengthened and stretched, flowing toward Duskfist’s own shadow. The others mobilized their own images and settled into fighting stances. Chakram flicked his wrists and produced the two glossy circular weapons. He suppressed the urge to vomit. He could hear his blood pounding in his ears.

Hank Howard just continued to smile. With great care, he patted his horse’s side and then began to roll up his sleeves. “Violence, is it? Can’t say I’m surprised. Jus’ pleased so many of ya waltzed right into our hands. Y’all have some ‘splainin to do. That shit ya dun with the kids? Lot’s of ‘splainin’.”

As Duskfist lowered his head and charged toward Hank Howard, Chakram was very aware of the sounds of the city below. He heard a young boy laughing, high and weirdly unnerving to his tingling eardrums. A door hinge creaked and wind whistled through the corridors between the buildings. A car honked its horse several times, mixed with an angry shout. Weirdest of all, the horse trotted sideways to avoid the action, its tack and saddle jingling.

Chakram didn’t try to stop the horse; it was an animal, an innocent.

Shadows rushed to their leader’s hand as he brought his left hand around in a wicked hook. Image power surged in the air around them, smothering the rooftop in a swamp of darkness and haze; Duskfist’s attacks were especially effective at this time of day.

Still with that confident grin on his face, Hank swayed backward just past the edge of the blow. Even as Chakram moved left and Thunderbolt moved right, he winced; it was a mistake to think you could escape from Duskfist by a thin margin. His shadows had a vicious quality of lashing out and ripping off the nearby flesh.

Chakram saw the shadows bulge and spike outward at Hank Howard and Chakram felt a thrill of relief. Behind them, Skystrike raised his crossbows for covering fire, but they wouldn’t need it. The cowboy had underestimated them, and would-

Hank Howard stumbled backward and snorted. He wiped his chin with his right hand. “Mighty sharp, fella. Ah, hell, looks like I’ll have to get serious.”

Chakram’s heart froze, even as training took over and he raised his weapons. He braced himself for a domineering display of image, the sort of which he had always been told a figure like Hank Howard could generate. Chakram had encountered such a feeling once, when he met the female leader of the Order Patricide and had been strangled into silence and submission in a single glance.

Yet nothing happened. Hank Howard just cracked his neck and stepped forward-

“Chakram!” There was a strange hint of fear in Duskfist’s voice as he screeched out a reminder. Jolted back to himself, Chakram raised his weapons and filled them with a cutting image of wind. Then he whipped the projectiles forward, aiming for Hank’s thighs. Opposite him, Thunderbolt released a crackling wave of electricity that shot toward the cowboy’s back. The timing was slightly disturbed by Chakram’s distraction, but it was a combination that could slow down even the most powerful combatants.

Their pure belief in their cause fueled their image. They needed to be strong because that was the only way they could build a better future.

Hank Howard drew his repeater, used the butt of the weapon to deflect one of the projectiles and dodged the other one with a sharp step. Roaring, Duskfist hopped forward and brought a punch hammering down at the man.

The deflected chakram struck Thunderbolt’s attack and caused it to discharge prematurely, most of its potency snapping at the air and dissipating. Meanwhile, cool as refrigerated milk, Hank met Duskfist’s heavy blow with a jab that smashed into the man’s mouth and stopped him up short. His swing harmlessly whipped through empty space.

Blood dribbled out of Duskfist’s mouth as Hank took another too-quick step forward, but Skystrike unleashed a volley of arrows that had to be deflected with the butt of his pistol. Which gave Chakram time to guide his weapons to spin back and aim for the back of Hank Howard’s head-

The cowboy stuck out a leg, catching and balancing one of the deflected crossbow projections on his foot. Then he twisted and kicked it up, sending the bit of metal smashing into the chakrams and somehow deflecting them into each other, the wind shrieking as the two manifestations of Chakram’s image working against themselves.

This gave Duskfist time to gather an even thicker padding of shadows around himself and stomp forward, but then Hank’s leg came whipping back, planting his weight on the ground, and his body pivoted smoothly around as his hips turned back square to Duskfist.

Unlike the sharp jab he used earlier, this was a blow meant for power. Chakram could see the sinuous grace of the cowboy as he threw his arm forward, the shoulder rotating inward as his knuckles crashed up against the heavy layers of shadows around Duskfist. The shadows broke; the blow landed.

It was, to Chakram’s eyes, just a punch.

Duskfirst dropped bonelessly to the ground. He didn’t even make a sound as all that oppressive image power he had squeezed underneath his robe dissipated.

Looking at Hank Howard, Chakram felt nothing like a zealot who had willingly spent the last several years training to bring about a revolution to build a better world. He felt like a child, a forgettable Danny, as he looked at this man’s shadowy silhouette. There wasn’t the faintest whiff of images around him, yet that fact only made the three remaining agents of the Order Patricide more petrified.

The images they had seen, had feared, and been taught to fight against, were flashy and overwhelming things. But this quiet competence, the easy smile on the cowboy’s face that spoke of the inevitably of their loss, that chilled them to their core.

“Now, don’t rightly make sense why ya keep resistin’,” Hank cracked his knuckles and spread his arms wide as he turned to regard them. Chakram couldn’t remember the last time that he took a breath. “We can do this tha’ easy way or tha’ hard way. And believe me, the easy way involves a polite drink. Y’all thirsty?”

The living legend seemed tall enough to reach up and rip down the sky. His smile promised something, a sort of suggestive image that Chakram felt himself helplessly succumbing to. Weakness crept into the back of his mind, carrying with it a shivering fear. It was an image virus both much more targeted and more effective, sapping at their resistance without even having to show itself.

Yet despite Hank Howard’s clear superiority, all three of them had been shaped for years to reach this point. The cold eyes of the Order Patricide’s leader lingered on their minds, so they raised their weapons and flared their images.

After a theatrical sigh, Hank Howard shook his head and got to work.