Nick sighed heavily. What a beautiful sunset. Nothing at all to disturb- and with one gunshot, the picture is shattered. Funny how easily that happens.
The young man all but flies from his seat on the rocky outcropping. Flattening himself against the ground behind a boulder, he peers tentatively over the edge. Apparently, he'd been so fixated on the sunset that he hadn't noticed the scene laying itself out below him.
The first thing he noticed: whatever was going down, it definitely wasn't a normal mugging or such. There were four figures. Two of them were wearing strange armor and carrying stranger weapons, looking like they'd walked straight out of a sci-fi novel. Standing behind the duo was a smaller figure, clearly female, wearing a lab coat and carrying a notepad.
But compared to the final figure, these things were all minor trifles. Obviously another female, she was laying prone on the ground in front of the two soldiers, their weapons trained on her. She had a white bandage wrapped around her head, covering her eyes like a blind. It appeared that the bandage was wet, presumably from tears. Attached to her neck like a collar was some kind of black device, which blinked red occasionally. As for clothes, she wore white cloth similar to the bandage across her eyes.
However, the absolute strangest thing about this woman was her legs; or, more accurately, the lack thereof. Up to just above the middle of her stomach was not skin, but scales. Her legs were replaced by a tail not unlike a fish.
Nick blinked again, and rubbed his eyes. Yup; that's a mermaid alright. Now that he had that insanity out of the way, what was with the gunshot? The girl/mermaid was obviously harmed, with various bruises and lacerations, blood trickling across most of her body. However, it did not appear that she had a gunshot wound upon her. So where did it come from or go to?
Beside the girl... Fish... Thing... Was a smoking hole in the rocks of the beach, the smoke trail leading back to the woman in the labcoat. She held a pistol in her free hand, the other holding the notepad, a stony expression upon her face.
The first guard fumbled with his belt, pulling off a device with two nasty-looking prongs on the end, and aiming it at the abdomen of the girl on the ground. Nick had decided to think of her as a girl, because he frankly had no better explanation. The white-coated women began to speak, but Nick couldn't make out what she was saying. Whatever it was, it was clearly a threat to the second girl, who began to tremble harder than before, and covered her face with her hands, looking very miserable indeed.
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The guard with the pronged device lowered his head to the side of the weapon, and deftly fired the device into the girl on the ground. Piercing the softer, human skin of her abdomen, the wires connecting the prongs back to the device began to arc with electricity. A high, piercing scream rent the air, lasting for several seconds, before it eventually tapered off.
Nick tightened his fists, ready to spring into action, but recognized that there wasn't much he could do against three other people. Both guards slackened their grips on their weapons, lowering the muzzles to point at the ground. The woman nodded curtly to the second guard, who heaved a great sigh and stooped down over the unconscious girl. Tugging the blackened barbs out, blood spurted across his hands. He swore loudly, bandaging the wounds with a dirty cloth from his belt, probably an oil cloth for cleaning a gun.
He then grabbed her and roughly slung her across his shoulder, not before binding her hands with rope. As the women turned away to walk back up the slope, and the second guard lumbered under the weight of the girl, Nick seized his chance. Rapidly, Nick slid off of the ledge, landing feet first on the shoulders of the first guard. A sickening crack sounded across the water, and the guard fell to the ground in a heap with a cry of pain.
The woman whipped around, but before she could respond, Nick had recovered and swung his fist into the face of the second guard. The guard staggered backwards, dropping the girl unceremoniously onto the ground. Taking advantage of these few seconds of shock, Nick buckled the knees of the guard with a swift and powerful kick. He cried out in pain, and sank to his knees besides his brethren.
Another gunshot.
Nick fell backwards, landing hard. Blood spilled from his upper right arm. The smoke from the woman's pistol hung around her head like a haze of mist.
"This is pointless. This is not your fight." The woman's voice was unnaturally deep.
"No, it wasn't. Not until you attacked an innocent." Nick gritted his teeth against the pain, fighting to stay conscious.
"Hah. 'She' is hardly innocent. You discuss what you do not understand. Step aside."
Nick shook his head slowly. "At the risk of sounding cliche, you'll have to kill me first."
The woman shrugged without emotion and raised the pistol to his head. Her finger began to pull back the trigger, until a voice thick with blood spoke.
"No."