1 Just a Quick Look Around

How long will this day last? She woke up half a day ago, and she knows she can't go home yet. Not before she has at least got some info on at least one of the three hundred confirmed surviving ex-inhabitants of this city. She rolls her eyes and shudders against the cold, huddling in her hunting suit. Those rats are too good at hiding. If only it hadn't been winter, she'd been happy to stay out on her patrol for nine hours straight at a time. Well, happy is an exaggeration. You'd think global warming had been able to do its job before the Great Purge. It's been twelve years, however.

Rounding a corner, one of the metropolis' old landmarks come into view. The ruin of the library's massive, and a lot of lost knowledge rest behind those collapsed walls. She kicks a dusty book and sighs. Those rotting pages won't help anyone anymore. Not that the science helped anyone in the war either. Machines didn't work the way they were expected, and the loss was great. Hence the hunt for survivors, they shouldn't be allowed to breed in the shadows any longer. She just wished she wasn't forced into this duty. Not that getting rid of them isn't fun, their heads always pop in a satisfying manner. It's more the cold and long hours that get to her.

She shakes her head and lets her gaze swipe the area before heading toward the next block.

Something moves to make a rustle and she spins around. Murmuring, she shoos the cat away and continues to walk. Gunshots. She pinpoints the source and picks up the pace toward what must be the people she's looking for. There can be no other explanation! They should know their situation, but the gunshots continue. She's close when she comes across a scene she never thought would happen. They're killing each other! She hides behind the many years' outdated telephone box and watches with her heart beating.

There are too many of them to take them on right now. If anyone of them noticed her and the battle turned on her it would become ugly. Definitely for her, although she's good at her job. Therefore she stays put, tries to figure out the situation, makes out who she will follow when the worst of it's over. She pulls her jacket closer and tries to find out where most of the shots are coming from. One of the buildings that are still standing seems to be housing the majority of them. Only one or two people are scattered in the area with the wrecked cars. She tries to catch a glimpse of a face. It's impossible because there're only silhouettes in the windows. A moving shape among the wreckage. She squints and sees another, unmoving shape behind the car. There's the smell of blood in the air as well, probably an accident of some sort. Someone screams in the building, and the rain of bullets from the group halts. The two behind the car scramble to their feet and disappear into the ruins. Time for action.

She stretches her legs and follows them into the shadows at a quick jog. Maybe another hunter, or a squad, got the people in the building. Anyway, she will track down these and reel in their credits. Luckily for her, one of them is giving off the blood smell she sensed before, and she finds them in a matter of minutes. She spots them and hides again. They're a man and a woman, both quite young, probably in their mid-twenties or early thirties. She never really understood ages in these people. They've pulled two, nearly intact, trash containers apart and made a makeshift shelter with some cardboard as a roof. Interesting problem-solving skill, she must admit. He props her head upon his shoulder, busying his hands with tying an, almost, clean rag around her thigh. She coughs, and the smell of blood strengthens. She looks near-death, an easy kill. He sits with his back towards his hunter, but she can tell he's not weak.

"You shouldn't have done all this," the woman groans. She places a hand on his shoulder and he flinches. "I've been a lost case from the start."

"Please, don't tell me what to do with my time," he replies sharply. The woman grins, but her eyes are sad. Their hunter snickers, amused by the drama. However, they don't seem to be part of any groups, and it's still cold. She'll have to strike soon and thus prepares. A metal chainlink whip appears out of one of her deep pockets and uncurls at her warm touch as if it were alive. She stands up and raises her hand, pleased by the terrified look on the woman's face as she realizes she's prey. The hunter swings her arm and expects the man's pretty little head to get crushed by the impact. She's smiling, but it quickly fades when he turns around just in time and raises his arm so the whip wraps around it instead of his head. It looks painful, by his grimace, but he's still alive. She's stunned, he's not what she thought he'd be, he's not one of them. If anything he's a half-blood.

He grabs the whip with both hands and yanks it out of her hands. She hisses and steps behind a piece of broken wall at the same time it explodes in a million brick pieces at the impact of her own whip. Growling, she changes her plan. He's out of the picture, all she has to do is avoid her own whip, and she'll be fine. The woman is the real target, the one who will bring credits, at least a few, and an ended day. The hunter is squatting behind a heap of rubble a few meters away from where the dust is still settling. He stands by his partner, looking around for the person who's out to get her.

"You're not going to touch her, you filthy animal!" he yells, and there's a surge in her body. Anger and frustration build up in her chest while he keeps calling slurs at her. She pulls a knife from her other pocket. A good one, with a jagged blade the length of her lower arm. Crouched down, she increases the distance between herself and the man until she's outside the whip's range, and stands up. Immediately the tip of her weapon cracks in the air in front of her. Not close enough to touch, but it creates a gust of air that ruffles her dark hair.

"I'll be getting those credits," she chuckles and gains great pleasure from the way the man's face darkens. He comes closer to her, and she steps further away. They continue this dance until there's enough room between the woman and the man that he can't reach her with the whip either. She doesn't think he noticed, and after grabbing a stone from near her feet, she readies her final attack. With all her force, she slings the rock at him, and despite his quick reflexes, he catches it between the eyes, going down on his knees with a hand covering his face. She grins and runs toward him, and when he looks up as she passes, she flings a handful of sand in his eyes. It's easy to avoid his grasp as he flings out an arm to stop her.

Time is of the essence, and she stands over the other woman for just a second taking in her state. Her face has gone slack from realizing she's defeated. A wonderful sight, indeed! The hunter kneels in front of her prey, and pushes the cold metal in between the ribs and into the heart. The wound has made the woman so weak that she can barely fight back. As her heart stops, her frail arms stop fighting and fall lifelessly into her lap. Her chin hits her chest with a soft thud. Behind the hunter, a guttural voice lets out a blood curdling shriek.

She just about manages to step out of the way to keep her head from being blown to bits, and turns to face her last enemy. It's kill or be killed. Or, perhaps she could somehow render him unconscious and carry him back to the headquarters for another kind of reward. The two of them stand in tense silence, eyeing each other and waiting for the other's first move.

While she studies him, she wonders what kind of race his father was, as the woman on the ground is too similar to him to be anything but a relative. Most likely she was his mother, judging by the age gap. He is quite tall and slender, and his skin reveals no hints of what clan his father could have belonged to. The hunter smirks, it would be interesting to know. He takes it as a taumt, shakes his shoulders, and holds back a burst of aggression. Anger, fear and sorrow paint his face a somber colour of despair. His dark red, nearly black, horns glitter with his mother's blood, ice and dust in the setting sun. They're quite similar to her own, only longer and straighter.