Fracture

Outskirts of Orna

Sector NZ2

The border town Leales.

        A hoverbike with a cart drives across the dirt road, the sound of metals clanging echoes through the alleyway, a disturbing silence echoes for minutes after the clanging stops. A drop of blood falls into a puddle of water turning it murky red, as a young blonde man holding a traditional katana with a neon green edge while blood streams slowly from a cut on his arm down to the tip of his fingers, parts of his grey shirt darkened with red, he makes a mad dash towards a building.

  " Is it too late to let me off the hook? " says the young man with a goofy smile on his face, "No one wants to die after discovering the secrets of the universe we live in, it'd be a shame and a bummer to humanity " he continues, giving his assailant a little gap between them,

" Come to think of it, how did I get into this situation, if I think about properly, it all begins with a short story and for that, we're going a little bit backwards before you butted in."

      " In the imperial country of Daelus, with buildings as high as the mountains and cityscapes as beautiful as the ocean, there are 40 most wanted people who live in all 17 states of Daelus. I'm Max Crowley aka Green Eyes or The Traveler, that last one was a recently added title and I'm the 3rd most wanted person alive, not on death row yet and I'm in the capital city of Orna, which is pretty bold if you ask me besides its part of my transitioning. What gave me a most wanted tag?! You ask... It's pretty simple but yet complicated, Here's my version of how things played out, I was an aspiring young scientist and inventor."

      " I had hypothesized and experimented on parallel dimensions and alternate timelines, but that wasn't we're trouble began no, it decided to rear up its ugly head after several trials and errors when I finally had a breakthrough but what I discovered was a dystopian world disheartened, I abolished my work fearing it was like playing the role of a God. Though as a man of science I don't believe in such things, One of the creatures from the dimension leapt through the portal and attacked me using its razor-sharp teeth to cut through my fingers. I quickly pushed it away then shut down my device as it ran frantically from the laboratory. It killed several people until it was hunted down and killed."

      "Several weeks after my discovery and the incident, the government came to claim my technology and my lab notes as one of their asset me included, I was forced to restart my project. Two years after my first discovery, I found another dimension, filled with untapped natural resources but there was still no sign of sentient life, the government handed over my technology to private military corporations who began immediate plans to colonise these parallel worlds."

      "After I was released I went into hiding, 3 weeks later one of the fancy-ass corporations had been destroyed and I got a huge bounty on my head, how? You might wonder, well my guess is the same as yours. Unfortunately, the bounty hunters after me are the best at what they do and they are relentless fuckers I tell you, coupled with the fact that the corporations juiced them up somehow making them a bit like supes but in reality, they're just really tough assholes."

The City of Orna. Sector A9-D

Outside Clanex Corp.

     A slight cracking sound is heard a distance from Max.

"Max Crowley! Clanex knows!. I know you don't want to surrender so make this interesting"

says a stranger with a coarse voice, Max throws a grenade towards the direction of the stranger's voice, it releases an electric charge spread rendering the stranger immobile

" Static Grenade, you like it. I made it just for you" he smiles scrambling at the stranger peering as though to attack but then feigns him and runs by, entering the building.

  Max approaches the main laboratory, in the corner of his eye he notices the charges set simultaneously on columns in the building, a whooshing sound airs through the lab as a purple coloured portal closes up slowly, as a silhouette is seen in it.

Max turns tail and heads back to the entrance only to be met with the remnants of the bounty hunter group, "Deus Iræ".

" Hey, guys nice weather we're having here huh?"

He slowly draws out his sword.

"so any surrenders? No! Ok then who's first?".

      An ebony haired man with light grey eyes and pale skin dons a hooded black jacket ripped tight jeans and a face mask

" my aren't you an arrogant piece of shit, you don't seem worth the bounty," he says cracks his slightly bruise knuckles.

While a short silver-haired lady, with sparkling blue eyes, stands next to him, dressed in a blue-black latex bodysuit

" Don't take all the fun now Franz, some of us still like our bounty fresh and warm, Ryan can call Belis, it seems they are late to the party as usual?" she says her meek voice hiding her hostile sense.

The redhead and ginger beard man with deep brown eyes outfitted almost like Franz but with a fur jacket and a small axe at his side, rests on a column nearby

"well I'm not surprised either, but Celeste I'll call me and get him up to speed."

He grips his double Axe tightly.

      "Listen uhm people I don't have time for this. And I'm guessing the building's gonna blow in the next 4-5 minutes" says Max as he darts towards Franz just to be impeded by Ryan who shaves max's shoulder.

"Gaaah!! "

Max grits his teeth

" three against one seems unfair but then again I don't have time"

he swings his blade at Ryan as he dodges, the shockwave releases a beam of light that cuts through anything in its path. Max hurries towards Franz and Celeste, he springs up and spin kicks Franz into a dumpster but is stopped midair by Celeste who uses an exoskeleton body armour, A quick strike his midsection placing him back in her line of sight.

  " Come quietly or I'll take you in pieces," she says as Max laughs

" well time's up" he jumps down into the sewers as the building explodes.

         "So far I've been successful in destroying most of the schematics and archives for my devices in three corporations and now I'm down to one, the one thing that still puzzles me was the figure I saw in the portal, is someone else doing the same work as I am or is it something else," says Max out loud to himself as he walks through the sewers filled with the sound of squeaking rats, water drain, cracking rusted pipes.

A few hours later, he appears in his workshop gathering the items he needs in a hurry.

" and now we're back to when you butted in, Belis and as you can see you guys have it all wrong but I guess money does the talking when it comes to you guys ".

      The purple-haired individual with a light green eye and a built-in cybernetic eye, sporting a jet black leather jacket, white t-shirt with gloves and blue jeans with a two guns strap at his left-hand side and a katana holster at his back

" Come on little man, Entrix knows what's coming they received the message already."

"And so they sent you to do their dirty work, how clever of them."

Max steps back slowly only to hear the voices of the bounty hunters he thought died in the explosion.

"Well, that changes things. I didn't want to do this but " he removes the large rectangular device from his bag.

"But you left me no other option" he pushes a red button, a flash of light blares up, the opens up a portal and Max grabs his bag as he feels a slight prick on his neck, he lunges into the portal.

" He's gone into the portal," says Belis as the portal closes up, he reads the coordinates displayed on the device's LED screen.

" So our bounty is lost," says Celeste with a mopping face.

" Not exactly there's a tracker on him " replies Belis as he picks up the brownish-red device.

Two days later,

In the nation of Hale,

The Reiki Territory,

Max Crowley comes out of a portal gate disoriented and falls unconscious on the ground.