California 2019
"Why are we doing this?" Nighthawk demanded.
"Trust me." Firefly muttered, slipping through a doorway.
"Because you're soooo trustworthy." NightHawk muttered to herself.
Firefly ignored her and listened for any sound. The sound of footsteps made her freeze and NightHawk nearly slammed into her. At least a dozen Dracs marched past them.
As the last one vanished Firefly slipped forward with NightHawk on her heels. Firefly raised her gun and NightHawk did the same.
"How do you know they're even here?" NightHawk demanded.
"I don't." Firefly answered, bracing herself for her friend's reaction.
"What?" NightHawk hissed.
"I told you. I heard a rumor." Firefly snarled.
"Look I want to find them as much as you but I want to stay alive." NightHawk hissed.
"Well at least I don't just shoot whatever I see." Firefly snapped and there was silence behind her.
"NightHawk, I…" Firefly started.
"Forget it. Let's just get out of here." NightHawk snarled, pushing past her friend.
"I know how to get there from here." She added.
"How?" Firefly asked but at the look her friend shot her she fell silent.
NightHawk slipped past a Drac that was guarding the door, although her finger twitched on the trigger of her gun she resisted.
"This way." She hissed, vanishing into a dimly lit room with a single light swinging above her head. She shuddered, remembering the last time she had been here.
Just as Firefly slipped through the door slammed and Korse appeared behind a wall of glass.
"Korse." NightHawk snarled.
"Hello NightHawk or should I call you number489?" He said, tilting his head to the side.
"What is he talking about?" Firefly demanded.
"It's nothing." NightHawk lied.
"HAWK!" Firefly snapped.
"Go on; tell your little friend how you were my assistant." Korse said.
"WHAT?" Firefly exclaimed.
"Where are they?" Hawk demanded of Korse before Firefly could say anything else.
"Oh they're safe but you won't find them." Korse smiled evilly.
"This way." Hawk told Fire and they tore off down a hallway.
"You can run but you can't hide from your past." Korse called after them.
Finally they stopped, gasping for breath. NightHawk searched her memory of the compound, trying to think where they could be. Then it hit her.
"This way." She said yet again and they tore back off and down yet another hallway.
They arrived just in time to see a Draculuids mask slammed over JetStar's face.
"Hey ugly!" Firefly called, waving her arms and shooting the Drac standing next to JetStar.
"Number 489. Traitor." A Drac called out in PartyPoison's voice.
"Well plan A is dead. Time for plan B." NightHawk moaned. "Do you have the rope?"
Firefly nodded and ran forward, wrapping the rope around the Killjoy Dracs and yanked the awful looking masks off their faces.
"Come on, let's get out of here." Hawk said with a shudder. Together they began to drag the Dracs out to their car and tossed them in the back seat.
"I'll drive." Hawk said quickly. Technically they couldn't drive since they were only 13 but they had learned from the other Killjoys which meant they just drove like maniacs but that was how the other Killjoys drove.
Firefly climbed into the passenger's seat and looked at Hawk.
"What were they talking about?" She asked, crossing her arms and staring straight ahead.
"Can't talk, driving." Hawk lied.
"HAWK why did Korse say you were his assistant!" Firefly demanded.
"I'll tell you when we get back to base okay?" NightHawk muttered. Firefly nodded, realizing she wasn't going to say anything else at that moment.
All too soon for NightHawk they reached the abandoned hotel they used as a base. Normally the Killjoys used the diner but that had been destroyed and they had to hide out here. They dragged the Killjoys in and locked them in a small room.
"Talk." Firefly ordered.
NightHawk sat down on the floor and Firefly did the same.
"Ok remember when we were separated that time for a couple months after Korse caught us? When he let you go and told you I'd been released too? Well it wasn't true. They had me trapped and they made me be Korse's assistant. They only gave me the pills once and I got my senses back but I kept being his assistant even though I knew it went against everything we stood for." She said, leaning her head forward, so that two of the red streaks of her hair framed her face.
"Why didn't you escape?" Firefly asked.
NightHawk looked up and glared at her. For a second she felt like hitting Firefly but she held back and whipped off her jacket.
"That's why." She yelled, pointing to a deep scar on her left arm. "Korse shot me twice and said if I tried to escape he'd kill you, Party, Ghoul, Kobra, and Jet."
"So how'd you get away?"
"He didn't need me anymore." NightHawk said, pulling her jacket back on. "He threw me out of his helicopter in the middle of the desert and tried to kill me but I just kept running."
"So that's why you didn't want to go there."
"I don't think any Killjoy WANTS to go to a danger base, but yes."
All of the sudden kicking and pounding was heard in the room where the other Killjoys were.
"I guess the pills wore off." NightHawk said, glad for a distraction.
"Yeah." Firefly agreed, brushing a strand of hair out of her face.
NightHawk walked in first and began to untie the Killjoys.
"Hawk what's going on!" FunGhoul shouted.
"It's fine." NightHawk said, undoing the last knot.
"Where's Firefly?" PartyPoison asked, flexing his wrists and wincing.
"Good question." NightHawk muttered, looking over her shoulder for her friend.
"She's here isn't she?" KobraKid asked nervously.
"Yeah, I thought she was right behind me." NightHawk said. "Firefly." She called.
"I'm coming." A voice called out, slightly muffled.
"What the fuck!" NightHawk snapped, walking out and finding her friend standing in the corner of the wall.
"Huh, oh well fuck you." Firefly snapped back, stepping away from the wall.
"Calm down." JetStar said quietly, as though concerned about getting too involved in the fight. He was right to be concerned.
"Shut the fuck up." Firefly and NightHawk both yelled at once, making JetStar flinch slightly at the force of their combined voices.
"Calm the fuck down!" PartyPoison yelled above them.
Instantly they fell silent.
"Don't be such a bitch." FunGhoul said, walking forward and pulling NightHawk away from Firefly. She glared at him but said nothing.
"OK I want to know how we got here. Last thing I remember was getting caught by Korse and him shoving something down my throat." Kobra said loudly.
Quickly NightHawk explained.
"Aren't you gonna tell them the rest?" Firefly smirked.
"What rest?" Ghoul demanded.
"It's nothing, just some fuck with Korse." NightHawk said, gritting her teeth knowing what was coming.
"What fuck with Korse?" Ghoul snarled.
"Go on tell them." Firefly encouraged NightHawk with a wicked grin.
"I'll get you for this." NightHawk snarled.
Quickly she told them the story; she flinched when Ghoul grabbed her arm after she took her jacket off again. It was the first time she'd taken her jacket off during the day in two years and it had been twice in that day.
"I'll kill him. I'll kill that motherfucker twice for that." He snarled.
"It's nothing. It's over now." NightHawk winced, pulling away from him.
"He shot you." Ghoul snapped.
"Why have you never told us?" Party demanded.
"What was there to tell. 'Oh Korse kidnapped me and shot me, he's an evil bastard'. Like we didn't already know that." NightHawk snapped.
"Don't." She moaned as Ghoul snatched up his gun and grabbed his mask.
"DAD!" She yelled. (I should totally end it there and just ruin your day but I won't because I'm nice like that)
"Where are you going?" Party demanded as Firefly loaded her gun, ready to follow Ghoul.
"Well you're not going to go and neither are you." Kobra said, leaning against a table and folding his arms.
"Dad, I wanna shoot some stuff." Firefly complained to Party.
"Yeah I shoot whatever I see." NightHawk smirked.
"We do need to get more ammo." Jet said quietly.
"He's right, we do. How about you two?" Mikey said, nodding to NightHawk and Firefly, ignoring the glare his brother threw him except to say. "Party we need ammo and you know it."
"Shit, I'm out." NightHawk said, checking her gun.
"Same here." Firefly said, smirking at Party.
Party glared at them all.
"Fine let's go." He snapped finally.
Normally he would be at the head of anything that might involve shooting some Dracs but he saw the way Ghoul clenched his gun tighter than usual and the way NightHawk's finger constantly twitched on the trigger but she always did that, which proved she was Ghoul's daughter. He noticed the look Firefly had in her eye, that need to shoot something.
All true Killjoys were born with the desire for Drac blood but he knew more than to charge into battle without preparation. Still he couldn't deny that their ammo supply was dangerously low.
By the time they came back it was near midnight and they were all exhausted.
"I'm gonna crash." NightHawk said, heading for her room.
"Me too." Firefly yawned.
Ghoul, Kobra, and Jet followed them and they each split into their own rooms. NightHawk and Firefly shared a room, as did Kobra and Party (since they were brothers) and Ghoul and Jet.
"For an abandoned hotel this place sure is small, I mean only three rooms. It must not have been a very popular one." NightHawk mused, taking off her jacket and boots.
"I guess not." Firefly said, doing the same.
NightHawk laid down on the ground and gazed through the hole in the sky. Every room (well the three that existed) had beds but they were rock hard and it felt normal to be on the ground after living in the diner for so long.
Firefly lay down nearby. Just as NightHawk closed her eyes she felt something wet dripping on her face.
"What the fuck?" she exclaimed opening her eyes and looking up. She saw Firefly above her dripping water from her bottle onto NightHawk's face.
"Shit Firefly!" She yelled. "This isn't a rainforest. It's a fucking desert. You need to save water." She sat up quickly and turned the bottle upright.
"What the fuck is wrong with you!" Snapped Firefly.
"What's wrong with me? I'm not wasting water in a fucking hell hole of a desert!" NightHawk snarled, eyes blazing.
"You're just pissed because you had to tell your dad that Korse shot you." Firefly snapped.
"And you would just be hugging and thanking me if I did that." NightHawk said with a sigh. "Look I'm tired. I'm going to sleep. And if you waste any more water trying to make me miserable I'll tell Gee."
"I'll tell him you told me to. You are Frankie's daughter after all." Firefly smirked.
"Mikey'll believe me." NightHawk smirked back.
"Even though he's my uncle." Firefly sighed.
"Ray might believe you, but I doubt it." NightHawk laughed.
"Can you imagine what they'd do if they heard us calling them by their real names?" Firefly laughed.
"Yeah skin us alive. Remember how the second we understood what was happening with Korse and all this shit they made us use our own Killjoy name?"
"And we were soooo happy."
"Now I barely even remember my name. It has no meaning. I mean not like this name…" NightHawk trailed off, twirling a strand of black and red hair in her fingers. (She had black hair naturally but she had put red streaks in it to make it more unique. Firefly had just dyed her hair black.) Firefly nodded.
"Remember the first I said fuck and Frankie nearly shot me?" NightHawk asked with a laugh.
"Yeah I thought you'd had it then. He lost it then." Firefly said laughing too.
"Yeah not like they've never said a swear in their lives."
"Or when Gee pissed me off and I called him a motherfucker."
"I can't believe one person could swear that much or look that red." NightHawk smiled.
"I'm sorry about making you tell them. You should have told them when you wanted to."
"Pfft. Like I would have ever told them." NightHawk said. "Frankie acts like I can't take care of myself. I mean how many times has he been shot? Yet he flips out when I get shot twice."
"We really should go to sleep now. You know what Gee and Frankie said we had to do tomorrow." Firefly said on a yawn.
"Yeah." NightHawk agreed, closing her eyes and drifting into sleep.