"Life is a great big canvas—you should throw all the paint on it you can." -Danny Kaye
2047 Hours Military Time - 13/11/XX
...
Pulling the freezer door ajar, a bottle of coke was pulled out. The door fogged up and a quick decision was made to draw a quick smiley face into the condensation. A tanned finger grew cold as it was drug across the cold glass door.
A shock of jet black hair swayed as cobalt eyes glanced around the small convince store in slight wonder as the freezer door thumped shut.
"Hrm, wonder where everyone went," the customer thought as she bundled her soon-to-be-purchases in her lithe arms. The faux fur that lined the hood of her jacket tickled against her neck as she made her way to the counter to make a purchases—lyrics from VACANCY booming into her ears.
There had been a small number of people around before she went into the bathroom.
Her dull red shoes squeaked slightly against the floor as she stopped in front of the empty counter. Placing her stuff onto the wooden like surface, she looked around again as she started to roll her earbuds up around her iPod.
"A bit early for Dmitri to be getting ready to close up yet..." she mumbled to herself, leaning forward over the counter to glance up and down the back area behind the wall of products.
Nope, no sign of her greying haired friend.
Rolling her eyes as she leaned back onto her feet, she briefly caught sight of a flash of refracted light on the floor straight down.
Huh?
Leaning back over the counter, pushing her purchases aside, she looked down to the floor right behind the place her friend should have been.
A bent up frame that used to be in the form of glasses was smashed against the floor, all former shape gone. The lens were shattered across the small patch of floor. The broken glass looked unnatural next to a couple spots of red.
Before the 5'9" girl could comprehend that it was, indeed, a liquid that was blue inside a person's body was spotted against the floor, there was a loud CRASH and a muffled BANG in the back room of the store.
"Holy shi—" was all she was able to say before a figure came flying out from the back room of the store. It flew around the corner, not only did the person not see her, it also rammed into her full force.
A few heartbeats later, she found herself sprawled on the floor a few feet from the counter, a good view of the ceiling now in her line of sight. She started to groan in pain as she finally started to feel the throbbing in the back of her head.
A hand was quickly placed over her mouth, muffling all the sound it would have caused.
Azure eyes snapped open in an instant, glinting red in the harsh florescent lights. She almost brought a clenched hand to the perpetrator's face when her eyes meet familiar, panicked brown ones.
"Shhh..." he hushed, bring a finger to his fall chapped lips. Dmitri, lifted his hand off of her face,"Quiet... or he'll hear you."
She opened her mouth to shoot a question anyway as she took her friend's hand to sit up, to be cut off by another voice.
A foreign and unfamiliar voice.
"Come now old man, you're just avoiding the inevitable," rasped a hoarse voice.
She could hear him suck in a sharp breath before standing from his crouch, jerking her up with him. Not letting go of her wrist, he pulled her down an aisle of chips and pickled... pickles. She nearly stumbled over her own feet as she was pulled behind the narrow shelf on the outside of the aisle.
Dmitri finally let go of her, now sore, wrist when he bent over to stand within the length of the aisle. She crouched too, mind running circles.
"What the hell Dmitri?" she hissed quietly.
She only got a hush in response. Shuffling forward quietly, she peeked around the corner to see what Dmitri was so intent on watching.
Her eyes widened as she took in the form of a hunched over figure. It person stood tall and... not tall at the same time, but what really got her was the mask the guy was wearing.
Five thick thread-like cords hung off the mask, and, strangely enough, a dark colored cloth mask hung over the mouth area of the mask.
Bored looking brown eyes shifted over the room from the eye holes of the mask. And for a moment the eyes came over near where she and Dmitri were hiding. They both shuffled back out of view and that was when she noticed her balding grey haired friend was clutching his left arm.
The long sleeve of his grey shirt was dyed a dark red, the clothing ripped in a neat line.
There was a soft click.
"I don't like to be kept waiting, nor do I like to keep others waiting; why don't you just come out already?"
The two slowly shuffled back down the aisle as the offender started to walk around.
She whispered to Dmitri,"You have a plan of action, Jiji?"
Knowing him, he probably didn't, but she had an idea. He wouldn't like it, but he didn't have many options.
"No," he whispered back,"But I know you do, don'tcha?"
She grinned even though she knew he wasn't looking.
After shuffling around, avoiding the armed assailant for as long as they could, the two devised a plan. One would be the bait, the other the enforcer. Dmitri couldn't do it with his hurt arm, but nonetheless tried to get her to go along with it. She denied him and said she'd do it.
Her arms were flat against her sides as she quickly rethought the plan, looking for anything else she could do.
It was like thinking through a rush, however, was she really ready for this? One misstep and the man could kill her. She didn't want to die, but if she didn't do something, he'd most likely kill both her and Dmitri.
Dmitri had a wife to go back too, and her best friend, his grandaughter and her parents, to also go back too. She didn't have much to go back too, but she also had her friend and her two mice if anything. That, and to live for her parents that weren't alive.
It wasn't an option; she had to live.
Lord Pain help her.
Another soft click, sliced through her train of thoughts, jerking her back to the matter at hand.
"Ah, there you are old man," went the faceless voice.
Her heart pounded in her chest, ready to pump out adrenaline into her system. She clenched and unclenched her hands as she waited for a word to be said.
It was simple, all she had to do was put the guy in a headlock. If the guy hadn't have broken the panic button, then the police would have been there by now.
She rubbed her hands as she gulped, she had nearly jumped out when her friend had let out a muffled scream of pain when a shot rang out, however, having second thoughts now wasn't going help. She had peeked around the corner and nearly gagged when she saw blood pooling around one of his legs that was visible.
"You know—pant—what you're doing—pant—is wrong," came Dmitri in a pained Dmitri in a pained voice.
"You are in no position to be lecturing me old geezer."
Now that she was closer, the voice almost sounded like it had an accent. If she had had more time, she may have guessed maybe Fire or Wind, possibly even Lightening, but she didn't have the time.
"Now, get up; you will unlock the safe and hand over all the money."
"Not over my dead body."
That was her cue.
To her, everything went past in a rush. As soon as she had launched herself onto the gun wielders back, she had immediately wrapped her arms around his neck and legs around his waist. The offender had let out a grunt in shock before immediately going to pry at her arms.
On an adrenaline high, she couldn't feel his nails biting into her arms or hear the gun drop to the floor. She pulled her arm back, leaning all of her weight to pull him back and away from Dmitri.
The man stumbled backward crookdly and lost his footing, falling onto his back, crushing the air out of her as soon as they hit the hard, cold floor.
With her dazed, her arms and legs loosened in their hold.
The guy took that chance, freeing himself from her loose grasp. Looking up, she tried to focus on his face as the mask was halfway pulled off his head.
Bright red hair was sticking out from under the odd mask in tuffs. When her mind cleared, she took in the edge of a bored looking brown eye. She looked out of the bottom of her azure eyes and saw that Dmitri was going for the downed gun.
He'd need more time with a hurt arm and leg.
Pushing herself to her feet, she narrowed her eyes at the assailant as he reached up and started to tug the mask back over his face. That action meant that he didn't see her as much of a threat.
On impulse she launched herself at him again, only to have him step to the side. She skidded to a halt, nearly running into a shelf of honey buns and the such.
Turning around, she didn't have time to register that the once gun man was upon her.
She sucked in a breath as there was a sharp pain in her mid-section, causing her to close her eyes in pain as it was pulled to the right. She pushed at the man before staggering out of his way and tumbling to the floor. Lying there, she took ragged breaths as she clutched at her abdomen.
Then, there was two loud BANGS, the second followed by the sound of shattering glass. The wispy sound of a fleeing pair of feet sounded like it was miles away to her.
She wanted to open her eyes, but found that they felt too heavy and couldn't lift them open. She suddenly felt drained and tired.
She didn't understand why.
"Elias... police... knife... coming," went a soft voice,"Stay... me now."
There was a moment of quiet, where Elias didn't hear anything, but some pretty church bells.
"Elias!"