There was something chilling, almost forbidding about the air. The man with the Briefcase looked around the deserted trailer park at midnight. He closed his eyes, shielding the world from seeing the green evil that layed behind them. Nobody would be awake to see the man in the black suit, covered in blood.

Emir Parkreiner was his name. It had been an approximate five minutes ago that he had chased down his last foe, the Last Smile. He almost felt a sense of fulfillment when he gunned down Last Smile, his Father, his Servant, his Worst Enemy. For quite a while, he'd been replaying the entire scene in his mind.

Into the basement. Down the stairs. Left turn. Right turn. Left turn. Left turn. Right turn. Right turn. Right turn. Back Him into a corner. One, two, three, four, five bullets. The man in bondage falls down. A satisfying feeling. Then, a sudden dizziness. Throw down the Golden Gun. Drop the briefcase. Open it. Weep uncontrollably. You are the Bloody Heartland. You are Garcian Smith. You are Emir Parkreiner.

All a memory. The same memory on loop; Emir's body on a state of auto-pilot. His body tensed uncontrollably as he imagined himself plugging Last Smile full of bullets. Suddenly, Emir felt free at last. No longer bound by Father, by Harman, he was free at last. But all Emir could feel was emptiness.

He wasn't always Emir. For a while, he was also Garcian Smith, member of the world's greatest assassins, the Killer7. They were elite killers; no job could not be undertaken. Wanted a target behind a tough lock? Coyote was your man. Needed a fast runner to gun down your victim? Con would be happy to oblige. Needed a stealth expert to sneak in unnoticed? The one known as Kevin could fill the role. Did you want your victim to be gunned down by a complete badass? Just call for the Killer7's resident badass, Dan.

Garcian was the Cleaner, a specialist in disposing bodies. While he wasn't the greatest in the team, his skills were undeniably useful. He possessed a curious ability: the power to resurrect the dead. It came in handy when the reckless comrade got ahead of themselves. All he needed was a body part of the dead, and he could bring them back to life. Rumour had it that he also possessed powers of clairvoyance.

Though all of it was in the past now. The killer7 are dead. Not even Garcian could resurrect them. Pure Smile saw to that. Dan, KAEDE, Con, Coyote, Kevin, MASK... Harman; all dead.

Ironically, Emir had killed them all before.

A small thought began to overlap the recurring memory in his head. Back to the school, over and over again. Back to That Place, the place where they all died. Perhaps it was Emir's loneliness - he'd had that loneliness for three years now - but he knew he had little time. Emir was careless, killing Him was possibly the wrong idea. But even He admitted it himself; maybe he deserved to die. If he did let Him live, then there would be plenty of people out for Emir's blood. He'd be defenseless, even for an assassin like himself. He knew what he did was right, for himself at least.

Emir weighed up his options: go back to That Place or stand around like a fool. He looked to the right of him. A blood-stained sports car, bought off by his late informant. Coburn Elementary couldn't have been less than thirty minutes, provided he avoided traffic. It would be the one place where he could find even a small clue... or at least relive the moment.

Above him, fireworks flew through the sky, to the East. Moving in co-ordinated paths, directed towards the Enemies of the West. If they were still trying to get rid of the Smiles, all of it was in vein. He had deal with the last one already. The Last Smile, the Father, the Servant, Kun Lan. Was the West just hellbent on eradicating the East? The world had finally been at peace, and now all that remained of that peace was quickly being destroyed. The peace that was destroyed by a smile.

Emir decided on an action. He grabbed an odd-shaped key, one that could be confused for an ancient relic, and opened the car door. Emir checked the front glovebox. No reason why he couldn't shield his eyes, at least. Mills must have forgotten to take his thick sunglasses out; Emir was going to take them for himself. The sunglasses, at the least, shielded his eyes from the rest of the world. To see a man with glowing green eyes would not be taken well by the rest of the world.

Driving along the highway, Emir noticed that there was a plethora of public service vehicles zooming about on the highway; police cruisers, fire trucks, ambulances. They seemed to be going along the same general direction. Nobody even bothered to notice the red sports car with rocket boosters attached to the back. Perhaps they were in a hurry.


The Union Hotel was occupied. That was strange. The only two residents besides the staff were two impudent old men; lounging around the penthouse in complete calm, spending their days playing chess and telling war tales. Very few people wanted anything to do with the hotel, especially with the new one two blocks away. The establishment's financial resources were being kept afloat by the government, for a plea of silence regarding a matter of national security.

The clerk, Edo McAllister, was unusually quiet. Normally, he'd be talking his head off at non-existing guests, trying to fight the boredom of being at a ghost hotel. A recurring joke by the other staff was that Edo had powers of clairvoyance; whenever he wasn't talking for most of his work day, there would be a guest.

It just so happened that there was a guest.

He was in his thirties, slightly higher than average, regular build, Irish-American; nothing really stood out about him. He sported a black business suit with a red tie. Nobody knew that he carried a handcannon in a holster, hidden by the jacket.

'Ah,' Edo said, noticing the man walking in, 'welcome to the Union Hotel. Will you be staying or just visiting a guest?'

'I'm looking for this man,' the man said, taking out a Polaroid print of an old man in his sixties, wearing a Roman Catholic priest's outfit in a wheelchair. Edo stared at the picture, adjusting his glasses as he did so. He recognised him.

'Oh, you must want Mr...'

Edo retreated to the computer near his desk and typed a few letters.

'Mr. Harman Smith?'

The man in the suit smiled devilishly. 'That's him alright. You mind if I go see him?'

Edo made a bow, a small gesture of courtesy in the hotel. 'He's in the penthouse suite. Please take the elevator. Would you like a message sent to him?'

'Yeah, sure.' The man checked his holster, confirming the gun was in there. 'Tell him the Hellion's here.'