Health warning: My sincerest apologies to Sunrise for writing this. I was bored at work. Don't take any of this seriously. All comments are welcome!

Chapter One: Sunrise Town

It was the height of noon and the afternoon sunlight beat down on the ground, scorching every living creature in sight. Not a breeze was to be felt by the inhabitants of Sunrise Town, population 43, and even the desert scorpions had ran away to the next village in search of something more exciting.

Inside the Ptolemy Saloon, where the action of this story begins, the regulars were doing their normal daily activities, namely playing poker over and over again. The four poker players at the corner table were all male, and they in fact made up a secret organization called Celestial Being. In the olden days, when the town was still thriving and prosperous, Celestial Being's job was to keep law and order. They would interrupt unruly shootouts between wannabe cowboys by firing a huge cannon between the rivalling factions. It usually worked. Celestial Being was very good at their job. Gradually, there were less and less shootouts but at the same time, the population of the town dropped like a fat rock, until there were only 43 people in the town. Still, as long as there was peace, Celestial Being didn't mind. Now, their days were generally spent at Ptolemy, playing their favourite card game. It wasn't a bad saloon either, apart from the fact that they were only given Coke because the barmaid Sumeragi kept stowing away all the alcohol, which sort of defeated the purpose of opening a bar in the first place.

Today, because of the mind-dulling heat, the poker game was going rather slowly. 'Call or fold?' Tieria Erde said impatiently. He often wondered at the brain capacity of his fellow team members and thought them unfit to be in the organisation anyway. The other members knew this because Tieria was constantly telling them exactly how unfit they were. But deep down inside, Tieria didn't really want them to leave because then he would be all by himself and look like a loser.

"I think he's bluffing," muttered Allelujah under his breath. Allelujah was another member of Celestial Being. He was OK most of the time but once every full moon he would go off somewhere and not return until the next day. He was a very mysterious guy. But the others never bothered to ask where he went.

"Tieria never bluffs," Lockon said. Lockon managed to win 80% of the poker games whilst flirting with every single female who passed through the doors of Ptolemy Saloon. (ed: obviously this is Lyle and not Neil.) Today his victim was the new barmaid, a pink haired girl called Feldt, who kept blushing and distracting herself by wiping cups or something.

Setsuna was the last and youngest member of the group. He didn't talk very much and took everything very seriously. He also had the best horse out of all of them, a magnificent white stallion called Exia. Setsuna talked to his horse a lot more than to the other guys. There were also rumors abound that the horse sometimes glowed green at night, but nobody believed it the rumour.

The doors to the saloon suddenly flung open and Lasse staggered in. Lasse worked at the saloon and he had gone out to run some errands. He had obviously been attacked because his lip was cut and there was a huge lump on his forehead, where he had been beaten. 'Lasse!' Sumeragi ran out anxiously. "What on earth happened to you?"

"I got attacked," he said weakly. "All the money's gone… I saw him...I saw Ribbons." His eyes rolled backwards and he abruptly fainted.

There was a shocked silence, which Lockon broke by asking tentatively, 'Um… Who's Ribbons?'

"He's an evil drug lord," Feldt answered, her voice shaking. "He leads a criminal organisation. They do everything – extortion, kidnapping, arson. He's got half the government under his control. They call themselves…the Innovators." At this point she became too overwhelmed and had to sit down.

"I told Lasse to put the money in the bank," said Sumeragi, who had gone as pale as two sheets. "All our money… It's all gone."

There was another round of silence as they all absorbed this shocking news. No more money inevitably meant the saloon had to close down. With no saloon, there would be no poker. Celestial Being would have to go find normal jobs, like accounting. It was a terrifying prospect.

"We'll get the money back." All eyes turned upon Setsuna, the one who had spoken.

There was a strange gleam in his eyes that none of them had seen before. But they all recognised it. It was the Gleam of Battle, a life which they had abandoned long ago.

Celestial Being was back.

- TBC -