Together We Break
Chapter One: Chased
I walked down the alleyway with my head down. When I was halfway down, I heard men following her. I turned. There were six men, acting like they were the predators. Cubs. Have no idea who I am, do they? Well, they better not. I'll have to remove them immediately.
"Hey baby, you want some fun?" asked one of the men. No, boys. They're boys. The cub who talked looked at the others of his little wannabe pack. I've seen wolf cubs hunt better. And look cuter.
"From you?" I laughed, "Hell no you little boys. Now why don't you run back to you mamas?" That should piss them off. It did.
The Lead Cub looked flustered and the others angry. I hit a massive nerve. Good. "You bitch! We'll kill you but before we're gonna have a lot of fun" shrieked the Leader Cub. Sweet, merciful Dark Goddess, I was sick of this boy's voice already. The leader came at me and I countered with a turning kick, hitting the cub in the gut. Another pulled out a knife, whilst another pulled out a Glock semi-automatic. I punched Knife Cub in the jaw on the left side with my right, and roundhouse kicked Gun Cub in the head with my left. Three down, three to go. I tackled one into a wall and his head smacked against it hard. One more got a front kick to the groin and the last cub got a side kick and a double punch for good measure.
I looked over at my handiwork. I saw a man at the other end of the alleyway. He was wearing a hoodie so I couldn't get a look at his face. He stared right at me. In the back of my mind, I realised that he was studying me and my moves. Huh. I gave the man a hard look and slowly walked off into the street. It was cold, and therefore tugged my black cotton hoodie down further to hide my face. After walking for about a minute I saw Hoodie Man in a reflection off a window. First studying me and now following me? What in the Underworld in this pup up to? I walked into a lingerie store. I started to finger through some of the smaller sizes, watching Hoodie Pup walk into the store and turning his head trying to find me through the throngs of women and the occasional man. Soon I walked out the warm store and into the freezing street. I hate the cold. I do much better in boiling temperatures, from living in Egypt for a while. Which is weird because I was born in Canada when it was snowing. Well, if you guys can figure it out please tell me. I picked up the pace of the walking. By now, I'm pretty sure the guy had figured out that I knew that he was my new best stalkerie friend. Fantastic.
I turned a corner and so did he. I was tempted to walk down another alley; by I think he's sort of expecting that. After five minutes a car pulled up next to my stalker friend. Help? The man who got out was Asian with scars and wearing a grey jacket, what appeared to be body armour and bright orange glasses. How conspicuous. Glasses started arguing with Hoodie. Hoodie sounded pissed but I couldn't hear any words, only voices but the tones were hard. There were tons of voices around us but I could tell. I'd recognise anywhere. Having conversations with Logan and Victor taught me. I hid in a doorway and watched the two men argue. Once I figured out that they weren't going to finish soon, I quickly darted out and continued down the street.
Ten minutes afterwards, I looked behind me and saw no Hoodie. Good. I went to the apartment and got into my room. The richer neighbours gave me glare, turned their noses up at me but no-one talked to me. Great. Today is going great! I checked the clock. It was 11:30pm. I walked up to my apartment on the third floor and opened the fifth door. Cerberus rushed me as soon as I entered.
"Come on boy! Give me some space and I'll get some food" I told him. He barked and danced around happily. I got some meat from the fridge and put it on three plates. Cerberus' three heads ate the meat in seconds. Yeah, my dog's not just named Cerberus, he's the actual Cerberus. Ya' know, son of Typhon and Echidna-
(Spikey!)
"Hey, where were you? Where's Bright Dragon?" I asked. I sometimes lose track of my voices. Big deal.
(*Cue my awesome entrance music!*)
I rolled my eyes. Is it crazy to ask for better voices?
(Probably)
I nodded while I got a microwave dinner out and put it in the microwave. I pressed a few buttons and the microwave lit up, while my dinner span around. I watched it and so did Cerberus. Speaking of Cerberus, he the Cerberus you hear about in the Greek and Roman myths. He's the Guardian to the Gates of the Underworld. Well he was. After I was born I was really sick ya know? My mum took down there too. That's where I met Cerberus. Shadow Dragon and Bright Dragon were there too Becoming their host started a low degree of my healing factor and saved my life. It also changed my brown hair and eyes to a silver white colour. That pretty much tells everyone 'Mutant here! Please try to kill me!' To stop that I tend to dye my hair. I look damn good as a redhead. Why the hell did I tell you all that? Meh, doesn't matter. I finished my dinner and put the rubbish in the bin.
Me and Cerberus sit on the couch and flick through the channels. Deciding there nothing good enough to watch, I slowly went to bed. After getting changed to some old ratty 'jammies, I laid under the sheets and Cerberus jumps on top of the cover and snuggled next to me. I put my arm around him and fall off to sleep.
I felt a tug which woke me up from a dreamless and nightmare-less sleep. I opened my eyes. Cerberus' right head was tugging on my sleeve. I groggily sit up and look at my clock. It said 3:32. I groaned. "What is it boy?" I asked whilst yawning.
(Maybe he wants food?)
(*Does he want us to meet his girlfriend?*)
"Cerberus can open the fridge and he doesn't have a girlfriend" I answered. I looked at him, "Do you?" Cerberus moved all three heads. The left hit the middle when trying to shake his head side to side, and the right nodded. I grinned, "Cery has a squeeze!" Cerberus barked and I laughed.
He grabbed my sleeve again and dragged me to the window. I peeked out and saw lights from helicopters and police vans outside of the apartment building. They were evacuating everyone else, all the rich people and I believed that I saw several SHIELD vehicles. Across the street I thought I saw Hoodie from yesterday. Damnit, does he have anything to do with this?
(Possibly. He could be SHIELD or CIA or FBI…)
(*Could be another merc pissed that we tend to get more of the high profile jobs*)
I closed the curtains and got changed into my warm merc outfit. It's a slimmer version of Ezio Auditore da Firenze's brown furry Assassin uniform. There was also plenty of places to hide my guns, knives and any other awesome goodies. I loaded and cleaned my guns, swords and knives. As I was putting them in their place, someone from outside spoke on a megaphone "NIGHTSHADE, WE'RE GIVING YOU THIS CHANCE TO GIVE UP PEACEFULLY. IF YOU DO NOT EXIT THE BUILDING WITHIN FIVE MINUTES, WE WILL SEND PEOPLE UP TO TAKE YOU OUT OF THERE. YOU HAVE FIVE MINUTES". I rolled my eyes. Me come out there? They come in here? I know bullshit when I smell it and Almighty Dark Goddess, do I smell it.
Cerberus snuggled next to me and moved his heads in the general direction of the window with the ladder outside. I grinned and patted him on his heads. I ran to the window, pushed it up and climbed out. I checked below. Dumbasses. No-one was there. Great!
(Es-cap-eh!)
(*Its escape not es-cap-eh!*)
I've seen Finding Nemo wayyy too much. Or is it Finding Emo? Whatever. I jumped down and ran down the alley. Goddess, I've been near too many damn alleys. Need to stop. Okay, tomorrow (Later today?) I'm going on an alley diet. If I can help it. I turned a corner and quickly hid behind a building. Damnit, I underestimated them. There were cops, agents and costumes waltzing around here. Thank all of the Goddesses everywhere that my outfit has a hoodie, which is sewn onto the back of the costume. I tugged it down and quickly walked across the street. I went into a 24 hour café and ordered a short black and a donut. Tasty. I gave some of the donuty parts to Cerberus, not the chocolate parts. Even though Cery is immortal, he doesn't like chocolate. He does like caramel though. I sipped on my coffee while the overly perky Southern waitress started to talk into my ear.
"They're looking for that killer ya know? His name's Nightshade I think" said the waitress, pouring more coffee into my cup.
His? Goddess why does everyone think I'm a guy? Well I guess it's because I bind my breasts. But do you know how hard it is to run without binding them? Painful. "Well, I heard somewhere that Nightshade's a woman" I replied taking a swig of my black coffee.
The waitress' eyebrows rose. "Really? Where did ya hear that?" she said.
I shrugged "Dunno, somewhere I guess". Cerberus snuggled next to my leg and I patted him. Boy am I glad that Cery can shapeshift into other forms of himself. It tends to be sizes and the amount of heads. Still glad. I wonder if the woman's figured out that I'm wearing an outfit that seems to have appeared in the video game Assassin's Creed. I'm terrible at it; in an hour I had already died as least fifty times, from falling off of buildings. I finished my food and I with Cerberus left. I walked down the street quickly and saw a few people who weren't cops. These obviously law abiding citizens were trying to distance themselves from the cops as soon as possible. If I was them I probably would've too. Except I wasn't. For that I am very glad. I walked down a few streets with Cerberus trailing behind, when I noticed that Hoodie from yesterday following me. I recognised the scent. He started to walk faster when he realised I recognised him. I walk faster as well and went around a sharp corner. I walked faster down there and used my telepathic power to imagine some beggar clothes and utilised my telekinetic powers to form them. Don't ask me how; I don't know how it exactly works. It just does. I sat down in the rubbish and rubbed some dirt on me and Cerberus. I then waited. Sure enough, Hoodie comes barrelling down the alley and looks around. Guess I failed my alley diet, huh?
(Damn straight!)
Hoodie turns to me. Does he recognise me? "Did you see a woman in brown clothes with fur walk down here?" he fired at me. Guess he doesn't. I shrugged and curled up as if I was going to sleep. Hoodie growled and stormed off. I yawned. I knew I had to get out of here fast, but I also knew that my adrenaline shot from before was wearing off. Cerberus curled up next to me and I automatically knew he was tired and wanted sleep. It's this bonding thing. I will always know what he's saying. Well, to other people he's barking. I don't speak dog. I only speak Cerberus. It's awesome. The bonding thing also lets me sense his emotions and thoughts. It's also a two way thing. He always knows my emotions and my thoughts too. I yawned again and closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep.
I felt something tug on my rag sleeve. Déjà vu. I opened my eyes and saw a young woman with auburn-y hair and kind eyes. I said ever-so-intelligently "Huh?"
She smiled "Hi, my name's Sandi. What's yours?"
I automatically said Temperance. I technically I wasn't lying. Temperance is one of my middle names. This girl smiled again. Cerberus woke up and looked around. He saw Sandi and walked around to get a sniff. I personally didn't think she smelled too bad. Cerberus sniffed and rolled on my leg. That was are our signal that the person who was sniffed could be trusted. "My name's not Temperance. I lied. It's Ariana Howlett. Or better known as Nightshade" I blurted out. I needed to tell someone. I trusted someone who woke me up just a minute ago with one of my biggest secrets, a secret that I haven't even told my sister. Sandi looked surprised and was silent.
When she spoke again, I was very surprised "How would you like to have a job?"
I blinked for a bit. I grinned. "Nothing that involves tons of paperwork".