When I finally opened my eyes at the end of the mildly painful procedure, I realised I wasn't that unhappy with the result. It was only as I looked in the mirror that it hit me. I wouldn't ever look like just another face in the crowd again. I was permanently marked and I couldn't just hide my face forever.

"Ready to go?" Torn asked as he threw me a helmet from across the room.

"I suppose…" I replied doubtfully. The helmet kind of squished my head and the mouthpiece was majorly creepy and it felt like it was suffocating me.

"You don't have to wear it you know," Torn said, laughing. Probably at how stupid I looked. He was just wearing his uniform, although his armour was yellow, and his hair was short and spiky but he still had the ear covers on. "I did until I got promoted last month and then it just started to seem weird. People knew who I was anyway."

I didn't reply as we walked into the vehicle garage. Most of the vehicles had already been signed out but Torn's hover bike was in an area of its own with a shabby KG hover bike next to it. I sat on it as it floated about half a metre off the ground.

"So do you know how to ride?" Torn asked as he confidently jumped on his hover bike. I got on fine but I grabbed the handlebar and flew into the air, almost hitting the roof, "I guess not then," Torn answered his own question before jumping up and pushing a button to bring me back down. An amazing feat considering he seemed to be almost cacking himself laughing.

"Ok so pushing the right handlebar forward is the accelerator," Torn said, revving the engine on his bike to make a point, "pushing the pedals back with your feet is the brake," he continued, grinning like a little kid as he played with the controls, "the left handle is the gun, push it forward to shoot and the button next to the left handlebar changes the height you're at, either ground level or at the regulation hovering height. KG vehicles have a mid height for arresting criminals," he finished before noticing the helmet; "you're still wearing that thing?" he snorted before opening the door with his KG pass.

We rode out and once I got the hang of the controls it was actually fun but the Krimzon Guard hover bikes were so much worse than even just the pedestrian ones. It might have to do with them being perpetually shot at.

To start off with, we were just on patrol but I almost fell off the bike when a voice buzzed out of the speaker on the dashboard to tell us there was a member of the Underground making off with an eco barrel in the port sector where we were patrolling. We caught sight of the criminal only a few metres later and even though Torn's bike was in good shape, the driver was still better in the gridlock into the red sector.

As soon as I saw an opening, I gunned the throttle and chased after him. I only vaguely heard Torn's voice as he called after me to stop but he was stuck behind the other bikes. Not that that normally stopped a Krimzon Guard but I was starting to suspect that Torn didn't belong in the Krimzon Guard any more than I did. He seemed to care too much about people, even those in the way of the baron.

The gridlock covered both the pavement and the air, meaning I had to dodge around at the mid height for half an hour before I finally got a shot on the underground's bike.

The exhaust exploded and the bike flipped before landing in the port. I sent the bike into a dive, catching the eco barrel before quickly swooping up again to avoid smashing into the water. The criminal was less lucky, he face planted into the water and a tired looking Torn fished him out after catching up by taking a shortcut from where he was stuck, around a kilometre behind.

We dropped the eco barrel off at the palace, dumped the criminal in a holding cell and walked out into the bright daylight radiating over the city walls. Haven City seemed too morbid to house sunshine like this but it did. Torn and I had our helmets off, soaking up the sunshine as we patrolled the streets. At the bazaar we had a cheap lunch of yakow cheese and bread before 'checking up on the pumping station;' basically, we wanted to get some fresh air.

Finally, we walked back to the barracks and Torn went to his office while I went to the locker room. At this time in the afternoon, everyone was in the musty room and going into the separate female area was a relief. When I walked in, a lady in a shocking lack of armour introduced herself as Ashelin. "So you're Torn's new pet guard are you?" she asked jokingly.

"Yeah, sure seems like it."

"Well, welcome anyway, the locker on the top left is empty," Ashelin said.

"Why is everyone in that corner of the showers, in uniform?" I asked, as nonchalantly as possible.

"Someone noticed that there's a crack in the wall, they're trying to make it bigger because something keeps whirring behind it."

I took off all of the outside armour to try and cool off after a day in the sun before joining the others in the corner. They were trying to chip it open and avoid it being noticed later but I got impatient with this method very quickly. "Seriously, that'll take us all year," I groaned before kicking the crack and shattering the tiles around it.

It revealed a tiny camera, whirring to look at each female. "Errol," Ashelin growled.

"Who?" I asked

"Errol, the baron's head bodyguard but he's normally on security when he isn't racing and he's a total perv. He manipulates girls for fun then dumps them when he feels like it. Just because he's the 'best racer in Haven City.'"

Ashelin shot the camera and the lens exploded, leaving shattered glass and an eerie feel in the air. Then everyone realised they could shower freely for as long as they wanted without whoever this Errol guy was, watching.

Eventually it was time to go back to the hammocks, where the chatter didn't die down until around twelve and there were drinks and stories going around the room but I was only really happy and sleepy when the story of 'the new girl taking out a top underground racer' made its round.