As odd as it sounded, something went wrong with the last hunt. An eyewitness had caught me just as I finished off my last target for the day. 'Witness'... Well, that's not the most accurate term to describe this particular encounter. It implies that this so-called 'witness' merely stared or pissed themselves cowering in fear when they found out what I did, but that didn't actually happen. Rather, this woman blew her fuse in a peculiar way:

"You… You're…! GUNS! IN THE FUCKING FLESH! SAY YOUR PRAYERS BECAUSE I'LL TEAR YOU APART!"

How the heck did she know who I am? I've never actually introduced myself in this form as Guns. The only clue that could come to mind was the old Horizon facility. If I had failed to destroy the systems fully, if they had a computer whiz on their side, if one was dogged enough to overcome even death… A leak may possibly occur. My appearance previously rendered in digital form, perhaps. Nataly probably wanted to make sure that we wouldn't have to download into some sort of broken chimera. Or maybe she was curious, I wish I knew what she was thinking then and now.

There was no way this woman was a match for me. Too much weight in her punches, and not enough chill to keep her wits about her. Honestly, her utter lack of skill despite her desperation was fucking hilarious. One could only wonder what had been pissing her off, till I noticed her aiming for my throat whenever a certain sound rumbled in the air. It was a rather nostalgic yet unfamiliar voice. Took several more kicks to her guts for her to finally scream something more sensible.

"SHUT UP! SHUT UP! SHUT UP! STOP LAUGHING!"

Man, I was chuckling the entire time apparently; I didn't even know laughing was possible, but anyway… Perhaps she was one of GUNS' victims? Mine by proxy, I guess. The confrontation eventually ended with her deranged screams reverberating against my fingers. T'was a drool-inducing tickle while I throttled her into the ground.

"Who're you again?"

That pissed her off even more.

"HOW COULD YOU NOT KNOW WHO I AM?! You… Toyed with me, fucked my life up so badly…"

"I'm afraid I'm not capable of one-night stands."

"FUCK YOU, YOU KNOW THAT'S NOT WHAT I MEANT! YOU KNOW WHAT YOUR MEN DID!"

Really, what on earth did GUNS do this time? Wish it wasn't kept a secret from me. Certain memory files had been heavily encrypted and nigh inaccessible, as though GUNS itself wanted to keep undesirable truths under wraps. What could've been worse than murdering too many clones of yourself anyway? Fuck's sake, imagine if Nataly had the ability to cover that up as well. I don't know what the point of hiding all those records was, but shit's confusing when the past catches up and I can't make any sense out of it.

"Uh… my bad? I honestly don't know who or what you're on about."

Her screams had gone silent at this point. Not from her losing consciousness, but from her rage physically (and conveniently) making her struggle to catch her breath. It's almost endearing how easy it was to rile her up. Unfortunately, this was neither the time nor place to remain held up any longer. If this woman's here, more pests are bound to show up.

"Look, I don't know what the fuck your problem is, but you'll have to stay still and look dead for a bit."

A solid hook to the jaw knocked her out cold and limp… God that was satisfying. If only I could savour it once more, but not much could be expected from the unconscious. Wonder if… She'll come after me again? That would be… Nice, maybe. We'll see how it goes. Anyway, the game's over and it's time to move on to the next one.

Becoming a mercenary is still my end goal either way, and nothing's gonna stop me.