A/N: If you see any typos or grammar mistakes, let them be known so they can be fixed.
5 August 2024
2:15 P.M EDT
New York City, New York, United States
Inside an alleyway, the yellow-haired girl in shorts and a tank top holds a statue inside a cardboard box. Bold "merch" in black ink inside of it all while she'd progress. A sign she was finding in view within her distance. Interrupted upon four individuals showing up behind her.
"What's inside there? Anime merch?" a girl's voice said, the brown hair and in a ponytail.
She shifts her foot backward, making for Dvinaslav to face the group's persons. Two orange and yellow eyes visible, slightly orange from the clouds of the day. Unchanging sternness while her glance continued from the narrow space bordered to the sides by brick and concrete.
"Please?" asked the girl.
Dvinaslav shook her head.
"Can I just see it for a moment?" the girl said again.
"I don't want to clean it again," Dvinaslav replied, unmoving like her glare.
"I wanna see it!" the girl charges the other girl.
Setting the box down, Dvinaslav used her body to redirect the girl's tackle attempt towards a hard surface. Both a deterrent to the other three to not try and do something, and to the girl herself.
"HRUAGH!" the girl screamed, her thigh several degrees from being completely vertical as it went against the wall.
The two guys there didn't concern themselves to what Dvinaslav's silent threat was. Sprinting for her. Releasing two jabs, one for her nose and one for her gut.
The leftwards boy's fist meets Dvinaslav's open hand from her right. The opposite hand for the other boy happens at the same time. Backing away before trying again, only to see her hands catch both near her breasts.
"Does it have to be that way?" Dvinaslav asked within the constant moving of her hands, "You're exhausting your energy when I wasn't going to attack in the first place."
"You broke her leg, bitch!" the boy spoke with, launching a forward-thrusting kick towards Dvinaslav.
Raising her knee to his foot, both make contact, then lowering her leg back to the ground. Stopping the attack before any damage or counter from her aggressor commences.
"Take her to the hospital. Don't make me fight back," her hardline glare shows as the hairs at the spines contract towards each other as she'd walk away from the scene.
Taking the walk, picking the box again, she'd come up towards the shady shop's crooked door. Pushing it out of the way while she walked inside.
2:17 P.M
Shady Shop, New York City, United States
Pushing the rest of the door sounded an antique Japanese bell. In truth, intricate use involving signals to make the replication of a similar bell derived from an online clip. Opening the store for a newcomer or a person arriving inside.
Compared to the exterior's monochrome. The inside's swirling browns, reds, golds, and other finer colors pop an environment seen in a Chinatown rather than an alleyway. Shelves storing merchandise from anime and manga series, and martial arts-related pawns stored inside too. The centerpiece to the display, the store master's desk, was an object that came off Chinese rather than Japanese or Korean. However, for odd circumstances, fit well with the scene.
"Welcome! Welcome!" said the person who owned the shop, spinning in a swivel chair.
Dvinaslav carried the box to the counter and sets it down. "Statue I want to sell to you."
The owner of the shop "Let's see…"
Rambling about the certain aspects of that specific model, a Hisoka statue from two thousand fourteen ensued. It continues for several minutes while she'd finally get an answer from the person.
"This statue is a collector's item. If it wasn't, this Hisoka, painted with greater shading and brighter colors, would've been three-hundred. However, since this is the case, it's four-hundred and fifty."
She'd shake her head, "I dissent, it should be five-hundred twenty-five."
"Five hundred twenty-five?" the shopmaster asked.
Dvinaslav nods. "It's not manufactured anymore. Both in pose and use of color. The clay and polymer materials aren't used anymore from Bandai."
As it saw her point, they backed away, speaking with a feminine tweaked yet masculine voice, "Fortunately, your word is correct in that the judgment when it comes to Hunter Hunter statues. I'll accept it, but only at five hundred. I understand the value in higher for that specific kind in its process. Money's tight, although, give another rare statue like it, an additional twenty-five will be added to keep the deal."
"Works." she shakes the hand of the owner.
Moments after completing the deal, she pulls her phone out and the owner scans a certain code, transferring money to the squad's collective bank account.
A simple wave from her hand, and then she was off of the area and back towards home. Her schedule was free for things she enjoyed liking.
2:22 P.M EDT
New York City, New York, United States
Out with several hundred bills, she strolled outside and past the alleyway, she had to bypass to enter the anime and martial arts pawn shop. Nothing seems to be wanting to get in her way again. No more does she have to face certain types of bullies or people who want to mug her money or sexually harass her. The person she threw taken out of the way, and the situation disregarded.
"Finally. Peace, quiet, nothing to get in my way," she said, smiling while she'd make a turn back into the public eye fully.
With a single change in the level of class, her eyes collected themselves to dramatically shot up. Something not concerned with would look awed at, to the inspiring, attention-grabbing, and otherwise the epicenter for a new revolution or incorporation to who's able to afford.
Dvinaslav stops at a crosswalk, waiting for the signal to begin walking to be sent and received. Yet, cars, buses, and bikes pass the streets with only the movement forward pushing the train of people forward. The light of her sky brightening her stellar colored eyes and spreading pointed ends of her hair to a slowly deteriorating to a normal hairstyle.
Three minutes of nothing but cars come to a halt, the outline of a man going for a walk appearing on the light. She took forward steps, staying within the white dotted line between it.
Coming to an apparent end when, violating the law, a sports vehicle brakes in the middle of the pedestrian path cutting through the road. Right in front of Dvinaslav. With shadowed windows, one of them rolls up. One of the guys inside, Haizi in a casual business suit with shades.
He leans out and said, "Greetings, Dvinaslav."
Trying to circumvent the car, she replies, "People are looking at us…"
"No worries. I just wanna talk to you. Come in for a moment?"
"In a suspicious car? I doubt you're Haizi."
"Chill for a moment. I am Haizi. My podcast associates are driving me somewhere." Haizi explained, a sense of smugness irradiating from him.
"Aright, but if anything funny arises..." Dvinaslav said back as her person enters the backseat head first, alongside Haizi's change of seating quickly.
"Don't be scared, we don't bite!" Haizi reassured, "Now gas it!" as he'd close the door as the car begins moving again.
The hidden hand Haizi concealed slivers Dvinaslav's back, feeling her person in a not so subtle fashion. Smirking when he stopped at the foot behind her nape.
"What's your secret to that?"
She spoke in a normal sense of tone, "I work out."7
"Good, good. But you seem to work out quite a bit, don't you? I can tell from your arms you have quite the muscle tone for a girl."
She closes her eyes and crosses her arms tightly.
"There's no use hiding your chest, Dvinaslav! You aren't flat."
"This isn't about my cup size!" she turns her person with an intense stare, "Pervert!"
Haizi just chuckles at the matter of the fact of the statement. Observing through the windows passing along roads with names and towards a parking garage nearby. Fiddling his fingers together as he began smugging his smile once more. One ramp rose the automobile, "So… What level."
"Two B."
"Make it Three C."
Upon Haizi's word, the car blasts to the section he described in his words and coming to stall in the middle of the asphalt. Its engine rumbling from the inside while the drivers in the front get out, Haizi's escorts. The guy got out himself meanwhile Dvinaslav's side swings open from Haizi's chauffeurs and the two grabbed an arm and leg of her each. Immediately running and forcing her on one of the several concrete posts piecing the entire structure.
The bowl haired person said as he chuckles, mature in the phonetics, and deep in the vocal release. Approaching the pinned girl with his confident one-sided smile.
"You know, you'd look beautiful in blue hair."
"I could dye it…" Dvinaslav replied, attempting to follow along.
"If you can. But I mean natural, baby!"
"You're weird."
Haizi stopped at the moment of her words, tilting with a forward lean, "What did you say?"
"You're kinky, immature, and probably should learn some lessons in not being a pervert and avoidance on touching girls."
"I'm only twenty-six years old..."
"Why don't you go after grown-up girls and not minors?"
"You got it all wrong, Dvinaslav. I think teenage girls are better than ladies…" he leans towards her, sticking his tongue close to her cheek, "And you know it. I've been keeping having dreams of a blue-haired girl, who acts just like you. Submitting… Powerless… I'm going to search for that girl, who I am dreaming in my head for a while now."
Throughout Haizi's explanation and saying, she kept her face straight through the whole routine. Observing Haizi's body language, the emotionlessness of his two escorts, and the use of a parking garage instead of something else for the requirement of what appears to be an interrogation.
"Let her go. She isn't sweet enough, and her soul isn't too." Haizi said once more.
Upon his command, they free Dvinaslav, who utilized the chance. Her hand casts a sphere radiating light. Stressing its area on the same pillar they used. Immediately making a run for it whilst making a swift text to the rest of his comrades in a hope they might respond to what she was calling towards...
2:35 P.M EDT
?
Bursts of sound as forceful as a roaring train, equal to anything going past the speed of sound. Constantly happening like the buzzing and collision between metallics. The vibrant blue eyes of Stanislav opened up. The epicenter of a whirlwind of conducted metal and lightning striking. Shrouded inside the circulation of murky gray and toxic green. A curved blade sword in his right hand, reflecting brief flashes close to his eyes.
Despite the dark, an eclipsing shadow appears above him. In the shape of one smoothly made metallic cube multitudes greater than his own. Tightening his grip on the sword as he raised it in an attempt to prevent the real possibility at the moment of being smashed into mush…
2:37 P.M EDT
New York City, New York, United States
Drahoslav's hands rested on the handles of Stanislav's wheelchair. Passing under the red and white alternating clearance bar. Looming with extended eyes through Stanislav's phone with a GPS app pulled open while continuing to abide by the route it gave.
The wildly distributed gray hairstyle Stanislav possessed skewed leftward as his head looked up.
"Something happened?"
"Just meditated within my Fluctlight," Stanislav replies.
"Oh, that…"
The two continue their current trajectory towards an area they were guided to. Rising to the second level of the parking garage. Echos from a level above becoming easier to comprehend, a basic idea to Drahoslav's ears could be heard.
"Did you hear that Stanislav?" he asked.
"Yes, it's a level up."
"Can you get to that floor on your own?"
"Yes."
"Don't push yourself with the wheelchair," Drahoslav said as he breaks from Stanislav for the moment.
Upon immediate notice, he sharply heads to the concrete and metal alley of steps heading north for the third level. Immediately heading up it with pace, jogging one step for one frame each with each foot. Adding wrinkles and sweat to his black t-shirt as it persists. Darting out of the second floor with a better idea of where to look.
Upon the glance of his eyes, aware of the distress signal and brief explanation of the situation. The brown cut above the eyebrows and half penetrating his ear with a grinned grimace.
On the ground, both accomplices to Haizi held their knees at the center of her back and two hands for one of hers.
"Is there an issue, Dvinaslav? Where's that reluctance to concede now?" he mocked, lightly tapping his shoe to her side.
Much like a fighter with much at stake, she forced her core up despite the odds against her, "SHUT UP!"
"Oooh. Now she decides to bite? Although she already showed her fangs..." he looks at her, lowering to his knees to say to her directly. "It's difficult to be tough against lethal stakes and the chances of a counterattack are slim."
Dvinaslav didn't counter the jab he released onwards, much to the dismay of the arriving Drahoslav, who saw the things going on with an open eye to what was occurring right in front of him. A scene straight out of a lethal police arrest or an aggressive takedown of a high-value target.
"What's going on here?" Drahoslav asked, "Why are the only female comrade I know eating the pavement from two NSC guys and this crazy bastard watches on with a tinted window automobile nearby."
"Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. Are you from outside and heard it all? Nothing."
"It isn't nothing, nothing can't come from nothing." Drahoslav shot back. "Everything about this scene is a cause for investigation. Let her go."
"You got me, you're smarter than I thought. Who says they know. You two, teach her a lesson."
At the moment of his words, he points at his two accomplices. They nod and helped Dvinaslav up for a mere period to get her on her feet. Before beginning their next brutality session. Compressing the center of her feet and spreading stance. Subjecting her to punches equal to MMA fighters. After one completes, another comes through to the other side, adding bruises throughout accumulative stages. Several attempts through the mess became potential counters to their jabs.
Drahoslav, unable to get close out of the abundant chance he could become like Dvinaslav, observes with boiling rage the harm she had to be inflicted with.
Until the wheelchair, Stanislav was bound towards, approaches the floor and area. He immediately became aware of what was up with the guys. Indicative with his eyes tensing up, a sign of his desire to jump into the action and do something.
"Don't push yourself…"
"You guys, she hasn't violated the law, she minded her business," Stanislav said.
Haizi translates his head to the right, as he looks at him, "Looks like we have a third potential soul."
Stanislav kept his gaze and posture, unmoved from Haizi's approach.
"At the apartment, you didn't look to talk at even the limited sense. Why now do you? Interesting." Haizi said, keeping his person at a distance.
Even for someone like Haizi, attacking a crippled person seems to be against his supposed types of morals. Indicative that he didn't act towards threats of violence towards Stanislav, as opposed to Dvinaslav and Drahoslav.
Meanwhile, her beatdown proceeded as plan, Haizi enjoying it similar to an intercepted candy truck by a mob of sugar happy children.
"She doesn't deserve it, let her go."
"Why should I, Stanislav?" Haizi replies to the boy unable to stand, "All bark and no true bite, and you can't fight. Not in your condition."
"That's all I ask, Haizi. Let her go," Stanislav replies.
The teeth of a sadistic person fill into a person's view, as Haizi's words speak out from his mouth, "After her sweet soul is mine…"
Upon hearing it, Stanislav's uncasted fist curls up and toughens.
"Don't-" Drahoslav turns around to see what's up.
"Come closer, I dare you. If you can try to absorb a girl's soul, can you attack a boy bound in a wheelchair?"
Haizi's words immediately change voices, turning into something more Slavic in voice, "Is that a challenge?"
And as Stanislav dared, Haizi got closer. From the intensely vibrant blue eyes, he's got the best seen of a frame made for dishing combat and muscle tone.
"Do I need to take your soul too?" he said.
Haizi brought himself towards a devastating grapple against Stanislav. In turn, bringing his entire body closer within weaker hands reaching. Reacted in Stanislav reclining his right shoulder higher. In theory, provoking greater room for what he was about to do. When the time struck…
"I'll strike you-"
A martial artist's solar plexus strikes Haizi. Opening his mouth into releasing spit as traces of blood enters into the view of Drahoslav. Stanislav's hit against him with only a single arm.
"This force… I haven't seen it… I'm bleeding too..!" He thought as he saw his consciousness drain from his eyes.
And physically, his person sped past the two accomplices. Who notices Stanislav's feat after it was conducted. Sitting in a wheelchair and having stains of blood on his hand with two places with occasional drips. Within the end of it, Haizi crashes into another pillar, significantly breaking partially deep cracks into the concrete. As well as stone as the brown bowl hairstyle he sports flies off with the wind.
"BOSS!" the two stopped harming Dvinaslav and instead headed for Haizi.
After everything went through, Drahoslav turns towards Stanislav, both shocked, but with disappointment and distaste as he gave the neutral expression. Then back towards the trajectory, Haizi took. Their comrade soon following.
As the fine dust cloud settles. A man with messy blond hair, two hanging bangs, and his left on his wound spot tended by the two originally doing his bidding on Dvinaslav.
Drahoslav stares at what occurs for several moments, his nerves telling him several messages as he looks to his two comrades. Then the recently unmasked man, brought him to grit his teeth, "He… That bastard… He was playing us..! Everything being said by him and his actions make sense to me now… He is him."
"Draho?" Dvinaslav looks at him with a tilted head.
"Dvina, contact Zeli and Jara. This revelation has to be added with immediate dialogue and movement."
"On it!" Dvinaslav replies as she gets to her phone and begins texting.
For the moment, Stanislav looks towards the two, making a gesture of prayer.
"Hope the Son holds mercy to his misdeed. And have sympathy for those who are forced to work with him. Amen."
Afterward, Drahoslav went behind him and proceeds to guide Stanislav back to the apartment that they stayed with him for the moment.
2:45 P.M EDT
Haizi's Apartment, New York City, United States
Isolated from his four comrades, concealed in a bathroom. His eyes stare at its mirror. Tensing up his eyebrows the longer he looked at it.
"What's with me? Am I losing myself at every possible moment I felt I need to take action? I shouldn't have done that to a person I barely knew. Even if he was giving commands to the men who were attempting to assault Dvinaslav? Rape? A message?" he thought around to himself.
His freed right, not bound by a cast, clamps again. Nails digging into his skin while producing a grunt.
"I'm just a dumbass with no place to go, too stupid to realise to not do such action. And I cannot change it."
He said out loud, feeling his person bubble up again.
"Everything we worked for. I can't live up to it…" Stanislav said again.
"Not when everything turns against me, becomes dangerous, or I put everyone at risk. Did the war do this to me?"
His teeth grits, strands of his har overlooking his eyes lifting above. Smaller objects hitting the more firm, stationary things in the room. Until, his calmer head struck, beginning quicker deep breaths. Nose inhale, mouth exhale. Soon as he said.
"Go back to your comrades, Stanislav."
Afterward, he gets back in his wheelchair, struggling at the transfer. Before heading back to the living room, where the four comrades came comfy and ready to begin why Drahoslav told Dvinaslav to tell the other two.
Once Stanislav was there, Drahoslav stood up...