BELLE: hey all, sorry for the lateness, i know, its depressing.
ok, without hessitation, enjoy.
DISCLAIMER: they own the neighborhood i just rent the house.
"So this whole place was lying under central this whole time?" Fury asked as he peered out over the wreckage of a city lost to times decaying whim.
"It was discovered a few years back by a lady by the name Amoi Fray," Mustang said in a low voice that bounced off the high sloping walls as he motioned his unit further into the mess of unmarked, narrow streets between the tall shadows of deserted and shambling houses. "Or so she claimed; it was obvious to the soldier she babbled to that she had clearly dropped of the deep end. But that was back before fuhrer Bradly, when Alios Warren was in charge and things like this just slipped under the radar. Nobody looked into this, not even when Miss Fray disappeared."
"An unsolved mystery?" Breada asked, fear coloring his voice in a slight tremble as he side skipped a piece of rubble suspiciously an jumped a foot in the air when Edward tapped his neck.
"Yes and no. She apparently left a note saying she would never be seen in central again. So really there was nothing overtly suspicious about her disappearance, just another mad woman missing. The records were just slipped under the rug."
a gun shot rang out, the sharp noise shattering the deathly quiet.
Mustang reacted a second too slow, fingers finding grip before his eyes could find target.
Hawkeye was the only one who saw the curtain twitch.
The only one who saw the girl with a bullet wound through the shoulder and kneecap limp away from the window without a mutter of pain.
But she wasn't the only one who reacted.
The clap that sounded, almost as sharp as the shot in the stillness- everyone waiting for a noise to alert them of the persons whereabouts. Blinding light seared through the gloom, casting stark shadows as looming walls soared upward to his will, surrounding the small house and its inhabitant.
Mustang hadn't moved, fingers poised to snap but still no target, the range was too wide, the angle difficult to get any real aim.
Havoc had dropped the supplies on his back, gabbing a rifle and scrambling up a crumbling wall to a shelf from a broken window, taking sniper position at the window Hawkeye was glaring at, her own guns raised to the ready before anyone else had time to move.
Fury had taken cover behind a mound of debris, trying franticly to load the gun he refused on grounds of personal safety to keep loaded.
Breada had also dropped his supplies, and was rummaging through them, it seemed, to find the flare gun; so the other units in the abandoned city would come tho their aid.
But it was pointless, the walls were to high fo the flare gun to be seen. The alchemical transmutation light would have traveled anyway, anyone who might have seen it would have assumed, but it was too late anyway.
Hawkeye was already on the move, mustang and Ed at her heels.
The door swung inwards on hinges stiff with unused, a high pitched wine cut of sharply as the dor hit the inside wall. The sluggish light illuminated only a few feet into the long corridor, the rest lay in menacing darkness.
Weary of the noise, the three soldiers kept to the walls. The wooden floor beneath them creaked softly with every step, giving away their position and their advantage.
Further into the darkness they crept.
Barely distinguishable in the darkness, a shadow moved.
The floor creaked.
The small group walked down the road, she watched.
From her vantage point above, crouched on the table behind rough and musty curtains, peering through he dirty glass of the chipped window. She watched the dark haired leader, so obviously in controle, leading the way; the small blond with golden hair and a dangerous gait of underlying power and pretty eyes. The beefy red head who kept avoiding the deepest shadows and glancing over his shoulder. The shorter brunet, adjusting his glasses and peering at everything in close examination with intelligent eyes. A gray haired man who's posture was stiff and seemed to keep everyone else under his eye at all times. And a light haired woman with a heavily loaded holster and eyes that continuously darted over the area searching for a threat.
Or perhaps her.
She had not been sent to wait here, she had decided the risk necessary not even the Mistress could stop her.
She had done that.
She had decided to simply observe. She was doing that.
They walked a little further down the street and the girl craned her neck to get a better view of the disappearing group, forehead pressed against the glass to peer further down, straining on her hands and knees so as not to fall and alert the soldiers.
The table wobbled, she flung her arm out to the side to stop her fall, grasping the rough, musty fabric of the curtain to slow her fall.
The curtain held and she struggled back into place on the table, hoping her near fall had gone noticed.
She glanced out the window again, sighing in relief as she noticed nobody had changed or looked up yet.
She turned her head slightly, her eyes slipping from the leader of the group.
Straight into the rust brown eyes of the alert gun-woman.
She heard the shots but never felt them.
She knew where they had lodged themselves, one in her shoulder, left kneecap and buried in the wood beside her right ear. She knew instinctively the one beside her ear was a warning shot. She scramble down from the table and limped into the safety the shadows so lovingly gave, they welcomed her. Enveloping the small girl in their folds of darkness until she was all but invisible.
She crept down the old wooden stairs, moving crab-like with her feet through the banisters slats so the creaky floor boards would not give her away. At the bottom she dropped to all fours, distributing her weight and minimizing target area, creeping across the floor and hugging close to the mold smelling wall.
She watched the three figures worm their way down the narrow corridor making so much noise it was impossible to think that they might have ever had the upper hand.
Except they did.
She held no weapons to use against them, nothing to protect herself. She could not fight in this body so wounded. There was only one exit, and the soldiers were blocking it the others outside would surely capture her if she manged to give these the slip.
She could feel the blood from her wounds soaking through her cloths and coating her skin in a sticky layer, making the floor tacky and slippery, staining the light wood. Her life blood was flowing out of her wounds to quickly.
She had to make a choice.
Fight or flight.
She couldn't fight, not in her current condition nor ever.
If she ran she would be captured and probably killed.
She couldn't hide, they would find her eventually.
But there was more that one type of flight available to her.
Breathing deeply she cleared her mind, preparing herself; dipping her fingers and drawing a hasty array on the palm of her hand.
She lunged at the figure closest to her.