Setting: An airship in flight
"These guys are criminals, thugs, lowlifes who prey on the weak and defenseless without the slightest hesitation. So why...why...WHY ARE THEY ON AN AIRSHIP ACTING LIKE TOURISTS!?" Silver thought as he observed his targets with a frustrated look on his face.
The six men Silver was tracking were sitting several seats away from him and were obviously enjoying themselves immensely. Taking pleasures in the complimentary cuisines, looking out of the window like children, and they were giggling together in the same manner as schoolgirls do when they talk about the boys they liked. Silver had never felt such disappointment in his life. They were the most underwhelming bunch of criminals he has ever seen and he continued to complain about them in his head.
"They're idiots, not worth my time, morons... but, they are morons with weapons and that's dangerous to everyone here and wherever they are going. Actually, where are we going? I got on this flight and barely looked at the destination. Some place called fortune something?...whatever. The point is these pawns are leading me to the king and his castle where I can really cut loose," Silver thought the last part with an evil smile on his face. With no real threat on the flight, Silver decided to relax and in moments, he fell asleep and slowly began to lean towards his left until he was sleeping on the shoulder of the young man with the shield.
Said young man was caught by surprise when Silver began to lean on his shoulder. Not sure what to make of this situation, he tried to awaken his sleeping neighbor, but pushing, poking, and speaking to him were reciprocated with no response. Silver was out cold, so instead, the boy removed him off his shoulder and had Silver lean against the wall on his right side.
The flight to Fortuna was only two hours long and so far, only an hour and a half have passed. The flight was uneventful. The boy with the shield got up to use the bathroom, leaving Silver to continue sleeping while leaving a long trail of drool sliding down the wall. Walking to the bathroom located near the first few rows of seats, the boy took notice of the same six men Silver was watching. They were still enjoying themselves with the same vigor they had when the airship took off.
Unaware of their true agenda, the boy merely smiled, "Looks like they're having a good time," the boy said to no one in particular. However, his good-nature feelings went away as soon as he overheard their conversation.
"I can't wait till we reach this city. We'll be unstoppable," one man said to his comrades.
"The boss is gonna drool over the haul we brought in. Those weapon specialists in Atlas really know how to make weapons and we really know how to take them," another man said.
One man who didn't look like a leader, but more accurately the alpha-male of the rag-tag group whispered to the others, "Be quiet! Do you want everyone to know what we're doing? Just shut up until we land then we make a B-line to the luggage area before any workers can see our stuff, grab our gear, and run the town," he said with arrogance and his brothers in crime silently cheering for him.
The boy's smile turned into a small frown. After finishing his business in the bathroom and sitting back in his seat, he exhaled a long breath and with a vexed expression on his face. Looking at his shield in front of him, the boy said to himself "Zelts, what are you getting yourself into?"
The airship finally reached its destination and the doors began to open so the passengers could exit. The crooks pushed and shoved everyone out of their way to reach their 'luggage.' Zelts was about to follow them until he noticed that his neighbor was still sleeping.
"Wow, he's a heavy sleeper," Zelts said aloud with a drop of sweat falling down the side of his face. He wondered whether he should wake him, but his past experience showed that the ordeal might take too long, so he chose to leave him there hoping someone will help him off the airship.
"This isn't his fight," Zelts thought to himself as he was following the crooks.
On his way to the cargo hold, Zelts found several crew members hurt and unconscious which meant the thugs have already reached their destination and probably found their prize. Zelts entered the cargo hold and stayed out of the crooks' line of sight. Spying of them, he saw two of them were carrying grenade launchers, three of them were wielding a pair of metal tonfas, and the pseudo-leader was fawning over the hoard of other untouched weapons.
The alpha, overjoyed at the success of their mission, turned to the others and said, "You know, with all this gear, we should test them out to make sure they're not defective. Let's use them as safety dummies," he pointed to the unconscious crew members they assaulted earlier.
One of the men fired a grenade from the launcher at a random crew member and laughed when it exploded. His good time was interrupted when the smoke from the explosion cleared and the only thing he saw was a large shield blocking his attack. Behind the shield was Zelts, sporting a serious look.
The men were surprised to see him and one of them asked, "Who the hell are you?"
"No one you're going to remember any time soon," was the only thing Zelts said while still bearing his solemn face.
Zelts began to charge toward the weapon smugglers. The two wielding the grenade launchers fired at Zelts only for him to respond by holding his shield up to protect himself from every blast without slowing down. Finally reaching his targets, he rammed into one of the crooks wielding the grenade launcher, sending him flying into a wall then swung his arm holding his shield to backhand the other one hard in the chest and knock him out. The rest of the criminals were beginning to retaliate until they were suddenly bombarded by a hail of gunfire right above their heads, causing confusion on both sides. Looking in the direction the attack was coming from, Zelts saw an object plummeting from the sky and land on the criminals, knocking them out while creating a small crater. Emerging from the crater was the same boy Zelts was sitting next to on the airship only he was glowing.
"You losers ready for the beating of your lives?" Silver said as his weapons changed from dual pistols to escrima staffs and his glowing aura faded. He just noticed that one of the smugglers was already knocked out on the ground and another was hurt, leaning against a wall. Lastly, he recognized Zelts as the odd man out in this situation.
"What the hell happened here?" he asked Zelts.
Security and police arrived before Zelts could answer Silver's question and took control of the situation. An hour later, the criminals were being placed into a transport vehicle to escort them to jail just when Silver and Zelts finished answering questions. Zelts began to leave the area until he overheard Silver interrogating the only conscious criminal. With Silver leaving the crook for the authorities, the conversation appeared to be over and he began to leave as well.
"Who were they?" Zelts asked Silver on their way out. He wasn't sure why Zelts was interested with his work but he saw no reason not to answer his question.
"They were nothing but cannon fodder making a delivery. I was tailing them so they could lead me to the head honcho, but some... unforeseen circumstances got in the way," Silver said, referring to Zelts as the unforeseen circumstance.
The older boy was fully aware of what Silver was saying. He couldn't help but smile at Silver's quip. "Maybe they wouldn't have made it this far if a certain someone wasn't sleeping."
"I was pretending to sleep so they would drop their guard," Silver snapped back.
"You still have some droll on your face," Zelts said, laughing while Silver wiped his mouth vigorously.
"I'm Zelts Allister. You?"
"Silver Synch."
With a new, comfortable atmosphere around them, Silver told Zelts what he got from the conscious criminal.
"Apparently there's an underground crime ring in Fortuna. These guys were smuggling some goods to kiss up to their boss who's an arms dealer in this town's crime world. Turns out their boss works under someone who's the leader of the criminal underground and he's trying to kiss up to him. Just a cycle of ass kissing."
"Who's the leader? And who's the arms dealer?" Zelts asked.
"Don't know. Whoever this crime leader never shows their face and only goes by the alias: Royal," Silver answered.
"I'm going to help," Zelts said bewildering Silver. "I came here to live a peaceful life. If something like this is going on, then I'm going to help end it," Zelts declared more to himself than to Silver.
"Good for you, hero," Silver said in a sarcastic tone.
"Work your way up the ladder with the good police if you want," Silver said while pulling one of his guns out. "I'm going straight to the top to cut the head off and watch the rest squirm. You can come if you want, it'll be a lot faster working with me than with the locals," he offered as he walked away only for Zelts to walk by his side in agreement a few seconds later.
Meanwhile in Moneta, Violet was looking at the screen board to find any jobs with good enough pay while at the same time trying to ignore Remus' presence. He stood beside her and didn't do anything but stare at her in a creepy fashion. She couldn't deal with these eyes on her for such a long disturbing time and she finally broke.
"Why are you still here!?" she almost shouted at Remus. Her patience finally reached its limit. Remus looked at Violet as if she was the odd one in this situation.
"I don't know anyone else in Fortuna. And I kind of like you. You're very interesting, Violet," he said, which confused Violet even more.
"Look, Remus, I know I'm the only person you know in this place, but I do dangerous things like fight Grimm and lowlifes from time to time. I have no time or interest to babysit you while doing this so-"
"I know how to fight!" Remus interrupted in a matter-of-fact tone. Violet raised her eyebrow in disbelief. "Let me come on a job and I'll show you." Violet continued to look at Remus, who appeared confident with his proposal. She took a few seconds to size him up and thought that he was bluffing. Violet believed the odds were in her favor with this little wager.
"Deal," she said as she accepted a random bounty mission.
Eyeing Remus, Violet couldn't tell if he was a fighter and his robes concealed what he was actually wearing along with any weapons if he even had any.
"If he's lying, I get him off my back, but, if he can hold his own, then I guess it'll make the job much easier," Violet thought, weighing all the boons and banes of this wager.
On her way out of Moneta with Remus trailing behind, Violet looked at the mission she accepted on her scroll and saw she took a bounty mission. The most surprising part was the bounty was for, Terra Cotta, 7,000 Lien.
Violet remembered hearing about this man. He was an arms dealer and a member of Royal's inner circle. This was probably the wrong bounty to take.