“So, what you’re saying is that you want us to kill a bunch of orphans…?” Phon asked the woman sitting behind the desk for clarification.
Kada had returned after a couple of days and was now living with the two Drazah siblings. She was eager to take on jobs and work as a Fiend For Hire right away, but they decided it was best for her to accompany them on a few jobs first to get a feel for it before she was given leave to tackle them on her own. So far, she had accompanied Drim and Phon on one job each.
She helped The Slayer with recovering a monster that escaped from the zoo, and helped The Vixen make deliveries. ‘Helped’ was definitely a loose term in both cases. With the monster, she had just accidentally annoyed it, and the beast chased her around until Drim could catch it in a vine cage. The deliveries didn’t go much better. It was a rush delivery, so Phon used her Curse to move them around fast. Having a second person is definitely convenient in this case, able to split up and cover more ground, but the sudden changes of location caused Kada to throw up repeatedly.
The space-warping chauffeur had to give her credit, though. Their new-hire was relentless in trying to be of help and kept up a good attitude. Earlier that morning, they received a new request from Kaselle Vinlot, one of the most well known real-estate tycoons in Domister. It came as a surprise to the group, not expecting someone so respected to be seeking out their services, at such an early stage at least.
She didn’t initially include her actual request, but instead it asked the Fiends to meet the mogul at her office. The request had asked specifically for the Drazah Duet, but they decided to bring Kada as well since it could be a valuable learning experience, and they didn’t know what they were walking into.
The three of them presently stood in an office on the top floor of a very tall skyscraper. It was lavishly decorated and larger than the entirety of their apartment. There were ten guards in suits in the room with them, five off to each side. They all had their hands in their coats, clearly armed and ready to draw their weapons at a moment's notice.
At the far end of the room, in front of a wall that was entirely a window, Vinlot sat behind an exorbitant desk likely made out of some exotic wood. She was wearing a black suit that appeared tailor made and must have cost a disgusting amount. It reminded Phon of the overly fancy clothes she was forced to wear as a child.
Vinlot had her elbows up on her desk and her hands clasped together. She then waved away the notion of what The Vixen had suggested. “Now now, I didn’t say that you had to kill them,” the business woman dismissed the idea in a pompous tone that only the richest members of society would dare attempt. “That orphanage is on a prime plot of land. I’ve bought up everything else around it, so it’s all that remains.”
“I want the orphans removed. If there’s none left, then there’s no reason for an orphanage to exist. How you do it is up to you—by force, trick them, I don’t know, get creative. I would personally suggest leading them into the woods with a trail of candy, but feel free to do whatever strikes the mood. If a few of those children happen to wind up missing or dead, well, such is life.”
Phon could see Kada shaking next to her, obvious that the cruel candor didn’t sit too well with her. Drim reached out and grabbed her wrist to help her calm down, and his sister looked back at Vinlot to ask, “Shouldn’t you be talking to the owner of the orphanage about this? We appreciate you thinking of us, but I’m guessing there’s an easier solution here.”
Vinlot’s lips twisted to a frown. “When I spoke to the owner, he flat out refused any offers to sell it. Frankly, he seemed a little fishy, so you’d probably be doing those children a favor,” she twisted the narrative as she stood up and walked over to a shelf. The woman uncorked a bottle of some fine alcohol and poured herself a glass then gestured over to the three Fiends. Phon waved her off, so Vinlot took her drink and returned to her desk to continue the negotiations.
“Now, I saw the footage of the two of you at the museum. The way you handled it was outstanding. What I wouldn’t give to be able to cause a ruckus like that and get away with it…” The business woman’s mind seemed to drift for a second. “So, I know you two are capable and willing to do things on that side of the line. I’m guessing your little friend there is just as capable as the two of you if she’s part of your group. This should be a walk in the park for you all, and I’ll definitely make it worth your while.”
Before Phon could give a reply, Drim spoke up and asked, “Do you have any children, miss?”
Vinlot tilted her head a little and replied, “Yes I have four, but I don’t really see what that has to do with anything.”
“Oh okay, I guess the orphanage should stay open then... They may need it soon.” The way Drim had said that frightened his sister a little. It was so cold and ruthless, almost like he was a different person. The man raised his arm, holding it out in Vinlot’s direction. Every guard acted in response, pulling out their guns and pointing it at the Fiends as a threat. Phon didn’t know exactly what Drim was planning, but had a good guess as to what he expected from her.
The Vixen quickly lifted both hands and covered her eyes. This worked as a temporary solution to provide darkness and activate her Curse. It wasn’t good for a long encounter, since it left her unable to fight, so she would opt to use her ribbon most of the time. Phonscience knew she didn’t have much time and quickly summoned a 3d replica of the building with the roof missing.
She grabbed all of the pieces belonging to the guards, five in each hand. If she could, she would just fling them away and send them flying, but unfortunately her Curse wouldn’t allow for that. The limitation was that she had to be able to place them down somewhere within her range, so there needed to be a solid surface. However, said surface didn’t need to be flat and horizontal, and they only had to touch there for a moment.
Phonscience placed the base of each piece to the outside walls of the office. Every guard vanished from the room at once. The Fiends heard faint screaming all around them before the guard plummeted down towards the ground. Phon could check on their condition if she wanted, but didn’t bother. A fall from that height would kill a human without fail.
Vinlot slammed her hands on her desk as she stood up and yelled, “What the hell are you—” The sentence was cut off by choking sounds that spurted out of her mouth. Drim had pointed a finger at her, causing a sharp vine to shoot straight ahead. It pierced right through her neck, leaving a splatter of blood behind her on the otherwise spotless window.
“Not gonna lie, I did not see that coming when we got this request. How do you feel about it, Kada?” Phon asked the girl who looked stunned by what had transpired.
“Well, she definitely deserved to die…” Kada accepted once she regained herself. “It’s still a little weird seeing people die, though. It’s only the second time I’ve seen it in person.”
“Well, I know it can be rough, but you’ll likely see it a lot more if you stick with us,” Drim attempted to console her, placing his hand on her shoulder. “I’m really not a fan of it myself, and only kill those I’m certain can’t be redeemed, so it hopefully won’t be too common. But honestly, if you wanted to bail, now would be the time. You don’t have a criminal record yet, so if you decided to leave, we’d understand.”
“No, it’s okay,” Kada reassured them. She pulled out the pack of crime cards The Vixen had given her and began looking through them. “Huh, there’s not enough murder cards for everyone.”
“Oh, I thought about that. I added ‘mass murder’ cards to the deck that go up in increments of five,” Phon mentioned as the woman continued to sift through the deck. Kada then pulled out a ‘Mass murder x10’ card and a regular murder card to cover all of their victims.
When she went to place it down, though, she had to ask “Hey, how do the police know which one of us committed the crime?”
The Vixen was taken aback by this and had to stop and ponder for a moment. “Hmm, that’s a good question. It didn’t really matter when it was just Drim and I since we didn’t care who the crimes went to, but now that there’s more of us, I guess we should distinguish them,” Phon accepted as she pulled out a marker and handed it to Kada. “I’ll make customized sets for each of us later. For now, put my name on the back of the mass murder card, Drim on the regular murder, and do an accessory card for yourself. Oh, and do a looting card for each of us.”
The trainee did as she was told and then scattered the cards around the room. When she got over to Vinlot’s corpse she placed the card in her suit pocket then stared at the hole in her neck for a bit. “Hey Drim, do you have to do motions like when you pointed to use your Curse?” Kada was genuinely curious.
Drim, who was looking through the bookshelf, perked up and thought for a second before responding. “No, I don’t have to do it. It just helps me distinguish when I’m using it, so I don’t do it accidentally… and I think it’s a little cool too…”
Phon smirked after hearing this, thinking it was just like him, then continued looking through Vinlot’s liquor stash. “Hey Kada, maybe you can answer this since you’re the only one who’s of drinking age. Can Fiends even get drunk? I’ve been wondering about that for a while.”.
“Hmm, don’t know, never tried myself,” Kada replied honestly before adding some cheek, “Never thought you’d be the type to obey something like drinking age laws.”
“Meh, just never had an interest,” The Vixen responded emotionlessly as she continued to sort through the bottles. “I can use some of this for cooking, so guess I’ll take those. It’ll taste extra good knowing I’m putting top shelf stuff on mediocre ingredients. I can hear the alcoholic’s cries of agony already.”
Once the three Fiends were content with their looting, they headed out. The trio got an endless amount of gazes as they walked through the lobby. Phon laughed in her head when thinking about what the onlookers must be feeling, seeing three super-out-of-place people walking around with boxes of their boss' stuff.
When the group got outside, police were already investigating the bodies of the deceased guards. They were so distracted that Phon didn’t even need to use her ability for them to get away. The Fiends just walked nonchalantly and no one even tried to question them. As they headed to the nearest subway station carrying their spoils, Phon noticed that Kada looked a little down. “Everything alright?” While the woman didn’t particularly care about the response, The Vixen at least wanted to attempt to be a good boss.
“Huh? Oh yeah I’m fine,” Kada mumbled though she had clearly just been in deep thought. “It’s just, I wish I could have done more. Well to be honest, I didn’t really do anything.”
“Your time to shine will come. I know it,” Drim reassured her with a smile.
It seemed to lift Kada’s spirits a bit as she began to walk along with a more relaxed stride. After a few more steps, though, she seemed to remember something and asked, “Oh yeah, are we going to do anything about that orphanage? Vinlot did say the manager seemed weird.”
“Not our job,” Phon dismissed the idea quickly. “She could have just been lying to further incentivize us to take it”
“Err, what Phon means to say is that no one has requested it of us,” the other boss added. “It’s fine to do things out of personal interest without it being a formal request, but I find it’s generally better to not interfere with people's lives unless they ask. That said, I did take Vinlot’s file on the orphanage, so I guess the best thing we can do is keep an eye out for any news involving it.”
◆◆◆
They had made the round trip from the office, back to their apartment in just a few hours. Drim went to his room to read the files he had taken from Vinlot’s office, Phon was taking a bath, and Kada was preparing dinner. Since they had started living together, Phon had been doing the majority of the cooking, but Drim was versed enough to make something when she was busy. However, Kada had insisted that she be allowed to help and suggested a rotating system of making meals, as well as with other chores.
The Slayer had tried to advocate that everyone could just do their own thing for meals, but the other two were firmly against it. His sister wanted to make sure that he was eating properly, and Kada felt that the idea of helping each other and eating a meal together would help boost comradery. So now there was a schedule of Phon cooking three days a week and the other pair each having two days.
Drim was laying in his bed as he went through the files. He read up on the orphanage and a few other prospects. It seemed Vinlot had used underhanded tactics in the past but nothing to the degree for which she wanted to hire them. Must be the first time she couldn’t eventually get her way, the boy thought to himself. After he finished reading, he tucked the files away, laid back in his bed, and decided to rest his eyes for a minute—or that was the plan until the smoke alarm started blaring blaring.
The comfortable man sighed, rolled out of bed, and headed out of his room. There was a large plume of black smoke trailing out of the kitchen, briefly followed by Kada stumbling out of it while coughing. Before Drim could say anything, the bathroom door burst open and Phon stomped out. She was wearing just a bath towel with her body completely drenched and had an intense scowl distorting her face.
“What the hell are you doing?!” the sopping wet woman screamed at Kada.
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The troublemaker blinked a few times to help clear out her watery eyes before looking over at Phon to respond. This was immediately followed by Kada swinging her head away bashfully and asking her own urgent question, “Before you yell at me, could you please put some clothes on?!”
“Oh get a grip, we’re both girls,” Phon sneered. “I guess you really do swing both ways if you get this uncomfortable from seeing me in just a towel.”
“Well yes, but it's a normal response to avert your eyes when someone’s naked regardless of gender,” Kada protested. “Drim, back me up here!”
The boy merely shrugged as Phon pinched her forehead and grumbled, “Whatever, that’s not important. Why does the kitchen look like a chimney exploded?”
“Oh right, that,” Kada’s tone turned defensive, looking away and pushing the tips of her pointer fingers together repeatedly. “Well, I was making burgers, and they were cooking pretty slowly, so I got impatient. I thought that if I melted them they would cook faster cus of the higher surface area.”
“So, your Curse works on dead animals then?” Drim suddenly inquired while the failed chef just stared at him, confused. “You said before that your Curse didn’t work on animals, but burgers are made from cows. So I guess the stipulation is that it’s a living thing and not that it’s an animal.”
“I mean, I guess,” Kada shrugged. “I never really thought about it.”
“Drim… Priorities…” his sister interjected before resuming her death-glare at Kada. That gaze softened a bit after a few seconds when she doubled-back to the tangent, “Well, in theory, I guess that should work… It would also allow for a more even cook throughout for some dishes...” Phon seemed to trail off and become lost in thought. Besides her brother, one of the very few things the woman cared about in the world was cooking.
“It did work!” the maybe, actually successful chef declared proudly before dejection spread across her face. “It worked too well. Once I did it, they cooked really fast and started burning before I could change them back. Then, at that point, they were boiling so I didn’t want to get burned sticking my finger in the pan to change them back.”
“We resist heat, Kada…” Drim spouted a reminder as a sudden look of realization popped up on Kada’s face.
“Weird methods aside, tell me, have you ever actually cooked anything before,” Phon got back to the more important matter, seeming to have lost a bit of patience.
“Well… Instant foods,” Kada mumbled while doing her best to look innocent.
The Vixen let out a large groan as her head rolled around. “I’m going to go dry off then get dressed. You! Will go clean up whatever mess you made in the kitchen. Then we will all go out for dinner.” She didn’t wait for any response before heading back into the bathroom and slamming the door behind her.
The chef looked towards Drim eagerly, her eyes begging for assistance. But the man’s eyes went deadpan, and he headed back into his room. Kada lifted a hand out towards him, feeling betrayed as he stared at her while slowly closing the door.
◆◆◆
“Look Kada, I know you want to be useful and all, but if you don’t know how to do something you’ve gotta let us know,” Phon gave some actually decent guidance while the three of them walked down a back street.
“Yeah, we’re all good at different things,” Drim added, parroting what his sister had said to him after Prosper. “So we can pick up each other’s slack, and we can help teach you anything you need to know, assuming we know it ourselves,”
Kada had been beating herself up over the failed dinner, so she was glad they were so nice about it, but still couldn’t help feeling a bit guilty. So far, she hadn’t felt like she’d really contributed anything at all. They basically still had to hold her hand through what seemed like simple tasks. She wanted to be able to pull her own weight as soon as possible. Drim and Phon utilize their Curses in useful ways I could have never imagined. I need to work on getting myself up to their level.
Even before Kada joined, the Drazah siblings would rarely go out to eat. Wanting to keep a low profile was part of it, but they also needed to save money at the moment. In general, they stuck to buying cheap groceries, or Drim would go out and hunt and gather, then they would make food with whatever he brought back.
This didn’t mean that they didn’t like eating out, however. Phon was always on the lookout for new recipes, and wanted to try as many foods from as many places as she could. Drim simply enjoyed visiting different places, and while he had never been a social butterfly over the past decade, it put him at ease whenever he saw others having a good time and enjoying themselves.
The restaurant they chose that night was one that none of them had ever visited. It had decent reviews, but was the sort of out-of-the-way place where they hopefully wouldn’t draw too much attention. When they got to the restaurant and looked inside, it was all but deserted. There was only a couple at the counter, and an elderly man and woman tending to them.
When the Fiends walked inside, they found a quite unexpected situation. “It’s not really negotiable you old coot. Give us your money, and we won’t shoot you in the head,” the man of the presumed couple threatened the elderly pair. His partner was pointing her gun at them while the man was holding out an empty sack.
Kada’s eyes widened with excitement once she grasped the situation. Wow, is this really happening? Things like this actually happen? she hollered in her head. The woman was standing between the siblings and began quickly glancing back and forth between them while asking repeatedly, “Can I? Can I? Can I? Can I? Can I?”
“Sure, have fun,” Drim shrugged, willing to leave it all to her. “Try not to damage the place too much, though.”
The trainee felt her heart begin to race and adrenaline surge through her body. It was a chance to prove herself. She stepped forward a few paces, pointed at the criminal couple and shouted, “Halt, ye dastardly criminals. Stop what you’re doing at once or face my judgment!”
Kada could hear muffled laughter coming from behind her. It seemed the Drazahs couldn’t hold back from laughing at what she’d said, but were at least doing their best to try to conceal it. The snickering didn’t really help her self esteem, but it wasn’t the time to worry about that.
The criminal couple at the counter spun around with utterly bewildered faces. “What the zjik?! Is this girl mawhged in the head or something?” the woman asked her partner and then pointed the gun at Kada. “Listen here, special girl, and your two giggling friends. You best get your asses out of here now if you don’t want to get hurt.”
The laughter behind Kada grew even louder. She didn’t know if they found it funny that the woman was making fun of her, or the idea that a gun would even be remotely effective. “Well, we’re not leaving. So what will it be? Do you want to surrender, or do you want to fight?!” The vigilante Fiend shouted while doing her best to strike a heroic pose.
“Yeah… Just shoot her…” the man suggested without a second thought, clearly fine with ending a life. A second later, the woman pulled the trigger, sending a bullet soaring right at Kada. It was a direct shot, right to the stomach, but the bullet didn’t penetrate. Instead, it melted on impact, splattering all over.
The shooting victim touched some of the metal liquid that was sticking to her and made the bullet projectile reform. Both criminals just stared in shock with their jaws dropped. Kada then raised the shard of metal, “Oh, do you want this back?” She threw the bullet directly at them with all the force she could muster. It wasn’t enough to rival how fast the gun shot it, but it was definitely enough to do some damage.
The man screamed in pain and collapsed to the floor after the bullet ripped into his shoulder. It got lodged since there wasn’t enough force to drive it all the way through. The woman knelt down to check on him, but he stopped her and got back up. “She must be a Fiend,” the woman suggested while helping him stabilize on his feet.
“Welp, have fun Kada, we’re gonna go get food,” Phon informed her as the siblings walked off. After they were a good distance away, Drim pressed a hand against a wall. Black vines shot out along the wall and ran all around the restaurant. They covered the door and windows at the front, and went as far back to the customer side of the counter. This created a cage that held Kada and the two criminals with no way for them to escape, but left enough room for the Drazahs to place their orders.
When they got to the counter, the elderly couple manning it were zoned out. They had been standing there in a stunned silence the entire time. Phon tried to say a few things to get their attention and waved a bit. There was no response, so she began mashing the little bell on the counter with extreme speed until they snapped out of it. Once she had their attention, the woman began to casually order, “Yes, I'll have a number 6… What do you think Kada wants, Drim?”
“Hmm not sure,” Her brother responded while looking at the menu. “I guess just get her a standard meal to be safe. I’ll have a number 3-” Before Drim could finish speaking, the woman criminal was thrown hard enough to break through the vines behind them and slammed against the wall. The Slayer did a little wave at her which caused the vines to drag her back in and reseal the cage, then turned back to the couple and added, “-for takeout please.”
The old man nodded and headed back to the kitchen, while the woman stayed at the counter. “I suggest that you call the police, but if you don’t mind, we’d appreciate it if you wait until we leave,” Drim asked for their cooperation.
Back in the cage, the woman was coming at Kada from the front, while the man was attacking her from behind with a chair. When the chair impacted, the parts of it that touched the Fiend turned to liquid, causing the chair to just breeze past her. Once it was all the way through, it resolidified and carried the momentum straight into bashing the man’s partner.
The woman collapsed as she reeled in pain, causing the man to briefly pause from the guilt. Kada hit him in the face with the back of her fist sending him to join the woman on the ground. Then Fiend then groaned as she leaned back with her face towards the ceiling, “This is too easy! Drim, I’m bored now!.”
“Kay,” the cage-creator acknowledged as he waved his hand. He did a little twisting motion with his fingers, and the vines that had formed the cage dashed towards the two downed criminals. It wrapped around their bodies tight, leaving only their heads exposed. Kada laughed a little when liked them to wrap Boon Day presents. She also tried desperately to not let it bother her, knowing that Drim could have done that from the beginning.
When their food was ready, Phon carried it while the other two dragged the pair of snuggly trapped criminals outside. The Fiends had tried to pay for their meal, but the elderly couple flat out refused and thanked them for what they had done. The vigilantes pulled the criminals back into the alley next to the restaurant. They could have easily picked them up and carried them, but they felt this would be more unpleasant for the dastardly duo.
“So what do we do with them now?” Drim workshopped ideas.
“Well, there’s no point turning them into the police really, since we’re criminals ourselves,” Phon argued. “We wouldn’t get a reward out of it. Plus, our food would get cold while we took them down there.”
“I don’t want them to get away,” Kada stated firmly. I worked... I want to say hard, but it wasn’t really to stop these guys. Still, they shouldn’t just go free.”
“What do you suggest then?” The Vixen encouraged her to speak her mind, though she’d be just as happy to make fun of her if the woman didn’t have a plan to offer.
“Well, I do have an idea,” the rookie shuffled over to a clear space in the alley. She spread her arms out as wide as she could then widened her feet to match. The woman spun rapidly in place and activated her Curse. As gravity pulled her down, it created a deep puddle which she sunk into and kept going until her head was submerged.
Kada climbed out of the hole and walked over to the robbers. As she bent down to pick them up, they began to flail their heads rapidly, like they were trying to scream. Drim had gagged their mouths too, so only severely muffled noises got out—nothing coherent. Their subduer grabbed them by the top of their heads and carried them over to the puddle. Then she lowered them into the hole feet-first until only their heads were still above the liquid.
The woman motioned to Drim to release his vines, then resolidified the ground, leaving the pair buried up to their heads. “Oh cool, it actually worked. I was wondering what would happen to the excess ground, but it just shifted,” Kada studied the area around them. It had been raised slightly, causing a distorted slope around the criminals’ necks.
“So, what would have happened if it didn’t work like you thought?” The Slayer had to ask.
“Uhh, probably their heads would have been cut off and then their bodies would have been crushed until they were squeezed out. I’ve always wanted to test it, but didn’t want to use myself as a guinea pig.” The eyes of the two robbers widened as far as they could go after hearing about their avoided fate.
Phon stared at them with a sadistic smile for a while, quite pleased that no regard had been taken for their safety. When the smile faded away, she inquired, “Couldn’t you have just tested it with a stick or something?”
“Huh, never thought about that,” Kada felt a little dumb for not considering it.
Then right as the Fiends were about to leave, a light was suddenly shone on them. A scraggly voice yelled at them, “You there, don’t move!” as four figures appeared at the edge of the alley.
“Guess we took too long,” Drim sighed as they looked at the four cops, holding up a hand to block the blinding light.
“So what now? You going to teleport us out of here?” Kada glanced over to Phon
“Nah, let’s let the mawhgers chase us a little,” The Vixen’s sadistic smile crept back up on her face.
As the four officers drew closer, one of them spoke up, “Hey wait, I think that’s the Drazahs!”
“Holy zjik, really? Didn’t they just kill eleven people earlier today?! We don’t stand a chance against them,” another officer protested.
“That doesn’t change what we have to do!” the officer holding the flashlight insisted, prompting the rest to draw their guns. “You three are under arrest. Come quietly or—”
Before the policeman could finish, the three Fiends bolted away down the alley. The officers chased after them in pursuit, with only one staying behind to tend to the entrenched criminals. They weaved in and out of the backstreets, sprinting after their targets with maximum effort. The Fiends purposefully weren’t going their full speed to give their pursuers a feeling that they had a chance.
After a while, they got into the area of the city that was nothing but tall skyscrapers. Phon stopped running and motioned for the other two to do the same. She didn’t say anything, but just pointed a finger up at the roof of one of the buildings next to them. The Vixen then placed her hands over her eyes and vanished.
Drim raised his arm and shot a vine up to the top of the building. He grabbed the bottom of the makeshift rope and made the top reel itself in as it was absorbed, causing him to soar up the building at blazing speed.
Kada was a little annoyed that they left her to her own devices, but was happy that they thought she’d be able to handle it. She looked around for any easy ways up and noticed the cops steadily drawing closer, so she jumped up and grabbed the railing of the nearby fire escape and used that to propel herself higher. She did this repeatedly all the way up the building, clearing a few stories at a time.
When she got to the top, the siblings were sitting down and had spread out the food from the restaurant. They ate quickly, but still had enough time to easily finish before the police finally made it up to the roof.
The three officers were quite winded and taking deep breaths while slumped over. Since they weren’t actively being threatened, the Fiends took the opportunity to clean up after themselves, and then just loitered at the other side of the roof until the cops were ready. When they were able to stand up properly, all three of them pulled out their guns and attempted to aim. However, they were all shaking too badly to line up a proper shot.
Drim smirked and then charged directly at the officers. They feebly tried to follow him with their guns but it was useless. When he got closer, they braced for whatever he may do to them, but The Slayer ignored them and ran right past. He got to the edge of the roof and leapt across the gap, spun around in mid air, taunted smugly towards the two girls, and landed on the opposite roof with a backwards slide.
Phon had mentioned that Drim sometimes liked to act showy or went out of his way to try and look cool. However, Kada couldn’t help but take this as a challenge, and the serious look on the woman’s face next to her indicated that she felt the same. The Vixen went next. When she got to the edge, she did a forward cartwheel and sprung off with her hands, then spun several times in the air and landed with a roll.
Kada felt she needed to give it her best too. She charged at the police but didn’t run past them like the others had. Instead, she grabbed the head of the middle officer and used that to pull herself up. Then, she kicked off the heads of the other two officers allowing her to get a decent amount of height with her vault. She did two backflips and then shifted into a diver’s pose towards the roof. The girl sank into it until her feet caught the edge, then sprung herself back up in the air and ended in a bow.
The police were shocked by the display they had seen. They had missed most of Drim’s jump but caught the other two in full. Two of them seemed completely disheartened and ready to give up, but the third wasn’t going to give in just yet; the one with the flashlight from earlier. He backed up a bit, rushed to the edge, and leapt across. There was nothing stylish or flashy about his jump. It was only pragmatic and enough to just get him across.
The Fiends were now just as surprised, not thinking that any of them would have the guts to follow. They weren’t going to stop there, though, and then leapt across to the next roof in just as showy a manner as before. This continued on a few more times, with each of the Fiends doing their best to one up each other, and the police officer just barely managing to make it.
Finally, they reached a jump that they were certain he wouldn’t be able to cross. The three of them had already made it and were staring back at him on the opposite roof. However, the officer didn’t seem like he was going to give up no matter what and attempted the jump anyways. He leapt across, but couldn’t manage to grab the ledge, and began falling down to his certain doom.
A hand shot down from the top of the roof and grabbed his arm just before it was out of reach. It was Kada. She was happy that she had just barely managed to make it in time and pulled him up to safety. The cop sat there for a few seconds to recuperate then demanded, confused, “Why? Why did you save me?!”
“I dunno, felt like it,” was the only response Kada had.
Drim chimed in and added, “Well, it's not like we really see the police as our enemy. We won’t go out of our way to hurt you all or innocent people.”
“But you already killed several people today!” the officer yelled at them. “How can you do that then goof off like it’s nothing? Then you have the guts to judge their lives for yourselves!”
“Trust me, they weren’t innocent,” Phon insisted. She crouched down next to him and looked at the name on his uniform, then spoke with as nice of a smile as she could muster. “Now, we may have saved you this time officer… Tusmon… but if you try to catch us again, we won’t hold back from brutally dismissing you from this world. Have a good night!”
The Vixen clasped her eyes and the three Fiends vanished into the night, leaving the officer alone, stuck up on the roof.
Discord, , and Amazon Release (Pending), can be found on the Fiends For Hire .
Was killing Vinlot and her Guards justified?
