KOTOMINE KIREI
“Um… why do you like him so much?”
The priest glanced at the man sitting next to him with a wry grin. “It’s only natural. We both understand what it means to have nowhere we belong.” The other man turned away, apparently unsatisfied with the answer but unwilling to question it.
The school bus the pair were riding in rocked back and forth as they hit a poorly maintained stretch of asphalt. The six other men and women that were also in the vehicle with them had to lean and hold onto the seats in front of them to keep their balance, holding tightly onto their weapons as best they could so as to not drop them.
It was dark, Nexus city’s multitude of lights were few and far between here. The narrow streets were devoid of cars, few were brave or foolish enough to venture out during the night. They were not afraid. The new, dangerous life they had here was one they thrived in.
“We’re here,” the driver said right before pulling into a particularly dim alley. Kotomine got up as the bus came to a stop and started walking to the doors, but stopped right before the stairs. With both hands clasped behind his back, the man in robes turned his head to those behind him.
“I trust I need not remind you of the consequences should you fail,” he said, nodding at the response of shaking heads and a couple audible no’s. “Then we shall proceed in the name of ‘god’.” With that he got out of the vehicle and strolled down the darkened streets.
A few brief minutes later he met up with another group, much different than those who had been on the bus. Black leather. Deep orange cloth. Cartoonish halloween masks. Instead of professional killers, these men held themselves like bloodthirsty thugs. Man, orc, and troll alike, they had the capacity to deface and destroy, and reveled it. What they lacked in discipline, they made up for in eagerness.
Fifty men strong, the gang had assembled in force. The Halloweeners were going to have a wild party tonight.
Private Jenkins held tightly on to his M16A1 rifle as he guarded his post, the blast furnace towering behind him. The weapon was archaic, primitive, as was the blue-grey patterned armor he wore. He felt vulnerable protection his old kinetic barrier - equipped armor provided, but that had been destroyed when he arrived here. His eyes scanned the shadowy buildings across the open field, illuminated by two large floodlights, searching vigilantly for any sign of movement.
A roar erupted from nearby, and Jenkins and the three other Enforcers on guard with him swung around, aiming their rifles in the direction of the sound. It was yelling, from what sounded like an entire crowd. Jenkins eyed an unorganized stack of metal pipes, and opened his mouth to speak.
“Sir, should we-” A flash of light, a sharp crack, and Private Jenkins’ lights went out.
It was an inconceivably lucky shot. The Halloweeners burst from the cover of the shadows, running straight into the open, firing with their weapons as they went. Most of the shots failed to hit anything, but one bullet from an AR-12 caught Jenkins right beneath his left eye and managed to pierce the skull and go into his brain. His body fell to the ground with a thud, not having even fired his weapon.
The remaining three Enforcer sprinted for cover, two returning fire while the other grabbed his radio, calling for assistance. A well aimed shot to the center of mass put a goblin flat on her back, only to get back up a moment later, her kevlar having shielded her from the bullet.
Although the Halloweeners were poor marksmen, the Enforcers simply couldn’t compete with their sheer numbers. In the end, Jenkins was fortunate. In less than twenty seconds, the gang of brutes had crossed the distance between them and violently tore the soldiers apart, literally limb from limb in one case, only using a gun to mutilate the body after the troll had finished removing the last leg. With a series of whoops, the brutes continued on their rampage, busting open the fence gate and rushing in to see what there was to pillage.
Behind them, a lone man in priestly robes with a cross around his neck calmly strode forward, a smile on his face.
