If you see anything good in fights I write, you can just take them and change them to be non lethal any time!
The Amnesiac - A Zako Story (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter ViridianShine
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ViridianShine
Club Regular
- Joined
- Sep 18, 2018
5
___
It was the first time I had finally taken a full look outside.
Nothing but desert surrounded the whole building from what I could see from my vantage point on the balcony. The building itself, however, seemed massive both in width and height. A resort in the middle of the desert? It was possible given what I had seen on the first floor, but it still didn’t explain all the overly trained guards.
Whatever the reason, I could still see my opponent inside the room, barely conscious on the floor. Our eyes locked for a moment before I left the room of unconscious bodies and climbed down the balcony.
Below and above me were several more lines of balconies, stretched out in similar patterns alluding to my resort theory. Although there could be more past that, it was blocked by the view of one single wider balcony covering a massive width. A reprieve in case I lost my grip jumping between balconies. Though the concrete floor of each was not exactly the softest recovery I could have hoped for.
I started to hear sounds in the room I had left. Time was running short.
My legs moved inside the balcony below me, slowly as I tried to lower myself safely onto the platform below.
But a sharp crack of a door bursting open above spurred my action. I released my grip, falling at an odd angle and landing directly onto the 11th floor’s balcony’s railing. In my sudden loss of balance, I waved my arms for stability, the gun I was holding also slipping from my grasp outwards and falling far off the building down onto the sand far, far below.
That would have been useful later.
Screaming and commands emitted from the room above me. In full panic mode, I got up immediately, climbed onto the railing once more, and leapt onto the neighboring balcony. I did this once more in a rush, before the mercenaries above thought to check below.
My third try, however, drained me of my beginners’ luck. A shorter jump and a slip of my foot caused my whole body to lose momentum. I fell between the gaps of the 11th floor balconies, collapsing down onto the elongated 10th floor balcony in a heap.
“Nngh…” My body ached from the impact as I shakily pushed it up with my arms, trying to find out what sort of room would validate such a wide balcony. Or perhaps how that fall was much longer than I initially thought it would be.
As it turns out, the 10th floor was massively taller than the other two; something I had not noticed from my vantage point above the floor. Stretched out before me was a massive space, filled in the center by a cheap elevated stage. Backdrops and props held above the stage with thick rope, and the perimeter was covered by a sturdy red velvet curtain.
Around it was a plain, square-shaped room with a slick black floor with assorted folding chairs laid about. Many tables and chairs adorned the sides of the room, put back neatly, but a small handful of them were still set up in seemingly random areas, likely for practice perhaps. In the corner, a space was carved out of the room to make a small drinks bar, but it was closed now.
The room had two doors ignoring the massive glass wall and glass doors leading out to the balcony I had fallen onto. One double door appeared to be the exit to the hallway, seeing into its glass panes, while a smaller single door on the opposite side led to somewhere unknown.
Though, most importantly, near the single door was a long railing stretched horizontally along the far wall. And, on that railing, was a single girl dressed in tight exercise gear complete with a black top, hot pink pants, and tightly wound platinum blonde hair pulled into a bun around the back of her head.
And this girl had already noticed me for a long while.
Play it cool, I thought to myself, scrambling to my feet and brushing myself off quickly. I opened the glass door with confidence and stepped briskly into the room. Not to the exit, of course, because this girl was already swiftly approaching me with a similarly brisk pace. Normally I would not be so threatened by such an attractive young girl in tight clothing, but considering my earlier encounters, it was seemingly very likely that this individual was not friendly.
“Quite an entrance there,” the yoga girl remarked, placing one hand on her hip. Her voice was high-pitched and young, a tad bratty, though the tone was polite.
“Aha…yeah, ah,” I looked over to where I had fallen, “bad decisions were had?”
The girl smirked, “a rather large understatement don’t you think, Prisoner One?”
My body became awash with a strong feeling of dread, even though I really should have expected this. I had no weapons except my own fists once more, but that has served me pretty well already. There were only about twelve feet between me and my opponent. A distance I could close in an instant, though I had to be cautious considering her attire and posture and what she had been doing when I entered the picture. Yoga? Dance practice? Considering the venue, perhaps she was a performer looking for some extra practice in the meantime, but why are the performers mercenaries as well?
The girl before me only giggled, “mmm, wow your brain seems to be really going there, huh?”
“You don’t know what you’re getting into, girl” I took a menacing tone, hoping to threaten her away.
“Oh, don’t worry. I’m not an idiot, y’know,” and beyond the confident smirk, the girl reached behind her back, and pulled a pistol aimed directly at me, “and my name isn’t girl. Its Annabelle. Talking down is so, so rude.”
I grimaced, tensing at the idea of being shot at anytime. Even after she pulled out the gun, Annabelle held on the trigger but never took the shot.
“Well? Hands on your head. C’mon now,” her voice was sassy and unamused, cocking her head slightly. I did as she said, placing my hands on my head. At least if her plan was to take me prisoner, I had a few more chances to come.
As my view was still opposite of the balcony, I noticed that three military dressed individuals seemed to be loitering outside near the double door exit. They certainly weren’t there the last time I looked, so they couldn’t all be guards. Perhaps they were scouting the room? I never did notice Annabelle pick up a walkie-talkie or anything.
“Hmm? What are you looking at?” Annabelle remarked, though her eyes never wavered, “am I not pretty enough for you?”
An idea finally ran through my head. I still had no idea who I was, but everyone I had dealt with seemed to be absolutely frightened of me. Perhaps it was time to bring their fears to life?
“Not really my tastes,” I smirked back.
“That so? Heh, I’ll bet.”
“No need to bet, because my tastes are here right on time,” I raised my voice intentionally, snapping my head towards the opening double doors where the three military dressed individuals, two men and one woman, began walking through.
Annabelle perked up at the sound of the door, her eyes flashed with a hint of panic and her smirk fell immediately. Her head and eyes began turning around, her attention diverted for that faction of a second.
And I knew I could close that gap.
I rushed forward and snatched Annabelle’s wrist in an instant, pulling myself onto her body with the momentum and forcing her arm to aim at the military dressed individuals. My spare arm wrapped around her body and held her tightly.
“H-Hey-!”
Annabelle’s surprised gasp was silenced by the shots fired from the pistol, aimed directly for the three people just stepping into the room. As the door closed behind the last person, the bullets found their targets. The first lodged deep into the face of the man in the front. His body crumpling immediately as his face distorted into a bloody mess. The second and third of the rapid-fire shots struck the man in the very back, crossing through the man’s thigh and neck. The neck wound proving to be a fatal one, as the man held his neck in anguish, and crumpled just like the first.
“H-Hostiles-!” The woman in the middle cried, her smaller stature the likely reason why no bullets had struck her so far. Overtop her military camo hoodie, the woman began pulling a larger assault rifle around her body that was slung around her back as her allies fell.
“Shit-!”
“E-Ee-!”
I released Annabelle as the two of us tumbled to the floor and scrambled away to dodge the flurry of bullets that lit up the spot where we had both stood intertwined just moments ago. I quickly flipped up one of the tables lying nearby, hiding behind it as the bullets rained and chipped the wood off the edges. Annabelle, from the corner of my eye, looked to have hid behind the elevation of the stage platform, across the room.
“I-I’m on your side you idiot!” Annabelle cried out from her hiding point.
“Who are you? Identify yourselves!” The camo girl called out, the shooting stopped for a moment. In the toss and chaos, Annabelle had likely not noticed that the gun ended up in my hands after we split.
I turned from my hiding spot and fired the pistol towards the camo girl, the bullets just barely missing her head as she ducked in panic. I peeked for a moment to see the girl in the midst of turning over her own table.
I jumped and bolted from my position behind my own table, while the camo girl had her view restricted by the table. I heard the crackle of static from an opening walkie-talkie and knew I had chosen the right move. I had to silence her communications before she could call backup.
“Hello?! He-“ The woman screeched from behind the table, presumably into her communicator. Her voice was interrupted by my hard kick against the table, knocking into her head. Before the girl could realize what was happening, I leapt over the top, landing directly onto the girl’s head with my feet.
She cried out as her body was crushed by the weight of mine being thrown directly on top. When the dust settled, I had found myself seated right on top of the camo girl, as she struggled to recover from the bad hit the back of her head suffered from the fall.
I made sure to quicken that suffering by smashing the handle of the pistol in my hands into the center of her face. Without even a further moan, the girl’s eyes shut and her tense body laxed, smoothing out along the floor.
I breathed out, standing up looking down at my fallen opponent.
Until the pistol was briskly kicked from my hands, the weapon flying to the center of the room near the patio before bouncing to a stop.
I whirled around and suffered a firm kick to the center of my chest. I skidded back a half step, before stopping Annabelle’s attack combo with a firm elbow to her incoming body as she tried to punch, nailing her just slightly above her breasts as her fist barely grazed the side of my head.
Annabelle winced, stepping back quickly holding a hand against the wounded spot before making two quick backflips as I tried to approach. The girl grimaced as she landed, glaring at me. Her body now in a complete fighting position.
“Quite a delay to the inevitable, huh?” I taunted to the previously confident blonde.
“Tch-,” Annabelle took another few steps back, her hands unravelling the tight bun of light blonde hair. Like a waterfall, her hair unfurled and flowed down to her shoulders, and a flick of her head straightened it to an acceptable look.
“Don’t think you’ve already won.”
I stepped forward together with her, fists at the ready. The two of us stared at each other as she assumed a fighting position once more.
“We’ll see about that.”
===
Pace. Pace. Pace. Pace.
The once red carpet had already begun to wear in only five minutes. Lauren walked all the way down to the arcade doors, then back up to the doors of a restaurant, then back down again. The wide expanse of the entertainment floor as a result of the taller ceiling provided Lauren with the much-needed room to pace, as unhealthy as it was.
“Darling, darling! Are you going to do that for our entire watch?” Madison piped up from her position in the center of the hallway, standing upright with her usual wide smile.
Lauren ran both her hands through her hair as she kept walking in the direction she was headed, turned around at her usual position, then finally came to a stop in front of Madison. Stop, being an optimistic term with how much she was fidgeting.
“Look, I…what if we run into him? What do I do?” Lauren began making a series of elaborate hand motions, “do I fight him? Run? Whip out my phone and scream into it and do my duty as I hope he doesn’t feel like crushing my neck like a twig?”
Madison’s smile never faded, “you act like that is not what we’re supposed to do in the first place!” Though her words sharp, the tone never changed either.
“I just didn’t I’d be put here!” Lauren’s voice raised, “reading the job description is a lot different than living it, you know.”
Madison took a step forward, her grin becoming increasingly menacing as she snatched Lauren’s throat suddenly and held her a small distance into the air.
“A-Agh-…” Lauren gasped, her body pinned against the wall.
“Now then, my dear, either you get your act together when we do find the prisoner, or perhaps someone else will ensure that you never run into the prisoner,” Madison released her grip, sending Lauren back down onto her feet gasping for air. The red-haired woman clapped her hands together enthusiastically, “I assume we have an agreement now?”
Lauren only responded with a small whining noise. Madison raised an eyebrow, moving closer again.
“Y-Yes, yes-!” Lauren stammered.
“Excellent! Now, you might be useful to me as we’re about to confront him.”
“Y-Wait, what-?” Lauren’s fear-struck face stared back at Madison.
The other woman pointed her hands over to the doors leading to the theatre, her other hand on her hip, “well! I had noticed some patrols that seem to have entered those doors over there and have yet to emerge. Seems suspect, don't you think?”
“T-They could just be slacking off in there!” Lauren yelled her response back, only for Madison to shake her head.
“S-U-S-P-E-C-T,” Madison teased, poking Lauren’s nose, “lets go do a little investigation, shall we? You can lead.”
“M-Me?!” Lauren pointed to herself before suddenly being dragged closer to Madison’s face.
“Yes. You. Is there a problem…?”
===
“Augh-!”
Annabelle slammed into the backdrop along the stage, thrown with a strong force. The large chested blonde gasped as she felt the impact, before falling to the floor in a heap.
But I was not done yet. I reached forward and grabbed her by the back of her head, her hair a large chunk in my one grasp. Annabelle feebly tried clawing the grip, but her strength was already long gone. Her flexibility and agility proving a strong defensive tactic, but it just stalled the fight out longer, and without it she had nothing.
I slammed the side of her head into the backdrop, the girl crying again as her head hit. I did it once more for effect, before releasing her head. Annabelle collapsed onto her side, her breathing erratic as she tried to use the last ounce of her energy to look upwards.
“I-I surrender. P-Please, no more,” she eked out.
“Where am I?” I asked. Though her face was in a daze, I could still see the confusion on her face.
“W-What?”
“I said where am I!” I screamed into her face.
“T-The Di’Set Desert Resort-!”
A resort? So, it is a resort then. But what kind of regular resort has such a prison in its basements?
“And where is that?”
Annabelle just appeared to look increasingly confused, “i-it’s the largest resort in the world, in the middle of the Sahara Desert.”
A large object suddenly crashed into the side of my head, causing me to hit the stage hard. I landed on my arm, a streak of pain shooting up my body as I did. A sneak attack? I was embarrassed that I was that careless.
I looked over to the direction I took the hit, the perpetrator, a chair. Two women rushed onto the stage from the side with the single door. One, a straight banged brunette, wore a scared expression on her face and climbed onto the stage with trepidation, while her partner, a red-haired woman in a black exercise jacket, leapt onto the stage with prep and energy.
“Annabelle! A-Annabelle are you okay?!” The brunette yelled, rushing to the fallen Annabelle on the floor.
“L-Lauren?” Annabelle asked with hope, before looking over to the red head, “a-and Madison? What are you guys-“
“Taking out the trash, of course!” Madison chimed, picking the chair up. I tried to recover quickly, but Madison was already in the process of bringing the chair down onto my head, I rolled to the side, barely dodging the hit as I continued to scramble to my feet. Falling off the stage wasn’t a death sentence, but it could hurt with how high it was.
Madison placed the chair down gently, and began to unzip her polyester jacket, revealing a tight black sports bra underneath.
“Beating on a defenseless girl? Darling, I hope you don’t mind if we evened the odds?” Madison laughed with a wide smile, holding the jacket with the tips of her fingers before letting it drop onto the floor.
The brunette, Lauren, said nothing and merely walked up to the chair slowly and picked it up with her hands. Annabelle, still leaning against the backdrop, looked like she wanted to try and help, but the heavily pained look on her face suggested otherwise.
I just frowned at the scene. I wasn’t sure how strong these two new girls are, and how effective Annabelle could still be, but I did estimate that Lauren was likely the weaker one.
And weaker she was, Lauren charged at me suddenly, holding the chair high above her head. I let loose a kick to her bare midriff, the girl gasping at the hit before falling backwards.
I snatched the chair out of the air before she fell, using it to take a swing at Madison. But Madison was much defter than her friend, ducking beneath the swing and returning several blows towards my chest and stomach. I swallowed the pain, swinging the chair once more and releasing it towards her. An attack proving to be relatively ineffective as Madison dodged to the side again.
Lauren leaped up and tried a weak kick towards my defenseless side, barely deflected by my arm. As her balance shook from the block, I backhanded her chin, a cry sounding as she stumbled backwards.
I turned back to Madison just too late, as a sharp feeling of skin against metal ripped through just below my left bicep.
The red-head had whipped out a knife from somewhere, and now wielded it against me.
I dodged backwards against another horizontal strike, then dodging to the side as she tried a thrust. The attacks were tense and far too close for my liking, as I ducked under another horizontal swing above my head. That attack only slicing sharply against the sturdy rope holding up a large wooden dragon held precariously high above the stage.
“You are starting to irritate me-!” Madison chirped with a menacing, yet cheery tone.
I heard a step from behind me and whirled around just in time for my fist to catch Lauren directly in the midriff. Lauren cried out in shock from the blow, before I quickly snagged her battered body and pushed it hard in Madison’s direction.
Annabelle had gotten up once more and tried a sneaky fist to the back of my head as I finished with Lauren, but I turned just for the punch to hit against my cheek. I absorbed the weakened blow, and returned my own, sending a chop downwards against Annabelle’s forehead. The blonde could not absorb the blow as well and dropped to the floor as it was dealt.
Madison angrily caught Lauren’s body and threw it to the side, before doing a little twirl with her knife. She lunged at me once more, catching only the rope again. Madison switched her grip to a stabbing motion, bringing it down against me repeatedly as I continued to dodge backwards.
Once, twice, and again, before a frustrated stab reached too far, and I caught Madison with a punch against her ribs. Focusing on the knife, I rushed forwards, grabbing Madison and kneeing her in the stomach. This blow causing Madison to drop her knife. I then threw her body hard, sending the woman onto the ground, bouncing once against the stage before rolling off it completely.
I recovered to my feet, and turned to run for the single door, before hands found themselves wrapped around my waist and brought me down onto the floor with full force, my chin taking the brunt of the damage this time.
Lauren had lunged at me and tried grabbing my head from behind before I used all my strength to force myself to flip around. Lauren tumbled off my body slightly, but still opted to slam her hands down at random, catching my stomach with repeated blows.
“G-Get him, Lauren!” Annabelle cried out like a damsel in distress, barely holding herself up in a seated position with her arms.
I caught Lauren’s wild swings as she kept going. I quickly flipped my feet closer to my body, and jumped up with the momentum, still holding onto an increasingly desperate Lauren still flopping along the floor.
I hurled Lauren towards Annabelle, the blonde releasing both arms to catch her ally beneath Lauren’s shoulders.
But it was time for this fight to end. As Annabelle and Lauren struggled to both stand, I winded up a massive hook with my right fist and delivered it directly in the center of Lauren’s chest.
“Aaaah-!” Lauren screamed, the blow powerful enough to send both girls flying backwards. Annabelle hit the ground first, the back of her head slamming against the stage as Lauren landed firmly on top of her. The blonde girl, with all her tenacity, finally shut down. Her eyes fluttered and closed. Lauren, spread out on top of Annabelle’s body, felt the same fate, and passed out after another small moan.
My adrenaline began to slowly fade down, as the feeling of tiredness started to sink in. I had no idea how many fights I had gone through so far, but rest was needed soon or else I was not going to be able to last for much longer.
Screeeeeeck.
The wooden dragon swung slightly, a response to the sole rope holding it up beginning to wear and give way from the fighting earlier. I looked up, then looked down at the two softly passed out girls in front of me, realizing their bodies was just slightly on the edge of the dragon.
“…Tsk, I’m too nice sometimes.”
With the last bit of energy, I had, I held both girls’ bodies by their sides, dragging them a short distance before sliding both gently off the stage. The two girls flopping off the stage slowly and gently dropping in a little pile entwined with one another.
I turned around, walking to the single door to the side, coming across Madison’s dropped knife by the breaking rope. I reached down and began to pick it up, thinking it would help in the future.
“Stop-!”
I froze, turning my head slowly to see Madison standing tall on the stage holding one of the assault rifles the earlier military men had dropped when they were shot.
Shit. I had forgotten about those.
I gradually began raising my hands.
“Hahaha. Hahaha-! A surrender? You think you can just fucking surrender?” Madison laughed, this one slightly more unhinged and slightly hysterical. Her finger fell downwards, the woman taking slow steps forwards with a maniacal grin on her face, “no, there are no more surrenders now.”
Sweat dropped down my face. The knife was near me, but what trick did I have left? What move could I do?
Was this the end?
I had almost begun to fall into resignation, as Madison’s slow steps brought her forward.
Right on top of the polyester jacket she herself had dropped onto the stage earlier.
Madison’s balance gave way, her eyes wide as she slipped backwards and fell onto her ass. The gun set loose, bullets ripping in an upwards angle as Madison fell, grazing the floor just beside me and up along the red curtains adorning the stage.
My eyes fell to the knife, then to the wooden dragon high above.
And I took my chance.
“The show is over-!” I yelled, snatching the knife off the floor and slicing through the rope with the same motion.
The rope split into two and the wooden dragon finally gave way. Madison looked up at the falling dragon and gave a deathly scream, before the wooden stage prop slammed down onto her head and body with a thundering crash. Her body buried beneath the rubble, a forming deep red pool beneath the broken structure gave all the signal I needed.
Turns out, backup was on the way. Perhaps called in by Madison and Lauren before they had entered?
But I had enough with fights. All I needed was a tacky, flower patterned buttoned shirt from the changeroom past the single door, and light beige pants.
Dozens of armed men and women began rushing into the floor, ushering out the stray tourist and civilian standing by along inside one of the many restaurants or casinos along the so-called entertainment floor, and into the stairwell, urged to go their own separate ways.
And in this crowd of people, was me.
___
It was the first time I had finally taken a full look outside.
Nothing but desert surrounded the whole building from what I could see from my vantage point on the balcony. The building itself, however, seemed massive both in width and height. A resort in the middle of the desert? It was possible given what I had seen on the first floor, but it still didn’t explain all the overly trained guards.
Whatever the reason, I could still see my opponent inside the room, barely conscious on the floor. Our eyes locked for a moment before I left the room of unconscious bodies and climbed down the balcony.
Below and above me were several more lines of balconies, stretched out in similar patterns alluding to my resort theory. Although there could be more past that, it was blocked by the view of one single wider balcony covering a massive width. A reprieve in case I lost my grip jumping between balconies. Though the concrete floor of each was not exactly the softest recovery I could have hoped for.
I started to hear sounds in the room I had left. Time was running short.
My legs moved inside the balcony below me, slowly as I tried to lower myself safely onto the platform below.
But a sharp crack of a door bursting open above spurred my action. I released my grip, falling at an odd angle and landing directly onto the 11th floor’s balcony’s railing. In my sudden loss of balance, I waved my arms for stability, the gun I was holding also slipping from my grasp outwards and falling far off the building down onto the sand far, far below.
That would have been useful later.
Screaming and commands emitted from the room above me. In full panic mode, I got up immediately, climbed onto the railing once more, and leapt onto the neighboring balcony. I did this once more in a rush, before the mercenaries above thought to check below.
My third try, however, drained me of my beginners’ luck. A shorter jump and a slip of my foot caused my whole body to lose momentum. I fell between the gaps of the 11th floor balconies, collapsing down onto the elongated 10th floor balcony in a heap.
“Nngh…” My body ached from the impact as I shakily pushed it up with my arms, trying to find out what sort of room would validate such a wide balcony. Or perhaps how that fall was much longer than I initially thought it would be.
As it turns out, the 10th floor was massively taller than the other two; something I had not noticed from my vantage point above the floor. Stretched out before me was a massive space, filled in the center by a cheap elevated stage. Backdrops and props held above the stage with thick rope, and the perimeter was covered by a sturdy red velvet curtain.
Like this, but way, way bigger. Also the props above the stage are missing.
Around it was a plain, square-shaped room with a slick black floor with assorted folding chairs laid about. Many tables and chairs adorned the sides of the room, put back neatly, but a small handful of them were still set up in seemingly random areas, likely for practice perhaps. In the corner, a space was carved out of the room to make a small drinks bar, but it was closed now.
The room had two doors ignoring the massive glass wall and glass doors leading out to the balcony I had fallen onto. One double door appeared to be the exit to the hallway, seeing into its glass panes, while a smaller single door on the opposite side led to somewhere unknown.
Though, most importantly, near the single door was a long railing stretched horizontally along the far wall. And, on that railing, was a single girl dressed in tight exercise gear complete with a black top, hot pink pants, and tightly wound platinum blonde hair pulled into a bun around the back of her head.
And this girl had already noticed me for a long while.
Play it cool, I thought to myself, scrambling to my feet and brushing myself off quickly. I opened the glass door with confidence and stepped briskly into the room. Not to the exit, of course, because this girl was already swiftly approaching me with a similarly brisk pace. Normally I would not be so threatened by such an attractive young girl in tight clothing, but considering my earlier encounters, it was seemingly very likely that this individual was not friendly.
“Quite an entrance there,” the yoga girl remarked, placing one hand on her hip. Her voice was high-pitched and young, a tad bratty, though the tone was polite.
“Aha…yeah, ah,” I looked over to where I had fallen, “bad decisions were had?”
The girl smirked, “a rather large understatement don’t you think, Prisoner One?”
My body became awash with a strong feeling of dread, even though I really should have expected this. I had no weapons except my own fists once more, but that has served me pretty well already. There were only about twelve feet between me and my opponent. A distance I could close in an instant, though I had to be cautious considering her attire and posture and what she had been doing when I entered the picture. Yoga? Dance practice? Considering the venue, perhaps she was a performer looking for some extra practice in the meantime, but why are the performers mercenaries as well?
The girl before me only giggled, “mmm, wow your brain seems to be really going there, huh?”
“You don’t know what you’re getting into, girl” I took a menacing tone, hoping to threaten her away.
“Oh, don’t worry. I’m not an idiot, y’know,” and beyond the confident smirk, the girl reached behind her back, and pulled a pistol aimed directly at me, “and my name isn’t girl. Its Annabelle. Talking down is so, so rude.”
I grimaced, tensing at the idea of being shot at anytime. Even after she pulled out the gun, Annabelle held on the trigger but never took the shot.
“Well? Hands on your head. C’mon now,” her voice was sassy and unamused, cocking her head slightly. I did as she said, placing my hands on my head. At least if her plan was to take me prisoner, I had a few more chances to come.
As my view was still opposite of the balcony, I noticed that three military dressed individuals seemed to be loitering outside near the double door exit. They certainly weren’t there the last time I looked, so they couldn’t all be guards. Perhaps they were scouting the room? I never did notice Annabelle pick up a walkie-talkie or anything.
“Hmm? What are you looking at?” Annabelle remarked, though her eyes never wavered, “am I not pretty enough for you?”
An idea finally ran through my head. I still had no idea who I was, but everyone I had dealt with seemed to be absolutely frightened of me. Perhaps it was time to bring their fears to life?
“Not really my tastes,” I smirked back.
“That so? Heh, I’ll bet.”
“No need to bet, because my tastes are here right on time,” I raised my voice intentionally, snapping my head towards the opening double doors where the three military dressed individuals, two men and one woman, began walking through.
Annabelle perked up at the sound of the door, her eyes flashed with a hint of panic and her smirk fell immediately. Her head and eyes began turning around, her attention diverted for that faction of a second.
And I knew I could close that gap.
I rushed forward and snatched Annabelle’s wrist in an instant, pulling myself onto her body with the momentum and forcing her arm to aim at the military dressed individuals. My spare arm wrapped around her body and held her tightly.
“H-Hey-!”
Annabelle’s surprised gasp was silenced by the shots fired from the pistol, aimed directly for the three people just stepping into the room. As the door closed behind the last person, the bullets found their targets. The first lodged deep into the face of the man in the front. His body crumpling immediately as his face distorted into a bloody mess. The second and third of the rapid-fire shots struck the man in the very back, crossing through the man’s thigh and neck. The neck wound proving to be a fatal one, as the man held his neck in anguish, and crumpled just like the first.
“H-Hostiles-!” The woman in the middle cried, her smaller stature the likely reason why no bullets had struck her so far. Overtop her military camo hoodie, the woman began pulling a larger assault rifle around her body that was slung around her back as her allies fell.
“Shit-!”
“E-Ee-!”
I released Annabelle as the two of us tumbled to the floor and scrambled away to dodge the flurry of bullets that lit up the spot where we had both stood intertwined just moments ago. I quickly flipped up one of the tables lying nearby, hiding behind it as the bullets rained and chipped the wood off the edges. Annabelle, from the corner of my eye, looked to have hid behind the elevation of the stage platform, across the room.
“I-I’m on your side you idiot!” Annabelle cried out from her hiding point.
“Who are you? Identify yourselves!” The camo girl called out, the shooting stopped for a moment. In the toss and chaos, Annabelle had likely not noticed that the gun ended up in my hands after we split.
I turned from my hiding spot and fired the pistol towards the camo girl, the bullets just barely missing her head as she ducked in panic. I peeked for a moment to see the girl in the midst of turning over her own table.
I jumped and bolted from my position behind my own table, while the camo girl had her view restricted by the table. I heard the crackle of static from an opening walkie-talkie and knew I had chosen the right move. I had to silence her communications before she could call backup.
“Hello?! He-“ The woman screeched from behind the table, presumably into her communicator. Her voice was interrupted by my hard kick against the table, knocking into her head. Before the girl could realize what was happening, I leapt over the top, landing directly onto the girl’s head with my feet.
She cried out as her body was crushed by the weight of mine being thrown directly on top. When the dust settled, I had found myself seated right on top of the camo girl, as she struggled to recover from the bad hit the back of her head suffered from the fall.
I made sure to quicken that suffering by smashing the handle of the pistol in my hands into the center of her face. Without even a further moan, the girl’s eyes shut and her tense body laxed, smoothing out along the floor.
I breathed out, standing up looking down at my fallen opponent.
Until the pistol was briskly kicked from my hands, the weapon flying to the center of the room near the patio before bouncing to a stop.
I whirled around and suffered a firm kick to the center of my chest. I skidded back a half step, before stopping Annabelle’s attack combo with a firm elbow to her incoming body as she tried to punch, nailing her just slightly above her breasts as her fist barely grazed the side of my head.
Annabelle winced, stepping back quickly holding a hand against the wounded spot before making two quick backflips as I tried to approach. The girl grimaced as she landed, glaring at me. Her body now in a complete fighting position.
“Quite a delay to the inevitable, huh?” I taunted to the previously confident blonde.
“Tch-,” Annabelle took another few steps back, her hands unravelling the tight bun of light blonde hair. Like a waterfall, her hair unfurled and flowed down to her shoulders, and a flick of her head straightened it to an acceptable look.
“Don’t think you’ve already won.”
I stepped forward together with her, fists at the ready. The two of us stared at each other as she assumed a fighting position once more.
“We’ll see about that.”
===
Pace. Pace. Pace. Pace.
The once red carpet had already begun to wear in only five minutes. Lauren walked all the way down to the arcade doors, then back up to the doors of a restaurant, then back down again. The wide expanse of the entertainment floor as a result of the taller ceiling provided Lauren with the much-needed room to pace, as unhealthy as it was.
“Darling, darling! Are you going to do that for our entire watch?” Madison piped up from her position in the center of the hallway, standing upright with her usual wide smile.
Lauren ran both her hands through her hair as she kept walking in the direction she was headed, turned around at her usual position, then finally came to a stop in front of Madison. Stop, being an optimistic term with how much she was fidgeting.
“Look, I…what if we run into him? What do I do?” Lauren began making a series of elaborate hand motions, “do I fight him? Run? Whip out my phone and scream into it and do my duty as I hope he doesn’t feel like crushing my neck like a twig?”
Madison’s smile never faded, “you act like that is not what we’re supposed to do in the first place!” Though her words sharp, the tone never changed either.
“I just didn’t I’d be put here!” Lauren’s voice raised, “reading the job description is a lot different than living it, you know.”
Madison took a step forward, her grin becoming increasingly menacing as she snatched Lauren’s throat suddenly and held her a small distance into the air.
“A-Agh-…” Lauren gasped, her body pinned against the wall.
“Now then, my dear, either you get your act together when we do find the prisoner, or perhaps someone else will ensure that you never run into the prisoner,” Madison released her grip, sending Lauren back down onto her feet gasping for air. The red-haired woman clapped her hands together enthusiastically, “I assume we have an agreement now?”
Lauren only responded with a small whining noise. Madison raised an eyebrow, moving closer again.
“Y-Yes, yes-!” Lauren stammered.
“Excellent! Now, you might be useful to me as we’re about to confront him.”
“Y-Wait, what-?” Lauren’s fear-struck face stared back at Madison.
The other woman pointed her hands over to the doors leading to the theatre, her other hand on her hip, “well! I had noticed some patrols that seem to have entered those doors over there and have yet to emerge. Seems suspect, don't you think?”
“T-They could just be slacking off in there!” Lauren yelled her response back, only for Madison to shake her head.
“S-U-S-P-E-C-T,” Madison teased, poking Lauren’s nose, “lets go do a little investigation, shall we? You can lead.”
“M-Me?!” Lauren pointed to herself before suddenly being dragged closer to Madison’s face.
“Yes. You. Is there a problem…?”
===
“Augh-!”
Annabelle slammed into the backdrop along the stage, thrown with a strong force. The large chested blonde gasped as she felt the impact, before falling to the floor in a heap.
But I was not done yet. I reached forward and grabbed her by the back of her head, her hair a large chunk in my one grasp. Annabelle feebly tried clawing the grip, but her strength was already long gone. Her flexibility and agility proving a strong defensive tactic, but it just stalled the fight out longer, and without it she had nothing.
I slammed the side of her head into the backdrop, the girl crying again as her head hit. I did it once more for effect, before releasing her head. Annabelle collapsed onto her side, her breathing erratic as she tried to use the last ounce of her energy to look upwards.
“I-I surrender. P-Please, no more,” she eked out.
“Where am I?” I asked. Though her face was in a daze, I could still see the confusion on her face.
“W-What?”
“I said where am I!” I screamed into her face.
“T-The Di’Set Desert Resort-!”
A resort? So, it is a resort then. But what kind of regular resort has such a prison in its basements?
“And where is that?”
Annabelle just appeared to look increasingly confused, “i-it’s the largest resort in the world, in the middle of the Sahara Desert.”
A large object suddenly crashed into the side of my head, causing me to hit the stage hard. I landed on my arm, a streak of pain shooting up my body as I did. A sneak attack? I was embarrassed that I was that careless.
I looked over to the direction I took the hit, the perpetrator, a chair. Two women rushed onto the stage from the side with the single door. One, a straight banged brunette, wore a scared expression on her face and climbed onto the stage with trepidation, while her partner, a red-haired woman in a black exercise jacket, leapt onto the stage with prep and energy.
“Annabelle! A-Annabelle are you okay?!” The brunette yelled, rushing to the fallen Annabelle on the floor.
“L-Lauren?” Annabelle asked with hope, before looking over to the red head, “a-and Madison? What are you guys-“
“Taking out the trash, of course!” Madison chimed, picking the chair up. I tried to recover quickly, but Madison was already in the process of bringing the chair down onto my head, I rolled to the side, barely dodging the hit as I continued to scramble to my feet. Falling off the stage wasn’t a death sentence, but it could hurt with how high it was.
Madison placed the chair down gently, and began to unzip her polyester jacket, revealing a tight black sports bra underneath.
“Beating on a defenseless girl? Darling, I hope you don’t mind if we evened the odds?” Madison laughed with a wide smile, holding the jacket with the tips of her fingers before letting it drop onto the floor.
The brunette, Lauren, said nothing and merely walked up to the chair slowly and picked it up with her hands. Annabelle, still leaning against the backdrop, looked like she wanted to try and help, but the heavily pained look on her face suggested otherwise.
I just frowned at the scene. I wasn’t sure how strong these two new girls are, and how effective Annabelle could still be, but I did estimate that Lauren was likely the weaker one.
And weaker she was, Lauren charged at me suddenly, holding the chair high above her head. I let loose a kick to her bare midriff, the girl gasping at the hit before falling backwards.
I snatched the chair out of the air before she fell, using it to take a swing at Madison. But Madison was much defter than her friend, ducking beneath the swing and returning several blows towards my chest and stomach. I swallowed the pain, swinging the chair once more and releasing it towards her. An attack proving to be relatively ineffective as Madison dodged to the side again.
Lauren leaped up and tried a weak kick towards my defenseless side, barely deflected by my arm. As her balance shook from the block, I backhanded her chin, a cry sounding as she stumbled backwards.
I turned back to Madison just too late, as a sharp feeling of skin against metal ripped through just below my left bicep.
The red-head had whipped out a knife from somewhere, and now wielded it against me.
I dodged backwards against another horizontal strike, then dodging to the side as she tried a thrust. The attacks were tense and far too close for my liking, as I ducked under another horizontal swing above my head. That attack only slicing sharply against the sturdy rope holding up a large wooden dragon held precariously high above the stage.
“You are starting to irritate me-!” Madison chirped with a menacing, yet cheery tone.
I heard a step from behind me and whirled around just in time for my fist to catch Lauren directly in the midriff. Lauren cried out in shock from the blow, before I quickly snagged her battered body and pushed it hard in Madison’s direction.
Annabelle had gotten up once more and tried a sneaky fist to the back of my head as I finished with Lauren, but I turned just for the punch to hit against my cheek. I absorbed the weakened blow, and returned my own, sending a chop downwards against Annabelle’s forehead. The blonde could not absorb the blow as well and dropped to the floor as it was dealt.
Madison angrily caught Lauren’s body and threw it to the side, before doing a little twirl with her knife. She lunged at me once more, catching only the rope again. Madison switched her grip to a stabbing motion, bringing it down against me repeatedly as I continued to dodge backwards.
Once, twice, and again, before a frustrated stab reached too far, and I caught Madison with a punch against her ribs. Focusing on the knife, I rushed forwards, grabbing Madison and kneeing her in the stomach. This blow causing Madison to drop her knife. I then threw her body hard, sending the woman onto the ground, bouncing once against the stage before rolling off it completely.
I recovered to my feet, and turned to run for the single door, before hands found themselves wrapped around my waist and brought me down onto the floor with full force, my chin taking the brunt of the damage this time.
Lauren had lunged at me and tried grabbing my head from behind before I used all my strength to force myself to flip around. Lauren tumbled off my body slightly, but still opted to slam her hands down at random, catching my stomach with repeated blows.
“G-Get him, Lauren!” Annabelle cried out like a damsel in distress, barely holding herself up in a seated position with her arms.
I caught Lauren’s wild swings as she kept going. I quickly flipped my feet closer to my body, and jumped up with the momentum, still holding onto an increasingly desperate Lauren still flopping along the floor.
I hurled Lauren towards Annabelle, the blonde releasing both arms to catch her ally beneath Lauren’s shoulders.
But it was time for this fight to end. As Annabelle and Lauren struggled to both stand, I winded up a massive hook with my right fist and delivered it directly in the center of Lauren’s chest.
“Aaaah-!” Lauren screamed, the blow powerful enough to send both girls flying backwards. Annabelle hit the ground first, the back of her head slamming against the stage as Lauren landed firmly on top of her. The blonde girl, with all her tenacity, finally shut down. Her eyes fluttered and closed. Lauren, spread out on top of Annabelle’s body, felt the same fate, and passed out after another small moan.
My adrenaline began to slowly fade down, as the feeling of tiredness started to sink in. I had no idea how many fights I had gone through so far, but rest was needed soon or else I was not going to be able to last for much longer.
Screeeeeeck.
The wooden dragon swung slightly, a response to the sole rope holding it up beginning to wear and give way from the fighting earlier. I looked up, then looked down at the two softly passed out girls in front of me, realizing their bodies was just slightly on the edge of the dragon.
“…Tsk, I’m too nice sometimes.”
With the last bit of energy, I had, I held both girls’ bodies by their sides, dragging them a short distance before sliding both gently off the stage. The two girls flopping off the stage slowly and gently dropping in a little pile entwined with one another.
I turned around, walking to the single door to the side, coming across Madison’s dropped knife by the breaking rope. I reached down and began to pick it up, thinking it would help in the future.
“Stop-!”
I froze, turning my head slowly to see Madison standing tall on the stage holding one of the assault rifles the earlier military men had dropped when they were shot.
Shit. I had forgotten about those.
I gradually began raising my hands.
“Hahaha. Hahaha-! A surrender? You think you can just fucking surrender?” Madison laughed, this one slightly more unhinged and slightly hysterical. Her finger fell downwards, the woman taking slow steps forwards with a maniacal grin on her face, “no, there are no more surrenders now.”
Sweat dropped down my face. The knife was near me, but what trick did I have left? What move could I do?
Was this the end?
I had almost begun to fall into resignation, as Madison’s slow steps brought her forward.
Right on top of the polyester jacket she herself had dropped onto the stage earlier.
Madison’s balance gave way, her eyes wide as she slipped backwards and fell onto her ass. The gun set loose, bullets ripping in an upwards angle as Madison fell, grazing the floor just beside me and up along the red curtains adorning the stage.
My eyes fell to the knife, then to the wooden dragon high above.
And I took my chance.
“The show is over-!” I yelled, snatching the knife off the floor and slicing through the rope with the same motion.
The rope split into two and the wooden dragon finally gave way. Madison looked up at the falling dragon and gave a deathly scream, before the wooden stage prop slammed down onto her head and body with a thundering crash. Her body buried beneath the rubble, a forming deep red pool beneath the broken structure gave all the signal I needed.
Turns out, backup was on the way. Perhaps called in by Madison and Lauren before they had entered?
But I had enough with fights. All I needed was a tacky, flower patterned buttoned shirt from the changeroom past the single door, and light beige pants.
Dozens of armed men and women began rushing into the floor, ushering out the stray tourist and civilian standing by along inside one of the many restaurants or casinos along the so-called entertainment floor, and into the stairwell, urged to go their own separate ways.
And in this crowd of people, was me.
Last edited:
ViridianShine
Club Regular
- Joined
- Sep 18, 2018
6
___
In the metallic confines of the prison level, a red-headed woman steps from the elevator room and enters cautiously onto the metallic catwalk, looking in each direction before proceeding. She has on a sleeveless black top, black denim shorts, and a similarly coloured black net wrapped around her short porcelain legs. Her long red hair is done up neatly along the top of her head, and her make-up so clean it contrasts heavily against the dirty pipes surrounding her.
Observing the bodies being carried gently past her as she made her way through the floor, she finally heard her destination sounding in the distance, and hurried her pace.
“And I thought I had A-Grade mercenaries here!” The new second-in-command, Nina Repinski, screamed at the two unfortunate women standing before her, who the red head knew to be Gracie and Olivia. Gracie seemed to be writing in a clipboard, trying her best to ignore the shouting commander before her, while Olivia stood awkwardly behind Gracie, avoiding eye contact.
“Disgraceful. Absolutely fucking disgraceful!” Nina continued her tirade, “I bet you all failed intentionally because you hate me, don’t you?”
“We did our best with what we had,” Gracie replied with a zen-like tone, “or do you think you could have done better?”
“Umm,” the red head started, but was drowned out immediately.
“Better? No shit I can do better, if all you could do was run with your tail between your legs. If that bitch Charlotte could capture this fucker by herself, then I can snap his neck without a sweat.”
“Ma’am,” the red head spoke louder, catching Gracie and Olivia’s attention.
“Oh, Dorothy? What are you doing out here?” Gracie immediately turned to address the woman standing there.
“Excuse me? I am in the middle of something,” Nina immediately growled towards Dorothy, whipping her head towards her.
“It’s actually for you, commander. We were not able to get your phone down here, with how bad the reception was,” Dorothy’s voice was level and light, keeping a professional attitude around her.
“Well what is it?”
“Prisoner 01, you see…” Dorothy began, telling the three women everything that had transpired on the twelfth and tenth floors. Or, rather, what they had discovered in the aftermath. Once Dorothy finished, Nina fell silent. The half-dressed woman looking to be close to blowing a gasket at poor Dorothy standing before her.
“It has to be, that Charlotte, it’s all her influence isn’t it?” Nina muttered to herself, nearly inaudible to her surrounding mercenaries.
“Pardon?” Dorothy asked.
“Its not important. You said this was ten minutes ago that you discovered what happened?”
Dorothy nodded, “yes, the evacuation of all guests from the tenth floor was ten minutes ago. I was assigned to finding your location and bringing you there. Afterwards, I will be stationed-.”
Nina hand-waved the remainder of Dorothy’s words, “yeah, yeah, I don’t care. I’m getting back to command, else this asswipe is going to be a stain on my record right before the operation,” the woman suddenly paused her words, pondering for a second, “you said twelfth floor?”
“Yes.”
Her eyes blinked twice, a flash of an idea seemed to past through Nina’s eyes before she turned towards the remaining two women, “you two idiots, go keep up your recording shit on the tenth floor. I need to be on the twelfth.”
“Aye aye,” Gracie responded lazily, as Nina walked briskly away without even hearing the response. The bitchy woman soon around the corner as the sounds of her feet against the metallic catwalk disappeared in the distance.
Olivia let out a long sigh, her body dropping as if releasing a great amount of tension. Gracie looked back to her clipboard in silence, before looking up at Dorothy.
“They pay you extra to deliver that tidbit to bitch queen there?” Gracie smirked at Dorothy, though the latter’s porcelain features remained stoic at the comment.
“This isn’t the time to be causing friction. Prisoner 01 will continue to threaten our lives as he tries to escape,” Dorothy responded curtly.
“Heh, right. You don’t change even in situations like this, do you?”
“More worried about my own life, than anything.”
“Think all those sports you play will help if you run into him?”
Olivia suddenly interjected into the conversation, “hey, you don’t think he will, umm, remember that I was the one that found him earlier?” The woman looked to her two allies nervously, pushing her fingers together.
“Did you do something to anger the prisoner?” Dorothy asked.
“Ooh, yeah, didn’t you give him that real bitch smirk earlier? Better watch your neck, Liv,” Gracie gave a smirk at the other woman, who returned a look of shock and fear. Gracie giggled at the reaction, but quickly retracted her words, “but no, seriously, the guy just wants to leave. He has no idea what he was.”
“You seem to be rather sure of that,” Dorothy stated, looking towards Gracie, “did you encounter the prisoner?”
“Encounter? Hell, she was one of the only people that confronted him and wasn’t even knocked out!” Olivia exclaimed, giving Gracie a slight push as she did.
Gracie laughed at Olivia’s words, brushing off her push, “like I said, the man just wants to escape. If you don’t corner the wounded snake, it won’t bite back.”
“It is your job to secure the prisoner, though,” Dorothy responded sternly.
“Right, of course, but I know my limits and I know that I’m not doing that alone.”
Dorothy paused, before nodding at the statement, opting to change the subject instead.
“What are you doing with your clipboard that the commander has tasked you to continue?”
“Oh, this?” Gracie flipped the clipboard around, showing Dorothy a swath of various numbers, names, and tags written across a neatly drawn table, “recording personal, injuries, deaths. Important to know what kind of manpower we have.”
Dorothy nodded again, “and with the operation coming so soon…”
Olivia seemed to look nervous again, “urgh, I almost forgot that was coming up. The prisoner was probably supposed to stop that, right?”
Gracie shrugged, “makes the most sense, given the timing of his arrival. Command might bump the time of action up now that they know we’re getting investigated.”
“Right, yeah. Hope the money will be worth it.”
“Of course, it’ll be. That’s why most of us are here.”
Dorothy spoke up again, “we should be proceeding to the tenth floor, then, if time is important. Shall we travel together, to avoid any more incidents?”
After their agreement, the three proceeded towards the elevator without further incident, as intended. Since the prisoner had likely disappeared with the evacuation, it would be difficult to track his current location without further information on his looks and appearance to every mercenary and guard on the compound.
Though, with every exit heavily guarded, and the desert location, it was easy to tell that the prisoner was still somewhere inside the hotel, trapped like a mouse in a maze. Or, with his deadly reputation, a specter, roaming the halls waiting to strike.
Some time passed completely uneventful. The unconscious mercenaries, all sent to the resorts medical bay, slowly began to recover. And, after five hours, they all had finally come back awake.
Except one.
===
The memory still stayed fresh in Charlotte’s mind. Though it occurred yesterday, the fear remained at the back of her mind, vividly replaying at every silent moment.
It was at around 10am when the mission began. Charlotte wasn’t much of a morning person, but the looming sense of adrenaline shaved off those last bits of cobwebs from inside her head.
“Our mission is simple. One target driving alone,” Knox Ludlow, the commander at the time, had stated before they set out. It seemed easy to Charlotte at first, but by Knox’s own different demeanour and the fact that he had chosen to bring along all the most elite mercenaries as well as himself for the task, Charlotte had a bad feeling about the whole thing.
Though, it was easy to feel complacent if Knox Ludlow was headed out together with them. An apparent former elite soldier, the man commanded respect and fear amongst everyone working here, even those self-proclaimed lone wolves.
But if it was just one person, as the reports said, how bad could it be? She had thought at the time.
Despite Di’Set being in the middle of nowhere at the center of a desert, numerous decorative rock formations were placed around the compound reaching one to two stories tall. To tourists, it looked like a simple decorative element, but to Charlotte and the others, they were useful as perches, watchtowers, and ambush points when necessary.
Evan and Quinn, two grizzled veteran mercenaries, took point a distance from where Charlotte was located. Both equipped with a high caliber sniper rifle, pulling the trigger was their duty.
Knox himself had hidden himself somewhere, overseeing the entire mission. It was often risky to split off on your own, but practically everyone respected or feared the man enough to trust him with his own decisions. Until that day, it had yet to fail.
Finally, Charlotte had been placed together with the final person that had came along for the mission, Brooklyn. More experienced with logistics and support than anything, Brooklyn was still an extremely intelligent, perceptive woman while being incredibly beautiful to boot. Never shying away from her inherent sex appeal, Brooklyn had it all, and Charlotte always looked up to the woman in admiration. Though the fact that Brooklyn always considers Charlotte to be far more combat proficient than her always leads Charlotte to become sort of a bodyguard for her in missions like these.
Despite the tense air, today wasn’t any different to how Charlotte was used to seeing Brooklyn. The blonde choosing to only wear a tight black sports bra and what seemed like a black set of panties. Though her white runners were practical, at the very least. It seemed a little ridiculous, to be honest, but Charlotte couldn’t tell if that was jealousy talking more than anything.
“You aren’t hot in that, Char?” Brooklyn had asked at some point, breaking the silent tension. Though striking up a conversation, she never removed her eyes from the binoculars trained directly down the only asphalt road heading up to the resort.
Charlotte looked down at her own attire, a simple t-shirt with jeans. Though, in exchange, she wore a sturdy bulletproof vest underneath. Usually it would be fine, but today seemed a little hotter than usual.
“No, not really,” she lied, looking away. It was tough to hold such a conversation while also staring at Brooklyn’s toned tanned body and massive…well…
“If you say so,” Brooklyn responded, though Charlotte couldn’t tell if she recognized the lie or not.
Maybe if I had that kind of body, I’d be showing it too, Charlotte thought in her head, frowning.
“…You say something Char?” Brooklyn suddenly piped up again.
“…Uh wha-? No, I wasn’t.”
“Oh, sorry. Just sounded like you were mumbling.”
Charlotte turned red, and immediately picked up her gun and began to reload it. Of course, it was fully loaded. She hadn’t fired a single shot yet, after all.
Their earpieces began to crackle to life, “you girls paying attention up there?” A mocking voice of their commander sounded.
Brooklyn pressed a hand to her ear, “just a little girl talk, Knox baby.”
“Well save the dollhouses for later and focus.”
“Yeah yeah,” Brooklyn dismissed, before pressing a button on the earpiece, “guess I left it on. Whoops.”
“We all gotta make mistakes eventually, right?” Charlotte looked to her side, “even you.”
Brooklyn hesitated her answer, though before she said another word, her body tensed up. Her hand immediately moved to press against the communicator in her ear.
“Visual,” she stated quickly, “car fast approaching. Looks to match our intel.”
Charlotte sat back down in her spot behind the rock, holstering the gun in her hands before looking around to her sides. The conversation continuing within her earpiece.
“And the target?” Knox asked.
“…Cannot confirm. Single driver, headwrap is covering his face,” Brooklyn bit her lip, seemingly straining herself as best she could to confirm something. Though, the effort was fruitless.
“Tch, anything hidden?”
“No roof but can’t see anything inside the car. If anything was hiding in there, it would be in the trunk.”
The line went silent for a brief, tense moment. Charlotte dared to peek in the direction Brooklyn was using her binoculars on but couldn’t make out anything with the distance.
“Your orders?” Evan’s voice came into the picture. Charlotte recalled that he held the sniper for this mission.
“…Take the shot,” Knox commanded.
Charlotte sat back down, bracing herself in the silence. Though she could not see anything of the operation, she could feel the tension from both the air and Brooklyn to her side. Still keeping her senses heightened, Charlotte continued to scan all the open areas around the pair in the small case that danger appeared from the side of the resort. Though Charlotte was used to the desert air and surroundings, sometimes it was still hard to discern what exactly was a rock formation and what wasn’t in the sweltering heat.
Because of that, Charlotte could have sworn she saw something move far, far in the distance to their right. Her vision waved from the heat, so it was best to not mention the possibility in the current moment.
“Direct hit!” Evan cheered from her earpiece.
“Confirmed, I saw it too,” Brooklyn added.
Charlotte heard the sounds of a car swerving. One swerve, two swerves, before it went silent again.
“Car has crashed into the sand alongside the road,” Brooklyn stated.
“No celebrating yet, Quinn get out there and confirm the target,” Knox’s voice remained stern as he gave the command. Once Quinn responded, Brooklyn pressed against her ear again.
“I don’t like this, Char.”
“Did you see something?” Charlotte asked, looking up.
“No, it just…it doesn’t feel right,” Brooklyn never released her focus from her binoculars, “call it intuition.”
Charlotte tensed in turn, moving up to a crouch as she continued to survey around them.
“Well you’re usually correct with-...”
“It’s a DOLL-!” Quinn suddenly shouted before the sound of a small explosion sounded inside the earpiece. Quinn screeched into the comm before all Charlotte could hear was the sound of a body falling into the sand.
“Told you-!” Brooklyn seethed through her teeth, now scanning all over her side. Charlotte stood up as well, a hand held against the gun on her hip.
“The fuck-?!” Evan shouted, before a shot rang out across the desert. Charlotte heard impact, and his comm went quiet in turn.
“Evan? Quinn? Fucks sake, what the hell is going on over there?” Knox screamed into the comm with no response.
“Char and I are still alive,” Brooklyn added quickly, still trying to find the source of the shot. Charlotte, too, could hear the general direction where the bullet came from, but she had a suspicion it was on her right somewhere.
“Then stay low, and good luck,” Knox warned, “there is just one target, but…”
“But what, Knox? Who the hell are we up against?!” Brooklyn shouted back.
Charlotte moved closer to Brooklyn, sweat dripping down her body, and not caused from the sweltering heat. But, if her suspicions were correct…
“Brook come this way-!” Charlotte quickly grabbed the arm of her friend before the rock they were standing around suddenly shattered from a projectile. Both girls yelped, scrambling around their cover.
“A-Are you okay?!” Charlotte yelled.
“Shit that was close-!” Brooklyn gasped, trying to sneak a peek around the rock. Though, now they knew the direction of the assailant, it became clear that they had a sniper equipped.
“What the fuck is happening there-?!” Knox crackled their comms back to life.
“The west side, Knox, the west-!” Charlotte quickly warned.
“Fuck, I’m over here-!” Panic creeping into his voice, before gunfire suddenly erupted from the comm. Rapid shots sent back and forth, though it was hard to tell just from the grunting in Charlotte’s ear.
“Damn it, Char come on-!” Brooklyn urged, rearing to go. Charlotte quickly grabbed her arm.
“Unless you want to be a quick target, stay down and follow me-!” Charlotte urged, her body in motion already as she dashed for cover below the low sand dunes that rose and fell among the terrain.
The cover was terrible and barely reached a valid height, but Charlotte moved quickly even though her body nearly slithered along the sand like a snake.
The gunfire continued to sound through the comm. It was starting to reach the point that Charlotte feared that it could be heard by the civilians in the distance, but they were sure it could be passed off as construction later. Their lives, and Knox’s life, was a more pressing concern.
Charlotte and Brooklyn dashed from cover to cover, the decorative rocks providing it much better than the sand dunes as they made their way west. Charlotte knew their target knew of their existence, as a bullet was shot in their direction every so often.
Both girls had their guns drawn, but it was still difficult to tell which rock the target had shot from. Charlotte hoped he would still be busy with Knox, but in both their moments of adrenaline, they failed to notice that Knox’s comm had gone quiet.
“Knox you still alive?!” Brooklyn suddenly called into her comm. The silence creeped a sense of dread into Charlotte’s heart, before they suddenly heard a cough.
“Knox?” Charlotte asked with apprehension.
“…”
“…RUN-!” Knox called, before one last shot from a gun silenced his comm.
Charlotte could barely hold her gun at their commanders’ final word, the sweat pooling in the palms of her hands as she fought every urge to seize up.
“C-Char…” Brooklyn quivered, her voice nearly at the point of break, “w-who the hell are we against?!”
“Don’t run, Brook,” Charlotte quickly added, trying not to break in turn, “there is no cover on the way back. They know we’re here.”
“…I-I don’t want to die.”
“Then focus-!” Charlotte tried turning the corner of the rock to look at what was in front of them, but a bullet chipped the rock beside her, barely missing her arm. Charlotte quickly retreated behind the rock in a huff.
“How does he know where we are already?!”
Brooklyn had already tried turning her side of the rock and fired two shots before retreating at the return.
“I think I…saw him,” Brooklyn panted, “behind a rock close by.”
“Which one?”
“Char how do I describe a rock?!”
Charlotte took a deep breath and turned the rock, firing at everything indiscriminately, trying to get a reaction. Though, no response occurred this time.
“W-Where is he?” Charlotte whispered, fear and tension in her voice. She continued to stare straight ahead, eagle-eying each rock in front of her.
Still no response came. Was he reloading? Waiting?
“Char-!” Brooklyn screamed before her voice cut off. Charlotte turned her body immediately to see her friend, whose neck was tightly held by a masked figure dressed entirely in black. The gear was combat and bulletproof, but just staring at the mask the man wore practically punctured Charlotte’s heart with fear.
And a gun was already pressed tightly against Brooklyn’s head.
“Drop the gun, girl,” the figure commanded bluntly.
Charlotte had nothing to say. Nothing to argue. She knew in her head, this man was out to stop them, and they were out to stop him. From his intimidating presence, Charlotte knew she couldn’t convince him otherwise.
And threw her gun into the sand.
All that was left, was to hope for an act of mercy. An act that was not intending to come.
The gun in the mans hand flicked immediately at Charlotte, and Brooklyn acted in unison. Twisting free from his one-armed grip, Brooklyn pushed the arm with the gun. The bullet fired just barely grazing Charlotte’s left cheek.
The man tried reacting by aiming at Brooklyn, but she wasn’t done, giving the figure a high kick to his chest. Stumbling slightly from the hit, the man instead sent a sudden hook with his now open fist, unknownst to Brooklyn from her focus at the gun. The blow struck her against the side of her head, sending the tanned woman sprawling to the floor.
Charlotte had long since recovered and tackled the man before he noticed her. Pushing him back from the tackle, Charlotte spun a kick as well, this time knocking the gun out of the man’s hands.
Charlotte continued her assault, but the man blocked her next attack effortlessly. Though it was difficult to get a decent footing in the sand, Charlotte attacked aggressively, pushing the man back with her every step. Though careful not to leave an opening, she managed to block his counters as well.
Brooklyn groaned behind the dueling pair, making Charlotte happy to know her friend was still breathing. She heard shuffling behind her, causing the man to suddenly aggressively push at Charlotte. She tried holding him back, but the heavier mass of his body caused Charlotte to step to the side.
That’s when she saw Brooklyn had almost reached the man’s firearm while crawling in the sand. She tried reaching out for it but was promptly stopped by a strong kick to her open belly.
Brooklyn moaned in agony, her body flipping over and away from the impact. The man stomped her belly once more as she laid with her back against the sand, releasing another cry from the tanned beauty. Charlotte charged back to the man to defend her, leaping onto his back, but the man grabbed her reaching hands as she leapt onto him, tearing Charlotte away from his body and slamming her down into the sand.
“Aah…-!” Charlotte cried out. The sand softened her fall slightly, but the impact against the back of her head still left her slightly dazed. Charlotte tried rolling over, but the man suddenly stomped against her stomach. Charlotte reeled from the pain, but it was luckily softened by the bulletproof vest against her body.
But he didn’t continue the attack. It confused Charlotte for an extremely short moment before she remembered the gun.
Charlotte struggled to get up, but the man had already picked the gun up.
And Brooklyn still laid on her back a short distance away, helpless and in pain.
“No-!” Charlotte cried out, but it was futile. The gun discharged, the squelch of impact ran through Charlotte’s ears as the blood splattering up seared into her memory.
Brooklyn’s lifeless arms reached to the side as they flopped over. The beautiful tanned blonde Charlotte had always looked up to now looked up into the sky with lifeless eyes. A bullet hole now dirtying her beautiful face.
“Bastard-!” Charlotte cried, her body already in mid-dive before the man could even turn to shoot her. She gripped onto his back once more, scaling around his shoulders as she gripped tightly like a parasite.
The man tried tearing her off once more, but Charlotte wouldn’t go without a fight. Her arms and fists continued to punch, tear, and rip at every piece of the helmet around the man’s head and dug her elbows down into his upper back.
His motions continued to be increasingly erratic as Charlotte endured every attempt to tear her off his body. As she made one more attack, his body suddenly fell backwards.
Charlotte hit the sand first, her grip finally freeing as the man tried to spin back around. She took a fistful of sand, throwing it towards his covered face. It had no effect at all, but the moment of instinct to block the sand let her make another struggle at the gun in his hands.
Her hands found their target, clawing away as she and the man both held and fought for the gun. Her desperate grunts and screams filling the air of the fight.
The gun finally fell to the floor as Charlotte took a sudden hit against her back. She stumbled forward slightly, but the man already laid another kick at her recovering body. The impact causing her to lose balance, Charlotte let another cry out before tumbling to the sand once more.
The man tried stomping at her immediately, but Charlotte rolled out of his way, feeling something in the sand as she did.
In a half roll and another tumble away to create space, the man continued to give chase, but Charlotte finally revealed the object she had pulled off the sand and leveled it at his face.
The man instantly froze mere inches from her body. Charlotte glared at him with a determined look, breathing heavily as she kept the gun trained at the man.
“Don’t move,” she commanded.
The man seemed to be trying to think. Even behind the mask, she could sense the resignation.
“Hands in the air-!” She called out to him. Still he hesitated, but Charlotte could just yell the command.
Over and over again.
“Get your hands in the air! Hands in the fucking air-!”
…
…
Charlotte’s eyes finally opened. A white ceiling. Distinct beeps surrounding the bed she was in. Charlotte breathed heavily as she sat up, the image of the man held at gunpoint dissipated to show the women’s medical bay.
“Moooorning, Charlotte!” A cheery, airy voice sounded beside her. Charlotte turned her head to see her friend Lucille, sitting on a stool beside her bed, “you’re finally awake, hey?”
“…Ah,” Charlotte rubbed her head, still blinking and reeling at the memory. It all still felt so real, but that was just because it was.
Lucille playfully kicked her legs in the air, completely oblivious to Charlotte’s distressed awakening.
“The…medical bay, huh?” Charlotte looked around the area. All around them, the beds were filled with other women, some still lying down, some seated, some looking like they wanted to get going already.
She recognized them all. The red headed Melody, Bella and her leather jacket, Nadiya their executioner (though Charlotte could vaguely recall her wanting some weird nickname again), Alison the black skinned guard,
all girls that were supposed to be stationed down in the prison chambers today.
Then Winter, whom Charlotte had put here herself, and still seemed to be avoiding glances with her.
There were some odd ones too. Faith, the more maternal of the mercenaries,
Hailey, someone Charlotte only recalled as one that really cared about her social media, and Caitlyn, a fighter that Charlotte recalled absolutely loved to challenge her, for some odd reason. Charlotte recalled they weren’t stationed in very important areas today, but that could have changed. Perhaps it was worth asking them.
“They’re aaaaall here ‘cause of the prisoner guy, or something,” Lucille chimed in, noticing her analytical stares.
“These many women survived an encounter?” Charlotte asked, flabbergasted.
“Well, there was a lot of deaths too I think,” Lucille put a finger onto her lip, looking around, “…yeeeeah, yeah, everyone here got knocked out and stuff. There’s a couple more from the tenth floor I think, but they recovered kinda fast, so Nina made ‘em guard more stuff.”
Charlotte looked down at herself, as if surprised she could even still do that. The fearsome man burned into her memory was not the person that would have just left her unconscious and defenseless back at her room, even though she had helped him slightly. It seemed to be true that he lost his memory, but to lose that killer instinct as well?
“Guy just got lucky,” Melody piped up, looking away, “I could have beaten him.”
“W-What happened to you, Melody?” Charlotte asked.
“Nadiya over there fucked up the execution, that’s what happened!”
“Hey, hey-!” Nadiya quickly defended herself, “s-someone didn’t tie him up properly-! That’s why he escaped.”
“If you weren’t doing your stupid theatrics-!”
“T-They aren’t stupid…” Nadiya pouted, turning away as well. Melody only replied with a quiet ‘ugh’, flicking her hair to one side.
“…Well hey, I’m glad you’re alive,” Lucille spoke again after a moment, smiling at Charlotte, “you took the longest to wake back up, y’know. It’s been, like, six hours. Prisoner is still somewhere here too, I think, but we lost him.”
“Really…?” Charlotte wanted to ask further questions, but before she could, everyone in the room seemed to react to the sound of the door opening to her right. Charlotte looked over to see Nina striding into the room. Nina, upon noticing Charlotte, gave her a wide grin.
Flanking her was Juliette, again, with her that dumb smug face Charlotte had always hated. Guess she didn’t receive a good enough beating due to hiding behind poor Winter earlier.
Though, Nina also had replaced Winter this time. A suspiciously large guard, though Charlotte reasoned that it made sense with the prisoner still presumably on the loose.
The replacement, a long-haired brunette, wore a simple long-sleeved black shirt open at her midriff, and tight blue jeans. Her name was Bianca, and Charlotte recalled her as just standard fare. Though she was more playful and flirtatious than the others.
And besides her guards, was Nina’s oddly wide grin. It was almost creepy.
“Sleep well, Charlotte?” Nina asked with an extreme level of fake cheeriness.
“What do you want?” Charlotte asked back.
“Oh, nothing. I just found something extraordinary, which I’m sure will help…stop the obstacles we are currently facing,” Nina turned to face the entire room, “this is for all of you! Don’t you want to get your revenge on that so-called legendary agent?”
“Fuck yeah-!” Melody called out.
“Hmph, well, we are working on getting a proper picture of our slippery prisoner to all of you, but for now, I thought everyone would be interested in a little bonus contract on one of his contacts.”
“He has contacts?” Charlotte asked, only for Nina to turn oddly back towards her.
“Why, Charlotte, I’m so glad you asked! Because, doesn’t everyone think its weird how this great agent managed to kill every of our best men and women, but little Charlotte here captured him alone?”
“Well, yeah, ‘cause Charlotte’s a total badass,” Lucille chimed in, grinning at her own statement. Charlotte had no such smiles, however, as her heart began to sink at Nina’s impeding accusation.
“W-What the hell are you saying?” Charlotte shot back, “you weren’t even there-! You’re accusing me of getting my best friend killed from an…an act?!”
“Friends? Oh, Charlotte, we don’t have friends in this business. Especially not you, when everyone hears this evidence.”
Nina produced a small action figure, which Charlotte recognized as a piece that was inside her room.
“This is a voice recording device that I had planted in Charlotte’s room. As I am obviously so smart, I could sense her treachery from a mile away,” Nina pointed towards Hailey and Caitlyn, “you both say you encountered the prisoner in Charlotte’s room, yes?”
“…Y-Yeah?” Both girls gave a resigned answer, the cogs turning in their heads. Charlotte continued to feel the dead feeling at the pit of her stomach grow, more and more as the mood in the room changed and the whispers started to sound around her.
Nina said nothing more, besides placing the figurine on a table and sticking a key into the back of it. Soon, a voice recording began to play that sounded all too familiar to Charlotte.
“Close the door behind you?” Charlotte heard her voice on the recording play.
“Right. What’s your plan?” The mans voice came back in the recording. Charlotte knew what was happening. She knew what Nina was doing. Surely, she had heard the full recording, so why was she doing this?
“I mean, clearly you’ve lost your memory if you already forgot that I’m your undercover contact.”
The conversation continued, but everyone already started to look at Charlotte. Daggers stared directly into her heart. Charlotte kept listening to the clip, hoping that it would begin to play the part where she tried to turn it around on the prisoner.
But it didn’t. It stopped right before she was about to.
“W-Why?!” Charlotte yelled in disbelief.
Nina only smiled back, “everyone, the legendary mercenary you all looked up to. The woman who was about to be your leader.”
“I-I gave you the leadership! Why? Why!” Charlotte continued to yell into the deathly silence, “play the rest of it! PLAY THE REST OF IT!”
The girls in the room had already began to stand up slowly. Nina’s three guards also took a step forward, as Nina herself snatched up the figurine and backed up slowly.
“Now, it seems to me like the prisoner’s picture is ready to be texted to everyone!” Nina chirped up, “so I need to go deal with that. I assume everyone here can deal with this little mess? And, no arrests, please.”
And with those parting words, Nina stepped away with a skip in her step.
Charlotte slowly stood out of bed, still wearing the same outfit she had earlier. The other girls did the same, as they began to slowly approach her.
“At long last,” Juliette taunted melodically.
Charlotte had given everything she had to this place. But it was clear, it was not ready to give it back.
And so be it.
===
Writers Note: I actually had intended to introduce the rest of the full roster right here, but it stretched on so hard that I ended up just cutting off some parts for the next section.
___
In the metallic confines of the prison level, a red-headed woman steps from the elevator room and enters cautiously onto the metallic catwalk, looking in each direction before proceeding. She has on a sleeveless black top, black denim shorts, and a similarly coloured black net wrapped around her short porcelain legs. Her long red hair is done up neatly along the top of her head, and her make-up so clean it contrasts heavily against the dirty pipes surrounding her.
Observing the bodies being carried gently past her as she made her way through the floor, she finally heard her destination sounding in the distance, and hurried her pace.
“And I thought I had A-Grade mercenaries here!” The new second-in-command, Nina Repinski, screamed at the two unfortunate women standing before her, who the red head knew to be Gracie and Olivia. Gracie seemed to be writing in a clipboard, trying her best to ignore the shouting commander before her, while Olivia stood awkwardly behind Gracie, avoiding eye contact.
“Disgraceful. Absolutely fucking disgraceful!” Nina continued her tirade, “I bet you all failed intentionally because you hate me, don’t you?”
“We did our best with what we had,” Gracie replied with a zen-like tone, “or do you think you could have done better?”
“Umm,” the red head started, but was drowned out immediately.
“Better? No shit I can do better, if all you could do was run with your tail between your legs. If that bitch Charlotte could capture this fucker by herself, then I can snap his neck without a sweat.”
“Ma’am,” the red head spoke louder, catching Gracie and Olivia’s attention.
“Oh, Dorothy? What are you doing out here?” Gracie immediately turned to address the woman standing there.
“Excuse me? I am in the middle of something,” Nina immediately growled towards Dorothy, whipping her head towards her.
“It’s actually for you, commander. We were not able to get your phone down here, with how bad the reception was,” Dorothy’s voice was level and light, keeping a professional attitude around her.
“Well what is it?”
“Prisoner 01, you see…” Dorothy began, telling the three women everything that had transpired on the twelfth and tenth floors. Or, rather, what they had discovered in the aftermath. Once Dorothy finished, Nina fell silent. The half-dressed woman looking to be close to blowing a gasket at poor Dorothy standing before her.
“It has to be, that Charlotte, it’s all her influence isn’t it?” Nina muttered to herself, nearly inaudible to her surrounding mercenaries.
“Pardon?” Dorothy asked.
“Its not important. You said this was ten minutes ago that you discovered what happened?”
Dorothy nodded, “yes, the evacuation of all guests from the tenth floor was ten minutes ago. I was assigned to finding your location and bringing you there. Afterwards, I will be stationed-.”
Nina hand-waved the remainder of Dorothy’s words, “yeah, yeah, I don’t care. I’m getting back to command, else this asswipe is going to be a stain on my record right before the operation,” the woman suddenly paused her words, pondering for a second, “you said twelfth floor?”
“Yes.”
Her eyes blinked twice, a flash of an idea seemed to past through Nina’s eyes before she turned towards the remaining two women, “you two idiots, go keep up your recording shit on the tenth floor. I need to be on the twelfth.”
“Aye aye,” Gracie responded lazily, as Nina walked briskly away without even hearing the response. The bitchy woman soon around the corner as the sounds of her feet against the metallic catwalk disappeared in the distance.
Olivia let out a long sigh, her body dropping as if releasing a great amount of tension. Gracie looked back to her clipboard in silence, before looking up at Dorothy.
“They pay you extra to deliver that tidbit to bitch queen there?” Gracie smirked at Dorothy, though the latter’s porcelain features remained stoic at the comment.
“This isn’t the time to be causing friction. Prisoner 01 will continue to threaten our lives as he tries to escape,” Dorothy responded curtly.
“Heh, right. You don’t change even in situations like this, do you?”
“More worried about my own life, than anything.”
“Think all those sports you play will help if you run into him?”
Olivia suddenly interjected into the conversation, “hey, you don’t think he will, umm, remember that I was the one that found him earlier?” The woman looked to her two allies nervously, pushing her fingers together.
“Did you do something to anger the prisoner?” Dorothy asked.
“Ooh, yeah, didn’t you give him that real bitch smirk earlier? Better watch your neck, Liv,” Gracie gave a smirk at the other woman, who returned a look of shock and fear. Gracie giggled at the reaction, but quickly retracted her words, “but no, seriously, the guy just wants to leave. He has no idea what he was.”
“You seem to be rather sure of that,” Dorothy stated, looking towards Gracie, “did you encounter the prisoner?”
“Encounter? Hell, she was one of the only people that confronted him and wasn’t even knocked out!” Olivia exclaimed, giving Gracie a slight push as she did.
Gracie laughed at Olivia’s words, brushing off her push, “like I said, the man just wants to escape. If you don’t corner the wounded snake, it won’t bite back.”
“It is your job to secure the prisoner, though,” Dorothy responded sternly.
“Right, of course, but I know my limits and I know that I’m not doing that alone.”
Dorothy paused, before nodding at the statement, opting to change the subject instead.
“What are you doing with your clipboard that the commander has tasked you to continue?”
“Oh, this?” Gracie flipped the clipboard around, showing Dorothy a swath of various numbers, names, and tags written across a neatly drawn table, “recording personal, injuries, deaths. Important to know what kind of manpower we have.”
Dorothy nodded again, “and with the operation coming so soon…”
Olivia seemed to look nervous again, “urgh, I almost forgot that was coming up. The prisoner was probably supposed to stop that, right?”
Gracie shrugged, “makes the most sense, given the timing of his arrival. Command might bump the time of action up now that they know we’re getting investigated.”
“Right, yeah. Hope the money will be worth it.”
“Of course, it’ll be. That’s why most of us are here.”
Dorothy spoke up again, “we should be proceeding to the tenth floor, then, if time is important. Shall we travel together, to avoid any more incidents?”
After their agreement, the three proceeded towards the elevator without further incident, as intended. Since the prisoner had likely disappeared with the evacuation, it would be difficult to track his current location without further information on his looks and appearance to every mercenary and guard on the compound.
Though, with every exit heavily guarded, and the desert location, it was easy to tell that the prisoner was still somewhere inside the hotel, trapped like a mouse in a maze. Or, with his deadly reputation, a specter, roaming the halls waiting to strike.
Some time passed completely uneventful. The unconscious mercenaries, all sent to the resorts medical bay, slowly began to recover. And, after five hours, they all had finally come back awake.
Except one.
===
The memory still stayed fresh in Charlotte’s mind. Though it occurred yesterday, the fear remained at the back of her mind, vividly replaying at every silent moment.
It was at around 10am when the mission began. Charlotte wasn’t much of a morning person, but the looming sense of adrenaline shaved off those last bits of cobwebs from inside her head.
“Our mission is simple. One target driving alone,” Knox Ludlow, the commander at the time, had stated before they set out. It seemed easy to Charlotte at first, but by Knox’s own different demeanour and the fact that he had chosen to bring along all the most elite mercenaries as well as himself for the task, Charlotte had a bad feeling about the whole thing.
Though, it was easy to feel complacent if Knox Ludlow was headed out together with them. An apparent former elite soldier, the man commanded respect and fear amongst everyone working here, even those self-proclaimed lone wolves.
But if it was just one person, as the reports said, how bad could it be? She had thought at the time.
Despite Di’Set being in the middle of nowhere at the center of a desert, numerous decorative rock formations were placed around the compound reaching one to two stories tall. To tourists, it looked like a simple decorative element, but to Charlotte and the others, they were useful as perches, watchtowers, and ambush points when necessary.
Evan and Quinn, two grizzled veteran mercenaries, took point a distance from where Charlotte was located. Both equipped with a high caliber sniper rifle, pulling the trigger was their duty.
Knox himself had hidden himself somewhere, overseeing the entire mission. It was often risky to split off on your own, but practically everyone respected or feared the man enough to trust him with his own decisions. Until that day, it had yet to fail.
Finally, Charlotte had been placed together with the final person that had came along for the mission, Brooklyn. More experienced with logistics and support than anything, Brooklyn was still an extremely intelligent, perceptive woman while being incredibly beautiful to boot. Never shying away from her inherent sex appeal, Brooklyn had it all, and Charlotte always looked up to the woman in admiration. Though the fact that Brooklyn always considers Charlotte to be far more combat proficient than her always leads Charlotte to become sort of a bodyguard for her in missions like these.
Despite the tense air, today wasn’t any different to how Charlotte was used to seeing Brooklyn. The blonde choosing to only wear a tight black sports bra and what seemed like a black set of panties. Though her white runners were practical, at the very least. It seemed a little ridiculous, to be honest, but Charlotte couldn’t tell if that was jealousy talking more than anything.
“You aren’t hot in that, Char?” Brooklyn had asked at some point, breaking the silent tension. Though striking up a conversation, she never removed her eyes from the binoculars trained directly down the only asphalt road heading up to the resort.
Charlotte looked down at her own attire, a simple t-shirt with jeans. Though, in exchange, she wore a sturdy bulletproof vest underneath. Usually it would be fine, but today seemed a little hotter than usual.
“No, not really,” she lied, looking away. It was tough to hold such a conversation while also staring at Brooklyn’s toned tanned body and massive…well…
“If you say so,” Brooklyn responded, though Charlotte couldn’t tell if she recognized the lie or not.
Maybe if I had that kind of body, I’d be showing it too, Charlotte thought in her head, frowning.
“…You say something Char?” Brooklyn suddenly piped up again.
“…Uh wha-? No, I wasn’t.”
“Oh, sorry. Just sounded like you were mumbling.”
Charlotte turned red, and immediately picked up her gun and began to reload it. Of course, it was fully loaded. She hadn’t fired a single shot yet, after all.
Their earpieces began to crackle to life, “you girls paying attention up there?” A mocking voice of their commander sounded.
Brooklyn pressed a hand to her ear, “just a little girl talk, Knox baby.”
“Well save the dollhouses for later and focus.”
“Yeah yeah,” Brooklyn dismissed, before pressing a button on the earpiece, “guess I left it on. Whoops.”
“We all gotta make mistakes eventually, right?” Charlotte looked to her side, “even you.”
Brooklyn hesitated her answer, though before she said another word, her body tensed up. Her hand immediately moved to press against the communicator in her ear.
“Visual,” she stated quickly, “car fast approaching. Looks to match our intel.”
Charlotte sat back down in her spot behind the rock, holstering the gun in her hands before looking around to her sides. The conversation continuing within her earpiece.
“And the target?” Knox asked.
“…Cannot confirm. Single driver, headwrap is covering his face,” Brooklyn bit her lip, seemingly straining herself as best she could to confirm something. Though, the effort was fruitless.
“Tch, anything hidden?”
“No roof but can’t see anything inside the car. If anything was hiding in there, it would be in the trunk.”
The line went silent for a brief, tense moment. Charlotte dared to peek in the direction Brooklyn was using her binoculars on but couldn’t make out anything with the distance.
“Your orders?” Evan’s voice came into the picture. Charlotte recalled that he held the sniper for this mission.
“…Take the shot,” Knox commanded.
Charlotte sat back down, bracing herself in the silence. Though she could not see anything of the operation, she could feel the tension from both the air and Brooklyn to her side. Still keeping her senses heightened, Charlotte continued to scan all the open areas around the pair in the small case that danger appeared from the side of the resort. Though Charlotte was used to the desert air and surroundings, sometimes it was still hard to discern what exactly was a rock formation and what wasn’t in the sweltering heat.
Because of that, Charlotte could have sworn she saw something move far, far in the distance to their right. Her vision waved from the heat, so it was best to not mention the possibility in the current moment.
“Direct hit!” Evan cheered from her earpiece.
“Confirmed, I saw it too,” Brooklyn added.
Charlotte heard the sounds of a car swerving. One swerve, two swerves, before it went silent again.
“Car has crashed into the sand alongside the road,” Brooklyn stated.
“No celebrating yet, Quinn get out there and confirm the target,” Knox’s voice remained stern as he gave the command. Once Quinn responded, Brooklyn pressed against her ear again.
“I don’t like this, Char.”
“Did you see something?” Charlotte asked, looking up.
“No, it just…it doesn’t feel right,” Brooklyn never released her focus from her binoculars, “call it intuition.”
Charlotte tensed in turn, moving up to a crouch as she continued to survey around them.
“Well you’re usually correct with-...”
“It’s a DOLL-!” Quinn suddenly shouted before the sound of a small explosion sounded inside the earpiece. Quinn screeched into the comm before all Charlotte could hear was the sound of a body falling into the sand.
“Told you-!” Brooklyn seethed through her teeth, now scanning all over her side. Charlotte stood up as well, a hand held against the gun on her hip.
“The fuck-?!” Evan shouted, before a shot rang out across the desert. Charlotte heard impact, and his comm went quiet in turn.
“Evan? Quinn? Fucks sake, what the hell is going on over there?” Knox screamed into the comm with no response.
“Char and I are still alive,” Brooklyn added quickly, still trying to find the source of the shot. Charlotte, too, could hear the general direction where the bullet came from, but she had a suspicion it was on her right somewhere.
“Then stay low, and good luck,” Knox warned, “there is just one target, but…”
“But what, Knox? Who the hell are we up against?!” Brooklyn shouted back.
Charlotte moved closer to Brooklyn, sweat dripping down her body, and not caused from the sweltering heat. But, if her suspicions were correct…
“Brook come this way-!” Charlotte quickly grabbed the arm of her friend before the rock they were standing around suddenly shattered from a projectile. Both girls yelped, scrambling around their cover.
“A-Are you okay?!” Charlotte yelled.
“Shit that was close-!” Brooklyn gasped, trying to sneak a peek around the rock. Though, now they knew the direction of the assailant, it became clear that they had a sniper equipped.
“What the fuck is happening there-?!” Knox crackled their comms back to life.
“The west side, Knox, the west-!” Charlotte quickly warned.
“Fuck, I’m over here-!” Panic creeping into his voice, before gunfire suddenly erupted from the comm. Rapid shots sent back and forth, though it was hard to tell just from the grunting in Charlotte’s ear.
“Damn it, Char come on-!” Brooklyn urged, rearing to go. Charlotte quickly grabbed her arm.
“Unless you want to be a quick target, stay down and follow me-!” Charlotte urged, her body in motion already as she dashed for cover below the low sand dunes that rose and fell among the terrain.
The cover was terrible and barely reached a valid height, but Charlotte moved quickly even though her body nearly slithered along the sand like a snake.
The gunfire continued to sound through the comm. It was starting to reach the point that Charlotte feared that it could be heard by the civilians in the distance, but they were sure it could be passed off as construction later. Their lives, and Knox’s life, was a more pressing concern.
Charlotte and Brooklyn dashed from cover to cover, the decorative rocks providing it much better than the sand dunes as they made their way west. Charlotte knew their target knew of their existence, as a bullet was shot in their direction every so often.
Both girls had their guns drawn, but it was still difficult to tell which rock the target had shot from. Charlotte hoped he would still be busy with Knox, but in both their moments of adrenaline, they failed to notice that Knox’s comm had gone quiet.
“Knox you still alive?!” Brooklyn suddenly called into her comm. The silence creeped a sense of dread into Charlotte’s heart, before they suddenly heard a cough.
“Knox?” Charlotte asked with apprehension.
“…”
“…RUN-!” Knox called, before one last shot from a gun silenced his comm.
Charlotte could barely hold her gun at their commanders’ final word, the sweat pooling in the palms of her hands as she fought every urge to seize up.
“C-Char…” Brooklyn quivered, her voice nearly at the point of break, “w-who the hell are we against?!”
“Don’t run, Brook,” Charlotte quickly added, trying not to break in turn, “there is no cover on the way back. They know we’re here.”
“…I-I don’t want to die.”
“Then focus-!” Charlotte tried turning the corner of the rock to look at what was in front of them, but a bullet chipped the rock beside her, barely missing her arm. Charlotte quickly retreated behind the rock in a huff.
“How does he know where we are already?!”
Brooklyn had already tried turning her side of the rock and fired two shots before retreating at the return.
“I think I…saw him,” Brooklyn panted, “behind a rock close by.”
“Which one?”
“Char how do I describe a rock?!”
Charlotte took a deep breath and turned the rock, firing at everything indiscriminately, trying to get a reaction. Though, no response occurred this time.
“W-Where is he?” Charlotte whispered, fear and tension in her voice. She continued to stare straight ahead, eagle-eying each rock in front of her.
Still no response came. Was he reloading? Waiting?
“Char-!” Brooklyn screamed before her voice cut off. Charlotte turned her body immediately to see her friend, whose neck was tightly held by a masked figure dressed entirely in black. The gear was combat and bulletproof, but just staring at the mask the man wore practically punctured Charlotte’s heart with fear.
And a gun was already pressed tightly against Brooklyn’s head.
“Drop the gun, girl,” the figure commanded bluntly.
Charlotte had nothing to say. Nothing to argue. She knew in her head, this man was out to stop them, and they were out to stop him. From his intimidating presence, Charlotte knew she couldn’t convince him otherwise.
And threw her gun into the sand.
All that was left, was to hope for an act of mercy. An act that was not intending to come.
The gun in the mans hand flicked immediately at Charlotte, and Brooklyn acted in unison. Twisting free from his one-armed grip, Brooklyn pushed the arm with the gun. The bullet fired just barely grazing Charlotte’s left cheek.
The man tried reacting by aiming at Brooklyn, but she wasn’t done, giving the figure a high kick to his chest. Stumbling slightly from the hit, the man instead sent a sudden hook with his now open fist, unknownst to Brooklyn from her focus at the gun. The blow struck her against the side of her head, sending the tanned woman sprawling to the floor.
Charlotte had long since recovered and tackled the man before he noticed her. Pushing him back from the tackle, Charlotte spun a kick as well, this time knocking the gun out of the man’s hands.
Charlotte continued her assault, but the man blocked her next attack effortlessly. Though it was difficult to get a decent footing in the sand, Charlotte attacked aggressively, pushing the man back with her every step. Though careful not to leave an opening, she managed to block his counters as well.
Brooklyn groaned behind the dueling pair, making Charlotte happy to know her friend was still breathing. She heard shuffling behind her, causing the man to suddenly aggressively push at Charlotte. She tried holding him back, but the heavier mass of his body caused Charlotte to step to the side.
That’s when she saw Brooklyn had almost reached the man’s firearm while crawling in the sand. She tried reaching out for it but was promptly stopped by a strong kick to her open belly.
Brooklyn moaned in agony, her body flipping over and away from the impact. The man stomped her belly once more as she laid with her back against the sand, releasing another cry from the tanned beauty. Charlotte charged back to the man to defend her, leaping onto his back, but the man grabbed her reaching hands as she leapt onto him, tearing Charlotte away from his body and slamming her down into the sand.
“Aah…-!” Charlotte cried out. The sand softened her fall slightly, but the impact against the back of her head still left her slightly dazed. Charlotte tried rolling over, but the man suddenly stomped against her stomach. Charlotte reeled from the pain, but it was luckily softened by the bulletproof vest against her body.
But he didn’t continue the attack. It confused Charlotte for an extremely short moment before she remembered the gun.
Charlotte struggled to get up, but the man had already picked the gun up.
And Brooklyn still laid on her back a short distance away, helpless and in pain.
“No-!” Charlotte cried out, but it was futile. The gun discharged, the squelch of impact ran through Charlotte’s ears as the blood splattering up seared into her memory.
Brooklyn’s lifeless arms reached to the side as they flopped over. The beautiful tanned blonde Charlotte had always looked up to now looked up into the sky with lifeless eyes. A bullet hole now dirtying her beautiful face.
“Bastard-!” Charlotte cried, her body already in mid-dive before the man could even turn to shoot her. She gripped onto his back once more, scaling around his shoulders as she gripped tightly like a parasite.
The man tried tearing her off once more, but Charlotte wouldn’t go without a fight. Her arms and fists continued to punch, tear, and rip at every piece of the helmet around the man’s head and dug her elbows down into his upper back.
His motions continued to be increasingly erratic as Charlotte endured every attempt to tear her off his body. As she made one more attack, his body suddenly fell backwards.
Charlotte hit the sand first, her grip finally freeing as the man tried to spin back around. She took a fistful of sand, throwing it towards his covered face. It had no effect at all, but the moment of instinct to block the sand let her make another struggle at the gun in his hands.
Her hands found their target, clawing away as she and the man both held and fought for the gun. Her desperate grunts and screams filling the air of the fight.
The gun finally fell to the floor as Charlotte took a sudden hit against her back. She stumbled forward slightly, but the man already laid another kick at her recovering body. The impact causing her to lose balance, Charlotte let another cry out before tumbling to the sand once more.
The man tried stomping at her immediately, but Charlotte rolled out of his way, feeling something in the sand as she did.
In a half roll and another tumble away to create space, the man continued to give chase, but Charlotte finally revealed the object she had pulled off the sand and leveled it at his face.
The man instantly froze mere inches from her body. Charlotte glared at him with a determined look, breathing heavily as she kept the gun trained at the man.
“Don’t move,” she commanded.
The man seemed to be trying to think. Even behind the mask, she could sense the resignation.
“Hands in the air-!” She called out to him. Still he hesitated, but Charlotte could just yell the command.
Over and over again.
“Get your hands in the air! Hands in the fucking air-!”
…
…
Charlotte’s eyes finally opened. A white ceiling. Distinct beeps surrounding the bed she was in. Charlotte breathed heavily as she sat up, the image of the man held at gunpoint dissipated to show the women’s medical bay.
“Moooorning, Charlotte!” A cheery, airy voice sounded beside her. Charlotte turned her head to see her friend Lucille, sitting on a stool beside her bed, “you’re finally awake, hey?”
“…Ah,” Charlotte rubbed her head, still blinking and reeling at the memory. It all still felt so real, but that was just because it was.
Lucille playfully kicked her legs in the air, completely oblivious to Charlotte’s distressed awakening.
“The…medical bay, huh?” Charlotte looked around the area. All around them, the beds were filled with other women, some still lying down, some seated, some looking like they wanted to get going already.
She recognized them all. The red headed Melody, Bella and her leather jacket, Nadiya their executioner (though Charlotte could vaguely recall her wanting some weird nickname again), Alison the black skinned guard,
Then Winter, whom Charlotte had put here herself, and still seemed to be avoiding glances with her.
There were some odd ones too. Faith, the more maternal of the mercenaries,
“They’re aaaaall here ‘cause of the prisoner guy, or something,” Lucille chimed in, noticing her analytical stares.
“These many women survived an encounter?” Charlotte asked, flabbergasted.
“Well, there was a lot of deaths too I think,” Lucille put a finger onto her lip, looking around, “…yeeeeah, yeah, everyone here got knocked out and stuff. There’s a couple more from the tenth floor I think, but they recovered kinda fast, so Nina made ‘em guard more stuff.”
Charlotte looked down at herself, as if surprised she could even still do that. The fearsome man burned into her memory was not the person that would have just left her unconscious and defenseless back at her room, even though she had helped him slightly. It seemed to be true that he lost his memory, but to lose that killer instinct as well?
“Guy just got lucky,” Melody piped up, looking away, “I could have beaten him.”
“W-What happened to you, Melody?” Charlotte asked.
“Nadiya over there fucked up the execution, that’s what happened!”
“Hey, hey-!” Nadiya quickly defended herself, “s-someone didn’t tie him up properly-! That’s why he escaped.”
“If you weren’t doing your stupid theatrics-!”
“T-They aren’t stupid…” Nadiya pouted, turning away as well. Melody only replied with a quiet ‘ugh’, flicking her hair to one side.
“…Well hey, I’m glad you’re alive,” Lucille spoke again after a moment, smiling at Charlotte, “you took the longest to wake back up, y’know. It’s been, like, six hours. Prisoner is still somewhere here too, I think, but we lost him.”
“Really…?” Charlotte wanted to ask further questions, but before she could, everyone in the room seemed to react to the sound of the door opening to her right. Charlotte looked over to see Nina striding into the room. Nina, upon noticing Charlotte, gave her a wide grin.
Flanking her was Juliette, again, with her that dumb smug face Charlotte had always hated. Guess she didn’t receive a good enough beating due to hiding behind poor Winter earlier.
Though, Nina also had replaced Winter this time. A suspiciously large guard, though Charlotte reasoned that it made sense with the prisoner still presumably on the loose.
The replacement, a long-haired brunette, wore a simple long-sleeved black shirt open at her midriff, and tight blue jeans. Her name was Bianca, and Charlotte recalled her as just standard fare. Though she was more playful and flirtatious than the others.
And besides her guards, was Nina’s oddly wide grin. It was almost creepy.
“Sleep well, Charlotte?” Nina asked with an extreme level of fake cheeriness.
“What do you want?” Charlotte asked back.
“Oh, nothing. I just found something extraordinary, which I’m sure will help…stop the obstacles we are currently facing,” Nina turned to face the entire room, “this is for all of you! Don’t you want to get your revenge on that so-called legendary agent?”
“Fuck yeah-!” Melody called out.
“Hmph, well, we are working on getting a proper picture of our slippery prisoner to all of you, but for now, I thought everyone would be interested in a little bonus contract on one of his contacts.”
“He has contacts?” Charlotte asked, only for Nina to turn oddly back towards her.
“Why, Charlotte, I’m so glad you asked! Because, doesn’t everyone think its weird how this great agent managed to kill every of our best men and women, but little Charlotte here captured him alone?”
“Well, yeah, ‘cause Charlotte’s a total badass,” Lucille chimed in, grinning at her own statement. Charlotte had no such smiles, however, as her heart began to sink at Nina’s impeding accusation.
“W-What the hell are you saying?” Charlotte shot back, “you weren’t even there-! You’re accusing me of getting my best friend killed from an…an act?!”
“Friends? Oh, Charlotte, we don’t have friends in this business. Especially not you, when everyone hears this evidence.”
Nina produced a small action figure, which Charlotte recognized as a piece that was inside her room.
“This is a voice recording device that I had planted in Charlotte’s room. As I am obviously so smart, I could sense her treachery from a mile away,” Nina pointed towards Hailey and Caitlyn, “you both say you encountered the prisoner in Charlotte’s room, yes?”
“…Y-Yeah?” Both girls gave a resigned answer, the cogs turning in their heads. Charlotte continued to feel the dead feeling at the pit of her stomach grow, more and more as the mood in the room changed and the whispers started to sound around her.
Nina said nothing more, besides placing the figurine on a table and sticking a key into the back of it. Soon, a voice recording began to play that sounded all too familiar to Charlotte.
“Close the door behind you?” Charlotte heard her voice on the recording play.
“Right. What’s your plan?” The mans voice came back in the recording. Charlotte knew what was happening. She knew what Nina was doing. Surely, she had heard the full recording, so why was she doing this?
“I mean, clearly you’ve lost your memory if you already forgot that I’m your undercover contact.”
The conversation continued, but everyone already started to look at Charlotte. Daggers stared directly into her heart. Charlotte kept listening to the clip, hoping that it would begin to play the part where she tried to turn it around on the prisoner.
But it didn’t. It stopped right before she was about to.
“W-Why?!” Charlotte yelled in disbelief.
Nina only smiled back, “everyone, the legendary mercenary you all looked up to. The woman who was about to be your leader.”
“I-I gave you the leadership! Why? Why!” Charlotte continued to yell into the deathly silence, “play the rest of it! PLAY THE REST OF IT!”
The girls in the room had already began to stand up slowly. Nina’s three guards also took a step forward, as Nina herself snatched up the figurine and backed up slowly.
“Now, it seems to me like the prisoner’s picture is ready to be texted to everyone!” Nina chirped up, “so I need to go deal with that. I assume everyone here can deal with this little mess? And, no arrests, please.”
And with those parting words, Nina stepped away with a skip in her step.
Charlotte slowly stood out of bed, still wearing the same outfit she had earlier. The other girls did the same, as they began to slowly approach her.
“At long last,” Juliette taunted melodically.
Charlotte had given everything she had to this place. But it was clear, it was not ready to give it back.
And so be it.
===
Writers Note: I actually had intended to introduce the rest of the full roster right here, but it stretched on so hard that I ended up just cutting off some parts for the next section.
ViridianShine
Club Regular
- Joined
- Sep 18, 2018
7
___
Charlotte moved her eyes slowly, surveying the room. Besides her, there were eleven girls total surrounding her. Of those eleven, eight of them (Nadiya, Bella, Melody, Alison, Winter, Faith, Hailey, and Caitlyn) all were in bed and were still recovering from sustained injuries, suggesting they may not be as strong as Charlotte was used to. Though she was just as injured, Charlotte figured they lacked the adrenaline spike she was receiving from having her life threatened.
Bianca and Charlotte’s ever favourite mercenary Juliette blocked the easy way out to the right, as Charlotte’s bed was conveniently situated at the very end of the row of beds. The two didn’t seem injured and would be in top performance, but even then, that wasn’t a very high ceiling.
The only concern was Lucille who was sitting on the nightstand right beside Charlotte’s bed, now right beside her as she stood up. Charlotte thought her a friend, but was she able to put her trust in her at a moment like this?
Charlotte shot Lucille a quick glance, who responded with a confused blank stare, blinking back towards her.
Same old Lucille.
Melody, sleeping on the bed right beside Charlotte’s, leapt off with enthusiasm right in front of Charlotte.
“Let’s dance, bitch,” she smirked.
“I agree,” Charlotte responded with a lighting fast throat jab with her fingers extended. The blow striking in a direct bullseye, Melody began to gasp as she clutched her throat with both hands and collapsed to the floor.
Charlotte planted one hand onto her bed and swung her legs over it in the same motion before anyone could yell a command or react. Her swinging legs impacted against Bianca’s stomach, causing her to stumble backwards into Juliette.
“Don’t let her get away-!” Juliette yelled, pushing Bianca away as she tried to rush at Charlotte. As her feet planted firmly onto the ground after finishing her vault over the bed, Charlotte sidestepped Juliette, shoving her to the ground as she did. The blonde’s velocity sent her into a metallic shelf nearby, collapsing together with all the supplies on top.
Alison made it to Charlotte first and had began to wind up a roundhouse kick aimed high at Charlotte, who quickly ducked beneath the kick. Bella quickly came from behind Alison and tried to deliver a fast-vertical kick, only for Charlotte to dodge that too with a forward roll.
Charlotte tried to leap to a standing position after her roll, but Alison’s boot to her open back sent her sprawling forward to the ground in a crash instead. Charlotte whirled around to see Alison prepped with another kick to her downed body and grabbed the woman’s foot instead.
Alison released a shocked gasp, tripping with her stunted momentum. Charlotte only needed to give a slight push upwards for Alison to fly over her body and slam face first into the wall past the two women.
Bella followed up immediately after, with Charlotte barely deflecting a close blow from the leather clad woman. Two quick blows were passed and parried before Charlotte quickly dispatched her opponent with an unblocked uppercut to Bella’s chin, knocking the woman backwards and flying towards the floor.
Charlotte turned and ran at that moment, bursting through a double door leading into a short hallway cut up into various paths.
Meanwhile, behind her, Juliette stumbled to her feet. Finding her bearings again only to come to three girl’s unconscious on the floor, and the remainder trickling out the door leading to the hallway.
“W-What the fuck?!” Juliette exclaimed, snatching Lucille nearby, who hadn’t really moved from her position, “where the fuck is that bitch?”
“Which…bitch…?” Lucille asked in her usual cloudy voice, completely unaffected by Juliette’s aggression.
“The…Charlotte, you moron!”
“…Oooooh, she went thataway,” Lucille pointed towards the still rotating double doors leaving the room.
“Are you fu-,” Juliette snatched her phone up from her back pocket angrily and pushed against the screen in a huff, “lock down the woman’s infirmary, now-!” She barked into the phone.
As she commanded, Juliette snapped her head back to Lucille, and released her with a hard shove, “you too, get out there and kill Charlotte, you idiot!”
===
Charlotte sprinted down the hallway, making erratic turns and barely dodging the unsuspecting medical personal walking down the hallway. In her mind, she just had to make it to the stairs and either change her floor or lose her pursuers.
It sounded like the prisoner managed to achieve that. If he could do it, then she could too. She could do whatever he could.
“Stop-!” Screamed a group of male mercenaries rounding the corner in front of her. Charlotte skidded to a halt and turned down the nearest hallway. A flurry of boots stampeding across the floor followed behind her.
The cavalry had shown up. Charlotte figured most of the stairs were now guarded in some capacity that she couldn’t dispatch with this goon squad behind her. She had to shake them first.
“Eek-!” Came a surprised Hailey as Charlotte suddenly ran into her while turning a corner. Hailey fell backwards onto her ass from what was essentially an accidental tackle.
Charlotte didn’t hesitate to give the tanned woman a swift kick to her throat. With a gasp, the stunned woman spread backwards against the floor, as Charlotte leapt over her body and kept running.
This was bad, Charlotte was definitely turning a loop if she was now running into the women from her room. Taking one final sharp turn, Charlotte quickly ducked into the first room she found and placed her back against the door.
The washroom. She had ran into a public washroom. At least it was the women’s washroom, and empty to boot.
Trying to catch her breath, Charlotte quickly surveyed this washroom. Though, every accessory in the washroom such as the hand dryer, the soap dispenser, and the mirrors, were all bolted down and couldn’t be used. The stalls in the back probably only had some flimsy toilet paper in them as well. Charlotte did notice a rather wide grate along the ceiling in the back, likely leading to a ventilation system.
That’s when her eyes spotted a mop inside a pail to the side. She darted over and quickly snatched the mop up. The door had a handle sticking out, and the hand dryer was situated along the same wall right beside the door.
Perhaps she could bar the door by jamming the mop behind the hand dryer and through the door handle…
Until a frantic flurry of footsteps outside the door echoed through the washroom. Charlotte held her breath, ducking beneath a sink near the door, mop in hand.
“Hailey! Hailey are you okay?” Said a voice.
“Where did she go?” Another asked.
“Keep going, this way!” The first responded.
“You two, check the washrooms,” another voice threw out, before the steps continued to run downwards.
Charlotte steeled herself, ready to fight for her life once more. Outside the door, she heard a small shuffling noise, likely from moving Hailey’s unconscious body to the side, but then it went quiet.
…
All she could hear was her own breathing and the sound of her heart beating in her ears.
…
Her hands continued to brace in a tight grip against the mops wooden handle. Sweat clamming the grip.
…
“…Sooooo,” Charlotte finally heard one males voice begin on the other end of the door.
“…I ain’t going in there,” a second male voice spoke.
“Well one of us has to check it.”
“Rock paper scissors?”
“No way, man, we have to go in together.”
“Why?”
“What if she’s inside?”
“Well yes, but I’d take that over getting both of us tainted.”
“Hmm…you’re right. Good point.”
“Besides, I wouldn’t mind getting beaten up by Charlotte. She’s pretty hot.”
“Yeah, actually, I agree too.”
“So, then I should go in there alone.”
“No, actually, I’ll head in there alone.”
“Rock paper scissors?”
Charlotte shifted her hands around the mop repeatedly. An extremely confused expression on her face. The urge to supress the need to scream “what?” And run outside right now was, perhaps, even greater than her earlier urge to live.
“H-Hailey?!” A woman’s voice suddenly came into the picture, along with rushed footsteps. Charlotte could recognize it as Caitlyn’s.
“I-Is she okay?” A second, deeper, softer voice followed. Likely belonging to Faith. Charlotte figured the rest of the girls from the infirmary were all out in the chase.
“Oh yeah, defs,” the first male voice answered again.
“Coulda been Charlotte,” the second followed.
“Definitely Char-Char.”
“…W-Well what the hell are you two standing here for?!” Caitlyn shot back, flabbergasted.
“Checking the washrooms.”
“Yup.”
“We haven’t gone in there yet, though.”
“It’s a big problem.”
“Are you waiting for someone?” Faith asked the pair.
“Nope.”
“Nah.”
“Could be voodoo magic in there.”
“Girls, you know? No offense.”
“These two are a complete waste of time,” Caitlyn vented, as the washroom door was suddenly violently pushed open.
Charlotte quickly reeled back into her adrenaline state, as she watched the bottom of Caitlyn’s tight fitted Jeans cross briskly into the washroom.
“C-Caitlyn, wait!” Faith shot out, hurriedly rushing after Caitlyn into the washroom. The skin of her bare ankles quickly coming into view as she stepped into the washroom.
Caitlyn didn’t even stop to check the sinks, making an immediate beeline towards the stalls in the back. Faith stopped just after the door, looking after Caitlyn as Charlotte started to see her eyes beginning to wander.
Time to act.
In one swift movement, Charlotte launched herself from below the sink and swung the mop at Faith’s head. The blow connecting cleanly against the back of her head, before she could even respond. The mature woman cried out weakly, hitting the wall as she used it to stabilize.
Charlotte turned with the momentum, weaving the mop handle in between the door handle then shoving the end through the gap between the hand dryer and the wall. An effective lock on the door, followed by a furious rattle.
Caitlyn had just turned around, trying to see how she could return to help her teammate out. But Charlotte wasn’t about to let her.
As Faith still stumbled, holding one hand against her head and one leaning on the wall with a pained expression, Charlotte quickly reached forward and slammed the woman’s head against the wall.
Offering no resistance against the blow, Faith collapsed quickly and easily. The muscles in her face relaxing as she slid down to the floor with nothing more than a soft whimper.
Caitlyn stopped in her place, looking towards Charlotte, then to the mop lodged through the door.
“Clever,” she begrudgingly spoke, tensing her body. Now that she was out of her bed, Charlotte noticed that Caitlyn was wearing nothing but a white bra and tight blue jeans.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Charlotte asked, preparing herself in a fighting stance in turn.
“Well I’ve…” Caitlyn looked away for a second, “I’ve always wanted a real fight against you. I wanted to know if I could be better than you.”
“…Whoa, is that Charlotte in there?” The male voice outside the door spoke again from behind, before Charlotte could respond.
“Yeah, she locked the door somehow. Did she bar it?” His partner continued
“Wow. She’s so smart.
“And hot.”
“I wish I was in there.”
“Okay I don’t know who the fuck is out there right now, but I assure you I will step outside there and break both your necks personally!” Charlotte screamed.
“Sorry Char-Char!”
“But we were complimenting you!”
“Though that does sound pretty hot too.”
“Actually, yeah I agree.”
“Though I wish Caitlyn would do that to me instead.”
“Caitlyn?”
“Did you see that clean white bra she was wearing? And the jeans? Really hot.”
“W-W-Wha…?!” Caitlyn’s face flushed red, as her hands moved to cover her chest.
“I thought hers were pretty small, though.”
“Small can be good.”
“I guess so.”
“I’m surprised she’s wearing something like that, though.”
“Yeah why is she wearing that?”
“Yeah why are you wearing that?” Charlotte asked.
“I ran into the prisoner and it’s a long story!” Caitlyn screamed out, still holding her chest.
“You got raped by the prisoner?” Charlotte questioned again with a surprised face.
“N-N-N-NO-!” Caitlyn stammered, her face flushing an even deeper colour of red than it already was.
“I mean, I wouldn’t be surprised, honestly.”
“Can we just fight?!”
“…Oh, right. Yeah. You guys trying to kill me and all that,” Charlotte shook her head, and assumed her stance again, “I got it.”
“I-I’m not sure I could do that,” Caitlyn gave back, slowly assuming her stance as well.
“Well someone else would if you didn’t, so pardon me if I go with none of the above.”
Charlotte stepped over Faith’s body, edging cautiously towards Caitlyn.
The other girl made the first move, jabbing her fists high at Charlotte’s head. Charlotte stepped back twice, dodging the light blows before responding with a swipe of her own. Caitlyn backed off her attack to dodge the blow, and barely blocked the immediate kick that followed.
The pair exchanged blows evenly, dealing and taking hits as they came. An equal trade of skill displayed as the nudging sounds of the door urged Charlotte to hurry with her dispatch.
Though the momentum did not shift in her favour. A surprise deflect left Charlotte’s midsection suddenly open, which Caitlyn responded to immediately with a clear kick.
“Aghhh…” Charlotte ate the kick to her stomach at full force, doubling over as she stumbled away. Caitlyn pushed her advantage, punching Charlotte in the face directly against her open cheek. The impact twisting her head away.
Caitlyn rushed up and snatched Charlotte’s upper body, preparing to slam it into the sink along the wall. Charlotte panicked, the sink in view knowing it was likely to knock her out immediately.
That could not happen.
Charlotte desperately threw her arms forward as Caitlyn pushed down on her shoulders, stopping her face from slamming into the sink. Caitlyn, stopping this method of knocking her opponent out, opted to grab Charlotte’s weakened body instead, and attempt to turn her around.
But Charlotte quickly reversed the momentum, instead twisting her body to grab Caitlyn instead. Surprised by the turn, Caitlyn was suddenly helpless as Charlotte pressed against her bare skin. The momentum allowing Charlotte to place a hand against Caitlyn’s bare back and give her a hard shove forward.
Directly into the mirror that was above the sink. The mirror shattered on impact; blood drawn from all corners of Caitlyn’s pretty face. The sharp sound of glass breaking only barely covering Caitlyn’s pained cries.
Now Caitlyn was the one panicking with her actions, flailing wildly trying to escape her situation. But unlike her opponent, Charlotte knew how to finish a kill. Charlotte immediately moved to wrap a strong arm around Caitlyn’s neck as the girl panicked and dragged her to the floor.
The pair dropped onto the glass covered floor as Caitlyn struggled wildly in Charlotte’s grip. Pained, furious screams from the girl continued, as she continued to claw and tug her hands at Charlotte’s arm in desperation. Blood starting to draw from Charlotte too, but she could not let go.
“Aah-! Ah! Aaah…!” Caitlyn continued to wail. Pain turning into desperation and weakness as her eyes flashed with the reality of her situation. Charlotte held tight, as the clawing turned to pawing, and the struggling turned to mere movement.
Yet against this particular opponent, it didn’t feel right.
I’ve always wanted a real fight against you.
Charlotte knew her real opponents, and she knew how deadly and greedy everyone here could be with just one order, and a handful of money. But was Caitlyn one of those people? Charlotte was fine with turning traitor, but maybe she wasn’t fully ready for it just yet.
And released her grip.
Caitlyn let out huge gasps of breath, trying to hold her throat before Charlotte hurriedly stopped her arms.
“There’s glass on them. Be careful,” Charlotte warned the girl on her lap, as she gently pushed her off. As she stood up, she began to question her decisions. There was no doubt Caitlyn would return as an obstacle later. Faith as well.
She looked down to the woman out cold on the floor, and the girl looking up to her weakly gasping for air, both surrounded by several glass shards.
Maybe she should…
Bang!
The door began to break, the mop nearly splintering. They had begun to batter it down from the outside. Charlotte immediately turned around to look at the washroom she was trapped in.
A vent. A steel grated vent along the ceiling, right above the toilet stalls.
She shot a quick look over her shoulders, “and don’t you forget this,” she threw back, before leaping onto the top of the stall with great dexterity.
Bang!
The mop had barely much life left in it as Caitlyn passed out quietly beneath the sink and the loud cracking of wood beside her. By now, Charlotte had already begun to remove the vent cover and had stuck her head into the ventilation chamber. A flat, dark, and dreary grey space only illuminated by smaller vent covers on the sides. Nothing she could fit through, but she had no choice but to climb in and find one that she could.
Crack!
The mop shattered into two pieces as the door broke open. Several individuals in heavy camo carrying assault rifles stormed into the empty washroom, barking commands and recovering the two unconscious bodies.
Charlotte had already found some distance by now. Juliette’s frustrated bitching soon nothing but an echo as she edged on slowly through the vents, trying not to make too much noise.
They would soon find the trail of blood Charlotte had left behind from her bleeding arm within the vent, but she hoped that it was not soon enough. Even as she started to hear the sounds of the vent cover being removed far behind her.
What now? She definitely could not simply escape the building, but this wasn’t a situation Charlotte had expected to happen to this point.
…The prisoner. The man who had killed her best friend the previous day. A man she hated, who was now potentially her only ally. A man who may or may not have forgiven her for trying to toy with him a few hours ago.
She had to find him. But, then again, so did everyone else.
Where had the prisoner disappeared to…?
===
The sun had slowly begun to set along the horizon. Guests split and dissipated from recreational areas and started to find locations to eat dinner. Down along the expansive main floor of the hotel lobby, a crowd still slowly began to disperse around the tightly packed shops, restaurants, and decorative flora decorating the entire area. A true tourists paradise on the outside.
Along one small boutique nuzzled in-between the chaos, a young woman stood browsing dresses lined up along a rack at the outskirts of the shop. Her outfit was plain and basic, sporting a simple sleeved white top cutting just above her tight midriff, and denim shorts. Despite her clothes, her eyes beamed with a bright youthful radiance, shining along with her delicate soft brown hair.
As the young girl hummed a melodic tune as she passively browsed the rack of dresses, a hand suddenly placed itself onto her shoulder. The girl turned quickly after a gasp, before relaxing when she saw the blonde woman before her.
“Juniper, you’re supposed to be on duty,” the blonde woman scolded the younger girl sternly.
“I-I was just doing a little browsing…” Juniper meekly responded, her voice dropping off, “sorry Michelle.”
Compared to Juniper, Michelle was dressed a lot more brazenly. A shimmery green bra was all that protected the top half of her body, besides the flowing transparent vest around her shoulders. A tight set of white jeans further enunciated her ideal muscular, hourglass figure.
Michelle sighed in return to Juniper’s excuse, “don’t sound so scared, Juni, I just want to make sure you’re aware of how dangerous things are right now. You know Prisoner 01 disappeared into the compound hours ago.”
Juniper fidgeted slightly, “y-yeah, but he won’t kill small fry like me, right? I’m not even sure what he looks like.”
“You don’t know what knowledge a man like that possesses. Just be alert for me, alright?”
“R-Right, I’m sorry,” Juniper looked down and away, causing the older woman to give her a hug.
“Oh, don’t apologize so much Juni, how are you ever going to carry out the operation if you continue like that?”
Juniper pulled away from the hug, “hey, what does that have anything to do with me apologizing? I’ll be fine in the operation.”
Michelle raised an eyebrow at Juniper’s response.
“Is that so?” The taller blonde questioned, leaning in towards Juniper long enough until the brunette took a step backwards.
“Yes, of course so!” Juniper puffed her cheeks out in anger, “I’m as good a fighter as anyone else here!”
“That’s not what my issue was,” Michelle shook her head slowly.
Before Juniper could respond back, a smaller, tinier voice spoke up to the side.
“E-Excuse me…” The little voice sounded. Juniper whirled her body around to meet two small girls no higher than the height of her knee, both with dusty blonde hair. The one in the back wore a light pink dress, and hid behind the one in the front, with a simpler t-shirt, shorts and a cap which nearly hid her entire face with its shadow.
“Oh, yes, how may I help you?” Juniper’s eyes gleamed in excitement. Michelle could only look at the other girl with a slight smile, before taking a step back.
“I-I…we just wanted to know if…umm…” The child with the cap stuttered, pushing her index fingers together, before the child with the dress behind her suddenly interrupted her.
“Are you really Juuni?!” She blurted out from over the other child’s shoulder.
Juniper could only give herself a self-assured smile, as she knelt down closer to the two children.
“Weeeell, if I said I was, what then?” Juniper cheekily poked the pair.
“I…you have to be! We saw you perform last night!” The child in the dress yelled out again, now finally stepping out from behind the other.
Juniper shrugged, “it must be true, then. Would that make the two of you fans of mine?”
“I was your one millionth subscriber on your channel!” The girl in the t-shirt spoke up.
“…Well, I subscribed to her longer than you!” The other argued.
Juniper could only laugh at the two squabbling, “alright alright, now now,” she giggled, patting both children on the head, “no need to argue, you’re both my treasured fans. Was there something you wanted?”
The pair looked at each other nervously, causing Juniper to speak up again.
“Weeeeell, how about an autograph?” Juniper asked, taking a market out of her pocket. As the two girls faces lit up, Juniper tapped on the one with a cap, “how does right here sound?”
“I-I would…thank you!” The child beamed.
“And who am I addressing this to?”
“Sylvia!” She declared as Juniper began to sketch a signature onto the front of the cap.
“Why, what a lovely name,” she mused as she wrote. Upon finishing, she turned to the girl in the dress, “and you? Do you have something to sign?”
“A-A-Ahh…” The other child fidgeted wildly, patting her non-existent pockets. Juniper just gave a gentle laugh. The singers slightly raw, deeper, yet childlike voice coming out with every word.
“Then how about this, next time we meet, you give me anything you want, and I’ll sign it for you. Deal?”
The child’s eyes shone with an incredible bright light, as she smiled back, “w-we’ll be at your next show!”
“I look forward to it.”
With that, Juniper waved off the two children as they scampered away into the lobby, excited hushed noises traded between them as the cap was held out in front of the pair. Juniper watched them leave for a while, her hands clasped in front of her with a beaming look on her face.
After a moment passed, Michelle finally stood up from the pillar she was leaning on and spoke up.
“Something like that, is what I mean.”
Juniper snapped out of her trance quickly and looked over, “look, that has nothing to do with…I mean…I’ll be reliable.”
“Just make sure you know when you’re in over your head, Juniper.”
“I know, I know. I mean, we get masks, right?”
Michelle gave Juniper a worried look, before she too walked off into the lobby and disappeared. Juniper watched her too, but with a slightly more worried expression. After some time, Juniper, too, left the storefront and walked down the main floor.
Nearby was a small cozy section cut into the floor filled with trees and shrubbery. A small wooden platform cut through the area and decorated itself with small wooden benches and railings. A bit out of the way of the shops and services, the natural sounds of a man-made waterfall nearby lent the area a peaceful feeling. Juniper always loved to come here when she needed a moment to think.
She wasn’t sure how she had gotten all the way here. A famous YouTube singer and artist, Juniper had agreed on a job as the head entertainer for the resort’s theatre at night. Before long, like most of the other attractive women here, Juniper was offered a secondary job as a guard. One that would be harmless if this was a simple, standard resort hotel.
But it wasn’t. A massive criminal enterprise hid behind its customer friendly façade, and the large sum of money offered, and her own greed gave Juniper a low-ranking position inside it. With everyone’s biggest and final job quickly approaching, Juniper only had to close her eyes for just a bit longer. The money would be worth it, she had always told herself.
She shook her head in dismay, a distressed and concerned look on her face as she took a seat at the very edge of one bench, beside a man sleeping on the rest of it. Hearing a buzz from her pocket, she removed her phone from it and turned it on.
Charlotte Bauscher has gone rogue. Kill on sight. Was the text displayed at the front of it.
Juniper frowned. She knew, in the back of her head that it would only get worse and more dangerous from here. She wanted to be a role model to all the children who watched her, but…the amount of money being offered to her for the completion of just this one final job.
Nobody would know it was her. Nobody will find out. Just get the money and be done with this, she told herself.
But with the slight worried rocking motion, Juniper was doing, the bench creaked slightly below her. The young man beside her suddenly shot awake, looking around frantically. Juniper’s heart nearly skipped a beat, not at how attractive the man was, but at how sudden his reaction was.
Though now that she was looking, he really was kind of attractive.
“I-I’m sorry!” She quickly apologized, “I didn’t mean to wake you…”
___
Charlotte moved her eyes slowly, surveying the room. Besides her, there were eleven girls total surrounding her. Of those eleven, eight of them (Nadiya, Bella, Melody, Alison, Winter, Faith, Hailey, and Caitlyn) all were in bed and were still recovering from sustained injuries, suggesting they may not be as strong as Charlotte was used to. Though she was just as injured, Charlotte figured they lacked the adrenaline spike she was receiving from having her life threatened.
Bianca and Charlotte’s ever favourite mercenary Juliette blocked the easy way out to the right, as Charlotte’s bed was conveniently situated at the very end of the row of beds. The two didn’t seem injured and would be in top performance, but even then, that wasn’t a very high ceiling.
The only concern was Lucille who was sitting on the nightstand right beside Charlotte’s bed, now right beside her as she stood up. Charlotte thought her a friend, but was she able to put her trust in her at a moment like this?
Charlotte shot Lucille a quick glance, who responded with a confused blank stare, blinking back towards her.
Same old Lucille.
Melody, sleeping on the bed right beside Charlotte’s, leapt off with enthusiasm right in front of Charlotte.
“Let’s dance, bitch,” she smirked.
“I agree,” Charlotte responded with a lighting fast throat jab with her fingers extended. The blow striking in a direct bullseye, Melody began to gasp as she clutched her throat with both hands and collapsed to the floor.
Charlotte planted one hand onto her bed and swung her legs over it in the same motion before anyone could yell a command or react. Her swinging legs impacted against Bianca’s stomach, causing her to stumble backwards into Juliette.
“Don’t let her get away-!” Juliette yelled, pushing Bianca away as she tried to rush at Charlotte. As her feet planted firmly onto the ground after finishing her vault over the bed, Charlotte sidestepped Juliette, shoving her to the ground as she did. The blonde’s velocity sent her into a metallic shelf nearby, collapsing together with all the supplies on top.
Alison made it to Charlotte first and had began to wind up a roundhouse kick aimed high at Charlotte, who quickly ducked beneath the kick. Bella quickly came from behind Alison and tried to deliver a fast-vertical kick, only for Charlotte to dodge that too with a forward roll.
Charlotte tried to leap to a standing position after her roll, but Alison’s boot to her open back sent her sprawling forward to the ground in a crash instead. Charlotte whirled around to see Alison prepped with another kick to her downed body and grabbed the woman’s foot instead.
Alison released a shocked gasp, tripping with her stunted momentum. Charlotte only needed to give a slight push upwards for Alison to fly over her body and slam face first into the wall past the two women.
Bella followed up immediately after, with Charlotte barely deflecting a close blow from the leather clad woman. Two quick blows were passed and parried before Charlotte quickly dispatched her opponent with an unblocked uppercut to Bella’s chin, knocking the woman backwards and flying towards the floor.
Charlotte turned and ran at that moment, bursting through a double door leading into a short hallway cut up into various paths.
Meanwhile, behind her, Juliette stumbled to her feet. Finding her bearings again only to come to three girl’s unconscious on the floor, and the remainder trickling out the door leading to the hallway.
“W-What the fuck?!” Juliette exclaimed, snatching Lucille nearby, who hadn’t really moved from her position, “where the fuck is that bitch?”
“Which…bitch…?” Lucille asked in her usual cloudy voice, completely unaffected by Juliette’s aggression.
“The…Charlotte, you moron!”
“…Oooooh, she went thataway,” Lucille pointed towards the still rotating double doors leaving the room.
“Are you fu-,” Juliette snatched her phone up from her back pocket angrily and pushed against the screen in a huff, “lock down the woman’s infirmary, now-!” She barked into the phone.
As she commanded, Juliette snapped her head back to Lucille, and released her with a hard shove, “you too, get out there and kill Charlotte, you idiot!”
===
Charlotte sprinted down the hallway, making erratic turns and barely dodging the unsuspecting medical personal walking down the hallway. In her mind, she just had to make it to the stairs and either change her floor or lose her pursuers.
It sounded like the prisoner managed to achieve that. If he could do it, then she could too. She could do whatever he could.
“Stop-!” Screamed a group of male mercenaries rounding the corner in front of her. Charlotte skidded to a halt and turned down the nearest hallway. A flurry of boots stampeding across the floor followed behind her.
The cavalry had shown up. Charlotte figured most of the stairs were now guarded in some capacity that she couldn’t dispatch with this goon squad behind her. She had to shake them first.
“Eek-!” Came a surprised Hailey as Charlotte suddenly ran into her while turning a corner. Hailey fell backwards onto her ass from what was essentially an accidental tackle.
Charlotte didn’t hesitate to give the tanned woman a swift kick to her throat. With a gasp, the stunned woman spread backwards against the floor, as Charlotte leapt over her body and kept running.
This was bad, Charlotte was definitely turning a loop if she was now running into the women from her room. Taking one final sharp turn, Charlotte quickly ducked into the first room she found and placed her back against the door.
The washroom. She had ran into a public washroom. At least it was the women’s washroom, and empty to boot.
Trying to catch her breath, Charlotte quickly surveyed this washroom. Though, every accessory in the washroom such as the hand dryer, the soap dispenser, and the mirrors, were all bolted down and couldn’t be used. The stalls in the back probably only had some flimsy toilet paper in them as well. Charlotte did notice a rather wide grate along the ceiling in the back, likely leading to a ventilation system.
That’s when her eyes spotted a mop inside a pail to the side. She darted over and quickly snatched the mop up. The door had a handle sticking out, and the hand dryer was situated along the same wall right beside the door.
Perhaps she could bar the door by jamming the mop behind the hand dryer and through the door handle…
Until a frantic flurry of footsteps outside the door echoed through the washroom. Charlotte held her breath, ducking beneath a sink near the door, mop in hand.
“Hailey! Hailey are you okay?” Said a voice.
“Where did she go?” Another asked.
“Keep going, this way!” The first responded.
“You two, check the washrooms,” another voice threw out, before the steps continued to run downwards.
Charlotte steeled herself, ready to fight for her life once more. Outside the door, she heard a small shuffling noise, likely from moving Hailey’s unconscious body to the side, but then it went quiet.
…
All she could hear was her own breathing and the sound of her heart beating in her ears.
…
Her hands continued to brace in a tight grip against the mops wooden handle. Sweat clamming the grip.
…
“…Sooooo,” Charlotte finally heard one males voice begin on the other end of the door.
“…I ain’t going in there,” a second male voice spoke.
“Well one of us has to check it.”
“Rock paper scissors?”
“No way, man, we have to go in together.”
“Why?”
“What if she’s inside?”
“Well yes, but I’d take that over getting both of us tainted.”
“Hmm…you’re right. Good point.”
“Besides, I wouldn’t mind getting beaten up by Charlotte. She’s pretty hot.”
“Yeah, actually, I agree too.”
“So, then I should go in there alone.”
“No, actually, I’ll head in there alone.”
“Rock paper scissors?”
Charlotte shifted her hands around the mop repeatedly. An extremely confused expression on her face. The urge to supress the need to scream “what?” And run outside right now was, perhaps, even greater than her earlier urge to live.
“H-Hailey?!” A woman’s voice suddenly came into the picture, along with rushed footsteps. Charlotte could recognize it as Caitlyn’s.
“I-Is she okay?” A second, deeper, softer voice followed. Likely belonging to Faith. Charlotte figured the rest of the girls from the infirmary were all out in the chase.
“Oh yeah, defs,” the first male voice answered again.
“Coulda been Charlotte,” the second followed.
“Definitely Char-Char.”
“…W-Well what the hell are you two standing here for?!” Caitlyn shot back, flabbergasted.
“Checking the washrooms.”
“Yup.”
“We haven’t gone in there yet, though.”
“It’s a big problem.”
“Are you waiting for someone?” Faith asked the pair.
“Nope.”
“Nah.”
“Could be voodoo magic in there.”
“Girls, you know? No offense.”
“These two are a complete waste of time,” Caitlyn vented, as the washroom door was suddenly violently pushed open.
Charlotte quickly reeled back into her adrenaline state, as she watched the bottom of Caitlyn’s tight fitted Jeans cross briskly into the washroom.
“C-Caitlyn, wait!” Faith shot out, hurriedly rushing after Caitlyn into the washroom. The skin of her bare ankles quickly coming into view as she stepped into the washroom.
Caitlyn didn’t even stop to check the sinks, making an immediate beeline towards the stalls in the back. Faith stopped just after the door, looking after Caitlyn as Charlotte started to see her eyes beginning to wander.
Time to act.
In one swift movement, Charlotte launched herself from below the sink and swung the mop at Faith’s head. The blow connecting cleanly against the back of her head, before she could even respond. The mature woman cried out weakly, hitting the wall as she used it to stabilize.
Charlotte turned with the momentum, weaving the mop handle in between the door handle then shoving the end through the gap between the hand dryer and the wall. An effective lock on the door, followed by a furious rattle.
Caitlyn had just turned around, trying to see how she could return to help her teammate out. But Charlotte wasn’t about to let her.
As Faith still stumbled, holding one hand against her head and one leaning on the wall with a pained expression, Charlotte quickly reached forward and slammed the woman’s head against the wall.
Offering no resistance against the blow, Faith collapsed quickly and easily. The muscles in her face relaxing as she slid down to the floor with nothing more than a soft whimper.
Caitlyn stopped in her place, looking towards Charlotte, then to the mop lodged through the door.
“Clever,” she begrudgingly spoke, tensing her body. Now that she was out of her bed, Charlotte noticed that Caitlyn was wearing nothing but a white bra and tight blue jeans.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Charlotte asked, preparing herself in a fighting stance in turn.
“Well I’ve…” Caitlyn looked away for a second, “I’ve always wanted a real fight against you. I wanted to know if I could be better than you.”
“…Whoa, is that Charlotte in there?” The male voice outside the door spoke again from behind, before Charlotte could respond.
“Yeah, she locked the door somehow. Did she bar it?” His partner continued
“Wow. She’s so smart.
“And hot.”
“I wish I was in there.”
“Okay I don’t know who the fuck is out there right now, but I assure you I will step outside there and break both your necks personally!” Charlotte screamed.
“Sorry Char-Char!”
“But we were complimenting you!”
“Though that does sound pretty hot too.”
“Actually, yeah I agree.”
“Though I wish Caitlyn would do that to me instead.”
“Caitlyn?”
“Did you see that clean white bra she was wearing? And the jeans? Really hot.”
“W-W-Wha…?!” Caitlyn’s face flushed red, as her hands moved to cover her chest.
“I thought hers were pretty small, though.”
“Small can be good.”
“I guess so.”
“I’m surprised she’s wearing something like that, though.”
“Yeah why is she wearing that?”
“Yeah why are you wearing that?” Charlotte asked.
“I ran into the prisoner and it’s a long story!” Caitlyn screamed out, still holding her chest.
“You got raped by the prisoner?” Charlotte questioned again with a surprised face.
“N-N-N-NO-!” Caitlyn stammered, her face flushing an even deeper colour of red than it already was.
“I mean, I wouldn’t be surprised, honestly.”
“Can we just fight?!”
“…Oh, right. Yeah. You guys trying to kill me and all that,” Charlotte shook her head, and assumed her stance again, “I got it.”
“I-I’m not sure I could do that,” Caitlyn gave back, slowly assuming her stance as well.
“Well someone else would if you didn’t, so pardon me if I go with none of the above.”
Charlotte stepped over Faith’s body, edging cautiously towards Caitlyn.
The other girl made the first move, jabbing her fists high at Charlotte’s head. Charlotte stepped back twice, dodging the light blows before responding with a swipe of her own. Caitlyn backed off her attack to dodge the blow, and barely blocked the immediate kick that followed.
The pair exchanged blows evenly, dealing and taking hits as they came. An equal trade of skill displayed as the nudging sounds of the door urged Charlotte to hurry with her dispatch.
Though the momentum did not shift in her favour. A surprise deflect left Charlotte’s midsection suddenly open, which Caitlyn responded to immediately with a clear kick.
“Aghhh…” Charlotte ate the kick to her stomach at full force, doubling over as she stumbled away. Caitlyn pushed her advantage, punching Charlotte in the face directly against her open cheek. The impact twisting her head away.
Caitlyn rushed up and snatched Charlotte’s upper body, preparing to slam it into the sink along the wall. Charlotte panicked, the sink in view knowing it was likely to knock her out immediately.
That could not happen.
Charlotte desperately threw her arms forward as Caitlyn pushed down on her shoulders, stopping her face from slamming into the sink. Caitlyn, stopping this method of knocking her opponent out, opted to grab Charlotte’s weakened body instead, and attempt to turn her around.
But Charlotte quickly reversed the momentum, instead twisting her body to grab Caitlyn instead. Surprised by the turn, Caitlyn was suddenly helpless as Charlotte pressed against her bare skin. The momentum allowing Charlotte to place a hand against Caitlyn’s bare back and give her a hard shove forward.
Directly into the mirror that was above the sink. The mirror shattered on impact; blood drawn from all corners of Caitlyn’s pretty face. The sharp sound of glass breaking only barely covering Caitlyn’s pained cries.
Now Caitlyn was the one panicking with her actions, flailing wildly trying to escape her situation. But unlike her opponent, Charlotte knew how to finish a kill. Charlotte immediately moved to wrap a strong arm around Caitlyn’s neck as the girl panicked and dragged her to the floor.
The pair dropped onto the glass covered floor as Caitlyn struggled wildly in Charlotte’s grip. Pained, furious screams from the girl continued, as she continued to claw and tug her hands at Charlotte’s arm in desperation. Blood starting to draw from Charlotte too, but she could not let go.
“Aah-! Ah! Aaah…!” Caitlyn continued to wail. Pain turning into desperation and weakness as her eyes flashed with the reality of her situation. Charlotte held tight, as the clawing turned to pawing, and the struggling turned to mere movement.
Yet against this particular opponent, it didn’t feel right.
I’ve always wanted a real fight against you.
Charlotte knew her real opponents, and she knew how deadly and greedy everyone here could be with just one order, and a handful of money. But was Caitlyn one of those people? Charlotte was fine with turning traitor, but maybe she wasn’t fully ready for it just yet.
And released her grip.
Caitlyn let out huge gasps of breath, trying to hold her throat before Charlotte hurriedly stopped her arms.
“There’s glass on them. Be careful,” Charlotte warned the girl on her lap, as she gently pushed her off. As she stood up, she began to question her decisions. There was no doubt Caitlyn would return as an obstacle later. Faith as well.
She looked down to the woman out cold on the floor, and the girl looking up to her weakly gasping for air, both surrounded by several glass shards.
Maybe she should…
Bang!
The door began to break, the mop nearly splintering. They had begun to batter it down from the outside. Charlotte immediately turned around to look at the washroom she was trapped in.
A vent. A steel grated vent along the ceiling, right above the toilet stalls.
She shot a quick look over her shoulders, “and don’t you forget this,” she threw back, before leaping onto the top of the stall with great dexterity.
Bang!
The mop had barely much life left in it as Caitlyn passed out quietly beneath the sink and the loud cracking of wood beside her. By now, Charlotte had already begun to remove the vent cover and had stuck her head into the ventilation chamber. A flat, dark, and dreary grey space only illuminated by smaller vent covers on the sides. Nothing she could fit through, but she had no choice but to climb in and find one that she could.
Crack!
The mop shattered into two pieces as the door broke open. Several individuals in heavy camo carrying assault rifles stormed into the empty washroom, barking commands and recovering the two unconscious bodies.
Charlotte had already found some distance by now. Juliette’s frustrated bitching soon nothing but an echo as she edged on slowly through the vents, trying not to make too much noise.
They would soon find the trail of blood Charlotte had left behind from her bleeding arm within the vent, but she hoped that it was not soon enough. Even as she started to hear the sounds of the vent cover being removed far behind her.
What now? She definitely could not simply escape the building, but this wasn’t a situation Charlotte had expected to happen to this point.
…The prisoner. The man who had killed her best friend the previous day. A man she hated, who was now potentially her only ally. A man who may or may not have forgiven her for trying to toy with him a few hours ago.
She had to find him. But, then again, so did everyone else.
Where had the prisoner disappeared to…?
===
The sun had slowly begun to set along the horizon. Guests split and dissipated from recreational areas and started to find locations to eat dinner. Down along the expansive main floor of the hotel lobby, a crowd still slowly began to disperse around the tightly packed shops, restaurants, and decorative flora decorating the entire area. A true tourists paradise on the outside.
Along one small boutique nuzzled in-between the chaos, a young woman stood browsing dresses lined up along a rack at the outskirts of the shop. Her outfit was plain and basic, sporting a simple sleeved white top cutting just above her tight midriff, and denim shorts. Despite her clothes, her eyes beamed with a bright youthful radiance, shining along with her delicate soft brown hair.
As the young girl hummed a melodic tune as she passively browsed the rack of dresses, a hand suddenly placed itself onto her shoulder. The girl turned quickly after a gasp, before relaxing when she saw the blonde woman before her.
“Juniper, you’re supposed to be on duty,” the blonde woman scolded the younger girl sternly.
“I-I was just doing a little browsing…” Juniper meekly responded, her voice dropping off, “sorry Michelle.”
Compared to Juniper, Michelle was dressed a lot more brazenly. A shimmery green bra was all that protected the top half of her body, besides the flowing transparent vest around her shoulders. A tight set of white jeans further enunciated her ideal muscular, hourglass figure.
Michelle sighed in return to Juniper’s excuse, “don’t sound so scared, Juni, I just want to make sure you’re aware of how dangerous things are right now. You know Prisoner 01 disappeared into the compound hours ago.”
Juniper fidgeted slightly, “y-yeah, but he won’t kill small fry like me, right? I’m not even sure what he looks like.”
“You don’t know what knowledge a man like that possesses. Just be alert for me, alright?”
“R-Right, I’m sorry,” Juniper looked down and away, causing the older woman to give her a hug.
“Oh, don’t apologize so much Juni, how are you ever going to carry out the operation if you continue like that?”
Juniper pulled away from the hug, “hey, what does that have anything to do with me apologizing? I’ll be fine in the operation.”
Michelle raised an eyebrow at Juniper’s response.
“Is that so?” The taller blonde questioned, leaning in towards Juniper long enough until the brunette took a step backwards.
“Yes, of course so!” Juniper puffed her cheeks out in anger, “I’m as good a fighter as anyone else here!”
“That’s not what my issue was,” Michelle shook her head slowly.
Before Juniper could respond back, a smaller, tinier voice spoke up to the side.
“E-Excuse me…” The little voice sounded. Juniper whirled her body around to meet two small girls no higher than the height of her knee, both with dusty blonde hair. The one in the back wore a light pink dress, and hid behind the one in the front, with a simpler t-shirt, shorts and a cap which nearly hid her entire face with its shadow.
“Oh, yes, how may I help you?” Juniper’s eyes gleamed in excitement. Michelle could only look at the other girl with a slight smile, before taking a step back.
“I-I…we just wanted to know if…umm…” The child with the cap stuttered, pushing her index fingers together, before the child with the dress behind her suddenly interrupted her.
“Are you really Juuni?!” She blurted out from over the other child’s shoulder.
Juniper could only give herself a self-assured smile, as she knelt down closer to the two children.
“Weeeell, if I said I was, what then?” Juniper cheekily poked the pair.
“I…you have to be! We saw you perform last night!” The child in the dress yelled out again, now finally stepping out from behind the other.
Juniper shrugged, “it must be true, then. Would that make the two of you fans of mine?”
“I was your one millionth subscriber on your channel!” The girl in the t-shirt spoke up.
“…Well, I subscribed to her longer than you!” The other argued.
Juniper could only laugh at the two squabbling, “alright alright, now now,” she giggled, patting both children on the head, “no need to argue, you’re both my treasured fans. Was there something you wanted?”
The pair looked at each other nervously, causing Juniper to speak up again.
“Weeeeell, how about an autograph?” Juniper asked, taking a market out of her pocket. As the two girls faces lit up, Juniper tapped on the one with a cap, “how does right here sound?”
“I-I would…thank you!” The child beamed.
“And who am I addressing this to?”
“Sylvia!” She declared as Juniper began to sketch a signature onto the front of the cap.
“Why, what a lovely name,” she mused as she wrote. Upon finishing, she turned to the girl in the dress, “and you? Do you have something to sign?”
“A-A-Ahh…” The other child fidgeted wildly, patting her non-existent pockets. Juniper just gave a gentle laugh. The singers slightly raw, deeper, yet childlike voice coming out with every word.
“Then how about this, next time we meet, you give me anything you want, and I’ll sign it for you. Deal?”
The child’s eyes shone with an incredible bright light, as she smiled back, “w-we’ll be at your next show!”
“I look forward to it.”
With that, Juniper waved off the two children as they scampered away into the lobby, excited hushed noises traded between them as the cap was held out in front of the pair. Juniper watched them leave for a while, her hands clasped in front of her with a beaming look on her face.
After a moment passed, Michelle finally stood up from the pillar she was leaning on and spoke up.
“Something like that, is what I mean.”
Juniper snapped out of her trance quickly and looked over, “look, that has nothing to do with…I mean…I’ll be reliable.”
“Just make sure you know when you’re in over your head, Juniper.”
“I know, I know. I mean, we get masks, right?”
Michelle gave Juniper a worried look, before she too walked off into the lobby and disappeared. Juniper watched her too, but with a slightly more worried expression. After some time, Juniper, too, left the storefront and walked down the main floor.
Nearby was a small cozy section cut into the floor filled with trees and shrubbery. A small wooden platform cut through the area and decorated itself with small wooden benches and railings. A bit out of the way of the shops and services, the natural sounds of a man-made waterfall nearby lent the area a peaceful feeling. Juniper always loved to come here when she needed a moment to think.
She wasn’t sure how she had gotten all the way here. A famous YouTube singer and artist, Juniper had agreed on a job as the head entertainer for the resort’s theatre at night. Before long, like most of the other attractive women here, Juniper was offered a secondary job as a guard. One that would be harmless if this was a simple, standard resort hotel.
But it wasn’t. A massive criminal enterprise hid behind its customer friendly façade, and the large sum of money offered, and her own greed gave Juniper a low-ranking position inside it. With everyone’s biggest and final job quickly approaching, Juniper only had to close her eyes for just a bit longer. The money would be worth it, she had always told herself.
She shook her head in dismay, a distressed and concerned look on her face as she took a seat at the very edge of one bench, beside a man sleeping on the rest of it. Hearing a buzz from her pocket, she removed her phone from it and turned it on.
Charlotte Bauscher has gone rogue. Kill on sight. Was the text displayed at the front of it.
Juniper frowned. She knew, in the back of her head that it would only get worse and more dangerous from here. She wanted to be a role model to all the children who watched her, but…the amount of money being offered to her for the completion of just this one final job.
Nobody would know it was her. Nobody will find out. Just get the money and be done with this, she told herself.
But with the slight worried rocking motion, Juniper was doing, the bench creaked slightly below her. The young man beside her suddenly shot awake, looking around frantically. Juniper’s heart nearly skipped a beat, not at how attractive the man was, but at how sudden his reaction was.
Though now that she was looking, he really was kind of attractive.
“I-I’m sorry!” She quickly apologized, “I didn’t mean to wake you…”
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