The moon was high in the sky. In one of the ghost towns of California, Karan was silently making his way to a abadoned factory. While he was making his way there, his helmet's visor was active.
Displaying on the right side corner of his visor was a warning, a proximity movement warning to be exact.
And there was a small feed on the upper left side of the visor, showing the live feed of the factory.
In the feed, he saw the cars from earlier. Those cars had pulled up in the factory, riddled with bullets, and were blowing off smoke. The passengers were not in good condition either. Some were staggering, some were barely walking, while others were trying to stop bleeding.
Around ten hostiles. And four of them are Metalics. He thought. Metalics or Cyborgs were a real pain in the ass, fast and incredibly strong. But luckily, the metalics on his feed had suffered a lot from earlier assault.
Karan was wearing a black combat suit, which was light and effective against small-caliber bullets. It was a good enough stealthy operation like this. Especially when he had to deal with heavy hitters like Metalics.
As he had already mapped the town and the factory out days ago, it didnt took him time to navigate himself inside the factory. The dark hallways of the factory were easy to navigate through the night mode of his visor, and because he had thoroughly studied the blueprints of the place as well.
While moving in the darkness, through the hallways of the factory, he picked up a noise, someone walking towards him.
They split up? They must be checking the parameter, making sure that they are alone.
He immediately hugged the wall and hid in the shadow of a column of the wall. It didnt took long for the sound of footsteps come near him.
Three hostiles. He guessed based on the steps that he could hear. No heaviness in the steps.. Normal humans. No metalics. He guessed their weight from the way the concrete below their feet sounded when they moved.
A small caliber grain bullet would do. He had decided.
As the trio moved past him, none of them noticed him, thanks to the camouflage of dark shadow of the column and his armor. And Karan was not someone who would waste an opportunity like that.
He immediately took out his small-caliber silenced gun and shot them. Two went down easily, the third one was rattled to do anything when he saw his friends go down, and he went down with ease as well.
The hostiles were people wearing black leather jackets, and all had bright red mohawks as their hairstyle. These guys were a gang called Red Hawks, a pretty infamous gang from District 21. But Karan already knew that, which was why after making sure that they were dead, he moved on…
***
"Curse those Kumegawa bastards," Angeline cursed, as her friend Joe tried to take out the bullet lodged in her leg. She looked around the battered faces of her gang members and couldnt help but think back on what went wrong.
She was the leader of the Red Hawks. As the leader of a powerful gang, when she got an opportunity to make some real money, she didnt think twice about it.
They were supposed to steal a knick-knack box from the Kumegawa transport vehicle. They didnt know what was in the box, they just needed to know that they were getting paid hell of a lot this grab.
She pulled up with the full force of her gang. Snatched the item and was on her way to the rendezvous point when Kumigawa forces attacked them. They were not able to handle their military force; more than half of their gang was now dead. People who were left were in no state to fight, not to mention they were low on fuel, cars, and ammunition.
They could not return to District 21 now, as wanted posters of her gang were now being circulated through net. Now they could just hope that the buyer doesn't back out and give them the money so that they can get out of this mess.
She looked around. There were 4 Meatlics in their group, which meant that they could still hold their ground in the outside world, but only if they could repair them. Others, on the other hand…
"Where are the triplets?" she snarled at Joseph, a metalic incharge of comms in their gang.
"You sent them to check the parameter," Joseph said.
"So why they havent they come back yet?" She asked. Joseph nodded, and his eyes turned blue. His eyes reverted, and he said, "I cannot get through. Something is blocking my signal."
"What?" Before she could utter another word, the lights were gone. "Wha.." She heard a small explosion, and some liquid splashed in her face. And then the heavy body of Joseph fell on the floor with a loud thud.
"Get down!" someone from the other side of the room yelled. While someone yanked Angeline down to the floor, behind the steel table that they had pushed down for cover.
Someone from their gang started shooting, but soon they fell. Someone else stood up, and soon they died as well.
One by one, metalics and normal humans alike started falling like flies from an electric fly trap. The darkness only made it worse. Angiline couldnt even tell where the shots were coming from. And before she knew, every one of her comrades was dead. She was the only one alive, because she stayed in the cover.
This is it. This is how I will die, she thought. A part of her mind thought back about her dreams, of how she wanted to have a place that had an overview of the whole district. She wanted to be a legend, like Jonny Silverman, Grego Bullet, and Angline De Santa, Darius Kincaid…
Yet, here she was about to die.
As a last cry, she yelled, "YOU TIT SUCKING COCKER FUCKER! If you have the balls, then come and face me, you coward! FACE ME!" She grabbed the pistol on her waist and stood up, "FACE ME!"
It was then that the light came back on. Angiline looked around to see the bodies of her comrades lying around with bullet holes in them. Before she could scream once again, she felt it. A piece of iron was sticking to the back of her skull.
"Who are you?" she asked, "Why are you doing this?"
"Name is Darius. Darius Kincaid. As far as the reason is concerned, feel free to investigate it after you have entered the gates of hell," And with the man behind her pulled the trigger, killing her…