[7] vs. Trisha

[Friend or Foe]

Kaden
Sophia
Piper


It was just like in the movies, after the good guys beat the big bad monster, the mastermind comes out and acts all cocky, like everything was going according to plan. Piper, Sophia and Kaden all looked in unison to find a tall blonde woman at the top of the stairs, topped with sunglasses and holding a cellular device.

"Patricia Demolic," Piper said aloud.

Even though this seemed like the perfect time to have a stare-off showdown, Trisha came down while hardly even paying attention to the trio. "Yea?" She was saying aloud, "Oh, that's so great, sweety. Congratulations. Of course I'll be there for the party. Tell your mommy to make a great big cake with the number ten on it." She continued talking as she walked up to the three warriors, then gave them a dirty look. "Listen, hun, I got to go. I have some business to take care of. Call me back in twenty minutes."

She shut the phone in one hand and put the device in her jacket pocket. She stood in black jeans and a white tank top with a dark coat covering most of her top half. The woman had told her husband that she wanted no part in this silly show, but she had to admit the camera time was kinda fun to her. It was a good chance to get a little exposure, and show there was more to her then just being the wife of the world's smartest man.

Once upon a time, she had met the man in a dojo that she had been training in. They had gone to war together, where she was declared a national hero. But there was always that dark side to her. When she was kicked out of both of martial arts and the military for unnecessary violence and even murder, she had no choice but to look to a life of crime. Kai had saved her from that.

She had spent her whole life walking from group to group, never finding acceptance because of exceptional ability to kill. But Kai had found it. He said he loved her...whether or not that was true was a mystery. He was a master manipulator. Trisha liked to believe that he was telling the truth, but there was always something that told her...maybe she was just a tool too. Maybe she was just being used.

"Alright," she said, pulling out a glowing dagger in one hand, and cradling a purple pistol in the other. "Let's get this over with. I've got better shit to do then deal with the likes of you."

Piper, Kaden and Sophia moved into fighting poses.

[Piper Juunanagou]

“All right,” the spoiled mistress began as she brandished weapons in both of her manicured hands. “Let’s get this over with. I’ve got better shit to do then deal with the likes of you,” she said with a frown as each member of the trio slid into their own unique fighting stance.

“Which one of you wants to go first,” the woman sighed as she leveled the oddly colored firearm with Piper’s head. “I’m sure it’s you, right? You probably want some form of retribution over how easily I discarded your trashy ass in the mansion,” Trisha said with a toothy smile as the redhead’s right eye began to twitch.

“She’s just trying to bait you, Piper,” Kaden whispered as he reached over and rested his right hand on his companion’s shoulder. Despite the show of compassion, the courier never once relaxed his tense stance, nor did he take his eyes of off Trisha Demolic.

“Well it’s working,” the medic rasped, prompting their pompous opponent to roll her eyes.

“You unstable types are sooo predicable,” Trisha groaned, making extra sure to play up the theatrics to ensure she got a rise out of the irritated redhead. “I should probably just put you out of your misery and do us both a favor.”

“Shut your mouth!” Piper screamed as Trisha’s composure suddenly went stern. A beat later, Kai’s wife yanked back the trigger on her flashy pistol, but as the bullet came rocketing out of the barrel, its target suddenly sprung forward. As Piper hoisted her free fist in the air, her body exploded into a sparse cloud of light particles, leaving Trisha’s well-aimed shot to rocket harmlessly into the abyss that was the empty, formerly zombie-infested mall.

“Where did she go?” Trisha screamed as her snide outer shell gave way to an underlying frustration. “Where did she go?” She demanded again as she moved to level the gun with Kaden’s face. Before she could even consider pulling the trigger, Piper snapped back into view right behind her.

“I said shut your mouth!” The medic shouted as she lifted up her right foot and slammed it straight into the small of Trisha’s back. The force of the blow, coupled with the element of surprise, was enough to send the blonde-haired woman hurtling forward like a football. With none of the grace that her attitude and mannerisms seemed to dictate, the wife of Kai Demolic crashed into a hotdog cart a few yards down the hallway.

“Well that was startling,” Kaden muttered as he looked at his female companion with a cocked eyebrow.

“Let’s just get the medallion and deal with her husband,” Piper said dryly as she walked between her two companions and straight toward the pile of twisted rubble that had once been a small stand bolted into the ground. As the redhead marched toward the heap of wood and steel, a fuming Trisha suddenly and abruptly stood up from the center of the damage.

With a sneer on her face, the female warrior sprung forward with such speed that she was barely more than a blur to Piper’s eyes. Before the redhead even had a chance to react, Trisha slammed her forearm into Piper’s ribcage. A blood-laced cry erupted from the medic’s chapped lips, but without meriting her opponent a second to breath, Trisha grabbed Piper by her head of red locks and literally whipped the woman through a nearby wooden storefront.

“Well that’s one less pest,” the snide woman said with a pompous chuckle as she turned her attention to Kaden and Sophia. “Which one of you would like to follow your pal?” She demanded as she began to casually advance toward the pair. “How about I pay you back for stealing my car?” She spat as she once again leveled her pistol with the courier’s head and fired off a round. With a grunt, Kaden dove to the wayside, and when he hit the ground, he managed to take advantage of his momentum and roll into a kneeling position.

Unfortunately for the talented courier, Trisha’s unnerving speed had carried her back down the hallway and over to Kaden’s position before he had even managed to reach that position, so when the courier came to a halt after his little moment of acrobatic flair, he received a sudden and abrupt roundhouse kick to the side of his head.

As Kaden went skipping down the hallway like a rock hurtled across a lake, Trisha let out a dramatic sigh and rolled her eyes as she turned to deal with her last foe. To the woman chagrin, however, she took a blast of ki right to the back that sent her right to her knees with an echoing thud.

“At least you’ve got a little spirit,” Trisha groaned through clenched teeth as pillars of white steam wafted up from her scorched back. “I’ll make sure to kill you first then,” she added as she rose to a standing position.

“Just give us the medallion,” Sophia shouted definitely as she placed her hands together and discharged another vibrant flash of azure energy. Unfortunately for the healer, Trisha was ready for this one, and with a roll of her eyes, Kai’s spoiled wife spun around and caught the energy with her bare hands. With a faint grunt, she proceeded to redirect it up toward the roof of the mall where it exploded harmlessly against the plaster and steel.

“I think I’m really going to enjoy killing the three of you,” Trisha said with one of her pompous, haughty chuckles as flakes of plaster began to rain down on the two women. “I’m going to enjoy this so much that it’ll make spending my precious time a little worthwhile,” she added as she broke into a run and began to charge down Sophia.
Before the confrontation between the medic and the ex-soldier had a chance to escalate, Piper lurched out from the ruins of the nearby store and fired off a pair of rounds. The report of the double-barreled shotgun resounded throughout the lifeless mall. With a scream, Trisha Demolic came to a grinding halt and quickly tried to react. A second later, the spoiled wife of the game’s mastermind was thrown to the ground by the shotgun fire.

“Piper?” Sophia gasped as she turned her eyes from the fallen woman over to her wounded ally. “You shot her!” She stammered, her voice an amalgamation of shock and horror. From somewhere down the hallway, Kaden, having heard the deafening bang of the rifle, was rushing to rejoin his companions.

“The bitch deserved it,” Piper spoke dryly as she slowly reloaded her gun whilst making her way over to Sophia.

“Oh, puh-leeze,” Trisha groaned with another sigh as she sat up off the ground. Other than a small amount of blood around her now torn sleeve, the woman was completely unharmed. “You mean you actually thought that’d would work?” She said with a dry, overly dramatic sarcasm as she opened her right hand to reveal the other slug.

[Kaden]

Plans were a funny thing. Kaden's plans, in-particular, always seemed far more fragile then they should be. More than once over the course of Kai's game show, the blond haired human had wondered whether or not he was actually trying to get himself killed -- that he had something of a death wish was another issue for another day. It wasn't always the big plans that made Kaden reevaluate the goings-on around him, but also the small ones.

He had planned on running back to Piper and chastising her for employing such lethal means against Trisha. He had planned on trying to restrain his teammates so that they might avoid any more bloodshed. He had also planned on whittling away at Trisha's strength so they might be in a position to reason with her. And then all of that went out the window.

"Did... did she just catch a bullet?" Kaden turned a particularly dumbfounded expression to Sophia.

"Yeah," came his answer.

"Fuuuuuuuck."

"... Yeah."

Whether it was a display of sportsmanship -- Kaden doubted it -- or for the cameras, Trisha holstered her gun and made a show of checking her nails while Piper, Sophia, and Kaden regrouped. There was also the chance that she wanted to display her advantage in an attempt to undermine the confidence of her opponents, but Kaden wasn't about to give her that much credit.

"Y'know," Trisha spoke off-handedly, her eyes locked on Sophia, "teaming up with these two isn't the smartest move you could've made, blondie."

Instead of responding, all three contestants visibly tensed. Whether Trisha was simply rambling or actually had a point to make, the trio were going to wait for her dialoge to play itself out. A chance to catch their breath was another thing they weren't about to pass up.

"How many was it?" Trisha inclined her head towards Piper and Kaden. "Four? Five?"

"What are you talking about?" As she spoke, Piper finsihed reloading and pointedly snapped her gun shut.

"I'm just wondering how many of your 'allies' have ended up dead." She tapped her chin with the barrel of her pistol in mock thought. "There was that ugly alien --"

"Szar..." Kaden said under his breath.

"-- and then that saiyan kid, though it was nice of him to protect his dearest friend--"

"Dimitri..." Kaden voice rose.

"-- after that, the boy over there actually talked his one-eyed hunter pal into getting himself killed--"

"Orion..." The name escaped Kaden's throat as more of a growl than anything else.

"-- and I got a message just before coming to fight you guys: that playboy of a saiyan got Rosemary to kill him, that other saiyan hunter that was with you thought he could out smart one of the Four Demons, and Sebastian captured that saiyan princess."

A tense silence filled the space between the Trisha and her trio of opponents. The food court around Kaden seemed to grow as Trisha's words sank into his mind. Or maybe it was that he was shrinking. Trisha seemed to loom before him as a monument to his weakness, his inability to actually use his power to help or protect others. Fortunately, Kaden's downward spiral of mental self-loathing was cut short.

"Oh well," Trisha shrugged. "Time to die."

In the process of diminishing his own self-worth, Kaden had diverted his attention away from his opponent. He hadn't even been looking in her direction. By the time Kaden's eyes turned towards his on-coming adversary, she was only feet away. Clutching her dagger tightly, the woman drove it straight for Kaden's throat. A quick, clean kill.

Luckily -- though luck had nothing to do with it, Kaden didn't know any better -- both Piper and Sophia had been paying attention. With her adrenaline flowing, and her mind focused, Piper was prepared for Trisha's speed and, fortunately, Kai's wife had chosen a simple, predictable method of attack. Trisha's eyes snapped towards the medic in surprise as Piper caught her wrist and stopped the attack mere inches from it's target.

Reaching under her outstreched arm, Trisha aimed her pistol at Piper, and would have had an easy shot if not for Sophia's follow-up. Thrusting her hands forward, the priestess expelled a blast of energy. As the blast struck, Piper released Trisha's wrist and spun to the side, allowing Trisha herself to be thrown sideways from the force of Sophia's assault.

As she hit the tiled floor of the food court, Trisha curled into a roll and vaulted gracefully back to her feet. Brushing herself off, Trisha took a moment to regain her composure before dashing forward once more. Unfortunately for Trisha, her opponents weren't stupid. Just rushing forward wasn't going to work forever.

Sopiha thrust both her hands forward once more, firing a blast of impressive size. As the blast traveled towards Trisha, Piper vaulted high into the air. Trisha herself was able to slide out of the way of Sophia's attack as she continued forward, but was less prepared for Kaden's attack. The courier thrust both his hands forward, firing off two beams of cerulean energy. Trisha prepared to dodge, but instead came to a stop and locked eyes with Kaden. The beams shot past Trisha, only inches from either of her flanks. With a smile, Trisha opened her mouth to say something -- presumably taunt Kaden's aim -- but she never got the chance.

Kai's wife tilted her head to the side as Kaden flashed her the briefest of smiles, seemingly pleased with his poor aim. Realization dawned upon Trisha, but it came a moment too late; she only had enough time to look up. Trisha's eyes widened as Piper came barreling towards her.

With her hands clasped together, Piper threw her momentum behind a massive axe-handle. The medic's fists slammed down onto Trisha's shoulder, a sickening pop filled the food court as Trisha began to buckle under the force of Piper's attack. Unfortunately, that tiny victory would be undercut as Piper's blood sprayed into the air.

In a display of uncanny reflexes, honed through a lifetime of killing, Trisha managed to not only keep her footing after Piper's strike, but actually spin away from the medic. As she did so, Trisha lashed out with her dagger haphazardly and her blade found purchase. In an upward arc, Trisha's blade caught Piper just under the breast and slashed upward, reaching her collarbone and coming dangerously close to the medic's neck.

"Piper!" Kaden hollered.

Trisha stepped towards the medic, wincing in pain as her arm dangled out of its socket. The woman brandished her dagger, preparing to finish Piper before moving on to her other pray. Before she got the chance, however, she was swept aside in a wave of cerulean ki. The attack had been intended to simply distance Trisha from Piper, and it did that remarkably well. Trisha was sent skidding along the floor of the food court, in an ironically similar fashion to the way Kaden had been only moment ago.

Kaden rushed to Piper's side, with Sophia only a step behind him. The courier's hands shook from the sheer amount of energy that he had summoned, but that was secondary to Piper's health. The medic herself wore an expression of fear as she gazed down at her blood-stained top. Fortunately for both of them, Sophia was less fazed by the injury. A soft green light surrounded her hands as she extended them towards Piper.

Turning his attention away from Sophia's healing -- in a rare show of being able to ignore his curiosity -- Kaden's eyes locked onto Trisha pulling herself off the ground. With a sickening grunt of pain, Kai's wife grabbed her dislocated arm and forced it back into its rightful place in her shoulder. The trophy wife returned Kaden's stare with a fierce glare.

As Sophia stepped away from Piper, and Piper examined her healed wound, Kaden noticed that one of Trisha's hands was noticeably empty. She had lost her grip on her pistol, presumably when Piper dislocated that particular arm. Unfortunately, Kaden didn't consider that to be particularly helpful. Given both his and Sophia's recent attacks, she would be more than foolish to engage them in long-range combat.

Reaching into his jacket, Kaden withdrew his dagger, Trisha's dagger, and extended it towards Piper. The medic hesitated for only a second before taking it and tucking it into her belt. Kaden was useless when it came to close-range combat; him having a weapon as potent as Trisha's dagger only put him next to useless. In Piper's hands, however, she would be a considerable threat. Or so Kaden hoped. Regardless, the thought of Trisha being struck by her own weapon, one that Kaden had taken from her, gave the courier a sick sense of amusement.

"Well well well," Trisha said as she watched the brief exchange between Kaden and Piper. "You saved me the trouble of having to buy a replacement. I wouldn't get too attached that thing, Red," Trisha glared at Piper. "I'll be taking it back."

Plans were a funny thing. Some of them, often the best ones, formed without any conscious thought at all. The pieces would simply fall into place in the back of one's mind, surfacing only when the entire puzzle was complete. That moment of realization, that moment of forehead slapping "ah ha!" brought many emotions along with it. Maybe elation, maybe frustration, and maybe even fear.

It was fear that gripped filled Kaden's mind as realization dawned upon him. It was a cold thing that gripped the young courier's heart. It was not something he shied away from, but neither did he embrace it. It simply was, and he would be left with no choice but to accept it. Running a hand through his hair, Kaden narrowed his eyes at Trisha.

"No, Trisha," Kaden's voice was soft, barely reaching the ears of his allies. "You won't."

[Jesper]

Just as Kaden’s display of silent resolve reached her notice, Sophia became light-headed.

It was an annoying thing to only be able to use the one thing that made her useful in a fight a few times before it wobbled her knees, but that was usually the case with her healing. The figure of Trisha doubled and even tripled in her eyesight before the priestess was able to focus her pupils on her foe. She shook her head furiously until the feeling subsided. Both courier and medic shot a glance her way before turning back to the trophy wife.

“Sophia!” Kaden shouted over his shoulder. “Are you okay?”

“I-I’m fine,” the priestess took a deep breath. “Worry about yourself, okay?”

“How touching,” Trisha raised her hand to cover a snicker, though it didn’t work. “Kaden has a history of taking care of himself, little girl. I wouldn’t worry about that. How else could you explain so many of his allies dying while he still lives?”

“Quiet,” Although the courier’s voice rasped in a whisper, the tone of his voice was much more effective than any scream.

“Or is it the redhead who’s caused so much death?” her attention turned to Piper, who only glared at her in response. Trisha shrugged. “I suppose it doesn’t matter. You’ll be meeting them soon enough.”

Kaden lifted a ball of ki. “Do you believe that? You seem to be saying that a lot,” his voice directed his next comment to his allies, though his eyes did not. “Hey guys, you think she’s trying to convince herself?”

Are you trying to convince yourself? Sophia couldn’t help but be pessimistic in her thoughts. Trisha seemed to have all her bases covered, and Sophia wondered if this was all part of Kai’s plan. Looking at her group, Sophia noticed two things: one, they all could use ki as easily as the next person, and two, they all left something to be desired in a hand-to-hand fight, though Piper seemed that she could hold her own against most people. Trisha wasn’t just anybody, though—she had a deadly beauty with an instinct to match. Did Kai consciously manipulate events to have this specific group fight his wife?

“Hmhm…” Trisha stifled another laugh. “Somehow I don’t think that smugness will last.”

“Here she comes…” Sophia uttered before she quickly shifted into a fighting stance, trying to prepare herself for a potential onslaught. The opposing woman dashed towards the group, not showing who her target was until the very last possible moment, planting her foot firmly on the ground and cutting towards the medic, who had her dagger. The sudden misdirection took Piper by surprise, but somehow managed to raise a dagger to meet her attack. The medic held her own fairly well, but Sophia wasn’t sure how long that would last—Trisha was slightly faster, and seemed much more comfortable handling her weapon than Piper did. Sophia’s fears came to fruition when a parry by the trophy wife knocked the medic off-balance. The priestess merely looked on in shock, not knowing what to do for the first time in the fight.

Luckily, Kaden was less dumbfounded.

“Piper!” he cried out, charging a quick beam of ki in the palm of his hand and releasing it. Sophia had seen more powerful beams come out of the courier, so perhaps he was just trying to catch Trisha’s attention rather than actually attack her. As the woman raised her dagger to slash downward fatally, the beam crashed into her back, causing her to stumble forward slightly. Piper took the moment to catch her balance once more and stabbed her dagger forward in hope that the distraction was enough to get in a killing blow. However, Trisha’s speed prevailed once more, narrowly avoiding a fatal gut wound and slashing at Piper’s wrist as she stepped to the side. The dagger went limp in Piper’s hand, but she maintained a firm enough grip to avoid dropping it.

“Nice try, plebeians,” Trisha smiled, turning to face the group as they regrouped yet again. “Too bad you’re so opposed to killing, Kaden. Maybe you actually could have ended it there.”

“I’m not here to kill anyone,” the courier shrugged. “I think my friends can say the same.”

“Not everyone,” the blonde said playfully, letting her eyes wander to Sophia. Kaden and Piper raised an eyebrow simultaneously, looking towards the healer for some sort of sign as to what the hell the lady was talking about. Sophia merely lowered her head, unable to give an answer.

“Oh, come on, now,” Trisha put a hand on her hip and shook her head. “Don’t be shy now. You seemed so sure of yourself when you decided to kill that stupid Saiyan boy.”

“Juno…” Kaden guessed, his voice softened quite a bit.

“How did you know?” Sophia inquired, her eyes watering.

“Word travels quickly, hon,” she answered, motioning around the empty mall around them as she spoke. “I don’t know if you noticed, but not much else is going on.”

“I…” she choked on the words. She looked towards Kaden, her closer of the two friends. How could she even go about explaining it to him? She was scared when Rosemary left her with the ultimatum, and she didn’t know what else to do. She was still scared. She didn’t want to die!

“How could you…” Kaden began.

“I don’t want to die!” Sophia cut him off with a cry. “Don’t you understand!? It’s kill or be killed! I’m not going to die to accommodate you!” She shook her head, turning her stare to Trisha. “I’m sorry, but…I’d rather kill you than die.”

“Good luck.”

[Piper Juunanagou]

There was trouble brewing in paradise.

A frown spread across Piper’s face as the realization dawned upon her that the stress of the situation was finally beginning to splinter their group. Unfortunately for Sophia, she had been the first one to take that step off the edge. The skewed morality of Kai’s ‘game,’ and the constant stress of the last day seemed to have at last caught up to the healer. With a look of heavy sadness on her young face, Sophia lifted her hands up and opened fire upon Trisha.

Leaping backwards, the trophy wife of Kai Demolic let out a smug titter and beat away the pair of energy blasts that the blonde-haired woman had sent spiraling toward her. Unlike the last time, however, Sophia was no longer holding back her power. Before Trisha had a chance to dash in for a counterattack, there was another pair of energy blasts boring down on her, and when those were pacified, more followed in their wake.

As Piper watched with a slight degree of awe, Trisha’s formerly impeccable defense waned. With each subsequent barrage from the healer, the ex-soldier had less time to bat them aside, until finally she could no longer keep up with Sophia’s emotional onslaught. It was at that point that Trisha took a hit right to the chest as she was trying to deflect the preceding blast. The impact of ki upon flesh caused Trisha to elicit a shrill scream, and with a soft sob, Sophia began to walk forward as she barraged the woman with bursts of azure energy.

“Holy…” Piper muttered softly as Trisha Demolic tried to back away from the stream of ki to give herself some room to escape. With each step backwards that Trisha took, however, Sophia took two steps forward until Trisha was backed right up against the wall.

“She’s over doing it,” Kaden muttered frantically beneath his breath as Sophia’s unending energy blasts continued to punish the woman. Although she had become rather enamored with the blonde courier over the course of the last day, Piper was straining to sympathize with him. After all, if Kaden hadn’t been there to help her through the last several hours, Piper knew she’d undoubtedly be as frantic and emotional as Sophia.

“Well if she doesn’t end this crap now, Trisha’s going to kill us,” Piper replied softly as she glanced over her shoulder at Kaden. Their eyes met for a moment, and it was then that Kaden knew this was one moment where the redhead was more than willing to turn the other cheek. “I’m sorry,” Piper muttered as she turned away from the blonde-haired courier.

Although he knew that this confrontation could easily spiral out of control, Kaden was still unwilling to watch as Sophia murderer Trisha in front of his eyes. Sprinting forward, the courier reached out and proceeded to push Sophia’s hands to the wayside, bringing about an end to the woman’s vicious bombardment. At that moment, three sets of eyes turned and watch as a visibly battered Trisha Demolic let out a single, hoarse cough and collapsed onto the linoleum floor of the mall. As the woman fell away from the wall, she left behind an imprint of her body against the blackened, partially broken surface.

“Why!” Sophia scream as she swung her left hand around and caught Kaden in the side of the face with her palm. A sickening crack echoed across the empty food court as the courier was staggered by the thunderous impact of the distraught healer.

“There’s no reason to kill her,” Kaden shot back as he touched the red mark on his face. “We just need the medallion…you’ve punished her enough.”

“Not enough,” Piper muttered as she raised a hand and pointed toward the scorched wall. When Kaden and Sophia followed the medic’s finger, a terribly unfair turn of events dawned upon them.

Trisha was gone.

“Bingo,” a harsh, frustrated voice shouted as Trisha dropped down from the ceiling. With a rather violent kick, she sent Kaden hurtling across the food court until a table managed to ‘catch’ him. As Sophia moved to defend herself, Trisha’s hand shot forward and closed around her throat. A moment later, the healer’s feet were dangling a foot above the ground. With two of her three foes incapacitated, the ex-soldier turned to where Piper had been standing, but this time, it was the redhead who was playing the vanishing game.

“Looks like you’re friend left you to die,” the scorched and visibly infuriated Trisha Demolic rasped as she tightened her grip around the thin neck of the blonde. A few yards away, Kaden was scurrying to his feet, but by in the time it would take for him to save Sophia, Trisha would have had more than enough time to snap her neck.

“Predictable!” Piper screamed from somewhere above the two. With a visible frown, Trisha lifted her head in the direction of the redhead’s voice. What she saw was not the lithe form of Piper Juunangou. Instead there was an ice cream cart plummeting down onto her from the second story of the food court.

Grunting beneath her slightly haggard breathing, Trisha flicked Sophia aside and lifted both of her hands to catch the freefalling cart. It was then that the ex-soldier caught the sparkle of lights in her peripheral vision. With a heavy frown, Trisha turned and clenched her fist as Piper came charging at her, knife primed and ready to end the day.

“Got you,” Piper whispered as she teleported away a few feet in front of the blonde-haired woman. For a moment, Trisha pondered the meaning of Piper’s remark, but just as she realized what had happened, she was crushed beneath the ice cream cart.

Rematerializing, Piper immediately turned her attention to Sophia, who was lying very still on the ground a few feet away from the wreckage of the cart. Dropping to her knees, the redhead slid an arm around Sophia’s neck and pulled the slightly smaller woman up into a standing position.

“Are you okay?” Piper asked as the woman began to cough and gag as her body desperately tried to draw air into its oxygen-deprived lungs. After a few moments, Sophia calmed down enough to nod her head and respond to the question.

“Yea…just a little lightheaded,” she muttered as Piper helped her up to her feet. A beat later, they were joined by the equally battered and bruised courier, who looked pale as a ghost until he realized that Sophia would survive her up close and personal interaction with Trisha.

“Is that it?” Sophia inquired as the groups’ eyes moved to the broken ice cream cart that lie where Trisha had stood just a minute before. Around the crumbled metal cart, a pool of melted ice cream was slowly expanding in all directions. Piper swore she saw streaks of red in that gooey liquid, but before she could be certain, the broken cart suddenly lurched up into the air. Soon thereafter, it was sent careening to the side by a bloodied, enraged Trisha Demolic.

Despite the burns and the light cuts that now dotted the woman’s body, the ex-soldier’s eyes still burned with an unyielding fury. Her mouth, which had been for the most part a snide grin, was now a vengeful scowl. After cracking her knuckles, Trisha drew her violet weapons and began to casually walk toward the trio.

Realizing that her double-barrel was several arms’ lengths way, Piper tightened her grip on the stolen dagger. As she did, the weapon began to glow with a soft green hue.

“Time to take out the trash,” Trisha seethed as she pulled back the hammer on her pistol and let loose the first shot. On that cue, the trio of winded, beleaguered contestants scattered.

[Kaden]

To say that things were getting out of control was quickly becoming more than an understatement. Trisha seemed determined to push Kaden's allies beyond the breaking point. While he didn't agree with Sophia and Piper's moral concession, he definitely understood it. Sophia had been right, it wasn't right for her to be prepared to give up her life just to make it a little easier for Kaden to sleep at night. Piper's decision had simply been a rational one: if they didn't take care of Trisha, she would take care of them. Kaden couldn't really argue with that.

As he continued to turn over ideas and thoughts in his mind, the courier had to take a short intermission to dive out of the path of Trisha's pistol. As he pulled himself back to a standing position, Kaden could feel his legs threatening to give out. He knew he didn't possess the physical endurance that Piper did, but it was... underwhelming to see that even Sophia seemed to be handling their physical trials better than he was.

For some reason, Kaden only stand back and watch as Trisha turned towards Sophia and dashed forward, her dagger gripped firmly in her hand. Before Trisha could reach the priestess, however, Piper intercepted her with a flash of her own glowing blade. As Kai's wife turned to address the latest threat, she was forced to dance away from a series of ki blasts fired by Sophia. Between the priestess and the medic, Trisha was pushed onto the defensive. The trophy wife's strength and speed, however, kept Kaden's allies from gaining any true advantage. The three women seemed to be at something of a stalemate.

And then there was Kaden. In a battle between people ready to kill each other, there didn't seem to be a place for someone full of uncertanty and hesitation. Unless, of course, that person was just determined to get themselves killed. For some, it have come as a relief to sit back and wait for an opportune moment to strike, the perfect moment to end the bloodshed with a single attack. For Kaden, such a prospect was simply too risky. Unfortunately, the only plans he could actually come up with involved a huge amount of risk anyway.

Risk to himself wasn't something Kaden minded. He'd put someone else's livelihood in front of his own every single time in a situation like the one he was in. Sadly, that wasn't really the choice he had to make. He barely had any choice in what would happen at all, not that he was trying to excuse himself. There were two pathes in front of him and it wasn't hard to decide which to take. Either he would do nothing and Trisha would kill them all, or he would act and just hope that he would be the one to deal Kai's wife the "finishing" blow.

A sudden cry of pain pulled Kaden's attention back to the fight. Piper had received a kick that could only be described as massive, and was sent skidding across the food court floor. Trisha turned to Sophia, hoping to capitalize on the sudden opening, but wouldn't get the chance. Hopping back to her feet, Piper vaulted forward into the air. To Kaden's surprise, the medic vanished in a shimmer of light, reappearing directly in front of Trisha almost instantaneously. Piper placed both her feet squarely on Trisha's chest and sent the woman flying backwards with a powerful kick.

Sophia and Piper exchanged a quick word as Trisha flipped backwards. The ex-soldier managed to right herself mid-flight and land softly on her feet. To Kaden's chagrin, she was no more than a couple of yards away from him. Whether she was more distracted by Piper and Sophia, or she just didn't see the courier as a threat, Kaden didn't even seem to be a blip on her radar. If Kaden was going to act, he had to do it right then, and right there. He slowly raised a shaking hand.

Barely pausing to catch her breath, Trisha bent forward, prepared to charge Piper and Sophia once more. Before she could take more than a step, though, she ran headlong into a shimmering curtain of cerulean energy. Trisha took a step away from the barrier of ki, confused by its sudden appearance. Before she could glean any answers, though, the barrier flashed with light and the woman was sent stumbling backwards.

Caught off guard and stumbling backwards was pretty much the only way Kaden was going to get close to Trisha, and he was morely than a little surprised when he managed to pull it off. Kaden's hands shot forward, barely striking Trisha before spun away from the courier and whipped the butt of her pistol across his face.

Piper and Sophia rushed forward as Kaden tumbled to the ground. Trisha was too busy putting distance between her three opponents to follow-up her attack on Kaden. Both of Kaden's allies watched as Trisha almost stumbled backwards, a combination of confusion and frustration plastering itself across her face. As Piper helped Kaden to his feet, she noticed a sad smile cross his face as he apprised Trisha with glowing eyes.

"What the hell did you just do!?" Kai's wife growled at the courier.

"Don't worry." Kaden assured her, "it's not permanent."

The flow of ki to Trisha's legs had been Locked by one of Kaden's more intricate techniques. For a few minutes, the woman wouldn't be able to use the speed that had kept her out of harm's way. At least, she wouldn't be able to use most of it. Regardless, Kaden, Piper, and Sophia were in a much stronger position than they had been only minutes before.

"However," Kaden took a step toward Trisha, adding on to his previous statement. "Death will be." Kaden sighed and shook his head. "And I really don't think you want that, Trisha."

"What I really want is to slit your throat and be done with this," the woman growled back.

"We all want to be done with this!" Kaden suddenly yelled back. "Look at us! You've been driving around in comfortable cars, talking to friends on your phone, and just enjoying the show. We've been out here almost getting killed time after time after time."

"Yeah, well, that's your problem." Kai's wife was obviously more interested in examining her legs than anything Kaden had to say.

"No!" Waving a hand in frustration, Kaden took another step forward. "It's your problem Trisha. What are you even doing here? Coming to kill us because Kai told you to? Is that how you marriage works; he tell you what to do and you just nod along like a good little girl?"

"You don't anythi--"

"Oh please. You think you're someone special? You think you're any different from the millions of people living on Earth? You do what you're told because it's easy. Because its safe. Because as long as you do you're not on your own. I know that feeling better than you'd think, Trisha."

As Kaden took yet another step towards Trisha, Piper and Sophia exchanged nervous glances. They're muscles tensed as they prepared themselves to move at a moment's notice. Kaden had no intention of telling them that Trisha was in a dangerous position. If he did, there was no doubt in his mind that they would try to finish things, and that wasn't what he wanted. In the meantime, Trisha simply watched Kaden with a glare.

"How do you think this is going to end, Trisha? You might be able to kill all three of us and go back to bowing your head to Kai, or you might lose. Both of my friends back there have no problems killing you, but I don't think you're even that afraid of death. I think you're more worried about losing and living. I don't get the impression that Kai smiles on people who fail."

Trisha's eyes darted to the side for only a moment as Kaden spoke. The courier would have been intrigued by such a thing if he were less focused on the flow of her ki. His time was limited and he needed to know when to wrap things up.

"But maybe you're supposed to fail," the courier continued. "Do you really think his master plan is for you to end his show by killing all the competitors? Or do you think it's to die trying to keep that emblem away from us? Which sounds like better television to you? That's all this is, after all. Everyone here is just playing his game. Either you never realized and you're stupider than you look, or you know it's true."

"Do you have a point," Trisha's voice had softened, but Kaden had no idea whether or not that was a good thing. "Or do you just like to hear the sound of your own voice?"

"My point," Kaden took one final step towards Trisha, placing him just beyond arm's reach. "Is that I want to give you a choice. More of a choice, I'm betting, than you've had in a long time. Show us that you're not just some puppet. Show Kai that you're here because you want to be and not because you have to. Show the world that you're strong enough to make a place for yourself. Come help us stop this."

"Kaden!"
"Kaden!"

The courier turned his head to see Sophia and Piper stepping forward, neither of them looking particularly pleased.

"You can't be serious!" Sophia's voice carried more frustration than Kaden was expecting.

"That's not a good idea," Piper said. While she may have been right, Kaden had no intention of changing his mind.

"Even if I wanted to help you children," Trisha scoffed, "I doubt your friends would be overly accomodating."

"I trust them, Trisha," Kaden's voice was soft. "And I don't expect that to mean much to you, but I don't think either of them would try to kill someone willing to help us. If they did," Kaden clenched his fist to keep his hand from shaking. "I'd stop them myself."

"Hahahaha..." Trisha shook her head. "You would stop both of them?"

"Don't underestimate me, Trisha." Kaden could feel his energy flowing. The scar on his chest began to glow faintly as energy poured through the seal on his chest. "I'm not saying this, I'm not offering you this, because I'm weak. I'm not afraid of you," the courier lied. "And I'm not afraid of a fight. I'm afraid of what will happen if I have to end one. Far too many people have died today."

"You seem awfully confident, boy," Trisha sneered at him.

With a frown, Kaden extended an arm forward, gathering in his energy as he did. Forcing open Solina's seal had taken Kaden quite a while to figure out, even conceptually. Actually putting it into practice was something he had only done once before. The feeling of even a fraction of his energy flowing freely once again was almost exhilerating to Kaden. If the situation were less intense, he might take some kind to simply enjoy the wisps of cerulean light that drifted off of his outstretched hand. Unfortunately, he had a point to make.

A ball of light sparked into existance in Kaden's palm and, with a flick of his wrist, the courier sent it shooting forward. Trisha's head snapped to the side as Kaden's attack sailed past, and her eyes locked on to the courier's. Her sneer remained on her face only as long as it took the ball of ki to crash into the far side of the food court.

Despite the deafening roar of the explosion, and the brilliant glow of blue energy, Kaden kept his eyes locked on Trisha as his blast hit home. The ball of energy expanded outward, easily enveloping the second level balcony and making it half-way to the third, before the explosion collapsed upon itself. What was left was little more than a spherical crater filled with debris.

"My technique will wear off soon," Kaden said after a significant silence. His glowing eyes scanned Trisha's leg. "So you have a choice to make. If you fight us, we'll fight back. I don't want anyone to die, and I'll do whatever I can to take that emblem without killing you, but I won't be holding back; Piper and Sophia's lives mean more to me than yours. All you have to do to help, though, is just give us the emblem. We will make sure Kai answers for what's happened today, and you can be there when he does if you want, or you can just go your own way."

"Really," ki rose from Kaden's shoulder like cerulean steam as he continued, "it boils down to one very simple question. Right here, right now, Trisha," Kaden extended a hand to Kai's wife, "friend or foe?"

[Friend or Foe]

The boy in the trademark red jacket was giving another one of his big hero speeches. There was a pro and con to this for Kai Demolic. It was great for ratings, as everybody loved the underdog and would enjoy rooting for (or against) him. He had a great optimistic view of life, as somebody who hasn't quite yet found out exactly what life has to offer. Give him another twenty years, Kai figured, and he would have changed his tune in the speech. As soon as he found out that the world didn't work on faith and happy thoughts.

The director of Friend or Foe sat in his chair, alone in the camera-monitoring room. He was in the boardroom where he had previously briefed his Demons on their instructions, and then he had got a page about Trisha's fight going wrong. So far, Sebastian and Rosemary had things under control, even if Rose had killed one too many. Trisha, however...was way behind schedule.

Kai sat and watched his wife of three years (and girlfriend of seven) listen to the speech of Kaden. She was denying everything he said and struggling to get out, so it was obvious that the speech wasn't going to work. But the more she listened, the more she seemed to relax her pose. Even though Kai would have liked to have faith in her, it was very hard.

She was always bad with decisions. She was a drug user, a horrible money spender and never finished anything that she started. When she was in the military, despite being one of the best sharpshooters in the military, she was kicked out because of her inability to follow orders. She joined one of the most respectable fighting dojos in Central City, but her tendancy to sway towards unacceptable violence had her kicked out.

The smartest man in the world had been friends with her since the days of the Frost War. They started dating as Kai's weapon production company was getting off the ground. Soon, after Trisha lost her position in the dojo, she was living off of his money, and he was okay with that. Hell, considering how beautiful she was, he probably would never mind it. But when it came to this idea, the idea of Friend or Foe, she finally was able to show her use.

There was a time that Kai Demolic was in love with Patricia Gibbons. There was a day that he would have given up every bit of intelligence, money and fame he accumulated just to hear her speak. That was a beautiful time in his life.

But her fifteen minutes were up. Trisha Demolic was no longer worth the risk.

He put the radio to his lips.

"Take the shot."

*****

There was an air of silence. Trisha Demolic knew deep down there was no way in hell that giving the Emblem to these three misfits was going to end well for her. She had seen first hand the kind of power that Kai could come up with. He thought about every last little thing that could possible happen. He had a back-up plan for his back-up plans. There wasn't a second in time that Trisha considered helping these outcasts.

But there still the idea of what would happen. Maybe they were right. In fact, she was almost positive they were right. Kai probably never really loved. He was like a robot, really. He was too smart for his own good, so he could do absolutely everything right. But she doubted he could feel anything like love. He was too much of a business man for that...she was just the trophy wife. Famous soldier, talented fighter, beautiful woman. What more could a celebrity ask for in a bride?

But she had been okay with that, until now, realizing exactly what that meant. So she kills these three outcasts...was that all? No, this was a television show. People didn't pay to see the villains win. At least not without a huge fight. Not three on one.

She could feel the sensation in her legs again, allowing her to move them correctly. She pulled a small orb out of her torn jeans, squeezing the Raptor Emblem. She stepped forward, holding it up.

Kaden stepped forward.

Trisha smiled. Sophia and Piper tensed.

Was this it? Was she really going along with it? Did she finally have enough of Kai's treatment? Had Kaden won her over?

Nobody would ever find out. A sniper shot opened fire, and a bullet lodged in the center of her spine. Her gut opened up, blasting blood over Kaden's body. Before he or the girls could react, machine gun rained down on them, causing them to scatter.

Because she was closest, Kaden's instinct was to tackle Trisha out of the way. The machine gun fire chased them all the way into a small cafe, with the blonde dragging the woman behind him. She had a huge opening in her chest, and it wasn't getting any better. Kaden hoped that behind him, Sophia was close because the only way to save Trisha was with immediate healing.

Unfortunately, he quickly realized as he ducked behind cover in the cafe, that Sophia and Piper had retreated in the opposite direction, being chased by sniper fire. Piper had been hit somewhere, he noted, but Sophia was already healing it, while at the same time the redhead returned fire.

"Fuck..." Trisha spat, red liquid pouring onto her beautifully tanned face. "He really did it...he...he had me taken out..."

"Don't talk," Kaden instructed, trying to think of what to do. "Damn, I need to get you patched up. I just don't know what to do!"

Trisha wasn't about to turn away medical attention, but she knew was she was going to do to get out of this. She wasn't the kind of person to just suddenly jump sides, helping out the opposition. No, Trisha worked for herself. "Go get the blonde chick," Trisha panted, feeling herself stating to lose conscienceness. "Get her to heal it."

Kaden nodded and turned to run. Trisha used her good arm to slide the Raptor Emblem in his pocket.

As Kaden ran through the gunfire that lit up the bottom floor of the mall, Trisha was pulling out a tiny blue orb, known as a teleportation grenade. It was exactly the same kind of power that sent the eliminated contestants out of the game. It might not save her, but it would give her a chance, while still looking like like she was dead.

Kaden turned when he heard a loud buzzing sound. He ducked behind a hot dog cart just as the cafe Trisha was at erupted in a blaze of blue fire. The explosion sent the glass windows breaking towards him, but he ducked back behind the cart in time to dodge it.

He had no way of knowing that Trisha had selfishly teleported herself to safety. The first thing he thought was that she had commited suicide. Of course, it didn't totally add up...why would she blow herself up? There was something he was missing...

"Kaden!" He heard, breaking his thoughts. He turned to see his friends, pinned down behind a wall. "We need a plan!"















(There you go. Trisha is gone, you've got the Emblem in Kaden's pocket (but he doesn't know it), and you just have to escape Kai's henchmen now)

[Piper Juunanagou]

The battle was over—all that was left of Trisha Demolic was a handful of small blue fires clinging to life against the ruined exterior of the café. Try as she could to find a redeeming quality about the woman, Piper could not, which caused her to immediately forget about Kai’s dead wife and move onto her own problems.

“You’re good to go,” Sophia said with a flustered sigh as she sagged backwards against the wall of the small bar that the duo had garrisoned behind. “Do you have a plan?” The healer asked, repeating the same question that Piper had screamed over to Kaden a few moments earlier.

“Well…” Piper started before she was silence by the hail of machinegun fire. After the hail of bullets died down, the medic let out a heavy sigh and glanced over at her slightly frazzled teammate. “We just need to get up there and bludgeon those guys until they lose consciousness,” the redhead shouted as another spray of bullets punished the nearby area.

“How are we supposed to get up there?” Sophia shouted above the gunfire as a playful grin spread across Piper’s dirty, flustered face.

“You can leave that to me,” the medic snickered as she fizzled out of existence. With a cocked eyebrow, the blonde healer crawled forward and tried to peek over the shattered bar without getting her face torn apart by the various streams of energized bullets showering down from the second floor.

In a puff of light particles, Piper popped into existence behind a trio of gun-totting mercenaries. As the three trained killers tried to pivot their bodies in an effort to turn their high-tech weapons upon the medic, she sent two of them plummeting over the balcony with a violent clothesline. And then a split-second later, her right foot found its mark upon the third man’s chest and sent him crashing through the railing and down to the court below.

“Piper!” Kaden’s voice was almost a whisper against the cacophony of machinegun fire. Glancing quickly over her shoulder, the woman managed to flash her male companion a warm smile before another team of soldiers engaged her. Piper heard the courier’s warning, but by then, she was already gone—nothing left behind by an ephemeral cloud of dancing lights.

“Damn it,” one of Kai’s grunts shouted through his helmet as he began to scan the balcony for the missing woman. “Just keep an eye out for the frilly light show,” the soldier barked, his tone laced with smug sadism as he cocked his heavy weapon. In the court below, Piper’s tryst with the soldiers had given both Kaden and Sophia the time they’d needed to get out of imminent danger. As the courier scaled a broken section of the balcony, he saw his red-haired companion reappear at the very apex of the courtyard.

With the faintest inkling of a grin on her face, Piper let go of the fancy support structure and took a dive down toward the group of five soldiers. When she was close enough, she swung her legs down and used the man at the back of the group to break her fall. At the sound of their comrade’s cry of pain and the audible snap that resounded from his sundered knee joints, the other members of the squad swung around in unison and opened fire on the medic.

Kicking up from the broken, writhing soldier, Piper jumped over the group of soldiers and managed to land flawlessly on the other side of them. As they moved to one again open fire on her, the redhead sprung forward and wrapped her hands around the neck of the lead soldier. With a grunt and some torque, she ejected the armored soldier from the balcony. Unfortunately for Piper Juunanagou, her little display had given the remaining soldiers all the time they had needed to level their weapons square with her eyes.

“Last requests?” The mercenary in the middle rasped behind his translucent visor as his arm muscles clenched around the heavy weapon.

“Just one thing,” Piper said as she lifted her hands in a show of pacifism. Mildly amused by the retort, the same soldier let out a smug grunt and seemed to just slightly relax his aggressive pose.

“What’s that?” The same thug inquired.

“Look behind you,” the redhead spoke with a grin as she lifted a finger and pointed behind the trio. Before any of them had a chance to realize what she meant, Kaden incapacitated two of the thugs, leaving Piper just the window she needed to bury the tip of her boot into the middle man’s groin. Almost instantaneously, a muffled scream escaped through the visor as the thug’s grip on his massive weapon failed. Before the energy weapon had a chance to hit the floor, Piper had already sent its owner careening down into the food court with a solid kick.

“Thanks,” Piper said with another smile as another small battalion of soldiers rushed in through one of the nearby hallways. Before the duo could have a moment to talk, they were separated once again by machinegun fire. With a grunt, the medic threw herself back over the railing as the courier lunged toward the momentary safety of a disheveled burger joint.

One story below, the redhead hit the ground with a resounding thud and rolled a few feet before coming to rest in front of the shattered remains of a small pool that was filled with discarded change. A ragged cough fought its way up from the woman’s beleaguered lungs as she attempted to take the momentary reprieve to regain her bearings. Despite her wishes to the contrary, the break came to a loud and jarring end only a few seconds after it had begun.

Scrambling forward on her hands and knees, Piper clenched her eyes shut as she tried to put some distance between herself and the hail of energized bullets tearing apart the linoleum behind her. Incoherent obscenities ran rampant through the woman’s head as she snapped her eyes open in time to see that she was close to a large chunk of broken balcony.

With the heat of the encroaching energy bullets singing the tiny hairs at the back of her neck, the woman bit down on her lower lip and awkwardly hopped off the floor toward the chunk of steel and plastic. Reaching her desperate hands forward, the woman grasped at a twisted piece of rebar and used it to swing her body around the debris. As she tumbled to the broken, dusty floor behind the huge chunk of balcony, Piper let out a sigh of relief as the debris shuddered beneath the energized onslaught.

She knew her cover wouldn’t last for that much longer, but it would at least give her a breather from the unrelenting chaos that she had been dealing with since entering the mall. This entire scenario was making the woman rather exited to put an end to things and get back to the military base.

As if it had been waiting specifically for Piper’s thoughts to drift to happier places, the hulking piece of debris suddenly split down the middle, prompting the woman to dive to safety once more. With a grunt, she flipped up to a standing position and tightened her hands into tight fists.

Here we go again. Piper mused as she disappeared in a swirl of blues and whites.

[Jesper]

“…friend or foe?”

The phrase made Sophia wince. Kaden had no reason to know how such a tiny phrase would affect the priestess, but it did all the same. Her thoughts immediately turned towards the tailed boy Juno as silence blanketed the already eerily-silent mall; although he would never have admitted it, his eyes screamed panic when she chose to essentially end his life. Pride probably made such a sentiment embarrassing to the kid, but Sophia definitely understood it. Death was a hefty price to pay for anything. The prospect of being killed made her shiver, and even when the tiniest feeling of hypocrisy hit her, she used it as a reminder to stay alive.

That was her mindset. That was her reality.

Reality, however, has a funny way of crashing down around a person. Through the foggy haze of silence came a single shot. The sound was louder than anything she had heard in the small timeframe that she had been inside the mall, and when it ended, the silence seemed even more agonizing. At first, the priestess had no idea what had happened. She looked around; first at her comrades to see if there had been a change in either of their facial reactions. The grim look pasted upon their visages pointed to the same thing, and when Sophia turned, she followed Trisha’s eyes to come to the same grueling conclusion.

“Fuck…he…he really did it…” she heard the trophy wife mutter through the pressure that had built up in the priestess’ ears. All eyes were on the gaping wound in her gut, and after the longest seconds of her life, Trisha slumped to the ground. Kaden rushed over to her and kneeled down, a panicked expression mirroring the expression Juno wore that Sophia remembered so well. He started talking to her in a calming voice, though Sophia was too shaken to comprehend the meaning behind those words.

One phrase from Trisha broke the threshold of understanding, however, as she pointed towards the priestess. “That blonde chick. Get her to heal it.”

Kaden turned to look at Sophia, and she found herself nodding her head violently. It was funny how readily she was willing to help the person she desperately wanted to destroy not ten minutes earlier. She supposed that death was the ultimate cure for a misdirected moral compass as she took a step forward to approach the wounded woman. This was her job; the way she made her bread. This was her moment to shine.

However, a click and an explosion of blue fire later, that moment was gone. Trisha had disappeared; escaped into oblivion for reasons that only she could have understood. Sophia so desperately wanted to know how her mind worked, and if she had time, she would have searched for a way to find the answers she sought. The machine gun fire that had her and Piper pinned down against a wall, however, made it difficult to do anything but focus on her own survival.

Piper voiced the sentiment that Sophia carried as they ducked their heads to avoid the gunfire. “We need a plan, Kaden!”

“Do you have a plan?” Sophia inquired.

“Well…we just need to get up there and bludgeon these guys until they lose consciousness.”

That sounded simple enough. There was just one problem. “How are we supposed to get up there?”

“Leave that to me.”

After saying that, Piper disappeared in the flash of light, leaving Sophia a bit breathless. The gunfire immediately stopped, allowing both Sophia and Kaden to take a peek at the mercenaries overhead. Sophia actually stood up, which upon later retrospect was the worst idea ever, to see what was going on. Had Piper distracted them somehow? Were they dead? Her answers came immediately as the trio flew over the railing and crashed to the ground below.

“She’s a genius,” Kaden laughed as he ran towards the fallen soldiers to assist the medic. Sophia nodded and took a step to follow, but more gunfire halted her progress. She nearly lost her balance as she wobbled backwards to avoid the bullets as they whizzed by.

“There’s one of them!” she heard a man shout. “You attend to the others. We’ll get the blonde.”

Sophia thought about staying and fighting, if only for a second. The ensuing footsteps made her immediately reconsider. The priestess turned around and started running, trying desperately to find an empty hallway to give herself a chance to get away. Thoughts of her allies gradually faded away as she found her destination, hoping that she didn’t run into a dead end. The footsteps behind her grew louder as they began to catch up, and finally, the fatigue caught up with her and resulted in a very annoying stinging in her legs. As the door in front of her flew open, however, she found that to be the least of her worries.

“Sorry, girly,” Kai’s croney smirked. “End of the line.”

Another soldier caught up behind her, effectively closing her in. The man in front of her even cocked his gun menacingly and pointed it at her. “Got anything to say?”

“Well…I guess I should warn you,” she sighed, slowly widening her stance.

“About what?” the voice behind her sounded amused.

“I’m a tired, dirty, and extremely emotional girl right now,” she slowly raised her fists. “Know what that means?”

The guard laughed and tightened his squeeze on the trigger. However, Sophia whipped her hand forward and knocked the barrel to the side, narrowly avoiding a headshot as the gun went off. A gasp immediately followed a sickening thwack. The blood splattered on the wall and the sudden thump made it so she didn’t have to turn around—the guard behind her was, suffice it to say, no longer any danger.

“What the hell?”

Sophia smiled as she kicked forward, knocking the wind out of his lungs and subsequently knocking him unconscious. She bent over and raised a fist to deliver the final blow, however…she couldn’t do it. As much as she tried to explain it to herself in her head, she knew she couldn’t do it. She told herself over and over again that this man was trying to kill her. He would likely try to kill her even if she spared his life and he somehow regained consciousness. He would never give her the light of day. But, somehow, Kaden’s voice remained somewhere in the back of her head, telling her that it wasn’t necessary.

And, as she tried to double back and regroup with his friends, she knew that he had been right.

[Friend or Foe]

Everybody advances to the final six. Congratulations.