Arson put on the breathing masked and immediately kicked in the door. Screams could already be heard throughout the entire building, and Arson couldn’t help but chuckle.

  Something tells me this is about to get weird…

  The screams that came from further into the building made Arson pause multiple times, like a child walking past their parents bedroom during a particularly flagrant argument, not meant to be heard by children’s ears.

  His eyebrows rose, and he smirked, truly looking around for the first time, only to realize his plan to catch the drug dealers within off-guard, may be working too well.

  A fog wafted through the hall, whipped into a frenzy by the air conditioning. The fumes of the potent narcotic was not only quick to filter throughout any bit of unaffected space, but was even more volatile once breathed in by the occupants of the building.

  Arson couldn’t help but laugh seeing men and women run in between the open rooms frantically trying to escape, only to be further effected by the roaming fog.

  Arson: Xani, not going to lie, this is a lot worse than I thought it would be….

  Xani: I sparking told you! I said it multiple times, the reaction from how you had Rob mix that bloody drug is as close to weaponized as possible.

  Arson lifted his watch to share a captured projection of one of the rooms, sending the hologram to Xani’s tablet.

  Xani: Oh my…!

  The hologram that was being recorded above Arson’s watch showed naked men and women dancing rhythmically to absolutely no music.

  Arson: That guy has some moves, right?

  Xani: you’re terrible… but yeah, he is a smooth dancer…

  Arson: I’m terrible? Tell me that you haven’t already sent this to anyone and I’ll send you every bit of money I’ve made since we got here…

  Xani: By the Maiden, I literally just hit send on the group message, you couldn’t have sent that sooner?

  Arson laughed, and shook his head. Taking down the building would be simple if every room inside was affected to this degree. Yet Arson still sighed knowing how much work he had before him as he pulled free a pair of zip ties from the near thousand in his spatial inventory.

  “Let’s see if I can make this quick….?”

  The first few rooms were easy enough to handle. Many of the workers within were either asleep, dancing, or fornicating, making tying them up rather easy. However once Arson began to get lower down into the building, everything changed rapidly.

  Either the drug hadn’t made it entirely down through the whole structure, or those on the lower floors had much higher resiliences to the narcotic being vented throughout the building.

  Arson was charged as soon as he made it to the eleventh floor of thirteen. He hadn’t even fully stepped from the stair well when a flailing couple of drug dealers rushed him, both swinging wildly in their approach.

  How the sparks did they know I was coming, thought Arson as he ducked one blow, turning his head to dodge another. A glancing blow still managed to clip his breathing mask, knocking it away from his mouth just long enough for him to breathe in a lung full of the potent narcotic.

  Normally for Arson this wouldn’t be a problem, as his mana’s ability to flush his system through its healing properties was unrivaled. Normally…

  Now though, Arson hadn’t been cycling mana since they’d gotten to the resort. He didn’t want to fall back on his habit of relying on mana while undercover as Carter Gestalt, so had completely stopped cycling mana or using the breathing technique he learned while in Endless.

  Arson’s eyes dilated, and everything slowed around him. He suddenly felt as if he was watching his own body move from a few yards away, which caused the two drug dealers to get the jump on him.

  A series of blows landed, but Arson felt nothing, and instead started to laugh, speaking his normally vaulted thoughts aloud as he slowly began to defend himself.

  “Have you ever had gummy candy?”

  The bewildered faces on the dealers was completely missed by Arson as he bobbed and weaved through the sloppy punches from the pair. Arson slapped away many ill-aimed strikes, giggling constantly as the dealers grew more agitated.

  “All your punches feel like gummy candy, no weight like fresh marshmallows, you should work on that,” said Arson, his voice lowering conspiratorially. Arson looking both ways down the hallway as if to make sure he wasn’t overheard, before he looked at the pair and nodded as if keeping their darkest secret.

  The next two blows from Arson were particularly devastating, as one dealer was punched in the collar bone and the other in the spine. Both bones snapped, making both dealers crumple to the ground instantly.

  Arson was walking off before either of his opponents fully touched the ground. The men groaned in agony, and would have gotten away with their singular injuries, until one began to insult Arson, the young man normally uncaring and able to ignore simple insults. Normally…

  “Oh yeah, walk away you little rat, that is why your mother warmed my bed last night, made me feel real good!”

  Arson’s mind twisted from overwhelming bliss, transitioning toward outright rage in an instant. His yet to be named scythe filled his grasp; his grip tightening as he gritted his teeth, unable to push aside his blooming anger.

  Arson’s currently drug addled psychosis wasn’t able to brush aside the nonsensical blathering of the man he’d just struck down. The young scion had no layer between his emotions and his thought process as he was. So even though his growing frustration ate through the external influence that was the powerful drug that rushed through his veins, in an instant, it still managed to open a door that Arson left closed within his mind.

  Behind the locked space of his mental, slept not only his darkest memories and feelings, but also a primal being born of the blood of dragons and phoenix. The Fury, and its sibling, Reaper.

  “What did you say…?”

  Arson didn’t turn around as the dealer sporting a broken collar bone laughed through his pain long enough to continue to babble senselessly in his direction.

  “You heard me, you trash can baby, I used your mother like a comforter last night and—“

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  The dealer’s words were cut off by a wave of force so powerful that Arson didn’t even need to close the distance. The man’s head slid free of his neck with the same ease seen by butchers when deli meat was cut by an electric slicer.

  All it took was one swing. A movement practiced countless times throughout Arson’s journey through Endless to kill powerful foes, now used to end the life of a person seemingly defenseless against the young scion.

  Only his suffocated traumas couldn’t be suppressed after a single burst of emotion. What happened next was nothing but bloodshed for the sake of bloodshed.

  Arson became the monster of his own nightmares as he roamed the halls of the drug den. His shadow whispering the purest of violence and horrific levels of persuasion to push him toward carnage. Using his doubts, fears, insecurities, and more to push Arson over the edge.

  No one loves you, Arson, said Reaper within his mind.

  They all want you dead. They want you to bleed. They want you to suffer.

  Arson growled as the beast within him fought to be freed from its cage. The wings beneath his skin rippled as power flooded him from his ancestral birthright. His blood beginning to boil as his inner Fury began to awaken.

  You must end them Brother. Nothing can stop us. We are the end and the beginning. We are Omen, we are Omni. We are the Cloud and the Reign.

  Arson roared and the building shook from top to bottom.

  We are the storm!

  Arson became a blur as his culling began. He was charged as many more drug dealers entered the hallways he traveled down. No longer did he intend to capture those that rushed toward him, but instead his blade drank the souls of all who crossed his path.

  No blow came close to him. No bullet fired touched his skin. Only screams and the sound of his weapon being swung could be heard.

  He entered a floor with nothing but wide open space to find dozens of thugs waiting for him. The group held weapons, wielded elements, and even held hostages, assuming Arson to be from Graveyard.

  Arson didn’t pause when faced with the numerous foes. His stride unaffected as he spun his large scythe through his fingertips.

  A woman at the head of the crowd began to speak, only to lose her head before she was able to say a single word.

  Her head fell free of her shoulders, and before her skull could touch the ground, Arson was already bisecting his next target, flipping through the frantic attacks tossed toward him.

  A missed purple fireball was vaulted, colliding with another of his foes, instantly turning a stunned young woman to ash. The second purple projectile was also smoothly dodged, as Arson pirouetted the fireball, while simultaneously spartan-kicking another foe, beheading them in one fluid motion.

  His bursts of speed were so incredible, that he seemed to be teleporting around the room. Spinning through attacks, killing individuals in every instance his figure was stationary long enough to be seen.

  It is time!

  Arson spartan-kicked a fleeing woman in the back, sending her clear out a window. The sound of the glass breaking drew the eye of people walking near to the building, causing onlookers to gape when the woman’s screams ended with her collision into the street below.

  Those on the lower floors of the resort were used to many kinds of violence in events and occasional spurts of chaos and mayhem throughout the streets, but when more and more bodies were sent soaring, most of which plummeted to their deaths, guests begun to realize quickly that something was wrong.

  …

  Jasmine and Xani sat working in the conference room of the hotel their group had yet to name. They’d long found comfort and had become silent after catching up, as one worked on projects based outside the resort as the other conquered their workings within RaidCorp Coliseum.

  “No sparking way…”

  Jasmine looked up to see Xani muttering to herself, and rolled her eyes. She almost returned to her work, until she saw the holograms in front of Xani.

  “What the sparks,” cursed Jasmine, looking at a series of cameras all displaying various apartments within a building, filled top to bottom with treasure.

  Jasmine could see mountains of raw uncut precious stones. Bricks of diamond and gold. As well as server rooms filled with what Jasmine could only assume was an unfathomable amount of stored credits.

  “I am either the luckiest person alive, or the best hacker to ever live,” said Xani softly as she lifted her gaze to smile faintly at Jasmine. Her friend’s eyes darting about a mere instant after their gazes met.

  “I would say both, sister, but why do you look like you’re about to use the bathroom right here and now….?”

  “Sparks, sparks, sparks,” yelled Xani, jumping to her feet and beginning to frantically press buttons on the large conference table, seemingly attempting to close windows down continuously as more and more screens popped up showing more and more areas filled with treasure.

  “Help me, woman, don’t just sit there!”

  “What, how, what?”

  “Help me close these down before they find out I got in!”

  “Jasmine nearly tripped as she rose, almost rushing around the table, before deciding to climb over the conference table completely.

  “What the bloody embers are you doing over here, Xani!”

  Both young woman rapidly continuing to close the pop ups like children nearly caught looking at adult websites on the holo-web.

  “I got bored, I tried to find the sparking treasure this whole place is known for, I found it!”

  “Well, why does it feel like the treasure found us!”

  “Because in my brilliance when I saw a file called treasure surveillance I thought it was too good to be true, and instead of opening the dot file through a program, I extracted it as a whole!”

  “You know I have no idea what any of that means, right!”

  “Just keep closing the screens woman!”

  The two rapidly worked on trying to stop the pop ups, only to both end up feeling like there was no end in site. Only for Jasmine’s eyes to go wide as Xani picked up the chair behind her and began to smash the conference table.

  “What the…” tried Jasmine, receiving a glare from Xani as she repeatedly smashed the table.

  “Help me!”

  After a while of the smash job, both young women sat in the very same chairs they’d used to destroy the conference table. Their now bent furniture leaving them leaning and exhausted; breathing heavily as they stared at the remnants of the table they’d come to collaboratively hate to a certain degree, while also having a grudging respect for the stability of their now dead-ish foe.

  “What the sparks was that table made of,” said Jasmine, jumping in shock as electricity shot from the scattered bits of screen that once served as the table’s surface.

  “A pane of translucent diamond, maybe, I don’t know that shouldn’t have been that bloody hard…”

  “So are we okay, we aren’t going to get our door kicked in, are we? I’m only down here because I needed to pick your brain, not because I wanted to get caught up in a sparking raid,” said Jasmine, wafting her sweat drenched shirt to try and cool down.

  “Yeah maybe, what did you want to pick my brain about?”

  “Oh well, we have to begin the installation for the runes on the waste system and the portal installation. Wait, no, woman, are we good or should I high-tailed it to a higher floor,” yelled Jasmine, nearly distracted by Xani’s calm demeanor as she asked her question.

  “We’re fine, I think, I hope,” yelled Xani, each statement quieter than the previous. Jasmine stared her friend down, until Xani shrugged, not truly knowing the answer to Jasmine’s worries.

  “Don’t worry about it, I will fix this table and clean any records of my snooping, we’re good, and as far as the new contract with RaidCorp goes, Jade should be sending the new hires here through a portal shortly from what Arson told me. Just let me clear this up and I’ll finish the schematics we will be working on.”

  Jasmine’s eyes narrowed, and she looked between the nearly obliterated table and Xani.

  “Don’t look at me like that, you and Lane got so bored you started a television show full of the most ridiculous lines I’ve ever heard in my life,” said Xani, crossing her arms and returning Jasmine’s glare.

  “Shut up, you love it, and don’t put my trifles anywhere near to the same levels of debauchery as what you just had me take part in, Xani,” said Jasmine pointing at her friend, knowing that she’d gotten the upper hand on the girl when the more than dominant young woman looked away with reddening cheeks.

  “The show is good…”

  “Thank you,” said Jasmine smiling to herself.

  “Stop that, flattery will not get you out of this, Xani!”

  “What, the show is great,” started Xani murmuring, only stopping when Jasmine growled at her.

  “Okay, Okay, I’ll tell Arson and see what he wants me to do, better,” asked Xani raising both her hands palm outward, admitting defeat.

  “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but yes, and sooner rather than later, Xani,” said Jasmine, standing as a portal opened within the room they stood in and Jade walked in.

  The regal woman looked between Jasmine, the table and then Xani, only speaking after her powerful gaze met the white haired girl’s, and her eyes narrowed in a way that made Xani know why she’d been so quick to back down after Jasmine had leveled a mockery of that same stare at her not but a few moments prior.

  It’s like she’s all of our mother at this point. Why do I feel like I am in trouble?

  “What did you do, Xani?”

  Oh, wow, I am in trouble! How did she know?

  “What, what did I do?”

  Xani looked between Jasmine and Jade, both wearing the same glare as orphans began to filter in behind the woman.

  “You wear guilt on your face like sloppily applied makeup, Xani. What did you do?” asked Jade as she walked closer, standing close enough to make Xani feel as if she was moments away from being snatched into the air for giving the wrong answer.

  “Hacked the RaidCorp mainframe and found out where they are keeping the resort’s hidden wealth,” muttered Xani underneath her breath as she looked away.

  “Oh,” said Jade, her eyes widening in shock before she struggled to keep the smile off her face, pulling the young woman into a one armed hug. Quickly patting her on the head before separating.

  “Good job,” said Jade in a whisper as the room filled with orphans.

  “What?” said Jasmine in shock; Jade looking between the pair before a contemplative visage took over her features.

  “Don’t tell Almarine I said that,” said Jade nearly whispering. Both young woman nodding back up at her before responding.

  “Yes Ma’am!”

  …

  Khalif stepped free of the building he’d been sent to work on. He like Micro, Arson, and the rest of the Wretches in the PocketApartmentGang all were sent to handle various drug den’s throughout RaidCorp Coliseum, and unlike their previous outing, Khalif left the building feeling quite proud of himself.

  As he walked down the street, a floating vehicle with a tombstone on its side sped by, stopping at the building he’d just left. Though dark, as he glanced over his shoulder from nearly a block away he could see the men and woman carrying out many zip tied individuals.

  “I love vacation,” said Khalif, laughing as he shook his head. One of the Graveyard officers literally walking down the front steps of the building with a still gyrating man slung over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry.

  As he walked further down the street however, all humor was stripped from his face in an instant. He stopped in his tracks, taking in the sight of a building surrounded with Graveyard swat vehicles. A large crowd enveloping the area, all gazing toward the burning structure.

  Isn’t that where Arson is…?

  Khalif pulled his flatscreen from his pocket, making a holo-call to Troy. The phone rang once and she answered, a hologram of her and a beautiful green eyed girl sitting at a bar filling the air above his phone.

  “Yo, what’s going on, everything okay?”

  Khalif pointed his camera toward the flaming building just in time to catch a woman bursting through the glass of a room on one of the top floors.

  The only reason the woman didn’t fall to her death, splattering across the top of one of the many swat vans, was due to the Graveyard officer that flew from the building’s interior, catching the woman a single blink before she completed her crash landing. The narrow save resulting in the woman’s leg snapping like a twig as the officer barely yanked her upward in time as he flew skyward, taking the screaming woman away from the cheering crowd below.

  “You tell me,” said Khalif, turning his camera back towards himself as he spoke.

  “Bloody embers, I’m on the way!”