Ch.1-1 ¤ Wildcards

I used to work for the Ninth. It brought in a pretty comfortable amount of money back then, but right now I'm as poor as a hobo. Sure enough, just like my house, my bank account had disappeared into some rude black hole. I had no contacts left, no place to return to, no money to do anything with and no Officio.

I've went on rampages for less, but somehow I feel like it won't really help me this time.

I let out a long sigh and took in the evening air. It was cold. After all the rush and mayhem of today, it felt like a slap in the face. The "get your shit together" kind of slap in the face. I always liked the night, as cliché as that might sound. The cold not so much, but the peace and the dimmed light levels are what I mean. It was a lot more relaxing than daytime, easier to think.

It helped me calm down. Yeah, sure I was all sorts of fucked, but just freaking out about it wasn't going to do me any good; nor was trying to cling back to what was familiar. I decided then with a deep breath: Clean Slate.

I closed my eyes for a few seconds and took this time to let the decision sink in. When I opened them back I felt a lot more like myself. More confident and sturdy, despite my loss of my cherished Warbringer. I stopped wasting time and checked my inventory thoroughly.

- My now mostly useless cellphone.
- A large bottle of Vodka; glorious, true Russian import.
- A pair of Grief Seeds, unused
- Three small cylindrical, labeled metal containers bearing the names: "Rose", "Blue Fire" and "Barkweed".
- One magically sealed identical container with the label "Satrophine".

I thought I had more stuff stashed in there... but it's the important stuff that mattered. The Grief Seeds most of all. My combat drugs were mostly full, except Blue Fire. I didn't have a chance to restock on that one in a long while. From the look of it, there still was enough for two uses. As for the Satrophine... Well the less mentioned about it the better.

When I made my way back into the city I was again feeling like a predator instead of a stalked animal. That was probably the most comforting part of all.

It felt good to be back in familiar territory

The next few days were strange, but mostly uneventful. I had to plan how to survive and deal with having no way to procure any basic necessities such as even food without stealing. I just decided to use magic to sustain myself for a while, but that was going to be draining, so I allocated a lot of time to scouting for Barriers. I didn't get a lot of luck with that, though.

"Are you going to act like a rat in a maze for much longer?"

I was following a trail when the voice hailed me in a bloodied back alley belonging to a run-down, forsaken area. I turned around in a blink and observed the figure that had apparently managed to be stalking me.

"What do you want?" I replied dryly, not in the mood for shenanigans.

"Now now, there's no need to be so defensive." The tall girl responded with an annoying, half-teasing tone as she made her way closer. She didn't seem armed, but in our line of work that didn't really mean shit so I stayed on guard.

"Believe me I have all the reasons in the world to be defensive right now, all of them." I sighed with some exasperation and resisted the urge to roll my eyes. I felt a bit of an itch and my mind wandered to the thought that if I had been a smoker this would probably be where I'd be reaching for a deathstick... or three.

When she reached about a few meters away she seemed to flinch at something, but managed to hide it pretty well with an annoyingly composed pace and expression. Might have been my eyes - you didn't come across black sclera every day... or shifting irises - but it could also have been anything I suppose. Hers were an icy blue and framed by long, flowing purple hair. She wore plain gray jeans and a sleeveless urban camo top.

"If that's true then what I have to say might be -especially- interesting to you." She continued in that pseudo-superior tone of hers without any signs of her earlier faltering, as if it never happened. I so hate her already.

I crossed my arms and leaned back against a nearby wall, raising an eyebrow "And what would that be?"

"You're on the run aren't you?" This time she dropped the line without any pretense of taunting. Cold, direct and down-to-busyness.

"...In a sense" I reluctantly let out before slowly tilting my head to the other side. "What's it to you? If you're a bounty hunter I'm sorry but you're so fucked that it's actually funny." It was a bit of bluff, but even in this weakened state I was still able to defend myself against a lot of things.

She waved one hand faintly in a small dismissive motion. "Oh no, quite the contrary actually." She put on a small smile. It was the warm and comforting kind, but my guts told me not to trust it. "I just wanted to let you know that in the.. aherm.. hypothetical situation that you were..." her smile grew a little more, somehow managing the difficult achievement of not looking horribly smug in the process. "There might be people in similar situations willing to lend a hand."

"So basically you're telling me you're an exile yourself, 'that it?" I cut the crap and went to the point with a cold voice. There was little that annoyed me more than being fucked with.

"You catch on quickly for an Eversor, but it's no good if you keep that unsightly attitude." Here she goes again with that smile.

"I'm going to assume you've been observing me for a while if you can tell that." I flatly ignored the second half of her comment. "But the real question here is, what are you going to do with that?"

Camo casually replaced a stray lock of her purple hair and shifted her position lightly, as well as her expression. "Well, no point in trying to play it all mysterious I suppose, fine, fine~." she let out a small sigh. "Look, you might be new to this, but rogue Magical Girls like us tend to get bounties on their heads pretty fast, so it's really better if we try to stick together."

Well, I never really -went- rogue so much as the entire universe around me decided to turn to shit, but it was still a valid point.

"This is what I'm offering to you; a place to stay, a way to get some work and a handful of people who you can trust not to backstab you the first chance they get."

I snorted lightly and rolled my eyes. "Yeah right, trust."

"You don't have to believe me right away, but it's better for everyone involved. Safety in numbers and all."

I shrugged lightly and moved away from the wall, uncrossing my arms. "Fine, I'll play along for now."