Chapter 4: The Ballad of Discord

Part 2 of 2: Divisions

"Obviously, we are going to have to attempt a rescue mission," Wilson stated. "Agent Balle had years of top-secret knowledge that we can't allow Discord to get his hands on."

"Honestly General, I'm more concerned about how Balle was captured," Celestia stated. She turned to the girls, who had been gathered in the Briefing Room back at Camelot. "Miss Sullivan, why did you decide to leave one of your best agents behind?"

"Well," said Tara, who felt very ashamed of her actions. She knew at the time that it was the right thing to do, but now, under the intense scrutiny of her supervisors, she felt much less confident. Her head hung low as she talked. "It was actually AJ's idea. She sacrificed herself to let us escape."

"You shouldn't have let her go," Wilson told the saddened Tara. "Anna-Jean has been known to have an unfortunate tendency to act upon increasingly dangerous and suicidal maneuvers. In fact, the first time she volunteered for a field mission, she was eleven. We've been trying to for years to fix this problem in her behavior. In any case, you shouldn't have acted upon her ideas. There is a reason you are now the Field Leader, and she isn't."

"Actually, I'm starting to wonder if you are now worthy of such a high position," Celestia spoke honestly to Wilson, not minding if Tara heard.

Tara was quite stunned. Celestia had always shown her support for Tara's capabilities, but now, she was quickly changing her position on the subject.

"Why?" Tara asked in her shock. "So I made a tactical error. One error. And you want to change leadership because of a goof? Everyone made mistakes out there today. Including," Tara said, quickly glancing back at Dash. "The direct disrespect of my orders."

"But you are supposed to be the leader," Celestia said sternly. "If you're not being followed, then clearly, there are some issues of trust amongst your team. You need to work that out by yourselves. The most pressing matter is that Miss Balle is probably being tortured as we speak. She has more knowledge of this organization than any of you combined. If her training fails and she actually talks, then the repercussions would be massive."

"So what was I supposed to do? Let her die?" Tara asked, becoming very frustrated. Celestia did not respond, simply looking away from the angered girl, and taking a deep sigh. Wilson redirected the conversation back to his original point.

"I think that's enough of that for now," he said, clasping his hands together. "What we should be focused on now is trying to get Agent Balle back here alive before too much is lost." He pulled out a small metal device, which held a screen that took up half of the space. "At the very least, we know where she is. Thank government security for that. According to this, she is at the Imperial Chinese Restaurant, which means she is still in the city. You will be sent in there tonight. Entrance strategy is yours to decide, same as always. Try not to get yourselves, or Balle, killed." He stood up, followed by Celestia, and went to leave the room. But one last thought struck him. "Oh, and I strongly recommend a change of leadership. It's still your call, but I think it might be for the best. At least, for this mission."

With that, they left the room, leaving the girls alone. Tara sighed, and leaned against one of the many desks. She had heard from AJ that this room was usually full of people who monitored the missions, keeping track of stats, surveillance feeds, and other things of that nature. But for now, the room was empty, and Tara couldn't feel gladder about it. She felt like a failure. She managed to get herself caught in a no-win situation, and now she was facing the price. She felt an incredible guilt washing over her, as she couldn't help but think of AJ, and all of the horrible things that could be happening to her at that very moment. Fiona tried to comfort her friend, but was shrugged away rather harshly. The room was filled with an uncomfortable silence, holding the room in a state of despair.

Until one girl spoke the only thought on her mind, breaking the feelings of discontent and sadness.

"So, who's gonna lead now?" Dash asked with no real sadness in her voice. In fact, during most of Wilson's talk, she had been smirking, glad to see Tara brought down to such a low level. She didn't consider herself a mean person, but she felt very happy to see Tara sad. Maybe because she thought Tara thought herself to be on a higher pedestal than the others, or maybe she just couldn't take Tara's smug claims of passion and honesty. Whatever the reason, her own pride skyrocketed, and she wanted to make sure the next few minutes gave her as much joy as physically possible. "I mean, you know who I'm voting for, of course. But I want to know what you guys think."

Tara stopped staring emptily at her own feet, and looked up at Dash. She was feeling horrible about herself at this time, and the last thing she needed was for Dash to get on her nerves.

"Now's really not the time, Dash," Tara said, annoyed.

"Hey, you heard the General," Dash said with a smirk. "He wants a new leader. He doesn't think you're quite up to snuff. I'm just following orders."

"Don't patronize me, Rebecca," Tara said back to her, with no sign of calming down. Fiona quickly glanced at Rachel, who was worrying about the same thing that she was. With wisdom, they both quickly took steps away from Tara and Dash, hoping to avoid the fight that they knew was coming. Rachel also grabbed onto Pinky, who had not yet seen the storm clouds, and dragged her out of the way as well, much to the blonde's annoyance.

"Look, Spark, it's not my fault that you're a failure," Dash said innocently. Tara stopped leaning on the desk, and took an advancing step towards Dash.

"Do you like making people feel like crap?" Tara asked her, her voice lacking emotion. Her bangs were falling in front of her eyes, but she didn't care. She was getting fed up with Dash's constant backtalk.

"When it's you, then fuck yeah," Dash spoke honestly, not feeling the least bit intimidated. "I only talk the way I do to prove a fucking point."

"And what is that point?" Tara asked coldly. She took another step towards Dash.

"That you're not nearly as fucking perfect as your delusional mind thinks you are," Dash smirked. "That you're pathetic; that you have so many deep social issues that you can't see that how fucking badly you treat people."

"At least people like me," Tara said coldly. The words came out as harsh and smug, like she was trying to be cruel. Fiona tried to intervene.

"Um, Tara, that sounded a little-" Fiona started to say, but was cut off when Tara turned and gave her a cold glare.

"Stay out of this, Fiona," Tara spoke sternly. Dash laughed.

"Yeah, stay out of this, Fiona," Dash said with a smile. "We can't let your inferior mind fuck up Spark's perfect argument."

"Don't speak to her like that," Tara said angrily.

"Why not? You just did!" Dash spoke back, keeping her smile on her face. She wanted to stay as calm as possible, make sure that Tara lost her cool before she did. "I thought you were supposed to lead by example? Just another reason why you don't deserve to be in charge."

Tara stepped closer to Dash again, now less than a foot away from the girl. Her lack of emotion was transforming itself into anger and frustration, and she was trying her best to stop it.

"I deserve to lead more than you do," Tara said with venom in her voice. "People chose to follow me. They put their faith in me, and I am the one to lead them."

"Yeah, well, people used to follow Hitler too, and we all know how that turned out," Dash argued. "The point is, people make mistakes, and they listen to the wrong people. Idiots have led others for too long, and all it takes is one slip-up for the people to know that they are hearing the wrong words of fucking wisdom."

"So what do you want to do? Throw me out? Adjust me, so I see whatever twisted point of view you see the world from?" Tara questioned. Dash snickered.

"Do you know how I see the world? Do you even know what the fuck you are talking about?" Dash asked with doubt. "You don't know shit about me, Spark."

"But I can take a guess," Tara said, coldly. "See, I've seen the way you act towards others. You don't know a thing about compassion, or kindness, or anything that society wants you to be. All you care about is yourself, and how much you can screw everyone over before your time is up." Dash laughed at this.

"You don't understand shit if that is what you think," Dash said calmly. "I know more about compassion than you ever will."

"Don't lie to yourself, Rebecca," Tara said.

"Come on, Spark," Dash laughed again. "If you're going to intimidate me, find a more threatening insult than my actual name. But seriously, you don't think I know about compassion? At least I wasn't the one who left our friends to be tortured."

"Don't act like that was my fault," Tara tried to argue. But Dash responded quickly and with determination.

"Of course, it's your fault!" Dash exclaimed. "You left her behind! You trapped us into that corner! You failed to come up with a plan to save her, and now, you fucked her over! It's entirely your fault. I may not be the best with plans, but at least I would have never left someone behind!"

"It was her decision!"

"Just because she wanted to be left behind, doesn't make it right!" Dash reasoned. "You see, you do this thing where you blame others for your failures, no matter how much it was actually your fault. It's fucking pathetic."

"And you have the tendency to point out every little flaw in humanity, and exaggerate it to the point of complete and utter futility!" Tara yelled at her. "You don't find any logical problems with people; all you do is pick away at them until they hate themselves for all of the small things that they are not!"

"Are you sure I am the one who you have a problem with, then?" Dash asked her. "I wonder how many times did your parents beat you for not reaching their expectations? How much fucked up shit happened in your childhood to make you so afraid of failing at anything?"

"Don't bring my family into this!" Tara yelled at her. "Don't pretend like everyone has to have as bad as a life as you in order for the world to go around."

"Oh, I'm sorry," Dash said angrily, finding that it was much harder to stay calm. "At least you fucking had parents. I'm sorry your life was so fucking horrible, living in a giant fucking house, not worrying about your taxes, not struggling to survive every day because you were given everything from birth."

"You know, maybe that's your problem, Rebecca," Tara said. "You didn't have anything growing up. You just lived your little, insignificant life, watching others pass you by. So, in order to make yourself feel less worthless, you have to bring everyone down to your level. Is that why you hate everyone so badly? Because you're insecure?" Dash growled.

"You're calling me insecure?" Dash asked in disbelief. "Who here can't take criticism? Who here wants to keep us all staying in line as to not fuck up her little plans for the future? That's you, Spark! Everything you do is to raise yourself higher on your own fucking podium, so you can continue to feel like you actually accomplished something while we do the hard work!"

"Shut up…"

"Do you want to know what I think of your life?" Dash spoke angrily. "Here's my fucking guess! You were born as part of a wealthy family, and you were given everything you ever wanted! Each day, you were told how special you were, and all of the fantastic shit you were going to be doing in your perfect fucking future! But first, you had to live up to your parents' hope before you could be great!"

"Shut up…"

"So you work tirelessly, making sure everything in your life is perfect so you don't disappoint the only people who could ever love you! You shut everyone out, and build yourself your own little Fortress of Solitude inside your own fucking skull! But it still isn't enough! You try and try, but you need to sacrifice more and more, just so you wouldn't consider yourself a failure in their eyes, because after pushing everything else away, that's all you have left!

"Stop talking…"

"And so you become an empty shell, devoid of emotion towards other people! If something goes wrong, it's not because of you. It can't be! You worked too hard to make sure that doesn't happen! So you get them out of the equation, so that you can go back to being the queen of the fucking universe! You refuse to listen to anyone, because you can't afford to hear that you failed once again!"

"Just. Be. Quiet."

"You think you are so much better than me, Spark! But we aren't that fucking different after all! You talk about me having no emotion, not caring about anyone other than myself, and how I refuse to get close to people! But you know what, you filthy, disgraceful, hypocritical, dishonest cunt?! There's one big difference between you and me! I may not fully care about what happens to others, but at least I don't pretend that I do!"

Tara had heard enough. She was absolutely furious. In her rage, she pushed herself right up against Dash, their foreheads pressed together, as Tara stared angrily into Dash's eyes. Her fists were clenched, her teeth gritted together, and, since she was a good two inches taller than Dash, she leaned into the other girl, almost ready to punch her in the face.

"How dare you?!" Tara shouted at her. "How dare you even make that comparison?! I am nothing like you! You are the most uncaring, cruel, emotionless person I have ever met! I can't believe anyone here would ever like you! The only reason why you are still here is because Wilson wants your skills, but aside from that, you're worthless!"

"Then what are you going to do about it, Spark?" Dash taunted her. She was also losing her temper, and she wouldn't mind if Tara started a fight with her right now, just so she could hit the smug girl in the face. "Hit me. I fucking dare you. Or are you both a rotten bitch and a coward?"

"That's enough!" shouted Rachel, who was now pushing the girls apart from each other. She had grown tired of hearing them argue, and she needed to stop them before they killed each other. "You two need some time apart! We are not supposed to be fighting each other! Calm down!"

Rachel held each girl apart at the chest, keeping them about a few feet away from each other. Tara was panting, trying to vent out all of her frustration. Dash took a few deep breaths, and then smiled. She smiled smugly at Tara, and then at Rachel.

And then, at lightning speed, she shot out her fist and punched Tara hard in the jaw. Tara collapsed to the ground and clutched her wounded face, as the other girls joined in to push Dash away from the girl on the ground.

"You like that, you fucking cunt?!" Dash shouted at her, taunting her.

Tara looked up at Dash, who was being pushed back against the wall. Tara slowly rose to her feet, and then, with no warning, charged into the pile and tackled Dash to ground. She could no longer contain her anger, as she released a series of punches towards Dash, hoping anything would hit the girl. Dash tried blocking, and threw some elbows of her own at Tara's face. The two rolled on the ground, trying to strike any flesh of their opponent. While the term "catfight" would normally be applied to a battle between two women, Tara and Dash could be considered anything but sexy. The blows they delivered to each other were intense, each impact drawing blood. Finally, after sixty painful seconds, the others were able to pull them apart. Fiona held back Tara, as Rachel and Pinky led Dash out of the room. Dash had several bruises around her eyes and a split lip, and she cursed Tara out as she was dragged out of the room.

"Fucking bitch! I hope you're fucking proud of yourself, you little attention whore! I hope you get fucking raped in your sleep, you fucking cocksu-" Dash was cut off by the door slamming in front of her, leaving Fiona and Tara alone. Fiona pushed Tara away from the door, and forced her to sit on the desk. Tara was breathing heavily, as her body shook with rage. She looked at her feet, because she felt like if she didn't watch them, they would carry her back to the fight. Fiona saw that Tara had a bloody nose, and several cuts along her cheeks and chin. She did her best to calm her friend down.

"She's not worth your time, Tara," Fiona spoke in a very calm manner. "She's gone now. It's okay. Think calm thoughts."

"Fiona," Tara said shakily through her rough breaths. "No one deserves to be spoken to like that." Fiona nodded.

"I know. I know," Fiona said, recalling Dash's words. She shuddered when thinking of such horrible things, especially Dash's last few comments. It made her feel disgusted. "Just stay calm. We're here for you. You know that right?"

Tara paused for a moment, before sighing and slowly nodding.

"Yeah, I… I know," Tara said, her anger slowly being replaced with sorrow. Dash's words had stung her deeply, and, while they were horrible and cruel, they weren't entirely false. "Fiona, you know I do care about you guys, right?"

Fiona smiled at her friend.

"Of course," Fiona responded, although she couldn't help of Tara's erratic behavior from a few nights prior. "Of course."

__________

The Imperial Chinese Restaurant was opened in early 2014. The original goal was to introduce more culture to the American eating process. It was very well supported by the community, who even donated money to help its opening. The decor was elegantly designed, and the ingredients were fresh. However, it barely lasted a year, after Americans realized they were not comfortable with the eating of dog legs, boodog, and the occasional balut. So, after it became shut down in March of 2015, the Smiling Dragons that it would be the perfect place to take up residence.

Now, with his main warehouse destroyed, half of his troops dead or deserted, and most of his money gone, Discord was marching around the main dining area on floor one, angrily talking on the phone with his superiors. Two Hound Dogs stood on either side of the room, and two more Hound Dogs stood over AJ, who was sitting on the ground, hands tied behind her to one of the many tables.

"Look, I know you're the boss," Discord said, continuing his pacing. "But let me cut off a finger or two? Clip some skin? Beat on her? Anything?" The person on the phone responded with something that AJ could not make out, and then Discord sighed. "Fine, she'll be left unharmed until the pickup. But do me a favor, will ya? Cut her tongue out. This bitch has quite an extensive vocabulary when she's pissed."

"Fuck off," AJ said with a grin, purposely to bother her captor. Discord hung up the phone and walked up to her.

"So, here's the deal, kid," Discord said as he pulled out his revolver and twirled it on his finger. "In a few hours, my boss is going to stop by here. During which, he'll judge my progress, and see if I'm bein' a good little boy or not. Then, he's going to take you away from here, back to whatever creepy-ass cave he lives in."

"Why?" AJ asked him.

"I don't fucking know," Discord shrugged. "Personally, I think rape. With all of the people I've worked for, it's almost always rape. Or torture. Or sometimes necrophilia. Man, I've worked up with some fucked up people."

Discord reminisced on some memories he had: some of people he killed, some of people that he made kill their families, sometimes of absolutely nothing other than just corpses. He smiled through these thoughts, as AJ quickly capitalized on her chance to gather information.

"What about the people you work for now?" AJ asked. "What are they like?" Discord groaned, and stamped his foot on the ground.

"I hate those fuckers!" Discord shouted. "I fuckin hate 'em. All they ever do is treat me like a fucking kid! Like I got no idea what I'm doin'! 'Discord's a failure' this, or, 'Discord's a failure' that! It's bullshit! I don't see The Unknown doing the shit I do! He never built the world's biggest criminal empire in eight fucking months! I aint never seen him make a million dollars selling meth alone!"

"So he is real," AJ thought aloud. Discord snapped towards her direction.

"Of course he's fucking real!" Discord screamed. "Motherfucker's been putting me down for way too long. But once he sees you," Discord smirked. "Oh, baby, you've been a concern since day one. And when I'm the one to deliver you to him, I'll finally earn my place alongside the others! And then, it'll be chaos all around, baby! Woohoo!"

He jumped for joy, exhilarated by his own sickened thoughts of victory. He was so caught up in the moment, that he didn't even notice AJ's huge grin.

Thanks for the info, AJ thought happily. It seems like someone never saw a James Bond movie.

AJ wasn't worried when Discord's men untied her, picked her up and carried her to the elevator, designed to carry supplies and passengers to any of the three floors. She wasn't concerned when she was thrown into the second floor kitchen, with the door locked behind her and no way out. She wasn't even worried that her hands were still tied behind her back at an awkward and painful angle. She wasn't worried because she knew that as she lay there in wait, P.O.N.Y. would have picked up the tracker in her phone, and Tara would be planning a rescue to save her life. She had gathered plenty of information from Discord, and once she told it to Wilson, huge advancements could be made to stop The Unknown. All she needed to do was get out of the Imperial Chinese Restuarant. Luckily, she knew she had one of the best teams in the world coming to support her.

__________

"This team is a fucking disgrace!" Dash yelled in anger. "If that lifeless bitch is in control, then she'll not only kill AJ, but every fucking one of us!"

Dash was currently being held in the sleeping quarters, with Rachel making sure that she didn't try to leave. Tara and Fiona were still in the Briefing Room, and Pinky was acting a messenger for the group. Since Tara and Dash couldn't stay together in a room without attempting to rip each other's faces off, Pinky was forced to run back and forth between the rooms, negotiating a peace between the girls.

She arrived in the Briefing Room.

"Dash thinks that you are a bad leader, and I don't think she likes your plans of action," Pinky reported.

"Well, Dash wouldn't do any better," Tara snapped. "She doesn't think anything through! She needs to learn self-restraint." Pinky sighed and ran back to the other room. It was approaching five o'clock, and she had been doing this negotiation for hours. While her energy was usually boundless, being around the two arguing women put a serious damper on her mood. She got back to the other room, and started to say her message.

"Tara doesn't think you can control yourself," Pinky said.

"Tell Tara to stick a vibrator up her asshole," Dash responded with a sneer. Pinky sprinted back to the Briefing Room.

"Dash told you to, uh…" Pinky said, rubbing the back of her head. "Well, she said some naughty things, and-"

"Okay, I think that's enough, Pinky," Tara spoke, annoyed. "We've been doing this for hours. AJ is in trouble, and we need to get her out of there." Tara sighed. "Look, I have a plan of how to get her back here, one that thankfully doesn't involve Dash. I say we just postpone this argument, and focus on getting our friend back." Fiona and Pinky were rather surprised by this announcement.

"Um, Tara, how do you exactly plan to do that?" Fiona wondered aloud.

"I'll explain on our way there," Tara said. "But first, we need to take care of some things. Fiona, I need you to go the training room, and silenced weapons and my sword. Pinky, try to get Rachel away from Rebecca."

"How do I do that?" Pinky asked. She wasn't particularly good with deceiving people, especially when she had to go off of her instincts.

"I don't know," Tara admitted. "You can rattle off a hundred thoughts per second. I'm sure you can think of something."

"But I don't actually think about what I say!" Pinky said nervously. "It just comes to me, and then it's gone. How am I supposed to distract Dash? What if she starts yelling at me? She can be really nasty sometimes…"

"Pinky, you can do this," Tara said with assurance. Pinky took a deep breath, and then gave a nod. She jogged out of the room and headed towards Dash and Rachel. She honestly had no idea of how to separate the two, and make sure Dash didn't know what they were up to. If she did find out, she'd be furious, and that was something that Pinky didn't want to see, ever. She slowed her pace down, trying to take her time reaching the sleeping quarters. It turned out that slowing down was actually quite hard for her, and she had to carefully guide herself through slow footprints. Hundreds of thoughts raced through her mind at speeds she wished she could be moving at right now. But none of them seemed to help, and now, she found herself standing at the doorway, with no plan or strategy. She wished that she could just find some way to eliminate all variables; find a way to make sure Dash couldn't interfere. And the, she suddenly got an idea. A very wondrous, fantastic, brilliant idea. She pushed in the door to find the two girls where she left them. She smiled.

"Hey, Dash, good news," Pinky said cheerily. "Tara wants to apologize to you." Dash was in disbelief. She had never actually expected Tara to come out with a full apology. She thought that Tara had too much pride to accept defeat. She grinned. Surely, she thought, that this meant Tara had been knocked down a few pegs, and that she had finally seen how awful of a person she really was. Hell, maybe it meant that Tara was willing to give up her position of leadership to Dash directly, officially claiming her to be the better person. Dash stood up with great pride, taking joy in Rachel's rather shocked expression. She happily stepped towards the door, allowing Pinky to lead her.

"It's about time she admitted who was the better man," Dash said as she left the room. Rachel followed her out, unable to believe that Tara would accept defeat to Dash's completely disrespectful behavior. The three of them walked towards the Briefing Room, pride ringing in Dash's heart. They finally arrived, and Pinky opened the door, allowing Dash to step through, a large grin on her face. Tara was surprised to see Dash walk through the door, and she quickly realized that Pinky must have messed up her orders. Dash was smirking at her with such confidence, and it made Tara sick. Dash felt so confident that she didn't even notice when Pinky place three fingers on a certain portion of Dash's collarbone.

"Well, Spark," Dash said in her cocky manner. "I think you got someth-"

Suddenly, Dash's eyes rolled up into her head, and she collapsed to the ground. Rachel jumped back and yelped, while Tara stood up from her seat on the desk, and looked at Pinky with shock.

"What did you do?" Tara screamed. Pinky suddenly started moving quickly again, hopping up and down on her toes, knowing that for every second she talked, it was another second wasted. She grabbed onto Dash's legs, and dragged her under a nearby desk.

"It was the only thing I could think of!" Pinky admitted. "Come on, I don't know how long she'll stay under." She rushed out of the room, and the others, still in shock, followed her. They passed Fiona in the hall, who had several guns cradled in her arms, and a sword strapped to her back. She turned to follow them as they rushed outside the building through the restaurant, and got in the van parked outside. As Tara started up the car, Rachel asked Pinky the one question on her mind.

"Pinky, where the hell did you learn to do that?" Rachel asked in bewilderment. Pinky smiled.

"Duh, my grandma was one of the biggest Star Trek fans, like, ever," Pinky stated the fact as if everyone should have known it.

"You know," Rachel stated. "I think I learn something new about you every day, Pinky."

"So do I, Rachel," Pinky smiled. "So do I."

__________

Tara considered herself very fortunate that her parents had taken her to the Imperial Chinese Restaurant one year ago. She was going through a stage of trying to learn more about foreign culture, and she begged her parents to take her there. At the time, she wasn't very comfortable with driving, and her parents never wanted her to go to the city alone, so they came along for the ride. Luckily, Tara's photographic memory was working overtime that day as she let the full experience settle in. She memorized every little detail of the restaurant, which was why she was now suspending herself in a window frame next door, waiting to coordinate a finishing strike to remove the guards. She wished that she had changed into more appropriate gear for the mission. She was still wearing her purple wizard T-shirt, jeans, and sandals, which she learned was not very comfortable for espionage. She did feel worse for Rachel, knowing that the foreign girl must be very uncomfortable suspended from a building wearing fur boots, a vest, and a scarf. Being suspended at such an awkward angle would have put plenty of strain on her upper back, and the extra weight of wool wouldn't help much. Tara was secretly glad that she had never devoted herself to any clothing trends, preferring not to sacrifice function for fashion. She shook the thoughts out of her head, refocusing on the mission.

After arriving, she had taken a quick survey of the area. Four guards patrolled the outside, this time staying in motion, tying to prevent an ambush. But Tara quickly discovered a flaw in their patrol schedule, and was now waiting to take advantage of it. She needed to wait three more seconds for one of the guards to walk beneath her.

Suddenly, her moment came, and she dropped from the window right on top of the guard, her weight knocking him to the ground. With haste, she unsheathed her blade, and drove it into the man's chest, penetrating through his armor and ending his life. Based on the lack of a panic, she knew that the rest of the girls must have followed with the same maneuver all around the building. With two silenced shots, two more guards died, unable to defend their weakened bodies. Tara smiled and headed to the back of the restaurant. There, the rest of her team lay in wait. The net part of the plan was simple: getting into the actual theater. If Tara's memory served a ventilation shaft should have been right above her, leading to the first floor dining area. She looked up, and saw that memory had indeed served her right once again. After getting a boost from the others, she was able to dig her sword into the vent, and tear off the gate. She crawled through the small shaft, and after a brief, yet hot journey, she reached the main dining room for floor one. She opened the vent as quietly as she could, and placed it beside her. She looked around the room.

It was quite adequately lit for being closed for six months. It was not as bright as it would have been, but the dim light made it just possible to see through the restaurant. Elegant paintings covered the walls and ceiling, and forty or so tables were placed around the dining area, once meant to seat plentiful guests. Each table was covered with fine silk tablecloths, never having been removed by the owners after the shutdown. At the back of the eating area, an elevator awaited to take people to one of the higher two floors. Five guards stood watch around the room, two standing by the front door, and three patrolling the room, their keen eyes on the lookout for anything out of the ordinary. On the walls, three mounted security cameras scanned the room, constantly rotating back and forth on its stand. Tara quickly crawled back to the other side of the vent to report to her team, and she dropped down back behind the theater.

"Okay, so here's what we are dealing with," Tara explained the situation to the girls, and then fully laid out her plans for attack. The motions were quite simple to follow through. All of them would start by entering through the vent. Pinky would shoot out the security cameras, while Fiona entered and eliminated the two guards closest to her. Rachel and Tara were to sneak around to the other side and incapacitate the remaining three men. From there, they would head up the elevator shaft to the second floor, where they hoped to either find Discord or AJ waiting for them.

The motions were carried out with extreme efficiency. In fact, everything almost happened too easily. Fiona managed to slip out of the vent just as Pinky destroyed the cameras, resulting in sparks flying from the broken machines. Fiona silently moved amongst the shadows created by the tables in the dim light. By the time the first guard saw her, she was already a less than a yard away, her quickened yet silent feet moving at full speed. She delivered a quick blow to his larynx, preventing him from shouting, before flying past him and doing the same to his comrade. As she took them down silently, Tara had reached one of the patrolling guards and dug her blade deep into his ribs. Rachel quickly moved to the other man, delivering a swift kick to his head, sending him slamming into one of the tables, causing the wooden object to splinter apart. The commotion drew the attention of the final guard, but he couldn't reach his superiors in time. As he reached to trigger his earpiece, Pinky shot him in the chink in his armor, at his neck. He grasped onto his throat, trying to keep the blood inside, but it was to no avail. After a few desperate seconds for survival, he fell to the ground, dead. The girls moved to the elevator, stepping past the corpses (as Fiona tried to avoid looking at the dead bodies.)

"Okay, so what do we do now," Rachel asked, looking at the elevator. Tara shrugged.

"I suppose we just take the elevator up," Tara suggested. Fiona was uneasy with this plan, however, and spoke out about her concerns.

"But, wouldn't that kind of, uh," Fiona said nervously, not wanting to show any accidental disrespect to her leader. "You know, draw attention to ourselves?"

"Well, we have to get up there somehow," Tara told her. "And I don't see any other way."

"I just don't feel like that would be the best idea to use something that would be so noisy," Fiona admitted. Tara sighed.

"Look, I admit, it may not be the smartest idea, but we really don't have another way up," Tara said honestly. Fiona face brightened up.

"Actually, I think I have a back-up," Fiona explained. "See, from where I was outside, I could see that on the third floor, someone left a small window open. We could probably get through there." Tara considered this possibility. She had not seen this window before, and had no idea it existed. It was actually not a horrible idea. It would certainly attract far less attention than otherwise using the elevator. Rachel, however, shook her head frantically.

"No way," Rachel said with determination. "No way in hell I'm going to climb up the side of a building wearing this." Rachel pointed to her outfit, including all of her fancy jewelry, belts, and designer clothes that she had spent good money on. "I already got fucking blood spilled on this tonight; I'm not going to climb vertically up an old, dusty building with this on." Rachel was so distraught with the idea of her clothes being ruined, that she didn't notice that one of the guards Fiona had knocked out was starting to stir.

"Rachel, are you being serious?" Tara asked in disbelief. "This is a life-and-death situation involving the life of our friend, and you want to jeopardize it to save a scarf?"

"For your information, this scarf is worth more than this entire building!" Rachel said, acting as if she was personally offended. "And besides, I am a lady of character. I will not risk my own health when an equally viable option is sitting right before us."

The guard by the front door got to his knees, and looked around, holding his foggy head in his hand.

"What the fuck happened?" he asked himself under his breath, letting out a groan.

"You're being ridiculous!" Tara proclaimed to her friend. The last thing she needed now was to argue with another one of her teammates. She was already down enough allies as it was.

"I'm not being ridiculous," Rachel said in defense. "We could kill ourselves in a climb like that. Besides, we don't even have the proper equipment for a steep incline like that. Do you know what equipment we need to ride an elevator? None."

The man at the door slowly got his thoughts straightened out, and he quickly realized that there were four girls standing by the elevator, and all of his squad mates were lying dead or unconscious on the ground. He panicked briefly, before he got control of his thoughts, picked up his gun, and rose to his feet.

CRASH

All of a sudden, a large white car drove through the front doors at top speed. It ran over the man, and drove through several tables, before coming to a complete halt. The girls were quite astonished to see the front doors practically explode and a vehicle to plow through the building, creating so much noise that any hopes of remaining stealthy were all but diminished. Tara was quite in question on who could perform such a chaotic and reckless act. However, the enigma solved itself when the car window rolled down, and a voice shouted from the driver's seat.

"Motherfucker, that was awesome!"

Tara witnessed one of the worst things she had seen all day, as Dash opened up the car door, and with one of the cockiest grins, started walking towards the girls with a gun in her hand. She smiled at them, acting like everything was perfectly normal.

"Uh, Dash, it's… really great to see you," Pinky said, trying to get past the uneasy feeling she had seeing Dash smiling.

"Yeah, it's good to be alive," Dash said with a smile. "By the way…" Suddenly, Dash punched Tara hard in the stomach, knocking the wind out of her and bringing her to her knees.

"Rebecca, what the hell?" Tara looked up at Dash, seeing that she was now letting her rage come out.

"THAT WAS FOR KNOCKING ME OUT AND DRAGGING ME BENEATH A FUCKING DESK!" Dash yelled at her. Tara slowly got to her feet, and searing pain running through her midsection. Dash turned her rage to the others. "And what the fuck I wrong with you guys?! You left me behind! I thought we were a team here!"

"We're… we're really sorry," Fiona said quickly, trying to avoid Dash's fury. Dash stuck up her middle finger at Fiona, and walked towards the elevator.

"Fuck you guys," Dash said with a sneer. "Just consider yourselves lucky I managed to track you down here." She pressed the button on the elevator, and waited for it to come down. Tara turned around, and started to yell again.

"Why do you think we need you here?!" Tara asked at her, as the elevator came down. "Everything was going just fine before you showed up. Now our cover's blown!"

"Excuse me, Spark, but if I'm not mistaken, I just saved your fucking life," Dash spoke back angrily. She stepped into the elevator, and the rest of the girls followed her inside. "Why do you have to be so bitchy all the time?"

"Don't you understand what you've done?" Tara asked in rage, begrudgingly entering the elevator, forcing her to be cramped in a tight space with someone that she very-much hated. "AJ is being held hostage. Now that they know that we're here, they'll probably execute her! She is going to die."

"Then we save her," Dash said nonchalantly. "We're a group of bad-asses. Why do you have to worry so much? It's not my fault that you've never cum before. Stop with the hate."

Tara was getting extremely frustrated with Dash, as the elevator was slowing down.

"I'll stop when you learn to take some fucking responsibility, and actually care about the people you're fighting for!" Tara shouted. The elevator came to a halt on the second floor, as the doors slowly opened. Dash turned back to Tara.

"Jesus Christ, calm the fuck down!" Dash yelled at her, their eyes never breaking contact with each other. "Nothing bad is going to happen!"

"Ahem."

Dash and Tara stopped staring at each other, and turned towards the open elevator door. Just outside the elevator, five guards had their assault rifles trained on the girls, with Discord standing behind them. AJ was in his grasp, and he had his revolver pressed to the side of her head. He looked at them rather disappointingly, as if they had failed to live up to his great expectations. AJ had a very annoyed and confused expression, as her first sight of her friends in hours, who were supposed to rescue her, was the sight of two of them trying to rip each other's throats apart.

"Not to break up your little, well, intervention," Discord said, as if he were trying to finish his business and return to his work. "But, in case you haven't noticed, there's a fucking car, in my fucking hideout, and you fucking girls are back again, fucking my fucking business over! How? How the fuck did you find me?!"

Pinky, showing no sense of danger (and possibly not aware of it existing) answered with a shrug.

"We have a tracker on AJ's phone," Pinky said, causing her to teammates to glare at her. She was puzzled. "What? He asked."

"Another thing," Discord asked with a sigh. "How much training do you have in the first place? You killed most of my best troops. Aside from those fuckers upstairs, these five," Discord tilted his head at the five guards. "Are all I got left. How long have you assholes been working for?"

"Two weeks," Pinky said yet again, resulting in even more glares. Discord was quite stunned by the answer, and took a second to mentally process the information.

"Pinky, shut up," Rachel said annoyed. It was enough that she had guns pointed at her, but the fact that Pinky was revealing all of their secrets was adding insult to injury.

"Two weeks?" Discord asked in disbelief. "Two fucking weeks? How… what… what the fuck?" Taking advantage of Discord's confusion, AJ finally got to speak out her concern to Tara.

"Tara, what were you thinking with that plan?" AJ asked, very annoyed. "Crashing a car through a building aint very discreet." Tara groaned.

"Trust me, it wasn't my fault," Tara motioned at Dash, who acted offended. AJ sighed.

"I leave you girls alone for a few hours, and you're already splitting apart," AJ said, disappointed. "I'm going to have to fix this, aint I?" Tara looked at her friend, very confused. AJ was clearly not in any position to fight. Her hands were tied behind her back, and at any moment, Discord could but a bullet through her brain. And it wasn't as if the rest of them were in very tactical position, either.

Suddenly, AJ started to count down from five.

"Five, four, three, two…" AJ counted, as Discord was still trying to register the fact that five teenagers trained for fourteen days, and were able to beat his best men, who had undergone years of hard work for their impressive skills to be attained. AJ reached the number "one", and she suddenly slammed her head back into Discord's face, causing him to bring his hands to his face, and drop his gun. The soldiers suddenly turned around as AJ managed to catch the gun, her hands still tied. She quickly rolled under Discord's arm, getting behind him. Then, with a sick cracking sound, she rotated her shoulders around two hundred and seventy degrees, wrapping her arms around Discord's neck, and pressing the gun against his forehead. The guards were now all facing her as she held their boss hostage, and they were unsure of what to do next.

In this moment of confusion, Tara gave the order to take action. She led by lunging out of the elevator, and tackling one of the soldiers to the ground. The others followed, attacking the men before they had time to react. AJ grinned at her masterful distraction. She was so glad that she almost didn't realize that she holding the gun in a position where she couldn't fire. She simply gripped the chamber, her fingers unable to reach the trigger. In this moment, Discord understood that he would not be shot, and retaliated with a head-butt of his own. Now, with AJ knocked away and his gun falling to the floor, he took up a fighting stance. He grinned at AJ, who scoffed at him. She took a stance of her own, her hands staying at her waist, feet firmly planted on the floor. She looked like she was fully able to incapacitate any enemy, even with her severe handicap, and Discord quickly remembered what she had one to his men earlier in the day. He realized that fighting her head on probably wouldn't be the brightest idea, so with a brief chuckle of embarrassment, he dove towards his revolver. He leaned over to pick it up, and AJ suddenly rolled over his back, landing on his other side, and kicking him hard in the ribs. He groaned and rolled over, as AJ slid the gun far away with her foot.

Meanwhile, the others were faced in a series of fights of their own. Tara had stabbed her target immediately after tackling him, and now she was helping Pinky fight against her opponent, knowing that her hyper friend was not the most capable close-combat fighter. Tara drew away most of the attention from her friend, but it didn't stop Pinky from nearly getting cut in half several times from her opponent's machete, as she tried to deliver quick jabs from behind. Rachel was caught in a game of cat and mouse with her Hound Dog, as he swung at her constantly, each swing carrying momentum to the next. She was very thankful she had taken yoga classes growing up, as her flexibility saved her life on multiple occasions. He took a high swing, and she bent backwards at eighty degrees, seeing the machete swipe just where her head previously was located. She took a quick glance at Fiona, who was keeping her distance from the soldier.

He was standing about a yard away from her, holding his blade out, tempting her to come closer. However, she stayed away, trying to learn his body movement as rapidly as possible. She noticed certain behaviors, like the constant twitching in his left leg. He leaned slightly on his right foot, indicating a bad leg. She saw an opportunity to strike, and she dove forwards to his left side. He stepped back, startled by the rapid movement, and Fiona delivered a sharp kick to the back of his left knee. He clutched the leg, and Fiona sprung up and drove an elbow into his spine. Unfortunately, she had hit his body armor hard, and she jumped back to hold her elbow, hissing in pain.

AJ noticed that she could have taken Discord down by this point, but she was severely limited by the lack of functionality from her arms. Discord tried his best to hit her with quick jabs, but every time she would sidestep the blow, and attempt a kick. He would see her leg move, roll away, and then they would repeat the process. It was starting to aggravate AJ that she couldn't take down a completely under matched fighter under such a pathetic handicap.

Rachel was finding herself to have a similar problem, still only being able to dodge attacks rather than deal out any of her own. Mostly, it was because the Hound Dog never gave her a chance to attack, but a small part of it was due to fear. She knew that one of her weak hits wouldn't do much to someone wearing armor, but she also knew she had to strike eventually. After a few more nerve-racking dodges, and a display of flexibility that was enough to make most cheerleaders turn envious, she finally let out a strong right hook at the man's face. He sidestepped easily, and then in one fluent motion, brought up his blade and swung it against Rachel's arm. She tried to dodge, but she moved too slowly, and the edge of the machete dragged deep against her arm, tracing a path of blood from the side of her bicep, down her arm, to the back of her wrist. She screamed in pain, grabbing onto her arm as she tried to gain distance from her attacker. Blood poured out of her wound, seeping over her fingers and dripping to the floor in a steady stream. The soldier readied himself for a lunge as Rachel backed herself into a corner, too focused on the pain to think about dodging. But before the soldier was able to strike, an object was thrown at him, hitting him in the back of the head. He turned around, and saw that Dash was standing triumphantly over the corpse of a Hound Dog, a cocky grin on her face. She had thrown her fighter's machete at him to draw his attention, not because she wanted to save Rachel's life, but because she wanted to end someone else's.

"Come on, you little bitch," Dash taunted. "Come and fucking cut me up already!" The soldier left Rachel alone, and charged after Dash. Fiona, who had knocked out her opponent with a swift blow to the head, ran over to Rachel, trying her best to treat her cut. Fiona noticed that it did not appear too deep, which gave her some sense of relief. She tried to focus some of her attention towards Dash however, wanting to make sure her friend was okay. But there didn't seem to be anything to worry about. Dash was smiling away as she dodged every swing of a sword the Hound Dog had to offer, showing no effort moving out of the way. All the while, she taunted the soldier, saying whatever harsh word came to mind.

"Come on, is that the fastest you can move?" Dash teased him. "I know you move faster than that whenever your mother offers to suck your cock again. Don't pretend like you don't love it. Ooh, nice swing there! You almost proved your worth as part of humanity that time! Close, but no cigar, fuck face."

As this was happening, the two-on-one strategy was working wonders for Tara and Pinky. The soldier couldn't draw away from Tara without the risk of her slicing him apart, which meant that Pinky had ample time to lay in the hits. Unfortunately, most of her strikes simply bounced off of his armor, resulting in some pain in Pinky's knuckles, and a rumbling traveling through the soldier's back. Tara blocked the man's swipes with her own sword, and she did her best to parry each attack. The soldier started to swing from higher angles, trying to use leverage to bring Tara to her demise.

And suddenly, she found herself failing. Her grip started to slip from her fingers. The increasing weight started to pile on more and more. Pinky's blows were being ignored completely now, and Tara's block was breaking right before her eyes. With one devastating slash, Tara's balance failed her, and her guard was broken, leaving her open to an easy killing blow. But Pinky, in her best attempt to assist her friend, jumped onto the soldier's back, wrapping her arms tightly around his neck. He lowered his blade, and tried to shake the girl off of himself, but it was to no avail. Pinky's grip was tight, and her determination was fierce. The man was slowly starting to suffocate as Pinky increased her tenacity, closing off his airway. He swung around desperately, trying to shake the hyper girl away. Pinky was starting to feel the effects of his struggle, as she felt her grip loosening from his throat. Her strength was starting to fade, and the soldier was regaining his balance, preparing to go on the attack yet again. Unwilling to let that happen, Pinky summoned the rest of the strength she had to tighten her grip around the man's head and neck. Then, with one mighty twist of his arms, she snapped his neck, bringing his life to a close. Pinky fell to the ground, panting, feeling weak, as she heard a cheer coming from across the room.

"Yeah, way to go, Pinky!" Dash called out in celebration. She was still dodging the swipes from her Hound Dog enemy, not caring at all about what danger he could cause. He was no longer the main focus of attention for Dash any more. Now, she was more focused on Pinky's excellent execution, ignoring the threat standing a few feet from her. She continued to call back to her friend, as her opponent rose was trying to calm himself after Dash's long, painful string of insults. "Thank God that's three of these fuckers dead! Now, tie for you to watch how the fucking magic happens!"

Dash turned back to the man, but she never saw him, as a shadow took up most of her vision. Suddenly, the armored knee of the Hound Dog collided hard with her face. She was defenseless against the attack, and the impact struck her so forcefully that she nearly lost her balance, stumbling back a few steps. She grasped her face, and tried to muscle through the searing headache she was getting. She let go, trying to readjust her vision, but her attacker gave her no such opportunity. He punched her in the face with an armored fist, and then repeated the process twice more. She stumbled backwards, struggling to keep her balance. She realized that she vastly underestimated her opponent, and now, her face was getting caved in because of it. Dash had always considered herself to be very tough, very resilient, and able to withstand any form of punishment. It wasn't as if she had never experienced pain. But as one spends their entire life associated with pain, they grow numb to it, and are able to overcome it in whatever form it takes. Which was why she knew that those armored hits hurt an incredible amount.

She was punched once more, and now, she couldn't stay on her feet any longer. Her vision was doubling, her head was hazy, and the world was tilting. She fell to her hands and knees, as a shadow of a man raising his blade appeared before her. Her instincts told her to run. Her instincts told her to dodge. Her instincts told her that if she didn't move right now, she was going to die. She was going to be sliced into pieces unless she got her senses together. But she couldn't do it. Her feet wouldn't respond to her commands, and she just couldn't focus on the danger that was about to end her life. She didn't comprehend the fact that in a few short moments, her existence would come to an end, in the bloodiest manner possible. The shadow moved, swinging something down upon her.

She didn't understand the feeling of dread she was getting at the sight of it. It wasn't as if she felt any pain. In fact, she felt nothing other than the painful sensation in her head. She started to regain a sense of her surroundings, and she heard the sound of metal scraping against metal. Then, she heard a female voice talking to her angrily.

"Dash, focus! Get up! I can't keep saving you forever, you know!"

Dash's senses snapped back to life. She saw Tara standing next to her, her sword locked with the machete, hanging just inches above her. Tara was struggling to keep the enemy's blade up. And suddenly, Dash remembered that she was about to die. She rolled out of the way, as Tara couldn't hold up the machete any longer. She ended the clash, as the machete struck where Dash was moments ago. Dash got to her feet, and said the first thing on her mind whenever she saw Tara.

"Didn't need your help there, Spark," Dash said with a sneer.

"Just focus and help me kill this guy," Tara said with a grunt. "After this, you need to learn a lesson in respecting others." The girls started to fight, although this could not interrupt their clash of words.

"And you didn't have to be an attention whore," Dash said, dodging a swing from the machete.

Meanwhile, AJ and Discord were still battling, and Discord understood that the only thing saving his life was the fact that AJ was still in handcuffs. She attempted an overhead swing, but Discord dove out of the way. They were still dueling by the elevator, now alone on their side of the room, all other's currently busy. Discord quickly studied the situation. Once his last soldier fell, he would stand no chance of survival. The remaining Hound Dogs were upstairs, and he knew that they were never supposed to leave their posts there, as the money they protected was far more valuable to them than his life right now, no matter how much he personally disagreed with it. He knew his only chance of survival was to get on the elevator and make it upstairs. But how? He then saw his saving grace as he was backing away from AJ's advance. A few yards from him, his revolver lay in wait. He knew he had to get to it, and fast. But first, Discord had to slip away from AJ.

He quickly reached into his pocket, and pulled out a long knife. He readied himself, planting both feet firmly on the ground, and bending his legs, making him a hard target to knock over. AJ charged at him at full speed, and he smirked, seeing his chance to escape come to life before his eyes. He waited until AJ got as close as possible, and then, he lashed out with the knife, swooping it upwards through the air. He glared at the knife in victory, knocking he had cut through something. He looked back at AJ, and his smile faded. AJ's ties had been sliced by the knife, and now, she was free and unrestrained.

AJ smirked.

Discord gulped.

Then, he ran.

He sprinted towards the gun as fast as he could, with AJ now close behind him. He dove onto his weapon, rolling as he hit the ground, so that he would spring back up. He jumped back up, his faithful revolver in his left hand. He turned quickly towards AJ, but could not react fast enough as she plowed into him. He held onto his gun this time, and tried to shoot once moreagain. But AJ now grabbed onto his wrists, and they started to have a tug-of-war over the colt revolver.

Tara was busy fighting when she heard the sound of a gunshot ringing through the air. She looked over towards AJ, hoping not to see her friend dead. Luckily, she was still quite alive, continuing to wrestle with Discord over the gun, which had misfired into the ceiling. Tara suddenly understood her priorities, and knew that if Discord got that gun, major problems would occur. The soldier was facing Dash now, trying to cut her open, and she was now fully focused on avoiding his attacks. Fiona was busy helping Rachel, and Pinky had dropped her own guns when she tackled one of the soldiers. Tara then realized that she was the only chance of assisting her friend.

With a quick glance back at AJ, she suddenly struck the soldier over the back of the head, briefly knocking him unconscious. Before Dash had time to react, Tara was already sprinting towards AJ and Discord, her sword at her side, ready to strike.

"AJ, I'm coming!" Tara yelled to her friend to alert her of the reinforcements. However, it was not AJ who was helped by this notification. Discord suddenly realized that another opportunity had presented itself, and this time, he would not let it get away. He raised his foot, and slammed it hard upon AJ's. She winced in pain, and then in the moment of her reaction, he head-butted her again, temporarily knocking her away.

With his hands now free, he quickly spun around towards Tara, smiling as he pointed the gun at the young girl.

BANG

Tara froze. She dint know why, but she felt like she couldn't move anymore. A strange sense of euphoria washed over her. She was shaking slightly as she held her pose, still positioned in mid-sprint. Tara's breathing was very jagged, and she felt her vision starting to fade. She saw AJ staring at her in shock, but Tara didn't know why. She felt as if something had passed through her, like a ghost phasing threw her torso. She didn't feel any pain, so she didn't understand why there was any need to panic.

And then, she had the desperate need to look down at her body. She didn't know why, but it just felt like she had to do it. Tara tilted her head, and saw that a large red stain was forming just between her last few ribs on her right side. It took her a brief moment to realize that what she was seeing wasn't any design on her shirt, but instead her own blood pouring out of her. Tara looked back at AJ, an expression of confusion on her face.

Then, she dropped her sword, and collapsed to the ground, her body going limp.

All AJ could do was stare in disbelief at Tara's form, lying on the ground merely a few yards away. It was in this moment Discord made a mad dash towards the elevator. He leapt inside, and pounded on the third floor button as many times as he could. Finally, the elevator doors closed, and he was carried up to the third floor. It was dead silent around the room. For a few seconds, no one could do anything but stare at Tara.

Then, AJ quickly ran towards Tara as fast as she could. She didn't care about fighting Discord anymore, her only thoughts focusing on her friend's well-being. She slid over to Tara and knelt beside her, slowly rotating Tara onto her back. Tara screamed at the sharp movement, feeling like someone was snapping her in half. Pinky ran over also, and even Rachel, who had been so focused on her own injury, now felt nothing aside from worry, sprinting over to Tara as well. Fiona slowly rose to her feet, and started to walk fearfully over, not wanting to know the full extent of the damage. Tara's scream shook her to the core. It only gave her a sense of dread, like something terrible had gone wrong. She had been so focused on helping Rachel that she didn't even have time to support her closest friend when she most desperately needed her. Already, tears were starting to form in Fiona's eyes, as she caught a glimpse of AJ's terrified face. It gave Fiona no sense of security, and her fears only increased once she finally got close to Tara.

"Rachel, scarf! Now!" AJ commanded Rachel, who covered her mouth with her hand, noticing the large amount of blood Tara was losing. A pool was forming beneath her friend, which was soaking through Tara's clothing. Rachel didn't even register AJ's orders, too shocked to move. AJ yelled at her again, and this time Rachel understood, taking off her scarf and handing it to the southern girl. AJ wrapped the scarf around Tara's torso, in a fast attempt to slow the bleeding. Pinky, realizing something was wrong despite her ever optimistic mood, tried to get AJ to explain what was happening. Fiona had now joined the others, crowded around Tara, who was breathing very raggedly. AJ refused to answer Pinky, too focused on Tara's wounds to think of anything else. She knew from training that she couldn't lose herself when other soldiers died, but she was finding it increasingly difficult. She didn't want to sit down and cry, but she felt like she was losing something far too important to let go of.

Tara felt intense agony. Every breath felt like her chest was on fire. Every slightest move of her body felt like someone was twisting her bones around in circles. It hurt her tremendously to breathe, but she couldn't stop breathing heavier and heavier, which only made the sensation worse. Her ears were ringing, and her surroundings kept fading in and out. The pain was slowly turning into a dull numbness, as her nerves started to lose all feeling other than agony. She thought she was going to die. She always heard that people went numb when they die; she wondered if this feeling was what they were actually referring to. In fact, for a brief moment, she thought that she wouldn't even care if she died.

She looked up, and saw the faces of her friends staring back at her. Pinky looked incredibly confused, with only a hint of understanding the grave reality of what was happening. Rachel looked like she was going to be ill. Fiona had turned away from Tara, the simple sight of her friend bringing her to sobs. AJ was still working hard to save Tara's life, but Tara saw that her resolve was fading. Tara felt like she should be saying her final goodbyes or something, but she was too weak to say anything.

No, Tara thought, trying to force herself to keep her hopes high. I am not going to die like this. Not yet. There's too much left that I'd leave behind.

Then, Tara noticed that there was one person left in the room not crowded by her. Dash was a few feet away, by the unconscious soldier. Dash was now leaning against the nearby wall. Her eyes were wide, and she stared blankly at the floor. Other than that, she had no expression on her face. There were no tears streaming down her cheeks, no desperate plea to God that Tara would live. All she did was just stare at the floor, arms by her side, as she heard her friends struggle to save Tara's life. She didn't bother looking at Tara to know the extent of the damage. She didn't have to. Tara's screams and Fiona's cries were all it took to understand that Tara probably was not going to survive the night. It seemed a little funny to Dash, actually. The thought that Tara would be killed by a crazed gunman, of all people, was rather humorous. The great, noble Tara Sullivan brought down by a lowlife psychopath was nothing other than pure ironic comedy.

Actually, now that Dash thought about it, it wasn't funny anymore. Suddenly, it became something else. Instead of making her laugh, it filled her with a different emotion, one that Dash was quite familiar with. She had felt it every single day of her life, through all of her most miserable hours and desolate moments. She felt it every time she had seen how wonderful everyone else lived, every time she witnessed how poorly everyone acted to her, every time she had been forced to fight against the stupidity of the world. She looked down at the unconscious man at her feet, starting to awaken. And the simple sight of him moving and breathing, getting up just to kill more people, pushed Dash's emotions to their brink. She clenched her teeth, and her hands closed tightly into fists, her nails digging deep into her skin. Her face was like death, as she spoke to no one, yet everyone.

"They're going to die," Dash said harshly, her voice rough. Blood started to leak from her hands as her nails dug deeper into her own flesh. She looked up from the ground, and AJ turned her attention to her, seeing Dash full of more rage than she had ever witnessed. Dash raised her foot in the air; now turning her attention to the other unconscious man Fiona had been fighting.

"EVERY LAST ONE OF THESE MOTHERFUCKERS IS GOING TO DIE!"

She slammed her foot down as hard as she could onto the soldier's head, breaking through his armor and skull. Her foot traveled through his brain, and pressed hard onto the other side of his bone. She pushed off from her blood and brain soaked foot, and sprinted as fast as she could towards the other living man in the room. Right before she reached him, she jumped in the air. She brought her full weight down upon his spine, shattering it instantly. She forced his body to turn over, and then she started punching him in the face, beating him through his armor. Her hands were bruising against the face mask, but she didn't care. She kept beating on him, knowing that she was causing him pain. Or at least, she hoped he was in pain. She felt him stir beneath her, and she wanted him to feel all of the pain Tara was feeling at this moment, if not more. It was the only thing that mattered to her, except for the one last piece of business she needed to address. She turned to the other girls, who were now noticing her outburst of hatred. With a bloody fist, she pointed at the elevator.

"WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU WAITING FOR?!" Dash shouted in anger. "GET UP THERE AND KILL THAT ASSHOLE ALREADY!"

The force of Dash's command knocked the girls out of their stupor. Without saying another word, they each understood that if Discord escaped, only more destruction would follow in his wake. Still, that didn't stop AJ from wanting to stay at Tara's side, help her through the pain. She knew that the girl also couldn't just leave Tara alone, bleeding to death in an abandoned restaurant. But Fiona kneeled down beside her, understanding AJ's worries.

"AJ," Fiona said through her tears, which she was trying hard to sniffle away. "I'll stay here and look after her." AJ nodded. She understood that Tara meant a lot to Fiona. She didn't know the exact details, but she imagined that Fiona would take Tara's death worse than any of them. Tara was one of Fiona's only friends, and Fiona would do all she could at keeping her friend safe. AJ looked back at Tara, silently wishing for her friend to be okay, and then she stood up, wiping away all emotion to focus on her job.

"Alright then, listen up," AJ instructed the girls. "We can't use the elevator. They'd be guardin' it like hell. So, I need you to grab assault rifles from the corpses over here, and follow me through the kitchen. It's time we end this bastard once and for all." AJ turned towards Dash, who was still pounding away into the lifeless shell of a soldier, her hands bloodied and bruised. "Dash, ya coming?"

"Go on," Dash grunted. "I... need to finish something here."

__________

The third floor of the restaurant was mainly used to house novelty items before the shutdown. It was designed for its ambiance; so many fantastic stain glass portraits lined the walls of the room, depicting Chinese artistry, including great dragons, fighting soldiers, and beautiful women. At a time, the room used to hold mostly shelves, but these were taken out to make accommodations for Discord's wealth. Millions of dollars were stacked in great piles across the room, signaling the Smiling Dragon's great accomplishments. Discord had instructed his five best soldiers stay in this room to protect the money with their lives, even at the cost of his own life. He figured that it was better to have a large sum of money be saved to be used later, rather than sacrifice a leader who could always be replaced by someone else.

However, Discord seemed to be forgetting this particular memory now, as he was holding one soldier down and slapping him repeatedly across his unprotected face.

"Why. Didn't. You. Help. Me?!" Discord punctuated each word with a vicious slap. He didn't give the soldier time to answer before he threw the man to the ground. "Fuck, fuck, fuck, fucking fuck, guys! Follow this order, will ya?! See that elevator?" Discord pointed at the large gray doors. "If that opens, light it up! I don't give a fuck who's inside! Just waste 'em! I need to get out of here, so if you excuse me…"

Discord started to walk away from the elevator, which was now being targeted by the soldiers. He had an escape route through the back room, which led down through the kitchen and out a hidden back entrance. Suddenly, a whirring sound was heard, and the light on top of the elevator lit up, indicating a new arrival.

Ding

The elevator doors barely opened before the soldiers opened fired into the small space. After a few seconds of firing, their clips were empty, and they paused to see who they executed. But the elevator was empty, not a soul in sight. Discord paused in his back stepping, to take a long gaze into the elevator. Suddenly, he heard the sound of a rifle clicking behind him, and his reflexes took over, as he dived behind on of the many stacks of money.

BANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANG

From the far side of the room, near the door to a back room, AJ, Rachel, and Pinky opened fire upon the group of soldiers. Some members panicked, trying to dive for safety, while some died instantly from the shots. But after merely six seconds, the five best soldiers in Discord's elite troop had been murdered. Discord saw their bodies lying on the ground, and it angered him. It angered him so much that a group of completely inexperienced teenagers had somehow managed to kill his business, his acquaintances, and now, were about to kill him. It brought him to sheer rage. He waited for the girls to reload, before he pulled out his revolver, and stood up, walking out into the open. He started twirling his gun at a vigorous pace around his finger, and started to randomly pause and fire shots at the girls. AJ instructed them to get into cover. They did so, and Discord started to speak his anger more openly.

"YOU FUCKING SEE THIS?!" Discord shouted in hate. "DO YOU SEE WHAT YOU'VE DONE! YOU RUINED EVERYTHING! IT WAS ALL GOING PERFECTLY UNTIL YOU LITTLE BITCHES HAD TO SHOW UP AND FUCK ME OVER!"

Pinky reloaded and tried to get out of cover to take a shot, but she couldn't even peek her head out of cover, before Discord shot at her head with near perfect accuracy. Luckily, she managed to duck down before it hit her, saving her life.

"Well, I want you to see something!" Discord shouted, realizing his clip was empty. He reached into his pocket with his spare hand, and pulled out a set of six bullets. He twirled his revolver again, flipping open the chamber, and expertly reloaded his gun while performing fantastic tricks with his revolver. He flipped it in the air, and rolled it sideways, and despite the fact that he had nearly killed her, Pinky thought the tricks were actually pretty nifty, and made a mental note to practice it later, if she managed to survive. "This is the .45 Colt Revolver. This is the greatest fucking handgun in the world, far superior to the shit weapons you use, so I know I'm better than you are! And now, I'm going to kill you with it!"

Discord fired more shots at the girls, not being able to penetrate past the thick stacks of fiat money protecting them. Pinky pulled out a small handgun that she had picked up off of the floor, and tried to get a good glimpse of Discord's position. She went back into cover, and took a deep breath, knowing that her trajectory would have to be perfect in order to get her shot off. She aimed at the ceiling above her, which was covered in metal beams and support columns. With one shot, she fired at one of the beams. With fantastic precision, the bullet ricocheted off of the beam, bounced off of the floor, and then struck Discord in the hand.

He yelped in pain and the revolver fell out of his hand, which Pinky had planned to give her an extra second to get in a killing blow. But Discord had managed to catch the revolver in his right hand, and started firing without a moment's hesitation, once again. Pinky, now stuck again, realized her plan was a failure, at least in the sense that she had intended. But yet, AJ happened to notice that Pinky's plan had some sort of advantage. Discord was firing much more wildly, his right hand clearly not being his predominate one. Discord still had them pinned against cover, but she thought that at least they had a fighting chance.

Fuck, was all Discord could think. He was now sufficiently outmatched, and it angered him even more. He had the enemy right where he wanted them, but he couldn't even finish them off. He fired anyway, hoping to take someone down. But in his rage and intensive firing, he couldn't hear the rapid footsteps approaching him from behind.

"THIS IS FOR TARA, YOU SON OF A BITCH!"

Shlkk

Discord didn't even have time to turn around, before a sword passed straight through his arm. Cut off at his shoulder, his right arm fell to the ground, still clutching the revolver in its unmoving fingers. Discord stared in shock at his bloody stump of an arm, as Dash ferociously turned him around and head-butted him, knocking him out. Dash's face was contorted in rage, and she raised Tara's sword in the air, preparing a finishing blow. But AJ quickly ran over to the enraged girl, and grabbed onto her wrists.

"Dash, wait," AJ reasoned. "We need to keep him alive."

"Why?!" Dash snapped at her friend. "You saw what he's done! He's a psychopath! Tell me why he gets to live, while she doesn't?!"

"Because right now, he's the only link we have to The Unknown," AJ stated factually. "And he's far more valuable alive than he is dead."

Dash considered this, and then begrudgingly lowered her sword. She spat on Discord's face, as she walked away, disgusted by the sight of him.

By the time Discord finally woke, he found himself in a bad predicament. He was kneeling on the floor, his one remaining hand tied to the table. He thought he was going to bleed out, but one look around told him that it did not seem likely. He was being closely watched by all four girls, who, despite desperately wanting to make sure Tara was okay, were staring at him with great caution, making sure nothing happened to him, even somehow bandaging his bloody stump of an arm.

"What the fuck happened?" Discord asked groggily.

"You're our prisoner," AJ responded. "We're waiting for a control unit to pick you up, and deliver you to a safe location. You're too dangerous to be left on your own."

Discord chuckled at the very thought of being contained.

"That won't do any good," Discord smirked. "No matter what torture you put me through, you'll never get me to talk."

"You mean talk about the council that constantly treats you like a child?" AJ said back, making Discord's smile fade.

"Oh shit," Discord said under his breath. "Man, if The Unknown finds out about this…"

"Trust me, The Unknown isn't what you should be worrying about right now," Dash said, her words full of hate. The elevator light suddenly lit up, indicating someone was heading to this floor.

That's weird, AJ thought. The control unit can't have gotten here that fast.

"Besides, what's so threatening about The Unknown, anyhow?" Dash asked.

"Look, I'm a crazy fucking maniac," Discord said bluntly. "But that guy, I don't know what his deal is. No one does! He's got some crazy fucking agenda of his going on, but I don't know what he's thinking in that nutty little head of his."

"We'll see how honest ya being once we get you to a secure location," AJ said smugly, despite curiously wondering how the control unit could have arrived so quickly.

Ding

"That's them,' Rachel said, walking towards the elevator. The door opened, and she greeted the group happily. "Thank God, you're here. We've been-"

Rachel paused. She stared at the single person in the elevator. He was wearing all dark clothing, a set of black jeans, a black button-up shirt, and a black blazer. His dark shoes were fancy, and looked expensive. His suit-hat was dipped down on his head, and he had his hands clasped behind his back, as if he were an extremely important executive, looking down upon his subordinates. But what was truly scary was his lack of face. A white mask had been placed over his head, covering his entire face, neck, and hair with a white polyester. He had no means of identification, and Rachel just stared at him, a feeling of dread running through her.

Time seemed to stop.

Suddenly, he lashed out, striking her in the head with an elbow, and knocking her to the floor. He sprinted out of the elevator, and moved towards Discord with fantastic speed. Pinky stood in his way, and she raised her gun to fire. But he moved too fast, grabbing onto her gun and giving it a harsh tug in two places. The barrel slid off the grip, and Pinky's gun became worthless. The man grabbed onto Pinky's shoulder with one hand and her waist with another, and flipped her to the ground, all while never losing any momentum. Dash tried to attack, but he rolled towards her, ducking her punch before delivering a strong kick to the back of her left knee. She stumbled, and in this time, the man grabbed onto her face and forced her down like the others.

All that was left standing was AJ, but she was ready for anything this man had to offer. She readied a fighting stance, and when the right moment came, she lashed out a quick jab, intended on making the man roll out of the way. Except he didn't roll; he simply paused right out of the range of AJ's fingers, and grabbed onto her wrist. He stared at her for a moment.

An eerily calm moment, where neither of them moved.

And then, he stepped in closer, placed his hands on her shoulder and stomach, and pushed her to the side. With the four girls briefly incapacitated, he looked down upon the kneeling Discord. The man broke the bonds, before grabbing Discord by the collar of his shirt, and holding their faces close together.

"We're leaving," the man spoke harshly at Discord. Discord gulped in fear. The man threw Discord over his shoulder, and quickly moved to the largest stain-glass window. The girls struggled to get to their feet as the man paused, and slowly turned around.

"Who the fuck are you?!" Dash yelled at him. The man tipped his hat at the girls, a signal of a decent fight being fought.

"You know who I am," the man said without doubt. "Oh, and by the way, I want you to stop interfering. Now. Before I have to end any of you sooner than you deserve. And remember, fear The Unknown…"

The man placed himself against the window.

"…for I don't fear you."

CRASH

With that, the man jumped through the stain glass window, carrying him and a screaming Discord down three stories to the hard concrete below. AJ quickly rushed over to the window, and looked down. She knew the results of a three story fall, and she had no idea why this man would ever end his own life in this fashion. But, when she looked down, there were no bodies outside except the soldiers that Tara had earlier killed. She looked around for any sign of the two men, but there was none. They had simply vanished into the night.

__________

October 21th-October 22nd, 2015

Tara slowly opened her eyes. Her vision was blurry; an endless haze made up her sight. All she saw was bright, blurry white, surrounding her in every direction. She tried to groggily look around, but she couldn't make out anything. Slowly, everything started to come back to her. Her hearing kicked in, and she heard a steady beeping noise. She began to make out walls, and a ceiling. A hospital. That was where she must have been. But she didn't understand why she was there. Suddenly, some of the memories came back to her. She remembered fighting Discord, then a gunshot, and then nothing else. With the memories, though, the pain suddenly kicked in as well. She groaned as an intense feeling of discomfort in her chest, and a horrible soreness in the rest of her body came to life. She tried turning her head, but the pain convinced her not to move.

"So you're finally awake," a voice came from beside her. Tara didn't need to see who spoke in order to recognize the southern accent of her friend.

"AJ?" Tara asked sleepily. "What happened?"

"Ya nearly died, that's what happened," AJ said, with great relief in her voice. "Ya got shot during the attack on the Imperial Chinese Restaurant. Bullet passed right through ya liver. It's a goddamn miracle that ya survived."

"Really?" Tara asked in disbelief. "How bad could it have been?"

"Bad enough that they performed surgery for twelve hours straight tryin' to repair ya," AJ said. "Ya really should have seen the girls during it all. I thought Fiona was going to go crazy waiting for ya. You must really mean a lot to that girl."

"You have no idea," Tara sighed. "So where are they now, anyway? It'd be nice to see them."

"Sent 'em back to Camelot," AJ stated. "Couldn't take 'em anymore. Too much worrying." Tara tried to sit up to talk to her friend, but more pain flowed through her, and AJ pushed her back down on the bed. "Whoa there. You've been out for three days. I don't think that any more sudden movements are a good idea."

Tara nodded in understanding.

"So when do I get to leave?" Tara wanted to know. It didn't make her feel comfortable that she was unconscious for three days straight, but it did explain her great weariness. Although she couldn't see it, AJ smiled at her.

"Well, I got Wilson to pull a few strings, so…" AJ said happily. "If you take it easy, we can get ya back to Camelot by tomorrow." Tara yawned and smiled, leaning deeper into her bed.

"That's nice," Tara said, very tired, closing her eyes. "I think I'll sleep for a bit now. Oh, and AJ, thanks for helping me out."

"I told you, Tara," AJ said. "Nothing bad would happen to you… except a shot in one of your vital organs." Tara giggled at the comment, before drifting back to sleep.

One day later, she was happy to find that she was allowed to leave the hospital. She and AJ left together, and despite a burning in Tara's chest every time she took a step, she felt really good. During the drive back to Camelot, AJ told Tara what happened after she was wounded. Discord's ramblings, Dash's retaliation, and The Unknown's arrival all attracted her attention. Tara patiently listened to the information, taking in the details. Before she knew it, they had arrived back at Camelot, and Tara slowly got out of the car to prevent more pain flowing through her. She walked into the Chinese restaurant, entered through the secret back door, and was immediately greeted with a tight hug from Fiona.

"Tara!" Fiona shouted happily, keeping her arms wrapped tightly around her friend. Tara laughed at Fiona's enthusiasm.

"Good to see you too, Fiona," Tara returned the hug. They hugged, and hugged some more, and soon, Tara realized that Fiona may have been hugging a little too much. "Uh…Fiona?"

Fiona immediately broke off the hug and backed away, blushing furiously and hiding her face underneath her hoodie. As Tara walked further into Camelot, she was also greeted by Pinky and Rachel, who each gave their own tight, if not somewhat uncomfortable, hugs to Tara. They each wanted to know how she was feeling, if she was alright, and so forth. Tara answered the best she could to all of the questions, although for most, she herself did not know the answers. Eventually, Tara realized the lack of one member of the group, and started to inquire information for herself.

"Hey, does anyone know where Dash is?" Tara asked to her friends.

"Oh, she's training," Rachel responded with a shrug. "I don't know why she didn't bother to welcome you back, though."

"Okay, thanks," Tara said, starting to walk towards the gymnasium. "I'm going to go speak to her." Fiona expressed concern, however.

"Do you need us to help you out?" Fiona nervously questioned. "You know, in case you two start fighting again?"

Tara shook her head.

"Nah, I think I got this," Tara stated with great confidence. She left the group, and made her way to the training area. When she arrived, she took notice of how empty it was, with the exception of one person in the far corner. Dash was working a sandbag with MMA gloves, moving around and punching it as hard as she could, yet never breaking a sweat. Tara moved slowly towards her, taking slow steps, to avoid hurting herself. She did reach Dash eventually, and although Dash never looked at Tara, she did acknowledge her.

"So, they finally let you out of the hospital," Dash said while letting out another punch. "Too fucking bad. I was really hoping that you're ruptured spleen, or whatever, would fucking make you bleed to death. Guess I got to wish harder next time."

"Hello, Dash," Tara smiled. She wasn't angered by the girl's comments, merely smiling her way through them.

"Jeez, you seem pretty fucking happy for someone who should be a corpse," Dash snickered. "What, did the doctor stroke you're fucking clit or something?"

"You know Dash, I don't think you're really this mean to people," Tara smirked. "I mean, how much of what you say do you actually mean?"

"Every last sentence," Dash stated, landing three more punches on the bag in time with her words.

"Really?" Tara asked, clearly not believing Dash's words. "Because I'm pretty sure AJ talked in great detail about, you know, how you went crazy when I got shot. How you attacked people like nuts because you couldn't handle the idea of me dying. And, something about, you know, cutting Discord's arm of in my honor."

Dash's fist landed against the bag, but she did not move further. Her eyes were wide, and she just stared at the sandbag before her. She sneered, and muttered to herself.

"Damn it, I told that cowgirl not to say anything about that," Dash said under her breath. She continued to stare at the bag, unsure of what to actually say. But Tara took hold of the moment, and suddenly grabbed onto Dash and gave her what she had never expected to give.

A hug.

A simple hug which took Dash by great surprise. Dash stared over Tara's shoulder as Tara continued the display of affection.

"You really do care, don't you, Dash?" Tara asked kindly. Dash had no idea how to respond. But finally, Dash sighed, and returned Tara's hug, even allowing herself to smile a little.

"Okay, okay," Dash said begrudgingly. "I'm glad you're not dead, Spark. That's the most you'll get out of me, so be fucking happy with it." Tara sighed as well, and broke off the hug.

"I'll take it," Tara said happily. "Good to see you too, Dash." Dash smirked, and went back to training.

"Yeah, yeah, go fuck yourself," Dash responded. Tara smiled at the comment, and left Dash to train.

__________

"You failed us again," The Unknown stated with much disappointment. Discord groaned.

"Look, I got one fucking arm, cut me some slack," Discord said angrily.

"No," Sombra said with disdain. "We gave you a second chance, and you disappointed us yet again. It is over."

"What do you mean 'it is over'?" Discord asked. "You saved me from being captured by those fucking ladies. Doesn't that mean you want me to be a part of this council, or not?"

"The only reason I saved you was to make sure you didn't say anything else about us with that horrible intellect of yours," The Unknown angrily stated. "We don't want you, and we don't need you."

"But… whose gonna take out those bitches if I'm gone?" Discord tried to argue.

"Have you forgotten about me?" Moon suddenly asked. "I'm an assassin. I can eliminate the targets before this moron can spell 'assassination'."

"That's not fair!" Discord shouted. "I lost my entire business from working with you guys! You owe me!"

"Be lucky that we haven't killed you on the spot," Chrysalis said. "We've seen enough of you. Now, if you will, please get the fuck out."

"You…" Discord was furious. It was enough that he lost all of his resources, but to be rejected with the only people he wanted to be accepted by was too much for him. He growled at them, spitting out his words with venom. "You'll fucking see what I can do! I'll show you how great I can be. I'll end those little P.O.N.Y. motherfuckers, and then you'll beg for me to come back!"

"I very much doubt that," The Unknown stated with confidence. "Sombra, do the honors."

"With pleasure," Sombra said, standing up from his chair to approach Discord. Discord gulped as the large man walked up to him, cracking his knuckles with satisfaction.

The next thing Discord knew, he was lying face down in the pavement in the middle of the woods, with no idea of how to leave.

__________

Gukovo, Russia was home to one of the most infamous pubs in Russia, The Kings Pub. In the winter time, the interior was always kept warm by the hundred or so people crowded around, drinking and having a merry time. But alas, it was this time of year that the bar underwent many reservations, as it was the time that the Korbalov brothers came to drink, and take time off from their busy work. Of course, taking time off usually meant fighting as many people as possible, while breaking every stool and table in the area.

And thus, tonight another victim crashed through a table, as Yuri Korbalov, younger brother of Kristov, smirked at his triumph. Another man ran up to him, and smashed a stool over his back. But Yuri never even flinched, simply looking at the man with disappointment that such a move was even attempted. He readied a punch, but suddenly, his phone rang. He and the man both stared at his pocket, and then Yuri sighed. He reached into his pocket, pulled out his phone, and answered.

"Yes," Yuri said. "This is the Brothers of Chaos. What is request?"

"Uh, hello," the voice on the phone said. "I heard you and your brother are the best hitmen in the world."

"This is true," Yuri said.

"Well, I need a favor. See, I need help killing six little teenage girls in America."

"You can't kill a bunch of little girls?"

"They cut my fucking arm off!" the voice angrily shouted. "Can you do it or not?!"

"Yes, we can do it," Yuri smirked. "But it will cost money. Lots of money."

"I got millions of dollars," the voice said. "You can do whatever you want to do. Torture, rape, whatever."

"Got it," Yuri said. "Anything else?"

"Yeah," the voice said. "Tell them, 'By the command of Discord, go fuck yourself.' Got it, commie?"

"Yeah, Yeah, we understand," Yuri said happily. "Pleasure doing business."

The man Yuri was fighting tried to strike Yuri while he was distracted, but suddenly, a large, crimson fist penetrated through his chest, killing him. He fell to the ground, and Yuri saw his brother standing behind the body. Yuri smiled.

"Kristov, we've been hired."

Kristov nodded in understanding.

"Where?" Kristov asked as the two left the pub, much to the relief of many drinkers.

"America," Yuri stated. "We've got a job to do."

End of Chapter 4