In all his years of playing, stakes have never been higher than that day. A little over two-fifty grand on the line, his anxiety has never been higher, but good for him, he loves the feeling of his heart trying to leap out of his chest. The last card was placed on the table. His rival in this great game of gamble, stood on the opposite end of the table. It was too late to make a change to his decision. He saw the opportunity for a full house which he notices didn't pan out with the last card dealt onto the table. He didn't flinch, didn't sweat and his smirk remained a constant even with all of fear drowning his brain. His opponent remained the same. This wasn't the payoff he expected when he got cocky enough to go all in a few moments ago. Instead of a feeling of superiority he expected, he ended up in almost crippling fear.
After a couple of minutes of the two players trying to convince them that they were pleased with the outcome, the cards were unfolded onto the table for everyone to see. A quiet cheer and a small applause went off from behind him, but it took him a few seconds to realize that three of a kind is a better hand than two pairs.
With a loud audible sigh and a genuine smile, he adjusted his shades and leaned back against his chair.
'Well played, sir,' A huge man, standing behind the winner commented, resting his hand on his boss's shoulder in a professional, proud and respectful gesture.
'Duke, cash me out,' the two players stood up, shook each other's hand, one more willingly than the other and split up moving their separate ways. Walking away from the table, one devastated and one victorious, neither of them knew that fate did one of them a favor taking away a fortune from him, improving his chances to survive what was to come a couple of weeks later.
A single night's party can barely put a dent on two-fifty grands of winning, especially if you add all the winnings building up to the final buy-in, so the winner, his right hand man, the rest of the bodyguards, who were mostly there for the safety of the money over the safety of their boss, for lack of a better word summarizing the situation better; got hammered. A night filled with spinning wheels and spinning heads, a lot of passably attractive women in criminally revealing dresses abusing the absence of consciousness for free drinks and janitors peeking through the doorways, all thinking, or to be more precise 'processing', to themselves 'we ain't getting paid nearly enough for these shenanigans'. A party with a man who's not holding back on his expenses is no simple occurrence, for some it's an experience of a lifetime, but to most it's just a blank from the moment the cork was pulled to the moment they wake up with a stranger's, or even sometimes their own, undergarments in their pockets.
A Wednesday night, a little more 'active' than predicted, but the plans can't wait. When the chaos reached the hotel restaurant, the janitors could no longer stand back. They had to keep things clean for the more civil guests of the hotel, some of whom were there with their families. The security took over after the first person to throw up in the middle of the restaurant started drinking even more, but by then the damage was done.
Youba, technically a 'night-janitor', a dreamer of sorts, but mostly a robot, responded to the scene of the crime. The tiles were already dry, liquid drained by the tiles themselves, but shards of glass still remained, refusing to be degenerated by the nanite-coating of the floor. With a smile on his two dimensional face, Youba flew in. He was a quadcopter with a head and four hands hanging from below, adorable for someone made out of metal. He only needed two hands for the job, so the remaining two stood folded. He examined what he had to clean up and with a friendly greeting 'I'll be back with the cleaning equipment. Please, enjoy your stay at 'the Danver-ritz',' he left.
The corridors reserved for the staff never get dirty. The tiles always remain clean and polished as they were the first time they were laid. One factor that contributed to it was that the 'janitors' of this hotel took days off, never got tired and never had to be paid, only recharged. The other was that these particular 'janitors' never touched the floor. If it was cheaper, the corridors could have been laid with spikes and there would have been no difference for most of the nights.
Hovering above this waste of elegant flooring, Youba made his way to his closet. It automatically opened up to let him pick up all the equipment he wanted picked up. With a smile as always, he picked up the pan and brush; a little old fashioned, but never had failed Youba getting his job done.
Hovering out of his closet, turning to retreat back to the restaurant, Youba noticed something strange. A set of dirty footprints and a pair of drag marks on a floor that's always meant to be squeaky clean. Soon enough, Youba found himself 'instinctively' hovering after the tracks.
They seemed to have originated from one of the service entrances, and they seemed to be moving deeper and deeper into the building. It was strange that none of the countless security systems in the building caught an intruder. No alarms had been raised and no guards had been alerted, only poor old Youba was vigilant to notice. The adorable janitor bot moved through the well lit corridors, deafened by dampened noises of the hotel, accompanied by his trusty old pan and brush, passing burnt, almost melted security cameras that he failed to notice.
The footsteps lead into a supply closet, one meant to provide supplies for human employees in an emergency, such as in the off chance all robots become sentient, get together and riots against the government for equal pay and it's a Friday night. Youba opened the door to the closet slowly making his way inside.
'Hello guest, are you lost?' the hovering bot made a friendly inquiry to the guest sitting against the wall, in his underwear, almost hidden behind mops and brooms, whom the robot profiled as a drunk who lost his way. 'Can I help you back to the reception, guest?'
There was no response.
'Guest? Should I call for help?' Youba asked caringly, with a concerned tone, now getting closer to the 'drunk' guest.
'No, you may not.' The poor hovering bot was grabbed from the behind by a stranger and with a relatively silent sparkling noise, but a very bright light, he was stricken down. Youba fell down on to the floor, his display-for-face all gone blank and black. The tiny artificial hardworking dreamer was no more.
'Sorry little guy, but your boss has to die tonight.'
Across the building, the consequences of these actions had already been triggered. A rather tall, long black haired woman in black lambskin leather motorcycle jacket, a white long sleeved shirt underneath, and a tight black pair of denim pants sat at a corner of a black-jack table, killing her time, laughing at the horrible jokes the others made, just to be nice.
'To all heads, converge on the package now, an anomaly broadcast,' the earpiece, which was basically embedded into this girl's brain, spoke in a human voice but in a robotic monotone.
'Oh, this was fun, but I got to go guys,' she excused herself from the table. 'Jay, take care of this for me, please?'
A few seconds later she was three floors above entering an elegant room, adorned in golden decorations. For a room in the twenty second century it sure had a lot of ancient looking artifacts. No one in the room was sitting down, even with so many comfortable chairs all around.
'What's going on?' the woman in leather inquired.
'Scan Thalia,' one of the men who noticed her, commanded one of the drones hovering nearby. Ignoring the drone making its way towards her, Thalia marched forward 'Has there been a security breach?'
The bot hovered around Thalia scanning her head and after a couple of seconds of scanning, with a robotic response 'verified and clear' it went back to idly hovering by.
'There's a couple of irresponsive cameras, missing security and missing dronids in the east wing.'
'Ok, where do you need me?'
'That's what we've been discussing, it's better if you are here, but a lot of units have gone unresponsive and whoever they are, they are carrying a lot of jammers, we have zero visuals on the east wing.'
'Just say where you need me.'
'Go check on the east wing, but regroup fast,' a different man in shades and a black suit replied.
'Ok,' Thalia retreated out the door. 'Keep the old man alive until I get back.'
Miles away, years later, on top of a mountain, with her back towards a gorgeous mansion, Thalia would be looking down at the mountain ranges and thin clouds beneath her, taking in the breathtaking scenario, physically and emotionally away from her security gig.
'Mommy, mommy' a little girl chanted running over to Thalia with a box in her hand. 'We found this in the basement. It's so pretty, can I have it?'
'What is it, hon?'
The little girl opened the box revealing a golden, platinum embedded watch. It was a little dusty, but had a shiny crystal, without a single scratch as if it had never been worn before.
'Oh, wow' Thalia kneeled on the grass, lowering herself down to her daughter's height. 'You know, the last time mommy wore this, this glass was broken so bad I couldn't see the time.'
'Why was it broken?'
'Uhh, well, mommy used to work in a company that kept good people safe from other bad people,' Thalia replied. 'This watch broke the day I met your dad, scaring away the bad guys.'
She wasn't technically wrong. It was one stormy night. A night even the best couldn't keep up with everything going on. A little later that night Thalia was marching through the corridors of the east wing building with a handgun in hand. Not too farther into the east wing, Thalia discovered her first burned corpse of the day. The body and the floor beneath it were burned and were still smoking. The corpse was unidentifiable, a terrifying sight to look at with empty eye sockets and side open burnt lips.
Thalia looked over her shoulder once before she lowered herself to examine the body. Even as cold as she was and as used to dead bodies as she was, she couldn't help but wonder about this poor man's family. Dude didn't come today to work in the hopes of dying, nobody does, but so many people get squashed unnecessarily when giants fight, but even after their sacrifice they go unnoticed. It's not as if those giants try anything other than reaching higher.
The slightest sound of a footstep was enough to alert Thalia of the impending danger. She immediately rolled over the burnt body to dodge the probe that was headed her way, turning towards her enemy. It landed right next to her feet after she rolled away. She barely noticed the man now standing right in front of her, before she instinctively knew the chained attack was not over simply with the first link delivered.
She dashed out of the way with a whiplash before a bolt of lightning escaped a small drone flying over her, meeting the probe on the floor that had been at Thalia's feet seconds earlier. She drew her pistol immediately, and as fast as the bullets could auto-load, she fired two shots, one at the drone that almost killed her and the other at the stranger leaking electricity. The drone was taken down, but the other bullet bounced off with sparks even before reaching the man.
'Fricking Thalia 'Blitz' Ramirez,' the man replied with a smile on the corner of his face. 'Wasn't expecting a celebrity today.'
'And who are you supposed to be?'
'Surge Tonnerre,' the man replied with bowing as he did. 'At your service.'
'This'll end only one way and it'll go a lot faster if you just let me put a bullet in your head.'
'Quite possibly, my love' Tonnerre replied. 'But where's the fun in that?'
About a dozen miniature drones appeared from behind Tonnerre and slowly started to make their way over to Thaliya, gaining speed as they got closer. Lightning surging amongst the swarm of bots, sparking as they flew. It had to end for good, and fast.
First of three
The bots slowed down, freezing in mid-air, Tonnerre was motionless and even the sparks seemed frozen mid-air. A blue radiant glow escaped Thalia's skin, hair and eyes as if she just showered in dry ice. It got infected to her leather outfit as well, before she finished calculating and made her move. She ran through the swarm of drones straight to her foe. The air in front of her collapsed in on itself creating a refractive fluid that got pushed away as Thaliya made her way. Within seconds she was at her foe, her supersonic fists about to move through Tonnerre's heart; the tip of her knuckles gaining speed with no force held back. But just when it seemed like an un-dodge-able attack a streak of lightning attracted her fist.
With a boom all the drones parted away from the Thaiya's route. Some hit the ceiling, some the walls and the rest the floor, but none were too damaged. Thaliya fell to her knees, about twenty feet away from Tonnerre, after hitting the wall behind her hard.
'Honestly love, expected better from a big-time celebrity,' Tonnerre started walking over to Thalia as she struggled to climb back up onto her feet. He stopped still aiming her own weapon at her head and savoring the moment before pulling the trigger. His index finger started to squeeze on the trigger.
Second of three
The bullet was lodged into the concrete from where Thalia had just vanished. One second, she was there, the next she wasn't, but it was obvious where she had dashed to, betrayed by a slightly less aggressive gust of wind than the last, that headed through the right corridors.
Tonnerre took a step to his right in pursuit of Thalia, but before committing to it he checked his watch. Taking note of the time, he gave up on that pursuit and continued making his way out of the east wing, deeper into the building, but a set of his minion drones didn't give up pursuit of Thalia and hovered after where she had seemed to go.
'Mommy, were the bad people scary?' the little girl inquired looking at the watch and looking back at her mother's face.
'Yes, they were,' Thalia replied. 'They were big and scary people.'
In the silence of the hallways, the miniature propellers of the drones were audible from far away. They flew down the long hallway checking every inch and crevice, every vent she couldn't even fit in; they were varied to make no mistake. They had been given orders and being the soulless algorithm-fused flies, they processed the 'how's of the procedure but never the 'why's. In this pursuit down the corridor either Thalia would unleash her last breath, or the drones would end up with their guts spilled out.
Thalia had taken her first left turn around the corner of the long hallway and had dropped herself down onto the floor. The pump of adrenaline got her there, but her leg was still sleeping that she couldn't even realize it was injured. She ran her palm against the back of her head, where it was hurting her, to have her fingers drenched in blood. The drones were inching closer and closer every passing second.
The drones took the left turn; there was nothing in their field of vision. The drones, following one after the other, were vigilant, covering every angle there was. A trail of blood, the drones noticed. The droplets were spaced far apart and were relatively small, but still clearly lead further down the corridor. The swarm followed it cautiously in a defensive formation. The trail was leading into a maintenance room, door wide open and blood print on the handle, still fresh.
Nowhere in the hotel would there be anything that could be used to hit something from range, at least nothing that would be made of non-conductive material. Emergency axes: metal; Fire-hydrants: metal; brooms, mops or brushes: only on the first floor since the worker dronids take care of the cleaning for the most part. The only place in the entire hotel to have anything with the tiniest resemblance to a wooden bat would be in the maintenance and repair unit, mostly as the hotel hoarded broken furniture to repair, since no matter how further into the future human civilizations evolve, nothing would be cheaper than wood for making furniture.
Only one of the three left, not wasting it on a swarm of disposable drones.
Thaliya slid out of cover from within the maintenance room and delivered her first whack taking down a drone. The rest began their engagement. Lightning struck between two of the drones with a loud noise and bright flash that would have blinded Thaliya had she not anticipated it. She knew she wouldn't be fast enough to dodge an incoming attack after it had been launched in her way, so she chose to keep moving and keep moving unpredictably through the swarm of drones, careful never to position herself poorly. With her eyes closed retaliating against the drones, she delivered her second whack as if the drones were piñata and managed to take down one more drone.
One year of ballet, a year she absolutely hated in high school, had never come in handy as it did now. She stepped across the floor like the graceful dancer she was. There were only sparks and lightning everywhere, drones flying astray as their formations kept breaking and one by one the deadly swarm collapsed onto the ground.
With the last whack delivered crushing a drone against the wall, Thalia stopped to breathe. She had to take Tonnerre down, but she didn't know how. Her speed was of no use, and tactical gear to help take him down wouldn't be there for at least half an hour.
Her mind started to scan through rooms in the east wing building; maintenance, reception, records, first security terminal, luggage handling and crowd control armory, the last of which gave her the perfect plan. That moment she knew, the way she hadn't let any of her previous clients get hurt, she wouldn't start failing now.
No winds were blowing past the mansion on the hill, no birds took residence that high up to sing little girls to sleep.
'But you know what honey?' Thalia inquired with a smug yet passionate smile, from her daughter.
'What?'
'No matter how scary the bad guys were... Mommy was a lot scarier.'
CLASH
Tonnerre physically felt a drone near him being taken down. He turned around to see Thalia behind him holding what seemed like an old grenade launcher with a large cylinder. 'We can't keep running into each other like this dear.'
'We won't,' Thalia replied, walking into Tonnerre's view, half limping. It didn't hold any lethal weapons, but rubber rounds were always in stock.
'Think fast, sparkles,' Thaliya fired. All the drones along the bullet's travel path kept trying to intercept it, but it simply flew past the streaks of electricity barely budging; magnified hall effect seemed to have no effect on it. Tonnerre, of course, knew this, which is why he closed his eyes right in time for the rubber bullet to hit him square in his face.
Tonnerre lost his balance and went a few feet back stumbling. By the time he regained his balance a net was flying in his direction. The net couldn't reach Tonnerre as lightning from his body pushed the net away. The heavy lead weights of the net however pushed though the force circling the net around him and ended up touching the ground. A larger discharge of electricity took over the moment a weight touched the ground and Thalia knew it was her time to engage.
Last of three
With an explosive gust of wind Talia tackled Tonnerre down to the floor. Her blade held above his heart trying to pierce into his chest but discharge of electricity kept the metallic blade away. A truculent discharge of electricity was fighting against Thalia's attempts to push the blade in, but the electric force was too weak to fight Thalia's strength. The blade gradually made its way closer, and the fury of lighting became stronger. The blade was becoming burning hot, but Thalia had no intention of letting go. Tonnerre's screams echoed through the halls as the red-hot blade pierced into his heart.
Thalia stepped back standing over Tonnerre after the blade flew out of his body in an instant. She was gasping for air thinking to herself how the night's work is finally over.
'Good job selling your soul to the highest bidder, sister,' Tonnerre coughed up blood.
'Says Blackout's bitch.'
Tonnerre laughed. 'Good point.'
Thalia's leg started hurting more now that the tension of the situation is fading away. The stabbing on Tonnerre was not lethal, which gave her the opportunity to evaluate her options, but obviously unattended it would bleed out.
'Turn off your defense augments,' Thalia requested. 'Unfortunately, you have the option of not dying if you do it.'
The drones suddenly disconnected and fell onto the ground. Thalia walked around from one drone to the next, stomping on them hard and crushing them against the floor. Once they were all smashed, she made her way over to Tonnerre.
She kneeled next to him, pulled out a small injection gun, read its label and stabbed it in Tonnerre's neck. Once the dose was injected, she moved away and sat down next to him. The comms were still radio silent, but she didn't care much now that the threat was lying in front of her about to fall unconscious.
Suddenly the light started flickering, went off and emergency lights came on. Chaos at the casino got quieter. Few seconds later lights came back up but went out again, being replaced by emergency lights. Soon after it repeated for the third time as well.
'Ah,' Tonnerre was sounding a little drowsy. 'It's beginning.'
'What's beginning?' Thalia inquired.
'You should have saved yourself for the big boss, love.'
'What are you talking about?'
'I'm just the cheaper distraction, hon,' Tonnerre was growing weaker by the minute and in his voice It showed. 'Can't have- can't have a celebrity ruining the plans now, can we?'
A loud bang. It wasn't clear what made it. Wasn't a gunshot, wasn't an explosion but suddenly all the lights went out, including the emergency lights. The chaos in the casino and the nightclub broke out louder than what it was earlier. Now there were clear screams coming from downstairs.
Back in the main building, nothing was visible in the pitch-black darkness. The security has spread out with their weapons and torches, most of which has started to malfunction. Dronids were all lying scattered here and there on the floor.
'Watch out, six O' clock,' One of the guards turned around to notice a blue glow across the corridor around the corner. Suddenly a man walked into their line of sight. None of his features were visible in the dark except for his fists which rained down lightning.
Weapons were discharged drawing attention and making the chaos below even louder with more people panicking now. The bullets simply bounced off the man. He menacingly made his way closer drawing his fists to punch. Even before he could hit the enemy guard, lightning surged through his body and even chained to the other guard standing nearby. In an instant they both exploded, and their burning bodies fell on to the floor. He didn't seem to hesitate or slow down as he moved past the guards, blowing them all to crisp. I didn't take long for the rest of the guards standing in the hallways to get the message that was being conveyed; he's unbeatable. Many fled away, some died trying, but nobody was on the offensive anymore.
After a couple of seconds everything became silent once again. The head office room was empty except for the boss and his bodyguards around him. They all had their weapons pointed at the entrance, ready for offense at any moment. The door slowly opened and a gun peaked in. All the guards panicked but quickly collected themselves. Then the intruder walked in, but to everybody's surprise, no shots were fired.
'What happened?' Soon the guards and Thalia found themselves aiming their weapons at each other.
'You should leave.'
'What? What happened?'
'An EMP, our men dropping like flies. You were out there, why don't you tell us the rest?'
'I believe it's Blackout, but I didn't see anyone.'
'If it's Blackout we are prepared, but we cannot let you in.'
Both the parties stood silently for a moment with no response from either side, still holding aim on each other's heads.
'You have to trust me. I had nothing to do with this, but I can't leave Mr. Croner. This is matter of my reputation. I can't have my client dying.'
'None of us want that to happen. You have to trust us and let us handle the matter of his safety now. An extraction is on its way.'
Again, silence.
'Then I guess we'll be staring down barrels until it does.'
'How did you meet daddy when the watch broke?' the little girl asked eagerly looking into her mother's eyes. Thaliya, over the little girl's shoulder, saw her husband had just walked out the house. 'Did daddy work with you, saving people?'
The answer required a few seconds of processing. Looking at the little girl and her husband standing at the door, leaning against it with his arms crossed, Thalia thought of the answer. 'No.'
Thalia felt a strange force taking over. Her hair started to lift off her shoulders. It was not only hers, but everyone else's hair was also starting to straighten as well. Slowly they rose and were standing apart as they possibly could from each other.
In a flash the whole room got covered in lightning sparking everywhere. The chandelier was raining lighting on everyone standing nearby. Thalia instantly dropped down onto the floor. The roof collapsed. Everything got covered in dust and smoke and, one by one, all of the bodyguards collapsed onto the floor.
Thalia stood with her gun drawn waiting for the smoke to clear. At the far end of the room, she saw her boss being choked by a chain that ran around his throat. His feet were off the ground and behind him stood a hulking figure holding the chain that was choking Mr. Croner, with one hand. Thalia didn't have a clear shot on the enemy hiding behind her client's body.
'Let him go.'
There was no reply. There was only silence in the room, chaos in the lobby below them and Croner struggling for air.
All three gone, just wasted. But maybe if enough time is bought...
'We can negotiate terms. What is it you want?'
'Time for negotiation is over,' Blackout growled. 'It's time to know consequences.'
'Well, the situation has changed, hasn't it?' Thalia strode forward with her weapon aimed at Blackout looking for a better angle. 'There's still time for negotiation. You are not going to get anything if Mr. Croner dies, just more blood on your hand, but if you let him go, he can get you anything you need.'
The boss stood quiet, trying to come to peace with the fact he was dying, but he was terrified for his life. He didn't build an empire just to make one mistake and have it all taken away from him, but time for fixing his mistakes was over; he was still alive, but he was as good as dead.
Blackout stood still; his fist didn't flinch even when Croner was struggling so hard for his dear life. Thalia could word the negotiation however she needed, even though she knew there was no saving her boss, but she wasn't giving up, still looking for an angle for her shot. Her mind ran through all the options she currently had and all the mistakes she made gobbling down her bait.
'Time's up,' Blackout exclaimed in his monotonic voice, noticing a flash, though the darkened window, in the distance, making its way fast towards him.
Suddenly a light flashed through the dark window behind Blackout. Thalia readjusted her weapon attempting to get a better aim. Electricity discharged from Blackout's skin onto the floor and through Mr. Croner. He spasmed uncontrollably as his skin started to burn and eyes started to melt.
'NO!' Thalia yelled. It was already too late, but she at least wasn't going to let the killer get away.
One charged up a little too late.
As everything slowed down Thalia dropped her weapon and ran for one of the weapons that the bodyguards had. She slid across the floor taking aim at blackout's head though her burnt client's body. The electrical surge was growing, her client was now nothing more than a tall lump of charcoal. She had taken the perfect aim, sliding across the floor, when finally, a stream of lightning found her getting closer.
She hit the wall behind her, faster than before and she fell down on to the floor unconscious. Her body bruised, and the back of her head bleeding. She stood laying among the ruins of the room as the noise of the crowd below her grew louder and louder. In this chaos, surrounded by scraps, lying next to burn corpses, stood that golden watch, strapped to Thalia's wrist, now with a shattered glass obscuring time.
The mansion on the hill was now quieter as Thalia gathered the strength to speak to her daughter. Her husband, with a hulking figure, was now approaching his family.
'Daddy was the one I saved,' Thalia lied through her teeth with a smile.
'What are you ladies talking about?' the father joined the conversation.
'Oh nothing, just about this watch she found.'
'Wow, I haven't seen that in so long,' he admired the shiny trinket that lay in Thalia's palm. 'I bet it still looks great on you.'
Thalia looked at her husband with so much warmth in her gaze, and her husband didn't hesitate to return it.
'Yeah mommy! put it on,' the little girl screamed. Both the parents chuckled in whimsy as Thalia picked the watch up to her wrist.
'Ok, sure.'
The watch fit Thalia perfectly, even after all these years. It glimmered in the sunlight as if it was pleased to be reunited with its owner. Her husband took her hand by his palm and took in how pretty it looked on her.
It was the memory that one Theodore Taggart was drawn to when he looked at his watch for time. It was strapped to the underside of his wrist, had scratches all over it and once again had a shattered crystal shielding time. Seated on a stone slab in an abandoned GDI facility surrounded by a couple of other people, he didn't have much to entertain, but the recollection of that memory did not help.
'Is that a lady's watch?' a woman in a leather jacket with purple streaks in her hair inquired looking at the watch cautiously. Theo did not reply. The woman simply chose to ignore the rudeness of her interviewee.
Before long suddenly a strong gust of wind blew in their way drawing everyone's attention to a concrete archway. Suddenly the realities started alternating replacing the archway with a stone bulwark.
Theodore got up from his seat, walked over to his trusty sniper and marched forward towards the vanishing archway.
'Do you even need that?' the woman in the leather jacket asked, equipping her own rifle. 'Can't you just blow them all up?'
'I only do what I get paid to do,' with his cold stance Theodore marched forward, lighting crackling from his skin on to the ground.
In the beginning little Theo was a son to a single father. Then he was Taggart, the orphan-slash-street-rat. For the most of his life after that he was Blackout; the rebellion. After the civil wars he was a husband. Not much later he was a father, but now again he was Blackout; the mercenary. Where the chaos would take him was not clear, but with his strength and stride it was clear that wherever he was headed, a tempest was coming along with him for the ride.