* * *
The rain pattered against the cheap construction plastic I used to replace the glass long shot out of my windows of the office that I used as a place to crash. The flickering neon lights of the local Bunraku Parlor gave them a surreal look as they dripped down.The office had all the comforts of home. A cot to sleep on, and a bottle to keep me company. I was sitting on the broken office chair behind the battered desk that came with the office, being good to my friend Johnny Walker. You help your friends when they're Blue. The frosted glass on the door somehow had stayed intact despite the neighbourhood, which allowed me to see the figure approach it in silhouette. The figure opened the door as my hand went to the holster under the desk and I got a mittful of Miranda, my 10mm speaking companion, but I relaxed my grip when I saw that it was a classy dame, obviously out of her element.
From her thick, but curvy figures hugged highly by her stylish skirtsuit of the latest Horizon Corporate style. Her delicate tusks dulled professionally and capped in silver, or possibly even platinum. The way the suit was on her it was proof that she wasn't wearing a weapon worthy of the name, nor even a bra. She had probably needed to have been sewn into it.
I should have known better than to relax... Every other woman in my life had been trouble, and this one... This one was worse than all the rest put together.
* * *
Sharp pain slammed itself into my back as my lined duster's ballistic gel did it's job, solidifying and dispersing the force of the 10mm bullet over the whole of my lower back. My kidneys would be unhappy for awhile. I promised them scotch in the future to keep them from aching. I turned around, seeing the corporate suit standing stupidly as I looked at him with hate filled eyes. He raised the pistol again, the laser sight playing on my chest as he moved it towards my head."Unauthorized firearm discharge detected, incapacitating assailant with extreme prejudice!" Came an automated voice, barely heard over the sound of fully automatic fire from the sentinel turrets built into the corners of the hallway. The suit had spared no expense in his security, but it had been his downfall.
I had to hand it to him. He wasn't any street monster like the scum I normally had to deal with. He was soft, weak, fat off of the sweat and blood of those underneath him, but he lived despite the damage done to his body. I simply smiled as I showed him the Colt Manhunter that had been in his desk minutes before, while he stared in amazement at the Laser-Sighted Walther Secura in his hands. His own assassin's gun was now the death of him as his security system did not recognize the distinctive report of the Colt. He tried to say something, but blood was all that came up from his mouth as he fell forward, an empty shell of a man for decades, finally emptied completely by his own paranoia.
I tossed the Colt into the nearest waste basket, my gloved hands leaving no evidence of myself on the unfired weapon.
Walking outside, I turned my collar up to ward off the rain, my hat pulled down low over my head. Kaptain Kracker had said she would keep the cameras from recording me, but there was no need to take risks. All the blood, all the pain, and it ended with a single gunshot from a dead man's own hand. I walked into the dark city, lit only by neon and streetlights flickering fitfully at trying to keep the shadows from consuming this small piece of civilization.
I had just walked out of the civilized world, and found it to be even more barbaric than the streets.
"Rest well, Doll." I whispered, thinking of the dame that had started this all. Thinking that the only thing worth a damn in this life was memories of beauty...
* * *
The ugly mug in front of me had a roscoe with a muzzle like a train tunnel pointed right at my belly, his smile showing broken and stained teeth and a lifetime of hitting and getting hit for money. “Time for ya ta meet da fishes in da sea.” He sneered at me, feeling full of power and fury. My brother was the person that had given him the dental work, and he was looking at payback.“Works better if the safety is off.” I said, looking at the pistol. He looked at it as well as my left hand took it out of his mitt, and my right fist, the metal one, ensured that his face would continue to stop clocks. The sensors in the fingers felt breaking teeth, and I smiled, full of power and fury as I turned the heater back at him. “'Course, revolvers don't really have safeties. They're very dangerous things. Dangerous to hold and use.” I said, flipping the cylinder out and dropping the old style brass cases into the gutter, soaking them in the dirty rainfall. I flipped my wrist and the cylinder went back to where it belonged.
He tensed up to move, turned to run away, but didn't even make the first step as I flipped the revolver around in my grip and gave him a knot on the head that he wouldn't forget for a week and a day. He crumpled to the ground like yesterday's flats. I snorted, “Damn things, guns. Any punk with a piece thinks he's got God's might in his hand, when all he's got is just what he started with. Nothing.”