Welcome to Gaia! ::

The man held his head in his hands, quivering and sobbing...it was a pitiful sight. He jumped when she opened the door, hearing the soft thud of wood on stone. His glazed eyes looked up at her, first frightened, then relieved. The mix between a grimace and a smile crossed his lips as he sniffed and wiped the tears from his eyes with already sodden sleeves. Three crooked teeth peeked out from behind his bruised, cracked lips which softly uttered:

“Did...did you get him?” he asked the hooded figure, “Is he dead?”

The figure tossed the bag that she held in one hand towards the table and it landed with a thud, spilling its contents onto the table. A round, hairy objects rolled out of the cloth and then lay still, squirting blood onto the polished wood. A human head, agony still captured in its last breath. The man stood suddenly as it fell onto the table and then, after taking a moment to examine it, sighed with relief and fell to his knees.

“Thank you...thank you so much...thank you...” he sobbed into his dirty hands, but quickly wiped away the tears and reached into his pocket and procured a small, jingling pouch. She nodded in thanks and turned to leave him. Just as she was about to disappear into the night, he called, “Wait!”

“I know...I know it wasn’t in our contract, but...my daughter...is she...?” he said hopefully. The hooded figure didn’t respond and after a moment of the suspended silence, she heard him sigh.

“I...I expected as much...” he said quietly, “...thank you.” But as he turned up to say the last two words, he noticed that the figure had gone.

Her clothing kept her unseen and her manner kept her unnoticed. Well, at least, for the most part. Angel had been getting worried these days. She crossed into an alleyway and, after checking for passerby, opened a door and made her way up a flight of stairs to reach a small bedroom. It was unavoidable and she knew it. A mercenary who took no sides, who made no alliances and who killed for whoever would pay...it was bound to attract attention. As she closed and locked the door to her bedroom, Angel slipped off her hood and a mane of white-blond hair fell to her shoulders. Next time, she might be being paid to kill the man that she had just received payment from. She was no protector.

Angel shucked off her boots and sat cross-legged on her bed, sighing softly. It was still problematic. She was getting too well known. It would get dangerous. Thankfully, she’d managed to keep most facts hidden. A few knew her profile, but even fewer knew she was a woman and still few knew her name.

Angel. How ironic. She’d always thought of herself as more of a demon.

Something wasn't right.

She had felt it as soon as she entered the room. There was something about it that wasn't the way it was supposed to be. A draft from an open window? No. It was the opposite. Too warm. Only slightly, but still...

Her eyes narrowed. Someone was here. Or had been here and left recently. Her hand felt the hilts of her two daggers. If they were still here, she should've seen them. The room wasn't that big, and it wasn't as if she was blind or anything. Yet still, she couldn't discern it.

"Angel, is it? I've heard much about you, Angel."

At the sound, her body froze, every muscle tensed and after a mere fraction of a second, she drew one of her daggers with her right hand, reaching her left hand over to the same side to draw the second while she took aim and threw the first towards the direction of the sound. With the other arm, she brandished her second dagger, slipping swiftly into a battle stance only moments after the words were uttered.

She didn't speak, but she knew where the person was. A woman, as well. Her back was to the bed, which was against the wall and a corner. She couldn't see, but the sound of her voice pinpointed her position.

"Show yourself." There was no point hiding her identity now. This person clearly knew who she was. Though how the information got to her, she had no idea.

Angel let the silence hang for a few moments before relaxing her posture and retrieving her dagger. With the brief noise of metal sliding and the rustling of bedsheets, she was back to her position, crosslegged, on the bed.

"What was that about?" she thought to herself. She had known that her acts had gotten herself a bit too much recognition, but for the Organization to seek her out... It was worse than she'd imagined. Then again, the members of the Organization weren't novices. It was possible that only through extreme amounts of information gathering that they had been able to find out where she lived.

After all, the woman who'd come through the window wasn't inexperienced. How she managed to escape detection, Angel would likely never know.

And the offer... The actual job seemed simple enough. Retrieval of items was a simple enough task. The hard part would be finding the man. Though with a jewel of that size, the information would leak from somewhere. Now, she just had to decide of she'd take the offer.

On one hand, with enough time, she'd be far too well known to operate efficiently. But on the other, Angel didn't like having to work under the orders of another. At least with her job, she was completely in control. It was a dilemma to be sure.

Perhaps she'd sleep on it.

Angel sighed and laid back on her bed, closing her eyes and trying to puzzle her way through the mess that she'd gotten herself into.