"This isn't how I thought we'd spend our dating anniversary--" Indra heaved from exertion, pressing her back against Akio's. "It's better than what I was planning."

Akio snorted, hooking her elbow with Indra's and throwing her out of the way of an oncoming attack, before bending backwards to avoid the gun fire. "What were you planning?"

The laser glowed inches from her face, the heat wafting was reminiscent of sticking her face in the oven. . . a mistake she hadn't planned to repeat.

The rolls were not worth those burns.

Indra landed nimbly on her feet, one leg bent and the other extended, with her cane sword out to the side. The gold handle with red embroidery was grasped delicately in her hand, it's serpent-like design menacing in the dimly lit hall. The silver and black blade dripped in blood. "It's a surprise."

Stone shattered on the wall behind Akio, it scattered across the floor, and rained down pebbles.

What was once a respectable hall of green and gold statues of the Lizz kings of countless generations now resembled a demolition site. A large hole had been blown in the wall from Chester's explosives, since this was the closest location they could get to the dungeons. The statues, being the only cover offered, were being chipped away piece by piece from the enforcers gun fire.

The royals, Eris included, had traveled to another planet for a treaty deal a week ago. Before she left, Eris let Akio know the newest declaration her parents had made. That refugees from other sectors were to be treated as enemies, imprisoned, and sent back to where they had run from. It was part of the most recent contract they had signed in exchange for help hunting the vigilantes.

"Watch your back, Akio, it isn't just my family you should be worried about," Eris declared, setting a copy of the paper contract her parents had made on Akio's desk. "The tensions are getting worse, it's only a matter of time before the sectors break into a civil war."

"They've brought reinforcements!" Chester cried, returning fire and ducking for cover behind a statue of the ruling Lizz king. Shards of the face and tail scattered to the floor with each hit.

Akio growled, rolling for cover behind the statue closest to her, of course they did. It wasn't likely they would give up the refugees easily. She willed her oi'ek to turn silver, and inhaled calming breaths. If they knew what she was feeling, it would put her at a severe disadvantage.

Leaping into the air, Akio kicked off a wall, propelling herself forward and into the middle of the ten Lizz guards in the center of the hall.

She grabbed the red scaled one on her right, using his black armored body to shield the gunfire of the others. He screamed with each laser piercing his flesh. The scent of burning Lizz filled the air in gaggablr pungency.

Akio threw him forward into another Lizz on her left, knocking both unconscious.

After Akio became the leader of the vigilantes, she made an oath never to kill again. It was a promise to those in her care, a promise to herself, and a promise to Indra. Too much blood stained her hands and her soul, no more would she let it run.

Five rushed forward, drawing their electrical batons.

In just this moment, Akio could see every weak point with the eyes of an assassin. She knew the fastest way to take them out would be to snap the neck of the one in the middle, stab the eyes of the ones beside it with his claws, then with her cybernetic hand crush the skull of the one remaining and bash his head into the last.

It would take seconds.

But she refused to kill, ever again.

Akio took out her nonconductive bow, extending it with the buttons, and twirling it in her hand. It was harder to fight and leave them alive, but it was worth it to avoid the guilt and shame that accompanied murder.

The five Lizz enforcers disappeared into their surroundings. With how much dust hung in the air from the destroyed stone, Akio had no problem keeping track of their movements. They split, forming a semi-circle, while the other five continued to move forward toward the statues.

Indra attacked the large group from the outside, cutting off a Lizz hand, stabbing one in the side of the throat, and slashing at the stomach of another, exposing their innards. Her cane sword was like an extension of her arm, graceful, swift, deadly. . . Hot, so starshitted hot.

It was mesmerizing, nearly dulling the ache in Akio's hearts from the unnecessary death Indra was causing. They'd need to discuss that later. Again.

Raising her hot pink, glowing bow, Akio just barely avoided coming into contact with a baton. Even after a year of dating, Akio couldn't help but be distracted by Indra. The rippling of the muscles on her pale body--

Akio's head snapped to the side from a fist to the face, the dull pain pulled her to her senses.

"Stop checking out my ass and defend yourself," Indra spat, though amusement trickled through her tone.

Hitting the closest enforcer in the chest, stomach, then catching his electric baton to whack him in the face, Akio laughed wryly. If only her thoughts had been that simple. "It's not my fault your ass is so starshitted fine."

Or that I admire you so much I have trouble not glazing over your wrongs.

Akio hit one of the enforcers in the knee cap, snapping their leg to the side with a crack.

The remaining three surrounded her, trying to attack from different angles. One behind, one to the right, and the other to the left.

All she'd have to do was snap their necks. And it would be over.

No. She shook the thought away.

Akio nimbly danced in her stance, blocking an attack from behind and then swinging her bow around her to impact a green Lizz on the ear hole.

They hissed, grabbing at their aching head and stumbled backwards.

An arm wrapped around Akio's neck, the claws dangerously close to breaking her skin. The pressure of the contact cut off her airway.

Grabbing it with her cybernetic hand, she crushed the forearm of her attacker, and then grabbed them, leaned forward, and slammed the Lizz to the ground with the momentum.

Blue blood spurted from their arm upon impact with the floor.

Footsteps echoed in the distance.

More reinforcements were coming.

Akio hit the last enforcer in the head with enough force to knock them unconscious. Surveying the damage, she counted four injured of the twenty vigilantes that came on this mission. Wait—why were there only eighteen?

Indra walked over to Akio and grabbed her wrist. It was obvious she was checking for injury.

"I'm fine, Indra. You don't need to worry so much, this is the fourth time you've done an assessment," Akio said gently. "It's unnecessary."

Shaking her head, Indra stepped back and slipped her glove back over her pale hand. "All it takes is a scratch, Akio, and overtime you could bleed out. I find it quite necessary to check when I can."

Akio raised a brow. "Do you think that I wouldn't notice if I got injured?"

"You can be pretty stupid," Indra said with a teasing smile.

Akio rolled her eyes and refocused her attention on the mission.

"Chester, take Sali with you and get the refugees out of the dungeon," Akio commanded, retracting her bow back into it's handheld position and tucking it into her pocket.

Taking her pistol from it's holster, she walked over to the other vigilantes. "Where are Devin and James? I thought they were with the rest of the defense team."

A gebul limped forward, blood soaking through their torn pant leg. Their black bushy tail was coated in crimson and very obviously dislocated. "Some enforcers jumped us on the way over. I managed to get away, but I don't know what happened to them."

Akio's hearts thundered in her chest. "Where did you see them last?"

Indra reached out to give her hand a squeeze. She knew better than anyone how hard Akio took losses. "We'll find them, they can't have gotten far."

Chester and Sali emerged from the stone starwell with fifteen varied species in tow.

Fire shot past Akio, she leapt forward pulling the injured gebul and Indra to the floor. "Dammit! We need to get the refugees and wounded out of here."

Akio helped the Gebul to her feet and put an arm around her waist.

The Gebul turned to her, a tear falling from their red and white fur-covered face to their snout. "We can't leave them here. What if something bad happened?"

"Don't worry, I don't plan on abandoning them. Once the wounded and those we are rescuing are at a safe distance I'll come back. Any longer in here and there's a possibility more than just Devin and James will go missing." Her eyes drifted to Indra who was helping other injured vigilantes make their way to the planned escape route. "We can't lose more."

It was the sad reality of it all. Even if she wanted to look for the missing members, right now she couldn't, it would put the rest at risk.

Passing the Gebul to another member Akio did a headcount a second time, making sure there weren't more than Devin and James missing.

Indra made her way over, her sword sheathed. "What now? After we get the others out, do you plan to circle back on your own?"

Ducking behind cover as another fireball flew past, Akio pulled Indra down with her. "Yes, I don't want to risk anyone else."

Akio peeked around the corner of the broken statue and returned fire, hitting one Lizz in the arm, another in the shoulder, and two more in the leg.

She ducked down when gun lasers and bursts of flame shot back. "Something about this seems off. It's like they prepared for us to come."

What if this was a trap? What if Devin and James were dead? What if there were more forces waiting outside, prepared to cut down everyone who attempted escape?

"Hey." Indra grabbed Akio's trembling, natural, gloved hand. "The intel came from you know who, I trust her. But, now that knowledge of your position in our group is traveling--"

Indra pulled daggers from her boots, standing up to toss them with precision before Akio pulled her back down. "It makes sense that the Lizz royals would double if not quadruple security. With a government weapon as their enemy, they have to be prepared."

Even if Indra's words were logical, a sickening dread in Akio's gut preached otherwise. It didn't seem like regular security, it screamed trap.

If it was a trap, what did that mean? Did they have a mole? Or was someone in the palace aware of Eris' activity and intentionally tipped her off to the presence of captives?

Akio shook her head, peeking around the slowly dwindling cover to incapacitate five more enforcers, her laser ceasing to hum on the last shot. Starshit, it needed time to recharge. "I can't shake it. Something is wrong."

There was so much smoke from fire, lasers, and crumbling stone that it became difficult to see, to breathe. Akio coughed, her chest tight and her throat raw from exposure.

"Not everyone is trying actively to kill you," Indra said, pulling her sword from the cane. "Just inactively killing you on sight."

Akio placed a hand on Indra's and halted the motion. "No more killing."

A large fireball of combined power from the enforcers flew toward them. The heat wafting from the attack was unmistakable. Akio grabbed Indra by the wrist and dove for a different cover, using her own body to shield the potential damage to Indra.

The fireball struck the flesh of her natural leg, burning through the cloth of her black pants and blistering half her thigh. Akio cried out from the searing pain, falling forward.

Indra's pale brows shot upward as she grabbed Akio by the arm and dragged her behind another statue just in time to avoid gun fire. "Are you serious? I respect your beliefs, Akio, I really do, but they are trying to kill us right now."

Shaking her head, Indra took out a small, rounded chemical bomb from her satchel. "Why should we grant them something they won't give us?"

Akio grit her teeth, her exhaustion washing over her beside the pain. "Because they are just doing their job. They deserve to live just as much as we do."

"These are the same Lizz's that terrorized the Gebul's and will daily make the choice to publicly beat and torment other species." Indra shook her head, the covering she wore over her face loosening at her throat to reveal a serrated scar in the dim light of the moons that was cascading through a large window. "The enforcers deserve nothing."

Before Akio could stop her, Indra hit a button on the bomb and threw it at the group of enforcers. She grabbed Akio's hand, helping her to the feet and running away from the poisonous smoke.

All those Lizz's. . . Indra killed them. The pure, venomous hatred dripping from her tone was unlike anything Akio had heard before. Yes, many of the enforcers were evil, but not all. How could Indra unjustly group them together and sentence them to death?

As much as Akio wanted to argue, it was too late for the enforcers in the hall. That poison was already in their lungs, tearing through the membrane and disconnecting the air supply from their heart.

"I promise I won't use this unless I have to," Indra stated, tucking the bomb into her brown satchel.

Either she lied, or Akio and Indra didn't agree on when it was necessary. It had been a close one, however, there was still a chance to take them out in other ways. The enforcers didn't need to die.

Chester's past outrage at Akio begged to come to the forefront, his raging sobs knowing that the weapon who killed his family now held his life in her hands. Just like him, the families of those enforcers just lost a parent, a son, a daughter.

Limping to the hanging rope, Akio gripped it in one hand while holding Indra against her hip with the other. Akio wanted to throw-up. Any of the vigilantes acting out like this was on her, Indra especially. She shouldn't have allowed her to bring that bomb.

Akio tugged the rope twice, the vigilantes on the other side of it began to slowly pull them up.

The violet gas hissed, swirling in the air in their direction.

"Hold your breath," Akio instructed before doing the same.

Indra clung to her tightly, but Akio could feel her girlfriend trembling like a frightened mamock in her grasp. This was more physical contact than Indra usually allowed. With how things were, there wasn't much of a choice.

The instant they got to the roof, Indra gasped and shoved away from Akio, placing her hands on her knees and inhaling deeply.

The ten vigilantes remaining on the roof rolled the rope up and started toward the zipline now that Akio and Indra had been helped to safety.

"Indra--" Akio started, her tone firmer than she meant it to be.

"No." Indra held up a hand before righting herself. "I don't want a lecture from you. They were going to kill us if I didn't do something. It was us or them."

Akio's oi'ek thrashed red and purple, a mixture of guilt and anger. She clenched her hands into fists. "That's starshit! If you had given me more time I would've taken them down without having to kill them. All I needed was time. You took advantage of my injury and used the bomb. That wasn't fair to the enforcers."

With an indignant snort Indra slammed her sword a bit too hard into the sheath. "War isn't fair. There's always bloodshed on both sides." She poked her cane at Akio's chest. "You're our leader and as much as you hate it, you're going to be forced to kill again."

Turning away, Indra started strolling toward the zip line. "Whose life do you value more?" She paused, her voice shaking slightly as it dropped low, her cape billowing in the wind. "Ours or theirs?"

Before Akio could utter a reply, laser fire grazed her arm and exploded the ground in front of her. She leapt backward to avoid falling through the crumbling stone roof. "Starshit!"

Avoiding the hole, she ran just behind Indra,  and drew her pistol. Luckily it had gotten enough time to recharge. Akio shot blindly at the direction the attack had come from.

Without her cybernetic eye, Akio couldn't track down the location of the sniper. One of the five towers? Maybe? A pistol couldn't shoot that far, it would prove no use.

The only option was to get out of there as quickly as possible.

Indra cried out, a crack reverberated across the rooftop.

"Indra!" Akio cried, lunging forward as another shot rang out.

The laser sliced through Akio's calf, the burning agony causing her to trip over herself and skid across the stone rooftop. They were targeting her natural body.

Gritting her teeth, Akio scooped Indra up in her arms and scrambled to her feet.

She jumped forward to narrowly avoid another shot that exploded a pillar beside her head.

There wasn't time to see if Indra was okay, or what the problem was. She needed to get her out of there as fast as possible, or they were dead.

But leaving a snipper could guarantee everyones death. How many had they already taken out?

The awkward limp from the sizzling hole in her leg nearly caused Akio to stumble.

Indra wrapped her arms around Akio's neck. "I know you want to go back for the others but you're injured, you need to leave."

Even with this injury, as long as she wrapped it, she could manage. It cauterized itself so blood loss wasn't a concern. "I'm fine, as their leader I can't abandon them."

"Go to the rondevu point and leave without me. I need to take out the snipper and find the missing members," Akio stated as they reached the zipline.

Shaking her head, Indra attempted to stand and failed, cursing under her breath. Her argumentative demeanor fell away, replaced by a grimace of pain as she avoided putting weight on her ankle. "Just, be careful. I'll see you at home."

Akio planted a kiss on Indra's forehead and helped her into the zipline. "See you at home."

Akio gave her a push, rolling to avoid another shot coming her way. It was obvious the snipper was in one of the towers, the question was, which one? With the speed the lasers kept soaring, it wouldn't be safe to use herself as bait to test the direction.

There would be no time to evade, as the pulsing pain in her calf reminded her with each step.

Breathe and listen.

And there it was, the indicative crunch accompanied by a scrape of metal on metal. The snipper was in the third tower. The only tower with specialized metallic brackets.

Akio lunged forward, doing a shoulder roll to go behind the next pillar on the rooftop. She hissed from the pain in her leg, but tried her best not to pay attention to it. The burn and wound wouldn't kill her, they wasn't bleeding.

The pillar exploded. Chunks of rock flung at Akio in all directions, battering her body with cuts and bruises. Starshit. "You Lizzassed fucker!"

Akio, despite the aches of her muscles leapt on top of the rubble and shot in the direction of the snipper. The shot fell short, since the distance was still too great, but the starshit reacted as if it had hit near them and scurried away.

With the aid of her cybernetic leg, Akio ran across the rooftop, jumping from pillar to pillar in the direction of the third tower. That starshit wasn't going to get away. She'd make sure of it. If they did, then the rest of the escaping vigilantes would be in danger.

In a minute's time, Akio reached the tower and punched her cybernetic arm through the wall, grabbing the fleeing snipper on his way down the steps and repeating pounding his body on the rough stone until it came through to the other side.

Blood splattered on Akio's face and chest with each hit, the Lizz screamed, viciously clawing at her cybernetic to do avail.

The red and gold scaled Lizz was bloody and unconscious by the time Akio pulled him into the open night air. She dropped his body, and stepped through the hole she made with it.

Devin and James were somewhere, dead or alive, Akio owed it to them to find them.

The pitch darkness of the tower stairs was dizzying. Akio paused for a moment, placing her hand on a wall until she could at least see the outline of the shapes to guide her way. If there was a guarantee that the tower was vacant, she would pull out her glowing bow, but there wasn't, and she had no intention of alerting any possible enemies to her presence.

Squatting down, Akio took the steps slow and silent. She bit her lip to keep from crying out in pain from each movement of her injured leg.

Stealth was her ally, and the only way she would leave the palace alive. If she was ambushed by more than twenty enforcers on her own, the only choices were to kill or be killed. Akio swallowed, she refused to break her oath. She would never kill again.

Finally reaching the bottom of the tower, Akio stepped out into a vacant hall. It was the same hall some of the vigilantes had entered through, namely Devin, James, and Hali. A trail of blue and orange blood was smeared on the wall and across the carpet.

James and Devin had that color of blood.

Akio's chest grew tight, it took all her will to steady her breathing. If she panicked, she was dead and so were they, if they weren't already. Inhaling a quiet breath through her nose, she exhaled it slowly and silently from her mouth.

Following the trail in a low crouch, Akio passed by severed limbs, black insect-like legs, bloody scales. . . bile rose in her throat, she swallowed it down.

The pistol almost dropped from her hand when Akio came to the end of the trail. Spelled out in shredded innards and varied pieces of Devin and James was the message. "We've been waiting for you."

Six Draken's stepped out of the gore covered room, spiked batons in their black-scaled claws. "We were worried you wouldn't show, Akio, leader of the vigilantes."