Panicking slightly, Etrius stepped to the side as the knife swung down and missed. Not expecting this, the man holding the knife stumbled, his neck helpfully within snapping range. A fact that Etrius took advantage of. The man fell on the floor leaving many, including Etrius, startled. A few in the crowd looked at it with hostile gazes. One by one, six individuals stepped in front of it, with knives at the ready.

With a yell, one of them charged it. Moving quick, Etrius attempted to dodge but that turned out to be unnecessary. From the crowd, an older man stepped in and punched the man in the face, making him fall over.

“What's the matter with you!?” The man yelled out. “Attacking a child just because your friend fell over!”

“Someone should teach them a lesson!” Another man said stepping forwards.

“Yeah!” Another yelled.

“Yeah, get em!” Another shouted.

Soon enough, Etrius’ would-be attackers were surrounded and greatly outnumbered by the surrounding people. Looking at the body, Etrius realized that none of the crowd actually realized that he was dead. Taking a step back, Etrius bumped into an older woman with a cane.

“You best run home dearie.” She smiled at it sweetly.

Taking this opportunity, Etrius nodded, took the briefcase in both hands, and ran away from the crowd. As he did, it was sure it heard the sweet old lady call for blood. Trying not to think about it, it decided to go back and look for an inn to stay at. However, at the end of the street Etrius saw two more men, both of them holding guns and both looking at it. Turning down an ally, Etrius booked it. The men followed.

Gunshots rang out in the ally but both missed and slammed into the wall in front of it. Turning for only a moment, Etrius threw its briefcase as hard as it could, as its pursuers turned the corner. Unable to even raise his gun, he suddenly found it hard to stay alive as a briefcase moving faster than the speed of sound tore through his body, rather literally, making quite the mess. The second man, rather alarmed at his exploded friend, attempted to cast a ward to protect himself from whatever spell did that to his friend. However, a thrown brick was not a spell, and this too broke the sound barrier. The good thing was that he didn’t suffer. The bad thing was that someone now needed to clean the area and fix all the broken windows.

Despite this, two more people decided it was a good idea to follow Etrius, who was now out of things to throw. Etrius jumped on the wall, and climbed up onto the rooftops, ripping it’s dress in the process. Looking back to see how much time it had, it saw one of the men pull out a second gun and take aim, so not enough. Immediately ducking, Etrius dodged a bullet, picked up it’s dress, and took off running.

Without much time, Etrius looked for a place to hide. Luckily the streets below were filled with people. Most of them running away from the sounds of gunshots and explosions. Mixing in with the crowd wouldn’t be that hard but jumping off the roof would make it stand out. First it needed to find an empty street and hope it wasn’t spotted. Running across a few rooftops, it found just that. Holding it’s dress down, Etrius jumped to the streets right as its pursuers made it onto the roofs. So, with any luck they didn't see where it went. Luck, unfortunately, was not on its side, as when it looked up at the roof a strong kick was delivered into its back. Winded, Etrius fell to the floor in pain.

Still catching its breath, it looked up at its attacker. Much to its surprise and disappointment, it was a familiar face. Lucy, in her black dress, was looking down at it, with clear contempt in her eyes.

“Oh, it’s you.” Etrius said none too pleased.

“Yeah, the bitch.” Lucy said before kicking it again. “Get up.”

“Please stop- that hurts…” Etrius half faking the pain.

“I was about to run to find out where those gunshots came from. To think it would come to me.” She said. “Must be my lucky day.”

“Oh yeah. I was being shot at.” Etrius said. “Could you do something about that?”

“Like I would ever-” She started.

At that moment, a gunshot rang out as Etrius was shot in the shoulder. Looking up in surprise, Lucy saw a man with the gun. Quickly pulling out her own, she shot the man, who fell from the roof, dead. The next man however aimed his gun at her. Unwilling to move and leave Etrius exposed, Lucy stood her ground. The second man fired, but the bullet failed to find its mark as it impacted a transparent blue shield. Casting another spell, Lucy fired an arrow-like projectile, killing the man instantly.

On guard, Lucy scanned the rooftops for any other dangers. Once she was satisfied, she turned back to Etrius who was clutching its shoulder. Its mouth was open, but it made no sound as it’s stupid body could, and did, feel pain. Despite the many times it was injured before, this was the first time in a long time it had ever felt this much pain.

“Hey, it’s not that bad. You’re an assassin, you’ve been shot before right?” Lucy asked, slightly worried.

“…” Obviously unable to respond, Etrius curled up hoping that it would make the pain go away, but it didn’t.

“Okay, um calm down.” Lucy said, realizing that Etrius was a child. “You’ll be okay. Just calm down and show me the wound.”

Given how badly Etrius reacted to being shot, doubt appeared on Lucy’s face as she truly wondered if she did have the right person. Despite her panic, she remembered her training started assessing the wound. It was as bad as it appeared, but it could have been much worse. Luckily for Etrius, she knew a bit of healing magic. She couldn’t completely heal the wound, but prevent further blood loss and infection.

Still in pain, Etrius decided that it would be best to let Lucy heal it. That and because it was unable to push her away. As Lucy cast her spell, Etrius felt the pain fade. It didn’t go away completely but it was much better than before. Even with the pain fading, Etrius lost a surprising amount of blood. Its consciousness was fading away. As if sensing this, Lucy looked at it with worry and tried to get its attention. Etrius tried to respond, but was unable. Its eyelids grew heavy as it tried to keep them open.

“Hey, come on. Stay awake.” Lucy said.

“Haa…” The girl managed to get out, eyelids threatening to close at any moment.

Abandoning her healing efforts, Lucy looked up and down the street but there was no one. She was no healing professional but she did know where one was. The wound was closed up, so she didn’t need to worry about any further blood loss, but the bullet was still in the girls arm. As carefully as she could, Lucy picked her up and held her in her arms. Mentally making a map of the city, Lucy headed off to the nearby ranger base.

Periodically, she would look down to check on the condition of the girl in her arms. She was struggling to keep her eyes open, but even with that effort, they were unfocused.

“Stay awake, your going to be okay.” Lucy said.

“Ha- Hannah…?” She asked.

“No. Lucy.” Lucy said. “I’m Lucy.”

“Ah…” She said as if understanding.

“Hey, don’t close your eyes!” Lucy said. “Dammit!”

Applying magic to herself, Lucy sped up her pace out of the city. Minutes later, she arrived at the ranger headquarters.

“Diagnostic initiated. Gen-2.0.1 structure damaged. Outer skin damage -self repair activated. Local memory storage intact. Identification system. Error detected. Spatial link damaged -reconnecting… Connection limited. Reconfigure structure. Gen-2.0.6 pending… Biomass insufficient. Energy insufficient. Reactivation process activated.” -0s 6.17b-8.

Opening its eyes, Etrius awoke with a start. Finding itself in an unknown room with a single light and in a rather soft bed with a food filled tray next to it, complete with a fork and knife, Etrius remembered the events that brought it to this. It was running from assassins, was kicked by Lucy and then was shot, so nothing too bad.

“Oh yeah, that happened.” Etrius reminded itself.

“Wait, hang on, are we in chains?” Etrius asked.

“Nope, Doesn’t look like it.” It said looking at its rather free and exposed arms.

“Okay, so what now?” It asked.

Lifting up the blanket, Etrius was surprised to see that it still wore its dress and disappointed to see that the dress had a hole in it, and blood on it, in addition to a rather large tear. It sighed at ruining a gift in such a short time frame. Although it didn’t like dresses in general, this one was different as although ripped it was fairly easy to move in, was in dark colors and was the first gift it had received in a very long time. Luckily for Etrius however, there was a gown it could change into. Rather conflicted, Etrius half took off its dress as it wondered if it should change. At this time however, the door was opened. Looking over, Etrius saw a boy, about the same age as Lucy standing there.

Holding a mug with a warm substance inside, he looked at Etrius with it’s back turned and dress halfway removed. He with his short blond hair and green eyes stood with his mouth open, simply looking at Etrius. The two made eye contact for a good few seconds, as Etrius wondered how long this would go on.

“One of us has to leave.” Etrius eventually said.

“Sorry!” He shouted as he slammed the door shut.

Etrius, now left alone, shrugged and decided that the dress would work for the time being. Once that was decided, it grabbed the knife, and opened the door to see the rather embarrassed boy standing there.

“Excuse me.” Etrius said.

“Uh, yes?” The boy said, regaining his composure.

“I am feeling much better now. Is it okay if I leave?” Etrius asked.

“No, sorry.” The boy said.

“Why?” Etrius asked. “I wanna go home.”

“Well as silly as this sounds you can’t. At least not at the moment. We were told that you were being investigated for being an assassin.” He said.

“Shit he knows!”Etrius thought.

“What do we do now?” It asked.

“We-” It started.

“We aren’t killing him!” It cut off. “We already have too much heat on us!”

“Damn.” It muttered.

“I got a plan! Pull out the amnesiac card!” It said.

“Done.” It readily agreed.

“Oh, you must be confused. I’m Duncan, a ranger.” He said, taking its silence for confusion.

“Ah! You’re with her!” Etrius said, slamming the door, shutting itself inside the room.

“Wha-” Duncan started. “What just happened?”

“S-stay away!” Etrius yelled out from the other side of the door.

Duncan, not quite sure what to do, looked at the door and then up and down the hall. Moving his arm, he knocked on the door.

“Hello?” He asked.

“Stay away!” She shouted.

“…” Duncan was stunned.

This was the first time anyone had ever reacted to him in fear. He knew that not everyone liked the presence of rangers, but this was the first time that anyone reacted like this. Shaking his head, he realized that this may be because he saw her changing. Even someone as young as her would be surprised if anyone, a ranger especially, saw her changing. Thinking it best to apologize, he knocked on the door.

“If this is about earlier, I’m sorry, I didn’t-” Duncan started.

“Go away!” She shouted.

Sighing, Duncan turned the doorknob and tried to enter. It was too early in the day for trouble to arise. However, to his surprise the door didn’t budge. He tried again, but it refused to open. The door wasn’t locked, but it wouldn’t open either. Suddenly, he realized that the reason it didn’t open was because the girl was holding it shut. She simply wasn’t shy or embarrassed, she was scared and from what she said earlier, it was obvious that she was scared of him because he was a ranger. Looking at his coffee, he sighed and decided to get someone more qualified to deal with this sensitive situation.

Walking through the base, Duncan exited the rather cleverly named medical building, and headed for the office block. Today, the base was rather empty as many of the rangers were still deployed searching for those that had attacked the princess some time ago. And from those that remained, many were out due to the incident yesterday. From what he heard, the assassins started attacking people in the streets with knives, guns, and bombs. This was far from their usual operation, but given how desperate they were getting, it wasn’t unexpected.

Next thing he knew, Lucy came barging in with a kid that had been shot. Taking care of her was the doctors first priority but things were not that simple. Apparently this kid was a member of the assassin’s guild and was directly involved with the kidnapping of Princess Cornelia. Normally when an injured suspect is taken in, they are to be chained to the bed to prevent any escape attempt or harming of the staff. However, given the fact that Lucy was the one who brought her in, and because she was a child, the staff refused to chain her up. Not only that, but they refused to change her into the standard gown. Why was that? Mostly due to the reason that one of the nurses noticed that she had no underwear, and being rather new nurses and young men, decided that a group of men should not take the only layer of clothing for a child. Once again, the staff shortage had its cost.

Sighing at this, he opened one of the doors for the office building, Duncan searched for one of the few senior rangers here. Seeing a head of short brown hair, Duncan called out to her.

“Hey Athena we got a problem.” Duncan called out.

“Oh god…” Athena sighed, turning to face him. “It’s been one day! What did she do this time?”

“You know the girl she brought in?” Duncan asked.

“She didn’t start kicking her again, did she?” Athena asked. “I thought I told her to stay away from her.”

“Yeah no, Lucy didn’t do anything.” Duncan said. “The girl locked herself in the infirmary.”

“Given how she was treated, it’s not surprising.” She sighed. “Alright, let me talk to her.”

Somewhat unsteadily, Athena got up from her chair. She winced in pain, but she didn’t let that stop her. Duncan was slightly worried about her given the injuries she had sustained. The doctors suggested that she rest for at least a month, but given their workload, she had been unable to. Not even glancing at the cane leaning against her desk, Athena moved towards Duncan with a slight limp. He wanted to point it out to her, but even if he did, she would ignore him. The best thing to help her would be to get this over with as soon as possible.

“Did she say anything?” Athena asked once at his side.

“Oh, just ‘You’re with her! Stay away!’ So nothing much.” Duncan said, leading the way.

“We’ve had worse.” Athena sighed.

“You know it would be nice if everyone respected us.” He said.

“It would be nice if I didn’t have to work, but we don’t live in a perfect world.” She said.

“Tell me about it.” He said. “It was bad enough that the assassins had guns, but now they summon monsters as well? Why can’t we do that?”

“Unlike them, we have morals and serve the people.” She said. “We don’t need monsters to do our bidding.”

“What we need is more rangers.” He said.

“We have enough rangers as it is, and if you ask me we have too many.” She said. “I remember a time when there was only one hundred rangers.”

“Remember when we were part of the Olufine kingdom?”

“That was before my time and you know it.”

“Is it true that they’re building up their army?”

“Yeah, but can you blame them? We’ve been moving troops around the border for some time now. It was only a matter of time before they did the same.”

“Who do you think will fire the first shot?”

“Who knows? We have guns but those sly bastards have got spies everywhere.”

“In that case we should strike while we have the advantage.”

“And have a coalition formed against us? I doubt the king is that stupid.”

“And the other nobles?”

“A few rotten potatoes won’t ruin a good crop.”

“Good point.”

After a moment, the two arrived in the medical building and to the girl’s room. Not even trying to open the door, Athena knocked on it instead.

“Hey, are you in there?” Athena asked.

“Go away!” The girl responded.

“Look, I know you’re scared but I’m not going to hurt you.” Athena said.

“You’re with her!” She said.

“Lucy isn’t here.” Athena said. “It’s just me and Duncan. You can talk to us.”

“Go away!”

“Look kid, I just want to talk. What’s your name? I’m Athena.”

“… Etrius…”

“Etrius, huh?” She said. “That’s a nice name.”

“Isn’t she a girl?” Duncan asked.

“Etrius do you know why you are here?” She asked. “Do you know where your parents are?”

“…” Etrius was silent.

“Etrius?” Athena asked.

“I don’t know…” Etrius said.

“Okay, tell me their names and we can go find them.” She said.

“I… don’t remember.” Etrius said.

“What do you mean you don’t remember?” She asked, confused.

“I only know my name. I don’t know who my parents are or even what they look like…” Etrius said.

“Oh dear…” Athena sighed. “Okay what's the furthest back you can remember?”

“I remember waking in a town and then being chased by that blond girl.” Etrius said.

“Do you remember what town it was?”

“No, I didn’t know where I was. She had started chasing me and I didn’t know what to do so I ran into the forest.”

“And from there, you managed to come here?”

“No, I met with two girls in the forest and they took me to towns to try and get my memory back.”

“Seriously?” Duncan asked in disbelief.

“Shut it.” Athena said to Duncan. “Do you remember the two girls’ names? If it would make you feel safe, we can bring them over.”

“It was Jordan and Lim. Although the two already left on a ship. They said that they were going to an academy.” She said.

“So, that ship already left huh?” Duncan asked. “So much for that plan.”

“Are you going to help or just make offhand remarks when you feel like it?” Athena asked.

“Fine, I get it.” Duncan shrugged.

“Etrius, it’s difficult to talk like this. Do you mind if we open the door?” Athena asked.

“… Okay…” She said hesitantly.

Slowly opening the door, Etrius peaked out. She was a short girl with shoulder length, messy black hair and dark brown eyes. Her dress was torn and had alarming amounts of blood on it. This slightly worried Athena as she wondered if the so called doctors even gave her a new set of clothes or just kept her in her old ones. A quick look inside the room however, showed that there was a clean white gown on the nightstand next to the bed. So if anything, she had decided to stay in her torn and bloodstained dress for some reason.

With permission, Athena and Duncan entered the room. Etrius, still cautious of them, kept a reasonable distance. Taking the hint, they both kept this distance. Thinking the same thing that she had when she first saw her, Athena wondered how she could be with the assassin guild. Despite her thoughts, Lucy had assured her that she was in fact an assassin, although yesterday she didn’t seem so sure.

“So Etrius,” Athena started. “To reintroduce myself, I’m Athena Hawkeye and this is Duncan Young.”

“I’m Etrius.” Etrius said.

“Well Etrius, I’m sure that Duncan told you this but just in case he didn’t, you are being investigated for being a member of the Assassin’s Guild.” Athena said. “I’m sure that this is a misunderstanding and we will bring you home as soon as possible. That said, it would seem that Lucy, the ranger sent to find you, made things unpleasant. For that, I’m sorry.”

“I- is she here?” Etrius looked at the door nervously.

“Don’t worry about her. Right now she is being punished for her actions. I mean who in their right mind would kick a little girl?” Athena asked.

“…” Etrius looked as if she wanted to say something but refused to speak up.

“That food looks cold, would you like something warm?” Athena asked.

“Yes please.” She said.

“Duncan, go get her something.” Athena said.

“Sorry, but I work behind the desk. Field work isn’t really in my training.” He said.

“Duncan…” Athena glared at him.

“It was just a joke.” He said. “I’ll be right back.”

With that, Duncan ran off, leaving Athena and Etrius alone, with the knife it still had hidden.

“Don’t mind him.” Athena sighed. “For now I want you to tell me as much as you can remember. It might help us in finding your family.”

“Okay.” Etrius nodded.

Etrius began to recount the trip it made here, starting from walking in town and being chased by Lucy to meeting Jordan and Lim, and leaving out the encounter with the assassins, all the way to the previous day where it was shot. Of course it exaggerated some details and left out others to make itself seem like a small child and to make Lucy look like an aggressor. Given how Athena reacted, this plan worked. Hopefully this would set Etrius on the path to gaining it’s freedom, and if not, it still had a knife and plenty of things to throw.

After recounting its story, Duncan entered the room with a simple meal. It wasn’t as much as Etrius would have liked but it was certainly better than nothing. Hopefully after a few more days with this food, it would be able to get its power back and head off to it’s normal operations. As it was eating however, Athena looked like she remembered something, and a rather odd question came up.

“So… Etrius….” Athena started hesitantly. “I have a question for you.”

“Okay.” Etrius said in between bites.

“You are wearing underwear, right?” She asked.

“No.” It said, having nothing to be ashamed of.

“Oh, oh no…” She said looking at the bare, burnt legs poking out of the dress.

“And I’m done here.” Duncan said turning away. “I’ll leave her to you.”