November 3, 1999

'Breathe in. Breathe out. Keep your heart pumping steadily, keep the pace. Breathe in. Breathe out. Forget the stress in the leg muscles, block it out. Feel nothing, nothing except the drive and the need to improve. Breathe in. Breathe out.'

How often had he been told that little litany? A hundred times? A thousand? TEN thousand maybe? Whatever the number, it had ingrained itself within him, giving him a tenant by which to regulate his training. If anything, his uncle had been an excellent teacher of patience, and his grandfather even greater. From them he had gotten his discipline. And from his discipline had come his strength. It was useful to him even now, as he jogged down the street lanes at five in the morning, intent on reaching the quiet park in which he usually did his morning training before going to work.

The day was fine, clear with only a few clouds. The air wasn't too cold for early November, and the wind was faint, only a breeze. And yet, something was definitely missing, in his own heart.

The past few weeks hadn't been very good, and he knew he was partly the cause, if only partially. The news of Cammy's pregnançy, the fact that she'd hidden it from him out of a fear he couldn't understand and which hurt him more than he showed, compounded by his cursed pride which had time and time again rendered him so stubborn one could compare him to a rock - excellent when on a mission or fighting, not when trying to patch up a relationship.

He saw the park just ahead, with its tall old trees, its grass and bunks and shriveled flowerbeds, with the pool farther out and a Soccer court next to it. He slowed to a rapid walk, quickly arriving to the small clearing he had found once with her, a patch in the little grove next to the park, naturally cleared and filled with wild grass and a few shrubs. He had been with Cammy there. It had been summer evening, just before their wedding and the weird honeymoon they had. He remembered how she had pointed out the trees all around would muffle any sounds, and that one could do anything there.

And they had proven it, as a quirk took them, and they made love in that clearing, unheard by no one except the warm, welcoming summer air...

He shook his head, pushing the sweet memory to the back of his mind, feeling a pang in his chest. He started to stretch a bit, warming each muscle by using his karate and SCD conditioning. God, he needed this these days, a way to lash out without hurting anyone.

As he did every other morning, Jeremy decided to practice his punches first, taking the wide-legged, loose, near-karate stance of the Storm's Fang discipline, a style passed down only from a Storm to a Storm. He took a deep breath, and then started up with a swift jab from his right fist, keeping the rest of his body completely stationary.

Jab. Jab. Hook. Jab. Side-Punch. Jab. Jab. Faster and faster, until one punch nearly blurred and flowed into another, pushing the limit of his muscle and bone structure, unheeding the pain which sometimes flared. It was only natural, and he was used to it by then. He kept on it, and while he did his mind kept going on his problem at home.

It hadn't ruined things, at least there was that much. He still loved the beautiful, potentially deadly fighting female as much as he ever did, probably even more. Yes, secretely even more, for she hadn't wanted to hurt him. She hadn't meant to. She had been scared, although he couldn't understand why, that he might leave her. I suppose that was what had hardened him for a while. That she thought he'd EVER leave her like this. But it also showed how much she cared for him, how much she wanted to be with him.

One couldn't help but feel a warmth inside his own self after that realization.

He switched to his other arm quickly. Next stop, chi formation.

These days things were awkward as hell, he decided. They both acted as if nothing had happened, as if there had never been anything wrong and that no new wall was standing between them. They didn't want to believe they quarrelled over any kind of matter, and tried to be easy and let it slide.

Jeremy, however, knew better, and he would be a fool not to think Cammy didn't as well. It showed.

Subtle things, mostly. They tended to talk more about past events than present ones, and seemed to lack the team focus they'd once had. There were looks of regret she shot at him, and he sometimes found himself absurdly awkward in her presence. This was starting to make them seem foolish and transparent. Already Julia and Giorgio both had told them that this had to cease, something they both wished to with all their heart, prevented by a situation they weren't used to occuring.

It didn't feel quite right. That wasn't what truly bothered him. What was it. He was so unused to this. With Melissa, love hadn't gone that deeply yet. All of the things he had with Cammy were new ground. How did young couples cope?

He stopped his series of punch, took a deep breath, regaining his inner balance. He had come here to find answers. And his answers sometimes came when he found himself in a trance, bringing up his chi, harnessing his hidden strength. He hadn't done that enough these days, and if he continued much he would become sluggish in doing his attacks or enhancing his speed and reflexes when on missions. He couldn't allow that to happen.

So he concentrated, reaching inside himself, contacting his spirit, catching a mental hold of the myriad of tendrils of power, then another, then another, calling them forward, into his physical body. There was some sluggishness, as expected, but once called the flow started to come forward sweetly and quickly. He called it into his shoulders, his arms, his hands, finally feeling the tingle of power gathering in his palms and fingers, the flow coalescing until a white hue and small spark started to erupt.

He brought his hands together, noticing one of them was unclean. There was some dirt on it. Ah, yes, he had brushed against a trunk on his way, that might be it. His concentration remained, however, as the sparks grew greater, and his hands started to shake as they were overwhelmed by the whiteness, the usual preceding symptom before his casting of the Nova Flare, the technique he himself had invented from his grandfather's famous Flare Talon.

Unclean. For some reason it stuck to his mind, trying to get his attention. It was like a final piece of a puzzle had actually worked at last. He couldn't help but pay a little attention to it, and his mind eagerly told him what it had discovered.

The shock completely took him by surprise, and his hands twitched violently. The energy gathered in fron of them was jarred loose, making a beeline to the nearest tree before he fully realized what had happened. It impacted the trunk with little noise, but huge chunks of wood flew everywhere, and the tree, unable to bare its own weight anymore, couldn't help but lurch down, toward the human who had unwittingly felled it.

Instinct and common sense took over, and Jeremy was well clear of the path the top of the tree had taken by the time it came to rest on the soil with a resounding thump. He couldn't help but feel rather foolish: he wasn't a novice in chi summoning, he shouldn't have lost control like that. Fortunately, it had been a tree and not a person standinmg there, or the concusion would have killed him or her, just like a burning version had cooked the Shadowlaw Doll called Juli.

But he couldn't help it this time. What he had revealed to himself was amazing and mind-numbing. Uncleaness. Cammy had always been fragile about what people thought of her, although no one had seen that side of her except he, Rose and once Julia. She also had the unfortunate tendency to deform events when one who knew her well treated her badly - something Rose had warned him against.

She had become pregnant and hadn't told him. He had been irked and disappointed and acted like the stubborn ass he knew he could do so well. Cammy hadn't touched him willingly since then, he had thought because of either anger or shame. But what if it was something more than that?

What if she didn't want to anymore, for she took the blame for herself completely and thought she should stay away from him. That might be why she was hurting so badly.

And he, like a moron, hadn't seen the signs, hadn't considered them. Fool. Pitiful fool. 'She couldn't read minds, and you never told her you'd been foolish. She took you at face value!' his mind screamed, and he agreed with it.

And there was no way he was letting this go on.

His training, and the tree he felled utterly forgotten, the young warrior started to treck his way back, jogging quickly, now not doubting his actions but driven by a desire to mend them. He yearned to be home. And once home, he would work on setting things right.

Somehow...

Around the same time...

Sharon could feel something was wrong the moment she stepped on the roof she had chosen for the murder.

It wasn't what she had felt when she had hesitated in taking the job she had been offered. Rather, it was something more immediate, like the impression of being watched by eyes who wanted anything but her well-being. It wasn't the first time she had had that feeling over the years - after all, she had made a long list of ennemies amongst both the upper world and underworld. To encounter this kind of situation was unsurprising, and in fact she had sort of expected it to happen.

But not with this intensity.

Sharon had been born with a sixth sense at her birth, a sense which she had used to get herself out of trouble more times than nine cats had of lives. When she had been little, she'd used it to get away from bullies, at adolescence from the violent gangs, and as a fully-grown woman, to avoid fights with other killers and street people who sometimes hunted her. It was a sense she trusted, flaring brighter as the danger was great. And right at that moment the mental flare she received was of the brightest white. Great danger. There were other people around, very dangerous, about to strike. She gripped her telescopic silencer-endowed riffle and scanned around, her eyes noth picking up anything on the nearby roofs.

Meant nothing. True specialists could hide and come out of any place. After all, killers and mercenaries thrived on surprising thei opponents. It would be the height of incompetence for true proffessionals to be seen before they wanted to be seen.

From what her sixth sense was telling her, she wasn't about to have an easy time shaking them off. They weren't even attempting to hide their presence - proof enought that they'd been waiting for her. She'd been right all along. This was a trap. For what purpose she couldn't teel, but it was.

But she just couldn't refuse to try now that she was commited. It had been her pride which had been at stake. And she had always been stubborn on things like pride.

She walked to the edge of the roof, looking down at the place through which her supposedly influent target was to come out, and yet wasn't her senses were to her back, where the fun would truly begin. Her hand stole to the hidden 8mm subtly, as the danger behind her flared.

They were here.

"My, I'm not sure I would have showed up." said a male voice which radiated amusement mingled with cond confidence. He was no more than fifteen feet behind her, from the sound. She didn't turn, but smiled slightly.

"I almost didn't. But you know how it is. Once you accept a job and you've got a rep to maintain..."

She could almost feel the nod. "...you must go through with it. Yes. That is our way, isn't it? I was never too big on that, but well, each to his own set of rules." he paused for a second. "Well, I respect your devotion and your spunk, you've got the steel nerves I'd expect from Sharon Dame. But this is still a trap. You are surrounded by too many."

"Yes."

"You knew?"

"Lets just say I have a knack for that. And as for my answer to your problem, there is only one thing the Dames do when faced with impossible odds..." she gripped both her riffle and her 8 mm, wrenching it out and pointing it at the man behind her out of instinct and the feel she'd gotten from his voice. "-FIGHT!"

She squeezed off three shots, from her gun, and felt shard impacts on her back. Too light to be bullets, they must be tranquilizers, she decided suddenly. They of course didn't penetrate, as she always wore a kevlar vest underneath her normal attire to cope with such unfortunate, perilous situations.

She heard steps behind her. No time to chat, it seemed.She flung her riffle on her back gripped the railing and swung herself downward, firing two shots into the window and shattering it with er weight just as the people above were about to make a grab for her. She held her gun positioned in front of her. No way it could be that easy. The tone of the man who had stood behind her told of utter confidence, a confidence which had been hard-earned. There must be something down here. People, traps, something.

She wasn't wrong. She instinctively ducked as she heard the first muffled shot, diving behind an old crate, narrowly missing being hit. Sparks of wood flew as her assailants squeezed a few rounds on the crate before cutting off all attempts as one. Truly experts. Not good. There was a very real chance she wouldn't make it. They seemed intent more on capturing her than kill her, she could tell, for they could have dropped her with high-caliber penetration ammo on the roof. That, and the fact that people like these wouldn't have put up such a charade.

They simply would have shot her at Los Angeles. No big deal for experts of the caliber she was increasingly giving them.

An object rolled next to her, small and round. She didn't take time considering what it might be, scrambling to her feet and away withing a second, knowing she had to pour some distance, for the object was too far for her to reach out to and toss back. She reacted as fast as she could.

But it simply wasn't fast enough.

Her eyes suddenly went nearly deaf, and pain exploded within her head. Sonic concussion, she knew. She forced herself to fight the pain and growing darkness, shaking off its effect and keeping them at bay. She rolled away, rolling to her feet, and pointed her 8mm right in front of herself.

Right into the helmeted face of a man cast in supple armor, holding out something in front of himself. She blinked, the sonic concusion grenade having set her sight a bit ajar from what it really was. Then her eyes widened as she realize what it was.

A lock of blue hair. A long lock, firmly held between the man's fingers. Sharon was as far from stupid as one could be. Her hands trembled slightly at the realization which hit her.

The man in front of her, of which she saw only the mouth, smirked as she did, and nodded slightly. "Yes, Sharon. We have your sister. Took us quite a bit of trouble, but she was the one who was the easiest to get, weaponless, without kevlar protection. Now, are we going to keep on resisting this, or are you going to listen to me?"

"Bastards!" she hissed "What the @#%$ could you want."

The man near her let his hand drop, still smirking. "But Sharon. We want you to work for us, in exchange for your sister's safety. A simple enough deal."

She gritted her teeth angrily. "And who would I work for, if I said yes?"

His mouth became serious for a moment as he answered. "White Arms." he said stiffly.

She gasped mentally at the name. White Arms! A name feared in the underworld, a dragon which looked on from behind the scenes, a powerful force bidding its time. The name was nearly as feared as Shadowlaw, the Steel League and the now-broken Circle. To cross White Arms was death, she knew. To refuse was worse.

"What happens if...if I refuse?" she said, trying to keep calm, seeing other men and women dressed in the same armor emerging from the shadows. The man who was obviously the leader cocked his head.

"Then you become a specimen and Blair Dame dies." he held out his hand. "Now give me the gun. I have orders to get you to Headquarters and I've never failed a mission."

She looked at his hand, then sighed. She didn't want to. Did want to surrender, her pride was forbidding her to. But she couldn't afford to fight and call the man's bluff. Not today. Not with Blair in probable danger. She sighed, then with an angry jerk, gave him the weapon.

She may well have made another mistake that day.

But what else could she do? What else?

Around the same time...

The house that Cammy and he had bought - with a bit of his mother's inheritance - was a nice, comfy two-storied house of post-victorian architecture, mingled with certain futuristic details built over by the previous owners and themselves. It was there that they had decided they would live out their life while on English ground. They had wanted to raise a family there, and grow old together - a sentimental dream for people whose lives hadn't afforded many, if at all, for a long time.

He jogged to the place, catching sight of his nice Lexus ES300 parked in the two-place driveway, behind the Astron Martin DB7 which Cammy had litterally drooled over and bought. They normally used his car to get to work, but when they needed to go somewhere in England, the blonde Elite insisted they drove in English automobile, a whim he had no problem in living with, since it meant she would drive most of the way!

He jogged to his lawn, catching sight of one of his neighbours, Henry Jameson, calmly raking the last few dead leaves which had fallen from his proud oak. He called out amiably and waved as he jogged, awaiting the man's smile and answering wave.

Instead what he got was a puzzled look. "Why, Storm, I could have sworn I saw you in your house a few minutes ago."

That stopped him cold, bewildered. He stared at the man who had been his neighbour for the past few months in confusion. "What do you mean?" he asked stupidely.

The man looked just as stumped as he felt. "Might have been my eyes playing tricks on me," Jameson said uneasily "But just a little while ago I could have sworn I'd seen two peeps inside of your house and - hey, there, Storm!"

Jeremy didn't even bother listening to anymore. They didn't have any visitors planned for the morning. In fact, they NEVER had visitors in the morning. Mark and Giorgio and sometimes even Julia came to chat or share a drink or two, but it always happened in the evening. Something was up.

Theories and possibilities jumbled his brain. He pushed them out angrily. This wasn't the time to think of possibilities, but be simply ready to take in the situation at face value. Actions, if any, would come upon confrontation to the facts.

He walked to the door, tried to open it. It did, without any problem. No sign of tampering at all. That, added to the fact that Henry hadn't seen or heard anything suspicious, seemed to tell that Cammy had let the person enter willingly. That was very good, but still not enough to satisfy him. Half-feeling yet trusting in the instincts which had saved him in many operations and allowed him to go head-to-head against powerful street fighters, he snuck into his own house.

At first he heard nothing, which didn't tell him anything worthwhile, and he soundlessly closed the door, stepping forward on the ground without making a sound, knowing which spots creaked perfectly after months of living in the house. He then heard a soft sound he couldn't immediately recognize. And then he heard Cammy whisper.

"Ah, yes, Grey eyes." she whispered, her tone groggy yet showing the softness she used when they were in intimate moments, together where no one could interrupt them, using a name she tenderly gave him when they flirted with each other.

Or when they were making love...

Forgetting, about being careful or silent, his heart pounding violently, Jeremy rushed into the direction of the sound, litterally catapulting himself into the living room, where a scene offered itself to him, a scene which would be burned into his mind forever.

Cammy was layed on the floor, in pants and t-shirt, as she always wore before putting on her SCD uniform and going to work. Her t-shirt was drawn up, revealing her magnificient curved bust. She was writhing slightly, soft moans escaping her lips in a fashion which a clinical part of his mind recognized as drug-induced. She seemed to find a pleasure to what was happening to her, as hands were busy brushing her sides langourously. Hands that weren't of the man she loved.

Over her, touching the drugged woman, his small dartgun next to him, was Albert Desmarais, a moderately-talented operative and the greatest jerk in all of SCD. He turned to Jeremy in shock and rose in open-mouth surprise and horror. Suddenly it all clicked. The dartgun, the moans, the fact that he'd arrived far sooner than he usually did. His mind formed all the elements and told him what it meant in a cold, assured fashion.

And Jeremy Storm nearly blacked out from the rage and hatred which surged within him.

"YOU @#%$ PIECE OF FILTH!!!" he screamed bestially, lunging forward, just as the man realized he might use the gun to bring down that particular danger.

Desmarais never made it to the gun, as Jeremy bowled into him and into the ground, his fury asking for his chi, which had no choice but to respond to the bestial mental summons. The man - the FILTHY MONSTER! - in front of him tried to rise, but with a swift pivoting move one one hand he swept his feet from under him. Then he came over the man and started to pound.

Punch after punched rammed everywhere they could, mostly focussing on the face which was the seeming source of the hate. He couldn't control himself, didn't WANT to control himself. Yes, the man had always been a jerk, yes he'd hated them both for being better agaents than he was, but they'd trusted him as they'd trusted all SCD. What had just been done...the attempted defilement was...completely...UNFORGIVABLE.

He heard a sharp crack as he slugged the hated visage one more time, and realized he had broken the man's jaw. It didn't matter. This hardly sated him. The enemy was out cold, face deformed by blows driven by chi and rage, his knuckles were bloody with blood which wasn't his, but it wasn't enough. He wanted this man gone, dead, buried deep under the Earth where it would be eaten by worms to have an indigestion on.

On impulse he grabbed one of the man's hand, one of the hands which had been starting to freely fondle Cammy - and broke the fingers backward. The sharp cracks were highly rewarding, and he nearly roared as he took hold of the other fingers and broke them with glee.

Thats when he stopped. Distantly, in the back of his mind, he heard the incoherent scream of a woman he had loved and hadn't been able to save, and realized the one who had killed her so savagely - his own cousin, his 'brother in all but blood' - must have taken extreme pleasure in it.

That was when he stopped, realizing what he'd been doing, what he'd set about to do so willingly. He couldn't allow himself to become like this, couldn't become like Tom. To do so was to spit on Melissa's grave, to laugh at Nathan McIntyre's wounds. He rose from the barely living lump of flesh he had just battered, looking at it with disgust.

'I completely lost it there.' he reflected 'I wanted nothing more than to kill that filth, and I feel not an inch of shame from it!' he turned away, his gaze softening sadly as it came to lay on the drugged, uncounscious Cammy. He cleaned off his bloody hands on his pants, putting her t-shirt back down quickly, then taking her in his arms and putting her in the sofa from which they had watched many movies and late evening shows. She smiled dreamily as he did.

"...love you..." she whispered incoherently.

"I know. I love you too, Cammy." he whispered back, and she drifted back down into drugged-induced sleep.

He looked at her, then at the man who had drugged her and nearly molested her sexually. "I dunno what nutty little things went of in your head, filth." he spat angrily "But I know I'm going to enjoy what'll happen to you when Cammy realizes what you were about to do. You'll wish I'd killedyou right here!" he drew comfort from that, first because it meant the jerk would suffer more later - if Julia didn't simply barbecue him - and from the fact that it allowed him NOT to take a life.

He walked to the phone in the room, dialing the number of the SCD Headquarters. He would ask for a medical team and security team, then wait. That's right. He would wait with his sleeping wife, watching her sleep, awaiting her awakening, waiting for the SCD medics and the advanced medical equipment which would quickly drain the drug out of her system.

And all the while he would fight the urge to kill the man who had gone nuts and hurt the woman he loved. He wouldn't allow himself to become like Tom. Never.

But, oh God, how he wanted to, right now. How he WANTED to!

Three days later...

The city of Perth was illuminated with lights, from its highes and grandest skyscrapers to the many appartment buildings and homes which were in the outlying streets or in the small towns which constituted the suburbs. As a city of well over one million citizens and the main industrial center of the entire western Australian territories, it was a place of money, finery and luxuries. Very fine indeed. And the fact that it boasted a big enought population to easily hide one's presence was even better.

Which was why the man known simply as the Hunter had a very important hideout there, well-hidden. Which proved to be a problem when one was supposed to deliver important news to the man - if man it was. And that was what Bensaku Misugi had to deliver. He knew the news were important and genuine, for he was a Shinobi, the very clan of assassins the Hunter had targeted for destruction.

It had been hard to enter in communication with the Hunter. Perth was a large city, and its local underground seemed especially unresponsive and unfearing of the fact that he was a ninja. It wasn't really surprising, as the people of Australia had a deserved reputation of being calm and composed, even easy-going, when faced with any crisis.

But he had managed, at last, to have an address. An Heiseil Factory in the industrial part of town. It was there the man went to tell the plans of his grandmaster, with the very intent of betraying his clan.

After all, word was that the Hunter paid three million American dollars to anyone who gave him good information on future Shinobi operations. And Bensaku had extremely good information.

He moved with grace and speed, moving from shadow to shadow like a shade of the night. Without a sound he came to the factory site, a swift jump and he was over the barrier and into the empty courtyard, landing soundlessly on hisa feet, his senses alert.

'At eight this evening' the message had said. It was evening, and there was no one here. He asked himself if he didn't somehow misread the note, when a voice whispering behind him nearly hads him jumping out of his skin in very real fright.

"I have to say, you certainly have nerve to come here by yourself, Shinobi." the voice whispered, so softly it was impossible to identify anything from it. Bensaku swiftly turned around.

In the dark stood a figure, of which he couldn't make out the details, except for the fact that it wasn't impressively tall, and that it seemed well-built from the form the cloak it wore showed. The head was covered with a mask of Indian design, grimacing and feral, one of the ancient gods of the hunters no doubt. Bensaku had no doubt this was the man he wanted to talk to, the man the Shinobi had started to fear despite the fact that they officially scorned him.

The Hunter.

A shiver ran up his spine, but the Shinobi bowed proudly from the waist, not wishing to show weakness at such a critical time.

"Hunter-sama" he said, respectfully, and was surprised when the bow was returned perfectly, as if the figure knew the ways of the japanese. As if it WAS japanese. It seemed the sentence 'know your enemy' was very seriously taken up with this person. It was fine by him, he hadn't expected otherwise. The Hunter HAD, after all, acted as if he knew them remarquably well, inducing uneasiness even amongst the Elders and Swordmasters.

"No need to glorify me with that empty flattery of a title, ninja." was the whispered response "I have no wish to be respected amongst your kind. I wish only to be feared by you all."

The shiver and dread intensified, and a part of his mind reminded him that this was the man who had killed at least a nine trained warriors of the Shinobi Clan, if rumors were true by himself. But he had decided to make a deal with the devil itself, and he had to stick with it now. If he didn't, he wasn't going to get out of the factory yard. After all, some of those who had been killed had had greater skill than he, he looked how much it had helped them.

He coughed, trying his best to hide his growing agitation. "You have...have suceeded. Even Grandmaster Geki takes you seriously now, even more than the Elders do."

That appeared to amuse the hunter. "Geki. The head of the Shinobi himself looks after my case? That is a very peculiar honor, one most people in the world wouldn't be exactly thrilled in earning. But I do feel flattered." he stepped forward a pace. "Now, what info do you have for me, little ronin?"

Benzaku stiffened at the word 'ronin', wich meant a rogue warrior, something insulting to a ninja from a clan. But he had betrayed them, so he admitted it fit him. The Hunter took another step forward and his nervousness increased to plain fear.

"Now don't be that way. I go by my word: One million dollars, I never lay a finger on you and I make sure the Shinobi won't track you down. That is my word, on the name of Buddah!" was the soothing, determined whisper he received "Now give me the information."

It wasn't like he had much of a choice on the matter now, was it? He decided to go ahead. He had already betrayed the Shinobi by not fighting, after all.

"Very well. The clan is about to go after you with a unit of some of the best warriors we have. They plan to lure you to Kalimantan, entrap you, and then question you before killing you."

"Efficient. Simple. Deadly. Exactly the kind of good plan I'd expect from that old wart Geki." a very soft chuckle. "Kalimantan, eh? How ironic old man. How very very ironic. A second death in Indonesia."

The ramble confused Bensaku, yet he pressed on, giving a small stack of paper to the one who seemingly more than a grudge against Grandmaster Geki. "Here. Those are the details of the operation." he coughed "Where's my money?"

The papers were snatched away from him in a flash, and at the same moment a black attaché was slammed on him. He clutched it instinctively, not realizing that it wasn't an attack on the moment. But as he looked and felt what had rammed into him, his expression lit up into one of greed, and he couldn't help but gasp as he opened the case and saw the many stacks of american bills. A true fortune! He would never have to stick with the old, dried-up ideas his father and grandfather had always forced upon him. He closed the case and looked at the Hunter, who had already turned its back.

"Thank you for honoring this agreement." he said earnestly. There was no response for a long time. Then a small sigh.

"There is something I wonder about." the voice whispered "You are a Shinobi, of the greatest ninja clan which ever was. Don't you feel anything, any blemish to your honor as you do this?"

That was an excellent question, and it demanded a fair answer. The problem was that Bensaku simply didn't know what he REALLY felt about betraying the clan. One one hand the clan had been everything to him: it had brought him strength, companionship, comprehension. But at the same time it was narrow-minded, stiff-ruled by dessicated old men and women who had no idea of how the world turned. Just like his family had been, always scorning his open mind and ambitions. No, he wasn't sure how he felt, but he knew what he should respond.

"I don't care about the clan. They're just bakas who just wouldn't change their tune when they should have." he declared.

The Hunter half-turned to him. "A shame" the whisper came "When one is about to die, it should be for a good reason at least."

It was at that exact moment that four men emerged from hiding places, training laser-guided weapons on Bensaku before even his Shinobi training could do something to help him. He could tell the guns were powerful - one wrong move and he was dead. His mind became a whirlpool of confusion and terror, and he reached out to the back of the Hunter, the one who had double-crossed him.

"No! We had a deal!" he screamed frantically.

"And I upheld it. You received your money. I never touched you. And the Shinobi won't come after you for betraying them." he slunk into the shadows "Goodbye Bensaku Misugi. Our transaction is complete."

And just before the hired killers pulled their trigger, Bensaku, instead of screaming or raging, simply had a very wise thought. 'I have made a pact with the Oni.' he reflected detachedly 'And he came to take my soul away.'

And then, within moments, his life was snuffed out.

The night had claimed him. And the Hunter had killed yet one other Shinobi.

Four days later...

Giorgio Castillo eyed the man next to him warily as he walked from the main command center to the extensive infirmaries of the SCD Headquarters. He was a ordinarily-built man, dressed in a blue shirt, a deep green coat and black pants, sporting sunglasses even though there wasn't much light in the corridors. He seemed quite normal a lad, with an expression of intense interest as he looked at the various SCD soldiers, technicians and medics of the Green Sector.

Well, if one didn't count the fact the man had hair the color of summer grass and that it wasn't any spooky teint, but natural.

If one also forgot the fact that the man was a psychic, one who had survived the epic battle between the Circle Elders and a group of independent mind-people of whom he'd been an optimistic member. Just that fact announced he was powerful, extremely so.

NOT someone one liked to have in one of the most high-tech anti-terrorist bases in the world. But it was needed immediately, to gether for themselves the truth about the matter of Desmarais and his attempted rape on Cammy. There was little doubt in his mind that Jeremy had told the truth about the situation, but Julia Simmons had wanted to make absolutely sure, and had asked the SCD's psychic ally, Rose, to send a trustworthy person for a quick mental scan. And so, that green-haired man had arrived.

"There's no need for apprehension, gramps." the youth said lightly, good-naturedly "I'm just here to make a little zap on a guy, and then I'm off again having fun in my nice little adoptive city of Lyons!"

Giorgio gritted his teeth. If there was something he disliked, it was when psychics decided that they could just zoom around one's mind and read what's there. It might be an effiecient way to clear things up, but it'd be a cold day in hell before he'd accept it, Dio!

"I see." stated the man more seriously "I'm sorry, I suppose I'm a little bit of a peeking individual, poking his nose everywhere. I'll just scan you friend and I'll be off."

And there was another word he didn't like. Friend. With Jeremy, Cammy and Mark it was alright. With Julia it was...well...a little weak a word. But he had never considered Albert Desmarais a friend. He'd barely considered him a colleague to begin with.

It had been like that from the moment the man had entered the SCD. He'd come in strutting, bright but extremely arrogant, and had started to treat many of the Elite with disdain, and fixated on rambling against Cammy when she voted against elavating him to the Elites. He had risen nonetheless, having sufficient skills, although he never shone bright like those the Elites themselves called the super-elites, a tight little group whose talents were more than beyond the norm. Joan, Julia, Michael, Tyrone, Jeremy, Cammy, Mark and himself had made that group.

He supposed it had gotten from bad to worse from then on, as the masn tried to become remarquable but was overshadowed by almost everyone. Being put under Jeremy's command probably hadn't help, especially since the man had been put down by his superior officer, especially after the screw-up during the Richmond Operation, while what was known as the Secret War went on almost a year ago. A man could get bitter over all that, there wasn't a need to have Joan babbling psychology to see that.

Just as there was absolutely NO EXCUSE for what he certainly almost had done to people he considered good friends.

He entered the main infirmary, a sterile place of beds and advanced monitering computers which usual hospitals and clinics probably wouldn't start seeing for a good decade or two at least, and passed many beds were wounded or treated personel rested, moving through the serious, disciplined medics injecting antibiotics or applying H28 skin patches, or simply reading data out of a tri-dimension computer.

They walked to an closed up area of the infirmary guarded by two big, grim soldiers in special bodysuits with tazer stick at the ready. Unnecessary precautions, of course, given the state of the man inside the little room, but one had to make do with protocols and all the red tape, witch included men to guard the very probable criminal. The soldiers saluted and he returned the gesture, entering the room-turned-cell.

"Nice meeting you guys." said the psychic behind him to his irritation.

Inside the room was Desmarais, completely unrecognizable under all the bandages and casts and skin patches. His eyes had recovered a little, and were open an inch as they entered, and a small moan escaped the man's puffed mouth. He truly looked miserable. Good. He had earned to feel that way when he'd put his hands on one of their best and brightest agents in front of her husband who happened to be another great agent.

"How are you feeling, Albert?" he said viciously, and smiled when he only received a vague moan in response.

"Wow." stated the psychic. "I've got to admit your man knows how to mess someone up. This is brutal work."

"Angry work, mostly. And your job is to see if it was in any way deserved, although I can pretty much guess that it was." he retorted grimly.

"In my opinion, it would be better to wait until this man has recovered..." the man with the green hair trailed off as Giorgio turned to look at him with blazing eyes "...but of course, why bother? Better to take care of things now and be done with them."

He approached the wounded man and fixed his eyes upon him, a direct, unblinking stare which was soon rendered startling by the gathering glow which they started to emit. The SCD soldier had met enough psychics in his life to know that this was the way those people's mind powers manifested, but Desmarais had no such experience. It was therefore unsurprising when he started to trash about slightly, groaning in pain and fear. The spanish didn't even consider calming the man. He just kept his attention focused on the green-haired psychic.

The face, which had been placid and rather uncaring to begin with, started to frown as its powers read thoughts that no one should read. The concentration frown soon became deeper, more forceful, showing traces of anger, until the psychic's face screwed up in disgust and the eyes stopped glowing abdruptly, leaving ordinary eyes which looked at Desmarais with anger and utter disdain.

Giorgio knew what it meant, but felt that he had to ask. "So...did he do the deed as we thought he did?"

A slow nod, still with a disgusted face. "Yes, he did." was the suddenly very seriously-voiced answer. "Jealousy rendered him crazy for some sort of payback, and it seems he planned to rape that woman, then leave without a trace, play the innocent and look gleefully as your two agents - of which Rose speaks highly - would suffer."

Giorgio ground his teeth. He had expected something like that, for it did fit the man's psychological profile that he'd perused as soon as this had happened. But to hear it said made it even more monstrous, even more inhuman. He suddenly wished Jeremy had killed the piece of garbage, and he had to fight hard to quell the thought down.

Still, he wasn't about to simply let it go at that. He walked right next to the heavily bandaged Desmarais, bending so that his eyes looked directly into his. He saw guilt and spite there, and - most pleasurably - there was some fear. Good. Let him fear. Because things were going to become very harsh once the man recovered.

"Listen to me you worthless piece of mierda!" he growled softly "Now that I know you wanted to screw Cammy and hurt two people I happen to like a lot, I'm going to make your life hell." he grinned. "I'll push the Elites together, and we'll get enough leverage so that, before you go to court, you're going to get what you deserve." he stood up, noticing the terror in the eyes of the would-be rapist, and liking it. He turned to the psychic.

"We'll take it from here. Thank you, mister...?"

The psychic simply smiled in response. "Just call me Herman. Everybody does. Just make certain this...man...is given what he is due."

He nodded and with a flash of power that Giorgio's keen senses barely detected, the man vanished, leaving him alone with the scum. He left almost, not wishing to stay any longer with such a foul human being.

But just before he left, he turned to the troubled, battered man and hissed. "Get better soon. Cuz as soon as you are I'll make sure to put you up against your helpless victim in a fight. I'm sure she'll be looking for the chance to skin you alive."

And with that, he closed the door. It was over for today.

But it would never be forgotten. And NEVER forgiven. He'd make damn blasted sure of that.