“That his den?” Bergamont asked, slamming his hand twice on the number 47 scratched onto a rusty, sickly-green door, staring expectantly at Gervyl, who was still climbing the stairs sluggishly with ragged breath

“Yeah, I belie-” he did not get to finish, as a deafening crash echoed throughout the stairwell. Without missing a beat, Bergamont kicked the door open, obliterating the chain that kept it closed, and breaking in half the mighty wooden bolt, that then scattered across the floor, covering it in dark brown splinters, like a carpet of needles to welcome him inside.

“Fucking great. That’s the subtlety out the door,” Gervyl grunted, slapping his forehead with the palm of his hand. The bitter taste of frustration completely overshadowing the sweetness of his small triumph over the flight of stairs. He followed his partner inside.

The apartment was almost completely shrouded in darkness. The warm glow of the orange light bulb just outside barely even revealed the outlines of the objects hidden in the courier's hideout. Gervyl raised his left hand, and around the very tip of his finger, dim energy seemed to coalesce from thin air, fluctuating erratically as it gathered into a single point. After a second it stabilized and took a spherical shape, shimmer with cold light.

The makeshift lantern illuminated the tiny hallway, which led directly into a dingy living room. The apartment was small, cramped and in complete disarray. Piles of decomposing rubbish rose up against the walls, and the floor was covered with sticky stains and paper pages, chaotically scattered around. There were a few cracked monitors on the busted bookshelves, but no matter how hard he looked, Gervyl couldn't find anything resembling a computer connected to them. Not close by, nor anywhere else, for that matter. There were, however, plenty of loosely hanging, distinct looking cables. Bridges. They looked broken, mostly, but Gerv couldn’t say for sure. Technomancy wasn’t his thing.

The room also had a peculiar unpleasant stench, different from the intense smell of decay that permeated the city. It was faint, but somehow suffocating. It choked the psyker as he moved further in and made his head spin. It was as if this room had been locked up, hermetically sealed, for months. So long, in fact, that the very oxygen inside seemed to rot and wither.

The steel shutters covering the windows, which Gerv instinctively tried to open answered him with fierce resistance.They either got stuck due to lack of use, or the resident welded them up for good to ward off any unwanted stares coming from the outside.It was also just as likely that, much like the damned elevators in this lousy neighborhood, they were simply broken... But Gervyl wasn't going to lose time thinking about it. He had to bear with it.

Miffed, he walked over to the table in the middle of the living room, which, much like a mountain peak, loomed over the smaller ranges of junk on the floor. On the top of it, crammed on the very edge, was a pile of what looked like documents. The mercenary greedily grabbed them, impatiently looking for the clues pertaining to Ol’s package, only to get disappointed. What he laid his gaze upon were merely torn fliers of the local eateries, generously sprinkled with grease. Some “Goran’s Grubhouse” stung his eyes like a colorful insult. He crushed the papers and tossed them against the wall with contempt, wiping his hand on his pants.

“Have you found anything?” he called out to Bergamont, who was getting rowdy, turning the neighboring room upside down.

“Yeah! A big, steaming pile of shit!” he replied in his typical crass manner, peeking back at Gerv from behind the doorframe. “Wanna see?” his moronic, toothy grin glimmered in the darkness.

The psyker only replied with a heavy sigh, then pushed him aside as he entered the messed up bedroom.

“Well, that was a waste of fucking time,” Berg grumbled, nonchalantly pushing a heavy drawer out of the way as if it was made of fluff to have a peek behind it.

In the meantime, Gervyl scanned the room, ignoring the noisy nuisance at his side. Only now upon closer inspection did he realize that the walls were sound-proofed. Not only in the bedroom. The whole apartment was in one way or another modified to stop any noise coming in or out. Whether it was born of caution or full blown paranoia on Epiteka’s part, it mattered little, but it did give Gerv a glimpse into his mind, if only just a miniscule one.

Drawers lay on the ground, thrown around and smashed by his partner, while the mattress, having also had a close encounter with the brute, was folded in half, propped up against the wall, spilling its spongy stuffing after it’s been brutally ripped open. Gervyl's gaze naturally darted towards the bed frame, which, stripped of the moldy mattress, was now sticking out like a sore thumb. It had a boxy structure, hollow on the inside, with a thick lid on top. A glorified chest, if anything.

Berg did manage to figure that fact out, as was apparent by all the the bed's contents that now littered the bed’s side. Thick garments and bedclothes half eaten by moths among them. Gerv crouched by the bed’s frame and gave the messy inside a solid 5 seconds look.

“Did you check the bed?” he asked almost rhetorically, reaching inside and digging out more garbage, until he could see the bottom clearly.

“As you can see,” he replied with inexplicable pride in his voice.

“Thoroughly?” he reiterated somewhat provocatively.

Gervyl looked on outside of the bed-chest and then inside again, suspecting that something was off. He knocked on the bottom and, sure enough, it answered in kind with a muffled echo. With great effort Gerv then pushed the enormous frame to the side, revealing a hidden compartment below, etched into the floor.

“Very nice. How’d you know?” Berg gave the psyker a patronizing whistle, putting a hand on his shoulder.

“I’ve seen enough red herrings like that to get general a feel for them. Fake bottoms, safes behind safes, distractions, all of them. Most people would stop at just checking the chest, since it’s hidden enough under the mattress,” he explained calmly, firmly pushing away the giant’s hand.

“Oh, so it’s not the first time you’re robbing a house, huh?”

“Quit barking and start searching,”

“What am I, a fucking dog?”

“Your owner… Boss, I mean, seems to believe so,” Gerv jumped at the opportunity for a petty jab as it presented itself.

Berg scorned, circling around the room. “We’ll see how he likes it when this dog here rips his throat out one day,” he kicked the bed back towards the psyker, almost catching his fingers between it and the floor. “Careful there, chump. The floor here does not look very tasty,” he cackled, seeing as he flinched and almost fell.

“You want to start something here? Huh?”

“Easy! You’re spilling that venom of yours everywhere. But we do have some unfinished business, now don’t we?”

For a moment they stared each other down in total silence, pressure rising at an abnormal rate, until it was released in a single twitch of Berg’s hand, as he suddenly reached for his holster … Only to immediately stop when Gerv tensed up.

“Maybe some other time,” he snickered, slowly reaching for that damned flask.

But the psyker was in no mood for laughter, his amber already glowing bright as he readied himself to strike the brute down in one motion If he had to.

“You’ll be crawling back if you get shitfaced now, because I’m not helping you.”

“As if this thing could even put a dent in me,” he shrugged, downing whatever remained inside the flask in one gulp.

Fair enough, Gerv thought to himself. It was honestly a surprise that the bumbling idiot was still standing after downing that glass of spiked booze they got at Gaidegen’s place. Maybe he wasn’t actually human after all. Well, doesn’t matter.

They cracked the sarcophagus open once more and took a good look inside, where a variety of objects glistened in the cold light. Throwing knives, steel balls, caltrops, and most surprising, even a small folding crossbow stuck to a gauntlet – a whole stash of supplies fit for a thief or an assassin. No guns, though. The owner probably liked to sneak around.

Beneath, there were documents, all paper and no electronics. Cryptic memos, lists of valuable objects, supposedly present on the island at some point in time, along with a whole slew of names and addresses. There were also maps of the city, but with markings that made little to no sense – paths that didn’t correspond to any of the streets or alleys, locations in nonsensical places, some off in the surrounding ocean. Scribbles and what looked like coded messages unlike anything Gerv has ever seen.

And at the very bottom, an empty picture frame, no larger than a palm of a hand.

“Now this makes me wonder. Don’t suppose he kept his own picture here, huh?” Gerv handed the item to Berg, who popped it open in search of clues. In vain, of course.

“Lover, maybe,” he shrugged, tossing the thing back as if it was trash. “But this place isn’t exactly somewhere you'd want to bring a lady back to.”

“Are there even women worth getting involved with on this dump of an island?”

“Not if you’re going to throw your life away… Or maybe that’s all the more reason to?” he snorted, twirling one of the throwing knives between his fingers. “But this map –“

“Shh!” Gerv cut the conversation short when he heard something at the apartment’s entrance, and immediately put out his light.

Muffled voices came from the stairway.

“Looks like some rats already gnawed their way in,” a deep-sounding male started. “Don’t be shy now, come out,” his way of speaking was slow and meticulous, almost labored, while his accent betrayed his rural roots.

“As if anybody would listen, genius,” another, higher voice mumbled all too quickly.

“It’s called good ol’manners, moron.”

“Botha you shut up and get your guns ready,” third voice, dry like sandpaper commanded, irritated. “The boss got a word that some scumbags were sniffing around. Seems like the intel was on point.”

“Aye,” the deep-voiced one let out a grunt accompanied by a sound of a revolver’s hammer being pulled back.

“Fuck,” Gerv hissed almost inaudibly, his mind shifting into overdrive in search for a suitable strategy as the dispersed light of flashlights fell into the room.

Berg on the other hand seemed raring to go, with one hand already tightly gripping his flamethrower, him slowly raising to his feet. He might have jumped the intruders right there and then, if Gervyl hadn’t pinned his feet in place with telekinesis.

The giant shook his fist silently, as if to say “You want me to slug you, you bastard?”

“No sudden movements,” Gerv mouthed the words with his face frozen in deep focus, before slowly turning transparent and vanishing completely.

Bergamont wanted to rebel, but when he saw his own fist disappear right in front of his eyes, he more or less understood the ploy.

“So this is the hideout of the famous porrigan ghost. What a joke,” said the bumpkin in the other room.

“You’re talking as if your hole in the wall is any better, Guur,” replied the skittish.

“Now listen ‘ere you little shit…”

They bickered back and forth for a good minute before finally stepping foot into the bedroom.

A medium-sized figure entered the room, frail and skittish but armed with what Gervyl recognized in the dim light as a double-barrel shotgun with a flashlight attachment underneath, with a narrow, but powerful beam of light.

“Like a fucking pigsty,” the intruder muttered, scanning the room slowly with his weapon, maneuvering through the chaotic mess Bergamont had left behind. Thankfully, he remained completely unaware of the two men present in the room with him.

Gervyl struggled to maintain a firm psionic grip on his partner, feeling him grow restless with each tiny movement of his hands that he had to adjust the illusion to. He felt even the tiniest pulse of blood rushing through his adrenaline-filled veins. He knew the giant was ready to kill but the psyker wanted to remain hidden for a bit more. Berg seemed to have different ideas, however, and was slowly creeping towards the guy, putting more and more strain on Gerv, whose head was not splitting in half.

The Forester was ready to strike, to break the scrawny man’s neck right at that moment. And he would have, had Gerv not stopped him yet again. Not yet, he thought, feeling a pang of pain radiate through his cranium, dulled only by the adrenaline.

The intruder swung his weapon around as if feeling the disturbance, the beam of his torch landing square on Bergamont’s chest. He even locked eyes with the brute for what felt like minutes, but was actually just a split second, and… nothing happened. He could not see anybody, as expected. A few drops of blood poured from Gervyl's nose, and a sharp pain shot through his head, but despite the difficulties, the duo was still in the clear.

“Fazom, report!” the bossy one yelled from the other room.

“Clear, clear,” he called back, having a look at the open bed-chest. “His usual junk and some documents,” he crouched right beside Berg, sticking his hand into the sarcophagus, gleefully stuffing his pockets with the so-called junk.

“Looting again instead of working,” another sturdier man walked in. It was the bumpkin, with a long, but unkempt mane full of hair. He aimed his flashlight at his colleague’s face with playful malice.

“Off with the light. Off, I say!” he hissed.

“It’ll be off with our ‘eads if you don’t get a move-on. Boss doesn’t like waiting and lemme tell ya! You’ll be her food before you know it if you keep this shit up.”

“What, you really believe those stories? Are you a scared little kid?” he mocked, pointing his flashlight at Guur, along with the shotgun.

“Hey! Watch where you aim that junk!” he flinched, raising his own weapon, a revolver with a holographic sight. “And those ain’t no stories, fool!”

A few insults followed, but they both lowered their weapons quickly and resumed their search when their supervisor scolded them after hearing their childish banter. They began to bustle around the room, giving the impression of being clueless of what they were actually looking for. A familiar sight ... After a few minutes, it even looked as if they were ready to leave – to foolishly turn their backs towards him and Berg – but the lion-mane just had to point his light at Gervyl’s feet at the last moment.

“Hey!” He called out to his friend, shuffling towards Gerv.

“What do you want?”

“Did you check this ‘ere blood?” he touched the small, blackish-crimson puddle at the psyker’s feet.

“What are you blabbering about?”

Gervyl could feel his heart sink the exact moment a drop of blood dripped from the tip of his nose right onto Guur’s hand. Less than a thimble, but just enough to make the cup of misery run over.

“Bloody ‘ell!” The lion-mane jumped up like a spring, reaching for his weapon in utter panic, having caught wind of Gervyl's trickery.

But his outburst spelled doom for his scrawny companion. With his cover busted, Gerv immediately cancelled his abilities. The moment Bergamont saw him appear, there was no need for words. Like an animal, he pounced on the skittish weakling. The victim barely had time to raise the rifle only to miss his shot, which only found the ceiling. The cleaner grabbed the barrel of his gun and, like a lollipop from a child’s grasp, tore it from his thin hands and hit him across the face with its butt.

Struck and horrified, he fell flat on his back, but before he even had a chance to gather his thoughts, the merciless colossus crushed his throat with one mighty stomp and broke his neck, killing him on the spot, trampling him like a worthless insect.

Meanwhile, Gervyl, no longer busy with maintaining his illusions, was free to grab at the lion-mane’s leg with invisible force, planning to trip him. He jerked him upwards, but lost control as a wave of pain engulfed his body. What was meant to be a simple shove, turned into a brutal slam. Like a ragdoll, the man’s body crashed into the ceiling, his tibia snapping like a twig, thighbone nearly ripping out through the skin. He left a wet, red stain on the dark ceiling and fell to the ground in agony with a splat.

However, his suffering was quickly relieved by Bergamont, who, with one shot from his captured weapon, spilled his brain on the floor, mixing the disgusting brown and green hues of decay with the vibrant scarlet red of his tissues and the ivory white of his bone.

“Was that so fucking har –“ Berg threateningly approached Gervyl, who was clutching his head in pain, but before he could finish, a sound of mechanical clicking resounded from behind the wall.

“Get down!” The word, as redundant as it was, considering what happened next, boomed from Gervyl’s mouth. Without hesitation, he then slammed the giant down into the floor, just in the nick of time to save him from a swarm of bullets that pierced the pitiful tin wall that separated the bedroom from the living room.

Bergamont greedily took in air, feeling the massive pressure lift off his body, and shook his head in confusion, struggling to hold back the tide of slurs that was now welled in his mind. He did not have the luxury to vent his emotions, however, as the hail of bullets had almost completely destroyed their pathetic cover by now. Regaining his cool, he reloaded the shotgun and grabbed the revolver off the dead bumpkin’s body, sliding it across the floor toward Gervyl, showing him five fingers, praying that he would understand his message.

And as it happened, be it through luck or otherwise, he did. The psyker kept a level head, and after five seconds he raised a concentrated barrier, which seemed to bend reality itself, in front of himself, and fired the gun through the open door several times, drawing the assailant’s attention. That was the exact diversion that Bergamont needed. In a blink of an eye he rose from all fours and catapulted himself through the massacred wall, piercing through it like a cannonball and plunging into a pile of rubbish, firing the last two shots he had midair. The pellets, however, missed their mark by a hair’s breadth, catching only the opponent's arm. He howled in pain, staggering backwards, loosening his grim on his massive belt-fed machine gun.

“Now!” Bergamont shouted, and as he did, a shockwave washed over the living room, lifting a layer of dust and easily sending most of the trash flying at the wall opposite of the bedroom, however, leaving the enemy completely unscathed.

“He’s a psyker!” Gervyl warned, not letting up and sending wave after wave at the man. But the guy wouldn’t falter – his defenses impeccable. But as Gerv kept assaulting, he could feel the energies flow slowly and chaotically around his target. He knew his weakness. “Light him up!” he shouted.

Happy to oblige, Bergamont peppered the man with balls of flame, covering him in a cocoon of flames as they spread over his shield. Soon enough the flames grew unbearable, searing the man’s flesh, as he struggled to divert the raging energies. In his desperation and with no other choice, he popped the bubble he surrounded himself with, sending fiery droplets in all directions. He let his fear show, as he realized that he was no match for the duo, opening fire with his wounded arm, sending inaccurate volleys of bullets down the corridor, as he fell back.

“Fucking hell!” growled Bergamont, as one of the flying flames caught his face, charring his cheek. Nigh instantly, he clawed at it with one decisive swipe, ripping off the scalded skin, as it was consumed in the flames.

In the chaos, Gervyl sent one last precise pulse and disarmed his target, only to fall down to his knees, drained and wheezing.

“Go! Go after him! I want him alive!” he command, vigorously waving his hand, unable to stand.

Berg did not hear a single word of what he said, however. But he did dash forwards, feeling an unstoppable urge to chase the man. A familiar feeling that he abhorred. But this time he did not fight it. Like a provoked beast, he jumped out into the stairway.

Having two escape routes to choose from, the fugitive unexpectedly chose the one leading up, climbing with leaps and bounds, ascending the floors with great speed. Bergamont, however, did not lag behind for long, his nigh-perfectly built body lending him the necessary strength. The distance between them melted like ice in the desert. Berg could almost feel the runaway's desperation in his mouth, which only excited him more.

His enthusiasm, however, was quickly quelled by the unexpected folly of the enemy psyker, who, numbed by fear and adrenaline, squeezed out the last of his mental strength and, in a single second, collapsed almost an entire floor worth of stairs behind him with an abnormally strong pulse that sent the giant flying back through the nearest door.

Like a battering ram, his hulking mass flew through the shabby portal and landed in someone's apartment. The tennants shrieked in pure terror, but Bergamont was deaf to the chaos, his mind set on a singular goal. He quickly sprung back to his feet once more and shot out of the apartment like a bullet, momentarily coming to a halt just at the edge of the ruined staircase. But not even this obstacle could stop his pursuit, now that the scent of his victim's blood had already ingrained itself into his mind. Standing on the edge, he leapt up and grabbed the torn concrete of the floor above him, pulling himself up without any problem.

In mere seconds he found himself on the rooftop, straining his eyes, looking for his target in the evening neon glow that seeped out from the alleys below onto the rusty building tops. It was only a matter of moments before his eyes fell on a single silhouette that kept on coming in and out of view, several buildings away. The ground almost shook as Bergamont rushed towards it, leaping across chasms, tens of meters above the crowded avenues. But as he gained distance, he started losing something much more important - vision. The closer he got, the more his vision got obstructed by the buildings which ascended like a stairway. There was no room for finesse, he had to act now.

Nearby, steel reinforcements protruded from an unfinished building, forever waiting in vain to become the support of another floor. The titan grabbed the longest rod that seemed to be in the worst condition and, applying all his weight and strength combined, bent it backwards. Steel creaked as Bergamont groaned. However, it was not the metal that gave way first, but the concrete at its base, separating itself from the rest of the structure. What was left in the hands of the brute was like a primitive hammer, a rusty shaft with a massive cracked concrete head.

Adjusting his grip on its hilt, the Forester steadied himself and began to rotate around his axis with the tool tightly in his hands. The hammer lifted off the ground and whizzed through the thick air. Bergamont, strained to the limit, threw the makeshift weapon at the fugitive. Like a missile, it flew in a shallow arc – the result of the giant's amateur technique, only made up for with his sheer strength. The projectile miraculously did not crash into any of the numerous obstacles between Berg and his target, and finally disappeared off in the distance.

And when the hammer left his hands, so did the feral rage that pushed Berg all this way. He realized now that he’d lost himself in the hunt, and instead of a calculating hunter he was taught to be, he became a wild predator, following the instincts that were not his own. And now there was nothing... Along with the weapon, all pressure, all emotion and energy left his body.

Now, there truly was nothing for him to do, but to check the site of the impact and whether he hit or not.

Taking a deep breath, the giant wiped his forehead, smearing it with a dark mixture of sweat, dirt and rust left on his gloves. Only now was he able to hear the ringing in his own ears, which pulsed in his head to the rhythm of his raging heart, drowning out the evening noise which came from the bowels of the city far below him.

He walked.

Lost in a moment of clarity, he entered a different world, his gaze wandering towards the almost completely black sky. He saw the few stars fighting against the city's radiance which crept into the heavens like fire, smothering the most pitiful of lights. He felt a quaint satisfaction in his heart. The sight of dying stars wasn’t sad to him. Instead he admired the few that persevered. He saw strength and steadfastness in them. Sometimes he saw himself in them ... But more often he saw someone else.

Before he knew it, he had already reached the hammer. The shattered concrete now littering the cracked roof, and the bent bar laying nearby on the edge of the building, the brief life Bergamont had breathed into it, gone.

The cold floor embraced the man as he slowly slumped onto it. He sat down among the rubble, empty flask in hand and a hint of disappointment tainting his face. That was enough work for today.