Crimson’s eyes widen as he ducks another swipe threatening to behead him. Rolling from the attacker he reaches his feet and executes an overhead strike, just for his opponent to stop his blade with her bare hand.

“That is just cheap.” Crimson says as Deidra front kicks him to the ground.

Deidra puts her hand out, helping Crimson back to his feet and giving his blade back.

“I will admit it comes in handy,” Deidra says with a smile, running her fingers over the small cut on her hand. “Still doesn’t feel pleasant but it’s better than losing a hand.”

Crimson wipes the dirt of his clothes and sheathes his blade. Taking note of Deidra’s new look.

Her already large stature has increased another couple inches from the mutation. While her size is noticeable, the most eye catching part is her skin. Just under the first layer skin is what looks like a dense plate of bone, its make up being almost identical to the armor that once covered the berve. The bone making her skin tone to an almost milky peach color.

“Too bad it doesn’t reach everywhere,” He says. “Still makes it impossible to win a fight against you.”

“I wouldn’t say impossible, just far more difficult,” Deidra argues. “If you had your bow you’d have a far better chance, but using a bow during swordsmanship training isn’t beneficial is it?”

Crimson nods in agreement. Hearing fighting, he looks towards Echo and Mon who are currently squaring off against Fey, and losing…badly.

In Fey’s hands is one of Mon’s bladed gauntlets and in the other is Echo’s hammer. The Siren is twirling the weapon with relative ease, her nonchalant attitude doing little to help the team’s confidence.

“How exactly are we supposed to beat her?” Echo says, her face showing defeat. “We haven’t even hit her yet.”

“We weren’t ever going to beat her,” Mon says, gasping for breath as she does. “We just have to survive her.”

Crimson stares at the situation until a bad idea formulates in his head. He leans over to Deidra with a sinister smile on his face.

“Think they need back up?” Crimson asks in a hushed tone.

Deidra smiles lightly as she twirls the sword in her hand.

Fey continues stalking towards her prey as her black scarf covers the smile over her face. Her unarmored state making her no less intimidating.

“At some point you have to attack, or I might get bored and decide to go on the offensive,” Fey says with a bored tone. “Honestly, I was expecting a bit more of a challenge.”

Fey’s smug attitude disappears as she notices Echo’s eyes dart to attention to something behind her. Fey immediately ducks, causing Deidra’s swipe to go over her head. The Siren spins Echo’s hammer in retaliation and sends it into the warrior’s chest, the momentum throwing her next to Mon and Echo. Fey then shifts slightly to the left and shoots her hand out, catching a surprised Crimson by the throat.

“Deidra’s strike was spot on, but you were a bit too slow to follow up,” Fey says, her grip on his throat tightening. “Good progress though, now let’s see how the whole team stacks up.”

Fey then loosens her grip on Crimson’s throat and then promptly throws him towards the rest of the team, his body skipping once before being stopped by Deidra.

“That only hurt…a lot,” Crimson says as he rubs his throat. “Honestly, how much can you lift? Even Deidra can’t toss me like that.”

Instead of answer, Fey pulls her scarf down, allowing them to see the near psychotic grin she is sporting. Crimson sighs, knowing this fight was undoubtedly going to leave some scars.

“Want to try one of the attacks?” Crimson says, unstrapping the bow from his back and pulling out a peculiar arrow.

Fey stares at the team, waiting for them to attack. Out of the blue Crimson aims his bow at her. Fey shakes her head at the pitiful attempt and waits for him to shoot.

“Go!” Crimson screams as he looses the arrow.

Fey’s hair stands on end at his words, but she ignores it and waits for the arrow, intent on showing the futility of the attack. That is until the arrow bursts into a thick cloud of smoke before reaching her.

Fey pulls her axe off of her back and waits, the dense cloud keeping her from moving forward. Eventually her eyes pick up on a figure moving towards through the smoke. Flying through the smoke screen; Mon, now wearing the goggles Echo made, aims her claws toward Fey’s throat.

Fey smiles at the change up and levels the flat part of her axe at Mon’s head, ready to hit her back through the smoke. Just before Mon’s head is turned into a baseball a sudden shift underneath Fey’s feet destabilizes her stance, causes her to lower her axe and let Mon grab onto her intended target.

“You sneaky little gremlins!” Fey yells as she watches Mon roll past with her axe.

The smoke clears enough for Fey to see Deidra and Echo rushing her, her disarmed state giving them confidence.

Instead of preparing for an attack Fey drops her stance and shrugs.

“Smart.” She says as she feels the bones on her knuckles beginning to contort.

Taking the chance to strike, Echo swings her hammer at Fey’s midsection. Instead of attempting to dodge or counter the strike, Fey pulls back her fist and sends a punch into the face of the maul. It shattered on impact. Echo looks down at her once beautiful hammer, now reduced to an oversized stick.

Not giving her time to grieve, Fey grabs Echo by the arm and throws her at Deidra before the warrior could close the distance. She deftly ducks the flying girl but quickly regrets the decision as Fey’s knee cracks into her chin.

Not bothering to attack Deidra again, Fey turns and catches Mon in her arms. Mon immediately digs her claws into Fey’s back. While the claws draw blood it doesn’t dig nearly as deep as Mon expected, causing the girl to panic and squirm in Fey’s grasp. Like an overjoyed hug, Fey begins to constrict Mon until she starts gasping for air.

For the second time during the fight, Fey’s hair stands on end. She drops Mon like a potato and dodges to the side. A very surprised Crimson sails past her, his sword pointed at the still recovering Mon’s throat. Even with Crimson’s dulled practice blade, a direct strike would prove deadly.

That is until Fey’s arm catches Crimson around the waist and slings him into the ground. The force empties Crimson’s lungs of air as he sees black splotches in his vision. Before he can recover Fey jumps on top of him. In an instant Crimson’s arms are pinned by one of Fey’s hands and one of her knees.

He looks up at her expecting to see her smirking but all that greets him is a brutal punch to his eye. He looks up to her again and peers into her eyes. Her eyes are bloodshot and the irises glowing an eerie azure, similar to her flames. Despite the intense situation Crimson still smirks, assuming his hypnotic eyes would stop her.

Crimson manages to lock the gaze just before she primes her second punch. Fey stops for a split second before her second punch hammers down into Crimson, this time his vision clouding with blood on impact. Through the red sheen and his one good eye he can see Fey’s eyes return to normal as he loses consciousness.

“Ah hell,” Fey says as she stares down at the bloodied Crimson, his left eye heavily damaged from her strikes. “That is going to be an annoying fix.”

The freshly recovered Mon jumps up and runs over to Crimson, dropping her claws as she does. She pushes Fey off of him and runs her hands across his neck, luckily feeling a strong pulse. A sigh of relief escapes her, then rage fills her body as she turns to Fey.

“What was that!” She screams. “Did you forget this was just a skirmish!”

Fey looks at Mon and back to Crimson. She sighs as she wipes Crimson’s blood off her fist.

“Skirmish or not you could have died,” She says with no regret in her voice. “A pierced throat is far more deadly than a concussion and damaged eye.”

“So? He made an error, that doesn’t mean you need to beat him into the ground,” Mon says with an uncharacteristic seriousness. “You could have stopped after you saved me.”

“It’s not that simple…” Fey attempts to explain.

Before it can get any more heated Echo and Deidra run up to Crimson.

“Was that a mutation?” Echo asks as she attempts to pull Mon back. “It was like a shockwave when you hit him.”

“He seems fine by the way,” Deidra says as he picks up the unconscious archer. “Aside from the blood loss and the possibly irreparable damage to his eye…I take that back; he doesn’t seem fine.”

Fey walks to Deidra, grabbing Crimson’s unconscious form from her.

“I’ll take him to the docs, they should be able to patch him up within the day,” Fey says, walking away from the steaming Mon and confused Deidra.

Once Fey got far enough away Mon falls onto her butt in anger.

“Why did she do that? Ruined all the fun, not to mention hurting Crimson,” Mon says with a huff. “I know she wants us to learn but come on!”

“I think she did it to protect you,” Echo says as she collects the shattered pieces of her practice weapon. “Crimson nearly slit your throat, even if it wasn’t meant I bet it put her a bit on edge.”

Deidra sits down next to Mon, taking a deep breath as she does.

“I don’t see why you are angry, accidents happen,” She says. “Training isn’t always safe. Plus, Crimson’s tough. He couldn’t die from two punches.”

“Two punches from Fey,” Echo adds as she joins them.

“Ok, he could have died but he didn’t,” Deidra admits. “The best scars aren’t the ones earned from combat, but the ones earned while training to avoid death.”

Mon nods silently, her tail curling up around her. Echo, seeing her distress stands and tries to give Mon a hand up but is rejected by the rogue.

“How about we get some lunch?” Echo says, prompting the cat to spring up at the mention of food. “Then we can check on Crimson after.”

Mon nods her head excitedly as she attempts to drag Echo towards the direction of HQ. As she is being dragged away Echo looks back at Deidra who is picking up any of the equipment they forgot.

“You coming?” Echo asks as struggles against the hungry Mon.

Deidra shakes her head, prompting Echo to give in to Mon’s tugging. Deidra watches them go for a bit and then heads towards the “docs” Fey spoke of.

Crimson opens his eyes to see a room full of janitors bustling around. Each of them cleaning and returning what looks like medical tools. Straining to sit up despite the pain in his head he examines the room closer. Its architecture is similar to the HQ lobby, the mix of gray color and red chandeliers giving it a sinister yet warm feeling. Even the bed he’s in matched the décor.

“Oh good, you’re conscious.”

Crimson swivels his head to see Fey sitting in a chair close to his bed side.

“They told me you’d wake up soon enough so I thought I’d stick around,” She says, her black scarf making her voice slightly muffled. “Still took you a while, you missed lunch.”

Crimson sits up from the bed, a headache already building at the sudden movement. He goes to rub the sleep out of his eyes but he notices a small eyepatch like plate covering his left eye.

“Did you wait around to punch me again?” Crimson asks with a slight smile. “Because I’d prefer you to have done that after I passed out.”

Fey chuckles slightly as she stands and walks over to Crimson. Reaching her hand towards the end of the table Crimson hadn’t noticed, she picks up a mirror and puts it in his face.

“I essentially popped your eye,” Fey says. “They managed to get it working but not as well as it was. Feel free to move the plate from your eye, just be ready for a change.”

Taking hold of the mirror Crimson runs his hand over his face, noticing little changes other than the plate over his eye.

“Well at least most of me is alright,” Crimson says. “I don’t remember my hair being that dark though…probably the mutation.”

Steeling himself, Crimson lifts the plate off of his left eye and examines the damage. The color of his iris is now amber, identical to a lunypna’s iris.

“Well I guess it isn’t that bad,” Crimson says. “The amber doesn’t look too off, even if my other eye is hazel. Hopefully the hypnotism still works.”

Crimson looks up to see Fey’s eyes arc in confusion.

“What?” He asks.

“Your right eye is green,” She says slowly. “Did I give you brain damage too?”

Crimson looks back to the mirror hurriedly and checks on his right eye, just for it to be hazel like he expected.

“Are you color blind?” He asks. “That is clearly hazel.”

Fey reaches behind her, grabbing an unlucky janitor that was walking past. She pointed at Crimson.

“Green or Hazel.” She says.

Crimson stares at the dark figure, wondering if it will speak. Instead its shadowed head glows a dark red before walking away.

“What the hell…” Fey says as she watches it walk away.

“Maybe it’s the light or something, I honestly don’t care,” Crimson says as he shakes his head. “I do care what happened after you… well after you snapped out of it.”

“You don’t want to know what caused me to clock you?” Fey asks, surprised at Crimson’s lack of curiosity. “That’d be my first question.”

“Admittedly I wanted to ask,” Crimson concedes. “but I figured you’d either tell me when and if you wanted…or you wouldn’t at all.”

Fey chuckles through her mask, her signature flames puffing out of her black scarf.

“Smarter than you look.” She says.

“Not smart enough to think you’d just punch me when we took your weapon,” Crimson says with a chuckle. “Seems like we still spooked you though, your reaction was evidence enough.”

“I wouldn’t get too prideful,” Fey says as she walks back to her chair. “You didn’t make me fear for my life…”

“…You feared for Mon’s” Crimson says as it dawns on him. “Probably should have guess that.”

Fey nods in confirmation, a sigh allowing more flames to escape her scarf.

“You need to be more mindful of your strikes, in actual combat an opponent would have let you skewer her,” Fey lectures. “Still, I probably shouldn’t have reacted like I did. Thought I had it handled.”

“I’ll make sure to remember that,” Crimson says with a nod. “And I’ll be sure to pass on the info as well.”

Fey nods at his acceptance and leans back in her chair.

“Do you know the myths surrounding the Igbo?” She says suddenly.

Crimson thinks for a moment, then shakes his head.

“What about you?” Fey says as she turns to look towards the entrance to the room.

A very surprised Deidra walks into the room, bowing her head slightly.

“My apologies, I was told this is where you took him and I didn’t want to inte-“

“I asked you a question, I didn’t ask for an apology,” Fey interrupts. “So answer it.”

Deidra raises her head at the order.

“I was told it as a child ma’am,” Deidra says as she stands to attention, her hands behind her back. “The details are foggy but I can try my best to recall them.

“Stop with the ma’am stuff,” Fey says with a smirk, though it’s unnoticeable due to the scarf. “I’m really not old enough to be called that.”

Deidra relaxes slightly at her words, though her hands remain in a uniform position.

“Well don’t leave us in suspense, tell us the story,” Fey tells her. “Myths always tend to be interesting after all.”

Deidra nods at the request. After a few moments of recalling the memory she starts.

“The Igbo is said to be a very rare creature; few people have had the misfortune of coming across them. There is only one confirmed sighting, but if there are more is unknown. Mostly due to this creature almost never leaving survivors,” Deidra says, attempting to remember the rest. “The only credible evidence of its existence was when Asthana Craven, the founder of Stena, recorded a sighting while traveling with a small group of Butchers and Sirens. ‘The beast’s roars drew us up and over the hill, towards the nearby city. Our hopes were that its walls held it long enough for us to assist. Those hopes were dashed at the sight before us. The city was awash in flames, the blue color casting the entire city in an azure light. Within the blaze a massive creature appeared, its stature putting anything I’ve ever seen to shame. I thought with all my experience that nothing could cause me to be afraid, but this thing shook me to my core. Despite the horror we saw, many of my comrades wanted to help the city. My cowardice forced us to leave those people to their fate, I knew that beast could be the end of us all and’…and….”

“’and I was living for two. I was willing to risk my own life, but not his.’” Fey finishes for the struggling Deidra.

All of them sit for a moment, until Crimson’s curiosity gets the better of him.

“So, why did you want to know about it?” Crimson questions. “I doubt you just wanted the story.”

“I wanted you to know that not every monster can be killed. If the founder of Stena ran from a beast, then you have to know when to do so as well,” Fey says with a solemn voice. “You try to be a hero then you’ll be killed with whoever you’re trying to save. If you can’t win then run and live to fight another day.”

“So you want us to be cowards?” Crimson accuses.

“I want you to be survivors,” Fey retorts. “You two are the least experienced, so you need to know this.”

Instead of arguing Crimson and Deidra remain silent, intent on listening to Fey’s advice. Fey looks between the two of them and then shifts uncomfortably in her chair.

“Stena was made to give some type of order to the world. We can control and cull the monsters to an extent, but in the end…we are just part of the food chain,” She says with brutal honesty. “And you don’t rattle the chain.”

Deidra nods slowly at the answer, her mind accepting the brutality of the world. Crimson on the other hand throws his hands up in protest.

“So what happens if someone needs help?” Crimson asks. “You didn’t leave me, so why should I leave someone else!”

“I’m not saying you shouldn’t try to help those who need it!” Fey snaps. “Just don’t go getting yourself killed for no good reason.”

Crimson goes silent at the reasonable request. Fey stands up and walks past Deidra, turning and leaning against the doorway before she leaves.

“As much as it doesn’t look like it, I do care whether or not you all die. I’ve seen enough people end up dead looking for glory and I’d prefer you don’t become a part of that list,” Fey admits. “But I won’t stop you if that’s what you choose to do.”

Fey then peers into Crimson’s eyes, his hypnotic vision barely affecting her.

“You can die a hero and I’ll accept your decision,” She says as her eyes take on the azure glow once again, the change sending chills down Crimson’s spine. “But if you drag Mon down with you, you better hope you end up dead. Because if you don’t…I’ll make you wish you died in that village.”

Fey looks away from Crimson, allowing him to take a sharp breath, and looks towards Deidra.

“You’ve got two more weeks to prepare. You’ll be traveling with Grunt to the location of the job,” Fey informs. “At least until I finish my own mission.”

“Who’s Grunt?” Deidra asks curiously.

“Crimson can tell you.” Fey says as she walks out of the room, her threat still lingering in Crimson’s mind.

After a moment of respite Crimson looks towards Deidra.

“Grunt was at the gate when I first arrived,” He explains. “He was wearing some heavy armor so maybe you could learn something from him. He also seemed to know Fey, definitely respected her a lot.”

Deidra nods at his answer and sits down in the seat Fey was using. She looks over to Crimson as relief washes over her.

“She did not seem very happy,” She reports. “Though her advice…and her warnings were very helpful.”

“The threat on my life wasn’t very helpful,” Crimson answers. “But I understand her fear. I’m not one to let others suffer. I honestly thought you’d have argued with that as well.”

“I understand that if I can’t win then I shouldn’t fight if I don’t have to,” Deidra confirms. “But if I can help someone I will. I just have to be able survive protecting them. After all, if I die protecting some else, who is going to die to save you three?”

Crimson smiles at the joke but the smile soon falters.

“I’d prefer if you didn’t die to begin with.” He says.

Deidra smiles at his response. Sighing, she stands from her seat and puts her hand out for Crimson to grab onto.

“Come on. I think you’re healthy enough to head back to the room,” She says, prompting Crimson to grab onto her hand and pull himself up. “The mix of grey and amber does suit you at least. We could probably get Echo to tailor your outfit to accent them.”

“Thanks.” Crimson says in a depressed tone

Deidra turns to look at him walk away, confused as to why he seemed so upset at the compliment.