The swirling mass of a dark cloud arising from one of the arched doorways in the underground catacombs, a bottle of partially consumed liquor was thrown towards it in frustration. Its glass, shattering on the coarse stones behind Chiri, after having narrowly missed her head. The Guardian pressed her lips together gravely as she materialized to perceive this unfriendly reception from the leader of the Moon Gate faction. Glaring at him from the large frame of the dreary opening, Chiri could guess at the reason behind Ryker’s hostility towards her and maybe even his drinking as she viewed him for the first time since her mission. The destructiveness of her powers, whilst sizable, was now known to be inconclusive. Although accomplished in the act of reducing her childhood home to a pile of dust. Chiri had failed in the ultimate goal of her deployment, which was to bring about an end to the shrewd and formidable Xavier Crouse. The feat attempted and nearly achieved, Chiri had found hersel

The floor like a chessboard of immaculate black and white tiles laid out in front of him, Allen found that the halls of the Crouse’s Vemery estate presented themselves with a forthrightness he had not been expecting. No secretive dark passageways or domineering ancestors looking down from the walls, there was not much apart from his own shadow to cast a dark outline upon the unambiguous tiles. The corridors, light and airy, it seemed that the only mystery they held was how they had managed to evade the oppressive heat of the day outside. However, the events of the tragedy that had taken place at the Crouse’s main country estate over a week ago, lacked this same clarity. Pondering the incident repeatedly in his mind during his journey there already, Allen Pierce had been sent to the opulent property in the city to investigate what exactly had transpired that day. Not engaging in many active missions of late, Allen had been deployed to the capital in order to gather a statement from Xa

The ruby gleaming from amongst the books and pages on the desk, it winked knowingly up at Cazer. A crack marring the otherwise perfect surface of the memento that was left to him by his wife, his brow scrunched together as he considered its meaning. However, increasingly uncertain whether there even was a message to be deciphered from the accessory’s presence there, it had come to instill in him a constant sense of inadequacy. Desiring to have more of Chiri than just this trinket alone, Cazer realized that it would require more than just his power alone to recover her from the place she had gone. Not seeing his departed wife again since their dream-like encounter, Cazer had found the earring presented sparse answers to his many questions. Her indefinite existence in this plane and the manifestation of her powers upon their brief reunion, confirming nothing other than the supposition that Chiri had now somehow become a part of the Moon Gate as its gatekeeper. Cazer pinched at the br

“Those damn toothy bastards can burn in Hell for all of eternity!” Cazer roared, the doors slamming shut behind him in order to punctuate the vehemence of this outburst. They were then battered again as he landed a ferocious kick onto the barrier of the office. The eruption of his fury causing the solid doors to shake, Cazer barely regarded the man who sat observing the dramatic display from his position on the couch.Allen’s eyes following him warily as he stormed into the room, Cazer found the silent pressure of his judgemental stare of little consequence as he marched over to his desk. Breathing agitated and his hair disorderly, he jerked open a drawer on the bureau. Withdrawing a half-full decanter and wiping the rim of a glass on the desk that had previously been used for water, Cazer poured himself a sizable portion of the spirit. Not offering any to the Hunter, he waited for Cazer to down the drink before asking, “No luck, I take it?” In too foul a temper to accept the smugness

The rank smell of decay and mildew immediately enveloping her, Chiri knew that she had rejoined the dark catacombs where the cohorts of the Moon Gate’s malicious hoard gathered. Hissing as her form solidified again in the tunnel, Chiri again grasped at her side. Unsteady, the weight of her body found some stability as her back slumped onto the damp wall beside her. Expecting to be met with some snide remark in regard to her injury instantly upon her arrival, Chiri was to discover instead that her entrance had hardly been noticed amidst the affairs that had preceded her. Voices heard in the large junction between the tunnels, Chiri turned her head lazily in their direction. Leaning wearily against the dark tunnel, her eyes pinched together mildly as she squinted at the figures in the opening. Most of them the usual suspects that collected around Ryker Crouse, there was one amongst them that was only vaguely familiar to her. The woman’s hair matted and clothes dirty and torn from the t