Cloak and Dagger II.

[Mr. Moon]

Gabriel #16 

Gabriel cursed, just for himself of course, because no matter the circumstances he was still gentleman. The situation he got himself into just turned around 180°. He didn´t have to be a genius to realized that the Rose who was pointing her gun on his face was the same girl who was supposedly kidnapped by the bandits, meaning that this whole thing was staged to rule out her uncle, who however unlike Moon didn´t cared. If not for the seven armed people who used the time he gave them to encircle him in a small semicircle he would probably start to laugh.

“So? Where are the money?”

Rose raised her voice impatiently.

“Yeah, the thing is...”
Gabriel gently smiled.

“There are none. You see, I am just passerby and I heard that some local girl was kidnapped, so I decided to help out a little, however this….”
Professor shrugged his shoulder. Causing stunned silence.

“What do you mean there are none?”
Yelled Rose on a verge of hysteria while one of her guys asked.

“S**t, we screwed up? What now?”
“No...no...that´s not how it´s supposed to be, what if he´ll talk? What than?

“We have to silence him!”
Rose yelled again.

“What? This was only supposed to be act! No one was supposed to be hurt let alone die!”

Gabriel´s eyes widened as the conversation was turning, for him, in very unpleasant direction.

“What? Wait a second, you definitely don´t have to do that. See, since there is no real hostage in danger, I´ll just turn around and walk away as if I was never here.”
As he said, he tried to turn around and walk, however right at the time the guy standing closest to him grabbed his shoulder and pulled.
“Like hell you will!”
He yelled while thrusting with a hunting knife against professor Moon. That guy was complete amateur without any real fighting experiences. Way slower than Myra, but yet being surprised the only thing Gabriel managed to do at the moment was clenching his muscles before the blade hit him and he fell on the ground.
“What the...are you mad?”
“You killed him? My god, you killed him?”

“That wasn´t supposed to happen, I am fisherman no murderer, I am leaving!”
“No one will leave!”

Once again Rose´s voice silenced everyone else as she was wildly moving her gun from left to right to keep everyone in check.

“No one will leave! You agreed to help me and you will stay here to the end, do you understand?”
Silent as if he was really dead, Gabriel was lying on the ground cursing.

“Turning your muscles into steel, blades will break when they´ll hit your skin my ***...**** this hurts...”

It was a close call. Back than, when Gabriel noticed the blade his instincts kicked in and he tried one of the techniques he managed to salvage with the help of Myra´s medical knowledge. However as it turned out his Indestructible was still imperfect or the old masters exaggerated it´s effectiveness. Either way, he got stabbed. Not much, but still it was painful and he definitely didn´t want to experience it again. And so for the time being Gabriel decided to play possum. At least until his reinforcement´ll arrive. After all when it worked for Beast why it shouldn´t work for him?

[Cat]

Myra # 16 

The way up was easier then safe way down. It wasn’t easy, but it was possible without the help of the bushes. Small steps in combination with fingers hardly grabbing grass and everything close enough to grab she finally found herself on the other side of the fosse.

She victoriously smiled, but then she saw contours of the wall.

“Damn it”

She silently cursed and tried to climb up. It was hard, her hands were already tired by climbing up the slope. Slowly and carefully, she looked for suitable protrusions. When her hands finally touched the top of the wall, she was tired. Myra was pretty sure she wasn’t strong enough to climb the last part of her way and to pull herself up.

“I have to….Gabriel .... My money….I couldn’t lose against a st….d wall”

She muttered and imagined what could she lost. She found residue of her strength and pulled herself up only to saw small empty camp hidden behind the half-collapsed wall, which she unfortunately and so painfully climbed up.

The worst thing was the fact that it seemed the camp was empty, only with a small fire in the middle. She frowned and looked more carefully around. She saw few silhouettes in one of the places where was wall broken. Then she heard their angered voices.

“Presto”

She quickly moved on the top of the wall. She saw Gabriel, a few men and one yelling girl. All of them were engrossed in their conflict that nobody looked at top of the wall behind them. She took out her revolver when she saw how one of the men stabbed Gabriel.

She frowned. It was her source of money and he didn’t mention her in his last will! He was her friend! She pointed at the man who hold guns and shot and then again. The first ones were two men with guns. She angrily laughed.

[Mr. Moon]

Gabriel #17 

Playing possum, Gabriel was listening to the argue above him, until it was interrupted by thunder. Alright, maybe it wasn´t thunder, he realized second later, when some guy fell to the ground just few centimeters away from him. And than another, and another...the rest of the so called bandits started to panicking and tried to run away, but Myra´s revolver had six bullets.

“I don´t think so...”

Muttered Gabriel for himself, he noticed Rose sprinting away into the darkness. Fortunately for him and unfortunately for her, she was running way too close to his leg, so all he had to do was straighten it and she fell down too.

“Uhhh, that wasn´t pleasant, you are lifesaver.”
Smiled professor Moon as he got back on his feet, trying his best not to look around the dead and wounded around him.

“Can you imagine it? They stabbed me!”

He unbuttoned his shirt to show her shallow wound on his abdomen.

“Do you think it needs a treatment or something?”

He wanted to say something more but was interrupted by Rose, who finally managed to get up on her feet.

“You...you are alive.”
She muttered in disbelief.

“And they...they are dead...you...you killed them!”
Gabriel face darkened as he turned around and slapped her across the face.

“No, your arrogance and irresponsibility did that. You organized this, you promised them money, you kept them here on a gunpoint, so don´t try to shift your blame on someone else.”

She felt on her knees crying.

“A bit too late for that don´t you think?”
Muttered Moon for himself, before he turned back to Myra, this time more serious than when he was fooling around about his wound.

“Five out of six, you have pretty good aim miss Raven. Too bad they weren´t real kidnappers but just a bunch of local guys who wanted to make some extra money.”
He commented on the fact that only one of the so called kidnappers managed to escape to the woods.

“We should probably go, or do you insist on tour in this beautiful ruin?”

[Cat]

Myra # 17 

It was easy. Those guys obviously weren’t trained, so before they got what was happening Myra shot twice. Then the men and girl started panicking and tried to run, but as they weren’t trained and never cooperated together … Everyone simply got in way of others. The girl fell down and one of the men decided to be gentleman and stumbled over her. So Myra managed to shot once again before someone found the correct way to the forest.

“Too late”

She smirked and shot the running man. The next running man was luckier than others and managed to hid behind the trunk of the tree before Myra aimed at him. She frowned, because she realized the man who stabbed Gabriel was still alive. One last shot and then happened something Myra didn’t expected. Gabriel moved with his leg.

The young doctor frowned as she realized she was maybe a little bit hysterical and without reason.

“Yes, that’s clearly me … always willing to help, lifesaver”

Myra replied sarcastically to Gabriel, who decided to show her his wound, which was a little deeper scratch. She rolled eyes.

“Of course it needs treatment, but I will need more light to do it”

She decided to treat Gabriel wound with an extra portion of disinfection.

When she heard the surprise of that girl she smirked. That girl didn’t realize it would be better for her to stay quiet. Myra jumped from the wall and examined her first two targets.

“Yep they are dead, this is what usually happens to so-called kidnappers...”

She replied to her with an amused smile to the girl and then turned to Gabriel who put the serious expression on his face. When she heard his assessment of her performance she smiled again. He was the first one in her life who was willing to praise her abilities when she missed one of her targets.

“Of course I insist on tour in this beautiful ruin but before that let me treat your wound”

Myra pointed at Gabriel’s abdomen and then in direction of nearby fire. She needed more light to see clearly how light or bad it was.

[Mr. Moon]

Gabriel #18 

Myra didn´t surprised and insisted on the tour around the ruined outpost without even thinking about their current biggest problem.

“And what about her?”
Gabriel nodded towards Rose who was drowning herself in self-pity and sorrow. He wasn´t asking about the guys laying on the ground around them as he believed in miss Raven´s medical expertise when she declared them dead but was a bit cautious about the girl as leaving her as she was, was a probably the worst from all the bad options available.

“Shouldn´t we take her back to the village or something?”
Professor asked, biting his lip as this was exactly on of the situations where he felt helpless. Not because he woudln´t be able to do anything, but because he had no idea what he should do. His life spend as far away from other people as possible simply didn´t prepared him for this. Not to mention that after his anger calmed down he started to feel sorry for her, even if only so little.

“Alright, get up, kneeling in the mud don´t help anyone.”
He muttered and offered her a hand, however she ignored him completely.

“Hey, do you hear me? Get up or...”
“Leave me alone!”
She screamed, hitting Gabriel´s hand with her own, before jumping up on her feet.

“Hey wait….”

Gabriel reached for her shoulder but was too slow as she was already blindly dashing into the darkness. Professor quickly looked on Myra worried.

“Can you catch her?”

He asked as he wasn´t really confident in his techniques yet. After all Indestructible barely worked for him and he didn´t want to risk hitting a tree or something like that in a full speed.

[Cat]

Myra # 18 

Myra was confused. She didn’t understand Gabriel and his expression. Why did he asked about that tour, when he obviously didn’t want to be her guide. She looked at Rosa and shrugged.

“What with her? She isn’t our problem”

Gabriel said he would like to take the girl back to the village. Myra raised her eyebrows. What was Gabriel expecting? Cheering from villagers? That girl would probably do her best to set villagers against them. Thinking about it, Myra decided to load her revolver.

“Definitely not”

She shook with her head and observed Gabriel. He tried his best to behave like a gentleman towards that girl. Myra didn’t understand the situation and his motivation. Was he so naive or did he have some plan? Luckily, the girl was angered and retorted.

Myra decided to go closer to the fire and ignore her companion, so she wasn’t sure what happened in the next few seconds. But when she turned after Gabriel’s question, she saw running girl. She frowned, she wasn’t a dog so she didn't fetch on command.

“Beast, Fetch!”

Myra said with an amused voice, while she was grabbing her revolver. She didn’t expected that the Beast would be nearby. They locked her in the hotel, after all. In the next second, she unexpectedly saw a big fluffy dog. The dog looked pretty similar to Beast and jumped on the running girl and then started enthustiacaly barking.

“Good dog?”

Myra tried to save the situation and slowly walked in direction, where she saw the big dog sitting on the yelling girl.

[Mr. Moon]

Gabriel #19 

Gabriel sighed for himself, when he realized that Myra isn´t willing to help him. Well he should probably expect it since from the very beginning she acted like a spoiled, self absorbed brat. Even going so far as calling Beast who as she knew was locked in...his...motel...room…

“WHAT?!”

Moon´s eyes widened when he saw giant Malamute jumping on fleeing Rose, taking her down. Than, she sat down on her bell and raised her head as a proud dog who wants to be praised for being a good girl.

“How did you...”
Professor asked Myra dumbfounded by the fact that she noticed and he, her owner didn´t.

“Well, guess that´s the assassin training for you, now...”

Moon accepted that miss Raven´s skills in this field are simply better than his before turning back to Beast.

“Now, as for you young lady...”
He said with dead serious voice as he was marching to her.

“didn´t I tell you to stay?”
Beast´s head dropped down just as her mood, from feeling proud to feeling sorry.

“Woof?”

“But this time, just for this time”

Gabriel scratched her behind ear.

“Good job.”

Happy once again, beast got up on her hind legs, licking Gabriel´s face. After few moments of cuddling (and Rose´s cursing as Best was still standing on her) Moon let his dog to guard their prisoner before taking Myra to the tour. There wasn´ t actually much he could show her and so he was mainly talking about the history of the outpost and all the interesting and sometimes funny stories he knew about that place. Took him about an hour before he finished and so they could go back to their prisoner. She finally accepted the fact, fight with a huge dog can not result in her victory and so was quietly waiting for their return.

“Good girl.”

Professor Moon called Beast back to him, before he helped Rose on her feet. She was silent for a moment before asking

“What...what will you do with me now?”

Gabriel sighed. He was thinking about the exact same think for some time already and the only think he could figure out was…

“Nothing. But you will confess to what you did and apologize to both your brother and the families of the men who died.”
Her eyes widened.
“What? But...but than I´ll go to jail or worse!”

Moon shrugged.

“Probably, yeah but you know kid, there is the thing called responsibility. It´s the first thing you have to learn as an adult and since you acted all high and mighty it´s time for you to accept it as well.”

She didn´t responded to that and so they headed back to the village.

[Cat]

Myra # 19 

Myra wasn’t only one surprised but she hid her surprise quickly behind the smile. When she heard Gabriel’s reaction she was more sure about the identity of that dog. It was Beast.

“She probably has already eaten all bones so she decided to sniff us out ”

Myra shrugged as if it was self-evident. She observed the dog, who exceptionally did something right. She was surprised when Gabriel started to reprimand Beast and after he ended he slightly praised her.

Gabriel tried to avoid his treatment by the lesson from the history of the ruins, but Myra stopped him for a while and took care of it before she agreed to continue. It was similar to his lessons on the university and Myra suspected him that he used bad visibility at the night to create a new version of history for her.

Myra was sure that the night was even darker when they finished and professor Moon decided to go back to the village. It looked like he saw in night slightly better than her so she followed him and Beast without protests. It was still better than staying all night in the jungle with who knows what animals. The “kidnaped” girl looked like she had similar opinion like Myra and followed them.

When they walked into the village, it looked similar to the previous night and Myra was also similarly tired.

“I need to sleep, Gabriel”

She sayed and her voice was able to reveal how tired she was.

[Mr. Moon]

Gabriel #20 

To Gabriel´s surprise, rose decided to follow them out of the jungle. Moon was surprised by her decision, as he thought that given her mood, she will stay in the forest and will try to run later, but as it turned out, he still didn´t understand people really well. Or maybe his short speech moved her so much? He didn´t know.

As they were slowly leaving the jungle for the open field behind it, he realized that maybe they should bury the dead before leaving and so he opened a mouth to ask, but Myra was faster.

“Really, than come here...”
Professor Moon stopped for a moment to take Myra on his backs before continuing on their journey.

“You can sleep this way.”
Gabriel muttered. Without a doubt he was very tired himself, but the gentleman in him couldn´t allow him to do anything else.

“If you´ll try to run, Beast will fetch you and this time, she won´t be so gentle.”
Professor warned Rose, who was watching them with suspicious look in her eyes.

“I didn´t wanted to do anything...”
She assured her captor quickly with a voice filled with sadness, and so they continued.

“Man, I should really work out a bit more often.”
Muttered Gabriel for himself once they got back to the village. Carrying Myra the whole way took a great tool on his physical reserves and so when they finally arrived his arms which were supporting the girl sleeping on his back were screaming with pain but still, he didn´t allowed himself to wake her up.

“Where is your house?”
He asked as they were getting closer to the main gate.

“Why do you ask?”
Muttered Rose silently.

“Isn´t it obvious?”
Asked Gabriel in return.

“One of your underlings escaped. He will be probably blaming you for his friends death so wandering around in a darkness, alone won´t be safe for you for some time.”

Even in the darkness of the night, Gabriel noticed how she turned pale and than stumble in surprise as she realized something else.

“Wait, you won´t hand me over to the guards?”
Gabriel shook his head.

“No, I told you already. It´s up to you whatever you want to be a spoiled child with blood on her hands or become adult that takes responsibility for her actions.”

She didn´t responded. As they were passing the night guards near the gate they immediately recognized her. Thanking Moon for her rescue, they promised him to take her home and that the town council will arrange appropriate reward for his action, but Gabriel knew that he won´t be anywhere near when the time will come.

Surprised, that Rose didn´t try to spin the story so she would be the victim and they the culprits he went back to their motel to settle the bill, before heading to their modest ship. There Moon laid Myra to her bed, before he checked the provision prepared by the dock workers they hired this morning. With everything on place and ready, he prepared their ship for setting sail.

“That was pretty interesting day.”
He muttered with a gentle smile, as he was taking their ship out of the port. A hour later, back on the open sea with a course set back to their original destination, he finally fall asleep.