And Now For Something Completely... Different.

Jin Settsuoshima crept quietly from tree to tree on a small hill behind the mansion, charged by the crisp night air. It was in the moments of approach that he would put the majority of his thought into the operation and how he would go about its execution. The intelligence work had been solid; more so than he would have expected coming from an unknown 3rd party. His directives were clear: free the captured knight ‘Bell,’ observe the battle in the foyer to ensure the mansion owner was neutralized, and clean the area of everyone if detected or if failure was imminent. Detection wouldn’t be an issue; he was far too well trained to be detected by non-military, or even paramilitary, lackeys.

He pressed on to the back wall of the mansion and quickly surveyed his surroundings. The wall was old and in ill repair, and there were plenty of partially crumbled sections for him to maintain his footing. He attached a small metal spike to his left foot and hand and worked his way slowly up the side of the damaged wall, being careful not to rush or make any sound. As he neared the top, a sound caught his ear. He flattened himself against the wall, almost becoming one with it, as two men with lanterns rounded the southeast corner and closed on his position. From the small slit in his olive green hood, he watched the men pass under him and stop, oblivious to his presence. One pulled out a small pipe and loaded it with a leafy substance, as the other rambled on about his latest encounter at a brothel.

These two men would need to be incapacitated or they would interfere with his escape. He quietly swung his right arm around to his back, pulled a drawstring on one of his flat belt pouches, and brought out a small tube with six flesh-colored darts. He placed the tube in his moth and took a slow, deep draw of breath as he worked a dart into the tubing. The guard lit his pipe with his lantern, and inhaled deeply. A small glint of satisfaction crossed his face momentarily, and then switched to bewilderment as the world spun around him. His friend, too busy rambling on about his latest brothel induced love, didn’t notice his fellow guard was on the ground until something bit his neck.

Jin carefully placed the remaining four darts back in his belt pouch and took one last look at the two unconscious men on the ground. Satisfied, he pressed upward over the edge of the wall and onto a small balcony. The window he needed was two over to the right of his current position. He looked up, then grabbed the edge of the roofing and vaulted himself onto the slate roof. Stepping ever so lightly, he made his way to the second window and stopped. He then rested his body flat on the rooftop, pulled himself forward, and leaned his torso over the roof edge, using the metal spike on his foot to maintain his position. From his inverted position, he took stock of the room. Three guards around a cage with a woman inside. He looked up at the ground to ensure the two men were still unconscious before readying his next move.

Jin hung silently inverted from the roof, watching the guards for just the right time to strike. Inside sounds of scuffling could be heard through the partially open window, and he assumed the diversion had begun. The three guards had positioned themselves in a triangle of sorts around the cage; the lead man, hearing the ruckus, walked over to the door and called out to some unseen party. Now was the time to strike.

He quickly pulled two half-inch corked glass tubes from his belt and shook them before taking them in his left hand. He then readied two 4 point circular darts and placed them in his mouth. From his inverted position, he gently opened the windows slowly outward, listening carefully for any hint of creaking. With the windows open, he committed the guard locations to memory, gave the vials a final shake with his left hand, and tossed them upward into the room. As the vials lobbed through the air, he grabbed the roof edge with his free hands and swung around into the room, landing crouched on his feet with his back to the men just as the vials hit the floor.

The men turned to see only the movement of Jin entering the room. There was a momentary flash of brilliant white light as the vials broke on the floor and began smoking; all three men were taken by surprise, and effectively blinded. Jin snapped up and pivoted on his left foot as he took the darts from his mouth. With a smooth motion, he flung a dart toward the closest guard. Jin released the second dart toward the guard at the door, just as his first one had finished slicing through the ascending smokescreen and found its mark squarely in the first guard’s forehead. Both men hit the floor almost simultaneously as Jin crouched and drew his steel tanto, holding it down handled. The remaining guard lunged blindly in the direction of the window, swinging his short sword with voracity. Jin swiftly executed an upward backhanded strike, cutting the man diagonally from waist to neck in a continuous motion before quietly helping his body to the floor.

He looked briefly at the ceiling; he knew he had only a few seconds before his smokescreen would have made its way out of the partially open door and into the main room where everyone else was. He moved swiftly over to the door and removed the cage key from the lead guard’s body. Crossing quietly over the open portion of the door, he flattened himself against the wall and took out his last small vial. He quickly shook it and peered out the side of the door at the people in the mansion’s foyer, making a mental note of who was standing where. He noticed immediately that his second objective, the death of the mansion owner, had been met. He lobbed the readied vial into the room in-between the two women who had created the diversion, and had now positioned themselves to fight the remaining mob.

Not waiting for the vial to make contact, he leapt over to the cage, grabbing a short sword in the process. He quickly unlocked Bell’s cage and imbedded the blade of the sword at her feet in the wooden cage floor. The expression on her face indicated to him that she was unable to see clearly.

"Your vision will return momentarily. He whispered. " Your path is clear. Find your strength and assist your allies."

With that, he sprung for and through the open window, hit the ground squarely with his feet and broke his momentum with a head-over roll before he disappeared into the darkness.


---I wrote this maybe 3 years ago for a gaming group I was involved with at that time. Yes, I was a dork. Yes, I still can be a dork. Anyhow, I decided to clean this up a little tonight (okay, a LOT, this was a very rough piece back then), and post it here for your amusement. I entertained the idea at one time of continuing this little story, but ..meh™

Should be a nice change from my normal 'oh woe is me, my life sucks, I am forever doomed' style of writing that is all over this blog.

Cheerio.

The Disclaimer.

Just to get a couple things straight here.

I write a lot of fiction. I have these little stories from time to time on this blog. Some are a collaboration of memorable events, some are just plain fantastical idealism. Sometimes I remember specific events in my life, and I write about them; not necessarily the way they happened, but the way I remember them. I think I've said that before somewhere.

Anyhow, for the few readers I have here, please keep that in mind when you read the works here. Chances are that unless I've told you specifically I am writing about you, or I've had some kind of major life change, it's all just some fantasy or idealistic scenario I've thought up in my head.

You know, because I am delusional and all.

Don't go off on me about it. mmkay? Mmkay, yeah thanks.

78 Degrees and Cloudy.

A cool breeze blew through his open car windows as he sat motionless in the traffic jam on the freeway. He mused to himself the reasons he would willfully sit in a traffic jam on Friday afternoon when, normally, his afternoon routine would keep him away from such a mess. He sat patiently, though, tapping his foot to the music of the radio and letting his mind wander to nothing in particular.

He was heading to the university campus to see where tomorrow morning’s class would be. A pre-emptive strike at tardiness and misdirection was always a wise endeavor in his estimation. He read over his map instructions again in an attempt to make sense of the ambiguous directions he received from the website. The directions had him making several turns towards the end of his trek, and he read and reread them as the traffic moved forward and then stalled. Eventually he made it to his exit, and left the freeway at a greater speed than he had enjoyed while actually on it.

Right, and follow for 0.5 miles, then left for another 0.5 miles. Then, another right for 1.8 miles, and another right again for a short 0.1 miles. Easy enough, he thought. This whole routine saw him past several gas stations and a grocery store, before it dropped him dead center of the little suburb the university campus was supposed to be in. One problem though… there was no campus.

He took a deep breath and took stock of his surroundings while stopped at a stop sign. He had landed somewhere in the middle of a sub-division, with decent sized two story brick homes on either side. The neighborhood was out collectively watering their lawns while their kids were playing with their toys on the sidewalks. A honk of a horn jerked him out of his observations as a local resident decided he had sat too long at the stop sign and wanted to finish going home. He pulled forward and found a nice spot in front of a house to park his car so he could read his instructions again. He leaned over to the passenger seat to grab his papers, but stopped dead in his motion.

Before him, sitting on the tailgate of a pickup truck parked in the driveway, was the most beautiful creature he had ever seen; her eyes were so bright blue that he could see them from where he was sitting. Her hair was an unbelievable copper brown that cradled her face and flowed effortlessly over her shoulders. He was in awe, shock even, at the scene before him. Her eyes left his and she took her attention back to her book and the apple slices she had by her side.

He realized he was holding his breath. He exhaled slowly and sat back in his seat, mesmerized by what had just happened. The instructions on this map had led him right to this woman; this couldn’t be just chance.
An idea struck him, and he pulled away from her house, performing a U-turn in the middle of the street. He drove as reasonably fast as he could to the nearest of the many convenience stores he had seen on the way in. He ducked inside and found exactly what he was looking for within seconds. He plucked a perfect red rose from the display in front of the cashier and paid for his purchase.

He took a different route back to her house – one that would position the driver door nearest to her when he pulled up. He rounded a turn and saw her still sitting, right where he left her, on the back of the pickup truck reading her book and enjoying the late afternoon. He rolled to a stop in front of her house, slipped the car into neutral, and engaged the parking brake.

She looked up at him with a curious expression, and waves of excitement and fear flowed through him as he exited his car, leaving his door ajar. He walked up to her slowly… calmly, and offered her the rose. She reached out and slowly took it from him.

"What’s this for? Do I know you?" she asked, obviously bewildered.

Her sweet voice melted his heart. He looked into her eyes but spoke no words. He took in her beauty for one final moment, smiled, and went back to his car. He stopped at his door, looked back at her, then entered his car and drove away.