A Stain Called Blood

PROLOGUE

They should have told us... They shouldn't have lied to us... They should have kept to thier word.

Yet they sleep easy at night knowing they've killed us all.

I looked at my watch. It's synchronization said fifty seconds more. Fifty seconds until everything was all over. Soon enough, there won't have to be any fighting. No more bloodshed, and balance would be restored.

I exhaled. The temperature today was nothing out of the ordinary: below zero as usual.

The ice cracked a little beneath my feet, but that didn't scare me. The ice below the ground was at least twenty foot thick. And after that, there was solid clear titanium steel separating us from the Real World. If you strained your eyes enough, you could actually make out figures of people... The so-called leaders of our city and every influential person they knew, all below our feet. A city of its own!

Thirty seconds!

I held my sides to make sure that my two weapons were there. Two large pistols I decided to name "Erebus" and "Tartarus"... Fully loaded. Each of them had the letters 'IV' carved into them. Four: This number had kept me alive for as long as I could remember. Apart from being my lucky number, if had significance.

Slowly, I reached out to my back and grabbed the tilt of my sword. This was a Japanese two-handed sword I called "Deathwish". My favorite weapon actually. Guns run out of bullets...Swords don't.

Twenty-five seconds.

My different colored eyes darted around quickly. The left brown and the right blue. I brought out a deck of cards from my pocket. Quickly, I shuffled them and drew one card. Four of Aces. And suddenly I believed that this operation would be successful.

Everybody had thier own talisman. Something that they believed would foretell a bit into the future. Something that would protect them as well.

Kevin was more like my brother. He leaned against a dumpster and pulled a dye from his pocket and tossed it up and caught it. His lucky number was three.

When he opened his hand, the dye said three. He didn't smile, but he stared at me and nodded, assuring me that everything would be alright. I knew that. He drew one arrow from His quiver and tugged on the green bb bb bandana round his neck. And held the bow which was slung behind his back. He was an archer and his eyes were as cold as the ice that was our ground. The familiar scar ran down his left eye to his temple. A reminder that there would be better days.

Mouse pulled out a coin from his pocket, and tossed it up. He always chose tails no matter how many times the coin would land on heads.

Time seemed to pause as the coin suspended mid-air. Truth was...Mouse's talisman was the most accurate. If it landed on tails, that would be enough proof that we would make it.

Everyone seemed to hold thier breath, and then...the coin landed and Mouse caught it.

Everyone gathered. Mouse opened his hand. Tails.

We all smiled. Victory!

Mira stood beside me. Her auburn hair drifted with the cold wind. Her eyebrows knotted together.

She didn't not have a talisman. She didn't believe in such things. She lived as she went and was prepared to die anyday. I admired this.

In her right hand, she carried a four foot rectangular suitcase at least ten inches wide. That's where she kept her sword; Abysus.

She got her orange bandana from her jean pocket and wore it round her neck.

Then, CLANG!!!

We turned around. Mouse's coin had dropped and fell into a crack in the ice. That was not good. That meant death. Once something unusual happened with your talisman, that spelt death mostly.