Protect me? ~babyLETSplay & Kharvek ~

Blood splatter on the wall that was now covered in flame. She had called this place home. She still remembered playing hide and go seek here with her parents and in a blink of an eye it was gone... "Rose! Run! Get out of here!" desperately yelled her mother as she fell to her knees holding her the gash in her stomach. Tears fell down young Rose's face as she whimpered for her mother. Rose was young but she knew her mother wouldn’t last long. She knew what she had to do. Rose jumped through the flames and ran as fast as she could to safety as she watched from a distance as the humans massacred her village with some kind of machine…. Her village was unprepared for the surprise attack from the humans. The humans and Neko’s have been at war for years. It seemed the humans were afraid of what the nekos were capable of. You see it’s rare but at times Nekos were born with magical abilities. But great power brought great side effects. Everytime they used their magic, depending on how big the spell, an amount of their life would be depleted. Although the only ones who knew that were the Nekos

It’s been years since the death of her family and every since rose has tried hide her existence. What few Nekos were left try to be invisible for the sake of their lives. If there were any other nekos than her, she has never seen them. It was rough, but she’s lasted 10 years on her own and only used her magic a handful of times when it was needed. Today would be no different than any other. right?

Rose took shelter in a long time abandond cave in the middle of who knows where. After wandering aimlessly for as long as she has you tend to lose track of your suroundings. On this particular morning the sound of voices in the distance reached her sensitive feline ears. Someone was heading her way and by the sound of it they were hunters. Exactly NOT who she wanted to find her….

the two men aproached the mouth of the cave with caution. In case a wild animal slept inside. To their surprise what they found was Rose…

“Look what we found” One spoke to the other.

“Here, Kitty, Kitty.” The other said as they both approached Rose.

Rose took a step back to find her back against the wall. When the took men noticed she had no where to run is when they grabbed her. On grabbed ehr hand and pulled her forward while the other ran behind her and placed his knife against her throat.

“Now be a good Kitty” the guy with this knife whispered in Rose’s ear.

Rose stiffened eyeing the men with a mixture of anger and fear. With ease, she could kill both these men in a blink of an eye. but it wasn't worth the risk of her life shortening in doing so. Her best chance was to corporate, for now…

Then the man with the knife other hand began to wander to cup her breasts. “How about we have a little fun with her before we kill her?” the other man nodded in agreeance as she stalked forward with a nasty grin.

Rose didn’t waste time. She quickly elbowed the man with the knife causing him the drop it. But just when she reached to pick up the knife the other man pulled his out pushing it into her neck actually drawing blood. “I believe we told you to be a good Kitty?” he pressed it harder against her neck. she did the only thing she could think to do at this time, scream as loud as she could in hope that someone was around to come and distract them so she could grab the knife on the floor.

Vic Sheffield had seen and been through a lot in his years. Five years retired now he lived on his own out in the woods. He preferred it that way. The first few years of retirement he tried living in the city and getting a normal job, but after his line of work you just don't go back to doing things the normal way. You look at every person as a potential threat or target. You eavesdrop on any conversation you can find to try to get one more little edge on someone, another piece of information someone might want. You're always thinking of what persona to present to someone to get what you need. Normal people don't need to do that in their day to day lives. Vic did before he retired though.

He spent nearly fifteen years of his life with the Imperial Scouting and Intelligence outfit. On paper they were an outfit who's purpose was to map unknown regions and mark areas of interest. In reality they were spies, agents and assassins. They did the kind of work for the Empire that the Empress and Parliament didn't want to leave a paper trail behind. In fact the Empress rarely knew what the division was up to, and she preferred to keep it that way. She never read the direct results of the operations they engaged in, she just knew that they would always act in the interests of the Empire. This made the chain of command for the Scouts fuzzy, and that's how they liked it. They didn't have to adhere to any silly moral code the rest of the Imperials agents and soldiers had to abide by.

Vic had done it all. He'd assassinated political rivals, infiltrated corrupt trading companies and sabotaged the military might of many a foe. He also did many darker things than that. The world he lived in was a strange place with many mysteries and magic, and at the forefront of the Scouts he had to go to the darkest places that existed. He was good at what he did. Growing up in a rough part of the Imperial capital, he had to learn to act and think quickly. When he swiped the purse of an agent of the Scouts...that is how he got recruited. Instead of punished? He was offered further training and a job. Vic accepted that job and for fifteen years served the Empire in ways most people didn't have the stomach to.

It was the Neko War that pushed him over the edge. During the early years he'd do intelligence operations against them, but never found them to be all that different than humans in many ways. They fell weak to the same things humans did, enjoyed many of the same things. They weren't identical by any means, but they weren't this strange, alien thing to be feared. However humanity is known for being afraid of anything different, and aside from looking different than humans, Neko could use magic. The more and more that become known of that magic, the more afraid the humans got until war became unavoidable. Having been deep in Neko territory Vic knew better. He knew magic likely came at a price. He didn't know *what* price, but he didn't fear it the same way the others did. He certainly had some fear and respect towards it, but not enough that he felt the entire race needed to be wiped clean in order to preserve humanity. So when the war broke out? Vic resigned. With his old age came a bit more of a conscious than he'd had before. There was more to it than just that of course, but Vic wasn't the kind of man to open up about it over a pint of ale.

So here he was now, living in a cabin out in the woods by himself. He'd occasionally go to town for supplies and put down a few pints at the local pub, but he mostly kept to himself. Despite living alone he didn't look like what one would expect a hermit to look like. He made an attempt to keep his appearance trimmed. His hair, while on the shaggy side was cut above his shoulders and he shaved at least once a week. It was later in the week this time so he had a full blown five-o-clock shadow going. His frame was on the stockier side of lean and despite his advanced age he was quite nimble and spry. The training and conditioning he'd received certainly let him age well. He was in his late thirties at the time he took that fateful walk this crisp evening.

The cry sharp and shrill, echoing across the trees. It was near. Vic's instincts kicked in as he ran directly towards the sound of a scream, towards the mouth of a dingy cave. From the mouth of the cave he could hear sounds of a struggle, but wasn't yet able to make anything out. Someone was in trouble, he knew that much. All he had on him was a carving knife but that likely was all he was going to need.

"Hey! What's going on in here?" He shouted. If they were just a couple of kids, as Vic assumed, they'd likely get scared and run off at the sound of an outsider.

The man quickly hit her face hard arfter the scream “Don’t even try missy, no one will come to your rescue” the man told her

But he was wrong. luck was on her side today. “Hey! What’s going on in here?” the voice of the man caught their attention.

“Shit hurry up and kill her!” one of the men yelled but it was too late.

Her movements were skillfully swift when she elbowed the man wth the knife in the stomach and dodged the others approach. she dashed from the cave’s mouth to catch sight of the man who had helped her eariler. but it was alittle too late to stop at the speed she was going. She ran into him knocking them both down to the ground hitting her head on a rock in the process. Dizy and shaken she stood to her feet a bit off balance. The voices of the two other hunters fell close behind and the sight of the stranger on the ground starting to get up, she decided to go to drastic measures..

she held her hand up, one to the stranger and one to the hunters and with just a quick clentch of her fist roots from the surounding trees rose from the ground to wrap around each mans body. Restraining them long enough for her to get away.

She ran as fast as she could deep into the trees. finally her pounding head and blurry vision forced her to slow down. the effects of using her magic caught up to her causing her to crouch down holding on the a tree for suport as she coughed up a handful of blood. she has only used her magic just a few times but no matter how small the spell is her body deteriorates slowly. the sound of foot steps approaching acught her attention. Pouncing up she rounded the tree trunk taking shelter behind it. and watched to see who approached

Vic heard his voice echo into the cave as he could hear the men inside scramble. He could hear them shouting at each other but wasn't able to make out what they were saying.

"They will be hauling ass out of there any moment now." Vic thought to himself. They were surely just a couple of kids in over their heads and likely didn't want to stick around and get in any trouble. Of course Vic ended up getting more trouble than he bargained for as before he could think another thought a Neko came hauling out full tilt and smashed right into him. Caught completely off guard he tumbled to the ground face first against a tree trunk. The force of the blow staggered him as he tried to clamber back to his feet as quickly as he could. Before he could even find his footing the roots of the very tree he slammed into began to entwine themselves around his limbs, rendering him immobile.

He bucked and thrashed in the clenches in the roots as he took a moment to take stock of his situation. His scout instincts all came rushing back to him as if it was only yesterday that he'd been enlisted. He caught a glimpse of a tail as the neko that slammed into him took off into the woods as he turned his eyes to the pair of hunters. They were young, untrained, likely after a big score. They were also scared and very much in over their heads at the moment. One of the men was right handed and clearly had a recent injury to his left leg with how he favored his right. The other had recently been struck in the stomach. Once these roots broke Vic knew this wasn't going to be much of a fight.

The pair shouted a string of curses after the neko as they looked Vic over. "Who the fuck are you old man? You ruined our score! You're gonna pay for this geezer!"

'Geezer?!' Vic thought to himself, 'I can't look *that* old. I'm not losing my hair and I don't have any gray.'

"Look, why don't you punk kids just go home and leave the neko alone. She hasn't done anything to you. Don't make this day get any worse for anyone." Vic said in a calm, easy tone.

"You know what her hide will fetch us? That shit is going to change our lives! We'll be rich! And she's just a fucking neko! That damned feline witchery of theirs was going to ruin the world!" The other hunter snarled towards Vic as the roots holding the three men began to weaken.

Vic had broken his roots but simply waited as he gave the two men another once over. Their own roots had broken as they both made a mad dash towards Vic, knives brandished.

'Here we go again. Amateurs.' Vic easily side stepped the first man and connected with a vicious strike to his elbow, causing the knife to tumble harmlessly to the ground. He whirled around to face the other man with a calm and almost lazy grace. He'd been in countless fights like this. These two were untrained kids who've maybe had some luck beating up a few kids on the schoolyard. The fact they had a numbers advantage on Vic only made them more careless in how they fought. They didn't have an ounce of training and probably just caught the neko off guard as she likely could have taken these two with more warning. Vic capitalized on a wild swing by the other man to land a swift blow to his stomach. In perfect rhythm he smashed the man's face as he began to double over with his knee, staggering him back a step. Fully on the offensive now, Vic swung a wild hay-maker right at the man's temple, putting him out cold in just his third strike.

The other man had staggered back to his feet and was charging Vic from behind, attempting to take him by surprise. Without even looking Vic landed a firm heel kick right into the man's ribcage. In a single fluid motion he then scooped up the knife and pinned the man against the tree, drawing the knife up to his throat.

"You and your friend are going to get lost now. Your prize is I'm not going to kill a couple kids today." He then plunged the knife deep into the shoulder of the man. "And you're gonna have to explain to your mother how you fell on your knife. Now get outta my face, and take your friend with you."

Vic quickly walked off from the fight and took a moment to wipe some dirt, mud and blood from his clothing after the scuffle. Despite being a member of the Scouts for many years he'd only seen magic being used a few times. This certainly wasn't what he bargained for in the woods this day. He went to look for the neko. He knew enough about their magic to know she was going to be in rough shape and likely needed some help. There weren't many safe places for neko left in the world, and this forest was about as far from those safe havens as you could get.

He stepped cautiously through the woods, easily following her trail, occasionally calling out, "Hey! You okay? I took care of those guys! I'm not going to hurt you! You gotta trust me on this one!"