The Six Guns

Rose was the second to come outside and join them. She climbed to a higher stone than Siran and sat impatiently there, swinging her short legs back and forth. Then Finn and Alex came outside as well, and joined in. Finn stretched across a gap in the stones to find his comfort position and Alex stood beside Zia, seeming more restless than the rest. As Siran finished singing his song, Rose started opening up to the rest of the team.

"Being here always reminds me of my family" Rose says quietly. "It's painful to remember, but I couldn't stand forgetting about them, ya know?"

"Family?" Siran asks.

"Well" Rose begins to correct herself, "they weren't my real family. I've been an orphan for as long as I can remember. But the rest of the rebels that used to be here were the closest thing I had to a family. To me, they were better than a real family"

"What happened?" Zia asked.

"They said they had a mission" Rose begins to explain, "and they left, but only one person came back..."

"Was it not the person you wished it was?" Finn asks.

"I wouldn't say that" Rose responds. "The person who came back I was the closest to. She was basically my older sister. But she couldn't stay here anymore so she left"

"Why?" Siran asked.

"Well, she wasn't from here" Rose says. "She was kinda like a mercenary or something. She traveled around the world, helping people. She stayed in Cairo for a few months but those months when she were here were the best! She was always kind, and tried to take care of me. But she was also strict sometimes and yelled at me a lot, but she only did it for my own good"

"Sounds like someone we know" Alex says.

"Well, she had to leave eventually" Rose says. "She stayed to help the rebels out here, but none of them returned alive. So she left, by herself"

"Who was this girl?" Siran asks.

Right around that time, their conversation was interrupted by a sudden loud bang. They looked to where the noise came from, Cairo, and saw dust flying over the outer walls of Cairo. Several explosions then went off consecutively, and fire began lighting up the night as well as city lights. The team, Siran, Alex, Zia, Finn and Rose all seemed to have the same idea as they all nod at each other and run towards the now burning Cairo.

Upon arriving, they find several citizens using magic to attack at a platoon of Ly'Lum soldiers, and others who couldn't use magic were throwing Cocktail Molotov's at the soldiers to spread more fire. However, their struggle seemed futile. Soldiers in the front were shielding off the attack as the soldiers behind them were firing off magic weapons into the crowd. One after another, more and more citizens fell to the ground. A truly horrifying scene.

Rose couldn't hesitate. She ran off first and threw a couple of throwing knives with a paper charm attached to the handle of the knives. As the knives flew in front of the crowd of soldiers, the paper suddenly ignited with a bright, blinding flash of light. Rose charged at the nearest soldier and kicked his feet out from under him, making him fall to the ground. She jumped up to land on him, but was blocked by another soldier's digital shield and thrown back. The soldier that threw her, punched her in the gut hard enough to send her flying backwards a few feet. He then throws a large fireball out of his hand at Rose, now onlooking in fear of her own life, but the fireball was redirected suddenly and flew off course. Not far from Rose stood Siran with his index finger out pointing at the fireball, redirecting it into the ground away from other people. Finn rushed to Rose's aid, helping her walk away from the battle. Rose could barely move on her own, and she was also having problems breathing as well. The hit took too much out of her. As Finn carried Rose away from the fray, Siran shielded all attacks, so they wouldn't get harmed. After Rose and Finn got to safety, they saw waves of people coming from behind the civilians, riding horses. They were all wearing uniforms from The Sayeret, an Israeli special forces division. They were allying with the Cairo civilians to fight back against The Ly'Lum's forces, and successfully at that. As The Sayeret pushed forward, The Ly'Lum fell backwards.

"We need to get out of here" Siran says. "They look like they have things under control for now, and it would be really bad if The Ly'Lum discovered that we are here right now"

"Holly was right" Rose coarsely says, "I really am too weak to fight back"

"We'll worry about that later" Siran says, "For now, let's head back!"

The team runs back to the hideout, without being followed on the way there. When they get inside, Rose was gently set down against the wall where she can rest. While barely breathing, she kept saying to herself "I'm still too weak, I'm still too weak" over and over.

Finn sits next to Rose and gently pats her on the head and says "Don't be too hard on yourself. You can't win every battle, no matter how strong you are"

As Rose's breathing returned to normal, she began to cry as she said "I can't win any battle! Not without Holly! I'm too weak on my own!"

"You must really miss your sister" Siran says. Rose just nods as she covers her face with her hands. "Do you know where she left to?" Siran asks. Rose nods agains. Then Siran says "Then why don't you go see her? This city seems to be in good hands for now and we can't risk fighting in an all out war right now".

"I can't do that until I'm strong enough to leave this country" Rose says.

"You already seem well equipped in my opinion" Finn says. "I mean, I've never seen skills like that. A flash charm on a throwing knife is pretty clever"

"The way I see it" Siran says, "you just need a little boost to expand your potential, and your sister here to keep you motivated and protected. On top of that, we also need more people in our group, and a ninja and hacker sounds like a great addition to the team, so why don't we compromise?"

Rose looks up at Siran as he says, "I can give you that boost you need if you agree to join us. However, your sister joining us would be a different story, since she'd have to volunteer herself to join us. We can't force her to do that. We'll help you find your sister, as long as you help us along the way, agreed?"

Rose wipes away her tears, sloppily, as she nods while still crying. Siran holds out his hand with the same blackish smoke like substance emanating from his hand as he says "then we'll shake on it". Rose shakes his hand and the smoke envelopes her before disappearing suddenly.

"For now" Zia says, "we gotta worry about whether this place will be safe to stay in"

"It should be fine" Finn says. "I doubt they'd just stumble across this hideout, especially while fighting a war"

"True enough" Alex says, "but you said you knew where this Holly person should be at?"

"Yeah" Rose says behind tears.

"Well, where is that?" Siran asks.

"She said she was going to America to collect 'data' or something" Rose responds.

"Oh no" Siran says.

"So we're going to The United States then?" Zia asks.

"Apparently so" Alex replies. "We'll get to see the country that Siran came from"

"This is going to be unpleasant" Siran says.

The team finds it hard, but eventually find sleep shortly after the sun arose. After they had awoken, most of the fighting had stopped, but there were still sounds of fighting coming from Cairo. They found their way around the city, although it took them a while since they had to avoid Cairo completely. As they headed northeast, towards Israel, they came across some Sayeret soldiers shuttling civilians away from Cairo, evacuating civilians from the battlefield. From there, they were able to get a ride to Eilat, a city in the southern corner of Israel and far south of Jerusalem. After once again exchanging the currency of all the money Finn had, they were able to board an airplane from an airport in Eilat. From the plane, they arrived closest to their destination. Cuba, just southeast of Havana. According to Rose, Holly had left to Jacksonville, Florida, a coastal state on the southeastern side of The United States. So they would have to find a boat that would take them to Florida and find their way to Jacksonville. After several days of nonstop traveling, they arrive in Florida and slowly walk their way north to Jacksonville. Several more days pass as they walk, rest, eat and gather more food. There were lots of towns that still housed lots of people. Most of this land was still perfectly habitable. They would even find buses to use to go long distances as they took time to rest and close in on their destination.

"This place isn't so bad" Zia said. "I was expecting more of a wasteland".

"Well" Siran begins to explain, "after several decades plus a century, most of this land was cleaned up and reestablished. However, a lot of places weren't fixed, since most of this country was a battlefield for a long time. Some people just decided to adapt to the change and live amongst the debris left behind from the war"

"What do you mean?" Finn asks.

"You'll see if we ever come across it" Siran replies.

Eventually they reach Jacksonville. They arrive at the coast in specific, where they were first greeted by a very old aircraft carrier ship that has crashed onto the beach. The ship was very very old, and vines and moss covered most of the ship. There were several enormous holes in the hull of the ship, and shelters and houses built inside of the ship, exposed by the large holes.

"That's pretty impressive" Alex says. "Really turning a curse into a blessing"

"This is what I meant by adapting to the debris of the war" Siran says. "Now where is this Holly person supposed to be?"

Rose just shrugs her shoulders and then says "All I know is that this is where she came to. I don't know where exactly she went, how she got here, or if she had left already"

"Then I guess it comes down to a manhunt" Alex says.

"But first, we need to rest for a while" Zia says. "Hopefully there's a hotel or something on this giant ship"

"Good idea" Siran says with an exasperated tone. "Rest first, then come up with a plan. We'll have to find some way to track down Holly, but we need rest so we can keep our heads on straight"

Finn let's out a loud yawn and says "I'm all down for that! I'm super tired"

"Agreed" Alex says, rubbing the back of his neck.

"Then it's settled" Rose says. "Rest first, then find Holly"