An Unknown Saviour

Just as the gunshot sounded, Steve covered his ears and shut his eyes preparing for his fate. Clair, on the other hand, went wide eyed. She glanced at the blood and bits of flesh that scattered on the floor with her mouth touching the ground.

Oliver crawled into a sitting position, his body trembling badly from the gunshot just now. He looked at his hand and wiped his forehead again but there was no blood. His eyes wandered to the man on the floor with a gaping bullet wound on his head.

He was dead!

The other five Zeros turned to the other end of the alley and before they could even aim their guns, another shot rang out sending the woman who had chased Clair down.

They lifted their guns. The tall, muscular man at the other end switched the hand gun from his right hand into his left hand and nimbly turned the bluish-black pistol into his right hand. He aimed both weapons at the tensed men without flinching.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

Without giving them any time to react he shot—just as the remaining four had just raised their guns at him—at them. The dusty slug was fast and when it touched their skins, it burnt like an acid and left a ghastly hole that stretched through their bodies, scattering their skin asunder.

The few seconds the five Zeros had been stunned had proved vital making them unable to fire at the critical moment. The last man standing immediately turned his gun to Clair and aimed it at her. His intention was obviously to use Clair as a hostage to escape.

It was obvious to him that this newcomer wasn't someone to be trifled with. He had quickly made the connection that he was here to save the three people they were chasing. He reckoned that they might be working with him.

The man aimed the bluish-black pistol at the man's hand and his hand gun at his head. The man opened his mouth and tried to quickly make his intentions clear. "Stop or I'll…"

Boom! Pa!

The blue dusty slug ripped his right arm off, sending it rolling to the other end of the alley. The man let out a sharp cry of horror and quickly held what remained of his right hand. His face was contorted but it didn't take long before the bullet from the hand gun put him out of his misery.

The tall, muscular man blew at his gun's muzzle after the bullet buried itself into the man's skull. He cast a glance at the three people huddled together and moved towards the bodies he had just killed.

When Steve noticed his look, he quickly raised his hand. He assumed that this one man—who appeared to not be afraid of these six individuals who were armed—was likely to be an opposition or just a hater of the 'Zeros'.

"We have nothing to do with those people!" he quickly said to clarify the situation, fearing that his head would be the next to roll. "We just got unlucky!"

Oliver and Clair looked at him in a daze and then their eyes travelled to the man that had just saved them. Oliver asked with a shaky voice, "Who are you?"

"Relax, I'm not here to hurt you." the man said with a bright smile. "I'm here to help. My name is Richard Brad."

Oliver ruminated over the name but found it very unfamiliar. He threw a glance at the other two and found that they had the same confused look. Why would this man help them and how did he know where to find them?

"How did you know we were here?" he asked.

Richard pulled out a small enveloped that had a little too many creases and threw it at Oliver. Oliver opened the envelope with shaky hands and took out three photos from inside. One was of him, the other was of Steve and the remaining photo was of Clair.

At the back of each photo was written their address . Oliver trembled slightly. The more he looked at the picture, the more he found this man to be terrifying.

"It wasn't really difficult to find a bunch of amateurs who foolishly decided to put up posters to search for a hidden organisation they know nothing of." Richard put his blaster away and tucked his hand gun into his holster.

The blaster he had received from Lily in the afternoon had proved to be very useful. Not only did it have a large area of effect but the slugs were able to move faster than he imagined and it was perfect for killing with one blow. He was thankful for his mother for employing people to work tirelessly to provide him with 'sweet babes' of weapons.

"You were keeping tabs on us?" Oliver finally stood to his feet and dusted his clothes.

Richard walked to the nearest Zero member and kicked his leg with a frustrated sigh. "I can't believe that I met these scumbags and killed them all. I would have really used the info they would have provided."

"You know these people?" Clair found her voice.

"You're after them as well?" Steve asked.

Richard turned to them with a smile. "They call themselves the Zeros. A very powerful yet secretive organisation with a great deal of fire power."

He glanced at Clair and added. "You're a long way from home."

Clair sighed. She didn't know which one was more disturbing. Was it that this guy had been 'stalking' her all this while or the fact that he actually killed all those people without batting an eyelid?

She sucked in a cold breath and nodded. "I came here to search for clues concerning these 'Zeros'."

From what Richard said, she had come to understand that they were called the Zeros. It was obvious to her now that she carefully looked at the uniform. She glanced at Oliver and then at Steve not knowing if they were as afraid as she was or calm. They didn't show it on their faces.