:: he stepped inside, his black velvet cloak swirling gently about his feet. his pale white eyes blazed from the deep shadow of his hood. West End was his.. each face in the Horsehead would slowly grow somber, as their eyes fell upon the crimson embroidery. upon his chest lay the upturned moon, pierced through the center with a dagger, Guildmark of the Nightblades. he smirked to himself, quite enjoying the subtle attention from the patrons as he drifted through them. his snowy gaze fell to Alain, the only here who seemed to match the description.. he wound through the tables, making his way accross the room to stand before the man. his voice was smooth and direct, his gaze locked intently with Alain's :: ...you are D'Mourir... are you not..?

Pidane Menuine.. a freind, perhaps... :: he took a seat accross from Alain, extending a hand in greeting :: ...i've been told you were persuing certain... interests of late?

:: he took a seat accross from Alain, folding his hands upon the table before him, his gaze cold and level. :: ..The Nightblades offer you a place, Alain D'Mourir.. do you accept..?

:: he gave a curt nod, rising from his seat :: ..then it shal be arranged.. notice will arrive shortly.. and.. as for our headquarters, feel free to come by.. we're on the map.. :: with that, he turned winding his way back through the crowd to the door and out. ::

:: a small slat in the door slid pen, a pair of ash grey eyes quickly scanning Alain's face. the slat shut, followed by the noise of several locks being undone befre the door itself swung open lightly. :: ...Hello D'Mourir, you've been expected.. :: he stepped aside, letting Alain enter before shutting and locking the door behind him. two halls stretched from the foyer, one straight ahead, the other to the left. ornate golden lanterns hung from posts on the walls, filling the halls with a warm light. the halls themselves were decorated with tapestries and paintings of all sort, each depicting it's own disturbing scene. the man's footsteps echoed from the ebony tiles as he turned, heading down the left hall without o much as a glance behind :: ...best to keep up.. unsupervised visitors are.. frowned upon..

:: he glanced over his shoulder, moving ever-onward :: ...certainly.. :: and his attention was ahead once more, the two having come upon a wide arched door. the man pushed through, the noise of the Main Hall spilling through. the man turned, holding the door for Alain before moving off toward one of the various other doors offshooting the commons. the assembly grew quiet as Alain stepped into the room, all eyes turning to watch the stranger. whispered conversations would end as he moved past, only to start up again after he'd gone. the man wound his way through the tables, pushing through a second doorway to the right. :: ...we'd better get a move on.. if we dont find him soon enough.. he finds us.. :: and he was off again, along a short corridor, lined on either side with small arched stone and gold doors. the last door stood a full ten feet. stone, with an intricate battle scene being played out in gold accross it's massive surface. the man turned to face Alain, his ashen eyes cold and lifeless, his expression grim. :: ...through there.. :: he stood aside, saying nothing more as he watched Alain, curious as to what his master might have planned for him :: ...and.. good luck..

:: the room was dark, two large lanterns glowing on the walls, one to each side. the throne was in the center, backed by an ancient looking tapestry, hung directly behind. the crimson seal seemed to glow in it's own right in the deep shadow of the room. the throne sat 6 ft. tall, stained Oak with a black velvet trim and cusions. the wood itself was covered in small marks, dozens of runesetched into it's surface. Twin orbs of ice slowly grew from the shadow of the throne, the cold, unwavering gaze falling upon Alain. he spoke, his voice low and smooth, a whisper that echoed through the room. :: ...Alain D'Mourir.. you are here for employment.. tell me.. what have you come to offer..?

:: he grinned, leaning foreward in his seat. :: ...you are not yet ready to recieve such information D'Mourir.. though perhaps you might help my men.. we are currently planning a hit on the First Goblin Bank of Rhy'Din.. we could use someone to move and store the cargo until shipment to the treasury can be arranged.. :: he settled back into his seat, his eyes gleaming in the vast shadow ::

:: he gave a light chuckle :: ...tonight.. during the Ascension Moon gathering.. the entire staff of the bank has agreed to be there, leaving the place empty.. you simply meet the brothers in the small backalley behind the bank. 10:00pm (EST). I will contact you in a few days for the cargo, in return, you recieve 100 silver... payable upon final shipment of cargo.. agreed?

:: he laughed, grinning :: indeed you are smarter than you first seemed D'Mourir.. that is certainly good.. fine.. since you seem to know your buisness.. i'll offer you 15% of the full cargo.. and perhaps a part in the next act.. sound a bit more to your likings?

:: he shook his head, waving the man off :: ...you may show yourself out.. none here will harm you.. :: he settled back in his chair, adding :: ..have fun tonight, D'Mourir.. :: he let his words hang as he watched the man leave, running through the plans in his head... ::

The cargo having been safely delivered, a messanger was quickly dispatched in search of Alain D'Mourir. within a day, he'd found him.

:: the black cloaked figure stepped inside, the Horesehead being particularly buisy this night.. it took several minutes, but sure enough, there was Alain.. just as the informant had said.. he crossed the room quickly, approching the man at the table. :: ...Alain D'Mourir.. this is for you.. :: he tossed a yellowed envelope atop the table before him, letting it slide to a stop :: ...a letter from my master.. :: and, message delivered, he was off, back out the way he came. ::

Things did not go as planned. Twice. All along, Alain had been contracted by the Scathachians to find out information about the Nightblades and, if possible, bring them down. Information was easy... but the takedown was the hard part. He was ready to set up an ambush against the Nightblades when they planned to burn the Temple of Divine Light. Backfired. They called off ever committing that act. Then they were to ambush the Scathachians using information Alain gave them, while he stormed their guildhall. Also backfired. They were minus one intact guildhall and probably out a good deal of money between all the damages and their money that they allowed him to spend... but these weren't the kind of results that would earn him big bucks from his employers.

Still. Alain felt he had made something of a name for himself by getting involved in this whole thing and trying to take on a guild head-on... but he didn't exactly have people running out and throwing contracts at him. As usual, he would have to seek out employment himself. Or at least put himself in the right place at the right time. Circumstance is what gets a mercenary his best jobs.

The day after the assault on the Nightblades Guildhall, circumstance took a turn for the weird. He was standing on the front porch, barefoot, wearing only his undershirt, jeans, and his trusty blaster pistol holstered at his hip... thinking about what to do next... when, as if to answer his question offered to the Almighty, a pumpkin head floated by. Blink.

Alain was intimately familiar with pumpkin heads, so he knew that they stayed on front porches during All Hallow's Eve and were occasionally thrown out into the street to be smashed the day after, and never had they ever floated. But that's not all. This pumpkin head went floating by, bobbing slowly up and down like a boat riding the waves at sea, listing eastward in the breeze, and it said something. Something profound.

"Baaaaa."

Another blink. After turning to him, it just floated on... and Alain, acting on an impulse he could not really justify, decided to chase it. He raced up the stairs to collect his jacket and boots, still lacing them up every other step, and then ran back down... out the back door... through the alleyway... coming out into the street maybe fifty feet behind the pumpkin. He had to walk swiftly, jogging every so often, to keep up with it, as it wound its way into the West End...

* * *

A half hour and a decent amount of sweat later, Alain was pumpkinless, out in front of a bar the name had worn off. He didn't care what the name of it was, so long as they served cold beer...

Walking away from the counter inside, Alain quickly discovered that they were all out of cold beer, but they had plenty of lukewarm beer. Blegh. Whatever. He tries not to make too much of a face after his second sip with a bunch of ugly, burly-looking men staring standoffishly at him, and retires to a table by the window, pretending he's not being looked at or resented for breaking into their turf at all. He sets the glass down on the table and stares at it. Kicking his feet up on another chair.

He is acutely aware, though, when they start looking at something else. Something tapping... they begin to mutter things like "possessed vegetables" and "Devil's tricks." Three more taps, and Alain looks over his shoulder, at the window.

"Baaaaaaaaa."

The pumpkin head is running into the window repeatedly, wanting to get in for whatever reason. To see him? It seemed in a hurry to get away before. Maybe the little guy really likes lukewarm beer... In any case, amid loud protests, Alain opens the window and lets him - it - whatever, in. The pumpkin shoots inside and bobs rapidly up and down, circles his glass, nearly tips it over, and sets down on the table.

"Baaa."

"What's up."

He looks at Wally, tilting his head this way and that, the beer forgotten... reaching out to touch him, when he hears something unusual for this part of the West End. The clicking of ridiculously high heels in the alleyway beside the bar, right outside the window. He looks slowly over his shoulder... and sees just a slice of a cute, petite red-haired girl peeking over the window sill at him with great big violet eyes. Man. What is it about Rhy'Din and cute red-haired girls? He feels like Charlie Brown, only less of a failure. He leans up in his seat slightly to get a better look.

"Hey... can I... help you?" Cute as she is, he's a little thrown by cute little witches peering through windows at him. Especially while he's having very serious conversations with floating pumpkin heads.

"Baaaa."

He watches her at first with a grin, then with a blink as the pumpkin disappears into her witch's hat, and with a more startled blink as she moves in real close-like. Let it never be said that Rhy'Din women don't know what they want and don't know how to get what they want. ...Employment, Alain, employment!

"You don't say." When she leans close, he gently taps under her chin, and then leans back in his chair, his easy grin returning. Arms folding behind his head. He's only armed with one blaster pistol right now, but he has the look of a "contract worker." "I suppose I could help Wally there - or wherever he is - by finding the rest of his friends. But I might want... well..." He leans forward again, elbows on the table, hands clasped together. "...reasonable monetary compensation for my time." A quick wink at her. He knows his game.

He eyes the paltry sum... but money is money... and accepts it... and then looks up at her. One finger pointed at her, though there's a smile on his face... head tilted, quickly able to tell the witch is a little taken with him, and using that to his advantage. "This 20 is my starting fee, and for leading Wally somewhere you could find him. Then it's 30 more for each additional pumpkin I find. That's 180 total... if I find all of them." He raises an eyebrow, folding his arms, keeping the bag tucked against his side. What an attitude. His several earrings jangle when he shifts. "I don't think that's altogether unreasonable... do you?" Ah, and that sly, smug smile again. Something inside his mouth, his tongue ring, clicks against the back of his teeth. Habit when he's doing business.

His eyes can't help but follow her hands to where she plucks out her business card. He accepts it, squinting at it, reading over it, occasionally noting whether or not she's keeping up her interest in him. Yep. Consistently interested. He'll have to ask for more on the next assignment. His eyebrows lift at her mention of his name, and he smiles, tucking the card away and extending his hand. There's a tattoo, his family seal, on the inside of his right wrist. "Alain D'Mourir. Pleasure to meet you... boss." He winks.

Well, he's going to play this for all it's worth. With a sly look at her, he lifts his hand to kiss it softly. Not something he usually does. So unlike a young mercenary leaning towards gruffness. But something tells him it'll work. "Likewise... Elly." Releasing her hand, he rises, one hand on his holster. Getting a bit of that swagger going on all ready, even just edging out from behind the table. "Now... if you'll excuse me..." Looking back at her. "...I've got some hunting to do." And he walks out the door, even brushing some big guy, his elbow pushing enough to nearly knock him into his drink. The big guy starts, ready to get up and get into a fight, but the door is already swinging shut...

Alain had become restless. His last mission fizzled out - whatever was going on soon no longer seemed worth investigating, and the woman on the opposite end of his contract apparently felt the same way, so he was left with nothing, or as close to nothing as he gets. Uninventive, grunt-type smuggling work. Shannon continued to wait tables, and money continued to come in from his end, too... but even when he said it was about the money, it really wasn't.

Even when he'd said that to a real mistress of Rhy'Din's underworld.

The young mercenary had come to recognize his capabilities, that he had more to offer than hiding illegal goods in plain sight. His new mission wasn't merely about economics... it was political. He had suspicions about certain mechanisms of the regional black market, and he took up a contract with the mistress to puzzle it out. But he would not work alone.

No... recently his path had crossed with a creature with an arrogant nonchalance, the same boredom as his own... and very similar interests...

"Where's Joe?"
"Wasn't feeling so hot. Took the rest of the afternoon off. Anywhere I need to put this stuff?"
"Ernie should be on the loading dock."
"Appreciate it, bro."
In an RPS uniform and sunglasses in order to hide just how nervous he felt about this mission, Alain wheeled the truck up to the loading dock, got out, and met up with Ernie, a middle-aged man with a pinched face. He had the same question.
"Hey, where's Joe?"
"Wasn't feeling too hot, so I took over for him..." Alain already had his arms around a box, and Ernie followed suit. "Neither am I, really. Hope nothing's going around..." The warehouse was pretty big, with boxes and crates reaching up to twenty feet and rooms on either side. On one side were the break room, the restrooms, things for the usual employees, some of the rooms up a flight of stairs... The other side, though, was hard to tell anything about, except that the regular employees didn't go there, probably. Six men in suits standing around that area of the warehouse, and from their poise, Alain could tell they were packing heat. He tried not to look too much, but pretty soon, they were looking the same way. Maybe wondering, Where's Joe?
They seemed too on edge. Six guns sitting on one little piece of paper around the clock? No organization was that wasteful unless they knew something was about to happen.
"Probably his ulcers," Bernie offered. "Girl he's with drivin' him crazy. Keep tellin' him he oughta ditch her an' move on, yeah?"
"Pray I see him tomorrow a single man."
Alain's stomach gurgled again. It had been doing that a lot on the drive over. Loud enough for people to hear. All part of the plan. He pulled a panicked face and looked over at Ernie: "Where's the bathroom, man?"
Ernie wrinkled his nose and pointed: "Up the stairs, on your right. And don't make too much of a mess!"
"No promises," Alain called over his shoulder, already jogging his way up the stairs. As soon as the bathroom door was locked behind him, he looked up. Just as he thought. Tiled ceiling. Before stepping onto the counter, he dug a sandwich out of his pocket, and scarfed it down. "Goddamn I'm hungry..." Hence the stomach noises.
He stood on the counter, pushed up on one of the tiles, pushed it out of the way... and climbed up. Already the ceiling creaked under his weight, and he grimaced. He was going to have to move fast, but moving too fast ran the risk of falling through the ceiling.
Someone else had taken notice that Joe wasn't there, and Alain could hear one of the suits talking to Ernie.
"...wasn't feeling too good. Been in the bathroom a while, come to think of it."
"What's his name?"
"Dunno..."
Alain tensed up for two reasons: one, he heard the suit running up the stairs; two, the tiles and narrow metal supports were creaking under his weight. He laid perfectly still and said a prayer, even when he heard the door get kicked in. In fact, he was perfectly still until he heard "HE'S IN THE CEILING!" For a long moment, the men murmured confusedly amongst themselves... until the ceiling tiles creaked again, and they opened fire.
White hot pain shot through Alain's torso as blaster fire pierced the ceiling tile and burned his shoulder. Instinctively, he scrambled, and the ceiling gave way, groaning, cracking and splintering, with a groan of his own as his bare arm was dragged and torn along the jagged edge of a metal support. He landed with a thud on a hard wooden surface, and had barely a moment to orient himself. People were shouting and shooting at him. He would have to think fast.