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Inigo hated formal wear. What was the sense in wearing uncomfortably stiff shirts with far too many frills and buttons? To convey status? Surely there were more practical ways to do so.

The black wingless bat was dressing awkwardly in front of the guestroom mirror in preparation for some big business trip in which he was to escort his lovely employer. He had already put on the white undershirt, red vest, black pants, shoes, overcoat and belt, but the wretched cravat simply refused to become tied. He had been trying to tie it in front of the guestroom mirror for near five minutes now, and Inigo knew that his employer wasn't the type of woman to enjoy waiting around for another. Best to focus and recollect the steps she had taught him.

Take the right lace and bring it around the other and then bring it through the loop... or was that the next step? Dammit, what was it?

It was then that he heard a knock coming from the other side of the guestroom door. A soft female voice filled the room,

"Inny, are you quite finished yet? We're to leave fairly soon."

"Nearly done Alarice, just trying to get a hold of this damn cravat," he said with a hint of frustration as his human employer entered the room.

She was a lithe, pale human of average height, dressed in a beautiful flowing red gown with black silken gloves that surprisingly well matched her blond hair and grey-blue eyes. Inigo couldn't see her shoes, but he suspected she was wearing he favorite pair of long black boots with far too many rivets and buckles that she seemed to adore; it wasn't as if anyone could see what was on her feet past that incredibly long dress.

Alarice frowned slightly as she watched Inigo struggle with the piece of black cloth. "Didn't I teach you how to tie a cravat just yesterday? Have you already forgotten?"

Inigo gave her a guilty, childish grin in response. "You know talk about clothes always goes over my head. Back in my tribe and at the brothel I never had to wear a shirt, let alone tie one of these damn pieces of fabric."

Alarice sighed, but any sign of disappointment was gone by the time she reached Inigo's side. "Here, I'll tie it for you," she said as she turned him by his shoulders and began to properly tie the black cravat.

The close proximity suddenly made Inigo very aware that his glasses were drooping slightly. He readjusted them before he grinned again, a dirty thought popping into his head. "We wouldn't have this problem if you just let me escort you shirtless. How very much easier that would be for me," he said with a chuckle.

Alarice smiled. "You wish to show off your scars?" she said as she deftly formed the knot for the cravat.

The black bat gave a slight shrug. "Why not? Men fear and respect scars while women think of them as exotic and sexy, and I'm inclined to agree."

Alarice's response was a slight smirk. "I think you're exotic enough as you are Inny," she said, playfully flicking his stark red hair before she centered the cravat. It was now properly fastened to him, tight and uncomfortable. Alarice quickly examined the bat and smiled when she found him quite presentable.

"Come now, we should leave with due haste; Geoffrey and Faula are likely waiting for us by now."

*

It was a pleasant morning in Newport; children were playing on the sidewalks, carriages, and the occasional steam-powered vehicle filled the streets and men and women in fashionable (but surely stuffy) attire were walking elegantly to their workplaces. Granted this was one of the wealthier districts in Newport, but that didn't make the scenery any less pleasant, especially considering how there was not a cloud in the sky, an uncommon sight for the coastal city. Yes, it was a good day with good company.

Inigo always enjoyed walking with Alarice; he always felt like his red hair and black fur (which denoted his tribal origins) made him stand out but when he walked with her it seemed that nobody found him out of place. He chatted with her about simple things on the way, news, politics, sales, anything except the details of the coming business trip; it was her habit to hold off on the details until all members were together to hear them. It wasn't long before they reached their rendezvous point, a trendy little tea and pastry shop on the corner of the street. It was a store they frequently patronized, considering it was only a few blocks away from Alarice's estate and had some of the best tarts and brews in town.

As they entered the neat little store, the middle-aged mare behind the main counter eyed the human and bat suspiciously, but still gave them a polite "welcome". It wasn't terribly crowded, as it was past breakfast time for most, so there were only a few other customers scattered throughout the store's well-cleaned tables and booths. Inigo caught sight of Geoffrey and Faula, his coworkers, silently sitting together in the booth farthest in back.

The wolf and otter were both wearing the same red and black attire as Inigo; Alarice always made her bodyguards dress properly and uniformly. After all, a good image meant good business, or something to that effect. As Alarice and Inigo approached the chestnut booth the two were occupying, Faula's greeting was a polite and refined, "Are you well Miss Alarice?" while Geoffrey's was a simple, perfunctory nod; he never was the talkative type.

"Quite well, thank you," she responded, taking the open seat next to the brown wolf. Faula offered her employer a cup of tea that she had just poured, which Alarice politely accepted and daintily sipped.

Faula was a tall brown wolf in her late twenties with a taste for violence and well-brewed tea. She was incredibly fast on her feet and dangerous with a blade in her paw, as Inigo could attest to; he sparred with her quite often when he was freshly employed and now from time to time being more or less on her level. Sure, as bodyguards they mostly used their firearms to protect their employer, but as Alarice so eloquently said, "A proper bodyguard is prepared for all sorts of contingencies in combat", in which case Faula was quite the prepared individual.

Still, the woman was a complete prude. She absolutely refused all sexual offers and, according to hearsay, hadn't even done so much as kissed another. Inigo never understood why a woman would want to guard her lips and cunt so fervently, but then again, there were many things he didn't quite understand about the stern-looking wolf.

When Faula looked at Inigo, she did so with cold untrusting eyes, to which Inigo responded with a bright toothy smile. He then took his seat next to Geoffrey, a fairly short white otter, about five-foot-five or so, and the oldest one of the group at a bit over thirty years of age. He was a quiet, bookish individual, with tired blue eyes and often was lost in his own thoughts, but very skilled with firearms, and incredibly intelligent; he possessed an extensive, eclectic knowledge of many fields of study ranging from linguistics to ancient agriculture and could easily recite large passages from his readings verbatim.

Inigo had a very fond liking of the otter. This was mostly for the reason that back when Inigo was newly employed by Alarice and still illiterate (what with being a boy from a tribe that spoke a different tongue and all), Geoffrey had offered to teach Inigo how to read, seemingly out of the goodness of his heart, and the otter was absolutely an excellent teacher. With Geoffrey's apt instruction, it took hardly a month for the once illiterate bat to reach a fair level of written proficiency. Inigo eventually caught on that Geoffrey's offer wasn't purely an act of altruism, for in one of his later lessons, Inigo caught the otter staring at him with wanting eyes. Once Inigo caught on, their lessons weren't so much about reading afterwards.

"I ordered some of those pastries that you like Inny," Geoffrey quietly commented as he slid over a plate of three small-sized strawberry tarts to Inigo's side of the table. Inigo smiled; he really did love the pastries at this shop. Newport might not been his true home, but at least the food was good here.

"Thanks a thousand Geoff, do you want me to pay you back?"

"No, they didn't cost much," the otter said with a dismissive shake of his head.

Inigo inched his muzzle up to Geoffrey's ear and whispered in it, "I didn't mean with money," before he grabbed one of the tarts and suggestively lapped up some of the strawberry filling. Geoffrey blushed slightly and averted his gaze to the passing carriages and steam-powered vehicles out the window. Even when flustered, Geoffrey always seemed so bored and disinterested. The only time he seemed to have any energy was when he had a gun in his hand. Maybe that was why the otter took a job that seemed so mismatched for his personality; it had to be the only way for him to get his kicks. Inigo jammed the whole pastry into his muzzle and began chewing as Alarice put down her teacup and delicately cleared her throat,

"Now then, a quick synopsis and we'll be heading off." All eyes were directed to her. She folded her hands together. "Today's meeting is to be had with the leader of a local gang, the Black Hounds; I believe his name is Bartolomeu. For a while they were the only local provider of a certain high-class gunpowder, until I joined the market. They made me an offer to collude prices, but the 'request' they sent was less than courteous and a bit threatening," she said scornfully.

The other three furs at the table kept quiet waiting for her to continue. She took another sip of her tea,

"If they prove genuine and reasonable, I may very well take them up on their offer. But considering that they wish to rendezvous at an abandoned warehouse, I'm quite frankly expecting an ambush."

Inigo stopped chewing. They were to escort her knowingly to an ambush? He eyed his colleagues; Faula seemed just as perturbed as he was, but Geoffrey had a blank expression on his muzzle as most always did.

Alarice continued, "and if that's the case then I'll give the command to kill." Upon hearing this, Inigo nearly choked on the food in his mouth before he forced it down. Alarice waited for him to finish, "with extreme prejudice," she finished. A feeling of disquiet washed over Inigo; it had been a long time since he was last expected to kill, and he wasn't looking forward to doing it again.

"So we're probably walking into an ambush? Alraice, this sounds far too dangerous," he said, still rattled.

Inigo was surprised to see Faula nod her head in agreement, "for once, I agree with him."

Geoffrey just remained silent, quietly tapping his fingers again the table. It was one of those peculiar habits of his. Alarice seemed to be anticipating a disagreement. Her response was cool and collected,

"First of all these are gang members we're talking about; they'll resort to sabotage and other foul play if we don't confront them now, and I'm not about to bend to their will like some spineless mutt. Second, if it is a trap, it's going to be a poorly constructed one. Again, these are gang members, not trained assassins. They're hesitant to kill and their only strength is in numbers. Also, I'm more than familiar with the type of man their leader is: pompous, arrogant and loud-mouthed. He won't take the initiative to engage us until after he brags about how much better he is than me and what a fool I am for encroaching upon their fiscal territory. In those regards, we'll have the upper hand."

"And if they have guns?" Geoffrey commented softly, still looking out the window.

A faint smile crept up on Alarice's mouth, "What sort of an arms dealer would I be if I feared that which I sell? If they have guns then we shoot them first. You're wise to be cautious, but with your skills and the weaponry I've supplied you with, you three are possibly the deadliest furs in Newport." She furrowed her brows, as second guessing what she had said, "No," she corrected herself, "in all of Lehsunia. So there's nothing to fear and nothing to discuss; we'll be leaving shortly."

Faula seemed convinced enough, and Inigo thought he saw the faintest impression of a smile of Geoffrey's face. Alarice finished the last drops of tea and carefully placed her cup back down on the saucer.

"Geoffrey, would you be a dear and call a cab for us?"

*

"No Inigo, for the last time, I'm not going to have sex with you!" Faula exclaimed in exasperation to a grinning Inigo.

They had been riding for some twenty minutes in one of those new steam-powered vehicles that Inigo had a distaste for. Riding it was well enough, but just looking at all the gears and mechanisms visible on the underside of the vehicle made Inigo's head swim uncomfortably. He'd prefer a feral horse drawn carriage or even to walk, but Alarice was all about extravagance, so she would use nothing less than the fanciest and most expensive means of transportation. She, of course, was sitting in the front passenger's seat and was quietly reading a copy of the newspaper "Lehsunian Times" while the three others sat in back.

Inigo's grin persisted. He was particularly forward with his advances toward Faula today for no particular reason. He wasn't expecting anything to come out of it, but she was just too much fun to mess with, "But I still don't understand why. You say you don't want to, but you never tell me why that is, so it just makes me all the more curious."

She huffed angrily, "what part of 'I'm just not interested' do you not understand? There isn't any other reason besides that!"

Inigo chuckled; he always found her overstated reactions hilarious. "Oh come now, no one isn't at least interested. There's something you're not telling me, something scandalous undoubtedly, but what?" he pondered in an overly quizzical fashion, rubbing the red hairs on his chin in contemplation.

"I'm beginning to lose my patience, Inigo," Faula said through gritted teeth.

"Don't tell me, you have some disfiguration on your womanhood so hideous that all suitors flee in terror and declare you an abomination from the Nether!?"

Faula breathed in deeply through her nose in an attempt to calm herself. This was getting good,

"I'll take your silence as a yes. But you don't have to fear Faula, I'd bed you if even if you were stricken with the plague, lost all your fur and had your head chopped off; one little hideous disfiguration is nothing!"

"Alarice, may I slap him?" she practically shouted. Alarice was particularly disapproving of infighting, so Faula always had to ask whenever she wanted to slap Inigo; it was quite comical really. But Alarice's answer was always the same,

"No," she said curtly, eyes still on her newspaper, "but you may want to change topics at this junction Inny," She added, disinterested in their petulant behavior.

"There, will you leave me be now?" Faula said with a snarl.

Inigo frowned melodramatically. "Oh Faula, you're so cruel to me. Ah, the wicked ways of chaste women..." Inigo changed his focus to Geoffrey, who was looking quietly at the passing buildings and pedestrians to his right, "at least I'll always have Geoffrey to have fun with," Inigo chirped, embracing the otter in a playful hug.

Geoffrey jerked upwardly in surprise upon contact. "N-Not in public Inny; you're embarrassing me," he managed, blushing nervously. The poor otter looked like he was about to pass out from embarrassment. It was funny how such a timid man could make such a deadly bodyguard.

"Look how shy he is! Isn't that just the cutest thing? " Inigo said with a huge smile, giving Geoffrey a wet sloppy lick along his left ear.

"A-ah-ah!" Geoffrey stuttered, unable to form proper words upon feeling the wet sensation. Faula's response to this was a roll of the eyes, but Alarice's was vocal,

"Inny, please leave Geoffrey alone, you know he performs worse when you rattle him up like that," she stated calmly, her eyes still not leaving her newspaper.

"Aww..." Inigo whined in an overdramatic fashion as he let go of the startled otter.

It wasn't long before they reached the assembly of warehouses by the docks, the panda chauffeur parking on the street in front of the first row. Alarice was the last to get out as she was the one who paid the panda chauffeur; the price was about three times the cost of a carriage, but such was price of luxury.

"Is everyone fully loaded?" Alarice asked once the panda was safely out of earshot.

"Yes," they all responded in unison.

"Good." Alarice's eyes began to scour the warehouses; thankfully there weren't too many dock workers at the time. "Mmm, ah, there it is, Warehouse Five," she said, pointing to a dilapidated warehouse past three other warehouses (in much better shape) to their left.

"Alright, standard formation: Inny to my left, Geoffrey to the right, and Faula in back. Let's do this," she said as they got into formation and headed to the rundown warehouse.

The front gate to the warehouse was wide open, and the first thing that Inigo noticed was that there were crates stacked up high to the left of right past the entrance in a staggered fashion such that it would be easy to hide people behind them. Inigo wasn't sure what he disliked more about the place, the ominous aura or the pungent stench of mold.

Reaching of clearing of crates, man waiting inside, his back facing more stacked crates, with four men on his left, and three to this right. He was a black Doberman, well dressed in a black suit and purple tie with a menacing look on his gruff muzzle. With a distance of about ten feet away from the Doberman and his men, Alarice raised her hand, signaling Inigo and the others to stop.

"Well met, mister Bartolomeu," she said politely.

The dog made a tsk_ing noise, "there you are. I was wondering if you were going to show, _Alarice," he said with a sneer.

"I'm right on time," she responded simply.

Bartolomeu gave an unamused grunt, "sorry but I'm going to have to spare you the pleasantries here. Ya see, I didn't actually invite you over here to negotiate. We're here to make demands."

"Oh?" Alarice said calmly, not surprised in the slightest. Despite how calm his employer was, Inigo tensed up as he noticed that Bartolomeu and all his men had gun holster hanging by their legs. This was going to be ugly.

The Doberman's eye twitched slightly at Alarice's nonchalant response, "As you already know, I'm an important business man here in Newport with a reputation to uphold, so I can't have stupid whores like you undercutting my prices and stealing my customers," he said with venom in his tone. As the Doberman was talking, two men appeared behind them from behind the crates, a bear and a husky, effectively blocking off the way out; they were hiding behind the crates before, undoubtedly. As the bear and started approaching the party, another two, a lynx and a tabby cat showed up behind them as well. The bear and husky were now right up to the party, on either side of Faula, hands in their pockets and grinning threateningly. This did not bode well. Bartolomeu's eyes were like daggers as he continued, "you are to close up shop immediately, or there will be some unfortunate complications that you'll be forced to deal with. And by complications, I mean we'll fucking kill you."

Some of Bartolomeu's mean began sniggering at his comment, but Alarice wasn't intimidated in the least. She smiled at him, "I don't think you quite understand your situation good sir. I took a look and noticed that your men are armed with single shot derringers, old models at that. Terribly inaccurate, known to misfire, and all in all unreliable. Says a thing or two about the quality of your enterprise."

Some of the gang members seemed confused; they looked at Bartolomeu, waiting for his response. The black dog just glared at her angrily.

Alarice continued, "while my personnel are each equipped with the latest and most expensive firearm to date; the Firemane Revolver. They yield deadly accuracy and are light-weight with separately rotating firing chambers; each one cost me a small fortune. Your guards are children with toys compared to my men. I'd say it would take less than ten seconds to dispatch them all."

Bartolomeu's men began to look at each other nervously, their weapons still in their holsters. It seems Alarice's intuition was correct; this was a poor attempt at an ambush. His men seemed as though they weren't expecting a fight, so if Inigo and the others took the initiative... Bartolomeu grunted angrily,

"Shut your damn trap, you stupid bitch. There're twelve of us of only four of you. There isn't shit you can do."

Alarice smiled wickedly, "Are you going to bark all day little puppy," she took off the silk glove on her right hand, "or are you going to bite?"

She snapped her fingers; it was the kill command.

In a flash, Geoffrey snatched his loaded revolver from underneath his overcoat and shot behind his shoulder with a loud bang. The bullet cleanly pierced through the unexpecting husky's left eye and killed him instantly, his blood and brains splattering across the already filthy floor. Without missing a beat, Geoffrey brought his gun back in front of him and opened fire on the startled eight furs in front of him.

Catching the opportunity of a freed flank, Faula grabbed the bear to her left by the wrist and shoulder, arched him forward and tripped him one with a quick sweep of her left leg. While he was still falling, with lightning quick speed, she drew her dagger in one hand and her revolver in the other before stabbing the fallen bear through the throat right after he hit the ground. He wasn't dead until she then shot him through his forehead. Her attention then shifted to the two frightened felines behind her. She removed the knife from the dead bear's throat and charged.

Inigo too drew his revolver and opened fire on the furs in front of him, albeit he wasn't quite as fast to do so as Geoffrey. He was able to get four chest shots off, killing two men to Bartolomeu's right before the other grunts had time to draw their guns. He was a pretty good shot, but nowhere near Geoffrey, who could consistently make successful headshots on moving targets, and who had already felled three more foes with a single shot each. Inigo noticed one of Bartolomeu 's men on Geoffrey's side, the cheetah, attempting to flee, but Geoffrey promptly shot him between his shoulders before he could run past the crates and out of sight; he didn't make it much farther.

The only remaining Black Hound grunt facing them, a young orange fox, finally drew his gun and fired it clumsily at Inigo. The bat jerked to the side fast enough that the bullet only made glancing contact with his right arm and immediately fired back, the bullet making contact with the fox's belly. The young fox dropped his gun and fell to his knees while covering the grave wound with both paws, all the while shouting in pain while as tears formed in his eyes.

The fox was as good as dead; Inigo attempted to mercifully finish him with a headshot. But the bullet didn't make contact with his head; instead it pierced him through his left shoulder. The fox gave off a primal scream, one that sent a chill through Inigo's spine, before collapsing on his back, the life slowly draining from him.

Inigo was then terribly aware of how much his claw was shaking.

At that time Faula regrouped with her companions. "Back flank's clear," she stated proudly. Inigo glanced back and saw the bloody corpses of the other two gang members that Faula had undoubtedly killed.

At this point Bartolomeu was the only adversary remaining. He had attempted to drawn his gun, but Geoffrey deftly shot it out of his paw before the Doberman could use it, disarming Bartolomeu and causing him to yelp in surprise. Geoffrey reloaded in a matter of seconds and then pointed his gun back at Bartolomeu who now shaking in place in utter disbelief.

Alarice hadn't moved from her spot during the entire fight. She was now glaring at Bartolomeu 's quivering person and smiled. "Well, well, well, guess I was right; it only took nine seconds. I was counting you see," she said mockingly as she took Geoffrey's revolver and started making her way toward a still shaking Bartolomeu.

The Doberman's eyes grew wide as he watched the armed human slowly approach him, his terror now palpable. He began to back up. "Wait, wait, stop! Don't kill me! I-I'll do anything for you if you don't! I'll be your ally, I'll even lick your boots!" he said holding both his paws up in the air surrendering fashion. The Doberman soon backed up into the crates and couldn't retreat any farther.

Alarice approached him. "Oh please, if I wanted an ally like you..." her ladylike composure became something malicious, as she stuffed the barrel of her gun up the Doberman's muzzle. His ears folded down pathetically and he began whimpering in fear.

"I'd just squat down and shit one out."

Bang.

A grim silenced persisted in the room; the loudest noise was the ringing in Inigo's ears from the gunshot. Alarice removed the gun from the dog's muzzle as he slid to the ground, walked back to Geoffrey and returned the gun to him. She then picked up her fallen silk glove and slid it back on to her arm, "I'd say this a successful meeting," she stated proudly.

Successful my ass.

"We just killed twelve people," Inigo replied grimly, a solemn expression on his face.

Alarice shifted her vision toward Inigo; there was ice in her eyes. "Inny, those men were nothing but thugs, scoundrels and extortionists. They're more useful to the world dead than alive, so you need not feel remorse for what we did."

Inigo discarded his dower expression with a bright smile, "Yeah you're right, sorry, I don't know what came over me."

Alarice returned the smile. "Glad you see it my way. Come now everyone, let's leave this unsightly area." With Faula and Geoffrey following, Alarice began making her way out in that exceptionally refined manner of hers, but Inigo stayed where he was, looking at his still trembling trigger claw. Geoffrey took notice and turned around while Faula and Alarice continued out.

"Are you coming Inny?" the otter asked.

For a short while Inigo said nothing and continued looking at his claw. He eventually looked up and quietly said, "Just give me a second here."

Geoffrey seemed disquieted by Inigo's distinctly not cheerful behavior. "Well, alright. Just don't linger for too long or we'll leave you behind," he said before catching up to the others.

When the others were out of sight, Inigo began to really soak in his surroundings. Three men killed by Faula, a bear a lynx and a tabby cat. The lynx had two bullets in his stomach and the tabby was covered in knife wounds and had a bad case of rigor mortis, still desperately clinging onto his pistol in death. The bear's head rested in a pool of blood, the fur around his throat soaked red. The five men that Geoffrey had killed, a husky, badger, raccoon, deer and cheetah were the messiest. Most of them were shot in the head; Inigo could make out small chunks of grey matter sitting in the ample pools of blood around their dead bodies.

Yes, dead, the people here were dead, their spirits sent off to the great Unknown. It took hardly a minute for these twelve men to become nothing but corpses on the ground. Inigo sighed in spite of himself; he used to hate violence, blood and death, but for Alarice, the only person in the world he truly cared about, he would learn to tolerate it. It was as she said,

If you're going to work with me then you must learn to tolerate blood and accept death. From where you stand now, you need to see the world differently.

Strangely enough, after she said that she gave him a pair of glasses. He knew it was a joke, but he took it to heart. The glasses were a symbol of his devotion to her; he was no longer a child who was weapons and violence as abhorrent and despicable; he was a man who understood their necessity. But still...

Inigo walked up to the three men he had killed and looked at the fox, blood still flowing from the hole in his chest and an expression of terror and fear still etched into his muzzle. Getting a better look at his muzzle, Inigo realized that this fox couldn't have been older than sixteen.

I wonder...

Inigo took off his glasses and looked at the dead fox; it became the corpse of a bat, the likeness of the one he saw that night his tribe was raided, the adolescent that resisted capture and was slain. In a panic Inigo tightly shut his eyes and put his glasses back on. When he opened his eyes the corpse a fox once again. Inigo shook his head, turned around and made his way out of blood-stained warehouse.

"Gods forgive me."