Parallel: United Front

Chapter 3: Double D

"Oh damn," Dayle muttered as he tapped the gauntlet's screen for the umpteenth time. The same message popped up whenever he scrolled to Map: Please connect to Terminal. Well, great. Due to the rain which had recently just passed, he was both wet, and lost, in a giant city, with no idea where he should be heading. At least, if nothing else, the rim of his hat had shielded his eyes from the pouring rain. It now sat in the gauntlet, still soggy from the rain.

Determined not to let a little situation get him down, Dayle obtained directions from a kind store owner. Armed with direction, and purpose, he returned to the ridiculously crowded streets. Really, if he didn't know any better, he would think he was still in New York, what with the impossible crowd density.

Teenagers on hoverboards flew overhead and on the main road, effectively dodging the traffic. Dayle made a mental note to get himself one of those as soon as possible. They really looked handy.

Maybe it was the luck of the day, or his heightened senses as a Radi, but somehow, muffled screams from an alley reached his ears despite surrounding noises. Dayle paused, for a moment not trusting his own ears. However, when the scream repeated, he elbowed his way past the throng of pedestrians, into the alley.

For an alley it was much neater than Dayle expected. The ground was pristine aside from a piece of paper someone had recently abandoned. He spotted a group of men gathered near a large dumpster to the side. Really? Dumpsters in the future? Developers probably just felt that particular detail wasn't important... Or maybe humans would still be using dumpsters thousand years in the future. Who knew? Either way, his main concern should be the B-list movie thugs gathered around it. He counted five.

"Hey guys," Dayle called cheerfully.

The thugs turned to face him, each man worthy of a WWE Championship belt, what with the muscles they were packing. Like any generic thug group, they sported lots of denim, and more jewelry than should be legally allowed. If he was to color code them by the dye they had chosen to use on their hairs, they would go: Red, Green, Orange, Pink and Indigo. Indigo shot, "Who the fuck're you?"

Redneck accent. Gotta respect the classics. Dayle glanced past the men to a huddled figure on the ground beside the dumpster. A girl judging from her figure. Long, dirty grey hair spilled over, shielding her face from view, but he noted a tattoo on her left arm. Her right was buried beneath her so he couldn't confirm if it was a twin tattoo. "A friend of hers." He pointed at the figure.

"You know Dee?"

Easiest name-get ever! "Yup," Dayle pronounced. Sure, every mentor and boss he'd ever had always had the same thing to say about this exact situation. But he'd never listened, and he wasn't about to start now. "Got a problem with her," Dayle thumbed at the girl, "You deal with me." He pressed the thumb to his chest.

The leader—he assumed he was the leader because he was the biggest—made a show of cracking his knuckles as he took a step towards Dayle. He raised his right arm high... then tapped Dayle's shoulder, a large grin on his face. "Why didn't you say so?" He hooked his arm around Dayle's neck, laughing madly. "Hey Dee!" Orange called, hook tightening ever so slightly round the smaller man's neck. "You didn't tell us you had friends."

"That's cuz I fucking don't Vega," cursed the girl called Dee as she rose from the floor, so she sat against the dumpster.

Dayle's breath caught.

Dee was stupid beautiful, and not in that supermodel kind of way. A single dark, auburn eye regarded him with disgusted suspicion, full lips pursed to match her scowl. A left eye was shielded from sight by long dark-grey curtains, but he could make out what seemed to be scarring beneath. A blood-red sleeveless vest left enough of a toned mid-riff to get the imagination working, but cargo pants ending in work boots covered all of her legs.