[Shade] Black and Red [Flara]

Graffiti. Graffiti everywhere. There was more graffiti on the walls of the East District than there were homeless people on the streets in the South District. Seriously, it wasn’t even funny.

Flara walked aimlessly on the sidewalk, brightly colored words surrounding her. The graffiti was really starting to piss her off. For God’s sake, the girl liked fighting, not writing cuss words on people’s walls. That was just annoying as hell.

Flara looked around for a graffiti-free building as she walked and failed to see the hooded person in front of her. BAM! That was the sound of two heads colliding.

“Shit,” Flara muttered as she stumbled a few steps back due to the collision. That girl (or was it a guy?) had a freaking iron skull. Flara rubbed her throbbing forehead before looking at the person in front of her. “Sorry.”

…Everyone was (literally) bumping into Flara these days, huh?

Ouch, goggles. That had to hurt pretty badly. “I wasn’t either,” Flara said quickly as a response to the other female’s words. “Anyways, I’m Flara. Nice to meet you.”

“Hey, you two! You’re blocking the way to the alley. Move it.” a thug told the girls. A huge group of brutes stood behind him but that sure wouldn’t stop Flara. She narrowed her eyes at the muscular man, giving them a death glare. “Like hell I’m going to follow your orders. I won’t move. Just try and make me.”

“You little brat! Fine, I will!” The thug threw a punch at Flara, who removed her duo steel pipes from her sack to block. The sound of bone hitting steel rang in the air as if to declare that the fight had started.

Flara swung one of her pipes at the man’s jaw, successfully knocking out a tooth or two. With her other pipe, she made an attempt to jab him in the stomach, only to have her wrist grabbed by a meaty hand. “...Let go of me,” she muttered in a deadpan voice. “Hah? Speak up, girly.” “I said to let go of me!” Flara snapped as she yanked her wrist away and gave the guy a powerful kick in the crotch. He doubled over in pain, moaning. The others that had been with this thug surrounded the two girls. “…If you want, you can get out of this…?” Flara offered to the other female in an unsure voice.

“Not by choice at least,” Flara responded, a violent grin sliding onto her face as the other girl prepared her weapon. “But I’m sure that you’d be able to−” “You two bitches ready to die now?” one of the men interrupted. Annoyance flashed in the girl's amber eyes. “No, but I’m guessing that you are.”

In an instant, both steel pipes made contact with either side the guy’s jaw line. Flara brought her weapons down to the floor and used them as a booster to jump up. Down came her foot on the enemy’s head; a heel drop kick. Two down, one army to go.

The group of men split in half, both clusters surrounding one of the girls. They held various weapons, ranging from baseball bats to oversized shears. From looking at their eyes, Flara could tell that some of them were Harbingers.

Actually, this was pretty pitiable. They needed a whole gang to fight two girls? The brunette didn’t hesitate to voice her thoughts. “Harbingers or not, you guys must suck pretty badly if you can’t even take on the two of us without an entire mob.”

“...Don’t screw with me! I don’t even need a weapon to beat some little girl like you!” roared the man closest to Flara. Trying to prove his point, he shoved his knife at another guy (nearly chopping off the poor male’s fingers) and threw a clumsy punch at her face. Flara easily stepped out of the way, causing the man to hit one of his comrades instead.

“…Kill her!” another guy shouted. Men charged at Flara from all directions.

Flara soon began to regret all of this. The thugs just. Would. Not. Stop. Coming. It was all just one stupid pattern: The thugs swing whatever weapon they had at Flara, trying to show their nonexistent skill. Flara would block some, parry some, and knock them down. K.O. Boring.

“Ugh, I’ll just end this right now,” the brunette muttered to herself. Deciding to go a little fancy, she jumped and threw her pipes as high up into the air as she could, the way her mother had taught her to do so with batons. Her hands free now, Flara went in for some good old-fashioned punching. Of course, she had to throw in some kicks as well, or she’d never finish in time to catch her weapons no matter how far above the ground she threw them.

The thugs lay on the floor all around Flara, like a bunch of dead flies. She’d received some damage as well: a punch to the stomach, two nicks to her left knee, and numerous scratches all over her hands. So much for getting through this unharmed.

Flara jumped up to catch her makeshift batons and landed back on the ground. Her stunt was completed. Or… Not. Flara only held a pipe in her right hand. Her left hand was empty. A rapidly spinning tube of steel was headed toward her temporary comrade. Shit.

“MOVE MOVE MOVE!” Flara yelled at the hooded girl. The pipe flew past her, barely missing her by a few centimeters and instead whacking a few thugs around her in the face. The enemies turned to stare at Flara, hopefully giving an opening.

“Hurry!”

Flara whipped around and scanned the people on the ground. She had heard that loud whisper. Eventually, her amber eyes locked on a rather wimpy looking dude who was apparently playing dead. And had a cell phone clutched in his hand. Like hell Flara was going to let him call for help.

“Yeah, right!” Flara roared, her one weapon coming down in a stabbing motion at the guy. To anyone watching, it probably looked like she was a crazy woman who was about to puncture the poor sap’s face. But, no, she was aiming for the phone; the phone which gave a satisfying crackle when it came in contact with a steel pipe.

Out of nowhere, a foot made contact with the brunette’s back, sending her staggering forward and dropping to her knees. She was too late; the backup was already here.

Spoiler: