[sylvanSpider]

Marco should have seen it. It was one of the possibilities that he saw, certainly, but it was one of the least likely; he shouldn't have been pursued. The twins from earlier seemed to just watch him leave, but out of nowhere there was another predator. Gasping when something latched onto his leg, he shook it until eventually a large piece of his pant leg was missing but he continued to run.

Of all of the planets Marco could have chosen to live on, he had to choose Ariacan. It made the most sense given his talents, sure. He was great at showbiz so long as no one talked to him after. Hell, he was even willing to give out autographs so long as everything was done through the mail, but the lad was shy. Unbearably so. Much more than he'd ever care to admit. As such, he'd always been sort of a loner, too afraid to talk to anyone that might become an exception to the rule. As far as he was concerned, there were no exceptions that could possibly come. Each and every person that he met caused the same anxiety, and now he had all the more reason to fear them.

And while Ariacan for the past several months had been good to him—he'd earned his living doing what he loved, shooting for show rather than necessity—he knew that it was a place crawling with bounty hunters. Ariacan attracted more than just tourists, although there were certainly more than enough of those. The employees of the tourist trap were always said to add a certain amount of reality to the illusion of the Old West, but a lot of that was because a lot of them were of the rougher, the more tumbling, crowd. They were the kind to get plastered in the saloons after the sun set and the tourists went to bed, and a lot of them came here to hide out.

But, that brought forth yet another kind of face one could see in the crowds of Ariacan: bounty hunters. For every five or six wanted unchecked employees there was a bounty hunter hunting and ready to collect. This was the side of Ariacan that few bothered to look for. Marco didn't fit into any of these crowds. Not initially, at least. He was a good man just looking to earn his pay through an honest day's work, and that's how he made it, at least...until he became wanted himself for apparently being too good.

He looked behind him, his right eye once again going crazy with possibilities until he was able to calm himself down and look at the passing faces rationally. Most, here at least, were tourists. He leaned against the wall panting and out of breath, closing his eyes if only for a brief moment. He was getting a head ache, probably due to his right eye putting in so much work, but he needed to survive. There was no knowing what they'd do to him once he was brought in alive.

Though, it was peculiar that he was wanted alive. Generally cheaters were wanted dead and a corpse would suffice. What would they possibly want with him alive?

=-=-=-=-=

“Oi! Damon! Get a load of this shit!” Roek exclaimed rapping his knuckles on one of the many wanted signs adorning the city. The twins, while there as tourists, were all too aware that the wanted posters were indeed authentic and had seen several instances of their own mug just walking down the street.

“Well, ah'll be damned,” Damon murmured under his breath, “The bloak's wanted! Says 'ere 'e's a cheatin' rat! D'ye buy it?”

“Giv'n 'is countenance? Not a bit. Bloak's innocent. Still though, makes ye scratch yer chin, don't it? What'd 'e do t'deserve this?” Damon looked closer at the mug shot. Yeah, the artist really did do a nice job, but then, they got plenty of practice and the twins had a gay old time comparing their mug shots with the other. Left out one of the O's in their last name though. Rookie mistake. The pair laughed at this and joked about what they'd do if they found him again. If he was decent enough they'd ask A'vi if they could keep him as a pet. They'd done it before, though the last one didn't make it very long. Tragic story having something to do with a misunderstood statement and an incredibly faulty exploding escape shit.

Ah well, what's done is done. They meandered their way into one of the shows going on. A burlesque show by the looks of it with some fancy looking broad singing and dancing on the stage. She was just finishing up when the twins showed up, drinks in hand and clinking their mugs together shouting things like “Such showmanship!” and “Brava! Brava~! Bravisime!” as if they were at some fancy opera or other.

When the crowd stopped cheering for the performer, Damon nudged Roek. “Did ye catch 'er lookin' at ye? Like she wanted t'eat ye...” he whispered.

“Yeah, I saw it...Bounty hunter?”

“Definitely.”

The twins had had their share of bounty hunters after them and ninety-eight percent of them wound up dead. The other two percent were paralyzed. They had a habit of turning the predator into the prey in which they would lead their hunter all over the fucking place only to turn around on them when they thought they had them and, more often than not, burn them alive or simply....blow them up. If Miss Dancer wanted to be added to the list, she was welcome to try.