The horrible case of the Bunny Robber

Aideen looked surprised when the bag of loot made it's way into her hands, and almost considered taking Bon Bons offer. This was going to get her a lot of money. Too much she knew what to do with... Besides. She didn't earn all of it anyway. "Bons. You're the one that came to me. The one that had an army of rabbits that held off guards and freaking angel boy. If I wasn't there, you'd have used them to knock all those mercs to the ground. But you hired me and I got you out of there with the loot. I'm good help. That is because of you. Now. Take your loot... And tell me my cut. Boss. Also, we should go, in case shirtless and angry get out and after us. I did take quite a bit."

Jake frowned at the man, the wall of shadows, and the man again. Before deciding that he'd take the advantage as it came. The man wasn't attacking yet, and he was okay with that, but it seemed, Johanna wasn't having any luck with finding the jewel. He could tell, she was asking for his help.

"I can only see the living and the dead, this place is filled with things that would outline other things..." Even with his words, he used his sight to look, to really look. He could see the shape of a great many deal of things, but he couldn't truly define anything. Luckily, he did know what the outline of the jewel was, and there were a few similar outlines.

"Over there! And there! And over there. Three areas that have the jewel like shape." Jake called out, his arm pointing to each location. Okay, they were close, he just had to wait and... Where was the tall guy?

The next moment, Jake felt something slice though his shoulder of the arm that had been pointing, yet he felt no pain. In fact, he didn't feel anything, his arm dropped, as if the nerves, the ability to use it, became obsolete. The tall man stood behind Jake now, his scythe having just sliced past the boys shoulder, the blade turning to a ghostly image before solidifying back to what looked like a real blade. "Tick... Tock... Girl." The man said as Jake jumped away from him, his arm flailing about uselessly.

The pale girl stared at Aideen and then back to the bag of money. Was this chick for real? A gloved hand reached out and grabbed the satchel. The bandit brought it to her face and began to look through it. Two of her armored little friends floated along side her. As she looked up from the bag, she looked to the two bunnies and nodded. “We’ll split it fifty fifty. But only this once ok? I don’t want you getting the wrong idea or anything. Heist was my idea anyway.” she said crossing her arms and pouting.

Johanna had turned her attention away from the display case she had just smashed. Jake despite what he had said, managed to give her some sort of clue. He pointed to three different locations in the dark. *Great just gre-* Her train of thought faded as she watched the boys arm go limp. The scythe wielding man had done something to Jake. Johanna had to use every ounce of her strength as she could feel herself ready to burst with anger. Her turquoise eyes locked onto the tall man and narrowed. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

As she shouted at the man, the flames around her bellowed and grew. The ashen haired girl noticed this and then thought about what the man had told her about the jewel. It responded to magic. Her power was kind of magical right? Maybe. “You touch him again, and I’ll introduce you to a side of me you’d not want to see.” As she spoke the flames began to grow more rampant and out of control. The aura around the girl began to expand little by little.

She looked up to Jake with a slight smirk. “Get ready to make a mad dash.” She then hunched over and began to focus. Her mind drifted from the current predicament and trailed off to more bitter memories. Her thoughts began to fill with things she detested most. Her parents, her mother, all the lies. Each one of these life changing moments in her life fueled the raging fire around her. As she chose to focus solely on those memories, the aura around her grew exponentially and literally flooded the area. Heat emanated from her body and the air began to grow heavy. As the aura grew, a faint glimmer began to poke through the darkness. It was the jewel.

Aideen smiled as the bandit took the bag of loot. A smile that didn't show much, but Aideen was quite pleased with the outcome. Bon Bon was the kind of person that might hire her again. If she had quit now... It'd be annoying. "More then I hoped. It'd be a pleasure to work with you again." The speedster demon finished, a satisfied smir- smile. On her face.

Jake tried to move his arm a little more, but found that he just... Couldn't feel it from where the scythe had cut. He poked it, yet found he could... Bloody hell what kind of scythe was that? Lost control yet still could feel it. That freaked the boy out. Not as much as Ann seemingly getting angry at the action did however.

The tall man resided where he was, looking bored and tapping the scythe again, but the flames, the air. It seemed he did not care for them, in fact, he reached into his back pocket and pulled out a small stone like shape, throwing it towards the roof where a shadow caught it, taking it into the darker areas of the vault.

Letting go of his scythe, it sank into the ground as the man walked forward and clapped his hands. In a moment, the darker area of the bank would seem to lose...Color, as if something was taken from it. And when Johanna received the Jewel, a shadow would spring to life right in front of her, opening up like a flower to reveal a dice shaped rock. "Keep it. Someone gave it to me but it might as well be better off in your hands. Just crush it when you need help I guess." He finished as shadows and darkness curled around him, building and building till he couldn't be seen, right before all the shadows that seemed to reside in the room shot to the roof of the bank's underground, going clean though it.

And right after, the shadows vanished and the man was no where to be seen, the wall of darkness that had held off the mercenary turned to wisps of left over power and a horde of foes charged in. Yet the roof now had a generous sized hole, a hole that seemed to sprout. Sunlight. Jake, who didn't know where Ann was in her findings, turned to the army and got low for a moment, readying to jump. "Spider! Get what you can. I'll distract." He finished as he jumped towards a group, feet planted on someone, kicked off them and back flipped back to his position, the merc himself forced back into a group, creating a domino effect.

Johanna had watched as the odd man and his shadows blew a hole in the vault roof and then vanished, but not before leaving her with a strange present. She only opened her eyes for a moment when the man told her to use it if she ever needed help. It was a very strange and confusing gesture indeed. Still, she couldn’t lose focus on her bad memories, so she ignored the strange rock before her. She had to keep the jewel alight long enough for Jake to get to it. That however was going to be a whole different problem.

With the scythe wielding figure nowhere to be seen, all the shadow constructs he had summoned, faded with him. This meant the mercenaries he had been holding back could now enter the room and attempt to stop the two teens. Johanna had half hoped Jake would do the smart thing and rush for the gem like she had said, but when did he ever do something she expected him to do. Releasing a sigh at Jake’s words, Johanna began to rotate her body so she could see the rest of the vault. She maintained the raging aura in order to keep the jewel lit.

The aura would also serve to help Jake a little as the air would be heavy enough to slow the mercenaries down. With the open hole in the roof of the vault, Johanna could make out the rest of the display cases now. It appeared Aideen hadn’t taken everything like Johanna had thought. Still, as much as she wanted to take the rest of the stuff here, the jewel was top priority. With a grunt of exhaustion, Johanna exerted her will on her power. The flames intensified one last time and the jewel began to shine extremely bright.

The young thief would take a collected breath. Her eyes focused on the glowing stone. With all the strength she had been building up, Johanna launched herself at the jewels case and smashed right through it. She rolled on the ground as she moved past the case, but as she rose she looked to her metal hand. In her palm was an egg shaped jewel that shone as bright as the sun. Her eyes trailed from the jewel to the rest of the cases. All this loot was hers for the taking, and it would piss off a lot of people. “Give me five minutes!” she shouted.

Using her boosted strength, Johanna resorted to literally launching herself at each display case. Smashing through each, Johanna would grab the contents as she passed through the glass until the vault was completely empty. “Alright pigeon, time to make our great escape!”

It was luck they were all banged together, luck that Jake could feel the weight of the air and... Ignore it somewhat. He had felt aura like this before, but that aura forced him to his knees after some resistance. And it was so much more stronger then what Ann was giving off now.

So as he jumped and kicked and threw and got shot at a few times, he did the best he could do without an arm. And when she called for five minutes... He jumped. He kicked and he threw a lot harder. Maybe it was five minutes. Maybe it was less. Maybe it was even more. Jake wasn't actually sure. But by the time Ann called for her name for him, his 'codename.' So that no one could really get their names right now.

He noticed he had a few cuts, for he swore a few of them had swords. Swords!? For crying out loud, and weird swords at that if they could cut him with ease. Then again, he had noticed a few of these mercs were faster then others.. Stronger then others... He just shook his head and jumped up, twisting and kicking someone at the same time, he looked to Ann and nodded. "Then go!" She had her webs. She could shoot up to the hole and get out, he'd follow. But before he could make a move, a man climbed out of the ground from below him, the tall man to be exact, he held out a stone to him, frowning, a look that Jake shared. He didn't have time for this.

Swiping it, Jake then jumped and dropped kicked the man, who looked surprised for a moment as he flew back into several others, not as many as before however, out of the doorway, they were beginning to surround him. Jumping back to his feet with ease, Jake thanked for the first time today that he didn't have his shirt on, his wings exploded out his back and he jumped into the air, flying to the hole in the roof to make his escape.

As he made it to the hole, his wings would retract to his back as he made the climb up. The hole itself led into the bank, but even more holes showed that the underground banks roof was not the only roof, but all of them, right to the exit. And he'd take them, or if Ann had a better idea, follow her. After all, he was here because of her.

The thief nodded at Jake’s words. He didn’t need to tell her twice to make a break for it, especially with all this loot. But then again, the girl had grown to have feelings for the boy and couldn’t just leave him behind. So, she’d leap up through the hole in the roof and eagerly await for Jake to follow her. Sure enough, Jake would shoot through the opening in the vault. The boy shot all the way up to the roof of the bank. Johanna would follow him, but not before sealing up the holes with some of her webbing to make sure the mercenaries wouldn’t follow them.

Johanna would do this for each hole she leapt through, until she finally joined Jake on the roof of the bank. They were extremely lucky that the bank was tucked away between a bunch of tall buildings otherwise they would have had a helicopter to deal with. At least that’s what Johanna was thinking, and she turned her gaze skyward to make sure they wouldn’t have any unwanted attention. She’d turn to Jake and throw her arms around him.

There was a large smile on her face, and she was laughing. It wouldn’t last long as Johanna realized what she was doing and quickly put some space between her and Jake. “You tell anybody about this and I’ll kill you.” she said clearing her throat. She’d place the bag of loot on the ground, where it would land with a soft thud. Opening the top, Johanna peered inside. This had to be one of her more successful heists. The fact it occurred during the day without any planning, and interference from that pale girl and her rabbits meant that it was going to be hard topping this outing.

Shuffling past all the artifacts and items Johanna had stolen from the vault, she pulled the jewel from the bag. Despite the aura dying down and being nothing more that wisps of smoke, the jewel still lit up in Johanna’s palm. “What do you suppose is so special about this thing anyway?” she said holding the jewel out for Jake to inspect.

Making it to the roof, with the exit being covered by Ann, Jake had a moment to just breath. His arm still felt useless, but his heart hammered and he felt like he was going to need to take a shower... Somewhere. Soon.

And when Johanna came up to join him, he gave her a smile. Despite all the set backs, they did it. They made it and they got what they where planning on stealing this entire time. A jewel shaped like a egg among other things. Yet the entire day could not have prepared him for the singular action of having Ann really close and her arms around him. That. Left him speechless.

And she was laughing, a laugh that Jake couldn't help but match. This... This was a day he wouldn't be forgetting soon, the boy knew that all too well. And while he was a little saddened when Ann suddenly returned to her norm, asking him to forget what just happened, Jake couldn't help but laugh a little more, before shutting his mouth, a grin yet remaining. "Yep. Sure." He all so happily said as she began to look though what she had taken while he distracted the swarm that would most likely be making a effort to find them soon, but for now, it seemed like they had the entire world at their fingers. And he loved the feeling of it.

Yet there was still a mystery. The egg. It reacted to magic, which was, in itself, a surprise. It meant that it had some magical use. But he wasn't sure what the hell it could be. "Who knows... Maybe it just glows in the presence of magic. Maybe it does something. All I know is. It's yours now. To sell or keep." Jake finished, deciding that he didn't need to solve every mystery that presented itself to him right now. No... Right now he was just happy to be close to someone he cared about. Cause he didn't have a lot of people like that.

Thinking that, Jake felt the dice like stone in his pants pocket, placed midst his climb, grow heavy. Offered to Ann, she hadn't accepted it. The real mystery was. Who the hell was that tall guy. That he was pretty sure, wouldn't be answered, but his words... His words could be. He didn't want to think about them too much, but the feeling wasn't great. The treatment he seemed to give Ann was uncanny. And why the hell did he need to give something like this to her? To him? Crush it when in need? Shaking his head, he just kept up a smile, wondering what was next... Oh... What was next? Did he take some of the loot... Should he?

Johanna retracted her hand and stared at the egg. Despite all its shining brilliance, Johanna could see that the stone was old, like BC old. “Hmmm.” she thought aloud. She knew people that could date the jewel and could give her an explanation as to why it glowed the way it did. The only problem with that, was that she had just stolen this jewel from some underworld boss or slimeball criminal. If they knew she had the jewel they would most certainly try to get it back. That was a risk Johanna could take, but didn’t want to.

She examined the egg shaped gem a little more before sliding it into the bag. She knew exactly who she could ask about the gem. As a matter of fact he was there on the roof with the two teens, he had been with them the entire time but refused to show himself. Still, she wouldn’t call him out. If he wanted to be mentioned he would have shown himself. That and he no doubt knew Johanna knew he was nearby the entire time. Instead of calling out the demonic fluffy black cat, Johanna knelt down and began to rummage through the bag.

“Look I know you’re broke and all so here.” the ashen haired teen said. She reached into the bag and pulled out a stack of money and held it out for Jake to take. That was until she realized he really didn’t have anywhere to put it. “You really need to work on your wardrobe.” Johanna would drop the money back into the bag. “come on, lets go get you some proper clothes and a decent way to transport all this money.” She walked to the edge of the bank and swung the bag of money and loot over her shoulder before looking over her shoulder at the boy. With a slight nod of the head she signaled for him to follow her. Today had been an overall success and interesting day. As Johanna leapt off the building and began to swing off through the city, Jake no doubt in toe, she thought about the jewel. Identifying it would be an adventure for another day.

(THE END)