Below 13’s swinging feet thousands of monsters trampled the overcrowded streets, pushing and jostling against each other. Even from the roofs, their noise created a mindless, incessant buzz. It grinded her already spent temper.

Maybe calling them monsters was unfair. Monsters were ignorant of the world around them, desiring only to eat and to reproduce. But the ones below her? Take my neighbor, take my child, but oh god just don’t take my life.

Disgust welled up in her stomach. She gritted her teeth. Not yet. She needed to wait a few more seconds, and she needed to remember that she was no better. Maybe even worse. Her left hand rested on the green skull on her lap. Its smooth top felt as revolting as plunging her hand into a warm body. In her right she held a scabbard that was taller than her. So much worse.

Someone stepped onto the roof.

13 snapped her head around. Walking towards her was a tall woman in a dark suit with a white buttoned-up shirt and a black tie. Her hair was the color of the moon. It stretched down to her shoulder blades, where two sheets of glossy purple silk protruded from. The ends were morphed into tridents. They slid forward and rose like snakes.

13 turned back to her front, looking at the walls surrounding the city that rose higher than the clouds.

The surrounding noise faded. 13 only heard metal heels hitting concrete, getting closer and closer with each click. 13 wanted to be angry, but instead she was disappointed and tired. So tired.

With a whistle the Ranker sat down next to her. She took 13’s hand into her own. Each one of her fingers had a purple metal extension split into three different segments, stacked one on top of another, that mimicked how the bones of a finger bent. They seemed more suitable to interact with precise machinery than flesh.

“Out for some morning revenge, are we?” she said, placing 13’s index finger on her palm.

Justice, 13 wrote. The skin she touched wasn’t young nor old. She could not guess at an age. The Ranker’s voice was even more perplexing. It was deep and amused, and spoken with a smile. She knew I can’t speak. That meant she knew who 13 was, and what she was about to do—would have done.

“Lovely,” she said, not sounding impressed. Her sight fell on the skull. “That’s a peculiar looking Augmenter.” She reached for it, inserting her finger into the eye socket, and reeling it in circles. She flung it in the air and caught it facing her. Another finger slid down the nasal bone, causing sparks to fly, but no mark was left. That gave pause. A minor pause, but a pause, nevertheless. That probably meant something. 13 didn’t care. She just wanted this to be over with.

“Marvelous,” the Ranker whispered, pressing her forehead against it. She hummed, her tridents swaying in an uncanny rhythm, like an upside-down pendulum.

13 shivered. It might have been the cold, but mostly it was fear.

Fear? Fear for what? Lady Death was sleeping on 13’s lap a moment ago.

“From nothing, to the richest girl history will ever have the pleasure of hearing,” she said, leaning forward and placing her cheeks on her palm. She looked at 13 with a frown. Her eyes were hidden behind purple coated lenses. “But where do we even begin with you? You have the grim looking skull, a key symbol of human nature really, yet you didn’t even commit to that style.” She motioned towards the empty roof with one of her tridents. “You’re going to bring death and destruction in this beautiful sunny day? The roof isn’t even riddled with the corpses of your enemies, and these rags on your chest.”

Half of 13’s shirt was burnt black. The other was riddled with so many cuts and bruises it was at its last thread. The Ranker shook her head. “They’ll laugh before they fear you, which is of course a wonderful style all by itself, but you must smile, laugh, and joke for it to work—three skills that you seem terribly lacking in.”

Any second now. 13’s head would be impaled, the trident’s little blades each scooping out her eyeballs while the central one took out her brain, and her corpse would splash against the ground below. The filthy things underneath her will lick the blood off the ground with a smile on their faces, all while praising their idols.

13 began to shiver. They were fierce, almost uncontrollable. Her fist tightened and her teeth clenched until she felt them shudder. She fumed underneath until her body felt like it was going to burst.

But minutes passed and nothing happened. She waited longer, she had to admit the breeze was pleasant and the sun was fresh on her skin, but her head remained whole. The anticipation quickly became unbearable. She turned towards the Ranker, unsure of whether this was part of some sadistic act.

The Ranker was smoking a poorly rolled cigar. She took in a deep breath, then coughed it out. “Oh my, the things the kids do these days!” she said, laughing loudly. She raised it in front of her, inspecting each side curiously. “Lunch break, love,” she explained, distracted. “Lunch break.” One of her tridents dangled the skull in front of 13.

13 reached for it.

The Ranker swayed it back just out of range of 13’s fingertips. “I offer you a deal,” she said, lowering her cigar and looked up. Way up. Her head rolled on her shoulders as she stared into the sky above them. “You’ll have your little friend back on the condition that you’ll spend the next three years under my instruction.”

Like hell I will. What 13 will do is kill the Ranker at the first opportunity she gets, and that’s only if 13’s body doesn’t combust from her experiment. She nodded anyway.

“I’ll need that long to teach you how to dress,” she said, answering a question 13 did not ask. She handed 13 the skull back.

Bullshit. The Ranker wanted the sword. There were a few nefarious ways to use those things, ways that were even more nefarious than what 13 were using them for, but that was going to be someone’s else’s concern.

13 stuck her thumbs inside the eye socket and her pinkie in the earholes. She reached into the Energy stored inside her scabbard, coursed it through her bones, and channeled it into her sister.

It bellowed a declaration of war against the 4th City, from the Rat, to the Ranker, to the Ace. It vibrated the concrete buildings, shattered every piece of glass, and burst every eardrum on 13’s side of the planet.