The dirty light bulb that lit the upstairs room in the Hairy Knuckle was starting to blink now. It has been on for many hours, and its wear was beginning to show. Lunarey was bound to the chair by her arms and legs ever since she was led there by Triggen, several hours ago. Her head was bowed down at the floor, and her hands and legs were feeling numb. She hoped that her face could be numb as well, as Triggen made sure to give her a hard slap every now and then. He claimed that it was to keep her focused while wearing a nasty grin on his face. Lunarey felt weak and tired, having not eaten or drank anything since she got there. Triggen promised her that he would give her something to eat, as he needed her alive, but so far he has yet to keep up on his word. Lunarey guessed he was just trying to enjoy pushing her limits.
He needs me alive only so I could be used as a bargaining card against Sunyula Trife… that name wreaked havoc in her mind every time she thought of it. My mother… Lady Dread… how could this be? How could this psychotic sadist gangster be my mother? She hoped she could think of any way to disprove that fact, but somewhere in her heart she knew that there was no disproving the truth. The AL brand shoes… it makes sense now why I have such expensive shoes… Henrick Trife used to live in a magnificent mansion in the luxurious district, Fraenon Hill. Sunyula inherited that mansion, so she keeps herself close to her outpost in Framstead, Northstock.
"What are you trying to do here, Triggen?" Lunarey asked him in a tired, heavily breathing voice.
The brute with the beanie hat let off a smirk. "What do you mean, Princess Trife?" that nickname hurt more than any slap he gave her so far.
"What do you want to bargain me with Lady Dread for? A truce?"
"Well, that's up for our Red Rider to decide."
"Fane Hallstead, your ringleader? Is he coming here?"
"He is. He was held up with some business in Hawksen, but I got a call from him saying he was on his way a while ago. He's bringing his lieutenants with him and a few more men for backup." Lunarey sighed in despair. "That’s right, Princess Trife, you're a hot catch. You're attracting the best of Harley Nation down here."
"Stop calling me that."
"Calling you what?" the grin once again appeared on his face, showing his grubby, dirty teeth. Lunarey gave up on keeping up with his game of taunting. She was too tired and beaten to try to reason such a thing out of the savage brute.
"Can I just please have something to eat?" her stomach growled.
"Alright, alright, I'll get you something." Triggen surrendered, after putting it off every single time she asked so far. He got up and went downstairs, leaving his ever-annoying presence in the room by having his foul stench still linger in the room after his departure.
I just want to go home, Lunarey thought. Actually… I don’t know if there's even a home for me anymore. There's a good chance that Kelia lied to me, that she knew who I am and she kept it from me, making sure I wouldn’t find out. If that’s true… I don’t think I'll be going back there.
By now Lunarey had lost all hope. She felt alone and afraid. Her heart screamed for mercy, for any kind of relief from the horrible reality that was thrown on her. That morning she was still a clueless girl who was living with her only and best friend, and now she was tied to a chair in a filthy pub, as the daughter of Lady Dread. Rosabell… she remembered her. Is this the kind of feeling that you had? Is this the level of despair and depression you've reached in your last days? Is this how alone you felt? A tear threatened to form in her eye, but she stopped herself. She didn’t want Triggen to see her crying, as he would likely make fun of her, and she was sick of seeing his lousy grin.
Triggen appeared back in the room, holding a plate with some potatoes and rice. He walked up to Lunarey and laid the tray on her knees. "There you go, Princess," he said. He held up a fork and jammed it into one of the potatoes. It looked raw and stale, probably laid on the back of some shelf for a while now. Lunarey swallowed some spit and opened her mouth. The potato had a foul taste. It was hard to chew and its peel seemed to have some dirt on it. "Do you like it?" Triggen smiled at her. Lunarey held herself from spitting what he considered being food right at this face.
Triggen then took a handful of rice on the fork and started delivering it into Lunarey's mouth. As he fed her, his eyes caught a glimpse of her arm, specifically on the injection mark on them. "I see you like having fun with needles," he said, chuckling. "Where did that come from? Vex?"
"I… I don’t remember," she said. "I have no memory of that injection mark. I don’t know who did it or what was injected into me."
Triggen kept on feeding her when suddenly he halted. His eyes traveled further down from her arm to her pocket. "What's that?" he asked. She looked down and saw the folded piece of paper that was peeking out of her pocket. Oh, no… she immediately thought. "Don’t touch that," she told him, but to no avail. Triggen's dirty fingernails were already clutching at the paper. I didn’t want him to see the list…
Triggen unfolded the paper and his eyes started rifling through it. That list… those people… at first, I wanted to ask him about it, hoping that he would shed some light on it, but once he told me that I was Sunyula's daughter, I knew that would be a mistake. Whoever killed those people is most likely to be affiliated with Lady Dread, and, in that case, there's a good chance one of those victims used to be a member of Harley Nation. At first, Triggen seemed natural, but at some point his eyes narrowed and his nostrils widened. He looked up at Lunarey, his face appearing wrathful. "What the fuck is this shit?" he asked her. His hand twitched, ready to strike at her in the case of a wrong answer.
"I'm not sure myself," Lunarey told the truth and prepared herself for another strike at his hand. "When I woke up with no memory this list was in my pocket. I swear. I'm not sure what it is."
"Do you know who these people are?" Triggen bit his lips in anger.
"Not really. I read online that they're dead."
"Do you recognize these names?" he held the list up in front of her with his finger pointing at numbers 8 and 9 on it. Garnell Sears and Jetter McKinley were their names.
"No," Lunarey said. "But I can already guess that they were members of Harley Nation." She knew her fear was right.
"Oh, they were… but more important than that, they were my brother and best friend." A great weight was suddenly dropped on Lunarey's heart. Her fear and anxiety multiplied within a second, as Triggen rose to his feet, his eyes red with the flames of fury and revenge. He was no longer grinning. His face was dead serious, and his hand still twitched in eagerness.
"T-Triggen, I-I had nothing to do with their deaths." She started stuttering. "Please, y-you have to believe me, I—"
"SHUT UP!" he sent a mighty punch at her face, making her lose her balance just as before and fall along with the chair onto the floor. A never-ending sense of burn and pain washed over Lunarey's throbbing face. She couldn’t help but stop the tears. Triggen didn’t help her back up this time. He left her weeping on the floor, standing above her like a giant overshadowing a small, helpless ant. "You can say whatever you want. Even if it wasn’t you, it was your fucking mother that ordered their deaths. And you know DAMN WELL that no one dies quickly when it comes to Lady fucking Dread!" he sent a powerful kick at Lunarey's stomach. Suddenly, the intense pain in her face lost volume compared to her temporary inability to breath and the overwhelming soreness that ruled her lower body. She was too weak and in pain to do anything, even to try to talk some sense into Triggen. "I'm going to make sure to give you every ounce of pain I can without killing you before Fane gets here," He said.
"P-Please…" Lunarey mustered up her strength to weakly blurt out her plea, but Triggen didn’t seem to care for it. Just as he was ready to send another kick at her way, gunshots were suddenly heard from downstairs. Triggen turned around and drew his gun. As more shots were heard, he slowly paced towards the stairs with his gun aimed forward. Gunshots? What's going on? Who's shooting? Lunarey wandered as the waves of pain still ensued. Triggen looked focused. His hand was steady and ready to pull the trigger. Once he placed himself right in front of the stairs that led down, he stood still before walking down, trying to see if he could see who was shooting from where he stood. Several seconds passed until finally the shootings stopped. Triggen remained at the top of the stairs, his hand still holding his gun firmly. Lunarey looked at him when suddenly she noticed him flinch as if he saw someone downstairs. She saw his finger starting to pull the trigger, only one second too late, as Triggen was shot in the chest just before he could kill whoever the shooter was. Triggen fell back and his finger went on to pull the trigger, only that the bullet was fired at the ceiling now.
An eerie silence fell on the Hairy Knuckle. Lunarey now noticed that she couldn’t hear any of the people downstairs. She heard footsteps coming up the creaking stairs. The steps were slow and careful. Lunarey wasn’t sure if she should have been glad that Triggen was gone or terrified by whoever the killer was. The entire place was silent as a tomb. Nothing made a sound, except for the slow, creaking footsteps of the shooter, as he made his way upstairs.
Finally, the man appeared at the door. Wearing purple Elastics, the man was tall and fit, looking to be in his 30's. He wore a long trench coat and held a silver pistol. He took off his mask and revealed himself. His hair was black and wavy, his eyes were bright green and his face was adorned by a light beard. At first, his eyes lingered on Lunarey, making her fear that he was about to shoot her as well, but then he quickly ran to her side and helped her up. "Vaikillia!" he called. "Thank God, you're alright." He untied her hands and legs. A sudden rush of blood reanimated Lunarey's limbs. "Oh, god, what did they do to you?" he touched her face and a small ounce of pain triggered.
"Ouch!" she cried.
"Oh, sorry," He apologized.
"I-I don’t—"
"I was worried sick about you." His face betrayed that he was genuine in his words. "When you ran away, I…" he held back. "Never mind. Anyway, your mother is going to be so happy when we go back to—"
"Wait." Lunarey stepped back, away from the man. The mention of her mother startled her. "Who the hell are you?" she asked him.
"V-Vaikillia… what do you mean—?"
"Answer the question!" Lunarey's voice rose.
"I-It's me, Samuel."
"Samuel…" she repeated the name. Samuel… that name rings a bell…
"Vaikillia, what's going on?"
"Don’t call me that. That's not my name."
"W-What?" he seemed perplexed.
"I don’t know who you are. I lost my memory. I woke up in an alley with no recollection of who I am or how I got there."
"Please… tell me you're joking."
"I'm not. I've only learned who my mother is, and I can tell you I'm not going anywhere near that woman."
"You don’t have to worry about her, she loves you. And I'm always here to protect you."
"Then where were you when I woke up alone in an alley in this god-forsaken city?"
"I…" he choked on his words. "Look, you're not going to have to be with her for a long time. We had plans, the two of us. We were going to get rid of Sunyula."
"G-Get rid of Sunyula…?"
"That's right. You would take control of the organization and make me ringleader with that authority so you can live a happy, peaceful life away from all this."
"Why should I believe you?"
Samuel made a long sigh. His face appeared genuine, yet Lunarey refused to take the risk. "You… you really don’t remember anything?" he asked. "You don’t remember anything about us as well?"
"W-What do you mean?"
"Never mind…" he looked away. "In any case, Lady Sunyula is already informed of your location, and she'll be coming here anyway to look for you, so you don’t really have a choice."
Lunarey closed her eyes in defeat. Sunyula Trife… they say there's no escaping her. She's the kind that gets what she wants. "How did you even find me?" she asked.
"I got a call from someone who claimed to have followed you and that man to this place."
"Who?"
"Kelia Hopewell," he said. Every syllable of that name hurt like a sting. Lunarey's heart sunk. "She's actually outside."
"Then let's go thank her." Lunarey looked determined. Kelia… the best friend I've had… and the best liar I've seen. She thought as she left the room with Samuel.
Once she crossed the doorway out of the filthy room she was held in, she glanced at Triggen, who was lying on the floor with a bullet wound in his chest. He was still breathing and his eyes were still open. As she looked at him, with no hint of mercy in her heart, she noticed his gaze turning to her. His face remained the same and he was too weak to say anything, but Lunarey knew. Deep down she knew that he wanted to let her see that slimy grin of his one more time, or perhaps call her Princess Trife one last time before he took his last breath. She turned towards the stairs and climbed down, forgetting about the wounded brute as soon as she did.
Downstairs, the pub looked like a bloodbath. Blood stains and corpses decorated the Hairy Knuckle. Two bodies rested against the wall inside a sitting booth, riddled with bullet holes, with weapons still clutched in their hands. The old bartender lay on the floor behind his counter. He had no weapon in his hand, and yet he was shot multiple times just like the other ones. Broken bottles of booze and shattered glasses were abundant on the floor and bar counter. Two men stood at the entrance, wearing purple Elastics and holding submachine guns. Lunarey flinched as she noticed them. Even through their masks, she could sense a drive for killing coming from them. They looked so calm and relaxed, as they stood between a horrifying image of massacre and brutality, just the kind that defined Lady Dread.
As Samuel and Lunarey left the pub, the two men accompanied them. That was when Lunarey finally noticed Kelia, who stood outside, still wearing her school uniform. "Luni!" she called and ran towards her. "I'm so glad you're okay. I was so—"
"Stop it," Lunarey interrupted her, coldly. "You lied to me." Kelia's cheerful expression vanished. "You knew who I was and you kept it away from me. You kept me from watching the news or going online so I won't accidently bump into one of the many 'Missing' posters of mine."
"I-I…"
"Stop lying. Stop trying to think of excuses. I'm sick of it. Just tell me why you did this."
Kelia's face fell. "I knew who you were," She confessed. "I recognized you as soon as I saw you in that alley. And I also knew who Sunyula Trife was. And… I also knew my mom and I were starving."
Lunarey struggled to wrap her head around her words. "You… wanted me around so you can get money from Sunyula in return for me?"
"You have no idea what it's like to live here. Please, you have to understand—"
"Then why did you let me live with you in the first place?"
"I didn’t know anyone from Lady Dread, so I had to keep you around until I could reach out to them. And it just so happens that I finally got my hands on a member's phone number. I-I followed you and that man after that speech you gave at my school so I knew where you were."
"Did your mother know as well? Was Cynthia also a part of this?" Kelia merely bowed her head in shame. Lunarey knew that it meant that she did. "You were my best friend." Lunarey found that moment more painful than Triggen's hits. "I trusted you, and you were just using me." Suddenly she remembered Rosabell again. Rosabell mentioned that she had friends in the past and that they turned on her… and since then she lost all hope in people.
"Luni…"
"Don’t call me that." Lunarey looked away. She couldn’t even look at the person who now taught her how cruel and heartless people can be. She looked at Samuel. There's no escaping Sunyula Trife, she thought. "Let's go, Samuel. Mother's waiting."
