The sun beat down hard on Blessing reflecting on the blood of honest men and monsters. The heat stirred up the aromas of gunpowder, and flesh into a rancid stench enough to make most men gag. Wisp however was not most men. Neither did he have time to indulge in such a humane fantasy as disgust.

He stood surrounded by the bodies of innocent town’s people he had given his all to try and save.

He stood in the middle of a town thrown into a chaos and conflict beyond its very comprehension.

But mostly he stood as the sole survivor in a battle against blood thirsty crazed Reavers.

Wisp drew the breath from the last Reaver on the rooftop with his bare hands as his knees finally gave out. He collapsed beaten and bloody into the pile of limbs strewn around him, consciousness slipping from him. After the last of his fellow defenders had fallen, he had beaten a hasty retreat to the water tower to defend Chloe. Vastly outnumbered he had sprayed the crowd with his shotgun till they were upon him at which point he grabbed the barrel of the weapon and used it as a club. Like a Wildman he had swung it into the heads and chests of the oncoming horde till it had broken under the strain at which point he thrust the broken point into a nearby neck and drawn his long dagger from its sheath. This felled more enemies before becoming caught in the metal armour of one of the attackers. The final few Wisp had beaten with his knuckles till they streamed raw with blood. As calm descended over the rooftop Chloe finally came down from her perch atop the water tower where she had watched the tail of this grisly scene. She had personally seen Wisp take several blows that would have felled even the best of men and feared she would find him another member of the ranks of the dead. Upon reaching where he lay she checked for a pulse upon the wrist of the warrior, and found none. Frantic she held back tears and thrust her fingers at his throat to check again and was rewarded with a weak but steady pressure against her. Overcome with relief flooding to replace the terror ebbing away she allowed herself to weep. A few solitary tears broke into a racking sob as she looked over at the men not as lucky as Wisp who lay dead around her. Holding Wisp to her breast she wiped the blood from his face as best she could and cried herself to sleep in the leftovers of the slaughter.

The next morning a militia from the surrounding towns and hamlets crept slowly into the village of Campbell expecting to find the same malignant scene of death and depravity. It came as a great shock to them to find the majority of the town untouched by the maelstrom that had passed by. It was only upon reaching the tavern did they encounter the site they had expected. Bodies lay deep strewn around the base of the building leading out in a path out of town. Upon knocking on a few doors townspeople enquired after the men upon the roof of the tavern claiming tales of the able bodied men leading a resistance led by the mysterious young man known as “Wisp”. The would be rescuers had originally avoided this area of town for fear of booby traps and an unspoken fear of the dead beasts. However upon insistence by many of the natives they braved the blood soaked part of town to check the rooftop. Only a small cluster of the reinforcement headed into the slaughter field around the pub and many of those that did had to turn back and vomit before the roof was reached. Eventually ladders were found and the team entered the centre of the killing storm where Chloe sat dressed in blue in a field of red. Eventually after hysterics she managed to get across the fact that despite appearances Wisp was alive and in desperate need of medical aid. With great difficulty Wisp was carried to the ground and brought with all haste to the town doctor. A crowd began to gather as news spread of the heroic standoff and the lone survivor. Eventually the surgeon came out of his clinic to address the masses. His injuries were diagnosed as extensive with an assortment of broken and bruised bones, punctured and battered organs; however the doctor assured the waiting crowd he would live. Woops and cheers broke out amongst the town’s people, women wept with joy and men held back their own watery eyes. Wisp lived as a symbol of defiance against unstoppable odds, without his presence they all knew what would have befallen the town. Chloe told all the story of the rooftop as accurately as she could but stories spread like wildfire as the man went from hero, to myth across the whole planet. By the time Wisp was well enough to leave the hospital a team from ‘Verse Today’ an independent wave team were waiting to interview him. Still high on pain meds he nodded to questions and waved for the camera on a chemical daze.

Weeks passed and Wisp recovered in Chloes bed as the town continued as normal, recovering from its own near disaster. However Wisps ordeal was far from over. After going to bed in the sweet embrace of Chloe as their relationship had blossomed since that fateful day, Wisp awoke with a start. Rather than being in a soft feather bed, his head was hooded and he felt himself suspended upright by chains at his wrists. He was naked, with his bare feet against a cold steel floor. Someone had found him. As he was so close to a new life someone had found him and was here to make him pay. Could it be the Alliance? No this sort of cloak and dagger wasn’t their scene, they’d have just killed. Unless maybe they wanted information? Vankeetsen was a more likely option, casting his revenge from inside a cell against the person who brought him down. There was another option as well but Wisp knew that it spelled a very unpleasant end for him.

“Well, well, well. Little boy blue back in front of me”

Vixen. Vixen had him. He felt nails against his skin from behind tracing gouges in his freshly healed skin. Wisp knew he had no chance. His psycho ex had him hooded and chained after he left her suddenly in the middle of a fire fight. She was heartbroken. She was insane. Wisp physically shuddered at the thought of what she had planned for him. She ran her hand gently over his chest “How long has it been since you left me” She turned the stroke to a stab for the last two words and continued to stab as she spoke “abandoned me” each sentence jabbing a different part of his chest “left me to die?” She pulled the hood from his head and the light stung into his eyes. The Vixen he knew was not stood in front of him, this Vixen was truly wild. Her trademark cat suit was no longer shiny and polished but soiled, torn and stained. Her hair flew around without control tangled and knotted. No make-up was upon her face with dark circles shadowing her eye sockets against the deathly pallor of her skin.

Wisp tried to speak but found his throat incredibly dry forcing him into a cough “how did you find me?” he eventually choked out.

“HOW DID I FIND YOU? Thats it? Not how have you been? Not you look well?” She slapped him viciously across the face twice with the back of her hand. “I FOUND YOU after your stint on the whole verse wave! ‘Young man saves town from Reaper attack’ even without the holo it stank of your morals.”

She walked behind him disappearing from his view and Wisp winced expecting a fresh onslaught of scratches which she predictably gave him.

“I’ve spent a lot of time looking for you hoping to make you pay for what you did. They tried to arrest me you know? Tried. Please those incompetent fools couldn’t manage that. They were too busy cleaning up the piles of bodies I left. Even children. Yes I remember how that got to you so I threw in a few extra for luck.”

Wisp tried not to picture the scene and forced his mind to think about how she abducted him. It was then his thoughts landed on Chloe. “Chloe. What did you do to her?”

“Chloe?” Vixen circled back to his front “Oh! That floozy you were with? She’s right here. Would you like to see her?”

Before Wisp could respond Vixen pulled a freshly severed head from a nearby box. Dangling Chloe’s head from her blonde locks she raised it in front of Wisps eye line unable to look away.

“This her? Blonde didn’t know that was your type?” She grasped the severed neck and brought the face to hers in a sick caricature. “Is she prettier than me?” Vixen pursed her lips and then brought her free hand up to make the lifeless lips mirror her.

“Please don’t do that to her”

“Why Not?!?” Vixen flung the head by the hair into the corner of the room “Why shouldn’t I? Because it upsets you? Because it hurts you? By dear boy blue I’m going to upset you. I’m going to hurt you so bad. Worse than you can imagine. It’ll be long and slow. I’ll make you suffer...”

Vixen picked up a nearby pipe wrapped in cloth and began to beat Wisps ribs whilst offloading a torrent of abuse. Wisp passed out and was awoken several times and clearly felt all of his ribs break and crack. When she was done, or tired, or just bored she used a device nearby to reset his ribs then did it all again. This went on for a few days of breaks and repairs. She splashed out occasionally on burns and cuts. Always healed and repeated to draw out the agony.

Over a week after he had arrived a man came into his cell after Vixen had finished her latest beating. He injected him with a strong painkiller and splashed water on his face. Wisp was dragged back to reality with a start. “Listen. I don’t know who you are or what you did to her. I’m part of her crew. I’ve seen her do this to other guys. Guys who look a lot like you. I think she was practicing, and I've seen what comes next. I was ready to bail before you came along and now I wanna take you with me. She’s crazed. There’s nothing you could have done to deserve what she’s gonna start doing to you. I heard what you did on Blessing lemme repay a favor?” The stranger half carried Wisp down a series of corridors to a nearby shuttle and the pair of them disappeared into the black.