Dawn- An age of Darkness

Biteria ate fast- was the biggest understatement of the day. The little devil really had a thing for meat. But then again it was carnivorous, to begin with.

"I\'m sorry! I-"

Before I could come up with a reaction Brenda jumped into the fray. "Don\'t worry Daarc. It was my fault and I too have money you know…"

"But-"I was relived internally. I had little money and I didn\'t want to waste them on the damn little bunny. I was most definitely tempted to though.

"No buts!"

She shushed me and I stayed quiet. It worked out for me anyway.

We ate our fill and paid the old man.

The old man was silently smirking at us. "He he, looks like you\'ve got yourself a lovely one too." The damn geezer said something outrageous in my ears. Before I lashed out, he continued in a larger voice. "That little missy is quite something though. In all my days of adventuring, I never saw anything quite like that. I still can\'t wrap around my head, on where all that food went. Look at the size of that thing and the amount it ate!"

"Me neither," I replied. My voice was stale and I stared at him blankly. But he was right. The rabbit was definitely a walking talking nescience: I couldn\'t understand it even if I wanted to. I still loved it and it didn\'t talk though: I would have freaked out beyond repair if it did speak.

Brenda for some reason seemed more than enthusiastic. If my eyes did me justice, then I\'d say she was jumping around no less. "Hey daarc, let\'s check out the back alley. I heard there are lots of thugs there!"

My face twisted. How could she be so energetic while saying something so stupid? "Shouldn\'t we avoid that?" I kind of knew where this was going. I did see a lot of things yesterday and I could picture what sort of future lay in my wait. I really wished I was wrong though.

She pointed at me and grinned. "What are ye saying? That\'s the perfect place to earn some booty!"

I don\'t like where this is going.

I really didn\'t. "Your accents slipping…" My voice didn\'t show any enthusiasm. I had none.

"You heard the lady, get going lad," Bonkarin pushed me forward, with a slap on my back. Was he trying to get me killed or something?

What the hell are you doing you geezer?

"See ya around, old man," I said. My face was plastered with a weird expression. It was somewhere between a grin and despair.

I didn\'t want to go but I had no choice. I didn\'t have any enthusiasm either. Why always me?

I can\'t even have one peaceful day?

Normal trouble wasn\'t enough for her, so we had to go in search for more. Ah, what a world I was summoned to!

We went towards the so-called back alley. It was the darkest part of the town. While the rest of the town was bright and clean, this area was dark and not so clean. Obviously, ordinary people didn\'t come here often.

"Are you sure, we should be here?" All of my senses tingled. I didn\'t like this place and I didn\'t care if I was labeled a coward.

"Don\'t worry. I\'m very good at robbing thugs." She was awfully proud of the fact.

She checked her knives and hummed something. Her humming wasn\'t all that bad.

That\'s not comforting, you know.

My sword was busted, so all I had was a knife. Made me feel safer, but I didn\'t feel too comfortable.

We walked around like we owned the place. There were a few guys dressed in all rags and stuff but they didn\'t seem like the thug type. All they had on themselves were nothing more than rugs anyway. They were running away from us though. Did we look like thugs instead?

It didn\'t feel that bad though. Actually, it felt good that I was running around like this with a pirate. Maybe spending that week on the boat with the pirates wired me a bit differently. Or perhaps I just enjoyed the company.

After strolling through the entire area, we didn\'t come across a single thief or thug. I sighed in relief.

"What is going on?"

"Maybe they ran away seeing you." I chuckled.

I don\'t know why, but my laugh was audible. It had been a while since I had genuinely laughed. There was a difference between laughing and faking along with your companions. Never thought sarcasm would light the fire of my humor.

"You have a pretty smile," she said.

Hey don\'t go hitting on me!

"That\'s not something a girl should say," I said.

I wanted to remind her that she shouldn\'t say that to a guy. He might take it in another way. In my case I didn\'t think of it anything other than praise. But someone else might not.

She rolled her eyes in disappointment and picked a pebble. "You don\'t have the right to say that ye know!" And threw it far away up in the sky. I didn\'t want to think about whose head it might have fallen.

In the end, I decided to give up anyway. "Ha ha, you\'re right."

She was right. What gave me the right to control her life? If she wanted to do something, she was free to do so.

We made a second round and finally ran into some thugs who were coming back from their daily hunt- I mean their daily business.

Can\'t believe I\'m actually glad to see some thugs!

Seeing us, their faces lit up with smiles. Chuckles filled the air. The few guys in rugs that were here ran away for their lives.

These thugs just found new customers: us.

"Lost are we? What do you say; we take you back to central? Of course, we\'d need a little fee for accommodation," the large thug said, grinning ever so devilishly.