“Let go of me!”
The man whose arm Rita still had in a lock began to thrash. One of the onlookers snapped up some of the meat he’d dropped. Someone else reached for him. The crowd broke into a scuffle for the meat.
“We’re the Garrison Regiment! You do realize we’re armed?!”
The civilians weren’t listening. In fact, they seemed to have forgotten she was even there. Taking advantage of the commotion, the man broke free from under her and launched himself into the crowd. There, more fights started to get the remaining meat.
“Hey, that’s enough!”
Duccio moved in to break them up but ended up getting surrounded. Elbowed in on all sides, he was about to lose his equipment.
It was hardly surprising. A recruit in his first month was little more than a novice. No one could expect him to hold his own against strong grown men.
“Don’t take on more than you can handle!”
Just in the nick of time, Rita took his collar and yanked him out from the crowd.
He turned to face her, gasping for air, and asked for advice. “What now?”
“I, I think…” The odds were stacked against them. She couldn’t think of a way to end the disorder without injuring any civilians.
Or maybe…that isn’t true?
“Duccio, can you go and fetch guns for everyone? As many as you can carry.”
“We’re gonna shoot them?”
“No, we’re not. The reports will do!” If they threatened the use of firepower, they might be able to disperse the mob.
“A-ha, I see!” He seemed to catch Rita’s meaning. “Roger!”
“Summon everyone who’s free.”
“What about you?” another recruit asked Rita.
“I’ll just have to do what I can here.”
She was outside the butchers with a drawn blade; as could be expected, people had stopped trying to get in. She turned and took aim at a building across the street. Careful to avoid the crowd, she fired both anchors. They punctured the surface between the second and third floors. The impact vibrated down to Rita’s waist.
Work with what’s available. That’s all I can do.
She kicked off the ground and started to reel in the wires. The belt around her body tightened and she began to rise. Her feet took to the air.
She sailed up above the crowd. They glided past the corner of her vision.
The wall was pulling closer, and fast.
She adjusted the rewinding speed. Shifting her weight, she swung her feet up towards the wall. At the moment of impact, she curved her knees and torso to absorb the tremendous force. She kicked straight back off the wall, for the moment leaving the anchors embedded in the surface. This time, she let the wires unwind slowly, thereby regulating the speed of her descent.
Below her, looters of all kinds were making their getaway, shouldering boxes and sacks filled to the brim with vegetables. Rita adjusted her posture midair and pointed her feet at the ground.
She landed right in their midst. Using both hands she held out her blades.
“This is the Garrison. Please desist from any further criminal activity.”
“What?”
One of the men casually turned around.
Rita dropped into a crouch, kicking off the ground to instantly close the gap between them. Turning her wrist she drove the hilt of one of her blades into the man’s solar plexus. He coughed up froth, then collapsed. His cloth sack hit the ground, scattering beans everywhere.
“Why, you little…”
One of the other men began to approach her. But he wasn’t thinking straight. He was still carrying a wooden box on his shoulder.
How does he expect to fight like that?
Rita tripped his legs and he fell backwards in apparent slow motion, a bemused look on his face. His box crashed into the ground, tipping to spill potatoes.
“Holy…”
“Shit, she really is Garrison.”
Some of them started to run.
Right decision.
Others had put down their loads and were making their approach.
Wrong decision.
One of them had a poker clasped in his hands. Probably something he’d used to pry open a door or a window. The bearded man brandished it upwards, then swung.
“You asked for it,” Rita muttered.
She thrust her blade but pulled it back at the last moment. She wasn’t out to kill anyone. The Garrison’s duty was to protect all citizens.
She judged the trajectory of the poker and stepped to one side. She rammed the hilt of her blade into the side of the man’s head as part of the same movement.
There was a sudden impact in the small of her back. She’d taken a kick from behind.
“Ow…”
She found herself stumbling forwards, but managed to keep her footing. She turned to see another man moving in, hands up before his face. He was almost in reach.
“You get special treatment!”
Without hesitation Rita fired an anchor from the mechanism around her waist. Startled, the man swayed to evade it. This much Rita had anticipated. It wasn’t her intention to skewer him.
The anchor zipped through the air and stabbed into the building to his rear. Rita set the wire to rewind. A brutal force took hold of her, and she took flight at a staggering pace.
The man’s eyes opened wide.
Riding the momentum of the wire Rita raised her knee, connecting it with his chin. The man flailed backwards, spurting blood from his nose as he staggered to the ground. With the attacking knee as a fulcrum, Rita executed a half front somersault to land both feet on the wall.
The rest of the men stared up at her, dumbfounded. But Rita suspected it wouldn’t be long before they regained their cool. It was time to end this.
“Go home!”
She couldn’t stay there on the wall forever.
As she started to fall she looked up, adjusted the angle of the firing mechanism, and fired an anchor towards another building across the street, which housed an ironmongers. She pulled the first anchor out from the wall at the same time. Yet again she sailed over the crowd below, cutting a beeline across the street.
They were becoming increasingly wary of her presence. She landed on both feet between two windows where the anchor had speared the wall. Standing perpendicular to it, she gazed down at the mob below.
“Looting is forbidden! Please desist from further criminal activity!”
She kicked off the wall again and swung into the air. She plummeted down towards a man carrying a bundle of what looked like cookery tools. Timing the blow to connect when he turned, she drove the hilt of her blade into him. He took flight, spinning multiple times before finally landing sprawled across the cobbled street.
“Sorry, but it’s your own fault!”
She silently touched down.
I guess I don’t need this. She re-sheathed the blade and detached the hilt, taking firm hold of the latter. Being able to fire the anchors sufficed. She didn’t want to cut anyone down.
Tipping forwards, she deftly launched herself towards another group of looters. Sidestepping punches she let loose a barrage of roundhouse kicks, accelerating her heel into the sides of their heads.
“Theft is forbidden! Reinforcements are already on their way!”
She neutralized three more outside a tannery, then two outside a private home. She repeated the process outside a tavern and a tailors. From one side to the next, one building to another, Rita crisscrossed the street with lightning speed. It wasn’t necessary to subdue the entire mob. Only to demonstrate military presence.
She fired an anchor into the third floor of a building markedly taller than the rest. She set the wire to reel in and pulled herself up, coming to rest on the upper ledge of a bay window. She pulled the anchor free.
Casting her eyes down to the street below, she found a man carrying a smallish leather bag. No doubt it was stolen, too. He was pushing roughly through the crowd, shoving people this way and that. Those who saw him coming were scurrying to get out of the way.
“Perfect…”