Rift

Chapter 22: Trust the Lies

Anger fills her heart. No. Not anger. Frustration, maybe? She worked her ass off to get those Augmentations, and before she could even use them, that fucking machine took the Augmenter.

Then that psychotic bitch took it for herself.

Jane keeps her hood up and she stalks through the streets of Nerawin, hiding under the cloak of the night. If she's not careful, Corbin's new attack dog might catch wind of what's going on. She needs to make this quick.

Making her way down the alleys, she constantly checks over her shoulder to make sure she's not being followed before she finds a way up to the roof of some apartment building slapped in the middle of this nothing backwater city. She could be anywhere else right now, but no. She needs this.

The psychopath has been leaving endless hints all over the city, so finding her isn't the problem. Dealing with her is. She already killed her cousin, but without the Augmenter, this might be a bit more challenging. But killing her isn't the part she's worried about. It's suffering the headache she'll inevitably get just from talking to her.

Jane waits atop the roof, irritably tapping her foot and scanning her eyes around the alleys and roofs around her in search of J. The instructions told her to wait here, on this roof, so where the hell is she?

'Eleven forty-eight my ass,' she scowls her annoyance.

A sudden rock hits the side of her head and she winces, holding her head and looking down at the rock in time to see as it bursts out in a puff of pink smoke, turns into a rat with a cowboy hat, and scurries off down a vent.

Jane lifts her head to see that on the building across the alley from her is J, silhouetted in the night and waving like a lunatic.

"Hey! Hey! Hey!" J jumps up and down, flailing her arms in the air. "Oh shit, did I give the wrong address? Sorry, I meant to meet you on this sketchy roof! My bad!" she snaps her fingers and vanishes, reappearing on the same roof as Jane.

The instant J appears, Jane draws her gun and takes a shot at her, but J laughs and turns into a pigeon to fly out of the way and then instantly turns back into herself with a scoff. "Rude."

"Give it to me," Jane hisses and keeps the gun trained on her as she holds out her free hand expectantly.

J glances at her hand with its palm facing up and tilts her head before high-fiving her. "There you go! High-five, given!" she states proudly.

Jane pulls her hand back and growls, tightening her grip on the gun. "My Augmenter," she snaps. "I know you have it," she says and briefly glances over J's body to see if she can locate it, when J laughs again.

"No shit. I told you I have it," she squints at her. "You're a bit dense, aren'tcha?"

"You're trying my patience," Jane states.

J pouts. "Aw, only trying? Damn, I'm losing my touch. Ah well, might as well get to the point since you're having such a hard time keeping up," she pulls out a baseball bat and smacks it against Jane's head. The woman recoils and glares at the psychopath as she pouts and looks at the bat.

"Dammit. I forgot the nails before I did that," she holds up the bat and it's suddenly cloaked in pink mist, and when it disperses, it's now covered in rusted nails. "Better!" she giggles, then quickly hops out of the way as Jane fires at her again.

J lands on the stone ledge of the roof and holds her bat ready as Jane runs at her. The woman grabs her arm, but J winks and sticks out her tongue before transforming into a monkey and climbing along her arm, swinging around to her back and perching on her shoulders which is when she turns back into herself with the bat hooked around Jane's neck.