The Scarlet Letter (Private)

Scarlet City, 2048. While super-criminals run rampant in the Wild West, life continues as normal in Scarlet City—albeit it is buzzing with activity every time new news of the criminals in the Wild West so much as lift a finger. Out of these criminals, there were two in particular making quite a splash: Josephine Beaumont and Ryder Mercy, the co-leaders of the up and rising faction N.O.W.H.E.R.E.
Enter a hunter. The hunter moved from small game onto more fun targets: humans. Very particular humans. The greater the challenge behind the hunt, or the greater the meaning behind the hunt, the better. As it just so happened, Josephine and Ryder both have family living in Scarlet City—perfectly out in the open. Surely, killing family members of two famed super criminals would mean something—and who knows? The targets might have had special potential to them.
The hunter left notes—calling cards, if you will. A prelude to what was to come. It was unsure when the hunter would strike—but it was clear that they meant business. In a city so enamored with crime and criminals, most of the time, protecting your own life becomes your duty, and your duty alone—as it will for the unfortunate prey of this tale.
Will the prey succumb? Or will the hunter become the hunted?

░░▒▒▓▓Ｅｖｅｒｙｏｎｅ  ｌｏｖｅｓ  ａｎ  ｕｎｄｅｒｄｏｇ▓▓▒▒░░



░░▒▒▓▓Ｄｏｎ＇ｔ  ｌｅｔ  ｔｈｅｍ  ｂｅ  ｄｉｓａｐｐｏｉｎｔｅｄ▓▓▒▒░░

⧱Damon Monroe⧱
⧰Scarlet Youth⧰
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Even with death in the air. . . . . . .  . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . .courage can bring you farther
than you ever might have expected
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Damon had no idea what to make of it. He’d realized that he’d forgotten to check their mailbox today—and when he’d headed down to the mail area of the apartment building, unlocking their box and looking inside—all that sat in the box was a single, solitary piece of card paper, about the size of a business card, and emblazoned by a crimson symbol and the date—that very day’s date. He lifted it out of the box and glared at it for a moment, not really sure what to do with it.
“What is this crap…? Doesn’t look like the usual junk mail…” he turned the card over—the back was blank at first glance, but when he looked closer, he saw two names penciled in: ‘Damon Monroe’ and ‘Mickey Monroe’. He paused for a moment, staring at the card, feeling a hole beginning to form in the pit of his stomach. ”What the hell…?” He couldn’t deny that this freaked him out—a lot. In fact, he shoved the card in his pocket, slamming shut their mailbox, and immediately headed for the elevator. He ran inside, punching the floor number then repeatedly hitting the door close button until the thing started to rise. He paced a bit in the elevator, wondering just what this all was about. He wanted to believe that this was a joke or something, but honestly, it was scaring him. Not that he’d admit it—but he just wanted to make sure. As the elevator doors opened, he bounded down the hallway back to his apartment, opening up the door and looking inside. Everything was normal. The TV was still on, there weren’t any sounds of distress—nothing had changed. He heaved a quiet sigh of relief, walking inside, and heading into his bedroom—then pulling the card out of his pocket again, looking at it. This was just too weird…he wanted to investigate. He grabbed his skateboard from where it lay up against the wall near his bed, then headed back for the apartment door. “I’m going out!” he called so that his family would know he was gone—then he headed back down to the lobby. As he moved outside, he felt the winter chill of the air hit him—it was certainly cold, but he was going to wear shorts anyway because he liked these shorts and nobody would tell him to wear anything else—…well, they would, but he wouldn’t listen. He set his skateboard down on the sidewalk, then got to rolling down the city street, looking around as he did so. Something definitely felt fishy here…he just had to figure out what, before something potentially dangerous happened to him or even worse, his brother…

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Sparking Embers - Watercolour