The Chaser (Niko)

A plain white shirt, blue jeans. A black jacket that lay beside him, the collar pulled back at the front. The warrior was out and about, soaking up the sunshine. He stretched out both arms, settling back against the seat with his legs slightly spread apart and gazed up at the sky. His expression was thoughtful, rough rugged features creased. His light brown eyes peered upwards, at the autumn skies. Around him, on the trees and the fallen leaves that were scattered on the ground around him were bright orange and red, a panorama of fiery colours that burned and roared among the grey bars of the cages and the bland white stores. Laughter and chatter trickled through the air along with the sound of animals that punctuated it every so often. Monkeys screeching, birds chirping and twittering. Lions purring and roaring. Even the seals doing that weird barking noise. He tuned out all the noise and chatter as he had learned to do, his mind deep in thought. He was growing bored of the same thing. Excitement and adventure were the only things he lived for. Love too. Was that all there was to him? Maybe. For those who were foolish enough to underestimate him. They did not see the daggers behind his charming smile. The killer behind the gentleman rogue. The trickster who twisted, bent and fiddled with words like they were putty. Who could put on an act as well as he could entertain and charm women. The ruthless monster that had ravaged the battle-field, decapitating heads like they were bowling balls and ripped off arms and legs, torn out spines and used them to gouge out eyes and whip the flesh from bone and choke and suffocate life from bloody, sliced-up bodies. The demon that had ripped out hearts and brains from chest cavities and shredded them to pieces. Darius was a hot-headed man even though he had tried to temper it. Headstrong and fierce. Whether that was what led him to fight or whether he just simply enjoyed it, it was still a mystery even to him. It could have been a combination of both.

Darius had done a walk around of the zoo, a habit he had picked up from his previous time as a bodyguard. Even now, as he relaxed he kept his ears out for any abnormal pieces of conversation that floated his way. Things that seemed out of place or didn’t fit in with the atmosphere. He kept his senses alert, for the sound of a hand-gun being drawn or the crackling of a high-tech phone. Or footsteps that were frenzied and rushed, coming closer and closer to him. He slipped his hand inside his jeans pocket, fishing out his wallet. Once, it had held pictures. Pictures of his loved ones. Now it would hold a picture of Ren. When he managed to take a picture. He needed information. About the vampires. He knew they had mind control. The arrogant vampire captain had spilled so much information to him thinking Darius would die before he could use it. Mind control. He needed to combat that somehow but all he had was brute strength. Brute strength and cunning. The second half of that equation could help him more than the first. Those blueprints. He had them at his apartment. If he could find the creator maybe he could get some information on how it worked. Then he could create it or modify it and tinker with it so they could use to it to their advantage. He put the wallet back inside his pockets, looking at the bird sanctuary a little to the right.

He couldn’t find the blue-prints for the project. It was impossible. They had been at his desk, in a folder in the   drawers with the rest of the prototypes. But the drawers had been open. All of them which meant someone had been rummaging through his files. The project was going to start next week and they were finalizing the designs for the robots. This was such bad timing. As luck would have it, the director wanted the designs that were missing and he wanted it done by tomorrow morning. He wanted to have a meeting tomorrow afternoon. Niko didn’t think he would be able to find the designs but he could be able to draw some more designs by then. The ones that the director wanted. The zoo was his least favourite place to be. His very, very least. But all his designs had been based on animals. Monet Quarter didn’t have any pictures of animals. Just literature and sparse books on medicine and herbs. No wild-life. The library might’ve had something but he couldn’t find the gate-keeper. So here he was, at the zoo with a back-pack and some rolled-up sheets of paper stuffed inside. It was the first time Niko didn’t feel completely relaxed. He was usually a chill guy but being around caged animals unnerved him. It made his features unusually tense, his jaw tight and the muscles in his shoulders and stomach lock up. He could see the sadness in the animals’ eyes. The frustration and humiliation at being locked behind bars to be gawked at and stared at by others day and night with no privacy. To be trapped. One day, he might try to help them escape. They were animals but they were kind of family in a way. Especially the lions and leopards. Niko was part animal, part human and the animal side of him was seething with rage at the sight around him. He headed for the bird sanctuary though. He moved fast, jean-clad legs sweeping through the air and boots crunching the gravel and crisp leaves that tumbled by. He looked like a typical college kid. Scruffy, curly brown hair past his ears that was slightly unkempt, blue flannel shirt over a white shirt. Even a hooded jumper to go with it. It helped that his features were naturally youthful. Something about his eyes and his curly locks. He had the look of someone who worked out a little more than a typical college kid but being well-muscled was normal. Everyone that was a teenager or above seemed to be built well in this world. So he fit right in. Niko slowed to a halt in front of the bird sanctuary, reaching back to grasp the rolled-up piece of paper and the sketch board. He sat down, setting the sketch board down in front of him and unfurled the paper, stretching it out over the board. There was one bird. One rare bird whose body structure was exceptionally stream-lined and aerodynamic. It was a frigate bird. Right there perched on a tree branch at the back. He took the pencil he’d put behind his ear and started to sketch quickly. One minute. It took him one minute to do five quick sketches with his pencil.

Finished, he pulled out the paper and threw the pencil and clip-board inside his back-pack. As he started to it was only then that he realized that he’d sketched a complete picture of one of his ideas for a sonic weapon in the corner. He had drawn something that looked like a massive grey water gun. Except it had a square speaker attached to the front to transform sound-waves into lethal weapons that would make ear-drums rupture and eyes bleed. It would make the heart-rate increase so much that it could give someone a heart attack. And he’d scribbled some notes on it. Niko stood up, chuckling to himself. Shame it hadn’t been the one that the director had wanted. He stretched out the paper in front of him, looking over it briefly before putting it back inside his back-pack in between the clip-board and another board. Some creases were okay but tearing was not. He started to turn to leave. The birds reminded him of the canaries he’d rescued with Blake. He hadn’t even seen them since the attic. But Blake had fixed the wing well. And he hadn’t even seen anyone else. There was something amiss in the clan. He didn’t even know what it was but he knew something was up and he should’ve been there. Been watching over the others more than he was. He was their Epror. Though he was easy-going, he took that seriously and he wanted to protect them. He started to walk away, telling himself he'd check up on all of them after this.

He watched the birds for a moment, his mind swirling with thoughts of what could be. Maybe he’d work on some weapons. It’d be like he was in Venice all over again. Dismantling guns, learning how things worked. As he stood up, he felt something crash into him. It was a kid, a little girl. She was looking past Darius and that was when Darius realized that a balloon had floated by, the kid’s hand outstretched towards it. He took the string and kneeling down, handed the balloon back to the kid and said gruffly, “Don’t lose it again.” The kid beamed at him, thanking him and then ran away. Somehow, that made him feel good. Darius stood up, glancing back at the guy. He looked young but that could’ve just been his hair and the back-pack. Standing, Darius swiped his jacket from the seat and pulled it on. Time to get out of here. He needed to take another look at those blueprints. The kid in front of him was stuffing his things inside his back-pack, getting up and looking at what he’d done. Darius started to turn, wanting to go buy some food before he left until he caught a glimpse of one of the kid’s drawings on the paper. He could recognize what had been used to draw it immediately. It looked like his time spent in Da Vinci’s company had not been wasted after all. Having to buy all his materials for his paintings and drawings had meant that Darius had learned to recognize the difference between oil paintings, acrylic and water-colours. The texture was completely different for all three. What the kid had used was water-colour with black ink. The water-colours had dried a long time ago. It was a painting of a grey water gun. With diameters and notes. The same diameters and notes Darius had seen when he’d been poring over those blue-prints. 10 cm. Decibels over 130 hertz. Light-speed. Blood vessels popping. Darius took a step closer, his suspicions growing. This kid? He was the one that thought of all of this? He wasn’t a werewolf. Damn. A human? Shifter? Vampire? All three looked the same on the outside. But he didn’t seem like a vampire. So he was either a human or a Shifter. The kid hadn’t noticed him and Darius couldn’t take the drawing point blank. So the only thing was to play stupid. It was time to act. He loosened up his features, making them appear friendly. And he struck.  

Darius ploughed into him, grabbing his shoulders and pulled him in for a one-armed hug roaring,“Hey Leo! Where the hell did you go?! You were meant to give me the blue-prints before you left!” He made his voice sound genuine. His eyes wide, friendly. He was playing dumb. Acting like he knew this kid. But was he smart enough to figure out what he was really doing? What his motive was? Deceive and distract. Something which people underestimated. It sounded so simple but it took patience and a devious cunning. And the guts to act cool and completely innocent when accused or suspected of deceiving and distracting. With a perfect poker face. Like nothing had ever happened. Like Darius just hadn’t managed to unzip the back-pack with a finger while covering the noise of the zipper being opened with the loudness of his voice. Like he hadn’t managed to tilt the back-pack so that the paper would begin to fall out from between a pair of boards. All in three seconds. He had taken great care to make sure the paper was secure but not quite enough. When it started to tip out halfway, Darius stepped away and clapped him on the shoulder heartily enough to make him stumble a little, dislodging the paper completely so that it fell on the floor. He held the boards discretely so that they stayed in the same position so the kid wouldn't feel anything from his backpack. He let his eyes widen in surprise and said,“Sorry thought you were someone else.”He side-stepped him, just as the paper tumbled from the back-pack and nudged it into the shape of a cylinder. He kicked it where it rolled across the ground, ending up behind the dust-bin out of sight from both of them. Darius turned and started to walk away. Just as he reached the dust-bin he put his hand inside his jacket pocket pinching a coin from it and let it slip from his fingers as soon as his hand fell by his side. The coin fell, spinning as soon as it hit the ground and tumbled across the concrete behind the bin. He knelt down, folding the paper into a palm-sized square in two seconds so that it’d fit into his pocket and picked up the coin. Except, he hid the paper so that only the coin was showing so it looked as if he'd just dropped his coin by mistake and was just picking it up.

Just as he was about to leave, he was hit by someone knocking him off balance slightly. It was a guy with black hair and brown eyes.“Hey what are you-?!” Niko started to say. Then the guy went in for a hug in a split second before he could blink. What was he doing? Was he drunk? Niko started to slip away, slip underneath his arm to get out of his hold but the guy was holding him tight. What’d this guy eat? Was he a werewolf or a vampire? No human had that strength. No Shifter or Mora either. Niko started to shove him, aiming to grab his wrist to twist his arm and throw him. This guy could be dangerous. Werewolf or vampire, Niko knew he stood no chance against either race if either of them wanted him dead. What’d he want? He was ranting about blue-prints and thought Niko was someone called Leo. Then the guy clapped his shoulder so hard Niko felt the shockwaves rattle all the way through his shoulder-blades down to the bones in his arms even when he stumbled. Geeze was this guy really drunk? Or crazy? And he was so loud. Niko’s shoulder was smarting from the hit. Niko was a big guy, well-built. He had taken a lot of hits before but the other guy looked like a gladiator. He could see the muscles in the arms practically suffocating from the jacket. He looked like he fought for a living. Niko kind of knew what that was like. Fighting to survive. Literally fighting for his life when he’d been running from the poachers.

He winced as he moved his shoulder, spasms of pain erupting from it and shooting down his arm. But it looked like he didn’t want to kill him. Looking at the guy as he apologized, Niko laughed.“It’s cool. I’m still breathing.”Niko started to walk away, adjusting the back-pack so that the straps weren’t loose on his shoulders. He heard something fall with a loud wooden clacking noise followed by another clacking noise. Niko turned around, spotting the boards on the ground and picked up his back-pack. He knelt down to pick them up, taking off his back-pack to put them back in only to find the piece of paper he used wasn’t in there. What the…? Niko spun around, looking for that guy. He was picking up some a coin from the ground and putting it into his pocket. It was him! He’d taken it somehow. But where was it? It had taken five seconds for everything to happen. He can’t have folded it that fast. Then it hit him. When the guy had wrapped his arm around his shoulder he’d unzipped his bag. That was why he’d used so much force and been so loud. He’d been distracting him and he’d done it fast so that Niko didn’t realize what had happened until it was too late. He must’ve folded the paper to fit into his jacket pocket. There was nowhere else it could be. The coin was just another distraction to make him look innocent. The guy was a trickster! Niko bolted across the ground, vaulting through the air and crashed into him in a huge tackle, grunting as he made contact. It was meant to send him flying with him slamming into the side of the seat so that he’d crash his head against the metal railing of the chair. The force of the hit would be enough to stun him so that Niko could use that time to swipe the paper from the guy’s pocket. He could see the white tip sticking out. It was a miniscule piece, a V shape that was the size of a dot but he saw it. He knew it was the paper. He was hoping he’d catch the other guy off guard.

He heard the sound of foot-steps punching the pavement, frenzied and fast. No shout. No yell. But he had learned how to tell noises apart. What was normal and what was just slightly out of place in the situation so that it warranted attention. It was vital to concentrate on the important things when someone’s life was on the line. To distinguish what was a threat and what wasn’t. People who wanted someone dead would use and do anything. A poison dart. Explosives. Planting explosives. A knife or chemicals. Or if they had anything inside their clothing or pockets. Or they’d just flat out attack. If the kid needed them so badly he’d attack and try to get the drawing back. Darius was ready for a fight and it looked like that’d happen. Darius spun around just as the guy crashed into him. He took the confrontation partly on the side, feeling the impact hit him. He had to hand it to the guy. He was strong. The hit managed to throw him off balance, sending him to the ground backwards on his side. Darius grabbed his right arm, twisting his body to the left side to spin and drag him down with him so that he would be on top. Still, he didn’t get a complete hold on him as in the scuffle he hit the back of his legs and spine against the metal edge of the seat railing hard. It hurt but it was nothing, barely registering in his head. But his body reacted, his fingers slipping on the jacket sleeve for a split second. Darius landed on his side while still holding onto the other guy’s right arm. He swung his left leg over his waist to get into a sitting position on top at the same time, taking his left wrist with his left hand and pinned the arm connected to it down flat out so that he wouldn’t use his hand to punch him. Darius knew he’d caught onto him. But there was one thing he could be sure of. It was that he had found the owner of those blue-prints.

So it didn't go as planned. No sound of the head clunking against the railing. But he heard the sound of something hitting, felt the other guy's fingers slip on his sleeve. Still, Niko lost his footing and fell, tumbling to the ground with a crash. Pain shot up his side. Damn he'd landed on something hard and sharp. He could feel it eating into his skin. Luckily it wasn't his back. He began to roll as he felt the other guy pin his wrist down while still holding onto his right arm but he managed to get his leg over his waist getting on top of him. He was heavy. It was all pure muscle. Nothing but muscle. And though Niko was taller the guy had more weight over him. Not that much but still enough to make Niko notice. He swung out with his right hand, lunging forwards in an open-palmed strike to the ear-drum of the other guy's right ear that would cause enough pain to distract him and give him a chance to escape. He wasn't holding onto his right hand that tightly so he could break out of his grip easily as he was concentrating on his left arm at the moment. At the same time, he slammed his foot down on a nearby piece of metal from the support ruts of a sign-post that was near his foot. He spied it just in time. It was broken at the end with jagged piece that could cut and tear. It spun through the air in a circle before landing in his open left hand, the end of the metal in his palm. Here goes nothing, he thought. Gripping it tight, he swung it into the air to slam against his skull. Niko had long arms. It could reach if he was quick enough. Even if he blocked, it'd still give him time to distract him. Then he'd shove the other guy off him, pluck the paper from his jacket pocket and roll onto his feet, pelting away. The exit gate. He'd make it for the exit gate and climb over it like the well-trained, awesome acrobat he was.

Darius felt him roll as soon as he started to get on top of him. He wasn't just going to lie down and die. He had some fight in him. That was good. He lashed out as fast, with his right hand when Darius had locked his left wrist down. And the curious thing was that he didn't out-right punch him. He was aiming for somewhere, using his palm to hit. Darius blocked his arm, knocking it away. He could feel the fingers brush his ear, the wind from the speed of the strike and hear the wind as well. So that was where he'd been going for. The ear. Not something Darius saw in an everyday fight. Or even in a typical fight. Usually it was just punches and kicks. Tackles, head-butts, throwing things. The odd hair-pulling and eye-gouging and biting thrown in there when things got heated or when that was the only thing you could do. Because in a fight anything went. There were no rules. Darius had seen that so many times. But usually someone didn't think to make a move like that. Who was this kid? He started to say something, looking back at him but what met his gaze was a huge piece of metal instead. A sign-post? It hit him, contacting with the side of his head. Pain exploded in his skull. He roared, swiping the metal away with a hand to send it flying out of the kid's grip. It was only three seconds but the kid took the chance to shove him off. Darius was unbalanced and tumbled off. The edges of his vision bled black. As he rubbed the spot where he'd been hit he saw the kid run, getting to his feet and bolt and a piece of broken sheet metal that was tinged with fresh blood. Some of it had splattered down the side from the top. No doubt the kid had landed on it. Darius stood up, watching him as he held the side of his head waiting for the throbbing to stop. That had been a hard swing. No blood luckily. But at point blank, the hit had hurt. It'd go away. It always did. He growled, shaking his head and sprinted after him.

Whatever had hurt him had gotten through the jacket and shirt he was wearing. It stung and that was it. He'd have to check it out when he got back home just in case. He ran, not bothering to see if the guy had chased after him. Niko hadn't ran so fast like this in a long time. Not since the Shifter mafia or when he'd escaped the poachers. Good memories. Fun times. He went past the bird sanctuary, weaving past the clusters of people strolling by with unfaltering speed and swiftness. He twisted and turned, avoiding crashing into them. Yep. Definitely brought back some good memories. He didn't stop running then either. Not until he had put an entire block's worth of distance between him and his pursuers. He could hear the birds chirp and twitter, screeching. And his stomach rumbled. He thought of the canaries. But mainly he thought of the canaries because he thought of Blake first. The canaries and Blake. The canaries and Blake were one. One could not exist without the other. And he resolved never to tell Blake that he was thinking about eating birds. He ran down the winding pathways that lined the enclosure and around the giant penguin fountain spouting water that was right in the middle of the path. The information kiosk was up ahead and the path-way split around it. But there were too many people clustered around, pointing and watching the monkey sanctuary and the meerkat enclosure on either side of the kiosk. Had to get through the kiosk. Niko plunged through the people gathered there, through the double doors. He twisted around the people there, apologizing as he crashed into them. Bolting to a row of chairs, he took off his back-pack and knelt down with his back to the front doors. He faltered slightly as a prick of pain stabbed his wrist. When he'd knocked the piece of metal out of his hand it'd been abrupt so it'd jarred his wrist. Part of the metal had cut the inside of his palm as well. Ripping the bottom of the paper off where he hadn't drawn on it, he lay the back-pack down and placed the torn part in the back-pack that it would look like part of it was sticking out of the back-pack. Inside, he was cringing. All this for some drawings? Yeah, he loved his job that much. He could just leave the blue-prints there. He could always get another job. Yeah...but he could get away. He could. And there went his back-pack. He'd used this ever since he'd started working. The exit gate had to be somewhere nearby. Further down. Niko sighed, patting his back-pack."We had some good times." He rolled up the blue-prints and ran, bursting through the exit of the double doors.

His feet pounded the ground. Adrenaline pumped through his veins. He bolted down the pathway, his eyes never leaving his target. The guy was fast and agile. Able to twist and weave through the people gathered without crashing into them. Darius gave him that. He was sprinting past the penguin statue heading for the kiosk where the path split in two around the statue where there were a lot of people there. Smart move. Maybe he thought that the people would act as blockage and give him time to escape out the back or out the front where he could disappear into the clusters of people that were standing in front of the monkey and meerkat enclosures and in front of the information kiosk. But that wasn't going to stop him. He could see a zigzagged path among a bunch of people, as thin as it was, that he could run through. It'd be a tight squeeze because of how many people there were but he could make it. Darius poured on speed, vaulting over the bench in his way by kicking off with his legs. He cleared the it, grabbing the top to swing over it. As soon as his feet hit the ground he shot off running through the crowd directly down the path. He flashed on-lookers and people who were staring a charming smile, "Just practicing a stunt folks! We're training!" He shoved the doors open, stepping inside and looked around. No sign of him. Just his back-pack with some paper sticking out. He saw the guy rushing out the back doors recognizing him by his mop of curly hair and hooded jumper. Darius ran to the back-pack and swiped it up by the curved handle at the top to pick it up. He reached inside, pulling the paper out. It looked like he'd ripped out the bottom and put it in there thinking he'd mistake it for the blue-prints. Opening it up, he saw nothing but pencils, pens and erasers in there. The exit gate. The kid was going straight for the exit gate. Darius bolted for the exit doors. He had no chance.

He skidded to a stop, looking around. He could see the brick wall in the distance. The path split off into an intersection with a sign-post where the path split at which had the words lions, wild dogs and tigers painted on each sign. Each sign pointed in different directions. Wild dogs to the left. Lions to the right. Tigers southwest. Nothing in front and no pathway in front. Just left, right and diagonal to him. And behind him was the direction to the entrance. No trees to jump from and the wall was too high. No way to know where the exit was. No way to know where the exit gate was. If he changed he'd be seen by people that he didn't want to see him change into a leopard. So he picked left. He ran, feet pounding the concrete. As he did, the people started to thin out. He heard frenzied noises that sounded like a cross between a howl being fed through a meat shredder and erratic, high-pitched wails on repeat. It was fragmented and way too excited. Like the sound a deranged, disturbed misshapen maniac would make while gutting his victim open with a knife. The wild dogs in their enclosure. There was an open enclosure that had been dug out, beneath ground level so Niko didn't see them at first. All he saw was the steel bridge that acted as a pathway from one side of the enclosure to the other at ground level. But then he saw them. Four of them zig-zagging across the ground. And when Niko went past he saw what they were heading for. Fresh meat that the zoo-keepers were tossing out. Niko mentally shuddered. It reminded him of the times when he'd been with those poachers. Just him and a bunch of other animals eating whatever food that the poachers felt like giving them whatever meat they could scrounge up. The sounds when those that won, of the warning snarls to keep away from the food they fought for and the sounds when those that lost, of the desperate whines and whimpering and yowls from the felines and dogs that begged for that food as they lay starving or dying would never leave his memories. He sped up, heart thudding. Staying here too long definitely gave him chills. There was more foliage back here. Some leafy trees that were high, the branches arcing out high through the air. Yes. That was just what he needed. He leaped into the air, his feet touching the bark first so that he didn't slam into the trunk and wrapped his arms around it to hold on tight. He shimmied up it, using his arms to pull himself up and drag his legs up at the same time. He continued to move like this, unstopping until he reached a branch and twisted, using both arms to pull himself onto the branch. When he had secure hold, he let go of the trunk with his legs getting into a crouching position on the branch. He stood up, making his way towards the end with his arms out to balance himself and hopped onto the top of the wall. If he could've changed into his primal form it would've been great but he couldn't risk that. He had to scale the wall. He could do it. He'd done it before but never being chased by a vampire or werewolf. He turned, grabbing the edge of the top wall with curled fingers and lowered his lower torso down putting his feet against the bricks. Letting go with his hands, he dropped down the walls rushing up. As he neared the ground he started to crouch.

Darius' feet pounded the ground as he raced across the ground. The exit gate was farther to the far left near the wild dogs enclosure. He saw him, running across the bridge over the middle of the enclosure. Well, he hadn't transformed if he was a Shifter. He had his wits about him not to show his true form to an area full of people that could potentially kill him. Or he really was a human. Darius saw him leap onto a tree, using his feet to soften the landing and make his way up. If he was a Shifter he'd probably be a feline. Darius bolted around the enclosure. It was a long run as the enclosure was big but the werewolf was fast. Faster than he looked. By the time he rounded the enclosure, the boy was on one of the branches making his way across it with his arms out for balance. The gate was there, some trees with long over-arching branches surrounding it. Darius came to a halt near the gate, all the speed and momentum gathering at that point in one climatic ball. His powerful legs launched him through the air at the gate, clearing the branches in his way as he stretched his body to the fullest with his arms stretched out in front of him. He made it over the gate, feeling the cold metal brush his skin and the air rushing in his ears. He landed in a roll, using his shoulder to carry the brunt of the fall as he made impact with the ground. Darius stood up, looking for the boy. He was scaling the wall, his back turned towards the back street where cars were driving past. He waited until his heart had stopped pounding, catching his breath before deciding to walk over to him. Gripping the back-pack by one of the straps he made his way over, walking over to him his feet crunching pebbles on the pavement. The sound of the roar of tyres on concrete and even some irate drivers honking punctuated the air. Darius held the back-pack in front of him, reaching into it to see if he had missed anything. He said raising his voice so that he'd be able to hear him,"Hey you're the one that made the blue-prints right? The one with the arrow-guns and exploding fire arrows with the fail-safe mechanism for your project?"

Standing up, he turned and froze, staring at the man in front of him. Crap. He was right in front of him. Niko took an involuntary step back, feeling his back hit the wall with a loud thud. His free hand curled into a fist. Did the guy change his mind? Was he going to take the blue-prints by force from him? He was rummaging around in his back-pack, not really looking at him. Niko didn't see a weapon on him. Now was when he could make a break for it and he'd lose his jacket if he tried to grab him but then what he just said registered in his mind. Blueprints. He'd been talking about blue-prints. Arrow-guns with exploding fire arrows with a fail-safe mechanism. Chances were, the guy could've been bluffing. But he'd wanted the blue-prints. And he'd been specific. Incredibly specific. How many fail-safe flaming arrow-guns were there in this world after all? It wasn't like he'd be able to figure out how the weapons worked or he would've left Niko alone. Maybe he wanted Niko so he could figure out how it worked. Vampire or werewolf or even on the off chance he was human, if he did figure out how it worked he wouldn't have needed Niko. Or he could've just found someone else once he figured out Niko wasn't going to help him. And he wasn't ever going to. If on the off chance he was human the weapons would've been dangerous for Shifters. And in the wrong hands, where the werewolves or vampires were concerned, it would be equally bad or worse. He couldn't figure out how it worked so he needed him and he'd chased him down for it. It looked like it was important to him. Niko had the leverage then. Some leverage. He had to get them back. But he needed some insurance just in case he was wrong.

Maybe he had a weapon in his jacket. Part of his jacket had been torn from the piece of metal. As he slipped his hand inside his jeans pocket for something that he could use, he winced slightly as his jacket made contact with his shirt which in turn made contact with his skin. The cut had been deeper than he'd thought. He'd have to check it out later. He raised his free hand, palm facing upwards to gesture towards his back-pack and nodded. "Yeah I am. Can I get my back-pack back? I guess you have the blue-prints right? I'll go with you to take them back."

Darius lowered the back pack, watching the boy step back. He raised both hands in front of his chest in a gesture of peace just as the other guy's hand curled into a fist. He put the back-pack down in front of him, taking a step back with his hands still in front of him.He was running the situation over in his mind it seemed. Maybe he thought Darius was lying. A smart thought and one he should be having. Darius could have been lying and indeed, at one point in his life that did happen. He had lied and tricked his way into getting shelter, getting women, getting food, getting money. But that had been a long time ago. It didn't happen as much anymore and in any event, he'd played his card. And now he had no more tricks left. He didn't have the knowledge to create those weapons. He could try for sure but there were things in there that he didn't know about. Things that could make the weapons extremely lethal. He had made things before like guns, dismantling them and disassembling them and taking them apart to see how they worked. But to actually make them from nothing required a little more than layman's knowledge. And to make something so outrageous such as sonic weapons that caused blood vessels to pop required attention to every little detail no matter how insignificant it seemed. The width, diameter and height had to be exact down to the last component. He said, "They're at my apartment. Here's the deal. You wait outside the apartment. I'll go inside and get them and pass them to you. Anyone asks you any questions just say you're with a friend. If they ask for a name just say Dart. And trust me, I'm not going to hurt you or I would've done it earlier. We good?" As he finished, he noticed the other guy had winced and added, "And I got some bandages if you're hurt that bad."

Werewolf. The guy was a werewolf. He didn't think a vampire would even notice the cut. Niko knelt down reaching out for the back-pack with one hand, grabbing it quickly and stood up. He opened it, sticking his hand inside it to grab his pencils and feeling for anything else in there that shouldn't be in there. Nothing out of the ordinary. Grasping them in his fingers he pulled them out, dropping the torn piece of paper in it. Swinging the back-pack onto his shoulder with one hand he said with a smile, "Well since you didn't try to kill me we got a deal. But if you touch me again I'll use these pencils on you. You're fast but I'm faster. Don't have anything else to defend myself with. Sorry but I can't really trust you that much. Now we're good." He said, hitching the back-pack on his shoulder, "Thanks but I'm not hurt bad. It's just a scratch. It'll heal in a couple of days. So lead on Dart. I got to get back home before y'know, all the werewolves come out to eat tasty humans like me."