The Horseman Ch. 01

She had grown up an only child with a deceased mother and a police captain father, so she naturally took to tomboy ways and decided that she wanted to be a detective. Everyone thought it was just the cutest thing until she grew breasts, then they told her to start thinking about something more practical. She never listened and her father had long ago learned not to try and force his way where she was concerned.

When she did actually start working at the precinct, it took awhile before she was able to really get involved. When she did though, those who didn't agree with her actually working cases quickly found themselves publicly humiliated, often physically, or forced to keep their opinions to themselves and play nice.

Either way, she didn't really care. As long as she was working cases, helping people and fulfilling her desire to work as a detective like her father had, they found say whatever they wanted (so long as they didn't mind talon-like hands crushing their scrotum). She had always worked extra hard in her hand to hand combat training as well as at the shooting range, to negate any natural size, weight or leverage advantage of a man. And often times use it against them.

Things hadn't been all roses and smiles in her career thus far though. Apparently, criminals and gangsters didn't like being taken down by a dame, not matter how hot she was. What had initially been angry talk and hollow threats had eventually turned into rumors of a hit being out on her from one of the city's mob bosses.

This had worried her father no end and he had demanded she stabs down and take a vacation for awhile until things calmed down. Of course, she had refused and he had to settle with assigning two patrolmen to follow her around everywhere and wait outside her house at night, no matter her objections.

She smiled to herself as she sparked a cigarette on her drive home, she didn't have to worry about anyone breaking into her house. Not with Bruno around. It was actually almost true, seeing as Bruno was a 190 lbs. Bull Mastiff who was fanatically loyal to his Mistress Lisa. She tended to bring him a full cow femur from the butchers shop on most nights to give him after their walk in the park across from the suburban house she lived in alone as thanks for him not destroying the fence and yard as he was stuck in the yard all day, and though it wasn't a small yard and there was plenty of shade and water, he was a BIG dog with long legs.

She chuckled as she pictured the violent wagging of the bobbed tail that was his nightly greeting to her as he barely restrained himself from jumping up on her in excitement. At only three years old, he was the best dog she had ever had and proved a great companion far beyond what she had a right to expect from an animal. She even spoke to him as if he was literally a human being, knowing that Bruno's unusual intelligence and the lifelong habit itself allowed him to understand the vast majority of what she said.

As she pulled up and walked into her house, she exhaled in frustration upon seeing the two patrolmen assigned to guard her for the evening take their place parked across the street from her house on the curb in front of the neighborhood park. 'It's good thing I don't have a social life', she thought.

It wasn't that Lisa wasn't attractive but rather the opposite. Her olive complexion and luscious raven hair would have made her a great beauty. The problem was that she never smiled and her stern demeanor usually projected the image of a stern and arrogant woman. The truth was, she wasn't really an ice queen. She simply found it easier to effect a distant demeanor as it prevented her colleagues from amorous attempts as well as prevented them perceiving any further vulnerabilities. Being a woman in a 'male' profession was ready hard enough.

As much as she loved her job, she secretly yearned for a solid, equal relationship. A romantic partnership. She also knew that this was likely a fantasy, especially with her chosen line of work. It was always at night that these thoughts crept into her thoughts. She expertly crushed these feelings of longing with an iron will and prepared for bed. As she lay her head down on the pillow, however, she couldn't quite keep those thoughts from returning.

:..:

Outside, the police officers in the cruiser lay slumped with their throats cut. Aiden had been too far away to prevent that but as soon as he saw the thugs pull the dead patrolmen from their vehicle, his stomach sickened further. He realized the mobsters were going to don the dead officers' uniforms to get Lisa to the front door, exposed and with her guard down, rather than trying to sneak into her house. Surprisingly smart considering these were just some thugs trying to make a name for themselves by offing the city's only lady Cop (the one who'd proved more a thorn in the mob's side than any male officer), not even made guys or the mob's hired guns.

Stupid kids. Stupid kids with enough wit to pull this hit off, he reminded himself as he moved seem least through the shadows, quietly lifting and rolling under her detached garage door.

Now that he knew their plan, he devised one of his own, helping himself to a few ingredients from her garage shelves. He quickly slipped out the side door and steeped up into her front porch. Removing the bulb from the porch light, he quickly filled the bulb with acetone before replacing it back in the fixture. He then proceeded to mix the laundry detergent and lighter fluid together in a bucket before pouring it to either side of the front door, particularly the blind corner on the right.

Gathering everything up, he placed the mostly full can of acetone under the porch steps and put the rest in her dumpster before retreating across the street, staying away from the cones of light cast by the streets.

As it proved, he was not a moment too soon. The two men garbed in the clothes of the dead policemen walked confidently down the sidewalk while three others snuck through the yards and took up positions in the sides of the porch, out of site from the front door. All three had pump action 12 gauge shotguns, Winchester 1912's as best as he could tell from his position behind a bush in the park across the street. His breath caught in his throat as the fake cops knocked on her door.

:..:

Bruno was growling. Bruno never growled. Especially without reason. Lisa eased herself up out of bed quietly, a Browning Hi-Power pistol appearing in her hand. Screw those little snub nosed thirty-eight's and their six little bullets. She had a magazine hiding thirteen 9mm rounds that put a .38 Special bullet to shame. The hairs on the back of her neck were tingling and her adrenaline was pumping for no apparent reason.

She almost jumped out of her skin when she heard the knock at the front door. She told herself she had likely overreacted but decided to hang onto her piece just in case as she went to check the front door.

"Ma'am! This is Officer Petrelli from the 13th. It's your father. Something's happened."

Her heart stopped at the pronouncement and she abandon her caution to rush to the door. She quickly swung it open after setting her pistol on the table next to the door.

"What happened to my father! What's wrong?" She said as she swung the front door open to see two large men in police dress as she reached for the porch light's switch.

"Well, miss." The man started, his face morphing into a feral grin as he snarled, "he had to bury his only daughter!"

The man who spoke brought up the service pistol from it's holster as his partner, standing slightly behind and beside him, did the same. Her heart stopped as the light from inside the house illuminated the death staring her right in the face. She was dead and she knew it. And then, almost as a nervous after though, her fingers brushed the light switch next to the doorframe.

"POP!" As glass and chemical flame burst from the exploding lightbulb. The 'speaker' got a face full of fire and shards of glass while the 'partner' was forced back, his gun firing the round that had been meant for her up into the sky as he teetered backwards.

After the split second it took her to force down her shock, she was diving for the Browning in the table where she had placed it seconds before. She barely registered another man in a trench coat and fedora heading forwards the door with a shotgun before she was rolling away, pistol clutched in hands.

She had no idea what had happened with that lightbulb but she wasn't going to sit around and ponder it. A figure lurched through the door whom she recognized him as the 'partner' and she put a round into his center mass before she realized that he was ready dead. There was an arrow sticking cleanly through his neck. An arrow? What the fuck!

The distraction almost cost her life as another man followed through right on the 'partner's dead heels. His shotgun swiveled her way and she knew she was too far behind the curve to get her pistol into position before his shotgun could cut her in half. Again, an arrow flicked through the open doorway and pierced the shooter's skull before he could generously ventilate her with a load of double aught buckshot. Then, all was quiet.

Lisa stayed in position for a few heartbeats to make sure nothing else would jump out at her before she got up and assumed a firing position. She slowly advanced on the open front door without seeing any signs of life or movement.

She barely caught a shift in the darkness in the park across the street as another arrow noiselessly passed through the night air to impact the base of her porch's steps with a flash that triggered a surprising fireball right as two more shooters stepped out from the blind spot to the right of her door, where they had been taking cover. They didn't even have a chance to raise their weapons before the fireball licked their flesh before immediately spreading across the ground on which they stood to race up their legs, quickly engulfing both men as they screamed and flailed about.

It was at that moment when Lisa saw a man step just into the outer edge of the flickering light to give her a polite bow before disappearing into the night before she could process it. The man's face had been obscured by a hood but it had been clear that he was covered in some sort of complex dark armor whose overlapping lames, plates and scales shined in the firelight. Most notably, he had had a curved bow slung on his back. Right next to what appeared to be a quiver of arrows. Even with the hood, she could see the flash of white teeth as he smiled at her in that brief moment.

Still half in shock, she looked down at the man with the arrow penetrating his neck almost completely. However, it was the arrow itself that drew her attention. In what appeared to be some sort of vaguely Mediterranean font, there was one word artistically rendered down the length of the black metal shaft of the arrow. As sirens wailed in the distance, growing ever closer, she looked closely. She saw one word. It read, 'The Horseman'.