Chapter 12: Beheader

"Dude, they've been like this for days, what happened?" Lubbock leaned towards Parc and whispered into his ear as he looked between Sheele and Mine, standing uncharacteristically far from each other with the rest of Night Raid between them.

Sheele on the right side of the room, Mine on the left. With Parc taking centre stage at the circle of assassins. Lubbock and Akame between him and Mine, and Bulat and Leone between him and Sheele.

"I… don't think that's my story to tell," Parc nervously said as Sheele readjusted her glasses which gave a light glint, obscuring her eyes while Mine opposite her crossed her arms with a glare as sharp as Akame's muramasa. Pointed straight at Sheele.

His mind falling to the days earlier, before they had all gone out to take out a man called Lokal, a kidnapper who would whip women to death after having raped them along with his bodyguards. All of which unnoticed due to him using prime minister Honest's name as a get out of jail free card.

It was an exceedingly easy task, Lokal himself was quickly put out by a single shot of Mine's pumpkin while his guards were taken out by the rest, except one their leader who found his way to Parc and Mine, who at the time were struggling to come up with any form of conversation as they made their way to the meeting point. A lonesome cherry blossom in a clearing.

He was quite the skilled fighter, but there was only so much a single man could do in a two on one situation where one of the enemies used a big ass combat knife shaped rifle called Pumpkin.

"It has something to do with you, doesn't it?" Lubbock asked almost too astutely.

"Seriously, not my place to say," Parc sweatdropped.

"Aniki, help me here," Parc turned to the heavily muscled man besides him who also wore a heart shaped pompadour as a hairstyle. This, was Bulat, the resident powerhouse and likely the strongest fighter in the entirety of Night raid, both inside and outside of the city walls.

Bulat threw his head back with a jovial laugh, which ended abruptly when his gaze shot to Parc with a neutral sparkling gaze that send Parc and Lubbock's hackles on end. "I am curious as well, exactly what did happen?" Bulat leaned down closer, coming unnervingly close to Parc with his face.

'TOO CLOSE, WAY TOO FUCKING CLOSE!' Parc internally screamed.

"Akame! Help, please!?" he called to the only person here not currently launching sparks at each other or trying to pry information out of him. Not including Leone who was likely to just make things more difficult considering her current laughing fit.

Yet Akame remained in place, staring impassively at the empty seat where Najenda was usually sitting when she called everyone in for a briefing.

"I'LL CARRY YOU'RE MEAT FOR YOU NEXT TIME YOU GO HUNTING!"

Akame appeared before him, grabbing both Lubbock and Bulat's ears and tugging down, sending them face first into the floor. "We'll go when we get back from the mission," a small sparkle appeared in her eye. She now had an indentured servant who would nearly double her haul.

Parc looked to the two groaning men by his feet, relieved that they now seemed more intent on dealing with their sore ears and picking up whatever tooth they may have lost in the newly cracked floor.

Just then, the door to the meeting room opened and in walked Najenda, cigarette in her pink lips, her short, silver her fluttering behind her along with the cloak covering her prosthetic arm. A true, cool, tomboy beauty, Parc could only think about her.

She walked past the group, barely casting a glance to the recovering duo on the floor before arriving at her seat and plopping down in it. "Right, shall we get right to it."

The room went silent, all focuses shifting to Najenda, including Mine and Sheele who broke the death staring contest to listen to her.

"Right, this time we're going after something a bit different than our usual targets." She began, "reports have been rushing in these past few weeks about beheaded bodies appearing in the city, the heads never being found. Rumour says he pops out in the middle of the night and takes the head as his trophy. We are unsure of how many dozens of innocents he's murdered outside the capital, reports with headless bodies are all too common out there. But in here, reports say he's taken nearly eight heads in the last weak. One of which, just happened to be a spy for us inside the imperial guard."

Everyone sucked in a breath at that, their aura's growing sharper, their expressions more serious. Night Raid may be a group of assassins all prepared to die or even see friends die. But that didn't mean that they wouldn't take it personally, and this murderer made it personal.

"Has to be Zank the beheader then…" Lubbock muttered.

Parc had read up on him in the library. A man who worked for the imperial government at some point in the past at the empires greatest prison as the executioner. Days of murdering people went by and eventually he began to enjoy it. And when he couldn't scratch his itch for death, he went ahead and cut off the head of the warden and escaped into the night.

Over time he had become something of a bogey man to the empires children. 'Be good or Zank'll come and take your head,' possibly the most morbid bogey man he had ever hear of. Definitely the most violent.

Worst part yet, the warden he murdered, he used a teigu. Now one believed to be in the very hands of Zank the beheader.

"Right you are. I want you all out on patrol for tonight. Mine, you and Lubbock will take the northern part of the city." Lubbock gave Mine a glisteningly white toothed grin, causing her to reel away. "Leone, you an Sheele will take the west. Bulat, you're on your own in the south."

She looked to Parc, "Akame and Parc will take the south," both nodded. Parc internally chuckling that fate just wanted them to work together what with him now being her dedicated meat carrier once they get back.

"Good, then everyone…" her gaze flickered between everyone.

"Kill this fucker."

***

"Oh my, it seems even the professionals are coming out for fun," Zank's grin grew larger and more malicious. His overcoat billowing in the wind as he stood atop a church top clock tower, "This city is so dangerous~ so happy, so happy." He chuckled.

The images of all the members of Night Raid filling his mind, showing them walking through out the city. "Who's head shall I take first~? Hmm?" Zank's grin fell as he noticed one of the Night Raid members, a boy with black hair and crimson eyes shiver. His eyes sharpening as his gaze fell over the roof tops around him. Searching for whatever it was watching him.

"Hoooo~ he noticed me! He noticed me!" Zank danced atop the roof top. "You're first~"

***

Parc rested against a wall as the soft munches of Akame eating her snacks besides his filled the air. The night had been silent so far apart from a few near run ins with some imperial guards who were just as antsy about Zank as they were.

By now, most families had made their way home and were staying there since the government started advising for citizens to go on curfew until Zank was found and apprehended or killed.

"Hey, Akame…" he looked up to her. Seeing her hold out her bag of treats to him, "no thanks. I'm good," he waved her away, letting her return to snacking on some jame filled cookie, "what does it feel like to use muramasa?"

She tilted her head at his question before beginning to think. "Heavy. Like a weight always with me that I can never get rid of," it was a short answer. But it said more than it needed to.

"I see…" he lifted his gaze to the moon above. "Why did you become an assassin?" he leaned his head against the wall.

"I didn't have a choice." She snapped a cookie between her teeth, silent as she chewed it. "My parents sold me to the empire when I was little. I was trained to kill. And kill I did."

Parc hissed, 'what type of parent sells their child!?'

"Eventually, I started seeing what the empire really was. And defected when I was sent to kill general Najenda. She offered me a new start and an end to my killing." Her expression that of utmost neutrality, the same she always wore.

Parc whistled, "being sent to kill Najenda, that must have been terrifying." As he finished speaking, he heard a soft humming noise in the distance, drawing his head to look towards where it was coming from.

"At the time, I didn't think that…" Akame continued to talk, but he couldn't hear her.

His eyes had dilated and widened, there, walking past the alley they were in was a woman, mature, nearing the middle of her life. With long, flowing blonde hair as golden as sunlight. A lean, womanly figure.

One he had seen many, many times before.

Parc shot to his feet beginning to walk after the woman.

"Need to piss?" Akame bluntly put, distracting Parc enough to get a reaction out of him.

"What? Oh, oh yeah. I'll be right back," he said, falling into a light jog. Entering the street, turning his head to the left to see the woman turning down another street and disappearing from view.

'You dare.' Parc growled as he began to run after her. Crossing through street after street, alley after alley until he came to stop at a small square at some part of the maze that was this city.

"Stop!" he shouted. Getting the woman to stop in her tracks and turn back to him with a questioning look.

Now that she looked back to him, he could see the features of her face, her soft oceanic eyes, the smooth, untainted skin that glistened in the moonlight. Her ruby like red lips. All put together bring only a single word to his mind.

'Mother…'

He stepped closer. The woman squinted suspiciously. Soon turning to one of surprise as Parc faded away from where he was standing, leaving only a few dark feather fluttering though the air.

The woman rose her arms up just in time to block Parc's lunge, his dagger clashing with metal as the woman faded from existence. Replaced by a tall, broadly shouldered man in a military style over coat. His short, blonde hair slicked back with a black hairband keeping it in place.

On his forehead a single green eyeball with sharp metal eyelashes giving it a crown like appeal.

"How interesting~" The man, Zank, as Parc immediately guessed, said. "You were able to see through illusion sight~ You must truly hate whoever you saw." Zank broke their lock, forcing Parc backwards.

"Oh, no. You love your mother; you would never hurt her. Is what your thinking right?" Zank pointed at Parc with a gloved finger.

Parc flinched just slightly, before calming and poising his dagger for another attack, 'I see… mind reading right?' he thought.

"Correct!" Zank held his hand out, palms to the sky. Using one of his hands to point to the eye on his head, "Spectator see's all. Giving me insight into every movement you make. Every twitch of your brow, twist of your body, even the smallest, minute twitch of your muscles. Nothing is out of my sight, not even those four daggers you have hidden around your body. Two on the legs, two in the coat and one on your hip."

Parc frowned, 'great, you're not only a crazy bastard, you're also a pervert.'

Zank laughed uproariously, "I have no interest in perversion boy. I don't want anything as worthless as a body~ I would much rather have your HEAD!" Zank charged him, two, arm width swords extruding from his sleeves, bringing them down in a overhead swing at Parc.

"Dodge to the right and thrust to the liver~" Zank recited, his hand falling down, parrying Parc's dagger to of the way before sending a jab to his side, hitting him in the side and sending him rolling to the side before hopping back to his feet with a hiss of pain in his side.

"Fucker has a strong hook~ is what you are thinking~"

Parc rushed forward once again, another burst of dark feathers landing where he once stood, arriving behind Zank in the blink of an eye. "Throw the dagger at my head and go in for a low slice to my ankles~" Zank moved his head to the side, avoiding the dagger while spinning his body around slamming his sworded arm against Parc's sending the dagger flying while his fist came down, smashing Parc into the ground beneath his feet.

Parc rolled to the side the moment he collided with the ground to get out of Zank's attack range. Bushing himself up onto a single knee, spitting blood to the side while wiping his brow of sweat.

"Oooohh, you really want me dead~ don't you~ your thinking of all the manners to get around my Spectator. A jab to the throat~ Guerilla tactics~ distract me with another dagger~ oh and my favourite, keep me busy until your friend arrives~"

"Oh, now your thinking about how fucking annoying it is that I'm speaking so much~ Well, it keeps the voices at bay. So What can I do~"

Parc groaned, "I knew you were insane, but now you're REALLY insane. You ever think to get-"

"-myself checked out by a therapist? Why yes, I have, she had such a beautiful head, I just had to have it shrunken and added to my collection~" Zank cackled.

"This is-"

"Going to be a long night? Don't worry, I will be happy to make it much, much shorter for you~"

Zank lunged forwards, clashing with Parc's blades, "Shoulder bash~" Parc sighed, hearing his own action heard before he even did it. Deciding last minute to just dodge away, out of Zank's range.

Only for Zank to press him, sending clashing blows of his swords against Parc's daggers that he had now come to dual wield to help with defence more than anything. He still preferred to leave one hand open as it gave him a versatility that he otherwise didn't have with both hands tied up.

Parc grit his teeth as Zank forced him to his knees, his dagger shaking and growing small, hairline fractures along them.

"Oh, I'm sure you're mother won't kill you for breaking them~ That's for me to do~" Zank lifted one arm, smashing it down, shattering two of Parc's daggers into nothing but splinters of dark steel. The tip of his blade cutting through Parc's vest, leaving a thin gash on his chest.

"Tch, shit," Parc backpedaled, thankful Zank didn't follow.

"Haaahahahah~" The beheader laughed, stomping towards Parc as he tried to stymy the flow of blood from his chest. "As much as I love playing with you. I'm getting a little bored. I wonder what expression you'll make when I take your head off~"

'Go fuck yourself you crazy degenerate.'

"That is quite rude. I am no degenerate. But I must give you my props for being so brave to say that."

'Yes, you're a degenerate. And to add a little more to that. A terrible murderer…' Parc, stood himself up. Pulling out two daggers from his boots, "you can't even kill me."

Parc sucked in a breath, letting the cool air clear his mind. The wind beginning to pick up around him as Zank went on guard. "What are you doing? I can't see them. Why are you not thinking? How can you not think? Not even your muscles are moving?" he mumbled, suddenly feeling an intense pressure around him.

"You pissed me off, Zank." Parc shot forward, a speed faster than anything his previous rushes had entailed, so fast even that the feathers he left in his wake were taken into a back wind.

In desperation at being unable to read Parc, Zank tore his blades up, crossing them over just as he felt two, razor sharp daggers enter his stomach. While also feeling his own blades tear through flesh.

Parc flew through the air behind Zank, blood spiralling around him as he landed, agony in him as a cross shaped scar interwove with the previous. The taste of iron bursting from his lips, sending a cloud of into the air as he coughed.

Parc attempted to push himself to his knees, only for his arms to give out on him, sending him back to the floor.

"NOW, I AM ANGRY." He heard Zank say, his voice cold, like that of a true demon. Zank gripped the handles of the daggers in his stomach. Tearing them from his body with a spout of blood.Throwing them to the ground by his feet. Smashing them to pieces with a stomp of his boots.

"That…" Parc coughed, "…was just unnecessary…" he grunted from his bloody pool of a bed.

"I DON'T CARE. DIE!!" Zank roared, his feet cracking the ground as he bullrushed Parc, arms once again raising above his head, ready to slam them down on Parc and end him.

But just as his arms were about to come down, his body froze, pain coursing through his heart as he felt something. Something that hadn't been there before. Blood spurted from his lips, his head slowly turning to see Akame, her expression rutheless as she plunged her ebony katana straight through Zank's body.

Akame pulled her katana free, letting Zank slump to the side, blood pouring from his wounds. "Ah…" he muttered in a half dead daze, "I can't hear them…" the earpieces he wore shattered, "Hah…" he sighed, "Happy… Happ…y…" his eyes glazed over, finally passing to death.

Akame looked down at Zank's corpse, her expression as neutral as ever. Though Parc felt that she was angry—slowly calming down now that Zank was dead. She stepped up to his body—Murasame sheathed and bent over to pry the silver eye from his forehead. They weren't going to just leave a valuable teigu lying around.

She turned to Parc, and knelt besides him. Slowly, but gently turning him onto his back. Tearing away at his shredded vest while pulling out a haemostatic ointment from a red leather satchel hanging by her side.

"It won't hold for long, we should get out of here." She hooked his arm around her neck and stood. Beginning to walk whether he was ready or not.

"You're lucky I got here in time. I almost didn't make it." She said.

He chuckled, his throat burning up, "yeah, I noticed." He rubbed his chest, flinching as he felt the cuts in his chest. Though they didn't feel deep, he knew they would still leave a visible scar. Albeit, it likely wouldn't be as noticeable as his other, much smaller ones from his time as Esdeath's favourite torture toy.

***

"Hehehehe, I seeeee you~" Officer Krave chuckled, his spine twisting in on itself as he clambered down the wall of a building, shuffling along the floor on all floors towards a tree overlooking where the wanted criminal, Akame and boy, a very familiar boy were hobbling through.

"Her greatness will be please to hear you are safe." Krave's cackling continued into the night as he scrambled through the forests, on a northward path.

***

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I'm predicting this AkG storyline will be done around 50 - 70 chapters. Once I get close to the end, I'll put up a poll to choose the next Primary world for Parc to go to and conquer its women.

Also, I have an idea for a world I want to do next or as the third world. Haven't decided yet because I need to get something in the story before that will actually work.