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"A gryphon?" Jason said. "That's bullshit."

The balding man, out of breath from yelling, sat back down in his leather chair. For someone who's only physical activity consisted of walking to and from his car on casino and arena days, he was capable of some energetic displays. He looked down to his platinum crested gambler's coat, which denoted his status in public places quite well, and sighed heavily. "And you really have to start being more respectful of the stuff I just hand over to you for free, kid," he said. Beck, again, questioned why he received so much help from someone he so often mistreated. "I mean, really? The frag too? Are you expecting the weapons embargo to magically lift itself tomorrow?"

"I know, I know..." Beck said. He hung his head in shame after uncurling his scarf. The maroon cloth was soaked with sweat and harbored enough sand to make a magnificent castle fit for a magnificent sand kingdom. Sliding his goggles off his eyes, he blinked a few times and looked up to his friend. "I'm sorry, man."

A smile found its way onto the rich man's face. "It's fine," he said, again adopting a standing stance. "I just like to hear you apologize every now and then. But hey, let me get a few things straight here." He turned and beckoned for an assistant. As the sound of her high-heels against the smooth, concrete floor echoed in increasing intensity, he reached for the now unpopulated platinum tray on the table. She politely took it from his lazy hand and left the room. "You said there was a gryphon out there?"

"You sure you're gonna let me off the hook just like that? And yeah," Beck said, "a gryphoness if we're being politically correct."

"I'm not usually correct in any sense of the word," Jason said, ignoring the question. He coughed and donned an interested expression, his cleanly shaven face looking attentive. "But enlighten me. What's the difference?"

"Well," the boy started, "based on what I've read about them, the females are much more valuable to poachers. And that's because of the feathers. She seemed aware of that, too. She told me to fork over any I had taken, assuming that I plucked some while she was out."

"Whoa, whoa. Slow down, kid. What do you mean, 'out'?"

Beck tightened his face and scrunched his eyebrows in confusion. "Out. Like, sleeping."

"Ah, I thought you meant 'K.O.' out. She'd be as good as dead if that's what you meant."

"Well, I mean, when I left her to come here, she was out, out. Like, done. She got close to fucking me up and then just collapsed."

The gambler's brown eyes opened widely. "Beck! You said you wanted to save this thing?"

"Yeah, why?" he said, looking around the room. Jason was reacting as if the house was being invaded.

He watched as his friend jumped from the chair in a hurried leap, beginning to fill a traveling bag with all the survival stuffs he had organized on the table. He threw a set of keys to Beck. "Well she's as good as fucked unless we get back to 'er right now. Like right the fuck now."

It was Beck's turn to reel in surprise. "Whoa, why? What's wrong? You're not tellin' me some-" He almost fell from the impact of the full backpack that found itself in his arms.

"Get outside, we're leaving."

The sand bike was a marvelous luxury. Beck wondered why Jason hadn't just lent him one to begin with. Walking the sandy path from the ridge to the port took nothing less than three hours.

"Bandits, boy," his companion yelled forward from the passenger's position, breathing life back into the conversation. "They want the feathers. Why didn't you tell me she was a sitting duck?"

"I didn't know it was such a big deal. Are you sure there are bandits patrolling nearby?" Beck said through the tiny mic he thought Jason would have used. "Seems to me like they wouldn't find much of anything out here. It's not every day that it rains gryphons."

The bike revved with a heavy roar, the constant sound overpowering the clicking of sand against all nearby surfaces. "If the cuts you described are what I think they are, then she knew they were here too."

Beck turned his head slightly to the left, looking back at his friend.

"Why are you so keen on savin' everyone and their mother lately, boy? The desert normally gives people the gift of selfishness," Jason's voice cackled over the speaker lodged in Beck's ear. "Not the fucking burden of selflessness. The trait cuts your life expectancy out here."

He pushed further down onto the metallic transport's gas pedal and the engine yelled in response. "I ain't dead yet, right?" Beck shot back, dodging the question. "And why should you care? I thought 'the great Jason' gave no fucks."

"Hey, hey. Don't get cocky. You've been lucky so far. And really, kid? You're an investment; I don't want one of my best sources of income just off and killing itself."

Beck laughed. "At least not yet, right?"

"At least not yet," Jason repeated, smiling under his visor.

A few minutes later, Beck began to ease off the gas. He couldn't remember exactly how far out the gryphoness had landed, but he knew they were getting close. The last thing he wanted to do was miss the distressed beast.

"Over there! Left, left," Jason said. He pointed with a covered finger. "Ah, shit."

Slamming on the breaks, Beck stretched his neck to try and get a better view of what was worrying the gambler. The bike slid to a stop in the sand, the engine silencing itself. As the two dismounted the vehicle, Jason grabbed Beck by his left shoulder. "We're not prepared for this. They're already here, kid."

Beck cursed under the whipping sands. "What do you reckon they brought?"

Jason held up his hands in disapproval. "Oh, no. Definitely not. There ain't no way in hell you can convince me to risk my own damn life for this fucking misfit of the animal kingdom."

Beck just stood there, goggles and scarf hiding his determined expression. The silent treatment normally did wonders in the efforts of convincing Jason of Beck's interests. This time, his friend just stared back. "You know, when I said 'I'll pay you for your trouble,' I didn't mean 'I'll pay you to unnecessarily jeopardize my life for the sake of a feathery abomination.'"

The boy had already positioned himself behind a sand dune, peaking around the corner to survey the soon-to-be battlefield.

"You fucker..." he said, sliding up next to Beck. "I saw four. Probably just lightly armed. But I wouldn't be surprised if one had a ballistic shield on them. They like flaunting around new tech, and they've had 'em at every reported skirmish for the past three days."

"How many rounds are in their standard issue firearms?" Beck asked, his mind triple checking combat details. His hand moved over the equipment attached to his belt in a rehearsed sweep.

Jason slowly shook his head. "Standard issue?"

"These guys look like low-lives. No doubt they just got the shitty bottom of the barrel stuff."

"I think it's just twenty for the submachine guns. Maybe twenty-four for rifles," Jason said. "I could be wrong. It's been a while."

"Twenty's nothin'," Beck said. He gripped a flashbang and leaned further out of cover. Luckily enough, the bandits hadn't seen them yet.

Three hostiles were huddled around the gryphoness, two of them stuffing their weapons in the creature's face. The carbon fiber barrels clacked against her dark blue beak. A third was taking shearing scissors to her flank, stepping on a white stool in an attempt to reach her folded wings.

The bandits' scarlet, ceramic masks guarded their faces from the sandstorm. A few meters away from the others, the fourth bandit stood. He seemed to be talking on a phone. His weapon was holstered on his hip. Beck noted the most threatening of his enemies. Given the distance and the range of his assault rifle, that particular bandit would cause problems.

The flashbang's range was enough to either stun the three on the objective or disable the one standing apart. And that was assuming he could even throw it far enough to tag the loner. If Jason was right about the anti-ballistic shield one of them should be carrying, it was possible that could become a factor. It was a risk though, as if he counted on its existence and it turned out to be absent, he could end up eating shots from the rifle.

He turned back to his makeshift tactician. "On a scale from one to ten," he said, "how likely is it that the head honcho over there is the one carrying the shield."

Jason leaned out from behind the dune and squinted. He thought for a moment before opening his mouth.

"Ten."

"Fuck."

"Maybe nine?"

Beck bowed his head and thought for a moment longer. He went over it in his head twice, then thrice, then four times... He could use her as cover. The bandits needed her alive for her feathers to remain harvest-able, if what he had heard was credible. Though, that was a particularly obscure claim, and no one really had anything to back it up; people just reported a few first hand accounts of botched poaching attempts.

He reviewed his gear. Two flashbangs hung from his right hip. A fragmentation grenade, courtesy of Jason's unending generosity, sat hidden in his jacket's pocket, and his T4 combat knife was ever waiting to be drawn.

The frag, while definitely powerful, would remain unusable. He couldn't risk its explosion going off too close to the gryphoness. Even her highly regenerative properties would not stop the flak from ripping her a new one.

It really just came down to his skill here. He turned back to his friend. "Jason. Stay here."

The older man stood for a second before letting out a sigh. "Be careful."

With the greatest care, Beck eased out from behind the sand dune after confirming none of the bandits were looking where they would see him. The stinging ambiance the sandstorm supplied was important for his approach. Its consistent sound masked his footsteps as he gained on the objective's rear.

He leaned up against her left hind paw. Her tail hung from above, swaying only to the command of the whipping sands. Peaking out from behind her, he confirmed the positions of the only two targets he could see: the shear wielder and the now attentive rifleman. The rifleman's position was especially unfortunate, as his presence prevented Beck from being able to perform a take down on the unaware cutter. He would need only to turn slightly to the right and pull the trigger.

Sliding over to her right paw, he looked for another means of action along the length of her opposite side. From here, the beast's massive body broke line of sight with the rifleman, so that was a plus. Then he saw it: the deciding factor. What looked like a decently sized off-white sphere was hanging from one of the bandits on her beak. The ballistic shield. Even better, the same bandit had an extra defensive measure hanging loosely out of his pocket. The T9 semiautomatic pistol sealed the deal, and this man's need to carry two weapons around would hopefully come back to bite him and his unsavory crew.

Beck shifted back behind the gryphoness.

Am I really going to do this?

He looked back to the dune Jason was hiding behind. His mind drifted back to the day his mom and pop sent him off to the ridge. Their expressions of joy and hope couldn't be clearer. They gave him this opportunity to do something. Something, anything greater than simply tending to fields and attempting to fight off starvation. This something, he thought, would define him. It could put his well being in jeopardy; it could risk his life as a whole. But it would be worth it if he helped somebody, even if it was just one person. If he could free someone else from their captor, whether it was poverty or otherwise, he could say he had done the best he could.

Beck climbed to his feet, brandishing a flashbang and the sharp T4 in the same motion. Mind clear with purpose, he entered a stance suitable for transitioning into a burst of speed. The next few moments would most certainly define him, for better or for dead.

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