Swallow all your Doubt [Open]

It was a day. That was a fact, it was a day that existed. It was a day where some people would do things. Some people seemed to like doing these things. Of course, there were those who preferred not doing anything. What? It's a beautiful day outside? Everyone would argue that people should be out and making the most of the day. Not this man though. A rather lean, but tall, man sat, leaning against a building. He was out of the way, maybe partially out of respect for the people who might want to pass, but definitely to avoid the work of needing to move if he was in someone's way. People might think he was asleep, but most people knew better than to try and take anything off his body. He'd point a gun almost instantaneously at their had and inform them he didn't want to shoot, and to move along, should they try to pickpocket him. Everyone typically did. Even if they didn't know who this man was, he still had a gun pointed to their head. He probably wouldn't shoot regardless, he'd probably sigh, complain about the effort, and go somewhere else. It'd be hard to call him a productive member of society, but he had a talent. His talent was to fight, and if necessary, kill. His targets tended to be criminals, so in a way, he did contribute. He only did so though so he could eat. How this man, Coyote Starrk, could enjoy doing literally nothing all the time was most likely beyond the comprehension of most people.

He slept for a rather long time, but unfortunately it was not to last. The brown haired male was woken up by the sounds of what sounded like terror and combat. He opened one eye, he wanted to think that whatever it was would resolve itself. Sadly the sound of blade meeting flesh seemed to make that rather unlikely, or rather it signaled the possibility of more blade meeting flesh. "What am I supposed to do about it?" He said rather halfheartedly to no one in particular, but he still began to push himself to his feet. With a sigh he began to walk in the direction of, from what he saw, a girl running away in terror. He wasn't sure if she was actually terrified. He just knew someone running from the sounds of things happening wasn't usually a good sign. Maybe it would have been a better idea to go here the violence had actually taken place? He assumed that'd be more work and merely followed the girl. He found his way to the market, and what a pain that'd be. If he chose to make the effort he'd just made worthwhile, he'd need to put even more effort in finding the girl again.

He looked for a short time, which with his power really should have been easier than he'd admit, but after a few minutes he figured he might want to give up. Well, he did want to give up, and so he was about to. Unfortunately dark shadows began to descend upon the market. If by shadows...he meant thugs. The market surprisingly had no law enforcement around at the time. He knew that meant it was up to him unless someone else boldly stepped forward, and hoping for that to happen was a recipe for disaster. Many people moved away. The thugs seemed entirely focused on one person, the girl he had followed here! Why was she seemingly where all of the danger was? "Come on, we just wanna..." With a quick whisper of some unknown word, Starrk vanished. He reappeared right behind the man who was speaking, who stopped as he felt the gun pressed against his head. "I really don't want to shoot you, could you just fall back and leave the girl alone?" Starrk asked, in his usual halfhearted voice. The man turned around and went to punch Starrk in the face quickly, so Starrk wouldn't have time to pull the trigger. Starrk simply grabbed his arm mid swing and slipped him on the ground. He pointed the gun at the now grounded man, taking out his second pistol and aiming it towards where the others stood. "I really don't want to shoot, please leave." He said again, no different than the first time. As if on queue, one of the men seemed to recognize him. He signaled the rest of the men and they seemed to leave without arguing. "That was some trouble you seemed to be mixed up in." He spoke to the girl as he scratched his head, his weapons back in their holsters.

When Starrk began to interact with this girl, the first thing she did was yelp.  How?  Somehow this girl had managed to stay completely oblivious to the fact that the men were talking to her, right next to her, and going in to grab her all at once was beyond him.  Of course, not everyone could sense danger in their sleep.  It was such a hassle, it's hard to sleep when his mind is crying out warning alarms.  He sighed and stood as the girl turned around.  She would have noticed the guns being put away as a sign of non-hostility, or maybe she would have if she didn't seem oddly intent on seeing him as a threat.  Did she know who he was?  If she was innocent then that wouldn't make a difference, since he didn't target innocent people.  Though if she did know, and she was reacting like this...  Starrk sighed and just hoped she wasn't someone who should be scared of him.  More work.  He'd have to scold her or something, it was such a hassle.  She held up her shield, which realistically probably wouldn't have worked with it's size and the fact his firepower might just shatter it, and told him to stay back.  It's odd that someone who seemed to worried and alert now could be so totally oblivious to danger moments before.  Did she somehow think a marketplace was safe?  Unfortunately while it is safer, no location is truly 100% safe.  If this girl had guy's following her she should have been alert from the start.  He didn't want to know what they wanted to do with her, partially because it was likely grotesque...and partially because thinking about the work they're going through to get her made Starrk almost cringe if it was for something that stupid.  "Assassin?  What reason would someone like you have for an assassin to be sent after you?"  He asked in slight disbelief, he didn't believe this girl could do anything worth being assassinated over.  

Even worse, she asked why he hadn't killed her yet.  "You don't look like a thug, or a mugger, or a bank robber."  He said shrugging.  Why waste effort killing someone when they didn't do anything wrong?  It takes effort, and besides even Starrk knew that was just plain rude.  The girl began to lower her shield and continued, flat out asking if he was an assassin.  "As long as you haven't done any of what I said before, you can just call me a passerby."  He spoke.  "In other words, don't go around randomly attacking people, damaging property, killing, or anything else like it.  It'd be more work for me, and I'd probably try not to kill you, which means even more work."  He spoke rather lazily, basically saying he doesn't feel like doing anything and that he didn't want her to do any of that because of that fact.  He yawned as he continued.  "Tell me little lady, you didn't even notice the men who were about to grab you a few seconds ago did you?"  Starrk walked up and offered an empty hand.  "Coyote Starrk."  He said, telling her his name.  It was an odd name but it suited him fine he thought.  Sounds better than Wolf Starrk, which would fit his ability to conjure magical wolves.  Whether or not the girl shook his hand he'd eventually lower it.  He looked around, but he figured the men were scattered by now.  They seemed to recognize him.  Coyote Starrk, the mercenary.  The hired gun.  The bane of all criminals, even if he only followed his line of work because it was easy.  Not everyone knew him.  Some normal people did, some didn't.  Some looked at him like he was some legend, which he didn't particularly like.  Some thought of him as a nothing but a myth, but plenty of normal people don't know him for one reason.  There's no need to learn the name of the person who won't kill you, sadly only the name of the one who will.  Probably why thugs ran from him.  "Those thugs were determined to get to you.  Any reason?"  He hoped the answer wasn't that she held something powerful, oh how he hoped that wasn't the answer.  Last thing he needed was every thug trying to get a hold of something that makes them stronger, and thus more dangerous.  Still, something told him that if she needed it, he'd end up being the escort duty.  He couldn't just leave her if she was being targeted, not alone at least.

For someone so scared and clearly out of her league should Starrk have been her enemy, she had a fair amount of sass in her.  Upon his pointing out she didn't look like a criminal, she made a sassy little noise and folder her arms.  She's lucky Starrk wasn't going to harm her, but giving people with bad intentions a reason to pick her as the target wasn't the brightest, if that was what she was concerned about anyway.  Even more, she asked him why he even bothered.  She was probably referring to his obvious dislike of work, which he made clear by his stressing how much extra work he'd have to go through.  "How should I know?"  He asked rather blandly.  It seemed like a rather strange thing to say.  If he bothered to go through all that work, he should know why he bothers.  Honestly though he doesn't.  Because it's the right thing to do?  Something about that excuse just seemed incredibly hollow to him.  As if there wasn't any real substance behind it.  Maybe that's because while his actions often align at least a little bit with a standard "moral" code, he wasn't acting in such a way BECAUSE it was the right thing to do.  He could say it's because he had to, but while it was accurate in some ways, it didn't explain the extra lengths he'd go to and the extra work it inflicted.  Determining thinking about it was a waste of energy, Starrk went on to offer his hand to the girl.  She timidly accepted the handshake, and told him her name.  Ackerman?  And she mocked the name Coyote?  Not that he knew she considered his name weird, but Ackerman managed to strike Starrk as strange.  

Finally he got around to asking her about what happened more specifically, and the girl began to explain.  Sounded about right.  People doing things they probably shouldn't be doing, get caught, and then have to go the extra mile if they don't want to get screwed over.  Right, that's why he did the right thing.  It was less work in the long run if people considered him a good guy rather than a criminal.  "If it was important enough to chase you that long little lady, it's probably not over."  Well wasn't that tiring.  He might have to stick by this girl, at least until they've done the stupid thing and went for her while he was around, or they saw him around her long enough to believe that pursuing her would only end poorly.  It was a shame, the weather was perfect for sleeping.  Actually, anything that wasn't a torrential downpour worked.  Why couldn't this have happened during one of those?  "If it was that important, they're just waiting for me to leave.  The moment I walk away, that's probably when they'll strike."  He sighed a heavy sigh.  "Which means I either stay here until they get impatient and punish them for it...or until they believe I know you and they become to scared to try attacking you."  He could have been very wrong about this of course, but many thugs worked off a limited brain capacity.  Most could only perform so many calculations per second, and most of those were used up keeping their heart pumping.  A simple strategy like that wasn't uncommon.  They could be more dangerous, smarter, but the odds were slim.  He just shook his head and looked back into the distance.  Whatever they were, they weren't just people who happened to be down on their luck and only want to survive.  Those people usually only steal food so they don't starve, if they steal at all.  Whomever these guys were, they were criminals for a bigger reason. Whatever this bigger reason was, it was a bother to be sure. "It's up to you, but I can stay with you for a bit, just in case. If not, I can just go back to sleep."