Aleksija ran fast through Orkoza's paved streets, entering one of the largest city squares. The noises and clatters of the imperial city in her ears: heavy machinery at work, busy people coming and going around her. She secured her small flintlock pistol to her side, ensuring it was well hidden under her jacket.

She observed the people around her, looking for the wayfarer who stole the ancient artefact at the university. She needed to retrieve the object, possibly killing the mage in the process, thus proving to be a valuable agent. She had already pinpointed his location to that square, exploiting the magical instrumentation at the magitechnical department. The crowd was dense and it was difficult to move, let alone pursue a thief.

Finally, she thought to have spotted him and began moving in his direction, without hurry, to not startle him, but also quickly. She had dispatched information about the theft and the thief's location to other agents and soon the whole organization would have been on his back. She had to be the one catching him.

She gently opened her way through people, trying to reach him. Many recognized her as the nice medicine student volunteering at the hospital, stopping her to talk and congratulate about her work. «I apologise, I'm in a hurry, I really can't stay know.», she answered timidly.

Abruptly, a cry echoed in the square «There's the thief!». She saw the person she spotted run away, and others begin the chase. “I don't want to work with other agents like this anymore in my entire life. Why yell and not approach silently and just stab him in the back? I almost had him, darn it.”

She guessed the mage would head towards the north gate, to exit the city and escape into the Dark Lands. She decided to try the side alleys, hoping to outsmart him with her better knowledge of the city shortcuts and catch up with him. She ran for some minute and was almost in the gate district when she stepped on an unstable brick and fell, twisting her ankle. “That's it, with this I am going to lose him now, great.”

But she could not let this chance fade. She stood up and resumed to slowly walk, limping. She could not run anymore and walking was painful. She leaned to a wall at a crossroad corner to rest, ready do give up the chase. Maybe she could find a hidden spot near the gate and lurk there waiting for the thief to show up. If he didn't run too fast, she was probably closer to the gate than him.

Focused on her thoughts she did not hear someone running towards her from the intersecting road. She stepped out of the corner just in time for the other person to bump into her, knocking her off her feet. But it was the thief. She had her last chance now. Deception.

She raised her eyes to him, a messy lock of her long hair on her young face, with the most innocent and ingenuous look she could produce. And she mastered that art long ago. She stretched her left hand to him saying «I'm sorry, I didn't see you coming.». He grabbed her hand, helped her standing and turned his back to resume the escape.

With a single movement of her right arm and hand, without even aiming, she fired and he was down, dead.

She retrieved the stolen artefact from the body. The small luminescent orb greeted her faintly lighting her gentle hands. She slowly hid in a nearby alley and sat on the paved road, listening to the capital city sounds. Heavy machinery in the background, people yelling getting closer and then dissolving.

«A flawless headshot», she later reported to her superior, «If this is the opposition we find from Wayfarers, the Empire has already won.»