Gatehound: No Gate No Break

The city didn't sleep. Not really.

It blinked slowly, neon eyelids fluttering behind bars, flickering signs, and cracked windows. Even at this hour—long past midnight—Violet wandered streets washed in pale light and gutter trash. The storm had passed, but the streets still smelled like wet asphalt and old metal.

She walked with her hood up, hands in her pockets. Her left palm still felt strange—itchy and warm—like it remembered holding something it shouldn't.

A faint sound made her pause. Across the street, just past a row of boarded-up shops, something moved. A figure.

Sliding into the gate of a closed corner store—the kind abandoned for years, left to rot. Violet squinted. No light inside. No signs of life. But the person moved like they belonged there.

Her gut twisted. She should've kept walking.

Instead, she crossed the street.

The gate was cracked open, a brick jammed beneath it. Faded graffiti stretched across the metal shutter like a scar. She ducked down and slipped through.

The inside was dead quiet. Shelves collapsed in jagged rows. Dust blanketed everything. Somewhere, a piece of plastic flapped lazily in the stale air.

Then: a footstep.

She crouched low and peeked through the broken shelves. The figure was near the back. Female. Late twenties maybe. Black boots, tattered trench coat, pale arms crisscrossed with faint scars. Short, ragged hair. She was staring at the shattered refrigerator door like it held secrets.

Violet stepped on a loose wrapper.

The woman turned.

Their eyes met. And Violet froze.

The woman's eyes were entirely black—no whites, no pupils. Just liquid dark, like staring into oil. A grin slowly crawled across her face.

"You followed me."

Violet tensed. "What are you doing in here?"

The woman didn't answer. She tilted her head.

Then vanished.

Violet's instincts screamed—move—

A shelf exploded beside her.

She hit the ground hard, coughing. Glass rained down. The woman appeared mid-air, her foot coming down like a hammer.

Violet rolled just in time. The heel cracked tile where her skull had been.

She scrambled up, breath ragged. "Who the hell are you?!"

The woman pulled out a slender black rod from her coat. It shimmered—then snapped into a curved, obsidian spear.

"I'm like you," she said softly. "Only faster."

Then she attacked.

Violet barely dodged. The spear grazed her side—a flash of pain bloomed along her ribs. She stumbled back, clutching the wound. Her heartbeat pounded in her ears.

"Executioner," the woman said, circling her. "You've touched a Gate, haven't you? I can smell it on you."

Violet didn't answer. Her fingers trembled, reaching for something—anything.

The woman rushed again.

Violet ducked, swung a rusted metal bar from the floor—missed. The spear struck her thigh. She cried out, dropping to one knee.

"You don't even know what you are yet," the woman said. "You're raw. Untuned."

Violet staggered to her feet, blood running down her leg.

"Yeah," she muttered, "but I'm still loud."

The woman raised her spear—then paused.

Something in Violet's hand shimmered.

A pulse. A flare.

Light flickered in her palm.

The faint outline of a guitar began to form.

The woman hissed. "So it's true."

She lunged, but Violet was already moving. She swung the half-born weapon, catching the woman in the shoulder. Sparks flew.

The woman stumbled.

Violet pressed forward, desperate, swinging wildly. She wasn't trained. Wasn't fast. But she wasn't quitting.

The weapon flickered with every strike, unstable but real enough to hurt. But the woman recovered too quickly. She ducked, spun, and drove her elbow into Violet's stomach.

Violet fell hard. Her vision blurred.

The spear came down—she rolled away just in time, pain lancing up her ribs. She crawled behind a fallen shelf, bleeding and dizzy.

She was going to die. And then she remembered the guitar pick. Her fingers closed around the black triangle in her hoodie pocket.

The hum began.

Not from the weapon—but inside her. Her chest. Her throat. Her bones.

She stood.

"Last words?" the woman sneered.

"Yeah," Violet whispered. "Cover your ears."

She screamed.

A pure, focused wave of sound shattered every window in the store. The force knocked the woman back into a row of shelves, spear skidding from her hands.

Violet lunged.

The guitar completed in her hands—solid now. Metallic. Glowing.

She swung it like a hammer, cracking it across the woman's legs. Bone snapped. The woman howled and fell.

Violet didn't stop. She struck again. And again. Every note rang with pain and fury. The lights above them flickered. The woman stopped moving.

Violet stood above her, arms shaking, skin slick with blood and sweat.

Behind her—clapping.

Slow. Measured.

She spun.

From the shadows at the far end of the store, a woman stepped into view. Trim black suit. Gloves. Pale eyes that gleamed like glass under moonlight. Cigarette glowing at the corner of her mouth.

She was smiling.

"Not bad," the woman said.

Violet raised the guitar again, staggering. "Who are you?!"

The woman didn't answer. She looked down at the fallen Executioner, then back at Violet.

"You're stronger than I expected," she said. "Barely trained, leaking power, half-dead… and you still won."

"I don't know who you are," Violet said, voice hoarse, "but take one more step, and I'll flatten you too."

The woman grinned. "Feisty. Good."

She pulled a silver card from her coat and flicked it across the floor. It landed at Violet's feet. A single word engraved in black:

Q.

Violet stared at it, heart pounding.

"What do you want?" she asked.

The woman turned, already walking into the shadows.

"Answers," she said. "Eventually. For now? Get patched up. You'll need your strength."

"For what?"

She paused. Smiled over her shoulder. Then just vanished.

The guitar dissolved in Violet's hands. Her knees buckled. She collapsed beside the broken glass and didn't move.