The rain fell almost like mist throughout the city of Kelos, spattering off of wrecked roof tiles and shattered stone. The streets below ran red with blood, faintly dissipating to run into the streams of water that now flowed about freely.

Already, the bodies were disintegrating under the pounding rain and combined effect of their already shattered bodies causing the material to disappear. Vindicare Assassin Vendrilis shook his head faintly, almost mentally as he looked at the scene through the scope.

"At least the Tau are gone." He smirked. The city had been attacked by Tau recently, he had been dispatched to make sure the city was secure before the imperial guard came to reclaim the location for the throne.

He made another sweep quickly, then rose from his prone position, and got up from behind the low pile of rubble, that looked as though something had cut straight through the building near him. Railgun most likely, Xenos abominations tend to use that often. He walked across the street, his rifle at his side, knowing he was an open target.

That was the whole point.

He stopped in the middle of the street, and looked at the tall spire of the once-capital building of the city, now shattered and broken. He looked for another moment, then stopped, and froze as though he was a statue.

He heard the fainted tell-tale click, a flash of blue light, and spun himself to the left, the spatter of plasma already fading into the scorched stone. He raised his rifle and snapped of a few shots, not caring about their effectiveness as he sprinted into the ruin of an office building to his left.

There were no more shots made at him as he made his run, and he looked about the deserted and dusty hall before him, looking through a door to his right to see a lounge of sorts, the furniture was burnt and scarred, las-shots pocketing the walls, a few guardsmen bodies still lying about, large chunks of their flesh removed.

"Kroot, xenos barbarians." He knelt behind a coffee table, and edged towards the unbroken window before him. He raised his rifle towards the buildings before him, and looked through the scope, magnifying his already godlike sight.

There he is. He smirked, seeing the tau "fire warrior" standing in a window about a hundred and forty feet above the ground, his long barreled rifle scanning the street below for his quarry.

He held the sight for a few more seconds, watching the auto tracers in his lense give him the precise adjustments he would need to take the shot. "May you burn xenos." He squeezed the trigger like any good sniper was supposed to, not pull like some rookie, but squeezed, feeling the trigger pull back as his shot soared through the air, cutting a hole in the crystal that made the glass, not shattering it like any common weapon, and watched as the small black pinprick of the shell flew towards the tau.

He shot it. The tau, miraculously had turned, just by a small fragment of movement, and had pulled the trigger of their blasphemous weapon, sending a burst of blue energy to consume the shell!

He rolled backwards as the Tau readjusted again to spray several shots in his direction, shattering the glass into splinters as the shots began to fill the room.

He finished his roll, exiting the room before turning to sprint up the stairs, only to be met by a lone Kroot sniffing the air with his elongated beak. Before it could let out so much as a sound, he spattered it's internal organs into the stairs behind it with a shot and shoved it aside, making a mental note to burn the glove when he was back in orbit.

He hurried down the hall and into an office, closing the door behind him to lean against it, turning his rifle over to load another shell into the chamber. He closed it with a jerk on the small "nipple" that stood on the side of the rifle, then eased over to the window, and aimed up at the window yet again.

He's gone. Not that I’m surprised, any good sniper doesn't hold their position for very long. He began to scan about, then suddenly his concentration was broken as the window shattered.

He looked for the cause, then saw a disk like object almost lazily float through the air to land on the blood stained carpet behind him. "Wh-" Grenade! His mind screamed before he finished the word.

Without further ado, he hurled himself out the window, the grenade detonating behind him to tear at his back and force him into the side of the building opposite the building he was in, nearly clearing the low roof.

He fell back off the stone wall to the floor of the alleyway that was between the buildings. He lay there, then slowly began picking his way up off the floor when he heard a voice, a crude xenos voice behind him, speaking in his language. "Point match gue'la."

His last thoughts were on what was about to kill him before the shot reduced his cranium to a pulp as he dropped to the ground, thoroughly dead.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Shas'la Pathfinder Ti'rik put the long barreled rail rifle over his shoulder, and drew out his pulse rifle again. The human had been a good adversary, his locations and shot superb, but they weren't good enough to beat good Tau ingenuity and skill.

"Back to the HQ." He murmured before keying his vox to call in a ship to pick him up, leaving the body in the alley behind him as he jogged out into the street, his hoofed feet making little sound as he ran. He made a mental note to have a drone retrieve the holoprojection system inside the building overlooking the square.

Note by Author:

Tau: A race of blue skinned humanoids who favor long ranged warfare and follow the idea of a “greater good”.

Vindicare: A branch of the assassin cults that specializes in sniper combat.

Throne: The Vindicare’s race (humans) worship a “god emperor” who sits upon a massive golden throne, and is referred to as “throne” instead of “god” or the like.