Haywired – Initiation

"Why Lion's Arch of all places in Tyria to have our base of operations?" Zhenii asked Haytexx as the new krewe walk towards a large human-styled house.

"Because!" Haytexx opened the door, hastily entering the house into a large foyer decked with all the necessities for all kinds of species. "Lion's Arch is in prominent part of Tyria, perfect for what we need to do!" He leaves the door open waiting for the others to come in, Haylium was already beside her brother as he showed off the house. Zeyyn looked at Zhenii and shrugged at her, calmly walking inside. Zhenii gave an annoyed grumpy look at the others before reluctantly stepping in herself.

"You still haven't said what this krewe is about," The door closes behind Zhenii automatically. "Only four krewe members including yourself, no proposed projects and all this expensive equipment for what?" she crosses her arms, glaring at Haytexx.

"Simple! Krewe experience for my sister and I." Haytexx casually pats Hayli on the back while she gives Zhenii a weak and nervous smile.

"And what is exactly that?" Zhenii pinches the bridge of her nose.

"That, I'm still not sure on!" Haytexx said cheerfully and confidently.

"Excuse me? You hired my brother and I to do nothing?" Zhenii sounded progressively irritated.

"Oh please, you should be thankful I hire you and your brother to do nothing for the time being." Haytexx started to pace around Zhenii with hands behind his back. "I have gone through so many applications of bookahs wanting to join my krewe." He gives a mock dramatic gesture of grief. "Besides! You have a run of bad luck with previous krewes and I can assure you that we won't DIE!" he does the jazz hands, "Unexpectedly."

"Uh huh, so what made you decide on us?" Zhenii still gave him a sour look.

"Oh, you and your brother's skills are definitely worth while to have." Haytexx looks at Zeyyn who is staring at Hayli, who is staring between the two and him back and forth. "But I just thought it'll be the perfect sense of irony to hire you." He cants his head at Zhenii, giving her a devilish grin "Miss number two."

"… You son of glitch!" Zhenii started fuming wanting to deck Haytexx in his smug face. "You do remember me!" she jabs her finger at his chest.

"Eh, don't flatter yourself too much." Haytexx chuckled, not worrying at her approach. "It's hard to worry about the rival college krewes when they always fail to win the big one." He leans his arrogant face obnoxiously close to Zhenii, almost like he's waiting for her to punch him, in which, she does throw hook at him, but he ducks his head in a bowing motion to dodge the punch. "But I'll give you credit." He goes back to an upright position and goes back to pacing around her. "It's impressive enough to win second place every time we did those quote on quote competitions." He air quotes as he said that. Zhenii ignited her body for a second, scaring Hayli to hide behind Zeyyn who is still stoic as a statue throughout the entire banter. Haytexx still had his mischievous look on his face as he watches Zhenii.

"That's it! We're out of here!" She turns around to the door, but Haytexx quickly steps in front of her.

"Bahahaha! Oh, this is why you never win first place." His golem hovers over to him and displays a holographic contract. "You and your brother signed a joint deal. You leave, your brother leaves too. Meaning none of you get the pay that I know you desperately need."

"Grr, we'll manage without you." Zhenii hissed at him, which causes to Haytexx laugh hysterically.

"Did you forget how these contracts work? You break them, you break the law, and you don't want that now do you?" He fixes the collars of his shirt. "And I'll have you know that our mother is a Peacemaker Chief, and she won't be afraid to deal with you. Oh yeah and I'm a peacemaker too, who happens to be on the rise of ranks quickly."

"Are you blackmailing me now?" Zhenii protests.

"Oh no no no, this is a statement of legal affairs! You signed a contract and I explained the rules to your dust bunny head." He said in a condescending tone. "And just you let you know." He gets up to her face again "I have a lot more political power than you think, I have very DEEP connections." His eyes flashed pitch black for a moment. He then flops an arm around her shoulders giving the salesman dazzle to her "So make yourself at home!" His tone suddenly jumped to his usual gleeful attitude. "I have a feeling that we'll make a great krewe and get along so very well!" He shoves her away, "Now! if you need anything just ask my golem here J.O.N. for assistance, I'll be in my room thinking of what this krewe is supposed to do, see ya later!" Haytexx walked calmly up the stairs, leaving the others to themselves. Zhenii was stunned to what she just experienced with.

"… What in the Alchemy was that?!"

"I'm so sorry." Hayli walked up to Zhenii. "My brother gets very… Excitable."

"Excitable? Your brother is an egotistical maniac!"

"He's actually really nice when you get to know him…" Hayli holds and rubs her arms with unease.

"I think he's fine." Zeyyn finally spoke up in his deadpan tone, shrugging his shoulders.

"How are you so calm about this, Zeyyn? We're practically stuck with this krewe!" Zhenii stomped, causing Hayli to hide behind Zeyyn. He looks at Hayli for a moment then back to his sister.

"So?" Zeyyn said bluntly, which makes Zhenii smack her palm to her face. Suddenly she felt something pawing her leg, she looks down to see a wolf pup looking up at her, which causes her to jump.

"Gah! How long has that been there?" Zhenii pointed at the puppy.

"Oh, that's our wolf, Geo. He's very nice." Hayli went to pet him and Geo licks his owner's face.

"I'm not even going to bother anymore." Zhenii turns to Jon the golem. "You, golem, there any strong drinks here?"

"Right this way!" Jon leads Zhenii to the kitchen. Leaving Hayli, Geo and Zeyyn alone.

"… So…" Zeyyn tried to make conversation with Hayli, "That contract isn't that restrictive." Hayli shrugged.

"I don't know how it works…" She lets Geo run around the house.

"Zhenii didn't read the entire thing, but I did…"

"Oh, so it's not that serious?" Hayli then stared at him. "Wait, so you guys can-."

"Yes." He interrupts her.

"… Then why stay? Your sister really seems to hate my brother…"

"… Your brother knows what he's doing… I like leaders like that. I think this is the best possible job to have."

"… Thank you…" Hayli timidly looked up at him.

"Thanks for what?" He questioned her with a deep yet lax voice.

"For wanting to stay..." Hayli looked away shyly. "Haytexx started this krewe for me, He always works hard to make everything right for me and this is just another thing he's doing for me… Are you that way for your sister?

"… I try to…" He looked at the doorway to the kitchen.

"You know, you seemed scary when I first saw you, b-but I don't mean that in a mean way." Hayli hides her face away by tucking in her hood. "You're very big…" She said to the towering asura.

"I get that a lot, it's fine, Haylium."

"Oh, you can call me Hayli." She looks up and gives a small smile to him.