"We go have a talk with him," Standard replied. The two walked back towards the Sweet Dreamer when they heard a loud scream. "What the hell!?" Standard yelled, mostly to himself. He took off running towards the origin of the scream, and when he got there he found a young boy lying in a pile of blood. "Tarka!?"

"Is that you, Standard?" Tarka whispered.

"Yeah kid, it's me. We need to get you to a hospital. Don't talk right now."

"Don't worry about me. It's too late to save me." the boy said.

"Who did this to you?!" Standard asked, or maybe yelled would be the word.

"My father...I told him I was going to find you and he came after me and shot me..."

"Wha..?! Your father did this to you?" Standard asked. But before Tarka could reply, he died. "No, he's gone too far!"

Standard ran towards the Sweet Dreamer, not noticing if Karlos was following him.

Ton stopped only for a second to check the boy's pulse, found him to be dead, and take the ID chip he had in his pocket. He would copy it and return it later.

Then he bounded after Standard, blaster in hand...

Standard kicked the doors in at the Sweet Dreamer and shot both of the guards at the door. He made his way back to the office he knew to be Sporelli's, and kicked those doors in too. Sporelli was at his desk.

"Hey Zed, nice to see you." Standard said as he pointed both pistols towards Sporelli's face. "Why'd ya kill the kid Zed? Why? He was your own son, and you killed him."

"Wha...what do you mean? What kid?" Sporelli asked.

"Tarka you fool. You know who I am referring to. I know you did it, he told me, just before he passed away."

"He was going to be my downfall, I had to get rid of him. He was too good, you know what it's like to run a business. It's a cut throat world, and he was holding me back."

"Wrong answer," Standard said, then made two nice little holes in Sporelli's head. The body fell to the ground revealing a large splatter of blood on the wall behind him.

"You've Just Been Standardized."

He's so... ruthless. So efficent. He has no memory, no idea who or what he was. But he knows what he's doing.

He knows just enough to be dangerous.

Ton ignored the still-smouldering corpse of Sporelli and looked at the big, bald man. Was this really the kind of guy they wanted in Shadow Hand?

The answer came to him immediatly...

...yes...

"Where did that come from?" Standard asked himself, repeating the last sentence in his mind again and again. "You've just been standardized..." Odd, it had just popped up. He had no clue where he'd heard it.

Then Standard noticed Karlos. "He got what he deserved." Standard said, calm as could be. Karlos just nodded, with a slight grin forming on his face. What was going on inside the head of the Shadow Hand operative, Standard wondered.

I think," he said, casting a distasteful look at the body of the Sporelli man, "that we're done here. I suggest we leave before we are found."

"Good idea." Just as the words came out of Standard's mouth a group of Sporelli's men walked in, blasters raised. "Get down!" Just as the men started firing, Standard and Karlos ducked behind Sporelli's large desk. "Follow me," Standard told Karlos.

The man with no memory picked up the large body of Zed Sporelli and put it in front of his own. He got up and started shooting the attackers, while they shot their dead boss.