Blood bath (continuation to Bad Dictation)

(FOR STORYLINE PURPOSE)

Thesaurus: bloodbath (noun)

The savage killing of many victims: bloodletting, bloodshed, butchery, carnage, massacre, pogrom, slaughter. See help/harm/harmless.

Chelsea: Midnight.

The operatives were thorough and precise; three square blocks were pronounced “clear”. No blue-pills, no gangs, no anybody. Several lookouts on the roofs of various buildings that framed the three block radius were posted, each scanning for anything that would upset the dead of the night.

The two operatives arrived right on time at the rooftop of the intended target. Short work getting the roof door open and even easier work getting to the upper floor, they made their way down the darkened stairwell slowly before they saw the first wash of light on the floor…

The night watchman never had a chance to scream or react before his mouth was covered, slight resistance and then a sagging as the cold steel of a gun was pressed to the side of his head. Bright flash of both pain and light and then both sensations ended as the watchman sagged to the floor having no thoughts, ever again.

Corphe looked down at his handiwork and then back up to Pops who said nothing but crouched down and searched the pockets of the dead watchman and grabbed an access key. “Quicker for us then me just hacking our way in” Pops said lowly as he rose and made his way to the office door while Corphe grabbed the dead watchman under the shoulders and dragged him under the receptionist’s desk.

Walking towards Pops he said with some worry “I do hope we are not gonna have anymore trouble here.” Pops smiled while he swiped the lock and said “relax, the whole place is hacked, I blinded all the cameras and sensors and the real beauty is that everything is registering like it is operating normally so no alarms of any malfunction either.”

Corphe nodded and breathed easier, he knew it was just nervous jitters he had, being his first real mission for Merovech. He hoped that Jahzel and Barloke would approve so far of how he was carrying out.

The red light on the lock turned green and both operatives could hear the bolts pull back with a metallic clack. The office itself was tastefully done in a way that made you feel cozy and relaxed. Pops thought all it needed was a fireplace and he could sit in one of the plush recliners and sleep forever.

Shaking his head and getting back to the business at hand Pops circled the ornate desk and sat in the chair, pulling the keyboard on the desk closer to him while he turned on the computer and began to work.                                                                                                                                   

Corphe looked through the file cabinets even though the information they wanted was in the computer, but Barloke said to be thorough and leave nothing to chance, he checked file case after file case until he did come up with something, all the way in the back of the last file. Shaking out the contents he pulledfrom the folder a disk and a hard plastic file. Walking over to Pops who was working furiously at the keyboard he said “what do you make of this?”

Pops only had to look at the disks and plastic file for a second before returning to the keyboard and saying “looks like a construct modifier and program. I read up on those, pretty classy program. Let’s you create any kind of construct, probably for training.”Corphe nodded and turned over the disk, looking at it a moment “uh Pops” he said still looking down “you sure this is only used for training?”

Pops didn’t look away from the monitor but said “yeah, usually that’s all they can really use it for, its part of a loading program, why something there that doesn’t look right?”                                                                                                                                                                             

 

“Can’t really say for sure” admitted Corphe “but the desk reads “My Beloved” what do you think that means?” Pops didn’t answer right away but just shrugged and muttered “almost in…..gotcha! Ok let me start downloading and to answer your question about the disk, we’ll just have to upload that and see what it says back at the ship, could be something important but it doesn’t hurt to be sure.

Corphe nodded and pocketed the disk and file. Hopefully this was something important that could be used later on. Pops chuckled “I tell ya” he said as he watched the monitor “Barloke is one sneaky devil when it comes to warfare, this is gonna be a bloodbath before this is done.”

Corphe smiled in the darkened office, yes the time for all the posturing, threats and talking was done. Corphe also had a personal stake in this as his own brother was threatened by the good doctor. As Barloke told them, they were fighting for their existence and it looked like he was right.

“There” said Pops as he stood up and pulled the disk from the computer “that should take care of it” Shutting off the computer he made his way around the desk as Corphe opened the door. “Don’t you think he is gonna know we broke into his system?” Pops shrugged at Corphe’s question “Not likely” he said “I have seen better defense than that, plus I put so many non tracers on it, it would take him centuries to figure out how we did it, but he’s gonna find out anyway I suppose.” Corphe looked back questioningly as Pops snapped his fingers and said “aw man! I almost forgot!” Reaching in his coat pocket he walked back over to the desk and placed a sheet of paper on it.

                                                                  

“What was that?” asked Corphe as he shut the door and followed Pops to the exit doors. Pops chuckled and said “a note Barloke wanted to leave, so it really didn’t matter what I did as far as covering our tracks, but that’s cool. It was nice to get out of ship for a few. Corphe nodded and reached into his pocket, pulling out a small cell phone, pressing a button he put it to his ear.

“Operator”

“Done, ready for extraction”

“Head over to Walsh and Abbott, we’ll be waiting for you there.”

“Roger that” and hung up.

Both men looked at each other and then walked away to the extraction point leaving the office the way they found with the exception of one letter on a desk and one dead watchman, the entire operation took 10 minutes, not bad for two operatives their first time out…

((special thanks to Jahzel for the screenies))

Downtown 6 pm

Center Park

      

                                                                                     

Barloke put away the paper as Jahzel walked up to him in the park. “So did you send flowers” Barloke asked as he tossed the paper to the side. Jahzel saw what was on the cover and said “no, but I showed up so that’s something I tell you the families of the ones we just knocked up are set for life with the amount of money Tranque was throwing their way.” Barloke nodded and stood and said wryly “sure…why not? He can always code more…”

                                                                                                    

Both men walked out of the Park talking. Jahzel said “he did make some small mention about you.” They stopped on the corner waiting for the light to change and Barloke said “you mean about the “troubled individual” jazz?” Jahzel nodded and said “yeah” as they crossed the street. “I also heard some rumor that the Zionites are beginning an investigation of sorts.” Hmmm” Barloke said as they reached the other end of the street and headed towards the subway “that is surprising; I would have thought the Mechs would have taken a greater interest than the Zionists...”

As they descended to the platform Jahzel said “well I doubt they will for long, word is that they are tired of the whole mess and some have said they wish Tranque would try to come to some peace agreement with you if just to end all the slaughter.”

They stood on the platform while Barloke shrugged and said “well he knows my number, he can always arrange for talks but until then the rock and roll doesn’t stop…”

Richland 7:30pm

Mara

26 year old Bob Dugan was playing with marshmallows on lawn table on the rooftop of his apartment. His aunt always hid the keys to the rooftop from him, but Bob always seemed to find them. He knew he wasn’t supposed to be up here and that if he was caught he would probably be punished by staying in his room all week, but he was having the time of his life and not once did he thing about flying. He was just finishing making a marshmallow castle when a red headed man approached him and said pleasantly “heya Bobby! What ya doing there?”

 

Bobby looked guiltily at the red headed man and then at his friend who looked older and for some reason made Bob nervous as he said “nothing mister, I’m just building things.”

Jahzel looked at the lumps of marshmallows and said “ah and that’s a what? Clouds maybe?” Bob shook his head rapidly and said “Oh no that’s a castle.” Jahzel smiled “well it looks great, me and my friend here were just thinking about flying and we wanted to know if you would like to come along.”

At that Bob’s eyes took on a dreamy look “fly” he asked almost to himself. “Uh huh” answered Jahzel “maybe fly all the way to Downtown and back again, wouldn’t that be fun?”

Bob smiled and said “you are fooling me mister” he said “Doc told me I can’t fly, that only birds can do that and people in machines. I used to think I could, but then I got hurt bad and they took away my comic books, but I still like to come up here to see the birds fly.” Looking at Jahzel he said lowly “that’s why I steal the key when my aunt’s asleep, if she knew I was up here it would be grounding for sure.”

“Hmmm” said Jahzel as he scratched his chin “so you don’t believe you can fly then?” Bob shook his head and said “no mister.”

 

“well what if I could prove it to you?” said Jahzel with a smile and Bob laughed and aid “sure! That would be great!”“Ok” said Jahzel cheerily and looked over to Barloke who hadn’t said anything yet “hey Bar, you mind flying to the next building over there?” Barloke looked at Jahzel curiously and said “what?” “Yeah” said Jahzel his smile a little strained now as Barloke didn’t understand “just fly over to the other building.” Barloke then got it, because he sighed and rolled his eyes while he said “fine.”

 

Both Bob and Jahzel watched Barloke as he walked over to the edge of the roof and with one leap sailed easily over to the other building across the street. Jahzel smiled lazily as Bob’s jaw dropped in wonder and amazement. “Oh my!” Bob exclaimed “I never seen anything like that!” Jahzel chuckled and said “well you can do that too you know.” Bob looked back at Jahzel and with a voice that was tinged with innocence and hope said “really?” Jahzel nodded and tapped the side of Bob’s head gently as he said “you just got to believe it up there my friend.” Bob nodded solemnly though his eyes were wide open “for now just jump to the next building and my friend will catch you” said Jahzel “what do you say?”

 

Bob licked his lips and thought about it and then with a trembling of excitement he said “I’ll do it!” Jahzel smiled and said “good! Ok get ready then.” Bob walked over to the edge of the rooftop and looked back once to say “thanks mister, you’re my new best friend” Jahzel smiled and nodded as Bob leaped off the roof screaming all the way down “I’m flyyyyyinnnnnnnggg!!!!!!!”Then a dull thump from below and with that both men jumped down to the streets and walked over to where Bob landed. As they approached Jahzel said “now that is a clear cut case of cement poisoning.” Barloke took out his phone as he nudged Bob over to his back with his boot and said “or massive deceleration trauma.” Jahzel chuckled as Barloke got the coordinates.

 

As both men walked away Jahzel said to Barloke “hey how does that song go? I believe I can flyyyyy...”

“Oh you’re a regular comedian, a real Bob Hope you are…”

 

Murasaki, 10pm

Green Tigers Restaurant

Avath ate her noodles without much relish, in truth the restaurant wasn’t exactly a five star, but the food was clean and the clientele mostly tourists who had no clue as to what good Chinese food tasted like. The only reason why she was here was because her “mark” was here, a Floyd “the Flow” Benice who for the past 12 years of his miserable 23 year old life was in and out of correctional facilities.

 

In her life before she was awakened, Avath was a prosecutor and the docket of the case file of the man in question past her desk on more than one occasion. The last case would have put him away for good, before the matter of his sanity came into question.

The defense was that killing a van full of teens wasn’t the work of some greedy kid armed with a revolver and dreams of getting a lot of money from the hit. No, the defense claimed that this was the work of a troubled individual, certainly a man with his colorful past in courts could prove that he was imbalanced, and what was more the word of a prominent psychiatrist that with rehabilitation was enough to convince the jury that a lesser sentence of insanity was the proper sentence, but that didn’t sit well with Avath, not at all…

Floyd took a last chug of beer before he told his drinking partner Miles “man if this deal goes through we are gonna be swimming in dough!” Miles looked back and warned “just no kill crazy rampages Floyd, you got off more than lucky the last time, so don’t push it.”

“Yeah, yeah” said Floyd as he got up “I’ll be extra careful this time, and we will get the goods. I just hope Garvin pays big for it. I don’t want to go through all this trouble for nothing.” Miles nodded waving Floyd off and sat drinking his beer as Floyd left, not noticing the woman that got up from the bar and headed toward the door.

Avath took her time following the man past the darkened alleyway to a lone opening by the bikes, knowing that Floyd would be there where she wanted him. She watched a moment a little amused as Floyd cursed a series of choice and colorful words at the bicycle he used to get around, the bike that now had two flat tires from earlier courtesy of Avath.

                                                                               

Floyd gave the now useless bike a kick before turning to walk away before he heard “Hello Floyd, having some bike trouble?” Floyd turned around slowly to see the woman pointing a gun straight at him and his eyes widened when he saw her face.”

“You!” he said in shock “you’re that lawyer babe that wanted me locked up forever!”

Avath smirked and said “I’m flattered” she cocked back the hammer of the gun as Floyd started to babble “hey you can’t do this, you’re a lawyer!”

“Not anymore…”

“Look lady, please! I didn’t kill those people! I swear it!”

Avath lowered the gun slightly and said “we both know you did, the only thing that got you off was that your friend has money and he has use for you, that’s why you got out. So what was on the agenda tonight Floyd? Planning to knock over a liquor store? Maybe leave the owner dead for your trouble?”

“Well actually it was a jewelry store…” muttered Floyd and he began babbling again when Avath raised her gun again.

“No! Don’t lady! Please lady! I’m a sick man! You heard what the shrink said! Temporary insanity! I need help lady, I need medical help!”

 

Avath could have let the man go on talking but she heard it all before, and besides time was not in her favor…

“I got all the “cure” you need right here” she finally said and emptied the entire clip into Floyd who was dead even before he hit the floor without so much as a scream, like he wasted all his breath begging to live and had nothing left for the actual dying part.

                                                                             

Avath looked around a moment as she tossed the gun in a garbage can and pulled out her phone.

“Operator”

“Done”

“Shin Dao and Chen two blocks away, we’ll be waiting.”

“Roger that” and hung up, walking away from her final case….

Shinjuku 11:03pm

Shinjuku- Club Masamune

Trung saw the guards outside the club and already knew he was in for a difficult time. Well, it’s not like Barloke didn’t warn me, he thought while he tossed his guns in a alleyway and walked toward the entrance of the club.

Due to the recent crime wave of events, many clubs were adding extra security so it was no surprise when one of the guards produced a hand scanner and checked Trung and several other patrons for weapons.

The club inside wasn’t as loud as Trung thought it would be, which was good news and bad. Good because as far as Trung was concerned they could take their synthesizers and screeching guitars and shove it. Bad because the noise would have been a good mask in case his “mark” wasn’t going to go out quietly.

He headed over to the bar and ordered a beer, quietly taking in the surroundings. Club was maybe half full, or maybe half empty, depending on how much of a optimist or pessimist you were, which spelled more bad news for Trung.

                                                                                          

The waiter however was the only good news for Trung as it was his “mark.” 33 year old Mel Stentson approached Trung with a beer on his tray and served it with a disinterested “here ya go” before walking back behind the bar.

“Geez Laura I got to go to the bathroom and wash my hands.”

The bartender looked at Mel with frank disbelief and said “again? This is like the fifth time in an hour you had to go wash your hands. For chrissakes Mel, you’re serving booze, not plutonium!”

Mel looked at her and said “c’mon Laura I’m gonna go nuts if I don’t!”

Laura looked at Mel with disgust before rolling her eyes and waving him off with an impatient hand saying “Fine, just get back here before the end of this century!” Neither of them noticed that the man that was just served beer left the bar and was already walking through the bathroom door with his beer bottle in hand…

Mel walked in the bathroom a few seconds later and with a happy look of satisfaction started washing his hands the same way he did since childhood. He made sure his hands were literally covered in lather before applying some scalding hot water to rinse it off. You could never be too careful, germs were everywhere, everything you touched nowadays was a germ factory waiting to infect you, waiting to sap away at your health, to make you cough and sneeze and generally become a germ factory as well. His parents raised him right; he would always wash his hands, always. No matter what you were doing, the reasoning in his household was there was always time to make sure you didn’t become a germ factory. Then the nightmare hit him, he felt the pressure in his belly that didn’t come up, but made an agonizing trip downward.

He looked at the toilets with something like horror knowing that the inevitable was at hand, but dreading what must be done. He wrung his hands in fists in a what to do, what to do gesture even as he walked to the stalls and saw with some relief that the toilet paper bins were full. His small smile was for a reason, paper comes from trees, and trees were pronounced as “clean” to Mel so therefore the paper must be clean. Thanking his luck he started pulling at the toilet paper and in a minute the entire seat of the toilet was covered with it.

Trung sighed and waited in the stall next to Mel’s wondering how he was going to take his “mark” out. No weapons on him and no easy exit out of the bathroom. He looked down for a moment and smiled discovering that at least one of the two problems he had was solved…

Mel heard glass smashing just before he was about to sit down and called out worried “everything all right there?

“Yeah” the voice in the other stall chuckled “just dropped my bottle is all, its times like this I wish I had three hands!”

“Oh….ok” said Mel uncertainly before hearing the toilet in the other stall flush. He turned around and was just starting to lower his pants when the stall door crashed inward, knocking him onto the seat. The killer with a jagged bottle neck charged in and began cutting quickly along the neck of Mel as he held him down.

 

Mel’s last thoughts weren’t about the obvious fact that his life was now in the milliseconds, he was surprisingly thinking of all the germs that must be on the glass bottle….

Trung stepped back and out the stall away from the bloody mess that was Mel. Reaching into his coat he pulled out his phone.

“Operator”

“Done, but I got a few problems here>”

“And that is…?”

“I’m pretty much trapped in the bathroom” said Trung and then frowned when the operator started chuckling. “Yeah, yeah real funny, now how do I get out?”

The operator stopped chuckling but said in a amused voice “turn around.” Trung turned and saw a door where the wall was a few seconds ago and smiled as he said “thanks man.”

“No problem” said the voice on the other end “but you better move fast, Agents tend to notice when you start changing things.”

“Right” said Trung and then grimaced and said “ugh”

“What is it now?”

“Nothing” said Trung as he looked at all the blood on him, “just saw the mess this left on my clothes”

As he stepped out of the door and in the alleyway, Pops who was in the real laughed and said “well Barloke told me to say if you mentioned it, that that’s what you get for wearing all white to a mission.”

Trung rolled his eyes and hung up, just relieved that this mission was over and he was on his way out…

                                                                                       

Well this actually concludes this little mini event. To recap the final moments Tranque and Barloke did meet and hashed out the problems they had. Barloke has agreed to a non agression stance against the remaining patients of Tranque and has donated 400 mil to be divided to the families of the victims. No word on the Zion or Mech stance but as Barloke would say "he wouldnt give it a second thought."

We had alot of fun doing this and in all honesty this was something that was done in the begining on the fly. Yes we could have accepted Tranque's note to us as the genuine article, but upon relfection we saw oppourtunity and took it. This was the first time Jahzel or i have ever worked on a project like this together and we are rather happy with alot of the results.

The most we took from this was alot of tips on how to make an event work. One thing i learned in partiular was that an event like this shouldnt go over a week long and the echoes of the seven P's were always going through my head, Previous, Proper , Planning , Prevents , Perilous , Poor , Perfomance.

While we would have loved to have seen more of a reaction rp-wise we still had alot of fun working with what we had and with that we hope to make another event down the road even better.

Special thanks goes out to

Jahzel- night after night those emails were something to look forward to, the screenshots were something I enjoyed seeing everytime.

The cast of Merovech and the victims- (Avath, Ilithia, Melwon, Shayded, Trung, Corphe, Pops, Jahzel, Olbaid and Kaleeb) Thanks for putting up with us in the director's chair, without all of you this wouldnt have been possible.

Tranque- What can i say ? The man can roll with the punches, he rp'd this as best as he could with practically no input from me or Jahzel and pulled off his end brilliantly. The man has my deepest respect as a fellow roleplayer.

Sieges-I had to chuckle when you told me you felt bad about some of the things you said, believe me there was never any anger on this end and your first gut reaction sometimes is the right one, or at least the truest to the soul of the person you are.

Vesuvious- Thanks for the roleplay material (and i think Jahzel wants to contact you on some tips with using those newspaper templates) a through and through rp'r if there ever was one. We really appreciated the interaction and the kind comments.

To all that I didnt mention , thank you for your participation. We hope we can bring out some future events that are even better