InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "I wanted to be a Jedi!"

Skandra Tyullis (roll_the_bones) wrote in jh_corporation,
@ 2008-02-13 00:28:00

big day out (meredith, leander)
Sooner or later, you always asked yourself that same fucking question.

How did I get here?

And sooner or later, you always got an answer.

Manhattan was the civilized part of town. They wanted you to think it was urbane instead of urban, but no matter how many times Skandra wound up in Manhattan he always knew the real score. Dirty. It wasn't that the buildings were filthy. They weren't. You could see it if you looked hard enough. Women hanging out too long on a corner. Men shaking hands in New York Fucking City. The Big Apple, Skandra had decided in a moment of hard-boiled noir whimsy, was rotting from the inside out. Maybe because nobody cared, he wasn't supposed to either. And truthfully he really didn't care, as long as nobody was trying to shoot his ass off. Since someone was currently trying to do just that, Skandra took a decided interest in the outcome of the situation. The Marine Corps taught you early on the most important rule - when somebody's shooting at you, you shoot the hell back.

Running away was for Navy boys.

"Jesus Christ, he's a fuckin' snake!" someone shouted.

His arm was outstretched, keeping Meredith pressed against a flimsy metal shelf that didn't have any business stopping a bullet. But they were shooting 9mm automatics at him, which meant every round was ricocheting like a bat out of hell. You could hear them whizzing by your face in those seconds that stretched out too long. For Meredith it was probably happening too fucking fast, all this noise and flash. For Skandra the world was slowing down, until he could feel his heart slapping against its prison of bone and muscle. Each assault was a reminder that he was still alive. And with that goddamn hand cannon clutched in one fist, Skandra figured he had pretty good odds of staying that way. Just keep your cool. Find a target, and make it dead. Fast. These hoods were used to dealing with rimfire .22's and piece of shit switchblades. A Magnum round reminded them that you had to be careful who the fuck you shot at.

Of course, that reminder was going to be pretty useless in a minute.

"Where the fuck did you go, kid?!" Skandra bellowed above the noise.

The beginning. It was pretty simple. You went back to the beginning and found out how you got somewhere. So start from square one.

Robert Skandra was born on November 1st, 1985 - weighing in at 7 pounds, 8 ounces...

Not that square one. Square one-b.

"Why do I have to go with you?" Meredith didn't sound bitchy to his ears, just annoyed - probably because there was paper everywhere.

"We might need your help."

"With what? Grunting?"

"What if I need somebody to write shit down for me? That's why I hired you."

Okay. Manhattan. The FBI had them on a cock-leash, and they were jerking pretty goddamn hard. Skandra didn't like it when people not named Skandra jerked on his pecker, excluding VIP guests, but when the government gave you $45,000 you learned pretty quick that they expected you to do whatever the fuck they asked. Seemed like he'd gotten into this line of work to hunt down renegade AIAs and the scum of the earth, not find people who were knocking off AIAs without official sanctions. And it was pretty weird for the government to give a shit that AIAs were dropping like flies, considering they were tossing money around right and left to get people to 'humanely terminate' them. Nothing more humane than a .500 caliber S&W Magnum round exploding your head like a can of soup in a microwave, but...

Something about it felt wrong.

Then again, Skandra didn't really have a lot of faith in the fucking government these days. That was the second thing they taught you. Unless the guy was shooting next to you, don't trust him. You followed orders, but following orders and displaying trust weren't the same thing at all. Anyway the FBI called him and jerked on his pecker through that brand new digital phone service that their money had paid for. Hard to tell a guy to fuck off when he owned your phone until you paid him back for it. Suddenly Skandra realized the government had paid him $45,000 for the privilege of putting a nylon noose around his junk. Nylon was a metaphor. So was the noose. Far as he knew, Skandra didn't have anything on his junk that he didn't put there himself.

Knock on wood.

Manhattan. Square two. Some BFOT - Built For One Thing, as the slap-happy shore leave boys of the Immortals had called them - was all cut up. Turns out the local cops were dicks, and since they didn't have an FBI guy on scene Skandra was flashing a badge he didn't actually have. When a bounty hunter said FBI the cops pretty much assumed he was drunk. Of course, in Skandra's case he actually was drunk, but that didn't mean the FBI didn't send him. So no crime scene access. That was fine, the locals could give him a ton of info he could use. The bitch of it was that nobody had any idea how it happened, when it happened or why it happened. This led to a very unfortunate situation in the establishment of one Han Li Kwoong and his beautiful wife, owner / operators of the Seoul Deli.

"Come on guys, don't bust my balls, okay?" Skandra sighed heavily. "I'm not a cop. I'm just wondering if you saw anything in that alley two blocks over."

"Man, only cops ask you what you fucking saw."

That was the voice of a conspicuously named Darrellina Max.

"Darrellina because I respect my male half and my female half, but I'm not a slave to either one, baby."

Darrellina was the sort of person your mother hoped you didn't turn into when you were a small child. Shit right out of a movie. Transgender prostitute. There was never a more unlikely candidate than the 6' 5" mountain of toned male flesh that was Darrell...ina. He looked like he should be playing basketball in a prison yard, not selling his grotesquely beautiful body to the night. One of about five or six 'hookers' - by now Skandra was starting to suspect they were more than 'hookers', and he wasn't referring to the angry black penises they were all sporting beneath those neon minis - working the corner in front of Seoul Deli. In this neighborhood, it was unusual. But then again pretty much anything was unusual when you added transgendered black ex-cons turned prostitutes to the mix, wasn't it?

"She mighta been a working girl-"

"Bitch wadn't no gurl, whitey," Darrellina's husky voice could have rendered any man impotent. "Bitch was a robot."

"Fine, she mighta been a working robot. Did you see something?"

"Why the fuck would Darrellina tell you a god damn thing?" another of the dick chicks asked angrily. "Go to hell, you sorry piece of-"

Leander hadn't learned the finer points of street diplomacy yet. That was at least part of the reason that brass knuckles made such an ugly sound when they filled a grown man's mouth with teeth.

His own teeth.

So here they were. Squaring off with a group of black hookers and drug dealers, some transgendered and some just wearing skirts in an expression of solidarity. What Skandra was really asking himself - aside from why Leander was so touchy, why there wasn't a law against transgendered hookers and why this fight had somehow worked its way into the deli - was where the fuck they had hidden automatic weapons under dresses that left nothing to the imagination. Of course, that question was kind of pointless like so many others, but maybe if one of the six was still breathing he'd god damn ask them.

"You get out! Take black men and get out!" Mr. Kwoong, hunched over on Skandra's right, was screaming above the sound of gunfire. "Take them and go! No niggers in the store!"

"I don't think they're men anymore," Skandra pointed out grimly, also shouting. "Also, if you want to kiss and make up it's $30! Otherwise shut the fuck up and let me concentrate!"

"You gonna die, motherfuckers!" one of them shouted.

Well, it could have been worse.

Skandra was willing to bet it was the first time any human being on the planet had thought that while a gaggle of transgendered black hookers were trying to execute them with illegal automatic firearms.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

(Post a new comment)

clerical
2008-02-13 06:25 pm UTC (link)

Meredith was severely out of place in this fiasco. She didn't know how to hold a gun; she'd barely ever seen one outside the gun controller for the latest video game. Things like Halo, and Counter Strike in no way prepared her for exactly what was going on. What she was good for was exactly what she was doing. Recording things. She had her PDA out and was furiously recording everything that was said and heard between the goings on. "Call of Duty 6 said something about this kind of stuff." She muttered to herself.

She really didn't want to die.

"Everyone knows not to touch the black ones, they all have guns." Meredith muttered under her breath, it was a big hello, how long had they been in the city? She just wanted to go back to filing. None of what was going on exactly made sense, thrilling though it might have been, she would have been gasping with fear if she hadn't decided to keep a tally on bullets and keep up with the forum she was on. "You get out. Take black men and get out." She quoted, finishing off Mr. Kwoong's lines a few seconds after he'd said them. "Only 30 to kiss them? I'd have asked for at least 50." She was keeping all the dialogue on her PDA, Since Skandra had told her she might need to write something down.

"This wasn't in my job description. In between Computer Science and Tele Communications it didn't read, vast experience dodging bullets, and I certainly didn't express a need to" Another gunshot to the right. "25 and counting.." She checked it off. "Learn such skills." Meredith looked over at the shop owner, who was much more experienced than she was since he was shaking, she was. Well, when she stopped focusing on who was messaging her.

"They're going to need to reload soon." She mentioned before she went back to staring at her PDA. She pulled a cigarette out of her pocket and put it between her lips. She bought out her lighter and flicked it to life when Mr. Kwoong reached out and pulled the cigarette out of her mouth.

"No smoking! You no read sign on door?"
"Isn't there a no guns sign too?"
"Stupid American whore, think she own everything. No smoking!"

Meredith gave him the finger and went back to tallying off things on her PDA.

"They're about to reload." Meredith waited. "And now. Fire now!"

(Reply to this) (Thread)

fight_star
2008-02-13 09:23 pm UTC (link)

Leander stood at his new partner's side. His hands were placed in the pockets of his red motorcycle jacket. He nodded along with the conversation, half a smile on his face. As far as anyone could tell, Leir considered this just any other afternoon out on the town. If he noticed that the six gigantic black women in front of him were actually boulder-shaped men, he gave no indication.

"Bitch wadn't no gurl, whitey," Darrellina's husky voice could have rendered any man impotent. "Bitch was a robot."

"I like your perfume," Leir said quietly to the tranny standing to Darrellina's right. "It's Chanel, right?"

The tranny looked startled enough to be at a loss for reply. Her face was covered with wiry black stubble, his cheeks rouged with bright pink circles like some sort of doll. Leir shrugged; he was just trying to lighten the somewhat tense mood that...Well what was this? Not an interrogation, not just a conversation. And everyone seemed to know it.

Leir had been fully prepared to let Skandra do all of the talking. The old ex-marine seemed cut out for that sort of thing. But then the tranny he had tried complimenting had to open her--his--fucking mouth. Leir glanced quickly off to the side, lips pursed. As if dryly addressing an unseen audience. And then, as swiftly as he had looked away, his head snapped back to attention. His hips pivoted. His shoulders turned with them. His hand exploded from his pocket and he laid what could be referred to as waste to the tranny's mouth.

Leir tended to throw the type of sucker punch that no one got up from. At least until the paramedics put them onto a gurney, disoriented and mumbling gibberish with their broken jaws. And this one, loaded with the weight and density of brass knuckles, certainly did not disappoint.

However it certainly did escalate things. So now, as a story teller would say, here they were. Leander and Mrs. Kwoong herself, huddled behind the reinforced cashier's counter. Fragments of formica counter peppered the air like sawdust. The cash register rang loudly as yet another spray of bullets tore through it's skeleton. Shredded ones and fives rained down on Leir's head like confetti. Mrs. Kwoong clung to him like a cat to a fireman.

The shots stopped for a moment. An empty casing rang, tinny, on the floor of the mauled korean deli.

"Where the fuck did you go, kid?!" Skandra bellowed above the noise.

"If I was up your ass eating a ham fucking sandwich, you'd know it!" Leir shot back. His head turned, quickly, snapping from the right to the left. At any second, some huge tall drink of prison love was going to peek-a-boo right over the counter and end him. And it pissed him off.

"You own a gun," Skandra began, "right?"

The office was dim. Unorganized despite the pretty secretary's best efforts--Megan? Marlene? Meredith. Haggard was the right word for the entire situation. But then after being in the public eye so long--a foreign public at that--maybe he didn't mind haggard so much.

"No," Leir shook his head. "I don't really like conflict."

And then Mrs. Kwooong raised a shaking hand. Pointed with one bone-thin finger. Behind his head, on a narrow shelf, beneath the cash register. A stockless, pistol grip shotgun.

"You and your gay uncles are in a world of fucking shit!" Leir shouted.

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

roll_the_bones
2008-02-13 11:30 pm UTC (link)

Everybody had lip.

If this were a TV show, their minority opinions - full of humor and insight, such as pointing out that he would indeed be aware of a California boy eating a sandwich up his ass - would be so welcome that Skandra's overworked liver would explode in his belly, and all of them would be showered in $1,000 bills that were razor sharp just long enough to escape the confines of Skandra's sad fleshy prison. It wasn't a TV show, and he hated minority opinions. Skandra shot Meredith a cross look as the gunfire erupted anew - if Skandra had jumped out to get a shot off just then, he'd probably have a face full of hot lead. Maybe he should tell her to look up anatomy on that piece of crap and see if the human body was supposed to contain hot lead. It wasn't her fault. The hookers were using squad-like tactics - cover fire while they each reloaded. Didn't seem kosher.

Something told him it wasn't, but what did he know?

He couldn't even keep track of his younger associate's ham sandwich eating habits, right?

"Meredith, would you do me a favor and get me a beer?" Skandra asked as politely as he could given the circumstances - to Meredith's left was the back of the store and the beer cooler, where an unopened six-pack of Bud Light bottles had somehow escaped destruction.

Skandra paused.

"And one for the kid, assuming he's still got a face when this is over."

Cheetos sprayed them all, hurtling over the top of the aisle and spraying them all with foil-like wrapper and cheese powder. Skandra used his free hand to pick one off his collar, then drop it in his mouth. With a final surly look at Meredith, Skandra turned away and started hustling his ass down the aisle. Fighting crime in Leander's gear was one thing. Fighting crime at all was quite another. He should've been wearing something other than a rumpled $2 suit, but when hefted the Raging Bull he figured it was better for everybody that he wasn't. Something else and he might have brought the USP, which would have fucked them all. The .45 ACP round was a good round, but the .500 Magnum was a beast. It was gonna do all the work for him - all he had to do was line up the gun and squeeze the trigger.

"Hey, Betty!" Skandra screamed at the next lull, still moving down the aisle in a crouch. "How much to cradle my balls!"

"Nobody would cradle your balls, you sick mother fucker!" one of those s/he/it things actually had the juice to call him sick.

"You can wear a glove, sweetie!" Skandra called. "I like the feel of leather round ma' balls!"

"Fuck you!"

(Reply to this) (Parent)

roll_the_bones
2008-02-13 11:31 pm UTC (link)

By now his voice, carrying and deep as it was, had attracted their attention. Metal getting hot as the bastard sprayed gunfire into the aisle. Skandra heard one can of carbonated beverage after another explode as bullets ripped through them, flooding the aisle with syrupy water and foam. Tucking the Raging Bull under his left armpit, Skandra lifted a cigarette to his mouth and fired. The sound was very different from those piece of shit Israeli guns the hookers were firing at them. Every flash of the muzzle, long streaming clatter as the cycle worked or terrific boom as the bullet was fired with an explosive charge of gunpowder was just foreplay. When the .500 Magnum was fired it made a sound like the end of the world. Son of a bitch had a lot of kick, but tucked under one arm and pressed against the leather of his shoulder holster, Skandra almost didn't feel it.

Almost.

The ex-marine didn't need to look behind him. Smoke curled up around him, a cloud of it, and the metal shelf was still rocking back and forth. There was a hole in the metal of the aisle, a hole only a Magnum round would leave. His aim had been right on target. Firing through the sheet metal that made up every shelf, he'd hit one, one that was dumb enough to try and hide behind sheet metal. All that banter had been good for both of them, let each of them know where the other was. The only difference was, Skandra was packing enough heat to do something about it. A vicious shriek rang out, and Skandra heard the drumbeat of blood spraying against the metal as someone's day was ruined. Then the gunfire was quiet.

"Darrellina's dead!" a girlish voice proclaimed.

Skandra shook his gun hand loosely, which had the double benefit of keeping the overly annoying Korean proprietor away from him - nobody stared down the barrel of a Raging Bull and wanted to get closer - as well as helping him deal with the shock of firing the gun without proper posture. Mother fucker really was a beast, no matter what anybody said. And on top of that, Skandra was fishing his cigarette lighter out of his pocket. Easier to strike one up if nobody was going to make a move, afraid they'd take a hand cannon shot to the pecker.

"I'm surprised you can tell who it is," Skandra remarked casually as the Zippo flipped closed. "I must've aimed low."

Of course, that got the gunfire started in earnest once more. Neon lights hanging off their hinges, sparks flying from the damaged electronics. Flat panel TVs meant to reveal every motion of every patron in the store were ruined, nothing but a collection of green boards and silicon. Urban decay was moving at an accelerated rate inside the best little Korean deli in Manhattan. And Skandra figured there was probably about a minute and a half before the cops showed, and the shit got really hairy. Which was just enough time for him to eat another one of the Cheetos caught on his jacket, crunching loudly as a drumbeat to the world that was ending all around him one second at a time. Best of all was his cigarette bouncing up and down in one corner of his mouth. Smoke tasted pretty odd after the cheese powder.

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

clerical
2008-02-14 12:33 am UTC (link)

People ordered coffee in a lot of different ways. There were the people who had no idea what they wanted but wouldn't say it out loud and move to the side so the next person could go up. They'd just stand there dumbly and take up space. Then there were as she liked to call it. The pros. They knew exactly what they wanted it and said it as fast as they could as if hoping the Cashier and the barista would screw it up. Little known fact, Starbucks gave you a free drink ticket if they screwed up your order bad. Especially if you looked like a high strung mother of 4 on your last leg for the day. Then there were those people who couldn't pronounce Venti and Grande correctly and would say Large and Medium instead.. or the fuckers who'd order in degrees.

She wondered if she'd miss those customers. Course gunfire was raining around them and Mr. Kwoong was still yelling about his little store being shot up. Meredith gave a look towards the beer Skandra had pointed out. Then he was gone again. Meredith rolled her eyes. She was going to die getting him a beer, wasn't she? Why was she anyway? She started off slowly around towards the beer; Mr. Kwoong had decided to fire her.

"You take it you pay for it."
"I'll give you a dollar for it, that’s all I have."
"Not enough, ten fifty."
"Highway fucking robbery. 2 Dollars!"
"I said ten fifty!"

Meredith's jaw set in a line; she picked one of the beers up and held it out into an aisle, the thing exploded as a bullet hit it. Meredith looked back at Mr. Kwoong.

"Three dollars, final offer."
"...StupidAmericanwhore. Fine Three dolla."

Meredith took 3 out of her pocket and handed it over. Then crawled back behind the shelf with the 5 beers and put them between her knees. Then sat back and pulled out another cigarette. Before Mr. Kwoong could argue with her, she pointed towards the cloud of smoke Skandra had left as he lit his cigarette. Gunfire erupted again behind them and Mr. Kwoong was in no mood to argue. Meredith leaned back, cracking open her own beer, and then went back to recording everything in her PDA while smoking and drinking in the little store that clearly stated no drinking, smoking, or guns.

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

fight_star
2008-02-14 07:26 pm UTC (link)

For someone who had never been shot at before, Leir thought he was doing surprisingly well. He was used to excitement. Violence and confrontation. He'd had guns pointed at him of course. Never fired upon though. And as he took hold of the pistol grip pump, he tried to remember anything from the three times he'd been to a firing range.

He could hear Skandra shouting at the men gathered around, both inside and out. He thought only two had entered with them, while three stood outside laying down suppressive fire. And one of course was taking a long fucking nap. Judging by how directly he'd knocked the guy (gal?) in the teeth, he might be drowning on blood.

Good for her!

The weapon felt oddly at home in his hands. he seized the pistol-stick foregrip and racked the weapon. Sounded just like the movies. There was a bullish roar in the deli behind him. A sound like the black pig iron gates of Hell slamming back on their hinges.

And judging by the voice that followed, the gun had been Skandra's. He had to say, this job wasn't bad, all things considered. Robert could certainly handle himself and talk some good shit while doing it.

"I'm surprised you can tell who it is," Skandra remarked casually as the Zippo flipped closed. "I must've aimed low."

But in between his partner's witty remark and the tinny flick of a Zippo, Leir heard the dull, heavy steps of a man trying to be quiet. A man in high heels, trying to be quiet.

Fuck. One of them was circling in on Skan. He had to do something. Mrs. Kwoong clung to his jacket.

"Get off!" he whispered. He jerked his head to the counter. She shook her head wildly.

And so Leir simply slipped out of his jacket, nodding to her as calmly as he could.

"It's Armani!" he whispered, winking to the terrified, confused woman.

And with that he spun from behind the counter. He was as fast as he could be. He brought the weapon to bear. Couched it right into his ribs like a knight's lance.

The tranny was surprised. Spun to face Leir, bringing his bulldog of an Uzi straight up with a scream.

"Armageddon, bitch!" the tranny wailed. He was quick on the trigger.

But Leir was quicker still. He yanked the trigger with a jerk. He lowered--no, fell roughly-- to his knees. The shotgun roared. It stung his hand like punching a heavy bag. The tranny screamed in an awful, animalistic passion as his legs were torn free of their fishnet, severed right at the thigh.

Leir racked the weapon. The empty shell was hot. Smoking. it fell to the tiled floor, landing heavily in a spatter of blood still hot from the body. And he stared at the carnage.

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

roll_the_bones
2008-02-15 04:48 am UTC (link)

Skandra snatched up the Uzi just as the gunfire stopped, and sudenly all of them were standing. Leir with his bitch pointed at one of the trannies. Skandra with the Uzi locked in on a second. The Raging Bull leveled calmly at a third - and that tranny bastard had Meredith around the neck. Before today Skandra had imagined that Mexican standoffs only happened in the movies - after all, it was hard to believe that two people focused intently on killing each other would actually just stand there and dumbly point guns at one another. What did you think about when that sweat was pouring down your face like rain? Who's got the faster finger. Who can make it happen first. If it was you, and you were sure it was you, then you rocked and rolled and ended somebody's world forever, right? But one of them was using Meredith like a shield, her beer having falling to the ground.

Shattered.

That left four - they'd give one to Mr. Kwoong, for him and his wife to split.

"Drop the guns and let us go!" the tranny coward snarled, pressing the Uzi barrel harder against Meredith's head. "Or I'm gonna waste your chick, got it?"

"I don't give my employees health benefits," Skandra shot back with a sneer. "You think I'm gonna hesitate?"

Kicks like a mule when you fire with one hand. Aim low.

"You hesitatin' right now, ya stupid mother f-"

Nobody argued with a bullet. Meredith was showered with skull and brain matter as the transvestite's head exploded in a cloud of red. Blood sprayed against the shattering glass of the cooler. At the same instant, Skandra squeezed the trigger on his Uzi. Another one went down, screaming as bullets peppered his face. Smoke was curling around him as the shotgun spoke, all in the span of half a second. And that quickly it was over. Only fluid rushing across the floor of the Seoul Deli was testament to the passage of time. In every other way, it was silent. Mr. Kwoong was clutching his head and kneeling on the ground. A headless corpse was clutching an Uzi it would no longer need. Mr. Kwoong looked up slowly. Armageddon had blown into town, fucked the shit out of his store, and then gone. Hit it and quit it.

Skandra could feel his hand starting to tremble, only slightly, so he lowered both guns.

Fuck, he needed a drink.

"Everybody stay right where they are."

The steely voice of one of New York's finest was all the encouragement he needed not to move.

Maybe it paid to be more discrete.

(Reply to this) (Parent)