Andrew Forsythe (androphagos) wrote in blurred_lines, @ 2009-06-18 23:37:00 |
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Entry tags: | ! [1980-06] june, ! npc, andrew forsythe, elle abercrombie, sam madley, tabitha pryce |
Thursday 18 June 1980.
Who: Elle Abercrombie, Andrew Forsythe, Samuel Abercrombie, Tabitha Pryce, and two NPC DMLE officers.
Where: Tinworth, Cornwall.
When: Thursday 18 June 1980; after curfew.
What: Sam and Elle attack one of the DMLE-werewolf patrols in Tinworth.
Rating: PG-13.
Status: Complete.
Curfew had already been in effect in Tinworth for some time as the last light lingering from the longer day-time hours of the summer faded into the black of the night sky, leaving only a few lighted windows and Lumos to illuminate the paths where the patrol groups were walking. One particular team of four composed of two DMLE officers (one man and one woman) and two 'reformed' werewolves (also one male and one female) who had recently been assigned to them for additional protection after last week's ambushes was now nearing the end of the street they had been ordered to watch. The witch and wizard, neither of whom seemed especially enthusiastic about the arrangement, had taken the lead and remained several paces ahead of the other two, heads snapping back with excessive frequency as if expecting them to take off and cause trouble if left unwatched for more than a second. So far though, nothing more chaotic than a cat tipping over a rubbish bin by accident had occurred. 'This is absolutely ridiculous,' Andrew snapped, quietly enough so that the DMLE officers couldn't hear him, but Tabitha could. He was walking on her left side, partly to be polite in staying where she could see him and partly because he didn't want to startle her accidentally by approaching from the wrong side and possibly getting punched in the face on reflex or worse. 'We're not really getting anything or at least much worthwhile out of this, are we?' The idea of having to work for the Ministry in some common policeman job wasn't exactly been the 'greater freedom' he had been hoping for when he had joined the Dark Army last year and spent the last several months waiting to be rewarded for the group's efforts. Tabitha's lips were pressed together in a thin line, the bored, exasperated expression on her face clearly stating she felt the exact same way Andrew did about the whole situation. Were they even going to be paid for this? "Hell if I know. Not like the lack of information is anything new to us. They probably think that the fact we can go out in public now is reward enough," she said, the aggravation she felt toward the situation creeping into her voice. All they could do was hold out until the end of the war and hope they would be rewarded appropriately, then. For everything she'd lost -- for everything they had all lost -- she hoped it would be worth it. On top of it all, it wasn't even exciting work. How many nights a week were they expecting them to do these patrols? Elle had her back to the wall of a shop, glad for the darkness that the alley she and Sam were down provided. She knew it was more dangerous these days given that they'd discovered the leak and he knew they were attacking patrols, but Albion needed to keep on their path and not let Amycus deter them. Her wand was clutched in her hand, and she raised a finger to Sam, letting him know she heard something. Footsteps - and not far off. She inched closer to corner of the building and peered out; she could see the faint glow of lumos lit wands heading toward them. She gestured with her head for Sam to come closer and then said in barely a whisper, "Take down the wand carriers first. It'll give us the advantage. I'll get left." Sam nodded. He had a lot on his mind these days, but he was focused as ever right now, if only to distract him from the less pleasant thoughts running around his head. Right. This was likely the highlight of his day. He felt like maybe there was something fundamentally wrong with that. As it was though, he just adjusted his grip on his wand and gave a single nod in response. He could hear them coming now too, and likely more than the two he'd encountered last week. Elle was on the outside so he couldn't see, but he trusted her judgement. They'd have to move soon to maintain the element of surprise and Sam felt a kick of adrenaline in his blood. Time to move. He took a deep breath and then rounded the corner, aiming to the right and throwing a silent stunning hex at the officer. The female DMLE officer, Jane, had just noticed the two werewolves behind her speaking with each other, and had she not spun around and strode towards them to tell them off, she would have dropped to the ground unconscious from the Stunning Spell that had come out of nowhere and for which there was no spoken incantation. As it was, the red light from the hex barely missed her and exploded against the stone wall of a nearby shop, causing her to stumble forward before turning around and pointing her wand in the direction she thought the spell came from. 'This is the Department of Magical Law Enforcement,' she said loudly as she swept the area in front of her with the light from her wand. 'You are ordered to cease your activities, put your wand down, and come out with your hands up where we can see you.' Instead of becoming alarmed, Tabitha found herself grinning -- finally, something potentially exciting was happening. She hoped these people wouldn't come quietly. She hoped they were out here looking for a fight. She flashed a grin at Andrew and then moved forward to stand beside the male DMLE officer (she couldn't remember what his name was -- Warren something? -- it didn't matter), trying to see if she could spot the intruders before the officers did. Warren was holding his lit wand up as well, sweeping it across the area opposite to where his companion was searching. Sam couldn't help but roll his eyes as he was shouted at. For a moment he considered their options. There weren't a lot of them. This was going to turn into a full scale fight soon and now they were on alert. He bit his lip and glanced sideways at Elle. On three, he mouthed. Blasting hexes. One. Two. he held up his fingers, took half a peak around the corner, tightening his grip on his wand. After a beat, he breathed, "Three," and cast a handful of blasting hexes at the patrol group in as quick succession as he could manage. 'This is your last warning. Put your wands down and come out with your hands up, or we'll --' Whatever it was that Jane had been about to threaten to do along with Warren was cut off as she blocked one of the Blasting Hexes, but was thrown back by a second one as she failed to cast a Shield Charm quickly enough. Andrew, on his part, had chosen to stay somewhere behind the other three as Tabitha had moved forward, but the moment the volley of spells had been thrown, he had taken several steps forward and tried to catch the female officer as she was blasted backwards. Being thrown onto the ground with her on top of him was not what he had in mind exactly (and it must have looked so improper), but he gave her a push to help her up as she pointed her wand in Sam and Elle's direction and shouted, 'Reducto!' But finally -- something was actually happening, and he got to his feet, peering in the direction from which the spells had come from to see if there was anyone there and if there was a way to get behind whomever had cast them. Elle nodded with Sam and sent a battery of blasting hexes toward the man and whoever was standing with him. She set her jaw and peered in the darkness. Three... no - four figures. She gestured the number to Sam and then began to round to the right of the group. There was no sense in staying in the same place - it would only lead to them actually being hit. Thank goodness that she moved, because she managed to move out of the way of the Reducto and cast a quick and sharp Expelliarmus toward the woman, hissed under her breath. As soon as the spells began to fly, Tabitha dashed behind the wall of one of the shops to avoid the blasts, and she circled around the back of the building to get behind their attackers. When she came out the other side, she saw the DMLE witch's wand fly out of her hand, and she chose that moment to attack, lunging at the one closest to her -- the blonde woman. One of the blasting hexes sent Warren flying back off his feet, elbows scraping across the ground as he skid across it. He pushed himself up -- first, a shield charm cast at Jane, and then he turned on the attackers again, retaliating against the blasting hexes with hexes of his own. Elle managed to turn in time to see the werewolf pounce at her, which allowed her to control her fall to the ground. She grabbed the woman's upper arms and kicked up with her knees, using her leg strength to flip the werewolf up and over her. She rolled onto all fours and peered into the darkness. Tabitha Pryce. "Incarcerous!" There was a sick sense of pleasure knowing that she had killed this woman's husband only 6 months prior. Elle had accepted the sacrifices in her morals that she had to make now that she was on the other side of the law and no longer regretted the murder she had committed. She glanced up for just a moment to make sure Sam was all right, and shot another Incarcerous at the wandless DMLE officer to incapacitate her. Andrew had just turned to ask Tabitha if she could see where the spells were coming from when he had noticed from the corner of her eye that she had already moved. Well, so much for waiting and trying to figure out things first -- he had apologised and excused himself to the DMLE officers as the male one had been thrown back before following Tabitha's lead in going around the building (albeit from the other direction) and getting behind the wizards who were attacking them. There was a man still standing there, and hoping that he was distracted enough by the sight of two women fighting each other and the two officers (one of whom was now tied up) throwing spells at them, he sprinted forward from where he was hiding and tried to tackle him to the ground; honestly, this would be so much easier if they had been allowed to carry weapons themselves. Sam was too focused to really notice that the werewolves were gone until he heard Tabitha attack Elle. "Shit," he muttered, deflecting a blasting curse, sending it into a pile of rubbish. "Stupefy!" he murmured, aiming at the remaining officer. He didn't quite quite have the patience to try to do loads of silent spells at the moment. At least not confidently. His attention was already divided and he was just wondering where the other werewolf had gone when he was tackled from the side. Sam landed hard on his side, twisting under his opponent to throw a punch at his jaw. Merlin, this was not how this was supposed to happen. Tabitha landed hard on her back, her vision jarred for a few seconds as she rolled over onto her front, pushing herself up -- and then there were ropes winding around her arms and her body that pulled her out of her haze quickly, digging her claws into the ropes and pulling them away from her body before they could constrict her. She looked at Elle with her good eye, her upper lip curled back into a snarl as she launched herself at the woman again. Warren deflected the stunning spell with a shield spell, and once he was on his feet again he let the werewolves handle the attackers, moving to help free Jane from the ropes binding her. Elle managed to shoot a stunning spell at the male DMLE agent before Tabitha launched at her. She threw a strong right hook before tumbling backwards, wincing as she felt the gravel scratch against her back through her clothes. She kicked hard at the werewolf and then spat out, "Stupefy!" The spell, however, easily went flying past the werewolf as Elle was attempting to fight her off. "Get off me, you bitch!" Being punched in the face was never something Andrew expected when fighting with a wizard, even though this must have been at least the second time it had happened now, so Sam's fist smashed into his jaw as he tried to dodge it at the last second. Of course, it could have been worse if he had used magic, but it still fucking hurt -- and if he was going to go for the only thing he had other than his claws to use as weapons, then he was going to return the favour. Using his greater physical strength, he tried to grab both of Sam's arms by the wrists so he could pin them to the ground as he went for kneeing him hard in the stomach, then leaning over so he could bite and tear into his wand-arm over and over again with his teeth. Some distance away, Jane managed to block the Stunning Spell headed for Warren with a Shield Charm of her own just has he got her arm free of the ropes. She couldn't tell what was going on with the werewolves and the people attacking them anymore, and perhaps the best thing to do was to get the hell out, but she fired a few Severing Charms in their direction as a distraction before working on the rest of her bindings. The air left him in a rush as Sam was kneed in the stomach, and it seemed the second he had any strength in his diaphragm again there were teeth in his arm. Jesus, was he just wearing a sign that said bite me? Sam couldn't help but scream, struggling under the werewolf. He twisted and pulled under the werewolf, kicking at him to get off. Just when he thought he was free, severing charms hit the ground around him and merlin, this was a bad situation. "Confringo!" he said finally, his wand somewhat pointed toward the man on top of him, uncaring to any damage he might do to himself if only to get this monster off of him. Tabitha grinned as she dug her claws into Elle's ankles, pulling herself up and crawling up Elle's body, trying to hold her legs down so as not to get kicked. She pushed her knees down on Elle's legs, using the leverage to push herself up, reaching with outstretched claws toward her face. A claw swiped across Elle's cheek, and she could feel the skin slice as Tabitha raked against her. She reached across and elbowed her hard in the face, wincing as she felt her knee twist dangerously close to dislocating again. That was not what she needed. She noted the woman's asymmetrical features, and pointed her wand and cast a Conjunctivitus curse. She saw Sam struggling underneath the other werewolf and grimaced. At least it was two against two still, the DMLE agents were dealing with the spells that had already been cast against them. Where did they find these inept people!? Her elbow caught Tabitha across the face, and her head jerked to the side -- and when she felt the spell's effects take over she couldn't keep her good eye open anymore, eyes watering from the pain. Even attempting to force herself to keep her eye open despite the burning agony didn't work -- her vision through one eye was too blurry, she couldn't see anything -- oh, God, she was blind. Panic set in, and she shifted back suddenly, her weight crushing down against Elle's knee as she tried to rub her eye to alleviate the pain. When that didn't work, Tabitha screamed, and then she was clawing blindly at Elle like a crazed animal, jerking her body forward to try and bite her, teeth clicking together with each snap of her jaw as she tried to catch hold of anything. Expecting magic to be used against him didn't mean he wanted it to be cast, but before Andrew could push himself off Sam and dodge the Blasting Curse, he was thrown back several feet and landed hard against the ground. Honestly, he didn't understand why any of them couldn't use weapons themselves, especially given they were only Muggle werewolves -- teeth and claws could only do so much against wands, stubborn pride aside, which they ought to have learned by now. Remembering the takeover, however, he quickly fumbled around for a few rocks form the ground as he stood up -- they obviously wouldn't do much, but at the very least, they might work as a brief distraction. Aiming mostly for the other man's face and wand-arm, he whipped the rocks in his direction before taking a running start and trying to tackle him again, this time trying to pin down his legs with his own while clawing at his stomach and chest. Sam was having none of it this time. His arm was bloody well throbbing and bleeding all over, but this wasn't exactly the time to let it stop him. He regathered himself and sidestepped most of the rocks, ducking out of the way and keeping his wand up. With a rather painful slash, he cast another stunning hex at the werewolf bound for him. He didn't want to be under that again, Merlin. Elle screamed in pain as she felt the sharp pop of her kneecap sliding out of it's place. She cast Levicorpus at Tabitha and concentrated on it, trying to keep the werewolf out of the way until the sharpness of the pain subsided. "Fuck off!" Elle struggled to her feet (well, foot, really), and let the werewolf tumble to the ground. She grasped at the ground as she felt the tug on her ankle, trying to anchor herself, but the spell lifted her up into the air, and Tabitha shrieked again -- she couldn't see anything, she couldn't feel anything, and she was flailing in the air, trying to get down. She let out a moan of pain when she fell, crashing to the ground on her shoulder and feeling it dislocate as she landed. But still she struggled to get up, inhaling deeply, trying to follow the woman's scent to find her instead. Tabitha pushed herself up, one arm useless, and attempted to lunge at where she thought Elle was standing, stumbling as she lost her sense of balance. Andrew had been half-expecting some sort of spell to be thrown at him before he got close enough, and sure enough, he narrowly dodged the bolt of red light from the Stunning Spell -- except in throwing his weight forward as he meant to tackle Sam to the ground, he lost his footing and landed awkwardly on his shoulder. He still, however, had enough adrenaline going to ignore the pain that was starting to throb there for now as he reached out with his good arm and tried to rip his claws into Sam's ankle, pull him down, and bite into his calf before he could cast another spell with his height advantage. Sam swore under his breath and firing another mis-aimed blasting hex before he was pulled nearly off balance. Teeth in his calf and Sam grit his teeth in pain, refusing to actually acknowledge how much that really bloody hurt. Instead, he shook his leg free, kicking and stomping at Andrew's chest before turning his wand down again, growling "Confringo." He'd just about had enough of this. Bloody werewolves. As with one of the fights during the takeover of the Ministry, Andrew kept his teeth firmly clamped down on Sam's calf in order to do more damage and hopefully rip out a chunk of muscle as the man managed to shake his leg free. Just as he had been about to shift his weight and kick out his opponent's legs from underneath him in another attempt to bring him down, he swore loudly as he felt several of his ribs snap in spasms of pain as he tried too late to dodge being kicked and stomped upon, which was made worse when the force of the Blasting Curse also knocked him back several feet into the wall of the nearest building. He smashed into the stone with the brunt of the impact on his injured shoulder and couldn't stop himself from yelling more vulgar obscenities as a reaction to the pain, although it hopefully got the attention of the DMLE officers who were only a short distance away. Elle lunged painfully out of the way of Tabitha's pounce, and made her way back around to Sam. She cast a sharp Petrificus Totalus at Tabitha, followed by Stupefy. She peered into the night, trying to see what the other wizards were up to, trying to track their moves. "Hey!" she called out to Sam, not wanting to say his name, "Since we're outlaws now, don't you think we should up the ante a bit? It wouldn't be the first Avada Kedavra I've cast, after all." Who said a little intimidation couldn't help them out, if just for a moment? The first spell missed, but the stunner had hit Tabitha straight on -- and she collapsed onto the ground and didn't get back up, unconscious. Warren was already moving toward Tabitha, firing blasting curses at Elle to force her to keep her distance. "Get the other wolf!" he shouted the order to Jane, bending down to grab Tabitha's shoulder -- and then he apparated away. Although Jane may have been a relatively new recruit, she knew that was an order and not a suggestion -- and anyway, she wasn't about to stay behind when two terrorists had been able to take on four of them at once. She ran over to where Andrew was as she shot an Incarcerous at Sam before grabbing him and Disapparated from the premises, leaving the two former DMLE officers alone in the dark. |