getting away with murder Who: Abel & people. Cannon fodder, really. What:Whoops, here he goes killing again. Where: Rip Surf Shop, Newport Beach Pier. When: Early August. Rating: PG-13? For some violence.
Abel came to a slow stop across the pier from the surf shop, hands tucked into his jacket pockets. It was both an odd choice and yet well suited as a front for what he'd been told he'd find here. Darkness enshrouded his deeds on this particular night, the only light coming from dappled stars in the sky and a handful of well-placed street lamps that shed their light like overused shark teeth, ripping through the shadows. Rolling his shoulders, he walked forward, moving close enough to peer into one of the well-laden windows that proffered shoppers everything the store had on hand: bathing suits, surfboards, wetsuits, etc., ensconced in a charming assumedly underwater display with fake fish hanging from transparent wire. One hand disengaged from a pocket, rising up to cup his eyes as though this would give him better vision into the gloom that described the shop in one word: closed.
Stepping back, he moved toward the door and tried the handle. Unsurprisingly, it was locked, and he was about to move back to the window when the entryway previously denied to him suddenly opened. A blond man wearing a tee and jeans with sandal-shod feet glared at him; Abel realized there must be cameras, well hidden ones that allowed those within to keep a view on those without. He smiled -- people trying to seem unthreatening should always smile.
"Help you?" The blond man said, his voice as light and skinny and unmarred as his surfer boy persona would have one expect.
"I'm hoping, yeah," Abel replied, carefully and slowly removing both hands from his pockets so they were limp and helpless at his sides. Teeth slid behind his lips, trying and failing to present an innocuous demeanor. "I was told I could meet Rodrigo Santiago here, for, ah...business." He tried to widen his smile a little. The blond man's gaze raked him from navel to face, uncertain; this arrival was not expected, at least, not by this goon.
"I'm just looking to score," Abel continued, pressing his case. He stayed where he was, not applying more pressure than needed -- not yet, anyway. "Was told this was a good source. I've got cash." Carefully, his left hand descended into his pocket, the blond man starting; his hand went toward his back, assumedly reaching for a piece. Abel withdrew a fat billfold, which made the blond visibly relax. Finally, he nodded, holding the door wide for Abel to step inside first.
And he did, wasting no time; he tucked the billfold back into his pocket as he did so. The interior of the shop continued its charade; walls stained blue with fish and sea stars, reigning over ringed shelves of carefully sorted clothing, stacks of surfboards leaning next to kayaks and paddles. Glancing behind him, the blond man made quick work of locking the front door before motioning for Abel to follow a plain path between the clothes toward a rectangular cutout behind the counter, where a singular register sat unused, waiting to be refilled by customers the next day. He moved casually, his eyes taking in everything around him.
"You worked for him long?"
"Just keep moving," the blond replied, annoyed, clearly either unused or unwilling to make conversation with these particular sorts of 'customers.' Abel smiled to himself and followed the preset path, moving into a backroom full of cardboard and plastic-wrapped boards waiting to be made ready for display. Beyond that was another room, this one furnished with a simple folding card table on which a swarthy looking man was weighing bags of white powder and counting out bills.
He looked up, dark brows coming together across angry eyes as he looked at the two men entering the scene. "What the fuck, Frank?"
The blond man -- Frank, Abel assumed -- shrugged, hands wavering out like birds that were startled into flight. "He said he was looking to score, I thought... He knew your name..."
"You're not paid to think," the man Abel labeled as Rodrigo snapped back. He pulled up a small case and snapped it open, shoving bills into it and out of Abel's sight. With nowhere else to put it, he shoved it under the table, leaning forward onto both palms as he glanced between his ineffective worker and his unwanted customer. Suddenly, a switch seemed to go off as one impulse outweighed another, and he worked an uneasy smile onto his face.
"So what're you looking for, huh? Let's get you set and on your way." He looked Abel up and down, sizing him up as he rose from the table, folding his arms over his chest. Abel smiled, plastic, taking a few steps into the otherwise empty room.
"I was looking for you, actually. Rodrigo, I take it?"
The swarthy man's eyes narrowed, the stillborn smile dissolving, and he glanced at his colleague with no small amount of annoyance as his arms unfolded from his chest to lie tensely by his sides.
"You tell me where you heard that name and I'll let you know if you're right or not."
Abel nodded, shrugging, taking a step toward Frank. The blond edged away from him, uncomfortable. His hand started to stray, which Abel took note of.
"A friend of yours, I think. Or former friend, anyway, now stool pigeon. He had a lot to say about you and yours and this little place, and he wasn't too far off the mark."
For a moment, a pin could have dropped in the silence; then everything exploded.
Frank made a move for his gun, but Abel grabbed him first. He twisted Frank's arm around, pulling the man in front of him just as Rodrigo grabbed his own piece, firing off a shot that, through Abel's maneuvering, went right into Frank's back. The blond screamed, but Abel held fast, keeping his meat shield between himself and the man he was truly after. Rodrigo grimaced, but held his gun up, putting them all into what he believed was a standstill. Frank remained bowed over, held in place by a hand in his hair and his arm twisted around his front. Abel could feel his heart pounding, a million miles a minute; the sensation made him hard.
"That's sure as fuck not how a cop operates," he muttered, motioning for Abel to get the fuck back. Abel did no such thing.
"That'd be because I'm not a cop," Abel replied simply, thrusting the wounded and still crying Frank forward into the card table Rodrigo was standing behind. It folded instantly, crashing to the ground with the same amount of sound as one crumples paper, baggies and white powder flung into the air. The two men stumbled back, Rodrigo trying to find his footing before what would come next.
But somehow, Abel was faster. By the time he'd thrown Frank, he shifted forward, using the minor chaos he'd caused to slip behind Rodrigo and kick one of his knees out from under him. Rodrigo floundered, trying to bring his gun up; Abel grabbed his arm trying to loose the weapon from his grasp before it could do more damage. Between Abel's grasp and his still good leg, Rodrigo somewhat kept his feet but was forced to lean against his attacker, which he used to his immediate advantage. The butt of the other man's gun hit Abel in the face, a gasping, angry breath leaving him before he grabbed Rodrigo's wrist with his other hand and twisted it until he heard a sickeningly wet snap. A mix between a groan and a scream tried to crawl out of Rodrigo's throat as he collapsed to the floor not unlike his card table.
"The fuck do you want, man? The money? Fucking take it!" The dark man continued to struggle, reaching for his weapon, but Abel picked up the gun.
"I already told you what I want," he replied, slowly rising to his feet. He took aim at one of Rodrigo's kneecaps, his finger wrapping around the trigger slowly. He could feel the force, the decision that would be required in pulling the trigger; no accidents could happen here. One shot rang out, shattering his victim's right knee; then another, each punctuated by a scream. Frank seemed to come to, and tried to crawl away toward another back door, but Abel sought to stop this before it could reach its fruition. One step in the opposite direction, crossing the distance between himself and the blond, and he easily landed a shot in the back of Frank's head. A brief pulse lit up his body, as though he were levitating from the floor, and then he lay still.
Switching the gun to his other hand, Abel took a deep breath and tried to calm himself, feeling hints of cocaine seeping into his lungs; his nose and his face ached from the blow he'd been dealt. He closed his eyes, trying his best to not move the other areas of his face, wincing as he failed to do so. He turned back to where Rodrigo was writing on the floor in pain, looking down at the gun distastefully.
"Never really understood the appeal of these things," he said, approaching the wounded man sprawled on the ground. The nearly empty room was a scene of disarray, with the carefully measured and bagged white powder now tainted by dirt and other debris on the floor. Rodrigo continued to gasp, his good hand making a fist and hovering over his middle that was a better barometer for the amount of pain he was in than any noise he might have made. Abel kneeled next to him; the hand holding the gun rested its arm on his knee, while the other went to his face, coming away with blood after gently touching his nose.
"Wow, you got me good. Kudos. It's been awhile since that's happened." He grinned, putting the gun down. "Seriously, though, guns. I just can't get into them. They're too...distant. Like that? With Frank?"
He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder toward where the dead blond lay on the floor. "Too quick. But you, my friend. We're gonna have some fun." Abel reached forward, turning Rodrigo's face back toward him. His hand, lightly wetted with blood, slid in the faint sheen of sweat that greeted his palm, Rodrigo's breath coming quickly beneath the pads of his fingers. The man's eyes were wide, and Abel could feel his heartbeat. He stared down at him for a moment, a smile slowly flickering over his mouth, before he dragged his eyes up and glanced around the room.
"You guys got a tool box?"
At that, Rodrigo started openly crying. He rolled on the floor, pulling his head away from Abel's grasp to slam it into the concrete flooring. Abel put the gun down, using both hands to cup Rodrigo's face, shushing him. He studied him for a long moment; his skin wasn't the same flavor as Rafe's, nor was their bone structure even close to being similar. But, still. Not everything had to be about him.
"Now, now, come on. Be a man. Isn't that what you guys are supposed to be all about, with this gang banging shit?" He patted and then slapped the side of Rodrigo's face, rising again, taking the gun with him. "OK, if I was a tool box, where would I be..."
Three hours and so many screams later, Abel was whistling as he drove a nondescript rental car under a fake name toward the northern part of L.A. Music he didn't immediately recognize blared from his speaker, chosen by some unseen radio disc jockey who annoyingly interrupted every few minutes, belying the fact that there were three irregularly-shaped trash bags in the rear of his vehicle. He took a right, turning onto Franklin Avenue, bringing him within sight of what he was looking for.
The construction site looked like a missing tooth inside a partially rotted mouth. The area was fairly well-to-do, gentrified with nicer shops and restaurants amid some less than welcoming buildings. Palm trees swayed over it all in the lamp-lit darkness. Using his blinker, Abel eased into a street parking spot, doing everything he could to look perfectly normal and unassuming. He waited until another car passed on the street, and then got out of the driver's side door, moving to the back to grab one of the garbage bags. This area of town was not entirely bereft of people, but neither was it the moving hot spot like Hollywood Blvd or other, more nightlife-inclined areas of Los Angeles might have been at that hour. He lifted the black plastic from the back of his car, walked across the sidewalk, and disappeared down an alley next to the construction site, seeking a dumpster.
He reappeared a few moments later, duplicating his carefully measured step to ensure that no one looked at him twice. He was just getting rid of some garbage in a not-so-legal manner, but who in the wide city of the angels hadn't done the same once or twice? A dog walker moved right across Abel's path, and the two exchanged quick greetings via curved mouths; the dog growled a little, sniffing pointedly at the bag, but his owner dragged him away by his lead. Abel waited, watching them go, waiting until they were around the corner before continuing.
The third bag did not make it into the dumpster. This time, Abel waited, ensuring that anyone who would come near him had done so and was far enough off that when he ducked through the chainlink fence and into the construction site itself, no one saw him. He carried the third bag, which was full of his favorite pieces of Rodrigo (those being his now toothless head, a handless arm that boasted a large tattoo that proclaimed his allegiance to his chosen gang, and some other bits and bobs from Rodrigo's stomach area), and began to narrow down his decisions on where he wanted to leave it. Bobcats and other, larger equipment were scattered around, ready to resume laying pipe and erecting foundation. Abel wandered directly into one area that was meant for a concrete pour, leaving it near a handful of shovels that had been left out for that particular task. Some dirt scattered over it made the bag look like part of the scenery, though by the time anyone got to the scene in the morning it would have a certain smell that would attract just the sort of attention Abel was looking for.
Shoving his hands into his pockets, he exited the construction site with the same care that he'd taken upon entering it, keeping the number of people who saw him to a minimum. As he walked down the street, he discarded his rental's keys in a garbage can, and started making his way to a nearby bus stop. He could not help that his step had a certain hop to it, excitement shivering throughout his form as he would have to wait to see how events would unfold.
GANGBANGER'S BODY FOUND AT LOCAL HOLLYWOOD CONSTRUCTION SITE
Police recovered the remnants of a body at the Franklin Village development site Wednesday morning.
Workers arriving to the site noticed a smell and one discovered portions of the body in a black garbage bag in one area of the construction site.
Police were not on hand to give further details, but it is believed the remainder of the body was recovered from a nearby dumpster. Sources say police are working off of the theory that this killing may have been a gang initiation or something related.
The body has not yet been identified.
Franklin Village has been the site of much tumultuous debate as previous residents were ousted in order for the original apartments to be converted to condos. Protests and pickets have slowed construction.
Construction has just recently gotten underway, under the direction of Strigidae Corps. It's believed that police proceedings will slow development.