FRIDAY, DECEMBER 22, 2017 - The Bust, Part 1 WHO: Alicia, Pamela-as-ET, & Kit, with Huang & Villegas (NPC hits) WHAT: The jig is up! Let’s go find some bad guys. WHEN: Friday afternoon as everyone else is getting ready for fancy parties. WHERE: Auror offices, the warehouse WARNING: Violence.
Alicia was never naive enough to hope for a perfect op. Honestly with as as much lead time between apprehending Caulk and the sale, she had prepared contingencies. She had just never quite prepared for this. Alicia didn’t try to involve herself in office gossip. She had no need for it: she came Stateside to do One Thing: capture the last of the Death Eaters and bring them to justice.
While she might be willing to play fast and loose with the idea of justice, she wasn’t going to risk leading a team into an op half-arsed just because they needed to move quickly. Pamela was in ET’s body, they were down a wand, and rushing to quickly get Huang up to speed.
“Alright, so let’s just go over it one more time.” They were huddled around the table, blueprint of the warehouse in the middle. “We attack here. Primary goal is detain Wilkes, but if he’s smart he’s probably long gone. Secondary goal is to recover any ergot and gather more information about supply lines we can have. If the item Knight brought to us is actionable, we no longer have the element of surprise. So we need to be quick. Smart. Precise.” She around at the aurors and hit wizards awaiting comment.
Huang stood half a step back and listened to the plan's explanation, taking note of each location as they were pointed out. This wasn't his op and while he was happy to lend an assist, the amount of information he had been given was limited at best. "Beyond Wilkes, are we expecting any other combatants?"
“We think that Dayton Shock is going to be on the other side of this sale tonight. He’s a known associate of Wilkes and a suspected crime boss. We just haven’t been able to pin any evidence on him to keep him locked up. This could be our chance today,” Kit said looking to Huang to answer his question.
"If it's like the previous busts Miles and I--Pamela, that is, not ET--did with the syndicate, they'll have a bunch of redshirts hanging around guarding the place." They'd explained to poor Huang about the body swap because he needed to know, but it had to be weird for him. Even though Pamela was so obviously Pamela in vocal affect and gesture, and it wasn't like it was the first time any of them in the office had seen her in full disguise, seeing her in the form of one of their colleagues in more than passing was a new and disconcerting trick, not least for Pamela. "Be prepared for a little duelling or even a fistfight. It's been known to happen." In her own body, she might have brought a firearm, but Pamela didn't want to put ET in that position. They had to tell the people in the bust it was her, and probably Audrey's husband knew, but there was no point in risking anyone else needing to know.
Huang ducked his head in understanding as he tried not to stare at the person he knew at ET with Pamela's mannerisms and vocal inflections. They might have explained that something had occurred to swap consciousness around, but to have it explained to him and to see it with his two eyes were two totally different things. It was one of the oddest events he had witnessed in his career, but it did not quite top the list. "Right. Point me in the direction you want me and I will follow your lead."
Villegas entered the room, nodded to Huang, who wasn't his usual partner, and tried to figure out who was in charge of the operation. "Villegas. Cap assigned me to your operation." Someone would answer. At least he'd worked with Huang before. He looked at the team, gauging their firepower. This was a beefy operation, they must be expecting someone to put up a fight.
"Hey, Villegas," Pamela said, and it was not at all ET's inflection, but her own. "There's a long story here but the short version is that it's me, Pamela Knight, and I'm stuck wearing ET's form for this bust. So it's going to be weird, but let's just run with it. Alicia Spinnet of the British Hits is in charge of this op, so I'll let her take it back."
Alicia nodded to Villegas. “So one more time for real now that we’re all here?” There might have been a slight tone in her voice, but maybe the yanks would take that as being British. In the big scheme it only took a few extra minutes and agreeing on the plan was more important that rushing into things.
“If there are no other questions? Let’s head out.” It was an easy matter to get the team transported to the warehouse. Those preparations hadn’t changed. From the outside it seemed to be business as usual. Nothing seemed out of sort. The place was as dead as any other day they went to recon the location. Inside? Well, that was a giant unknown.
“Alright, be smart, be quick, don’t be an idiot.” Alicia signalled to send the two teams out. She waited until Ghezzi and Huang started around the back before she signaled her team to approach. There was a time for grace. Now was not that time. Leading the charge, she blasted the door open, clearing the path for Knight and Villegas. Alicia would follow quickly behind. With any luck they would create enough of a distraction to get the other team through the back door.
Villegas followed the splintered door, only seconds behind the blast. New York Hits hadn't been at war for a decade like their London counterparts, but Fun City required a certain toughness and willingness to go where the explosions were happening. He lit the place up and got out of the doorway. The two security wizards were just reacting to the explosion and Villegas took advantage of that. He used his wand to pick up the large potted plant by the far door and throw it at them. That would count as covering fire, for a first approximation. He looked to make sure that there wasn't more security than the briefing had suggested. He didn't want anyone free to aim at his charges.
Working with ET's body (and wand, would that ever stop being ridiculously funny?) was different to working with her own. The center of balance was higher, which she knew how to compensate for, and it wasn't that ET wasn't coordinated or anything but ... there was a subtle difference in the way his wand handled.
It was never going to stop being ridiculously funny.
Still, Pamela popped off a stunner at one of the guards--in her own body it would have been two, but with ET's hands she just couldn't aim and speak fast enough--and looked round, mostly overhead and behind, to make sure their exit would stay clear if they needed it.
Goon number one caught sight of the pot heading for his friend and redirected the course toward Pamela. Goon number two might have dodged the pot but wasn’t so lucky as the stunning curse brought him immediately toward his feet.
“Call Simmons. We need to get the asset out!”
Alicia slammed a ward on the front door. More of a deterrent to not let anyone run. She then popped into the warehouse. She made quick work of the pot shattering it into a dust of clay and dirt. And then finished the goon on the ground with another stunner and bound. Bigger they come right?
“Villegas check the back? We’re right behind you.”
Villegas sent an opening spell at the warehouse's inner door and rolled under it before it had lifted more than foot off the ground. He scanned for hostiles, and reported back. "Clear!", he yelled, so that they knew they wouldn't be running into hostile fire. He stood up, and cast "Homenum Revelio!" He swept through the warehouse towards the back door, scanning on and under the empty shelves of the warehouse for someone to come out and fight, or the Auror or the Brit to give more orders. He was getting pretty nervous, since he'd expected to see the back door team before this.
In her own body, Pamela's reflex would have been to do something ridiculous like jerk him up by his feet and let him hang in the air while she questioned him. Maybe it was the extra testosterone she was carrying around in ET's body, but she threw another stunner at him--weak by her own estimation of her powers; she still wasn't used to ET's body--and then met him bodily, using ET's significant height and mass to stonewall against the perp's momentum. He failed to overbear ET's body, but Pamela knew she was going to be feeling some bruises in the morning. Or someone was, anyhow.
High kicks weren't going to work the way they did for her--balance!--but she could still throw punches and blocks with the best. ET might not have the martial arts experience she had, but his reflexes said he had some of his own, and she could put his strength and power to good enough use. She had her man down after a couple of passes. On the down ET's jaw was aching and she didn't think ET's nose was broken. A quick Incarcerous bound up the perp.
While Pamela went mano-a-mano, Alicia did a quick sweep and secured the perp on the ground. Or two now with Pamela’s effort. “Well done.” She set up a stasis charm around the two men -- witnesses to question for later if nothing else -- and did a once over of Pamela-in-ET’s body. “If you’re good, let’s catch up to Villegas, and find the back door team.”
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After the quick decision on splitting up, Kit took Huang with him around to the back of the warehouse. They couldn’t risk any of their targets escaping. They had to act quickly while Alicia’s team was causing a distraction in the front. Kit had his wand out, and as they rounded the corner the coast was clear.
They’d had intel about the wards up on the warehouse, and Kit quickly removed it. “Alright, the others are going to draw most of them to the front, so we have to move quickly to secure the back exit. Wand ready and follow my lead,” he said to Huang. He had his hand on the door, and quickly cast a charm to unlock the door as they both ran in.
However, instead of running inside the warehouse… they ran back outside again. “What?!” Kit said turning back around to look at the door again. It was locked again and Kit tried another unlocking charm, and this time kicked the door in. But same thing… Kit and Huang ended up outside. So much for a distraction. “Any ideas?” This was new… their intel didn’t tell them about a ward like this.
Huang had no problem following the Auror's lead, even as the repeated going through a door, coming right back out into the alley. "Time displacement, maybe?" He looked at his watch, but nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Glancing around, he spotted a discarded soda can and picked it up.
One unlocking charm later, he tossed the piece of garbage through the door and waited. And waited. "That only affects organic materials. Or there's a much longer delay than I anticipated."
After Huang threw the can in, Kit left the door open and pushed a rock over to prop it open. “Alright, we’ll go with non-organic material for the moment. We need to work fast here,” Kit said looking at the open door they couldn’t actually go through.
Kit cast a few quick charms that would remove typical wards, but there seemed to be no indicator that it worked. There wasn’t enough time to bring this down.
“Do you think the ward is only on the door or the whole wall?” Kit asked Huang but was also just thinking out loud. “We could try blowing through the wall?”
Blowing a hole through the war was a bit louder and messier than he usually preferred, but he was under no impression that his line of thinking was among the norm among the hit wizards. "There are windows," he pointed out. The glass was dirty and likely didn't let in much light, but it existed nonetheless. "Vanish the glass and levitate me up there. Or vice versa. And I guess we'll find out."
It also kept the element of surprise. He really didn't to explain to his wife why he couldn't hear out of his left ear again because they thought an explosion was a good idea.
Getting to the windows weren’t a bad idea either but… “What if one of us gets levitated up there and the same ward is on the windows?” Kit asked because that was definitely a possibility. But then he had another idea. He put his hand idea as he put his hand on the brick wall. “What if we actually just… take the wall apart. It might interfere with the ward, and we can get in before it closes up again.
"I would hope that the other would be pretty handy with their feather-light charms," Huang said dryly. Because he thought that was a rather obvious contingency plan. Apparently not. "Confusing and disrupting the paradigm?" He considered. "We'd have to work quickly. Transfigure the brick into something much more permeable?"
“Well, yes but it’s still going to take up too much time,” Kit said about getting up to the window and using feather-light charms. At least Huang got the other suggestion. “Right, exactly. Should we try just transfiguring the brick to dust,” he settled on. Kit walked over picking a spot next to the door. He drew out a perimeter big enough for Huang and Kit to walk through together, and he cast the spell making that part of the wall suddenly fall into a cloud of brick dust. “Hurry, and have your wand ready,” Kit said and went through the opening to the back of the warehouse.
When they found themselves on the other side of the wall rather than the alleyway, Huang let out a small sigh of relief. He was pretty sure the distraction up front wasn't about to last much longer and he didn't want to be forced to go through plans C through M. "At the risk of jinxing ourselves, it's far too quiet. Think we missed all the fun?"
"Too quiet by half," said Villegas, making sure not to surprise the others. "I've cleared the warehouse, we took out two in the entryway. Let's get back to the front and see if the l--others have found anything else."
Kit turned when Villegas was at the back to greet them. “You mean there’s nothing? No perps, and not ergot?” Great so they did know they were coming. “They had a ward on the back we didn’t know about from earlier intel either,” he explained to Villegas but this was was information later for Alicia later for debrief… He followed after to rejoin the others.
The warehouse was all but deserted. Any merchandise long gone. It should have been quiet. Except there was a sound from the office in the middle. A shout, an agonizing groan, and then a clatter.
Pamela was usually not the first through the door in any bust like this: she usually left that to whoever she was paired with, like Miles or Ariel. Apparently all that testosterone was really doing a number on her, because this time she was first toward the office and broke the window and shades as she crashed through them, landing on her feet, ready to break up the fight, such as it was. "Aurors! Wands down, hands up!"
Even before the glass shattered, the office a mess. Papers everywhere, chairs overturned. On the far side was two men. The older of the two pinning a younger man to the ground. By first glance it didn’t seem right that the older man would win, he was worn, beaten, and yet furious wrapped his hands around the other man’s neck.
Regardless of intention, it didn’t get far. He looked toward the booming man raining down glass. It gave the other man a desperately needed gasp of breath and enough space to shove the other man free. Once free he scrambled for his wand, despite the warning.
“We have contact!” Alicia yelled, still outside the office. No sense in hiding now. They’d need to be at the ready. “Two unknowns.”
While Pamela-as-ET made her grand entrance through the window, he went for the door instead. It was open and his entrance was not as grand, just swinging the door back to hit the wall. But he knew from Alicia’s yell there were two unknowns inside, and when he joined Pamela, it was in time to see the younger suspect go for his wand. “Expelliarmus. Accio wands” Kit said quickly to unarm their suspects. The older man though who had just been physically attacking the other suspect, still was a risk.
As the aurors burst into the office, Alicia started barking orders to the other hitwizards. Wilkes was not here, but that didn’t mean there couldn’t be other surprises. She would keep a close perimeter, but her goal was to ensure that no one else crashed this party.
"You're both under arrest. We'll get this sorted out in holding," Pamela said. But she was already pulling back on the bad cop, and added, "And medical attention for both of you." If nothing else, the older man, for all that he appeared to be in some distress, was down for assault and the younger for drawing a wand on an Auror. There were grounds to hold both men for a while on those charges alone, before they got to whatever they'd been doing before they arrived.
Kit could be the good cop. She resisted the urge to say "Book 'em, Ghezzi," because even though she could, and Kit probably would even get the reference, the humor wasn't even slightly appropriate.