Emerald City Nights (Solo Project), 'IC' Thread Options

[Digital Heroin]

//12/24/70 :: 11:25 :: Bellevue Square Mall :: Seattle, UCAS//

There are days when any sane person in the Sixth World is simply better off to avoid being in a mall. Black Friday, Boxing Day, and President's Day are all killers, but nothing quite beats the frantic pace of Christmas Eve. In a time when shopping can be done instantly in Artificial Reality, malls still see traffic because instant purchase isn't fast enough - people want instant possession. The need to have something to put underneath the tree for the kids to open, combined with the ultra-busy 2070s lifestyle, make a day like Christmas Eve Day in Bellevue Square beyond frantic. Throngs of shoppers bustle past each other, holding conversations with people near to them, across the mall, or further out in the world as they clutch to their holiday finds, or jockey to enter stores first in search of those dwindling stocks of must have items. To spend an hour here would be stressful to most, but Jon had spent the better part of four calmly walking the mall property and the adjacent Bellevue Plaza and Lincoln Square properties, maintaining a facade of a shopper out to see all of the sales, with another, less jolly agenda on his mind.

He had memorized the mall maps in the days prior, as well as more detailed maps a contact of his had pulled for him, and had them on call should he require them. The morning spent making his way amongst the glossy faux-holiday cheer and weary-wired shoppers wasn't about getting the lay of the land, it was about tying in all the little details. It was about learning where the seasonal displays had been put up, where decorations might hamper security's eyes on the scene, and about getting an idea of that most tricky of factors: the metahuman one. He had passed by Center Square, and the Holiday Wonderland a half dozen times, just another suit in the crowd, and had developed while passing a sense of the holiday routine of his current mark, who was due for a break and a nip of holiday cheer soon.

Making his way along the first floor of the mall, Jon approaches the open area which has been converted - both in the physical and in AR - into a slice of the fairy tale Arctic, complete with a small workshop, a fresh snowfall (courtesy of snow machines which operate for five minutes on the hour, every hour), and a rather ostentatious throne parked at the foot of a tree that nearly reaches the skylight above. Upon the throne is seated his mark - Tyson Ballard, formerly Orlando 'Rubberface' DiMarco, currently St. Nick. Ballard used to be a low level Mafia enforcer on the East Coast, which was a natural enough job for a two and a half meter, fifty stone slab of angry muscle. He had made a few desperate decisions, borrowed money from the wrong family, and ended up running to the FBI for protection. In exchange for information and future testimony, Ballard had been placed in Witness Protection and carted across the continent to the city-state of Seattle to keep him out of the sight of his former employers. He would have stayed out of sight, too, if he hadn't fallen into old habits and decided to pick a mob backed bookie to do his betting with.

Jon had been provided with very little of this information through his fixer, of course. Most of what he knew had been arranged through the same hacker who had given him the more detailed specifications of the mall property. He never accepted a contract without a twenty-four hour consideration period, and then he only accepted when his contacts could provide him with detailed enough information about a target's past and present circumstances, and about his prospective employer, to satisfy him. He did not select contracts based upon the information uncovered, he merely wanted as thorough a picture of the situation, and the motivations of his employer, as possible before negotiating his fee. Ballard, he had found, was a man of many habits, which made him perhaps too easy a mark. The gig as mall Santa was a new wrinkle in his history, however, and was what had ultimately led Jon to accept the contract. His employer - a Mafia Capo, and thus a man used to grand gestures - had wanted a statement made with Ballard's death. He wanted it to be very obvious what happened to people who crossed the Family and thought to hide behind Federal protection. While many in his line of work would balk at such a public affair, Jon saw it as a challenge. To conduct business is such an open fashion, and to do so successfully, would be making his own statement. This was not to say he was negligent in his planning, and that he wasn't going being thorough.

He approaches the workshop only moments after one of Santa's elves - a dwarf, as Sixth World irony would have it - was shooing away the waiting children and activating the ARO which would inform their parents Santa was on his lunch break, and would be returning in an hour. The other elves are busy packing up everything not nailed down on the display and carting it off to the small workshop cum storage area. Jon walks calmly around the line markers and past the working little men in their holiday cute outfits, and rounds the throne to the small break area there. As expected, he finds Ballard unscrewing the cap off of a silver flask. The troll looks utterly ridiculous, and rather unsightly, in his veil of Christmas pageantry. His beard is already pulled down and he has taken off his fuzzy black gloves, discarding them carelessly with his hat on the bench beneath the boughs of the mall's genuine Christmas tree. Ballard looks up when he realizes someone is there with him, and he mutters to himself, covering the flask with a meaty hand.

"I'm on my break, tell you're little snot-rag he can sit in my lap on the mall's da-" The mall Santa chokes back his words when he sees Jon reach under his suit jacket, and draw a rather large chrome-and-ceramic finished pistol - a heavily modified Savalette Guardian - from the holster tucked under his arm.

Jon doesn't take a moment to say something profound, or to chide Ballard for the sins of his past. He simply levels the pistol at Ballard's face, off a burst of hollowpoint rounds even as the mall Santa surges to his feet. Even with the two of the slugs tearing runnels of flesh out of Ballard's face, and the third shattering part of one of his tusks, the troll manages to stumble clear of the little break area, and out into the winter wonderland. Jon shifts his footing and takes up a marksman's stance, sending a mental command via smartlink to the Guardian and switching firing modes. As Ballard blunders into one of the mall elves - a human this time, thanks to the mall's desire to maintain diversity - and grabs the guy by the felt of his shirt, Jon fires again, the impact striking one of the dermal plates over the troll's shoulder blade. Ballard lets out a howl and spins, throwing the human-elf at Jon, and stumbling backwards. Jon steps forward to meet the stumbling mall employee, keeping his pistol level, and freeing a hand to catch the man's near wrist, guiding him clear of the line of fire, and squeezing off another round. This time the hum of the electronic firing mechanism of the Guardian is rewarded with a choked off gurgle and an empty eyed look in Ballard's face mere moments before the round mushrooms inside of the soft part underneath his chin, sending shrapnel into his brain and punching his massive frame back with the force of the impact. The arc of the troll's body brings him slumping back against one arm of the large throne, and there he falls before everyone who is looking at the winter wonderland display, Santa, riddled with bullets.

Not paying any heed to the human-elf, who is not cowering under the tree, trying to bury himself under presents, Jon calmly issues a mental command to eject the partially expired magazine from the pistol. Catching the magazine as it falls, he unbuttons his jacket, placing the magazine in the left interior pocket, and retrieving a fresh one - this loaded with less than lethal gel rounds - from the right interior pocket. After seating the magazine, he re-holsters the Guardian and extracts from another pocket a small black case. Flipping the case open, he takes from it a single rectangle of printer card; bone, with a Cillian Braille typeface which reads, simply: 'Winter is coming.'

Jon steps clear of the break area and into a brush of freshly falling snow. He takes the barest of moments to watch the intermingling of red into the accumulation around Ballard's corpse. A flick of his wrist sends the card spiraling down onto the troll's chest, and without a second thought he walks away from the bubbling panic around Santa's Village, heading towards the glass elevator which will bring him to the second level of the mall. As the elevator begins its ascent he gives himself a quick once over, making sure that no errant blood spray has alight his suit. He re-seats the holster to his pistol and looks out of the elevator at the scene below, where Santa's elves are gathering around their fallen master and people are finally realizing something isn't right in Christmas Town. Looking up, he spots three MallSec officers milling about on the second level, watching the scene unfolding below with an eye more critical than a mere passing patrol. They were taking orders for someone. They were waiting for him.

He doesn't give the guards the time to settle in and ambush him. As soon as the elevator's brass doors slide open he explodes out of the car, hooking the arm of the nearest guard and slapping his stun baton from his grip. When one of the other guards reacts, Jon steps in closer to the guard whose arm he has hooked, simultaneously dodging a swinging stun baton and shoving the first man away. The third guard steps in and thrusts the contact head of his baton into Jon's rib, triggering the internal taser charge from it. Snow sidesteps with the impact, and the shock courses into the sophisticated nano-weave underlay of his armored suit. A few steps and he sets himself facing the guards in a triangle before him. Not giving them a chance to gather themselves for a coordinated attack, he goes on the offensive again, stutter-stepping and sweeping a leg to trip up the guard on his left - the one who had just recovered his stun baton. His effort is met by a guard hopping over his leg, another impact on his back, and a thrust which he intercepts, grabbing the guard's wrist and guiding the impact into the chest of the guard who had hopped his leg. The man shudders with the impact, stumbling back into the railing beside the elevator. Still retaining his grip on the guard's wrist, Jon steps a foot behind his ankle and jerks him off balance, sending him sprawling on the ground. A quick twist of his body and a step forward lets an attack from the guard who had struck him twice previously go wide. When the man attempts an overhead swing, Jon catches the man's wrist, locks an arm with his free hand, and cranks his body over, stepping into a throw and sending the man sailing several feet before he collides with the mall floor and skids into an Bust-a-Move toy display, sending animatronic friends flying and the display tender running. As the guard who had been tripped begins to scramble to his feet, Jon grabs the cuff of the man who he had previously disarmed - who is just now shaking off the shock of his peer's baton - the guard strikes him harmlessly on the shoulder, and Jon twists, pulling the man forward and once more slapping the baton from his grip. He releases his grip on the man's cuff only when the recovered guard jabs him in the back. Even as the last fallen guard begins to scramble free of the display, swatting aside dancing dolls, Jon shrugs off another strike and dives clear of the two remaining guards, rolling to his knees by the fallen man's discarded stun baton. When the man surges to his feet, Jon raises to meet him, brushing aside a haymaker and sending the man stumbling.

"Hold it right there," the guard Jon had twice stripped of his baton now draws a bead on Jon with his sidearm - a Colt L36, loaded as Jon's own weapon now is with gel rounds if his intel is correct.

A heartbeat passes; two breathes. Jon lets the guard settle into a sense of confidence, a gun-fueled calm. He watches for that moment as the other two guards recover their bearings. When the guard with his sidearm drawn looks to the left, to address his peers, Jon is quick to close the distance, reaching one hand to brush the Colt aside with the back of his hand, and jamming the stun baton into the guard's gut, triggering the shock mechanism. A twist of his free hand and he grabs the wrist of the guard with the Colt. He steps in, raising an elbow to deflect a swing from the last guard holding a stun baton. Pressure on his wrist, combined with the stun to the gut causes the guard to squeeze off two wild rounds, the shots going wild, leaving the gel slugs lost to the bows of the Christmas tree. Backing off several steps, the guard who had tried to punch Jon fumbles his own sidearm free of its holster with the characteristic shudder of a man who has never fired his weapon at a living target. He brings it up, firing before he has had time to draw a bead on his target, causing the round to impact loudly upon the brass elevator doors. Snow releases his grip on the first guard's wrist, brushing past the one he had elbowed the baton strike away from, and he lances forward to strike the unsteady shooter, shocking him heavily and causing him to crumple to the ground. Sensing an opening, the guard with the stun baton twists and comes about with a wild backhanded swing. Jon, having anticipated the attack, ducks low and drives a shoulder up under the swinging arm, rapping the guard in the leg and activating the taser mechanism. Staggered backwards and slumping against the wall, the first guard Jon had hit with a stun baton manages to fire two more ineffectual shots, the crack of which stir up the growing riot of shoppers pressing to escape the scene of action.

Even in the scuffle with the guards, Jon maintains the presence of mind to notice another trio of MallSec guards fighting to climb the escalators on the far side of the center court area. Knowing his welcome is about worn out, Jon grabs the last guard standing by the collar, hooks a leg, and trips him to the floor hard. He looks up when he hears the elevator gears spin up, and walks over to jam the stun baton into the gut of the guard slumped against the wall. Another shock and the guy is out and twitching. Discarding the stun baton, Snow calmly walks the five feet to a nearby maintenance door. He pulls open the door, ducking inside, and closes it all but a crack, drawing his Guardian as he watches for the advance of the MallSec reinforcements. Several moments pass and Jon watches through the crack of the maintenance door. He watches as one of the trio of guards that tops the elevator points to the maintenance door, saying something indecipherable at that distance over the cheery generic holiday music. He waits another beat as the guard rushes forwards, his brethren in tow, and raises his sidearm, firing. Jon doesn't stick around to test the man's accuracy. Instead, he sprints down the hall. Recalling camera positioning, he hugs the wall and heads down the hall that takes him away from the center court area. Confident in the knowledge he's got a lead on the guards, but not wanting to press his luck, he keeps up the pace until he reaches the next corner. Pausing a moment to listen for the guard's footfalls, he ducks two doors down and enters through the back door of one of the shops.

He finds himself in a world in stark contrast from the barren plastcrete of the maintenance corridors, or even the slathered on cheer of the mall proper. The world he has entered drips with well crafted sensuality, an artifice of lace and silk. The music is sedated, seductive, and matches well with the vaguely shimmering AR overlay which details the prices of various collections of lingerie. A moment's thought, and Jon places himself in Victoria Secret. He lets the hand holding his sidearm drop to his leg, and moments later he is noticed by a shop attendant who had been peering warily out of the front of the shop. The honey blond elf takes a long look at him with her big blue eyes, and he regards her with a careful smile, noting that the most substantial piece of clothing she is wearing is a jauntily angled Santa hat.

"Um, is there something I can help you with sir?" She's wondering just why it is he came in the back door, and if he has something to do with what sounded like gunshots outside of the store. It's all over her face.

He doesn't hesitate, already having tagged two items in his quick inventory. "I'd like the red satin and lace teddy, and the black pleated babydoll, both size small, please. No need to gift wrap them, I'll do that myself."

A blink from those big blue eyes is followed by a commission based click in her head, and a smile. The elf girl picks up the items in question and goes to ring them up. He approaches the counter, fishing a small selection of certified credstick from one of his pockets. She names a price, and he slides over one of the sticks She bags the purchases, and he favors her with a smile, thanking her. With a shift of his hand, he obscures the still drawn Guardian with his new purchases and exits the store.

Despite the confrontation with the guards just around the corner, Jon finds himself in a throng of determined shoppers, too focused on their agendas to have noticed the gunshots. He shuffles his way into the crowd of people, matching step with them and adopting the mannerisms of a harried shopper just looking to get home after finding the gifts he was looking for. He walks with the crowd past the scene of his original scuffle, and along to the walkway towards Lincoln Square. As they approach the walkway, he spots another MallSec guard, and a man with a bit more bearing about him in a similar uniform. From the hardened glint in the man's eyes Jon pegs him as the mall's top cop, probably retired Lone Star or the like. Whoever he is, he isn't at the top of his game, however. Jon manages to walk right past him without being spotted, and he is soon clear across the walkway, and heading down a stairwell towards street level. As he heads down the stairs, his nose rankling at the acrid smell of urine which wafts over him, he re-holsters the Guardian.

Merging into street level traffic, Jon heads down 8th Street for several blocks, enjoying the crisp air and the press of metahumanity about him. When he is a good distance away from the mall, he hails a cab to take him downtown.