"Rigor Mortis"-The life after death RP(Started/PM for participation)-Arc 4: Closing Loose Ends

[TheIronRuler]

Dan noticed something was wrong with Marcus when he raised him on his feet and pinned him to the wall. "You don't know", he quietly murmured. Dan smiled as Marcus applied more pressure to his chest. "You don't know" he repeated himself louder. "She needs me", Dan continued smiling.

"If you want me to give you the package you will follow me back to the office. I have the documents. I can tell you about Alice, about everything. Just let me go" Dan said, trying to pull away from Marcus.
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Edger was sleeping on the couch when he heard his dog, Greg, barking, followed by someone knocking on the door. He sat up and rubbed his eyes. Something must be wrong Edger thought to himself as he stood up and wore his slippers. He slowly walked towards Greg and held his collar then attempting to calm him down.
Greg sat down at the hallway behind Edger, eagerly awaiting for the door to open. Edger looked through the lens in the door and saw a man he did not recognize standing on his doorstep. Without opening the door he said out loud, "Who are you and what do you need?".

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

"If you want me to give you the package you will follow me back to the office."

Marcus didn't like this. Right now, Marcus still had the upper hand; but if this guy was just trying to stall for time, he would be leading Marcus onto his home turf. At least he still had Mira.

"First, I'm getting back up," He told him " and then we'll do it your way. But remember, screw with us, and you're a dead man. I don't care who you think needs you alive, my instructions were pretty clear. They told me I could kill if I wanted, so just think about that if you were planning anything smart."

 

[Generic_Username]

Spencer didn't want to harm the man anymore. He seemed distraught at the sole mention of Alice, and judging by what they've seen by now, he wasn't the sort of person who scares easily.

"Alright. We'll leave, but we'd be grateful if you could just help us understand the situation a bit better."

He wanted to leave and let the old man go on with his life, but his description of Alice was so unnerving he just had to ask. Besides, his life was hanging by a thread, and he only just got it back. Alice seemed like a common enemy, and he hoped Higgins would have some sympathy.

"Who exactly is Alice? And what do you owe her?"

 

[TheIronRuler]

Jeremy kept his gaze fixed at a burnt spot on the carpet lining the floor. "She was an angel", he said. He held his letter opener tighter. "She saved me" he continued, "Then she asked me to help her. I accepted. But now... Now I'm useless." his voice trembled as he tried ending his sentence. Jeremy felt he was alone in the world. Nobody cared for him, nobody but Alice.

Jeremy stayed silent. He looked up and stared at the young miss.
"But I can still do some good" he said, "I can still call her here". His right hand started shaking.

 

[Link_to_Future]

"Who are you and what do you need?"

Adrian noted the attorney's caution towards strangers. He understood...if someone he didn't know had been knocking on his door, he would have also been careful before opening the door. No need to take unnecessary risks.

"Hello?"

His voice cracked in his throat as he spoke. His nerves were showing through just a touch. Still, he could play it off to his advantage.

"I'm sorry to bother you sir but my car is on the fritz. Some sort of engine thing I think. I can't really tell, I'm terrible with cars."

That much was a fact at least. Adrian had never been very mechanically inclined. He had always been more interested in the wonders of nature than the achievements of man.

"I just need some sort of help. I'm already late to my daughter's recital and my wife is going to kill me."

 

[TheIronRuler]

I'm no good with cars , Edger thought to himself as he opened the door and turned to the living room. "I can lend you my phone", Edger said as he walked to the living room and turned on the lights. He gestured the stranger to follow him and then walked over to his phone.

"I can't help you with your car, but you can call help from here", he said. "Anything else? I'm tired and it's late" he said while rubbing his eyes. Greg was sitting in the hallway, studying the stranger.

 

[Berenzen]

Damn.

Ben thought furiously as he listened onto the conversation, it was barely audible unless someone was concentrating. It looked like the Adrian was being invited into the house. This was not good, Adrian was on his own here.

What to do, what to do

Ben snuck back over to his car, using darkness as cover. Suddenly, he had a flash of inspiration. Ben opened the back passenger door to his car, then closed it. He strolled up the walkway to the house palming the syringe with Midozolam into his left hand, keeping it out of sight of the men at the house.

"Uncle Dennis, is everything alright?" Ben asked.

Ben kept his left arm behind Adrian's back, sneaking the syringe into the back of Adrian's pants. He turned to the target at the living room.

"Hello sir, I'm Derek, sorry for bothering you tonight, it's just that we really need to get to my cousin's recital. She's an amazing pianist."

 

[TheIronRuler]

Edger felt uncomfortable having another person pop into his house. "You should hurry, I don't want to wake my kids", Edger said as he handed the first stranger the telephone tube. "Go on, do it quickly" he encouraged the stranger to leave as quickly as possible. Greg felt oddly uncomfortable as the second stranger walked in.

 

[Link_to_Future]

Everything suddenly began happening too fast. One moment the lawyer was inviting him into the house and the next Brendan had swung into action. Suddenly a cover story had been spun and a syringe had been delicately placed into Adrian's pocket. A lump formed in his throat as 'Derek' explained away his presence.

The phone was placed in his hand hastily by their host. He had seemed immediately put off by the sudden appearance of a second stranger in the shadows. Adrian didn't blame him. Brendan had demonstrated quite effectively that he was not someone to be trusted on the ride over.

His hands nimbly dialed a number into the phone and he placed the receiver to his ear. He had called the university; at this time of night, no one would pick up. The automated answering service would take over and give him plenty of time to fake a convincing conversation.

He looked up at Larkin and smiled as warmly as he could muster.

"Thank you so much. You have no idea how much we appreciate this."

 

[Mr.Ivebeenframed]

Curiosity. That and a concern for people, nailed into by her career, made her open the car door and peer into the darkness that took hold of the Marcus and their target. She had lost sight of the two the second they went into a dark shadow of a building. Her footsteps rapped against the concrete. Her steps grew quieter as she heard them speaking. Mira looked to either side of her making sure that there was no on-lookers or law enforcement. She clutched a pair of scissors she had in her pocket in case Marcus was in trouble but once she got there he looked relatively fine and surprisingly, so was the target.

"Marcus, is everything okay? What are you doing?" She asked in a hushed voice as she slowly walked towards them, allowing the shadows to envelop her.

 

[Berenzen]

Ben shut the front door and stood in front of the target, drawing out the second syringe into his right hand and uncapped it. The line was busy, the lawyer couldn't make a call onto it. He was trapped. Ben looked at him coldly and made his voice deadly quiet.

"Mr. Larkin, I have something to tell you, keep your hands where I can can see them, and if you yell or move, you die. Now, we were sent by Alice to collect on a debt. I have express permission to kill you, and don't think that I wouldn't. I don't want to harm you or your family, but I will if I have to. It's time to pay up."

Ben signaled to Adrian.

"Dennis, unplug the landline and search the man down, we don't need him calling the police through his cellphone if he has it on him."

Ben waited, if the man didn't appreciate the threat on his own life, he would probably take the one on his family's life seriously. People tended to be attached to family for some reason.

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

"He says what we want is in there." Marcus responded, subtly inclining his head to gesture towards the office building. "I think we should both go this time. I've got a bad feeling about this and I want someone watching my back in there, and if something did go wrong and you were still out here I'd have no way of warning you."

He decided to neglect telling her about what else he had been told. That could wait until the mission was done and they were out of potential danger. They didn't need to both be distracted now. In fact, that was part of the reason he wanted her to accompany him now. Secretly he was scared, and for the first time in his life he felt he needed company.

He knew deep down that it was crazy. It was less than 24 hours since they first met and he still barely knew her. It was probably just the pure insanity of the last few hours messing with his head, but despite himself, Marcus was beginning to like Mira. It was something in her eyes that fascinated him. A sense of maturity and toughness that so many of the people he had associated himself with before (particularly the girls) had so severely lacked. She had the look of a person who knew great loss and suffering, yet had risen to the challenge and overcome it. Marcus remembered that back at Mira's apartment there had been several photo's of her with another man which appeared to have spanned several years, and yet there was no sign of anyone else things in there. He wondered just what this person had meant to Mira, and how she had lost him.

Marcus felt a mixture of admiration and jealousy. He knew it was stupid, but in a way he wished he could grieve for the people he had lost. The only memories Marcus had of his parents were so patchy and indistinct he wasn't entirely sure if they were actually real, or if his mind had just invented them to fill the gap. He couldn't feel sad about their loss, nor the childhood he had never had. It was all he knew, and in some ways those were the happiest years of his life. The orphanage could be a brutal place at times, but had it not been for his years there Marcus knew he would not have developed the skills that he most prided within himself today.

When he finally found himself a family Marcus remembered finding it extremely difficult to adjust. He didn't want to connect with his new parents, because he was certain that the process would fall though at some point, just like all the others had done. They loved him, he was certain of that, and he would be lying if he said he had never felt fond of them in return, but they didn't understand him. How could they possibly understand him? They gave him everything they thought he wanted, but it just made him feel mollycoddled and unchallenged. He saw it as them treating him like a stupid kid, when he knew he was far tougher, far smarter, and far better than the poor, ten year old orphan everyone saw when they looked at him. In those first few years of so called 'normal' life he felt, instead of gratitude and love, merely frustration, and an almost longing to be back where he felt he belonged.

But now was not the time to dwell on such things. He had a job to do and needed to stay focused.

"Lead the way." he said to Mr. Mark, careful to keep a firm grip on his shoulder with one hand, and firm grip on the knife in the other, which was still, for now, concealed in his pocket. "But remember what we talked about."

 

[TheIronRuler]

dger was stunned by the complete change of the situation. He finally came to his senses and realized the mistake he had just made. Greg growled at the two strangers and began barking at them. The Presa Canario began barking at the two strangers, ordering them to leave. Edger jumped back and shouted a command he never thought he would say. "Kill" he shouted, "Greg, Kill".

The massive canine launched himself at Ben and latched his front legs onto his shoulders. His teeth tasted the flesh of the poor stranger, tearing through his throat with frightening expertise. That is the nature of a war hound. Greg noticed the other man standing in shock, watching the horrific display of carnage next to him. "Nobody threatens me in my own home", Edger shouted and ran lunged at Adrian with his right fist.
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Spoiler: OOC

The Presa Canario is a large canine. He is a blood hound and he's bred to work with cattle, though his previous occupation included dog fights and participation in wars.
Makes for a great house pet. I'm serious.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perro_de_Presa_Canario#Temperament
If you're wondering why the hell did Ben just die, don't worry, you're still in the game. Do you remember how it felt when you first died? Here is your chance to relieve it again. Cue in the emotional post where you describe your second demise.

 

[TheIronRuler]

Dan felt a familiar blade pressed against his shirt. He unwillingly walked towards his office through the poorly lit street, now accompanied by another kidnapper.

"You have a companion", Dan said as he moved his head to the left and glanced at the young woman. "Fine company", he added. "How could you work for such a monster? She almost made me kill a man." Dan asked the young woman , pleading for her sympathy.

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

"How could you work for such a monster?"

"You think we had a choice?" Marcus growled in retort. "If we want to live, we need that information; and if you want to live, you'll shut up and do as your told!"

Marcus had almost had enough of this man's agonizing. He'd analyse the morality of the situation later, but right now, he had a job to do and it seemed to him like Mr. Mark was trying to impede him at every turn. He wasn't going to buy in to sob stories, not yet, and it was all he could do not to just slit the man's throat then and there.

 

[Mr.Ivebeenframed]

"Marcus, calm down." Mira said. She didn't raise her voice but she shot Marcus a glance. A glance that meant that it was time to disconnect your feelings from the task at hand, to ignore everything else but action. Many times she had seen some of the more experienced Paramedics give that look to the rookies or the broken to let them know that it was time to keep their head level no matter the situation.

"Why did she want you to kill the man, Mr.Mark?" Mira asked with curiosity and not agitation. This question would clearly not appeal to Marcus but Mira thought it important as to why they were to commit these acts and perhaps see the reasoning behind them. Mira did not want to kill unless of course, there was a unique reason.

 

[Generic_Username]

Something was off. Alice, an angel? Spencer wondered if it was the same Alice that had them out here, doing her dirty work. The same Alice that gave them the permission to kill this man if he didn't cooperate.

"I can still call her here."

Now we're getting somewhere.

Curiosity killed the cat. If there was anything Spencer knew for sure about Alice, it was the fact that she's bad news. But he couldn't bring himself to follow her orders with no explanation whatsoever. He was also curious as to why Higgins was so fond of her. He had to meet her.

"...could you?"

 

[TheIronRuler]

"I had to cook the books at first", Dan began telling his tale to Mira. "Set up false businesses. Launder dirty money. Requests came from all directions and I obliged. I had to." Dan saw his office further down the street. "Someone found out what was happening. He didn't catch me but he knew that someone changed the numbers. She told me to get rid of him, but I refused." Dan had stopped. "This is it. My key is in my pocket", Dan instructed Marcus to take his key and open the door to the company offices he worked in.
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Jeremy did not know why Alice chose him. He stood up and looked at the two strangers that came into his home. He could only remember that Alice saved him from certain death. After he had fallen down the stairs and suffered unbearable pain, Alice came to rescue him from the darkness. "She asked me for so little. Just to change a few numbers, sign a few papers. But now I'm useless. She came to me when I was dying. She saved me so she has to save me again!", Jeremy held up the letter opener in his right hand and pressed it against his throat.
"I have nothing left but you, Alice. You made me understand." Jeremy barely managed to keep himself from crying. Men don't cry, Alice. I have nothing left but you

 

[Link_to_Future]

Hell broke loose.

Brendan threatened, completely tipping the hand they had been given.

Larkin responded in kind, letting loose the dogs of war upon Brendan's unsuspecting body.

Adrian stood in a state of dumbfounded awe. Part of him hated Brendan for blowing their cover so quickly and for remorselessly threatening the target instead of appealing to any sort of reason. But being torn to shreds by this hellbeast...it was a fate that he wouldn't have wished on anyone.

"Nobody threatens me in my own home"

Edgar lunged, preparing to deck Adrian and end this invasion of his home as quickly as possible.

Adrian was never fully aware of what came over him. While watching the lawyer's fist flying at him, everything seemed to just slow down. Instinct and reflex replaced the paralyzed inaction that had grasped him moments before.

Punch to face averted by simple step backwards.

Target caught off balance by missed blow.

Take opportunity to twist arm behind back.

Use syringe from pocket to levy demands.

Suddenly Adrian was in control of the situation for the first time. He pressed the tip of the syringe into Edgar's neck; the skin was not pierced but he made certain that if Larkin tried any sudden moves he would receive a dose of whatever chemical cocktail Brendan had slipped in his pocket. His voice was lowered to a grim whisper as he spoke into the target's ear.

"Mr. Larkin...Edgar...I'm sorry for my associate's manners. No one here wants anyone involved to die. If you cooperate, I personally promise that no harm will come to you or your family."

He paused for just a moment to let the reality of the situation sink in to Larkin's mind before he continued.

"Call the dog off now."

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

Marcus took the key from Mr. Mark's pocket with his right hand, sheathing the knife once again, but making sure to not loosen the grip with his left just in case he tried to run. When he opened the door he was met by possibly one of the dullest sights he had ever seen in his life. The reception are was grey. That pretty much summed up the whole description. It was bland, lifeless, with everything there having nothing more or less than a functional purpose. Marcus hadn't been expecting an art gallery, yet the lack of personality this place had was almost unreal. He'd worked temp job's in offices before, but even by there standards this place was bad.

In the far corner of the room there was a set of double doors leading to a stairwell. A sign next to it indicated which departments were situated on which floor.

"Where to now?" he asked.