The Praetorians, a fantasy cop drama. (Game thread Started/CLOSED Prologue)

[Pappytech]

"Gods above..."

Dragging a palm across his face, Archibald glowered down at his compatriot's new form. A mutt through and through, with ratty little eyes and an unpleasant color scheme, the beast was certainly an irksome development, one that the officer had no intention of putting up with.

"And just what exactly," he asked coolly, his neutral tone a sharp contrast to the annoyance dancing across his face, "do you intend to do looking like that?"

 

[CrazyGirl17]

Cali blinked, finally understanding what Rat had been doing. Shedders had been rather rare around where she had grown up, so she had only heard of them. But now she was seeing one of them in action... and it was not exactly impressive. Still, first impressions could be deceiving, after all.

Archibald, however, did not look amused. "And just what exactly, do you intend to do looking like that?"

Despite herself, Cali smirked a little. "I think I have a pretty good idea..."

 

[Voidrunner]

"This may be a bad time to tell you but... I'm not good with guns."

"I wouldn't worry about it," announced Collin, "I'm not much good with_" he was cut off as the criminals returned fire, their shots flying wide of the patrol car, or at least Collin hoped they missed the patrol car. He quickly looked down at himself to ensure he wasn't bleeding to death without knowing it. "Well that was certainly unfrie_" the two cars slammed together, sending Collin flying to the side and almost leading to him dropping his gun. Even worse, his desperate attempt to catch it almost had him firing it by accident. Now that cars were stuck in a lock, either the criminals would be forced to a stop or this patrol car would give up and fall to pieces. They were going to need an edge, something the criminals didn't expect. A Loose Cannon. Novak was busy driving, Draven might have been a loose cannon but Collin didn't know for sure. It looked like his only choice was to be the Loose Cannon himself. What would a Loose Cannon do in this situation? Scare the hell out of the criminals by firing off a shot at point blank range?

"Cop this!" shouted Collin suddenly, lifting his gun and firing wildly into the other car, he sincerely doubted he'd hit anyone in there but that ought to break the drivers concentration if nothing else.

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

Jason wasn't about to waste any more time arguing. Taking one partner's silence and the other's indignant backpedaling for agreement, He strode over to the building. The stairs of the fire escape were down a side alley, attached to the southern wall. He took the metal stairs three at a time, racing past one floor, then another, and than another. When he got to the same floor from which the voices could be heard, Jason vaulted over the safety railing, planting himself on the ledge that jutted out from the wall. It was just wide enough for a man of Jason's size to have a full footing, provided he kept his back to the wall.

His earlier haste gone, Jason shimmied slowly out towards the corner of the building. The most difficult part was easing his way around the hard right-angle that would put him back above the main street. As he did so, a gust of wind came howling down on him, channeled and accelerated by the tall, rickety apartment blocks that were jammed so close together on either side of the road. Jason clung with strong fingers to the rough, weathered surface behind him so hard, that his hands kicked up miniature clouds of brick dust. He had never been particularly afraid of heights, but as the air beat at his face Jason felt it would be best not to look down.

'Lloyd and Hemingr had better be at the front door by now. If I'm all on my own up here, I don't expect the element of surprise will do me much good.'

Fortunately, the wind died down, and Jason felt safe to move again. From then on his progress was much easier. Hear he had a drainpipe and window-sills to cling on to and help him on his way. The shouting was so much louder up here, and Jason was certain he heard more than one voice, but whatever it was that was under discussion was so heated that Jason could not tell what was man or woman, fear or rage, aggressor or defender. As he approached the broken window, Jason crouched, going down almost to his knees, with one hand resting on his sidearm, and the other steadying himself on the ridge. Oh-so-slowly, making no noise or sudden movements, Jason craned his head as far forward as he dared, and peeked into the room...

 

[Ruedyn]

"We're not splitting up, it's too risky. Either we all go up, or we don't go at all."

'What kind of cop does that? Suggest people are in danger then threaten to leave when efficiency is introduced.' Marc sighed, and rubbed his temple. Saying that out loud would just make Jason hit him, which would make the Talin boys snigger even more at them. Marc watched them walk off, and started thinking.

"I'm not bothered either way; then again, I don't know this neighbour very well."

Only to be interrupted by Chris' back pedaling and Jason rushing off to be a fucking idiot. Cops shouldn't do that, nobody should use an emergency escape to get a surprise attack on something that could be NOTHING. He held in his sigh, and just shook his head in disappointment. He turned to his raven haired, and apparently shameless partner.

"I'm going to continue the patrol. Do what you will." Marc waved him off as he started down the street again, a bit behind the Talin kids.

 

[Belmarc]

Rat barked at Archibald matter-of-factly, before trotting over and sniffing around the cat bed. After a few moments, he lifted his head, satisfied, and began following an invisible trail, his nose to the ground. He made it a few feet before pausing, literally barking an order at Archibald while pointing his nose at his discarded clothes, then pointing at the collar the old lady was holding, his tail wagging mindlessly behind him. Not waiting to see if his companions would follow his thinking, he started off on the trail again, eager to find where it led.

 

[Trasch17]

Sameera was shaken thoroughly as both cars collided. Shots were fired at them from the other car.
"Oh shit!" She took cover in her seat as good as possible. ~Whoop-de-freaking-doo... what's next? Explosives?~
"What are these idio-" The criminials' car slammed into them again locking both vehicles together.
"Oh, you just made my shit list!"

Just as she wanted to shoot her remaining three shots, Collin decided to make the criminals' car swiss and fired blindly at them. Sameera suddenly had an idea. "Keep the other guy pinned!" She leaned out of her window, right next to the other driver's window. "Now.... the top right corner if I remember correctly..." she murmured to herself and hit the window with her fist with full strenght. Needless to say that the poor thing didn't stand a chance against the dark kin's rage.
The driver, who was a dark kin as she noticed then, gave her a haunted look. She reached through the window, ignoring the pain in her right hand, caused by several glass shards that were sticking in it, and grabbed his collar. "Get over here!", she yelled with a wild grin while mercilessly pulling him out of his seat, through the window into the patrol car, robbing the other vehicle of it's driver. And just to keep him busy, she repeatedly punched his face with her left fist while pulling him into the car with her other hand.

 

[Terratina.]

"I'm going to continue the patrol. Do what you will."

With sigh, Chris replied with, "Don't wander off too far, okay?" That done, he bolted towards the front door, ironically hoping that there was in fact something going in the building. If there wasn't, he and Jason were fools and police wasting police time. He cursed his own inexperience, 'Join the Praetorians, yeah. Even though you're a scrub that's just stumbled into this city. Look at how much good I'm doing right now. Ugh... Why the hell would they want me anyway?' He settled on the idea that his being in the Paetorians was part of an elaborate scheme, because nothing else made sense. Thoughts aside, he unholstered the revolver and took point next the front door, one hand ready to open the door and the revolver cradled in the other.

"Fucking first day..." Chris muttered to himself, surprised that he had resorted to swearing so soon.

 

[Voidrunner]

Ok, there was no denying it, Draven was definitely The Loose Cannon! Collin's mouth dropped open in complete and utter shock and Draven punched her way through the other car's window and casually dragged the driver from one vehicle to the other. Oh, all while violently assaulting the man as well. That made Collin's stunt with the gun pale in gun comparison, in fact, he holstered the weapon immediately. Why have a gun when your fellow officer could pull stunts like that! Without a driver the other car was probably about to crash into something any second now and thanks to Draven they even had a suspect to question.

"Nicely done!" Collin nodded respectfully, "couldn't have done it better myself, actually I couldn't have done it full stop but you know what I mean? We can question this joker and find out what he's been up to."

 

[Dogmatic99]

Most of the neighbourhood was coated in a light sprinkling of the target cat's scent as the animal had apparently been more than happy to wander the place marking anything in sight as its territory. One trail was clearly fresher than the others though and it lead Rat down to the end of the long, winding street before cutting off sharply down a narrow alley way; stopping at a dumpster that had been tucked away as far out of sight as it could. Inside was Charlie the cat. Judging by the state of his body he had been dead for at least a week, probably more.

*****​

"Oh gods!" Novak blustered as Sam turned the front seats of the car into a boxing ring. He had to slow down to avoid smashing into something as the fight threatened to spill over into his seat as well.

The perp's car on the other hand was not so lucky as it ended up on the wrong end of a lamp post. Novak slammed on the breaks and piled on the wounded driver who tried to take a chunk out of his arm as he flailed against the two offiers. That cleared up what he was supposed to be. The sergeant sprang out of the car and dragged the perp along with him, with Sam's help he managed to clap a pair of iron cuffs on the driver, the dark kin hissed in defiant pain as he collapsed to his knees.

Across the street a wounded gunman stagared out of the hulk of his ride and made a break for a sidestreet, snarling and letting his fangs scare off any pedestrian in his way and waving his gun at the ones who were too startled to move fast enough. Novak noticed him just as the gunman (gunkin?) ducked behind a greasy spoon joint, leaving a thin trail of blood behind him.

"Get after him! I've got this one!" He yelled at his subordinates.

*****​

Jason was greeted with the sight of a middle aged man and woman in the middle of a blazing argument, their mutual shouting blending into each other as they let loose. It only came to a stop as they both noticed Jason peering in. The woman burst out screaming and rushed from the room as the man seemed to position himself between the two and launched into a tiraid at Jason. Most of it leaning towards "Who the hell are you?" and "Get the hell out of my house!"

Downstairs, the front door flew open and the woman in this situation almost bowled into Chris. She managed to stop herself just short of that and took a moment to register who he was in her surprise. Taking in his uniform though she seemed to become relieved. "Thank the gods you're here, someone's trying to break into my house!" She cried, pointing him upstairs.

*****​

Down the way Marc had caught up to the two errant talin boys, though they hadn't gone particularly far. Having switched from idly hanging around a tenament porch to idly hanging around a street corner. Though the two didn't seem bored, casually talking to one another and looking out on the whole area like they owned it. They were briefly approached by an unwashed human looking man who seemed to mumble something at them; the two laughed and said something that made him cringe. Quick enough the man gave them a wad of money which they gladly accepted and patted him on his way, the man taking a moment now and then to look around him like a nervous deer.

*****​

The ambulance arrived in respectable time and took over from the praetorians with trained efficency. They buzzed around the wounded shedder, transfering them to a gurney and wheeling them into their vehicle before whizzing off, sirens blazing. They informed Rory and Mordecai that the regular police had been informed, as was protocol and were on their way. Leaving the crime scene souly in praetorian care for the time being.

Off to the side the restraunt staff gathered together, one of the chefs was grumbling up a storm as some of the other staff tried to quiet them down. All the while the customers were looking to one another wondering when they could go home or try and salvage their savaged evening but none quite had the nerve to ask the two strange looking officers in badges none of them even recognised.

 

[CrazyGirl17]

"Hey, wait up!" Cali hurried after Rat, not even looking back to see if Archibald was following. He lead her down the street until they came to a dead end alley... and the gruesome remains.

"Oh... oh Gods..." Cali leaned over and vomited in the street. She knew it was unprofessional of her to do so, but she couldn't help it. Especially seeing as she had many pets growing up, including cats, that she had loved dearly.

What sort of creature could have done this...?

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

'Damn it!' Jason cursed inwardly, although a part of him couldn't help but be relieved that the scene he'd witnessed didn't appear to be anything too serious. He had no choice but to step through the window and into the room, carefully avoiding the ridges of broken glass that still clung to the frame. Perhaps Lloyd or Hemingr wouldn't have been seen, due to being smaller, if only they'd both not been so bloody timid, and forced him to take action. If Jason had hoped that his uniform would be enough to calm the man down, it had been a hope misplaced. The combination of the yelling and Jason's own frustration were quickly giving him a headache.

"Sir..." he began calmly, trying to find a gap between the man's tirade that he could interject in order to explain himself. "Sir, calm d-Sir, I'm a pol..."

'Oh fuck this shit!'

"SHUUUUTT UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUPPP!" Jason bellowed, bringing the full force of his rather large lungs into play. Finally, it seemed the man was cowed, and Jason took a breath.

"See this badge?" Jason asked, holding it up with his left hand, while gesturing to his uniform with his right. "It means I am a Police Officer. My name is Jason, Constable Jason Hunt, and I am not here to hurt you. Now get that through your head, pipe down, and listen!"

Jason was walking on rotten ice, he knew. However, attempting to retreat at this point would only have made things worse. He was in uniform, and he was going to act with authority. The sooner that he could get this situation resolved, the sooner Jason could be on his way. His head was pounding, and he considered it fortunate that all the man had done was shout, and not tried to attack the intruder he thought he saw. Had he done that, Jason might have lost his temper, which wouldn't have been good news for anyone concerned.

"Now," he continued, his voice quieter this time. "I apologise for having scared you, that was not my intention. However, that vase you or your wife threw, not to mention all the broken glass that came with it, could have caused serious harm to anyone on the street below, which just so happened to be my colleagues and I at the time. So, if you don't want to find yourself in cuffs for disturbing the peace, not to mention assault of a police officer, then I suggest you explain yourself, and quickly!"

 

[Voidrunner]

"Get after him! I've got this one!" He yelled at his subordinates.

A foot chase? Those usually ended in a rooftop shootout and Collin was pretty much all out of bullets thanks to his Loose Cannon bullet barrage earlier. That meant Collin was left with the options of either physically grappling with an armed and enraged dark kin, or trying to talk him down. Neither of those seemed particularly likely to succeed but Collin knew which option was less likely to get him killed. Collin drew his now useless gun and took off after the dark kin, following the trail of blood around the back of what was possibly the seediest café in town. He caught a glimpse of his target and shouted to get his attention. Obviously that was pointless as no criminal who wasn't as thick as a bag of wet rocks would actually stop to listen to the officer chasing him. 'Stop, police!' wasn't going to cut it so Collin was going to try a different tack.

"Listen! There's going to be way too much paperwork if my partner gets to you before I do, she stark raving mad you know. I'll just arrest you, she'll probably rip you apart!" Draven probably wouldn't find it overly flattering to be referred to as 'stark raving mad' but if it got the criminal to surrender it was worth it. Besides, Collin may have passed the academy fitness test but that didn't mean he enjoyed the thought of chasing suspects all over town.

 

[Ruedyn]

"Don't wander off too far, okay?"

"I haven't been a little boy for over 200 years." Marc called back, feeling a bit grumpy now. If Jason found a drug cartel and busted them, Marc might look a bit like a fool. But then again, he hadn't climbed a fire escape for no reason other than loud noises.

He was paying too much attention to that, he shook his head and looked around. Talin kids again, scared a man and took his money.... Were they gang members?

'They DID say there were two gangs. Pride and Dawn Claws.' Marc approached the man, hesitantly. He didn't like talking to humans... He made himself a bit more agreeable as he cleared his throat, and tried talking in his most authoritative voice.

"Excuse me, sir? Do you know anything about those boys?" Marc focused his gaze on the man's nose, and he could already feel himself sweat a bit. Had Marc eaten one of this man's kin, long ago? Would this man tried to hurt him? Maybe he was a shedder, or warg. That'd be good...

 

[Pappytech]

The mongrel's barking had been annoying enough. The fact that it so obviously desired Archibald to carry its clothes for it was downright infuriating. Still, somebody on this squad had to have the decency to care about modesty. If no one else would accept that role, then the man supposed that he would have no choice but to do so.

Though of course he didn't bother keeping the Warg's clothes all neat and folded. It would serve the beast right, having to dress itself in wrinkled garments.

Deciding to humor his squadmates' asinine desire to track down Charlie, the missing feline, Archibald trailed behind them, making sure to keep Laura and her mother in sight. It wouldn't do to let them get lost simply because the Warg and Talin were too impatient to solve such a childish mystery. If one could even deign to call it a mystery.

"Oh... oh Gods..."

The sound of vomiting snapped Archibald's attention back to his compatriots, namely the girl. The man's nose wrinkled in disgust as the scent of gastric fluid filled the air, and he tossed a nervous glance down the alleyway the Talin had come racing out of. What could she have possibly seen to induce such a reaction?

Tentatively, the officer made his way down the alley, the Warg's clothes still clasped in his arms. The cretin in question, still in the shape of a mutt, seemed to be hanging around a dumpster at the end of the alley, and Archibald slowly made his way towards the container...

Only to find a dead cat as its most interesting contents.

"Oh, for heaven's sake," he muttered to himself. This was what had sent the Talin into that fit? It may not have been a pleasant sight, but honestly, was she really that weak-willed?

Still, it wouldn't do to let the old woman see her beloved pet in such a state. From what he had seen of her, it was apparent to Archibald that she had loved the cat very much; finding its half-rotten carcass in a dumpster would not be good for her.

Taking the Warg's shirt, the officer carefully tossed the garment over Charlie's body, letting it fall so that only the feline's silhouette could still be seen. Then, turning around, he made his way out of the alley just in time to impede Laura and her mother. "I'm sorry, ma'am," he began, addressing the old woman with as much neutral courtesy as he could muster, "but I don't think you should see this."

Then, out of the corner of his mouth, in a whisper loud enough for everyone to hear: "Oh, will you get a hold of yourself!" Archibald hissed at the Talin, glaring at her disapprovingly. "If that's all it takes to set you off, why on Earth do you believe yourself suited for this position?"

 

[CrazyGirl17]

"Oh, will you get a hold of yourself! If that's all it takes to set you off, why on Earth do you believe yourself suited for this position?"

Cali straightened up,m glaring daggers at Archibald. "Well excuse me for having a pet when I grew up!"

Seeing the women behind him, she closed her eyes. "I'm really sorry, ma'am..."

 

[Trasch17]

The criminals' car crashed and Novak slammed the breaks. Sameera neither paying attention to the street nor to what Novak was doing so the braking hit her unprepared. Her head banged against the dashboard. Everything went dark.
When she opened her eyes, she felt dazed and saw Novak tying to tame the driver. Sameera figured that she has only been unconscious for a few seconds. She grunted and got off the car, well, 'fell out' would have been a more fitting expression.
She struggled to her feet and helped Novak with the handcuffs.
She noticed that something warm was running down the left side of her forehead, down her cheeks and chin, dripping down on her uniform. Seemed like she had a laceration on her forehead.

"Get after him! I've got this one!"

Her knees were feeling kind of wobbly and she was still a little dazed but did as she was told, running just behind Collin.

"Listen! There's going to be way too much paperwork if my partner gets to you before I do, she stark raving mad you know. I'll just arrest you, she'll probably rip you apart!"

~Stark raving mad?~ She gave her fellow praetorian a gloomy look. "Well, thank you..."
Essentially he was right. She wouldn't rip him apart, no, not this easy. First she decided to tear him a... no, two new assholes and then... she didn't know what she'll do after that but she was sure, that she could come up with something even more painful.

Sameera ran past Collin and tried her best to catch up with the gunkin while pulling the glass shards out of her right hand.
The blood from the laceration made it past her eyebrows and got into her eye.

 

[Voidrunner]

She gave her fellow praetorian a gloomy look. "Well, thank you..."

"No offense, but you did kind of punch out the window of a moving vehicle and drag out the kicking and screaming driver," which was apparently far crazier than emptying a gun into the vehicle. "That's kind of crazy, not that I have a problem with that," he added quickly as a dark look crossed her face. Thankfully her vengeful expression seemed to be directed at the fleeing Dark Kin rather than tactless Collin as she overtook him and tore off after the suspect. It was at that precise moment that the coffee Collin had consumed that morning decided to return with a vengeance, Collin's stomach churned in agony and he ground to halt, doubled over and gasping for air.

"Officer down," he groaned, "don't touch the coffee." Maybe when Draven caught up with the gunkin she'd force him to drink that stuff.

 

[Dogmatic99]

"Oh... oh..." Julie covered he mouth, a faint beginning of tears showing in her eyes. A small group of neighbours had gathered out by the alley moth with the pair, attracted by the odd trio they were following down the street. A few made moves to comfort the grief stricken Julie. Granted they had been doing that already talking about how they had either been robbed or lost a family pet recently as well (or both) but now it became louder as they tried a little too hard to 'be there' for her. Her daughter, Laura, on the other hand seemed to go quiet, losing the frustration and venom from before and just took up a place by her mother's side.

*****​

Seeing at least some kind of chance at a break the lone gunman let off the few shots he had left in Collin's direction while the officer's were distracted by his dramatics. It wasn't much but it added enough time for him to crash into the backstreets and into a set of bins, leaving an open manhole in his wake. Whether anyone would follow him into the sthinking dark was left to be seen.

*****​

The male half of the pair shrank away before Jason. "Sh- she threw the thing at me an... an - cus she thought I was - and 'er sister - and 'cus when I... the bar and..." He stumbled and stammered for words. "Wait but you broke in here?" He said seeming to remembering himself. "Police aren't allowed to do that, I could report you!"

*****​

"Uh no! no, no; no I don't know anything about them." The vagrant seemed far more on edge around Marc than they had around the talin youths. What followed was a series of mutters and half sentences as he tried to make his excuses and squeeze past Marc. He didn't go far though as he turned a corner, hunched over to another pair of talins and shiftily said something to the two of them. It looked as if he shook ahnds with one of them before going his own way, still glancing around nervously like the smallest animal in the foodchain.

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

Jason scowled. While he wasn't going to give up any ground on this exchange, secretly he was starting to feel a little ashamed of himself. He'd been so eager to prove himself that he'd jumped the gun and made a situation far more complicated than it had to be; and who was it he was trying to prove himself to exactly? Lloyd and Hemingr, Captain Ackerman and Sergeant Novak, Emilia, himself? Whatever the answer, he'd fucked up, and he needed to get out of here as soon as possible, to see if he could at least do something right before the end of the day. Jason had no reason not to believe the man's version of events. It made perfect sense, and the man didn't look even half bright enough to make up a convincing lie so quickly. He hoped that the woman who had ran out of the room was also being interviewed at this moment by his colleagues, so that their statements could be cross-referenced.

Biting back his anger with himself, for it would do no good to show it here, Jason took another step towards the man, better to emphasise how much he towered over him, and growled.

"Broke in?" he said, poking his thumb over his shoulder at the smashed window. "There was no breaking required; and I can actually, if I had reason to believe someone within the premises was in danger. So, unless you want 'Wasting Police Time' to be added to the list of things I could heap on you right now, I suggest you disabuse yourself of the notion that we're having a debate between equals."

Jason was being a bully, he knew, and it stuck in his craw. He didn't want to think about what Emilia would think of him intimidating the man like this. However, if he'd tried to back-track and stammer out apologies, the man would likely just have yelled at him some more, possibly thrown more furnishing in his direction, and then reported him anyway, leaving Jason, his superiors, and the entire Praetorian initiative looking like a laughing stock on it's first day. Going down this route, he might just prevent all of that.

"Now, if what you've told me is true, you may well be within your rights to press charges again your wife for Assault and Attempted GBH. Is that what you wish, or would you rather the matter was just put to rest here and now?"