Return of the Emblem Chapter Four: The Human Condition

[Phoenix]

Party

"Oh and some advice to you wyvern riders." Gabbie chirped up suddenly. "Don't fly around in the daytime. It ain't illegal to own a wyvern but it's about as popular as bein' a dragon sympathizer so don't fly around on them in the daytime. Just lead'em around by the reins or somethin'. At night, travel however ya want. Up that high they can't tell the difference from the ground. Could be a pegasus rider or a pigeon for all they know." she explained to John and Domovoi, the only other wyvern owners present.

"I guess I should start looking for a decent hotel." Raquel muttered.

"Five star, please." Gabbie practically ordered, throwing the 'please' at the end as a clumsy disguise. "Ugh, aside from that, I've got a lot to do; head to the markets, fix the damaged clothes, figure out where to begin with this investigation ... oh man, I need help here." she moaned.

Well, I've had the files for quite awhile now. Maybe I should take care of this ... with some help of course. "If you want, maybe some of the others and I can deal with this investigation thing." Amon said.

"May as well. It's not like I'd be of much use anyway."

Thieves

Bron didn't have time to answer Robin, so simply shrugged, and then went back to thinking. Outside Liza and Liliya appeared and as they made for the entrance, they spotted Robin working on those arrows of hers again. "Seriously, there's ... a damn armory right down the street." Liza said to the hunter. "There's pride and then there's silliness. Unless you're just always broke or something, I think this is the latter."

"Let's not worry about this right now. We need to see what else the broker can tell us about that guy. Let's get Bron and Olga and get going." Liliya said to her sister. "Um, you're free to come along too, if you want, Robin." she added addressing the girl.

"F'course. You can't have a shake down without an intimidating number of people." Liza said grinning.

"We're all women, and young women at that. I don't think he's going to be very intimidated."

"Not until Olga starts acting crazy and beats him half to death with a sheep." Liza shot back.

[MinunRobotnik4]

OOC: Yeah sorry I did not see that, and I wasn't certain about the distance either, so sorry again. Still, Saken did have a reason, a simple reason, to steal. But to do so successfully would have probably required you to stop, which I guess they had no reason to.

So now to go about the business of trying to find a needle in a heystack without allowing

IC: Of the two choices that Saken had given himself he chose to start pickpocketing. Made a fair wage and it was a nice day out so he did another routine cycle for him. Find a person who looks like they have money, start running towards them from a distance, bump into them and say "my apologies," while taking from their money from their pockets, and then continue running as to get away before they make the realization that they have been robbed and call the fuzz.

OOC: I don't have time to make a longer IC, but before I go, is there anyone who wants to volunteer to be robbed, if not Saken is probably going to rob Raquel.

[Snowy_One]

"She is only acting?" asked Robin in a joking manner as she looked down at her arrowhead in making. Already, she had managed to get one of the edges she needed and was starting on the other one. With a sigh, she pocketed the still-taking-shape stone before fishing out her knife. "We can still be intimidating. Watch!" she exclaimed before dropping down into a low and aggressive pose, the knife held out before her like a weapon as she mock-sized up Liza like a wolf sizing up a sheep.

"Give us da information!" she hissed to Liza, heightening her accent to unbelievable levels. "Or else I vill cut into yoor sister bad, da?"

[Phoenix]

OOC:

Context:

Raquel's currently driving the wagon so bumping into her isn't physically possible at the moment. Though I guess it wouldn't matter either way since she's wearing a large heavy cape and the only thing on her is the fanny pack with the fire emblem inside it(closed with a button mind you). Though I guess the goal here isn't to actually get away unnoticed so eh.

Twins

Liza lifted up her hand and held it out like a gun aiming for Robin's chest. "Bam." she said with a crackshot's smile on her face. "I'll be honest with you, Robin. I wouldn't have even considered playing tough with the guy if Bron didn't have a gun too. As long as he draws first, we should be good, I think."

"Oh right, we should be careful. He did shoot his assistant yesterday for blurting out information we hadn't paid for. I don't think he's one of those 'normal' people that work well in society." Liliya murmured sounding worried.

[Snowy_One]

"If he is crazy like that, then I do not think that intimidation would do us much good. He may very well shoot himself if he feels endangered. Would be much better if one of us could convince him to tell us willingly; possibly flirting with him if needed. Or, we can find the information out on our own. I favor the latter choice."

[Phoenix]

"If we could find out ourselves, we wouldn't need to talk to this guy in the first place. We don't know a lot about this place and don't have any feelers of our own out gathering information for us, so it'd take months before we could get the kind of info he could get his hands on in a few days." Liza explained.

"Well either way, we should get going, I think. The sooner we find out who the killer's next target is, the sooner we can get him where we want him and set up our decoy." Liliya added.

That was when Bron and Olga emerged from the inn and shut the door behind them. "Is everyone ready? We're going to keep things casual at first, but if I get the feeling he's not budging, or is about to threaten us, I'll pull my gun on'em, and one of you take his."

"Then I'll take over the interrogation" Olga interjected smiling.

"Err ... sure whatever."

[Snowy_One]

Robin nodded in agreement, though to what she wasn't sure. This was not her domain, information and subterfuge. "Keeping things casual? How will we do that?"

[Phoenix]

"Just let me do the talking for now I guess. If things get out of hand, watch the door and make sure we've got a way out of there." Bron instructed.

Thirty-five minutes later ...

As Bron and the girls walked down the street, to gather information from the one they would meet, a surprising sight was found at their feet, a large scaly wyvern stood there to greet~

"Who's wyvern is this?" Bron asked to no one in particular. It wasn't attacking them but didn't look very friendly either.

"Dark blue skin. Probably from up north somewhere. Maybe." Liza commented. "If he's not going to act like a guard dog, then let's just carefully make our way past him." she added as a suggestion, already taking a few careful steps around the beast. Olga picked up her sheep and held him close as she made her way by. Unsurprisingly, the wyvern's eyes stayed on her and the sheep for the most part, making it even easier for the others to get by. His master had told him to sit there and wait for her, but she said something else he didn't quite understand, and he ignored it. Liza and Liliya having been the only ones to go there before led the way down the stairs that led into the building, the main floor seeming to be below street level.

At the bottom of the steps was a door, which Liza hesitated to open. She heard something going on inside and didn't want to barge in on something. "What's going on in there? Sounds like someone's yelling." Bron murmured.

"Whoever that chick is, she's loud. This is an iron door." she replied.

"Let's find out who it is!" Olga said reckless trotting over and pulling the door open. "No wait!" was the last thing Liza could say before the door was opened and the lot of them were staring down the barrel of a precision rifle! Holding the gun and ready to shoot them was a tall blonde woman with violet eyes, and teal colored armor. She was behind the desk with what looked to be the broker as her hostage, and plenty of cover.

So much for that plan. And to think I was actually pretty sure I would be the first one to draw my gun. Bron thought.

"Uh ... hi. How're you today, miss? Heheh." Olga said nervously.

"Who the fuck are you?!" was the woman's retort.

[-Cynthia-]

OOC: Minun you can rob from Veronika if you want.

Veronika

Veronika got off the wagon and stretched after the long journey. "I can help you locate lodging if you wish Raquel. They have people there that fix clothing I assume?" she asked, looking down and noting that she had a fair amount of rips and bloodstains on her clothes.

Nadya

"Sure I'm sure. If we're not doing anything urgent I wouldn't mind heading to the market myself. Haven't shopped for food in well, a while," Nadya replied to Raquel, patting Luca behind the ears.

Connor

Connor exited the wagon, shield in hand and presented it to John. "Here you go! Good as new, well actually in a sense it is kind of new," Connor said, pondering whether the shield counted as a new object or not by traditional standards.

[MinunRobotnik4]

OOC: Thanks -Cynthia- time for some long overdue action to interact with the group.

IC: After counting the money from his last heist, Saken thought he was doing fairly successful today.

What bugs me is the people who don't keep their money in their purse and keep junk in there instead. Very annoying to find a purse of junk, he mused to himself as searched around for a new target.

Eventually his eyes fell upon a red-haired woman who wore clothes both nice looking but torn and stained.

Clothes look nice enough to suggest wealth, but stains may say otherwise. Eh, I'll risk it, he thought as he began running.

He bumped into the woman and with the normal false courtesy of "My apologies," grabbed his target and continued to run expecting things to go about as planned.

[-Cynthia-]

"It's no problem," Veronika said to the man, though he seemed to run away shortly after bumping into her. Thinking that finding lodgings would take quite a bit of gold, Veronika looked to see how much she had...only to find her coinpurse missing. Where could I have left it, I had it just a moment ago...that man who ran into me!

"Stop! Thief!" she yelled, running in the direction the man had gone, hand on her sword. He had a bit of a lead, but the crowd was getting in the way of both of them, forcing Veronika to shove a few people out of the way.

[MinunRobotnik4]

Tch not the time to foul up, Saken thought as he began shoving those around as he tried to find his way into the alley ways.

Of course this was the biggest city in the nation, which caused him no small deal of grief trying to get away. Some ways led to the fuzz, another led him to be stopped up by a caravan of carts leading out of town. Then he finally found an alleyway in which he could make an escape... only to find that this alleyway cut off halfway through with a tall wall.

"Oh come on," he said as he found that his means of escape was cut off, swearing underneath his breath.

[ReformBlade]

Nanahm thought Europa was pretty nice, but holy crap, Ursentius was huge! it was almost overwhelming to the fighter, and unfortunately he couldn't hide his awestruckness very well, but he could deal with it. He overheard talk of lodgings and 'many things to do' in general, and he snapped out of his stupor. Speaking of things to do, he should probably be doing what Veronika asked him to do way back when.

Sammuel, up on top of the wagon, simply watched as they rode on in. While not a regular, he had been here before, and he still marveled at the city. However, his eyes wandered over to Veronika who was walking on the streets, a bit too far out. Must not be from around here, I guess? You could easily get pickpocketed aaaaand wow. I didn't think it'd actually happen! he thought as a man bumped into her and apologized before quickly running the same direction he had been. Jumping off the wagon, Sammuel chased after the man, keeping an eye on him quite difficult due to his size, but his eyesight was still pretty keen, and thankfully due to his size (for once a good thing), the thief probably wouldn't be paying attention to him. He saw the man face to face with a dead end, making Sammuel let out a chuckle. "And odd place to be hanging out, don't you think?" he smirked.

[Rothene]

While drinking in the scenery of the city, Ranyin suddenly heard Veronika shout about a thief and gave chase. As he contemplated how would he approach the scenario, he saw the little newcomer leap off the wagon roof and gave chase. Not wanting to let the boy one up him, Ranyin followed suit and put his years of running experience to the test. No way am I gonna let this kid beat me, thought Ranyin.

He may be a mage from an academy, but he was no slouch when it came to running an some simpler acrobatics. Thankfully, his small-ish frame allowed him to evade the by standers and keep up with the excited boy. Unfortunately, the smaller frame of the boy meant he was able to sqeeze past people better than him, hence keep farther and farther ahead. By the time Ranyin caught up, he saw Veronika and Sammy corner the thief.

[MinunRobotnik4]

Saken turned towards the wall and back towards his three pursuers.

"Generally yes, but I think in this case, it is acceptable if not normal," he said considering his next move calmly.

Let's see there is three of them cornering me, I can't climb the wall, and there are no entrances to duck into. That leaves three options, one give up and surrender leave my fate to their choosing, try and fight them which could be difficult considering I am outnumbered and they are probably better armed, and then there is try and run at the smallest one, push him aside and try to make a break for it, which would leave me open if it failed. What to do, what to do?

Edited May 30, 2011 by MinunRobotnik4

[Rothene]

Finally catching his breath, Ranyin made sure he stood slightly further back than Veronika and Sammy. A mage needed as much space as he could get to cast his spells, and it helped that Stormcalmer had a greater reach than the average wind tomes, meaning he had absolutely no reason to stand to close the the thief. Raising the tome, Ranyin opened a familiar page in the tome, the one that gave simple instructions to allowing wind magic to sweep the ground, knocking down all but the most sturdy or fleet of foot, all the while keeping an eye on his target.

OOC: Yesss...knock over the little boy. 8D Depending on how you respond, Ranyin might or might not react in time.

[Phoenix]

One of those ... situations ...

Bron and Olga put their hands up defensively, along with Liliya. Liza just stood there with her arms on her hips eying the woman closely. "You're interrogating him, aren't you?" she asked the armed woman.

"It's none of your concern." That idiot, I told him to stand guard, and these worthless scumbags show up? I bet he rolled over and asked for a treat before letting them by too. Ugh, dumb wyvern. "Why don't you back up and leave this room before you all end up dead."

"Tch, you can only shoot one of us, then you're wide open." Liza shot back confidently. That's when the broker reached for his own gun only for the woman to swiftly smash the butt of the rifle against his face so hard that it sent him to the ground, letting the pistol land on the desk. The woman held the rifle up with one hand, still with great aim, and picked up the pistol.

"I'll shoot two of you morons, and then cleave the rest. Simple enough."

"Now now, this doesn't have to end violently, miss ... uh, what's your name?" Bron paused to ask.

"I'm Sabina. Anything else you don't already know about me is irrelevant, now get the hell out of my sight."

"Listen, all we want is a little information about a person, after that we won't bother you anymore." he explained carefully.

"Looking for information on a person? Heh, aren't we all." she shot back as she placed her boot on the broker's ailing face and kept him down out of view. "This is your last chance. Get out of this room or I'll kill all five of you ... and you, I want to know everything you do about this guy. Everything. I can't hunt down a serial killer with garbage information like that, now can I?"

"Wait, did she just say serial killer?" Bron commented surprised.

Street Shenanigans

Veronika had offered to help, which was always welcome, but another situation came up immediately. She was practically run over by a clumsy person, who immediately took off again. Wait a second ...

"Raquel, remember, if you see someone running in your general direction, test them. A pickpocket's goal is to run into you making it look like they're in a rush ... well, sometimes. Other times they'll just disguise their pocket diving under all the brushing and shoving of heavy traffic, but in the case of the running, try stepping out of his way. Amateurs will stupidly keep coming at you. That's when you know, then feel free to flip them on their ass. Of course there are the professionals who know that if they're target moves, it's best to just keep on running and pretend they were actually in a hurry to get somewhere."

"Why do I need to know this? I wear this cape, so there's nothing they can get at without me knowing right away."

"Knowledge is power and merchants need all of it they can get."

I guess dad was right. Up from this seat I saw him coming from a ways off but I didn't think he was a pickpocket, just someone with something important to do. Oh no. Raquel thought to herself thinking back to a talk she had with her father. Meanwhile Amon stood up and kept his eye on the thief as he tried to escape. Being in the street, there were both wagons and people crowding around everywhere. Moving through the crowd after giving the thief a head start might allow for his escape, and so Amon took a few steps back and then made a short sprint leaping from the wagon onto the back of a horse pulling the wagon behind theirs. From there, he jumped onto the seating and then leaped over the driver and onto the roof of his wagon only to find that it was a soft roof, and that the only thing keeping him from falling through was a fluke of foot placement.

"Oh crap! It's one of those wagons! Gah!" he said before losing his balance, and falling off into the crowd. He didn't fall on anyone since enough people had seen what he was doing and moved when they saw him falling. Hauling himself up, he got a swift talking to from the wagon's owner.

"You damn nomad circus freak! Mind your own property!" the man shouted.

"Hey, I'm not a nomad, or a circus freak. Whatever gave you that idea-" "Shut up, I don't care what you are. You're a crazy kid in my book. Try something like that again and I'll have your ass arrested, that's all there is to it, punk!"

"I'm sorry, I'm just so use to a hard roof I seriously thought yours was too until I got a closer look." he explained.

"Tch, whatever. Just get lost, please?" he said conceding somewhat.

"Of course." he replied before navigating back to the wagon. "Well so much for helping out with the thief. This is why I like it better up on rooftops. There aren't that many things you can mistake for a soft surface and fall off of ... nobody robs you ... what you see is what you get ... and about half a hundred other things I could probably think of if I sat down and though about it." He sighed.

[Mercakete]

Norbert had thus far not really been inclined to socialize with the group much, but after Amon's stunt, he found himself laughing. "Hahaha! To save you the trouble, Rooftop, I'll just fly you a little ways next time! Hahahahahaha!" Funny thing was, he was actually serious.

Gytha was a bit skeptical, though. "Are ye makin' fun o' him?" she asked, not really chastizing, but more unsure and somewhat confused.

"No, I'm serious. The truth is I'm the only one who can really take advantage of Ursium sky, from what I've seen. Most of you are earthbound and wyverns will usually have to be grounded in this country just to keep the peace with the locals," he explained before his grumpy mood returned somewhat, "Not that I'm wanting to fly until I get my tunic back from those repairs." Then he shifted his annoyed gaze to Raquel and asked, "You are planning on working on that soon, aren't you, Pinky?"

Edit: Fixed a typo.

Edited May 30, 2011 by Mercakete

[Acacia Sgt]

'Figures.' John thought about Gabbie's warning. 'I suppose it could've gone without saying.'

As he just waited there, not too soon did Connor approached him, with the shield. ''Thanks.'' He said taking the shield in hand. He had to admit, it was a surprising good piece of work. He couldn't tell it had previously been the wooden shield. 'But I guess in the end it doesn't matter much.' He thought. 'It's still an Iron Shield, and I'll be making use of it well.'

And then there was something about a thief, as he saw a few chasing after him. He thought he could probably help the chase, but he quickly lost sight of them before he could make up his mind.

All in all, he resumed just waiting around.

[MinunRobotnik4]

Saken noticed that one of them stepped back and pulled out a book, which confirmed to Saken that he was a mage.

Let's see one of the others looks to be a sword wielder, and the other an archer. The better two choices are definitely the mage and the archer. If I try and make a break at the, he'll cast a spell, however he stepped back and made an opening. Hope this works.

Saken decided to go for it and began running at the mage making as if to push him aside but then jumped left so that he was behind the other two and made a break for it.

[Snowy_One]

A thin vein of irritation started to pulsate on Robin's brow as the woman, Sabina, threatened to shoot the entire group. This... woman... was outright irritating beyond belief! It wasn't just the threats, but her very manner and attitude. She had no doubt that Sabina would try to shoot the entire group if it came to it. Taking a step back behind the rest, Robin feigned leaving. "Come on girls, this man means to try and kill us if we get in his way." she muttered. In truth, she was seeking a bit of distance so that, in the event that the woman tried to kill them, Robin would be in line to score a shot upon her. Already, her hand was quietly reaching for one of her arrows, waiting for Sabina to make the first hostile move.

[ReformBlade]

Sammuel couldn't read the fake out until it was too late, but his body reacted all the same. He dove for the thief, his tiny frame somehow managing to close the gap and he latched onto the thief's foot as he tried to run, causing no end of frustration to the archer being dragged about. "Ow, fuck, dude just- Shit that hurt- Fucking STOP, man!" It's times like this he wished he wasn't born so goddamn short.

[-Cynthia-]

The thief had made a feint as if to push the mage aside, but ended up jumping behind Veronika instead. The little archer kid had made a rather brave move in jumping onto the thief, only grabbing his foot but slowing him down nonetheless. This allowed Veronika to run ahead of the man and she quickly turned around, drew her sword, and pointed it at the thief.

"Stop running or I'll have to use this," she said quickly, noting that the thief was still dragging the kid around.

[Phoenix]

Party

"I don't think there would be much point in this area. There's at least thirty feet between buildings in this area ... probably more between the buildings parted by the intersections." Amon replied looking up and measuring the distances. "No human's making a jump like that, that's for sure."

Raquel found herself being addressed by the impatient pegasus rider again, and grumbled a bit. "As soon as we finish renting rooms, yes." she replied.

At Gunpoint

"W-what did you say?!"

"Hey, she's got one of those bulging veins like when people get angry in those drawings! Heheh." Olga chirped up.

"YOU! Archer with the fucked up haircut! Not. Another. Step." she said emphasizing it by aiming her rifle at the girl's head. "Did you just call me a man, you lopsided park ranger? Did you?!"

Hoping to salvage the situation so he wouldn't have to shield any of the girls from a shot he could almost feel coming, Bron tried to get back to what he had just noticed. "Wait! You said you're looking for a serial killer, right? Is it the same one that's been murdering a person a night and uses a sword and a gun?" he asked, prompting her to shift her attention to him, but only slightly. Given everyone's positioning, it was extremely easy for Sabina to keep a single eye on all of them, while keeping the broker in view. His desk was in a perfect spot, though it was now being used for the same thing by someone besides him. Ironic ...

"First off, how do you know about any of that, and second, why do you care?"

"Well we got some info on the guy yesterday and came back for more-"

"Tell me everything you know, right now, or you're dead. Five seconds. Go."

Bron flinched as the barrel of the rifle nudged over a bit to face his head instead of Robin's. "I just told you everything we know already. He's a serial killer targeting these seemingly random people, killing all the witnesses, the police can't seem to catch him, and he uses a swords and guns." he explained as quickly as he could manage.

"Huh. You don't know anything." she shot back before glancing down at the broker, who was covering his face so as not to be struck in the same spot a second time. She had since taken her foot off of his face but was ready to take him out with his own pistol if he tried anything. "Now that these random scumbags have been probed, I want to know everything you know. Just a fair warning; you're an information broker. I expect people like them to not know much of anything, but if I don't hear anything new or helpful, you're going to be begging me to put you out of your misery, understand?"

The broker nodded and carefully stood up putting a three foot distance from Sabina. "The person you're looking for ... he's going after researchers and scientists. They're all related to each other through a project they're working on. To figure out that much took all of the time since these murders started, and another information network has been getting in my way; gathering info while blocking my contacts at every turn. I'm assuming it's the government or something."

"Like I give a damn. Tell me about the guy." she demanded.

"According to the murder scenes, he uses at least two pistols. They thought he might have been quick to reload, and maybe he is, but where people have died in relation to others suggests either ridiculous speed, multiple weapons, or possibly both, but the authorities are positive he's got at least two."

"Are you sure he's a male?"

"Estimated height and combat ability suggest so, but with no living witnesses you can't be sure."

"Who's his next target? Are they getting hit in any particular order?"

"His next target is obviously going to be one of the scientists on this secret project they're doing. That's irrefutable at this point. There's really no way to be certain which one though ... he's not exactly going in alphabetical order, and I'm not even sure if my contacts accounted for everyone on the project itself." he explained.

Let's find out, shall we? "Write down everyone you do know of that's involved. Now."

He went right to it, and there turned out to only be three names. He obviously hadn't written down the names of anyone who was already dead. Ahah. That's my man alright. The project lead isn't on this list. Not surprising since he's a ghost.

"Hey, do you think that maybe we could sneak a peek at that list?" Olga asked.

"... oh right. You people came here for information too; on the same person no less. No I don't think I'll let you have a peek at this list. You're less likely to get in my way if you don't know who these people are." she shot back.

"Uh, well why not? We can just pay the broker for the same info."

Sabina gave her an unamused stare, and without looking, shot the broker in the head with his own pistol. "How about now?" she asked.

"WRATHDAMN, WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?!!!" Bron erupted, completely blown away by what she'd just done.

[MinunRobotnik4]

The boy on his leg really screwed things as far as escape were concerned.

He tried to shake him off and yelled, "No you get of my leg!"

That was when the swordswoman moved in front of him and cut him off.

Darn it, I can't fight them off, and with this kid on my leg, I can't run for it.

Keeping himself calm he said, "Ah well, looks like I have been beat."