Well, you know me, I never learn. So peel me off the hook.
Rusty Hunt leans against a tree in a park with his face pressed up against the bark. There's only partial awareness of his surroundings right now. He's supposed to be working. He hasn't sold shit this week. Rusty feels like shit. Sick as fuck. The trashcan sitting a foot away from him is filled with trash and his vomit. He may have seriously fucked
( Read more... )
Except God probably doesn't know either... Des has never had much faith in God paying attention to anything on earth, despite being pretty close to sure that He exists.
"I keep scheduling these things and not keepin' my appointments." Des hops backwards off the railing and leans on it backwards, crossing his arms over his chest. "Dmitri Lang still owes me a hamburger the size of my head." He chuckles and shakes his head. "As Ferris Bueller once said, 'Life moves pretty fast around here and if you don't stop and look around for a bit, you might miss something.' Glad to hear you're okay."
He shrugs and stares up at the sky. "About the same, really. Tryin' to get a lead on the CLF's like trying to find a hay in a needlestack and twice as bloody." He pauses. "Not that I've been in any skirmish with the bastards." He looks over at Luke, arching an eyebrow. "Have you?"
Reply
Luke has no desire to find out what might be crawling around down there in the water. He had his fill of adventures with the Rift already. Well, there was only the one creature. The other adventures involved falling through one, but... details.
"You kinda got a big head." He grins, turning sideways on the railing. "I think that's somethin' I'd have to see for myself." Luke blinks and stares at him, with a half smile filled with confused amusement. "...Ferris Bueller?"
Luke has never had much time to watch movies... or anything entertainment wise so that stuff tends to go over his head.
"Nah. I'm good at not attracting attention though." Spends enough time in beds, it's hard to be found out. "You be careful. If you're pokin'. Course I know you're experienced and all, yeah."
Reply
And is it just his imagination or did he see a shark's fin or something drift near the top of the water? ...Right, probably just his imagination. He's sitting here talking about things in the water, so obviously, he's going to be seeing things.
Des looks affronted at the mention of the size of his head and then just snickers, although his determination to look like that doesn't bother him is greatly hindered by the fact that he's now compulsively touching his head. "Yeah, it's a movie," he says absent-mindedly. Don't worry, Luke. Most of the people he used to know are a little weak on pop culture. It's very sad, but not unheard of.
"Good, Cat-Boy," Des grins, giving him a clap on the shoulder. "And I'll be careful, I promise. I'm good at getting myself out of bad situations. It's a talent." He winks, looking smug and arrogant. The sort of look that the universe really loves to wipe off people's faces really, really quickly.
Reply
He grins at the hand on his shoulder even if it hits him painfully, too. Luke misses the ridiculous nickname. He misses feeling like he has a family to count on.
He misses having people to come home to, but that was all such a long time ago. It's hard to believe he can still remember what it was like.
"Yeah, I know, you are. Big detective, ri-" Luke would finish that sentence, but the water moves. Not in a natural way either like with the breeze, but it shifts, creating larger than normal waves. It catches his attention like the pink sparkly bike caught his attention in kitten form. "Did you see that?"
He turns forward on the railing, again, and leans over it trying to get a better view of what's happening down there. There's a rumbling from the water that sounds an awful lot like a distorted growl. The pier seems to be shaking.
Reply
Yeah, because there being a space whale under the goddamn pier is surely a reason for everything to be FINE, TOTALLY FINE.
And then comes the growling and he instinctively grabs Luke's shoulder. "I think we better step away from the railing."
And yet he makes absolutely no move to do so, staring at the water like a deer stares at oncoming traffic.
Reply
And how has no one ever noticed it before? Unless it keeps to the depths usually, which means something must have enraged.
"Ye- Yeah, I really think that might be a good... idea," he says, but only makes a halfhearted effort to step backwards as he hardly register's Des' hand on his shoulder. Curiosity has the best of him. What is it?
And then a blue dragon-serpent creature rises up from the water towering over the world and roars with its mouth hung open, swinging it's gigantic head around as it searches for the source of what has it enraged.
"Back," he yelps, sounding a lot like a kitten whose tail's been stepped on. "Far... far back!" Luke grabs on to Des' arm, pulling, in both a desperate need to protect and be protected from the giant monster flailing and heading towards the pier in the water. Luke nearly trips over his own feet trying to back away from the pier as fast as he can, unable to turn away, because what is it?
Curiosity really did kill the cat.
Reply
He registers that Luke is pulling him and then manages to get enough of his senses to haul him back on target when Luke nearly trips over his own feet. "It's bad news!" He answers Luke's unspoken question and now it's his turn to start tugging.
There's a warehouse not far from where they're standing. Why there's a warehouse on Navy Pier is anyone's guess, but it's there and it might be unlocked and it's the best option right now. "That way. That way," he yells, practically tugging Luke in that direction and trying to avoid looking behind him lest he get captivated by the sheer what the fuck of that thing. He's seen dragons before, but they sure as hell didn't look like that.
Reply
He runs, looking back to keep an eye on what the dragon creature is doing at every moment.
The dragon-creature rears up and widens its mouth, aiming a hyper beam attack in their general direction. There is running. The running angers gyarados. There's a moment that the beam collects at the mouth of the creature, bright, light of pure energy generating power.
Luke yells, again. "Des!" And then he runs into him in an attempt to tackle Des to the ground as the beam goes over their head and takes out part of the warehouse.
The creature seems satisfied enough with that though for now as it roars and swims-slithers toward the ferris wheel. People come screaming from around the pier, running for the safety of the inner city as parts of the pier get torn up by the monster's flailing. Water comes crashing on to the pier, shoving people over.
Reply
"Cat-Boy, we got ourselves a situation," he groans, getting to his feet and heading towards the warehouse- they have to keep things there, right? Maybe there's a harpoon or a rocket launcher somewhere in there.
...Actually what is in there is about four bodies- some crushed rather unpleasantly by the falling debris and some unpleasant looking corpses that look like they got the business end of the hyper beam. Des chokes and grimaces, but climbs inside through the hole in the wall anyway, expecting Luke will either follow or hang back.
There is one survivor and he's desperately trying to pull debris off some guy who looks like he's already dead three times over. He's a pudgy, little guy with curly black hair who kinda looks like Joe Pesci had a love child with Fran Descher and it entered the mob. Charming.
"Come on, Vinny. Wake up, man. We got the stuff all to ourselves. We got-" The mobster realizes that someone else is in his warehouse and whirls, pulling his gun, Des, expecting this from someone who looks like the mob type, pulls his revolver.
"Easy there, buddy. We don't want any trouble."
The mobster doesn't lower his gun. "You cops? 'Cause I don't know nothin'. Vinny and I... We're insurance salesmen. Yeah, that's right."
"Do we look like cops?" Des quirks an eyebrow. "You're sellin' insurance in a warehouse?"
"Hey, I don't question, how you make a livin', buddy!" The man yelps. "Poor Vinny. We were just out doin' business and then what? Crushed by a... What was that? A bomb?"
"Something like that..." Des responds, dryly, wondering if this conversation is going to get anywhere.
Hidden only partially in the middle of the debris and dead bodies is something covered in a tarp that Des has yet to notice, because he's a little bit occupied not getting shot by Itchy Fingers Vitolli here.
Reply
He turns back to keep an eye on the monster. No, it's not paying attention to them anymore, which is good, because the warehouse doesn't look like it can take too many more blasts like that. Luke climbs into the hole in the wall behind Des, but once inside he wishes he had hung back instead. The guy that whirls the gun on them makes him jump and tense, mostly because Des is in front of him and in the line of fire here and there's nothing he can do. Luke doesn't carry a gun and has never even held one.
Then he gets distracted by the corpses, especially the one that must have been hit by that beam. Vomit keeps rising up in his throat, threatening to bring him to his knees, but he can't look away from it. That could have been them, either of them. Luke starts to tremble barely aware of their conversation.
The screaming from outside and the sound from thrashing brings him back into the moment and the realization that he cannot afford to puke. He can't freak out. Luke looks back over the warehouse, again. "What's that? On the ground there," he says in a hushed, tense voice that's aimed at Des, because he's somehow managed to completely forget about the other guy with the gun.
Reply
"I don't gotta answer nothin'," the mobster says, setting his jaw. "Gino don't take lip from no copper."
"I ain't a fuckin' copper!" Des snaps. "Luke, go check it out." He inclines his head. "If you so much as sneeze, I put one in your head. Do you really want to place bets on which one of us is faster?"
Gino, apparently, wibbles a little bit and he keeps staring at his own gun like he's not sure how to actually shoot it and is being told to. "I-I ain't afraid of you. And it's nothin' anyway. Just... Uh... Insurance stuff!"
Des rolls his eyes. "Uh-huh. Cat-Boy, I got this. Don't worry about him. He's a pansy. Also his gun's not loaded."
The mobster balks. "IT IS TOO!"
Des snickers. "The, uh... Thingy. On your semiautomatic... The thing that indicates when you don't have bullets? Yeah, that thingy is indicating that you don't have bullets. I can see it from here."
Des may not be articulate or know much about semiautomatics, but he's right. Gino lowers his gun and goes back to murmuring over Vinny's corpse. "Wouldn't'a happened if you were alive, Vin."
Of course, the tarps are not hiding copious amounts of insurance forms. They are hiding guns. Big guns. Big shiny illegal guns. Gino would be concerned about this, but his best friend is dead and some guy has a gun on him and there's something going on in Chicago, and FUCK.. He knew he should have stayed in Jersey.
...Gino is having the WORST DAY.
Reply
"Bloody hell," he squeaks and practically jumps back at the sight of it. He really should have expected it, and he did expect weapons, but not weapons that are this big.
Well, that's useful.
He looks over at the gangster... who is now apparently talking to one of the corpses. Luke winces and bites back the urge to vomit, again. He actually feels bad for him and has to resist the urge to put a hand on his shoulder. Somehow he doubts it'd go over well, and the thrashing that shakes the warehouse and practically sends Luke sprawling on the floor reminds him that this isn't the time to offer comfort to strangers.
Luke raises his eyebrows and grabs on to the biggest gun, hauling it out of the pile. "Think this'd do the trick?" Or should they get more than one?
Reply
"Insurance?" He asks the gangster who is now standing up and brushing himself off... And wiping his nose on his sleeve like he's been crying. Des would feel bad for him if he wasn't selling weapons in a warehouse.
"That's my story and I'm stickin' to it," he mutters, which is when the shaking starts again. Des puts his own gun in his pocket and walks over to Luke to take the weapon from him and inspect it. "Looks good to me. C'mon. It's monster-killin' time."
He saunters towards the door, ignoring Gino's complaints of, "Hey! You can't take that! Where are you goin'? Are you two gonna sell me out? Fuck! Ma always said this would happen."
Des does not react to him in the slightest. Just climbs out of the hole in the wall and heads towards the ferris wheel, glancing over at Luke over his shoulder. "You know, I almost feel bad for that guy..."
Hey, focus on the faily mobster and you don't have to focus on certain monster-related death!
Reply
He exits the hole after Des and nods.
"Yeah. I- Sorta do."
And then the ground shakes, again, and Luke tumbles forward, grabbing on to Des to keep from falling on to the ground. The monster is ramming against the pier.
"Down there. By the ferris wheel," he says and points, willing his legs not to runlikefuck, again. "Don't think this is another time where I've got to try to distract it while you drop the bullet shaped anvil through its head, is it?"
Luke pauses and stares down at it, all wide eyed and trying to process what it is again.
"Cause I really don't think the kitten me will be much of a distraction to-" Course he does turn into a horse, too. He hates it and never does it, but... he does and he can run bloody fast in it, too.
Reply
He does, however, take a moment to laugh and look up at the sky, his expression vaguely nostalgic. "Those were the days..."
...Right. Monster attacking the pier. No time for nostalgic moments. He gestures to the ferris wheel. "The highest point in the whole place is right there- if I can get up there, then I bet I can shoot it, but... Yeah, a distraction would- what?" He tilts his head to the side, looking at Luke incredulously. "Luuuke, what else do you turn into?"
This should be good.
Reply
Luke blushes at the question, which isn't something he ever really does. He doesn't like his other form, and no one that knows he's a whore, knows he can turn into a horse, because he spends most of his time thinking of all the jokes that go with it.
Rawr! Gnash! From the end of the pier. Right. No time for embarrassment.
"... a horse. Yeah, I know, everybody's had a ride. All that." He scratches the back of his neck, tense, and watching the end of the pier occasionally. "I'm not all that good at controlling it still so if I get too terrified and go from horse back to human and piss myself, I wouldn't be surprised. But if it's quick enough, I think I can manage."
Reply
Leave a comment