savetheearth | [Closed] Then for all past efforts - they're buried somewhere in your stomach.

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[Closed] Then for all past efforts - they're buried somewhere in your stomach.

Who: Anthony Janvier, Lazarus Lawliet, Anthony Sparado
Where: Espresso Yourself
When: Sometime during the day of Friday, October 17th.
What: The poor harrowed coffee shop receives a drop-in by a few decided non-patrons.
Warnings: Probable language; violence up to and including murder. Heads-up!

There's no calm, even when, environmentally, there is. There's always hope, obviously - another call for all of them to do something, take the Network back, gather and spread any information they've got, was just made, by someone who does. It had happened before, it had been talked down or fallen through the cracks, but she - Ms. Kaiser, that is - wouldn't permit that, would she...?

The visit by the radio crew meanwhile leaves work feeling as if everyone's resigned to being on trial, Anthony included. And least of the worries that's come on in since the ninth - the night of the murders - is that he's bad for business. He hasn't been any better for it, certainly, with panic burning out with sounds danger, visions of things he can't be seeing, seeing himself taking the sword he of course hasn't brought to work and slashing away at nebulous human-shaped threats attempting to claw to the back over the counter, all of that recognized when it comes and necessitating a step back.

There're always remarks, attempts at instigation, but he's encouraged to hang back. Police have spoken to him, but they've not carted him off - perhaps his twice-over statement that he doesn't eat, period, has worked (another point for transparency, perhaps), or perhaps someone on that end knows something which he doesn't, which could be a thing to fuss or not. Uncertainty - how much it's going to take, who helps who, who hurts who - won't stop presence any time soon. And any change at all is therefore cause for immediate alertness.

It downward-slams and freezes him to the spot when a set of steps marches hard - a trio or more, maybe - and gathers at the door. He turns his face right on to it with his sockets wide.

And acts on his immediate instinct to shuffle over to the back to notify L, "peering" and muttering "Excuse me, sir?"s.

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It's a dubious distinction, one that L would be happier without, but he has gotten very good at discerning when there's trouble brewing. He glances up when he hears Anthony's cracking, insubstantial voice, concern etching his pale features.

"Yes, Anthony? What's wrong?"

Weeks ago, many weeks, the question might have been is something wrong? Now, it's a given that something's wrong, given the degradation and outright harassment they've experienced since that broadcast aired. Even though Anthony is objectively bad for business, L has never said as much, or even implied it, maintaining firmly that he hired Anthony and has no intention of dismissing him for matters beyond his control. Anthony is the epitome of what Espresso Yourself vowed to help in its mission statement, as well as a project L is personally invested in seeing flourish. Anthony, after all, reminds L of the person he once was to an uncomfortable degree, so it makes a strange kind of sense that saving Anthony means saving Lazarus, too.

If they have a problem with you working here, they're the people I want out of my store. Not you.

Before Anthony can provide an answer, though, the sound of raised voices reaches them, bringing L instantly to his feet. They're unintelligible from the back room, but unmistakeably angry.

"Anthony," L says softly, "stay back here, please. I'll handle this."

Hopefully it will be as easy as telling the troublemakers to leave; L has had to do this a few times, recently. He's had people larger than him scream in his face, but if anything can be said about the detective these days, it's that confrontation barely perturbs him anymore.

Edited 2014-10-17 19:02 (UTC)

"I -- "

It's anchored, gains a bit more volume from confirmation of L's attention, but the order (an order, yes - a "please" frames it like a request, but it's an order, making the response he's locked into all the more incongruous) rings him out of focus.

Yes, it's bad; no, he doesn't want to be out of space to be on-call, not without certainty as to why it's bad, whether there could even be a chance of it being objectively better or worse one way or the other.

"Forgive me, what's - what's -- ?"

Quick monotonous stammer as he casts a face with two round black sockets under a roofed brow repeatedly between the door and his boss to hear anything more from either.

The door opens. The voices come unobstructed, separating and quieting into a group of four.

Anthony cuts the stammering. Something more will be coming, all right - he awaits reassertion of or alteration of that order.

The plaintive request isn't something L wants to ignore. He's always been patient with the boy, even when it's difficult and frustrating. "Just wait," he repeats, leaving the office and making his way toward the front of the store, emerging behind the counter to investigate the source of the unrest that had caused the normally-dutiful Anthony to retreat from his post at the cash register.

He reaches the cash register and wraps a hand around the ice staff tucked into the corner beside it, suspiciously eyeing the group of five that had entered the store. All men, all large, all posturing like they are here to cause trouble.

"I don't want to jump to conclusions, but if you're here for any reason other than to get a cup of coffee, you need to leave."

A man's jaw tenses as he strides toward the counter, pulling out a pistol and pointing it right at L's face. The detective's eyes go wide, but only because the man looks horribly like Moises. He blinks, and the illusion dissipates.

"You Numbered think you can threaten and intimidate until we all just fall in line? Where's the zombie?" The man demands, his thumb removing the gun's safety with a sinister snick.

"Not here. He's not here," L says, raising his voice, hoping that Anthony will hear and take cover somewhere safe, go to the teleporter in the basement and flee to Vegas to make the words true.

The others are pushing past the swinging door leading behind the counter, and when L takes a step toward them, the gun goes off, shattering the mirror behind the counter.

"Don't move," the man snarls. "We'll get him."

L draws a deep breath. "Anthony, RUN!"

Edited (Phone tags :() 2014-10-18 00:33 (UTC)

He hears nothing coherently until the first sound loud enough to overpower his nerves humming and buzzing in his ears, waiting for the next cue.

The gunshot is that cue.

Danger. Danger and L's alone in the front with it - he doesn't think a bit of what that means for him. Only that he's less vulnerable to bodily harm, and L's telling him to run -

"NO -- !"

A wheeze, a no to this, a no to them, whoever they are, clambering and pulling himself up after L - the staff, the staff, he knows it's there, and again fails to think twice, that L would be going for it himself.

He hears movement below and around him - dives at the back of the counter to feel for it...

All of it happens in several seconds, too quickly to register and process until it was several more seconds past. Anthony is charging out of the back, diving behind the counter as L raises the ice staff. The gun is off of him by the point, aimed at the pitiful, diving figure, and the others have guns too, trained and set and fired in near unison.

The sound is deafening, and a fraction of a moment later, the temperature in the room has plummeted and weapons and limbs are sheathed in thick, viciously cold ice.

L continues to grip the staff; this is the first time he's used it to such effect and so devastatingly, but he isn't thinking about that. He's thinking about the kid who was supposed to save his sorry and shaky soul by being OK, on the ground, riddled with bullet-holes.

His phone comes out, he dials 911, and his fingers are at Anthony's throat searching for a pulse... even as he realizes that the endeavor is absurd, they continue to reposition themselves hoping to find a sign that he's all right.

911, what's your emergency?

"My friend's... been shot. Please hurry, we're at Espresso Yourself..."

It was too quick to register. In Anthony, not as anything more than a roar of urgency. Now.

Then a blast of force and an unfamiliar supernova pain, and nothing that followed. The now, and that was all. In other words, he died trying.

However much noise anybody makes, however much checking he does, and whoever comes in, meanwhile, the body isn't going to do a thing on its own. A bit of a look when one can spare one would seem to explain it well enough - at least one bullet struck Anthony's head, entering at the hairline and passing clear through. Surely the hyperbolic everyone knows the best way to kill a zombie.

Its staying down, however, might have taken the most biting edge off the fire.

Tony had been in the back counting inventory, rotating and sorting stock. Every now and then he'd wandered up front to survey and assess the customer base, and at the time had noticed nothing amiss. As such, he'd returned to his task in the stock room, out of sight and mostly out of earshot of what was to happen.

He'd heard the elevated voices first, and was already turning to make his way out to see what all the commotion was about, but then the gun shots rang out. And at that all pretense of calm was dropped. Like a switch had been hit the adrenaline spiked, he charged from the back like a rampaging bull.

Everything had happened so quickly he barely had time to absorb any of it. Gunshots, L shouted something he didn't quite understand, vaguely he saw that Anthony fell but not how or why. Ice exploded, three men trapped, two trying to flee. He couldn't allow that to happen, something told him they couldn't be permitted to get away.

Like a blur he launched over the counter, skidding over an ice-caked floor and using it to fuel his momentum. The first man he encountered earned a shoulder straight into his spine at full speed. But he didn't stop there. Barely sparing a moment to take stock of the situation he charged after the next. That one tried to put up a fight but also found himself the victim of a full-on battering ram of a kid. As he raised his gun to try to fend off the snarling teen an elbow dug itself fiercely into his chest, the free hand catching his gun deftly.

Now he was the one who was armed, and not afraid to put a few bullets in the men to keep them where they were.

L's calmness feels preternatural and forced. He draws his breaths slowly and composes himself as he gives the 911 operator careful directions.

What do you mean, he was already dead?

"Just hurry. This wasn't supposed to happen."

Meanwhile, on the other side of the counter, Tony is facing off against the two members of the mini-mob L hadn't frozen sufficiently enough to prevent them from fleeing... or, at least, attempting to. The first skids and drops with that elbow to his spine, colliding with the iced-over floor and curling into a helpless fetal position. The other continues inning toward the exit even after his gun is taken, only dropping when two bullets find their way into his calf and his side. He goes down too, and for a second, there's absolute silence in the coffee shop.

"Tony..."

L's voice breaks even as he tries to keep it steady.

There's a moment, a brief moment tense as a thread on the verge of snapping where Tony has the gun trained on the man's forehead as he continues to try to squirm. A heavy boot is planted on a fresh bullet wound, digging in, teeth bared in a silent snarl.

The other man, sensing his friend's danger and somewhat recovering from his fall tries to free his own weapon. Tony doesn't even look, it's as if he simply knows and quicker than the man can steady his weapon another shot is fired sending it flying out of his now bleeding and mangled hand.

Tony never stops staring down the one he's effectively pinned, as if daring him to give him a reason to make good on the unspoken threat.

Move, and die.

The man under Tony moans, the sound sick and miserable with pain. The frost-touched men struggle like insects caught in amber, but the thick ice glaze imprisons them; though it was created quickly it's strong, stronger than anything L had ever thought he could make. The most recent foolish soul, the one who had unwisely tried to take out his gun, is sobbing and cradling the bleeding remnants of his hand.

L pulls his hand away from his head, where he'd been gripping dark hair and bracing in reaction to the gunshots he hears on the other side of the counter but can't see the aftermath of. His phone is lying on the ground a few feet away. Anthony is still motionless, and rather than creating unease in L for moving despite being dead, the opposite is true now: the fact that Anthony's existence actually makes sense now that he's been reduced to a simple, still corpse is horrifying.

A significant part of L might have wanted to curl under the counter at this point, abandoning the situation to be handled by more competent individuals with constitutions that can weather the mental and emotional taxes. Instead, he straightens, using the counter to pull himself upright, and at the sight of him, all five men flinch. At some indiscernible point, L had become what he formerly relied on to pull him out of trouble, but the victory rings hollow.

"Tony." His voice is clipped and sharp and devoid of emotion. "An ambulance is coming. So are the police. Drop the gun; if you take this further it can't feasibly be called self-defense."

It helps to focus on what's happening, approaching it like a list. What's most important is making sure Tony doesn't murder anyone, regardless of what's deserved and just; later, he can mourn, fall apart, do what he has to... but there's no way he can convince Tony to remain calm if he isn't.

That sound elicited a kind of perverse, disturbing grin from Tony. He was enjoying this, part of him knew he shouldn't be but there it was. Causing pain, watching them squirm and cower. Perhaps it was that he had been powerless for so long, perhaps it was something else entirely. Whatever it was, this was certainly a far cry from Tony's usual behavior.

There was a slight flinch at the harshness of his name, but Tony didn't dare take his eyes off the man he had pinned. His lip curled, peeling back in a sort of silently defiant snarl, and he only gripped the gun tighter.

It was tempting to finish him off, he was weak, wounded. That was the proper way to do things, wasn't it? A blood-hungry part of him said yes, insisted in fact. But still he held back, because another part remained abhorrent to the very idea. To the facts of what he was doing at all.

Of course, if he knew Anthony was dead, that might have been a different story.

Though L can't see the grin, he can feel the tension in the air, the heavy pause before a potentially devastating blow to more than a sinner's skull. Though he's seen, firsthand, the grisly destruction that Tony's capable of, he vaults over the counter when his words seem to fall on deaf ears, clutching his ice staff and covering the distance between them in several long, urgent strides.

If Tony was of two minds, and at war with himself, L would eliminate the problem by eliminating an option. Heedless of the potential danger, he's reaching over Tony's shoulder, fingers latching the gun's safety before he's got a firm hold on the young man around his thin shoulders, pulling him away from the maimed and helpless attacker.

"Tony, it's over. I won't lose you over something so senseless."

Losing Anthony was already too much.

He could tear them apart easily, couldn't he? He'd done it before, after all. Though that had been under significantly different circumstances. Now though, now he probably wouldn't even need the claws and desperation. Now he just needed to cross a line one couldn't go back over...

He was't ready to take that step.

Thank goodness for L, because he might have tried otherwise. Though he doesn't really flinch at being grabbed and pulled away, there is a slight twitch at the shock of being snapped out of his furious trance. L's stronger now than Tony remembers, but he doesn't fight as he's pulled away. After a few moments, he looks at the gun in disgust, dropping it by the wayside as he moves back voluntarily now.

"...Yeah," A glance back, almost sheepish. "Sorry. What happened?"

He'd missed the worst of it, best to get him further away from the gun before telling him though.

L is stronger than he was, in more ways than one. Though he still looks as frail and brittle as ever, being drug-free and taking better care of himself has had a positive effect on him. He's therefore able to have some effect on the situation at hand... to an extent. While he can pull a skinny kid off of an injured man, he has no hope in the world of subduing the monster he's seen Anthony become, even with the ice staff.

Fortunately, it doesn't come to that.

Still, he kicks the gun away, watching it spin inaccessible into a corner, before telling Tony anything about what happened. And even then, there's no kind or gentle way to put it.

"I need you to try to stay calm," he says softly. "Everything gets harder from here. Anthony's down..."

The thought of that bullet hole in poor Anthony's head turns his stomach, but he pushes it down, fights past it, just in case he has to restrain Tony again.

The monster, while loud, hungry, and demanding, didn't have the strength to completely overcome Tony while he was well and still fighting it. It wasn't until he lost that battle that anyone had a need to worry. Although, admittedly, right now it was close.

Staying calm was asking a lot right now, he was still battling his furious instincts and worry was quickly overcoming the initial adrenaline rush of rage. "Down?" A blink, confusion and a lack of comprehension clear. "What do you mean, down?"

Now he twisted, trying to wrestle free of L's grasp to go see for himself exactly what the problem was. Down? Who would attack Anthony? He was the most harmless out of all of them...

Tony's attempt to pry himself out of L's wiry but strong arms just made him hold tighter, out of a protective instinct and also sheer preemptive caution. He'd seen Tony lose control before, and while he thought he understood the teen's triggers to a workable extent, he couldn't afford to take any chances while they had committed no murders here today. Anthony's death was devastating, and L found himself trembling as the reality of it began to sink in, but holding it together was crucial while the volatile Tony was a factor in the frenetic equation.

"Please understand," he said quietly, "that it isn't a good idea. It's better if you don't..."

Edited 2014-10-23 06:15 (UTC)

L really was stronger. Before, it wouldn't have taken much to wrestle free of his grasp, but now Tony found himself struggling with it. Granted, he wasn't the largest or the strongest by any means. He'd always been small and malnutrition had played a large role in preventing him from putting on much in the way of muscle. But now that he'd been eating consistently he had gained some strength and weight. Nothing like L had, apparently.

He squirmed, clawed at the air as if trying to find purchase, then finally slumped in defeat.

"What?" Another twist, an attempt to see L's face instead, searching there for the answers he was being prevented from seeing. "What happened what's wrong with Anthony?" That familiar ball of dread began to nest in his stomach again, the one the mafia had taught him all about. Cold and heavy, and absolutely terrifying.

Even after Tony slumped, L retained his hold, just to be safe... and perhaps, just a little bit, out of a helpless desire to somehow comfort him in any way possible.

Just as long as Tony didn't see his face. It wasn't the most reassuring shade of grey in the world. He turned away every time Tony came close, determined to conceal those answers as completely as possible.

"Tony, there isn't anything we can do."

"What do you mean by that?" He demanded, tone fearful, almost desperate. Why wasn't L letting him see, letting him help? What was going on and what had even happened? He knew he was a danger to the thugs but he'd calmed down now, he'd never hurt Anthony!

Now he grew even more urgent, once again struggling against L's hold to try to go discover for himself what it was L was trying to save him from. This was all so... painfully familiar. And a part of him knew deep down exactly why L was holding him back, and that was what made him fight all the harder.

They'd tried to stop him from seeing his parents after the crash, too.

L's resolve was only so strong. He was exhausted and in shock and the adrenaline that had powered his slim, wiry frame through the last few minutes was starting to seep out of his system. His grip loosened and went slack around Tony's shoulders, allowing the teen to break away from him as he turned away, clutching his ice staff and bowing his dark head.

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[Closed] Then for all past efforts - they're buried somewhere in your stomach.

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