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Post by jarahamee on Nov 29, 2020 1:27:17 GMT -6
Cassius paused, checking each window briefly as he loped about at a low angle. His dark eyes burned intently, catching the moon’s light here and there with a flash of greenish light. His white teeth gleamed, a contrast to his dark skin in the night.
Could he see the hostages? Taking this fellow quickly might be key, but who knew if they were actually criminals? How would it look if they weren’t even magical, and he had come in, guns blazing, on the prompt of a kid.
No, but they needed to be quiet. He looked up at Stenson, and then gestured as if indicating they should split up, tapping his radio. It was set to low, low enough he could hear it, but not high enough it should alert anyone nearby. He slipped his tasers out of his belt, and held one in each hand. They wouldn’t kill his target, but they would knock him down and stop him from shouting.
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Post by Vaitris on Dec 3, 2020 22:08:31 GMT -6
Hau's jaw clenched but he said nothing, only nodded stiffly and watched Stenson leave. He lingered by the car, shuffling his feet restlessly and watching the house and the agents prowling around it until they left his line of sight. Then his mind wandered, returning to horrified speculation and worry. What did these people do to their victims first? Drug them? Tie them up? Were they in there, leading her on, while an invisible timer counted down the last seconds of her freedom? Of her life?
He forced his gaze away from the white house, hoping to change the path of his thoughts, and his attention caught on a power pole standing near the road. Hau's eyes traced a wire running from it to the white house and suddenly realized there was something he could do after all.
The kitsune rushed back to the abandoned house where he carefully stashed his clothes and changed into fox form. Then he crept back outside and carefully crossed the road, trying to avoid the view of anyone looking out their windows or wandering the street, including Stenson. Technically, the gargoyle hadn't specified where Hau had to be or that he couldn't interfere, only made him agree to staying low and out of danger. Still, Hau had a feeling the agent might not agree with his specific interpretation of things.
He slipped into a patch of wild, untrimmed bushes near the power pole for cover. From here, the top of the pole was just barely within reach of his abilities and he set to work, thrusting ice into the electrical workings, not caring what he broke so long as the electricity to the white house was cut. After some persistence, there was a soft snap as something flashed and spit a few sparks into the night sky. Then the end of the power line dropped loosely into the grass as every light in the house snapped off.
Hau's tail twitched, satisfied. If they didn't need light for whatever terrible plans they had, at least they'd be distracted trying to fix it.
Back behind the white house, the porchlight died as well. And even though there was only moonlight for illumination now, Cassius could still see the man beneath it huff out a cloud of cigarette smoke and glare at the darkened lamp. With a grumble, he turned to the door and beat on it with his fist. "Very funny, asshole. Turn the light back on." He demanded, tone distinctly unamused.
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Post by Pearl Dragon on Jan 9, 2021 22:22:06 GMT -6
The basement windows were blocked too. That much was obvious as Stenson came upon one and tried to peer inside. It was the kind of dark that suggested a barrier was in place, otherwise his nightvision would've given some insight on the basements contents. He knelt beside Cassius and watched the figure now at the back door. His thoughts were much in line with the gold badge's, wondering at the possibility of taking that individual out first. However, if there was something going on in there, that might the purpose of this individual, a watch of sorts. Or, if there was nothing going on, then this was an innocent person and WDSA would be held accountable for the raid of an innocent household.
Either way, they'd need more to go on before they made any move, even if this house was incredibly suspicious already just off the covered windows.
Cassius turned to him, gesturing to split up and tapping his radio. Stenson's own radio was also set to low, and he nodded. He could go back around the front perhaps to try and find a way in or clue to what was going on. Just then, there was a loud pop somewhere down the street, a flash of electricity and sudden darkness all around them. Stenson inhaled sharply, turning to look back towards the powerlines he'd heard it from. His eyes scanned up and down what he could see and noticed a flash of blue near the powerline pole. Hau.
Stenson's hand raised to his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. No matter how he asked that boy to keep clear, somehow he had a feeling the youth would find a way to try and help. The man on the back porch, thankfully, seemed blissfully unaware of the electrical explosion down the road as he shouted into the house about turning the lights back on. That was good, maybe this would help them. Stenson patted Cassius on the shoulder in an 'ok, let's keep going' sort of way, and moved back towards the front of the house. At the corner, Stenson peered around at the front and waited, wondering if someone might come out to check the streets. He could only hope Hau had moved out of sight by now.
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Post by jarahamee on Jan 17, 2021 0:44:26 GMT -6
Cassius moved around the back quickly, and crouched behind the shadow of the house’s corner, mentally calculating. This civilian was no match for him. It may have been dark, but the werewolf could see the man quite well in the dim light of the moon, and knew he was not expecting what was going to come next. The man moved quickly, without hesitation. He only had a moment to act, and he was going to take it.
The gold badge maneuvered behind the man and moved to grab him from behind. He was immensely strong, despite being a middle-aged man. A firm grip, muscles well-conditioned by practice, moved over his victim’s mouth, and the other over his… No… No, don’t kill him. Cassius paused, holding the man firmly in his arms, keeping his hand over his mouth so he didn’t scream. He could push him down, and choke him out if he needed to…
He whispered in his ear;
“Police. Don’t make a sound. Hands behind your back, or I’ll shoot.”
Cassius did not have a gun in his hand, but he could seriously injure or kill this man without one. In fact, he nearly did. Not that his new friend needed to know that.
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Post by Vaitris on Jan 24, 2021 22:22:55 GMT -6
At first, nothing happened at the front of the white house. Hau wasn't sure what he had been expecting. Immediate alarm maybe. Someone to realize what he'd done and that they'd been found out. But there was nothing. A tiny sliver of doubt wormed its way into his thoughts but he tried to ignore it.
After a few tense moments there was finally a flicker of something at the edge of the curtains. Flashlights. Hau turned his ears towards the house, leaned closer, tried to find voices and figure out what they were saying. His paws churned up the dirt beneath him as he crawled forward a little on his belly, the urge to stay out of sight and out of danger warred with the impulse to just charge up to the front door. But he shouldn't do anything yet. No one had come out, there were no cries of alarm. It all seemed… normal.
Behind the house it was a slightly different story. With a quickly muffled noise of surprise, the man went stiff and still in Cassius' grip. This close, the man didn't look so much like a man anymore. He appeared young, maybe early to mid-twenties, buzzed hair and heavily tattooed. His eyes were wide in surprise but he didn't act on his panic.
"Okay, okay, don't shoot." The young man whispered, words barely audible behind the werewolf's palm. His hands came up in surrender, cigarette falling from his fingers. Then he seemed to register what Cassius had said and they dropped and went behind his back.
Then the sound of bootsteps came from inside the house and the back door swung open with a creak. "It wasn't me, dipshit. The p-" Another man, not much older than the one Cassius held, looked out on the scene. For the moment he was frozen in mute shock, but it would only be another second or two before he recovered and alerted the household.
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Post by Pearl Dragon on May 31, 2021 17:09:49 GMT -6
Stenson watched the flicker of flashlights from his vantage point near the front. Not a soul opened the door or windows to look out, at least from what he could tell. He took a moment to think over his options before moving towards the front door. With the back of his hand, he rapped two quick knocks before ducking back to the side and out of view but still within reach for whomever might answer.
He waited, tense and ready for the next few moments. His mind raced with every possible scenario, but one that stood out the most was that of disguise. The moment someone answered the door, he would move, reaching immediately from his hidden location to pull the person into a sleeper hold, one stone-skinned hand clamped firmly over the person's mouth to prevent sound or biting while his other arm wrapped tightly around their neck to deliver powerful pressure.
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Post by jarahamee on Jun 1, 2021 20:14:17 GMT -6
Cassius had already drawn out his cuffs and started securing them, when the second figure appeared. The first had been no challenge to his skills, but this situation posed a different set of threats. No time. If there were hostages, then this was going to go south quickly. He shouldn’t shout this time, the door was still open.
He grinned, feeling his heart pounding, his hands trembling a little with that familiar and pleasant adrenaline, as he clicked the cuffs closed on the first young man. Nowhere to hide them. He heard the door swing open and shoved the first man to the side.
His body drew itself like a spring as the second man spoke, launching himself at the back of his knees with a leg sweep, before punching him in the solar plexus.
It would knock the wind out of him, and render him silent, so he’d have a moment to cuff and bind him, and give them some time… Was this a human rights violation? He certainly hoped not. He would have a lot of explaining to do if this was someone’s garage band.
He glanced back in the direction of Jones and hoped things were going smoothly there. A forked maneuver.
If this worked, he could get these men into the van, and move farther inside. The van was secure enough for magical creatures, it’d be secure enough for a couple of humans who just needed to be questioned.
Remember, don’t hurt them… Remember…
A small part of him knew this would be so much easier with lethal force, but that was never the point here, was it? Much different than the military service. Everything had been so straightforward then. But then, how many times had he found himself of the wrong side?
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Post by Vaitris on Jun 12, 2021 9:48:41 GMT -6
Hau watched tensely from his hiding place as Stenson approached the front door and knocked. The lights from inside the house abruptly stopped moving and a moment later one of the window curtains fluttered. The kitsune craned his ears toward the house and could just distinguish the murmur of voices from inside, but they were so muffled he couldn’t tell what was being said.
After several long moments there was noise from within and the front door creaked open. Stenson would have to look down to see who had done it as a small child peeked out from the crack. Still well inside the house, she clutched the door knob with one hand and an over-sized flashlight in the other, shining it out onto the crumbling porch. “Hello?” She asked, voice small. The glow from another flashlight could just barely be seen from somewhere behind her.
Behind the house, handcuffed and shoved, the young man Cassius had been holding dropped to the ground with a heavy thump and audible ‘oomph.’ With the breath knocked from him he was quiet for a few moments, but as soon as he recovered he began to shout. “Dan! It’s the cops! Get dad!”
Dan, standing just inside the door, scrambled to grab something at his waist as he backed up into the house. Cassius’ leg still caught him and made him stagger and he dropped it, the distinct sound of metal clattering to the linoleum floor betrayed the fact that he had a gun. The young man half turned, mouth open in a warning, but his breath escaped him in a whoosh as the agent’s fist made contact with his midsection.
“Ma-!” The word died as a wheeze and the young man folded, lost his balance. It all would have been as quiet as Cassius hoped had Dan not crashed into the wall, sending something glass crashing to the floor around them.
The fight put Cassius just inside the threshold of the house. He and the young man were at the edge of a tiny mudroom just barely illuminated by moonlight. It adjoined a darkened, but vaguely discernible, kitchen. In the corner of that room was an open doorway, the other side of which was softly lit by some other light source.
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Post by Pearl Dragon on Jun 12, 2021 12:19:49 GMT -6
Stenson's tension doubled as the lights inside stopped their erratic, searching motion at the sound of his knock. As the door creaked open and he looked at who answered, not a single scenario of a child answering had gone through his mind as he prepared to react. His motion to reach out and grapple the person paused in an awkward half-reach as he watched the small child grip the doorknob and shine a flashlight around. A tiny "hello?" escaped her and Stenson noted the beam of another flashlight not far behind her. If he acted now, obviously whoever else was there would see her, but he hoped the distraction of his knock was enough to draw the attention of most, if not all, occupants inside for Cassius' sake.
Just then, the crash of something hitting the floor and breaking sounded somewhere towards the back of the house where Cassius was. A scuffle, more than likely, and now their cover was surely blown. Not to mention, he also heard a shout of "Dan! It’s the cops! Get dad!”
A family operation, possibly? And with small children too. Stenson took the second moment of distraction from the back to move forward and make a grab for the girl. Whatever was going on inside, he needed to get her away and to safety. If she tried to scream, his hand would rush immediately to her mouth to silence it while he whispered a soft "Shhhh" to her. His grip would be firm, but gentle. He knew this would probably do nothing to calm her, he already felt bad for frightening her. The moment he had her secured, he would back away to the side of the house again and around the corner while keeping clear of the windows.
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Post by jarahamee on Jun 12, 2021 14:08:07 GMT -6
Cassius acted quickly.
He grabbed the ankles of the fallen man and yanked him out the door with all the subtly of a horror movie monster, getting him out of reach of his weapon. His dark eyes gleamed in the dim light, and his uneven mouth took on a horrifying twist as he grinned a little. He didn’t have a lot of time, and they were armed. Good. Challenging. He didn’t have faith in someone this stressed aiming well, but it was better not to take that chance. For being an older gentleman, he was immensely fit and strong, almost frighteningly so.
A part of his mind flickered back to memories of being caught in a hail of bullets. He would do well not to repeat the experience. But first to get these two under control. He cuffed his legs and pulled his arms behind him to cuff them as well. All practiced. Quick. He’d have to be faster. Put them on their stomach, make it hard to move…
He cuffed the legs of the first man as well, moving the second next to his body, before darting back towards the house, using the side to cover himself. He crouched low to investigate the doorway to check and see if anyone was coming. After he was sure it was clear, he attempted to move into the mudroom to grab the gun and take cover again.
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Post by Vaitris on Jun 16, 2021 17:56:17 GMT -6
Two things happened in quick succession.
First, Stenson managed to get a hold of the girl, snagging the arm that held the flashlight. She gave a surprisingly shrill cry and, though the agent attempted to cover her mouth with his other hand, she managed to duck away. Dropping the flashlight, the little girl slipped her arm from her sleeve and wiggled out of her shirt so that Stenson was left holding it as she fled back inside the white house, now only half dressed.
Second, two gunshots shattered the relatively quiet atmosphere. Aimed towards the open door, one chewed a chunk out of the wooden frame and spat splinters across the porch.
Hau’s whole body flinched at the noise. As soon as it stopped he crawled forward, trembling with adrenaline, creeping slowly and silently up to the house. He used the porch as cover, only climbing up over the edge of it when he was out sight of the doorway. Then he worriedly nosed at Stenson, checking to make sure the agent had not been hit.
Someone whispered inside the house. This time with the door open the fox was able to hear it clearly and the words made his ears pin. “Good job, Willa. Now stay close behind me.” The tone was oddly light, just like what you would use to address a child. Hau let his teeth show in a silent growl. He could hear quiet footsteps moving slowly and cautiously towards the door, the owner probably ready to bolt at the first suspicious movement, but also probably ready to start shooting again as soon as they saw Stenson.
At the rear of the house, Dan tried vainly to grab onto something to anchor himself as he was dragged out the back door. He kicked and thrashed, trying to break free, but was unprepared to fight the much stronger agent without a weapon. So instead he resorted to screaming curses and insults, scraping the bottom of his limited vocabulary for abusive things to say.
As Cassius cuffed him, two gunshots rang out from the other side of the house. After the noise died down however, it was strangely quiet. When he returned to the house he heard little except vague whispered words from beyond the doorway across the kitchen and the creaking of floorboards somewhere overhead.
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Post by Pearl Dragon on Aug 15, 2021 14:14:08 GMT -6
Stenson's hand missed the girls mouth as she squirmed in his grip. He could feel her arm twist in the sleeve of her shirt before pulling quickly out from inside of it. "Hey!" He hissed between clenched teeth, struggling to keep a grip on her without hurting her, but ultimately his efforts were in vain and she soon darted back to the front door, leaving Stenson with an empty shirt. "Shit!" He hissed again, and then ducked backwards as gunshots rang out and splintered the wood around the doorframe. They were shooting with a child potentially in range! He felt a rage boiling inside of him, and massive anger towards himself for not keeping a better hold on the girl. If they hit her....
Just then, he felt a cold canine nose push worriedly into him. He turned to see Hau, and laid a hand half-hazardly on the fox's head. "I'm fine, but you need to get back." He said, voice low. Though he had to admit Hau's sudden familiar appearance did help to take the edge off. He only hoped this neighborhood was mostly empty and abandoned houses, as the gunshots surely would've attracted some attention by now. His mind raced once again. He could hear voices inside whispering, a soft praise towards what he could only guess was the child, and then footsteps approaching the door cautiously.
Stenson could not think of many other options, the front door was compromised, there was now a child involved, and one of the inhabitants had no problems putting them in harm's way. Stenson looked back at Hau one more time, his face grave. "I need to get inside, and I'm going to try from the roof. Keep down, stay out of sight." He said, before moving back and away from the door.
As he left, the sound of strange boney cracks and a suppressed growl of effort escaped his body. He pulled a few tougher articles of clothing from himself and dropped them to the ground as he went, just in time for the muscles of his shoulders, chest and limbs to begin expanding and thickening. Two large protrusions grew from between his shoulder blades, stretching up and out to form long webbed appendages that arced into the shape of wings that spread at his sides. He almost seemed to limp as he walked, as if injured, while his body rapidly transformed from human to something much larger and gruesome. Even his skull and face began to change, a longer muzzle stretching with gnarled fangs growing out into white daggers. Spikes protruded down his neck and onto a thick, blunt tail. New sets of sharp, thick black talons dug heavily into the softer dirt of the garden as he trampled over bushes and shrubbery to make his way to the other side of the house.
His breathing became a constant growl, rumbling in his chest as he worked. He reached to the side of the house and leapt upwards in a pulling, climbing motion. One back foot gripped a window frame, while the other dug into the wall itself. His reach was much longer now and soon he was clawing his way up and reaching over onto the roof to scramble heavily over the side. He knew he was making a racket, but he almost wanted it. Something to throw the inhabitants off and confuse them. He only hoped the darkness from the power outage would hide him from the sight of any onlookers in the neighborhood.
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Post by jarahamee on Aug 15, 2021 16:53:01 GMT -6
Cassius moved quickly into the mudroom, glad that his two victims could not see where he was headed. His boots were quiet but left prints behind. It was doubtful that the untrained eyes of these men could tell his bootprints from their own shoes, but the thought stuck in the back of his mind. He’d worry about it later.
He scanned the ground quickly to pick up the gun, moving close to the floor as he listened and looked about. Good, the gunshots were drawing them to the front. The back of his mind prickled with a tinge of concern, but it did not sound like Jones was injured, at least, not badly. Besides, he could help him better attacking from behind. They likely had no idea there were two attackers yet.
He grinned, and strained his ears to listen, scanning the floor from his vantage point to look for legs or any sign of movement. Guns really upped the ante on whether or not overlooking a detail was going to end up being a fatal endeavor. His keen eyes gleamed, and he looked for his next bit of cover available.
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Post by Vaitris on Sept 9, 2021 16:29:33 GMT -6
Good, Stenson wasn’t hurt. Hau huffed a breath in relief, but left his ears pressed back against his head. He nodded at the officer’s words, he couldn’t make any promises on dropping back but staying out of sight he could do. Someone should probably keep an eye on whoever was doing the shooting.
Shortly after Stenson left, he heard shuffling from inside the house and the voice, a woman he realized, called out. “You best get the fuck out of here before I call the cops!” And he heard the gun cock. That was a dangerous problem. Freezing it would be the best answer, but to do that he’d have to see it and to see it he’d have to make himself a target. He needed a distraction.
Blue flame bloomed inside the room, floating in one of the corners. Without being able to see Hau couldn’t be certain where he was drawing her attention to except that it was away from the door. As soon as he heard the soft sound of more movement and an under-the-breath expletive he peeked around the corner.
The woman was older and overweight, with long gray hair that reached all the way down her back. She wasn’t stupid enough to turn the gun away from the door, but she wasn’t looking in that direction either. Glassy ice flowed from the tip of the barrel up towards her hand. His distraction only bought him a few seconds to work before she looked back at the door and very nearly spotted him as he dove for cover again. Hopefully he’d managed to jam up the gun with enough frost that it was useless.
Up above them, Stenson would see the gabled roof was covered in leaves and debris and badly in need of both cleaning and replacing. There was no direct access to the house from there by either chimney or skylight, but on the front and the rear of the building were two windows just under the lip of the roof, presumably giving access to the attic. The view through them was pitch dark but unobstructed by any sort of curtains.
Back in the kitchen, Cassius saw nothing move. There was no evidence of anyone else in the room, nor were there any signs that the household owned any animals. But at the noise of something big and heavy making its way up the side of the house, he would hear the creaking of the floorboards above him abruptly stop.
After picking up the gun, he could move to cover near the doorway on the opposite side of the kitchen. On the other side of that was a tiny stretch of hallway with a closed door on the left side, followed by a staircase leading up to the second floor. There was no wall to separate the stairs from the living room beyond, but there was still a meager amount of cover near the base of the steps.
From there, most of the living room could be seen. A television, a coffee table, and a pair of lumpy couches could be made out in the combined glow from a flashlight and a ball of blue flame. Children’s toys were scattered liberally around the room. If Cassius craned far enough, he would see that the holder of the flashlight was standing across the room, pointing a gun towards the front door. Behind her and clutching her arm was a shirtless girl only maybe four or five years old.
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Post by Pearl Dragon on Sept 22, 2021 16:29:00 GMT -6
Stenson dragged himself on top of the house, claws grasping for purchase amidst the debris and mess of the neglected rooftop. Once he was up, he stood and glanced around. His wings parted slightly for balance as he turned and looked here and there, examining the only to entry points available to him. The windows seemed to lead into an attic, and with a grumbled huff, Stenson made his way towards the back window. He hunkered down, trying now to move quietly in case anyone had moved to the back yard, but he hoped here he would be less visible to pedestrians from the front sidewalk if anyone were taking a stroll this late in the evening. The windows themselves were dark, but that was all. It was simply a lack of light from the inside, and Stenson's nocturnal vision was at least able to pick up an interior of sorts through the glass. He balled one large hand into a fist and pressed it to the glass. Rather than drawing back into a punch, Stenson pressed firmly little by little, waiting for the glass and frame to give way and hoped it would create less noise than if he were to hit the thing. Once it was open, he would begin the laborious act of squeezing his much larger frame through the window. His arms and shoulders worked at the edge and wall, breaking away any more of the opening needed for him to fit through until he was inside, picking himself up to peer around the darkened attic and listening for any sign of a threat.
He also remained ready, in case someone entered the room. His body would harden immediately into a solid granite form, appearing as a strange and monstrous gargoyle statue that had just been magically and forcibly delivered into the homeowner's attic. Like a bizarre Santa Claus present....
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