ArchivedLogs:Incident at Times Square

Incident at Times Square
Dramatis Personae Nivekh, Cage
In Absentia	2013-05-17 '
Location <NYC> Matterhorn Hotel - Times Square
Situated right on Times Square, its location does a great deal to drive the prices of a stay in this hotel up. It is comfortable, as well, to be sure, if not overly extravagant. The concierge will do his best to make a stay a pleasant one, and the rooms, if not exorbitantly luxurious, are clean and spacious. They even come with a pleasant little packet of fresh-warm brownies upon check-in. Nivekh says, "Spare some change? Some food?" Nivekh slams his hammer against the pavement, erupting a percussive ABANG from the cracking stone. "Some FOOOD!?" PEOPLE. A whole bundle of them. Trotting past in the mid-day; waltzing by and offering the occasional glance, maybe, to the unusual scaled fellow with the hammer. A stare; a rather impolite /glare/. But little in the way of money or food. Begging isn't exactly /smiled/ upon in Times Square - most of the people trotting by probably just rush past to get wherever they're going. But when Nivekh drops his hammer on the pavement with that concussive *BANG* - followed by a cracking of pavement - people start paying attention to him. There are a series of yelps; somebody's yelling, somebody else has whipped out their phone to videotape him. A large group of pedestrians have /fanned/ out around him, keeping their distance - one of the hotel attendants out front of the Matterhorn is darting between the doors, fishing out his cellphone to call the police. This might escalate quickly. Nivekh laughs openly, his voice cold and monotone. With a swift thrust of his hammer, he launches himself into the air, vaulting to the middle of the street...on the hood of a car. The car shudders under the weight of excessive gravity. Luke is sitting out in Times Square apparently just enjoying the sun. Everyone knows the shabby little Hero for Hire office is just right over -there-, so he doesn't have to wander far. He's got on a /very/ bright yellow collared shirt, with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. He's also got a pair of dark jeans on, and heavy boots. Pretty standard for him. He's waiting in line at the hot dog cart when a kid comes up with a photo from Luke's trial and asks him to sign it. He's smiling down at the kid, just about to oblige him when Nivekh's banging begins. Cue the running and concerned faces, including Luke's. (Shh, don't tell!) He pats the kid on the back to get him on his way back to mom before crossing the square to see what the commotion is all about, just as Nivekh sails to the hood of that poor car. "Sweet Christmas! That guy's..." An armadillo? Luke glances at the two cops already present, understanding their hesitation, and just approaches himself. "Hey there buddy," he calls over the sound of people panicking. "Why dontcha come down off that thing, lemme buy you a hot dog. Best dogs in the world, right here in Times Square, man." The yelps turn into screams. People go from gawking and avoiding to actively /running/; a crowd /surges/ away from Nivekh as he flies through the air, launching himself atop of that car. The vehicle Nivekh lands atop of - it's a cabbie, with a driver just - first, /honking/ the horn with surprise - before he's staring, and then /struggling/ to unbuckle his seat-belt - charge out the door, stumbling to the street while yelling out a stream of profanities. Behind him - and around him - traffic comes to a screeching halt. Cars swerve to the side; a van rear-ends the truck it's been tail-gating. The sound of honking horns becomes a cacophony of noise. The two officers Luke Cage notices - hesitate for a /moment/, but in the next second, they're radioing it in. /And/ pulling their guns. One of them already moving toward Nivekh - circling around the intersection, shouting something about him - putting the hammer down. Now /several/ people are video-taping this with their cell phones. The cart comes crashing back to the earth, hot dogs and sausages scattering the street. "Looks like they taste like dirt to me." Lowering the hammer at his awareness of the guns, Niv walks to the nearest police officer and sets a single finger at the end of the gun barrel. With the pasing of a few seconds teh gun feels as if its weight is increasing. 5 pounds, 15 pounds, 30 pounds. After thirty seconds the gun feels as heavy as a 50 pound prop. The moment Niv starts walking toward the nearest police officer with his gun drawn, the officer roars: "GET ON THE /GROUND/!" This is the only warning Nivekh gets. It isn't much of one, because an instant later - he is opening /fire/. /BLAM/. "Oh, you've gotta be ki-" Luke stops when he sees the hot dog cart sail into the air. He bulls forward, pushing people out of the way, and places himself basically under the cart's landing area. It crashes onto him, burying him in pile of twisted metal, broken glass, and WASTED HOT DOGS. Emerging from the mess, Luke's clothes are ruined, and he looks pissed. Leaning down, he wads up a bunch of the crumpled, cheap metal into something the size of a medicine ball and winds up to hurl it, but somehow Nivekh is right next to the cop. Can't take the chance of hitting him. Instead, he tucks his projectile under one arm and charges Nievkh like a running back, plowing through the gunfire, unworried. "Knock it off, big guy!" he shouts as he goes, "This only goes from bad to worse..." Cage lowers his shoulder, preparing to bowl over the smaller man. As one police officer opens fire on Nivekh, the other is screaming into his radio - even as he pulls his own gun, swinging around the far end of the cab, clamboring up on top of the volvo behind it, sliding to the other side. This means Nivekh is between him and Cage; nevertheless, he /does/ see Cage - and even as he points the gun at Nivekh, his eyes flicker to the charging mutant an instant later. "GET THE FUCK /DOWN/!" he shouts, mirroring Officer #1's yell - this time, directed at /Cage/. The crowd is /rushing/ the fuck out of here. More screams, more yelling. People tumbling out of their cars, charging to get the hell out of the way. Pretty much: Pure chaos. With a whirl of his hammer, he throws himself backwards into Luke turning the thick hide toward the gunfire. Bullets prove faster than a good spin, and Nivekh grunts as he spills against Luke, four pullets lodged amid his armor. With a knee to the ground Nivekh heaves and gasps for air. The draw of energy from his spin wasting much of his focus. Paniced and spent, Niveklh grabs a mashed hotdog from the street and eats it. He sucks in a breath and stares back at the gun in the lead officer's hand. In three seconds the gun feels as though it weighs 50 pounds, and Luke is hit with another wave of rotten eggs and maggot decay smell. With enough awareness, Luke would see the lether scales coated with a yellow ooze now. "Hot /damn/ that is some stench," Luke complains. He grabs for the edge of Niv's armored back and tries to pull the man down to the ground. When they crash down, Luke rolls away and dry-heaves on his hands and knees as he tries to wipe the yellow puss off on the ground. Trying to catch his breath, Luke coughs out, "Just stay down, man, this can only get worse from here." "STAY TH--" The gun in officer #1's hand is suddenly pointed at the /ground/; in shock, he fires again - a bullet pinging off of asphalt. In the next second, it's out of his hands, hitting the ground with a loud THWUNK. At once, he's crouched, reaching for it - trying to pull it up - "Th-hell--Jesus what--" The second officer is circling around Luke and Nivekh as they both go down. Gun aimed at them both. /Maybe/ a bit more at Nivekh than Luke; he's still screaming. "Stay down! STAY DOWN! STAY THE FUCK DOWN!" In the distance, there are the sounds of sirens. Officer #2 is keeping his distance; he's clearly just a few small centimeters away from pulling that trigger and blasting them /both/. Maybe the only thing stopping him are the number of camera phones currently locked on the scene. Wrapping both arms around Luke, Nivekh grumbles "Hello there, shield." The wieght of Nivekh;s arms sinks around the other mutant, pinning him down like a living armor. His breathing grows slower. Deeper. The cement fractures lightly in an outward circle, the subtle smell of eggs sweeping low to the ground. As it reacher the feet of the nearest officers, they feel the light tugging of their boots against the street. Luke struggles against being grabbed, threatening to break Nivekh's hold eventually, but for starters, time to break his concentration. Luke perfected his fighting techniques in prison, after all, and he has no concerns about fighting dirty. He pulls his face as far away from Nivekh's as he can manage at this point and slams his forehead down into Nivekh's nose and mouth, one, twice, a third time, as hard as he can, until he feels crunching under him. In the cloud of stench and being grabbed, Luke only barely has his fight or flight instinct in check, which is keeping him from making killing blows. Lets hope he doesn't go all the way. With Nivekh stunned, Luke rolls away, dry-heaves once more, but hauls himself to his feet anyway, readying a real fighting stance. The cops are probably shooting at him now, but that's fine. He's been there before. Just doing my civic duty, officer! Actually, at this point, the police officers - who have been keeping their distance from this /bizarre/ turn of events - are not really sure /what/ to do. A big black man is apparently /beating the shit/ out of the mutant they were about to riddle with bullets. And now the phone cameras are on them, and - it's probably occurred to them that getting videotaped filling some black dude fighting a mutant with lead is /not/ going to go over well. So, instead, the officer who's been trying to pick up his 50 pound gun has reached for his taser, instead. Pulling it out and - the moment Luke separates from Nivekh, he's /firing/ directly at the more /noticeable/ mutant. Meanwhile, the cop who's still got his gun is pointing it at Luke Cage, attempting to /force/ him back, away from the situation. "GET DOWN! ON YOUR KNEES! HANDS ON YOUR HEAD!" he's screaming. The sirens are getting louder! Reflexively, Nivekh rolls onto his side, coughing and spitting blood and bits of tooth. The taser prongs graze against the leather scale edges, allowing enough time for Nivekh to attempt to get to his feet. Halfway to standing, Nivekh's knees buckle and he hits the floor again. The force of gravity fades out with the dissipating odor, but Nivekh still clings to his hammer. "Your hate," his words are loud but muddled in the gurgles of spit and more blood, "Drives us from the surface. Our stigma will be your downfall." He slumps back against the street, mumbling "Hungr...food...time...change...fuuuuu..." Luke goes from tense, ready to fight, to sighing, shaking his head. "Don't start nothing, and there won't /be/ nothin," he whispers as Nivekh fades. Then louder he shouts, "Officer, I am complying with your commands. I offer no resistance." And slowly, deliberately, he drops to his knees and laces his fingers behind his head. "Just a concerned citizen..." The tazing just keeps coming. Officer Mc-Tazer isn't going to let up on it; not until Nivekh shows /no/ signs of resistance. By this time, a squad car is /swooping/ into the intersection, coming to a screeching halt - tires squealing across asphalt as it swings to a pause. Doors flinging open. More officers. Luke Cage, upon complying, /still/ gets screamed at. "ON THE GROUND! FACE DOWN!" officer #2 yells. But the whole situation /seems/ to be de-escalating. More officers are swarming in; officers moving to section off the area - to take statements, lock down handcuffs, determine if Nivekh needs an ambulance - and start the process of transporting Nivekh and Luke Cage off to be filed and processed. Nivekh needs an ambulance. His face looks a bloody mesh, and the gurgles of attempted words bubbles from his throat as he "sleeps".