4872/Germination: A new Player

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Germination: A new Player
Date of Scene: 10 July 2018
Location: Unknown
Synopsis: Lex Luthor makes a move, contracting a number of individuals to kidnap a mutant 'asset'.
Cast of Characters: Lex Luthor, Egghead, Darkness, Shadow King
Tinyplot: Germination


Lex Luthor has posed:
Discreetly, word had gotten out to trusted circles of a potential contract job in underworld circles. The client was anonymous, but had a PO Box for interested parties to drop off contact information. It was all very hush hush; which meant big money, big connections, and big risk. Attempts to find the source were met with stonewalling from people who genuinely /did not know/ who the client was. Those who prodded deeper... tended to either end up dead, or misdirected, depending on how much Lex was displeased by their methods.

Lex Luthor was not a man who liked to be connected to overt criminal activities... and was one of those with the resources to make sure they stayed unconnected. A number of potential candidates had been screened for the job, including Jackie and Edgar. Those who had been picked were given a reply: an abandoned warehouse in Mutant Town, Manhatten. Coming in person was acceptance of the contract, with details forthcoming upon arrival.

The warehouse itself is a shitpile. Abandoned for a reason, there was nothing but dust, cobwebs, and a barely functional electrical grid.

Which made the holo-projector and stereo audio system in the main office all the more out of place in the midnight moonlight.

Egghead has posed:
A black sedan with yellow upholstered vinyl seating and white hubcaps pulled up to the warehouse, a rugby build driver wearing a black suit and wearing a little courtesy hat at the wheel. It comes to a halt outside, and the driver steps out, with the engine still running. He steps around to the side, where there's a black tinted window hiding the occupant, and opens the door.

Egghead climbs out with pomp and splendor, wearing his signature yellow-white suit and gold cape. He's accompanied by a teak cane with an ivory handle on top, hiding a long French blade inside the stick. The driver closes the door behind him and climbs back into the car, as Egghead struts into the warehouse, moving through austerely with a sense of noble disdain for his surroundings.

Egghead steps into the office with his chin tilted upwards, a prudish frown on his narrow lips.

Darkness has posed:
Jackie arrives with a cautious stance, as is normal for one in his profession. His Family sanctioned his application for this job, the money can't hurt after all. As long as the Franchetti Family gets its' cut, Jackie is free to be a temporarily outsourced agent of this mysterious employer. Jackie Estacado is on foot, entering the abandoned warehouse slowly, even pausing after turning the handle, and again after opening the door. When silence follows both precautionary measures he steps inside and looks around.

Lex Luthor has posed:
A number of other people in various masks and ragtag outfits step into the office after Edgar. At midnight on the dot, the Holo-Projector turns on on it's own, showing a projection of Mutant Town proper. In the corner, a previously hard to see camera flits to life, and out of the stereo system comes a masked voice, "Good. About the turnout I expected." The projection turns into a 3D model, "I'll get right to the point, as we don't have a lot of time."

The projection zooms into an apartment complex, "This is a retrieval job. Your target is an asset in one of the apartments in this building. Anyone with qualms about this sort of work leaves now." The voice demands.

Egghead has posed:
Egghead opens his vest, revealing a bandolier of multi-colored metal eggs. He pulls a cord on his rig, and then another on the other side, all the eggs' holding cartridges opening so he can pull them out easily.

He's not here for the money, or even the entertainment. Egghead has a far more obsequious purpose; he wishes to make contact with the employer for this mission, to expand into New York City and out of Gotham for his enterprises. The gaunt, gangly man does a stretch, and looks to the others gathered here. "The name is Egghead. I'll be your rabbit."

Darkness has posed:
Jackie nods after the mission briefing is given, "No problem at all." He looks around to see if anyone leaves. When Egghead introduces himself he remains silent, certain that if his employer needs to know anything else about him he will ask.

Lex Luthor has posed:
None of the others leave either; looks like this is a hand picked crew. "The target is potentially telepathic, and I have spotty intel on the power level involved. Psi-Inhibitors will be provided for the purpose of short-term protection against attempts at mind control, along with a control collar custom designed for this job." A previously decrepit looking dresser pops audibly, and inside is a large suitcase, "There are enough for all of you. You wear them around your head like a headband. They're designed to blend in. The collar is underneath the headbands."

"Your job is to put the collar on the target before the target can get out any calls for help, and bring the target back to this warehouse, where a means of secure transport will take the target. Your job will to be to do the grab, and deal with any issues that crop up. Payout will be 100k each if this job is done silently, with no one the wiser. The more noise you make, the lower your payout goes depending on how much heat you draw. As long as you get the target back here without being followed, you get a guaranteed 50k."

The voice gives a moment for that to be processed, "Any questions?"

Egghead has posed:
Egghead opens the suitcase and withdraws a psi-inhibitor for himself, then making the case accesable for the other minions. He slides one around his smooth, tall head, tightening it.

"This will require strategy. The basic scheme is straightforward, meaning the details of our operation will have to fit into the plan, as opposed to our details shaping the egg-xact parameters of this mission," Egghead says to the others.

"A simple lever turn is all that is ever needed for a kidnapping. We will have one force move the principle against a hidden force outside the principle's range of vision, and then the third force will collar and capture the prisoner, before all three forces coalesce and bring the target back to this location."

Darkness has posed:
Jackie strokes his chin as he listens, taking one of the headbands as directed, placing it on his forehead after extracting the collar, "I volunteer as force number one if that's our game plan. It wouldn't be the first time I scared the holy hell out of someone. Believe me I can do it."

Lex Luthor has posed:
"One of your number has been given a tranq rifle for a silent takedown. This time of night has been chosen after careful study of police and mutant patrol habits. You will face minimal resistance if you manage to do this stealthily. Your strategy has been laid out. I leave the tactics of your endeavor to you." Another dresser drawer pops, "Generic transceivers that I will have access to. Put them on and you'll all be able to listen to each other." The other masked minions take their headbands and their transceivers and place them on the head and ears respectively.

"If you are followed back here by anyone but your team members, the mission is scrubbed and you will never hear from me again. Make sure that doesn't happen." The projector zooms out a bit, highlighting a yellow path through the blue 3D model, "Your route from here, to the complex." A floor and number shows up above, "The room you're hitting. The sooner you go, the more nighttime you have Good luck."

Egghead has posed:
Egghead takes a transceiver, and takes the tranq rifle, pulling his knife out of his cane and slipping it into his bandolier, before discarding the stick element. "I will be the third force. I will capture our agent, after he's been grounded by you irregulars. Number one, you push the target into number two's position, number two will temporarily disable the principle, and I will poach the egg. The proper visual: we push them backwards, onto someone on all fours behind them, then I will place the bag over their head when they are on their back."

He rigs the tranceivers into his ear and beside his mouth. "Good hunting, lads. We stay together until we reach the complex, then force number one breaches the room from the fire escape, out into the hallway, into force number two, with a wheel from the left to force them to their right down the hallway, where I will tranquilize them with a clear shot to their chest, heading into me."

He begins moving, marching out of the offie. "Number one, you scale the building and don't go loud until you get inside. Number two, you take the elevators, to move into the hallway. I'll go up the stairwell to block the last egg-scape for the target."

Darkness has posed:
Jackie nods as he puts on his transceiver, "As good a plan as I can think of. I'm willing to bet that this wise guy depends on his psychic ability more than his own sense. What I'm hinting at is that when he realizes that he can't Vulcan shazam his way out of this, he'll panic. When he panics he won't be using the better portions of his brain. I think we got this.."

Lex Luthor has posed:
Over the transceivers, the team can hear the voice again, "The target is now with a group of prostitutes." A moment passes, "If they see you, take them out. No witnesses. That goes for the whole operation."

Egghead has posed:
"A shame to kill a gaggle of geese for just a single gander," Egghead sighs, as he moves out of the warehouse into the night, tranquilizer rifle slipping down along his arm and held with a subtle hand. He falls into the middle flank of the group of loosely moving rogues, to hide his weapon. Egghead mutters into the transceiver to use his superfluously egg-xact memory to move them towards the target building, taking a detour through a side-street to avoid a cabbie waiting outside a building in the late night for a fare.

Darkness has posed:
Jackie grins, "I'll rip their hearts out.. fucking whores. I'll bet money that they've been working for competitors of my family. I'll gladly punch their tickets if it comes to it. Don't worry about them, I'll make it quick."

Shadow King has posed:
    When the group move to the location, the place is pretty straightforward. The apartment is on the third floor. It is sandwiched between other ones, it isn't a special penthouse apartment, or anything like that. There are stairs that have emergency doors, there's an elevator as the main entry point for most people. The elevator is way down at the end, and would require something of a lengthy walk to get to. There is a small balcony, crowded with some old white patio furniture and a dead plant. Maybe a cactus. And those are difficult to kill.

    There are lights on inside the apartment. It's a two bedroom: a main room, with a kitchen and the balcony connected, then a hallway to the two bedrooms and closets. Two people wander in front of the long blinds, dark against the light inside. Looks like women, though the lighting isn't good. Tech devices can easily tell they aren't wearing a lot of clothing. They settle down after a short while, but all appear to be in the main room, instead of any of the bedrooms. It isn't obvious what exactly they are doing, but guesses can be made. Getting closer reveals some music, but it isn't extremely loud.

Egghead has posed:
"I like a man with good hands," comes Egghead's voice over the transceiver, as he moves to the stairwell and withdraws a small white leather sheaf of electronics tools from within his jacket. "I hate getting shell in my breakfast."

Egghead drops to a knee and begins toying with the emergency exit system, his calm, patient hands bypassing the alarms on the lock's electronic system, so they won't trip the fire alarm when he opens the door. There's a thin sheen of sweat on him, despite his steady focus and hard nerves, as Egghead's feverish fury begins to overtake him. A certain wrought tension, the kind that men outside time experience when dreaming about fortune.

Darkness has posed:
Jackie is screwing on silencers for his two glocks as he approaches the fire escape entrance. The door is clearly more modern than most, possessing an internal lock, but it doesn't matter to the seasoned hitman. With a grin he manifests The Darkness briefly. He quietly shoots any nearby lights so that his strength will be at full power. Jackie then presses his hands against the door, slowly pushing against it, the metallic hinges snapping bit by bit, little sound being emmited as a result. Once the door is removed he sets it down gently to the side, it now being only barely connected to its' former source. Jackie reigns in The Darkness and his appearance returns to normal, now escalating the stairs towards his target.

Shadow King has posed:
    There's a loud sudden sound. It's not the fire alarms. Just one of the women laughing way too loudly. Maybe a bit forced, laughing intentionally. The balcony door must have been opened. But there's no signs that the intruders were noticed or bothered with by anyone in the apartment. In the hallway one of the other doors opens and an elderly lady begins to walk her Spaniel out along the path on the second floor towards the elevator. She doesn't /seem/ dangerous. She does have blue hair, but they are in Mutant Town after all. She Spaniel perks up and barks a little. "Stop it," the woman says.
    The fire alarm system, when addressed by the professional, turns off without a problem.

Egghead has posed:
"Stairwell breached. Force two, elevators," Egghead says with a sotto voice, unaware of the little old lady about to enter the elevators on the second floor. He picks up his rifle and begins lazily climbing the stairs upwards, with a little jaunt to his walk upwards, cape trailing behind him. He rounds the stairwell up onto the second floor, and turns to move up an additional floor, to make it to the top of the building.

Meanwhile, the four masked mercenaries get into the elevator and hit the button for the target floor, the doors sliding shut.

Darkness has posed:
Jackie ascends the stairs until he is outside of the targets room. The door being open means that he only has to keep moving. He pauses at the entryway, weapons in front of him. He is able to immediately see one prostitute, he points one pistol at her and pulls the trigger, hoping that the silencer will quiet the discharge long enough to keep the element of surprise. He stands up from his kneeling position, trained eyes immediately locking on to any visible prostitutes in the immediate room.

Shadow King has posed:
    The lady pushes the 'down' button the elevator. Which means the one carrying the mercenaries goes right up past her. She'll get it when it goes back down again, or another one. She has, of course, no idea about any of the mercenaries passing by her, and fishes in her pocket for a poop bag.

    There are no changes at the apartment that is the target, not from where they are looking. At least, until suddenly Jackie heads inside. A quick glance can take in a lot in the room. There's some weird thing going on. There are three prostitutes. One didn't get to turn before she was shot by Jackie. She collapses. The other two orient, and he gets off another quick shot on the blonde. The last one is 'involved' with the man, and neither of them react very quickly to the intruder. The weirder thing in the room is there is a long freezer all along one wall, like you'd expect in a serial killer's apartment, or maybe a hunter's garage. The thing could probably have a whole deer in it. "---What?" asks the man, angry, sitting up. He's on the couch; so is the prostitute; she's covering him physically, but not on purpose.

Egghead has posed:
Egghead steps out of the stairwell, after a brief pause to get in a lungful of air and steady his breathing. He moves to the end of the hallway, as the minions exit the elevator on the other side of the hall.

"Have you in sight, force two. Force one, we will be in position in under a minute. Let's make this fast."

As the four mercenaries move to form a curve around the door, to steer the target into Egghead down the hall, Egghead places the rifle against his shoulder, aiming down the direct center of the hall and downwards.

Darkness has posed:
Jackie immediately sights the three prostitutes after a quick once over of the room, silenced weapons locking on to two of them. Pulling the triggers, the only one remaining is the one on top of the target. Jackie sneers as the man finally comes to his senses, "Hey Obi Wan... use the Force.. try it.." His right hand pistol locks on to the third prostitute now..

Shadow King has posed:
    The man does 'try it'. The mental compulsion is sent, hard and fast, at the target directly in front of him, with a leer of expression. The Prostitute also is given one: she gets off him and leaps at Jackie, with a feral looking snarl on her face. The man extends a hand sideways towards the freezers, with a clear intent to interact with them in some way: maybe telekinetics: a lid starts to lift.

    Egghead's way is clear, there's nobody apparent in the hallway or in their way.

Egghead has posed:
The mercenaries line up outside the door, with one directly beside the door, up against the wall, one to the diagonal, barely out of sight, and the other two in front of it directly. They all slide on brass knuckles, the chosen weapon of the street thug, as Egghead hears the last prostitute inside.

"We are in position, force one. Engage or report if unable to achieve your objective."

Darkness has posed:
Jackie laughs as he involuntarily flees the room and jumps over to the balcony next door. He doesn't bother shouting his thoughts, after all this is supposed to be covert. Losing precious seconds, Jackie regains his mind after landing next door, and he calls upon The Darkness armor, gaining the strength to quickly jump back over. He scans the room again, firing on the last prostitute as soon as he is visible. All that is left now is Jackie and the target. By now there are multiple tendrils extending from Jackie, the two largest close to his shoulders manifesting heads filled with razor sharp teeth, and glowing red eyes. Jackie's voice isn't quite normal at this point, being a fusion of The Darkness and his own, "You have no idea what you are dealing with. Run away... keep running. I'll even give you a head start you fucking speck of DIRT.." One of the headed tendrils darts towards the target in hopes of setting him off.

Shadow King has posed:
        "Oh?" Says the telepath, their target. He's angry as hell, obviously, teeth bared. He basically just pulled up his pants. He lacks a shirt, though. He backed off to the door, but still has his hand extended towards the freezer. It's open, and there are white tentacle-like vines coming out of it. Slow, as they were chilled, but there are horrors emerging from it, much like Jackie's tendrils, really. Except these are physical: these are a different kind of monstrous nightmare.

    "We'll see," he mocks, and runs out his door, and abruptly into the hallway. He was focused elsewhere, not looking into the hallway at all mentally. He'll probably pay for that.

Egghead has posed:
The man beside the door sweeps around to give the telepath a hard knock on the side of his head, or at least attempt to, with his brass knuckles, before the two in front lash out with their brass knuckles, a torrent of body blows. And then, the fourth, at the diagonal angle, comes rushing in with a shove and an underhanded jam at the liver from the back.

Egghead stands at the far end of the hallway, walking forward carefully with his gun at his shoulder, waiting for the man to get forced in his direction from a right turn.

Darkness has posed:
Jackie laughs as his quarry escapes. Jackie does not pursue, instead focusing his attention on the other tendrils rising from the freezer. The first headed tendril turns as the target flees, teeth bent on crunching one of the fungi. The second headed tendril attempts the same on another fungi tendril, albeit seconds later. Jacker is shooting other fungi manifestations with his pistols.

Shadow King has posed:
    The telepath can't scream, too much of a liver shot for that. He can pulse an immaterial power, though, throwing everyone in his immediate vicinity off of him, and runs a few more steps, into Edgar's sights. He partially turns, leering, to 'finish off' the men that pounced on him, beaten and bleeding, but not down.

    Inside the apartment, two dog-sized fungal monstrocities are easing their way out of the freezer. They look, really, like overgrown Face-Huggers out of an Aliens movie, feeling around and orienting towards any good targets. They're strong; the bullets do lodge in them, though, and it looks like lots of bullets can tear big holes in them when focused. A fanged phantom tentacle bites at one of the creatures, and is able to bite off one tendril of fungus, while they advance quickly at Jackie. If they can get to him, they'll try to rip his limbs off in return.

Egghead has posed:
The thugs on top of the telepath are thrown aside, falling into the walls and down the hall.

Egghead fires the tranquilizer gun several times, shooting and re-nocking, until the cartridge of darts is empty. He aims at the unshirted man's chest and stomach, angling his rifle down at his shoulder at a faint incline to make sure that he's aiming at the center of mass, making him far more difficult to evade - particular inside the close quarters of the hallway.

"Force three reports trap sprung successfully."

Darkness has posed:
Jackie keeps laughing as the fungus growths attack him. His armor prevents the bulk of the damage but he does feel the pain of their impact. He yells out in pain, "FUCK!" Tearing away from them he sprints towards the balcony again, leaping off, fully aware that he will land on his feel mostly unharmed.

Shadow King has posed:
    The telepath is struck by two, three of the shots before he starts to evade, but by then, there's no way that he'll do much. He goes down with an angry sound, collapsing in the hallway.

    Within the apartment, the squid-fungal creatures don't chase Jackie: they see the prostitutes, and are distracted by that. They don't give chase on anyone, yet.

Egghead has posed:
"Door shut, force two," Egghead says, as the mercenaries get back to their feet. They close the door, then Egghead motions them over.

The four mercenaries grab the man, each taking a limb, as the sufficiently less athletic Egghead leads them down the flight of stairs, hauling off their prize.

Shadow King has posed:
    "Stop that," the old woman admonishes as her dog barks towards the stairwell. She gets maybe a glimpse of one of the men. "Leave those boys alone," she says, opening the door to her apartment and heading inside slowly. It seems they have gotten away with their target without issues, beyond that, anyway.

Darkness has posed:
Jackie is staring back up towards the balcony where he junped from, alert for any pursuing... entities. Pistols in hand he backs away towards the property's exit, ready to fire on anything trying to come after him. As far as he is concerned the mission is accomplished and he gets his cut of the money.

Lex Luthor has posed:
Getting back to the 'abandoned' warehouse, there's one thing that is decidedly new within; a UPS delivery truck, with plates and everything. At the back are two heavily obscured and armored individuals with sub-machine guns. The gas mask and lensed eye sockets, along with the hoods, give nothing away of the two... other then their shapes suggesting two males. One of the two steps forward, "We'll take it from here." Taking the as-of-yet unused control collar and placing it on the drugged telepath, the two then bring the target into the back of the truck... the inside of which is dark, but enough can be made out there some sort of cell in there that the man is placed into. The doors are closed with a click, and the truck starts to drive away casually into the night.

Back in the office, there are six new windows. Each showing different screens; anonymous account transfers of some kind, each into the various accounts that were given for payout for this mission.

Apparently, The Voice was satisfied with their work, as each member received the promised 100,000, which each man can confirm on their own.