New Allies

[Ryker]

++++++

Oriena fucking admitted to it. The bloodied rag of a woman hurled those wraiths. He fucking knew it! Their remains crunched beneath his boots as he stalked closer, grinding the bits as he did.
“Did it hurt, Oriena?” he repeated himself. The sound of her name was nails cragged on his tongue. And now he knew the answer.

His fists balled. He didn’t need a knife to finish her. A flick of his hands would do it.

Mikhail popped up, but Ryker shook his head. “After,” he said, pushing through with obvious intent.

Oriena’s defense was pathetic. Weak. Useless. She admitted as much, and he nodded. Everyone assumed he had some guiding sense of honor that bound his rules of engagement. They assumed wrong.  Weak was just as he preferred, “Makes it easier for me.” He snarled when her soggy hair flailed backward. He was going to kill her properly this time. Consequences be damned. Videos could be scrubbed. Falsities written. He knew better than most. He orchestrated that kind of shit around the world.

Course, last time it landed him in prison in the fucking west for years. But it was a passing thought.

Such was his surprise when a pound landed square on his chest. He flew, world blurring, landing on his back that crushed the air from his lungs.

The sense of a power-user hovered before the shadow overtook the sky. The world fell black as the last thing he saw was the mother fucking uniform of a Dominion.

((ooc: Authorities arrive in the company of one of the rods of dominion, binding him up, and barely saving Oriena’s life. While he’s unconscious, you can assume he is bound with a sort of eye-covering neck-brace device and hauled away in a truck while the others investigate.))

[Mikhail]

Mik turned slightly to glance back over his shoulder at Ori over, looking her up and down. Yeah whatever those things had been had done a number on all'a them. She seemed like she'd gone toe to toe with something that threw her around like a rag doll.

But Doll was still standin'. Swaying....but standing. He jerked his chin at her and shot her a grin of respect. Yeah, only a bitch died on their knees.

The sounds of the sirens stopped and he noted all the commotion as cars emptied. Ryker wasn't stupid. Nah. I mean with cops around? Cameras? He didn't know what had happened between them, but it was past time they got the fuck outta there.
He started to walk by him, lightly tugging on his shoulder to draw him away. He'd go, Mik knew. They'd laugh about the night over drinks.

The power dissipated, tired of being held so tightly for so long. Which was fine. They were heading out...

He was stunned as Ryker shrugged him off as if he wasn't bailing. Said as much. He turned, surprised? The fuck was he...? The thought trailed off as the man started to advance on Ori.

Mik fumbled for the power and nothing came. He touched the lighter in his pocket and....damn!!! Nothing. He realized he was tired. He tried again. And again, looking at Ori in alarm. He didn't have anything against men and women fighting. He knew women were just as cruel and hurtful as men could be.

But Ryker would beat her to a pulp. And it just didn't seem like a good game. Now if she hadn't been thrashed within an inch of her life from those things....

He grabbed at the man's shoulder. "Ryker!-" before he could do more, the man flew back as if punched in the chest. A man in black was moving toward them with purpose. Mik tried to say something but before anything could come out, he was flying through the air, head bouncing off the ground.

Just fucking great...

[Nhysa]

Nhysa gave a short sigh as the sirens drew closer. Like little rapscallions the feuding between the two had begun anew, though the laughing boy at least made some attempt to settle the spirited emotions. Despite her stated intention, she observed a while longer, hopeful it might resolve itself without her having to yank the two by either scruff. She’d taken half a step forward when the rumble of an unmarked van caught her attention, and now she was precisely where she did not wish to be. The Dominion bound his quarry and removed him quickly, and then only the more ordinary authorities and first responders mingled among them. It seemed quite the perfect time to slip away, and yet after a moment Nhsya’s arms folded. She stared flatly at the woman who had drawn her here. Nothing pulled any longer, but she had been given the knowledge for a reason. Or the suspicion anyway. 

Something tainted that dark soul, stirring at the flames of kinship. A hospital waited. Questions to follow. Perhaps the Facility after that, if the destruction wrought here transpired to be less incidental that it appeared at first glance. Nhysa should feel no sisterhood, and yet in the same way she had been reluctant to harm the vampiric creatures for their simple nature, she was inclined to protect broken things. And that one was most definitely broken.

She shot Li a sly smile, like perhaps she blamed him for her new bout of conscience, and then she plunged herself into the hive of busy worker bees assessing the damage and those still standing in it. No one here had clearance to know who she was, but authority was an aroma men usually responded to. She picked her way over the debris, glancing briefly at the unconscious victim on the ground -- or what she could see of him, anyway, as the ambulance crews began their work. The excited or distressed tones of various eyewitnesses effusing their stories to police and each other brushed her attention with amusement more than interest.

The woman had stubbornly clawed herself to her feet, and was presently fussed over by a member of the ambulance crew who seemed to regard her with all the wariness of a feral cat being tempted into a trap box. Without pause, Nhysa’s hand wrapped around the woman’s bloodied arm. The muscles tensed underneath, like she contemplated lashing out. But there was such a glaze in her eyes Nhysa suspected the main of her concentration was plied simply into keeping her feet. She almost had the urge to tickle the woman under her chin for such adorably fierce pride.

Instead she turned her attention on the first responder. “I will take it from here,” she said.

The man’s eyes flicked her up and down. Nhysa’s clothes were nondescript, just black on black. But her expression was direct, her sharp gaze unwavering. A little discomfort flickered as he looked away, as sometimes people did when they gazed unknowing into the eyes of a killer. Usually it made Nhysa smirk, that subconscious recoil. Today she just waited for it to do its work. “CDPS can question her after she’s been treated. She’s in no fit state.”

“Do I look like a monster?” Brief amusement pulsed her dark gaze, but her chin angled for the challenge. “She will be cared for first. See to the others that need attention.” She did not wait now for a response, just began to move away. For one irritating second she thought that the moment the woman’s feet unrooted from the ground she was going to fall, which would have been a marginal inconvenience. But she only shuffled with a wince and staggered so heavily it was quite fortunate that despite Nhysa’s small stature she was strong. Or maybe it was a scowl. Hard to tell in that swollen face. Either way, she moved. The man's expression twitched unhappily, but he let them go with the mutter of a rather delightful curse under his breath.

[[Exiting the thread now so you're all free to wrap up or move on as you wish]]

[Tan Li]

[ continued here ]