mdk

The Final Hazard

With all hell breaking loose yet again, it was hard for Luca to process what the police-knights had said. He had a nagging feeling, growing stronger, that something very significant was just uttered -- something crucial. But he simply didn't have the brainpower to think it through yet. The thought was rattling around in his mind and it would make sense eventually -- the biometric pass -- but not yet.

For now, he was back in instinctual mode. Priority one is to protect human life -- even if it's your own. He was standing near another human, Ariett, and bullets were flying. He grabbed her and pulled her towards some semblance of cover. There wasn't much to speak of -- only the bombed-out Rolls-Royce -- but that would have to do. While they ran, that feeling of something important -- that glim is the biometric pass -- kept getting louder. He couldn't help but think he could figure it out, if everyone would just stop fighting for a second. Stop everyone fighting.... biometric pass..... No. There was no time to think. He put his head down and continued to tug and shove Ariett towards the wreckage.

Oi, politidorks, hit me up with some nuanced articles you've been reading lately.

He Will Not Divide Us heist

It's only peripherally political, but lordy lordy, it's pretty amazing.

The Final Hazard

<Snipped quote by mdk>
Ariett rolled over and latched onto Luca's arm, wincing as he helped pull her up. "Thanks." Upon seeing the remains of the remaining two 'thugs', she visibly sagged. "I'm fine, I think. A bit sore, I guess, but whatever damage the metal did it promptly sealed right back up." Her gaze lingered on the spear-laden bodies before turning her attention fully to the kid. "You took quite a few tumbles yourself, and you look none the worse for the wear—the advantages of youth, I guess?"

@Holmishire

Luca didn't even seem to notice the various bumps and scratches he had received until she said something about all that. He shrugged. "...You're teasing, right?" he chuckled. The chuckle grew a little more awkward when it became clear she hadn't been teasing. "That is, I mean.... uh....." he kicked at the ground. It should be so obvious that I'm a clockwork, he thought, struggling to think of a polite way to point that out. He came up dry. "Yeah.... youth......"

The Final Hazard

"Let's see if we can get to the university without any more deaths," he said with an almost cheerful sound in his voice and he looked at the others. "Anyone want to take bets on that?"

@WiseDragonGirl

Luca thought of a pithy rejoinder while he was standing up, but his proximity to Donny forced him to keep it mostly internal. There was a soft, mumbled beginning of a word, then a look of suddenly-dawned awareness and abject terror, and the words died in his throat with an awkward squeak. "Ixnay on the okesjay," he muttered, white-faced.

@Holmishire

He needed a distraction, and a metaphorical security blanket between himself and Donny, the newly-arrived-but-equally-violent knights.... all of it. He found all of that in Ariett. Things had slowed down enough that now for the first time her injury was really registering in his mind. Now he also remembered how she'd tried to slow him down during his bullish rush towards suicide-by-redhead, and looking at the metallic scar-pattern on her back, he realized why she'd cried out in pain. It was MY fault, he thought, and then he followed that up with a few self-depreciating internal comments about what an idiot he was. He offered her a hand to get up. "Are you okay?" he asked.

The Final Hazard

Ariett remains lying on the ground in the same position as before as she tries to avoid drawing attention to herself in these trying times.

@Holmishire

Luca, too, remained motionless.His mind was racing like Donny's, but he was thinking about all the wrong things -- I am in so much trouble, oh my god why is this happening to me, what did I do to deserve this, and so on. Thoughts of no utility to the group and no consequence to the scene playing out. The dangerous folks were scary, and Luca was scared, and that was about the size of it. He didn't move a millimeter.

The Final Hazard

Luca wasted no time in doing exactly as he was instructed. His sudden collision with Donny had not resulted in immediate death, and the gunman had even spoken -- coherently, no less -- without shooting anybody first. Luca was chalking all of these things up in the 'win' column, whether they had anything to do with his outburst or not.

He took no preparatory posture, nor did he announce himself to the authorities, nor demand any information from them. He didn't so much as glance up at the newly-arrived authority figures. He simply placed his hands in the appropriate position and lay perfectly, precisely motionless. Except for the ticking, he made no sound at all -- an observer might even wonder if he was breathing. He wasn't, at least, not in the traditional sense -- but then the only person near enough to notice would have been Donny. Probably. Some of the others certainly seemed perceptive, so who could say?

TTL: The Final Hazard OOC

<Snipped quote by Terminal>

Please let this mean we get another Luca. The more the merrier.

@Doc Doctor

TTL: The Final Hazard OOC

Only @mdk still needs to post, and I suspect they were mainly waiting for Donny to act.

@Terminal

Indeed. It is now done.

The Final Hazard

@Holmishire

Ariett's chucked backpack registered on some level of Luca's mind, though it was only a glancing contact and it didn't really slow him down. He hardly would have taken note at all, but for the soft-scream that accompanied it. Damn it, he thought. That's his fault, too!

It wasn't. If Luca had been thinking clearly, he would have realized that Donny had only acted to protect himself, and by association the rest of the occupants of the vehicle. If it hadn't been for Donny, they all might be dead. Luca wasn't thinking clearly, so he didn't think any of these things. Instead, he thought grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr or something along those lines. In the vastly-superior future civilization from which Luca came, great thinkers, psychologists, brain-wave scientists and the like had termed these sorts of thoughts "freaking the fuck out." Such a concept, alien though it may have seemed to the primitives in the modern era, described Luca's mental state perfectly. He charged on.

@platinumskink

Amelie had a bit more luck slowing the wild idiot's progress, but only a little. His sprint turned abruptly to the left, so that, without losing momentum or balance, he was suddenly running towards (and punching blindly at) a wall. He stopped short of actually striking said wall, bewildered. How in the hell...... THIS IS HIS FAULT TOO! GGGGRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR...... Luca wheeled back around and ran at Donny anew.

@Doc Doctor

From this new angle of approach, Luca could actually see the glint of the garrote wire a little better than when he was running head-on. Not that he recognized it as a garrote wire, per se -- more of a grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. A dangerous grrrrrr to be sure, but still just a grrrrrrrrrrr. He launched himself at the hitman and threw a mighty punch.

In the end, it was his own error that spared him from the wire. He ought to have known better than to initiate a leap in hazardous gravity conditions. His momentum carried him over the red-headed object of his rage, and face-first into the twisted roof of the blown-out Royce. He ricocheted off it with a metallic clunk, made louder by his own metal componentry, and settled into a nearly-stationary zero-g hover. As luck would have it, this all occurred right over the hitman's prone and ready position.

Luca took another swing. He was too far away to reach. He took a second airborne swing just to confirm that he was out of range, then he tried (and failed) to swim his way over through the atmosphere. When at last it was clear that his efforts to inflict pain on the ginger were entirely futile, he let his arms drop. They floated instead, at awkward angles, but this was normal to Luca. "Dude, please stop killing everybody we meet." His voice was remarkably calm -- perhaps that whack on the head had done him some good. In his mind, some of the muted growling had dulled, and a new thought filled in the absence: be cool, be cool, be cool or he will cut you in half with his pinky.

TTL: The Final Hazard OOC

I mean I'm all for people doing whatever they like -- perhaps next round we ought to consider more god-like characters among the rest of us? Or not.