[center][url=https://www.roleplayerguild.com/posts/5635989][img]https://i.imgur.com/Bk3nW6o.png[/img][/url]
[color=crimson][b][h3]Φ PAYBACK Φ[/h3]Meeting Room[/b][/color][/center]
One long gulp of coffee. Maybe two. Myla sat in one of the folding chairs, listened to the way it squealed under each person’s weight. The team itself wasn’t all that impressive, sure, a mismatch of goody two-shoes like ‘Lightning Girl’ - fukkin nightmare of time she seemed to be - and near-psychopaths like Eclipse, who as far as Myla could tell was just…Red Ring to the max. Dude needed to switch-up his theme, really, show some self-respect. Oh, and a few near-crazies.

It almost reminded Myla of prison.

Then a new guy came in, someone that Myla didn’t really recognize, along with the boss. Well, that wasn’t all that uncommon. She didn’t know a lot of the people who hung around the place. They just kinda kept to themselves, most of the time. She didn’t really blame them. All the had to talk to was either one-another, the boy scouts, or former criminals. Out of that group, she’d probably choose the first option too. It just seemed a bit safer.

[quote][i]"So, we've had a problem. Our afternoon shift has had to be redeployed to SDN Pasadena. And your dispatcher has been reallocated for another task. Too complicated to explain, but, in a nutshell, we need you to work late. This is James Speight. Some of you may have worked with him, but he'll be your interim dispatcher. He knows SDN well. Treat him with respect, and he'll get you through this afternoon."[/i][/quote]
The sound of cracking knuckles echoed through the bare room. Myla turned her head to it, staring for a moment at the cause. Did she know the guy? Was there…something there? Ex’s? Hell, she really didn’t know. The smile seemed to have something there that was different to that kinda energy though. In any case, Myla just shook her head at it, breathing out. 

As the girl scout kept on by asking for extra pay, that second fact stuck out to her. Yeah, work late. She knew they wouldn’t be getting any time off the next day, or a week from now. Getting paid back like that just didn’t happen. So, hey, a shit day today, a shit start tomorrow, great. Seemed they were, though. ‘Standard rate of overtime’. Boss kept on talking, though, even as the girl scout had gotten put in her place. What she deserved, anyways. The conversation got cut down pretty quick though, and they were off.

Another gulp of coffee as they all stared to file out of the meeting room. There was a good reason why Myla didn’t like to run around in that stupid building. Always bad news, always annoying fukkin people, always a stupid time. The warmth of that free coffee from the break room was the nicest thing there. She raised it up again, just a little sip while walking along. She’d need that.

[hr][center][color=crimson][b]Dispatch Parking Lot[/b][/color][/center]
Myla had her bag over the shoulder, leaning on the back of a bench while the new dispatch guy seemed to settle in. The shape of a little rubber ruler made itself known in her pocket, a little 6 inch yellow and happy thing you’d expect from an elementary school. What was the name…Paul? Paul’s desk was kinda like that. Lots of little things here and there. She’d seen that knitted container full of rulers and just knew she had to have one. Why? Well, hey, because she could.

Yeah, it was another reason why she never liked being in that building. Too much stuff. Too many people used to looking out for their stuff. Paul definitely wasn’t the kinda guy to be used to that. Sucks. The rubber ear-piece snapped to life, though, and a tinny little voice came on through. Well. Several tinny little voices.

[quote][i]"Okay, A-Team, appreciate the change in plan is a bit different. Keep the comms clear, and I'll get you through this. Sending co-ordinates, first batch of calls are screened and allocated. I hate this from a compliance standpoint more than you do. But let's focus on the overtime pay and keeping the subscribers happy."

"This is bullshit. I was going to actually go to the DTLA ball, go see how…”

"Yeah, well, let's focus on the here and now. We'll stop at 4pm for a breather. Then keep going till 7pm, like we discussed. You won't needed early in the morning because the shift pattern's moved." James added, trying to make some sort of speech, but he was equally as pissed about it. "Oh, and Solaris, if your.....companion decides she wants to rear her head, remind her, she needs to get a pass if she wants to get in the building at the end of the night. I'm not dealing with security."[/i][/quote]
She [i]really[/i] was tempted to take the thing out. Who the fuck cares about a ball? Was that tonight? Shit, Myla might care about that. It would have been [i]perfect[/i] to take some things, especially maybe a fe- no, [i]no[/i]. Stealing some cars would be bad, especially from the place where all her alleged co-workers would be. That wouldn’t go well. ‘You don’t shit where you eat’ and all that. Then the various locations came on in. 

[quote][i]"Okay, Solaris, I have reports of a drug bust going wrong, officers in need of assistance, multiple assailants. Pin sent. Non-lethal if you can, let's talk them down."

"Uhhh, Payback, I've got reports of some trouble at the AMOCA, someone trying to break in and steal some art. Need you on that one. It's all ceramics, so mind your magnets, would you?"

"Eclipse, I've got a school that's asking for us to cover a speech that Meta-Man was gonna be at. Can you go there?”[/i][/quote]
Myla listened for her own friggin thing, but hey - there were a few different things that she clicked in on. Drug bust gone wrong, yeah that sounded about right but there wasn’t enough information. How many, what sort of wea- hey, there was her call. AMOCA…the fuck was that? Museum, ‘Ceramic Art’. Who the hell steals art in the middle of the day? What kind of amateur hour nonsense was this? 

She exhaled at it, rummaging about her pocket for the most wrinkled map known to mankind. AMOCA, AMOCA…down in Pomona. E Holt Ave, then down on South Garey. Had she been there before? Probably. Of course, while thinking that through the call for Eclipse came. [i]A school[/i]. What a joke. What a real big joke. Yeah, we’ll send the drug-guy to a school for a talk Meta-Man was going to go to. Poor friggin kids, expect Meta-Man and get [i]that[/i]. She wasn’t the only one who thought that, though, because another voice came in.

[quote][i][color=gray]"Idiot."[/color][/i][/quote]
[i]Yeah that was right[/i]. She would have laughed, really, if it didn’t look so crazy. Putting the map away, she tapped a response out on the Timex.

[color=crimson]”K.”[/color]
[hr][center][color=crimson][b]American Museum of Ceramic Arts[/b][/color][/center]
Well, maybe [i]that[/i] was why the amateurs were trying for the middle of the day. AMOCA was closed.

She stood outside the place, watching as a van had pulled up in the parking lot out back. A group of maybe five or so, all in blue coveralls, were moving boxes in and out, in and out, another guy standing to the side with a clip-board like he was all official. Maybe they weren’t amateurs after all, trying for the ‘Act like you belong’ shtick. Yeah, cool for em. Sucked that whatever they were trying for clearly hadn’t really worked all that well. What, did it have some kind of silent alarm? Weird museum, honestly. It wasn’t even that big a building, though, most of it being one floor with a little tower of another. Had she been there before? It felt familiar. Maybe.

The bag was still slung over her shoulder. Yeah, she’d wait it out. Just a little bit. Hey, that was a pretty interesting building over…there, yeah, real pretty building. Look around down this way or the street and that like she was waiting for a ride. Let em all keep on moving, keep on moving…yeah, a few were waiting around the end of the van. They were about finished. Great. Good. Move the bag off the shoulder, crouch down to mess with it…unzip the end just halfway. Last two boxes were coming out. Yeah, was about time for that.

Myla got up, brisk-walked across the street real, real fast. Clip-board dude noticed first, pointing with the end of his pen. Other guys turned around, beetle-brows raised at the idea that someone would run up [i]then[/i]. The two with boxes set em down, clearly ready for some kind of problem or another. She brought the bag up into the crook of her shoulder though, wrapping an arm around it. A quick unzip. She could see their eyes grow like saucers. Holy fuck, it was perfect.

The pull of a cord. Four Type 50 bulbs flashed off, reflecting from the hidden cone in a flash that could be described only as ‘biblical’. Stark shadows painted out from each of the guys, the little green columns by the door, reflected off of the windows too. Each of them screamed, hands coming up as she pulled the cord again. Another flash. Another painting of shadows, the windows lighting-up like snow in the sun.

Drop the bag, hand going for the metal rod in her belt, Myla took it out before whipping the thing down to the ground. Nearly two feet of metal baton was there, then, and she held out one hand. Just a pull there, that magnetic field, and pass the rod on through…she  could feel it flex in her hand…and it seemed to crackle just a bit. Three were still on the ground, hands to eyes as the sirens sounded in the distance. One got up quicker than the rest, eyes pinched. Reach out with the baton like it was a pointing, and she zapped the first right there on the forehead. He stumbled back as the other two, who were trying to get up, took a pause.

“We didn’t sign up for this, man. Look. It’s all neat, too,” complained one still on the ground.

“Shut the hell up, Keith. We [i]know[/i].”

She could see them still thinking through their odds of getting out, making a run for it, and passed the baton through her hand again. It crackled again. The guys against the side of the van swallowed, eyes fixed for a second on that before they looked at something else. The cops had finally came into view. Yeah, they deflated. What suckers. She watched for a bit as the cops did their shtick, got em cuffed and handled into the cars, then for the evidence people from the police came in to get the van and everything else.

Fuck it, was a Jack in the Box on the way over. Might as well have something real quick. She tapped out on the Timex, though, before making her way down the street.

[color=crimson]”Break in done. All good.”[/color]