Pundii

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This looks rather interesting, out of curiosity - what do you mean by 'synthetics'? People with cybernetic enhancement, or robots?

🦄 Darker Than Black - Merged With T.S.

Jeremy Bennet

Location: Roof of the renovated building
Interacting With: Detective Gregory @Lady Amalthea

Jeremy would be lying if he said he hadn't been hoping someone was up there, he'd been itching for some sort of a fight. Alas, he was let down yet again, there was definitely signs of a fight, the footsteps, the blood, and generally the disturbed muck and grime of the roof. He was just a few minutes too late to the party. Hearing the footsteps behind him, he spun around, half-expecting to get attacked from behind when he saw the detective. Looking him up and down, it was pretty clear Roy had a much more difficult time getting up there than he had. "Duly noted." He nodded his head simply to Roy's threat, turning back around to look over the roof, watching as Roy moved to pick up the cigarette butt.

"Alright, well, give me a pair of those gloves, so I don't uh... 'tamper with evidence.'" He commented, reaching out to take a pair from the detective and slip them on, a rather sarcastic tone to his voice as he began to wander about, muttering something under his breath akin to "I'm an archaeologist, not a detective..." Kneeling down, he tapped a finger against one of the smaller bits of blood on the ground, looking over it on his fingers as he rubbed it in idly, thinking. It was more than obvious to himself, and he assumed to some of the other locals that this was more than a coincidence, first block party in six months, and another supposed 'suicide' - though the suicide angle of this one was far less convincing than it had been six months ago.

Something in Jeremy knew this had to do with Gerard yet again, it wasn't as direct as Peyton's death, but he just had that feeling, that impossible-to-shake twisting feeling in his stomach that he was already falling behind, that he needed to start moving, and fast. He'd put off going to see Gerard's daughter since he got out of prison, he didn't want to drag her into this if he could avoid it, but as much as he hated to admit it to himself - Jeremy had no clue where he was going with this by himself, he needed help. Letting out a sigh, Jeremy stood and moved toward the ledge, peering down to the party, right down onto Danica and the crowd surrounding her. It seemed a few of the others from the Heights were trying to keep the reporters away while the girl examined the body, it didn't exactly look like an easy job.

Then the glint caught his eye.

Adjusting his gaze closer to the building, he narrowed his eyes at the glint coming from the windowsill below him, there it was, the shell casing. "Found it, it's on the window sill below..." Jeremy remembered there was no floor in that hallway, there wasn't going to be a very easy way to get down there. Looking over to Roy, he sighed again, the detective definitely wasn't going to be able to get it on his own, he'd struggled enough getting up to the roof in the first place. "I'll... I'll go get it." He grumbled, having no real desire to end up falling off that building and ending up as the next part of these reporter's story.

"Hell, at least maybe i'll get on tv." He muttered to himself as he moved up to the very edge, peering down and looking for the best way to approach. "This is... Probably not a good idea." He concluded finally before he jumped down, there was some scaffolding below them, it was a ways from the window sill but it'd be a good starting point. Unfortunately, the wood he landed on wasn't quite as strong as it looked, and a half-second after he landed he heard a loud snap as the wood broke and he started to fall again. "Oh, goddammit!" He exclaimed as a hand shot up, just managing to take hold of the metal beam as he hung there, wooden planks making a relatively loud bang against the metal supports below him.

Letting out a sigh of relief, Jeremy brought his other hand up, hanging from both on the metal bar and locking his eyes on the next step, a smaller brick outcropping ahead of him. The climb began, no support line, no safety net, and as he went along, fingers clinging to thin and weak brick outcroppings as he shimmied and crawled along the outside wall of the building, he realised - this was what he lived for. The rush, the adrenaline, even the fear of falling five stories to his death alongside Danica. Hell, the fact he was putting on a show for the reporters didn't hurt either, it worked up such a feeling within him that he hadn't felt in a long time, since he went to prison. He loved it.

For all the grumbling and complaining, Jeremy was at the top of the world right now, and it was just making him more and more the risk-taker. near the window now, he was as close as he was going to get climbing safely, shifting his body to the left, he took a deep breath before thrusting it to the right, pushing off the wall with his feet and jumping, a brief rush of air going past him as he was thrust over to the window, arms wrapping around the Sill to catch himself firmly, one hand slapping down on the casing so it didn't fly off. Letting out a sigh of relief, he brought up his right hand and opened it carefully, looking over the shell casing as it sat neatly in his gloved palm. Carefully, he wrapped it in the same glove as he climbed through the window back inside, carefully making his way along the gutted interior and back up to the roof, more covered in dirt and grime now, along with a few more scrapes on his hands as he held the casing out toward Roy.

"Remind me not to become a detective."

🦄 Darker Than Black - Merged With T.S.

Jeremy Bennet

Location: The Block Party
Interacting With: Detective Gregory @Lady Amalthea, Lyle @Scallop, Lana @Charnobylisk, Riley @Nallore, Cecily @Morose

Jeremy had seen bodies, plenty of different kinds, too. From ancient skeletons to fellow explorers killed by traps, or, more likely, each other, but just because he'd seen a fair few in his time didn't quite mean he was okay with it. He spotted the falling shape out of the corner of his eye, and it didn't take him too long to piece together what it was. The music, the sounds of conversation, everything at that point seemed to blur out as he fixed his gaze on the falling figure for a moment, only keeping his eyes there for a moment before moving them up toward the roof, where the body had come from in the first place.

Thud.

A scream came from elsewhere in the party as the body crashed down on the table and shattered it. That scream, along with the piece of metal striking one of the women beside him, snapped him out of his little trance as he looked back to the body finally. Eyes wide and lifeless, blood pooling beneath her, bullet hole in the side of her head, he hadn't known her personally, but Jeremy did know who it was - Danica, that was her name, he was pretty sure. There was one thing that stood out though, bruises on her face and knuckles, the sight of them triggered a series of thoughts which brought Jeremy's gaze back up to the roof, an expression of realization crossing his face as he stood there.

That same realization pushed him into action finally, the world finally seeming to be back to normal around him as he rushed to the door of that same building Danica had fallen from. He tried the handle, locked. He could have gone around, found a different way up, a back door maybe, but by then if someone was up on the roof they could've been gone, slipped right under his nose in the interim, no, he was going this way. Taking a step back, he drove the heel of his left foot into the ground, bringing his right up and leaning forward as he kicked near the lock of the door. Luckily, the door still appeared to be older than the renovations, as it broke open with relative ease following Jeremy's kick.

Moving inside, Jeremy took a quick look around to take in the surroundings, no stairs, of course, but a room to his right had a hollowed out roof, along with some scaffolding and a few still-hanging shelves on the walls, it'd do. Picking up the pace, Jeremy got a running start and jumped up, hand taking a firm grip of one of the metal supports holding up the scaffolding. Reaching up with his free hand, he grabbed onto another and hauled himself upward, climbing ontop of the first bit of scaffolding, farthest from the door out. A quick glance around the room put him on to his next move, taking a running jump along the wall, he reached up and took hold of one of the shelves still hanging on the wall, praying that it would hold his weight.

Luck was on Jeremy's side this time, and he was able to get a stable grip on it to jump for the doorway, grabbing onto the ledge at its base and pulling himself up into the hallway on the second floor, just three more to go. Luckily this floor had at least part of the stairway still intact, and with a little effort, he was on the third floor. Jeremy just hoped the last few floors would be as easy a climb.

They weren't.

On the third floor, another hollowed out room, no floor or roof, scaffolding about, and an open window to the fire escape. Another run and jump got him onto the scaffolding, but he was still quite a ways from the window. Eyes shifting around the room, they settled on another shelf hanging on the wall between himself and the window. "Well, worked out last time..." He muttered to himself, leaping outward and grabbing onto the shelf.

This one didn't support his weight. "Crap!" As one end of the shelf broke off the wall, Jeremy struggled to maintain a grip as he was swung down and along, reacting out of instinct more than anything, he thrust his body forward and let go, reaching out his hands and just barely taking hold of the window sill as he took a moment to look down. "Okay, let's not try that again." Hauling himself up and through onto the window, Jeremy began to climb up the fire escape to bypass the last few floors to the fifth. Climbing in through another window, he made his way to the stairs leading up to the roof, pushing the door open and moving outside carefully, eyes shifting around.

🦄 Darker Than Black - Merged With T.S.

@Lady Amalthea

Vague is my middle name! I'll make sure to make the climb appropriately dangerous/eventful. (Thank god Climbing is a skill)

🦄 Darker Than Black - Merged With T.S.

Alright, i'm awake and have an appropriate amount of coffee, time for someone to head up to the roof!

🦄 Darker Than Black - Merged With T.S.

@Lady Amalthea
Cookies and huggles are an acceptable apology, all is forgiven!

🦄 Darker Than Black - Merged With T.S.

That's one way to kick off the action, i'll try to put together a reaction post tonight, if not tomorrow!

P.s. I'm hurt, A, left me out of the tags </3

🦄 Darker Than Black - Merged With T.S.

Jeremy Bennet

Location: The Block Party
Interacting With: Detective Gregory @Lady Amalthea, Lyle @Scallop, Lana @Charnobylisk

Jeremy's eyes followed the cap as it flew off Roy's bottle toward the back of a reporter's head. A semi-impressed smirk split his lips as he took another drink, likely looking just as guilty as the detective beside him when the reporter looked in their direction. "Must be a slow night for the news, six months and all they can do is still gawk over it." He commented in response to the detective, gaze shifting back over to him, and then along to the woman he'd spotted behind him, looking in their direction and commenting about the reporters. Unable to help himself, probably because of the beer, he shot a wink in her direction before looking back to the detective. "Regina Eilheart?" He questioned rather naively before the detective asked his last question.

"Oh, heh, names Jeremy, Jeremy Bennet, I uh, only moved in a couple weeks ago, was out of the country for a while." He left it at that, figuring that the whole prison aspect of being out of the country was better left unsaid to the detective. Glancing around, Jeremy took in the general atmosphere of the party, took in the faces he knew - which wasn't many. He had begun to feel somewhat unprepared, it had seemed as though most of the partygoers had established the newcomer was someone worth talking to, and while he certainly wasn't upset by that, he felt like perhaps he should've done some more research into everyone at the heights, rather than a select few.

Jeremy's eyes settled on JD once more as he began to see her approach, called over by the woman on the other side of the table which seemed to be the new center of attention. He'd been about to shift around close to the two, when a new figure caught his eye, approaching himself and the detective. Glancing back over, he offered something of a half-smile to the man who approached and greeted them. "It's certainly something, more of a turnout than I was expecting." Jeremy fought the urge to make some quip about how the 'loyal protection of the PD' might have been useful the last time there had been a party such as this, but, in the effort of keeping some semblance of taste, decided against such an action.

Raising an eyebrow, Jeremy seemed legitimately surprised as Lyle brought up his own name, while he had done his own research on a few of the inhabitants, and by 'few' he meant JD and no one else, he hadn't quite anticipated the fact that some of the tenants might have done some research into him, and so it had caught him off guard a bit. "Yeah, yeah that's me. Figured it might be a good chance to meet some of the neighbours, y'know... Haven't really spoken to anyone since I got here." He chuckled with a shrug, glancing back around out of habit more than anything, before looking back toward Lyle. "Sorry, i'm bad with names but uh, you are..?"

🦄 Darker Than Black - Merged With T.S.

Jeremy Bennet

Location: The Block Party
Interacting With: Detective Gregory @Lady Amalthea

Jeremy hated parties where he didn't know anybody. He hated parties where he didn't quite feel like he fit in. Hell, Jeremy really just hated parties, the music, the drinks, the conversation, the people, the setting, all of it, it was all just so... Normal. Jeremy well and truly hated how dull the past few months had been since he got out of prison, no gunfights, no scaling cliff-faces or spelunking ancient temples and archaeological gold-mines for loot, none of that. Instead, he got this. A block party, at a place he'd only moved into a week or two ago, he still had barely anything in his apartment, a TV, computers, and boxes of files and parchments with the occasional trinket. A block party where he was standing alone, in a cheap pair of nicer trousers and shoes, a buttoned blue shirt and a black sweater, sipping a beer.

Normal.

The thought bit at Jeremy's ears like an eager lover looking for attention, prompting the man to take a long drink of the beer in his hand, and turn over the coin in his hand. It was a Spanish Doubloon, 18th Century, a good luck charm he'd picked up on one of his first expeditions in Mexico. He carried it with him everywhere, counted it as explanation for his immense luck, and if it wasn't good for that, it was at the very least good as a conversation starter. However that evening it was certainly seeming to be good for a whole lot of nothing. No conversation had been started, no luck had been needed, and all Jeremy had done up to that point was stand there, drink, shift the coin between his fingers and watch everyone that was there. He was only there because he figured it would seem odd if he was not, and because he knew who would be there, the woman he'd discovered was the partner of the deceased Peyton.

He set his eyes on her, JD Mason, he'd done a little research, knew she worked for Channel four and lived in one of the apartments next door, and that she had been Peyton's partner... That was about it. He was really rushing through this whole thing, but he didn't particularly want to miss out like he had a few years ago in Mexico City. He was about to move over when a figure passed right in front of him and picked up a drink, murmuring something about 'Parasites'. It didn't take Jeremy too long to piece things together, this was the detective who'd been speaking to the journalists and reporters, he'd looked into him as well, though didn't know a great deal in relation to him, either.

Deciding to put off approaching Mason, Jeremy moved after the detective and quickly finished his beer, replacing it one from the table that the detective had grabbed his own drink from, popping the cap off and glancing over to him with as charming of a smirk as he could produce. "Not a fan of the press, Detective?" He played off his comment in the most lax manner that he was able, simply trying to start a conversation for now, if he was going to get any information out of the Detective, he was going to have to butter him up first, after all. He just hoped something would happen that would let him do something other than mingle, other than getting information. It was the right setting, the right time, something had to happen.

Anything but normality.

🦄 Darker Than Black - Merged With T.S.

@Lady Amalthea

Fantastic! I'll try to have a post up as quick as I can, looking forward to getting into it!

And I felt I had to use one of my chars from yours, Joel was one of my favorites, he and Claire would have caused quite a bit of trouble! ^^