Little Black Heart (Ch. 2: Day 2)

Rachel · Posted: Sun Nov 28, 2010 10:07 pm

The Griffin couldn't help but smirk a little at Sheffer and Mako, who where pretty funny when they wanted to be (for Mako she thought it maybe accidental). The rest of her group set off to go snoop for the emerald that simply, under no circumstances, should be given to the toughest punching bag that's entered the tournament. Jack however, wanted to poke around in a different fashion. Knowing what little she did about Vince, she could assume that giving away something so very valuable or powerful in a tournament couldn't be as simple as a desire to draw in opponents. A sentiment she was getting the feeling Mary shared with her.

After Jack sheepishly got herself straight on everyone's name, she tipped her hat to each then leaned back looking at the group of strangers she found herself with, Jack was easily as relaxed as she had been with Sheffer and the others. Why? Because she's a sheriff, she deals with people at their worst and best, it made it easier for her to be friendly with people she didn't otherwise know. She looked over at Mary, the reporter, it was hard for her to get past her strong dislike of reporters, but Mary had made it a point to try and warn them about Vince. Strange as it was for a reporter to go of her way and keep something as sensational as Vince attempting to murder all them from happening.

"So Ember, ya'll from 'round he-" Jack abruptly stopped, her mouth hanging open mid-word. She jumped from her chair looking squarely at Mary all of a sudden, like the girl had suddenly burst into flames. "Yer a reporter!" she said, as if that was some kind of revelation. "Can't ya get in to see the big cheese fer an 'interview'?"

Mary's warnings obviously fell on deaf ears, and now Jack wanted to farther involve the lamb with herself and the others she recruited. "I'm sure you'd need a crew for camera's and stuff, you could do yer thing, and then we could get out. I know ya don't know me from Eve but, ain't that why yer here?"

It was obvious she just answered Embers inquiries as well. Jack's plan was to wing it. As she was so expertly doing at the moment.

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Maren · Posted: Mon Nov 29, 2010 6:05 pm

"GET BACK HERE YOU--" Snarled Mary at the boys, arsenal of expletives just waiting at the tip of her tongue when Jack suddenly said something that pulled her off her tirade and into attentiveness.

"Yer a reporter!" she said, as if that was some kind of revelation. "Can't ya get in to see the big cheese fer an 'interview'?"

"...Eh?" Mary turned around, brow quirked, giving the griffon a strange look. It was obvious where Jack was getting at with that statement, the real question in her mind was whether or not it was worth risking neck for.

"Depends on what ya fix on havin' me ask him." She retorted slowly.

They might have ultimately shared the same goal, but.. Most people got it twisted. She didn't become an investigative reporter to spread "truth" and "justice" to people or because she wanted to 'enforce morality' the way she suspected Jack's impression was; "good" and "evil" meant little in her vocabulary. They were just words, subjective opinions at best, that were almost as real to Mary as Saint Nick or the Tooth Fairy. Damn if she was going to risk her life over something that stupid, the only reason she helped the group at all was because she didn't need Vince growing suspicious of her while she tried to do things. Mary swore, if those saps even made THAT more trouble than it was worth, God help each and every last one of them from her wrath.

MuffinUnsane · Posted: Mon Nov 29, 2010 6:58 pm

Before Jack could intervene, Ember popped up from behind her. "Well what sorta questions do you ask famous people? Favorite color? Best pair of shoes? Love life? Boring stuff!"

Coming around to Mary's side, the bird leaned in close to the sheep as if they were close friends. "So will ya do it? You seem like such a nice person yes you do." Giving what she hoped was a winning smile, she asked again, "So...will ya do it? I'm sure people would love to hear more about this guy."

After a moment's pause, she added with a lower tone of voice, "Really like your voice by the way."

Rachel · Posted: Mon Nov 29, 2010 8:18 pm

Jack smirked a bit when Mary entertained the idea enough to hear more, she grinned when Ember jumped in to help. The Sheriff couldn't help but enjoy the birds enthusiasm. She crossed her arms smiling still as she nodded in agreement with Ember.

"I recken we'd draw the least 'mont of attention by askin' the same crap as normal. Then ask 'im 'bout the contest and his fabulous prizes. It's the same stuff ya would'a asked him anyway." She said confidently. "It'd be a great 'scoop'. what better incentive is there?"

Needless to say it was a pretty simple plan, with little risk involved to those involved.

Maren · Posted: Tue Nov 30, 2010 3:45 pm

"Err...thanks. Whatever." Mary sputtered, taken aback by Ember's sudden eagerness. Possible innuendo in mind, the awkward occurance of having another girl tell the lamb her voice was, well.. attractive wasn't helping her feel anymore comfortable around her, either.

"Aaaaanyway." She coughed, attempting to shake the thought off. "I guess thats.. fair and all if that's all you guys want," She managed at Jack. "But my company's booked me with the guy for tonight, already. 'Crew's set up and everything now, so no go with that part of your plan. Buuut," Mary offered, devious smirk forming. "If it makes ya feel any better about it, its all gonna be televised! Get back here by 8 and turn to Channel 5 and you'll get the answers straight out the porcupine's mouth!" She said triumphantly.

"You guys got anything... 'specific' you want me to ask him or somethin', or are we good to go?" Mary prodded. "I might be reporter, but I'm no mindreader. 'Anything comes to mind, just list your questions to me before I hit the set. I'm warnin' you though, I see anything on there too stupid or risky, I aint sayin' it."

Rachel · Posted: Tue Nov 30, 2010 4:42 pm

Jack was taken by surprise, staring at the lamb a moment blinking slowly as she processed what she just said. Jack's brow drooped, her cheery expression faded away as she tried and make the lamb understand.

"I mean no disrespect when I say I ain't gettin' what I need from the hacked up bits they throw on the tube. I need to SEE his reactions. Watching yer show, while I'd really love ta help yer ratings, ain't gonna cut it."

Underscore · Posted: Tue Nov 30, 2010 6:48 pm

Randall viewed the scene playing out between the sheriff and the lamb with mild interest. Sadly, their back-and-forthing quickly did grow tiresome for the impatient raptor.

"No time for this sillyness!" Cried the reptile, springing from his chair and slamming his hands down upon the table. "This 'Vince' character can obviously only be shown his error when confronted with the grand truth of reason and SCIENCE!"

With that, Randall positively galavanted from the buffet area. Upon reaching the first bit of open sky he could find, he pressed a small red button on the strap of his jet-pack, presenting his control arms.

His hands wrapped around the joysticks, a thumb flicked up a cage around a large red button on the left joystick. Only moments after the button was depressed, the raptor was gone, rocketing up into the air at a controlled velocity of 100 mph.

'Now' he thought, buzzing the city below him. 'To find out where the hell I'm going.'

MuffinUnsane · Posted: Wed Dec 01, 2010 9:02 am

When Mary gave her answer and revealed that they weren't to tag along for an interview, Ember heaved an overly-dramatic sigh.

"But that won't be worth a d*mn! We need answers that are worth something to whatever we're supposed to be asking him! Not about what his fav brand of pants are." Crossing her arms over her chest, she strutted away from the reporter. "Really now."

Her tirade had only taken a moment's pause for breath when the raptor threw out his view on the subject. Ember only watched as he sprinted away and set off into the air.

"Now you see, he should interview Vince. That would be worth watching. Think we could convince him? Also maybe we should get him back..."

Looking over to Jack, she gave a shoddy excuse for a salute. "I volunteer to snag him down!"

Maren · Posted: Wed Dec 01, 2010 5:02 pm

EDIT: Fixing it before any continuity booboos emerge through it. After talking it over with Tony, we came to the conclusion that its wasn't very plausible for everyone on channel 5 to know Vince's secret without the (high) risk of having someone squeal on them. So just to clarify, that privy's known only to those on the upper ends of the hiearchy right now. Mary's up there too to an extent 'cuz she's a dare-devlin', crime-fightin' reporter who has to know whose business is in and out of bounds to pick at.

And I made some grammatical fixes. =)

Between Randall's antics, and the apparently poor listening skills of Jack and Ember, Mary's patience had nearly stretched and waned to its limit. "That's why I said you could send me your questions before I hit the set." She growled, massaging her head. "Geez, don't you guys ever listen to people? Besides," She added as an afterthought. "Hasn't it ever occured any of you yet that if I know about Vince, the same would go for some of the other folks on the news? In case you haven't figured out why they're not exposin' him up the creek, it's 'cause he pays the execs keep everything quiet. Vince invited 'em all here to throw their company party after the interview, so they'll be watchin' everything we do behind the scenes. One person, they find one person on that crew not their payroll," Said Mary, repeating for emphasis, "And its gonna be all our asses under fire. Is that what you two --"

.. want?"

Her rant slackened and replaced itself with a seperate tangient; Eyes lit up with an inferred an idea. It was crazy, it was risky, but then, so were the things she did at her job, anyway. If she played her cards right it juuuust might work.

'And I can kill two birds with one stone.' Thought Mary surreptitiously, eyeing the griffon. A smile re-formed on her lips.

"Sheriff, can I speak to you in private for a moment?"

Rachel · Posted: Thu Dec 02, 2010 6:16 am

Now THERE was something you didn't see everyday. Raptors going on about the power of SCIENCE before jet packing away. Jack was a little dazed, she stood there blinking slowly as her brain struggled to catch up. After a moment she shook her head at Ember, raising a hand.

"Nawh let'em go. Mr. Randall said he had some stuff he was fixin' to do," she said to Ember with a smile. Jack would be lying if she said she didn't appreciate the bird's 'Go-Get'em-Ness'.

She shifted her weight to one side as she put ehr hand on her hip. "Oh, I though ya meant... Oh." She said as Mary went on. Then Mary seemed to have the same epiphany moment Jack did. Jack smiled slightly in response, realizing this could mean something good for her. Jack smiled a bit and walked closer, throwing an arm over Mary's shoulders. "Go fer it."

MuffinUnsane · Posted: Fri Dec 03, 2010 6:59 pm

A little disapointed that she wasn't able to go tear down the thrilled raptor from his happiness, Ember pouted. The expression went away though when Mary suddenly changed her tone. Even though it was Jack that Mary invited over to talk, the bird invited herself anyways.

Coming closer again to the sheep, she placed her hands on her hips. "So! Got an idea?"

Underscore · Posted: Fri Dec 03, 2010 8:35 pm

Randall was flying around and around the sky-scraping hotel, meandering his way to the roof which he reasoned was a good starting point for finding this Vince character, thinking about why he was tracking this guy down anyway.

'Wait. Wait, why am I tracking this character down again? Those people down in the cafeteria seemed to think that he was some kind of crook, sure, but what was their reasoning? He's running a fair, law-abiding, sanctioned athletic tournament and has made no real indication that he's lying about the prize or his intentions.'

Randall, of course, was a bit naive about the machinations of figures of power and all that such nonsense. All he could see was a law-abiding citizen that was soon to be hassled by a group of vigilantes who seemed intent on taking that Chaosol emerald all for themselves.

'Well, we'll just have to warn our benefactor of his peril, and attempt to persuade him to give me a look at that emerald and it's scientific value, of course.', he said to himself, angling himself up toward the roof of the hotel, slowly making his ascent.

Maren · Posted: Sat Dec 04, 2010 11:08 pm

Instead of an explanation, Ember got a finger waved in her face. "Wooah girl, uh-uh!" Mary Chided. "Nah-ah-ah, I said with the Sheriff and in 'private'! Alone. You," She said, arching her finger to jab and point at the girl. "Got better things to do with your time, anyway-- like stoppin' a certain 'raptor-without-a-clue' before he says somethin' stupid." She clarified, smile broadening to a smirk again. "'Cause I dunno about you guys, but crashin' through an enemy's office to 'show his error with the truth of reason and SCIENCE', aint what I'd call a plan of Einstein. No sayin' what'll happen to him or the rest of us if he talks like he knows too much, so we'd better get him back here and quick."

The lamb glanced over at Jack. "Got a cell phone on ya to spare, Sheriff, 'cause Ember here's gonna need it if we gotta go to plan B." And God, help that raptor if they did, Mary thought.

Underscore · Posted: Mon Dec 06, 2010 12:24 am

OOC:Collab between Amanda and I. It's long, so spoilered for your convenience.

"Whatever you say Bo Peep." Refusing the offer of the phone, she pulled her own out, indicating there was no need. "Don't worry your little head off, I'll bring him right back."

Leaving the room, she exited the building quickly. Looking upward, she searched across the morning sky using her hands to shield her eyes from the sun's glare. It didn't take too long for her to spy a rising figure in the air headed for what looked like the top floor of the hotel. "Gotcha."

Bending her knees, she jumped up quickly and tried to gain height. It was a great deal harder to fly from the ground but it was much quicker. Finally getting a good speed going, she headed for the raptor. It felt great to feel her wings stretch out again, especially after being stuffed into a duffel bag. As she approached the raptor, she couldn't help but hum the JAWS theme under her breath.

Coming up behind him, she mimicked a deep bass voice fitting for a police officer. "This is a no flying zone sir!"

Despite what the quickly rising bird may have thought, Randall's hearing was quite satisfactory. He was aware of her approach several moments before her gruff imitation in his ear. The steady beating of her wings and the humming didn't help much either.

"Ma'am?" He said politely, yet a tiny bit annoyed. "Is there a reason for your hassling me in midair like this?"

Put off by her surprise enterance being foiled, Ember frowned. "Any reason you're flying? Last time I checked dinos didn't fly. How well can you move in that thing anyways? Or can you only go up and down?" Moving around to his front, she shook a finger at him. "Oh! Also, you never said bye right."

"I assure you that I meant no rudeness by that."

Deciding to rock her world, he threw back on one of the controll sticks and to the left on the other, causing him to do both a full backflip away from her and a complete horizontal spin at the same time, ending up facing her about 20 feet away from where he was.

"And that's how well I can move, by the way."

Though her world was not rocked, it was jilted. Giving a smirk, shook her head. "Not bad...for someone without wings."

With a flap of her wings for speed, she shot like a bullet towards Randall. If there had been another in the air alongside them, it would have looked as if there was going to be a rather nasty mid-air wreck. At the last possible second though, she jerked up and went over his head. The only contact was the light feeling of a foot tapping the back of his head. From behind him, she gave a loud laugh. "How was that?'

His eyes widened at the aeronautical acrobatics of the crimson bird.

"Yes, that's quite impressive." He said, turning around and looking up at the bird. "But you never did answer my question. What is the meaning of your detouring me from my destination?"

"Oh! That!" Looking thoughful, she tapped a finger against her cheek as she cast her gaze above. "Hmm...well. What is with you going all the way up here? All we wanted to do was ask the big cheese some questions. What makes you so freaked about it?" Turning her gaze down to him, she gave a wide smile. "You know him or something?"

"Not a bit." He said plainly. "But from the way you and your group were conspiring it appeared to me that your intentions are to lift from him something that is by no rights yours to take." With that, he resumed his ascent, pushing the Chaos drives to their limit and rocketing up into the air.

Giving a long drawn out sign, Ember speed up to catch up with him. "Wait up! Jeez you're freaking over nothing! You think we're stupid enough to do something like that!" Pushing herself harder, she was able to get closer.
"We were just going to ask him some questions!"

"Well then. Looks like we're in the same boat. I have a few pertinant questions for him myself. I'm just being a bit more direct about it." He pulled into a vertical plane and began moving away from the hotel in a straight line, a plan forming in his head to lose the pesky bird should she chose to continue her pestering.

"Annnnd you think he'll listen to a raptor busting in like some spy? He might, I sure would, but I don't think he will. "Maybe maybe you should go talk to that sheep. She said something about her giving him an interview. She even asked us for questions!"

"Or...I think she did anyways."

"My questions are not things that would be asked by a reporter looking for a scoop on a boxing event. It'd look quite strange with the lamb asking Vince if she could get a look at the emerald to test it's relative energy density and the optimal resonant frequencies and such." He looked at her like these things should be obvious, still flying away at the same speed and trajectory.

"That's what you wanted to ask? That's...boring. What you gotta ask a boring question?" Looking rather dissapointed at the answer, she tsked. "Doubt he'll let you. Prolly think you're stealing it or something."

An exasperated sigh came from the raptor's mouth as he contemplated why he even bothered with the bird. "The proprietor of this establishment and tournament seems to be a man of considerable talent as a merchant and a buisness man. If I show him an opportunity for profit, I doubt he'll balk at me, now if you will, I must be going."

With that, he did a quick flip around, pointing himself directly toward the hotel once again. Pulling a small ripcord on one side of the jetpack, he looked at the bird with a smile and a wink. "See ya!"

Suddenly he was gone, zooming away in a disorienting blur as twin collums of speeding fire emitted from the back of his jetpack, the pyrotechnic blast hurtling him toward the hotel at uncontrolable velocities.

Ember did little as she watched the soaring raptor hurtle towards the hotel. The reason she had even been up there in the first place had been forgotten and only one though echoed through her mind.

"I want one."

After a few seconds, she shook her head clear of that. There was no way she could catch up to him now. Though later she had to ask him if she could borrow that thing. Pulling the phone free from her pocket, she quickly punched in the number.

"Sheepy isn't going to like this...no she is not."

The science-minded dinosaur's plan was, of course, to blast away for ten seconds and begin to slow down to a controlable velocity before lightly touching down on the windy rooftop of the hotel.

What happened was slightly different. He had apparently over-filled his tank that morning, causing his chaos-drive motors to overheat, stalling the entire thing just as he was passing over the concrete roof of the glitzy hotel.

Long story short, he made it to the roof, and left several raptor-flavored skidmarks behind as evidence.

Standing from his embarassing crash landing, Randall found the roof entrance door. He brushed off his body of any roof that may have gotten stuck to it and began his search for the elusive Porcupine benefactor.

Rachel · Posted: Tue Dec 07, 2010 5:57 pm

Jack blinked slowly at the commanding lamb. She really demanded people to do what she asked. Jack scratched her head at her and offered her cell phone to the bird, only to find she didn't need it. Jack's cell phone was the very tiny type that was good for calls and playing music. Odds are Jack didn't use it for music so it was a very tiny phone that made it abundantly clear Jack did none of this 'txt'ing non-sense.

Ember ran out to find the rocket-dino and jack sighed a bit turning to the reporter. she'd have rather given the raptor the benefit of the doubt. But Ember was on her way before Jack really had an opportunity to form a coherent argument against her going after him. "Don't you do anything hastey Ember!" She called after her, but the bird didn't seem to hear her, which concerned Jack more then a little.

"Right..." She said after a moment then looked at Mary. "Now what is this secret ya've got fer me, I'm a might worried 'bout Ember now. I don't know if 'stoppin' him fer her means havein' a chat or throwin' punches..."

Little Black Heart (Ch. 2: Day 2)

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