Somebody's gonna come undone (Ch. 4: Day 3, pt. II)

Sheff · Posted: Tue Dec 13, 2011 11:27 pm

Geoff was tense through the whole incident.

Having found conversation abruptly cut off from the racket near the entrance, he merely hoped it was just a small scuffle. But, he watched as things slowly unraveled from a light disruption to an outright problem. Fists clenched and crystal bulked up around his hands, prepared to deal with whoever-

The monkeys. Of course.

The hedgehog's steely blue eyes traced the two intruders' path, barely exchanging a glance with the lead white one before they wandered off to their feline companion. His lips tight in a frown, he suddenly grasped Coop's bulky arm as the bird gave his warning.

"And trap everyone else in here with them?" he snapped lightly under his breath, his voice quiet. "Listen, he ain't wrecking anything yet, and if he were here for some... Eggman business or whatever, I'm sure he'd already be doing a good job of it." He nodded towards them now. "He's probably just here for Ace. If you want to give him some payback or whatever you think it is you need to do, keep it for when he leaves. Follow him or something. Just leave the rest of us out of it."

Diluss · Posted: Wed Dec 14, 2011 12:00 am

“I didn’t say I’d stop everyone else getting out, but if there’s one way you can lose someone, it’s in a panicking crowd, and I am not letting that bleach-furred, traitorous little screwball and his girlfriend get me again."

psikeout · Posted: Wed Dec 14, 2011 1:59 am

Rock stared at Ace from afar, then again glanced around at all the other unhappy faces glaring at him. The corners of his eyes creased just ever so slightly with some sort of weird amusement at them.

He resumed striding slowly forward. The noise of his boots descending the stairs could've split the room in two.

The primate stopped at the bottom of the steps. His eyes flicked back and forth. Suddenly, he snorted out his nose and blurted a loud "What?" into the resonant hall, and shuffled in a slow circle, upturned palms held out. "You people waitin' to see a magic trick or somethin'?"

Rachel · Posted: Wed Dec 14, 2011 8:30 pm

Jack was all smiles and greeted everyone happily. Like a big family reunion she was happy to see everyone was alive and mostly in one piece. It was as ever short lived when a few party crashers showed up. Jack let out a groan when the lights came up and it was none other then the monkeys. To think she'd gone years without seeing Rock, and now she couldn't avoid him. "Uuugh, I'm so fired."

"No, Geoff, Coops right." Jack confirmed, nudging the others towards the back, where there was indeed another exit. "They ain't here fer drinks. We gotta split while we can. before this gets ugly for us."

She continued to nudge the others or pull or drag whatever she had to do, but it was certainly time for them to go. "They ain't fightin' on our side no more. It's more important we get outta here then have a spittin' match with'em right now."

Kazz · Posted: Wed Dec 14, 2011 11:04 pm

"I... think I missed something," Mako said, his eyebrows drooping as soon as enough of the clamor had died down-- he remembered the monkeys well enough, but, well, that's what you get for hiding out in an oasis in the middle of a middle-of-nowhere desert.
Still, however, he stood shock still to the spot, until Jack spoke up. "Great! Yeah. Am-scray. Let's." He shuffled after the griffin post-haste.

Meanwhile...

Rodolf also had missed something; he had come rushing back from wherever he had slipped off to at the noise and the disaster. He stood stoically as he was pushed and rushed past. There was a positively harried look about him, large portions of his (masses of) hair matted down. Entirely for how out-of-sorts he looked, though it wasn't, it even seemed that his horn was a little crooked. He took a few slow, deliberate steps closer, careful. Somewhere in the corner of his eye he saw the sheriff and company.

"You people waitin' to see a magic trick or somethin'?"

Everything he had been through ever since going into space suddenly reached its boiling point.
Of all of the most ill-advised moves possible at this point, of all the boneheaded, outright stupid things he had ever done, this immediately took the freakin' cake. Something all-but-audibly broke inside his little equine head.

Rodolf rushed at the pair of monkeys in a way preparing for something between a (very, ahem, sharp) headbutt and a full-body tackle. He didn't even really so much rush at either of them as he did so in their general direction. No aim, no technique, no idea what on earth he hoped to gain.

Today, on 'things that can only end poorly'...

Sheff · Posted: Wed Dec 14, 2011 11:23 pm

To Geoff, it seemed Jack was only focusing on one part of Coop's idea; the escaping (and not the, ya know, setting fire to the place bit). Yet he had to admit she could be right. There might just be an army's worth of robots waiting for them just beyond the front doors of the club.

"Wasn't planning on the spitting, but you've got a point," he replied. "Let's find a back door and just get out before things get more ugly."

He threw one last glance to the monkeys before setting off- wait. Was that a pile of white hair he'd just seen...

"Idiot," the hedgehog suddenly growled under his breath, watching Rodolph charge headfirst towards the two. He nearly stepped away from the scene then and there, but, surprisingly enough (even to him), he was almost concerned for the unicorn. Knowing both Rock and Jam's capabilities... well, it would take more than a horned horse to do much.

He took slow steps forward, not wanting to directly intervene but staying close to the sidelines just in case. Last thing he needed was for his own self to get tangled up to what could quickly become a chaotic mess.

Diluss · Posted: Wed Dec 14, 2011 11:25 pm

Coop got up and began walking deliberately towards the back of the establishment, making for whatever looked the most like a way to the kitchen.

psikeout · Posted: Wed Dec 14, 2011 11:32 pm

Rock almost looked happy that someone was taking a shot at him. He was grinning as Rodolf rushed him. Maybe he was just that kind of guy.

He spread and lowered his stance, and, with just a last-instant twitch-shuffle adjustment, thrust his big, leather-bound mitts to catch the unicorn's head with palms astraddle the dangerous part: the horn.

The impact jolted and skidded Rock backward a few feet, even though he'd thrown all of his own weight into the catch. (Rodolf was pretty heavy for his size.) With that much hair to grab at, though, it became a pretty straightforward matter to just use the attacker's own struggling force against him and... hurl him off to the side. Yeah, it was just a big, split-second redirect where he grabbed, twisted, and aimed to throw Rodolf over a cluster of tables and into the dancefloor by the hair.

There were probably a million nastier things he could have done in that situation. Not to say that trying to throw someone by the hair was nice, but anyone who knew Rock would know he usually went for blood, so maybe he really just didn't harbor any ill feelings against Rodolf.

Mie · Posted: Wed Dec 14, 2011 11:49 pm

The paler of the felines coincidentally seemed to mirror the mole's sentiments on the situation, albeit in a much more muted sense. Her brows were furrowed steeply, with bewilderment scrawled all over her troubled countenance as she glanced back and forth between the two parties, and then the fashionably late third wheel to their little unwelcome wagon.

"Ace?" whispered Tabitha, anxiously. "What's going on? You know these people?"

Jam hung back on the stairs, watching the tension wind progressively tighter. She didn't seem to enjoy it quite so much as Rock did, but when the be-maned unicorn quite apparently lost it, and decided to root for it in the whiter primate's intestines, she momentarily lamented her disinclination to follow. Not because she was particularly concerned for Rodolf's would-be victim, mind you -- it simply would've given her something to do, other than watch the exotic horsey get his horn handed to him with a raised-browed, mildly entertained expression.

"Feeling charitable, today, Rock?" she asked loftily, descending the steps to join him on the off-chance anyone else felt like dancing.

Kazz · Posted: Thu Dec 15, 2011 12:37 am

Honestly, Rodolf probably hadn't even registered that it was Rock at all, at least initially. It was merely what he felt was too long's worth of deep, profound frustration that finally reached its zenith, and the pale simian had just been the first thing in an Eggman uniform that graced his sight at the moment. (It is for these reasons that one can be very, very grateful that he had not stopped to take note of the sheriff's current choice of attire.)

That said, the unicorn muttered something rather rude as he was hurled by the hair into a table. He repeated it, considerably louder, as he stumbled back to his feet, and immediately lunged at Rock again, in the exact same manner as before.
"You mother$!%#ER!"
(Why, one almost imagined that he was channeling the absentee spirit of a particular angry, very short drunk.)

Mako, who had been in the process of shuffling away, paused to watch what was happening. His spirits visibly fell, and even the little hair-like fins on his head drooped. "I was kind of afraid of that," he remarked, making a point to stay well out of the way, though he cast a look after Coop and the eagle's sudden departure.
Perhaps there was a limit-one-lunatic-per-room rule or something in effect.

Mie · Posted: Thu Dec 15, 2011 1:19 am

The impetus to descend to Rock's level (physically, of course) paid off much more quickly than Jam could have hoped. As the raging equine picked himself up in a huffy hurry, still dropping f-bombs, and practically telegraphing his violent intentions to the world, the excessively red simian didn't even bother to stop in her stride; chain in hand, she breezed casually past Rock, and straight at Rodolf the Bloody-nosed Unicorn.

Fractions of a second prior to what would have been a messy collision, the monkey girl veered in a showy little sidestep, lashing the sparking, sizzling length of metal links at the steed's legs as she went. Unless the unicorn was feeling particularly adept at jump rope, he was looking at a good tangling, tripping, or shock therapy session for his lower extremities if lucky; if not, all three.

At once.

psikeout · Posted: Thu Dec 15, 2011 1:43 am

Rock had just bent down to pick up his dropped stun baton when Rodolf came back with gusto. He huffed a surprised, impressed sort of laugh (like a how 'bout that) and started to tense up, but then Jam came strolling through to intercept.

It was good to have backup. (That said: poor Rodolf.)

The primate really kept his focus on the others in the room more than Rodolf from that point on, though—the ones like Jack, who were liable to shoot him (if the empire hadn't already confiscated her gun, anyway), or Coop, who was liable to... do absolutely anything at any time. However, Geoff seemed to be the only one standing at ready to actually do something, while Coop seemed... conspicuously absent. His eyes darted quickly, and caught sight of a pair of free-swinging doors near the bar. It was a kitchen; there were flammable chemicals and gas lines in there, at the bare minimum. That meant Coop was probably in there. That meant their operation definitely had a time limit.

Rock focused back on the matter more immediately at hand: angry and confused people.

"I dunno what you think you're gonna get done here," he lectured the hall at large. "Fight us, drive us out? You think there's no cavalry comin' behind us?"

Kazz · Posted: Thu Dec 15, 2011 2:09 am

Rodolf was not in fact feeling like the world jump-roping champion on this fine day. As such: Crackle-hiss-whump. That was apparently the appropriate noise for an electrified chain coming in contact with unicorn legs, sending said unicorn stumbling forward. It seems that he would have actually kept on his feet if his legs hadn't convulsed violently at the electricity.
Funny how those things worked!

Rodolf shakily pushed himself back up to his feet a good several moments later.
If he looked a mess when he had entered, he looked like even more of one now. There was blood clotting on his face, and there seemed to be some seeping from the side of his head, from the looks of it.

He didn't seem eager to move, either way or for another attack... at the moment. (Possibly because his legs felt like only-half-set gelatin.) He merely glared daggers at Rock, rooted to the spot.

"... I have no idea what's going on," Mako up and said-- at least he was honest. He resumed trying to nonchalantly shuffle away, casting another cautious look in the direction Coop had gone.
Like usual, there was a sort of sinking feeling in his sharky stomach. (What bothered him, really, was that that sinking feeling -- the one that signalled that something was about to go horribly awry -- was usually completely right.)

MuffinUnsane · Posted: Thu Dec 15, 2011 2:47 pm

Apart from the utter thrill of watching a unicorn get his tail handed to him, the bird realized that splitting was the best option. Last thing she needed was to be tossed in jail for being at the wrong spot. Moving back slowly towards the kitchen, and hopefully an exit, she dug inside one of her pants pockets. Pulling out a small white bottle, she flipped open the red top and started to soak her glove in the lighter fluid. Watching it run over her beloved jeweled braclet, she stashed the bottle safetly into her pants. Done with turning her hand into an unlit torch, she started to back towards the kitchen and hopefully an exit. Confrontation was the last on her list of things to experience that day but it never hurt to be prepared.

Greens · Posted: Thu Dec 15, 2011 6:14 pm

Ace had barely even the opportunity to answer Tabitha's no-doubt burning query with an "I don't know yet" before another 10% of Hell promptly broke loose in the club. As if badniks, Seven, and a collapsing building weren't enough stress for the day, now he had to deal with a power-tripping pair of primates-- and to top it all off yet, the world's most awkward, painfully tense reunion with a confused looking Caz in an Eggman uniform. He honestly didn't know which problem to address first.

Needless to say, this was not how he'd pictured today turning out.

Fortunately for him, someone made the effort to impress one issue over the other. The mole had seen her share of violence, at least for the time being, and finally put her foot down-- literally, in front of Rock. "Wait!" she beckoned, holding out her palms in desperation. "Woul-woul'ju'just wait a second, God damn it!"

Wait. Caz knew how to swear?

And if granted her request, she hastily made her way to: where else? Right in front of Ace.

He shortened the distance as well, thankful for whatever moments given. "Caz!" he blurted, already scrambling for the right words that so clearly did not want to be found. 'Thank God you're alright'? 'I'm so sorry I've been gone'? 'I've missed you so much'?

"What 'n the Hell're you doing here?"

Whoops.

"What am I doing here!?" What are you doing here! You were gone for three months! Where have you-- wh-why didn't you, call me, or something? Just to let me know...! Who is this?" Her arms shoved themselves in Tabitha's direction, shortly followed by her actual gaze. "Who is this? Who are you?"

"Woah, Caz, jus'-- just slow down for--"

"No!" The bottom of her fist met briefly, but loudly with a nearby chair. Her breaths were gradually getting shakier and the intervals between blinks gradually became shorter. "I, I don't..."

Somebody's gonna come undone (Ch. 4: Day 3, pt. II)

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