2012-09-08 An Unearthly Aspect

The bitter metalic tang of cordite hangs in the air, catching in the back of Jackie's throat as he stares down at the bodies, his face hidden by the shadows cast by his long hair and the flickering flourecent bulbs that twitch and strobe overhead. The poker table across from him and the roulette wheel a dozen feet away now both carry crimson sprays of blood, and the soft ticktickticktick of the spinning wheel beats an off rhythm tempo to the soft plop.... plop.... plop.... of blood dripping down into the growing pool at the poker table's feet. Jackie reaches up with a hand and catches a pair of bullets as they squeeze their way out of his shoulder. He tosses them off into the shadows with a flick of his hand, but there's no sound of them hitting anything. He looks around, the 9mm pistol in his hand still wafts smoke from it's cigar like surpressor on the end, a lazy curl of it headed towards the ceiling. He steps over the corpse of a woman holding a small revolver, ignoreing her sightless eyes, and picks up a half finished bottle of vodka from where it was resting on the table. He moves over to the little bar and pushes a corpse out of it's barstool and to the floor with a heavy thump, and grunts his approval as he sees that the body had the good grace not to bleed on the bar itself. He takes a seat and grabs a pair of shot glasses which he sets down, on in front of himself, the other on a spot 1 stool away. "Might as well come out." he says evenly, filling both glasses.
The room was obviously some sort of back hall gambling joint, catering to high end clientele, mostly ex-Soviet bloc sorts with borst bellies and cavier dreams. Now it's a graveyard of nearly two dozen bodies strewn about like autumn leaves fallen from a tree. Jackie's good with a gun and the entire scene took less then a minute to play out, bullets slamming through everyone in the room... except the waitress who screamed and hid. Jackie let her go only moments ago, with her word she wouldn't tell a soul. She fled in terror and she's Russian, he doesn't have to worry about her going to the cops.
No matter where in the world one goes, rooms always share a common trait: they always have at least one spot where nobody bothers to look. A place where shadows collect while the residents go about their lives, oblivious to everything that isn't illuminated for them. This particular room has many such places, some of them appearing only in the last few moments, any one of which would make a fitting place for a dramatic entrance. But no grand entrance comes from any dark corner. There is no sound of slow clapping, followed by sarcastic approbation. These things would be to cliche. Instead, there is a voice. A voice that is both high-pitched and raspy. To the casual observer, the voice would appear to come from nowhere. But any creature of shadow who was worth his trenchcoat would realize that it came from the ceiling. "Ha! I think he's on to us... maybe we should stab him?" An inky black circle forms on the ceiling, which quickly turns into an impish little winged creature of cartoon-like proportions. He stands on the ceiling, looking down at the scene of carnage with an exaggerated smile. "Or maybe we should do that thing with the lawnmowers again. That was messy." His feet release their hold on the ceiling, and the creature flutters down onto the roulette wheel, spinning around lazily.
"Now now, Smudge, I've tried so very hard to impress upon you the simple fact that good manners cost nothing..." Another voice comes from a different direction altogether. This one is just as raspy, but nowhere near as high-pitched. "But since our attempts at stealth have evidently been a waste of time..." There is a wisp of smoke in the seat in front of the second shot glass. The shape quickly materializes into the form of a man who clearly doesn't shop at any store that has been open in the last hundred years. He looks down at the glass before him, the corners of his nostrils crinkling a bit. "Ah... how very... delightful." He clearly isn't delighted. But he puts his white-gloved hand on the shot glass anyway, as if he intends to drink from it... at some point in the future. "You see, Smudge? Our new friend here understands the importance of politeness." The randomly-appearing man continues to hold the drink, but only swirls it around in its questionably cleaned glass. "You'll pardon our intrusion on your weekend, I'm sure. The vile creature who is misusing that roulette wheel is called Smudge. I am called The Shade."
Jackie nods his head, "We know who you are." he says simply, as a small cartoonishly sized demon thing drops from the ceiling and onto the wheel in front of Smudge, he wears a Yankee's ball cap, Ruth jersey, and is carrying a Dessert Eagle. He spins around and round and round and gives Smudge a long taloned finger. The impolite one. "What's Kurt. He's sort of unruly too." Jackie swallows the vodka in a gulp and moves to refill the glass. It was a decent up scale place, it's not like it's some crap factory, the vodka is at least top shelf. "The Darkness." he says after a long pause, by way of greeting. "Why have you been following me?" Jackie isn't sure mind you, but he's had that 'hair on the back of his neck' feeling, and nothing can every truly hide from him in the shadows, not for any serious length of time anyway.
"That's not my name!" Smudge protests noisily, but his attention is quickly taken away from the scene at the bar. He shows several impossibly wide rows of pointed teeth in answer to Kurt's gesture, and his hands are suddenly covered in more claws than one could ever need. Minions, always good for a distraction.
"Play nicely, Smudge, or I shall be cross later." The Shade didn't even have to look behind him to know that his minion was most likely about to be up to no good. Chastened, Smudge disappears in a quick puff of smoke. "Right to the point then, Darkness. Typically one engages in small talk for several minutes before making accusations." Shade sighs with a mixture of genuine and mock exasperation. "Young persons. No appreciation for the fine art of conversation. I blame it on the cellular phones, and the lack of quality reading material." Again, Shade swirls the drink around as if he was thinking about drinking it. But just as he starts to lift the glass, he sets it back down. Maybe later.
Jackie's eyes slide sideways, eyeing Shade, "What are you talking about? Playboy has critically acclaimed interviews." he counters. "Acclaimed." he takes his second shot and then turns to more fully face the other man. Kurt, who was grinning around rows of shark's teeth at Smudge, suddenly looks crestfallen as his playmate vanishes, but soon there are two, three, four, a dozen, two dozen, demons dropping out of shadows all over the room. They yammer to each other in odd accents, everything from Texan to the Bronx to one that sounds like James Cagney, and they rifle through pockets and wallets and what have you, ripping open lock boxes and being looking for the house safe. Jackie ignores the little army, who out of respect for the conversation at the bar, keep their argueing and bickering to a dull whispered roar. "Conversation went out with the invention of the long work week, it packed up with it's buddy polite grammer and buggered for the hills. This is New York man, if you want polite conversation and chit chat you're in the wrong fuckin' town. Try the South. I hear they're full of hugs, sweet tea, racism, and long conversations down there." the words are rude, but the tone is oddly conversational, as if none of it was personal it's just... New York. It's how everyone talks there. Casually insulting, quickly, with many swear words, but not meaning any real offense. Yet. "You wanna talk about the Mets first?" he offers, "They still suck." he helps.
Although his eyes are hidden behind rectangular sunglasses, the corners of Shade's eyes visibly crinkle right at the edges of the dark purple lenses. "Oh I think you'll agree that we needn't strain ourselves in order to find conversation topics of mutual interest. As you noted, I've been doing a bit of research, with you as the principal subject. It hasn't been hard to find out a great deal about you, your... housekeeping being what it is." Shade turns his head over his shoulder, looking at the ghastly scene behind him with only the faintest of interest. "But although I have you at a slight disadvantage, I think you're a sharp enough lad to realize that the two of us share more than a hatred of casino employees and a darkly-colored supporting cast." Again, he swirls the drink around, looking at it the way children often look at their vegetables.
Jackie nods his head, "I know who you are." well, that's not really true, the Darkness knows, and it tells him. One of the great things about being the avatar of the Abyss, it's been around forever and it's not adverse to sharing some of that knowledge when the mood suits. "And I'll have you know my housekeeping is exceptional. I pay very well for it." now his /lighting/ on the other hand... not so much. "I get the mints on my pillows and everything." he sighs and turns around, leaning back on the bar.
A slow smile spreads across Shade's face. "My mistake then. Far be it from me to criticize a man who knows where mints belong." For a second, Shade is silent. He stares across the bar at the selection of liquors, eyes skimming the labels briefly. "But you're wrong. If you did know who I am, you'd be the only one on the planet who could make the claim." The Shade sets his drink back down on the bar, his stomach apparently having decided against imbibing. "Men like us inevitably become unfathomable mysteries, our histories obscured by the shadows from which we draw our strength." One of his his gloved fingers is placed on the bridge of his nose, to push his shades a bit further back. "You've already begun to discover this, I'm sure. Doubtless you have no interest in my unsolicited advice, and I have no interest in giving you much of it, considering that we'll be sworn enemies within fifty years time if history has taught me anything. But as a fellow creature of shadow, I feel a bit of responsibility to help you find your path. So here I am, in order to give you the advice I wish someone had given me when I first discovered my singular abilities." He pauses dramatically, still looking straight ahead at the shelves behind the bar.
Jackie eyes him, "I did not say I knew who you were." he states simply, and there's a look to Jackie that suddenly makes him appear much older then he should, a weighty heaviness that washes away the softness of youth, "I said I know who you are." the difference is fairly large if you ask him. The man he was when he was 20 is not the thing he became on his 21st birthday. He has changed, inexorably. Beyond that simple statement he remains silent, waiting for the Shade to say his bit. Jackie's arrogant, and he knows it, but he's new to this power and frankly, it scares the crap out of him. The things that claw in his mind, his dreams, they demand things of his darker nature, things he wants to do, would enjoy doing, but cannot do if he is to keep his promise. Shade, he senses, understands this at least partially, and while he's to hardened to have faith, he hopes the other man's words might offer wisdom.
Shade doesn't wait for a sign that he should continue. He does, however, turn himself completely around before continuing. His back propped against the bar, he looks out at the bodies and demons, his expression almost completely neutral. "You've gotten a taste for it, that much is clear. You can do whatever you want, take whatever you want, rip open whatever you want. You'll want to revel in your power, and I highly recommend that you do from time to time." He folds a leg over the other one, and props his elbows on the bar behind him to assume the closest thing to a lounging position that one could under the circumstances. "What you do, and how wide the swath you cut through history is up to you. But you would be well served to remember one thing:" The Shade's voice takes on a truly sinister intonation. "A rose is a rose is a rose." The corners of Shade's mouth turn up, and he casts a sidelong looks at the violent bar patron. "I'll be in touch. Probably when you least expect it." And with that, his body begins to evaporate into a plume of smoke. And then the bar has one less occupant.
Jackie watches and listens to The Shade, his expression unreadable as the other man talks. Once he's done, a soft woman's voice echos in Jackie's head, a soft voice, quiet and still beneath the deafening cacophany of screams and nightmares that are his ever present companion. 'Be a better man Jackie'. Quiet though it may be, the voice refuses to be silent. As Shade vanishes Loxley hops up on the bar, <<We got the vault open milord,>> his voice a posh yet oily British accent, <<you wish for the gold or the secrets?>> Jackie eyes the space where the Shade sat a moment ago, "Strip is clean. Get me the files, the black book, the money, all of it, then pack up the hardware for later." he casually raises his hand and shoots out one of the lights, casting deeper darker shadows over the room, instantly filling it with the sound of rasping scales and tacking claws on hard surfaces. "And don't dally. We're on a schedule." and then he's gone, simply sinking into the floor and vanishing without a trace. 'Be a better man Jackie'...
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