pre-distressed (open!)

[Kazuya "Hakuryu" Tellagory]

The front door shattering interrupted a whole lot of cheerful chatter and cheesy lounge music.

“Sorry,” Kazuya said, holding the frame of the glass door open with one foot so that his three companions could filter into the kitsch space past him, crunching glass under their boots. “Now that I have your attention.” He flicked his long hair out of his eyes, scanning the room. Artfully mismatched furniture, pre-distressed, with mismatched people also pre-distressed, screaming, scrambling out of chairs, sending minimalist cake and soy latte scattering. They were being very disorganized. He bounced his pipe on his shoulder a couple of times before swinging it down and leaning on it. It wasn't their fault; it was a very disorganized sort of raid.

“Please calm down,” He said, sounding part genuinely offended by their chaos and part bored. His three companions spread out, kicking people back towards the center of the room. “Uh, Skinny, please make sure nobody tries to leave through the kitchen.” His word use was as if he was unsure of himself, but his tone was confident and he leaned calmly on his pipe while everybody else panicked. Well, most of the people in the cafe, with low fat chocolate cake stains down their fronts scrambling around trying to get behind things like he was going to start shooting something, they panicked.

Oh, right, the glock sticking out of his trousers. He smiled, eyes crinkling behind long bangs last cut before the new year with blunt scissors over his sink. He tugged his hoodie back down by the ragged edge so it covered the black handle of his gun and the bottom half of a curl of dragon arm that reached across his stomach. He let the wrecked door swing shut behind him, the bell tingling. He thought about shooting it.

“I promise to not kill anybody, okay,” he said grudgingly, scratching the back of his head. “I'm looking for somebody. He owes my friends some money.” The guy had to be in here somewhere, or he was going to feel very stupid for breaking these nice people's front door. He kicked a couple of chunks of rough glass, clapped his hands. “Hey, if he stands up, I'll just take him and go, cool?” Kazuya had no idea who he was looking for, he was kind of expecting the first person to make a dramatic run for it to be the guy who owed the organization money. He could always just start hitting people until somebody stepped forward. He wasn't on anything, sober but still moving spider-fast-sudden like a junkie. Not powered up on meth, but still a lethal force, kind of a promise of brutality.

[Jan Lee]

Jan Lee had been having a pleasant day up until about now. Her mood was good and the weather just fine. She'd finished all her classes for the morning and was now free to do whatever she pleased - this, of course, entailed ditching her books back at the flat and skating over to the cafe which made the best hot chocolate in town.

So there she sat alone at her table in the back corner, reading a magazine, occasionally texting and daintily sipping at her drink. There she sat still when the front door of the cafe was suddenly smashed to a million pieces, wood and glass splintering and spraying everywhere. The resulting din startled her so much that she jerked in her seat and slopped hot chocolate all down her front and over the table. Cursing her misfortune, she hastily put down the mug and swiped the back of her hand across her mouth, snatching her phone away from certain death and glancing up towards the doorway.

Her eyes widened in mute shock at the sight of the imposing looking men standing in the space where the door had once been. In particular, she found her gaze drawn to the skinny-looking man in the middle, the one holding the destroyed door open - their ringleader, perhaps?
Around her, people were screaming and making mad dashes for the exits, pushing and elbowing each other out of the way, but Jan just sat frozen in her seat, her hand still raised to her mouth. She found herself too entranced to do anything - there was just something about this image that left her spellbound. The sight of these men standing there, their leader tapping a pipe on his shoulder, was just so mesmerising to her, so captivating, so.... so cool.

She saw him mouth words, but couldn't make most of them out over the racket. He moved his arm to pull down his hoodie and she noticed a flash of dark metal disappear underneath it - a gun? Welp, that wasn't good news. Time to hide!
Seizing the marshmallows on her saucer and cramming them into her mouth, she slid off her seat and quickly ducked under the table, eyes still drawn towards the doorway.

"...promise not to kill anybody, okay..." she heard. Jan laughed to herself a little. Right, as if that wasn't clichéd at all. She thought she heard mention of 'money' and shook her head woefully. Sigh. Money. Was that all it boiled down to these days? Halting her thought train, she suddenly remembered her poor financial situation and reconsidered her hypothesis. Then she nodded. Yup. Money. That's all it really boiled down to these days.

In any case, she couldn't stay here. Trouble was a' brewin' and something wicked was surely coming this way - that is to say, Jan was 90% certain that this wouldn't end without someone getting hurt. Preferably, the someone would not be her, although you can never count on these things, can you? Chewing thoughtfully on her marshmallows, she studied her surroundings. What could she use? Where could she escape? She sure as hell wasn't getting involved in a shootout if she could help it.

A few of the men were moving to cover all the back exits. Aha, Jan thought gleefully, but what about the front exits? As cafes often tend to do, there was a huge front window. Definitely a point of escape. Plus, she still had her skates on. If she could gather enough momentum, then maybe she could...

Nah, she couldn't do that all by herself. She's smack, SPLAT, against the window and knock herself out. But if she had something to help her...

Jan pulled her bag towards her and slipped it over her neck. Well, time to try make a break for it! She grabbed the wooden chair she'd been sitting in by the legs and gripped it tightly. Shoving the table roughly aside, she quickly pushed herself to her feet and gauged the shortest and least panicked-people-cluttered path towards her goal. Here goes nothing! Raising one foot, she kicked hard off and pushed herself off from the wall, gaining speed, swinging the chair back over her shoulder, closer and closer to the window until -----

[Invinciman]

Thirty more minutes before court was back in session. Just enough for a mug of tea. Chandler turned down an alley and into the first cafe he saw that had Earl Grey on its menu. He ordered the Earl Grey and sat down. The chair was uncomfortable.

A wholly boring case, Chandler said to himself. His client was probably guilty but the judge would take hours to realize. And then Chandler still had to defend him. Oh joy.
The waiter placed the Earl Grey in front of him. He took it without saying thank you. Court always got him into a bad mood. Tea usually helped counter that. Pity it’s always so hot. They should make tea that’s always the right temperature to drink. Nobody likes burning their mouth on hot tea, and nobody likes cold tea. Chandler peered into his tea, watching his reflection in the liquid.

There was a crash and a bang. Looking up unhurriedly, Chandler saw a group of four tough-looking goons step through the door. Apparently that was the new fashion. Nobody opens doors nowadays, god.

Three of them spread across the room like honey over toast. The remaining one was saying something, but everyone had started screaming and yelling and drowned out his words. People stood and panicked. A cupcake landed icing-first on Chandler’s table.
“Lemon...” Chandler said to himself.

When he looked up from the table again he saw that the three other goons had secured the exits. It was then that Chandler noticed the head-goon had a gun. A Glock to be exact. They were serious to do whatever they wanted to do.

“I promise to not kill anybody, okay,” the head-goon said, “I'm looking for somebody. He owes my friends some money.”

Chandler chuckled. Every crime in history had one of these three motives: Love, gain, revenge. Most of the time the three motives even merged into the one - gain. These goons were no different then the rest. They may think they’re all cool, but they’re the same as the rest.

Out of the corner of his fly-blood-blue eyes Chandler spied a shortish character looking like she was keen to make a break for it. Chandler watched, amused, as she grabbed her seat. Probably just thinking of doing something epic... just thinking, Chandler thought.

Suddenly this short person pushed aside her table and sprinted towards the front window. Okay... not thinking, then.
Oh god, this isn’t going anywhere good. Chandler took one look at the last dregs of his tea, then jumped up.

“Oi! I’m the one you’re looking for!” He said.

Oh god, I hope they don’t notice her, he thought.

[Monica Reid]

Fingers flicking through the various displays on her sCom sheet computer, Monica smiled at her client as he cracked a joke he thought was funny. "I didn't know Councillors had a sense of humour, Miss Reid," the man added, a too-wide grin plastered across his face. Vendor meetings were not her favourite, as regardless of how large a chain the vendor owned, they all seemed to think that because they were handing over money they were somehow more important than any of the other clients she saw on a daily basis.

At least the coffee was good; taking a sip from the kitschey mug it was in, she replied, "I think you'll find many people are in good humour with a fresh cup of coffee in their hand, Mr. Brighton". Giving him a moment to finishing chuckling (she'd had a hunch that one would go down well) she found the notes she was looking for on the flexible screen beneath her right hand and took a breath before she went in for the sell.

That breath was inhaled more quickly than she might have liked, though - turning into a gasp as a loud crash came from the doorway. A fizzling noise suggested her sCom had disagreed with her dropping her mug of coffee on it, but her eyes were on the door. 'One, two, three... four.'

As her eyes focused on the man in the doorway, the surrounding panic dropped away in her mind, and she felt a hunch that this man was dangerous - but he meant no harm. Not to her, anyway, and he had no interest in Mr oh-so-funny-Brighton either.

Said comedian was like a deer in the headlights - back pressed up against the wall of their cubicle, as if he was trying to disappear into it, and quivering to boot. It struck her as strange just then that she wasn't doing the same, but her hunches had never failed her before. Somehow, this irrational gut feeling told her she'd be okay, and she supposed she should instill some of this security in her client.

"Mr Brighton," she murmured in a low voice, "Unless you want to garner their interest, I propose we just relax. If your financial records showed you were in debt to someone, I wouldn't be here talking to you, so they aren't here for you, nor me." This seemed to quiet him a little, and she felt like he was a little calmer. Smugly, she noted to herself to bump up the stall price; he'd feel indebted enough to her to get away with it now.

Quietly righting her cup, she picked up a napkin and dabbed at her sCom in the hopes of reviving it. Her attention was elsewhere, though - something told her there were a few people who had very different ideas about keeping their heads down. No sooner than she'd realised as much, things started to happen all at once -

[Kazuya "Hakuryu" Tellagory]

Oh, for crying out loud. Maybe Kazuya wasn't flying weapons hot right then, but he still wasn't slow enough to miss the girl in the corner getting up and making a run for it. A roll for it, as the case may have been. He calmly swung his pipe across from by his feet, in one smooth arc that put it right under her wheels, interrupting her momentum somewhat. “Sorry,” he said. “I did say I wasn't going to kill anybody, right?” In the same breath he was brushing his unruly fringe out of his eyes to get a better look at the tall guy who had stood up, responsibly saving the rest of the crowded little cafe from any more undue violence. Well, a little bit. Direct violence, anyway.

With one hand keeping his pipe in the general direction of the girl with the skates and chair in case she had any funny ideas about say standing up and trying again or having a go at him, Kazuya drew his glock from his belt. The weapon was slightly warm from his body heat, like something alive.

There were probably quite a lot of people in the cafe who had already quite cheerfully contacted the police somehow or made desperate calls to their local neighborhood super. Quite frankly, Kazuya had no patience for either of these options. “Either you make a very good case for you have and can hand over in a prompt timeframe the money, or I will have to distress these people by putting a hole in you,” he said politely to the standing guy. He didn't really look like somebody who owed the Yakuza money; they usually had a more desperate, last-ditch look to them, even when they did come from all walks of life. Even the high-class looked a bit rough around the edges when they owed a violent organization money. Still, there was a dead-ender look to this guy. Kazuya's guess, it was a 'I have no hope of getting the money to repay these unpleasant men, my life is over, I might as well go wearing a nice suit, still digesting a cup of tea, in the middle of a crowded corner shop, like a big fucking hero,' kind of look.

Kazuya did not expect to get any money back from this guy. He should probably shoot him. His handlers had not been exceptionally clear on how much their mark owed – or even on exactly who he was, just some vague reference to his favorite hang-out-spot – or if in fact they had already tried just seizing all his properties. It was probably a good bet not to kill anybody before he found out of they were needed to sign pink slips.

[Jan Lee]

Welp, here we go again. Once more, Jan had failed to think of ALL the possible consequences for her actions. Had the notion that she would actually be stopped come to mind? No, not really. Typical.

And so when the cooldude-yakuza-whoswhachamacallit guy standing at the door had actually swept the metal pipe he'd been holding under her wheels and sent her hurtlingvery ungracefully onto the floor, the first thing that crossed her mind was an indignant 'The nerve of this guy!' (along with a secondary 'Ahahaha oh my god this is just about as bad as the time where I tried to vault over a REALLY HIGH railing and it didn't work argh the pain'. Yes, well. I guess some people don't quite learn do they?

In any case, Jan went sprawling, the chair went sprawling, her wheels were still spinning like crazy and a bolt of hot white pain shot through her chin and her tongue as she crashed to the ground. “Sorry,” she heard him say. “I did say I wasn't going to kill anybody, right?” Okay yes he had, but was Jan about to take a criminal at his word? Not really. Once she'd met a guy in the subway who claimed to have been mugged and had his wallet stolen. As Jan soon learned, yes some wallet-stealing had gone on that night, but it didn't happen to him.

Jan let slip some of her more 'colourful' vocabulary. It was slightly muffled against the floor. The chair was still in her hands, held above her head - she considered letting it go, since she probably looked ridiculous, but then she rolled over onto her side a little and saw the pipe was still directed at her, so she kept a hold on it. In the guy's other hand was the gun and it was pointed at someone. Letting go of the chair with one hand, she awkwardly propped herself up onto her elbow and wiped blood off her face from her bitten tongue. She saw a tall guy - dark-haired, stoic expression, smartly dressed - standing up from a table some distance away. Was this the guy that owed money? From the way the yakuza dude seemed to be talking to him, apparently so.

But, hmm. There was something about this guy in the suit. He looked.... rich. Jan knew rich when she saw it. Sure, she was born a country girl, but out in the city she'd traced up and down all walks of the city, trying to find good places to train. He looked like... ah, that's right.
A couple months ago, Jan had been vaulting over some railings outside the Supreme Court building when some guy came out and yelled at her for being a deliquent and yada-yada-yada. This one didn't look as mean as that one, but he held himself kind of the same way. Confident, upright, a little bit arrogant. That's right! This guy had the look of a...

"Lawyer!" Jan found herself suddenly blurting out. She clapped her hand over her mouth. Why would a Lawyer owe the yakuza money? Didn't these guys roll in the big bucks? It'd have to be a pretty heavy loan to warrant this kind of raid...

[Invinciman]

Okay... So much for that plan. Sure, it sounded like a good idea. Well, not even that. Oh, god, why do I always have to act before I think? Chandler shook his head and wiped sweat from his forehead with a handkerchief. Of course the goon was going to see the girl making a break for it. Did Chandler really hope that he could’ve stopped that? Now here he was, a glock pointed at his chest in the middle of a crowded, panicked cafe, a half-full mug of tea on the table. It’s bad manners not to finish your drink in a cafe. A true gentleman always finishes his tea... or can’t help not finishing his tea.

“Either you make a very good case for you have and can hand over in a prompt time-frame the money, or I will have to distress these people by putting a hole in you,” the goon said, not impolitely.

Oh god, what do I do now? If they find out I’m somewhat invincible, they’re probably just going to torture me, or something. I don’t know. What do goons do nowadays? They’ve probably going to sting me with bees or something. Oh god, oh god, oh god, oh god. Chandler’s thoughts raced through his head, chasing each other and tumbling through the aether of his mind.

But maybe they could actually kill him? There was a glimmer of hope in Chandler’s eyes.

Chandler wiped his forehead down again and cracked his knuckles. No use losing your head, Chandler. God, now I’m talking to myself? Okay. What do I do? Let them take me or let them shoot me. I’ve got objections to both those ideas.

“I’m none to keen on either, mister,” Chandler said. His voice was less shaky then he would’ve thought. “How about we forget about this whole episode?”

He grinned sheepishly. God, he hated his (never-ending) life.

[Monica Reid]

He'd promised he wouldn't kill anyone, but as the man in the corner stood up she felt a spike in his intent - malice... Mixed with boredom? Was this really so routine for him?

'Oh, what did you get up to yesterday?' 'Not much, just took a bunch of people hostage, beat up a little girl and killed a guy. The usual.'

As her thoughts shifted to the girl, she wondered if she was okay. The escape attempt was a foolish move if she was the one he wanted. If she wasn't, then why bother? The ringleader maybe wouldn't kill anyone, but he'd happily hurt them. She swallowed the lump that had begun to grow in her throat, suddenly thankful that her client had ducked under the table when the gun was drawn. She knew her composure was slipping, and didn't want him to see it.

He train of thought was interrupted when the girl blurted out "Lawyer!" suddenly, and Monica flinched. Fingers gripping the table in growing anxiety, her eyes slid across to the man who'd stood.

The girl was probably right - he did look like a lawyer, although... He seemed to lack that swagger that lawyers usually had... And, now that she thought about it...

“Either you make a very good case for you have and can hand over in a prompt time-frame the money, or I will have to distress these people by putting a hole in you.”

"I'm none too keen on either, mister," he replied, and mere seconds after it dawned on her.

The realisation hit, and she launched to her feet with a gasp of horror.

"He wants to be shot!"

[Ra Collin]

Ra was quite a distance away just "chillin" in a park near the city when he felt a large pulse of panicked energy emerge from the city. Worse that it originated from a place he liked to hang out when he was alive. Ra sighed pretending this was an annoyance in his daily laid back life and he began to walk off in the direction of the nervy pulse. On the inside he was feeling a mixture of excitement, panic and curiosity. It was going to be his first self appointed undercover mission ever.

Ra ran into an alleyway as a shortcut but from what he could feel he was quite the distance away. He focused as he ran out of the eyesight of others. ’ahhhh I’m not gonna get there in time!’ he thought to himself as he dashed through the shallow puddles and over ripped, compressed, dirty old newspapers. He was heading towards the distressed signal.

Next thing he knew he ran crashing into clean plates and cups in the kitchen of a café, yeah they looked pretty as most shattered things do as they sparkle in the light. Slowly getting up unhurt Ra was sure he only blinked a second, feeling disoriented Ra’s ears rang, he was sure someone was talking to him, rather at him. He felt a tug at the back of his hood before unwillingly moved into the front section of the café.

Had he of known what was going on he would of reacted differently maybe more heroic. But at this point his confusion washed over his youthful, colourful thinking.
Moved into the front Ra saw the shining gun in a tall rather intimidating mans hands, the attention may have been drawn towards him now for his sudden appearance. "Uh-haha...hi." Ra said nervously.