Jun 26 07:25:00 107 PA - Warnings and Gambits

From Chronicles

The first rays of dawn's light catch the rain-slicked trailor park to light it up like a barnicle-encrusted jewel. The residents are still largely asleep, the various trucks and trailors quiet and dark, though three men stand nervously around a fire barrel and stare behind one of the larger trailors. A bearded one in a denim jacket speaks to his friends, "A suit. I sworn I saw a suit. Over there. And then ... it was like the vampires come back. Just ain't natural." His fellows laugh, chiding him for hallucinaing. What was that he was drinking last night? Ma's home-stilled whisky?

Early in the morning is a great time for a little shopping, or at least browsing. Bridget might be a little -too- early, though. She walks from the nearby dress shop and heads towards the bazaar, cutting across the edge of the lot. The men and the laughing make her look over, but she just gives a half of a smile before hiding her face behind a paper cup. Of course she's got coffee.

She'd see what they miss. A warm body in the shadows, standing on a milk crate, peering into a trailor's window. Too warm, and the shape ... Ahriman. He has one hand on a knife at his belt, and he's awfully still. Though as the shadow slowly shifts about him with the rising sun, he eases a little closer to the window.

Bridget quirks a brow at the not really hidden splotch by the trailer window. So he went from burglary to voyeur? Isn't that sort of backwards? Her half-smile turns into a smirk and she takes a detour towards Mr. Tall, Dark, and Peepy. She's not quiet as a mouse or anything, but she's not trying to be noisy, either.

Of course in certain trailers, people -don't- sleep during the night, because of tall dark and spooky people who threaten to kill others. Inside that particular trailer Ash has been awake all night watching over Isabeau as the woman sleeps and keeping tabs on the surroundings out of boredom. He also has the ability to detect body heat, which is important when dealing with shadow people who have threatened the death of your friends. As per his usual he walks over towards the door when the sun starts to rise and looks at the surroundings before he opens the trailer door for some fresh air.

The door opening causes Ahriman to turn. He's well-dressed in a pinstripe suit and silver shirt. His black head peers down over Ash, a smirk covering his features. "Good morning Bridget," comes the rumble, impossibly low for his svelt frame. Ahriman's head quirks to the right. "And a stranger emerges! So. You're the reason my little Isabeau has not returned. I'm afraid I had not marked her yet, but rest assured she belongs to me. Stealing is a crime in this city, I believe."

Bridget is surprised to see Ash come out of the trailer, at least at first. Even before Ahriman finishes his little crime and punishment spiel, she can add two and two and get four. "Didn't we already have this little talk? Thought you said you didn't want her?" She eyes Ahriman over her coffee and keeps walking towards the boys and trailer.

"You don't own her Ahriman." Ash says without any surprise at where the voice comes from, pulling his pistol from it's holster and thumbing it to burst fire mode. He leans against the door frame and looks directly at the shadows. "We've also got some new information for the cops too... about some of your less than savory activities. If you don't grow a brain and back off then, well, they just might figure out more of what you've been up to." The quick-flex smiles, "Murder is also a crime in this city. You threatened her with death, well, that makes you a criminal even now." He cocks his head to the side, "Also, Tirzah wants you to know, you so much as breathe on Isabeau, she'll kill you for harming one of her employee's." He looks over towards Bridget, "Oh he's a liar see, which is why breaking his promise about killing Isabeau will be an easy thing to break." He looks back towards Ahriman, "Won't it."

"Whether I want her is irrelevant," Ahriman speaks, perhaps to both. "She is mine. If I allow someone to steal her without repercussion, what does that invite? More theft. That is how you humans think, no? Part of your tribal ancestry." Ahriman eyes Ash and reaches into his jacket to fall silent a moment, thinking, and then pulls his hand out palm-up as if to say 'look! No weapons!' But he fiddled with something in there. "I don't fault you for it. But please. Put the weapon away. We can be civil. Perhaps you could buy her from me?"

"No she's not. You don't -own- people. Pretty sure I said something about that a couple times, too." Bridget snorts and then shrugs her shoulders to Ash, looking between the boys. "A liar, or he's just really dumb..." They look like they're ready to throw down, but that doesn't stop her from walking right up to both of them. In the middle, but not dumb enough to stand between them.

"I'm not human Ahriman." Ash says simply, "And I really, -really- dislike being called human." The alien says with a narrowing of his eyes. "Isabeau worked for Tirzah before you tried to force her into slavery. You never -had- a claim. You were attempting to steal from Tirzah. Are you certain this is a road you want to go down?" He tilts his head to the side, "Leonard also says he wonders if you'd like walking in the noonday sun picking flowers some more. Or worse." He smiles wickedly, "You're not just facing me over this attempt to make her a slave Ahriman. Haven't you figured this out yet? You make a move against her, you keep up this ridiculous claim, and you're dead. Certainly you value your own continued existence. Or do you think you can handle Tirzah, Leonard, myself and so many others all wanting to see you dead over your misperception?" He looks towards Bridget, then says something so soft only enhanced hearing is likely to pick it up.

The black being just smiles at that. "Alien, then. What are you even doing here? Go back to where you came from. This isn't you land, so it's fairly plain you wouldn't know about humanity's proclivity for slavery. Ever since they've been able to swing rocks at one another, they've owned each other." Ahriman frowns at the rising sun, and the shadow around him seems to stretch. Darkness runs along the earth like a black stain, improbably casting the three into what would be an early morning twilight where elsewhere the morning sun burns happily. "Even today, you think you're free? If you were free, why couldn't you just take a mansion for your precious Isabeau? Get her good food, treat her medical condition? You're certainly capable enough of taking these things." The black being pauses, and continues, "You're not free, you've just come to accept that some people have and you don't. Well. I'm a better master."

Bridget is not really surprised by the instant shade. It's not exactly a new thing for Ahriman, and she turns to glare at him. Whatever smile she had before dropped into a scowl. "You only get what you can take, and I don't think you're taking her. Nobody's buying your master of everything shit."

"Enough." Ash says, keeping his gaze focussed on Ahriman. He lifts his pistol then and aims it at the shadow being, "Your parlor tricks aren't going to scare me. You now know you will die if you continue this ridiculous course of action. Might not be me that kills you, but rest assured you -will- die. Now run back to your room away from the sun, and quit trying to act like you have some claim on someone you don't. Or you're dead. That simple." Seems he agrees with Bridget.

The black creature peers at them both, and as he speaks to himself his bass rumble is gone. Instead he whispers with four voices, each adding a little to make a greater whole. A soap bubble appears around Ash, glowing faintly blue in its translucency to warble in the gentle breeze. "Look at him," Ahriman speaks, his rumble back as he waves at Ash. "Waving about that pistol as if it were a talisman against evil. Clinging to the notion that no matter what dire level of filth his mate lives in, it must be better than what I could provide. And you ally yourself with that?" Ahriman steps towards Bridget, reaching a hand to trail along the soap bubble's edge. Streaks of light follow his fingertips on its surface. "You buy into this ... natural rights nonsense? Perhaps you really are only human, after all." The black being sighs at that, blinking quickly at Bridget. He utters a few more words in that slippery tongue of his and black flames overtake him, eating the light around him and giving the shadow a sickly purple glow. In moments he's gone from their heat vision, and he fades into the shadows as well. Invisible, in a sense, save that the trailer's shadow lengthens to overtake another truck, which lengthens to overtake a building, in the direction of the guild ley line. Impractical? Very.

"I'm pretty sure he's waving it around more to kick your ass..." Bridget stops and blinks at the bubble, since that's new, but doesn't linger on it. Ahriman does his other disappearing trick when she looks back at him, but she keeps talking, anyways. "Rights? Maybe, but maybe not. Maybe I should just own -you-? You'd look kind of pretty in a little box for everybody to come and look at." She walks after the shadow trail, even if she can't really see him.

Ash raises an eyebrow at the bubble and walks towards it, rapping his knuckles on it a bit with a chuckle. "You're such an idiot, you think we -live- here Ahriman? You been coming here for how many weeks and... we weren't here. You really are ignorant." Ash says with a little smile before he starts to rapid fire blast away at the bubble with that pistol, pulses of laser fire weakening it with every passing second. Of course he seems more amused than anything else, so if Ahriman is leaving Ash isn't going to follow.

Bridget doesn't walk all that far. Maybe it was just enough to make sure Ahriman could hear her, wherever he was skulking in his shadows. The lasers flashing behind her make her turn around to walk back... and make sure she's out of the line of fire.

When the bubble pops and fades Ash ejects the clip of his pistol and slots a fresh long e-clip into it and readies it to make sure it's got a clean connection before he holsters the pistol. He doesn't shoot once the bubble is gone so no line of fire to get out of. "Just happened to be in the neighborhood?" Ash asks Bridget with a wry smile. "Looks like I can't be leaving just yet..." He says with a shrug. "And time to get something with... a little kick."

"Pretty much." Bridget shrugs and sips at her coffee, even if it's mostly cold. "Just out for some shopping and cutting through. So you're not leaving yet? Why's that?" She quirks a brow.

"Obviously can't. Since Ahriman is going to keep up this idiocy." Ash pulls out his mini-computer and jacks into it, "Going to have to let people know." He goes about sending some messages over the local computer network, yay for technology. "Can't leave while my friends are at risk." He then looks at Bridget and shrugs, "Still think it'd be better to leave, but... now I can't. Since now Isabeau -and- you are at risk."

Bridget snorts into her coffee. "I'm not worried about him. He's mostly hot air, with a couple of neat tricks. I think that's why he dresses like that. Makes him fit in with al the other suits." She shrugs again. "Don't let me hold you up. I can take care of myself just fine."

Ash unplugs his computer, "That's not it Bridget." He says simply, looking over at her. "I... spoke a bit hastily. It's easier for me, to run... and things here make it real easy to run." He rakes a hand through his hair then looks into the trailer to make sure Isabeau is still there and asleep before he looks back towards Bridget. "I don't really know what to do. I'm not used to caring about anyone but myself... between you and Isabeau..." He shakes his head, "And for your information." He looks straight at Bridget, "You're still the last woman I've ever been with."

"I wasn't asking, and it don't really matter." Bridget waves that away, but she doesn't really say what, either. "Like I said, nobody owns anybody else. Nobody can make you do what they want. Mostly."

"No, you didn't ask, but you were so wrong last time we spoke..." Ash shakes his head, "I'm not like how you were saying I was." He shrugs a little, "Not that it matters I guess. Have a good morning. Have to finish getting Isabeau's things packed up."

Bridget gives him a shrug back, then nods. "Have fun. I better get back to shopping before somebody else takes all the good stuff." She gives a little grin before her cup hides it. More coffee gets slurped and she turns to walk on.

"Right." Ash says a little bit lamely, still hanging out in the doorway to the trailer. "Take care gorgeous..."