Players:
Summary: An accident on the street leads to the death of a "businessman".
Date: September 28, 2012
Log Title: A Girl Called Cassandra
Rating: R for violence
Broadway
Broadway's not just a street in New York; it's where all the biggest musicals and plays in the world aspire to be shown. With street after street of theatres, gift shops, and restaurants, Broadway is a lively place. Bright lights fill the streets with the glowing and flashing billboards promoting the latest shows. Times Square leads right into Broadway.
Broadway! Friday night! The very best night to … have a stupid fender-bender accident between someone's seldom-out-of-garage BMW and a semi-truck.
The semi-truck is being driven by a big burly red-haired man in a dark red jacket reading "Team Drakos"… and the man who was driving the car is working himself up to a heart attack.
A young man, black haired, in a dark red jumpsuit, is inspecting the damage while the driver rants about insurance and lawsuits.
Lucas is walking down the street, having finished playing a gig at a ratty bar up the street. He's wearing black skinny jeans and a dark gray t-shirt, a black leather jacket over that. A puffy beret sits on his head, his long blond hair flowing from beneath it around his face. He's carrying his beat up guitar case over his shoulder. As he walks, he puts a cigarette in his mouth, and then his finger sparks into a flame, lighting it.
The apparent businessman, working his way to apoplexy by berating the red-haired truck driver, notices that the young black-haired man has moved around to the passenger side, and is now talking to the young woman in the car, and the young woman is responding in a friendly fashion. This is apparently unacceptable to the businessman, who stops in mid-rant, and spins around, pointing at the passenger. His face is purple, and bits of spittle fly as he redirects his rant.
"DONCHOO BE TALKIN TO HIM! WHAT, YOU WANT PEOPLE SHOULD THINK YOU A WHORE? GET AWAY FROM HER YOU SUMMANABITCH!"
At that, the young man's attention instantly focuses on the businessman. His face shows exactly the amount of annoyance that a police officer would show when confronted by a drunk peeing in public.
"Sir, you need to calm down now," he says in a level, calm voice, but not one that allows for argument, a manner that could have been copied exactly from one of several costumed heroes … but in this case was copied from Scott Summers.
This doesn't help. The businessman snarls, lunges for the car, shoving the young man aside, and yanks the door open. The young man, apparently thrown backwards by the larger man, moves into a seamless back-flip and ends on the sidewalk next to Lucas, glancing at him for a moment with recognition.
"Oh, hi, Lucas, how ya been? One moment, I have an emergency." And Mike lunges forward, as the man drags the young woman out of the car by one wrist.
Lucas looks towards where Mike ended up, "Huh?" And then he tilts his head, watching him go. "…the hell?"
He turns and follows Mike, sitting his guitar on the hood of the car as he moves in behind Mike. "You may wanna go easy on the bitch, pal," he says flatly. And then one of his hands bursts into a brilliant fireball. People in surrounding cars and on the sidewalks begin to shout, some gasp, others move for cover or run.
Mike is too busy to comment, but the red-haired truck driver isn't.
"Hey buddy, be careful wit' that," he advises Lucas, apparently unfazed by the appearance of superpowers. "We might got a fuel leak here."
This being New York, the ones running for cover are the sane ones. One or two gawkers get out cellphones and begin trying to take pictures.
"OH no," Mike mutters. "No camera tricks. I'm not gonna be on the u-Tubes."
Every cellphone in a 500 foot radius loses its signal as Mike jams them with a burst of electronic garbage. However, doing this means he's not able to focus properly on the man who is dragging at the girl. Still, he taps him on the shoulder - hard but not enough to, say, break skin - and says, "You. One chance. Sit down now and we talk. You don't want to fight."
The man isn't smart enough to believe that, and when he sees Lucas' glowing fiery hand he's suddenly flipped into 'oh shit' mode. First he soils himself. Second, he starts screaming like a little girl. Third, he actually achieves the heart attack he was working on, with a vengeance, pain like molten lead running up his left arm and into his head.
When Mike doesn't take the man down, Lucas steps past him. As the man grabs his own chest in pain, Lucas takes his non-fiery right hand and grabs the man's shirt. With some ease, he lifts the man up and then slams him onto his back on the car's trunk. It dents from the impact as Lucas hops onto the bumper and then kneels down on the trunk to put his face right up in the man's. He lifts his fiery hand, and he snarls.
"Apologize to the lady," he demands, ignoring the heart attack happening.
The young woman pulls herself to her feet using Mike's hand and then arm as a lever, and the tears from being pulled out of the car turn into full blown sobbing.
"Please, don't hurt my Daddy, please…"
Standing reveals her to be dressed in extremely conservative clothing, long sleeves and high neck and no makeup whatsoever.
Phones stay out of service for the moment, as do nearby wireless systems. Mike starts to move toward Lucas but finds that the girl is clinging, limpet-like, to his arm, preventing him from moving without dragging her, while continuing to beg, "Please don't let him hurt my daddy!" She looks to be too old to be talking with such a childlike attitude - perhaps twenty years old.
The wannabe paparazzi are beginning to realize that their phones aren't working… Bad Language begins making an appearance on the streets of Broadway, shocking. Complaints come from nearby coffee houses as the wi-fi is jammed. Someone's new Pandarian dies when they are disconnected.
Meanwhile, the red-haired truck driver moves closer to the car, without putting himself in the way, and says, "Huh. No, I don't smell gas. No leak yet."
Mike shakes his head. "Tommy, get back in the truck, man. Pull it back out of traffic, ok?"
The businessman has realized suddenly that the sharp pain in his left arm and his chest aren't because he pulled a muscle earlier, and he almost hears what Lucas is saying, but he's starting to gasp like a fish.
Lucas grips the shirt tighter, pressing the man downward onto the trunk, lifting his fiery hand a bit higher, a bit more threateningly. "You're havin' a heart attack. And that's the least scary thing y'all are facin' right now, buddy." He grits his teeth a bit, and leans closer. "Now. Say… You're… Sorry." he repeats again, nearly nose to nose now with the man.
Tommy, at least, has better sense than to try to argue. He gets back in the truck - though it maybe seems a bit odd that he's listening to Mike rather than the other way around. But then again Mike's the Boss's Kid, and he's been kind of running the company on and off for over a year.
Mike turns to the girl, "Margaret, I can't help if you don't let go." She blinks, because he knows her name, and lets go, grabbing her hands together and starting to weep again.
The man gasps, and whimpers almost inaudibly, "..m sorry…" but then his eyes roll up, and Mike taps Lucas on the shoulder. "Get off him, he said sorry."
Lucas lingers a moment, even after Mike taps to relieve him. He looks at the other kid, then back at the man. For good measure, he lifts the man a few inches off the trunk and slams him back down once more before pushing himself off the car, the fire around his hand sputtering out. He paces then, calming down.
Mike immediately begins trying to do CPR - the cardio part anyway, he doesn't breathe and so he can't do that other part. But then the too-old-little-girl Margaret leaves off the weeping now that Daddy's eyes no longer see her and his heart has stopped beating … and his breath ceases. She looks over at him with a face as expressionless as a ceramic mask.
"I told you, dearest daddy," she says quietly, in a suddenly adult voice, brushing the gravel off her skirt. "I told you that the ghost of the ghost, the one who killed Uncle Benjamin would come for you, and that the demon who was and is not, would end your curse. You thought I meant the Spirit of Vengeance, didn't you? Fool, your curse could only end with your death."
She walks over to where Mike is trying to do CPR… "You're wasting your time, Ghost. His heart was eaten by the mother of crows when he cried craven. His soul tries to find its way to the phylactery he made, but my dear dead cousin Romeo ruined it for him, as a favor to me."
And then she smiles at Lucas. "You have the gratitude of Margaret Ferelli, for what little it's worth now."
Mike stares at the girl, not even having to pretend shock. Cell phones start working again.
An ambulance approaches; apparently someone called it from a land-line. No police, though, oddly enough.
Lucas tilts his head at the young girl, "Ah um… Ah reckon you're welcome?" He looks back at Mike, now a little confused. "We should go," he says, flatly, as he moves to grab his guitar case.
Mike nods to Margaret Ferelli. "The driver will handle the insurance information, but I do have video of your father turning in front of us on a red light. Will you be ok?"
She shakes her head. "No, Ghost. I have Cassandra's gift, I'll never be OK. But I have a place to go." She considers saying something else and shakes her head, smiling faintly. They wouldn't believe her anyway.
"I wish she wouldn't call me that. Where to?" Mike says, figuring Lucas has a place he wants to go to. He calls up into the truck, "Tommy, I have to take care of some things, I'll call you in a few hours. Cops are almost here."
"OK, kid, I'll let your Papa know what happened if you don't call by 2am." Now that's a threat.
Lucas begins walking towards the next alley. "Why's she callin' you ghost? Who's Cassandra?" he asks as he walks. He does look over at the old classmate. "You should be gettin' back to Xavier's," he says flatly.
Mike says, "You have a lot to catch up on."
(the rest of the story is missing because someone tore the pages out of the comic to use for an art project. Jerks.)
