[luckace]

Scipio cursed like he had never cursed before. I falied... the man was gone and he would report to the temple about what had happened. We're fucked! Holding back his frustration and his tears, he returned to the others. We still have the spokesman, and I swear we will get every bit of information out of him! He had never felt so furious, and yet so scared. What if they send an assassin into the hive and smoke us out? They had to react quickly. But at first they had should question the spokesman. You will talk!

"Kill him", he bluffed briskly, making his face a stern mask of anger. "He might be able to communicate via..." Via what? He knew that fancy pashupatifolks used to talk to each other with some wireless matrix-stuff. "He could inform the temple about us. If he does, we're fucked. He has to die RIGHT NOW."
He hoped that his friends understood that he was bluffing, as he pulled out his rusty khukuri with a dramatic gesture.
Scipio never knew it could feel so good to be angry.

[gilga]

"Don't kill him... I want to keep him as long as he cooperates...", protect me while I search him... " Lucky gave the man a physical search looking for a commlink or anything of interest in his pockets or hidden on top of him.

[Jack_Spade]

"With pleasure." Riker stepped close behind the man and rested the knife lightly at his throat. Although he trembled from cold and adrenaline, his hand was unfailingly steady. Riker concentrated totally on the sweating man in front of him. If he had turned his head just a few centimeters, the mutilated form of his first opponent would have come into his field of view.
He didn't want to think about him, the living man was more important right now...

[luckace]

Unsure what to do, Scipio searched the body of the dead bodyguard, primarely for anything that might be dangerous or could be used for communication, but also for anything that looked precious. We still need the money for Musaas operation. If we get it by selling templethings, I'm perfectly fine with it.
He stopped for a moment before searching the troll and made sure was really unconscious.
He thoughts were still racing about how the bodyguard suddenly died in front of his eyes and about how he failed to hunt the assassin down. And about the assassins cold, dark eyes...

[Volker]

The man indeed wore a commlink, a fairly expensive one, too. In addition, he's got a purse full of cash, a Shiva VII (a light pistol) and a stun baton. Oh, and a golden watch. He's wearing an armor vest underneath his clothes.

Scipio's mouth turns dry and sour as he approaches the corpse. The heavy rain washes the bright red blood away in small streams, revealing the ripped-open flesh at the man's throat. There's something white in the neck, you think. Can you actually see the spine, or are your eyes playing a trick on you. His eyes are broken, forever caught in an expression of wonder and horror. The big gold chain lies in a pool of blood. It's a small skull on a plate of gold. It's grinning.
If you manage to put yourself together and search the dead body, you'll find a Ceska Black Scorpion and a combat knife. Inside a pocket of his armor jacket, you can find a couple of rupee notesc, reserve ammunition a pack of chewing tobacco. You find a commlink and metal handcuffs.

The troll wears orange robes and an armor vest. Apart from the commlink, he's got his forearm snap-blades and a collection of throwing knives. He brought nothing else, save for a lucky charm.

All three are equipped with datajacks.


Ravinder fights down his panic. "All right, boys, all right - no point in getting aggressive, right? I guess, you deserve to be treated accordingly. Right ... now, before we start ... would you boys mind if I ... I take a look at my comrades. They are... (he shoots a look at the dead man) ... were my friends...
Just make sure, at least Bhuwan is fine..."

[luckace]

Scipio took a deep breath. It wasn't the first time he saw a dead body, but most of the times, they were less... butchered. And mostly he himself was less involved. Ravinder's words sounded relatively unimportant to him, just like they were spoken from far away, yet they found a way inside his mind, where they lungered for a while and then suddenly bursted into an explosion of fury and anger. They had just murdered a man, their whole gang was in life-threatening danger, and yet this ASSHOLE just talked about not getting aggressive?! "Chill, Scipio, get yourself together!", one voice inside his mind said. "He's just doing his job." But there was another voice inside his head, a voice that he normally tried to ignore: "Who died today deserved to die. And this slimy drekhead also deserves it... Don't let him check the corpses, he's up to no good! Take him as a hostage, send a small piece of him to the temple and tell them, if any of their guys visit us, we will send a bigger piece!" Scipio knew that unnecessary violence was against everything he stood for, but BOY WOULD HE LOVE TO CUT OFF THIS DAMN BASTARD'S... "Damn, calm down!"
He cleared his throat and spit a thick glob of slime, dust and sorrow onto the metal-planks. Then he turned towards Ravinder, the templemen's goods still in his hands (he had put the khukuri away while searching them), giving his best to hide his tears. He wanted to act strong! "You answer our questions, and then MAYBE we will let you live and if we are VERY FRIENDLY, we might even let you take a look at your mercs. But don't count on it, that depends on your answers."
You can see that Scipio really comes to like showing his cold shoulder more often...

[gilga]

No... said lucky aggressively: "first tell us what exactly did you do to Bikki, and toward what end." He browsed the comlink for contacts trying to figure out what are the most significant contacts in there to get some meat for his investigation.
 "You should have thought about your dead friends before you tried to kill us.... for no apparent reason. there are tens of people that know what we do about Bikki are you going mass killing now?"

[Volker]

As Lucky browses through the contacts, one contact immediately attracts his attention:
Manisha Thapa Magar, 19:47:33
You check the time. It's 19:48:12.

Ravinder casts a nervous glance at the commlink, then starts babbling. "Bikki is part of a research programme. They perform ... I don't know. I really don't know exactly. It's actually a corporate. I'm just doing, you know, communication and stuff. See that Bikki's fed and everything..."

[gilga]

Lucky turns off the commlink and say, guys we must change location. Can you pack our friend here please, his last call was about a minute ago... either during the fight or while we were talking... "come sneaky one... we are going to hide you so so deep that nobody would find... In the meanwhile if you want to stay alive you'd better tell me about this  "Thapa Magar" girl. ":

[Jack_Spade]

"NOT. Good enough." Riker had to grit his teeth at this painfully obvious attempt to distract them: "Answer the fucking question."
He was now at a point where he had to force himself to stay angry. He knew that the instant he let any other emotion in again, he would lose it. First his composure and then his last meal. Fuck. He had killed a man. That was bad. He had seen someone killed in prison and he had used the knife in anger to not get raped while in juvie, but not like this.
Despite the pouring rain he felt hot. With an effort of pure will he steered his thoughts back to why he had done it. The fucker had tried to shoot them. They had given them every chance and they had blown it. There was always a price to be paid, always a price...

At Lucky's words he removed the knife and instead grabbed the mans wrist and forced it into a painful position: "Move."

[luckace]

Shit, this is getting worse and worse! Scipio hastingly put the money and the comlinks in his pockets. "Any of you want the gun or the knives?", he asked his friends.

After a short moment of hesitation, he takes the handcuffs and approaches Ravinder. "All right, let's tie the fucker."

He casts a worried look at the injured Sissy. "Are you all right, chummer? Where did he hit you?"

[gilga]

"I am more interested in finally having a comlink of my own. But take them - maybe some people in the gang will need weapons especially if the temple go after us. Besides we cannot leave weapons where there is an unconscious troll that will wake up in several hours very angry.  That guy is a weapon on its own... don't give him knifes and guns. "
He was nervious - help was on the way and he did not want to be there when it arrive - but he couldn't even convince his friends to let the spokeman go as he haven't given them anything yet.

Perhaps he should leave him with Riker to interrogate him, Lucky did not feel very skilled at interrogation.

[Volker]

As it's his native language, Lucky would recognize Manisha as a female name. So I'll just assume you said something like "girl" instead of "guy".

Ravinder still evades the answer like a pussy circles hot milk. "What question do you mean? You posed more than I can answer simultaneously." As Riker twists his arm, he groans. "Fuck! Right, right, I'll come with you." You can read the fear in his eyes, smell it, feel it. He knows he lost this battle.

Sissy joins the others and grits his teeth. "I'm ... all right. I think. The bullet hit me in the shoulder. I'm fine, though."
You can see blood trickling down his body, only to be washed away within seconds by the rain. It's nothing he will die of, but it's gonna take a long time until he can lift two sacks of rice simultaneously again.

HarleQueen, too, leaves her hiding place, cursing audibly. "That fuck got away, bang Krishna! Me's a-tried ter deep-fry him, just me no thinks he has noticed it at all. Fuck!"


Scipio's commlink gives a soft buzzing sound.

[Jack_Spade]

"I'll take a gun, thank you very much. I want to be ready when the other one returns." Riker was thankful for the distraction and to be able to get out of this place.
"Take the vest to, it's good money."

[gilga]

Looking at sissy lucky said: "Poor thing  a medikit should be the first thing to buy with our loot. Our life seems so dangerous... "