2014.01.19: Turfwar Part 5

Turfwar Part 5
Beckett helps Detective Glover invite one of the local Thugs to an off the books interrogation.
IC Date	2014.01.19
IC Time	9:40 P.M
Players	Bastion Beckett, and Lana Glover as ST.
Location	City Streets, Prospect CA.
Prp/Tp	Turfwar
Spheres	Mortal, Mortal+

"At the closed arcade in twenty minutes," the Yakuza on the phone instructs Beckett, hanging up without waiting for a reply. Nearby, an impatient Lana leans against her car, arms folded and tapping her foot.

Walks back into earshot and relays the message. He opens her back passenger’s side door and tosses something in. It looks like a bedroll of all things, but the light catches it just right – just once. It’s the hilt of a sword or something. Not just /any/ sword though. Its one of those Japanese swords that people always have in Samurai movies. He closes the door and opens the front one for himself, looking over the car at Lana. “We have twenty minutes. Old arcade. We better roll.”

Lana gets into the car, but is mostly just staring at the sword. "A sword? Really? What are you going to do with that? Go back in time five hundred years to when having one made sense? Why didn't you just bring a rock, since you seem to like antiquated weaponry?" She teases as she starts up the car, and gets it rolling.

Beck glances in the backseat after getting in and closing his door. “Sakura,” he says, thus naming the Katana. “Just consider it like a badge? A symbol you might say. These guys may or may not respect it.” He shifts back towards the front, looking through the windshield. “Besides, I have an aversion to firearms. They’re very dangerous.”

Lana rolls her eyes. "You named it? Damn right guns are dangerous, that's the whole point in carrying one. I'm pretty sure the guys we are going to meet will have guns, too, and you'll be stuck their with your silly sword, literally the man that brought a knife to a gun fight."

“I didn't name it,” Beckett replies. “The swordsmith that forged it did over six hundred years ago.” He cants his body so he can watch Lana as she drives. “I’m betting your right them though. So I’ll be as precautions as possible. Hopefully no one gets shot. Especially me.”

Lana nods, mostly focused on the road. "Yeah ... I really don't want to get shot again either. What's our plan for this anyway? You going to go talk to them, wag your sword around, and tell them get in car?"

Beckett lifts a brow. He was half expecting some attempt at humor revolving around the antique nature of his Katana. It is basically a heirloom. “Sun Tzu said that we should let our plans be dark and impenetrable as night, and when we move; fall like a thunderbolt,” he comments looking from the women to the road. “I plan to fall like a thunderbolt.” He smiles for a moment, then looks back at Lana. “We don’t make the meet. We tail them when they leave. When they separate, we take one and force some answers.”

Lana shoots him a skeptical look. "Antiquated tactics to go with the ancient weapon? You're not exactly filling me with confidence. What are we going to do, if they don't separate? Gang members usually have at least one or two of their fellows around them."

He gives a brief chuckle, and smirks. “It wouldn't be a total loss. We might learn where their spending the majority of their time.” He meets her gaze, lifting a brow. “Isn't that what your guys do on stakeouts? Get some tag numbers. ID some people. If I’m not mistaken this is the first crack we've had at seeing what their up to without them knowing.”

Lana pulls the car to a stop in a relatively dark side street that overlooks the meet spot. "Yeah, but this isn't exactly a stakeout. If we don't show, and don't get the leverage we need for the real meeting. They are going to hurt people in retaliation. I'd rather not get any more people killed because of me."

“Relax,” Beckett tells her in a non-condescending tone. “I never mentioned you.” The call was in Japanese, so she can’t know what he said. However, he doesn't seem the type to lie. “They think their meeting an information source that your dead body had on the side. Hell, they think I’m Japanese.” Having lived there mostly all his life, Beck can pull the accent fairly easily.

"Easy for you to say, no one's died because of you yet," Lana snaps.

Across the way a car pulls into the parking lot of old arcade. The driver doesn't get out, but a couple of guys do get out of the back. They appear to be joking with each other as they lean against the car to wait for the meeting.

“Lana, you shouldn't beat yourself…” He stops speaking as the car pulls up, gesturing towards it to alert her as well. Beckett watches for a moment, though distance makes reading the plate to difficult, and hearing their conversation impossible. He closes his eyes, and forces his sense to extend beyond the normal human range. Something is wrong though, and he can’t quite focus. After a brief and awkward moment, he opens his eyes and massages one temple. His eyes shift to Lana, “I… Um, so we wait.”

Lana leans back checking the time. "Shouldn't have to wait long. I can't imagine Yakuza are patient people, and the meeting time is in just a couple minutes," she responds.

Beckett attempts to focus again, but even forcing it doesn't seem to help him. At length a little growl breaks through his normally cool exterior. No doubt Lana might find it odd, and he shakes his head. “Yakuza always make me edgy,” he says. It isn't a lie.

Lana looks over at him. "Why? Just another group of punks that think the law doesn't apply to them. No different from any other criminals - whether they pretend to be or not."

The conversation between the waiting Yakuza seems to have ended, as one of them keeps glancing at his phone. He is clearly angry about Beckett not arriving at the meet he requested.

“It’s the methods they employ that bother me,” he notes just as seriously. He knows Lana can relate first hand to the statement. What he doesn't know, is that she knows why he feels that way. The death of his family is after all attributed to the Yakuza.

Lana nods solemnly. "They do have a way of involving people that have nothing to do with things, that is most infuriating," she replies, before starting back up the car.

In the parking lot, the Yakuza have grown tired of waiting. The two that got out, get back into the car, slamming the door in anger and speeding off with squealing tires.

Beck just nods his head in response. His mind is elsewhere. Probably the reason he can’t focus. The laying in wait only reminds him of the tactics used against him all those years ago. It wasn't Yakuza though, it was far worse. The dark shadows of his past are what only the most powerful Yakuza bosses can call up and employ to do their bidding. The Ninja.

Lana is far too busy keeping up with Yakuza to notice Beck's angst, not that she's the sympathetic type anyway. The two end up chasing the Yakuza through the streets for a while before the car slows to a stop long enough to let a couple of men out of the back seat. They are close enough to see that each has a handgun tucked into their pants.

At some point Beckett scratches down the tag number, in addition to the address where the two men hop out. All of that will be leads Lana has the ability to run down. One never knows. “I say we take the guy in the car. Those two are armed and won’t be easily taken off guard. My money says the driver cracks faster anyway.” He glances over at the Detective, and lifts a brow. “If he’s their wheels, he has to know a few locations.”

Lana nods, though it's likely she just came to her own conclusion to do that. The car speeds off again, and Lana once more gives chase. This is a shorter trip, ending with the car parking along the street before the driver gets out. He is also armed, but at least alone.

Beckett smirks. “I have a plan.” That’s never good. He hurriedly begins rolling down his window, while fishing around for the glass Coke bottle at his feet. “Drive past his car nice and slow,” he says to her before he starts climbing out the window to sit in it and look across the roof at the guy walking away. “Hey!” He shouts loud enough to get the guys attention “Zipper head!! Yeah you! We want two orders of rice and some wantons!” That said he flings the bottle to crash through the guys rear windshield, then he slides back in the car beside Lana. “I suggest you start moving detective. Fast. Just don’t lose him!” If everything go right, this is about to be a reverse car chase.

Lana looks at Beckett incredulously, for just a moment before slamming on the gas. There's the loud crack of a gunshot that doesn't seem to hit their car, followed by the sound of the man Beckett antagonized squealing his tires to give chase. "And where exactly am I supposed to be leading this guy?" Lana demands.

The man whispers a very small prayer in Japanese: forgiveness from the ancestors for his previous language. Under normal circumstance he’d never use a racial slur like that. His wife was Japanese, and his daughter is (though Lana doesn’t know she’s alive) half. He turns in his seat, watching the headlights close on them. “Find us a deserted stretch of street. Either downtown or some surface road leaving the city. Get me enough gap that I can get out, and then lead him in a circle back towards me. I only need a couple minutes, Lana” he grabs Sakura; unwrapping the cloth that concealed the sheath until now. “I’m asking you to trust me.” It’s a real fucking sword.

Seeing Beckett pull out the sword does not instill a look of trust on Lana's face. If anything, she manages to look even more skeptical. "You want me to let you out, and lure a speeding car with a man you angered badly back toward? Why? So I can watch you turn into a pile of red goop? That's not happening."

“I’ll be fine. I have a plan remember?” He glances back at the car chasing them. “And we don’t have a lot of time before he decides it’ll be easier to catch us if calls help. The only reasons he hasn't yet, is probably pride.” He lifts a brow at the female Detective, canting his head. “Trust me Lana. I can do this. Just be a few car lengths ahead of this guy when you come back,” Beckett says. Sheathed sword in hand, he places a hand on the door handle, ready to roll out at a moment’s notice.

Lana rolls her eyes and sighs. "Fine, whatever, throw your life away. At least after he kills you, I can just arrest him, rather than kidnap him." She leads shifts directions, quickly finding the exact sort of deserted road Beckett was looking for.

When Lana finds a good spot, Beck makes his move. She slows down just enough. For a college professor he’s without a doubt a very athletic man. Beckett leaps, rolls, and comes up running for cover to escape notice from the pursuing car. He turns watching Lana’s taillights vanish, and then the Yakuza drivers too. After that he rises and moves back to the street. Waiting for their return.

There's a screech of tires a little way down the road as Lana spins her car around. The Yakuza follows the maneuver, chasing Lana back toward where Beckett was dropped off.

Beckett stands ready as Lana passes him at high speed. No doubt she thinks he suicidal by this point. If he knows Lana she’s looking in her rear view watching so she can testify at the murder trial. He holds Sakura’s sheath in his left hand, pressed to that same hip. His right closes tightly over the hilt. Here he focuses, his body reflexively lowering in his stance as the breeze of Lana’s car hits him.

Seconds tick by in slow motion as the Yakuza thug’s car closes on him. Then Japanese steel whispers forth in a sibilant hiss. A roar comes from Beckett as he slash backward, and then reverses direction only to drive the blade cross-ways down the passenger’s side of the passing car. Headlight, tires, doors, and the taillight: nothing can withstand the fury unleashed by the Ancient weapon. He holds his position as sparks and shrapnel explode into the air around him.

Rather thoroughly wrecked on the passenger side now, the car skids out of control around Beckett, careening off the road to crash into a ditch with a loud crunch. Further down the road, Lana skids to a stop to exit her car.

Sakura snaps into her sheath, and Beckett runs towards the wreck. He’ll likely have to explain what just happened later, but for now there are bigger fish to fry. If the driver isn't out cold, he soon will be.

The driver is not out cold, and in fact kicks his door open just before Beckett arrives. He pushes himself out of the car while clutching at his head and trips, falling to his hands and knees in the ditch.

Reaching the man, Beck lowers enough to be heard, “Hey buddy, you okay?” However before the man can answer, the college professor’s right hand is already cocked back and falling. The hit connect solidly with the man’s skull. After dropping the thug, Beckett rises and motions to Lana in the distance. “Bring the car,” he shouts towards her. Turning back to look at the thug, he lifts a brow. “And your cuffs,” he mummers under his breath. Yeah he just cut through a car with a sword, and then dropped the driver with a single well delivered blow. College professor has some explaining to do.

Lana brings the car around, parking it nearby and stepping out. "Well I guess that worked. Surprised that rusty old antique didn't snap in half," she remarks as she comes down and cuffs the guy.

Beckett rests the length of Sakura’s sheath over his shoulder, holding the sword by the hilt. “You see a man cut through a car and that’s the best you got, Detective?” He smiles, and then walks over to pop her trunk while she cuffs the guy. He leaves the Katana in the backseat again, before coming back to help her drag their quarry over and deposit him. After getting him in the trunk, Beck uses the cloth he had around his sword to gag, and blindfold the prisoner. “Think we should search the car?”

Lana shrugs. "What were you expecting, praise? You accomplished something you could have done with a gun by just shooting out the tire. Oh and the gun doesn't require you to dodge a ton of speeding metal bent on trying to crush you to a pulp."

Beckett smiles at her, and chuckles softly, “I suppose.” He doesn't press further. All in due time. Instead he slams the trunk and heads over to the car to give it a quick search. Lana likely finds things that she knows might hold value – paperwork and such. Beckett grabs the only thing that isn't busted. The GPS. He shows her, then when their done he heads back to her car. “You know any abandoned building were we could have a chat with this guy?”

Lana thinks for a moment then nods. "I know of a place we can use," she says. "I'm looking forward to beating some information out of him."