2017.12.24: Shadows of the Past - Pt.2 - Beach Attack

Shadows of the Past
Pt.2 - Beach Attack
IC Date	December 24th, 2017
IC Time	Night
Players	Amelie, Heathen, Mikael, Nicolai
Location	The Beach
Spheres	Vampire Camarilla
Theme Song	I'm A Wanted Man [1]

Amelie, busy as she is, takes absolutely NO time just for herself. So the boys do it for her and Nicolai. They've set up a picnic of sorts, with some wine, and wheeled and dealed some actual sustenance for them. Electric candles are lit, forming a path toward the gazebo from where they parked. White rose petals form the walkway, and red are scattered around the table itself.

The boys, for their part, remain out of the way, and out of earshot. The looming presence of Amelie's guards is hard to miss, even as the lighting tricks one into focusing out on the waters, though Mikaël and Heath staying with the vehicle is easily faded from memory

Amelie was surprised by Heathen and Mikael's plans, and when she arrives with her entourage, she gasps when she sees what they setup. She kisses them both on the cheek, and gives a warm hug. "Merci beaucoup, mes amies. This is beautiful." She looks to Nicolai to see what he thinks before they head to the gazebo.

Mikaël is standing with Heath, by the vehicle up over a dune, that is above the beachline, making it easier for them to be out of sight, out of mind.

Nicolai arrives with his arm around Amelie as they enter the area. He smiles at Amelie's reaction. He bows to the men, "Thank you for setting this up. You guys have gone through a lot of trouble. I appreciate it." He escorts her to the gazebo, and helps her to sit down first. He sits across from her and pours two glasses of sustenance for them both. "To a peaceful evening," he toasts to Amelie.

Heathen gives Amelie a grin, and returns her kiss on the cheek before slipping away quietly like a good ghoul, patting Mikaël on the shoulder as he contemplates an evening of games on his phone instead of running all over town in a snowsuit.

Amelie takes a seat, and crosses her legs under the table. "Oui, a beautiful peaceful evening." She picks up her glass to toast with him, and clink glasses. "They really are so thoughtful. I am happy we could have this respite together. We have both been all together too busy."

Nicolai takes a good long swallow from the glass. He nods, "Yes, this POP program has been taking up a lot of my time. I'm looking into hiring a Executive Director that can handle more of managing the program. It will give me more time to work on my practice, and being Primogen, and deputy... Jax's law company practically runs itself, thankfully."

Amelie takes a slow drink, enjoying the vintage. "That would be an excellent idea. I am sure your practice needs your time, and with recent happenings, I'm sure after the new year there will be much to discuss at the next Primogen council meeting."

Mikaël had given the two a flourishing bow at their words, and just smiled. At the vehicle he brings out a deck of cards, and tries to practice a magic trick that Guivre showed him, urging Heath to pick a card. The rest of the beach seems deserted, they had picked a good location that seems very out of the way. Another vehicle's headlights are seen at a distance, driving slowly. When it comes within view it is seen to be a dune buggy type Jeep with a canvas top. On the side there is a emblem, but it is too dark to make it out completely. It is not unheard of for the occasional officer to patrol the beach area, and one might assume that is what they are doing by the mounted spot light on top of the vehicle.

The jeep moves slowly past the Escalade where Heath and Mikaël are standing, the spotlight coming on and sweeping over the area, which could be seen easily as a flash of light from the beach below with Nicolai and Amelie are. They continue slowly by though, moving off down the beach.

Amelie pays little attention to the jeep and the lights at first. As it passes and the spotlight goes by she watches. Then the lights are gone. No, turned off. She watches closer. She says softly to Nicolai, "I wonder what is up with that jeep. They turned off the vehicle...they did not drive off. I hope something is not wrong."

Nicolai follows the look of the jeep as he drinks from his glass. He finishes it off and licks his lips. He looks for Amelie's guards, and he gives a signal to gesture toward the jeep. He has communicated well with Amelie's guards, and it's a simple motion that points out a possible issue. "I guess we'll see."

Roscoe and DeSoto move off at Nicolai's motion, looking to Amelie for confirmation first. They approach the vehicle, which will take a few minutes, and as they near it the couple see the lights come back on. Both are watching now though, and saw a bit of movement as at least one figure moved away from the vehicle, back toward the two boys, a shadow of something else could be seen, but it is a bit too far to tell more. Both bodyguards stop as the lights shine straight at them, and the jeep slowly starts to pull away.

The couple at the table were watching and caught the movement, though the bodyguards didn't seem to notice, their attention is on the vehicle itself.

Amelie reaches for Nicolai's hand. "Something is going on. This does not feel right."

There is movement out in the dark, while the jeep moves away. The blinding lights on the guards not so blinding on the two in the gazebo in romantic dimness. A large figure, and a smaller animal like figure moving across the sand back toward the parked vehicle.

Mikaël is busy trying to shuffle cards that are now all over the ground. He leans over to start picking them up, his voice carrying a bit as he tells Heath, "Some went under the vehicle, mon ami..."

Heathen for his part, is oblivious to the approach from the other direction, not being here for security and all, and probably less physically capable than the two guards and former deputy anyway

Nicolai nods to Amelie, and he squeezes her hand, "It's alright. We'll be able to handle it." Nicolai pulls out his heavy pistol, Walther P99, and he makes sure that it's loaded to be used.

Amelie looks over to where Mikaël and Heathen are. She hopes they are ok. She watches Nicolai take out his gun. "Ok. Not freaking out. We can do handle this."

There's a quick whistling noise, and a sound that may be familiar, that of a silenced pistol. One guard going down, the other barreling toward the shadowy figures.

Mikaël is at a disadvantage, head almost underneath the vehicle, chattering to Heath about finding him a flashlight and listening to the music coming from within the vehicle. He misses the quiet sound of the silenced pistol, or the approach of anyone.

Nicolai gestures for Amelie to move down, and he moves down as well. He looks for cover and begins trying to find a better idea of what's going on.

Amelie's eyes are wide and now she is worried. One of her guards is down. She does just what Nicolai tells her and she waits.

The figure doesn't even slow for the other guard, and instead the animal, a large Doberman, sleek and powerful meets the guard as he continues trek toward the vehicle, letting off a couple of shots at the vampires. They aren't particularly powerful shots. Or particularly aimed. More to keep the couple off balance than anything, obviously not expecting a fight from that angle. The Jeep is speeding back though, to cut off the escape of anyone getting into Amelie's vehicle.

Mikaël is standing up, "I think I have them all, just let me count..." finally catches motion from the corner of his eyes. A shadowy 'something' moving toward them from the darkness, and calls out to Heath. "Look out, behind you!"

There's a quick burst of movement, and suddenly Heath is over the dune. Not exactly thrown there, just suddenly there, rolling down the dune with Mikaël and coming to a stop with his eyes rolling into the back of his head and convulsing. Those with Awareness would get a little taste of magic in the night.

Amelie tucks herself up into a ball. "OMG! HEATH! MIKAEL!!" She covers her mouth after her outburst.

Nicolai looks to Amelie, "Stay quiet." He begins moving slowly, attempting to keep as stealthy as possible, pausing when he needs to. He tries to make better sense of what's going on. Nicolai shoots at the dog.

Mikaël finds himself suddenly taken, cards scattering, and ending up at the bottom of the dune, disoriented with a convulsing Heath, "Mon ami...?" states sharply, as he draws his dagger from his boot, shielding Heath as he can, and trying to locate where Amelie is as the moment.

Amelie stays under the table at this point. Quiet, her eyes wild as they dart from person to person. Her face shows her concern for Heath and Mikaël, and wondering what they have gotten into!

As the shot goes into the dirt, the man with the gun takes aim at the two boys rolling down the hill. Confident, or dedicated, and not perturbed by the shots fired at the dog, but the rolling requiring him to take a moment to aim. The dog shakes the hell out of Roscoe's arm as the other tries to aim his own weapon, the slamming of doors indicating that it won't just be one shooter and a dog shortly.

Nicolai turns his attention to the man that shooting at the boys, and he fires off a shot.

The shooter spins and hits the ground himself, clutching his shoulder and the gun in the dirt, the ratching KACHUNK heard with two voices coming over the dune yelling obscene sounding threats in Spanish about what they are going to do with what holes.

Meanwhile the dog releases Roscoe, and follows it's single-minded order and heads straight towards Heathen, snapping and growling. The boys are now on the other side of the prepared romantic area, and Amelie is between that dog and its target...

Mikaël sees Amelie finally, his head beginning to clear some, and the dog shift its attention at about the same time. He places himself over Heathen's unconscious form, dagger at the ready, shaking his head some to try to get his eyes to focus better.

Amelie doesn't know what to do besides what she has been told. Stay quiet, stay low. That is what she does. But she realizes that dog is coming near her and heading toward the boys.

Nicolai looks at where the man is on the ground, and where the dog heads to. He takes a shot at the dog, and then runs over to the fallen guy. He places his foot on the man's shot shoulder. "What are you doing here? What do you want?"

The man on the ground is hurt, and the foot adds to the pain, but as he steps down, and smells the warm, fresh blood begin to flow, the gun out of reach, he simply attempts to bite into Nicolai's leg (a futile gesture with human teeth). The two men come over the rise, one with red glowing eyes and claws of his own, and the other with a shotgun being leveled at the two ghouls.

Amelie watches the dog now...fearful he will attack her. She begins to move behind a chair (like that will help!).

Amelie's guards are at least making noises, DeSoto is down but moving, attempting to heal what he can, and get to his feet. Roscoe is dazed, holding his arm, but he too is burning blood to heal himself.

The dog emits a high pitched yip and rolls mid run, attempting to get back to its feet to continue its charge, wounded.. but unlike a human, the animal is more single minded in its goal and its target is still within reach.

The man under Nicolai beats and bites uselessly at the leg pinning his useless arm.

Nicolai punches the man in the head, hoping to knock him out with his Gangrel strength.

Amelie stays low, eyes darting between everything, so missing things here and there as she looks around.

Mikaël sees the ones coming over the dune, and the shotgun, and his mind does a /very/ quick take on the situation - dog incoming, red eyed man, probably vamp, and biggie - shotgun pointed at them. Hearing the shot he decides on trying to deal with the two coming at them. He uses a mental attack, throwing terrifying images into the mind of the one holding the shotgun, sending the suggestion to him that the man beside him is a demon about to attack him.

Shotgun Boy wheels on his more feral partner, who quickly sees the situation turning sour, and smacks the shotgun away, the blast firing into the dirt, but he's a quick little bastard as begins running toward the injured dog with a wild eyed look. (

So places are currently Nicolai with his foot on the shooter, who's futily trying to get the foot off, and Nicolai getting a glancing shot on his hard head. The dog is injured but not out and is perilously close to their date. One guard is down and, functionally, out. The other is trying to aim, but seems a bit confused. Shotgun boy is also confused, not sure if he should shoot his own fleeing partner or the boys in the dirt. The partner with obvious Protean powers (or something that mimics them, never know in this town) heading toward the injured dog. Amelie, being between the two groups, is placed right in his path as well as the dogs, which is trying to go the other way.

Amelie worries what is going to happen next, and readies herself, in case she needs to defend herself.

Roscoe sees the danger to Amelie and is courageously ignoring his own pain in his efforts to gain his feet, which he does. He wobbles up, staggering over towards her in an attempt to at least place himself between her and anything that comes at her. Desoto is trying as well, but a gunshot is harder to recover from, and he doesn't get to his feet.

Mikaël just keeps his mental attack up on the already weakened one with the shotgun, trying to push him into shooting the red eyes feral partner. He is already practically laying on top of Heathen.

Nicolai takes another punch at the guy beneath his foot.

Blood starts to gush a bit from the head wound of being smacked round by Nicolai from the first shooter. The second starts opening up with BAMN at the fleeing partner, who has subtly changed direction and is both evading the shot, and leaping toward Amelie.

Mikaël takes a precious few moments (this round) to check to make sure Heathen's breathing, putting his hand against his friend's throat. At this point he knows he has damaged the one man's head enough to keep it scrambled for a few.

The shooter under Nicolai isn't completely out cold, but has stopped struggling

Amelie gasps as she sees that guy leaping at her. All she can do is put up her fists in front of her face.

Nicolai leaves the guy and begins heading toward Amelie. He shoots at the man who comes after Amelie.

The guy is fast, not celerity vampire fast, but animal fast. He's used the time well while Nicolai was dealing with the first shooter, and has his arms around Amelie quickly if she doesn't fight him...claws at the ready to do some damage.

The guy with the shotgun is freaking, it's all gone to shit. Easy hit turned into a giant clusterfuck, and is hauling ass back over the dune to GTFO. Big gun is obviously compensation

Nicolai is coming after the guy with claws at the ready.

She gets a good solid shot off the guy, and the guys head pops back toward her, not able to solidify the clench as she isn't the hostage he'd hoped for and actually starts fighting back.

Nicolai comes after the man who DARES to attack his lady love. After she punches him, Nicolai's claws rips into the guy's stomach and slices him from the belly to the neck. His guts hang out and he looks at them before falling to the ground.

He gets blindsided by the enraged lover and looks in horror as his guts start to fall out, trying to push them back in... but instead finds himself doing even /more/ damage to them with his own claws in his haste and panic

Amelie stands back as her hero steps in to defend her. "Take that, stupid. ". She puts a gentle hand on Nicolai's shoulder, keeping behind her love as he defends her.

Amelie will note, the scent is /bad/ as the internals are opened up for air. He definitely is alive still (well, for a few moments anyway), so the big dog is still someone's bitch.

Roscoe manages to prop himself up on the gazebo pole, and apologizes profusely to Amelie, blood dripping from his mangled, but healing slowly arm. Desoto still moans on the ground but is moving.

Mikaël 's widen as he watches Nicolai go into pissed off lover mode, obviously impressed. With the other one running for his life he spares a glance to the injured dog, but his concern is more for his injured friend and he only has basic first aid knowledge, but he starts to check over Heathen, knowing Amelie is in good hands - or would that be claws?

Heathen grunts a little from where he's laying, still out cold

Nicolai grabs the man with his claws, stabbing into the man's shoulder, he bites the man's throat feeding from him and draining him of his life's blood.

The Big Dog thrashes for a moment, but only a moment. Unfortunately, much of the blood is flowing out onto the sand so he doesn't have much to replenish. The one with the shotgun and jeep are nowhere to be found, and the dog finally gives up as it bleeds out. The initial shooter however, is starting to try to drag himself away.

Amelie looks at Heath and then rushes to him while Nicolai feeds. "Heath! ". She drops down next to him. "Mikaël, he needs to get out of here. Can you get him to the car? ". She looks back at the other guy, "Nicolai! The shooter is trying to leave. We need to find out what the hell this was...or who sent them. "

Nicolai drops the man he was feeding from and goes after the guy who is attempting to drag himself away. "Speak up- now. Who are you? What were you doing here?" He holds a claw to the guy's neck.

Mikaël looks at Amelie, and then down to Heathen. His face shows his attempt to concentrate at something, but it doesn't seem to be working and he frowns, dropping his head and taking a ragged breathe. "I can't lift him..." he mutters, "... too heavy."

The man crawling away grabs Nicolai's wrist with his one good hand. "Larga vida al Sabbat, perra."

Although while Mikaël was making such a face, Heathen's arm did raise up, but then fell back to the ground.

Amelie will take an arm of Heath, and try to help lift him a bit. She hears the guy say Sabbat and she drops Heath 's arm. "Sabbat? "

Heathen starts to stir a little, and his eyes pop open as his arm is dropped.

"Sabbat? Thanks for the information," Nicolai says, and then he claws the man's jugular

Mikaël glances over at the man's words, and frowns, knowing Nicolai wasn't in the mood probably to discuss much. He reaches out quickly, trying to get anything he can out of his mind.

Amelie is both unhappy their night went so ugly, but she is so proud of how her love defended her. She remembers Heath and checks on him again, "Heath? wake up sweetie. please. "

While not bleeding as badly as the first body, the he's also bleeding out, and likewise won't last long.

Heathen mumbles a bit as he hears the voice. "Mm sorry.. couldn't get..."

With that finished, Nicolai heads over to where Heathen is. He picks the man up easily, and begins carrying him to their car. He looks around to make sure that there is no one else coming.

Amelie goes with them to the car, concerned for Heath. We cannot leave the bodies. There will be too many questions. We need a cleanup crew. Maybe I should call in some of my staff from Elysium.. . "

Mikaël watches Nicolai lift Heath, and blinks. He could have done that himself, but he had been a bit busy. He tells them quietly, "Monsieur, I... I know a bit about the man. He was after Heath. He is part of that gang that is lead by the Obertus. I saw Heath in his mind."

Heathen starts to try to stand, wobbly and uncertain. "Yeah.. yeah. 's some body bags.. compartment under the back seat... in case of emergency, daylight proof. Just... let me stand. up." and he tries, and falls back on his butt. "Oh, I have a headache."

Nicolai helps Heathen to the car. He watches the guy fall on his butt, and he moves to help him stand and sit in the car. He nods to Amelie, "Have the cleanup crew come in. We have to make sure he's alright."

Heathen looks Nicolai over, and all the other guys blood on him. "You look terrible." as if he should talk.

Amelie looks with concern to Heath. "We get you home, I will give you some blood.". She nods to Nicolai and gets on the phone. Staff are ready and heading over immediately. "Everyone should get in and they will help Roscoe and DeSoto when they arrive. Until they get here, my guys can protect the scene. ". She smirks at Heath. "You can both clean up at home. "

Mikaël rolls his eyes upward at Heath's words, "You do not look beautiful yourself at the moment, mon ami."

Nicolai looks at the blood on himself, and he shrugs his shoulders, "I just ripped a guy's guts out. I'm not going to be ready for the black and white ball." He makes sure everyone is sitting down before he gets into the driver's seat. He drives to Amelie's place. He smiles at Amelie, "So much for peace."

Mikaël looks at Heathen as they ride to Amelie's, and concentrates, sending him everything that he had picked up from that ghoul before Nicolai took him down.

Heathen reaches under the seat and gets out a travel medical kit and pops a chemical cold pack to put against his head. "Oh man, at least now I know what happens when I try to jump with too much weight."

Amelie grins, "No kidding. Well, here is hoping we find peace when we sleep. ". She looks at Heath, "You cannot go back to your place tonight. Can you stay with Ashe? Or Mikaël? or do you want to stay in my place or Elysium? " Amelie whispers to Nicolai.

Mikaël frowns at Heathen, "Are you saying that I am too fat now, mon ami. You and Phoenix are constantly after me to eat more." He hears Amelie and nods, "He has been staying with us, he is welcome to continue to do so. He is safe as long as either his Ashe or others are around. They attacked tonight because they did not see any Kindred or others with us."

The images Mikaël is sending is an actual picture of Heath from D street, taken obviously when Abraham was still 'alive'. A Spanish language description of Mikaël and Asheton, and a big warning about Asheton being highly dangerous. And lastly a phone call to a landline where the three were staying telling them tonight might be an opportunity.

Heathen rolls his shoulders a little. "I'm saying I could do that with a couple of grocery bags, but past that... more weight is more hurt. Take up Madeline's offer to learn Celerity." and he nods to Amelie. "Wherever you think is a good spot, though I'd rather it not be in a dungeon or freezer."

"Why were those guys after Heathen?" Nicolai asks Amelie. He whispers something in her ear. And then he looks at Heathen and Mikaël.

Amelie looks to Heath as she answers, "Heath was trying to get in on some of Abe's influence in transportation back from when he was his ghoul. It backfired a bit and they got shot at. that was a few months ago."

Heathen moves the cold pack a little. "It didn't exactly backfire. I'm getting it. Problem is the Tijuana end isn't happy about me taking it away."