What He Beheld

What He Beheld
Date of Scene:	21 June 2014
Location:	Los Angeles
Synopsis:	John, Sarah and their allies go to put the squeeze on Sarkissian in response to his extortionate demands. But the future is always shifting and events are transpiring in unexpected ways as pawns are moved across the board. And Sarkissian himself is more than he appears.
Cast of Characters:	Kotone Yamakawa, 24, 38, 304

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John Connor (24) has posed:
No one tries to extort anything from Sarah Connor, much less two million dollars. That sort of thing makes Sarah Connor mad.

The meeting place is a little street in the Los Angeles CBD, in the vicinity of what looks like a computer store and LAN cafe, and the Connors pull up in their big, black SUV. Inside, John and Sarah doublecheck their handguns and holster them. John doesn't have one, and the young woman sitting next to him - Cameron - doesn't need one.

The job is a simple one. Get in and convince Sarkissian that attempting to blackmail them was a mistake and, in the process, ensure that they never have to worry about him again. With that accomplished, they should be able to get him to tell them where he has stashed the Turk, the chess-playing computer that will, one day, start playing chess with nuclear arsenals.

Inside Sarkissian's store, the lights are still on. It looks like there's still plenty of clients, even in the early evening.

Black Arachnia (304) has posed:
There's a member of the Connors' party who is not in the SUV with them ... or in a car, or even at street level. But if anyone were watching the local rooftops, they might catch sight of a large spider-like robot skittering and jumping her way across said roofs until she reaches the computer/LAN store.

And there, Black Arachnia stops, already surveying for access points. Preferably of the hardwired variety, but she can make do with a wireless connection - but she's also looking for physical entrances to the building from the roof, just in case there's no way into the network from up here.

... or in the event that a robot (in disguise or not) could lend some weight to the Connors' arguments.

Noble Six (38) has posed:
How does one hide a nearly seven foot tall, heavily armored super soldier? Well we're in Los Angeles, so the answer is you don't. This town is known for it's weirdos, and people who love to dress up in costumes and take pictures with kids for about twenty bucks each.

Right now, Noble Six is walking down the street, across the street from the shop in question. She's fully armored up, and is stopping to pose for photos and such, as needed. This gives her an excellent vantage point to see inside of the shop, as well as see any threats coming from the street.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa had come to help she wasn't sure about how to deal with the person blackmailing John's mother but she agreed if Turk need to be handled before it starts playing out the sort of thing that the anti cyberists on her world feared, hell she feared would come to pass somewhere else? Here she actuall wearing a jacket over her normal outfit to hide more traces of her cyberentic nature and a pair of wrap around hades cover her eyes. God this was in a strange way a blast from the past for her with how this world was to boot.

John Connor (24) has posed:
Derek leads the way into the building and the door lets out a pleasant sounding chime as he steps through, followed by Sarah and John with Cameron bringing up the rear. There's maybe a dozen young people in the LAN cafe area, no one in the actual shop, and a pale, gaunt-faced man with a perpetual frown working the counter. "Where is he?" Derek asks him.

The clerk blinks. "Who?"

Sarah grabs the man by his shoulder and forces his face into the wooden counter top. "He," she says, icily. "Need I repeat?"

The clerk, slowly, raises his hand and points towards a door on the other side of the LAN Cafe, almost hidden by a vending machine. A few people have looked up from their games and Internet to look at the people hassling the counter guy.

On the roof, Black Arachnia would find what looks like a fire escape. It looks like it could be forced open easily enough. There's a wireless network, something which seems to be the LAN Cafe's service, but nothing else. It's likely that this Sarkissian fellow is fairly switched-on when it comes to technology.

Amidst the camera flashes and excited night people, Noble Six doesn't see anything too threatening - although the SPARTAN might get a glimpse through the window of Sarah and Derek's diplomatic efforts inside the store. And of the clerk reaching under the counter for something. Police alarm? Panic button? Warning signal? Who knows.

Black Arachnia (304) has posed:
First order of business: gain access to the building's network connections ... which, of necessity, starts with the wi-fi. How quaint.

But that's just the customers' side of things - what good is a wireless network that stops at the building's walls? If you're gaming with others locally, that's one thing, but a cafe like this HAS to connect to the Internet somehow ... Black Arachnia quickly penetrates the network's security, hides her presence within it, and starts locating the Internet connection proper. If she can get access to the business's phone network connection as well, all the better.

If all goes well, she'll be able to lock down the electronic perimeter before the clerk has time to push any buttons. She'd do better with a physical tap-in of some sort, but no time to rummage around for promising-looking wires or junction boxes.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa is just keeping herself out side she can pull some stunts that this world isn't ready for. She's a bit bolder as to her the sorts of counter measures that could deal with someone like her even a rookie. She also had tapped some files on older programs that might have had counter parts here which means she could attempt certain exploits that were not known to people. She's going to start moving to lend Black Arachina a dital hand as she makes use of her wirelness connects to try and see just what suyprises the people are dealing with are packing.

Noble Six (38) has posed:
The SPARTAN is still watching through the window, in between taking pictures, and when she sees the hand starting to dip below the counter, issues her warning over their radio frequency. She excuses herself from the crowd that had gathered, and makes her way across the street, to get closer to the building.

She knows she could take a shot from here without missing, but taking out this guy now, well, that'd pretty much ruin the plan entirely. She'll need to wait until she's 100% sure that he's about to pull out a weapon before she draws her own.

John Connor (24) has posed:
Black Arachnia gets inside the network without much issue - this is Windows XP-era stuff! - and quickly gets to shutting down the electronic perimeter. It seems like that she and Kotone won't ave much issue doing whatever it is they wish. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like they can find much in the way of surprises - either Sarkissian is just a small-time crook who's somehow got his hands on the apocalypse device, or he's very good at hiding his stuff.

Inside, Derek, Sarah, John and Cameron move deeper into the building. It's completely different once they get through the door, all white and business-like with harsh, flourescent lighting. As they round the corner, they find Sarkissian.

He's a decent-sized man, where his size comes from muscle and not fat. His hair is close cropped, dark but greying, and his eyes go wide as he spies the Connors. Perhaps thanks to Arachnia's techno-wizardry, he's completely flat-footed. So much so that he drops his cup of instant coffee and runs for it!

Outside, Six peers through the window. The front desk clerk rubs at his temples and slouches against his counter, no weapon in sight. However, there's three people moving towards the LAN Cafe, coming up the street. They're wearing grey coveralls, and Noble Six might be able to make out the rather telltale bulges of some sort of automatic weapons hidden on their bodies. Probably sub-machine guns. Trouble, in any case.

Black Arachnia (304) has posed:
Oh, 'shutting it down' would be EASY. Black Arachnia's trying to be a bit more subtle than that - leave the customers' network traffic unimpeded, but - if there's an emergency signal going from that button, for instance - attempting to keep it from getting out to cause trouble, immediately or later on. That standalone button, if a button it was, is probably rather conspicuous for its simplicity, so it gets intercepted, interdicted, and stifled entirely.

She probably SHOULD see about heading inside, though, shouldn't she ... ?

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa she's looking to see what she can find there's not much in the ways of things laying in wait for them in this old grungy version of cyberspace. Humm so just what is going on here she's not sure and she's very much concerned at this point she's brought a weapon with her, and has a nanovest on so she's got osme protection.

What was going on here? Either wy she's be moving in and Black ARachania would find Kotone's own prence she's going to attempt to stabotage anythign relatd to their target's own information networks and make it seem like nothing's wrong to him. She's not as effient as Black Arachina is however.

Noble Six (38) has posed:
The trio of armed individuals look like they might be looking for trouble. Six decides to intercept them. She's not sure if they're more of those robots or some sort of human strike team. Either way she is going to try to stop them non-violently, as taking down three people in the middle of a street in LA is not the best idea unless they've started to attack.

She moves towards them and sets herself in a position to keep them from entering the store, going back to her posing and playing like she's just some cosplayer. She'll determine their intentions first.%

John Connor (24) has posed:
Sarkissian gets ahead of the group and ducks into a room, slamming the heavy, metal security door behind him. "John," Sarah says, "Go check the office - see if he stashed the Turk in there." John nods and races off, beginning to check through each door and each room until he tracks down the office. It's a decent sized room, filled with filing cabinets.

Sarah turns to Cameron. "Can you get through the door?"

Cameron steps up to the door. She looks at it, eyes going high and then low. "Yes," she declares, "But the wall would be much faster." And so, Cameron steps to the side of the door, clenches her fists, and begins to punch the wall, shattering cinderblocks. Her fists are a blur and, inside, Sarkissian is probably wondering what the hell is going on!

Up on the roof, there are just subtle tremors as the only evidence of Cameron's handiwork. Up there, Arachnia has prevented any news from going out. No one should be finding out what happened here. And, thanks to Kotone, is anyone is monitoring the place remotely, no one will be able to see anything going wrong either. Early 2000-era technology is nothing to a Cybertronian and a future-tech cyborg. Everything's silent.

As Six takes up the doorway, striking a pose, one of the grey coveralled men remarks: "Excuse me. We'd like to, y'know, get inside." Six has faced Terminators before and these three? They don't seem the type.

Black Arachnia (304) has posed:
The nice thing about being hooked into the network wirelessly is that Black Arachnia still has relatively unrestricted mobility, as long as the signal strength doesn't bottom out while she's moving around. So, keeping an eye on her wireless signal, she creeps over to the front edge of the roof, peers down over the edge ...

And shoots her mouth off.

Literally - that's where the mandible grapnel is located in her spider form, and she launches it down to grab one of the three guys, preferably one that's NOT in front, and just - yank him straight upwards. By the shoulders, so he shouldn't get worse than a mild case of whiplash ...

At least not until she lets go, flipping him up and back in an arc that should land him cleanly on the roof. The impact ought to knock the wind out of the guy, ESPECIALLY if he lands on his back - and if that's how it goes, Black Arachnia turns and skitters over to crouch over top of him, looking all terrifying-giant-cyborg-spider-about-to-eat-you at him. "Who sent you?" the Maximal hisses, mandibles and palps quivering as if she'd love to dig into a fresh, hot meal of gun-toting thug.

Noble Six (38) has posed:
Well since Black Arachnia is going to be taking one of them, Noble Six reaches out to grab the other two by their overalls, and haul them up into the air. She figures that lifting them up off their feet will probably surprise them to inaction. But if that doesn't work, she'll just slam their heads together with the proper amount of force to knock them unconcious.

This should be a good way to keep them from getting inside, without having to hurt them too bad. Plus BA is able to interrogate the third one, this'll work out for everyone involved.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa sees that she's got that all cleaned up at this poing and message the transformer. Her voice over cyberspace has an odd reverb that maker her sound more like an older Gen Transformer than a human. <<You all right up and and damn you got to be least class A with the stunts your pulling there.>> She's keeping her profile low as she's not a fighter but she is making sure no one will know just what's going on there and that she thinks is of use.

John Connor (24) has posed:
With a final push, Cameron caves in half of the wall and steps through, followed by Derek and Sarah.

The room is empty except for a single computer. A small hatch, some sort of duct or escape tunnel, lies open. Sarkissian is gone.

Outside, Noble Six abruptly knocks out the two men with the ease of a pair of rag dolls. Some of the people photographing the SPARTAN cheer - what a show! With their focus on Six, they completely miss Arachnia hauling one of the greys up and onto the roof. His eyes go wide as he comes face to face with the spider Maximal. He says nothing, instead, going for something in one of his pockets!

Meanwhile, John is tearing the office apart. He throws open filing cabinets, tears open boxes, yanks open drawers - and nothing. No sign of the Turk. John steps over to one end of the room, what looks like a storage nook, and gets that open. Inside, there's a young girl, coloring away on some spare paper. "Hey..." John begins, "What're you doing here?"

"Waiting for my daddy to finish work."

John kneels down to her level. "Okay, listen. I need you to stay in this room with the door closed, okay? Even if you hear loud noises or you get scared, you have to stay in here. Can you do that for me?"

She smiles. "Yes."

John grins. "Yeah? Okay."

He shuts the door behind him, leaves the office, and goes to pick one of the locked doors.

And that's when Sarkissian grabs him and puts a gun to his head. John is hauled out into a side alley, possibly just in sight of Kotone, followed quickly by Sarah - who levels her own weapon at Sarkissian. It's a stand-off. Or is it?

Black Arachnia (304) has posed:
Protip: when a giant robot spider hauls you away from your compatriots and tells you to talk, digging in your pocket is the wrong answer. And Black Arachnia DOES have hands - well, manipulators - in her spider mode ... but they're not conveniently placed for grabbing the mook's arm and keeping his hand out of his pocket. At least ... not directly.

So she skitters a couple of steps back, seizing the mooks arms just below the shoulders - and then advances again, forcing his arms VIOLENTLY upwards to pin to the rooftop. The dislocation of shoulders, or worse, is not entirely unlikely as a result of this maneuver.

More to the point, even if he DID draw a weapon, he won't be able to aim it at her. He might be able to pull a trigger - *might* being the key word - but unless it's a grappling hook pistol and he can pull himself out from under the giant cybernetic spider, it's not going to do more than make a fair amount of noise and make her even angrier.

Something drips from her palps as the Maximal spider hisses, "I'm not going to repeat the question again, so listen and answer: *who sent you*?!"

Noble Six (38) has posed:
The crowd seems to think it's all part of the show. That's good. Six looks at the two unconcious guys, and fishes the weapons out of their coveralls, since the last thing she wants them to do is wake up with their guns on them.

"Hate to say it folks, but the show's coming to an end. Thank you all for coming out, and have a nice day!" She's trying to disperse the crowd now.

John Connor (24) has posed:
The crowd disperses, although many of them don't seem happy to have been asked to leave by such a great cosplayer! It's highly likely that they'll be getting home, trying to track down just who was so amazing at portraying a SPARTAN on the streets of Los Angeles. Soon enough, Noble Six is just there with the two grey-coveralled men.

On the roof, Arachnia pins the man to the ground. Something pops in his upper torso and he shouts out, in obvious pain. "Nnngh!" he grunts, "You can't fight the future," he spits out, bites down on something, and he begins to froth at the mouth, spasming in Arachnia's grip.

Down in the alley, the standoff continues. The door opens and Derek steps out. He's moving slow, gun in one hand, guiding the little girl from Sarkissian's office with his other. "Let him go," Derek says, with the quiet ice of someone who is making a very unspoken, very violent threat.

Sarkissian stares right back at Derek, although he clearly looks out of his depth. "Not my kid."

"Not mine either," Derek replies. "Are you okay?" Derek asks the girl. "Yeah," he murmurs, setting his hand over her eyes. "You're okay..."

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa is not part of the main force at this point, she pauses for a moment wondeirng what's going on. She pauses for a moment noticing as Sarkissian has grabbed John she maqkes her move heading for him, for once glad she can put this almost cursed body of her's to use, Sarkissian has no idea what she is right. She's moving in and is just moving in a bit not grabbing her weapon in the open.

"That's enough out of you I suggest you let him go. The future has changed already there's new variables on the field."

She looks at Derek for a moment she's supicous of what Derek is going to do. Then again he may just be covering the kid's eyes. She does know with how things are with John's explaing about Camreon if there's one like here there could be others and she attempst to see if there's any sort of wireless activity from the kid or the man holding John.

Noble Six (38) has posed:
It's a good thing for these guys that they're unconcious. Six hauls them up over her shoulders to get them out of the street, and then heads for a more secluded area so that she can perform emergency dental surgery. Honestly she doesn't really care if she hurts them in the process, because it's clear they'd rather die than tell what they know.

Once she has them in a more secluded area, she grabs the first, and opens his mouth. Following Black Arachnia's suggestion for which tooth to try, Six pulls out her combat knife, and ever so carefully inserts it into the man's mouth, the intent being to try to pry out that suicide cap without setting it off. She just hopes he doesn't wake up while she's doing this and she has to stab him.

John Connor (24) has posed:
Derek whispers out a quiet, "Ssssh, sssh-sssh..."

As Kotone approaches, Sarkissian turns, distracted, although he keeps his weapon pressed against John's neck. He opens his mouth to say something and-

Derek shoots him in the head. John flinches. The girl screams and Sarkissian drops onto the alleyway ground as Derek holsters his pistol. "Thanks," he says to Kotone, and then says to the young girl, "Let's go inside."

Sarah moves over to her son and hugs him, tight. It takes John a few seconds to catch his breath. "He has a computer," Sarah says, "We'll pull the hard drive and you can look through it at home. I don't think we should stay here any longer."

Out of sight, Noble Six drags the greys to a hidden spot and gets her combat knife into their moth. The first suicide cap comes off easily, the man none the wiser - although his jaw might sting in the morning! However, the second man wakes up to find Six's knife in his mouth - and he screams.

Noble Six (38) has posed:
The sound of the gunshot makes Noble Six hesitate, which gives the man she was working on long enough to wake up and scream. She pulls the blade from his mouth and covers his mouth with her hand to muffle his scream. "Listen to me very closely. I don't want to kill you. Do you really want to kill yourself? Because if you do, then do it. I won't stop you, I already got your friend's suicide cap out. I can extract all the intel I want from him. So it's up to you. Ask yourself, Is this the hill you want to die on? Make your choice, and make it quick."

She removes her hand from his mouth, and lets him make his choice. She even stands up and moves to the other grey, pulling zipcuffs out of a pouch on her armor and tying his hands behind him. This guy was going to be a POW one way or another.

John Connor (24) has posed:
The man makes his choice. There's a subtle 'crack' of him breaching his cap and, soon enough, he begins spasming. He's gone. Just one for Noble Six, it seems.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa seems to have helped or fucked up there's a look of stark shock and horror, more at the effect of the shot than the act happening. He was holding a friend hostage, clearly not caring about unleashing a crazed AI upon the word. Now she gets what Derek was doing, at least the kid /didn't/ see it directly. She grimaces and then looks to Sarah for a moment.

"I can help look the data over, if you need it."

She looks a about for a moment and notes "I got every camera around here scrambled there shouldn't be an issue but this won't hold forever."

Black Arachnia (304) has posed:
"Black Arachnia, maximize."

It's kind of hard for a giant spider to rifle a corpse's pockets. In robot mode, Black Arachnia is not so restricted - and she goes through everything the guy's got. If she can fish the broken suicide capsule out of the guy's mouth, she does so - analysis of the residue could prove interesting, although it's a long shot. She also multitasks, checking the 'Net cafe's computers for logs of phone numbers called and websites visited, e-mail addresses received from or sent to ...

You never know what might just offer a useful clue. But it's going to take a while for her to go through, too, even if John and/or Kotone are going to sift Sarkissian's own hard drive as well.

John Connor (24) has posed:
In a few moments, John has Sarkissian's hard drive pulled from the computer. The store has cleared out by now - the clerk and the gamers have all apparently fled. Derek returns, holstering his weapon, followed by Cameron.

"Thanks," John says to Kotone, "But I'll be fine with it. I kinda just want to go home now."

Black Arachnia goes through the 'net cafe's computers but there doesn't seem to be anything immediately incriminating there. It makes sense - one wouldn't conduct such a sale through a public space. Everything must be on the hard drive.

Noble Six (38) has posed:
Noble Six brings the one that she did successfuly operate on to meet with the rest of the group, "Lets put him into the SUV and you all get out of here before the authorities show up." She notes. Last thing she wants is them getting caught here.

John Connor (24) has posed:
"Works for me," Derek says to Six.

And so the Connors file out - Derek first, then Sarah, then John and then Cameron. The grey is tossed in the back and Derek assures Six, "Oh, I know just what to do with someone like this." He gestures to his clothing but says nothing more about it, not even to John and Sarah as they drive home.

Later, after the police have been and gone, after the bodies have been collected, the front desk clerk returns to the store. He moves down the hallways, into the secure back room, and stops.

The man frowns, and adds another line to his frown-creased face. The Connors didn't accept the two million offer. Now, he's going to have to hurt them.

Margos Sarkissian pulls his phone from his pocket and makes a few calls. By tomorrow morning, everything will be in place.