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Lilian Rook     UCS apparently means Urban Center Security. It's not complicated. People haven't gone back to calling these places 'cities' at any point. Because most of them originally weren't. 'Urban Center' works fine as a refuge point to move to ASAP, not moving from one devastated city to the next. In the same vein, an Urban Center doesn't have 'police'. It has security. Never mind that, with a surplus of time, they're very obviously the police *now*. It's different.

    The pre-designated point is also deep in this legacy, out in the Third Circle, referring to the outermost concentric band of urban planning, running all the way up against the walls, that clearly wasn't cleverly planned to start.

    Narrow streets with somewhat haphazard turns, plain concrete buildings mixed with abominably out-of-code self-made housing, clothes lines hung out to dry from from window to window across roads, colourful potted flowers and banners hung from prefab balcony rails, cheap corrugated fire escape stairs on everything, seemingly random trees planted where pieces of sidewalk have been heaved out to make space in pleasing locations, solar panels and electrical cabling rigged up hither and thither, a dire lack of cars anywhere to be seen in place of bikes and the shadow of a skyrail overhead, and all of one public school, one clinic, and zero places to eat for a mile around. It looks like something that used to be a built-up transient ghetto before the walls went up and people started paving it and hooking it up to the power grid.

    You do get to meet up in front of a police van though! You can tell it is because it has a radio antenna, a little rotating dish, and some kind of black bulb thing on a swivel mount, which totally isn't suspicious on this unmarked vehicle that several people and a hundred pounds of equipment could fit inside with a lack of personal space. They're not trying to keep it particularly secretive though. Armed men stand at the adjacent street corners and dissuade lookie loos by existing. That is to say, people walking or biking past either hurry faster or look like they're barely suppressing the desire to flip them off.

    It's not too unreasonable. The men on the corners aren't wearing SWAT vests. They're wearing hard suits and full face helmets.

    The unit captain, with a badge printed with Acton, is wearing just a charcoal and white-striped uniform while a technical assistant is stuck hovering over people looking to install teeny tiny fly-sized 'wires' somewhere on their clothes, unreasonably small and discreet compared to the bulky faire used in cop dramas.

    The briefing is very basic. There are a bunch of punks known to be 'around' here selling off stolen property to passing Multiversals for dirt cheap and physical credits. They can tell they're in this area due to the fact that all the hastily placed surveillance cameras keep getting subverted and looped, but that also does make it next to impossible to track to a specific block. At least someone has to bait them into picking a 'mark', then just follow them back to wherever their warehouse is, and the UCS will raid it. You're told that you shouldn't be in any serious danger, given that they're barely organized amateurs, but it's possible they might have access to weapons, or at least some Anarchist's Cookbook measures. Don't look ridiculously suspicious. If you have to buy anything to keep up the act, you'll be reimbursed. Don't blow the place up.
Arthur Lowell >Arthur: Sting

    Dilapidated, out-of-code urban zones? Distanced, resented police? /Punks/? There's only one specific thing to do. We'll name it later. Arthur is on the scene, and somehow he integrates the wire application into a highly complex series of daps and pounds with both the technician and the unit captain. "YEAH, YEAH, HOMIE." He says, as if he's not paying any attention whatsoever. "FOR SURE. YEAH. I can do the whole PASSING MULTIVERSAL BIZ."

>Arthur: Shred

    What's a good way to look like a Passing Multiversal? A good way to look like you, too, say things like "fuck the police"? What's a good way to make sure some people see it, without caring too much? The answer is simple: Skate or die, motherfucker. Arthur hops on one of his ROCKET BROOMS (not the battle-one) in a surfing configration; this one's mostly a hovering type, and he immediately begins his personal strategy for punk-attention-drawing: Shredding the absolute hell out of this dilapidated urban zone with the gnarliest tricks anyone has ever seen since the probable and unfortunately untimely death of this universe's Tony Hawk.
James Bond      There's a lone figure roaming the streets. He keeps to himself, but that isn't enough to properly describe it. It's as if he's invisible, as if any urge to stand out or socialize has been beaten out of him. His clothes look as though they're hand-me-downs, and like many of the people here,

     He's tall, perhaps breaking six feet, but he couldn't at all be called imposing. His posture, the outdated, worn-down earbuds in his ears, the way his eyes lock on the horizon... he, like many of the people on their daily business, just wants to be Done, but knows there's More to do. There's always More.

     It's an act, right down to his brisk-but-not-urgent gait. It's all fiction, woven by a man perfectly comfortable with his assignment. Dressed in the clothes of the local working class, blending in as one of them, Bond has watched these people for the better part of a week now. He's learned their places, watched how they conduct their business, learned the shape and scope of their security measures.

     A voice chimes in his earbuds, in truth a surveillance device disguised as consumer electronics.

<Q-Conversation> Lilian Rook says, "Alright. Whichever of you feel like being unfamiliar faces to bait criminals out from their little black market ring, the UCS detachment has alerted me that they're gathering in 30 minutes and now that I've passed along the message I'm blocking them from my network."

     That withdrawn man disappears down an alley to have a smoke. Like the others, the sight of the 'security' officers appears a barely tolerated outrage. In the relative secrecy of the claustrophobic alley--a space between two crooked DIY tenements--Bond extends the antenna on his portable radio. A hidden panel reveals a small, but powerful directional microphone.

     To be seen talking to these people would disrupt his disguise. He has his own recording equipment, anyway--no need to pick it up from them beforehand, when he can just transmit to their frequency. Bond listens in from afar.

     It's more or less what he's already surmised. That means it's time for the next part of the operation. The aged-looking light jacket he wears is reversible. He does so--and the other side seems much newer, with a square kind of collar more contemporary and sleek than this place's usual. Now, instead of blending in, he looks like he's trying to blend in--which is assuredly what he wants.

     While Arthur plays up the radical anti-authority angle, Bond's demeanor shifts. Now, he isn't an average joe anymore. His movements are deliberate and his eyes wary. His hands rest at his sides, waiting for a chance to move for some deadly purpose. Here is a man used to hurting people, looking for a means to do so. This man isn't from here.

     Playing the hardened Multiversal criminal looking for an untraceable weapon, Bond makes his way to one of the dead drops he'd seen in his inital recon. He waits there, his posture broadcasting that he knows what happens there, and knows what he wants.
Eryl Fairfax     Logically, Eryl should be terrible for any kind of undercover operation. He is, after all, the Grandmaster of the Paladins. A face a lot of people recognise. But that is why, in this particular case, he is actually exactly what is needed. He is /exceedingly/ multiversal. And it is for that reason that he does nothing to hide who he is. His badge catches the light, his face on display to all as he strides down the street.

    Why is Grandmaster Fairfax here in the USC? A question he answers through an animated call on a cellphone that isn't actually on. "I wouldn't be here if you had done your job right," he says to the no-one on the other end of the line. "... what do you mean it's been scavenged?... uh-huh... tsk. Locals looking to make a buck by selling it off, I get it. All right, set some funds aside for me. The quieter I handle this, the better. But remind me, what did it look li-hello? You still there?... dammit."

    He then 'hangs up' and continues wandering. The bait is placed. Grandmaster Fairfax is here to retrieve 'something' and he doesn't know what it looks like. Anyone looking to stick it to authority and make a buck doing it will smell the blood in the water.
Tony Stark 'Selling for dirt cheap' Yes, good. The proper way these things should go is *cheap* black markets, these are buyer's markets.

'And real credits' Excuse me, what?

Anthony 'Iron Man' Stark - a living embodiment of market forces with the Stand power of Adam Smith's [Invisible Hand] - had to slow up someone and really get into it about the 'real money' problem. He's so weirdly off about this when they start wiring him, taps his left wrist, where a rather large smartwatch sits on his wrist. "I've got my own, thanks. I'll buzz you in."

While incredibly smug, he also oblidgingly dials into the police frequency. He doesn't even need their command codes! He's so polite.

As for 'getting seen by amateur thieves', Tony presumes they wouldn't beeline for him anyway (over such storied personages as the Grandmaster, or the extra LOUD and COOL Lowell). So he meanders, wandering around town and checking buildings while '''texting''' on his dataslate-like phone.
Rean Schwarzer Rean is here, wearing a red hoodie and torn jeans, his black hair pushed back with a white cloth bandana. He's definitely channeling an 'ex(?)- friend that shall not be named' with that last bit. But apparently, said ex-friend is his example for 'anarchist punk' now. He probably also looks kinda stupid. His sword's hidden inside a long purple drawstring bag, slung over his shoulder as he meanders around.

He's also got one heck of a death glare on his face as part of the 'anarchist punk' act, highlighted by the massive bags under his eyes. He probably should be fine if things get crazy, though. Probably.
Lilian Rook     The captain and assistant accept 'I have my own' without question. They are vaguely familiar. There's really no question about whether or not Tony can record up to the standards of 'holds up in court later'. It'll be a guy half pulling off his earphones to tap a monitor and drag Acton in later that notifies him of Tony patching in by himself, after which point it'll be too late to say or do anything about it anyways.

    Having the Grandmaster of the Paladins cooperating is a big deal. As in, they make a big deal about how he could possibly fit in as a sting operative. Sure, he's kind of the *pinnacle* of 'known to be Multiversal', but that's sort of the problem! There's a lot of fretting and hand wringing until he assures them it'll be fine, and then goes off and does his thing.

    Some underpaid technician murmurs "Clever bastard." over the work comms.

    There are shades of this going on. It's clear that Multiversal visitors aren't super common here in the first place, and *definitely* not in the Third Circle. Arthur can tell especially, because a kid barely older than h(e looks)im flags him down from a street corner that turns into a haphazard cul de sac where someone has actually set up some ramps and half pipes out of actual ramps and half-pipes for screwing around on, and that kid says "Pretty sick moves. Makes people wonder what you're doing getting up in it here though. Nobody comes out here just to shred it up. It's not like there's no pigs watching. Actually, you're probably just going to get arrested harder if you cross one having a bad day. Seriously."

    Arthur has essentially fucked around until he eventually ran into someone who still likes skateboarding (albeit, cultural renaissance to the late 20th century seems to be a thing here). "You waiting on a friend? Meeting someone? Or just looking to get into trouble?" This seems to be about the same level of response Rean gets too. In fact, he looks so ridiculously stereotypically punk, someone rocking his dad's dad's dad's dad's dad's look back when that was a real thing compliments him on his 'nice threads' as a very non-punk era term, and tells him to come check out the same 'skate park'. Because this dude's understanding of punk is 'like skateboards and stuff right?'

    Eryl's best acting, meanwhile, is convincing but still intimidating. He gets a few furtive looks here and there, but the only people who come up to him for a while are the odd mom or older brother looking for an autograph. It takes a while for a young man just old enough to plausibly 'not have class right now', hands stuffed in his pockets, to wander up. "Hey man. Sorry if I'm being nosey. I just saw a guy having trouble and, y'know, we look out for each other here, right? I've got nothing to do. Let me help you. Where are you headed?" As far as people looking to scam him, Eryl's implants and psychological training tell him this guy is actually surprisingly genuine.
Lilian Rook     Bond attracts exactly the kind of attention he's looking for. He's the sketchiest looking dude in this entire part of town, and it takes all of five minutes for someone to 'pst' him from a too-narrow alley between half-bricked buildings someone squeezed tightly together, unable to even fit a dumpster (albeit, he hasn't seen a dumpster around anywhere). "Hey. You. Over here. Don't look. Turn right. Cool your jets for a minute. Patrol's coming around in a minute." The mystery voice is entirely correct, because a team of four of those armed officers strut around the corner and pass down the street pretty much on the dot, not paying too much attention while talking to each other, largely there for presence. When they're gone, Bond is stuck with a guy in a hoodie, cap, and half a cloth face mask, looking as suspicious as possible hiding his face like that, but ostensibly out of any camera coverage. "You look like a guy who knows why he's out here. A place where the tourists don't visit and the cops don't care about, if you catch my drift. Can I hook a friend up?" Yeah that's probably what people are expecting to find.

    Tony is not currently being hassled. He looks well to do and clean cut, and has some expensive corporate-looking thing. He is, in fact, not even followed or mugged. This place is pretty colourful, and obviously on the low income and DIY end of things, but he doesn't get the sense of hostility and lowkey desperation that stinks up poverty stricken holes on New York streets.

    The architecture and structure is a bit of a mess though. The further 'uptown' he goes, the older the buildings look, but the more renovated, like they were originally cobbled together out of spare construction supplies and volunteer elbow grease, and were since smoothed over and brought mostly to code, getting power and running water first, while the outer sections look mostly built out of large prefab chunks thrown up cheaply and quickly with a lot of mechanical labour, and people have largely just 'made them homey', a degree of it vaguely ethnic here and there, in shades of fifth generation East Indian or vaguely Middle Eastern.

    There are wifi networks on the way past, which is surprising, but no satellite reception nor any signal towers nor relay stations that'd suggest internet outside the Urban Center. The whole place is practically a blob of local coverage, overlapping from tiny servers and routers, a great many of them mobile. A few people snap pictures as he passes.
James Bond      Bond's eyes briefly flick towards the source of the 'pst.' He doesn't turn his head, lest the cameras watching spot it, following the instructions given him by his would-be contact. It's all just part of the act. He turns to his right and pretends to idle with his back against a power pole. Cooling his jets. His hands are stuffed into the pockets of his pants.

     Under the guise of turning down his headphones--the volume of his music even turns down--Bond's fingers activate the microphone hidden on his body. Now transmitting onto the local security frequency, he begins the negotiation. "Maybe," says Bond. He goes with an American accent, since so much of the Multiverse inexplicably has one.

     "I need something," says the vaguely multiversal criminal. "Hardware. Small enough to carry, big enough to matter." In this kind of transaction, less is more. Say too much, and you risk looking inexperienced--or worse, like a plant. He's laid out what he's looking to buy. This guy won't have it--but he'll know someone who does, more than likely. That's where his next question comes in, which is also sent to the van.

     "Maybe you could show me around, help me find it."
Arthur Lowell >Arthur: Tell the insolent punk what pigs can do

    Arthur describes in graphic detail what pigs are, by default, invited to do if they want to give him grief. It's pretty un-writeably gross! "Homie, I get my WANDER on up in this bitch, you know what I'm SAYIN'? I get all up in TROUBLE on the REGULAR." He punctuates this with a standing kickflip.

>Arthur: Lay your bait already!

    "Besides, wouldn't believe all the COOL SHIT you can find if you can RAMP ONTO LOW ROOFTOPS. Like, people THROW SHIT UP THERE 'cause it's basically STASHING it, right? But half the time the stupid motherfuckers FORGET to PICK IT BACK UP. Sometimes I'll RAMP A BITCH and," Ha-cha! Arthur does a fancy kick and winds up with the broomstick balanced on its nose somehow. "There's, like, WEIRD BOOKS, SKETCHY HARD DRIVES, OLD LIFTED SHIT, some like... I dunno, DRUG MONEY or whatever. Modern day fuckin' TREASURE ISLAND. People don't understand OBJECT PERMANENCE, homie."
Eryl Fairfax     Eryl always makes time for autographs and pleasantries. Asking their names, how they're doing lately, that sort of thing. Everyone walks away feeling as if they've made a friend in the Grandmaster. Eryl is very good at his job.

    But eventually, his bait reels someone in. A young man, surprisingly polite as he comes up and offers his help. Eryl is all smiles. "Oh thank you. Some help is exactly what I need right now. Thank you sir." The use of 'sir' is very important. Eryl is, in every way, treating this young man as an equal, not some street urchin. "Eryl Fairfax, Grandmaster of the Paladins. Yourself?" The name is offered with a proffered handshake to go with it. He needs to be eager, but not too eager. Let him feel in control of the situation.
Rean Schwarzer "Uh-" Rean stammers out, eyes wide. That's not quite the response he was expecting. He settles back into his disguise pretty quickly, though, the glare returning to his face. Skate park...He isn't sure what that means, aside from picturing an out of season ice skating rink. Still...Maybe he'll find a lead there?

"'Course I will." Rean says, lowering his pitch a bit too. "Don't got skates right now, though. Know where I can get some, or even fancy ones?"
Tony Stark 'Some Expensive Corporate-Looking Thing' is the title of Tony's Spotify mixtape, as well as his current energy. But, when you get down to it - past the sky blue 'sapphires' set in quicksilver chrome stud cufflinks, and the obvious tailoring to every aspect of his wardrobe - Tony is just a random encounter on Table 72-2b 'C-Suite Executives', and wanders like one. His very energy is one of a security detail tailing his every move (even though there isn't) and every member of the local authorities-slash-security-force being on his take directly.

Which makes his lingering in the cobbled-together area of buildings, near the graffiti and corrugated-metal-and-dreams areas of the Third Circle so odd.

He seeks out, of all things, conversation with the locals, especially those actively blackthumbing any machinery or infrastructure with a casual 'dude on the street out for a walk' tone.

He's entirely willing to close the social distance of his pinstripe suit and pants and talk nothing-shop with people.

But in every conversation, he brings things around to batteries and power supplies, guiding any topic towards how he'd really like to get his hands on local kit.
Lilian Rook     "Christ mate I get it!" Arthur's skate friend says, waving his hands back and forth at the increasingly graphic description of proper ACAB procedures. "You don't hafta get that crazy! I'm just telling you is all." He looks actually pretty legitimately invested in Arthur's descriptions of roof treasure though. "Damn, seriously? You sure it's fine going climbing around up there? Not that I bet you'd worry about falling off, but eventually someone's going to see, right? If you're just trying to get some hard electrics and antique shit without paying a traitor a five thousand markup, I'll just show you to my bruv, man." He really tries to say 'bruv' naturally. He really does. He is far too much of a post-post-post zoomer to know how. "It's a Friday man. I got nothing to do. You up?"

    The attempted punk rocker claps Rean on the back with a laugh. "Nice mate, nice. You'll fit right in. Not! But still. C'mon." Leading Rean along back to Arthur and buddy, the skate kid looks at Rean and straight away says "Oh hey, is this who you were hanging with? Whatever mate, more the merrier."

    The young man with Eryl shakes his hand without hesitation, despite being a little sweaty. "Lewis Chapman. I'm . . . I guess honoured? Sorry, I don't really know much about the Paladins anyways, but that means you're really important right? Ah, sorry for touching your hands then." He then wipes his palms off on his shirt. "But seriously, lost stuff in this neighbourhood all tends to show up in the same place. When it looks like nobody needs it, it passes through a few hands and trickles in to the same dump. I can show you if you want. It's at least somewhere to start right?"

    Bond's sketchy dude is very into this. "Yeah I know a guy. He's one of those guys who won't take anything but hard cash though. Works hard. Doesn't have a lot of inventory. Only fair. You get me?" Unsurprising. No paper trail, literal or electronic. It does seem like it'd be really hard to get guns here.

    The locals seem generally put off by Tony. Many of them just walk away when he approaches. There aren't mothers coming out to shoo their children off the street, but plenty of people just put down what they're doing or suddenly decide they're hungry or they forgot something. Small groups of men in matching, bland coveralls and gloves end up being his best bet, working on old transformers in cable assemblies that are primitive by this world's standards (and starting to get dated in Tony's time period anyways), wrist deep in a dug up pipe, or laying down fresh concrete, in such configurations where they really can't just invent an excuse and walk off.

    When he actually gets to talking though, they're all very personable. Affable, even. More than basically anyone he'd meet on the streets of Manhattan. They have no clue why the hell he'd want a power supply from here, given it's probably a hand-me-down, self-made, 'fell off a truck', or literally fell off a truck and forgotten about. One guy is eventually able to tell him about a 'pawn shop but not really' because 'there aren't technically shops here' and 'but a guy can do a favour and trade around, so it's no big'. He's given vague but helpful directions, not an escort. He's a dude who knows a dude who heard from a dude.
Lilian Rook     Everyone going along ends up approaching the same block from different angles. It is, of course, a warehouse, but one that's in active service, not abandoned by the dock and blotted off of paperwork. There are plenty of equally blandly dressed workers with hardhats moving heavy cargo from further out, the only interesting part of it being that large numbers of them are wearing industrial exoskeletons with slightly corroded warning yellow paint. There are a bunch of dumbass teens doing dumbass teen stuff outside in a perfectly normal way and the workers don't bother, or want to, chase them off, given no supervisor is being paid to get up their ass about it, and they probably know the local kids anyways.

    Still, it's not exactly a bustling center of commerce. It's just a storehouse, stockpiling low cost materials being shipped in bulk overseas and divvied up between a very large number of small stockpiles throughout the whole Third Circle. There's no Amazon Fulfillment Center here, just guys employed in something very marginally useful, managing very large and very infrequent trades from . . . probably what was once France.

    Bond, specifically, is lead through a hole in the back fence and a knock sequence on a metal back door with a busted camera. Arthur and Rean are guided through the cluster of dumbass teens who all give them a wave, and show them over to a burly guy with five o'clock shadow on a smoke break, who then keycards an employee door and just kinda shows them in. Eryl is flat out just guided straight to the front. Some of the workers say hi and crack some jokes about Lewis towing around a public figure. He explains that some guys who work part time here or hang around because their dads do use some of the disused space to collect lost stuff from around the surrounding area and generally spread the word that someone can find it here, or at least they find it a new home.

    Tony just gets the directions. He can probably intuit which portions of the warehouse aren't ever busy. It's the rear, away from the loading bays, in a large strip and two adjoined rooms that only have doors large enough to carry hand-held palettes in and out of. Any kind of manifest and-or scan indicates it's mostly piles of emergency supplies gathering dust for not having been used in years, stocked to capacity with cheap disaster relief that'll stay there for many more years if everyone is lucky.
Arthur Lowell >Arthur: Follow insolent punk

    Aw yes! Goldmine. Arthur elects to follow the PUNK. "Dawg, I'm always UP. I ain't got no mode but UP." As if to demonstrate, one more kickflip, leaving the broomstick over his shoulder. "Lemme take a GOOD LOOK, might be somethin' I can grab without riskin' BEEFIN' ROOFS."

>==>

    It's only a short while later that he finds the WAREHOUSE. He provides the DUMBASS TEENS a series of coolkid handshake gestures in rapid fire, and provides a single pound to the burly guy with the keycard. This is seeming really nice and harmless so far, so, for a moment, a needling temptation rises to just defect and help these cool low-class scavengers do their low-class scavenger thing without police getting involved. Thankfully, his ALLEGIANCE SYNOPSIS is something he can keep from displaying too publicly.

    So, where's the part where he'll be able to sleep a bit easier busting this up? Because he just knows there's probably a briefcase nuke, or an ancient eldritch tome, or something similarly horrifying here, if the police were so willing to target this with a sting operation. What drew so much attention? What ring of businesses /exactly/ is the problem, here?
Lilian Rook     Bond is specifically let into one of the two adjoining rooms, which is dingy due to being powered by an old (modern) lightbulb strung up from the ceiling. Some 'shop desks have been pushed around and scraped up the concrete to make a sort of fake u-shaped store counter arrangement. There is a wide variety of quite literal hardware, none of it surplus from the warehouse; it's actually pretty upscale stuff. It includes some outdoorsy-type gear, radio equipment, surveillance equipment that is either domestic or *definitely* ripped off a street somewhere, and a handful of weapons and probably improvised explosives. The guy tending it isn't one of the workers, but another dumbass teen who just happens to be tall and shifty.

    Bond's specific brand of hardware is largely what he'd find at a black market he's familiar with. Surplus MP5s that haven't been disarmed to civilian standards. Handguns you'd need a concealed carry permit for with the registration filed off. The only meaningfully stand out piece is a slightly oversized sidearm that's a good couple of pounds heavier than the rest, finished metallic black, with a split port instead of a proper muzzle and a lack of ironsights or accessory rails. The kid has even set up little price signs by folding up sheets of paper and drawing on them with markers.

    It's all ridiculously cheap. Like, a quarter of what it'd be in a real black market. The two start talking and nodding towards Bond, but they don't seem like morons who don't know what it's worth. It seems like a quick cash in setup. Make any amount of money fast and get lost.

    The others are lead onto the 'main floor' as it were. Indeed there are huge stacks of orange carry crates, smaller white kits, plastic wrapped pallets of cans, and what look to be folded up parachutes and stacked fire extinguishers, but a great deal of it has been cleared away to make a little linear strip mall, roughly divided into blobs of makeshift counters and shelves from where tools used to be mounted, where a gaggle of mostly guys aged probably fourteen to twenty five are sorting through a literal sack of junk and handing it off to their respective sections.
Lilian Rook     It has an almost lemonade stand feel, or like a recycling drive. Except that one portion is stuffed with bottles of meds, both over the counter and definitely prescription narcotics. One is stocked with electronic merch that is certainly freshly store bought, from smart devices the size of a letter stamp to flexible 'roll up' TV screens to (as Tony was told) high end portable chargers with multiple port fixtures. Another is filled with plastic trays labeled with marker and scotch tape to organize stacks of media chips that appear to be movies, shows, and video games. There are racks of clothes that are actually much nicer than what anyone here is wearing, and a few bundled up sets of what are obviously professional getups, including one for a doctor and a three piece suit. There are home appliances that are obviously the obnoxiously pointless bluetooth kind.

    On the central lane, there is even a pair of cars --nice ones, in good condition, ready to roll out a loading bay, though not gassed up. Skateboards are a trivial thing to find here; very little of this actually looks handed down or 'lost'. Most of it looks fresh out of a shopping bag. It's all 'priced' but roughly untended, and, keeping pattern, ridiculously cheap. The equivalent of a 900 dollar smartphone is 75 credits --a sum someone might reasonably have in their wallet, appealing as a nice surprise buy from someone feeling the local colour. A sign says 'hard transactions only' and 'no refunds, no regrets!'. The shadiest part about it is that some young men have taken it upon themselves to lounge around with bats, pipes, and some probably stolen firearms lying close to them, like a treehouse club decided 'well we need muscle, right?' after seeing a mob movie.
James Bond      "I get you," says Bond to his contact, nodding. There's a pause as he takes a drag from his cigarette. It's important to keep that casual air. It's easy. "Lead the way." In other words, he's interested, and cash is no problem. In keeping with the goon energy he's emitting, Bond waits to see if his contact has any instructions--more along the lines of 'turn to your right' or 'cool your jets a minute.' Barring any such instructions, he'll maintain that professional air, following a ways behind so as not to appear on the same cameras at the same time.

     It has to look good. Security aren't the only ones watching the cameras.

     This route, he knows. It's a warehouse--the rare kind that's still in use. He follows his contact, alone, eyes scanning the horizon. As before, he doesn't turn his head. Unlike Arthur, Bond isn't fazed by the nature of the people he's been sent to essentially sell out. That this is apparently an operation cobbled together and hidden by the local working people is inconsequential to him. After all, this is the mission. His is not to stop or ask why, his is to do. As such, after stepping through the hole in the gate, Bond subtly leans forward, allowing the microphone hidden in the buttons of his sleek, futuristic 'definitely a Multiversal' jacket to pick up the sequence of knocks.

     He looks at home in the black market. In keeping with his character, he appears to know what he wants. The money is already in his hand, already being extended. As soon as there's a gap in the conversation, he says, "The handgun. With the black finish." It's curt and businesslike. And that gun is exactly what he said he needed--small enough to carry, big enough to matter. Arthur may not be stinging the local middle school, but Bond will. The alternative is to question. That never goes well.
Eryl Fairfax     "Suffice it to say that I lead an organisation of superheroes," Eryl says with a smile. "And there's no need to apologise. I offered the handshake, out of respect to my fellow man." He places a hand on Lewis' shoulder (not the one he just used to shake, least he think Eryl was wiping his palm off). "It would be a place to start. Please, lead the way."

    Eryl follows behind the boy, keeping his hands visible (so no one jumpy thinks the boy has been taken hostage) and out of arms length away from him. Once they reach the warehouse, he plays along with the banter. "Had he not found me, I'd still be wandering like a headless chicken!" he jokes. He slips Lewis a small roll of credits with a wink and then makes a show of exploring the stalls.

    In truth however, he has his implants humming. This places is likely a mess of dusty, dirty footprints. No doubt centred around the front door and stalls. He's looking for a point where a lesser amount fork off. A direction they go towards, or disappear.
Tony Stark Tony is actually fairly well versed in power engineering and infrastructure due to his background in 'being the biggest name in clean energy' and having to tinker with generators and the like. The way things are put together make sense to Stark in a tangible way.

The journey gets him to slide out of his jacket rather early, folding it over an arm or hanging it on handy hooks and corners of things.

When he speaks, he wades in, his shirtcuffs being loosened as he gets in there with the cables.

He's a bit more than familiar with cable management or wire patching, and seems nonplussed by the cost to his shoes.

When the conversation turns to the tipoff, he wraps up his assistance, faking 'tipping his hat' and collecting his jacket to move on.

MEANWHILE, AT THE WAREHOUSE:

"How charming. A warehouse." Stark observes, entering to move among the products at a disinterested window-shopping pace. Phones! Suits! Tchotchkies!

Cars... Cars Tony will come back for. He slips whoever is minding the cars a buisness card, a phone number, and a billfold for the trouble. Pickup can be arranged later.

The batteries get a more critical eye, and Tony buys a local charging station with plug set with all the bells and whistles, bags them in a canvas bag (Stark branded, of course) he produces from a pants pocket, and drops them into. He already knows his target.

Moving to the Goon Squad, Tony throws another billfold onto the table in front of the hoodlums and raises his voice. "My name is Anthony Stark, owner of the Stark suite of companies, most famously Stark Enterprises, one of the most accomplished weapons manufacturers in this or any world."

He reaches out and, without a hint of fear - or even paying attention to the owner - grabs one of their pieces by the slide, dropping the magazine with his thumb and clearing the chamber, before beginning to disassemble the piece in his hands. "This is garbage. This is a toy. I am looking to place a large order for three-six-two or four-nine-five chambered modern man-portable solutions: and I'm willing to make a large buy offer, especially of IMA-family platforms."

The rest of the gun's pieces clatter to the ground as he spins his hands palm up. "Get me someone who can make decisions, and the money is yours."
Arthur Lowell >Arthur: Question, that always goes well

    Arthur takes this all in a friendly way! His grin is wide and he seems quite fascinated by all the options. Hey, you never know what you might want to do PUNCHCARD ALCHEMY with. There's a whole, whole lot of temptation he has to take off the wire and crush it underfoot riiight about /now/.

>Arthur: Examine marketplace for secret magic problems!

    Arthur successfully resists the urge! He instead elects to check if this is, what, maybe too good to be true? Does MAGELY ANALYSIS turn up anything he should be concerned about? Curses? Radiation? Something like that? Anything that makes this something he should be stinging? The others will find the actual black market if there is one; Arthur, in spite of his persona, has the street smarts of a common household lamp, and would never find his way around a black market.
Rean Schwarzer Rean follows the punk, eventually running into Arthur in a similar situation, and going the same way. Eventually, they catch up with the others, too at a warehouse that looks more like a makeshift open air market than something super shady. It's also staffed by mostly young folk which makes him slightly uncomfortable.

Rean ALSO has the street smarts of a lamp, so he tries to do something a bit different. He leans up against the nearest wall, like he's just sizing up the place. In reality, he's got his aura sense open, trying to see if there's rooms with people in them, or people doing things in a hidden basement or something like that. Perhaps there's more to this building than just this swapmeet thing.
Lilian Rook     When Bond specifies the specific gun, the lad behind the 'counter' nods, but slaps his hand firmly down on top of it before Bond gets to touch it. He stares him dead in the eye. Aggressively.

    "This was my old man's. You take care of it. Capisce?"

    It's the priciest one in the room by far. It's still 'the actual going rate for a military sidearm' and not nearly a black market jack-up. He only has one magazine to hand Bond, though it's stacked with an enormous number of tiny bullets, with straight, pencil thin casings with a hexagonal texture. "You charge these up yourself. Can't have primed ammo around the house. Not my problem. You look smart, so you'll figure it out."

    It doesn't take Eryl long at all to figure out the lesser used areas, being the two adjoining rooms. One obviously contains Bond and his particular racket. The other has tape on it. It is the same direction Arthur senses. Eryl can tell that people go in that direction least of all. The shitty duct taped sign has bright red marker in bold saying "GHOSTY BULLSHIT. BUYER BEWARE." There's actually a pretty built lad by the door. The big home grown specimen. Even then though, Rean can tell there's nobody actually beyond the door. There are only a whopping three people in the other shady room, but this taped off area is a closet of mingled, weak magical auras.

    He gets up, folds his arms, and slowly and carefully explains that they 'have no fuckin' clue what half the shit does' and 'if you're seriously into this then it's your own ass in the fire' with a rather stock 'don't go using this inside the city or whatever' added on. They are clearly not even the slightest bit magically educated and they know it. They're almost . . . sort of spitefully prideful of that fact. But they know that it could be very valuable and aren't willing to pass that up.

    Inside of there, nobody is 'tending the stalls'. It's hard to tell if any of it is bought, stolen, disused, thrown away, or gotten through black market connections, on account of it being weird junk. Arthur can tell that some of it isn't even magical, just suitably occult looking that someone figured it probably had to be. Closed jewel boxes with ominous carvings. Tiny bags and vials filled with powdered substances. Silver athames and red incense, strings of slowly colour-shifting beads and tiny stone crosses. There's a whole-ass skull covered in engraved patterns, a few books locked shut with chains (two of which are mundane and just meant to look flashy, one of which twitches occasionally), and stacks of old paper inked with intricate circles and glyphs that looks like someone wrote each one by hand to stock up for later.

    The prices are all 'best offer'. A lot of it is kind of ominous in a viscerally visual kind of way, but nothing reeks strongly of magic by itself. It mostly seems more like a stockpile of aides for an actual spellcaster to use, not anything containing volatile magical functions in of itself. Something someone with means could make or buy in their spare time; just nobody *here*. It's no wonder a bunch of highschool to college guys would assume it's nasty, potentially cursed stuff though. At last maybe some of it could explode or combust if mishandled, but none of it is going to tear open a hell portal or anything.
Lilian Rook     Tony obviously puts the wannabe goons off guard immediately. They all stand up together, actually holding their improvised instruments, but honestly don't have nearly the machismo to match him, standing around like they forgot their lines. They understand the words he is saying, but look uncomfortable regardless. "That's . . . mate that's some heavy duty shit." one of them says, rubbing the back of his head. "Yeah it's not like we've got hands on that kind of milspec hardware. I mean . . . shit I might be able to wrangle up some guys but . . . how big is a 'large order'?"

    They seem . . . genuinely hesitant to pull out the stops needed to acquire 'anything that shoots a known modern military calibre' and sell it. It's sheerly the money that has them at the table right now. "Hey don't go calling it a toy." one of them says, a little indignant. "Maybe it's fun for you, but you can't just walk outside and buy this here. You're a rich guy right? Can't you just buy that off the admins or something? I mean, I feel why you wouldn't want to go through the ghosts, I really do mate, but you're kind of . . . like why're you nagging on me for a crate of shiny assault rails?" The tallest one wanders around in agitated circles, clearly losing his cool. "Shit . . . I dunno, I can *try*. I don't know how the hell he'd source it but . . . fuck I can ask Smith I guess. If he says no way though, that's that. Sorry mate." He just can't pass up a real fat stack like Tony probably has to throw around. He points in the direction of the room Bond is currently in. "Go check him out. He's the only guy who pulls down this kind of hardware. I don't ask why or how man. We're all in this together."

    This doesn't seem to be the subject on the UCS wire though. Those inside the warehouse are getting a good string of minor requests to keep talking, hold position, look to the left, et cetera, for the purposes of slurping up data, but when it seems pretty well explored, they hear Captain Acton on the other end with a fairly simple request. "Ask them about the money. Where is the money? Where are the credits going? They have them on hand; don't let them bullshit you and say they're exchanging them. They're taking credits only, so it's going *somewhere* to *someone*."
Tony Stark Tony raises his hands disarmingly when he finishes field stripping the handgun he got his hands on, his winning smile backed with the absolute confidence that between him and the goon-stack that the man who'd draw steel and drop the other party would be Anthony 'Iron Man' Stark.

"Gentlemen. I'm not asking you to perform a hit for an enormous sum." That would be entrapment! "I'm doing opposition research. If there was someone with a large amount of those weapons, I'd want to buy from them."

"But you are a... curious collection of traits. You want money bad enough to hit military grade groups for the stuff - and I'm absolutely liquid enough to float a properly equipped hit with bells, whistles, and spinning rims."

He gestures in the direction of the car showroom. "But I liked your cars. And the Third Ring has been quite kind to a capitalist like me. So, consider that chunk:"

Tony points to the billfold of heavy, weighty denominations.

"My payment for the tip on Smith. A finder's fee. You can figure out what's a fair way to distribute it, even." Stark smirks. He knows that'll get them squirming, because it is a Lot of Money. "What do you even need it for?" He adds, with the casual hook of someone looking for an answer over a watercooler.

When that line concludes, he moves towards Smith's shop at a slow, even pace, hands returning to his pocket.

The wad of cash Tony had tossed is made up entirely of unmarked, honest bills. The billfold has a Stark brand logo on it, and a tracker in it. It's the little things.

He'll probably arrive while the weapons deal is ending.
James Bond      Bond meets the kid's glance with cold professionalism, not backing down as the explanation is given. "Capisce."

     The gun and the magazine are placed into his jacket, which seems to have large enough pockets that a carrying a firearm--even a weighty one like this--won't be overly suspicious. Maybe it's some kind of fancy Multiversal lining. Once it's paid for, he nods. He has no idea what's meant by 'charge' in a specific sense, but he can guess that some form of energy is involved. He might keep one of the bullets and pass it along to Q Division--see if they can use it to come up with anything.

     In his ear, he hears Acton... making a pretty bold request. That's going to take another purchase to really sell it... but he can manage that. Bond nods towards something else on the wall. "Vest, kevlar." It's small enough to fit under street clothes, fitting with the purchase of the handgun. It paints a picture of a close-up job. The money is, again, in his hand, extended, as he says, "Why credits? Not that I mind." It's blunt and businesslike.

     This is the question he's asking just as Stark enters. He hasn't spoken up on the radio. He doesn't look or sound familiar, and he doesn't turn to face Stark as he enters. But... it is an unusual coincidence, perhaps, that question. What Stark will make of that is up to him.
Arthur Lowell >Arthur: Analyze weird magic stuff

    Arthur has two things to focus on. The first is analytical: Is there something about the magical or semi-magical materials that unifies them? Someone who might be the source, some place that they might be scavenging from, or perhaps someone in dire need of cash who is supplying them from their own stock? Anything that might narrow it down?

>Arthur: Irradiate

    In any case, he's got another, also quite important thing to go do. Which is to head to the first floor where Tony just whopped his wad on the counter, and with a quick snap, point at it. Ping! Among Arthur's stellar powers is solar fire. A trick shot should be able to IRRADIATE some of the bills. Wait, isn't this Tony bribing the /kids/? Arthur has no idea that this isn't actually going to the top at all. Thankfully, he just /started/ there, and is still going to put some cash through buying some media chips, a few appliances for alchemy, and a new handheld game console, with bills that aren't too spicy to hold for a week or two, but which burn pretty damn bright for someone who can sense solar radiation.
Eryl Fairfax     A door with a deal in progress. Another filled with occult paraphernalia. Eryl explores the latter thoroughly, listening in on the chatter back in the van to make sure nothing here is extremely dangerous. Upon their assurance that nothing here is something any capable mage couldn't make themselves, he leaves the room.

    There really doesn't seem too much awful here. The open sale of drugs without a license has him slightly concerned, but this is a community shopping centre, not a shady drug trade. People wouldn't let their neighbours buy a dangerous amount. At least, he hopes so.

    But then the request; figure out where the money is going. The Grandmaster looks around, and notes the prices again. They're... absurdly cheap, even for potentially stolen goods. Why are the prices so low? Does someone need money quick?

    Eryl continues wandering in a way that just so happens to bring him close to Lewis again. "No luck as of yet I'm afraid," he says to the boy with a sigh. "Though I have to say, I'm amazed at how cheap everything is. Even luxury goods are well affordable. I'd love to know how they do it."

    Tony is handling the actual merchants. Eryl needs to tap a different well. Things overheard by a young man orbiting his father.
Rean Schwarzer Rean cautiously heads into the room marked 'Ghosty Bullshit' And finds....random talismans and things that might not actually be magic.

There's some conversation over comms requesting that they track where the money is going, somehow. Rean nods, and signals over the radio for Arthur to DO THE RADIOACTIVE THING on his credits too. Once that's done, he heads over to do what he said he'd do: Buy skates, or a skateboard.
Arthur Lowell >Arthur: Irradiate additional money

    Yeah! Arthur's been requested to help Rean out, so he also makes sure to subtly slip by him and flick the bills with his finger, pulsing them with just a little bit of solar fire to leave them known to one's sensors, when properly tuned.
Lilian Rook     The boys Tony is talking to seem pretty relieved. Despite the fact that they're holding all the potentially violent implements, Stark had them rattled pretty good. "Look, I didn't say for sure we would. That's kind of crazy. I don't know how every single thing ends up here. Nobody does. That's kind of the point." They all go pretty much bug eyed when Tony drops the massive stack. A couple of them start talking to each other quickly and quietly, visibly looking up an exchange rate off an anonymous image board. As he walks off, the first guy shuffles around on his heels and says "What don't you need money for in this world mate? I know what it's like. Even if they swap around the names, it's all there to cover eating, sleeping, and piss breaks at work isn't it?"

    Arthur zaps the money with the Stark tracker. Rather than fussing over how to divide it, the boy goons all very cooperatively cart it off to a stack of orange carry cases behind the 'stalls' out of sight, flicking the locks on an unassuming, identical case in the pile --clearly memorized-- and stuffing it in. Rean buying a skateboard (with a wicked sick skull for his punk ass) confirms the money goes to the same spot. If he cares to peek, there's a pretty nice pile of cash; mostly common hard form credit chips, but a number of dollars, yen, gold and silver coins as well. They could have filled a pallet of suitcases with what they have on hand, but it's still probably worth at least a few hundred grand.

    The guy Bond is buying for makes a little noise with his tongue against his teeth, and says "Yeah, rough streets out there I hear. You stay safe." i.e. I don't want to know what it's for. He goes rummaging around in the back and pulls out a slightly dusty but otherwise unused vest that actually dates back to a time period Bond recognizes. One of the stab proof varieties too. "'cause sosh ain't worth shit outside. You savvy?" The way he pronounces it is s-oh-sh. "Why do *you* have credits? Same reason.Won't make it out there without 'em."

    Arthur's scanning of the 'ghosty bullshit' finds mostly inconsistent results. The only strong theme is that none of them resemble anything inherently enchanted or with an active spellcasting component. Catalysts, ingredients, aides, foci, ritual implements, but nothing that would be useful on its own, never mind in the hands of a total amateur. More or less, someone or another with magical talent must have picked some up for the convenience. These things are *probably* stolen, but they're easily the things most likely to not be missed by the type of people who'd stock, sell, or buy them. More importantly, his radiation scanning picks up deactivated RFID chips on some of them.

    Lewis just kind of shrugs at Eryl. "Hell if-- I mean I don't know. I couldn't tell you what's the real cost on the market; just a couple of guys got the Syndicate listings to go off I think. I heard someone got a cheeky radio for a minute last month, but it's none of my business." He frowns uncomfortably. "I've gotta assume it's crowd sourcing it. Like, those cars. Nobody here has the credit for that right? You'd only see some First Circle admin driving one around right? At least that's what I like to believe. If it's all big C credits, I guess someone here needs something they don't make here."

    He shuffles in discomfort, in the way that someone does when he has an inkling his friends might be getting into trouble but is hoping in blind faith they aren't. Eryl can tell that he's absolutely hoping they aren't doing something stupid, and starting to regret bringing him here. "Well, I'm sorry for wasting your time then. I'll show you to the nearest station."
Lilian Rook     The irony of this. Not in the wry twist of wording way, but the concept of dramatic irony. The actors speaking aloud words the audience knows better of. The other end of the line is filled with a rush of hurried "Verbal confirmation of intent.". "Confirming visual on a large quantity of restricted currency.". "The car's trackers match. Checked with the distributor.". "That's all we need. Give the signal."

    The USC don't wait for further confirmation of nefarious activity. They don't even wait to hear the name of a seller or see where the cash is going beyond the walls of the building. Once a few lads have confirmed they're intentionally stocking up and a big wad of hard cash shows up, the scene becomes a shitshow. Within instants, mass yelling can be heard outside, not fully covered up by the churn of the loading bay doors all being forced open at once and the crash and clatter of dropped cargo and scrambling men wearing heavy equipment. The tone of it is unmistakable, in its hoarsely peaked, aggressively assertive way.

    The doors adjoining the stockpile strip to the actively used warehouse floor explode open. There'd been just four armed officers on the street corner before, but that seems to have been an indication of not having more than that on hand, because there must be thirty or forty --an absurdly excessive number-- piling in through every entrance, evidently already primed to bust from adjacent blocks, and waiting on a hair trigger to have the go-ahead.

    A dozen different voices are all barking out variants of "ON THE GROUND!" and "HANDS BEHIND YOUR HEAD!" Someone with a radio mouthpiece is loudly broadcasting "Do not move! You are, all, being detained for false accreditation of restricted substances, operating an unrecognized place of business, possession of delta-level exotic properties items, possession of restricted currency, intent to commit administrative credit fraud, and intended unlawful relocation! Your identities have been verified and recorded! There is nowhere to go!" There are a pair of loud bangs as the doors on both of the side rooms are blown off.

    There is, of course, an enormous panic. Perhaps less than half of the people in the area actually comply, and most of them just by freezing up and trying to yell back over and over again, rattling off in panic while failing to comprehend the orders being shouted at them.

    The kid who'd sold Rean his skateboard yells "Shit shit shit I can't be here!" and bails on him instantly, running for the back doors. The guy rifling through media chips for Arthur looks wide-eyed at him and goes "This way!", motioning him to the fire escape. Lewis just hovers around Eryl in a panic, running back and forth before asking him "What's going oN?!" Most of the crowd is trying to scatter, crowding around entrances they can't all get out of. Some climb up on stockpiles and try to break out of a sealed window or two. The wannabe goon squad yells "YOU FUCKING PIG! YOU SHIT BASTARD!" after Tony, with some of their number just trying to drag the others away. Some enterprising youth charges a stack of crates, hollering at the top of his lungs, sending the whole thing toppling all over the floor in front of the USC officers to block them off.

    It's complete chaos. Within literally five seconds of the doors coming down, personnel are chucking flashbangs and tear gas ahead of the fleeing crowd to cut them off, further men tackling teenagers and college students to the ground, or getting rougher with the few who double down and default to the thing they said they'd do --taking a bat to the baddies and taking one for the team.
Lilian Rook     Slicing the corner around to where Tony had been, one of the men finds the stripped down handgun and yells "Weapons! Weapons!", and so when the big crate stack comes toppling down, the inevitable happens: one of the four squad stacks just starts shooting. The enclosed space makes the rapid gunfire completely deafening. They aim for the kid pushing over the loaded pallet. They aim for the lads Tony had been talking to currently trying to flee. They aim for the big lunkhead by the sealed off room for making a startled motion. They aim a bit of everywhere.

    Of course this means the room Bond and Smith are in is immediately burst inwards. Clearly not even slightly recognizing Bond, an officer in what must be fifty pounds of body armour goes to tackle him to the ground from behind. Smith, being in the middle of a pile of guns, jerks his hands up over his head to surrender, and is shot on the spot. It takes the fifth squad's captain a moment to yell "STAND DOWN" enough for them to stop aiming at Tony.

    To make matters worse, once gunfire can be heard, warehouse workers from outside begin crowding through the bay doors, some trying to get in front of the UCS officers who aren't already shooting, holding their arms out and adding more yelling to the confusion, a couple of brave souls trying to tackle the squad that's already opening fire. A few outside, probably complicit, try to run out the other way while things are going down. The rest are committed to creating a huge, angry, riotous commotion, piling around in a disorganized, outraged crush.
Arthur Lowell >Arthur: You should definitely go ham

    Arthur doesn't even get to go to the top. He can't find the source, the place where money is supposed to be going, the root of the problem. In his mind, at least, things have gone sideways. For those who might be attentive to him, there's a very, /very/ abrupt flare. Sensors might see magic rising, while people with basic observational skills might hear grinding of teeth and a rising anger -- albeit, both are a bit hidden under the surging violence. Arthur remains motionless in this disaster as it sets in motion.

    Arthur is about to do something very, very stupid and entirely against the mission they were assigned. Unless someone has a lot of motivation and a compelling way to stop him before he sends this far more wild than it currently is, things are about to get Stupid. Things are about to get Arthur Stupid.

>Arthur: Get hella triggered. Pop off.
>Arthur: Get IN there

    Arthur pulls his wire and crushes it in his hands.
Arthur Lowell >Arthur: Swap your ALLEGIANCE SYNOPSIS to the HOODLUM side

    Uh oh.

>[S] Arthur: Rebel

    Arthur slams his battlebroom into the ground. He casts WIDE-AREA NULL-GRAVITY, affecting the entire building all at once, a maneuver designed to minimize casualties by immediately nullifying grapples, pins, and easily-aligned gunfire. "AAAAAACTOOOOON! EVERY COP IN THIS BUILDING," He roars. "OUT. NOW." His first action is to take the entire building and begin to physically /lift/ the whole structure with antigravity. It is a challenge to the police, a demand that they dig into their bravery and fight without retreat, or they flee right now. The entire structure and much of the surrounding terrain will rise all at once, borne aloft by gravity, unless it's stopped by any sort of local magics.
Eryl Fairfax     Lewis is getting nervous. That's plainly obvious. Having some very official stranger come in and start asking probing questions. "Oh, I can find my way back. I'll just do one more pass just in case, but I'll be on my way after th-" The call is given, and the authorities come bursting in. "Oh hell," Eryl curses. The slightest hint of a lead, and instead of following it, they jackboot in to turn the place over.

    "My apologies Lewis," he says to the lad, before sweeping his legs out from under him and grabbing his shirt by the back of the collar as he goes down. "Stay low, hands behind your head, and I promise you and yours will be okay." That's a promise Eryl intends to keep. Even as the bullets start firing.

    Original Face goes into overdrive, capturing a single moment. A boy pushing the cart. The man guarding the magical stock. And then Arthur flips gravity like a table. And Original Face captures that too. Eryl whirls, his form a blur as he grabs tables, crates, chairs and hurls them. Each one goes spinning through the air, intercepting a bullet, targeted stray or otherwise, and absorbing it.

    Kicking off the wall, he goes sailing into the crowd of cops, and then proceeds to eject the clips and magazines from their guns, followed by hitting the ejector lever and slides to get rid of the ones in the chamber. Each one that gets this treatment has it followed by a backhand to the face.

    "Idiots! Dipshits! Fools the lot of you!" Eryl shouts. He is absolutely /broadcasting/ his presence right now. Paladin badge glinting as he glides through the nullgrav as easy as pacing. "You get one lead and decide to bring your foot down on a place that is 95% community marketplace?! And you call yourself 'security?!' I had assumed I was working with hardened professionals, but I see now only a pack of overly-swaddled babies making a fuss for attention that their momma didn't give them!"

    The Grandmaster is a living nightmare right now. He is every strict teacher, harsh drill sergeant, and demanding boss at once. The one who leaves you quaking in your chair before their desk no matter how old you are. "You will ALL stand down! You will ALL await for the nice young man to give you your gravity back. And you will ALL pray I don't make sure you can only get a job cleaning toilets with your tongue before the end of the day!"
Rean Schwarzer And of course, based upon the tiniest bit of misbehavior, the UCS comes charging in, throwing tear gas and flash bangs as gunfire starts raining down around him. Rean scowls, kneeling down low with the skateboard and raising his hands in the air so that they don't accidentally shoot /him/ in the chaos. What did he /think/ would happen? That they /weren't/ going to just arrest everyone here? That they weren't going to go easy despite this being a bunch of dumb kids?

...Also, what the hell was that about "intended unlawful relocation?"

Rean looks down at the skateboard lying on the ground. He grits his teeth, then kicks it at the nearest UCS officer that's charging in, hopefully tripping them.

It's not much in comparison to what Eryl and Arthur do, though. Rean's got a bit more respect for the both of them now, not that he /didn't/ have respect for his boss to begin with.
Tony Stark Stark is standing in a room, about to charm and smile and put on his Sleaze Pomade to forge a connection, grease palms, and comfortably visit some good fortune on the people he had grown to like in the brief moments he had known them.

He was the sort to allow - nay, internalize - the random acts of philanthropy he visited on those that had personally crossed his path. It was his way of moving through the world as both the 'Tony Stark' of today and 'Iron Man'. A hero. Someone in whose wake was something good. The alternative was too depressing to think about.

Being a tireless creator of good for everyone was unattainable. He saved who he could: it wasn't everyone.

It takes time to deploy his reserve armor, a forcefield projecting from his sapphire cufflinks as both hands plate with backup power gauntlets, triangle emitters on the palm.

The glove goes for the gun but it barks - putting a bullet in Smith. There's probably a guy on Bond still too.

Tony's grip closes around the murder weapon, augmented grip contracting to crunch the barrel. The Grandmaster of the Paladins has many high level action words for the troops. The Mage of space holds Gravity in his very palms -- and Tony's shoes appear to be magnetically locked to the floor. He subvocalizes quietly, adding soft 'useless, sloppy, ham-fisted...' to his mutterances as he goes to Smith. If the man is just normal shot, it could be salvageable.

Shot in the head, of course, and that's that.

'Action' had gotten enough yelling. The people here had gotten enough yelling.
James Bond      Bond pretends to examine the vest, despite being quite familiar with its general design. As he does, he ponders what the salesman said about credits. They do spend just about everywhere, don't they? These people have nothing in the way of power, and they know it. This is not a place people live in by choice--only by circumstance.

     Maybe they think the credits are their ticket out of the Third Circle. How would he do it? ...he'd find a smuggler. Pay him with some of the credits, keep the rest to spend off-world. "I'm savvy. Can't say I blame you for wanting to leave." He isn't certain that's what they're being used for. But call it an educated guess. He's sometimes worked to turn functioning countries into places like this, after all. As if on cue, the security radio frequency erupts into a cacophony of voices. They're moving in.

     That'll be his cue to leave. He's in the midst of wordlessly turning to leave when he's struck from behind by a security agent. Reflex takes over.

     Twisting with the force of the blow, the secret agent strips the grapple, breaking a few of the officer's fingers with the force of his grip. Bond hurls the officer over his shoulder just as Smith goes down. Barely a man yet, that one. He turns as soon as the officer's back hits the ground, breaking into a roll to take cover. Repeated shouts of STAND DOWN gradually draw him out, and he emerges in time to see Stark crumple the other officer's gun.

     The UCS has their evidence, for what little that seems to matter right now. Someone is yelling--multiple people are. While the police are weightless, he makes his exit. A cassette tape with a recording of the audio evidence is tossed over his shoulder, whereupon it floats in the air.

     "For the ride home," he says to the UCS officers as he edges past Stark. No more American accent, no offer to assist. He'd only get in the way. The vest is thrown to the ground. The gun... that he'll keep. It's unique. He's had many expensive things, but few truly unique ones, and few that were truly his. Perhaps in this case, what M doesn't know won't hurt her.
Lilian Rook     The captain of this operation, or whatever contacts he'd gone through, had asked for Multiversal faces to lay bait. The true meaning of everything that comes with that might not have been obvious. At least, not to anyone set to be on the ground at the time.

    Lewis yells as he's thrown down to the floor, but narrowly escapes a bullet for Eryl doing so. Eryl takes a bullet, the one individual man who fired it falters for a second, and then the Grandmaster is slapping bolts and magwells left and right, sending composite and metal clattering all over the floor in a flurry of shouting confusion until gravity decides to go fuck itself.

    A skateboard goes flying out of nowhere, spinning dangerously through the air, towards one of the squad charging to take Lewis where Eryl had left him, and cracks him across the feet, launching him off the ground and sending him sailing through the air. Loose crates, electronics, pill bottles, tools, racks, spent brass and grenades, bound arrestees, disoriented raid officers, and concerned and outraged warehouse workers alike, go wobbling, drifting and bouncing around the whole sub-floor.

    Tony's hand goes crunch around the submachine gun of another raid officer, the barrel squealing, bending, and snapping in his grip, its wielder dropping it and falling over. His comrade cries out when Bond breaks his fingers and flips him over, bouncing once off the floor and drifting away in a panic as well. Acton is bellowing red-faced into his radio, somehow completely inaudible except for the men patched in with earbuds in their helmet, and soon, as the building starts to shake, the men in black suits are fleeing, via running, sliding, or spinning off the walls, the same way the warehouse workers are as well, dodging sliding crates and vehicles, save thise wearing exoskeletons which can grip the floor and reach out to catch their work buddies. A handful more 'criminals' escape through the back routes, or simple outrun people during the chaos, but otherwise everyone in the building is dumped out in the warehouse yard all together.

    And now, people from the street are there. The van has pulled around blaring its emergency siren, but with all that flash and noise, all that yelling and gunfire, and especially the local distortion of gravity, not only has everyone for blocks stopped and crowded up on the other side of a cordon the sparse remaining guards are setting up, but they've called others too, many of them doing the equivalent of holding up phones to record the goings on. An undercurrent of fearful murmuring is mostly drowned out by waves of yelling and some hurled objects.

    The shitshow has spread, though the shooting has stopped. Nobody is in dire danger of being filled with lead, but the number of armed officers who were shaken out of the building only have so much ability as a group to cow the more numerous shift workers who'd tumbled out with them like mixed nuts. Acton is trying to fight through the crowd to reach Eryl in particular, his attempts at megaphoning Arthur to stop largely garbled by several hundred people.

    Skipping the stage where the media comes in and causes a mess the next day for ratings (actually, there doesn't seem to be any media anywhere), the increasing press of people are already a mixture of both scared and incensed about gunfire on in their neighbourhood, to the point that a whole warehouse --and the site of a lot of jobs-- is being turned inside out, sufficient to be close to starting a riot out of sheer human Brownian motion.
Lilian Rook     The final extent this spreads is the radio, and it caps out there for the minute, for obvious reasons. There's a small explosion on a clear section of the warehouse grounds, where a black fire roars loudly enough to startle and send people shrinking and stumbling back, but briefly enough to only leave a corroded black mark on the pavement. It diminishes the angry yelling just long enough for the person who'd had their radio explode with this for the past minute walk out.

    Lilian struts all the way up through the warehouse crowd with a purpose. The mix of workers and officers falls away in a hurry; whether they have any idea who she is or not, the general idea is clear. The greater mass of men in grey and yellow parts and spreads out into a wide ring, matching the changed tone of the fervent crowd outside. Those in black group together roughly at the center. She gets as far as the captain, being the person who knows exactly who was called on for this favour.

    "What is this?" Lilian asks. Acton gets as far as "The operation-" before being cut off with a much louder, sharper, "What the *fuck* is this? You have the *balls* to beg daddy dearest up two levels above you to get someone to page my line, use up my time, and pretty up your personal promotion bate with 'outside' specialists for *what?* Help with setting up skeets? I leave you alone with the help you requested for *less than an hour* and there's been a shooting?"

    Acton is, just now, putting on his best, hardest, most stony poker face. "Miss, the operational resources requested were to serve as undercover informants only. We've found comprehensive proof of our operation's intended target, being the felonious accumulation of restricted currency under fraudulent administrative accreditation." Lilian snaps "And who gave you a shoot on sight order for *accreditation fraud*? As I understand it, there *isn't such a thing*." He continues in that police professional way. "Miss, I'll politely ask you to step back and allow our department to handle this. This is civil security jurisdiction only. You are neither-" And then Lilian reaches up and physically cracks him across the face with the back of her hand.

    Of all things, this immediately changes the mood of the crowd. The yelling dies down a pitch to be replaced with hooting and picture-snapping. A couple of armed men march up out of line and then a couple of their fellows wrangle them back and start talking to them quickly and quietly over the comm.
Lilian Rook "Who gave you the order to open fire?"
"Our team encountered armed resistance within-"
"Then you have body camera recordings. Show me."
"Miss, that's USC-owned classified case material--"
"Which is never going to show up ever again. Don't *lie to my face* captain. Prove it."
"Miss I cannot comply with that order. You are not part of my chain of command."
"Command? *Command?* You think you're *above* me? You think you can stonewall me? Are you serious? You realize you're public servants, don't you? Do you have any idea who I am? It'd take me *five seconds* to find out all your names and badge numbers and have you *done* with. Don't pull that 'brotherhood through service' tripe with me. Tell me, which one of your idiots opened fire."

    Acton remains completely silent. The crowd of warehouse workers is shifting all around, cracking knuckles, leering, squaring up. The crowd on the street is straining to try and get a look at what's happening. Now the cordon is trying to keep them out of viewing range and attempting to confiscate cameras. Lilian looks past him.

    "Which one of you gave the order to open fire? Whoever tells me in the next three seconds keeps their job." The whole mob of black-clad officers remains completely silent. They remain stoic and stood together despite the audible jeering from both crowds, catcalls and sardonic laughter.

    Lilian shakes her head. "Wow. You really don't get it at all do you?"

    She looks past them and walks up to Eryl, Arthur, Tony, Rean. Pointing towards the crowd of silent officers.

    "Would you kindly relate to me the events that transpired within the past thirty minutes? Including any evidence of weaponry inside that building, and would you kindly point out each man in that crowd that pulled a trigger?"
Arthur Lowell >Arthur: Fondly regard commotion

    But he fails to regard. Arthur fractalizes the scenario into an estimation of the broader situation. Everyone here has had their identities recorded. Regardless of how satisfying it might be to turn on the authorities for their malfeasance, they have all the power here. When he leaves, they'll just arrest all those recorded identities. Arthur's frustration boils. As with many situations where someone takes very sudden, very hugely disruptive action, what happens after the first step is mostly the results of one painting themselves into a corner emotionally with impulsive actions at the start of it.

>Lilian: Interrupt

    You can't issue commands to Lilian. But still, on her own, she decides to intercede. In this sense, Arthur is given a... sort of a release valve. There's the palpable sense that this was going to go in an entirely different direction; as if the script had been entirely written for an effort by Arthur to facilitate unlawful relocation, the creation of a new antigravity-powered Wandering Bazaar featuring his own alchemical tools, and an offer of full-scale exodus, all societal consequences be damned. As befits a Time-aspect, this doomed offshoot timeline gently slides away, and we are stuck with the frustrations of the present and all its compromising glory.

>Arthur: Elucidate. Don't be crazy about it.

    But he fails to not be crazy about it.
Tony Stark Stark kneels on the wounded man, adjusting something on his glove to stop the bleeding. Stabilization will have to wait for a full medical suite, but if he's not bleeding out, he may live. There's a little hope. People died, but the ones in front of him lived.

Stark hears Lilian downstairs. With the gravity of a man who commands armies of flunkies, Stark points to one of the operators. "Stabilize him. Now."

He doesn't care if the man is a medic. A medic will appear. This is a professional operation, despite running roughshod over things - Tony uses his 'Or I will obliterate your career and it will lay barren unto the seventh generation' voice. It's a specific voice.

Stepping out the door he had entered, Tony adjusts his gloves, the watch-face reappearing as a display, showing a set of yellow-orange grids turning blue.

"Dame Rook. I was just about to call you. Just the per-son I wanted to see. Is that man... giving you trouble?"

Now in the sort of almost-warm atonal humor that bites at the end of every sentence like a knife drawn across a block, Stark watches boxes turn blue with some interest. "Because he's given us some trouble. But that's fine. Technology... Isn't it really grand?"

Spreading his arms wide, Stark sarcastically pivots lightly at his waist, encompassing all of the tactical operators with their body cameras, magic heads up displays, smartwatches, radio tags.

Somewhere else, commands start being ghosted. Inputs are validated and scraped in real time. Intranets - what must be a cohesive network - are filled with a presence remotely.

"Because that gentleman has lost his entire civil security division's technology priveleges. Now, Rook, how much footage did you want?"

Tony drops his spread-armed pose to flick the holographic display towards his fellow paladin, a visualized data structure imposing itself in the air, with a lot of labelled files.

"I had Friday patch me in at the start of this fiasco. Normally she's more a voyeur, but then you just went and threatened my life, the lives of my colleagues, and the life of hundreds of un- or under-armed people, when that just /really/ was not necessary."

"Anyway, which camera do you want? Thirty minutes? An hour? The strategy session beforehand? Golly. What fun stuff will we find?"

Stark's voice drops. "You shot a gun past my head because I dropped a billfold in the laps of children. You're all done."
Eryl Fairfax     Eryl has no words for Acton. He sees the man approaching, and immediately ignores him, making damn well sure that none of the men reload and fire again. Anyone who so much as twitches gets a cuff on the head and another dressing down. Even as he's bleeding from that bullet wound, the red pooling across his cloak and suit, he doesn't stop until things are under control.

    It takes a while, but he sticks around for the whole thing, waving off any treatment until everyone else is looked at. The men give the whole stony silence thing, solidarity in the face of 'tyrannical' external pressure. And so Lilian does the smart thing, and appeals to them instead.

    "I'll do you one better."

    Eryl retrieves a discarded hard drive from the mess left behind after the raid, and plugs it into a slot hidden behind his ear. He taps his foot for a moment as information is transferred, and then hands it to her. "Here. All the visual information from my point of view, with overlaid telemetrics. You'll be able to see exactly who fired, when, and at who, along with tracking of their movements during and afterwards."

    Original Face is very thorough. Not a single moment escaped his sight.
Arthur Lowell >==>

    Arthur leaps from the warehouse, with its drifting mass, and slams into the lot. He strides with aggression he hasn't often displayed before, and crashes his arms into a heavy cross in front of him. Both eyes are suns. A halo of gravity warps everything behind him.

    "'THOU SHALT TREAT THY FELLOW MAN WITH DIGNITY AND WITH VALUE, REGARDLESS OF THEIR STATION. THE LAWS OF THE COMMANDMENTS SUPERSEDE ALL OTHER LAWS.'"

    "The money could have been traced to the root of the problem. The bazaar could have been made a useful fixture of this community and others. We started working to trace the money, creating marked bills that we could trace to the lynchpin of this -- whoever it is who seems to be fulfilling a /lot/ of local demands that aren't being fulfilled properly."

>Arthur: Continue

    "THESE SHORT-SIGHTED, IDIOTIC /MORTAL--/"

>Arthur: Continue
>Arthur: CONTINUE

    Arthur swallows. He seems... suddenly much more recalcitrant. "Alright, uhhhh, shit, dawg, I didn't see that much. Kinda was all distracted, but. Couple weapons, that's confirmed. Had some self-regulation in there, they were bein' all responsible. Uhhh, I saw... fuck, they're all in helmets, shit." He rubs his face. "Okay, so, right when we made the purchases to set up the traces, everything basically went to hell. They started shooting the kids, so the workers came in to help 'cause they were /shootin' kids/ and all, so they started shooting workers-- christ. Christ." Arthur pinches the bridge of his nose. He lets out a strained exhale and tries to avoid something pouring out of him.
James Bond      The reversible jacket is un-reversed. Again, it is an unassuming, worn-down windbreaker. Bond's demeanor, his gait, change to that of a bystander just attempting to get home. He doesn't rubberneck. But he does listen, popping those headphones back on. The directional microphone is pointed towards the crowd. It's hard to pick out what's being said. He fiddles with the knobs, adjusting the volume while maintaining that brisk pace.

     There's something. Laughter. Jeering. What's that? It's... Rook. So, someone is holding them accountable. It's Code Red, of course. But Stark, Lowell, Fairfax, and that kid in the punk getup--they'll spill, he imagines. It'd be cold comfort to them, but they'll do it. Anything to tell themselves at least some justice has been served. He could speak up, too. But would there be a point?

     A few seconds pass. The distance growing steadily between himself and the unfolding confrontation. Can't stop moving. ...no. There wouldn't be a point. They'll fire the officers, maybe, but the UCS as a whole won't change. This is working as intended--they knew from the start these people were defenseless.

     He's out of the hot zone now, rounding a corner onto a familiar street. This is ordinarily where he'd find his car--but the streets here are so narrow, so chaotic and cramped as to make that impractical at best. His exfiltration route is pretty direct, and not much of a walk.

     He indulges himself with a cigarette, removing the earbuds and listening to the sounds of the Ring. It must be difficult to be a Paladin--to hope that everything can be solved with the right application of reason and empathy. To have to work under the assumption that good will exists. "Poor bastards." Bond exhales, disappearing into the night.
Rean Schwarzer And everything erupts into (further) chaos. There's now people outside wondering what the hell is going on, and this is probably a bad look for their group too, isn't it?

Suddenly a familiar voice rings out. Lilian? Rean watches her come in, not sure what she's going to do.

And sure enough, she's pissed at what's going on. And asking what happened.

"Let's see...there was a market here. Staffed by mostly teenagers. There might've been a plan to move up higher using the funds earned here, I guess. As for who fired...."  Rean folds his arms over his chest. "Is it still valid if I just say 'all of them?' It was kind of hard to tell who was and who wasn't shooting beneath all the /flash bangs and tear gas./"
Lilian Rook     Though his friend is long gone, having fled for his life, Smith is unconscious but still alive, though the bullet seems to have nicked an artery wall on the way through him. Yelling for one, Tony finds a medic who is more desperate to be away from the disaster than he is scared of stepping out of line.

    There are, of course, two with the detachment, but no doubt for treating officer injuries; a man who'd been left to metaphorically sit in the van outside, who would rather be anywhere but here. Without even a question, he kneels down by Tony and Smith, pops open his kit, shines a blue pen light of some sort into the wound channel and begins injecting some kind of aerosol gel before working on him.
    Lilian, meanwhile stalls exactly as long as Arthur is a nimbus of cosmic fire and wrath. She maintains an arms folded, patience kept, 'this is what I deal with' posture and expression throughout the whole terrible spectacle, and then reaches out and pats Arthur on the shoulder. "You're right." she says, without contextualizing it further, and then begins pacing back and forth ahead of the group.

    Rean explains his perspective, and she says out loud "Oh there certainly appears to be common elements here. If you'd like to say 'all of them', *be my guest*. If that is an exaggeration, I'm sure they'll *correct me*." she says. Meandering over to Tony and Eryl, spitefully and dapperly providing not one, but two complex electronic reconstructions of the whole thing in turn, Lilian claps her hands together, connects her device to the data drive, and starts paging through Tony's offered files, saying "Oh, look! Corroborating evidence! Fancy that! Clearly we have professionals here. Too bad they're the people *I* called in and not the ones being *paid to keep the peace*."

    There's a lot --a lot-- of spite coming from the whole act, radiating out in the form of frigid and knife-edged faux-delight. It couldn't be more obvious that Lilian is, essentially, too angry to yell. Yet, at the same time, Bond's parabolic microphone can pick up every single variation in the noise of the onlookers, hanging on the spectacle word for word. The increasing frequency and decreasing volume of background jeering. The shared whispers trying to place names and faces to the Elites involved. People trying to look things up on their holographics. Murmurs of anticipation and schadenfreude. The special Multiversal people ratting on the USC is met with *immense* approval from these people.
Lilian Rook     Lilian walks back up to the stack, singling out the squad leader of the flanking wing that'd opened fire, picked out of the data by RFID matched to alternate camera angles and ballistics. She holds out her hand. "Badge." she says. The man flips back his goggles and pulls down his mask, looking at her in grim bafflement. "Excuse me?" Lilian wiggles her fingers, palm extended. "Badge. Give it over." He replies in increasing disbelief "You're not even in government, never mind civil security. That's not how it works, no matter how much money--" A second squad leader smacks him on the back, hissing "Just do it." With a sour look, he finally reaches under his ceramic chestplate and produces a card.

    "Weapon." Lilian follows up with. He scornfully tosses the SMG that Eryl had emptied into her arms. She brass checks it and then tosses it. "Service weapon." she says next. The man rolls his eyes, drawing his handgun and offering it butt first. "You know all this is being recorded too, right? What are you, seventeen? Your parents are going to be the one taking the heat for this you know." Lilian pulls the slide to brass check the handgun too. "Our job is putting ourselves out in the line of duty here to keep these cities safe when you won't even touch them." Lilian nods, lets the slide snap back, points the gun down and shoots him straight through the thigh. The man collapses, howling on the spot, clutching his bleeding leg. "You call this 'keeping it safe'?" she hisses. "Record it all you like."

    Despite shooting a police officer, in broad daylight, in front of his armed comrades and an enormous crowd, the only thing that comes out of it is a sharp shuffle back from the squad and a round of uproarious, derisive cheers from the spectators of the show. "You have *one* job." The level of violence starts escalating when Lilian begins kicking the bleeding officer in the stomach between each sentence, yet the crowd fucking loves it.

    "You *exist* at my pleasure, on the assumption that you're *doing* it. You are *permitted* to carry a weapon and a badge for this *sole purpose*. 'People like me' *made* you, and I can certainly take it *all* away when you *fuck things up*. You think your job makes you *entitled* to living here? You aren't entitled to *shit*! You aren't entitled to *human rights* as far as I care!"%
Lilian Rook     She turns away to stare down the rest of the squad crowd. She's at least half a foot shorter than all of them here, but the absolutely naked power dynamics on display create the surreal sight of them all flinching back. "Would you like to apologize to these people? How are you going to make amends for the way you've *colossally* failed them." It doesn't even take a parabolic mic to hear the crowd stirred up into a showman's frenzy, now actively yelling all sorts of colourful suggestions, eating up the vicarious payback. They officers are either too stupid or too smart to respond.

    "No? Then you're all fired." Acton finally finds the words to yell "You *factually* cannot--" "THERE IS A BULLET HOLE IN THE *GRANDMASTER OF THE PALADINS* YOU DEGENERATE! EVERY WORD I HEAR THAT ISN'T A LETTER OF RESIGNATION IS A BULLET IN YOU TOO!" An enterprising senior officer steps out to try and intervene and is snap shot in the gut without even being looked at. The second medic that Tony hadn't flagged down is now spurred into action to help him too.

    That clinches it completely. Lilian ordering a forty strong unit of heavily armed grown men she doesn't officially have any power over to turn around and walk back to their base to be processed is so wildly successful that the specific words she uses are lost in the uproar. Now the cordon has to shift jobs to preventing people from throwing anything more menacing than rocks and bottles at the line of men who have to hurry out, two men unable to walk being carried between them. The people around here had been furious to the point of a violent riot that better paid men with power had showed up and enacted violence in their neighbourhood, yet someone with vastly more power and privilege showing up in front of them and flaunting it even harder has them dangerously ecstatic.

    In other words, it has the exact same air as a hated noble being put to death by public execution ordered by the king.

    Lilian tosses the gun, then hits up her device to start calling in emergency services properly, briefly rattling off something about a full lockdown, medical staff, media blackout and all that. Closing it up, she turns back to the assembled group who'd wholeheartedly sold out every single aspect of the operation to her, and she is evidently, visibly glad for it. She looks pleased. "My sincere apologies for being roped into this absolute circus. I can promise that none of the associated bureaus will have anything even accidentally resembling your contact information. As for the rest; Don't worry, it's being taken care of. Please, now, if there's anything I can do, let me know."
Arthur Lowell >==>

    Arthur observes the ruthless career and physical beatdown that occurs. Each impact of a kick, each gunshot, makes his body shift just slightly, like the front half of a tremble that never finishes. When this is all done, he just finds himself staring at Acton, wordlessly, motionlessly, with an almost desolate look, or it would be if it didn't have a sense of confusion in it.

    That rambunctious crowd, screaming like an intersection between football hooliganism after a worldwide event and something out of the french revolution, seems to be the only thing he can hear. He's not supposed to take satisfaction in this, right? That feeling in his chest shouldn't be there -- the guilt of feeling it shouldn't be weighing on him. This is just people, trying to do their best in whatever ways they can, for communities they have strong feelings about.

    Right?

    The thought of offering a congratulatory bro-pound to Lilian for what she did crosses his mind, and he is disgusted by it. God. No. No, that unashamed line of thinking would be...

>Arthur: Fondly regard termination

    Despite his better nature, his regard is fond.

    The warehouse thuds back into the ground and he doesn't even care.
Tony Stark The spectacle of it is something that Tony manages to remain unphased by. Truly, his expression becomes more neutral, more washed away - a sort of 'trembling on the edge' that he retains as he moves through the press of the crowd. Two more men are shot - the sort of experience that while sympathetic to wishing to perform himself, or perhaps with his 'bare' hands rather than with a gun.

The show is proving, though.

Stark finishes his approach to the Immune and merely stands there. His armored gauntelets disassemble themselves and retreat into a wrist bracelet and a watch, for right and left hands, and a nod is given to Grandmaster Eryl.

Leaning over to Lilian, Tony mutters a 'her ear only' whisper - followed by a quick smile, and a pat on the shoulder. Then - and only then - does he start to push out towards the shoving and cheering crowd.
Eryl Fairfax     Eryl just stands quietly by as Lilian dresses the soldier down. But the moment that she shoots him has his eyes wide. The ensuing beating and cheering by the crowd has him aghast. Plainly, public security is unpopular here. No doubt they've been flaunting their power, and deserve a good shaming and changing of the guard.

    But no. This is too much. He can't abide this.

    But right before he steps in, Lilian stops. The moment has passed. To step in now would not be corrective, but punitive. It would not remind their crowd, or Lilian, of their better natures as people, with commonality with the man on the ground. It would just be shaming them without having done a thing to stop it. Weak, limp.

    He shakes his head to Lilian. "I'll get looked at back at Aegis Astray. After I see these men back to base to ensure paperwork doesn't 'go missing.'" He smiles, and begins to follow the thoroughly browbeaten men along. And any in the crowd who prepares to throw anything that might deal any real damage gets A Look. It's not a glare, or anything threatening. An expression of quiet pleading. A look that asks them, as a person like himself, to show the mercy they were not shown.

    He doesn't actually do anything to intercept the missile if it is cast regardless. He might help the target up if they stumble from it though.

    As they emerge from the other side of the crowd, Eryl looks back at Lilian. His neurons and Original Face hum in accordance as a single possibility is drafted and associated with Lilian's profile.

>PLANNED?