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What kind of criminal bothers with trouble in the predawn building? Clearly someone totally unspeakably nefarious. Shadows clamp down thickly around the tangle of unfriendly streets near the Larson Building. It like so many other tenements really lacks for personality or defining features. To a mystic's senses, the place brews with squalor, despair, and sorrow. A few offices have yet to open for the day. Their dumpsters make a prime spot to scour for records and one man does just that, being watched by another. Not exactly high-profile criminals, these lot.
Nor is the shabby motorcycle left halfway up the street, tipped against its stand at a precarious angle. No sign of the rider, either, since he's presently choking around a sweaty cotton gag. Stowed in the alley, the Puerto Rican guy is trying to free his wrists without much luck. His muffled groans are not intended to attract the attention of the person responsible for binding him.
Jessica Jones could be working a case. She could be doing a client's dirty work, perched as she is on a fire escape in the nearby alley. Maybe she's snapping illicit photos of a cheating husband. Maybe she's listening to a wiretap, getting the goods on a corrupt councilman. Maybe she's taking down a pimp running his illicit affairs out of the tenement across the way.
All of that would seem more likely if she wasn't snoring.
When she comes awake, she groans, pushing greasy black hair out of her face, "God dammit," she mutters. She looks up at the twilit sky and throws a middle finger of defiance towards the coming sun, rolling over the railing on the side and floating at the last moment, letting her land just a bit gently on her feet.
Only to find herself staring at some guy bound and gagged and bulgy eyed right in front of her. "Aw, it's too early for this shit," she mutters, narrowing her eyes.
Kaleb was clearly lost. His suit likely cost as much as these people's rent even without the matching tailored coat to match. If that hostage wanted a distraction, Echo didn't intend to give him one, but all the same made for a delightfully convenient new target and drew their attention by being all the wrong things to be in this area at this time. Wether it was the gold watch or the shine on the shoes he drew that attention to himself and seeing this pinched his expression into a sigh.
On the rooftop of the building across the street a large, armored figure peers down. Ten seconds is all Deathstroke needs to realize what is going on, which brings a muffled snort out of his helmet. The courier was late, of course he was caught. Small wonder given the cheap motorcycle. Only question is if those two men are alone. There should be a vehicle nearby. Ah, yes, that black van.
Jessica waking in the fire up barely registers. Witnesses are always inconvenient, but pretty much unavoidable in New York. It matters not. He judges the chances of the woman being involved as very dim, unless she is an amazing actress her reaction to waking up was too… natural.
So he jumps, four floors down, and lands on the top of the black ban with a loud crash that almost sounds like a gunshot. The windshield shatters as the metal frame yields half an inch. The driver… dies. The armored man stabbed the top of the van with a sword, it went all the way into the deriver skull. There is another man in the van, sitting at the right of the driver, and he screams loudly in surprise and fear, clumsily trying to pull out a sawed off shotgun from under the seat.
Jessica Jones had been in the process of bending over and ripping the gag off of the bound man, when suddenly Slade makes his sudden and violent entrance, the shattering glass echoing and bouncing off the surrounding buildings.
"Fuck!" she shouts, gloved hands going up into her hair. That noise is a hell of a headache and the headache only gets worse when she sees the armored dude piercing that guy's pumpkin with a…a…
"Is that a GOD DAMN SWORD? WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH THIS CITY?" she shouts. She starts stalking towards Deathstroke and swings an arm out, shoving a parked car out of the way and making it skid down the street, leaving streaks of rubber on the pavement. Jessica doesn't usually show off her powers in public. Doing it so blatantly means she's pissed.
Kaleb was just staring into the alley watching this unfold. He should be scared, well he seemed concerned at the very least. Very, very concerned. He watched the screaming and the people's life of progress being brought to an abrupt and violent end with a numb and curious observation. The screams set off a baby to start screaming in a nearby window. That too abruptly stopped as the subtle will to reflect that sound bounced it back into the apartment where it belonged. The parents were at fault for beingint the noisy thing in the the world, it shouldn't be bothering him. What concerned Kaleb presently was the rule of witnesses and now some thug with a sword and a deathwish ramping the caper from a 2 to a 12. His eyes moved off the carnage to Jessica though as he took a step, several, out of the way of the car.
It was, yes, a sword. Large sword, about 50 inches long from pommel to point. Rhetorical questions get no response, though. Not that Deathstroke is given to chat when someone is trying to pull a shotgun on him.
Moving swiftly and with feline grace, the armored man pulls the bloody sword free and jumps to the side of the van just as the man inside tries to open the door. Fails. Deathstroke stabs him through the throat with an almost casual gesture, then turn to Jessica and the two guys by the dumpster. The dark-haired woman gets upgraded from %<u2018>civilian%<u2019> to %<u2018>possible threat%<u2019> when she shoves a car out of the way. But the kidnappers behind her are pulling handguns, so they are the priority. Miss, he growls, his voice a hollow bass. Duck. He advises, drawing out and throwing a knife to the closest gunman.
Bullets fly. The armored man stops two of them with his sword before they hit him.
The pair hurriedly working through the dumpster are not unaware of the situation. They sort through the trash bags and seek whatever intrigues them. Another bag of trash that stinks of last night's rancid pork chops, a meal cast aside for the rats. Garbage that's mostly paper, a crime to trees everywhere, makes for a difficult survey when they have to slit bags, look at the contents, and decide if it's worth the crime. The task continues while the lookout uneasily waits, weapon at the ready. Sort and swish. The deaths nearby might register, a hastened snarl and a curse. The car screeching by means it's time to cut their losses and run. Two men with two fat garbage bags of paper and one questionably smaller one are hightailing it. Their ride is destroyed. But hey, on foot they can vanish.
Matt Murdock might be concerned about the state of affairs in front of his office. Too late for him.
In all that chatter and noise, the fugue of action is sufficient to bring down chaos. Not actual chaos, but a woman poking her head out from an open window. A few adjustments allow her to slide into the windowframe, gauging how far the fire escape goes. Wanda isn't particularly noteworthy or visible, yet. Her vantage gives an appropriate sense of what is going on, and that is enough for the witch to slip onto the worn metal and make her way down to the street.
Jessica Jones feels a couple of bullets hit her in the back, punching her forward just a bit. That distracts her from Sir Stabs-A-Lot, at least for the moment. She turns back towards the robbers and flexes her fingers.
Being a detective, she might notice a lot of the lesser, background details. Well, normally she might. Again, the shooting is a bit distracting. "That's it. Gimme the guns," she says, extending her hands out, "C'mon, hand them over. Give up to me now before that guy Marie Antoinettes both your rotten asses. Do it fast, cause if you shoot me one more time I'm gonna twist those guns into very hard, very uneven metal balls and then I'm going to shove them elbow deep up your assholes."
"I've done it before. They'll tell you all about it at Riker's."
"Aaaaaaaaaand you're running away. Because of course you are. That's the way my life goes. God dammit," she mutters.
Kaleb was arrogant and entitles, he was not bulletproof nor stupid. Echo ducked into the doorway that led to Murdock & Nelson keeping a nice layer of brick between he and the flying bullets. The only contribution coming from him being an area around the entrance to that alley that was as deafeneingly quiet as the void of space. Nope nope nope nope. No more gunfire setting of the tinnitus, thanks. Was it all ove- Aaaand they're running past him. He hissed one command to them to compell them onward, "Keep…running." And that seemed to be all the motivation they needed to leave him the hell alone.
Conveniently the spot Kaleb hides is quite literally where the pair of thieves were scoping out the dumpster. So chances are good he's got a fantastic view of the mayhem if anyone comes running by.
Running away might be the smartest career move. If inconvenient for Deathstroke, as they are going into more frequented streets. The Puerto Rican fleeing too gets the man a brief stare.
"Good try," he offers to Jessica. Maybe sounding a bit sarcastic. Then he is off, running much faster than the thieves, despite the heavy-looking armor.
The dark-clad figure slipping down the steps is not outwardly seeking to draw too much attention, nor suppress her existence. Her feet touch lightly against the metal risers and, when the staircase runs out, Wanda has little recourse but to leap to the ground. Seven feet spanned in a fall, she lands in a crouch without quite touching the ground with her hand. No one knows what has been there, save the stones, and she would rather not discover the seedy affairs firsthand.
Her leather jacket waves in a burgundy sigh, split up the back, emphasizing motion. She's late to the party, though not entirely without recourse. "You want them?" she asks in heavily accented English, gesturing to the fleeing men. The question could be to anyone, but probably Jessica, whose luck is doubly poor.
Jessica Jones raises her hand in a single finger salute to Deathstroke's back, then tucks a hand into her jacket and pulls out a half-crumpled pack of cigarettes.
"Nope," she says to Wanda, not sure who the woman is but not in any mood to ask any more questions about it. This town is fucking crazy and no doubt about it.
"I have no idea what the hell just happened, but I know I'll be a lot happier if I just pretend it didn't. People shooting at the crack of dawn. Guys running around swinging," and then she turns and shouts at the back of the departing Deathstroke, "MOTHERFUCKING SWORDS," then turns back to Wanda.
She takes a long drag of her cigarette, her mascara smudged and her eyes bloodshot as she takes in the woman. "I don't know. I don't care. But if you pull a battle axe or a magic wand or something out of your ass, I'm going to punch you in the face."
Kaleb was good at three things, the very least of which was getting his way so when the 2 escaped dumpster divers dove into an alcove with him Kaleb turned his passive interest of the situation to the person standing next to him turning it into distain. The kid should be afraid, but he'd really need more emotions or empathy for this to happen. He sighed and pointed to the door withthe painted letters on it: Murdoch & Nelson LAW OFFICE. His fingers underlined it and issed last command to the straggler with him, "You're an idiot. If you touch me, speak to me, or touch me I'll bring you up on fucking assault charges. GO. AWAY." And having reason arrested and enforced, away the dumpster crawer went at a great rate of speed. Alone, finally his back pressed to the door. Why was he in Hell's Kitchen? He quietly wondered if someone took scissors to the map of New York and neatly clipped it out if anyone would care or notice. Finally his head looked back out to see if the chaos cleared.
The armored man is gone, certainly. Motherfucking sword and all. Although the two thieves will be found later, injured and without the stolen documentation. This being Hell%<u2019>s Kitchen, the cops are not swift to come to investigate.
Kaleb watched this: Super strong woman yelling about bullets, a serial killer that does not work for him and a woman in a fancy coat being all too casual? Yup that was his time to exit quietly and get where he was going.
Wanda responds to the threnody of various threats without so much as a frown. Her eyelashes flicker in a sooty line, and those unimpressed amber eyes flick back to the fleeing thieves. She shrugs a shoulder, motion faint and fixed. "Not my problem." The sliding edges of her accent imply somewhere east of Berlin, possibly further south. Catching the exact quality isn't easy as she's as much a mosaic of the crossroads of Europe as its countries. "You want them and I stay back for you." It's as close to an explanation as she's willing to proffer, under the circumstances. Her hands shove back into her pockets and she traces her way off to the slightly friendlier climes of the Lower East Side. Nothing like a killer sandwich.