Match of the Millennium

Description: A glittering gem on the Italian Riviera, the University of Genoa is a breeding ground for the rising stars of engineering and medicine. Sometimes, though, science goes too far; one of the University's students went on to become Jedah Dohma's top chop-shop surgeon. The former Interpol detective has gone back to the former stomping grounds of his departed love Fio Tessitore, seeking answers as to what led her astray and where she might have gone. And it just so happens that someone who had sought to end Tessitore's so-called life is also there in search of clues -- not to the mad scientist's current whereabouts, but how they could affect the tower in Southtown. Suffice to say, the two may be a bit at odds...

[DANIEL]
The University of Genoa was dead silent tonight.

During the regular school semester, the place is nearly always bustling, students seeking professor or study corners. And yet, the aging University grounds located in Italy were quiet. No security guards weaving through with lamps, no professors late reviewing their work. No students, eager to lurk around during the summer. Even the interior was a bit humid; the climate control was a little expensive, so why not let it sit at a higher celsius. It was a warm summer night, and there was nothing natural to reveal the mischief at work at this very moment.

And yet, the shadows were always the tell.

Cloying shapes, shifting and drifting, pulling and pushing. Slipping under locked doorways. Picking, and pulling. It was following a smell, a passing presence, deep and consuming. It came because the prizes of the King of FIghters tournament were impossible. It came, because there was a clear clue, that it had long missed. A trail, -something- that might reveal itself. Something that he never realized. It lingers before a wall of plaster. Before, there was a doorway that was locked too many years ago. Nobody had come to clean it out. Nobody dared to. Nobody -could-. So they covered it; so nobody would dare, nothing could come in, nothing could go out. And yet, the shadows trace over it, around it. Feeling for it, probing it. Scratching at the plaster. Scritch scritch scritch. Peeling away the plaster. Digging away at it. And revealing the once-covered brass nameplate.

'Fio Tessitore'

The shadow takes on a humanoid shape, drawing in the tendrils and whispers, piling up into a stack. There was the sense of a uniform, maybe a suit in the shape, with a wide-brimmed hat, broad shoulders. But as it peers at the nameplate, there was no other features. Just a swimming pool of black. But as it leans it, the features manifest, unlike any human there was. Only a pair of yellow eyes.

And a maw full of razor sharp teeth, coiled into a g

DELETE ABOVE ME

The University of Genoa was dead silent tonight.

During the regular school semester, the place is nearly always bustling, students seeking professor or study corners. And yet, the aging University grounds located in Italy were quiet. No security guards weaving through with lamps, no professors late reviewing their work. No students, eager to lurk around during the summer. Even the interior was a bit humid; the climate control was a little expensive, so why not let it sit at a higher celsius. It was a warm summer night, and there was nothing natural to reveal the mischief at work at this very moment.

And yet, the shadows were always the tell.

Cloying shapes, shifting and drifting, pulling and pushing. Slipping under locked doorways. Picking, and pulling. It was following a smell, a passing presence, deep and consuming. It came because the prizes of the King of FIghters tournament were impossible. It came, because there was a clear clue, that it had long missed. A trail, -something- that might reveal itself. Something that he never realized. It lingers before a wall of plaster. Before, there was a doorway that was locked too many years ago. Nobody had come to clean it out. Nobody dared to. Nobody -could-. So they covered it; so nobody would dare, nothing could come in, nothing could go out. And yet, the shadows trace over it, around it. Feeling for it, probing it. Scratching at the plaster. Scritch scritch scritch. Peeling away the plaster. Digging away at it. And revealing the once-covered brass nameplate.

'Fio Tessitore, Ph.D'.

The shadow takes on a humanoid shape, drawing in the tendrils and whispers, piling up into a stack. There was the sense of a uniform, maybe a suit in the shape, with a wide-brimmed hat, broad shoulders. But as it peers at the nameplate, there was no other features. Just a swimming pool of black. But as it leans it, the features manifest, unlike any human there was. Only a pair of yellow eyes.

And a maw full of razor sharp teeth, coiled into a grin. 

[ZACH GLENN]
Zach Glenn had been out celebrating with his impromptu motley crew of Michael, Rust, and Sasquatch. The quartet had been basking in their incredibly unlikely victory over The Mongrels Terry Bogard and Cody Travers. It was a sedate affair: food at a Southtown restaurant, along with drinks or beverages. Zach was, for the first time in entirely too long a time, enjoying himself.

And then, prehaps inevitably, the message came. A bonded courier showed up, handed Zach an envelope, and left after acquiring a signature.

He opened the envelope, and glanced over its contents. He excused himself, and walked outside before pulling a cell phone out of his jacket pocket. A number dialed. Before Zach can speak, the person on the other end of the line speaks.

"No," says the voice, one Zach knows and thought he had left behind, "We're not joking. Not really asking, either. It's time to get back to work." Zach has nothing to say to that, and ends the call without a word. Then he heads back to the hotel to grab a few things. He had thought he was /out/. He really should have known better.

Fifteen hours later, Zach is in black fatigues and tactical harness. Knives and pistols hang from the harness at convenient locations. Boots faintly crunch on dust and detritus as Zach sweeps night vision googles left and right, careful to avoid a patterned movement to prevent losing details.

He hasn't found the shadow creature just yet, moving slowly. He's already committing one of the biggest mistakes by coming alone, no need to compound the matter by moving with too much haste.

[DANIEL]
Crunch.

The footsteps, faint as they are, draw the creature's attention. He pulls away from the door. Immediately, the form of it collapses, falling into a weaving shadow. THe shadows pick and shape, pull and creep, drawing swiftly along in grim silence. It comes as a whisper, a chill, as ghostly shapes begin to dance at the edge of darkness. It had found Zach. It had his scent, his sound, his -essence-. Creeping on the edge, around, above, high, even low on the old floorboards of the university, the shape of the shadow ominus looms. And the shape envelops, as the tendrils reach for the boots of the hunter...

"=Zach?="

The shadow blurts out loud, overhead. The tendrils pull away, as the shape jerks from the wall. THe form shifts, as yellow eyes peer out. "Don't shoot! I'm backing off!" The shadows consolidate, falling from the hallway boundaries. Slamming on the floor with a neat pool, the shadows suddenly solidifies, as features come to the surface. The suit truly forms now, bearing a deep umbrage of purple and black. Even if there were an infinity of shadow monsters, none could be caught dead in the signature zoot suit.

It's Daniel Jack.

The darkness lightens, as an African-American tips his hat. The face was not an abyss anymore, though the yellow eyes stared out. The fangs pull back behind the lips, the thin mustache forming over it, as he looks wide-eyed at Zach, palms up, submissive. And the fangs? Spreading in a nervous grin. "Wow, it has been a while, hey, are you hunting me? Now's not a really good time to be hunted; did someone call? Is Honoka getting a fit or something? Cause I got a good reason to be here, I swear!" He spits out fast, rattling off his words as he keeps back. "It's about the tournament, like- you know the dumb Lightning Spangles thing. I'm here because of that!

A pause.

A shrug.

"Kinda."

[ZACH GLENN]
Zach did, in fact, have a gun drawn. A Colt 1911 in his left hand, and a flashlight held in a reverse grip in his right. He flicks the light on when Daniel tries to talk Zach down, casting a beam on Daniel as he does so. He doesn't speak at first. Partly because he was not exactly told what he was sent to deal with. Just that he would probably know what it was he was there for.

Zach's eyes flare when Honoka is mentioned. There is =also= a flare of deep violet around the psion, noticable only thanks to the help of the flashlight. Zach pulls the trigger, and the gun responds with a thunderclap of expressed fury.

The round does not strike Daniel. Zach had not aimed at the Darkstalker. The bullet =did=, however, slam into that nameplate as if to express =exactly= what Daniel was here about.

"Mention that treacherous bitch again," Zach growls, "And the rest of the clip is in your head."

The pistol tracks back to Jack's face, his next words clipped, restrained only through force of will.

"Are. We. Clear."

[DANIEL]
Daniel -does- notice the flare of energy, at the mention of Honoka. 

That gives him just enough foresight, when the finger moves. The gun shot -does- make Daniel 'jump' per say. The fire suddenly makes the shape of the detective shift -hard-, a single swoosh that sends up across the wall and on Zach's other side. Not hostile yet, but watching. And -fast-. And more importantly, not in a scramble to make a dodge worse. There was a -lot- he wanted to talk about that. BUt he also -did- not want to get shot up; any incident here would make investigating a LOT harder. "Yeessssssss." Daniel says, nodding slowly, glancing at where the .45 slammed into the nameplate...

WHich didn't even show a dent on it.

"So okay, so it sounds like you want to know what's going on." Daniel begins, narrowing his yellow eyes. "So I was setting up to make a big stink over at the Twiiiiii-" Daniel chokes. "At a circus, when I pick up a tack that there is a big Lightning SPangles thing going on there. Ai- hrm hrm- spangles with a show. ANd that's weird, so I am snooping around, and I hear all about this King of Fighters; you remember the one a few years back? Man, if Sergei didn't go and shit on me, I'd have probably kicked the Psycho Soldier's ass. THat was a good time, wasn't it. But anyways, I was looking at this tournament, and something stuck out on the prizes. A vacation at Celle Ligure. You know why that's funny? Well you already know why, you are on my trail." Daniel shakes a finger.

"Cause that's where the precursor to the Metro CIty incident took place." 

Daniel grins, flashing his fangs as he drifts to the plastered doorway. "YEah, uh, Celle Ligure was where Fio Tessitore got jolted out of this reality and slammed right into the clutches of Majigen. It's all tied to her dark pact with LOrd Do- with Jedah, that's the launching point for it. Now Fio's dead, right? She's dead, I'm looking for her soul, I did some -terrible- things, including to you, and I feel just awful but I still got some hope right? But where was she before she was consumed by Jedah?"

Daniel snaps his finger at the unblemished nameplate.

"She was a student here. Working on her thesis, a grad student! Before she was spirited away, she was doing her research right here in the University. So everyone who gets pissed at Jedah, they are off at Celle Ligure trying to make sense of the darkness there, right? But I know Fio, and the fact is before she got jerked around, she probably was doing -something- to get everything warmed up for the great big hello from Jedah. So I came here, to sneak around, and I picked up her scent here." Daniel gestures at the plastered over doorway. "Then I hear footsteps, I go to see if it is trouble or not, and it's you! You are kind of both I guess, but if -you- are here, then probably either it's about me, which is fine, or about Fio's old office and the JEdah connection, which is much better." Daniel was talking very fast, in making things less about him and more about not hims.

"Either way, uh, I -suspect- someone is trying to jerk you around, you dig?"

[ZACH GLENN]
The gun stays on Daniel. Zach trusts very little about this whole mess, honestly. But he listens. He's willing to do =that= at least. He lets out a breath, but keeps his finger on the trigger. He runs things down in his head. He's a novice when it comes to investigations, but his insights are generally pretty keen.

"Oh," he says, "I =know= who is trying to jerk me around. That's a short chain of connection. I'm not here for you, though. The timing is a bit too tight for that." People back home did not take Zach's attempt at retirement too well, and are clearly trying to force him back in the saddle.

"So you're saying she was working on something that got Jedah Dohma's attention, and =that's= why this place was picked for his... attentions." His eyes narrow. "You're trying to bring her back from the dead, aren't you."

Not really a question.

[DANIEL]
Daniel keeps his voice low, when he answers, hands on his hips.

"Yeah. Or at least, get closure, you know?"

Daniel sticks a black tongue in his cheek, lifting his voice up. "But yeah, I think someone's looking to get you back in the swing of things, like, I'd imagine with our history, they probably expected you to kill me or try to!" Daniel states brightly. "I mean, you probably are still thinking about it. I -was- a pretty top tier asshole, right scuzzy?"

It's like Daniel is just glossing over the horrible monster phase of his monstering.

Daniel, for his sake, gestures over the door space. "As for whether she worked on it, well, I would say -probably-. There is a kind of broad timeline here.  She was a grad student here, and she was working on her thesis. She was doing well, aaaaaand then she did something to make the professors here mad. Ethical violations, and stuff like that. She loses his funding, fired from being a TA, and then something something Jedah, then Celle Ligure, and then she becomes a kinda hot spider lady monster who makes terrifying chimera hybrid things, and also transform humans into Darkstalkers."

Daniel scratches the back of his neck, nervously.

"So here's the thing, like you said, you don't get a demigod's attention through ethic violations by plagiarizing or missing citations. She did something big and awful, but what was big and awful isn't clear. And what's more, how do you deal with a demigod reaching out to you. There has to be a correspondence, and conversation, something. But that's all gone, right? She leaves the school, and the professors junk her research, right? Well this is where she worked."

"And it's plastered over."

Daniel runs his hands over the plaster, scratching at it. He doesn't get as much progress as the plate. "This is a cover up, to keep people out and not noticing it. Not -good- at it, but not great. What I'm hoping is that it's not cleaned out, and there are some clues about what she was doing when she was looking at the transition between humanity and not. As well, as Like they want to kind of pretend it doesn't exist. So I'm thinking, that there is something in there that made it too hard to clean up. Something that made it easier that they just give up the room, and pretend the room didn't exist." Daniel gives up on the scratching, stepping back. "So you want me to try and clear this out, or do you wanna, you know." 

Daniel makes a Kasane Ate gesture, miming out a cutting motion.

[ZACH GLENN]
"Don't flatter yourself," Zach says as he examines the nameplate. Jacketed ACP round, close range, and nothing at all? That's interesting. The gun stays on Daniel as he walks up to the plate to examine it closer, brushing it with the fingers of his right hand. "You're still in the small fish category." He thinks for a moment as he glances up and down the hallway, considering. "A result of Ichijo's meddling, I suspect."

He had, when he boarded his plane, been handed another envelop with floor plans of the school. Aside from the lack of door here, things still lined up. He was wishing he'd brought Hibiki with him. The man was an artist with the explosoves. The demolitions expert would have slapped down some det cord, stuck a detonator on it, and cut a nice and neat (if a bit dusty) hole in the wall. Hibiki really liked his work.

Zach steps back, and holsters the gun. He swaps the flashlight over, and flicks it up and down the hall again to reconsider things for a moment. "Step back," he says. Partly to give Zach some time to react if Daniel decides to stick the knife in here, and partly to give himself room to work.

[DANIEL]
Daniel does step back.

Hands in his pockets, he gives Zach plenty of room. Of course, if there was a knife to stick, it would almost be a 'I told you so' on Honoka. But not even Daniel was going to pick now to do that. "I'm happy to be a small fish. " Daniel reaches out of his pockets, a flash of sleight. ANd in it, is a tiny lantern, dangling on a chain. It glows a faint yellow. "See, she gave me this thing. As long as nobody is hostile with me, I can use it to draw soul energy out. Now I just pick up latent spiritual energy, and draw it out. Now it gets real fun when you get hauntings, cause it turns out if I help people cross over to the other side, I get some sweet ass souls, like real good stuff. Like this one time, there was this lady ghost, and she was really tense, you dig, and-" There is a brief pause. "Oh, I'll tell you another time, but yeah, it works real well, and then the NOL arrested me and tossed me in a cell without it. Man, fuck the NOL, you dig? Especially that Clover asshole." Daniel's yellow eyes go wide.

"Oh, uh, be careful, all right?"

The detective's voice is dead serious, as he stares in. "I don't know what Fio was doing in her young college years, but considering it is sealed off, and the strangeness of, well, everything. There might be a good reason it is sealed off. Like, I dunno, maybe a monster? Something cursed in there? Like I don't -smell- anything, and I got a real good sense of smell, like all senses are real damn sharp, you dig? And I don't pick up anything on the other side. I won't run though, I got your back scuzzy. It'll be like, like," Daniel squints his eyes.

"Wait, did we ever work together?"

[ZACH GLENN]
"That explains it," he says softly, rapping the wall with the knuckles of his empty hand, listening for something. Part of it is that he is not taking Daniel at his word, part of it is that he is listening to the kind of sound it makes.

Zach ignores, for the moment, everything about eating souls and the NOL. It's not important right now, and he does not want to go down either of those rabbit holes. He takes a deep breath as he steps away from the wall, focusing his will. Golden light spills off of Zach as he turns off the flashlight and hangs it off his harness. He holds his right hand out at shoulder length, focusing his thoughts a certain way.

"Not in this lifetime," he says in answer to Daniel's last question, a sort of melancholy in his voice.

Suddenly there is a sword in that waiting hand. Well, most of a sword. Daniel might recognize the white hilt of the claymore, but it's missing most of the blade. Only eight or nine inches of it is still there, ending in a few jagged spikes... which erupts with a beam of golden light resembling the rest of the blade.

Zach lets the breath out, swinging the sword five times. He carves an X into the wall, followed by three vertical lines to trace the corners represented by that cross shape. The sword comes to a rest at his side, the blade still there. Zach regards it with an odd look on his face.

He was not entirely sure it would come when he called for it.

[DANIEL]
Daniel instinctively recoils from the light.

Being shadowstuff, he didn't appreciate it. As the blade severs the plaster, it cuts cleanly through the door underneath. There is a hissing sound, as a pressure shift comes.  The seal is broken. And with a series of dull thuds, the remains of the door collapse. There is a sudden rush of thick, warm air.

And the smell comes out.

The heavy stench of mold was the first wave; the thick musty haze of mildew and decay, rushing out en masse. The spores are deep and nausieating, and even in the moonlight it's clear that the room is infested with it. The walls, the desk, the chairs, the ikea bookshelves, papers, the bins. The worst is around what may very well be the source: A small mini-fridge that was left ajar. The volume of the rainbow cacophony, the colorful display of the variety of molds in full force. And worse, as the air shifts, a clicking begins to rise, as something -moves- within. 

No, somethings.

Countless tiny beetles begin to shift and move, the clicking of the sheer volume of them spreading out. And there, another pattern breaks amongst the carpets of mold: Carcasses, endless insect carcasses are everywhere. It seems that the sudden assault disrupting their balance, with both the living and the dead separating in the decaying banquet. It was filth, it was beyond filth, and the former grad student's lair was left and abandoned as just that: filth. Zach probably had seen worse in the barracks.

Daniel, however, was doubled over.

"Oh god I can -taste- it" Daniel states, gripping his stomach desperately, clawing at himself. "Oh god the- I can feel -all- of it. Oh god, oh god, Zach, it's -horrible-. I can't stop it. I can't- it's in my mouth! My skin!" Daniel falls on his knees, writhing.

And promptly, he begins to retch a black bile on the ground.

[ZACH GLENN]
Zach =has= seen worse, but the barracks are generally kept so clean you can eat from the floors. The non-coms would allow nothing less. The bugs start to skitter around, and Zach takes a reflexive double step back, his left hand extended and flaring with an amber light. His nose wrinkles in disgust as he waits and watches.

And then Daniel starts vomiting. Now might be an excellent time to decapitate the Darkstalker. It's not like he hasn't earned it. Might even be the smart move in this situation. It may be that by exposing Daniel to... whatever was here, the unlikely duo unleashed some horror upon the world.

Then again, when does Zach ever do the pragmatic thing? He shifts the hand, aiming it at Daniel, and waits.

[DANIEL]
Daniel moans in agony.

As he is given a bit of respite, the long tendrils draw from the ooze pooled out. He looks up pitifully to Zach. "It's not vomit, oh god, it's not vomit." Daniel blathers, sobbing as he claws at the shadowstuff as the beetles scurry over it. "It's -me- and it tastes and smells and touches and -oh god-" There is a high-pitched whine, then whimper. "Gotta, gotta just, get- composure- and-"

ANd with a great, thick slurp,

Daniel draws back in the shadowstuff.

Trembling in sickness, there is the faint sound of ghostly whispers- laughter- pouring around him. "Okay, okay, I think- I think I got it- I just- lets make it fast, I-" Daniel shudders. "You search the desk- thing- and I will look at the papers on the- on the ground" Daniel shudders a bit, shutting his yellow eyes tight. He shuffles his feet towards the horrible black beetle room. "I swear I both want to die, and I think I want to kill Fio TEssitore again!" A brief pause.

"I'm joking about both of those, right?"

[ZACH GLENN]
(OOC Question: What's =Zach= sensing in all of this? I know he sees what whatever's going on is doing to Daniel.)

Zach watches Daniel through narrowed eyes. The Darkstalker is clearly is some amount of distress. It almost hurts to watch. The psion heaves a sigh, and lets the broken blade fall from his hand. It doesn't hit the ground, but vanishes into the ether, motes of light heralding its exit. He aims the open hand in towards the now opened room.

"How about you stay out here," Zach says, "And let me do the digging. This place ain't good for you, apparently."

Zach doesn't even wait for a response, and heads for the desk Daniel mentioned. He is still using that aura around his hand as a flashlight, but Daniel would doubtless recognize it as a readied weapon.

[DANIEL]
"No complaints from me!" Daniel groans, recoiling from the cursed room.

Within the room it is just a pigsty. Zach could hear the crunch of beetle corpses underfoot; the nastiness was abominable. Every breath was bringing in fresh waves of nauseating spores. As he approaches the desk, the first impression might be a fruitlessness. It -does- look like it was partially emptied out; the drawers are ajar, and the shelves and desk have no books, no laptop, no computers. There are pens, loose-leaf papers around with notes scribbled down, and a piece of stationary that looks heavily corrected. Outside of that? Just a few paper containers for chinese food, with what was the last meal. THe only thing of note is that there -is- a small 'in' basket, which holds several unopened letters. It looks like it was a last round of mail call, before the place was left into the horrible state as it was. The letters are relatively official looking, though the top one may catch Zach's eye, from the return address.

*Southpoint Canine Laboratory*

Fairmount, MD, 21871*

[ZACH GLENN]
Zach shuffles through the stack, stopping at the one with a name he sure as hell recognizes. He pauses for a long moment, scowling at the letter as he proceeds to open it.

"Might have something," Zach finally says, even as he is reading the letter. "Though I don't know what we'll find other than a bunch of wreckage." Zach flicks the envelope towards Daniel.

"There =was=," he says, "A facility where the United Nations was manufacturing Gears there at one point."

[DANIEL]
The letter goes into the normal salutations, and quickly gets to the meat. It talks about concerns about the university blocking their funding to Fio Tessitore's thesis and research projects. It describes an interest in continuing funding in her unique breakthroughs in biology, and that if she continues to have difficulty with the short-sighted individuals at the university, that she should not hesitate to reach out to the Southpoint Canine Labs. The date?

Only days before the Celle Ligure incident.

Daniel, meanwhile, sniffs the envelope. "Well that doesn't make sense. Fio was working with Jedah, I didn't even hear about other folks. It doesn't smell like her, I do smell woman, and dog in it though. I guess that makes it real. It also doesn't smell like mold good lord thank you. Are there more of them?"

There are in fact more in the basket, a grand total of five (discounting the one that Zach just fetched out).

[ZACH GLENN]
Zach picks up the stack, waving them at Daniel by way of answer. "Dogs," he mutters, "They were basically trying to make Darkstalker canines at that facility. They were a pain to deal with, too." He grins faintly. Hibiki had done an excellent juob that day. "But I doubt they are doing so anymore."

Zach takes another look around. One clue is nice, but a second clue would be grand. "I wonder if they cribbed her notes or something."

[DANIEL]
"Dogs?"

Daniel repeats it back as he.... slips around Zach, envelope over his face. He was trembling at the toxic air. "Making Darkstalkers- oh well duh. That would explain why they were looking at Fio then." Daniel was looking at the basket, while the second clue for Zach might lay in the document on the desk; the loose-leaf paper with corrections on it. At first glance, what it could be isn't clear amongst the red lining, though a single name stands out.

Celle Ligure.

"Jeeze, Fio got a lot of invitations it looks like." Daniel rattles off as he circles through the envelopes. "Got this lab from Tijuana, focused on human wellness research. Another one out in Korea, focused on human genome sequencing. Got one from an island called... Villtania? And this one is from Ultratech, okay. And the last one is in Southtown, huh. From Violet Systems." He gives the last one a sniff.

"Why does it smell like cologne though?

[ZACH GLENN]
"Because Lee Chaolan is a pratt," Zach says. "All goes back to Celle Ligure, though." He heaves a sigh. "Road trip?"

[DANIEL]
Daniel opens up a letter. "Blah blah blah research funding blocked blah blah blah people blah blah blah come work for us if you have problems." Daniel opens another one. 'Aaaand ditto." One more. "Diiiitto.' Another. "Diiiiiiitttt- wait, excuse me? It's not a clue, but- jesus Lee Chaolan is a pratt. Okay this is the last one, and..." Daniel blinks. "Huh, this one is kind of threatening. 'Failure to cooperate with us will result in dire consequences. Is this the Mexico one? I think this is the mexico one. Okay, so lets say these were all assholes trying to reach Fio."

"Where's the link to Jedah here? "

Daniel scrouges around the desk, reaching for the paper. "Yada yada, Silvia, going to Celle Ligure... and want you to come? Or stay away? Or come? Stay away? I -guess- fingers point at Celle Ligure, or what's left of it. But where is she- oh wait." Daniel taps on the document, handing it over to Zach. "Yeah, maybe we got a road trip." What Daniel was pointing at?

An address, scribbled in the corner, located at a villa of some sort at....

... Gameragna, just north of Celle Ligure?

[ZACH GLENN]
Zach heaves an even heavier sigh at the mention of the Mexican letter. "Fucking /Mexico/," Zach mutters. "I swear." He turns and leaves, hand still lit while he reaches into a pocket with his free hand. He fishes out a set of keys.

"You coming," Zach asks over his shoulders, not waiting for an answer.

Things may not be forgiven between the two of them, but maybe they have been set aside for the moment.

[DANIEL]
"Yeah, yeah, I am coming!" DAniel grips the papers, keeping them all together as he drifts over the -ick-. As he slips out of the room, leaving the aftermath, he follows Zach as he wanders off camera. A brief silence comes.

"So like, seriously, what happened between you and Honok-"

[ZACH GLENN]
The keys hit the ground with a clatter, and there is a gun barrel aimed directly at Daniel's right eye. The gun roars eight times as Zach does exactly what he told Daniel he'd do. The echos of the salvo don't even have time to fade before Zach has another clip loaded and the gun aimed once more at Daniel's head.

"I fucking told you what would happen."

[DANIEL]
There is a grim silence.

"Okay!" Comes the pained gasp from Daniel. "Okay!"

"I got the hint!"

Log created on 16:37:37 06/11/2019 by Daniel, and last modified on 14:56:36 07/19/2019.