Match of the Millennium

Description: Metro City police officer Dennis Browning has made his way to Southtown to try and find Raina Rodfield in his crusade to keep her from her self-destructive behavior. There, he meets Echo, who immediately takes the opportunity to recruit him into helping her find someone else's missing person. A sucker for heroics, Dennis and Echo are walking right to her occult shop.

[DENNIS]
How a Metro City police officer found his way to Southtown is anyone's guess -- it was significantly more difficult to do with the Darkstalker crisis, but Dennis had survived a similar invasion before. He had already comandeered what seemed to be an abandoned vehicle and drove it through the outskirts of the city, but it had run out of gas before he can get too much further. For this reason and this reason alone, Metro City's finest police officer (or at least, someone confident enough to boast he is) stands on top of the car at the moment, his phone up, trying to get a signal and failing for the time being.

"Knew I should have got that Saturday Night Fight cell phone plan," he complains to himself, swiveling his cell phone from side to side. He eventually tucks it into his jacket and hops off the car, looking around at the beseiged city while rubbing his nape. "Like looking for an extremely angry needle in an extremely dangerous haystack." Dennis has always had a bad habit of talking to himself aloud when he thinks no one is listening.

[ECHO]
The business area has likely seen a lot less of the fighting and damage from the last wave of darkstalker raids, likely due in part to private security from Howard arena working alongside police to cordon off certain (see also: more expensive) areas of the city. That's not to say the area is completely safe, of course... though it has seemed like the violence and danger has calmed down since the situation began to come under control. Echo is around, though she'd probably rather be relaxing in a limousine somewhere, preferably with champagne with some rich slob, movie stars or other celebs tended to be able to pay the best if they wanted some occult service... Echo was good at putting them in touch with /some kind/ of spirit even if it wasn't the /exact/ one they asked for.

No, right now she was out searching for something. She'd at least had the sense to put on a more sensible pair of boots along with one of her black dresses. Which led her to /this/ situation...

The man had likely been connected to the criminal, at one point--rather flashy leisure suit, some gaudy gold rings, slicked back black hair, just a bit of gray creeping into it at the temples. Echo had already gotten bored of fucking with him, and was about to the bite on him as she got closer to him in a nearby alley. Course, he saw a normal, human lady--however she was anything but. He'd pulled out his phone to snap some pictures of her, though he didn't apparently like the image he got in the camera.

"EEYARGH!"

[DENNIS]
The scream draws Dennis' attention, naturally. And of course, his protective instincts kick into full gear -- he breaks off into a sprint that could probably break some sports records if had gotten into them; while Dennis wasn't quite a martial artist by any means (more of a brawler than anything), he is the pinnacle of human athleticism. He arrives at the mouth of the alley and -- well, he doesn't see the immediate problem, perhaps. He probably sees a normal human lady too. Still -- that was a scream, and so poor Dennis awkwardly wonders:

"Uh, what seems to be the problem here?"

[ECHO]
Dennis is nearly knocked down by the fleeing man--who takes off down the street running and panting like his life depended on it, at least he gives the impression that it did. Echo follows along behind, exiting the mouth of the alley, looking down the street at the man as he flees.

"Aw, so brief, like all the men in my life--you forgot your phone," Echo held the rubber-cased smartphone idly with her thumb and forefinger, idly using her thumb to flick through the various images on the phone itself. Unsurprisingly, there was a lot of him and his buddies on there--as well as several upskirt shots of ladies--most of them probably taken without their knowledge. A common sport among men in Japan. They'd probably be sharing them amongst themselves in a bar at some point, laughing about it.

"He got cold feet," Echo looked up at the very bedecked man in all that gear, a light smile rising to her features.

"You're a police man?"

[DENNIS]
Or rather, the fleeing man nearly gets knocked down by running into Dennis. He's not a giant like some fighters, but you'd be hard-pressed to find many larger than him, and he looks over his shoulder after him before squinting over towards Echo. From his angle, he doesn't see that the guy was a scumbag, but it is what it is. And while Dennis isn't wearing his uniform right now, the police badge on his necklace is for all the world to see. He does look down at it, then up at Echo, his hand lifting to rub at his neck.

"Yeah, but uh -- this is out of my jurisdiction. You still probably shouldn't be stealing phones but uh..."

Very awkwardly, he wonders next...

"Can I borrow that?"

[ECHO]
"I didn't steal anything, he dropped it when he ran off," Echo tilted her head, sounding genuinely serious, blinking a little. "Sure, sugah," Echo said brightly and casually as she handed over the phone, gingerly as she had rather long red pointed nails. It lightly had a signal, being a more expensive model of phone.

"Just uh, don't scan through the photo album, the guy was a real creep," she nodded lightly, apparently meaning what she said.

"I guess you really /are/ a police man, then, hmm..." Echo puts a hand to her chin briefly, lost in thought. "Don't suppose police here like to share information on active cases, eh?" she said enigmatically, folding her arms over her chest lightly, looking the man over. Under the illusion, she'd look more or less like she did for real--or rather, a very humanoid approximation of such, just with pale skin.

[DENNIS]
"Well -- it doesn't matter, I guess. Sorry for calling you a thief," Dennis says. He's so very earnest, looking over his shoulder once more as if he culd see the guy. He takes the phone and fiddles with it for a moment, before holding it up to his ear. After a moment, he sighs, mouthing 'voice-mail' to Echo without quite answering her question immediately. Then he speaks into the phone reluctantly.

"Hey, Raina, it's Dennis. Uh, I'm in Southtown looking for you -- the Business District, I guess?" He looks around briefly. "Uh, this isn't my phone, but I'll bunker down here and wait for you for a few days. If you don't show, I'll try a different part of the city."

He hands up the phone and offers it back somewhat awkwardly to Echo, shoulders shrugging. "Well, like I said, this isn't my jurisdiction," he clarifies. "So I wouldn't know about any active cases in Southtown. I'm from the States, Metro City," he explains. "Though we don't share information on active cases over there either."

[ECHO]
"Alas, I was trying to help someone find a missing person," Echo drew in a deep breath and let it out, relaxing herself. "Yeah, I got that idea from your accent, I actually am from there too--well, I moved there from the old country back when I was younger, but that's where I've lived for a long time," the long dark-haired woman explained, she grinned, taking the phone back. She figured he was probably eager to get rid of it, who knows where it had been, after all.

"Oh well, guess I'll have to look for a private investigator to help, Japanese cops are not always that helpful," she shrugged, looking a little sad for a moment, lower lip lightly parted. She might be thinking for a moment, wait, do I really care about this? But she might also be trying to manipulate a response out of this man.

"You will be needing a place to stay, I think, did you have an apartment lined up? They're not as xenophobic around here as you might have been told, don't worry."

[DENNIS]
"I'm actually pretty amazed by the almost American population here -- I saw a bunch of guys I'd never be able to tell were born in Japan on my way in," Dennis converses -- this is a nice lady, he decides. He does wonder why the guy ran from her, but that's beside the point. She said someone is in trouble, and Dennis happens to be the kind of guy who is about protecting people. Echo probably is able to read that about him as she's considring manipulating him and he doesn't disappoint.

"Someone's missing? I don't have jurisdiction here, but I'll try and do what I can to help. Don't worry about the apartment -- I mean, I don't know if I could get one in the market right now, considering all that's going on, but I've slept on the streets before."

[ECHO]
"You will, huh? just in town to see your sister, though? That's nice of you," Echo seemed to be more considering her own feelings on the whole matter, as if unsure how deep she should really get in this. She had already done a lot, but she /had/ said she'd help Tai... and it was generally poor form to break promises, even if that's not what this was, necessarily.

"I might be able to help you if you need some place to stay, it might be a little weird though, where I live--I run an occult shop, y'see--are you okay with that? I realize some might not be from back home--religious stances and all," she grinned a little, waving it off.

"I can't rightly let you sleep in a dumpster though, now can I?" some of her guile and showmanship were returning, it appeared.

[DENNIS]
"Well -- she's kind of rambunctious and I uh... well, I'm trying to keep her on the straight and narrow," Dennis explains lamely to Echo, his hand lifting to ruffle the hair at the back of his head. "But yeah, if someone's in trouble and needs help, I'd be... well, I wouldn't be able to sleep at night without trying. So sure, I'll take you up on the offer, we can use your shop as a base of operations." There's a moment where Dennis does realize the guy probably ran from her because of the information she just shared with him -- she could possibly be a real occultist.

"...I've got nothing against magic, I uh..." He doesn't quite know how to put it, so he looks at his hand and flexes and unflexes it. "...I can hold things in my hand. Like, fireballs and magic and stuff, I can catch it and... you know, hold it. I don't know if that's some kind of magic power or something, but it's made me pretty accepting of other people's weird abilities."

[ECHO]
"Of course," Echo seems to understand him quite well, not seeming to mind at all. "You can't pick your family, but you can pick your friends--something I heard back in the states, it does rather hit home for me," Echo reaches up and scratches at the side of her head.

"My family wanted me to follow the family business, you know--I didn't, I moved out," she seemed more solemn at that, before finally brightening.

"Do you now, well my shop is actually meant to be what you'd expect from a normal occult shop... though I am somewhat familiar in what you speak of," Echo grinned, walking up along Dennis and holding up the camera to take a selfie of the two, before she offers the man her arm.

"Shall we go then? could use a policeman to walk me home, it's scary out here these nights," she grinned, nodding to him. She however doesn't show what the camera of the smart phone revealed--the phone is out of sight, out of mind--tucked into a pouch in on her belt.

[DENNIS]
Dennis flashes the camera a winning, white-toothed smile -- he clearly is full of confidence, at least about his appearance. He even gives the camera a thumbs up. When the selfie is snapped, he looks down at Echo's arm before reluctantly taking it -- what's the worst that could happen? This is the most noir moment in Dennis' life -- he's always fantasized about this sort of thing, the poor guy. If someone is in trouble (he hasn't yet asked who), he'll probably let himself be led into Hell.

Log created on 19:13:24 06/23/2020 by Dennis, and last modified on 23:54:52 06/23/2020.