Description: Zach Glen finds Daniel Jack in the hospital. (Big surprise.) The two talk some shop, and the Detective drops a name out of Zach's past. Plans, such as they are, are made.
Sunshine City National Hospital. 5 PM.
Daniel Jack lays in the hospital bed, reading a book. "The Characteristics of Psychopaths." An interesting read, and a wholly too relevant one. Daniel Jack was recovering nicely after not only ending up stabbed and beaten, but after earlier getting face-smashed and beaten. This entire week was about being beaten, and worst of all, it became very clear that Daniel was just dicking around for over four months. '
All in all, a miserable end to a deplorable week.
Sulking, the detective mulls about what to do next. The watch thief was a lie. But then if the gang wasn't watch thieves, what were they up to? And why were they trying to start an army. The commando's association with the Black Dragon Gang was fairly likely; which meant the gang was acting like Rolento. The only thing that made sense was going for a more international attempt, like Rolento. But that didn't make sense either. Starting an army meant resources, a black market. That was it. A black market. The detective keeps thinking, analyzing.
And where did Amy Johnson fit in with all of this.
Daniel Jack's visitor might or might not have insight on that one. The psion, unable to shake the general unease of Sunshine City, was paying another visit to the town. He spent the time, when not conference calling about the Quon Chen Institute, simply wandering the city and helping out where he could. He was passing by the hospital when he felt a familiar presence.
Zach went in, and made some polite inquiries before being directed to Daniel Jack's hospital room. The psychic peers into the room, noting the title of the book before speaking up. "Interesting title," Zach says almost conversationally. He gets a good look at the detective before speaking up again, "You look like hell, man. Who'd you piss off?"
A guest, and not an unwanted one at that.
"A lot of psychopaths." Daniel states bluntly, placing a bookmark in the book before closing it. "A friend of mine, Roland, got messed up bad; a real complex this with Ayame. I don't want to get into the details." The detective swallows a bit. "I've been on the trail of the missing people here." The detective pauses. Of course, he was also teaming up with Zaki and her gang. But he wasn't going to bring that up, yet.
"What about you. I heard you got stomped by Mister Jones. God that asshole." The detective seethes. "I should have took him out in my round. How is the NDP treating you anyways? Will I be running into you next season?"
Zach frowns when Ayame's name comes up. He listens patiently, noticing that Daniel is not being /entirely/ up-front with Zach. But that's okay, the psion muses; everyone has secrets. He notices Daniel's irritation with Jones, it's as palpable as it is audible. He grins a bit.
"Well," Zach finally says, "I've got some good news for you, then. I won't be back next season. Talked to Ken about it after that fight with Neuer. More than a couple of the fights just felt too much like bullying for my liking." He considers Daniel's mention of the missing fighters. He had persued the matter as best he could, but his avenues and leads (or lack thereof) proved to be a bit too formidable an obstacle even for the determined Zach. "Have you found any of them," Zach asks, too casual-sounding. He is probably not fooling Daniel for a second.
Daniel Jack notices every single reaction Zach has.
Of course, he is more surprised Ayame gets a reaction before Mister Jones. "Not showing up next season? A real shame. I might have to sneak into the Neo-League to rough you up. Unless you are getting out of competive fights all together." Danny leans over a bit, looking at Zach.
Why the missing person focus?
"Yeah, uh." The detective mutters a bit. "I've gotten a lead on four of them. It looks like a lot of low-ranking guys, you know, like when you first bumped into me. I think it is a kidnapping ring; I actually ended up getting jumped by a crazy dame investigating the matter." The detective pauses. Maybe there was a reason why he was interested. "Someone by the name of Amy Johnson." Daniel Jack leans over, eyeing Zach with dilligence.
"Do you know her?"
Jones is one of those guys you just put up with, if only because there's not much else you can do about them.
"I was kidnapped, once," Zach says in response to Daniel's first inquisitive look. "By Ayame, as a matter of fact. Was bad shit, man." He heaves a sigh, shoving that particular personal trauma to the background. "I'm going to try and stay in competitive fighting, though. Even with the school," Zach frowns, recalling Athena's concerns about putting a bunch of budding psychics in one place. "Hell, /because/ of the school, I'm going to need to stay sharp. Fighting's a good way to keep the edge."
Zach listens to Daniel's assessment of the victims, which lined up /exactly/ with what little he was able to find. "And I bet every one of them had signed up for the local tournament, and didn't qualify for one reason or another." Zach's face goes blank for a moment when Amy's name gets dropped. He takes a long breath, getting his bearings. It might surprise Daniel to know that even in the face of all of the insanity that has been in Zach's life since coming into his power, there are some things that catch him flatfooted.
He finally walks into the room proper, grabbing a chair to sit by the detective before levelling an grim look at Jack.
"Where is she?"
Safe bet he knows her.
Daniel Jack nods back.
"Me too, for the Rolento army crap. That's why I thought it was Rolento at first. And the exact same thing, Zach. A bunch of bums that didn't qualify. But no, it was-" When Zach's reaction hits him, Daniel Jack stops cold. Staring at Zach, he raises an eyebrow. Grinning, he nods a bit.
It looks like he has his lead.
"Now before I start talking, Zach, you better tell me what you know, scuzzy."
Zach heaves a sigh, disregarding the Rolento Army angle as utterly irrelevant to the matter at hand. "I met the woman in this city, in that workshop in Outer Sunshine a few years back. Seemed like a nice enough lady," he says. The statement, and the inflection, are fairly neutral. They met for a fight, and it is fairly clear Zach had not put much into it aside from that initial encounter.
He looks at Daniel for a long moment. "What do you know about the events surrounding the King of Fighters last year?" Zach is probing for information, so that he has a starting point.
%
Well, heck, Daniel Jack thought that Rolento Army thing was a big deal!
Daniel Jack weighs in more carefully. "Not a whole lot. But I know you'll tell me." THe detective states dryly, adjusting his position on his hospital bed. "Tell me what you knew about Amy when you met her. What her personality was like. How did the encounter go down?" It seemed Daniel Jack had his own questions on Amy.
And he may be approaching this in a different direction than Zach.
One might be surprised. "She... was fairly friendly, the first time we met. Cheerful, outgoing, more than a bit curious about things. The fight was a three-way brawl with her and Karin Kanzuki." Zach takes a deep breath. "I saw her again, just before everything started to go to shit during King of Fighters." Things went to shit alright, sooner for some than others.
He leans back in his chair a bit. "/That/ time, she was a bit more... intent. Purposeful." Zach frowns. "Then I saw the headline about she and that other guy tried to raise some hell in a church in Metro. Which doesn't at all line up with what she told me about herself." Zach scowls. "Metro's Division 8 put a kabosh on it. She was thrown in jail, and then she just..." Zach shrugs, the frustration clear on his face. "Disappeared. Here's the thing, though."
Zach leans forward, elbows on his knees as he looks at Daniel with eyes that burn with an emotion that might be hard for Daniel to identify. "During the KoF, there was a group of people that were fucking up people's chi. Making them go crazy, turning them into berzerkers, mostly. You probably heard about Ken Masters going on a rampage or two. They got a teammate of mine with it to." Zach frowns. "I'm not... entirely certain, but I think those same guys got Amy, too." Zach looks at the floor, somewhat ashamed for some reason. "Ken was able to get help breaking free of whatever it was that was tainting him. I was able to help Antoine, and one or two others." Zach takes a deep breath. "We weren't able to find Amy. As far as I know, she could still be influenced by this shit."
They always started out friendly.
Daniel Jack listens, taking in Zach's story word by word. Nodding along, he carefully considers those very words. WHat she was before. The meltdown, that took her to jail. He would look at criminal records. But the poisoning of the chi... the madness. That was all in line. Finally, when he gets an opening, he speaks.
"As if she was kidnapped, and brainwashed, huh."
Daniel Jack leans back in his bed. "Well, she was exactly that. Crazy. But she is crazy with a purpose too. She believes she is on the right path to die. A crazy cultist type, you know? She was trying to stop me from following that lead wit hthe kidnapped people. And I have reason to believe that the kidnapped people are kidnapped by Abobo's types..." Daniel Jack raises his eyebrows idly, focusing on Zach.
"Which would mean she is associated with the Black Dragon Gang."
"Or just brainwashed," Zach says almost absently, "They got to Ken during a televised fight." Everything else, though, makes a certain amount of sense. Zach's frown, already a very present thing, deepens. Daniel, though, seems to have a lead.
"Black Dragon... Cult?" Zach seems as if he's not ready (right this second) to accept the reality of such a thing. The thing he mutters, though, shows that he does. "...fucking /cults/. Why's it gotta be /cults/?"
He looks back up to Daniel, resolved. He pushes out of his chair, rubbing his hands together in an almost meditative manner. "We're wasting time," he says abruptly. Amber power illumines the moving hands, the glow taking on flecks of green in it as Zach continues to focus his energies towards the working. "Tell me about this cult while I get warmed up."
"Gang."
Daniel Jack corrects. "A Black Dragon Cult? That's just dumb. Who has heard of a gang that was actually a front for a cult. I mean, there isn't anything special about a Black Dragon. Why would we care anything about dragons. I mean, what. Is Amy like..." The detective pauses again. "... Wait. She was taking a very messiah-like tone. This is getting way to bizarre. Is there a cult going on?" Daniel Jack just sighs. "Not like it matters."
"I might be skipping town once i get out of the hospital"
"Well," Zach says firmly as he considers the proper application of power. Enough that he heals Daniel's wounds here and now, but gently enough that the surge of energy doesn't simply put the man in shock. "She was a Knight Templar," he says as he stops rubbing his hands. They have a green glow to them now.
"Like, an /actual/ Knight Templar." Zach concentrates for a moment as he holds the emerald-shining hands to Daniel's crown and solar plexus. He eases the flow of soul power into Daniel, kick-starting the detective's immune system and healing abilities. He keeps the hands there until he senses the work is done.
"You can leave town tonight, if you want. Docs will probably either call it a miracle or chock it up to the whole 'fighter' thing." Zach shakes his hands loose, motes of green light falling away as he does so. "I'm staying, and I'm going to help Amy. If I can. Any idea where I can find her?"
Well, that was awkward.
Daniel Jack recoils a bit as Zach touches him. For good reason; Zach is part of the reason he associates Psycho Power with horrible painful blasts. This time, however, was not Zach nearly caving in his chest with a blast of energy. Instead, his wounds heal, his bruises fade. Feeling suddenly refreshed, Daniel Jack takes in a deep, hearty breath. And then, exhales.
"A Knight Templar."
Daniel Jack sits up, rolling his shoulders, inspecting his arm. "So she is a zealot. I'll look into that. As for finding Amy... I found her with the mists. She came with the mists. And she was in Inner Sunshine city." The detective grabs a pen and notepad. Jotting down on the paper, he tears it out, and hands it towards Zach. "I last saw her at this address. This is where she jumped me." The detective mulls, quietly. They would find it a miracle, the doctors.
But what would Daniel do with his life now?
Zach isn't at all surprised when Daniel flinches. He shares this ability, but doesn't exactly /advertise/ it. Most people associate psychic energy with destruction, and rightly so. Look at what Vega does with this. This is one of the things Zach is working to change, through the school.
He takes the piece of paper, looks it over, memorizes the address. He then shoves it in his pocket. He looks to Daniel, the detectives doubts clear to the psion. "You seem a bit lost," Zach says bluntly. "Want to talk about it?"
"Yeah, I do."
Daniel Jack just sighs. It was like the NDP fight all over again, except with Zach as the listener, and Daniel with the problem. "Basically, scuzzy, you remember the watch thief thing? I just was jumped by the woman who gave me the job. She looks like she is part of the Black Dragon Gang too.... which is the gang I discovered... from the lead she put me on." The detective pauses. "I feel like I've been played into something, but I don't know what I've been played into. What happens if I keep pushing the gang? Will I actually be playing someone's game? I can't even see myself helping out in Sunshine City anymore, being a rube. A guillable rube." The detective leans over at Zach, eyes burning.
"I attacked the Ikari Base over this crap, Zach!"
Zach raises a single brow only when Daniel mentions the attack on the Ikari base. "You don't do things by halves, Daniel Jack," Zach finally says. He's silent for a moment. A lot of Daniel's problem, it seems, is one of perception.
"Well," he finally says after thinking about. "It sounds like you got tricked." He chuckles dryly. "Some ne'er-do-well pulling a fast one on some perhaps too trustful do-gooder. That's /never/ happened before. Ever." Something might give Daniel the impression that such a thing is /exactly/ what happened to Zach once. "But it begs a question, and it's important. It says a lot about you."
Zach shrugs. "Do you want to help this city?" He scratches the back of his head for a second. "I don't care about the motive behind it right this second, just... do you want to help this place?"
"But why?"
Daniel Jack shakes his head, looking at Zach wide eyed. "Why would the organization trying to conceal themselves go out of their way to make me discover them? You don't understand. It isn't about being played. It's about being played to actively hamper them. I was tricked into STOPPING THEM!" Daniel Jack was raising his voice, his mind in overdrive.
Why was this so confusing?
"I mean, what am I doing here to help this city?" The detective belts, his words growing more and more intense. "I'm clearly in a game way over my head. Fight to stop the gangs? Isn't that what the gang WANTS me to do? It actively manipulated me into me working hard to stop them. Helping Sunshine by the fighting the gangs isn't clear cut anymore. I mean, what's under the surface. What's under the mask. Zach, I'm not kidding right now."
"What if the worst thing for Sunshine City was stopping the gang violence."
Zach lets the anguish, the rage wash over them, focusing on memories of celebration and calm in succession. Athena, apparently, gives good advice, Zach thinks. "First off," Zach says calmly, pointing at Daniel's head. "Do you /really/ think that NOT stopping the gangs is going to help the city?"
"Second," Zach says, tapping Daniel on the chest firmly, "Do you feel like that's the path you should take?" He turns toward the chair, sliding it out of the way before turning to face Daniel. "I don't have answers for you," he finally says. "The only thing I can think to tell you is to look inside yourself for your answers. When you find your way, you do whatever you can. Whatever you /have/ to do to stay on that path."
He heads for the door, before looking over his shoulder. "You're a good man, at the end of the day, Daniel Jack. I've seen you in action, listened to you talk. Even if you decide that you need to pack it up and head back to Southtown, I'll understand that decision."
He shrugs slightly. "I know what I have to do," he says after a moment. "I can help Amy get free of whatever's clouding her mind, but the longer I wait, the more time her... conditioning has to set in and make things more permanent in her mind. It... would be good, though, if I had someone I could trust to watch my back."
Daniel Jack just sighs.
"I don't know anything anymore." The detective states, defeated. "As far as I know, they might be doing it because they really don't believe I can do any harm. Which is an insult to me and Todoh-Ryuu." The young black man seeths. "Within me? I want to punch this Abobo person in the face, and punch this Russian dame in the face, and as for Amy..." The detective pauses, then sighs.
"That dammit, if Amy is crazy, she needs help."
The detective looks at the IV, warily. "If we do free Amy from whatever is over her, we might be able to learn more about the missing people. Yeah, that's the ticket. But Amy is pretty far off the deep end. I mean, really far. She thinks she is going to die, and whatever her master is. She is a textbook psychopath, a visionary psychopath. If -I- wanted to get to the bottom of this, though, of this Amy chick?" The detective scratches his neck.
"I want to learn more about the Templar movement."
"Or we could find her and ask her ourselves," he says. "Too many myths and rumors surrounding them to really get good information." Zach turns to the door, calling over his shoulder.
"Check your ass outta here," he says, "You're fine, and we got work to do." Zach suits action to his words, and heads out.
Daniel Jack pounds a fist on his bed as Zach heads out.
"Dammit Zach, no, we don't just- Hey! No! We don't just hoof it! We already know that Amy is crazy and will TRY AND KILL US if we find her! I mean, we don't just have magical powers to make her-"
The detective looks at his freshly healed wounds.
Daniel just sighs, jerking out the IV. "God damn psychics. I'm gonna kick his ass...." Danny mutters to himself, sulking as he gathers up his gear. Checking out. What a pain. He wanted the whole picture before charging blindly into Chesty McGingerTits again. There might be some clues they were missing. The detective sighs, heading out of the room to the entrance.
Maybe he should have just skipped town.
Log created on 20:17:37 07/07/2012 by Zach, and last modified on 00:49:31 07/08/2012.