Fianchetto: The Hit
Dec. 8th, 2010 11:15 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
x-cypher.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
xp_logsDoug is out and about wandering the city, when things go sideways on him.
Doug Ramsey was a creature of habits and patterns, even if those patterns tended to be broader and more incomprehensible than those of the average person. For instance, once a month he liked to wander through one of the ethnic neighborhoods in the city - Chinatown, or Little Italy - and just watch people. Guess at peoples' stories and interpersonal relationships from brief glimpses of their body language, get lost in a crowd with his thoughts for company, eat at an obscure "hole in the wall" restaurant, that type of thing.
This afternoon, it was Two Bridges, an ungentrified corner of Manhattan dominated by Hispanic and Caribbean families. Many of the store signs featured both English and Spanish, and as he passed open windows, he caught snatches of tejano, salsa, regge and heavy dub dueling for primacy in the shops. Each neighborhood had its own distinct 'feel', a particular combination of sights, smells, and sounds that made it unique. The savory spicy scent of several open-air Hispanic restaurants made Doug's stomach grumble in good-natured anticipation. The street bustled with people going about their business, here a small group of teenaged boys easily distinguished by their swaggering machismo, there a group of young girls skipping rope. Doug ducked around and through the throng with a smile, his hands in his pockets as he meandered aimlessly.
He was forced to step aside as a pair of large men passed him on the sidewalk, directly into the path of another, who stumbled into him with a curse. The man kept going, muttering to himself, but at Doug's feet, he felt a cellphone ricochet off his shoe. Obviously it had fallen from the man's pocket when they'd bumped.
Doug's eyes narrowed. The whole thing had happened quickly and smoothly enough that his instincts (or what he sometimes called his 'bump of trouble' from reading the Riftwar saga one too many times) twitched and suggested it might have been planned. But the quickness had kept him from getting too good of a look at any of the men to read them. He bent down, his eyes scanning around him, and picked up the phone.
It was a normal Nokia, slightly battered, and unremarkable underwise. The man who'd dropped it reached the corner, waiting for the light to change in order to cross. There was no sign that he even knew that his phone was now in Doug's hands.
"Sir? Sir! Your phone!" Doug called. He supposed it said something about his line of work that he was still suspicious, but that didn't mean that it was necessarily some kind of setup. Still, he surreptitiously thumbed the call button to take a peek at the call history as he walked toward the corner.
As he thumbed the call button, the phone hissed, venting gas all around his hand. It had the aroma of bitter orange, filling his nose as the burst caught him full in the face. None of the crowd seemed to notice anything untoward as he sagged, lurching drunkenly to one side from the effects of the gas. Strong hands caught him, stopping him from falling, and a slightly overloud voiced filled his ears.
"Little early for a drink, young man. Let's get you a seat." The street reeled, as he was half supported, half dragged towards mouth of an alley.
Thankfully Doug had managed to hold his breath slightly when he felt the phone vibrate just before it let the gas loose. He was still woozy, though, so his staggering along was only about half playing possum. Hopefully the gas was quick-acting, and would be out of his system as quickly. Mentally, he cursed himself for a fool as he assessed the situation.
Doug was shoved against the brick, and his wallet was easily plucked from his pocket. The man held up the driver's license beside his face and nodded. "Thank you, Mister Ramsey. You just saved me the trouble of using your sister as bait." The wicked bladed knife appeared in his hand like magic, obscured from the street by his back, and drove upwards under his ribcage.
Doug's reaction time was dulled, but his head was clearing more rapidly than his attacker undoubtedly intended. He crossed his wrists at right angles, catching and redirecting the thrust. He hadn't been quite fast enough, though, and the tip of the knife scored along his stomach before impacting the brick wall behind him. He hissed, his brain telling him that he needed to break loose, trade space for time to shake off whatever that gas had been. Even as the knife scraped along the wall, one of Doug's feet came up, his knee pulled into his chest. With his foot against the other man's abdomen, he used the wall as leverage for a pushing thrust to move his attacker away.
The assassin reeled back, but before Doug could react, grabbed his feet and yanked. The ackward position gave him the opening to slash at Doug's achillies tendon, but the off balance blow missed, sliced higher up into the calf muscle.
Doug managed to jerk his foot free and get back to standing. He hadn't managed to hardly lay a finger on this other person, but he'd already gotten cut twice. Adrenaline was burning the last of the haze off of his thoughts, though, and it pushed the pain of the two cuts to the back of his consciousness. The playing field was starting to get back to level, at least Doug hoped it was. The cuts weren't deep enough to pose any serious worry about bleeding out, and he doubted his attacker had that kind of time to wait anyway. So Doug stood in an open, ready stance, waiting for the next move.
"It's going to hurt more if you want this the hard way." He said, moving forward with the knife in a closed position. He was trained, whoever he was, and handled the knife in professional, quick motions. His jabs forced Doug back, further into the alley.
Doug's first thought was a sarcastic quip about his other option being just laying down and dying, but he saved his breath for the fight. The man's grip on his knife was the right medium between too loose and too tight. And he was smart enough not to overextend himself, either. Jab, slash, jab, jab, slash...Doug's mind cataloged the movements, searching for a pattern, something that he could turn to his advantage. Even the most practiced of fighters tended to fall into a groove the longer a fight went. Another slash and Doug surged forward, trapping his attacker's knife arm under one arm while twisting violently at his wrist with the other hand.
The man pivoted under the strain on his wrist. He smashed his head back, slamming into Doug's nose and earning a spray of blood for his efforts. But the blow didn't back the hold, and he was forced to keep turning with the wrist to avoid breaking it.
Doug grunted at the impact, and shook his head briefly to clear it after the headbutt left it ringing. He spat wetly to clear his mouth of the blood so that he could breathe. Continuing the movement of his assailant, he kept moving him in a circle, and then used the pressure on his arm to drive him face-first into the brick wall of the alley. With one elbow in his back, Doug used his hand on the man's wrist to drive the fist with the knife knuckles-first into the bricks several times in quick succession.
The knife dropped from his nerveless fingers, but his scrabbling other hand found a grip on Doug's jacket and yanked him against his back, extending his hold far enough that he could twist his arm free.
Reaching down for the knife would have been a spectacularly bad idea, so instead Doug used his foot to send it skittering deeper into the alleyway. Then, while the man's back was still toward him as he broke free, Doug used his off hand to brace himself on his shoulder and jump up with a muy thai knee strike to the floating ribs.
The ribs broke with a sickening crunch, and the man reeled back, blood starting to bubble from his mouth. The strike had driven the bones into the right lung, and he was quickly starting to asperate blood as the damaged organ began to collapse.
Doug continued to press forward as the man staggered away. He understood that imminent death tended to lead to desperation, the way the knife against his ribs had for him, so he continued to press the shift in momentum, feinting several sharp jabs to the head before pivoting and driving a fist toward where he had struck with the knee attack.
He clawed at his chest as the blood filled his lungs, slowly drowning him from the inside. Finally, he sagged against the alley way and slid down, his body too heavy to stay on his feet. His head pitched forward, landing sideways in the random trash, lurid red bubbles blowing from his nose and mouth.
He took a long time to finally die.
Doug took no chances, carefully feeling for a pulse at the man's neck and watching him closely before coming to the conclusion that the 'kill or be killed' situation had ended in his favor. Rolling the corpse over, Doug searched through his pockets, not expecting to find much, but looking for any clue as to why he had been targeted by the man.
The search yielded very little, which spoke to him being some manner of professional. Remy's warning about the price on his head rang in his head as he pocketed the man's wallet, the phone that had been used to trap him, and every other effect on his person. Then, after snapping a picture of the man's face with his phone, Doug hoisted the body over a shoulder. Farther back in the alleyway, a dumpster sat in back of an apartment building, a garbage chute hanging over it.
Doug tossed the body into the dumpster, then grimaced as he jumped in afterward, shifting bags of refuse to bury the corpse. With luck, the body might escape discovery for some time, maybe completely if fortune truly smiled on him. Either way, he was going to be watching the NYPD's servers like a hawk for a while now, to ensure that the body didn't get traced back to him. When he was done, he climbed back out of the dumpster, dragging a small clean patch of sleeve across his bloody nose. Time to get out of here.
Doug Ramsey was a creature of habits and patterns, even if those patterns tended to be broader and more incomprehensible than those of the average person. For instance, once a month he liked to wander through one of the ethnic neighborhoods in the city - Chinatown, or Little Italy - and just watch people. Guess at peoples' stories and interpersonal relationships from brief glimpses of their body language, get lost in a crowd with his thoughts for company, eat at an obscure "hole in the wall" restaurant, that type of thing.
This afternoon, it was Two Bridges, an ungentrified corner of Manhattan dominated by Hispanic and Caribbean families. Many of the store signs featured both English and Spanish, and as he passed open windows, he caught snatches of tejano, salsa, regge and heavy dub dueling for primacy in the shops. Each neighborhood had its own distinct 'feel', a particular combination of sights, smells, and sounds that made it unique. The savory spicy scent of several open-air Hispanic restaurants made Doug's stomach grumble in good-natured anticipation. The street bustled with people going about their business, here a small group of teenaged boys easily distinguished by their swaggering machismo, there a group of young girls skipping rope. Doug ducked around and through the throng with a smile, his hands in his pockets as he meandered aimlessly.
He was forced to step aside as a pair of large men passed him on the sidewalk, directly into the path of another, who stumbled into him with a curse. The man kept going, muttering to himself, but at Doug's feet, he felt a cellphone ricochet off his shoe. Obviously it had fallen from the man's pocket when they'd bumped.
Doug's eyes narrowed. The whole thing had happened quickly and smoothly enough that his instincts (or what he sometimes called his 'bump of trouble' from reading the Riftwar saga one too many times) twitched and suggested it might have been planned. But the quickness had kept him from getting too good of a look at any of the men to read them. He bent down, his eyes scanning around him, and picked up the phone.
It was a normal Nokia, slightly battered, and unremarkable underwise. The man who'd dropped it reached the corner, waiting for the light to change in order to cross. There was no sign that he even knew that his phone was now in Doug's hands.
"Sir? Sir! Your phone!" Doug called. He supposed it said something about his line of work that he was still suspicious, but that didn't mean that it was necessarily some kind of setup. Still, he surreptitiously thumbed the call button to take a peek at the call history as he walked toward the corner.
As he thumbed the call button, the phone hissed, venting gas all around his hand. It had the aroma of bitter orange, filling his nose as the burst caught him full in the face. None of the crowd seemed to notice anything untoward as he sagged, lurching drunkenly to one side from the effects of the gas. Strong hands caught him, stopping him from falling, and a slightly overloud voiced filled his ears.
"Little early for a drink, young man. Let's get you a seat." The street reeled, as he was half supported, half dragged towards mouth of an alley.
Thankfully Doug had managed to hold his breath slightly when he felt the phone vibrate just before it let the gas loose. He was still woozy, though, so his staggering along was only about half playing possum. Hopefully the gas was quick-acting, and would be out of his system as quickly. Mentally, he cursed himself for a fool as he assessed the situation.
Doug was shoved against the brick, and his wallet was easily plucked from his pocket. The man held up the driver's license beside his face and nodded. "Thank you, Mister Ramsey. You just saved me the trouble of using your sister as bait." The wicked bladed knife appeared in his hand like magic, obscured from the street by his back, and drove upwards under his ribcage.
Doug's reaction time was dulled, but his head was clearing more rapidly than his attacker undoubtedly intended. He crossed his wrists at right angles, catching and redirecting the thrust. He hadn't been quite fast enough, though, and the tip of the knife scored along his stomach before impacting the brick wall behind him. He hissed, his brain telling him that he needed to break loose, trade space for time to shake off whatever that gas had been. Even as the knife scraped along the wall, one of Doug's feet came up, his knee pulled into his chest. With his foot against the other man's abdomen, he used the wall as leverage for a pushing thrust to move his attacker away.
The assassin reeled back, but before Doug could react, grabbed his feet and yanked. The ackward position gave him the opening to slash at Doug's achillies tendon, but the off balance blow missed, sliced higher up into the calf muscle.
Doug managed to jerk his foot free and get back to standing. He hadn't managed to hardly lay a finger on this other person, but he'd already gotten cut twice. Adrenaline was burning the last of the haze off of his thoughts, though, and it pushed the pain of the two cuts to the back of his consciousness. The playing field was starting to get back to level, at least Doug hoped it was. The cuts weren't deep enough to pose any serious worry about bleeding out, and he doubted his attacker had that kind of time to wait anyway. So Doug stood in an open, ready stance, waiting for the next move.
"It's going to hurt more if you want this the hard way." He said, moving forward with the knife in a closed position. He was trained, whoever he was, and handled the knife in professional, quick motions. His jabs forced Doug back, further into the alley.
Doug's first thought was a sarcastic quip about his other option being just laying down and dying, but he saved his breath for the fight. The man's grip on his knife was the right medium between too loose and too tight. And he was smart enough not to overextend himself, either. Jab, slash, jab, jab, slash...Doug's mind cataloged the movements, searching for a pattern, something that he could turn to his advantage. Even the most practiced of fighters tended to fall into a groove the longer a fight went. Another slash and Doug surged forward, trapping his attacker's knife arm under one arm while twisting violently at his wrist with the other hand.
The man pivoted under the strain on his wrist. He smashed his head back, slamming into Doug's nose and earning a spray of blood for his efforts. But the blow didn't back the hold, and he was forced to keep turning with the wrist to avoid breaking it.
Doug grunted at the impact, and shook his head briefly to clear it after the headbutt left it ringing. He spat wetly to clear his mouth of the blood so that he could breathe. Continuing the movement of his assailant, he kept moving him in a circle, and then used the pressure on his arm to drive him face-first into the brick wall of the alley. With one elbow in his back, Doug used his hand on the man's wrist to drive the fist with the knife knuckles-first into the bricks several times in quick succession.
The knife dropped from his nerveless fingers, but his scrabbling other hand found a grip on Doug's jacket and yanked him against his back, extending his hold far enough that he could twist his arm free.
Reaching down for the knife would have been a spectacularly bad idea, so instead Doug used his foot to send it skittering deeper into the alleyway. Then, while the man's back was still toward him as he broke free, Doug used his off hand to brace himself on his shoulder and jump up with a muy thai knee strike to the floating ribs.
The ribs broke with a sickening crunch, and the man reeled back, blood starting to bubble from his mouth. The strike had driven the bones into the right lung, and he was quickly starting to asperate blood as the damaged organ began to collapse.
Doug continued to press forward as the man staggered away. He understood that imminent death tended to lead to desperation, the way the knife against his ribs had for him, so he continued to press the shift in momentum, feinting several sharp jabs to the head before pivoting and driving a fist toward where he had struck with the knee attack.
He clawed at his chest as the blood filled his lungs, slowly drowning him from the inside. Finally, he sagged against the alley way and slid down, his body too heavy to stay on his feet. His head pitched forward, landing sideways in the random trash, lurid red bubbles blowing from his nose and mouth.
He took a long time to finally die.
Doug took no chances, carefully feeling for a pulse at the man's neck and watching him closely before coming to the conclusion that the 'kill or be killed' situation had ended in his favor. Rolling the corpse over, Doug searched through his pockets, not expecting to find much, but looking for any clue as to why he had been targeted by the man.
The search yielded very little, which spoke to him being some manner of professional. Remy's warning about the price on his head rang in his head as he pocketed the man's wallet, the phone that had been used to trap him, and every other effect on his person. Then, after snapping a picture of the man's face with his phone, Doug hoisted the body over a shoulder. Farther back in the alleyway, a dumpster sat in back of an apartment building, a garbage chute hanging over it.
Doug tossed the body into the dumpster, then grimaced as he jumped in afterward, shifting bags of refuse to bury the corpse. With luck, the body might escape discovery for some time, maybe completely if fortune truly smiled on him. Either way, he was going to be watching the NYPD's servers like a hawk for a while now, to ensure that the body didn't get traced back to him. When he was done, he climbed back out of the dumpster, dragging a small clean patch of sleeve across his bloody nose. Time to get out of here.
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