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Hail to the King; All welcome
Topic Started: Jul 5 2011, 01:25 AM (429 Views)
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((( Nick Taggert Start)))

Nick was...frustrated. Very, very frustrated. This op already wasn't going as planned. He knew Zalgorians were sticking him with some dead weight greenhorn, but he never imagined it would be this bad. He'd been stuck with a crackpot by the name of Jacob Stratz, a little worm with no ambition and no interests. He'd be dead before they hit their first break-room, and then he'd be out of the running. He expected to find him curled up in a ball in a bathroom somewhere, weeping softly and wailing for his mommy. Jesus, the competition had barely started and it was already over!

Wait, what was that? They'd said something about weapons. That was important. He reached back to check his back pocket, and when he pulled it back out he had a grin big enough to shame the Chesire Cat. In his hand was a Benelli B76, mint condition. A Benelli B76, which he'd been hunting for near twenty years. Renowned for their soft recoil and accuracy, a Benelli was a damn fine gun, but difficult to find in perfect condition after all these years. How the hell had they...right. Infinite power. Might as well get used to it.

Nick chuckled and shook his head. Then, with a near reverent level of caution, he began to disassemble the gun. Switching off the thumb safety, he unlocked the ears around the block. Then, depressing the firing pin, he pulled the slide forward. Beautiful, just like he'd imagined. After he put the gun back together, he stuck it into one of his hidden pockets. The Zalgorians had taken most of his things, but the pockets were all still there, even if they were considerably lighter than they used to be. The Benelli would stay just below his neckline, where he could grab it with a quick gesture. Contented, he began to search for his partner.


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(((Jacob Stratz Start)))

So. This is how it begins. For the first time since leaving college, Jacob had a reason to care. He was a little rusty, after all these years. How does one...care, exactly? He hadn't been able to muster the effort to break out of his usual monotone in years, or change his expression by more than fractions. There just wasn't any reason to. Looking around, everyone else seemed to care a lot when the broadcast went through. There was running, and screaming, and lots of crying, but he wasn't sure that was caring. It didn't seem like the caring he remembered. Maybe he should ask somebody. The lady in the cubicle next to his seemed to be otherwise unoccupied, though it looked like she might be trying to take a nap.

“Um, excuse me, uh...” Jacob was struggling to remember her name. Vicky? Kelly? It was one of those words. He'd honestly never bothered keeping track.
“Um, miss? Can I ask you something?”
She sniffed and looked up at him. Great. She was crying. This wasn't going to be good.
“What do you want, Jacob?”
“Well, I wanted to ask how you felt.”
She stared at him blankly for a few seconds. “How do I feel? How the fuck do you think I feel? We're all going to die, Jacob! This is just some kind of sick game to them!”
Hmm. Obviously, she felt poorly. Perhaps he could cheer her up? “Well, you know, we aren't all going to die. At least two people are probably going to live. They have to get the prize and all.”
This didn't seem to help her. “Oh, yeah, great, somebody and their new friendly psychopath will be walking out of this building while the rest of us die. That should be great! I feel sooo much better now!”
Obviously, words weren't working. He remembered that when he felt bad as a kid, his dad would put a hand on his shoulder before giving him the bad news. That always seemed comforting. “Look, ma'am, you are probably right. We are all probably going to die here. I don't know you. I don't know your name. You probably aren't that important. Then again, none of us are, so there's--” his words were cut off by the woman unexpectedly kissing him while struggling with her top. Now he was really confused. Hadn't she just been depressed?

Jacob lost track of where things went from there. He thought long and hard about what he'd learned about caring in the last few minutes, and decided he didn't like it. He wasn't exactly sure how things had progressed, but when he turned his attention back to the office the girl was very confused, and very naked. Looking about, she gathered her clothes and ran, screaming about probes and abductions and pervert aliens. How the hell had that happened? Then he remembered: The powers. Jacob mentally ran through the information he'd been given. It appeared that with a single touch he could instill an insatiable lust in anything that wore clothing. “Well,” he said to himself, “This is officially fucked up enough for me to be interested.”

Jacob thought about searching for his partner, but that turned out to be unnecessary. He walked into the nearest restroom to find a large, bald man with a well-trimmed orange beard pissing in the corner. He fit the description they had given him of his partner to a tee.
“Nick Taggert?”
The large man flinched, his hand flying to his neck. “Who wants to know?”
“Jacob Stratz. You're my partner. What's your deal?”
He visibly relaxed. He turned around, seizing Jacob up. “CEO of Infinity Inc., your friendly neighborhood PMC. Assassin, soldier of fortune, and cook, when the mood seizes me. You?”
“Peon of Willford and Gumbs. Pencil pusher, gopher, and as of today, The King Midas of Strippers." The monotone wasn't gone, but he felt it cracking. Maybe there was something exciting to be done here. Maybe he could finally have that adventure he always wanted.

His unflinching gaze didn't even waver as the gun barrel appeared in front of his face. Damn. Dead just as things got interesting. Oh well.
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Where would you go if you wanted to find a crying snivelling coward in the heat of an alien takeover? A bomb shelter would probably be your first bet, or perhaps you'd look for someone dangling from a rope with their feet off the ground after going on a journey that involved a short drop and a fast stop. Craig Carpenter was in neither of these positions, but then Craig Carpenter could hardly be called a crying snivelling coward. On the contrary, he was just clutching his hands to his head whilst snivelling from the hiding spot of under his desk; no tears were involved yet.

On the inside he'd been whimpering the 'Why, why?!' that accompanied most bad situations in his life, ones that were usually followed with a defeated 'of course, it's me we're talking about', though right now he was somewhat too distracted to reach that half of his self-loathing thanks to the stampede of people on the floor around him. Half of them were people at least, the other half from what he'd caught sight of were roughly four feet tall and very much not human. Covered from head to toe in a great big mechanical looking backpack and armed to the teeth with sticklers, as he'd dubbed the pretty damn strange choice of weapon, but still not something he wanted to deal with. Not that that should imply he wanted to deal with anything at that moment.

”Just had to fill out those reports, get the spreadsheets done, easy work today!” he continued crying to himself, though the tears had still yet to come. ”Why does the fricking world have to end!? ” He was quite aware that he must have looked pathetic under the desk with his tail between his legs, but now was not the time to be overcoming his self confidence demons. Now was the time to curl up in a ball and wait for the end.

He knew about the partner he'd been assigned by the Zalgorians (More than likely a mistake; why pick him of all people?) and part of him figured out that he could've come off worse. An MI6 operative; those were like the English CIA weren't they? You didn't get to be in the MI6 by being a crazy serial killer after all. Sure James Bond was crazy at times, and he'd killed loads and loads of people in his movies, but all in the name of her Majesty!

But what did that matter? Dead dead dead, that's what he was. Any minute now, one of those Stickler aliens would come and bash him over the head with it and that would be the miserable and unexciting end to the oh-so-drab Craig Carpenter, cowering under the desk in his casual white shirt and drooping black tie whilst hell ran around outside.

A blast of gunfire broke the constant screams of the background, ringing through the air above his cubicle and beyond. Though not the first gunfire he'd heard since it all started it was still the closest to go off in it all. He would've quiet happily opted for continuing to curl up in the foetal position whilst everyone around him made better use of their time, however it was the sight of the Sticklers, or whatever they were really called, all apparently charging in one direction that brought up his attention. Were they running away from whoever was opening fire? Did that mean that the guy with the gun was fighting off the aliens like some John Wayne, except as that guy, whoever he was; the main guy in Alien? Oh wait the main guy was a woman.

Oh screw it there was a guy with a gun shooting aliens! Good enough for Craig!

Summoning up all the nerve he had left in his trembling body, courage renewed by the promise of Stickler carcasses lining the halls, he crawled up on to his desk and poked his head ever so carefully just past the rim of his cubicle, past the various artistic doodles and 'You're here forever' note pasted to his wall from earlier that day, looking over the rows upon rows of office worker homes. Though seeing anyone was a bit of a hard task in all this commotion, there was no-one with a gun in sight.

Another round of gunfire starting up from behind him pointed Craig in the right direction as he realised that the Sticklers had been running towards the gunfire, not away from it. Apparently the Men in Black were involved in all this too, because the shooter in question was dressed in a very black suit with eyes hidden behind the darkest of sunglasses, his face contorted as he opened fire on the last of the little aliens standing there, apparently snarling at him, and waving their sticks in all directions. His response of blowing a bullet through their heads would be almost comical if it wasn't apocalypse and all.

As the last of the aliens met their sticky end on the once moderately clean rug, their killer looked over the rows of cubicles. It lasted only a second, but even with his eyes hidden behind impenetrable sunglasses Craig knew that they had made eye contact.

And back under the desk he was.

“Gonna die gonna die gonna die gonna die gonna die gonna die” was, as I'm sure you've come to expect by now, going through his mind like a broken record. The Man in Black had obviously seen him and now he was going to come over and put a bullet right between his still-not-crying little eyes and all because he'd just had to give in to his curiousity and look at what was going on. He didn't want to die like some damn kitty! Why oh why couldn't he have just passed out under his desk? Why oh why couldn't he -

The man was standing right at the entrance to his cubicle, glaring down at him fiercely.

He stopped thinking he was going to die for a second as he remembered what the Zalgorians had told him and had been on the front of his memory not minutes ago. The partner. Dane Copper, MI6 agent, former SAS, all around super spy. That was the man in black who was looking down at him like he'd just pissed his pants! Hallelujah!

(A quick check revealed that no, in fact, he hadn't. His pants were quite clean for now.)

“Dane Copper?” he asked, voice quiet with manners brought on by intimidation from his saviour's presence. Dane himself did not reply immediately, merely stared deeply into Craig as he measured up the man in front of him. “That's right,” he eventually said, in a tone so gravelly and husky that Craig almost wondered for a second if the man doubled as Batman in his spare time. He had a super spy who was also Batman for a partner?

Whoever he was, he did not look impressed with his new partner, not even remotely. To be fair Craig was hardly from the most impressive image in the world right now, or indeed ever, but it hardly did anything to reassure him that everything was going to be peaches and cream from now on. He'd probably end up shot to save on the dead weight before too long. No-one said they both had to be alive at the end, did they? He thought that they did both have to live, but maybe he was just being hopeful to avoid finding his brains splattered against the floor

He opened his mouth to say something, he wasn't sure what he wanted to say, just something, but Dane Copper quickly cut him off with a grab for his tie, choking him as he yanked him out from under the desk with one arm and hoisted him to his staggering feet. Even this close he still couldn't see behind those sunglasses. “You listen to me and you listen good, son. You do as I say and we'll get out of here alive if it's the last thing I do, clear?” he instructed with his firm voice, Craig nodding obediently as his new partner threw off his jacket in to a pile on the desk, the arm swaying in front of his former hiding space. “We're heading upwards, so show me to the stairs.” Another silent nod and they were on their way.

Halfway down the row between the cubicles though, Dane paused, his voice heard to Craig even over the shouts of panicked masses, only a handful of whom had actually noticed the secret agent charging down their office floor. “What's your name, son?” he asked, though his voice sounded less authority and more of mild curiousity this time. Whilst Dane was just checking to be sure he had found his partner correctly, for all he knew the Zalgorians had beamed his face to every one of these office monkeys, Craig was just surprised to hear him take an interest. It made sense why he was asking, everyone asks what people's names are when they first meet, but his voice was still nervous on exit.
“It's Craig, Craig Carpenter.” he answered, Dane accepting with a straight forward nod. There was blood on his jaw. “You, uh, you got a little something there.” he muttered nervously, reaching out to idly poke at the offending stain. “Some blood.”

His escort frowned again, probably in irritation at such a minor detail, but he still reached up to check for himself as his bare fingers became speckled with alien innards. Not the most sanitary of things.
“Show me to the bathroom first.” Dane replied, order back in his voice but with a hint of drudgery slipping through. He could still be phased by little details after all, it seemed.

Carefully the two made their way to the nearest rest room, Dane only inches ahead of Craig as both their eyes darted around the room for anything or anyone that would try to staple them at the first opportunity. Another worker jumped out in front of the two, pleading with the gun toting bodyguard for help too, but Dane coldly brushed her off as Craig turned around and shrugged an apology, face fraught with embarrassment at having his own personal life line. It didn't take very long to reach the water closet.

In pretty much the most stereotypical manner of someone in his profession, Dane did not enter the room simply. First there were orders for Craig to hug the wall whilst Dane took forward position, his pistol held to his side as his finger brushed against the trigger that was begging to be pulled. Shoulder ramming the door open was inevitably going to follow, though the predictable 'All clear' that would come out of that Nolan-esque voice did not follow suit. Once again in a less than planned out move Craig poked his head round the doorway, greeted by the sight of Dane's pistol concentrated firmly on a red headed mutton chopped man who had a fire arm of his own.

Edited by Slamexo, Jul 5 2011, 05:28 PM.
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It never broke. That monotone, that empty stare...even in the face of all this insanity it never broke. That pissed him off, for some reason. This guy wasn't void of emotion. He just seemed void of everything. An empty space with a mouth. But that wasn't why he was going to kill him. No, that was because this man couldn't be Jacob Stratz. The voice he could account for, but that stare? He hadn't seen anything like that stare since he served in Panda War 3. The resigned hopelessness of it was just unreal, a logical improbability. No, this man wasn't Jacob Stratz. He wasn't no pencil-pushing lick-spittle. He was a killer, a trap, he had to be!

Still, he didn't pull the trigger. His mind was still screaming that this was Jacob Stratz, even if his every instinct told him to shoot this imposter where he stood. Why was that? How could he be sure? He wracked his brain for something, anything, that he could use to prove this man guilty or innocent. He hadn't ever had to do that before, usually he just shot people and was done with it, yet if he shot Stratz now it would mean they were done. If it was an imposter, then he'd probably be dead himself before they left the bathroom. Jesus, this was one hell of a fubar.

A sudden noise made his decision for him. A man in dark sunglasses burst through the door with a gun at the ready, forcing a change in tactics. Nick's instinct didn't give a shit about Jacob anymore, all his focus went to the newcomer. Nick began to seize the man up, taking in all the details. He definitely knew his way around a gun, and it looked like he'd been using it. Given his attire, Nick pegged him as a member of some intelligence agency. CIA? No, CIA would have rattled a few shots off before opening the door, they weren't much for stand offs. Massad? Hell no. One of them would be dead by now if he was Massad. KGB? Too direct. KGB would wait outside. Who was he forgetting? He didn't want to engage an unknown. Time for a tool he hadn't used in quite a few years...diplomacy.

“Well. Nice piece you got there. I got a real pretty one myself, be a shame if we had to use 'em on each other with all these freaky alien bastards running around. Cards on the table: I'm playing for keeps here, and I'm sure you are too. But I figure we've got a good hundred floors to sort that out and we can burn that bridge when we get to it. Whadda say, truce?”
Edited by Doc Balance, Jul 5 2011, 10:27 PM.
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Just because Dane Copper had kept calm during his introduction to his dear new partner Craig, it did not mean that he was completely meditated and serene about the whole situation. Whilst as an experienced operative a façade of serenity for his escort's sake was easy to maintain, he was quite eager to keep things moving and get it over with and return to safety as soon as possible. Suddenly finding himself deadlocked with a short red haired man was not his idea of ASAP.

His finger stayed perfectly poised on the trigger of his pistol, ready to take him out and neutralise the threat the moment it became more than he cared for. The third man in this situation, Jacob Stratz, had of course been noticed quickly, but unless he pulled out a gun of his own and decided to join the Mexican stand-off he was quite easily to dismiss save for the careful observation from the corner of his eye, the rest of his gaze fixed squarely on Nick Taggert's pistol.

As with many situations of this nature, one of them eventually had to talk and break the ice. As this was always a sign of crumbling as far as Dane was concerned, his lips remained tightly sealed as the Irishman started trying to talk peace into him, fingers at the ready the whole way through. He scowled as an alternate to the much more threatening scoff as a response.

“No dice.” he put bluntly, remaining as vigilant for return fire as always. Team ups were never his shtick, even back in the army, and joining forces with an armed stranger in the midst of alien takeover was not going to be the exception to the rule.

He needed to think carefully; he did not want this stand-off to end guns blazing when the mission had only just begun. All he could do for now was stare at him icily wait for Mr Irish to give him the opportunity to neutralise the threat or to exit the bathroom without having to paint the tiles red.
Edited by Slamexo, Jul 6 2011, 04:54 PM.
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The stand off was making Jacob slightly uncomfortable, mostly because he couldn't see who Nick was talking to, nor could he figure out why Nick had been gunning for him before. Was this how people acted these days? Okay, so he hadn't really been paying much attention during the last five years, but still, this wasn't how he remembered things at all. What was the proper social response here? Should he run? Scream? Piss himself? No, those didn't feel right. Should he attempt to hug them? Hugging was supposed to be good, and a show of friendship. Maybe hugging was the right thing to do. Then again, if he touched anyone he figured the room would quickly resemble those pictures he found of his mom's bachelorette party. Dear god, why had he thought of that? He'd completely forgotten about it, and now it was back. It was going to be in his brain, forever. The last thing he'd be thinking about before he died would be his mother partying with man whores. Perfect. Just the note he wanted to end his life on.

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Though he didn't realize it, Nick wasn't in a much better position than Jacob. Specs here didn't look too keen on teaming up and seemed pretty intent on redecorating the walls with Nick's bodily fluids. Granted, this wasn't any different than most of his average afternoons, but it was still an inconvenience. He waited for the other shoe to drop, hoping his opponent would slip up and make the first move.

No dice.

Well, that was it. Time to start...wait, the hell was that? That accent...there. The last piece of the puzzle. He had him now. With this newfound information, Nick did the one thing nobody in the room was expecting. He started laughing.

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If there was a reason for Nick's outburst, Jacob didn't get it. It seemed like he was laughing, maybe? It was more of a barking, really. Was his partner half-terrier? Was that scientifically possible? He remembered someone sending him an e-mail forward about a woman marrying a dolphin, so maybe that's just something people did now.

Jacob's musing on human-animal pairings were interrupted when Nick spoke up.
“So, you're an MI-6 boy? Shoulda known. Always were the one's for stand-offs. Honor, nobility, that kind of thing. How many of these aliens you planning to screw on your way out, Mr. Bond?”
There was a loud thump at the door. Outside, something sounded angry.
“Looks like you've got some new friends out there. Are we gonna kill each other, or should we let them handle it?”

He wished Nick would shut up. He was discovering for the first time in years that he didn't really want to die all that badly, at least not here. In an airplane, maybe, or at the hands of aliens who didn't remind him of bored frat boys, but not in a bathroom with a saucy Irishman and an angry Brit. This was probably the second or third worst thing that had happened to him today, ranking just below the coffee pot being empty when he clocked in this morning.

The thumping grew louder. There were several of them. They were all going to die. You know, he never did get that coffee. Goddammit.
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The loud thump at the door caught Dane off guard, but it wasn't enough to lower the gun trained on Nick. He could keep talking out of his ass all he wanted, because MI6 knew better than to give him a moment to open fire whilst he was distracted with idle conversation. Hell, he should have considered himself lucky that Dane hadn't taken the opportunity to pin one square between the eyes when he was busy laughing his head off.

The fact that he had told his partner to wait outside, however, did turn the minor thumping grievance into a full blown concern: if those alien bastards were tearing the guy apart from the inside out then his new Irish acquaintance was going to be taking responsibility for it in a very messy manner. Not one to leave things to chance but nor one to lose his cool, Dane called out for Craig, looking for any sign that he was somewhere within earshot, even if it was screaming for help from under an alien mass. Fortunately his partner had been smart enough to head inside the door when things started craving his juicy flesh and thus his most nervous sounding 'I'm here', no doubt caused by the very tense gunning going on, reassured the spy that his partner was safe.

Now he just had to worry about Nick Taggert and his own friend. The fact that the door was behind him did not play in his favour, but then not much in the midst of an alien takeover ever would. He knew from experience that whatever was outside didn't seem very capable at taking bullets to the face, so the only thing he needed to do was to make sure that the other firearm toting member in the bathroom didn't shoot him in the back in the midst of a fire fight.

The corner of his mouth twitched in irritation at the dilemma in front of him, forced to fall back on the chance that his opponent was true to his word rather than see who could pull that trigger faster. He nodded just once, then began edging towards off of Nick's side and a clear view of the doorway where target practice was complicating matters.
“Craig, get against the wall.” he instructed, not caring about Jacob's position. He wasn't his concern as far as his safety went and he did not need another person behind him, out of his sight; for all he knew he would just try to get in his way later or do something to Craig and then he'd have to shoot more people today. Bullets were better off rationed for now.

With a sharp glare at Nick to make their temporary alliance clear, Dane prepared to open fire on the door and whatever happened to be lurking behind it. All the while making sure that the moment everything seemed calm he could swing that gun's aim straight back on to Nick's head and take charge of things.
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The distraction was more than welcome. Nick knew that nothing out there posed a significant threat to any of them., unless their benefactors were being cheeky about where they were placing their obstacles. He'd cleared the immediate area of everything but a small group of those crazy midgets with the big metal helmets. He had spared them out of pity, and perhaps a bit of empathy for their plight, and they'd paid him back without even knowing it.


He was also glad his gamble with the Brit had payed off. His temper didn't seem to be an issue, which meant that they could probably work something out and get out of this mess alive. He didn't want to kill him, or the scared little man that appeared to be his partner. Truth be told, something about this whole op didn't sit well with Nick. Picking each other off this early seemed to be exactly what the Zalgorians would want them to do. After all, they never said it was guaranteed that one of the teams would reach the top, just that whoever did would win the prize. It seemed all too likely that all of the humans in this building could die and their hosts wouldn't give a rat's ass. They just wanted entertainment, and that was fine by Nick. He'd give them a damn good show, but he wouldn't do it at the expense of the only people he might be able to call allies in this place.

Nick took up a firing position next the operative. “Ease up, eh? I've got no intention of gunning for you unless you're gunning for me.” He was developing a professional respect for this Brit. Here he is, in a pretty bad situation, with a shaky partner and a crazy Irishman, but his calm never broke. It wasn't a disturbing calm like Jacob's. This was the calm of a man who was just doing his job. That calm was why Nick was always fond of working with MI-6 agents on his ops. It was never quite as cold as the chilling killer instinct of the Massad agents he'd work with, and didn't have the unsettling slipperiness that came with most CIA and former KGB officers. MI-6 was a no-nonsense proposition, which is why Nick was praying that this man really was with Her Majesty's service.

His hopes were forgotten when the door opened. Two of the little buggers had teamed up to open the door. They were exceptionally bright for their kind, and had they been in a better environments they might have thrown their race eons forward on the evolutionary scale. As it stood, they taught their surrounding brethren one last lesson as they were gunned down: Doors are bad.

Nick didn't pay much attention to anyone else as he went to work. For all he knew, the Brit was getting ready to cap him in the skull. It didn't matter, the targets were in front of him. If his faith had been misplaced, then he'd take that lesson to heart. For the moment, Nick was on the battlefield, the one place where he always felt at home.
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As the two badasses in the room made a temporary truce, Craig let out a silent sigh of relief from the bathroom wall, back pinned tightly against it as he had been instructed. The last thing he wanted was everyone to start opening fire in the place because if Dane had been shot straight away then he might as well have bid everyone adios!

The Sticklers invading straight after, however, was not doing anything to help him live longer through relaxation. On the contrary, the hail of gunfire that painted the once grimy tiles a brand new shade of alien spludge just made his ears ring and his heart race in fear of the moment that something would go wrong and one would bound over the ass kickers in front of him and tear him a new one. His hand clenched around the rim of the nearby sink.

That didn't mean he was stupid: if he was to even try and get involved in the fire fight he'd almost certainly end up dead in five seconds. He wasn't fast, strong, or exceptionally smart, so he was much better off leaving this sort of scenario to the hardened combatants whilst he waited orders from his bodyguard that would direct him up to the next floor. Following orders: it was where he could shine!

He raised a half clenched fist, trying to force his face into an encouraging smile but ending up with a much more awkward look. He wanted to call out something reassuring, give the team some morale boosting that they'd always tried to shove down his throat in company programs, but he was far too tense to even give a rallying 'hurrah!'. It wasn't like they needed it anyway, since the aliens were pretty much thinned out by that point. With all of them done in, hopefully Dane would thank his Irish partner and the two could be back on their way up through the tower of doom!

Things were never that simple for Craig though, as once the last alien had its innards turned into outtards Copper's gun was back on Nick's head, ready to take charge and escort the thoroughly confused Craig out to safety.
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Jacob didn't believe in luck. It was a coping mechanism of sorts: If things just happened, then everything that had contributed to his utterly unremarkable existence was destined, and it was pointless to fight it or be upset about it. If, however, there was some vast unknowable force that determined events by chance, then at some point this force had decided to crush everything he'd ever hoped for, and that turned his life from merely empty to intolerable.

Take this moment for instance: He had just watched Nick and his former opponent utterly dismantle an alien brigade together. Working together, they were a force to be reckoned with. Yet the second the last alien dropped, they turned on each other again, with Dane's gun flying to Nick's head faster than you can say “Parley?” If this was luck, he might as well just give up then, because he wasn't going to catch a single break for the next hundred floors. On the other hand, if their stand-off was merely an inevitable fact of reality, he had no such worries. Thus, he tried facing the situation by falling back on his characteristic apathy. For some reason though, he was having a harder time not caring here. He couldn't just accept it. Something was building.

Nick had kept a steady position, not making any sudden movements, but his body was tensed and ready. His eyes were locked on Dane, while his gun was pointed squarely at the Englishman's crotch. He grinned. “You may make it out of here friend, but if you pull that trigger I'll make sure you regret it a lot more than I do.”

Jacob watched on with growing annoyance. How could they act this way? They were all prisoners in a sick game, and these stupid bastards were getting ready to shoot each other up for no reason other than they could. He felt like his insides were boiling. For the first time in years, he began to shout.

“What the hell is wrong with you two? There are aliens all over the goddamn building, we clearly aren't alone, and it's a safe bet that time is of the essence! Yet you're standing there, staring each other down like a couple of middleschoolers. Here's a hint, morons: It doesn't matter who's bigger. Can we just walk out of here and go our separate ways like adults?”

That probably didn't help. He didn't care. He couldn't remember the last time he felt this pissed, or this good. He was at least partially in control for once, and he wasn't letting go even if it ended up costing him his life.

Nick didn't feel like standing off with Dane any longer, and Jacob had a good point. The longer they waited here, the more threats they attracted, and the next ones might not be so pathetic. As a show of faith, he holstered his gun. "I'm gonna trust you here, friend," he thought. "Don't make me regret it, or I swear there aren't any powers in heaven or Earth that'll stop me from coming back to settle the score."
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This situation was starting to annoy Dane more and more by the second: Nick was pointing his gun straight for his crotch with a cocky smirk like he felt it mattered any more than his own gun pointed for his skull. If either of them were shot at this point, one would be dead from a bullet in the head and the other would pass out from blood loss in seconds; neither position was stronger than the other.

After that his little friend in the corner who'd been standing their staring the whole time finally decided to make a little input, and like any citizen it was completely unhelpful. He had a gun aimed at the Irish man's head precisely because there were aliens all over the building: this was a high threat situation and he was not going to be leaving himself open at any moment, not even for a second.

So if Nick wanted to holster his gun for whatever reason, he would let him. He wouldn't lower his own, nor would he change his fixed stare for even the slightest hint of changing his mind. Dane didn't want to open fire on him at this point as he would rather save the bullets and as far as he his opponent went he hadn't returned fire yet. But he still had to keep himself and his partner alive.

“Then you should leave now.” he finally stated at Jacob, eyes never leaving Nick the whole time. He wasn't expecting them to change their mind any more; even if they were planning a double cross doing it now would be the stupidest move on their part today. When you're escorting a hostage vigilance is always critical.
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