The Criminal AU Meme

[cerebel]

THE CRIMINAL AU MEME

Warning: This meme will contain violent content and possible triggers.



HOW TO PLAY:
1) Post a comment below, detailing your character and canon. For best results, DO NOT LEAVE THIS COMMENT BLANK; pick a role, or an AU, or write up a little on what you'd like to explore with your character.
2) Tag around and make magic happen.
3) If you get stuck, use RNG to select from the options below.

THE ROLE.
1) Criminal. (The one who committed the act.)
2) Law enforcement. (Cop, FBI, prison guard.)
3) Witness. (What did you see?)
4) Victim. (Probably not applicable in the case of murder. … Probably.)
5) Lawyer, judge, or paralegal. (Participant in the legal system.)
6) Private security. (Unaffiliated, but with an interest in keeping your client safe. Or in getting your target caught.)
7) Other. (Let your imagination go wild.)

THE CRIME.
1) ROBBERY. The crime of stealing via force or threat or fear.
You need the money. You're desperate. You have the gun, the convenience store is right there, and everything will be better once you've finished the job.

Or maybe you've been hired. Provide a little intimidation, and someone else will take care of all your problems.

Or it's a thrill. Rolling across the country, robbing banks as you go. A Bonnie & Clyde crime spree, and it can only end one way.

2) BURGLARY. Illegal entry into a building for the purposes of committing theft.
Non-violence, for you; you're just going to break in, take this one thing. Maybe a television, to sell for the cash. Maybe some jewelry, a computer.

Or maybe you're a master thief, dangling from a wire into a museum. Sliding through the air ducts of a skyscraper in search of a particular little item.

3) GRAND THEFT AUTO. The criminal act of stealing a motor vehicle.
You know your cars. And you can steal one in under 60 seconds. Better hope you don't get tripped up with one of those newfangled security systems.

4) MURDER. The act of killing another.
He had to die. He had to, and the guilt of knowing where you buried the body, of knowing that the police are coming after you -- it's starting to wear down your sanity.

5) SERIAL MURDER. A crime involving the killing of three or more people over a period of more than a month.
You have a drive to kill. Again, and again. Nothing satisfies it, nothing stops it. Maybe you hate yourself. Maybe you hate the human scum who only exist to go under your knife.

Or maybe you're a professional hit man. You've killed dozens, you know how it goes. It's just business.

6) CONSPIRACY. An agreement between two or more persons to break the law at some time in the future.
Mafia, Yakuza, crime families who keep their operations quiet under pain of death, dishonor, betrayal of the family. You're part of one of these operations, whether as a patriarch or a peon.

7) FRAUD. Intentional deception made for personal gain.
Blackmail. Cover-ups. Insider trading -- the marks of corporate crime. Perhaps you're a CEO who thinks they can do whatever they want. Perhaps your business is on the rocks and you just need a little time to make your golden parachute before you ditch it.

Or maybe you meant to destroy it. Maybe you're a professional con man, and you're stepping away from your latest conquest with plenty of cash in hand.

8) KIDNAPPING. The false imprisonment of another person against their will.
Do you do it for the ransom? For the money? For revenge?

Or is it a hostage situation, with dozens of prisoners, for some sort of political gain?

9) TERRORISM. The systematic use of terror, especially as a means of coercion.
For a religion, for a philosophy. But -- are you a terrorist, or are you a freedom fighter? It might just be a matter of point of view.

10) WILD CARD. For any crime not mentioned above.

Comments

[clansman]

[ just a scratch of a low laugh in his wake as mikoto follows him out to the shoddy-edged hallway, a step in lag under the fluorescent lights. clear space, no targets.

it's almost too comfortable. ]

Are you gonna rely on that?

[permit]

[ there's a vague yet fluid gesture with his hand, a slight lift of his shoulders that might've been a shrug.

it's all oddly edgeless, but he's straight-backed and expectant all the same despite the way he never turns his head to address the man behind him, walking onwards. ]

I'm afraid I don't quite understand your meaning.

On our tech? [ ... and then the next, with amusement in his tone. ] On you?

[clansman]

[ a scenario: bones salted and doused briefly in gasoline before struck for flame, abandoned to burn until they turned to ash, and the ash itself crumbled, left in the middle of a desert with the sun rising closer and closer every time for three hundred years.

now imagine all that dryness in four words. ]

What do you think?

[permit]

[ hmph -- with all the smoothness of sandpaper, sure.

and, with dreadful, soundly clear enunciation- ]

That you need me more than I need you.

[clansman]

[ a beat wasted on the quiet (for comparison's sake, no tripped last-minute alarms or staggered lurking breaths around corners) and tone (because oh, how smug) -- and not thought (because there is no calculator in the world sturdy and versatile enough for mikoto to calculate those odds).

still - ]

Guess it counts.

[ to the door! ]

[permit]

[ he checks his wrist for the time, tapping the glowing face of his watch to the count of the next handful of seconds before they hit the one hour and thirteen second mark. from what he's already gathered, the first floor will be the easiest sweep -- as long as they stick to the sides, he'd told suoh mikoto a few days before, when he rattled off the game plan with more than half a mind that the chances of the other man actually listening were slim to none. i know your group tends to stick out more often than not, was the first understatement he had allowed himself, and while i am sure it makes for a good show, it's also somewhat of a giveaway as to who exactly is responsible for it.

(he had smiled, too, when he took a long drag of his cigarette and curiously inquired, smoke curling out of his mouth in tendrils, like a serpent -- how well can you use a gun?)

they reach the end of the hallway and he stands, back pressed against one of the double doors as he slowly opens the other, the press of the brass handle soundless with the care with which he commits to the otherwise tension-less action. he peers through the small opening and counts, lifting four fingers to verify that, yes, there are four guards on the first floor, just as he'd reminded suoh in the car.

all of them guard the stairs. every ten minutes, they circle the side rooms to patrol. it isn't so much the patrolling that makes it difficult, as it is the fact that there are two guards on the balcony floor above this one -- should the four guards not check back in front of the stairs after ten minutes, the two above will likely run off to alert the others of something gone awry.

they have about three minutes before the four guards begin patrolling close enough for them to snag them -- about ten to get rid of the two above. ]

How are your nerves?

[clansman]

[ cues and signals and caution. this, mikoto imagines, is how plans should go -- imagines, because planning's never been his problem, and because this isn't either. the job's the priority, isn't it.

the sliver of space confirms: no extra guards, the stairwell a straight slope of railing and cold lights, and the room's gaping illumination is relatively helpful, aim-wise, and they've got a certain quantity of minutes and change to make it through. it isn't four, and it isn't zero, and between the two he isn't keeping count. the safety's bare and idling in his grip, one flinch from a shot. a fragile kind of damage -- worth doubting, almost, as to whether he'd taken one of Anna's toys by mistake.

almost. ]

Thought this was just the first floor.

[ --and is that really worth nerves? but it's mostly true -- as far as mikoto'd bothered to think about it -- and only partly delivered with that particular twist to his mouth because munakata reishi's unfrowning expression is beginning to look a little fixed, a little mechanical, worth a little bait. still, mikoto shoulders the door, stopping just short of the hinge's inevitable creak. there he stops, index crooked against the trigger -- considers, weighs an actual estimation. ]

Count to fifty-two or something.

[ in deeply helpful tones. ]

[permit]

[ he's had more than a few years of practice learning how to deal with surly egos, but there's certainly something to be said about suoh mikoto's in particular.

regardless, reishi takes the cocksure remark in stride. he smiles, too -- if it can truly be called that -- as his back straightens against the door behind him, his arms folding across his chest. ]

One minute and forty-six, actually.

[ he remarks casually in hushed tones, adjusting the right arm of his glasses. ]

I suppose it's one minute and ten, now, however- [ and here he tilts his head, gauging the man beside him. ] has your aim improved?

[clansman]

[ an answer would waste breath and thought, and so mikoto doesn't even bother. he slides between the doors, absently heeling the swing of it shut behind him. a shot rings out, the sound of bullet cracking floor, a burst of dust and ceramics -- and in the moment that four out of four guards look sharply over their respective ledges to check for the noise, three shots ring out, mechanical with ease.

(fifty-six, fifty-seven --)

there's silence after that, a brief sputter of curses from a floor up. the fourth guard's jerked his head back behind the ledge by the time the third-lowest collapses -- his steps rattle sharply up the case as he makes his way out. fortunately mikoto's after him.

step after step, there's a fourth shot -- and, at last, silence.

(seventy-four and counting.) ]

[permit]

[ ... he'll admit, it's been a long time since he'd last found himself panicking.

but there it is -- a white-hot blare of anxiety shoots up through his nerves, adrenaline crashing into him like a wave that very nearly has him reaching out to grab a fistful of suoh's jacket before the other man storms into the guarded room before them like a sure idiot. reishi doesn't, of course, when blind desperation isn't something even his instincts know anything about. but his eyes widen marginally regardless, he breathes out of turn --

it turns out to be unnecessary in the end. (and he notes, a little less than clinically -- that suoh mikoto is an impatient, arrogant bastard to boot.)

there's a sigh -- meant, really, to be a laugh -- when he finally steps through the doors just seconds before the fourth shot. he fingers the hilt of the gun in his waistband when it finally rings out, pausing behind a pillar as he listens in on the commotion, straining his ears against the sound of the death rattle of one of the dying henchmen spilling blood on the floor before him.

he steps around to avoid staining his shoes. ]

Suoh.

[ he announces into the silence. because if that grand display of self-restraint didn't give away their position, then a simple check wouldn't hurt either.

so, pleasantly - ]

I don't suppose you're alive.

[clansman]

[ there's a laugh, faint and cut jagged from the chase. from a flight up, mikoto's braced a hand to lean over the railing: prominently graceless, and look at all the fucks he gives about it. ]

Munakata. [ only a little louder than his own summons. ] This way, right?

[ he's even, kindly, waiting. ]

[permit]

[ ... it's not as if there's much to be said.

which is partially why he doesn't say anything at all in response to the blatant dare in suoh's voice. reishi does, however, draw his gun, with a movement delicately precise, his motive incisive -- but he doesn't bring the weapon up to eye-level, pinning suoh with a carefully blank look. ]

deus and disappointing distraction, mea maxima culpa, we'll say i owe you a setup.

[clansman]

[ his answer comes in gestures: a glance to follow the draw and the sinking hand, and another laugh, dimmer than the last. his fingers flick in an idle little wave and he turns, hired muscle obligingly vanishing from the banister's edge.

get a move on. ]

and we'll say i owe you fifty one-liners free of mentions of headgear henceforth

[permit]

[ the huff comes just as suoh rounds behind the wall, just milliseconds too late. it's fine, it's not a real response anyway. (perhaps he's forgotten how to scowl after all of this time out of practice; that's fine, too, it doesn't matter -- his displeasure's obvious enough without a facial expression to match it.)

there's no rush as he heads on up the stairs after suoh mikoto, taking the time to loot a fedora off of one of the corpses as he goes. as much as he'd hate to admit it, the other man's brash charge through the front lines has given them an extra window of time even reishi's hard-pressed to put to efficient use. it's nice, at least, to take it easy, to breathe in and listen to the stillness from the balcony, to immerse himself in the tomb-like silence in the wake of suoh's massacre.

and then, at his watch hand's cue, he opens the door to the walled section of a skyway completely adorned with arched windows, and the streetlights down below illuminating the path. there are plenty of men walking along the streets beneath them, but he doesn't seem deterred.

he doesn't pause, depositing the hat in the empty space before suoh while they're both still out of sight. ]

Walk as usual. Don't dawdle, and don't speed up if you don't want to attract attention.

yeah, like you're ever cashing those.

[clansman]

[ his hands go up; automatically he catches the (non-lit, non-lethal, non-wait what the hell) hat by its brim, already walking before the question actually finds its way to his tongue -- ]

Disguises?

[ dry as a small, salted desert. ]

you don't know me

[permit]

Ah.

[ he's still standing, watching idly as suoh walks right past him into the small, closed-off corridor, just a few steps from the windowed area of the skyway. if suoh takes another step closer into the walkway, there's no doubt he'll - ]

The red is a bit of a giveaway.

but i judge you, i feel like that should count.

[clansman]

[ sssstopping just short. look, look, caution. ]

Yeah? To who?

[ . . . or, at least, a cousin of caution, possibly twice removed! ]

):

[permit]

[ pleasantly: ]

Are you truly this unaware of your notoriety, or was that asked in the rhetorical?

[clansman]

Hah. And you're not?

[ notorious, that is. LOOK, IT'S A REALLY STUPID-LOOKING HAT. ]

[permit]

Arguably. Or not at first glance, perhaps.

[ unhurried, and most importantly of all, unruffled. his shoulders roll in a gesture supposedly meant to be a shrug, but there's nothing casual in his elegantly kept gait, in the way his eyes warm with something less like laughter and more like a simmering flame. ]

They're less likely to notice anything unusual about a man with rather common physical features, no?

[clansman]

[ ... taking the hat ...

and staring at it. all the bloody intrigue derailed for headgear, and a total inability to blow out the floor. THIS IS DUMB. ]

[permit]

[ for how he moves (slow and purposeful, a rolling stride that only just keeps itself from flowing into a prowl) it happens quickly enough -- his heels don't make a sound when he takes a few steps forward with his arm extended, fingers sudden and firm over the back of suoh's knuckles, over the hand holding the fedora. another blink, and the crown of the hat slips over the other man's eyes and forehead, gets pushed with a pressure just shy of biting when the hard material digs into the bridge of suoh's nose.

that's when he leans forward over the man's shoulder, pressing the man against his side and close enough to feel the metal edges of his own gun digging into his hip between the press of their bodies. there's a smile in his tone, in his voice pitched too low to be overheard despite the fact that they're alone in the dimly lit hallway. ]

It's not too tall an order for your family's safety.

Is it?

[clansman]

[ pressure and determination prevail -- the hat, dutifully, gets squashed over his hair. only mikoto laughs; only he turns his head too, undisturbed by proximity or edges. ]

So. [ languidly said, and very close, absolutely unmoved. ] You oughta start moving, right?

[permit]

[ it's close enough to catch the acrid scent of gunpowder coming off of suoh mikoto, and before he can help it, his expression lids with distaste.

but it happens before he arranges the hat properly on suoh's head after all, and therefore it's nothing so giving. still, when reishi clamps a hand over the other man's shoulder with his fingers digging into the bone, it says more than his businessman's smile ever could. ]

With your hands in your pockets. Back straight, if you could.

[clansman]

[ the hat settles, a little high on his skull but enough to cap the color of his hair. which means his free hand finds better purchase in munakata's collar. idle, disinterested, only tugging down slightly.

he hasn't yet looked away. ]

Think they're gonna be looking that close?