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It grated on Albite, relying on others to get to and from places he needed to be. Especially for an assigned task. He hadn't spent nearly enough time in the spaces that housed their people to know his way around properly, couldn't teleport in and out at whim. It wouldn't have mattered as much if it didn't make him feel like an absolute inconvenience. He wanted to be useful and not in the 'congratulations on becoming cannon fodder way', but genuinely useful.

He couldn't dodge the branding heat of less than pleased looks as he passed, and not just because he was a low rank, but because he was a Senshi. Those who had been here 'before' the nice little baton pass amongst the current regime, especially from the few other corrupts he'd crossed paths with, the one's who'd had to live with what it was like pre 'peace, fellowship, and comradery' for all. Just because it was the 'new rule', didn't mean everyone was het up on drinking down the Kool-Aid and forgetting.

He was told it was better now, that he'd gotten in at a good time. Was making all of the right choices. A lot of pc branded drivel and soft phrasing about how things were. Albite was thinking people were mistaking his 'niceness' for stupidity; naivety even. It certainly explained the reaction he'd gotten when he agreed to this. The fact that he'd brazenly disregarded whatever rumors and gossip about Faustite had followed. He was making a conscious choice. He needed something to do, and Fuastite was a General, youma, on fire, whatever. Even if he didn't quite know what he was walking into, he'd size things up for himself. He didn't wanna hear it from anyone else.

Albite was so engrossed in the idea of what he should have been looking for, that he'd nearly walked past the general the first time. Tripped over himself once he realized his mistake, growled an apology at two other officers he brushed past. Only to spend another moment standing dumbly before the man. Not entirely sure he'd gotten it right - even though his energy screamed 'yeah ya did dumbass'.

"Hey, Faustite right?" Did he prefer the titles, something else? Damned if Albite was one for code of conduct and he was sure the man'd correct him if he misstepped."M' Albite, sorry if I was late. This place is...yanno..." gesturing vaguely at the whole of it, as if that explained everything "...but uh. At your service, beck 'n call, etcetera." and the grin on his face for the general was genuine.

Any pause he gave while staring, he'd blame on the screaming wall of shadows looming directly behind the general that made his skin want to crawl alllll the way o f f. He wanted to get the man a sandwich, a hospital, dry tinder? Something. He'd expected the general to resemble some perverse blazing hellfire born human, not a slightly wet bag of dying embers.

h a t e d it. Next chance he got he was filing a complaint with HR about the details of his job description, and then demanding the drivers license to his own damned body so he could run the thing. Playing passenger was disorienting as all get out, especially when he didn't have any indication on where they were supposed to be headed!

Which apparently was the rooftop of the museum, in the middle of the day, 'senshi and youma-esque firebrand' all out on display. He'd be shocked if they didn't attract company, or cops, both...The whole situation just screamed 'for a good time fite me' .

To top it all off, Albite now had reason to sympathize with juice boxes world round. His arm still warm from where Faustite had held it, the drained tingling sensation lingered, well beyond the point where his swimming vision and general vertigo subsided. Blessedly quick enough that he could manage a coherent sounding response to what seemed like an insanely tall order.

"Huhhn...yeah-yeppers..gottcha" a couple of weeks worth?! What was that in people? Albite wanted the numbers in metric. An order was an order though and he understood it, would nod along even as he figured out how best to be bait and spotter without accidently getting himself tased by security. It'd have been infinitely easier if he coulda slipped the powered guise and played 'hot tour guide'. Whatever, Albite wasn't going to b***h bout being given lemons when he had a perfectly good recipe for lemonade.

"There's uhm..s**t..they've got those exhibits yanno? World heritage exhibitions - tours of Egypt, ancient Mesopotamian stuff..." and Albite was moving then, eying the steepled skylight windows. A lot of them could be moved or tilted open, often had a pole or chain latch just outside. Something he'd learned about somewhere. Something to do with fire safety? He couldn't remember..."You could blend in nice there, play mannequin or something. It'd be darker." the words hissed in a rush as he tossed the sun above them a glare while carefully moving along each window. "We've got the tablets yeah? You comm me when you're in place, I lead 'em in." There were a lot of long dark corridors, benches for napping bodies, even an amphitheater of sorts for whatever documentary they were showing at the time. Albite could see it working. They could get what they needed, hide the rest, no one would notice if they were careful enough.

Albite found a particularly loose window, tested the latch on it before strong arming it open, the soft ping as it gave from rust and disuse. Ever so slowly he tilted it open until he could peer over and locate a nice spot to drop in near some railing; close enough to a hallway that the could slip off the main path and get working. He could have gone for a roof exit door, but didn't want to chance tripping an alarm so early on in the game. Besides, if there was one good thing about people in a museum? They never tended to look up. Half of them had headphones, cell phones, whathaveyou, all of them were too busy gazing slack jawed or chittering about.

It wasn't much of a plan, but it was all he had and he hoped Faustite would be okay with it. Albite had a moment where he genuinely felt for the General who looked far worse off than he should have, maybe teleporting sucked for him too? Albite wasn't a doctor...or an expert on whatever Faustite was, but he was pretty sure 'hacking up black ooze' fell under the sign of things that 'should not happen'.

"Yah-kno, I gotta say, never been sucked off quite like that before. Most people buy a guy dinner first; personal suggestion. Take it or leave it." Drawled out slowly as he glanced between Faustite and the open skylight. Let his gaze linger even, before heaving a rough sigh and dropping in. Landing in a heavy crouch Albite was moving as soon as his boots touched the carpeted flooring. Tilting right around a corner and making a beeline for the nearest set of stairs; just in case someone had seen. He'd head straight for one of the more exotic exhibits. He could play native attraction for the locals if it worked.

Only slowing to nice meandering pace once he was sure he was in the clear, and then, he started hunting....

Albites brain was running full loading screen, processing what the General had said in his stilted, gruff tone, because - *oh he shoulda known all of that* - That was like, important information or something? Suddenly the concept of what being bait actually entailed had clicked firmly into place. Along with the very loud thought of - 'Wait..but if he's up there, getting all the goods, how the ******** do I get out afterwards? The front doors? The window I came through?'

"Wow..I am some kinda stupid." he hissed to himself, tousling his long dreads into something he wasn't stepping on while he moved through the exhibit and exited into an adjacent section that remained in view of the skylight. Albite marveled a bit at everything on display and all of the people.

He r e a l l y hadn't thought this through.

He could admit he'd been stupid, yes, but the handsome kind of stupid! He was going to make a list of s**t to learn, and like, ask REAL questions. He needed to work with more Generals, or ******** Captains, something? Mabye read a book? Which, hell they had an Infops group solely for that s**t. He'd do that - Instead of playing the role of potato in the worlds longest game of 'pass the Senshi'. Albite was not some basic b***h. A Basic yes, but ********.....

"I'm just too damned easy." Albite sighed and made one mental note of many, to berate himself later for lacking in all the areas, and to make up for it with some significant progress. In the meantime he needed to focus on the fact that Faustite wanted him to be 'useful'. Easy. Get 'em in one place, close enough for the general to do his thing, didn't need to touch 'em.

E a s y

He absently pet some of the pelts he walked past, marveled at a bone or two that belonged to - an animal - whale? The plaque said something about a filter feeder - so definitely whale. A grin remained etched on his face for anyone who passed by. He even shamelessly flexed for a small group of older women who stared just a little bit longer than they should have.

It was an exhibit after all, and Albite was always down for being on display.

He thought it was hilarious that a museum would have a whole indigenous winter themed exhibit going on in the middle of summer. Museum's were supposed to be dusty, full of mummies and bad modern art. This one was actually kinda cool. He nearly got distracted even, looking around while summarily picking out potential targets, and chewing over the best way to go about reeling them in. Maybe the guards would have been best? Woulda sucked for him, but at least he'd get a kick outta watching the General snack on 'em..

He didn't necessarily want to drag a bunch babies into the line of fire. Or did he? Maybe children would have been better? They had all sorts of energy!

Casually he looked up and caught sight of Faustite's visage. Those ember eyes boring into him with meaning. In response Albite tilted his head like an especially intelligent and endearing Labrador, gestured openly at the whole of the museum, and then he grinned. Like he'd done a really neat trick. There was a whole place chock full of somethings. All sorta somethings. Ceiling somethings, floor somethings, every shape size and flavor of 'something'.

He should have maybe taken more than five seconds to speak with the General before leaping in.

It was fine though. Albite was forming an idea, changing his plans as he went, now that he knew he wouldn't have to lure them around in the museum - Just up close enough to those skylights.....

So Albite started a rumor - tracked back to the haggard looking moms - made nice and exclaimed "There's a raffle for free childcare, courtesy of the museum. We'll be calling out names from ticket purchases in about five minutes on the topmost level. Just look for me." he winked as he flitted past. Throwing on all the charm he could muster "I know you fine ladies could enjoy some free time without the little ones. Make sure to tell your friends, you could make a girls day of it."

Circling to another section to find a group of kids harassing the some of the touchable items. Flint rocks, magnetic ancient metals, petrified wood. Albite barked "Hey! Free ice pops, five minute's, top level. Don't tell anyone." best way to ensure every person in ten miles knew something, was to tell a group of kids to shut up about it.

Besides if the guards got suspicious of him, all the better. Bodies were bodies. Albite had gone from panicking about being spotted, to tossing all caution to the ******** wind. If Faustite weren't going to be down there, it was a little less to worry about. People weren't as likely to freak out about him as they would have a living furnace...

Albites grin was nearly Cheshire as he answered the buzzing device with zeal, loving the way the little pen flicked open effortlessly into a tablet; the organizations modernization was the absolute best.

"Let them chase me huh? Is this a hate to see you go, but love to watch you leave sorta thing?" he laughed into the communicator before stowing it away in whatever magical space held it, excited for what he was taking to heart as an 'absolutely must obey' order of the highest regard. Cause Albite could make his leaving very, very interesting indeed.

Chase implied he shoulda simply started running, but Albite needed to have some fun for himself too. Give the local doughnut brigade a show, inspire the youth, be someone worth chasing!

He needed to cause a scene.

He hadn't even gotten his daily workout in yet! With that logic firmly steering the wheel, Albite moved to get a head start on it; there being no time like the present and all that jazz.

Albite ran full tilt to the nearest spot of railing, and vaulted the thing like a gymnast. His long body and the power granted to him by his form helped him eat the distance of the gap - palms gripping against the rungs on the adjacent wall that had been firmly mounted along the second floor. From there he used the decorative siding adorning it to further descend.

Albite made a show of dropping with ease from one floor to the next. Listened for shocked shouts and heavy steps. Paused - only when a large extinct mammals exhibit caught his eye. Some wooly thing hunted to death long before, a baby mammoth, or a giant sloth? Albite didn't particularly care. Muscles straining briefly as he hoisted himself up and over the siding one more time and planted his feet firmly on the carpet ******** - Binding Retribution!" the tattoos across his body slithered to life and flew from his skin to form a tether that leashed him to a leg of the statuesque creature. The ink made living ribbon bound it tightly. Once Albite sensed he was firmly cinched, he threw the entirety of his weight onto his heels, then hauled back until it cracked and the bulk of it gave out under the pressure. Whooping joyously amidst the screams of museum goers when the whole of it came down in a horrendous scattering of support wires and cavalcade of busted bones and plaster models. As soon as the thing was down Albite dropped the magical casting and got moving again.

If he hadn't had the whole places attention before, he sure as ******** had it now.

With that in mind, Albite dutifully made for the front. Definitely heard the local museum cops screeching over their walkies to close the thing off...He'd make a race of it, a personal challenge for which the only existing record was a mental one he’d set for himself. Either he'd make it out the doors, or get tazed for being a brazen jackass.

Strickenized

Albite hit the doors full force with his right shoulder, felt the hinge and bar give as it rattled in its frame. Head whipped around as he stared wide eyed behind himself, into the pissed off, crew cut toting, cops eyes. The guy looked like a man of purpose, and he had him in his sights.

Albite knew that man would make him pay for it if he managed to get his hands on him. It was that thought that spurred him just a bit faster through the doors, his speed combined with the way he twisted his body nearly sideways to make for a smaller target, was probably all that saved him in that instant.

"Owowow-shitting son of a b***h!" Albite cussed up a storm as he watched the man squeeze off a shot from the taser, the prongs flying with vicious purpose just as his momentum pulled him through the exit to the front of the building.
Even if one of the prongs had missed, the other found its mark with perfect accuracy. A bit of snapped wire still dangled from where it had thoroughly embedded itself into the muscle that encased his ribs on the left side. He'd heard the second prong ping off the metal framed doors, and without a way to complete the circuit, he escaped unshocked, if not completely unscathed.

Narrowly he avoided a makeout session with the well maintained concrete stairs that led out from the building's entrance, as he stumbled onto and down the steps. Albite slid past the rows of shocked museum goers, leapt to the bottommost part where stair blended into sidewalk, and tilted around the side of the building. Gaze cast upwards in search of a safer spot to spring up to, hopefully one that would put him on a rooftop not so close to this one. He could already imagine the sirens...

Or maybe they were actively approaching? He couldn't think beyond his own glee, and the throbbing rush of adrenaline. The brief tinge of pain from the prong was negligible. Though he knew he'd bruise like hell later from both the prong and where he'd made best friends between the door and his right side.

A niggling little thought in the back of his mind about where Faustite had slipped off to. Though it maybe didn't matter, so long as the guy was safe. Wasn't like he'd asked Albite to personally cause this sort of chaos...

Strickenized

Lol! I love it, infinitely, eternally.

Albites head whipped around at the sound of his name, pleasantly surprised to see Faustite's slight frame, and the crumpled lifeless heap that had been Cop 1. He reached out instinctively to catch the glittering crystal in a gentle cupping of hands.

So Faustite was old school? How F u n.

A flick of his fingers encased the delicate gem in a protective orb, a languid and practiced motion as he deposited it into subspace for later. Future fodder for the Negaverses eternally hungry flames. Whenever he got around to getting back down there.



The thunderous clopping of an overweight bull heralded Justices appearance into the alleyway.

A flat slapping of soles echoed against pavement, drowned out only by wheezed breaths, squeezed from the crumpled bellows that just had to have been the mans lungs giving out. It all screamed diabetically induced asthmatic - coming your way.

Albite almost felt bad for the man as he saw him slough into view. In the back of his mind, he ran through a thousand torturous simulations of how he would have saved him from himself. Until he settled swiftly on the knowledge that putting him down clean was far gentler than what his own piteous end would have been 10 to 30 years from now. In some medically induced coma, tubes and lines struggling mechanically to continue a job the body could no longer manage.

"Hell - Binding Retribution" and Albite closed the distance in stride, consumed the space between himself and the errant officer with long steps.

Even as Justice paled at the realization of Earl being downed, even as he staggered on his overwrought frame to backpedal out of the alley. It was already too late.

The magical bindings had loosed themselves, slid like wet trails of ink over and down Albites flesh, to hook like a lasso between them. Ankle to ankle they were tied, the tether yanking taught when the three feet of distance was tested. Albite kicked his own leashed leg back with force, and took Justices legs out from beneath him like rickety house stilts.

Gravity's pull did the rest.

The back of the mans skull split like a melon across the unforgivably filthy tar and gravel surface, a wet guttural punch of escaped air silenced any scream that would have followed.

"Oof, sorry man, my bad." Albite made the next part quick. It was the least he could do for the poor sack of person he'd downed so erratically. He grit his teeth against the feel of it, because even though there was no blood or gore, even though it was as clean as reaching through water, his mind still readily supplied the visceral image of what should have been.

It didn't make it any less a simple task to dip over and reach within the girthsome chest, clasp the warm essence of Justices self, and yank it free. The only beautiful thing about Justice was apparently on the inside, proven by the glimmering starseed clasped between Albites fingers.

Winded and bleeding.

Justice died with a whimper.

Messy

Albite had meant for it to be cleaner, painless. He lamented his lack of more precise control over his magical ability, but the ink occasionally had a mind of its own, and retribution could be an ugly thing.



"Looks like you just invented a new weight loss program firebrand." not that the man was any less heavier for being alleviated of his life force, but surely his soul was lighter for no longer having had to drag such a massive body around. Relieving him of it was probably a blessing in disguise.

"Figured you'd be more of the calorie burning type, lotsa cardio? Not that you need it. Your metabolism must be insane." ******** did Albite want to get him a sandwich - No - scratch that - Faustite clearly needed carbs. A truck full of white rice and fresh pasta would have done him far more good than a sandwich would have. Something starchy and calorically dense.

Maybe even the rent-a-cops starseeds? Albite didn't think they contained anything nutritional, but he'd never actually tested that theory for himself.

Instead of popping what he now deemed Cop 2's starseed off to the void, he offered it up for the Generals purview. Just In case he needed it to get them out of there.

Strickenized

And this is the way the world ends. Not with a bang, but a whimper ...

“M’sorry did you say ten thousand?” The whiplash between one moment and the next, the weight of carrying on a conversation with multiple tangents all at once. Albite took a deep breath and centered himself on the task at hand. Make the body disappear. He felt a little guilty for having possibly wasted more of Faustites energy that way, toting on two passengers instead of one. The situation was unavoidable though, and Albite had been the one to make it so utterly messy. <********, yeah.” Murmurs of crowds, broad ******** daylight, Albite hissed an annoyed breath out between his teeth. Tucked the previous starseed away the same as the first, a flick and flickered motion before he'd snagged the hefty day cop and hauled him over.

The apology for the possible ******** died on his tongue, tasted ashen and hollow, because he didn’t work that way. He’d try again, take more missions with the guy, make up for any mistakes and waste he’d made of this situation with doing better during the next run. Actions always spoke louder than words, always.

“Let’s get the hell out of here.” and Albite reached out to Faustite with the body in hand, snagged up by his uniforms stretched collar, Albites strained slightly under the weight, but he’d bear it up for the amount of time it took to get them out of there.