11388/Hell is Gotham People

Hell is Gotham People
Date of Scene:	29 May 2022
Location:	Dixon Docks - Chinatown
Synopsis:	Oh poop...the Ogdru Hem have come up...but "these five are safe".
Cast of Characters:	Vic Sage, Hellboy

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Vic Sage has posed:
Gotham is dying.

There's been a cancer in this city this whole time that's never been excised. It's sickness runs over every aspect of this town. Crooked cops, corrupt politicians, little old ladies selling their pills to get by. Nothing is sacrosanct in Gotham. But who will be its deliverance? That is The Question.

With his blue trench coat billowing in the salty breeze, The Question leaps from a nearby building to light on the roof of Universal Exports, a beaten-down and weathered now-defunct shipping company. Its warehouse has say largely unoccupied for going on five years now. Officially, at least. Though word has reached Vic Sage that something dark has been going on within.

It's a poorly hidden secret that young girls are smuggled through the docks by an Eastern European cadre known as Wyzwolenie. They keep impeccable records and their bookkeeper is remarkably talkative when the right pressure is applied; notably, a broken table leg to the base of the neck. The accountant let it slip that a new group has been ordering girls. Some shadowy, cult-like weirdos, in his words. He didn't know what they were doing with them, just that their money was good.

The faceless detective Vic shuffles slowly across the rooftops, his attention shifting left and right between skylights, looking for a sign of anything going on within.

Hellboy has posed:
    Meanwhile, while it's absolutely terrible and worth every ounce of public attention and taxpayer dollars to shut down a human trafficking ring, even in Gotham, that's not the 'thing that goes bump in the night' that Hellboy has been sent after. For the most part, he's used to trolls, but not with ones who don't have a face at all.
    Intercepting someone running along the rooftops is easy. Hiding on rooftops is a lot harder. However, as Vic's attention is clearly not on the possibility of someone else being up here with him, the vaguely, almost, very nearly sneaky demon manages to close the distance. "Hey, no face!" Red calls from the edge of the roof he finds himself sharing with the detective.

Vic Sage has posed:
Vic's expression is sometimes easy to read. For instance, when he's frowning. Which he is right now. He doesn't like it when people get the drop on him. The Question turns his lack of eyes on Hellboy and the detective stands up straight, looking the man all over.

"Thought you were a myth, Hellboy," remarks Vic's gravelly affected voice. There's a theory circulating the internet that a giant Nazi-born demon is actually the real black hand (or red) that's been manipulating the global super government for decades. He doesn't lend that theory much credence.

Hellboy has posed:
    The demon's pride gets the better of him and he saunters forward. "Hey, I'm pretty mythical, but I'm real as you," he says. He stops a first down away from the other man. He gestures, making no attempt to hide his curiosity or the fact that he's staring. "So what's that, glamour? It's not acid burns if you don't have a face."

Vic Sage has posed:
"I'm not real. Haven't been for years. Just a spirit. An idea. An inquiry," Question says, hands slipping into his pockets. "Pseudoderm," is his answer to Hellboy's question.

"What do you know about what's going on inside of Universal Exports?" he asks, a foot reaching out subtly to gesture towards one of the skylights.

Before he gets his answer, he's already asking another question. It's his thing. "The words Ogdru Hem mean anything to you?" he asks. He knows they probably do. He continues his study of the big man.

Hellboy has posed:
    Red looks into the Universal Exports endeavor through the skylight, though the talking on the roof has definitely attracted some attention. That warrants a frown from the cambion sharing roof space with the inquiry. As Question asks about the Ogdru Hem, Hellboy's face lifts and he makes eye contact once more, less curious and more serious as he draws his huge revolver from its holster. He doesn't raise it, it's just ready now for when people burst onto the roof with guns aiming to stop this nice discussion. "Where'd you hear that?" he asks.

Vic Sage has posed:
"The man who lead me here said it. He said he thought it was Albanian. It's not Albanian," Vic says.

Question's hands stay pocketed, even with the movement going on below them. "What's happening down there isn't smuggling, is it?"

Hands slide free of his coat and one is gripping for the 1911 tucked into his shoulder holster.

Footsteps can be heard clanking up the inside catwalk. Only a few moments and the cultists will be upon them.

Hellboy has posed:
    "Not really why I'm here, but if they're involved, I doubt it," Hellboy agrees. He flips the safety on his overlarge custom weapon. Looking to the catwalk, he turns his right side away from it, lifting his firearm up to his left side at arm's length. "Feel like you'll do better about finding out. I'll hold their attention."

Vic Sage has posed:
"So why are you here?" Question asks, producing his pistol and pulling the slide back with a heavy and satisfying CLINK.

He begins stalking towards the one door that leads up to the rooftop, sidling around to stand just to the side of it, weapon at the ready.

Their time is up. The door swings open with a meaty kick and a trio of the cultists burst through out onto the rooftop, each of them wielding curved daggers. At the sight of Hellboy, they look on in awe.

"Anung Un Rama..." one of them says, looking to the others. He's about to speak again when the barrel of a Colt is pressed to his temple and all of his bright ideas go shooting out of the other side of his head.

Hellboy has posed:
    Hellboy has no time to answer the question when the cultists are at the roof. He fires once, his cold iron bullet wasted penetrating simple human flesh. He rushes forward and grabs the third cultist's head, smashing it through the far wall and letting the man's limp body go so it can fall. "You, uh..." he says before walking back a step. "You better handle these guys," he concludes. "Nobody who uses that name has good intentions, and my bosses don't know this is going down." He tosses the Samaritan to his Right Hand of Doom and slips a smartphone from his pocket. He unlocks it with a swipe and touches a quick-dial number.

Vic Sage has posed:
"Agreed," Vic says. Does he know all about Hellboy's penchant for world-ending? Maybe. Vic knows a lot of things.

The Question swings past the now open door and tackles a charging cultist, the two of them rolling down the stairs before coming to a stop at the landing. Question's forearm intercepts an elbow to his head and he's rolling over on top of the man, pistol gripped like a club. It's swings harshly into the assailant's nose more times than is necessary. Down at the next landing, another cultist is screaming commands back down into the warehouse. Question throws his gun into the man's head, stunning him for enough time for Vic to leap across the stairwell and drive a knee into his chest. The two collapse into a fist-swinging pile on the floor before Question gets the upper hand, dragging himself and his target up to their feet before he hip throws him over the edge, the man clanking meatily against a few railing on his way down to the ground.

Vic picks up his gun and continues his march down the stairs.

Hellboy has posed:
    As Vic ends up being the distraction, Hellboy takes the opportunity to change the ammo in his revolver away from the fewer cold iron rounds and into just some shotgun shells. He pinches the phone between his shoulder and ear and ducks to move to the edge of the roof. More and more of the cultists go to intercept Vic.
    Once his call is over, Hellboy vaults over the side of the roof and down. He lands without difficulty. He opens the locked door also without difficulty, though only because his Right Hand of Doom doesn't get enough resistance from the flimsy steel to register that it was locked in the first place. He moves toward the girls who are still captured. He doesn't want to have to deal with the cultists, the Question's questions possibly less so, but he is as shivalrous as an old-timey knight crossed with a horny teenage boy, and he can't just let them be left in slavery. He's not the best at stealth, but the Question is making an awful good distraction, which lets him get by at it.

Vic Sage has posed:
As Big Red approaches the girl, he'll see clear signs that they were being prepared for sacrifices. Some that didn't 'make the cut' are already dead and have been left in a pile. The ones still drawing breath, however, have been bathed and perfumed, and their blank expressions so clear signs of having been subjected to some fierce narcotics. Five long granite plinths, arranged as if they were the points of a pentagram lay ready for them.

"Anung Un Rama!" shouts a man from behind him. He looks quite mad, his eyes have been gouged out, his lips are cracked and covered in sores, and one of his arms has been replaced with a writhing black tentacle that's nearly as big as the rest of his body. "You have tread upon sacred ground and must be destroyed! These girls will not be leaving with you today! They are of utmost import to the return of our great and horrible Ogdru-Jahad! Their bodies will be twisted and broken and made as unto vessels for the Ogdru Hem!" he leaps towards Hellboy.

Vic, on the other hand, continues his fight down the stairwell. His ammunition is spent, and he's returned to relying on the lessons he learned from Richard Dragon. Not least of all, knowing how to take a punch.

Hellboy has posed:
    Red doesn't look at the man shouting at him. He pulls the trigger and the priest's head just explodes. "Yeah, no," he says as he stares at the pile of dead girls, his pistol being put away. He waves his hand in front of one of their faces. Unresponsive as she is from the drugs, she won't feel it when the demon piles them up on his shoulder like cordwood. He picks her up and tosses her over his shoulder, then grabs another and does the same. Standing with five beautiful young probably virgins over his shoulder, the demon draws his pistol again. His gun is NOT quiet, and despite Vic being a great distraction, he's drawn attention, only now he's got people on him that he would give his life to protect.

Vic Sage has posed:
The doorway from the stairwell into the body of the warehouse swings open and The Question comes staggering out of it, followed by a man swinging a baseball bat into his back. Vic OOOFs and spills over onto the floor. The assailant steps forward and lifts his bat to swing again but is caught off guard by the yellow gas that envelops the two of them. When it clears, Question is back on his feet and his attacker is sprawled on the floor, his neck twisted in a wholly unnatural way. Question picks up the baseball bat and moves to close the distance between himself and Hellboy, clocking their surroundings. "Sacrifices," he surmises. "My car's just down around the block. Follow me," he says, overtaking Big Red and marching out of the door and back out onto the street.

Hellboy has posed:
    Red only takes a moment to consider. Question Man is the lesser of his worries, right now. He's got his cell phone and whatever other SHIELD tracking devices he's unwittingly carrying. "Right," he says. He takes one last glance at the pile of dead bodies, crosses himself with his left hand, and moves onto the streets of Gotham to follow his new...ally?

Vic Sage has posed:
Question tosses his baseball bat aside and straightens his gloves, looking over his shoulder at Hellboy. "A summoning?" he asks. "I hate cultists. Too many of them in this town."

His leather shoes trod over the concrete with determination, rounding a corner, leading them through an alleyway, quickly picking a lock that leads inside of a laundromat, swinging that door open, not even setting foot inside of it, continuing down the alleyway, and rounding a corner to reveal the 1966 Pontiac GTO sitting there waiting for him to return.

"Is there somewhere we can take them?" he asks, looking up to the demon.

Hellboy has posed:
    "I've got my guys incoming," Red says. He pulls his vibrating phone from his pocket. He answers it and puts it on speaker with a tap before simply addressing Question while slipping his phone into his nebulous coat pocket. "Five girls, possibly even not from around here, in the hands of a demon and a man with no face?" he sums up. "Can't exactly go to the cops." He opens the door of the car and looks inside. He then huffs out a sigh and shuts the door. "Not gonna fit in this car," he says.

Vic Sage has posed:
"Your guys?" Question asks, looking across the car at the man with an eyebrow very clearly raised beneath his mask. "Who are your guys? And what where you doing here in the first place, if not stopping an apocalypse cult?" he asks, moving to pop the trunk and sliding his hat and coat off to toss back there. "You could ride back here. I'm a very good driver," Vic explains, sitting on the lip of the trunk and sliding the first aid kit back there a little closer to him. He rolls up a bloody yellow shirt sleeve and sets to work stitching up a gash on his left forearm.

Hellboy has posed:
    Hellboy considers things, and while he's doing that, gunshots ring out. He ducks instinctively, holding up an arm to protect the girls he's still carrying all on one shoulder. The ones on the bottom are likely going to feel it when they sober up, but at least they won't be dead. He jumps up into the trunk. "Keep that blood inside you and drive," he insists. Reaching out, he grabs a handful of the car's roof...yeah, that's not going to buff out.

Vic Sage has posed:
With his stitch only halfway done when the shots start firing, Vic's eyes Bolt open wide and he's looking towards the sound. Hellboy's already diving into the trunk, though, so at least that particular negotiation is passed.

Vic's squatting down and crab walking to the front door. He slides it and cranks the mighty V8. As he'd promised Hellboy, Vic is a /very/ good driver. Now did he leave out the 'stunt' part? Yes. But will they get away mostly in one piece and with great style. Also yes.

Hellboy has posed:
    Hellboy has to drop himself down to his knees, sliding the batch of living, breathing bodies onto his overly crowded lap to keep them from being shot or flying out of his grip. He takes a couple bullets in the back, but it's nothing he hasn't dealt with before. He looks at the dead eyes staring blankly out into space and his jaw muscles tighten. He closes his eyes and counts silently to himself before he begins softly singing a lullaby to the high girls who have, thanks to himself and the faceless man, failed to be sacrificed, even though several other women are now dead. These five are safe. He repeats that in his head as he sings Twinkle Twinkle Little Star softly, not really sure what else to do. Over and over, he repeats it to himself. These five are safe.