M15 Vignettes

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News spreads fast. The brutal murder was reaching every corner of the city- social media worked at double the speed then any public broadcast, and even the TV stations caught on quick. Laufey, snug on the couch in the House where she and her compatriots stayed, watched in horror as a newscaster narrated events as she watched the breaking news report. Her hand was over her mouth.

Nojus watched as well, their face firm and stoic. Shadows lined their eyes as their brow tensed. They put a comforting hand on Laufey’s shoulder. “Perhaps we should watch something else tonight, friend.”

—

Gioia and Honeydew stared at the corpse. A small crowd had started to form from under it, and they remained a good ways away from it—having put down some simple attraction.

The popstar was utterly silent. Her hands shook, the fingers white as she gripped them into fists as hard as she could. She looked towards Honeydew, who calmly put up her hands as if to say “Not my M.O.”. Her wide eyes stared at Gioia, watching her every reaction.

“Call Vasant to get us a ride. I’ll get everyone else collected— we need to talk about this.” Gioia said, stiffly walking away from the spectacle.

—

“She looks beautiful. Like a sculpture.” Helena Beats looked over Grace’s shoulder as the two of them stared at pictures of Paris on the boy’s phone. Grace was almost speechless.

“...It's hard to believe someone could do something like this. All she wanted was something better. Better for everyone.” The brutality stunned him. He had never seen anything like it. He had to stop himself from instinctively crushing his phone in his hand with a claw. The senselessness of it got to him.

“Only someone "exceptional" tends to be capable of this kind of creativity." Helena responded. “But when it comes to murderers, I’ve found that exceptional is rarely a positive.”

—

Marghe wasn’t very happy. He stared at the morbid sight on his phone, before quickly putting it down on the wooden table. “What’s up?” Jim Peckle asked, the concern on his face clear. Marghe was usually pretty tough—something rattled him bad. He sighed, leaning down and rubbing his forehead. “Someone rubbed out that Paris chick… And they did it very-”

“Pictures?” Jim asked, eyebrow raised. He felt concerned for his pal—that stuff was dark.

“Yeah. They aren’t pretty.” Marghe said in return. The pictures were pretty freaky, but that wasn’t even really his concern. That wasn’t Heart of the Rose’s fault, was it? He didn’t remember hearing about any hit orders getting sent out, but if it wasn’t them… Who was it?

Jim pulled Marghe in, giving him some comforting touch. He was ignorant to Marghe's actual concerned, merely worried for a good pal. “Shit, man. Sorry you had to see that. Let’s go see how Who’s doing, maybe? Might help take your mind off of it.”

—

“No no no no! This can’t be happening!” Konan said, pacing back and forth. “Paris was the best shot Bedtown had! If she’s out of the picture, then my shop…”
Konan adored the woman, he really did. The news hit him pretty hard- but when Konan got stressed, old habits kicked in. In classic style, a woman's brutal murder had somehow managed to become all about him.

He was still recovering from his fight with the tigers, bruises lining his body. Dawn was making an effort to try and keep him grounded, grabbing his face and looking into his eyes. “Hey. Hey. Look at me, alright? People will get this sorted out, alright? Your shop isn’t closing, and things’ll keep moving.” She wasn’t too good at this emotional comfort stuff, but at least she was trying.

—

“She seemed like such a sweet lady…” Roxanne said, sitting on the shoulder of Ms. Mayura as they walked through a dark street. “That’s awful.”

Mayura reached her hand up, taking Roxanne’s. “It is awful. It's hard to explain why these things happens, but... Some people are just very ugly inside. Sometimes that ugliness spills out of them, splatters all over everything around them. It's up to good people to stop that from happening, even though it's scary.

Roxanne gripped her hand tight. It comforted her a little... but she didn’t expect that the joy of being alive would come with things this frightening.

—

“Who the hell’s showing us up?” Jyotsna screeched at the TV. “I spend time, money, and love trying to be the biggest baddest crook in Rakin, and somebody goes and-”

“You’re *not* the “biggest baddest crook.” Danny California coldly interrupted. “It’s a whole metropolis. We’re big fish in a big pond…it’d be embarrassing to forget that there’s plenty of space for fish even bigger.”

That just incensed her. “Whoever it is, I’m gonna show ‘em that they pulled shit on *our* turf- and *nobody* fucks with the *Dead City Haunts!”*

—

Alex held Luna tight, the two of them gazing up at the corpse as a cold night breeze washed over them. “Jesus.” Alex said, her gruff voice much quieter than it usually is. “You don’t gotta look if you don’t want to, hun.” She said, trying to comfort Luna.

Inago stepped up beside them, having accompanied them to the festival. His face was red with fury—it took everything inside him to not unleash his Stand. it itched inside him, eager to burst from him like a whirlwind. “Who do you-” Alex said, before Inago interrupted with an uncharacteristically quick, “I don’t know.”

“But they’re not gonna get away with it. Not if I have my way.”

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