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Post by Avalon Yuciano on Jun 15, 2010 17:29:36 GMT -5
It'd been seven years since Avalon had been in London and part of her wished she were anywhere else but London, but she had promised. And Avalon was a woman of her word. Glancing around she spotted the young man she had hired to bring her bags along and waited for him to spot her waving before picking up her own belongings and moving along. God, she couldn't remember the last time she'd felt this frazzled, but there wasn't anything she could do about it now that she'd promised her mother. God, that promise! What had she been thinking the night she'd spoken to her mother about her future? Was that even a question? "Of course not." Because if she had been thinking she wouldn't have found herself in London.
London! Of all places! Inwardly groaning at her self-made disaster, Avalon glanced once more over her shoulder and beckoned the young man toward the archway where she'd hail down a cab, pay him his due, and make her way toward her townhouse. A townhouse she'd never even seen, mind you. "Thank you, mother dearest." She mumbled, raising her hand above her head and hailing down a cab. Once a black automobile spotted her, she turned around, fished a note from her clutch and handed the lad his earnings. "No, I don't need any change." She laughed, "Yes, I'm quite sure it's the right amount. Thank you."
Sliding into the backseat of the taxi, she waited as the man and boy shoved her many trunks into the trunk. Closing her eyes, she refused to see the scenery pass her by as the cabbie started up the engine and pulled away from the curb. It wasn't long before her nerves began to rattle in the backseat and she wondered once again how she'd gotten into such a situation. Mother. Promise. "I can't. Stop. Stop the car!" She braced her hand against her window as the cab driver squealed to a halt and looked at her through the rear view mirror. "Yes, I'm quite all right. Long journey." She leaned back in her seat and placed a hand over her eyes. "No, don't start up just yet." Breathing deeply, she reached for the door. "Take my things to this address," She fetched the note her mother had sent her and handed the slip of paper to the man. "The man inside will pay you twice what your trip would have cost me. Mind you, I have your plate and license number. Straight there, understood?" When he nodded, she pushed the car door the rest of the way and stepped out into the brisk September air.
It was on exiting the cab, watching the cab drive away and stepping back further onto the walk that she stepped into throng of those walking and lost her footing...
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Post by Sirius Black on Jun 15, 2010 18:01:08 GMT -5
"Be advised, Hudson," Sirius whispered behind his newspaper. One of the things he liked about working in the muggle world... The ability to use muggle devices. The implementation of mics was ingenious and invaluable, but unfortunately, they were crap in the Ministry. Whoever thought flying airplanes was a better system of communications, or that sticking your head in a fireplace to talk to somebody cross town, obviously didn't know the convenience of telephones. It didn't matter... Right now he wasn't complaining.
"Black, I've lost sight of him," Gabriel said. "He's disappeared into the crowd. Do you have a visual?"
Sirius cursed. He had slipped into a group of people and seemed to be moving with them, but no. No, he didn't have a visual. "Copy that, Hudson. I'm moving in. Have Martinez cover me. Stand-by." Sirius rolled the Prophet up and started in that direction, moving quickly but careful not to knock anybody over. That would draw too much attention. Soon, he saw the familiar brown coat, and he moved in, but his worst fears were realized.
Knowing he was being followed, he must have panicked... or something. A woman who had just lost her balance was easy for him to just snatch up, and after firing a warning stunner at the taxi which sent people screaming in fear and confusion, he pointed the wand at her temple and held her between him and Sirius and used the car to shield his back.
"Black, what's happened!?" Hudson demanded.
"Be advised. Ferguson has a hostage and has used a spell in plain sight. I repeat, he has performed magic in front of muggles. We'll need the MRS here ASAP and inform the minister. Nobody move until I have secured the hostage." He slowly approached them, his wand at his side, but not pointed at him. "Ferguson... You don't want to do this," he said calmly but clearly.
"Stay back, Black, or I'll shoot her head off. Don't think I won't! Now, drop your wand or I'll paint the London sidewalk with her pretty little head!"
"All right! I'm putting my wand down," he said, setting it on the sidewalk and kicking it out of his reach. In the end it wouldn't matter. He could summon wandlessly. "Now Ferguson, I did that for you. Now you have to do something for me. Release her and nobody will get hurt."
"I'm not going back there," he said manically. "You'll never take me back to Azkaban. You don't know what it's like!" he accused, but then bit his lip, realizing who he had just said it to. Even Sirius made a face that confirmed how stupid that statement was. "I'll let her go just as soon as I know you and your men aren't around."
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Post by Avalon Yuciano on Jun 15, 2010 18:20:42 GMT -5
Avalon grabbed the man's arm that helped her from falling and was on the verge of thanking him for his assistance when he spun her around and locked her against him. "What are you doing?! Let go of me!" The words lost much of their strength as she felt something pressed firmly against her temple. No, this couldn't be... The man's words confirmed her fears. Oh, God! She was being held hostage! To frightened to move, she looked frantically around until her eyes fell upon the man her assailant was addressing. "Help me!" She hissed, too scared to raise her voice any higher than a strained whisper.
The point of whatever he was holding against her temple was jabbed more securely against her skin making her flinch. Oh, God, this couldn't be happening. She couldn't believe it. This is why she hated London! Wait...did he say wand? Azkaban? "You're a bloody wizard!?" She shouted at her assailant. Her eyes flew back at the man who was trying to calm her nutcase down, "Let go of me or you'll regret whether you decorate that walk with my brains or not!" Her nose flared as she hissed at the other man, "I suggest you do something because what you're doing is not working, sir!"
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Post by Sirius Black on Jun 15, 2010 18:36:04 GMT -5
Oh great. Ferguson captured a bloody Rambo. Sirius hated hostages like this. They were more likely to try to take matters into their own hands not realizing that the time it took them to react was about two to three times as long as it'd take him to get a spell off. Statistically, even if she was a trained fighter, the odds were not in her favor to come out victorious if she decided to rescue herself. At least she knew that it was a wand, though. One thing worst than Rambo was a muggle who just thought he was holding a well carved twig at their head.
And then she shot that at him. Her suggestion? He let that roll off of his back. He'd been doing this too long to be taking suggestions from people who'd seen one too many action films. This was real life... Hostage situations were a bit more complicated than just taking a well aimed shot over the shoulder and then returning to home base to celebrate. "Ma'am, please calm down," he said, not even looking at her. His eyes were trained on the wand and he had no intention of taking them off any time soon. As soon as he let his guard down, that'd be it for him.
"Hudson, is grandpa in the den?" he asked. His voice was low, but even so, he had to use the code phrase. Translated to Auror speak, Sirius was asking if they had a clear shot.
"No sir. Taxi is blocking... We could remove the taxi, but that would only endanger the hostage."
"Damn it, Ferguson," Sirius whined, looking back at him. "Did you really think this through. You had two years left. Do you think that killing an innocent bystander is going to get that sentence reduced. Let her go and I'll speak to the Minister personally about your incarceration. You have my word."
Thank God Ferguson was more ballsy than brainy. The fool was actually thinking about it... And that gave Sirius the time he needed. Silently casting Accio, he caught his wand. In that same instance, the taxi behind them slammed into Ferguson, and in that split second before it could hit the hostage as well, Hudson apparated in, grabbed her, apparated out and took her to the other side of the street for her own safety. "Incarcerous!" Sirius shouted, casting ropes to bind the injured man. The taxi landed somewhere off behind him, but he'd let the others deal with that for now.
As soon as Ferguson started coming to, Sirius read him his rights and handed him off to Scudder. He wasted no time in crossing the street where Hudson was still holding the newly freed woman. "Good job, Gabe," Sirius said, turning off his mic. "Take her to HQ. I'll debrief her as soon as I get there. First I have to deal with Collins. See to it that she's comfortable, I'll be there in fifteen minutes at the latest."
With that, he turned around to go meet with the Head of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes. There was going to be a lot of paper work following this event... And another meeting with the Prime Minister which Sirius was sure Lupin was going to look forward to.
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Post by Avalon Yuciano on Jun 15, 2010 18:49:35 GMT -5
It all happened too fast, but she guessed it was better that way. One minute she was in the man's, Ferguson they had called him, arms and the next she was standing on the other side of the street watching the man who had told her to calm down arrest the lunatic. "Serves you right, git!" She shouted across the street before promptly shutting up as the Auror finished his arrest and came towards her rescuer and her. The man, he was handsome she noted briefly, didn't even look at her as he spoke to his man. "HQ? I assume that stands for headquarters. Well, I'm not going." She glanced at the man who had apparated her out of her tight bind, "I'm not. I've just come off the train and I'm exhausted and I've no time for 'debriefings'. So...go tell your boss that if he wants to meet with me, it'll be on my terms and on my time, not his."
The man just stared at her. "Fine, I'll do it myself." Turning on her heel, she went after the handsome one. "Excuse me. Excuse me!" She had to jog, something she was grateful she could do in heels, to catch up with the man's long strides. "You're man refused to refuse your orders so I'm here to tell you myself that I'm not going anywhere. Anywhere, but my house." She smiled, waved cheerfully and walked passed him. "Git." She'd never liked authority and much less those that thought to make her wait.
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Post by Sirius Black on Jun 15, 2010 18:55:17 GMT -5
Sirius was still talking with Collins, barely had time to register what the woman was saying, and once things were slightly sketched out by the tall, blonde woman, he decided to go after the short one. It did not take long for his long legs to quickly catch up to her, and once he did, he reached out for her elbow, taking a firm grip and turning her around. "Ma'am, we can do this the easy way, or the hard way. The easy way would be that you go with Mr. Hudson here and wait for me to debrief you. The hard way is that I could still debrief you... But instead of being a free woman, you'd be a prisoner behind bars. So, which will it be?"
He had no time for her childish antics. She could name call and taunt all she wanted, but this was not some game for him. This was his job, and one he took quite seriously. "I would not recommend you try to resist this ma'am, as I'm sure you're aware that resisting this would give me probable cause which would give me the right to bring you into custody." Okay, so now he was talking out of his ass, but he did not want to do this without the benefit of a debrief. That would only complicate things. Damn it... Why did women have to be so difficult?
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Post by Avalon Yuciano on Jun 15, 2010 19:08:16 GMT -5
"You do understand, and I don't mean to be rude, that I don't really care." She extracted herself firmly from his grip and shook her head, "Don't do that again." She said, referring to his action of taking a hold of her. "'Probably cause? Bring me into custody? Please don't make me laugh." She was as close to laughing as he was. "Look, I've told you I'm not going anywhere, but my house. If you are so determined to debrief me or whatever it is you call it, you can do it within the walls of my townhouse, not the Ministry of Magic." She wasn't acting this way to make his life more difficult although she would if she had to. She was acting this way because the last thing she wanted was for her mother to raise hell on finding out what had just occurred.
Octavia Yuciano would make something as small as becoming a hostage to some Azkaban escapee for a few short moments into a large and tedious ordeal. She'd blame the ministry loudly for their lack of proper security and she wouldn't rest until the men who had helped save her daughter were fired for not having prevented the case in the first place. And she do it all, not out of some motherly concern for her daughter's well-being, but in hopes that others would begin to stir and vote the werewolf and his merry gang out of office. Her mother was very much against the 'abnormal' and his friends. "Have a nice day." She turned once again and walked across the street.
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Post by Sirius Black on Jun 15, 2010 19:15:16 GMT -5
Well, she took stubborn to a whole new level. Normally it would be amusing. In this case, however, Sirius could have done without it. "To hell with it," he said, waving her off. "Just let her go," he said to Hudson. It would mean more paper work in the long run, but he'd rather deal with that than with her, which said a lot about how frustrated she'd made him.
"Are you sure about that, sir?" he asked, looking at her as though something was growing out of her neck and it offended him.
"Yeah... Let the brat do what she wants. Far be it from me to ruin her day..."
That done, he turned and walked back to Collins, hopefully to never see this woman again.
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