Capo di Tutti Capi IV -- Information and Story Summary Thread.

[GeneralHankerchief]

Post #3062 of main thread.

"And one morning all that was burning,
one morning the bonfires
leapt out of the earth
devouring human beings --
and from then on fire,
gunpowder from then on,
and from then on blood.
Bandits with planes and Moors,
bandits with finger-rings and duchesses,
bandits with black friars spattering blessings
came through the sky to kill children
and the blood of children ran through the streets
without fuss, like children's blood."

...I'm Explaining A Few Things
...Pablo Neruda


Eighth Night -- The Streets of Fatlington

fubbleskag never saw the end coming. He was walking down a side street, paranoid enough - you never survived long in Fatlington if you weren't, that was a rule - but he never expected the attack to come from THIS angle. Mafiosi, scum of the earth that they were, were at least supposed to have standards. That's what set them apart from the small-time gangsters, as it were. They had a code, things they would never stoop to do. Apparently ruining one's suit in the name of a kill was not one of these things.

As fubbleskag walked down the side street, a man watching from a nearby window signaled his partner by dropping a small rock onto the lid of a trashcan located directly below him. The can's lid lifted by a few inches, held in place by a head. The figure inside the trashcan paused, sighted his target, and then silently drew his silenced gun, firing it thrice. fubbleskag never saw it coming.

Upon examining his target, the attacker placed two Franklin silver half-dollars over fubbleskag's eyes, muttering that he would rather have saved the coins and taken his ruined suit to the cleaners. He then tipped his hat - the "all clear" signal to his partner at the window - and vacated the scene.


sturmhauke's attackers exhibited no such subtlety. They found their target drinking from one of the town's seedier bars - sturmhauke decided to stop frequenting the Hotel Abbatoir and Club 30 after so many incidents had happened there - and immediately zoned in, drawing their guns and preparing to open fire.

sturmhauke was taken by surprise, as were many patrons of the bar, but one such person was not. Seeing the entire thing as it was happening, he quickly stood up, splashed his drink in one of the attacker's faces, and threw his now-empty glass as hard as he could at the other. It was a hit, and Attacker Number Two went down, howling in pain. He was bleeding in a couple of different parts of his face.

Upon recovering, Attacker Number One saw his partner's predicament, and had a choice to make: finish the assignment, or tend to his partner. Another moan from Attacker Number Two made the decision for him. Cursing, Attacker Number One picked his partner up and left the bar, leaving a very befuddled sturmhauke to buy his savior a drink. Nobody noticed the picture of Alaska with the words "Seward's Folly" scrawled inside the outline the attackers had left behind in their hasty retreat.


Scienter was at her favorite wine bar, sipping on her usual vintage, trying to get to that preferred, happy place where she was liquored up enough to forget the fact that she was very likely to die soon, but still sober enough to be observant of her surroundings and enjoy the taste of her wine. The patrons seemed like regulars, she had recognized all of them there before - save by one shadowy figure lurking in the corner. Smoking a cigarette, tossing a 1951 half-dollar in the air, and not even pretending to drink his wine. Scienter knew a Philistine when she saw one. It was time to hightail it out of there.

She made her way to the bar's exit, walking very quickly, when soon she realized the trap. Somebody was of course waiting for her out front, ready to gun her down. It was a textbook trap play, but Scienter had no other choice but to go out. The man in the corner was now pursuing her, his "disguise" no longer needed.

Sighing, Scienter opened the door, fully ready to face death... and saw nothing. Shrieking with more shock than joy, she ran as fast as she could, out of sight. She found herself very much more sober now than she had been one minute ago.


Riedquat found himself in a similar circumstance. He had stumbled upon Fatlington's only all-night fashion boutique, as he was shopping for new stylish winter clothes to make an impression at the Committee meetings. The selections there were quite good if not a bit light - not much you could do with black and grey trenchcoats and hats. Nevertheless, Riedquat found a few items he liked, and went to the fitting rooms to try them on.

Upon entering, he noticed that the fitting rooms, which had several separate changing areas, had three of them occupied. Immediately suspicious, he braced himself against the wall next to one of the occupied the doors and pushed it open, immediately scurrying for cover into one of the empty rooms. Sure enough, a burst of machine-gun fire erupted from the door he had opened, followed by some movement and murmured conversation.

"You get him?" came a voice.

"Nah," said a closer one, "might just have been a breeze. Guess I've got an itchy trigger finger today."

"Well, don't let the whole store know," came a third. "Come on, let's set back up and wait for him to come in."

Petrified, Riedquat spent the rest of the night in his changing area, not making a sound until he heard the other three leave.


Scienter had finally stopped running, pausing to catch her breath. Blind adrenaline had overtaken her until now, and in truth she had no idea where she was right now. It looked like an alley, but Fatlington had too many of those anyway and this one was completely unmarked. Prime killing grounds, in other words.

Already having survived one brush with death this night, Scienter decided to take no chances and hightailed it out of the alley, doubling over so as not to further aggravate the stitch in her sides. A hail of gunfire met her as soon as she emerged from the alley, but it missed high - the stitch had saved her life. Cursing, her attacker reloaded and prepared to fire again - where was his partner?! - but Scienter had decided it was time to improvise, diving into a nearby parked car and hotwiring it to get engine access.

As her attacker heard the engine roar and watched the car drive out of sight, he swore softly to himself. There was supposed to be a follow-up. Would he ever be able to use his King of Hearts?


Khazaar was also the beneficiary of a lack of coordination this night - a common theme, it seemed.

He decided to spend his evening on the boardwalk, an activity that a diminishing few Fatlings took part in these days thanks to the change in the weather. However, there was one other person besides him that still was out, defying the elements and enjoying arguably the best part about living on the Jersey Shore.

Luckily for Khazaar, it was a clear night out, and the moonlight reflected off of two things on the other guy's person. One looked like a coin, right about the size of a new half-dollar. The other was unmistakably a gun. Glancing around, Khazaar looked behind him and saw no one. The other person was two far away. He ran off, the would-be attacker not even bothering to give chase, instead softly cursing.


Even when there seemed to be a large group of people in on the attack, it was still not enough, as robbiecon was to thankfully learn.

He was walking down from the street when gunfire seemed to erupt from every quadrant: above him, directly in front of him, and to both sides. Robbie was sure he was a dead man. All possible lines of escape seemed to be cut off, and there were four people closing in on him. But then survival instincts took over, and he saw something that might provide salvation: a manhole cover.

Rushing forward, ignoring the fresh outburst of gunfire, he threw the cover off and dove down into the hole, leaving the attacker who had been directly in front of him to swear and throw his gun down in fury. "Who was supposed to get him from below??!?!"

Nobody quite had an answer to that.


Monk had decided to take a very long and very gas-wasting drive around Fatlington. Figuring that it was more difficult to be killed while moving, Monk had trusted in the safety of his car. Big mistake.

It was dark out, and this one section of road was not very-well lit. Monk, as driving, did not see the row of spikes laid out on the road specifically for him and his car - and, of course, the 1951 Franklin silver half-dollar that accompanied the spikes, but this would not do any damage - until both sets of tires had rolled over them, completely blowing them out. Monk's first thought was something along the lines of "of all the rotten luck" - then he saw a car speeding towards him in the opposite direction, and his thinking changed. He was a sitting duck.

Thinking quickly, probably before his stupid brain took over and told him how ridiculous of an idea this way, Monk got out of his car and stood right in the other car's path. The driver of the car was not able to resist this and revved up the speed, telling his partner not to fire, that it was more fun this way. Monk leaped, but still took a direct hit and his body tumbled over the other car's hood, broken in more than a few places. The other car, meanwhile, hit the spikes and started swerving into a building.

Monk, unable to move in pain, noted with a pleasure that the ambulance sirens were coming from the direction nearest him. He would get to Mercy first.


In a nearby alley, Camikaze had just entered, coming from another bar. He found facing him a man dressed in a trenchcoat, smoking. His face was shrouded in darkness. Camikaze didn't like this. Immediately trying to get back into the bar, he found the door was one-way only. Uh-oh.

"Hello, Camikaze. It's been quite a while, hasn't it? Since that time in Baltimore, actually."

He turned around and saw that a second figure had joined the first, speaking one. Although not wearing a trenchcoat, this one was taller and more well-built. His face was also shrouded in darkness. This was looking worse and worse. The first one saw the expression on Camikaze's face and smirked.

"Ah, you remember my old friend, don't you? I know he remembers you. You know why we're here, right?" Camikaze, unsure of how to answer, at first played dumb, but then decided that wasn't the best idea. Overall his impression conveyed intense anxiety, but not much else. The first one laughed. "Good, because you now we couldn't forget."

He whipped out a gun and fired several shots at Camikaze, but they had all hit armor. This was Fatlington, after all. Camikaze, losing wind, staggered a few steps back, but he was otherwise unhurt. Meanwhile the alley door had opened again, a man poking his head out and looked ready for trouble. "Everything all right?" he said in a threatening voice, but then he noticed both attackers, one of them with guns drawn, the other one taking large strides to set up behind Camikaze Without a word he stuck his head back into the bar, slamming the alley door. Camikaze was too stunned to try to follow.

Meanwhile, the first one held his gun steady, aiming for Camikaze's head. Just as he was about to fire, though, a sharp blade appeared through Camikaze's neck - Camikaze had been stabbed clean through from the back by the second one.

"Ah, good timing as ever, my friend." The second one looked at Camikaze's corpse questioningly. "No, just leave it, though that's better than he deserved. Now, let me see..." At this, the first one took out a list and crossed out the first of a long group of names. They walked off, this time both of them silent, their faces eternally hidden in darkness even as they passed in and out of shadow.


guiri noticed the chill in the air with disdain. Say what you want about Fatlington in the summer, but these November nighttime winds made for a whole different breed of town right now.

"It could be a lot worse," one figure said suddenly, having appeared seemingly out of nowhere next to guiri. "You could be in Alaska."

"Yeah," said another one, "Seward's Folly ain't no picnic in November, that's for sure. 'Specially up north, 'round Barrow - that's where Will Rogers died, you know."

"Poor man," the first one said, and without further ado they opened fire on guiri a few times before leaving the scene. guiri, however, was not quite dead, lying on the ground and watching the blood slowly spill out from his wounds. None of his major organs had been hit, and had it been warmer out - say, Fatlington in the summertime - he probably would have died from blood loss. However, the cooler temperatures of a windy November night managed to slow down his bloodflow long enough for the ambulance to take him to Mercy and give him an emergency transfer. He would be spending some time there.


Sometime later, a third figure met up with guiri's attackers. "Did you kill him?" he asked.

"Yeah, we got him. Gave him the whole 'Seward's Folly' routine, even managed to throw in a reference to Will Rogers and Barrow. He's a dead duck."

"Works for me," the lone man said. "Partner never showed up. Guess I've got the night off." All three parted ways amicably.


Memnon was in big trouble. Unlike a good amount of his Committee peers, he was the victim of a coordinated attack and experiencing its power firsthand. He had been ambushed just as he was about to open his house's front door, the gunfire coming from the rhododendrons he meticulously kept, and now found himself fleeing for his life.

Looking for cover, Memnon found nothing, and cursed. Why oh why had he kept such a wonderfully-manicured lawn, insisting that no trees grow to spoil the symmetry of things? It turned out that, after all of this, gardening would be a fatal hobby after all. And his wife had discouraged him from rock climbing, too. Oh, the irony of it all.

His thoughts meandering, Memnon spent his last moments like this until a bullet tore through his brain. Afterwards, two figures walked up to him, obliged with the customary 1951 half-dollars over his eyes, and then one of them made the comment.

"Well, at least he'll make for good fertilizer."


robbiecon thought he was safe in Fatlington's sewers. Dirty, perhaps, smelly, oh God yes, but safe too, and that's what mattered. He thought wrong.

He continued inching along, trying not to go too far into the muck, when he heard the voice. "Hi."

"You have GOT to be kidding m-" robbie tried to say, but then was cut off by a hail of gunfire. This time there would be no escaping. He dropped to the ground, his blood slowly adding to the refuse.

Another figure stepped out of the shadows, regarding his partner oddly. "And I thought you were going to start monologuing, too."

"Nah," said the first, "thought better of it when I realized how bad it smelled down here. C'mon, let's take his toe and get out of there." And they did.


Though robbiecon was in a very bad situation by the end of his night, Frozen in Ice's predicament was even worse. Yes, the smell was better, but not by much, and he was tied up in a chair with no clue as to the purpose. And then he saw his tormentor, and his weapon, and screamed.

"Oh hush," said the man, "I haven't even started yet. You know, when this knife" - he produced a blade that was oddly colored red, and this was BEFORE the blood - "starts entering you bit by bit, you'll probably feel ashamed of yourself for having reacted so spectacularly to the preliminaries. Save some for the actual performance!" This piece of advice went unheeded as Frozen merely continued screaming.

"Wow, way to spoil the act," the knife-wielder went on, regarding Frozen with something that resembled disappointment. "It's not even 'Death by a Thousand Cuts', you know, that bit is mostly apocryphal. They usually died after about 12 or 13 cuts." Frozen continued screaming at the top of his lungs.

"Oh for heaven's sake," the attacker went, fed up with the noise, "Fine. I'll get it over with." And he did, plunging his red blade into Frozen's neck.


Andres was a classy guy. He enjoyed the classy life, and this included classy drinks at Fatlington's classiest establishment: The Hotel Abbatoir. Frequented by Committee members for over a decade now, this town landmark still managed to wrangle free of a "cursed" reputation despite the number of murders that had occurred here during the mafia incursions. In comparison, Club 30 was far more warily looked-upon despite coming onto the scene much later and having far fewer deaths take place there.

The Abbatoir probably survived because of its classy reputation, and because most of its clientele were people like Andres: men of good taste who could easily identify interlopers. And right now he was seeing two of them at a table nearby. Andres took another sip of his drink. It was probable that he was their target. He needed to think this through. He would have to escape while still maintaining an air of dignity, after all, it's what set him apart f-

*BANG!*

What Andres failed to take into account was the fact that, his attackers *not* being classy, they had no such reservations about causing a scene. Andres slumped onto the floor, dead before he could pass judgment about the calling card his killers left at the scene: a King of Hearts.


Askthepizzaguy was walking down one of Fatlington's main thoroughfares, supremely confident. He had shed his pizza delivery vehicle, he had twice defied the will of the Committee of Vigilance and lived to tell the tale thanks to some timely legal protection, and he was preparing to move into the Director's office the next day after he inevitably won his election. Life was looking good for him.

He heard a noise behind him, nothing unusual, but there was something different about this one. Instead of the roar of an engine, it sounded more like... *clop clop clop*? Puzzled, before he could goggle at the scene, some instinct took over and he ducked, causing his attacker wielding whatever melee weapon he had used to miss.

Pizza looked back up, and saw a very odd sight: it was a mounted figure, riding away, not even bothering to turn around for another shot, wielding what looked like a pair of bolas.

>>>He used something designed to capture animals by the legs to try to kill me? Okay then...<<<

Completely puzzled, ATPG decided to take this as a good omen and kept walking.


Ibn-Khaldun really wanted to see a show. He was tired of drinking, and needed something to take his minds off the town's predicament. But alas, it was Fatlington in November. No show was going to play in a seasonal town that was out-of-season... and any that did were not worth seeing. So he was back at the bar, slowly drinking his night and life away.

But finally, some drama! The establishment's main window shattered as a man came crashing through it - swinging, oddly enough, on a rope! - and this was immediately followed by the man's screaming in pain. He got up to dust the numerous shards of glass off his already-rumpled suit, and then regard Ibn-Khaldun for a moment.

"Christ! So swinging through a window hurts! Who knew?"

Whether this line was an attempt to completely distract Ibn-Khaldun from everything else going on or was just honest conversation (it was a 50/50 proposition with a man who had just swung through a glass window), it served its purpose, as Ibn-Khaldun was summarily gunned down from two other barroom patrons who had been there the entire time.

The man who had swung in tipped his slightly-bloodstained cap in a gesture of appreciation, and together the three of them removed Ibn-Khaldun's toe and walked out, this time through the front door.


09:02AM, Friday, 6 November 1951
The Executive Meeting Room (Small Ballroom)
Fatlington Convention Center
Fatlington, New Jersey

Despite the numerous failed murrder attempts that went on, Commissioner Fermanagh still looked grim - and a little tipsy - as he finished up the day's report to the Committee. "And now, the post-mortem results," he said. Everyone leaned in a little closer.

"As for your lynch, it was a middling choice. Montmorency had done some minor criminal wetwork and was almost certainly not an upstanding figure, but he was not reported to have done any work with the families before his death. At the very least this deprives them of another potential recruit." He eyed several members of the Committee with suspicion.

"As for the kills, it seems as if Montmorency had some company. J.D., Nictel, and Raskolnikov were all of similar ilk, and ByzantineKnight seemed to be nothing more than an innocent townie who was caught up in all of this. It's almost as if the families were unifying first." Fermanagh pondered glowering, then decided it was best if he just took another drink.

Captain Blackadder then took the podium and began the day's voting, reminding everybody that another Director selection was on the agenda as well.


OOC:

Day Nine begins. You are voting and selecting a Director.

Phase ends:


Feedback PMs will be out soon. I am taking a break first, I will get them done before I go to sleep tonight. If you are expecting a promotion PLEASE PM me after your feedback PM has been sent.

Attacked = 47: a completely inoffensive name (n2), Ameranth (n3), Askthepizzaguy (n1, n2, n4, n5, n8), Cahoma (n2), Camikaze (n7)Cecil XIX (n3, n6), Chaotix (n2, n3), Craterus (n3), Diamondeye (n7), Diana Abnoba (n6), Drunk Clown (n4, n5), Earthling (n1), edse (n5), El Barto (n2), Erebus (n5, n6), guiri (n8), Hero di Classico (n7), Ishmael (n4), J.D. (n6), johnhughthom (n4), Khazaar (n8), Master Necromanver (n2), Montmorency (n2, n4), Psychonaut (n5), Raskolnikov (n1), Riedquat (n8), robbiecon (n8), Sasaki Kojiro (n4), Scienter (n8 x2), scottishranger (n4), Secura (n3), Slash and earn (n1, n6), slysnake (n1, n3), sturmhauke (n8), Suburban Plankton (n4), taillesskangaru (n3), Zack (n6)

Wounded = 12: Choxorn (n7), dcmort93 (n7), edse (n5), Erebus (n6), guiri (n8), Lord Brennus (n3), Monk (n8), Psychonaut (n6), Slysnake (n1, n3), Tratorix (n4), Zack (n7)

Killed = 33: Ameranth [wiseguy] (n4), Andres (n8), Arjos (n3), Bow-wow-wow (n5), ByzantineKnight (n6), Camikaze (n8), Captain Black Adder [townie] (n1), Cecil XIX (n7), Drunk Clown (n7), El Barto (n3), ELITEWARMAN8GINGYBREADMENMILK [townie] (n2), Frozen in Ice (n8), fubbleskag (n8), Ibn-Khaldun (n8), J.D. (n6), Johnhughthom (n7), Jolt (n7), Kagemusha (n6), Lord Brennus (n5), Lord Winter [wiseguy] (n4), Memnon (n8), Moros [luca] (n2), Nictel (n6), Pharoah [townie] (n2), Raskolnikov (n6), robbiecon (n8), Romanic (n7) slysnake (n5), Suburban Plankton (n5), TinCow (n3), Tratorix (n6), Visorslash (n7)Xenoneb (n3)

Lynched = 7: Earthling (d2) [townie], a completely inoffensive name [townie](d3), Subotan [wiseguy] (d3), Major Robert Dump (d4), Ishmael (d5), Montmorency (d6), landlubber (d8)

Wogged = 4: bestrfcplayer (n6), cpdwane (n4), Master Necromanver (n4), taillesskangaru (n4)

Added: Autolycus (d4)

Active:

AggonyKing, Askthepizzaguy, Autolycus, B Ray, Backwards Logic, Beefy187, Believer, Beskar, BillMc, BSmith, ByzantineKnight, Cahoma, Captain Blackadder, Chaotix, Choxorn, Clitsome, Craterus, Crazed Rabbit, DaveShack, dcmort93, Death is yonder, Diamondeye, Diana Abnoba, Double A, edse, Erebus, fyremarble, GamezRule, gibsonsg91921, gnarleycharlie, God Emperor, Guiri, hero di classic, Ironside, Ishmael, Jarema, J.D., Johhog, kennigit, Khazaar, Krill, landlubber, LazyMcCrow, Lewwyn, Monk, Neri, Nictel, Nightbringer, Niklas, O!TheLastDays!, Peasant Phil, Populous Romanus, Psychonaut, qlphz, Renata, Riedquat, Sasaki Kojiro, Scienter, scottishranger, Secura, Seon, shlin28, Sigurd, Silver Jan, SisterCoyote, Skotsko, slash and earn, Sprig, sturmhauke, Thefluffyone93, The Stranger, ULC, White_eyes:D, Winston Hughes, woad&fangs, Xehh II, Yaropolk, Zack, Zim