Starring:
Guest Starring:
Also Guest Starring: John Carter
Summary: Ramon moves to finish what he started, but at what cost?
Date It Happened: July 9, 2007
Get Carter: Fireball
Abandoned Metalworks Building, South Syracuse, New York
He's so close now. And his car is blown up. And suddenly Ramon just gets this vicious grin on his face. He doesn't seem aware of it. He flips the gun. Fuck shooting. He's going to run to try to close the distance between him and his quarry. Then? He wants to try to pistol whip Carter. Then he's going to try to drive his wounded left hand into the man's gut in a serious sucker punch. He now wants the experience of laying into John Carter with his bare fists.
Dogs gone, car gone, and Carter more or less down with an angry Ramon on top of him, Lachlan's got a feeling that things are winding down. Lowering his own gun, he grunts softly and glances briefly to Peter. *Di'ye get Elena out a'righ'?*
Jack would much rather have used a bullet to push the back of Carter's head out the front of his face, but he'll settle for blowing up his car and stranding the man. When Ramon squares off with Carter, Jack limps closer and keeps his revolver trained on the fight, but he doesn't attempt to intervene. After all, Ramon has even more reasons to hate Carter than Jack does. This is Ramon's right as a Man. It's his duty. "Get 'im, Sarge," the bartender calls out. "Make 'im pay."
The revolver stays aimed at Carter. Just in case.
MEANWHILE! BACK AT THE OFFICE…er…LAB!
Eric just watches and winces as Ramon seems content to lay into the bastard.
*KICK HIM AGAIN!* He thinks.
~Yeah, she's— with Cass and Desiree— should be fine,~ Peter sends back, but he looks rather ragged as he steps further, trying his best to keep up, and he moves closer to join as the car he flipped over blows up dramatically. As Jack speaks up, he can't help but glance over and look at the slightly younger man. He's not even thinking that he's hearing when he shouldn't be. But the bald guy is a little distracted by fists flying at his face. Or at least one would hope. But there's really not much he can do besides watch the older man wail.
Scratched, bitten, running out of bullets, John continues moving backwards, the group of men closing in on him as they move further and further away from the complex and on barren dirt and earth. He could turn tail and run, right into the industrial wasteland of South Syracuse…but there's nowhere to run. And then he laughs, and laughs, and laughs, somewhat unhinged, but he keeps laughing, moving back slowly and away. But his eyes are fixed on Ramon as the man leaps on her, and starts pistolwhipping him. He laughs, and chokes, teeth flying as the Gomez Patriarch beats his face in, going down, his fist plowing into the dirt after a violent blow sends him spiraling and going down…
A hand comes up, grabbing at the dirt, and another, and another, still moving to crawl away from him. When he turns to look up at the men standing around him, and Ramon's face in the vicious grin, he grins back over his shoulder, shoving his body away and staggering upwards. His hands in his pockets, slouched a little bit by his injuries and blood rivulets running down on his arms and face, he turns around slowly and raises his arms as if in victory.
With two remote detonators in both hands.
His eyes lock on Ramon's.
"Checkmate," he murmurs, depressing the buttons with his thumbs.
Behind him, in the building where the girls are probably still in looking for a way out, the building ERUPTS. Balls of fire smash out the glass, the roof, the doors. The damage is DEVASTATING, considering he's packed a good amount of C4 in the metal drums of the building. Drums that the -entire complex- was full of when they first entered the building.
And then, nothing. Cass's echoing yell from deep inside the building is lost in the inferno.
Ramon lets out a scream of horror and fury. Wordless. Anguished. Primal. Animal. And then there's nothing but the red hot haze. He has fallen over from that shockwave, and he has to throw up his hands to ward against the glass and metal. But not before a huge piece of the glass hits him. It goes spinning across his face, razoring right across his left eye, rendering it to a pulp. Not through it, which would kill it, but right across. His roar has a fair amount of pain in it as well, and the gun? The gun drops from nerveless fingers while he scrambles and twitches in agony beyond what he's ever imagined. Luckily he's /not/ mentally projecting /that/.
*A'righ', th— * WHOOM! Suddenly the complex explodes, and Lachlan instinctively hits the dirt, covering his head with his arms. As soon as the debris seems to be finished flying, he glances over at the spot where a building once was, bewildered. "Bloody— !" And then horror starts to set in. He whips around to stare at Peter. *Did they get out?* He's not waiting for an answer; he's already heading for the van.
BOOM!
For a moment it seems like Jack might be able to ride the explosion out, but a hunk of concrete catches him in his already-wounded back and drives him to the ground. Lying flat on his belly, he watches in horror as the entire complex goes up. Poof. Finito. So far as he knows, Cass, Elena, and Desiree were all still inside. He doesn't stop to think. He raises his revolver and fires at the only part of Carter he can see. The man's legs.
Did they get out? When the explosion happens behind him, Peter staggers and falls to his knees, where he sits up and looks back towards the warehouse. Though he'd been pale before, now he's even more pale and takes a few breaths. Did they make it out? Did they— There's that one sound that he can't stop from coming out of him. "ELENA!" It's loud. It's pained. Apparently… he doesn't think they got out. Or the possibility that they didn't is bad enough to cause such a sound to come out of him. When he looks back towards the bald man and his eyes are slightly different in the fire light. Instead of mostly brown, the slight green that he had in his eyes has tried to take over, illuminated. And his hand raises up again. Instead of reaching for the car that he blew up a moment ago, he's grasping for the man's neck.
Ramon keeps one hand pressed to his eye. Still groaning in pain, the man looks at the dying Carter and finds he no longer cares. It's the women he cares for. He starts casting around with his mind in raw desperation, seeking them out. *ELENA. DEZI. CASS.* His daughter. The woman he's grown to love. And one of his best friends.
And Carter's laughing. Laughing as Ramon goes down and bleeds from the eye. Laughing as Jack shoots him from the legs. Before he even falls down, however, Peter is grabbing his neck. His knees buckle, but he doesn't fall. Instead, he's choking, gasping for breath, clawing at the air that constricts around his neck. He's hacking, his coughing, and gagging. His blue eyes turn bloodshot. Fingers twitch, and his gun slowly raises. Even now he's still trying to fight. Even now, he has that twisted grin on his lips.
There is no answer. Nothing that Ramon can hear. Either he's too far away, the others are in shock, or worse….that they might actually be gone.
Ripping out his earplugs in some vain hope that the others made it out, Lachlan hits a dead run toward the leveled warehouse. If they made it out, they'll be around the area, right? They couldn't have gotten far. "CASSIE? ELENA?" He sorta forgot the other lady's name. With Carter pinned down by the others, he knows he'll have plenty of time to come back and add to the abuse should he receive no answer.
Ramon got no answer. A bleak, horrible look passes over his face. He bends down and picks up a long shard of that glass. "You like to stab, don't you, you son of a bitch?" Peter's force choking him. Jack shot him. Ramon is going to cut out his heart. He slams the knife into Carter's chest. And twists. "My wife, my daughter," he hisses. "I'm going to find every one of you fuckers responsible for this and I'm going to make sure they get what you're getting. Die, motherfucker. /Die/. " His face crumples for the lost women. He brought them here. /He/ sent them into the danger.
Jack is able to stand. Barely. He's got exactly one round left in his revolver as he drags himself closer. Carter is being choked and stabbed to death, and Jack is enjoying the show. He doesn't say anything. There's nothing to say, and even if there were, he'd never be able to get words around the lump in his throat. He blinks once, twice. The moisture gathering in his eyes turns to trails of tears.
Eric? Eric is just staring in shock at the screen. Eyes wide. Jaw open. He isn't even seeing Carter's last moments, he doesn't care about him anymore.
The hand that grasps at the air releases as Ramon moves to finish things, and then Peter's hand drops, and his body sags. Falling back to the ground, his elbows hit the dirt and he practically curls up where he landed when he got hit by the blast. He doesn't even watch the man stop breathing. He can't even sit back up. All of that adrenaline that rose to the front is leaving his shoulders shaking.
Yes, he liked stabbing. John grins as Ramon comes up to him with a shard of glass in his hand. And when it's stabbed into his chest the first time, blood floods from the wound. It bubbles from his lips. He grins at Ramon, and one last try manages to grab the front of Ramon's shirt and drag him closer to leave a bloody whisper in his ear.
"Your children…" he breathes raggedly, choking in his own blood. "….are property, Ramon Gomez. -All-….of them….are. And…..I won't be….the only ones….looking for them…"
And then at the brutal twist of the glass, life from his eyes fades completely. When Peter drops, John drops as well, his dead body sprawling on Ramon's feet.
There is no sign of Lachlan, for some reason.
Ramon drops the knife with contempt and staggers back. He's covered in blood. His own and John's. He stares bleakly at the warehouse, tears now making unabashed rivers down his cheeks. "Let them come," he growls, pulling out his earplugs. "I'll destroy them too. None of you are hurting women ever again." It's a promise. He then registers Lachlan hasn't come back. He summons up enough to send a mental message. *Anything?* The hope in his mindtone is so fragile.
Jack wipes the back of his hand across his face, smearing dirt and tears and blood all over. Shock is setting in. Not only from his own extensive wounds, but from the deaths. Elena. His niece. The girl who brought him back from the ragged edge. Cass. Beautiful and pure-hearted and kind. That other pretty lady. He covers his face with both hands, still clenching the gun tightly. When he lowers them again he's wearing a carefully practiced and composed poker face. A close look will reveal a wildness around his eyes that's barely suppressed. He stows his weapon and kneels akwardly to check on Peter. "Hey, kiddo. Talk to me. You hit?"
There is silence…and then…
"PAPA!" the call is faint, from where they're standing. But it's unmistakeable. And only one person calls Ramon that in the group.