2010-07-26: Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah

Starring:

Laurie2_V5icon.png

Guest Starring:

Roberto_V5icon.png

Date: July 26, 2010

Summary:

A wonderful day?


"Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah"

Warehouse— Location Undisclosed

The door to the cement room screeches against the pavement — the recirculated air makes the room dank and dusty — as the shuffle of feet, that essentially jig into the room. The shuffle is on beat, rhythmic, and matches a whistled song, one familiar to most show tune fans. The whistling is so on tune that, people who know it might think of the lyrics.

I've got rhythm

I've got music

I've got my girl

Who could ask for anything more?

Finally the whistler rounds the corner and steps into the centre of the room, the tune changes.

Zip-a-dee-doo-dah

Zip-a-dee-eh

My-oh-my What a wonderful day!

Robert reaches into his pocket and extracts the package of Skittles he's carrying, a kind of arrogance reflected in his eye as he peers down the prisoner. Behind him two other men shuffle in, well under his control and his thumb. The arrogance touches his lips in a smug kind of smile, toothy and wicked from its inception, "So. Enjoying the view?" The Skittles are poured into his mouth from a small hole in the package. Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.

As the boss snacks, his loyal henchmen step further into the room, circling the seated — almost lounging — Roscoe on either side. When he doesn't move to get up, hands grasp under his shoulders, hauling him to his feet with a confidence born of their devotion to Roberto rather than a lack of actual fear. Maybe the one with the shiner is slightly more tense, but it only means he's rougher as he navigates a metal bar behind the man's back, through the arms, to prevent any swings as they all now square off in front of the Skittles eating superior.

Roscoe's own face is also on the bruised side of coloring, a mismatched patterning atop faded but unhealed cuts — the worst of which has since popped its stitches, promising an even angrier mark even when it manages to close again. But as Roberto gives him that arrogant eye, he spreads a tight smile that splits the split on his lip.

Behind it, the anger that's been simmering for days — weeks. There's been intermittent yelling since the first period of hoarseness, but now it's all tight, controlled. Caged. Like him.

Even with his voice partially back, it's rougher from the air, the slightly stricter diet regiment — from Roberto's last visit — and this lends a heavier quality to his reply: "Plenty of sunshine headin' my way."

Smugger still at the appearance and response from his prisoner, Roberto eases even more. Step. Slide. Step. Slide. Step. Slide. Back and forth like a little choreographed dance he moves. Left. Slide. Right. Slide. "So." Skittles. Crunch. Crunch. Crunch. Now that his little dance is over, he steps forward, that smug grin turning toothy and even more wicked as his canines almost appear fang like through the work of shadow and light. "Turns out the blonde bitch wasn't lyin'!"

He spins in a quick circle. "So. How was that for an entrance? Too… over-the-top? I think I need to work on my step work, it could be just a little" he raises his non-Skittle holding hand, thumb and pointer finger separated by an inch or so "tighter. Otherwise. I bet that dance was slept on!" Nose wrinkles and eyes clamp shut at his own like squee moment, delighted about something or rather.

His knuckles are cracked as he steps forward. "Now, now, now," he tsks for to himself than Roscoe as his hand rises to his chin. "Where were we?" He hmmms like a reader who has just lost his place in a book before raising a single pointer finger, "YES! The bitch didn't lie after all! It went away. And now it's back!" What he means by that is anybody's guess.

A thought, maybe even a response, is denied when Roscoe clamps his lips together rebelliously against his own inclination to speak. Instead, it melts back into form of that thin, barely tolerant smile. Not until he's compelled to guess does he decide to indulge the man. A spread of arms is halted by the bar there, so he only ends up splaying his fingers in flippant dismissal. At his attempt to move, the unbruised henchman pauses, wavering in his spot as though he's just had a strange thought. A twinge in the air. Unrelated to the its new ability to circulate air thanks to the open door — or, perhaps, somehow related…

"As fascinating as this all is," survey says: it's not, "I really can't be made to care right now." The hand twists, making a fist with one raised finger to match Roberto's. It's just a little harder to make a strict point when your elbow's being forced behind your shoulder. "Hungry, angry, bored as shit," they're counted off in rapid succession, then the fist released and that failed shrug once again tests his constraints. "But you know what, congratulations. Got 'em back, then? Your shrinks? Cause, I gotta say, any longer and it was gonna start lookin' like you're incompetent…"

"FUCKIN' INSOLENCE!! IT'S ONLY A MATTER OF TIME UNTIL I GET THEM BACK!!!" Happiness transforms all-too-easily to a selfish kind of anger. The comment is met with a raising of Roberto's arm poised to strike at Roscoe, but he stops midway, remembering what he's gained.

Clearing his throat, he presses a smile that almost creeps over his lips easily. "No. I have something back that's… much more precious. More important. And more honed than before." He adjusts his collar and backs up once more. "And with it back, getting that blonde cunt who amped it up should be a cinch. And once she's back?" He whistles, "Watch out world!"

He takes a few paces away, smiling smugly once again, his back to Roscoe. "So. Gonna tell me what you know about why Vincent wanted my therapists?"

An actual grin shows at Roberto's anger, as though Roscoe's stolen the happiness from the formerly whistling boss to keep it all for himself. He's even grinning at he sight of that imminent attack. But then Roberto begins to smile, and it evenly flattens out Roscoe's expression to be fair. There's a bit of eye rolling when the world is forewarned, and the entrapped gangster makes an impatient jerk forward, opposed in every way to being forced immobile.

"I don't know," he retorts loudly, purposefully doing nothing to hide its snark, "You gonna get me a beer?" A twitch above one eyebrow echoes in the edge of his mouth. The air retains its own tenseness around them: a wall butting up against another wall. "You know Vinnie, fuckin' enigma. Then again— he also just hates you guys." On the word, he pulls forward, straining his shoulders against his position and encouraging Shiner thug to give the metal bar a tug, twisting that one side even more uncomfortably.

"Vinnie WISHES he were an enigma!! He got fuckin' arrested! 'Nigmas don't get arrested!!" Roberto spits as he turns around. The words almost disgusting in his mouth. Skulking towards Roscoe again he peers at the other man with a kind of detest. "SO. Are you gonna tell me what you know about Vinnie's plan for them and why he wants them OR are do ya wanna stay in here— BORED and … stuff." His eyes narrow irritably. It's been awhile since Roscoe was put in here and Roberto is determined to have made it worth his time. Of course, if he can't, there are other means to ilicit cooperation.

Disgusting is an apt description, as the same reaction seems to apply to Roscoe as he lurches a second time, more angry than the wary testing of before. Hands ball into fists faster than before. "And FUCK the dickless scum-sucker responsible. The worst fuckin' kind of person— " His jaw working faster and angrier than he can quite keep up with, he finally jerks his head to the side and fiercely spits. The henchman on that side slithers to get away, weakening his station by Roscoe's contained arm.

After a thick, annoyed inhale through his nose, though, Roscoe's gotten himself to a place of more control. He crooks a head at Roberto with the sneer more typical his features. "But here we are, then. Vinnie's out, with your shrinks. And them copper's dead as fuck."

Even that smugness fades with a moment as he pretends to lounge there, lightly, considering Roberto's offer with a disrespectful briefness. "Funny. I ain't seein' my beer in here, but here you are askin' again."

"YOU ARE IN NO POSITION TO NEGOTIATE!" Roberto screams. Literally screams out of no where, his arms raise angrily in the air as he literally becomes unfurled. Pulling at his own hair, his irritability surmounts as he paces several feet in front of Roscoe. He stamps the ground angrily, pounding the pavement.

THUMP

THUMP

THUMP

"NO POSITION, ROSCOE!!! You will get your FUCKIN' beer when you give me SOMETHING worth givin' it up for!"

He reaches into his jacket and levels a gun at the other man. "Actually, let's negotiate something else! Give me the FUCKIN' information I want and I don't have one of my lackies" because hey, that's what they are, "blow your head off. Sound good?" His voice changes to a whisper, "That sounds good to me…"

Beyond intelligence, common sense, and that typically ingrained desire to live — at the display occurring in front of him — Roscoe smiles. For the screaming, the pacing, that violence against the floor, and the eventual sight of a gun's one narrowing his vision, there is only the broad, unhesitating curves into that merry expression. Pride mars its cheerfulness, challenge sapping any innocence or naivety. He knows exactly what his responses are doing to the man: and he's damn enjoying this display of control while his position — that one that shouldn't be able to negotiate — paints a picture of complete captivity.

"Sounds great to me." It's whispered back to fully capture that mood Roberto was going for before Roscoe's voice raises, pitching out into the small room but also where other thugs who weren't invited into this party can hear in their inevitable eavesdropping.

"Go ahead, bossman~" he cajoles, leaning ever more forward, straining against that bar but also inching his face closer to that weapon that seeks to threaten it. "Why you still holdin' your little gun then, huh? Hand it over to your lackeys like you always do." Shuffle shuffle. Is it to their (not so new) title, the insubordination, the undertone of irresponsibility hitting a chord… to something, the two thugs take offense.

"DON'T FUCKIN' UNDERESTIMATE ME!! DON'T YOU FUCKIN' UNDERESTIMATE ME YOU FUCKIN' PIECE OF— " And then he gets distracted by the Skittles in his hand and the kid knocking at the door. Finnegan Corbett lingers in the entrance way— no more than seventeen he's been looking for an opportunity to prove himself more, and frankly, has been driving the boss man crazy. Roberto twitches at the sight, more than being spurned he detests being interrupted, particularly as during said-interruptions he gets easily distracted thanks to his own personal ADD.

Angrily he stamps a foot, his rage surmounting although not on the originally intended target. But then the rage turns as Roberto's lips curl into a wicked smile, his teeth ravenous in the light; he's out for blood. "I have a special mission for you, young Finnegan— get that brother of yours back here and I'll relay details later."

The kid blinks several times over, glancing from one man to the next, altogether unsettled by what he sees. "Aedan said he quit, Boss… he won't— "

"Oh he'll come back. They always do. All you need is a little leverage." And Roberto has it. Standing in front of him. Flippantly the boss waves a hand, easily distracted into his own little world while reflecting on the reality of brotherhood and his own personal demons. "Libby," he murmurs before he tugs on the bottom of his shirt. What he's talking about is entirely unclear, but for the moment his anger seems to have disappeared. In fact, his expression has changed entirely, his lips curl into an unusually reminiscent smile, something few in this space have ever seen. It's odd to say the least.

"Awww, not Beanie." Being no longer the focus of all that attention and rage doesn't mean Roscoe has less to commentary on the matter. Though the gallery tends more towards rogue than peanut, he remains as vocal. "Fond. Fond memories. That man knew something about a deal. Though I always did prefer the kind of leverage you get hangin' a pal outta window more so. Vinnie always gave me the nicest things. Why did I come over here again? … Oh yeah. Money. Two things Vinnie doesn't have anymore…"

Despite that he's stopped pressuring his restraints, one of the thugs sees fit to readjust his grip a little tighter. A bit of a confidence booster when the shuffling didn't work up the nerves, perhaps. It's a small reaffirmation against the tug of independent (… so it seems) thought breaking through to his brain.

"Speakin'a leverage… boss," he ventures now, releasing one hand to make a placating gesture at the somewhat calmed Roberto, and building off the entrapped gangster's trailing comment. "Ain't we got us some, here? Salvatore got somethin'a ours." His eyes dart to those lines across Roscoe's face: marks, he called them. A claim. "… We got somethin'a his." The statement, confident enough, has the thug faltering afterward, frowning at his own gumption to speak without being asked to.

It earns as much of Roscoe's attention: a glance, a sneer. "Let's see if we can do the math, lackey boy. One plus one plus one… versus… one plus… hmm. I'm important but am I that important…" But he isn't as dismissing of the suggestion as his words may represent.

And the mockery snaps another string in the thug's mind, inciting that need to contribute again. "All we's need is the blonde bitch back, right? Din' we always say the hostages a waste'a time— " no, wait, that's what Roscoe always said. A frown, then he carefully backtracks, "'Cept— 'cept her. Or…"

It takes Roberto a few moments to come out of his rather thoughtful and unusual world. "Falkland reminds me of Lib— " Right. On task. Leverage. "Aedan was useless. But. I have something he wants. Or. At least something he doesn't want me to have," an idle glance is given to Finn, the stupid kid wholly unaware that he's the leverage in all of this. With a cluck of his tongue he begins to pace the room again. "That's the beauty of such things. If one object is more important than another then it's worth trading."

Roberto hmmms at the lackey's words, his eyebrows arch as he paces again— pacing that isn't angry rather than it's thoughtful. An internal register considering all options. "Well. You raise a point, the blonde bitch took it away and now it's stronger. And she was always good to talk to; she only yelled the once when I grabbed her by the hair and introduced her to— " he changes thoughts, "I was gonna do worse. And when I find her— " his gaze slides over to the lackeys again. "Well. I only need that brain of hers to work."

With a shake of his head, he's back on track with where he was going with all of this. "But then. Maybe. There's a way we can have fuckin' everything. The blonde bitch, keep Roscoe around, and screw Vinnie over. And while we're at it, let's fuck the feds up too!" He faces Roscoe directly, making that eye contact that he needs for his ability to work, "All it's about is control anyways. ANd thanks to Falkland, I got it." Eye contact is established and he's good to go, right?

Eye-contact. Roberto has all of it he could want, as his crazy eyes settle across that distance with Roscoe's blue devil-may-cares. Some of that cavalier attitude has since hardened — ever since, the observing eye might have determined, all that mention of the blonde little therapist who went away. His sneer has evened out into something just a touch of humor above a straight line. And he stares. And the room seems to crackle like so much static electricity, but nothing to be conducting it. Red threatens to appear at his nose, but a harsh sniff and it disappears.

After a long, drawn-out confrontation, Roscoe's head tips to the side, thoughtful in its movement but not in his bored tone: "… tryin' to see what'll happen if you wish real hard, looney tunes? I also respond to words, green, and booze."

Control. Roberto hasn't got as much as he thought.

For no rhyme nor reason, the thug with all the shiny new ideas steps off from his post completely, leaving his side of the restraints unmanned with a purposefulness not echoed in the seeming randomness of the act.

Twitch.

Gape.

And then. Eruption. "WHY THE HELL ISN'T IT WORKIN"?! I got it fuckin' back! I got seven full-puppets now and every day it gets stronger…" Roberto's eyes narrow as he maintains that eye contact, pushing himself harder. Essentially forcing said contact as he grasps that knife from the pocket— the one he'd stole from the blonde therapist. "It works on everyone!! It worked with her except…" his eyebrows furrow as he flicks the knife open. "She was fuckin' useless under my thumb! Like a fuckin' robot all of her fuckin' emotions vanished it was… FUCKIN' freaky… and I— " was left having to deal with his own fluctuations in mood, but the thought isn't finished, instead it turns back to her, "…she's fuckin' useless like that… nothin' more than a blonde cunt and only good for one thing… when I get my hands on her— " Greedily his lips tighten into a demonic smile, downright evil from its inception, an obvious betrayer to his thoughts. His intentions are beyond tainted.

His lips purse as the lackey lets up from his spot, Roberto spits, "Where the hell do you think you're going? HOLD HIM THERE!? Did I say you could move?! FUCKIN' insolence!! WHO do you FUCKIN' think you are?!" He turns to Finn, still perplexed by the situation, "Get him a beer," before closing in on his assumed prey. "How did you do that? Tell me how you did that…"

Finn disappears and comes back with a beer and his phone in his hand as he scrolls through a particular website of interest to him, a popular website these days. The beer is handed to Roberto rather than Roscoe— this particular lackey has no intention of upsetting his boss.

Roberto accepts the bottle with a sneer, particularly as the kid in question doesn't look up from his phone for a second. "What the fuck are you doing with your fuckin' phone?"

"Oh. I… uh… internet… sorry… it's a fortune-telling site… that.. uh…" Finn mumbles as he shifts from one foot to the other.

"How many times have I told you fuckin' morons that you don't ne— wait. Fortune-telling? Can it tell my fortune?!"

The kid stands rather dumbfounded at Roberto before he nods and types in the boss's name. The fortune that comes out, however, causes him to pale and he just tosses the phone in the boss's general direction before ambling out, all too aware he won't be getting his phone back.

Roberto quirks an eyebrow at the disappearing kid before scoffing to himself and bringing the phone to his face. He reads aloud, "You're a creeping creeper and I hope you get stabbed in the face." His eyes narrow before he pitches the iPhone against the cement wall, causing it to break into several pieces and the screen to crack. "Fuckin' idiots." He holds the beer. Still. Almost like a taunt.

Roberto's force is hitting another force of equal or greater value, creating a friction that reverberates in the mind, rattling that concentrating head with the inaudible but still effective whine of resistance. The unstoppable force seems to have stopped on this immovable object. But the nature of it all, outlined by Roberto's obscenities is outwardly a wince and another sniff to Roscoe as he observes the proceedings with narrowed blue eyes. It isn't until the beer's mentioned that he cracks a smile, tips his head. "Well, I would say that I asked nicely, but— "

That disobedient thug has been given a glance for his call-out as well. Now he shakes his head slightly to dispel some unwanted notion and scoots forward to toe the line he held before. He doesn't seem to breathe at all except when Finn becomes the new source of attention and shouted orders.

This little conference of wills is hardly the place for a plug on some new iPhone app, which is precisely why Roscoe so easily cranes his head to see what the big deal is. Some expression, softer and more curious than looks right on his angry face, breaks form at the distraction's short-hand description. From the moment of Roberto asking for his to the exact sound after it's read out loud, there's only a polite, bizarrely still silence.

Then a twitch. Not anything like the ones the crime boss gave. This one pulls up. Up. Smirking. Smiling. Then— Roscoe's few barks of escaping laughter turn into a peal of entirely unrestrained amusement. That tempting, taunting beer? He probably ain't getting anymore. But it doesn't seem to matter as the total merriment seems to fill the entire stifling room.

Just outside the door, where a small gathering has since packed in to pretend they aren't glued to how this meeting goes, one Irishman grabs Finn roughly by the shoulders and gives him a shaking. "What the fuck you doin'? Are you dull, lad?" But then others, one by one, also begin to snigger. To snicker. To laugh. It's almost contagious.

"That's a real lucky name ya got yourself," Roscoe declares on his next breath, his laughing abruptly cut off, "What a sport. Now you've gotten me the beer and the entertainment."

The laughter is met with rage. "WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU PEOPLE DOIN?! GET THE FUCK BACK TO WORK!!! NOW." It is commanding, authoritative, and literally screamed from Roberto's lips the knife is released from his hand (and subsequently dropped to the floor) in lieu of his own hair which he pulls out in large fistfuls— again he's pushed his ability to its max; his brain is splitting further, but amongst this crowd he'd never admit it.

"YOU ARE ALL FUCKIN' USELESS! SHOOT HIM!" he instructs one of his lackeys with a sneer. "SHOOT HIM AND BE FUCKIN' DONE WITH IT! INSOLENT FOOL! Do you know what we do with disrespectful pricks?! DO YOU?!" Hands flail in the air with every word, spat out almost like a kind of verbal vomit from his mouth. "SO MANY FUCKIN' IDIOTS!!!"

Shiner is willing in every way to comply. Enthralled both by Roberto and a life of violence, he gives the bar a harsh readjustment and then lends one hand to his waist for the weapon stored there. He's got a good, steady grip on both gun and restraint as he raises the former.

His buddy doesn't.

When his attacker's focus turns to aiming, Roscoe quickly hefts his arms up for a make-shift hold on the bar — long enough to surge sideways and jam it right into the man still holding on. It isn't a strong hit to his side, but it's as distracting as one might imagine having your target suddenly move would be. He's unprepared for the follow-up swing that sends his gun arm swerving off aim and forward: forward right into the range of Roscoe's boot when he gets a leg up for a high and powerful kick that sends the gun flying beyond recovery out the door.

Turmoil outside has also sprung up at the rallying shouts from their foaming at the mouth boss. Discontent in the ranks spurs a whole range of further shouting, but also the entrance of four guys into the room, breaking rank and command when they don't advance on Roscoe but Roberto, himself. Three look more determined than the last, but the most confident of them all tries to organize some kind of cornering rodeo around the crime boss as he puts up stopping hands. "Now this ain't how it has ta go! Maybe ye should get outta here fer a while!"

As the trio corner the crime boss, Roberto shakes his head angrily. He can get them in line thanks to other minions. Instead of sticking around, he stamps out, not allowing his own brain to break anymore. He'll get his retaliation. Later. When he gathers his loyalists, not all of whom acknowledge his leadership because of his ability, then there will be room and time for a genuine stand off.

The door is left open, freedom but a few steps away for a former prisoner with etching on his face. The beer and the knife are left on the cement ground, remnants of a crime boss disappeared and disconnecting from reality.

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