Ma Yize: The Red

[kahl]

Slouched in his seat, one foot planted on the console, Aerc stared over the bottle of jenny as he gulped at it thoughtfully. In his icy blue sights sat the bound and gagged family of the pirate John Savage. All pirates were a hindrance to any other- competition for the same swag, but Aerc "The Red" MacRoy had a special hate on for Savage that only began with the loss of his hand.

His good hand draped over his lower thigh, Aerc propped his prosthetic on his upraised knee and tapped idly on the glass bottle. "Do you know why I hate John Savage so much?" he inquired of Iris, his eyes expectant as if she could answer past her gag. The woman's brows knit and she shook her head.

Setting his jenny down, he dropped his boot to the floor with a thud and flashed his fake hand before him like a magician. "He took my hand," he explained sourly. "Shi a, this is a good hand. Stronger. Nigh indestructible, even. But it isn't MY HAND!"

The man's voice raised and raged with a sudden fury, like the explosion at the end of a softly hissing fuse. Sitting back again he drummed his fingers on the arm rest of his seat. He studied them like a shark sizing up a school of fish.

"You've probably no idea who Kahl Harra is, do you...?" he smirked. "He's married her now, you know. As if you never even existed. As if the lad there, little Roman weren't his seed."

Face contorting with anger again he snarled, "but she is MINE! Always was mine. Gorram...I had to kill so many other men to make sure she was mine. That Greenman...he was the hardest. Had half the GRE bearing down on me. But I beat him. Johnny-boy thinks he bested me but...he's a chun zhu if ever there was one."

Aerc sniffed and regarded Roman, meeting his eyes with a sage lift of his chin as if giving the youth fatherly advice. "Never walk away from a man unless you're sure he's dead, son. No amount of blood proves anything. You take his head--or you take his heart. You're pa...he got cocky."

Snatching up his jenny, Aerc checked the conditioning controls on his ship. So far The Red was holding up under Ma Yize extremes. It only had to hold up another day...then they were back in the Black.

Sucking on the bottle he then glowered over his shoulder at Iris again. He'd tried to make her an ally, and when that failed-- for whatever gorram reason-- he'd resorted to ransoming her and the gangly welp. "Kahl and I...we go way back. I knew her brother, you know...back in The Quad. Second he introduced us, it was special. Real special. We were together so long then--mu gou got it in her head that I wasn't good enough for her any more. She didn't understand that we were meant to be together. I even tattooed my name on her arm...I got hers here too."

Baring his chest to them, Aerc revealed an ornate Lesotho style caligraphy of "Kahl Sunyeung" inked over his heart, the letters acted as an ornate bed for a nasty looking scar. Running a finger lovingly over it, Aerc smirked. "S'from our first fight. She'd have sunk that switchblade right in too, if I hadn't caught her arm. Took it on the ribs, but...didn't go through."

Releasing the edge of his thick shirt, he swiped up his bottle again and gulped back the rest before pointing at Iris. "He don't know a thing about what she really needs. I know...and I hope for your sake, he figures that out in the next..." He checked the time on the console. "Fourty-four hours."

Patting Roman's head as he strode past, Aerc then gripped Iris' hair and pulled her head back. "Lucky for you I think you're uglier than a monkey's ass." Lifting a brow he threatened, "Thad and pug though...ain't so discerning. So watch yourself, Mo mu gou...or I'll let them play. I ain't promised John you two would be whole when he got you back."

Lifting his eyes to Thadius, Aerc grunted. "Make sure they keep quite. And hands off...for now."

Striding toward the back of the ship, Aerc paused in the cramped galley and eyed the scrawny, twitching bundle of strung out nerves that was Carter. "You find Sohn yet?"

"No sir, Red." Carter's blood shot eyes lifted off the thinkpad. "He's wanted by the GRE Verse-wide. Man's hiding deep."

"Find him. Keep seeding the Signal boards with that note I gave you. He'll find us." Aerc scowled.

Rubbing at his patchworked, mishaven head, Carter stammered, "wh-why you gotta find him now?"

"Because I been laid up a long time. Some five years--three in a gorram coma. Now that I got on my feet again, got me a ship...I want my old friends back. You, Thad, Pug...Sohn was my best friend." Aerc arched a brow and eyed Carter as if lecturing a child.

"And Kahl--"

"Shi a. And caoing Kahl. She's my girl, Carter. I'm not going to let some greasy headed wang ba dan put his hands all over her, get her all confused and try to take her from me." Finishing his Jenny and chucking the bottle in the corner with no regard for the broken glass, Aerc grunted. "I ain't just letting her go."

[kahl]

Tapping the blade on his boot, Aerc sat staring vacantly at his bed. His mind was in many different places at once. The more primitive was focused on the fact that said bed was empty, lacking the female companionship that he most certainly deserved--that he was owed. The more cerebral parts of his mind were concentrating on how to better seek out Sohn...and what to do if John Savage didn't comply. Shi a, he'd kill the woman and kid. They weren't worth anything to him. What, however, would be his next plan of attack?

Running a thumb along his lower lip, Aerc the red pondered the likliest place to find Sohn Harra. If he found Sohn, the man would know better than any how best to hook his sister and draw her back in. He wagered she was clean now, so narcotics was always an option. She'd had a taste for everything from Drops, to Tonic, to Blue Box and Pink. Pink, if he recalled, being her favorite. The rolling smoke, just lightly laced with drops. He wondered if she still smoked trips or if she'd tried to switch to basic blacks.

Ren Di'Tan. Ren Di'Tan was the unlikliest place to find Sohn Harra. Ma Yize would be the first place even the GRE would look there first.

Tapping the blade a time or two more, he then rose and slid it into his belt. Tromping up the steps he headed back out to find Carter.

The skittish junkie peered up at him and waited for another tyrade. Instead, Aerc merely said, "put in a call to Janessa...in Ren Di'Tan Capital City."

"Wait...Yuri Janessa?" Carter blinked.

"Yes. Caoing YURI JANESSA." Aerc snarled.

Carter gaped and turned back to his thinkpad then looked back. "Wait-- how do you know a senator?"

"Just make the caoing phone call." Aerc growled then leaned on the table with his fists.

- - - -

Crouching Pug smirked at Roman and formed a pistol with his fingers, slowly putting it to the youth's head just between his brows. After a few quiet gun sounds, he then pushed hard enough to push the boy onto his side.

"Leave the kid alone, Pug." Thad rolled his eyes. "You'll probably scare the piss and shyte out of him and then it'll smell like a gorram Bughouse in here. And I ain't cleaning that up."

Pug sniffed and cackled. "Aw'right Thad. I'm just havin' a bit o'fun..." As if to emphasize this fact he gestured crudely at Iris with one hand and his tongue in cheek.

[Melara]

Iris glared at the man over her gag as Roman wiggled a bit, getting back up into a sit as best he could. He was gagged too but his eyes above it were furious. If he weren’t bound he probably would have gone after one of them, and probably gotten himself killed.

Iris didn’t particularly care what they did to her, but Roman was all she had in the world. He was a good kid, and he didn’t deserve this mess.

[kahl]

Yuri Janessa was an older man, distinguished in his grey and shrewd of expression. His eyes were just as sharp as any youth's although the face that heald them was weathered. Through a grimace that was only slightly more sour than his usual, Yuri regarded Aerc.

"For me to even admit that I know where this man is--IF I even had such knowledge, which I do not-- to admit this would be a crime. One bearing a severe penalty." The man drummed his fingers on the arm of his chair.

Aerc inclined his head with a scowl. "And if you were to theoretically receive a sizable sum of money as an anonymous contribution to your newest...campaign, or whatever...might this alleged information possible drop onto the Signal where say...a Skimmer might find it?"

The man's thick, bushy grey brow rose. "Anything is possible."

Turning, Aerc nodded at Carter who then put through the credit transfer. e watched as Senator Janessa watched his screen. A light flicked on as he saw the numbers.

"Now, I'll have my man verify that amount as a legitimate transfer -- when he finds his cookie. My man likes his cookies." Aerc grinned.

Yuri Janessa's sour face curled into a grin nothing short of maniacal. "I'm sure you will find those cookies to be quite delicious."

"Indeed," Aerc smirked, then, as Carter confirmed all the necessary elements, he saluted with two fingers and disconnected the call.

"So where is Sohn?" Aerc towered over Carter.

The scrawny man looked up, blinking like a frog in a sandstorm. "He's on Moksha."