Play@YSDC

Soon, your group is across the street from 224 Bay Street. No one is sitting on the stoop of 224 or the neighboring houses and there's no one sitting at the windows, unlike most places you've passed tonight.

Then, a pale face in the topmost window of the house catches Delores’s eye. It looks like a blond woman. After a moment she begins waving at the police officers.

"Look there!" says Delores.

Dex parks the car across the street from the address. When Delores mentions the woman's face, he shuts off the car and takes a glance. "Alright gentlemen, as they say, in for a penny, in for a pound. Time for us to deal with these rascals once and for all." He glances back at Delores as he makes sure his assorted firearms are in place. "You ready for this? Because this is your last chance not to be in the center of it all." He looks at the boys, nodding his head, and then once he receives an answer, he gets out, tossing the sling that was supporting/holding his arm to his chest back on the front seat.

"Esposito, do we have any plan other than charging in and rescuing the client, while shooting anyone who fires back at us?"

Delores swallowed hard and nodded. "Let's do it," she said, with a bravery she didn't quite feel. She checked the load of the shotgun for the umpteenth time, the stock damp from the perspiration from her hands.

Dexter Ford wrote:"Esposito, do we have any plan other than charging in and rescuing the client, while shooting anyone who fires back at us?"

"Plan? Yeah: don't get shot."

When everyone's ready we'll move. I'm going in first.

Franky walks up the four steps of the stoop and pushes open the outer door, which swings loosely on its hinges. In the small vestibule, he hammers on the inner door, Pat and Jerry backing him up. After a minute, the door is opened by a bent old man, eyes glittering in his withered face. He gabbles something in an unknown language. The light in the hall behind him is just a dim glow.

"Police," growls Pat Corydon, as Franky shoves the man aside. Inside, in place of the customary staircase, is a roughly plastered wall, an inscription barely legible on its surface:

O FRIEND AND COMPANION OF NIGHT,
THOU WHO REJOICEST IN THE BAYING OF DOGS AND SPILT BLOOD,
WHO WANDEREST IN THE MIDST OF SHADES AMONG THE TOMBS,
WHO LONGEST FOR BLOOD AND BRINGEST TERROR TO MORTALS,
GORGO, MORMO, THOUSAND-FACED MOON,
LOOK FAVOURABLY ON OUR SACRIFICES.

As you read it, you realize it is written in a script you don't know, but can read easily.

Those on the steps waiting to enter the vestibule are startled by a crash from overhead and a shower of broken glass. Looking up, they see a stool hurtle to the sidewalk behind them. Vilas sticks his head through the broken panes: “Come quick! They’ve taken her down—“ Rough hands drag him back into the room.

I put the muzzle of my piece up against the old guy's face and pull the hammer back so there's no mistaking how serious I am. "Take us downstairs, bo, or I'm gonna fill you with daylight."

The old man drops to the floor in a dead faint.

There are two doors, one to the right and one to the left; in a normal building, they'd be apartments.

The right-side door has a heavy latch on this side, locking something in.

The left-side door is ajar.

Dex looks at Esposito and then at Delores. "Split up or stay together?" He motions for his two friends to cover the latched door. "I say we go right, you and the rest of the official force go left through the open door, and Delores, you decide which set of us you want to go with." He glances at the boys, and gets ready to move. "We meet back up here as soon as we can, to take the upper floors or the basement. My guess, in a place like this, it's usually down where the trouble is. But I'd rather not leave anything behind us, if that makes sense."

He waits for any confirmation to his plan. Sweat beads over one brow, though inside, Dex is cold as ice. The old calm before action, he's done this dozens of times against some of Capone's boys in Chicago. How bad could it get?

(OOC: Edited for clarity)

"I'll stay with you guys," said Delores. She still didn't quite trust the two he'd brought in with them and she thought she'd be safer with Dex and Esposito - at least they'd be looking out for her.

I think Dex is proposing he and his two old friends go through the left door that's latched on this side and that Franky and his cop-friends take the door to the left that's standing ajar. So Delores's option is go with Dex or with Franky.

(OOC: Gaffer has it right, that is what I was getting at. One group to the right, one group to the left.)

"Alright, Dex. I'll cover you while you open the door."

Once that's done, I'm heading through the other door and down, ready to squirt metal at anything that looks at me wrong.

I think I got your left-right choices reversed. Please clarify who goes through the door that's ajar and who through the door latched on this side.

Gaffer wrote:I think Dex is proposing he and his two old friends go through the left door that's latched on this side and that Franky and his cop-friends take the door to the left that's standing ajar. So Delores's option is go with Dex or with Franky.

(emphasis mine)

I'll take the left one!

I believe that Dex is going through the latched door and Franky is taking the unlatched door.

(Sheesh..However, that is right. Dex and two fed's will go through the latched door, Esposito and the coppers through the standing ajar door.)

Dex looks over the group of them, and then shakes his head. "Mother always told me to speak slowly and enunciate. So, me the feds will take this here latched door, Esposito, you and your boys take the door over there. Delores, you decide which group you want to come with." Dex's buddies laugh and one of them, its hard to tell which, sotto vocce says "Dex had the same issues in Chicago. Never quite clear what he meant, but he always got his way in the end."

"I'll come with you, Dex," said Delores, shifting her grip on the sawn-off. The perspiration on her hands was making the grip slippery and she took a moment to wipe her palms on her dress - not ideal but she had nothing else to hand. "Ready," she said.

Dex nods as Heine and Two-Guns. "Okay boys, get that thing open, however you can. Delores and I will cover you and keep our eyes peeled for any other trouble." He glances over his shoulder at Esposito and nods as he and his officers disappear. "Delores, keep an eye on the stairs and the front door, if you can." His automatic in hand, he moves to cover the boys at the locked door.

Delores shifts her stance, so she can cover both door and stairs as asked. "I've got it," she says.

Esposito pushes the door open and Corydon and O'Donough follow him through. They quickly realize that the apartment has been broken through into the next building, creating a passageway between the two. The rooms in both apartments are littered with men's clothing and pallets on the floor, the kitchens foul with months of greasy cooking.

At the end of the next apartment, the door opens into another vestibule, the exterior door to the right boarded over. Three other apartment doors open onto the landing where a staircase leads up, but where there should be floors steps [ed.] to the cellar is a solid floor.