2021-04-24 - The Sacking of the Hardware Store

Itzhak does not want to support that! He wants to support these nice lesbians who advanced him a solid whack of credit on his garage. So now he buys everything through them. He's in the process of examining a new circular saw when the front door slams shut and the daylight is suddenly cut off by the blinds. Itzhak jerks his head up like an alarmed deer.

Conner comes here all the time. Or he does, now that he's lost his real maintenance guy and has started trying to take care of all his residents himself. He is coming up to do some shopping when Ethel comes stumbling out. He puts out a hand, as if to catch her. "Ms. Ethel? Are you...alright? What's going on in there?"

He directs an owlish frown at the way the store seems to be...closing early.

Easton is in the hell that is the plumbing aisle swearing loudly as he stuffs one of just about every damn connector he can find into his shopping basket. He tells them individually just how much he wishes they would all go to hell but takes them anyway because he knows that he will inevitably still not end up with the right ones and be making yet another trip back to this god forsaken outpost. He's dressed in a hoodie and jeans over his worn leather boots and looks a little haggard from his latest foray into commercial kitchen maintenance.

Hyacinth is not driving all the way to fucking Hoaquim when local business should have everything the first lady of lumber requires. If they go out of business the town has an ugly little hole where business is not happening and that affects both tourism, her commute, and her drinking habit. It's vitally important! Her tell-tale cadence is audible on the tile floor.

She stops and almost runs into Itzhak murmuring something about a 3 3/16" circular saw and to making her steal one of Vyv's cookie cutters and trying to make her own. Mazel tov, she knows what a cookie cutter is. In theory. "Oh. Conner. Hello. When you find out if she's fine can you ask her where the 3 3/16th circular saws are?" Her face light up in a smile o pure appreciation before the man agrees to a damn thing or even gets a hullo out. "Oh! and see if she has the 18v Makita rechargeable batteries for my drill please." The smile warms. "I'll wait." Awww she looks so happy. "Moooorning, Itzhak."

"Morning, Hya." Itzhak flashes his luthier and fellow craftsman a smile that is not nervous at all. Then he yells a few aisles over, "MARSHALL! THEY CAN HEAR YOU IN SEATTLE!" Meanwhile he's just subtly loosing the sawblade from the mechanism. Juuuuuuust casually.

"Yes ma'am," Conner says to Hyacinth, the way he almost always does...like there is no doubt that he will do her bidding when this nonsense is done. But he looks at Ms. Ethel and says, "How about you get yourself somewhere safe?"

And then he looks at those who are outside with him. "I'm not letting a bunch of punks push Ms. Ethel around."

He's going to try to get the door open. Is it locked?

Without even stopping or pausing to think Easton calls back over the shelves, "I swear to God I will shove these down your throat sideways you ********" The insult is not appropriate for mixed company but Easton says it anway, but with love. The thing that does cause him to pause is the pitter-patter above them but after a brief glance around he squats (with a slight grunt) to check out the descriptions on the lower tier parts trying to find something that will work. Maybe.

Hyacinth finds peace in the built-it-yourself kingdom. Conner gets several little gold stars and silent endorsements for his property reccs. Then...the swearing. There's the quirk of a grin, "Easton are you singing us the song of your people?" And then the dulcet tones of Itzhak yelling. "May I remind you there's children present?" She has propriety? "can we get them out of here unattended?"

Itzhak snorts a laugh at the excessively impolite thing Easton yells at him along with offers to shove things down his throat. "Quit flirtin', Marshall, we gotta situation." He didn't hear anything but it's never a good sign when the door slams in Gray Harbor. Never. Hya gets a nudge. "We should all get outta heah," he murmurs to her. "Go on. I'll follow."

Conner steps carefully into the hardware store, frowning around. He is looking for hoodlums. Hoodlums to lecture! Hoodlums to stare down with his Disapproving Stare (TM)! He frowns, pausing to flick at the lights. Flick flick. Flick flick. "You kids have best not have messed around with Ms. Ethel's electricity," he says.

Disapproving Voice! This will stand in until he can Glare Effectively.

"The song of my people is waaay fuckin' dirtier Hya." The flickering of the lights comes right after Itzhak's warning and Easton just growls, "Oh come on. I'm already going to have to come back." And with that Easton starts shoving bits of plumbing parts into his hoodie pouch. He'll pay for them later, he promises, he just really doesn't want to not have the parts when this is all over. But he's alert enough to see the paint projectile incoming and side steps it. He calls out to Itzhak and Hya, "Possible gremlins in the rafters? I think they might need some aerating." He pulls a Glock m19 out of his hoodie pouch that should not by normal laws of physics actually fit in there.

Hyacinth is nudges. She looks at the offending elbow, back to Itzhak. One eyebrow pops up refusing to do anything quickly until he uses his words. ...okay to be fair those seem like reasonable words. "Yeah I can't actually finish installing the vanity, though until I get my-" TONK! There's a flailing and a wince, "The ever living shit you goddamn chum eating crumbgrabber!" Her pinky is out as she swears. Her head getting grabbed and checking for damages. Whipping her head around she looks for a mind to seize and march out of the damn building. Can she even do that? Who knows, but she is happy always to try,

"Hya! Fuck, you okay?" That empty paint can made an impressive CLONKGK. But Hya's swearing reassures Itzhak that at least she's not badly hurt. "Hey!" he yells at Conner. "We got gremlins, watch it!" And then he tosses the sawblade. It whickers evilly through the air, propelled by the swell of his Song, and slices towards where he did, at last, hear something.

Welp.

Now Conner can see these aren't kids who need a talking to. He stares for a moment as these tiny critters come out with their weapons and anger and blows out his cheeks. "Oh."

"Well."

And then, again: "Well."

He opens his hands, summoning the electrokinesis he's getting a lot more confident with of late, letting it crackle along his fingers, ready to defend himself. But he grimaces and tries to address the little dudes all the same. "Hi guys," he says, in placid tones. "I see that you seem to have used Ms. Ethel's hardware store to create quite the arsenal here. And it looks like..."

He's starting to clue into the others and what they're doing now.

"There's been a little splatting and such already. But...I don't suppose we can talk you out of this before things get uglier?"

He probably means I don't suppose I can talk you out of this before it gets uglier, as some are already past that stage, but...you know. Guy's gotta try.

A glancing blow to the shoulder gets Easton to sweep the ceiling with his gun before starting to move to the end of the aisle and peak out to try and find exactly where in the store the other people are. "Schnozz. Hya. Where you-" His question is cut off by the screeching and the little gremlins stepping out into the aisles. "You brought knives to a gun fight." He takes aim and tries to dispatch the closest of the gremlins with a double-tap. "Course, they're all gun fights far as I'm concerned." \
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"Feel free to talk if you want, I'm not interested in what they have to say." Easton comments to Connor, not unkindly, just completely lacking in patience for the thought of 'talking it out' with Dream creatures.

Hyacinth quips back to Itzhak, "Fuck you t-...oh... Thanks." There's the immediate reaction and she takes a step closer to Itzhak trusting him here while she gets her faculties about her. Is there an angry battle aura? No, the Veil doesn't work like that, but there should be. This would be a fantastic

There's a comfort knowing Easton is 95% armed and that also makes her keep Itzhak between she and Easton's direction knowing he's probably shielded. There's a frown and she reaches out to find the mind of the thing that hit her, GRABS IT, and blasts an air horn in its mind. Her hair falls and her eyes start looking a bit bloodshot from the feedback, but she's trying to hold them.

Itzhak steadies Hya with a hand on her back. "Yeah yeah, we can talk about that later." Then his face squinches up from the feedback he can sense from Hya. "God damn, girl!" He might need a little steadying himself! Finally getting a good look at the creatures and the numbers in which they appear, he blinks at them...then starts looking around in growing concern. "Guys! There's gotta be a nest nearby! They don't show up like this unless there is and...they...should be bigger? The ones I saw before weren't tiny!"

Well, now they're leaping for his legs, and Conner goes, "Yep, yep, no, you're right, yep," to Easton, even as he decides to stop talking too. Nope, he's just going to blast the little guys who are running at him, intent on making him, what? A much shorter man? Yeah, he's got enough complexes as it is, he'll keep his height, thank you very much.

Besides. Itz is saying that bigger ones might be nearby, if he's hearing this right. And also that there's a nest. And also bigger ones. They definitely lost some adorableness factors there, either way.

Dropping the first little munchkin Easton doesn't wait before picking out a new target. This time instead of firing though he sends a few sections of copper pipe to hopefully skewer a few of the little buggers to the wall. He moves out of the way of projectiles and sweeps a kick at any that come to close for comfort. He asks, "Itzel are you implying that we're killing baby gremlins because I don't really need a Jewish grandma's guilt complex right now buddy. I just want to get through this and go fix the stupid fuckin' prep sink."

"I don't think they're babies. More like, I dunno, ants, with warriors, yannow?" Just as Itzhak says that his eyes widen--several gremlins are taking direct aim at him. And firing. Pewpewpewpew! But none of them hit him, possibly because he grabs Hya and ducks. "SO!" he yells back, on key. "It is to be war between us!" And he kicks the metal shelving while humming the Phantom of the Opera theme. It's no chandelier but it'll do.

Hyacinth is hanging in there. Maybe right now only few can see what toll the strain is taking on her. Eyes are definitely little road maps. There's a small nosebleed starting and she is not so proud to not just let Itzhak tank. Physicality and looking distressed are not her thing. GIving a SWIFT DRESSING DOWN is.

IT hurts far more than she wants to admit and she's going to have that headache long after this with how tight she is clencing her jaw. She leans against Itzhak's side to keep balance and say "I dunno how much longer I can hold them. more...pewpew..." yeah words not the forte right now. Swaring under her breath while Conner and Easton and Itzhak clean up? Yes. good.