Hey who the hell is this guy? (Open & Closed)

[quizpersona]

Who: A man who isn't going by "Gogol" right now
Where: Aldrip (now with better accuracy!) The Inn, an abandoned house at the edges of town, at a diner.
What: The assorted shenanigans related to a certain local murder clown who has faked his own perma-death to assume a different identity. There will be various toplevels in the comments. This is "closed-ish" because it's not 100% closed but there's a lot of ooc plotting and scheming going on so please come join in on the plotting scheming instead of blitzing in with a "hey you guys that's obviously Gogol" when other people are investigating.

Getting short-lived CR with the nice, helpful, and well-mannered salaryman is 100% open though because frankly that's funny.

Edit: now including a top level for his sentencing failure.

Warnings: Kidnapping, nsfw dialogue, law advice for the dubious, torture (includes finger trauma).

Comments

[bonobos]

[ the relief does not fade — ultimately, whatever happens to him is a drop in the pond, an echo in this place at best. if minato was fine, he would accept it.

a brow raises at the reveal of his name — nikolai. he would remember that. sha-ming rocks back into the chair. strangely, he doesn’t seem to be particularly phased by the metal digging into his knuckle, mostly because he’s at ease now. ]

All this for a coat? [ a scoff. ] No idea what you’re talkin’ about, and I mean that. You kidnapped the wrong guy. I couldn’t be less involved in whatever the hell goes on in this city. Real sad for you, isn’t it, Niko?

[invinciblemikey]

(oops. no fucks given about anything currently, sorry gogol... he just prefers to be direct and leave the violence as an added bonus. information first, fun later?)

Do you buy that? He already lied once, caught red-handed.

CW Strangulation

[quizpersona]

Well? Actually, yes. In the first place that was never the reason why I brought him here. Which means—

[ If this was a movie he could've reached over and snapped Sha-Ming's neck... Alas, it takes a comical amount of effort to snap someone's neck with bare hands, actually. With all the time in the world and that thought in mind Nikolai lays that hammer back on the side table.

As Sha-Ming rocks back in the chair Gogol does end up reaching towards him after all, but it's to slip a finger underneath the tie digging into the cheek; where he'd left it to partially gag the guy. Once he has that foothold he yanks it down around his abductee's throat, and adjusts the knot so it fulfills the actual purpose of a tie in laying snug again the neck. Where that hand lands after the completion of that task is on the back of the chair. It brings Nikolai to lean over him slightly after he's nudged that table out of the way with his foot.

Belatedly— ]

...You can die now! Like you asked, riiight?

[ The end of the tie is wrapped once, and then twice around his hand to get a good grip. Aware that this will take approximately 2-3 minutes and that Mikey is in a position where he will have to watch, leave, or stop him— he pulls on the tie until it should cut off Sha-Ming's ability to breathe entirely. ]

cw death

[bonobos]

[ it happens in a snap moment; the tie, traversing down his face, taut around his throat. nikolai pulls back -- sha-ming chokes in response, eyes watering, teeth gnashing against his tongue.

his vision is fading -- his flesh is going cold. how strange. how lonely. darkness pricks at the corners of his eyes, and he sees a glimpse of nikolai's face, gaze fixated on him. there's this keen awareness: that this could be so much worse. that it should have been, that he expected it to be.

there's a part of his mind, in the throes of panic, that wonders if he'll truly come back. in those final seconds, slow like molasses, memories whisk by -- running through the dying weeds of a barren planet, smiling alongside bonobos; small fingers wound around his hand, a blue haired boy trailing behind him; making it to civilization for the first time, roaming asphalt streets, realizing he was an outlier; all of the faceless girlfriends who stepped in and out of the arena of his life; a brunette little girl who hid in thickets of trees, precious to a version of himself that didn't exist to begin with.

in the end, he still doesn't understand what his friends went through. because this man has chosen mercy, and sha-ming has realized. his friends died under the heel of a boot. they died for having wanted to live at all. nikolai did not want to do this. as the life wheezes out of his body, sha-ming can only come to one conclusion: he's always been a selfish bastard, through and through. ]