OSA Reimeiki

In response, a chorus of guns click and are aimed at his chest. A slight squeal escapes his lips before he faints dead away, falling to a the floor next to where Jessica stands, petrified and oblivious.

The silence is crushing, with only the barely audible whir of Diya's cyborg arm transforming into an ominous-weapon behind her back, as the crowd parts to dramatically emit a tall, plump figure. He steps forward, his blindingly white spats carving a path through the dim light, and opens his mouth-

"DUDE, no way!!!"

Nicole rushes forward, snatching the fedora off of one hit-man's head, examining it, then plunking it onto her own. 

"This is the most sickly hardcore hat I have ever seen!" She turns to address the utterly bewildered mafioso, who still has his gun pointed at John's crumpled figure, greasy hair now askew. "Nice taste."

By now, Jessica has realized that her beloved is in a heap on the floor and has dropped to the ground next to him, desperately trying to revive him in a series of disturbingly affectionate ways. Emily is taking infinitesimal steps backwards, trying to edge herself out the door, when she bumps into one of the hulking figures that had moved to secure the doors shut. Eyes wide, a cartoon sweat-drop sliding down the side of her horrified expression, she slowly turns around. The man moves to grab his pistol and aims with lightning precision as Emily meekly shrinks back into the group.

"Scusi," mockingly states the grandiose figure who had stepped into the center of the restaurant before the whole affair had started, "Se avessi potuto intervenire..."

The last was spoken through a thick accent, leaving the group of captives looking at one another quizzically.

"...anyone know what the heck that means?" Kyna quack-whispered, looking at Rosita, who shrugged.

"It means 'Can I speak?' ...I think he wants us to be quiet!" Jessica said, without looking up from her unconscious lover.

Diya, who had imperceptibly moved to search the word on her wrist processor, looks up from the small holographic screen triumphantly. "That's exactly what I got!" Then she frowned. "This probably isn't even the regional dialect of Pisa...it sounds like some lazy person using Google translate."

Somewhere across the world, in a dark closet, someone pushes masses of hanging clothing out of the way to bang her head against the wall.

A menacing "Ahem" brings everyone back to attention.

"Che cosa, mi chiedo..."

Diya types frantically on her keypad. "He says, 'What, I wonder...'"

"Sono tutti voi malandrini fare all'interno del mio ristorante?"

Clicking as hands fly across the keyboard again. "'Are all...crooks you...do in my restaurant'?! What the -"

Jessica sullenly mutters "He probably means to ask what we're all doing in his restaurant." She then bursts into tears, seizing John's lifeless body by the shoulders and shaking it ferociously while sobbing, "CUDDLE BOO, WAKE UP!!!"

Another belligerent sound comes from the impatient-looking mob boss, and Jessica resorts to whimpering, but her desperate attempt to wake John are of an unchanged ferocity. After a few moments of blank stares from both parties, the enormous man sighs, steps aside, and says "Geno?"

A smaller, very nervous man steps forward and mutters in an exasperated tone, "My boss here wants to know what exactly you miscreants think you are doing in his restaurant."

Catherine's expression is unusually antagonistic as she spits at the man, "MISCREANTS? Excuuuuse me, I wouldn't consider myself even close  to being as pathetic as you. WE came in here for some food -"

"Catherine," growls Diya warningly, flexing her cyborg arm. This little man - Geno -  is already cowering under her death stare.

"How would you expect us to know that this place would be some saloon for idiots dressed like bad actors from the '20s?! We-"

"Catherine..." Rosita clutches her staff behind her back, carefully monitoring the tens of pistols that weren't aimed at John anymore.

"-were just intending to LEAVE, thank you very much. We wouldn't want to spend any more time," she says as she strides past a crouching Emily towards the door guard, "in this rat hole."

A muffled yelp comes from Nicole as the fedora-less hit man finally comes to his senses and grabs her, aiming his pistol at her head. "Non e una mossa piu, o questo ottiene!"

Diya and Rosita simultaneously whip out their weapons, stepping in front of a hysterical Jessica Yoon as Kyna spreads her wings and draws Catherine away from the door guard. Emily, staring intently at the man holding Nicole, is swiftly becoming a comically bright shade of crimson, eyes flashing dangerously. Pistols are aimed everywhere, creating another painfully tense and silent tableau as they await the word from their boss. Again, he opens his mouth, to be interrupted by the back doors bursting open.

A figure leaps into the fray just as the first shot is fired.