Thirteen Robberies and a Mysterious Murder

Eddie Vex loved Vegas. He loved the way that the city bled with untamed probability and the prospects of millions being lost legally in a matter of moments. He loved it enough to rob the Cresswell Casino - formerly known as Ceasars Palace. He didn't give a shit about the previous owner, or anyone inside. Still, Eddie wasn't a murderer. At least not intentionally. Sometimes his tags caused some issues with the balance of things, and people got hurt. But Eddie did try to save them if they looked near death. Eddie was a villain after all, not a monster.

Eddie put on his costume and stepped into the casino. He started throwing around tags, and people started losing money at an accelerated rate. Thirteen felt the luck energy course into him with the force of a tidal wave. It almost knocked him off his feet, but he stayed standing and grinned. "Hello, everyone! Welcome to the robbery! Place your chips in the bag, and your luck will improve. Don't, and well..." Thirteen threw 5 more tags into the bodyguard pointing his weapon at Eddie. "Nobody wins." Eddie heard the gun fire, but it went wide, bounced off the steel support, and destroyed a display screen. "Well that's gonna hurt the old paycheck, eh?"

Thirteen's bag started filling with casino chips and dollar bills. He loved Vegas.

It was a strange place for Sam to go, but Melody had suggested that he take a vacation. She was after all and she wouldn't be around much to give him further guidance. He, of course, complained about the money and said that it should be going to his family which she quickly dismissed. She offered up to pay for the endeavor and again he tried to go against it, yet...she can be very persuasive.

So, there he was in Las Vegas. Someone once told him it was like a big circus and have previously been a carnie, he was interested in it.  Plus, Mel told him he may actually be able to win some money. He was pretty good at blackjack. Just...if he did, that he'd give her some of his winnings which he quickly agreed to. If he could make money on a vacation, money that he could send to his family...then, well...that was a vacation he was happy to go on.

So, there he was in a casino, it was third day there when...oh. That was far from good. He looked over his shoulder at the ruckus. The strangely dressed man beginning to hold up the place. Was he allowed to be a hero on vacation? He wasn't sure...he liked it and never really considered it work, but...it was his job? Hmmm...

That's when the guns were pulled and all missed their target. Yep. That was sign enough for Sam that he should probably step in. But what to do? He could just walk up to the guy and ask him to stop. He could use his power and try to restrain him or just try and knock him out right away. That didn't seem right though. He should at least give the man a chance. So, he let out a sigh and pushed himself away from the table he was at, a table where he had failed to notice the other gamers and dealers had ducked behind.

In a very casual way Sam raised his hand and waved to Thirteen, as if he had been some old friend. He gave him a chipper smile and slowly approached him, "Hey bud, any chance you want to not do this? Everyone here is just playing, having a good time, trying to win some money. Why not join in? earn some money the fun and legal way? I'll even play a hand with ya, pal!" It was a simple enough offer. "Come on, friend, what do you say we not do any of this, yeah?" Sam, of course, was not in his hero attire and just looked like a young gambler, no one threatening or even carrying some merit of danger. It was just a guy with an offer.

Thirteen looked the man up and down. He wasn't too tall, seemed about... a couple inches shorter than Thirteen? He frowned. This guy didn't look like he was too used to this setup. Thirteen heard him talking, but admittedly didn't really listen. He was busy picking up the golden tokens that had fallen on the floor.

"You know, it's weird." He said, talking to the apparent hero. "Here I am robbing a casino, and it never once occured to me that I should consider what I'm going to do with these chips and tokens." Thirteen bit one. Solid gold. Whoever owned this place had some excellent taste and resources. "I guess the tokens I can melt down and sell..." He suddenly whipped back to the other guy. "I'm sorry, you were saying some-" Thirteen was interrupted by the sound of a gunshot outside. "What the hell?" He asked, sounding genuinely surprised.

Sam frowned a bit. It didn’t really get on his nerves to be ignored, but it was still rude as hell! Ain’t no like that in the carnival business or back home. Who was this man’s mother? He should’ve gotten more stern talking to’s as a kid. Surely he knew that when someone addressed you give them a bit of attention. Yet, like any cliché villain, which did earn some points in Sam’s book, he was caught monologuing. Gosh, that was bothersome.

When the man finally began to address him they were both interrupted, their attention being brought to the source of the gunshot. That was never a good sound. Chances were it wasn’t the cops or the security given that it was too soon for the cops to arrive and the security, well, this man was sure to deal with them at a relatively decent pace. What kind of vacation was this turning out to be? He thought they were supposed to relaxing or…something? Not more work. Not that he minded all that much. Hero work was nice. It was fun. He liked it, but…it would’ve been nice to have some sort of break.

Sam looked back to the man and let out a sigh, “Alright. You’re gonna stay here and I’m gonna check that out. Alright-bye!” And Sam moved to walk past him, as he did so he would attempt to open two portals beneath Thirteen, one at his right leg, one at the left leg, the two connecting portals being in two random sections in the air. He’d try and open a third on his right arm for a good measure, also somewhere in the air somewhere.

Regardless of whether or not it actually worked, Sam would continue forward towards the sound of the gunshot. Someone better not have died or else he’d call Mel and complain to her about her choice of vacation spot. She was probably out on her vacation too…maybe he’d wait until she was back. No! Wait…that defeated the purpose of the angry phone call.

"Oh boy...here we go..."

Thirteen started to run out the door, when two portals opened just in front of his feet. His legs split, and... well, let's just say that the wedding rings and necklaces weren't the only gems that crashed to the floor. Thirteens yell of pain was audible throughout the casino as he fell face forward, losing concentration on his tags.

Outside, a gruesome scene befell Sams eyes. A man was shot dead in the alleyway, and... his face was missing. Not cut off, it was... almost like it never existed in the first place. A slenderman-esque visage facing him, the police sirens finally arrived.

Meanwhile, inside, Thirteen threw around a few tags to keep himself from being squashed by an anvil or something, and he crawled out of the hole, readjusting his outfit. "Damn... Nearly killed me with that." He said, walking out the front door after giving up on picking up the valuables.

He walked up to Sam, ready to punch him in the face for trying to castrate him; and... saw the victim. "Holy shit! What happened here?!" He asked, as he stared at the body on the ground. "Did you teleport his face off?!"

Sam looked over his shoulder at the man he had thought he had apprehended. Apparently the portals around his legs weren't tight enough to hold him in place. He'd have to try again, though...was that the pressing matter at hand right now? Sam's gaze flicked from the criminal to the faceless man on the ground and gave a slight tilt of his head, letting out a small hum. He had seen bodies before and as disheartening and terrifying as it was...Melody's words rang in his head; in these situations a hero should never show fear, you can feel it, but showing it will only make those you're trying to protect panic.

He had to do what he could to help ease the situation. His eyes fell back to the man who was causing problems before and shook his head, "Of course not..." He looked around at the gathering crowd and cleared his throat and rose up a hand. "Alright everyone! There's been a scenario, I'm gonna make sure you lot stay safe. My name is Odd and I'm a hero. Gonna make sure to keep you all safe as best I can." He gave a nod then pointed to one of the men, "You. Call the cops, tell them there's been an attack. The rest of you, go to the lobby and don't think of leaving. Stay with the security so they can keep you safe. We don't know what they're after and running out in a panic might only make them attack more." That was only part of the truth of course. The assailant might be among them and Sam didn't want them getting away.

He let out a breath as the crowd did begin to disperse and head to the lobby as instructed. A few of the security that were there as well followed suit, making sure to keep everyone in line. Situation was handled for the most part which only left one thing to do...

He looked to the oddly dressed man, the one who was causing problems and stared him dead in the eyes, "You didn't have anything to do with this, did you, criminal? Don't think because of this you're gonna get off the hook." Sam didn't trust this guy and following Mel's instructions he had to be a bit more stern, couldn't be as nice in this situation. Someone had died and it was no time to joke around.

Thirteen got the guys hero name. Odd. Strange name for a guy who made portals. He would’ve gone with Portcullis. Or maybe Portal Man. Though he supposed it wasn’t a bad name. He was shaken out of his introspection, by the heroes answer and commands. “Hey man, I’m not trying to be a jerk here. Just saying that a dudes face is missing, and you’re the only one with teleportation adjacent abilities. You seem like the best choice to me.”

Then he asked if Thirteen had anything to do with this. Thirteen scratched his chin. He didn’t remember hiring anyone else for this job. He supposed it wasn’t impossible that he might’ve, though Thirteen was pretty sure that he hadn’t.

He shook his head and said “Nah. My powers don’t steal faces, and I don’t kill. On purpose. Anymore. Point is, that I don’t have anything to do with this specific event. Plus, I have no motive. Best you can do is attach the motive for a distraction to you, and I don’t know if you noticed; but I have no money, and I’m not running away. So this would be a pretty shit distraction.”

Thirteen looked to the crowd, they seemed to flood back into the lobby at the heroes words. He saw a couple of stragglers though, notably the manager of the casino who had apparently recovered.

“What is the meaning of this, hero?” The man said the word with so much venom, Thirteen felt like the hero should’ve keeled over from the toxicity. “I want this man placed under arrest and thrown into the deepest hole you can find!” The little man was almost purple with rage. Thirteen grinned his best winning smile, hoping it was slightly threatening and knelt down.

“Listen here, you self important little turd.” The taller man said. “A man is dead because your security was too shitty to handle me. Your casino hasn’t lost a single dime, and don’t pretend that people picking up your cash is going to make any sort of difference whatsoever. Everyone knows these places never lose money. I bet you have so much cash stored in the vault that you could survive 20 of these robberies before the inside of your wallet ever so much as felt the slightest breeze from lost revenue.” He leaned in, and in a whisper so faint that Odd would have to strain to hear him. “Now get the fuck out of here before I shove my fist so far up your ass, we’ll have to start calling you Kermit.”

The manager blanched. “I- I suppose it can wait for now. There are more important issues after all.” With that, he and the other stragglers swiftly walked inside. They must’ve been his cronies.

“So ‘Odd’, what have we got figured out so far?”

Sam sighed at his apparently new companion’s comment. He was ready to tell of the manager in a more…reasonable manner. Though, still, it was kinda nice for someone to be able to tell off a citizen like that. Often times Sam was forced to deal with the needy and bratty, the sort that put business and personal gain before what was really important in situations like this. Though, going back to the other hand…this man was a crook and villain, one who was just trying to steal from this establishment and Sam didn’t much care for having his support.

For the time being, at least, he could keep this guy close so when he did catch the one responsible for the face removal (granted that it wasn’t this guy) he could easily detain him as well. For now he’d keep his focus on the task at hand, his gaze once more returning to the body without a face. He slowly kneeled down before it and placed a hand to the person’s throat, checking to see if there was still a pulse. He wasn’t sure how the person could be breathing or otherwise alive, but still…there may just be a chance that they could be saved.

At Thirteen’s question, Sam’s gaze once more looked up to him, giving him a slightly annoyed frown. “Well, besides you, I suppose…the manager seemed relatively guilty. He completely ignored the fact that there was a body here, as if he wasn’t surprised. His concern was with money, so that either implies he’s an overly greedy person, he expected this, or that he was behind this. There is a high chance for the first one, but it’s not enough to rule out the other options.” He exhaled, thinking and looking back to the body. “There is you, you have some sort of ability it seems, but you don’t seem competent enough to rob a casino and remove the face of someone in another room, plus there would be some sort of sign, probably…but that still doesn’t rule you out either.”

Inside he was still panicking, but he had to try and tackle this reasonably. A serious murder case with a meta involved. He couldn’t let his nerve scare him away or break his reason. He had to think carefully. So, with a breath he stood back up and brushed off his legs. “Alright, you.” He pointed to a nearby security member, “Take us to the surveillance room so we can go over what happened. The rest of security, uh, report to me if you hear or see anything strange or spot anyone suspicious. Besides me and my companion here. Don’t go causing panic, handle it has however your protocol dictates and, again, don’t let anyone out. We don’t want the crook getting out from under us.”

He looked back to the person he initially told to lead them, and nodded “Alright, whenever you’re ready, let’s go. Let’s see if we can put a face to our villain.”