Post by Atlas on Feb 5, 2022 21:57:14 GMT -5
Nico Calavera #1
The sun has a weird way of shining down on islands in the West Blue. In the dawn, it tends to show up suddenly, rising up abruptly at the sudden cry of a rooster. During High Noon, it shines painfully bright down on the inhabitants of this sea, leaving few things hidden in the shadows and illuminating even the darkest deeds and the most dramatic of confrontations. And finally at dusk, it tends to hang around in a haze, casting distorted shadows over the islands as people creep around in the final moments of the day.
This sundown is no different, the abandoned warehouses and ruins of Lee City illuminated by a dwindling sunlight, causing everything present to have distended shadows. It gives the desolate former port city a haunted look, as thanks to the vines and greenery sprouting in the city streets, it feels like the whole city is a giant graveyard. It's buildings less former homes and businesses than crumbling tombstones, the epithets longs since worn away with time.
And much like a graveyard, Lee City's air of taboo keeps away prying eyes from any unsavory business that might be conducted here. Unsavory business like the dealings of one Boss Grant Dickson, local leader of the island's council and mafia don. He stalks the streets with a gang of his cronies, well built men in cheap suits.
Grant himself is a stark contrast to those in his employ. Where they are large and thuggish, wearing cheap clothes that give off an air of purchased pride and sold sincerity, Boss Dickson is the very model of a legitimate up and coming businessman, young with flawless skin and carefully trimmed brown hair. His suit is clearly bespoke, hugging his frame without being too tight or stiff. The large coat hanging off his shoulders doesn't swallow his frame. Instead it sways in the evening wind, acting every bit as the cape of a local nobility.
Glancing down at a timepiece hanging off his wrist, Grant seems to take note of the time before striding off to a section of the ruined docks that are still barely functional. Much like a carrion bird, Boss Dickson is at home in this graveyard of a city, feasting off the scraps of a better time and repurposing them towards his own ends. In this case, using what little docks have yet to slip into the sea to provide a safe harbor for a transaction. Squinting his eyes at the horizon, a ship can be made out, riding in with the sun to it's back, making it hard to spot for those who wouldn't know to look for it.
Glancing back at his men as he smirks, Boss Dickson begins to lean against the side of an abandoned warehouse, waiting for his newest shipment of weapons to arrive. Little does he know, leaning on the same crumbling wall, just on the other side inside of the warehouse, is one Nico Calavera. Both of them awaiting the arrival of the ship into the port, but with very different intentions. And as a result, two very different expressions. Where Grant is anxious on the verge of impatience, Nico is bored stiff on the verge of irritation as he glares out the window.
Aboard the ship was an armory of weapons, and all of them in the hands of West Blue criminals much more widely known and feared than Boss Dickson, and naturally, with the bounties to reflect that infamy. And to a bounty hunter like Nico, that meant the ship was essentially a floating bank. And he was about to make a withdrawal.
But of course, that payday had yet to arrive. So, seeking something to spice up all the waiting, the bounty hunter reaches into his suit decorated with elaborate swirls and skulls. His hand digs around for a moment before pulling outwards, acquiring a vibrant red pepper almost as long as Nico's arm. And with a morose and distracted nibbling, Nico begins to silently crunch into it, the spice inherent to the pepper enough to blind lesser men. But to Nico's refined palate, the intense heat of the pepper is a dull tingle.
Nico Calavera #ffffff
Boss Grant Dickson #4c1e69
