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DM's website: http://www.project-daedalus.com/
The setting owes much to Urban Arcana, from the d20 modern book. Project Daedalus is a small group working towards closing the connection between the worlds, and ending the influx from Arcadia, as the other side of shadow is known. There's some character information at the site, too.
Tonight was our first session, actually none of us had ever met before, the game was arranged over the 'gamers-seeking-gamers' forum hear, and by post at the FLGS we played at. A good time was had by all.
Character creation, about an hour. We were slowed somewhat by the novel bits of the system compared to standard 3e, but we seem to have worked it out.
My character, Isaac Holt, is an academic, a rare book dealer. His business has brought him in contact with a number of arcane curios, and thence to recruitment by Project Daedalus. I'm visualizing him as similar to Johnny Dep's protagonist in The Ninth Gate, or maybe an early Wesley Windham Price from Buffy/Angel- smart and kinda wussy now, badass later.
Isaac is a consistent journaler- he deals in books, and would love to pen his own memoirs someday, thus the records.
Excerpts from the journal of Isaac Holt:
First day at Daedalus. Excellent library here- many of these books are worth small fortunes. Several fine examples of late Renaissance binding techniques. Wide variety of papers, from all over the world. Some need minor repairs- obviously no true bibliophiles here before my arrival.
Interesting people, too. Looking forward to training and evaluation.
later...
Past couple of weeks have been exhausting. Days of poking, prodding, testing, evaluations. Verdict seems to be that I am generally healthy, but lack advanced athletic skills. I could have told them that and saved us all a couple of weeks. My past aikido training has stood me in good stead though. Begun training with sword and pistol- slow progress, nothing to brag about.
My strengths are really in research and languages, not so much shooting and fighting. If this is the focus of the project, I question my place here. Still, intend to stick it out a bit longer.
Last edited by DanMcS; 8th April 2003 at 03:20 AM..
Returned from first mission. Placed with:
Mason Andrews, ex-police investigator;
Rae Winters, previously with national parks medic service;
Wolfgang Kohl, retired military.
Mission objective was distraction. Instructed to find one Big Johnny, an orc of (as we later discovered) fearsome reputation and even more fearsome odor. Johnny and his lads worked for an ogre who had been consolidating power among criminal gangs downtown. We were to find Johnny and keep his gang away from their hideout long enough for a strike team to go in and deal with the ogre.
Arrived in neighborhood approximately at dusk- we believed the orcs would not venture forth earlier. Report had it the orcs often visited a local liquor store, so we started there. More a gas station, we discovered, with a large convenience store and large liquor selection. Mason and I ventured inside to check it out. Rae took up a position across the street to call me if she saw them approaching, and Wolfgang went around back to look around.
The owner, Horacio, was an easily agitated Pakistani gentleman. I selected a small bottle of whiskey to appear as a customer, but when I went to check out Horacio reacted to some inaudible noise, grabbed a bat, and started towards the rear storage area. We later learned Wolfgang had broken into the back and was snooping around- he claimed it was unlocked. Mason and I suspected trouble, so we kept talking at the owner until he decided it must have been nothing, and relented to serve us.
Mason proceeded to question the owner. "I need to talk to Johnny. I hear you know him. Big Johnny. Can you get me in touch with him?" The owner tried to protest, but M. persisted, and we were told that some nights they hung out and drank in a park nearby.
We went outside and met Rae and Wolfgang. W. told us there was a car parked behind the store in the alley, we decided to check it out. The car was locked, but we found gashes in the wall of the store, as though someone had been hitting it with a large bladed weapon. This we also discovered, in the dumpster, a fireman's type axe, with old blood on it. A bloody rag was also found nearby. Very strange.
None of this was finding us any orcs, though. So we went to the park, maybe a half mile overland, in a somewhat residential neighborhood.
Wolfgang disappeared into the dark to look around. Rae stayed near the sidewalk to watch the street, Mason and I also investigated the park. It was block-sized, small parking lot at one end, little restroom building in the middle. There were two cars in the lot, one a running Mercedes, the other unoccupied.
Mason and I searched the area with flashlights; we discovered black tire tracks on the driveway, someone peeled out of there fast. I called out for my lost dog, wandered around, and approached the Mercedes. Knocked on the window. A Jamaican gentleman opened the driver's door.
"Excuse me sir, have you seen my dog? Little wiener dog, he got away from me and was dragging his leash, have you seen my Fluffy?" He told me unless I was buying, I should scram, so I did. There was someone in the passenger seat, too, but he didn't get out.
Rae, Mason and I regrouped and eventually found Wolfgang skulking in the dark. Mason had investigated the restroom building- there was a guy in there wearing sunglasses, washing his hands, but it was otherwise empty. All the faucets were running, though. They were the push-down type that turn off automatically after several seconds. Very odd.
Rae approached the Mercedes again, and initiated an exchange. I was called over to front the cash. I'm used to dealing in expensive plant matter, but mostly it's bound and printed on. We got out of there quick when Wolfgang reported a large Arcadian he had seen earlier was approaching the area. We later determined it to be an ogre.
From 20 yards away we saw the figure approach the Mercedes. I called Daedalus, and told him the ogre he was looking for was probably right here, right now, with no supporting orcs, and he should get here RIGHT the HELL NOW. He demurred, and ordered us to leave the area. The ogre produced a huge, double-headed battleaxe, seemingly from nowhere, and with a shriek of metal brought it down on the passenger side of the Mercedes. The driver popped out the other side and took off, right towards myself and Rae. I informed Daedalus that the ogre had just cut the Mercedes in half; he reiterated that we should leave. This was not particularly helpful, so I terminated the conversation.
The ogre brought the axe down again and again. The passenger had been struggling to bring a gun to bear, but he was never successful. We took the stunned driver prisoner and vacated the area. Under questioning, the driver proved unaware of the incursion of strangeness in the world- he babbled about the "'uge frigging guy" that had attacked the car. He did not recognize the assailant, and could give us no useful information on Johnny, so we zip-cuffed him, hobbled him with duct tape, and called the police to pick him up. He had sufficient drugs on him to incriminate him without our testimony, so we decided to stop wasting our time in this obvious wild goose chase and go back to Horacio's liquor store.
On the way back, Mason spotted a cop he knew investigating the severed Mercedes. The second car had disappeared from the lot, and with it I suspect the sunglassed man from the restroom. None of the drugs had been taken, but the passenger was messily dead, and the Mercedes had been searched.
A quick check behind Horacio's found the car there now unlocked- it smelled of an unidentifiable herb, but the trunk had more of those bloody rags.
Back in Horacio's, Rae told H to "Stop playing games" and hook us up with Johnny, we had a job for him. Wolfgang had gone to burgle the back room again, and picked up the phone in time to hear H talk to a deep-voiced person who wanted to work for beer. We regrouped in the store, and waited for the orcs to show up. A call to Daedalus told him when the orcs reached the store, and we were told to keep them there for 10 minutes at least.
Negotiations were difficult at first, as the orcs (rightly) believed we didn't have a job for them. They were distracted by the smashable glass doors concealing lots of beer. Horacio was displeased and produced a mammoth shotgun, but we pointed out that he was insured, and the gangers would outshoot him. Touch and go for a minute, though. We escaped out the front door, and pondered the merits of crashing the car through the front door, or torching the place with the gas hoses, but decided retreat was the better part of valor. H deserved to deal with the orcish vandals anyway; what good person keeps a box of bloody rags in his trunk? Daedalus picked us up several blocks away, commented that the ogre he saw had no battleaxe, but that he was reasonably successful, and so were we.
Who was that other ogre, though? And the sunglassed man in the park. Horacio is definitely up to no good. And we'll have to deal with those orcs eventually, I imagine. Maybe this job isn't so bad after all.
Illegal actions perpetrated by the party this session, roughly chronologically:
Concealed carry w/o permit (constantly)
Burglary (Horacio's back door)
Buying, possessing controlled substances
Kidnapping, armed robbery (searching the driver's pockets for clues)
Disturbing a crime scene
Burglary (the back door again, and the car)
Incitement to vandalism/riot (of the orcs)
And we're just getting warmed up.
Last edited by DanMcS; 6th December 2002 at 02:48 PM..
That list of crimes kinda reminds me of the scene in "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly" when the judge is reading off the list of crimes for which "the Ugly" is being hanged.
(One of our players had to skip this saturday; the GM brought a short one-session adventure we could do in one session, and we'll start a longer adventure next week. Plus, a short vignette for each character present.)
Wolfgang Kohl
Wolfgang, after our encounters with rampaging ogres and pillaging orcs, decided he needed a bigger gun. There was a gun show in the area, so he went hunting for an M4 carbine, a weapon he was familiar with from time in the military.
He struck up a conversation with a dealer who had two on display, one standard and one apparently modified, better barrel, sights, a good custom job. He attempted to sweettalk the guy down on the price of the masterly crafted one, but the dealer stood firm, and another customer walked up and bought it for the listed price. Wolfgang did a double-take, the other customer, slender, graceful, pale, pointed ears, obviously an Arcadian. He lost the elf into the crowd, but ended up buying the stock gun and some rounds.
Wandering around the show, he found something even stranger- another elf, this one dark skinned, pale hair. Different subspecies, maybe. The elf was dealing WWII memorabilia; some guns, defunct grenades, but mostly authentic looking Nazi stuff, and some bizarre grisly artifacts, necklaces made out of teeth and paperweights made out of skulls. Wolfgang talked to him a bit, didn't bother to buy anything, but later shadowed the elf to his car and got the license plate for later reference. Very strange.
Rae Winters
Rae got a call from an old friend, a park ranger in town for the weekend. She met him for dinner, and he related some unusual attacks in the park he was managing- a brown bear, normally a reclusive creature, had been attacking hikers and campers. They hadn't tracked it down yet, but the hunt was on. They spent the rest of the dinner in chit-chat, catching up on old times.
After dinner, walking back to the car, they witnessed a carjacking! The driver fought, the attacker fired several shots into the car and ran off. Rae and her date (I didn't catch his name) ran to the car, helped the victims as best they could, and called 911. When they spotted the ambulance coming, Rae took off in the direction she'd seen the gunman take, her bewildered date following in her wake. They got lucky and spotted the shooter walking down an alley. Rae drew her sidearm (to her date's shock) and called for the suspect to surrender. He turned, drawing his pistol, but she had him lined up and dropped him with a well-aimed shot. Bound his wound, zip-cuffed him, and left him by the nearest street for the cops to find.
She doesn't figure she'll get another call from the guy anytime soon.
Isaac Holt
Isaac used his couple of days to conduct business. Another book dealer, an older gentleman named Clayton McKendrick, an acquaintance of his, had passed away. The funeral was tomorrow, the estate sale a couple of days later.
He went to the funeral to pay his respects to an old competitor. A couple of other guys in the business were there too, and isaac smiled grimly to himself. "The vultures are circling all right." He ran into the old guy's daughter, Jenny, who he also knew vaguely, and assured her he'd stop by the auction- she knew he was in the same business as her father.
A couple of visits to local motels confirmed that a lot of regional guys would be here for the auction. Old McKendrick had a sizeable library and a big house full of his collections- the auction was going to be quite an event. One guy Isaac knew, some noveau riche chump with more money than taste, styled himself a Baron. He had stock market money and had gotten out at the right time, so he'd be hard to outbid on some of the better pieces. Rumor had it he owned a castle in Pennsylvania, a real one, shipped over from France or something stone by stone. Jerk.
On the day of the auction, Isaac showed up early. Pretty much everything was for sale, even the house, so all the furniture and everything had been brought out to tents on the lawn. The lower value pieces were in lots in the tents with listed prices, but the real valuables would be auctioned later that afternoon. He browsed the lots, didn't spot anything, and slipped away to venture inside the house.
He knew it vaguely from doing business with the old man, but it was very empty and kind of sad now. Isaac poked around, nothing really in most of the rooms. In the study, under a couch that hadn't been moved yet, he found a small book, handwritten, apparently McKendrick's journal. Pocketed that for later. Didn't really spot anything in the rest of the house, but he got caught snooping around by Jenny.
"Are you lost?" A disapproving look on her face.
"Just taking a look around for old times' sake. Place sure looks different now. Really going to miss the old guy." Hope she bought that.
"Yeah. Well, he'd been sick, it wasn't unexpected." Beat. "Well, you can find your way out?"
"Sure thing. See you later."
Safely back out in the tents, Isaac went through the lots more thoroughly- nothing else to do anyway until the auctions started. In one of them, he found an old, kind of shabby set of books. They didn't look like much, but paging through them, they proved to be Victorian era, medical texts of some kind, written by one of the Queen's private doctors. They /should/ be up for bidding, but since they weren't- he checked the price mark, and whistled. Still pricey, but undervalued. Some mental calculation- he found a sale worker, and offered them less than the asking price. Look at the condition, not real good, but interesting as curiousities. To his surprise, they went for it. Even if he got nothing else, this was a heck of a find by itself, and he stood to make a great deal of profit.
As he suspected, he couldn't bid with the big dogs at the real auction, but stuck around out of curiousity. The Baron snapped up a bunch of pricey but gaudy artwork and furniture, and some books Isaac wasn't interested in anyway. An old manuscript on Vlad Tepes went for a LOT, to a mysterious figure Isaac didn't recognize. Even the Baron got outbid on that one. Afterward, Isaac found Jenny McKendrick to say his goodbyes, and asked her the name of the Tepes buyer. The log said Nicholas something, but it was obviously a pseudonym- he paid cash. McKendrick said she'd look into it a bit; also, if any of the book lots were left over, was Isaac interested in being called? He left his card.
Last edited by DanMcS; 8th December 2002 at 03:53 AM..
The three of us met up later on- Mason was using his week for family time, but said he'd do some digging on that elf's license plate for Wolfgang.
Rae related the story about the bear attacks, and said she was going down to look into it. Nothing better to do, so Isaac and Wolfgang went along. Isaac was a city boy through and through, and the bears worried him. "Has anyone been really hurt by these things? I thought they were scared of people." He had to endure teasing after that, about the ferocious squirrels we were likely to run into in the park.
***
The drive was long, but we arrived safely, and got into a cabin by nightfall. Still too early to sleep, so we went out for a walk.
Down the path, we were approaching the lot where our van was parked. Sounds of voices alerted us to people ahead- arguing? We spread out, coming in on the parking lot from different directions. Isaac got there first.
A couple of guys, local toughs, giving a native american lady and her little girl some trouble. That's just obnoxious. We walked towards them.
"Hey! You guys got a cigarette I can bum? Who's that with you? You all right, lady?" The two guys told Isaac to buzz off.
Rae, coming in off to the right around some parked cars, saw three guys in a truck that Isaac hadn't seen. One in the back had a rifle and was looking off at Isaac. She pointed her pistol at him. "Freeze!" He was so surprised he dropped the rifle.
Wolfgang, circling around left, snuck in behind a tree and took a bead on the two by the women. They hadn't seen him, focused on Isaac.
Things started to happen very fast. The guys in the truck tried to back over Rae, who rolled out of the way and started shooting at the driver, but mostly hit the truck body.
The guy in the back grabbed his rifle, and shot Rae. She was knocked down and out.
Wolfgang ran in, took aim, and shot the driver. The truck swerved wildly as the passengers tried to control it. One of the two on foot punched at Wolfgang ineffectually.
The other took off, past Isaac. Isaac yelled, "Stop, fool!" in his most authoritative voice, stepped back into a shooting stance, and drew his taser to drop the guy. Unfortuneately, it tangled on his jacket, flipped out of his hands, and rolled off into the night. "Crap." He chased after the terrified thug, yelling his fool head off, but lost him in the dark and had to work his way back to the parking lot.
Wolfgang butt-stroked the last standing combatant into unconsciousness as the guys in the truck got control and peeled away. He ran over and began trying to stabilize Rae. We loaded her into the van, and headed out for the hospital.
After a visit to the ER, we determined Rae wasn't as bad as it first appeared, and with some bandages and antibiotics, and several police reports, we were free to go back to the cabin, about 4 in the morning.
***
The next day, our crew was able to go about our real business, instead of brawling with drunken rednecks. Hiking into the woods, several miles of trails revealed nothing. We were just meandering at this point, but then Wolfgang spotted a body down in a ravine. Quickly, Rae was lowered by rope to the man; she found him unconscious but alive, and was able to wake him up. He was very disoriented, but remembered being hit by something big and furry- it must have knocked him off the cliff. We left him a blanket and some supplies, we didn't want to risk dragging him up the cliff ourselves.
Rae's tracking skills revealed large hoofprints around the top of the ravine. We set off through the woods following them.
The bottom of the hill opened into a big clearing, with a number of standing stones in the center. 15 or 16 people milled around amongst them. Wolfgang went in for a closer look, keeping in touch over walkie-talkie.
Most of the crowd set out to leave- Wolfgang followed at a distance. Rae and Isaac went in to talk to the man who was left.
"Hey, how you doing? Do you have a phone? We found an injured man, over in a ravine."
The man answered, but not in English. Isaac's multilingual ear worked for him here, and he was able to pick out the gist of the conversation.
"No, no phone. No technology." Wierd.
"What were you doing down here?" Isaac inquired. Rae moved out, examining the standing stones, and getting behind the man.
"Make sacrifice. Appease nature demon." Wierder. Sacrifice- that dark spot on the snow, blood?
"Sacrifice? What are you talking about?" Isaac and Rae moved their hands towards their pistols.
"Sacrifice. Feed demon. Usually goat, rabbit, today little child." What the?!
Isaac and Rae drew. To the walkie-talkie, "Wolfgang, get back here RIGHT NOW." To the man, "What child? Where's the child? Get your hands up."
The man turned, pointed, and spoke. Rae fired and hit, but the man didn't even wince. Her gun got hot, and she dropped it. Isaac missed. The druid spoke to Isaac, but he resisted, and missed again. By this time, Wolfgang has heard the shots, and is running back.
Rae tried to hit the druid with her baton, but it bounced off his chest- was that a leather cuirass under his clothes? Who was this freak? The guy looked, spoke, and disappeared. Isaac saw footprints appearing in the snow, and tried to tackle the apparently invisible spellcaster, but landed on his face in the snow.
When Wolfgang got back to the clearing, he found Rae cursing and putting snow on her gun to cool it off, and Isaac trying to wipe the slush off his front. "What are you idiots doing?"
***
The group decided to try and follow the 'demon', bear, whatever, tracks to its lair. Rae was very good at this, and in a short time we found the opening to a cave. Snoring echoed from inside. It was dark, narrow, and didn't look fun. "Good luck, Wolfgang, scream like a girl if you need us." Isaac and Rae hung around outside the cave mouth, looking for psycho druids and pointing their guns at the cave occasionally.
Wolfgang crept quietly into the cave. Sloped up, and branched. The snoring was louder. He went left, but that didn't seem to be the way, and he went back and took the right branch, shining his penlight around, holding his gun, and trying very hard not to make any noise.
The tunnel widened into a cave. Off to the right, he saw the child- the same little girl from last night, amazingly. That family had the worst luck in the history of the earth. She looked uninjured, and packets of candy lay scattered around her.
Gulp. Shine the light left. Oh, crap. There's a hoof. Leg, leg, leg, very long legs. Oh, a body, wow, big critter here, hey, um, it's sitting up. Chin, mouth, eyes. Open eyes. And horns. A minotaur, very awake. It looked at him curiously.
"Who you?" Wolfgang found himself surprisingly not dead. Had to tread carefully though.
"I'm here to, ah, take the girl back to her mother. And you are?"
"Cedric. Good, take girl. Take candy too." Mmm, yeah.
"All right, thank you Cedric, I'll just be going now." Wolfgang gathered the little girl, and a couple pieces of candy (do NOT disobey the minotaur), and headed towards the cave mouth. He cringed as Cedric followed him.
And so Rae and Isaac were treated to the sight of Wolfgang, carrying the little girl, followed by the large, friendly minotaur, blinking at the light.
***
Cedric revealed that the druids usually gave him food, every couple of weeks. The rest of the time he foraged. Occasionally, usually after seeing the druids, he would lose control of himself, and roam around attacking hikers. We began to suspect that the druids were magically affecting him somehow.
Cedric said he could lead us to the druid's house. We gave a walkie-talkie to Rae, and sent her to take the girl and the wounded hiker back to the ranger station. Isaac and Wolfgang went with Cedric.
A large cabin, on top of a hill. Couple of windows, front and back door. How did this guy get away with building this in the middle of the park? We talked Rae in, it took her an hour to get back from the station.
Peeking in the window revealed the druid, engaged in some ritual involving a magical diagram and many candles. No way we were letting him finish that.
Cedric and Wolfgang went to the back, Rae to the front, Isaac outside a window. With a crash, Cedric kicked the door in.
Wolfgang slipped past him and opened fire on the druid. Rae burst in the front door and shot too. Isaac broke the window, shot, and missed.
Rapidly, the druid bobbed, weaved, and magically heated all our guns to glowing heat. Crap. Rae grabbed her baton, Wolfgang his knife, and Isaac a nicely non-metallic tree branch. The druid was still more than our match, he was too fast and most of our blows were glancing. He whirled, pointed at Cedric, and chanted something in his strange Gaelic. Cedric stirred, stepped in the door, and started towards Wolfgang, but shook his head and retargeted at the druid instead.
The tide turned then, Cedric was too strong for the druid, battering him and then tossing him across the room. The druid chanted rapidly, though, and Cedric was trapped to the ground when roots and vines grew up in seconds to tangles his legs. We had him on the ropes anyway, as Isaac clubbed him in the head, Wolfgang stabbed him, and Rae searched for her pistol (now starting to cool).
Just when we thought we had him, he twittered, turned into a bird, then flew out the door and into the dusk. Rae shot ineffectively, and Isaac threw his club after the bird. "I hate that guy."
***
Nothing was to be done, we'd never find him in this twilight, so we contented ourselves with trashing his place and taking his spell components. We stayed the night in our cabin and called Daedalus in the morning, telling him all about our strange escapades. He thought he might be able to do something for Cedric, so midmorning found us driving up the interstate with a four-hundred pound minotaur in the back of the van, under some blankets.
(The spells the druid cast were heat metal, charm person (failed, at Isaac), and invisibility. In the second fight, lots of heat metals, a failed charm monster at Cedric (had that worked, we would have had a TPK), entangle, and finally a shapechange of some sort. We HATE that guy.)
As near as we can figure, the druid was using some kind of Charm on Cedric, to get him to drive off the tourists and safegard the nature, or something like that. He was a nutjob.
Loose ends, after session two: The orcs, the car-axing-ogre, Horacio, and the sunglassed man, from session 1. The gun-show elf and drow, and the guy that bought the Dracula book. The druid escaped too. We just keep racking them up.
This session had wierd rolling. We consistently rolled low on Spot and Listen- our characters were wandering around oblivious. Other skill checks were amazingly high- Isaac had never spoken Gaelic before, but rolled so high with his linguistics talent that he was able to converse pretty well with the druid. Tracking, search, other checks were similar. Our shooting was just bad.
We learned that the class Defense Bonus makes a bigger difference in combat than you'd expect. Also, that melee weapons are extremely necessary against spellcasters- with guns or unarmed, you don't threaten, but with AoO you're getting double attacks when the guy casts spells. Oh yeah, and when your medic goes down, you're stuck using action points trying to stabilize her. We need more Treat Injury ranks in the party.
Last edited by DanMcS; 8th December 2002 at 07:05 AM..
The Daedalus team was called back to project headquarters the day after New Years. They'd had a couple of weeks to pursue side interests, but were now back on the job.
Eric Daedalus brought them in to his office for the briefing. "A number of Egyptian artifacts were stolen from the New York Metropolitan Library yesterday. The New Amsterdam branch, to be specific. They probably have occult significance. The night before, the Turkamen Star, a small freighter registered out of Cyprus, came into NYC harbor. Here's the crew list. Recognize anyone?"
Isaac scanned the list. "I recognize that one, Jamhad al-Akbin Abari; he's Saudi, deals Egyptian stuff in Europe, right? Never met him though."
"Precisely," confirmed Daedalus. "Go to New York, investigate the burglary, check out the ship and see if they were involved."
"That's pretty thin. A ship came into harbor the same night as the burglary. So what? A hundred ships must go in and out every day." Mason wasn't convinced. "What makes you think..."
"Good sources," Daedalus interrupted. "Here are the tickets, here's a debit card for expenses, phone in periodically."
***
By the time they got off the plane, it was getting dark. A short trip to the hotel, then they caught the subway to the library branch. It was closed. Discreet scouting revealed several private security guards patrolling, inside and out. No way they were getting in there tonight.
"To the ship!"
***
The Turkamen Star was small as cargo ships go. It nestled into pier 8 at the city harbor. Occasional lights pierced the evening gloom, but this dock was mostly empty of people. Two other ships, a big container ship and a smaller boat, shared the dock.
Trying to look nonchalant, Mason, Wolfgang, Isaac and Rae sauntered down to the far tip of the dock. Four guards at the foot of the ramp eyed us hard as we passed the Star, but we gave them a wide berth. The smallest ship was moored at the end, and we walked onto it like we knew what we were doing.
Once aboard, we wanted to have a good look at the Star through binoculars, but it was too dark. A whispered plan developed. Rae and Mason stayed aboard the ship, peering toward the Star, while Isaac and Wolfgang crept towards it, keeping to the shadows.
Wolfgang led the way towards the mooring line of the ship. He was nearly there, and WHAM
cringed as Isaac walked into a crate behind him. The guards shined a light towards us, and began yelling at us, not in English.
Isaac went for his wallet, and flipped it open at them. "Port authority! We're inspecting your mooring lines."
The guards, seeing him reach inside his jacket, had gone for their guns. "Oh, crap!" The guards opened fire.
Isaac ran for cover, several crates were around that might stop bullets. Wolfgang pulled his own weapon and shot back.
Rae and Mason, hearing the gun battle, ran to the dock and began working their way toward the Star, keeping behind cover as they came.
One guard ran back aboard the ship. Another went down to Wolfgang's fire, but Wolfgang was knocked back by several shots and fell unconscious. Isaac hid behind a crate, trading potshots with an equally terrified guard.
Rae and Mason finally showed up and finished off the two guards still standing. Rae checked out Wolfgang, tied off his worst wounds, and called for the retreat. Our heroes scurried away, Wolfgang over Isaac's shoulder, retreating to the hotel to regroup.
Last edited by DanMcS; 18th December 2002 at 02:10 AM..
I assume there's going to be part two with the library sequence and the second battle at the Turkamen Star?
I like the way you re-arranged Isaac looking at the manifest before the group left Columbus. That's actually how I envisioned it, but for some reason, we didn't get around to it until later in the session...
Rae performed ad hoc surgery one Wolfgang in the bathtub of the hotel room, pulling out a couple of slugs and sewing him up as best she could. He'd need to rest a day or so before he'd be particularly mobile. He was left to recuperate in the hotel while we went to case the library.
It was much easier to get into now that it was open. Isaac went to talk to the librarian, Rae and Mason checked out the area the antiques were stolen from.
That room was police-taped off, but Mason slipped inside and wandered around, spotting a slip of paper on the ground with the phrase 'hidden door?' written on it. He pocketed that for later.
The librarian tolds Isaac that the police hadn't mentioned any leads, the auction hasn't been rescheduled yet, and that's about it.
A brief discussion sent us to the city offices, to get blueprints for the library.
***
The library was built in the late 1800s; remodeled in 1979. Inspection of both sets (original and post-remodelling) revealed two voids which might contain hidden rooms; both adjoin the space the artifacts were being held in. No entries were apparent to either void, in either set of blueprints. We returned to the hotel room to plot.
Rae spoke up. "We need to get in there and check for hidden doors."
"We could hide in the bathrooms until the place closes, and then snoop around," Mason suggests. This is roundly denounced as a stupid idea.
"We could hide in the basement."
"That was locked."
"We could break in through the loading dock."
"Security cameras."
"We can sneak in through the sewers."
"Good luck with that, let us know how it goes."
"We go to the library, find the janitor's address, go to his house, tie him up, steal his keys, come back to the library, and hide in the basement."
"..."
***
At 6:00, the library closed. The upstairs librarian left almost immediately, turning off the lights to the second floor as she went.
Isaac peeked out of the closet he was hiding in; no one around. He tiptoed out, and whispered into Mason's, Rae's, and Wolfgang's hiding spots in turn. They carefully snuck out of the bathrooms and regrouped by the stairs.
Three guards were hanging around in the downstairs lobby. We could hear them from the balcony overhead. They were distracting each other, we could sneak by and get to the crime scene before they started patrolling.
Rae went down the stairs first. She walked softly across the carpet, but one of the guards heard her, and shone a light back that way. She laughed. "I was up in the bathroom, and they turned out all the lights. Is the library closed?" Two of the guards show her the way to the door, leaving one looking back at the open space.
Isaac follows a bit too closely, and gets caught by the third guard. "Hey, buddy, did you see where my girlfriend went?" The guard shakes his head, grabs Isaac by the arm, and heads him towards the door as well.
Mason creeps quietly down the stairs, catches his toe on the step, and falls down the last few stairs with a CLATTER, BANG, WHACK. All three guards are busy out in the entryway with Isaac and Rae, who pester them with irrelevant questions about the library's hours of operation, and Mason's fumble goes unnoticed. He scrambles across the lobby and through the door.
Wolfgang, injured and gimping, is the quietest of the four, and wonders what he did to deserve these nimrods.
Rae and Isaac find a deli across the street to sit in, order some food, and monitor the walkie-talkie. Of course, Isaac had the team's copy of the blueprints.
Wolfgang and Mason searched the employee-only rooms that abutted the void on the map. Nothing to be found. They snuck out of that area and around the corner into the crime scene, over where the note had been found originally. Inspection revealed what could be a door shape in the wall, but no opening mechanism.
A call to Isaac, and we found that they were near where a wall had been removed in '79. The opening mechanism must have been on that wall, then run either through the floor or the joining wall to open the door. Wolfgang ripped up the carpet, found nothing. Probing with a knife, Mason found a soft spot in the wall which revealed a rod. Taking a guess, he pulled on it, and with a click, the door opened.
Eric Daedalus discovered this article in the January 7th edition of the New York Post and thought he would pass it along...
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
FIREFIGHT AT BROOKLYN MARINE DOCKS
by Annabelle Redding
Sunday afternoon, Port Authority Police responded to reports of shots being fired at the Brooklyn Port Authority Marine Terminal. According to Max McClaskey of the Port Authority Police, several reports came from the area of Pier 8, near the Port Authority offices.
"We received at least three individual reports of shots being fired, one that indicated an explosion aboard a ship moored at Pier 8," said McClaskey at a press conference Monday morning.
According to Robin Saeger of the Port Authority, there was only one ship moored at Pier 8 over the weekend. This ship, the Turkamen Star, of Cypriot registry, was due to leave port on Sunday, but had been delayed for unknown reasons. Saeger confirmed that the Turkamen Star had arrived in New York from Cyprus on January 2, 2003.
William Portley, lead detective investigating the incident, described other strange events reported over the weekend at Pier 8, perhaps indicating that more investigation would be forthcoming.
"We have had other reports of shots fired over the weekend," Portley confirmed, "including a few explosions and possibly the theft and/or vandalism of a forklift."
"The Turkamen Star has not left the Brooklyn PA Marine Terminal pending the outcome of our investigation. We have requested that the captain remain in the U.S. for further questioning," Det. Portley said at a press conference on Monday morning.
When asked about a possible hijacking attempt, Det. Portley replied, "We have no reason to believe that any attempt was made to overpower the ship for hijacking purposes. The evidence we have collected thus far does not support a hijacking motive."
The ship's captain, Ibrahim al-Hakim, of Turkey, was not available for questioning. Police reports indicate al-Hakim was found locked inside a storage cabin aboard the Turkamen Star, his hands bound with police-style zip handcuffs. Port Authority Police had no comment about al-Hakim or his crew.
Melissa Ryberg, of the Port Authority Police Information Center, allowed journalists access to the Turkamen Star's manifest. According to the documents filed with the Port Authority, the ship left Cyprus, sailed the Mediterranean, across the Atlantic, landing first in Baltimore, and then onto New York City. The only cargo listed on the manifest is "passengers".
Another ship, the Beulah Marks, a container ship, was moored at Pier 8 on Friday and Saturday. The captain of the Beulah Marks, Denny Stout, reported that vandals or thieves may have boarded his ship Friday night. Several dock workers reported seeing people board the Beulah Marks, but that those people were there for a very short time. Capt. Stout indicated that he was not under investigation.
While it is not entirely unusual for a passenger ship to dock at Pier 8, the Brooklyn Marine Terminal is mostly used for cargo container ships since the opening of more modern passenger facilities in the 1970s.
Last edited by projectdaedalus; 24th December 2002 at 01:20 PM..
Mason and Wolfgang hustled into the secret room before the guards came by again, and let it shut behind them with a soft click. The dust of decades stirred with their approach. Crates and boxes littered the room, stacked haphazardly.
Peering around with flashlights, they saw footprints in the dust, and the outlines of missing crates. One had measured about seven feet by three and a half- very disturbing. And how had all these crates been carried out without being noticed?
A clipboard hung on the wall, and was taken for later perusal.
"Isaac, Rae, there's not much here, but some crates were taken. We're coming out." The walkie-talkie was turned off.
"Hey, Wolfgang, how we getting out?"
"Um, there's a back door..."
"It's alarmed."
"So? We'll be out."
Mason and Wolfgang opened the secret door, looked out, saw no guards, and took off. Cries of "Hey, who's there?" followed them, and they burst out the back door, which started wailing it's electronic warble. Mason and Wolf ignored it and ran, to a side street where Isaac and Rae waited with a cab.
***
The clipboard revealed a couple of Ancient Egyptian period relics which might have been taken, including the Sobek Scrolls, scripture of an ancient Egyptian god, and the Eliphantine Casket, which was probably the 7x3.5 box.
"You know what was in there? A mummy. I hate mummies."
***
Later that night, about the hour of three, another armed reconnaissance was undertaken toward the Turkeman Star. The arabic gunmen were still present, but a cleverly detonated propane fuel tank from a forklift provided distraction, and we think we managed to get a couple of them before being forced to retreat again. Whatever was on that ship, they were guarding it for keeps, and we NEEDED to get to it before they raised that mummy.
Last edited by DanMcS; 4th January 2003 at 11:01 PM..
We reported in to Daedalus. He hooked us up with a contact in Chinatown who could provide magical aid. We bought a number of potions, mostly healing, a couple of miscellaneous others. The ship was headed out of port today, so we went back, in daylight this time, to make a last effort.
In the daytime, the port hummed with activity. No guards were evident at the bottom of the gang plank this time, at least. Figuring they had to be concealed on board, we loosened our guns in their holsters and headed up the ramp.
It was a very odd feeling. We just walked right on board. "Well, that was too easy. Where is everybody?" Inside the deck structure, most of the cabins and rooms were empty, and we felt like the ship was deserted as we wandered the halls, rediculously unopposed.
We found the stairs up to the bridge, and were checking a last couple rooms when one of the doors to the deck opened. It was unexpected for both sides, and we looked at each other stupidly for a beat before everyone dove for cover and drew weapons.
The corridors we were checking had two exits to the deck. Mason covered one, while Wolfgang, Rae and Isaac shot it out with the cultists at the far door. They had enough and retreated, dropping a grenade as a parting gift and slamming the door shut. Isaac was out of range, Rae and Wolfgang ran as the fuse on the grenade ran down and it BANGED in a now empty hallway.
One gunman looked back in, and saw the hallway deserted. Isaac shot at him from his corner, and the response was another grenade down towards Isaac this time. In an act of unadulterated stupidity, Isaac scrambled around, found it, and threw it back. The cultist had shut the door again, and the second exploded as ineffectually as the first.
No time was wasted by the opposing side, who had sent their other men around the building to the door Mason was guarding. Wolfgang wes here by now too. The door opened, and a man leaned in to shoot at Mason, completely missing Wolf lurking behind the door. Mason got missed, and the cultist got a sudden impact to the brainstem. Wolfgang picked up the dropped Uzi with a smirk.
We re-ambushed the last two as they came in the doors, and the ship was quiet again. We took the grenades they didn't get to use.
***
The ship's captain was unable to tell us anything useful about his passengers, so we locked him in a closet and searched the cult leader's room. We found a list of adresses and a couple of notebooks and vacated the ship for the last time.
Last edited by DanMcS; 4th January 2003 at 11:41 PM..
The list of addresses proved to be subway stations. Most were crossed off, three were not. A subway map told us that one of those did not even exist any more. We surmised that the crossed off ones had been visited; the three uncrossed stations had not when the list was last looked at. So whatever they were looking for was probably in one of those three. Or it was in one of the 8 or 9 crossed off ones, but three was fewer to check than 8 so we started with the three first.
One of those was a perfectly ordinary subway station. We walked in, gawked, talked to some on-duty cops there, and realized we weren't getting anywhere.
The next one we checked was the closed station. There was a gate, but we just stepped over and descended the stairs.
***
The underground station was fairly decrepit, not in use for several years probably. We shone our flashlights around, and started to fan out from the stairs to search. The gunmen at the far end of the station opened up on us with their machine guns.
Rae dove behind the station-worker booth, crouched down low hoping it might stop bullets. She shot at the gunmen. Isaac ran toward the track, concrete pillars there might provide some cover. He tossed a grenade as he ran, which at least stopped them firing for a couple of seconds as they maneuvered to avoid it. Wolfgang and Mason rolled for what cover there was in the bare area, and opened up.
A couple more grenades and much ammunition flew this way and that. Remarkably, none of us were killed, and we got all three of the gunmen. Raw luck, that. This must be the place. We took their guns and remaining grenades, and looked for what they were guarding.
It took a couple of minutes, but we found a door built into the back wall, descending down into the gloom.
***
At the bottom of the stairs, a short corridor. Big double doors at the end, with light leaking under them. We nominated Wolfgang to go check it out, the rest of us having been less than stealthy in the past.
At the door, Wolfgang listened. Was that chanting? No, more like one guy... reciting... something. Wolfgang didn't recognize the language. He beckoned us down the corridor.
The plan: Wolfgang opens the door a crack, we toss in grenades, and shut the door. Wait for the boom, and then bust back in and hit them with everything we've got. Unfortunately, we didn't hear them hear us, and their guns.
1 Rae opens door.
2 Isaac and Wolfgang toss grenades.
3 Rae shuts door.
4 BOOM.
5 Open door.
6 Shoot the survivors.
Except that we got interrupted at about five and a half, by two of them who were able to react and hose us with their machine guns. Everyone got minor wounds from that. A couple more grenades went in the door and then we went through as the last gunmen crumpled before our stolen artillery.
On either side of the door lay bodies, cut and ragged from the fragmentation grenades. Dead ahead was a large stone box, the Elephantine Casket we presume. On the other side of that stands Jamjad Abari, reading from a papyrus scroll which crumbles to dust as we watch, horrified. We're too late.
The coffin stirs. Cracks. Breaks open. A huge snout pokes from the rubble. Great scaled hands brush away stone fragments none of us could lift. The very image of Sobek, the crocodile-headed Egyptian god, stands before us.
He shakes his head, squints, and sniffs. He turns on Abari, who shrieks a command at it, and it rapidly rends him with claw and snapping jaw. We look at each other. This thing can't be released on the unsuspecting city. Guns and grenades ready, we fire at the monstrosity now feasting on the priest.
The bullets get its attention. It turns and rushes across the room, slamming into Rae, who falls. Isaac pulls out his second pistol and shoots wildly at it, trying to lure it away from Rae, which works for a minute until it turns on him and bites a huge chunk out of him. Well, it felt huge at the time. Isaac passed out and lay bleeding on the floor.
Wolfgang had revived Rae with one of the potions we got from the herbalist. She circled widely around Isaac and got one to him, while it sniffed and hunted for Mason, who was hidden behind the door into the corridor. Up and mobile again (those potions were good stuff), Isaac limped towards the other side of the room, where another corridor led out. Maybe there was something down here to use against it, or trick it into a trap. None of us were shooting at it now. It didn't seem that bright, and might just leave if not provoked.
Bored now, the nine foot crocodile man pawed at the corpse of the priest, then started down the corridor Isaac was checking out. He scrunched to one side and held his breath as it passed him in the dark, and then it was gone. We followed it at a long distance, this tunnel connected to a storm sewer, and eventually the sea. Where it went from there, we don't know. We caught the next flight out to Columbus.
***
Rae decided this life wasn't for her, and returned to the comfortable normalness of her job in the national parks.
Rae Winters walked out of Hemmener Hall, and got all the way to the front step before someone caught her. It was Eric Daedalus, on horseback, riding through the fields in front of the manor house.
Daedalus rode up to the front of the house, with a somewhat puzzled look. "Going somewhere?" he asked.
Rae, still shaken from her experience in New York, was almost afraid to respond. "I... I have to go," she said, fidgeting on the spot where she stood.
Eric Daedalus dismounted and patted his steed on the side of its neck. "What is this about, Rae?" he asked.
She looked down at her suitcases, and then back to Daedalus. Her erstwhile mentor had a concerned look on his face, a look that Rae had seen many times in the training room. But something about this look was different.
"We need you, Rae," he said, filling the awkward space. "You are a valuable member of the team."
"I know," she conceded, "But I just don't feel at home here. You all have been great - don't get me wrong, but..."
Daedalus moved closer. "This isn't the life you imagined for yourself, is it?"
A tear slowly descended down Rae's cheek. "I just want to go home," she sobbed.
Winters sat down on the front step, her head in her hands. After a moment, she looked up at Daedalus, her face now flush. "Do you know how many times I've been shot?" She almost laughed at this question as it came out.
The look on Daedalus' face changed from concern to understanding. "This is a dangerous world we live in. Some of us can go about our lives with abandon, living as if we were in a vacuum. Others of us are chosen to defend the innocent against the threats that come from Arcadia."
"I know all that," Rae barked. "I don't know that I'm cut out for this."
"Maybe you're not," Daedalus said, resigning himself that Rae was probably a lost cause. His conscience could not just let her leave, however. "My calling is to stop the Arcadian threat. This is not a calling that many people can understand. Normal people cannot even perceive that this threat exists. You are special, Rae, because you know what's going on. You are one of the very few that do."
Rae smiled, feeling that Eric's confidence was not as shaken in her as she was with herself. It was nice to know that someone felt she was worth the trouble. "Still, I can't do this anymore. I have people back home who worry about me, and I don't want to send them any more postcards from the hospital. Do you see where I'm coming from?"
Daedalus helped Rae to her feet. "You can leave whenever you like. I wish you wouldn't, but it's your decision alone to make. When all is said and done, you always control your own destiny, if such a thing really exists anyway..."
Rae dried her eyes on her sleeves. "I have learned a lot in the past few months, and I will always treasure this time we all spent together. I wish things could be different, but... this life isn't for me. I'm a healer, not a fighter, and I can't continue hurting people, even if they're evil Arcadians bent on world destruction."
Daedalus laughed. "Are you sure you can't make an exception on that account?" he joked. "Seriously, I understand. But know this. You are indeed special, because you can see through the Arcadian's veil. You know what they really look like, and this is not something you can just put away in a drawer somewhere."
"I know," Rae replied. "I just - "
"No, this is important," Eric said, interrupting. "You need to know this. I believe that this ability to see the truth could one day put you in danger, so like it or not, you may one day be forced to defend your family or friends again from the Arcadian threat. I want you to be prepared."
Rae couldn't say much. This was not something she had considered. She had hoped she could just go back home and forget all of this. Maybe that was wishful thinking.
"Look, I'm not trying to scare you, Rae," Daedalus continued. "I want you to draw on this whole experience, and on your own innate survival instincts, should you one day find yourself in another situation like the ones we've faced. And don't be afraid to ask for our help. We're only a phone call away, OK?"
Rae felt better, but still a little uncertain about her future. Just then, her cab pulled up to the driveway circle and honked.
"I'd better be going now," she said, and she picked up her suitcases and took them to the cab, where the drive was now waiting beside an open trunk.
Daedalus could only watch the cab drive away, knowing that Rae Winters' medical skills would be hard to replace, and her presence even harder to forget.
Rumor had it that Bubba the ogre, Big Johnny, and their gang of merry orcs were consolidating criminal activity downtown. Gang activity isn't really our purview, but they are Arcadians, so we're taking an interest.
Bronagh Flannery is the new addition to our team. She's Irish, and has some sort of sordid criminal past. And apparently some history with some zombies, though we didn't get all the details of that. Definitely an asset. She, Mason, Wolfgang and I went downtown in our unmarked, bleeding obvious white van. We have to get a new van. We look like the FBI. Yep, inconspicuous, that's us.
Daedalus told us where they were headquartered, last he knew. An abandoned warehouse. Orcs don't go for condos, apparently. We drove by the park they used to hang out at, and the liquor store, but they weren't in evidence, so we headed down Broad into the neighborhood of the wearhouse.
We left the blindingly white van parked behind a row of abandoned apartments. Bronagh picked open the back door lock on one, and we went inside. Talented lady.
Through the shuttered front windows, we could see Bubba and Johnny's warehouse. There was a truck parked on the front lawn. Scratch that, more 'crumpled into the wall' than parked. Looks like a beer truck. Crack! Was that a gunshot? We didn't hear any more, immediately. Wierd.
No movement in evidence inside the warehouse. Crack! Another shot! Where are those coming from?
Isaac stayed put to watch the warehouse. Mason and Wolfgang climbed up through the attic to the roof of the apartment, Bronagh went out the back to scale the fire escape.
Crack! Definitely close. Something is moving on the roof, a couple of apartments down. Isaac, get up here!
Wolfgang, Mason, and Isaac headed down the roof, nimbly jumping the gap between buildings. Everyone managed to grab ahold of the ledge when we fell, too, so nobody got hurt.
Someone was hiding on the next roof. Behind a big air conditioning unit. Wolfgang pulled out his gun and covered us, as Isaac and Mason lept to the third roof, and even made it this time. A puff of smoke rapidly expanded, the guy had dropped a smoke grenade.
Isaac charged into it, trying to cut him off. Mason swept through the near side, and from behind us, we heard 'Drop your veapons." We are sooo not the swat team we think we are.
The guy covering us, dressed in a city-grey ghillie suit and holding a pistol, was very slight of build, and had pointed ears. "Are you an elf?"
He was. Ivan had translated to this world in Russia, picking up the native language there when he came. He'd come to America hunting orcs. Turns out Wolfgang had run into him a few weeks back at a gun show, buying a sniper rifle, which sat in a nearby corner aimed at the warehouse. "I've killed three or four. There are perhaps ten left in building. Have not seen ogre."
Ivan wouldn't come in, but he agreed to cover the windows and south and west sides if we went in to flush them out. We split into two teams, Bronagh and Isaac in the south door, and Wolfgang and Mason went to the west, where the truck door was a few feet open at the bottom. We communicated by radio, and went in the two doors simultaneously.
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