Savannah Knights (mild update 06-10-05)

[RangerWickett]

Galindrel White: Male Elf Ftr1/Sor6; Medium-size Humanoid (Elf); HD 6d4 + 1d10; hp 29; Init +3; Spd 30 ft.; AC 17 (+3 Dex, +4 Elven Chain); Atk +2 staff +8 melee (1d6+4), or +1 bow +8 ranged (d8+1/crit x3); SQ Elven Traits; SV Fort +4, Ref +7, Will +5; Str 14, Dex 16, Con 11, Int 14, Wis 10, Cha 17.

Skills and Feats: Climb +7, Concentration +10, Jump +7, Knowledge (arcana) +12, Spellcraft +12; Craft Magic Arms & Armor, Expertise, Lightning Reflexes, Spell Focus (Enchantment).

Spells Per Day: 6 / 7 / 6 / 4 — Dancing Lights, Daze, Detect Magic, Ghost Sound, Light, Prestidigitation, Resistance / Alarm Ward, Magic Missile, Magic Weapon, Sleep / Fey Web, Resist Elements / Invisibility Sphere. Arcane spell failure: 10%.

Background:
An Elf born on Earth, not the Faerie Realm, Galindrel was pushed by his family to join the Bureau at an early age. As a Bureau member, he could enjoy freedom on Earth or the Faerie Realm, without being as monitored by the Bureau as most magi on Earth are. He is mostly a relaxed agent, having worked with the Bureau for twenty years without actually advancing his status or skill.


High Fantasy Taxonomy:
For the past two centuries, humans aware of magi have labored to catalog the different types of magical creatures of the world, in effort to understand whether they are truly natural (in which case they do not fit with the current standing theory of evolution), or if they are the result of magic and do not fit into the normal ecosystem. After much consideration, they have come to a general consensus that chooses not to make value judgments, and instead simply says that there is more than one type of life, though evidence suggests that magical life is not the product of Darwinian evolution.

Firstly, we can divide all creatures into Living and Non-living. In the branch of living, we have MAGICAL LIFE and MUNDANE LIFE, and then among the non-living we have UNDEAD and ANIMATED creatures (things like golems). There is speculation of whether to add a fifth distinction for creatures from other planes, such as demons and angels. These OUTSIDERS, as they are called by some, are not known definitively to exist, and most scholars believe that entities historically believed to have been devils or angels were usually just Unseelie or Seelie fey, or any manner of magical beasts

Magical Life
Rather than define MAGICAL LIFE into Kingdoms, Phylums, Classes, etc., we have Elementals, Magical Creatures, Dragons, and Magi as the main sub-categories. All magical creatures in these groups share major traits, regardless of their exact appearances.

In game terms, all Magical Life has an additional type modifier of (magical), such as a fire elemental being a “Medium-Size Elemental (fire, magical)”. This extra descriptor has major effects when

Dragons are fairly self explanatory, but one misconception must be cleared up. There can be only sentient Dragons (like most Oriental ones, plus a few Norse Dragons). Non-sentient creatures that we might call Dragons (like wyverns and Hungarian Razorbacks) are more properly categorized under Magical Creatures. We make the differentiation because of the effect Dragons, and only Dragons, have on other magical creatures. All Dragons have the creature type Dragon.

Elementals are almost mostly self explanatory, except that in addition to traditional ‘pure’ elementals, arabian genies also fill this category. However, creatures like sylphs (air sprites) or nereids (water sprites) would fall under the category of Magi (Fey, in particular). Elementals can be either sentient or non-sentient. They are not quite living in the sense that animals or plants are, since they have non-standard anatomies, but they do heal and can grow, unlike UNDEAD or ANIMATED creatures. All elementals have the creature type Elemental.

Magical Creatures include all types of non-sentient lifeforms that have innate magical abilities, or that are native uniquely to Gaia. This includes things such as Hydrae, Shambling Mounds, Sea Serpents, Rocs, and Basilisks. Plus it also covers all manner of seelie and unseelie beasts, like dark wolves or fey ponies. Most creatures of this type have the Magical Beast creature type, but some are Aberrations, Beasts, Oozes, Plants, Shapechangers, or Vermin.

Note: In this taxonomy, wyverns are non-sentient Beasts, not Dragons.

Magi. Magi are any of the sentient magical creatures that have proper anatomies and are not Dragons. Among Magi, there are numerous small sub-categories that are either so rare or so similar that it's not worth defining them (though a few examples are treants, giants, gorgons, naga, true lycanthropes, and illithids). The only large subcategory is that of the Fey.

Fey are the vaguely-humanoid magi that most of us are familiar with, but with a diversity ranging from Gremlins and Goblins or Ogres and Trolls, through standards like Elves and Brownies or exotics like the Skinwalker or Wendigo, all the way up to the High Fey (like the legendary Titania and Oberon). All magi can be recognized as having vaguely human-like shapes, which leads most human scholars to arrogantly claim that humanity is the primary form of life, and magi mere imitations. Most fey scholars would counter by saying that humans are weak amalgamations of the awesome diversity of fey, stripped of any true power.

Among the fey, we have three primary groups, each defined by their natural magical ability and capability to bond with spirits. These three groups—High Fey, Middle Fey, and Low Fey—contain most of the key players in the world's mythology.

• High Fey have diverse natural magical abilities that require no training to control or develop. Though they can freely take levels in magical classes, most do not, simply because they find their natural powers enough. High Fey are typically very malleable of shape, often able to change their appearance or disappear entirely. These abilities are due to their powerful magical nature, which makes their body secondary to their magical spirits. As such, High Fey cannot bond with ghosts. High Fey might be immortal, though records to confirm or deny this theory are scant.
  
  Sample High Fey include the true Faeries, nymphs, dryads, the Yuki-on-na from Asia, and the wide variety of elemental sprites—pechs, salamanders, sylphs, and nereids. All High Fey have the ‘Fey’ creature type.
• Middle Fey are the fey with which humans most commonly interact, at least in the Bureau. They do not have innate magical powers of their own, but can take spellcasting classes freely. However, because their nature is inherently magical, they cannot bond with spirits. Middle Fey are characterized by a blending of the powers of magic and the powers of their physical forms.
  
  Sample Middle Fey include Elves, Goblins, Trolls, and Brownies. Middle Fey have the creature type Humanoid.
• Low Fey typically fit the Scandinavian mental image of magical creatures. Though they have access to powers unnatural to humans, they are not themselves inherently magical. They can freely take levels in spellcasting classes, without needing to bond with a spirit. However, they can bond with spirits if they wish. Low Fey rely almost exclusively on their natural physical forms unless they go to the effort to learn magic.
  
  Sample Low Fey include Centaurs, Dwarves, Orcs, Ogres, and Gremlins. Low Fey have the creature type Humanoid.

MUNDANE LIFE
Mundane life consists of the creatures native of Terra, none of which have natural magical powers. They can only access their magical powers if they bond with a spirit, or if they study magic rigorously in order to change their body's connection with Gaia, and as far as we know, humans are the only mundane life capable of doing either. All mundane life has the creature type of either Animal, Plant, Vermin, or Humanoid (human).

Mundane creatures can be altered to have magic within them, such as being turned to vampires or lycanthropes. In these cases, the soul of the individual remains the same, and it is only the body that changes. Thus, it is possible to have goodly and moral vampires. Their creature type changes from Humanoid (human) to the appropriate Undead or Shapechanger, but they do not gain the type modifier (magical).


UNDEAD
Undead are defined as any animate creature that is non-living (it has no functional anatomy), but was living at one time. Within UNDEAD there are two main categories—corporeal and spiritual. Corporeal undead include vampires, zombies, skeletons, and a few more bizarre types, while spiritual undead include Ghosts (sentient uneasy spirits), Spirits (sentient bonded spirits), and Wraiths and Poltergeists (sentient uneasy spirits that no longer remember who they are; poltergeists are simple apparitions, while wraiths prey upon the living). All such creatures have the creature type Undead.


ANIMATED
Animated creatures are defined as any animate creature that has no functional anatomy and that never was living. All such creatures have the creature type Construct, and the type modifier (magical).


Changes to Creature Type From the Monster Manual
The following creatures have had their creature type changed in a substantial way. This list is not to be considered complete, as our understanding of the nature of life is ever-evolving.

• Celestials, Demons, Devils, and other Outsiders do not exist. Though it is well known that demonic entities exist, and that apparently divine miracles do occur, such entities remain an unknown. Summoning spells either create an equivalent creature out of pure magical energy, or conjure a creature with the Seelie Beast or Unseelie Beast template from the Fey Realm.
• Genies have the creature type Elemental instead of Outsider.
• Ogres have the creature type Humanoid (ogre) instead of Giant.
• Trolls have the creature type Humanoid (troll) instead of Giant.
• Wyverns have the creature type Beast instead of Dragon. They have a 2 Intelligence.

Draconic Auras of Power:
The ‘Dragonfear’ presented in standard D20 rules for Dragons is a misinterpretation of the true nature of Dragons. Indeed, one rarely sees heroes in dragonslaying literature even sweat at the sight of a terrifying Dragon, let alone become shaken. Instead, consider that in such stories, rarely does a magic-user confront the Dragon. Rather, it is the warrior who lays upon the beast, defeating it in deadly physical combat.

All magical creatures—creatures with the type modifier (magical)—have innate auras of magic, tied to the magic of Gaia. It is the unique property of Dragons that their auras are expansive, extending far from their actual bodies. Their auras can burst out from them like a dam breaking its walls, and the resulting flood of energy can metaphorically flood the auras of surrounding magical creatures.

Rather than having a Frightful Presence ability, Dragons have the Aura of Power ability. Once per day per age category, they can unleash their auras, drowning out the auras of other magic-users around them. This aura burst has the same area of effect and saving throw as Frightful Presence, but its effects are quite different. Additionally, the effect this aura has differs between humans and other magic-using creatures.

Humans and Draconic Auras: Human souls operate slightly differently from the souls of magical creatures, if for no other reason than that magic is not inherently in their veins. Only humans who have magical abilities can be affected by the Draconic Aura of Power. Any human with a magic-using class—Adept, Bard, Cleric, Druid, Monk, Paladin, Psion, Psychic Warrior, Ranger, Sorcerer, Wizard, and various prestige classes—that fails his Will save against the Aura of Power ability temporarily loses access to his magical abilities.

For a wizard, monk, psion, or psychic warrior, or for a creature like a lycanthrope or undead, who only has a connection to the magic of Gaia, and is not inherently magical, the energy from Draconic Aura takes the place of their normal magic, much as an ocean tide can flow upstream and oversalinate riverwaters. Since they cannot control the energy from the Draconic Aura, they cannot use any magic. For characters who are bonded to spirits, it is actually the spirits who are affected, and if the spirit cannot access magic, it cannot pass it on to the person to whom it has bonded. However, the spirit uses its bonded counterpart’s Will saving throw bonus to determine whether its magic is overridden.

This temporary disruption of magic lasts for one round per three age categories of the Dragon, during which time the magic-user (and his bonded spirit, if he has one) feels uncomfortable, as if a great weight were pressing down upon him.

Magical Creatures and Draconic Auras: For all creatures with the type modifier (magical)—basically any creature that is native to Gaia or that was magically created. If the magical creature fails its Will save, it is stunned for 4d6 rounds.

Note that Draconic Auras have no effect on any magic item unless specifically mentioned otherwise, as they are not creatures in any sense, and their magic is confined. Some rare items, however, have been designed to absorb the power of a Draconic aura, and these are highly prized by human magic-users wishing to confront a Dragon in combat.

 

[RangerWickett]

Chapter Seven: The Tower of the Dragon

June 4, 2000

While the rest of the group investigates Max Dorman, aka Dornankanir, in Savannah, the Bureau assigns Tagin-Eve to a clean-up job abroad. Hong Kong.

Two days ago, Giriuko, the Dragon publicly known as Hong Kong millionaire Li Tsi Tong, was assassinated in her private offices on the 70th floor of her Hong Kong corporate skyscraper. The place was a wreck, charred by intense-heat burns in swaths across the walls and floor in addition to what appears to be frost damage on parts of the furniture. The only bloodstains are Draconic in origin, and security cameras in the lobby outside her office do not show anyone entering or exiting, only odd flashes through the cracks in the door. Obviously, anyone who was able to slaughter a Gold Dragon in her den without receiving any serious wounds is a serious threat not only to innocents, but also to the secrecy that keeps magi from the eyes of normals.

Fortunately Tagin will not have to worry about the attacker. With his mind-boggling hacking skills (a total bonus of +17 with unfamiliar systems: +5 skill ranks, +1 Intelligence, +3 Skill Emphasis, +2 synergy bonus from Disable Device, +2 synergy bonus from Knowledge (computers), +4 from Magic Touch feat), Tagin’s job is to liquidate Giriuko’s assets. As the Chieft jokingly explains to Tagin, the Bureau needs to get its funding from some place, doesn’t it? Her actual hoard has yet to be located, and that’s mostly what the Bureau is looking for, but if the ‘Clean-up and Redistribution’ team can send some actual cash at the Bureau, all the better. It is a bit of a dirty practice in human eyes, but has become the standard for Bureau business.

Tagin-Eve will be working with two other Bureau agents, neither of them knights. The term ‘Knight’ is used to denote someone who might be able to hold his or her own in combat against a magi, and neither of his co-workers meet this criterion. The first is Brian Greenman, who upon meeting Tagin immediately mentions that he knows Tagin’s “buddy,” Finagle.

Tagin smiles sarcastically: “Yeah, I’ve already held him at gunpoint once. I hope you and I can be buddies too.”

The other agent who he’ll be working with is Dalavar Keneil, a half-Elf who’s been with the Bureau pretty much since birth. He’s a telepath, trained by Autumn Yeiotana, though nowhere near her power. Tagin asks Neil what they need a telepath for, and Dalavar nervously replies that he’ll make sure no one sees them as they sneak into the most secret locations of a high-security skyscraper.

Then their fourth ‘teammate’ makes his appearance, commenting that if Tagin and Brian were foolish enough to think they’re just creep their way into a skyscraper owned by a paranoid dragon, then they should leave most of the thinking to Dalavar. The insult doesn’t actually reach their ears, but instead creeps into their head like something wet and heavy. They all turn to see the BMM’s head telepath Yondo J’Qwuan, who normally resembles something out of the Cthulhu mythos. Much to their surprise, instead looking all purply-green and tentacley, he just looks like a severe-faced Chinese human, still dressed in a business-suit.

Again, J’Qwuan seems to telepathically mutter that they were stupid enough to think an Illithid would go out in public without a disguise . . . but they couldn’t hear exactly what he said, so the two humans let it pass.

J’Qwuan will transport them to Hong Kong, then discreetly scan for any powerful magicks, and alert the rest of the group if anything approaches that might threaten them. Additionally, J’Qwuan will alter the memories of Giriuko’s most highly-trusted business partners to make sure they don’t get the foolish notion that their CEO was a Gold Dragon. Meanwhile, Dalavar and the two hackers—Brian and Tagin—will enter discreetly into the building and ascend to the 65th floor where the main business suites were. Dalavar will use his mental powers to make sure no one sees them. Once they’re inside the office, Tagin and Brian will hack into the system and get the job done.

‘Why two hackers with only one telepath watching their backs?’ Tagin wonders silently, to which J’Qwuan replies telepathically that he trusts any magi at least twice as much as he trusts any mundane. To accentuate his point, he hands Dalavar a light sword, leaving the two hackers with only pistols (and Tagin’s switchblade).

One more admonishment before they leave. J’Qwuan warns Dalavar not to go near the crime scene. A powerful enough magical aura can shut down another magi’s powers, and even the residue of a Dragon’s aura can be dangerous.


[Meta: This adventure resulted because Chad, Tagin’s player, missed the previous adventuring session. I believe it turned out to be one of the coolest sessions we ever ran. Jessie, our DM, had already introduced the hacker Brian to Finagle, so everything just clicked when she realized she had to run a solo adventure with Tagin-Eve. For this adventure, I jumped into the side-seat and roleplayed Brian Greenman, while the player who normally portrayed Cai just sat in for the hell of it.

Since we ran this game before we knew about the commoner and expert clases in the DM’s Guide, Brian happened to be a 0th level character. Yay me.]


The party uses a key to get into Hong Kong, in an alley behind a Buddhist shrine in a shadier district of town. Casually, arogantly, J’Qwuan leads them through the streets toward downtown. Dalavar tries to get to know the two hackers by showing how he can make people stop looking at them. He points to a couple of prostitutes on a corner looking at them, and then with a grin from Dalavar, the two oriental women just turn and look away.

Brian comments that it was probably just Neil’s smile that made them look away, but Tagin remains silent. He’s used to people not looking at him, and he’s been able to pull it off without magic. He remains silently unimpressed through the rest of the walk/ride (Brian whined that his feet hurt and asked if they could take a cab), until they reach the tower of Li Tsi Tong. They walk through the doors as if invisible; everyone looking away at just the right moment to never see them. Once inside, the three mammals and the squid-guy part ways, taking separate elevators.

They reach the 65th floor, and casually walk into a small archipelago of offices. A discreet telepathic scan of a security guard reveals which room they want, and Dalavar leads them into a wide office stretching across one side of the building. The blinds on the windows are parted enough to fill the room with dim light, revealing ornate decorations. This is apparently Li Tsi Tong’s own office, and the walls are decorated with Chinese-character wall scrolls and Japanese paintings, a few ubiquitous potted plants in elaborate vases that sit in the corners, and a full set of Samurai armor that stands mounted slightly behind and to the side of the main computer terminal. While Brian practically drools over the oriental artifacts in the room (“Whoa, look! A rice-paper Chinese Zodiac!”), Tagin sits at the desk and examines the currently shut-off computer.

It’s a Pentium III, high quality, hooked up via ethernet cable. The keyboard is in Chinese, which he hadn’t considered ahead of time. He plans to rely on handy Windows icons to help him locate a DOS shell, and he’ll work from there.

The screen boots up to an “Enter password”-style window, only the text is in Chinese, and there appears to be a clock ticking backward, with about a minute left. On either side of the screen, two gold Dragons stretch languidly in traditional Chinese style. Certainly not something your typical “Enter Network Password.”

Brian briefly panics, but after a quick argument, Tagin’s cool head convinces them to not try to unplug it, so Dalavar runs over, memorizes the characters, runs to the door, and establishes a link with one of the guards, trying to use the guard’s knowledge of Chinese, and his own ability to translate thoughts, to figure out what the prompt is asking. With about 15 seconds left, Dalavar shouts back to them that it says,

“Twelve arrive, twelve are blessed. Enter the date.”

Tagin throws his hands up in the air. “Great job. Like I know what the hell that means.”

With about five seconds left, Tagin types a few random keys on what would normally be the numeral line, then clicks what he guesses is ‘Enter.’

The screen flashes briefly and the two gold Dragons turn their gaze out at Tagin, through the screen. Their eyes flare an angry red, and Tagin and Brian feel themselves perfectly caught up by that hypnotic gaze . . . when Dalavar shouts, “Look out!”

Snapping out of their momentary daze, Tagin and Brian see a shadow coming up from behind them, falling across the desk. Twirling around, Tagin sees the suit of samurai armor drawing its katana. The face of the helmet is covered with a fearsome mask, and after a moment of abject terror, Tagin is able to leap away just in time to avoid a downward slice from the katana. The blade cuts straight through the modern plastic desk, and the unfazed samurai drops into a fighting stance, facing Tagin.

Tagin draws his pistol, but Dalavar says as loudly as he dares not to shoot, since he can’t block that much noise telepathically. Cursing, Tagin-Eve takes a few steps back and draws his switchblade, trying to keep the desk between him and the samurai.

Meanwhile, Brian babbles incoherently for a few moments, saying they should have found out what the date was from the guards, and now Tagin’s gone and gotten them all killed and he’s never going to get to play D&D third edition when it really looked cool from what he saw online, and how he’s never going to ever want to play a game in an Oriental setting because he doesn’t understand what the heck these stupid squiggly lines on the keyboard mean.

Tagin tumbles out of the way of a high cut, but a low slash catches him on the shoulder and digs deep. He comes to his feet grimacing in pain, almost staggering into a glass display case as he tries to keep away from the armor. He shouts for Brian to shut up and give him some help.

Dalavar, sifting from Brian’s incoherent ramblings a piece of actual advice, gets as far away from the samurai armor as possible, then closes his eyes, concentrating on the guards outside. Brian, meanwhile, yanks a lamp off the desk and hurls it at the armor. As the lamp was still plugged in, its flight is aborted as soon as its cord runs out.

Tagin feints a leap backward, then tumbles to the armor’s side and around its back, then stabs his switchblade into where a kidney oughta be. Not surprisingly, the armor doesn’t notice, and instead just backhands Tagin in the face, knocking him away.

Dalavar’s eyes flutter open, and he inches around the samurai/hacker battle to get to the keyboard. Brian’s about to throw the monitor at the suit of armor when Dalavar bends over the keyboard and types several keys, muttering “June 4th, 2000” under his breath. Then he clicks enter.

The screen flashes again, but Dalavar averts his eyes. Judging by the sound of Tagin scrambling across the carpet away from the still-active armor, Dalavar guesses that “June 4th, 2000,” is not the right answer.

Tagin moves backward toward the full-length window, making a few threats at the samurai armor in an attempt to goad it into charging him, but apparently the animated armor is wiser than Tagin, because it instead feints with a downward chop, then sweeps Tagin off his feet with a low kick. Tagin is barely able to avoid getting his leg severed as he leaps away.

“Dalavar, don’t you have a stupid sword?! Kill this thing!”

“I’m busy,” the telepath replies cooly, again closing his eyes and focusing on the guards outside.

Finally getting his panic under control, Brian yanks the arcane blade’s hilt out of the half-Elf’s pocket and rushes at the armor, igniting the blade and filling the room with an emerald glow for a moment before the magic fades into the form of a broadsword. Since the armor’s back is turned, Brian bravely swings to slash at it. The weapon digs into the armor at the back, above the hips, cutting through and into the hollow interior. With lightning reaction, the armor whirls around and bats the exposed end of the arcane sword’s hilt with the back of its katana, flipping around and slashing at Brian’s hand to cause him to lose control of the blade and drop it. Cursing, Brian staggers away, biting his lip as he stares at the armor’s snarling mask.

The armor makes two quick slices, but Brian reveals that he is much faster than one would expect for such a pudgy guy. So fast, in fact, that he staggers backward into the glass display case he’d been admiring earlier for its Zodiac wall scroll. He lightly cracks the glass, but, still panicking, he turns and tries to keep running.

“Dammit, Neil!” Tagin shouts as he leaps upon the armor’s back, tackling it. He kicks it in the back of its knee, and the armor begins to fall, but as they go down, the samurai spins so Tagin lands on the bottom.

“Neil! Do something constructive, okay?!”

Breaking out of his concentration, apparently unsuccessful, Dalavar Kineil glances about, then grabs a vase and heaves it off the ground, trying to get close enough to smash the armor. Meanwhile, the armor hits Tagin in the face with its elbow, then rolls over and pins the hacker at the legs and throat.

Brian, who in his panic has been staring dead into a zodiac wall scroll for 10 seconds, gasps and then shouts, “I got it!”

Just as the armor is about to take a lengthwise slash across Tagin’s neck, Brian runs past it toward the desk, stumbling over one of the armor’s legs. Brian keeps running, but in that moment, one of Tagin’s legs was free. Hooking his leg up and around the armor’s back, he leverages sideways and flips them over to put the armor on the bottom of the pile. Free from the armor’s pin, Tagin kicks away just as a katana slices through where his throat should have been. The armor begins to get up, when a massive Chinese vase crashes atop its chest, knocking it to the floor.

With a few moments’ respite, Tagin runs over to the arcane broadsword and grabs it, yelling at Brian to tell them what he’s doing.

“Enter the date, right? Twelve arrive and bless? It’s the zodiac!”

Tagin gives a shrugging nod in agreement as the samurai armor does a dramatic martial arts kick-flip to its feet. As Tagin and the Samurai armor circle, swords pointed at each other, Tagin nervously asks, “Yeah? And you’re going to start typing when?”

“Well, by the Chinese zodiac, it’s the year of the Dragon.” Grinning at his own greatness, Brian sits down at the desk.

Dalavar steps away and closes his eyes, saying, “I’ll find out what ‘Dragon’ is in Chinese.”

As Tagin shows his true colors by ducking when the Samurai swings at him, Brian shouts to Neil, “Nah, don’t bother. I got it. I have more than enough Chinese Magic cards.”

With a few quick keystrokes, Brian types in “Dragon” in Chinese, then clicks enter. The samurai, its sword raised to behead Tagin, stops. It takes a step back, wipes the blood from its sword, and sheathes the weapon, then bows to Tagin.

Tagin looks up sheepishly, watching as the animated warrior takes its place back at the stand. A few breaths of relief pass, and then Tagin nods his thanks to Brian. Brian grins back, and then turns his attention to the screen as Windows loads fully. Before the fat, roleplaying hacker can get a chance, though, Tagin comes up beside him and ousts him from the chair, saying to let him handle this. As Tagin hacks his way into the system and changes the language standard to English, downloading a translation program from the net, etc., he graciously thanks Dalavar for getting them into that mess.

For Dalavar, it’s all he can do to sweep up the dirt and plant pottings off the floor, hoping to leave little trace of their presence. Brian gives the suggestion to dump the dust down the slit he cut in the armor’s back, so as Dalavar, Tagin, and Brian leave the office half an hour later, they leave the estate of Li Tsi Tong a few million dollars poorer, but with a lovely suit of samurai armor, filled with a fern.

The trio load into an elevator, and as the doors close Dalavar’s finger hovers over the button for the Lobby floor. Then, looking upward at the ceiling as if in a daze, Dalavar presses button 70.

Brian coughs nervously, glancing at Dalavar. “What are you doin’, man?”

Tagin says, “Neil, don’t screw something else up, okay? Let’s just leave.”

Shaking his head, Dalavar gestures upward with a nod of his head. “No, I just have this feeling. I want to check it out. It might be important.”

Brian, shaking his head vigorously, half-shouts, “No man. This is like some kind of bad horror film. Like, ‘Press 70 for DEATH!” Think, man! You’re freaked out. We can’t trust you.” He turns to Tagin. “You know we can’t trust him, don’t you?”

With a soft toll, the elevator doors open, and without further ado, the telepath—their shield—walks out into the 70th floor lobby. With no other choice, the two hackers follow Neil to the doors of Giriuko’s private room. Dalavar, again in a daze, reaches out and pulls open the door, but before they can reveal more than a peek of the room beyond, Dalavar’s eyes roll back into his head, and he crumples to the floor.

Tagin and Brian both try to get as small as possible, as quick as possible, but the various guards stationed on the floor spot them suddenly, and they don’t take kindly to intruders. Leveling small arms at the two white men, they rush to surround them, barking orders in Chinese. Guessing their intent, Tagin and Brian raise their hands in the air and try to look as innocent as possible, as quick as possible.

Then, to their side they hear a door click at the edge of the lobby, and the guards suddenly shrug and turn to look away, going back to business as usual. After a moment’s confusion, the two agents look at the fire stairs and see J’Qwuan walking into the room, his head raised haughtily above them. He stops a few dozen feet away and telepathically asks them to shut the door to the Dragon’s room. That done, the two hackers drag Neil to the fire stairs, and once away from the aura of the dead Dragon, Dalavar slowly recovers. Afraid to let them take the elevator again, J’Qwuan orders them all to walk down the stairs, and so for 69 flights, Tagin shares every insult he can think of with Neil, until by about the 68th floor Brian has to tell Tagin to chill.

“C’mon man. He’s a telepath. Haven’t you ever seen Babylon 5? You don’t mess with them. Just lay off. He knows he did wrong, but it’s cool now, right?”

The SCAD student remains silent and makes the rest of them ignore him for the rest of the trip back to the departure spot. The mission was a success, if a bit of a fiasco, and things get even worse when they reach the alley to teleport back. A group of local teenagers are hanging out in the alley, spraying it with graffiti. There are too many for J'Qwuan to charm them all into leaving, so the Illithid has to find a payphone to call the Bureau.

Tagin grumbles and says that he’s going to get a cel phone first thing when they get back stateside.

While J’Qwuan makes the call, Tagin and Brian both notice that across the street is a high-tech, sort of technobrothel, the latest craze in techno-savvy Hong Kong. A soft, sweet singing reaches their ears, and ignoring their commanding officer, the two weak-willed hackers stride through the doors into the club, followed a moment later by an alarmed Dalavar Kineil.

The singing guides the two Americans through the crowd until they reach an exotic dancer draped with a feathery shawl, dancing erotically around a pole while jarring techno beats fill the air. Tagin and Brian stare at her beauty gape-jawed, until Dalavar comes up behind them and slaps them both across their heads.

“Sure,” Dalavar says, “she’s sexy now, but how about when I dispel the charm she put over you?”

Annoyed that the half-Elf interrupted their viewing, Tagin and Brian look back up, but now see that the feather shawl is actually real feathers growing from the slightly-misshappen woman.

Staring knowingly up at the woman, Dalavar remarks into the hackers’ ears, “A siren. Good job guys. You’re probably the first idiots since Odysseus to avoid getting eaten by one of them.”

The siren looks down at them, sneering at Dalavar. She calls over to her boss in Chinese and then steps down off the dancing dais to stand beside the agents. With a strange accent in her voice, she tells them she has something important to share about the killer they’re looking for.

“Interests” perked, the agents follow the swaying hips of . . . err, follow the siren into her dressing room, where she locks the door for privacy. Dalavar remains on guard, entirely certain she’s just trying to trick them again.

Her feathers ruffling softly over the distant noise of the techno music, the Siren says, “I’m not going to kill you. I don’t need meat, do I? Your agency so nicely gives me animal meat to dine on. Frankly, I miss the old ways. Days when Dragons weren’t dead. Things were nicer then.”

They notice that she seems to stare off a bit into space when she talks, but she seems to speak English well enough, even though she’s not making much sense. They prompt her to go on about the killer.

Siren: “He came in here after he killed the lizard. I think he wanted to kill me, but things were too public for his tastes. I would have killed him, but he was already dead, and it wouldn’t have done any good.”

Confused looks pass among the agents.

The Siren sighs and walks out into the hallways, motioning for them to follow her as she heads toward an alley exit. “He wants to be like a legend, but all the legends are dead. He wants to be like the Archangel, battling his Dragon in the Apocalypse.”

Tagin frowns at the Christian symbolism. “I thought Sirens were Greek.”

“My family converted a long time ago,” the Siren answers, actually lucid briefly.

Brian says, “Well, that explains you knowing Christian stuff, but what about you being here in China?”

The Siren growls in frustration. “Your agency told me to get a job if I wanted to live on Terra. Told me they’d keep an eye on me. They keep an eye on every magi that walks your ‘Earth.’ But humans. . . . Humans they don’t mind. I don’t mind humans either.”

Brian smiles dumbly.

Siren: “What I mind is the nasty fake meat you give me to eat. My kind do not eat animal flesh. Our nature cannot be held back forever. Your killer knows that, and that’s why he wanted to kill me. Why he did kill the lizard.”

Tagin shrugs at Brian, still confused. “So . . . you were saying that the killer is dead. What do you mean, dead?”

Having reached the alleyway behind the club, they stop. The siren points across the street, to where J’Qwuan, still disguised as a human, is making a phone call.

Chuckling, she points a feather-rimmed hand toward the Illithid. “Must be hard to make a phone call without lips. I imagine he just gurgles into it.”

Tagin snorts a little, and Brian laughs, pretending to be a phone operator: “Oh, it’s J’Qwuan. Hello sir. Are you alright? One blbopbpoblalp for yes. Two blbopbpoblalps for no. . . . Wait, was that two, or just one long blbopbpoblalp?”

The siren shakes her head and hums a little ditty, walking down the street toward the nearby river while Dalavar tries to make sure no one sees them. They follow out of curiosity for nearly a minute, while all the siren does is hum softly as she strolls toward the bridge that spans the river. This late at night there’s barely any car traffic, and so the Siren is able to stop in the middle of the road, on a part of the bridge where the shore is still beneath them, some thirty feet below. She walks to the railing, glances down curiously, then leans her back on the railing.

Staring at them, she addresses Tagin. “You know, skinny one, you’d taste good. But I can’t do that. That would hurt the humans. Scare them. Yes, your agency doesn’t mind the humans. But they can’t hold back my nature forever. The whole world is rebelling.”

Brian looks around in boredom. “Yeah yeah. So, . . . who’s the killer? He talked to you?”

Siren: “He’s dead.”

A pause, and then Tagin chuckles. “Yeah, a buddy of mine shot him as he ran away from another Dragon he killed. But you said he was already dead.”

The Siren shrugs, her feathers rustling. “I can’t live like this. My kind have lived on your ‘Earth’ since the Greeks, but now we are forced to either go away, or live in the walls you make for us. We are numbered, ordered, told what to do. Our lives are owned by you.

“Ahh,” she pauses, eyes frighteningly wide as she lolls her head from side to side, “but he was already dead, and he helped the lizard stop living this lie. Stop living with hunger repressed, urges controlled. I should have let him end this lie for me when I saw him.”

Brian realizes she’s about to jump just before she spins and vaults over the railing. He grabs her foot, and Tagin grabs Brian around the waist, but then against his will, Brian feels his fingers opening, releasing his grip. The Siren plummets to the rocks below and lands with a crack.

Brian whirls around to Dalavar, then sees J’Qwuan coming up behind him, dark in the dim lights of the bridge. J’Qwuan states that it was her wish to die, so he forced Brian to let go and grant her that desire. Brian begins to shout at the Mind Flayer, but J’Qwuan ignores the complaint, saying that he was able to glean a few things from her mind before it died, while her defenses were down.

Brian gapes in disgust. “You’re a monster! You let her die just so you could. . . . That’s revolting!”

J’Qwuan glares down at Brian. “You’re just a desk worker. Don’t talk up to me.”

Brian shakes his head, his expression livid. “Oh, I’m not talking up to you. I’m talking down to you, because you’re just scum on the ground, you brain-sucking squid-faced Monster Manual reje-”

[Meta: At this moment, Jessie, the DM, put a hand over my mouth to shut me up. She then said, “When Brian wakes up a few seconds later, he pushes himself off the pavement, and J’Qwuan turns silently to head back to the gate back to the Bureau.”]

Apparently the Bureau’s chief telepath considers insubordination a pet peeve. Sure, Brian has just received the worst ice cream head-ache of his life, but it felt dang good to get that off his chest. He even caught Tagin smirking later in pride, so Brian took a liking to Tagin. Tagin just said it was funny that Brian just passed out in mid-sentence.

Having Dalavar call this time, they get someone to come pick them up, and to recover the Siren’s body. They make it back slightly after the knights in Savannah return from wrecking Dornankanir’s house, and are debriefed by the Chief, then scanned by Autumn Yeiotana to make sure they weren’t charmed.

As Brian and Tagin leave the examination room, waving goodbye to Autumn, J’Qwuan glides in, greeted by sneers from both hackers.



[Meta: So, Tagin, for once, had to be heroic and take center stage. Brian actually grew a backbone, much to my delight as his part-time player. And both of them found a friend, though Tagin refused to admit it.

In hindsight, that riddle’s answer should’ve been patently obvious (I even had a “Year of the Dragon” desktop wallpaper from WotC’s website), but it sure felt gratifying to get it right.

Oh yeah, and we were still confused as hell as to how the killer could have been dead, when we had just seen him all bright and chipper running away from a crime scene a few nights earlier. Stay tuned.]

 

[RangerWickett]

Balthazar Mordred: Male human Ftr9; Medium-size Humanoid (human); HD 10d10+30; hp 94; Init +3; Spd 30 ft.; AC 17 (+3 Dex, +4 Defensive Cloak); Atk masterwork arcane longsword +13 melee (1d8+3/crit 19/x2), or masterwork silvered shortsword +13 (1d6+3/crit 19/x2), or stake +12 melee (1d3+3/crit x3), or stake +10 ranged (1d3+3/crit x3), or automatic pistol +10 ranged (1d10/crit x3), or throwing knives (5) +10 ranged (1d4+3/crit 19/x2); SV Fort +9, Ref +4, Will +7; Str 16, Dex 12, Con 17, Int 14, Wis 15, Cha 13.

Skills and Feats: Climb +7, Intimidate +5, Jump +9, Knowledge (religion) +8, Listen +14, Search +8, Speak Language (Latin, German), Spot +14, Wilderness Lore +4; Deflect Mind, Dodge, Iron Will, Mobility, Point-blank Shot, Precise Shot, Ranged Disarm, Rapid Shot, Shot on the Run, Track.
Note: All Knowledge skills and Speak Language are class skills for Balthazar because of his Classical Liberal Arts education. Listen and Spot are Balthazar’s floating class skills.


Background:
Balthazar Mordred was attending a private school outside London the night of a vampire attack. At a surprisingly young age, Balthazar saw a vampire for the first time, when it killed one of the headmasters of the school. No one else saw what happened to the priest, and Balthazar’s accusations were little more than laughable, so he kept his knowledge secret for years. He graduated in the middle of his class, not extrememly smart, but excellent in the outdoors activities. Several days after graduation, a Knight arrived, there to reinvestigate the case. Balthazar was among the curious who tried not to look like they were watching the man at work, but he was the only one to recognize some of the tools the Knight was carrying: holy water, a variety of holy symbols, wooden stakes, and a hammer. He knew then that he was right about that night almost five years before.

Balthazar kept his eyes on the Knight, and the Knight continued on with his business, neither of them expecting the murderer to return to the scene of the crime. However, the vampire responsible for the murder was extremely old and canny, and it knew that the Knight returning to investigate meant attention might be drawn to him. Late into the evening, as the Knight was sifting through the offices of the various professors, he was attacked. Balthazar, who had been following out of sight, recognized the vampire as his Latin professor. The knight was caught off guard, and he fell to the vampire’s attack.

Desperately, Balthazar grabbed a janitorial bucket of water and splashed it at the vampire’s feet. Momentarily over running water—one of the weaknesses of vampires—it was vulnerable, and Balthazar wrestled the beast to the ground and impaled it in the heart with a wooden stake from the knight. Then, disgusted at the deed he would have to perform, he broke into a fire alarm panel, took the axe, and beheaded the vampire.

When school officials arrived to the sounds of the fire alarm, they found two bodies and Balthazar, drenched in blood and rain from the sprinklers. He ran, not knowing how to explain the scene, and he was rescued by a team of five other Knights who had not arrived in time to save their co-worker, but in ample time to clean the scene. Impressed with the young man’s unrefined skill, the Knights offered Balthazar a place as a vampire-slayer, and though he had to give up his former life, he has been a Knight ever since.


Blood of the High Fey Template:
The magical nature of the High Fey allows them to crossbreed with virtually any humanoid creature. This occasionally occurs after a mortal has been enticed or charmed into the Faerie Realms, where he or she lives in timeless pleasure until the whim of the Fey determines it is time for the outsider to go back to Terra, though most often it is simply a High Fey bedding with a Middle or Low Fey. Most half-fey children are born in the Faerie Realm to dryads, nymphs, or other feminine spirits, but sometimes women emerge from Gaia pregnant with half-Satyr children, or a nymph might remain on Terra long enough to bear the child of a handsome human lover.

Feyblood children always appear more exotic and magical than their mortal counterparts, occasionally more fragile, but charged with the enchanting power of their fey blood. Even people with a Fey ancestor retain the same otherworldly appearance. Their appearance usually betrays their nature—flawless skin for nymph blood, shaggy legs and subtle horns for the son of a satyr, leaves constantly stuck in the hair of the daughter of a dryad, and almost always very vivid, piercing eyes.

Creating a Blood of the High Fey character:
“Blood of the High Fey” is a template that can be added to any Humanoid or Monstrous Humanoid (referred to hereafter as the “base creature”). The creature type changes to “Fey.” It uses all the base creature’s statistics and special abilities except as noted here.

Special Attacks: A High Feyblood character retains all the special attacks of the base creature and also gains the following.
Fey Influence (Sp): To reflect the various heritages of High Feyblood characters, choose two of the following spells. The High Feyblood can use his or her powers in an appropriate form to use either spell once per day as a spell-like ability. Possible spells: cause fear, change self, charm person, ghost sound, sleep, speak with animals, or speak with plants. Others may be added at the GM’s approval. This spell-like ability functions as though cast by a sorcerer of the character’s level, or of 10th level, whichever is lower.
Special Qualities: A Feyblood character retains all the special qualities of the base creature and also gains the following.

• Feysight. If the character is descended from a Seelie Fey, she gains Low-light vision. If she has Unseelie blood, she has Darkvision, but also suffers Light Blindness. Abrupt exposure to bright light, such as sunlight or the Daylight spell, blinds the High Feyblood for 1 round. In addition, she suffers a –1 penalty to all attack rolls, saves, and checks while operating in bright light.
• Damage Reduction: The Feyblood has DR 5/cold iron or wood. The true High Fey can only be readily harmed by items native to the land of the Fey. Magic affects them normally, but any manner of heat-forged weapon is part of humanity’s world, and thus not sympathetically aligned with the Fey. Cold iron weapons, however, are forged without being fired, simply beaten into shape with pure strength or melded with magic. Cold iron and wood can harm High Feyblood’s normally.
• Vulnerability to Iron: A Feyblood character takes 1 extra point of damage whenever she takes damage from a cold iron weapon.

Abilities: Increase from the base creature as follows: Str -2, Dex +2, Con +0, Int +0, Wis +0, Cha +4.
Skills: As the base creature, plus a +2 racial bonus to Animal Empathy, Hide, and Move Silently checks. The High Feyblood also automatically can speak Sylvan.
Challenge Rating: Same as the base creature.
Equivalent Character Level: Same as the base creature +1.

 

[RangerWickett]

Chapter Eight: Dead Men Tell Tales

The knights return to the Bureau from ‘interrogating’ Max Dorman, the human guise of the Dragon Dornankanir, and as they step through the doorway between the mundane world and the Faerie world they are greeted by the smirking face of Autumn Yeiotana, Elvish telepath. She sarcastically congratulates them on a job well done, then tells them the Chief would like to speak to them.

Jenny and Cai tell Autumn very quickly about Michael’s apparent mental breakdown. Autumn nods in feigned disinterest, her short auburn hair bobbing. The Chief already heard about what happened, and he told Autumn to take Michael off and check out his mind to see what’s going on with him. Michael nervously goes off with Autumn to an examination room, and the rest of the knights navigate the hallways of the Bureau for the Management of Magicks, crossing the vast complex to the administrative side of the facility. Soon the knights will each get offices here, except for Finagle, who has already moved in full-time to the residential section of the BMM compound.

When they finally reach the Chief’s office, the Chief is waiting silently, his eyes coldly scrutinizing them as they enter and take seats in front of his desk. After a few moments of letting them squirm, the Chief finally speaks, his tone serious.

“The wyrm is threatening to sue for the damages you caused, not to mention the invasion of his home.”

The PCs exchange sheepish glances, and then Jenny leans forward to try to explain. The Chief cuts her off with an upraised hand, not even looking at her. His gaze focuses on Iscalio Maxwell (who attacked the Dragon with a hail of gunfire) and Madeline West (who, in an effort to rescue her teammates, drove their van into Dornankanir’s house, shattering his front door in the process). Iscalio also receives a glare from his brother, Cai, who apparently feels free of guilt, even though he blasted the Dragon with a shotgun.

The only person apparently not being grilled is Galindrel White, an Elvish sorcerer who stayed in the van the whole time. Of course, that was because he was unconscious.

The Chief shakes his head. “I cannot believe you people. You’ve been with the Bureau for less than a month, and already you’ve gotten us in a lawsuit.”

But then the Chief cracks a slight smile. “Hell, it took me over a year before I did that.”

Feeling the tension ease, the knights cough in relief. The Chief explains that Dornankanir has been trying to sue the Bureau practically since it was founded around the turn of the century. He asks for their reports, seeming most worried by Michael’s apparent mental breakdown. It obviously isn’t just a coincidence that people have been acting mean to Dragons and then later claiming they didn’t do anything. At least this time they didn’t kill the wyrm.

A few other small arguments arise, such as why the group didn’t let Finagle go back and use mending spells on the door, and why Iscalio’s pockets look slightly bulged (plus the Chief heard a jingle of change as the druid sat down). All in all, though, the Chief gives them only a slight admonishment, then assures them that Michael will no longer be on this case (much to Finagle’s relief).

The Chief gives them on quick assignment to get in before the day closes, hopefully while the trail is still hot. In Historic Savannah, the Owen-Thomas House, one of the haunted museum-houses (Savannah has a lot of haunted houses) is curated by a Ms. Gina Perez, who, though not herself bonded to a spirit, has the unique gift to communicate with ghosts. She has occasionally been a help to the Bureau, since she hears many rumors about the magical events in Savannah. Ghosts tell many tales.

The Chief dismisses them, but Finagle asks something. The radio in the van recorded the words Michael said to Dornankanir in Draconic, and Finagle’s next door neighbor (Brian Greenman, see chapter 5) is apparently skilled in translation software. The Chief agrees that they should give the tape to Brian, but right now Brian’s on assignment in Hong Kong (see chapter 7). He should be back later that evening, the Chief states.

[Meta: Yes, our PCs did in fact go to an actual historical house in Savannah. The Owen-Thomas House is real, located off one of the squares on Abbercorn. I’ve been there too, but of course the curators deny that any ghosts actually live there. The evening ghost tours that ride through the city claim otherwise.]

As the knights leave the Chief’s office, Keira McCormick bumps into them, carrying a bundle of folders. Keira has heard what happened to Michael, her boyfriend, and she asks them what’s going on. They respond as best they can, saying that Michael just started acting odd, but that he seems fine now. Jenny hazards a guess that someone might have charmed him somehow, though she doesn’t know much about that.

They also mention that they’re going to talk to Gina Perez, and so Keira suggests they leave their weapons behind, because it wouldn’t be polite to bring them along, and Ms. Perez is sincerely harmless. Only Jenny listens to this advice.

Keira has to leave quickly to go see Michael, but with an ironic tone she says that Dornankanir will be attending a conference in Atlanta in three days, and the Bureau plans to have knights present as bodyguards. As she walks off, she shouts over her shoulder, “I’ll see you in Atlanta.”

Chewing on that little tidbit, the knights take a gate from the Faerie World to a BMM garage in Savannah. From there they drive to the Owen-Thomas House and inquire about Gina Perez. Gina Perez, a hispanic woman of about thirty, recognizes quickly by the tone of their voices that they’re knights, and she asks them to return after the museum closes, later that evening.

With nothing better to do, the knights, now free to be normal people for a change, go shopping. First stop is a comic book store for Finagle, then another computer parts store. They swing by Madeline’s dorm at Oglethorpe House at SCAD for she can get her camera and take a few shots of the museum at night, but refuse Jenny’s request to stop by at her church (she wanted to speak with her pastor about some personal issues, but the rest of the party could give a damn about her religion). Instead, mostly Madeline drives them around aimlessly through Savannah for a few hours while the group tries to make small talk. Jenny realizes she likes Cai much more than his brother, Iscalio, mainly because Cai doesn’t hate Christians on principle, and Madeline quietly ignores Iscalio’s come-ons to her.

Most entertaining is Galindrel, who shares stories from his family’s history. As an Elf, he’s only two generations removed from the British colonialization of India, which was the reason his family moved to America. (It was pretty cool that Galindrel’s player, Trey, just came up with these facts off the top of his head as if he’d rehearsed them with the DM, but she seemed as surprised as we were, and thanked Trey for contributing to her gameworld.)

Finagle, being only 16, doesn’t really say much because they wouldn’t listen to him anyway.

Finally, after sunset they return to the historic district and meet with Gina Perez again. She brings them inside and offers some milk and cookies while Jenny and Iscalio explain what they’re interested in. Jenny tries not to reveal too much about their case, but Iscalio tactlessly tells the museum curator that in a house only a few blocks away a Dragon was killed the other night, and they then pursued his murderer to Bonaventure cemetery and killed him.

Gina, in the process of dipping a cookie in her glass of milk, drops both cookie and milk in shock. Finagle’s ghost uncle thankfully provides a little magic to catch the glass, and nothing stains.

Gina says that she doesn’t usually hear much about such ghastly affairs. Usually she just hears about what ghosts are newly arrived in the city, or which ones pass over when they apparently fulfill whatever need kept them on this world. She had gotten the impression from other knights that there was more going on than she knew, but she hadn’t even met an Elf until Galindrel just now.

A soft piano music begins to play from another room in the house, and all the knights get suddenly nervous. Gina waves her hand in dismissal, saying it’s just Margaret Thomas, the owner of the house. And yes, she confirms, Margaret Thomas died in 1929. Catherine, Madeline’s ghost, wanders off to chat with the piano-player, then later returns and says that Mrs. Thomas has not seen anything either.

To their surprise, Gina replies to Madeline’s ghost, admonishing the deceased woman for not just asking her. The PCs are surprised, apparently having forgotten that Gina speaks to ghosts. The knights sit dumbfounded for about a minute while Pataman, Catherine, Finagle’s uncle, and Gina all hold a conversation. The knights, of course, can only hear their own ghost (if any) and Gina, but Gina seems to be having a stimulating conversation with them, sighing sadly whenever one of the ghosts complains about how poorly they’re treated by the people they’ve bonded with. After thoroughly embarrassing Jenny, Madeline, and Finagle, Gina smiles and says that she promises to call if she hears anything, and that she hopes to get a chance to talk to them all again. The PCs can tell that she is probably more interested in talking to the ghosts than to them.

Thanking Gina for her hospitality, the knights get up to leave. Madeline asks Gina politely if she can take some pictures before they go, but Gina’s smile instantly shifts to the mask of an official museum curator.

“I’m sorry, no flash photography in the building.”

The knights leave, and the trip back to the Bureau is relatively silent. Cai drives because Madeline is frustrated; she wanted the pictures for her portfolio. Aside from the Maxwells, all the other PCs have to listen to their ghosts commenting how nice it was to talk to someone different for a change. Jenny, for her part, promises to spend more time talking to Pataman and doing things for his sake. Since the ghost can’t travel far from whomever it’s bonded to, Jenny says she’ll bring herself and Pataman to a movie some time. The others laugh at this suggestion.

The knights get back to the Bureau, then make their own ways home for the night, Finagle staying up and trying to learn new spells off his palmtop. He stays awake as well as he can, so he’ll be able to give Brian the recording of Michael’s draconic ramblings when his fellow hacker gets in.

[The game seemingly over, everyone gets up to leave, but then Jessie, our DM, speaks up loudly to draw our attention back in.]

That night, around 4 am, the Bureau calls all the knights to inform them that Gina Perez was murdered as she tried to leave the museum. The door was left open, and apparently there was a pursuit through the house. She evaded her attacker all the way to the second floor veranda before she was cut down by a slash across her chest. The burns around the killing blow suggests that it was a Bureau-issued arcane blade. The attacker apparently left after delivering one blow, because aside from the path of the chase, not a single item in the house was disturbed, except for the bench to the piano, which was knocked over.

Efforts to scry the house have been unsuccessful because of a powerful aura that disrupts other magic. There are too many fingerprints for any of them to be useful.

They have only one other useful clue, and even it is vague. Apparently before Gina died, the ghost of Margaret Thomas bonded with her long enough to scrawl a message on the wall in Gina’s own blood.

"It was Legion"

 

[RangerWickett]

Michael Dunne: Male human Pal6/Hunter of the Dead3; Medium-size Humanoid (human); HD 6d10+3d8+9; hp 90; Init +2; Spd 30 ft.; AC 19 (+2 Dex, +4 Defensive Cloak, +3 Divine); Atk +1 holy arcane scimitar +12 melee (1d6+3 +2d6 holy/crit 15/x2); SA Smite Evil (+3 to-hit, +6 damage), Smite Undead (+2 to-hit, +3 damage), Turn Undead 9/day; SQ Detect Evil, Detect Undead, Divine Defense Ghostbond, Lay Hands (18 hp), Divine Grace, Divine Health, Aura of Courage, Remove Disease 2/week, Spurn Death’s Touch; SV Fort +14, Ref +8, Will +8; Str 15, Dex 14, Con 12, Int 10, Wis 14, Cha 16.

Skills and Feats: Concentration +7, Heal +6, Knowledge (religion) +6, Knowledge (undead) +8, Sense Motive +6, Spot +10; Blind-fight, Extra Turning, Improved Critical (scimitar), Spiritual Blow, Weapon Focus (scimitar).
Note: All Knowledge skills and Speak Language are class skills for Michael because of his college education. Sense Motive and Spot are Michael’s floating class skills.

Paladin Spells per Day: 2. Typically prepared—Divine Favor.

Hunter of the Dead Spells per Day: 2 / 1. Typically prepared—Invisibility to Undead, Magic Weapon; Bull’s Strength.

Ghostbond Abilities: Alertness, Empathic Link, Locative Bond, Manifestation, See Spirit, Share Spells, Speak with Spirit, Spirit Manifestation, Touch, Turn Resistance, +2 Fortitude.


Background:
Details are limited. Michael’s ghost’s name is Gerrard. Both he and his ghost are Christian. Michael was previously dating Autumn Yeiotana, but they broke up in 1996. He has been romantically involved with Keira McCormick since 1998.



Paladins and Alernatives to Special Mounts: At 5th level, Paladins can choose to receive a special mount, or they can gain an alternative power from the following list. Note, this list is tenative and has not been playtested.

• Manifestation. If the Paladin has a bonded spirit, that spirit can become manifest, as the Ghost template ability, for a number of hours per day equal to the Paladin's level. This is in addition to normal manifestation time that would be gained at 9th level. The manifested spirit gains some of the same abilities as a bonded mount.
• Divine Defense. The Paladin adds her Charisma bonus, if positive, to her Armor Class, even while flat footed. Additionally, she may expend one of her turn undead usages for the day to instead gain damage reduction x/+3 (where x is her Charisma bonus) for one round per level.
• Celestial speed. At 5th level, the Paladin's movement speed increases by +10 feet. It increases again at 10th level +20 feet, +30 feet at 15th level, and +40 feet at 20th level.
• Hospitaler. For the purposes of determining how much the Paladin can heal per day with her Lay Hands ability, treat her Charisma modifier as if it were increased by +2. She may Lay Hands as a free action to any ally she can touch, but not to herself.
• Favored Enemy. This functions as the Ranger ability of the same name, but only functions for a single creature type ever. This bonus is +1 at 5th level, +2 at 10th, +3 at 15th, and +4 at 20th. Additionally, the Paladin's detect evil ability can function instead to detect cratures of this type.

 

[RangerWickett]

Friday night, around 9 pm, Cai Maxwell picks up the phone, tightening his grip with a smile. He can feel the plastic of the receiver crack slightly under the strength of his grasp. Across the apartment, Iscalio is having an argument with his fox. Cai grumbles and puts the phone to his ear.

“Yes? Maxwell here. . . . Who’s this? . . . Why’d you call me then? You should be calling Finagle. . . . Oh, well good. I was wondering what the hell that psycho said to the Dragon. . . . Yeah, yeah, I’ll be there in an hour.”

Cai hangs up, then shouts to Iscalio. “Put your drugs away and get ready to go to work.”

Chapter Nine: Haunted Past

Everyone assembles at the Oglethorpe House entrance to the Faerie World, and Finagle (who lives in the Bureau) comes out through the gate to get them. He says that his next-door neighbor, Brian Greenman, just finished translating the tape of Bureau Paladin Michael Dunne insulting wealthy Dragon businessman Dornankanir in Draconic, which occurred just yesterday, a few hours before Gina Perez was murdered by “Legion.”

When they get to Brian’s room, however, the fat gamer is clicking away with not a care in the world, browsing the internet (our DM didn’t say so, but I bet he was at Eric’s Message boards). The party—Jenny, Tagin, Cai, Iscalio, Finagle, and Madeline—walk in and ask for the tape. Brian seems not to know what they’re talking about, but after a little reminding, he remembers that he was supposed to give them the tape, but . . . he can’t remember where he put it.

The group searches around for a few minutes, then realize that there’s a strange smell in the air, like burnt plastic. They track the smell to the bottom of Brian’s trashcan, where the tape sits melted in a pile of paper ashes. Brian, of course, doesn’t recall anything happening. A thorough search of the room for clues reveals nothing, especially not any more copies of the tape or the translation. But Brian is most dismayed by the fact that the translation files on his computer were deleted. Tagin makes a few jokes in poor taste at Brian’s expense, but stops when the rest of the group starts to give him suspicious stares.

They go to talk to the Chief, who is in his office conferring with Autumn Yeiotana about Michael’s mental health—which, for the record, is confused, but there is clearly no sign of current mind control. The Chief is as irritated as they are about the destruction of evidence, but he says he’ll have desk workers handle that. There’s another suspect they should check out, another Dragon, this one who lives in Atlanta. Since they’re going to have another job in Atlanta in just two days, the Bureau is going to put them up for the weekend in a Hilton. The Chief gives them the specifics of their mission today and sends them off, telling them Keira will contact them Saturday, tomorrow night.

The Knights head out, talking about their mission and what all went on in the past few days, especially since Tagin was on special assignment in Hong Kong with Brian. Tagin admits that Brian’s got a few screws loose, but he doesn’t think the guy purposefully burned his own tape.

Dramatis Personae et Recapis:

• Jenny Windgrave (21 year-old Native American theater arts student at SCAD and bonded with the ghost of her ancestor Pataman), played by me. Paladin 2
• Iscalio Maxwell (19 year-old albino Druid, bonded to Lancaster Cornwall, a man who died thinking he was a fox). Druid 2
• Cai Maxwell (25 year-old brother of Iscalio and owner of a small martial arts studio; he’s the party’s muscle). Fighter 2
• Madeline West (22 year-old photography major at SCAD, bonded with Salem witch trial victim Catherine). Wild Sorceress 2
• Chuck Tagin-Eve, real name unknown (21 year-old guy who hacked his way into SCAD so he could get free lodging, food, etc.). Rogue 2, hacking skill +14
• Finagle P. Luckshore (16 year-old kid genius [and you know how annoying they can be], bonded with the ghost of his inventor uncle). Wizard 2

One day ago, Tagin went to Hong Kong and discovered that whoever’s been killing Dragons apparently talked to some Siren, and that the killer is already dead. The party puzzles over whether that was metaphorical in that Dragons are being killed because of someone who has already died, or whether an actual dead thing has come back to kill Dragons, or whether it was just an outright lie.

Then, of course, there’s the clue they got from Gina Perez and the ghost Margaret Thomas. When Gina Perez was killed (by a Bureau-style arcane blade, it looks like), the ghost in the house bonded with her long enough to scrawl in blood the name “Legion.”

And, of course, none of this seems to fit with the suspect they’re currently heading to Atlanta to interrogate, who neither dead nor a legion, nor who oughta be carrying a Bureau light weapon.



Sexton lives in a relatively abandoned church in a seldom-visited corner of Atlanta. The Bureau gives the Dragon his privacy usually and makes sure no one bothers him because they like Sexton as he is now. Sexton, or at least he claims, is not a Dragon. He remains perpetually in human form, roaming his abandoned church and answering pretty much any question with “I’m not a Dragon. I’m not . . . I’m not one of those demonic. . . . I’m not a Demon!”

He’s generally a peaceful fellow, and has the form of a 98-pound weakling, balding, with the look of a Medieval monk to him. The Bureau’s not sure where he came from or when he decided to stick to being a human, but he’s been in Atlanta for at least a few decades, since soon after the church was built in the 30s. The only way they know he’s a Dragon is from scrying and by the power of his magical aura, though they cannot tell what type of Dragon he is.

The party takes a gate to Atlanta and checks into their hotel, then lounges about for a few hours, deciding to see Sexton in the early evening, because it’s best not to potentially provoke an obviously insane magical beast in broad daylight when thousands of Atlanta citizens would be able to witness the battle. Still, they need to be back before 10, when Keira is scheduled to visit them.

They take two Bureau cars—a minivan (driven by Cai) and a Cadillac (driven by Madeline)—to the church grounds. The church, which resembles a small stone cathedral, sits in a small wooded grove at least a mile from any residential area. It all looks very gothic, with gargoyles on the roof leering down, and shadows all over the place. No one, it seems, comes here on Sundays.

[Meta: At this point in the game, most of the party felt that they hadn’t been accomplishing much, meaning that they hadn’t been killing enough things. Jessie decided to give us a gratuitous fight to keep the hack ‘n’ slashers happy, but it didn’t turn out too well.]

They park outside the grounds and begin to walk through the trees toward the church. Iscalio makes some very crass jokes about Christian preachers and their gay love for choirboys upsetting (in character) Jenny and (out of character) the DM. Then, as they near the church, a cry comes from atop the church, high pitched, eager, and nasal.

“Smite the unbelievers!”

The knights look up to see a group of four tiny gargoyles, each maybe a foot or two long, diving from the top of the church. Another cry comes from the far side of the church, and they guess that there are more gargoyles on the way.

Cai blasts one out of the sky with his shotgun, and Iscalio waits until the gargoyles get close enough for an entangle spell in the trees to trap them. It gets the remaining three, and Finagle quickly runs toward them. Jenny shouts for him to not kill them until they know why they attacked. Finagle nods as he approaches the three little stone monsters dangling by Spanish moss from the trees.

The second swarm arrives from around the edge of the church, consisting of six more, these larger and fiercer. Again comes, “Smite the unbelievers!” and again it is answered by a shotgun blast. Tagin takes a potshot at one and misses, then takes cover by the entangled gargoyles, hoping to use them as hostages. Madeline casts sleep on the swarm, and one gargoyle thuds to the ground with a cracking shatter, while the one next to it gently glides to the ground near Madeline, hitting the ground with only a snore.

Jenny, short of ranged weapons, decides to try to talk to the gargoyles and find out why they attacked, but Finagle’s busy tranquilizing one with his dart gun (“I want a pet gargoyle if I can’t get a gremlin”), and Tagin is holding another at knife point, telling it to call off its friends.

The only two real combatants on the field, the brothers Maxwell, wait for the two remaining gargoyles to close. They fly by and scratch the two of them with stony claws, and one lands on Iscalio to try to bite at his back. The bat-winged beast (about two feet long, with a five foot wingspan) digs its claws into Iscalio’s shoulders and gnaws into his back with its teeth. Iscalio tries to get it off, but his brother comes to the rescue and slashes off the creature’s wings with his katana. The gargoyle falls away in agony and writhes on the ground.

Madeline tries to shoot the gargoyle sleeping next to her with her wrist crossbow, but the tiny bolt just bounces off the skin (an odd mixture of leathery hide and stone). Grumbling, she gets out her car keys, grabs the gargoyle’s limp arm, and drags it toward the Cadillac.

Back at the tree, Jenny shouts at the one Tagin’s holding at knifepoint, “Why are you attacking us? We’re not unbelievers. See,” she holds up the cross on her necklace, “I’m a Christian too.”

The gargoyle shakes it head and glares at her, gibbering in its high-pitched, squealy voice. “No! You’re trying to trick us! You use magic! Unbelievers! We smite those who use magic!”

The one remaining flying gargoyle is too far away to be hurt by Cai’s shotgun blast, and it dives in while Cai tries to reload, smashing him in the face. Iscalio command a nearby tree to catch the creature, but its branch doesn’t snake out fast enough, and the gargoyle swoops upward again.

From the street, the ominous sound of a Cadillac’s engine starting echoes through the trees. With a squeal of tires, the car lurches forward, then back, forward, then back, each time accompanied by the sound of rock crunching beneath tires. Two rounds of forward-and-back running over of a gargoyle later, Madeline will emerge to admire her handiwork.

One of the entangled gargoyles in the tree escapes and starts to fly away, but Tagin tackles it before it can get far off the ground, and he holds a pistol to the back of its head. In a fine Samuel L. Jackson impersonation, he says, “Try that again.” Jenny, of course, has to make sure that he won’t shoot the creature, because it just looks like the gargoyles are misguided. Tagin agrees not to kill the gargoyle, and with his bargaining position weakened a bit, he can no longer intimidate the gargoyle into sitting still. It claws his hand and scrambles away, taking to the air.

It gets about ten feet up before Cai and Iscalio both shoot it down (Cai is adept at fighting with either shotgun or katana, keeping the inactive weapon tucked under his arm for easy reach). The only remaining active gargoyle cries out in righteous indignation, “My brother!” and dive-bombs the brothers. The two Maxwells dodge, and so the gargoyle flies for Jenny and Finagle.

Finagle is busy getting his new pet out of the tree, so Jenny tries to stop the attacker. It hits her in the chest and knocks the wind out of her, making sure to stay close so no one will try to shoot it.

Everyone tries to run up to help the “stupid paladin” who “can’t even fight a stupid gargoyle on her own,” and who “wants everyone to play nice.” (grumble grumblebloodthirstysavagesgrumble grumble) Tagin ends up ripping the thing off her and driving his dagger into its back, and Iscalio shoots it before Jenny gets any notions of trying to heal the wounded creature. Only later would Jenny see the crushed and shattered gargoyle laying under the tires of Madeline’s Cadillac, a sight which disturbed her far more than any of the actual combat.

Jenny chastises everyone for making a racket and shooting firearms in a residential area, but Cai shrugs it off and Finagle ignores her as he tends to his new pet, which he names “Herbie.” Aside from Herbie, two gargoyles remain alive, one in a tree and one asleep. Finagle charms the tree one to be a look out for them, and even though the gargoyle doesn’t like magic, it agrees to.

They finally get inside the church and find Sexton exactly as they expected him. A thirty-something man with premature male pattern baldness, dressed as a priest, polishing a tall standing candelabra. The church has two long rows of benches, with aisles in the middle and along either side. The pulpit sits at the far end, across from the entry doors. In cubbies behind and to the sides of the pulpit are stairs leading up to the 2nd floor balconies which overhang along each side. The windows are tall and narrow glass, with only a little stained glass on the far wall behind the pulpit.

Sexton is frustratingly unhelpful. Despite numerous approaches, he says nothing of use. They ask if he knows anything about Dragons, and he replies that he’s not a Dragon. They reply that they know that he is a Dragon, and he gets agitated, shaking his head in denial, repeating that he’s not a Dragon. He’s not a demon. Jenny detects evil on him, but he’s not being evil right now, so nothing shows up.

While the party continues to interrogate him, the knights’ ghosts check around, looking for other evidence. There’s no treasure hoard, no stray Dragon scales lying around, nothing incriminating at all. Also no food, which confuses the party, leading them to think perhaps he’s actually a zombie. Much prodding, poking, and sniffing of this deluded man later, the DM finally admits that Dragons don’t have to eat if they don’t want to, especially if they’re not out pillaging much. Oh.

But then Jenny asks if he knows anything about the name “Legion.” This causes a big reaction out of the man, getting him to raise his voice and talk as if to someone else, maybe in a hallucination or a memory. He looks down at his hands, shaking his head and then covering his eyes, saying loudly, “No, I’m not a demon! Leave me alone. I’m . . . I’m not!”

The party decides he’s a dead end, just an excuse for the DM to let us kill some gargoyles. Just to be safe, after they leave, Tagin sneaks back in and stakes out the place for a few hours, getting the juicy news that Sexton made sure to clean every single candelabra in the joint. Finally, disgusted, Tagin calls the hotel and asks for Madeline to pick him up, since he doesn’t want to walk through Atlanta at 1 in the morning.

That evening, while Tagin is away, Keira McCormick shows up at the hotel the knights are staying at. She has with her Dalavar Kineil, the half-Elf telepath Tagin worked with in Hong Kong (Dalavar’s actually from New Orleans). Sunday afternoon, Maxmilian Dorman, known to them as the Dragon Dornankanir, will be at a fundraiser in Atlanta, and they’ll be working bodyguard duty.

Jessie ends the session then, letting us discuss our ideas. She also has a unique request for the next game session. She wants for us to bring all the Hot Wheels we still have from our youth.


[Meta: Though the story here didn’t quite reveal it, Iscalio’s player Blake did begin to get on Jessie’s nerves with his constant anti-Christian jokes. Jessie is religious and sensitive when people insult her faith. Worse yet, Blake didn’t seem to care that much, not understanding why she’d be offended. Jessie just asked him to try to tone it down for the next session.

Between this game and the next, Jessie asked me as part as my duty as boyfriend and fellow DM to help her prepare. We bought poster board, markers, a yardstick, and a bunch of Hotwheels. She had trouble finding one particular one she needed, but she wouldn’t tell me what it was she needed, so I couldn’t help her. Seems Hotwheels are more interested in making tanks and Indy 500 racers than actual cars. Sure, we could have had lots of tractors and airplanes and construction cranes, but those just wouldn’t fit for a nice car chase through Atlanta traffic. Heh heh heh.]

 

[Horacio]

Wow, a weekend away and this story grows up quickly!

Nice updates! I had never thought a modern D&D game could go so well and be so coherent. Maybe I should restart my Dark*Matter game woth D&D 3e rules...

 

[RangerWickett]

Scroll up a few posts. I filled in the blank spot where Michael's character stats should've been.

Autumn Yeiotana: Female Elf Psn12; Medium-size Humanoid (Elf); HD 12d4-12; hp 26; Init +2; Spd 30 ft.; AC 21 (+2 Dex, +4 Inertial Armor, +5 Brassiere of Defense); Atk automatic pistol +8 melee (1d10/crit x3); SQ Elf Traits; SV Fort +3, Ref +6, Will +11; Str 8, Dex 14, Con 9, Int 12, Wis 16, Cha 20.

Skills and Feats: Bluff +15, Concentration +15, Diplomacy +7, Gather Information +8, Knowledge (psionics) +8, Psicraft +7, Sense Motive +15; Disarm Mind, Intertial Armor, Mental Adversary, Mind Trap, Psychic Bastion.

Power Points Per Day: 90 — Burst, Catfall, Daze, Detect Psionics, Distract, Far Hand, Missive, Telempathic Projection; Attraction, Charm Person, Conceal Thoughts, Empathy; Aversion, Detect Thoughts, Inflict Pain, Suggestion; Mindlink, Negate Psionics, Schism; Inertial Barrier, Mindwipe, Crisis of Blood (stops victim’s heart); Mind Probe, Greater Domination; Mass Suggestion.


Background:
Autumn joined the Bureau at its founding, and for several decades served as a field agent, tracking down magi and reeducating them forcefully. Recently she changed to desk work, prefering to get out of the line of fire and just deal with the problems other knights bring in.



Prestige Classes

• Agent of the Fey Court** (modeled after Divine Agent)
• Alienist (Cthulhu mythos spellcasters)*
• Bondseeker** - Has lost his or her bonded spirit, and has defenses against other spiritual dangers.
• Devoted Defender*
• Duelist
• Feyspeaker
• High Sorcerer
• Hunter of the Dead
• Knight of the Chalice (Could be adapted to Knights of the Round to hunt magi instead of demons)*
• Lasher
• Ley Line Magus
• Loremaster*
• Order of the Bow Initiate*
• Redcap**- A goblin prestige class.
• Sacred Exorcist
• Spymaster
• Templar*
• Thief-Acrobat
• True Necromancer
• Weapon Master
• World Mage** - A powerful magus who knows a little of all the magic of the world. They focus on the connection between Terra and Gaia, and draw strength from that. Merlin is the most famous world mage.

*Need to add more world-specific flavor text.
**Not-yet written.

 

[RangerWickett]

[Meta: Before the next game, our DM Jessica asked me, her boyfriend, to help her prepare for a scene in the next game. I wasn’t sure exactly what it was going to be, but she had several sheets of posterboard, lots of markers, and a street map of Atlanta downloaded off Yahoo!’s website. We set to work to making a path of posterboard roads that would follow a route between two locations on the map.]



Max Dorman, the wealthy Savannah financier and closet Dragon, asks for the Bureau’s protection. He’s going to a business convention in Atlanta, and with the recent murders of Dragons, he doesn’t feel safe. He makes a special request that Michael, the knight who insulted him in Draconic and later seemingly forgot that he’d said anything, not be allowed as a bodyguard.

In the convention hall of a large hotel slightly outside downtown Atlanta, Iscalio Maxwell mixes drinks behind the bar while Madeline West and Finagle P. Luckshore sit in the security office checking the cameras and chatting with security guards. Jenny Windgrave, Tagin, and Cai Maxwell walk the floor of the convention hall, browsing among the various businessmen and women, waiters, and hotel security guards, on the lookout for suspicious characters. Jenny usually stays close to Dornankanir (Max Dorman’s real name as a Dragon), because Jenny’s the only one with healing magic. Even though Dragons are nightmarishly strong in their natural form, in human form they’re as weak as you or I, and can be killed by a simple gunshot.

Outside the main convention area, Keira McCormick, the ranking Knight on this mission, sits in her car in the parking lot, using her sorcery to try to detect any incoming magi. Atop the building, telepath Dalavar Kineil keeps an eye and his brain peeled, hoping to psionically hear any thoughts that might suggest someone’s trying to kill the Dragon. Everyone is linked through those lovely earpiece-shoulder radio sets, except for Iscalio and Finagle, who don’t have the radio because they have the hardest time blending in already (one being an albino, the other being a 16 year old kid).

Things are going smoothly, with everyone communicating back and forth regularly, until Keira radios in.

“I sense something powerful coming in. Can’t tell where it’s coming from, but . . . Ah! What the hell?!” Her voice gets distant; it’s still coming over the radio, but she’s obviously speaking to someone else, and not directly into the radio. Her voice seems amused, though, not frightened. “You scared me. What are you doing here? You’re not on this mission.”

There is a brief screech of some sort, and they can all make out the sound of a short, painful gasp.

Cai calls into the radio, “What’s going on, Keira? Keira, who is it? Keira?!”

Cai grabs Jenny and Iscalio and tells them to stay put; he’s going to check out what happened to Keira. As soon as he runs off, however, Dalavar’s voice comes over the line. “Oh no! Keira! I see someone down there. North side of the building, in the parking lot. Whoever it is heading in. . . . Oh , he’s seen m-! No!”

They hear Dalavar scream in agony, and everyone winces at the noise before the line suddenly goes silent. A moment passes as everyone recovers from the surprise, but just before anyone starts to react, Dalavar’s voice returns over the line.

He’s laughing lightly and maniacally. “Oh, we’re all stupid fools! That lizard won’t see it coming! But the angel of death has passed over me.”

Dalavar continues to ramble softly, apparently unhinged by whatever he saw, and the noise over the line makes their radios useless for communication. Since Cai has run off toward the parking lot, Jenny calls to Tagin. She grabs him and Iscalio, then tells Iscalio to stop bartending and stay right next to Dorman. Tagin she wants to go get Finagle and see if they can see anything on the security cameras. She’s going to the roof to check out Dalavar and try to help him. The elevators are of course all being used by catering, so Jenny breaks into a run up six flights of stairs.

Cai reaches the parking lot and quickly sprints to Keira’s car. He stops, speechless at the sight of Keira lying slumped out the driverside window. A hole the width of a swordblade pierces the car door, lining up with Keira’s chest. The woman’s blood drips out of the hole down the car door, forming a small pool on the concrete. Cai grabs his own sword and ignites it warily, keeping it low to remain inconspicuous as he scans the parking lot for signs of danger.

As Jenny nears the top of the staircase, she can make out Cai’s voice on the radio, now that Dalavar has finally gone silent. “Keira’s dead. Looks like a sword to the chest.”

Iscalio replies back, “You gotta hide the body. She’s part Elvish. We can’t risk her going to a morgue.”

Cai’s reply is the sound of a car door opening and something being dragged out and shoved under the car. There aren’t that many places to hide a body in the middle of a parking lot. Before he stashes her body under the car, though, he makes sure to take her enchanted bullet clips, even though her gun was missing.

Jenny hoarsely calls that she’s reaching the roof, and she flings open the door, squinting in the sudden sunlight. She glances around, finding her bearings, and starts to head for the north side of the building (where Dalavar last was) when a cry of high-pitched, jeering voices comes from further down the roof.

“MEAT!”

Jenny’s head swings to stare at a tiny horde of a dozen three-foot long Gremlins scrambling across the roof toward her. She turns to try to run, when the door behind her clicks shut, locking her on the roof. Looking up at the top of the door, she sees a half dozen more Gremlins leering at her, chuckling as they shove the door tightly shut. Calling for help, Jenny activates her spear and sprints for the northern edge of the roof. The Gremlins cheer and give chase.

Finagle, in the security room, hears that the Gremlins from the Bureau must somehow have gotten free and are attacking Jenny, so he and Tagin run to try to help her. Madeline leaves with them. They break through the main convention room, but as they’re heading past Dornankanir he stops them, grabbing Tagin by his arm. The Dragon demands an explanation of what’s going on, but when Tagin can’t think of anything to say, Iscalio steps up.

“Just stay near me. The other knights are trying to stop the danger before it gets too close.”

Dorman nods and sighs, finishing off the rest of his drink. “That’s good to know. I have a very important business deal that I might be able to. . . .”

Finagle has already sprinted off, but Tagin, Madeline, and Iscalio look at Dorman in dismay as the man clutches his left arm and bends over in pain. The crowd screams in panic as Max Dorman collapses to the ground with a heart attack.

This is followed by the sound of a thousand cel phones dialing 911.







Chapter Ten: Dornankanir Falls

Cai gets back inside and up to Dorman where a few doctors in the crowd are trying to check his vital signs while they wait for paramedics to arrive. Cai and Iscalio exchange knowing glances. It would be bad enough if Keira, a quarter-Elf, ended up in a morgue. It would be perfectly horribly bad if they let a Dragon end up in the public domain. Madeline reminds them quietly that if Dorman dies, his body will go back to Dragon form. Grimacing, Cai and Iscalio decide to try to load him in their own van and get him to the Bureau.

Tagin: “What about Jenny on the roof?”

Iscalio: “Oh, she’ll handle herself.”

On the roof, Jenny is by the edge, out of room to run. She bats away one Gremlin with the butt of her spear as it leaps at her, then stabs at another, missing the agile and tiny creature. A dozen snarling mouths pounce upon her, clinging to her clothes and hair and, well, skin as they tear into her flesh. Jenny flings one off the roof, and is contemplating jumping herself when the door to the roof bursts open, revealing Finagle. A moment’s hesitation later, Finagle shouts, “Guys! It’s me! Remember? Me and you? And you and me?!”

The Gremlins stop tearing at Jenny and turn to look at Finagle, smiling and shouting, “So happy together!”

Deep down, even more than wanting to kill stuff, Gremlins love a good song.

The Gremlins jump off Jenny and begin to dance around Finagle gleefully. Jenny slumps to the ground and tries to heal herself of the numerous tiny wounds across her body.

Back in the convention center, Iscalio and Cai’s attempts to drag Max Dorman’s body away are met with shock and refusal from the crowd of onlookers. When Iscalio draws his gun and threatens everyone to let them take the guy or he’ll shoot, he gets a spray of mace in his eyes. Hotel security chases after them, along with a small mob of business men and women as an ambulance siren approaches. Cai and Iscalio take the next best approach and hop into the minivan in hopes of pursuing the ambulance. Madeline and Tagin follow suit and run for the Cadillac.

Jenny radios and asks what’s going on. Cai replies that they’re the lizard had a heart attack and that the paramedics are taking his body; they’re going to try to stop the ambulance. Jenny asks them to wait for her, but Iscalio says, “Hell no. No time to waste.”

I helped the DM build the car chase. The hell if I’m not gonna get a chance to take part. Jenny glances to make sure Finagle’s still doing good with the Gremlins, and then she runs for the fire escape. She’s in a rush, so she jumps the last story and a half, falling on her side with a groan, but happy that she’ll be able to get to the rest of the party before they drive off.

Just then, they drive past her, zooming after an ambulance. Groaning in pain, Jenny slams her fist on the pavement and unsteadily gets to her feet. She runs to the nearest vehicle, a van reminiscent of the Mystery Mobile from Scooby Doo (i.e., Jessie picked a Hot Wheels car at random), knocks on the window, and commandeers the car for official . . . sorta police business. Shouting a promise to bring it back in one piece, she jumps in the car (and gags on the cloying smell of marijuana) and drives off after the rest of the group.



Alright, here’s the set up:

Ambulance, carrying Dornankanir who’s dying of a heart attack, has a 1 block head start on us.

Car 1, Minivan driven by Cai, with Iscalio riding “shotgun.”

Car 2, Cadillac driven by Madeline, with Tagin in the passenger seat. Madeline’s player asks if she can cast a siren spell, even though it’s not a normal cantrip. The DM says ghost sound works fine. Car 2 has a yowling siren to help keep cars out of their way.

Car 3, pot-mobile driven (perhaps in violation of that whole Lawful Good thing paladins are supposed to follow) by Jenny, 2 blocks behind the rest of the group due to her late start. Jenny would much have preferred a motorcycle or something, but she got a nice puke green van. Her rationale as to why it’s okay to steal a car and chase after an ambulance is because she’s an officer of a pseudo-government agency, and she’s well within her jurisdiction.

Jessie lays out on the ground the sheets of posterboard roads, three at a time, showing that the ambulance is ahead of the knights. It’s just after five o’clock, so traffic is heavy (there are lots of other Hot Wheels on the board, going in either direction). Driving past small blocks of stores and offices, the three bureau cars try to catch up with the ambulance and stop it before it can reach the hospital. Whenever we try to pass a car, we have to make a Controlled Driving skill check (and Madeline is the only person who ever took a defensive driving course). Also, if we want to try to speed up substantially, make a sharp turn, or swerve through an intersection and avoid cross traffic, Controlled Driving skill check.

We get our first big break when the ambulance driver fails his Driving check to get through an intersection, and has to wait for the cross traffic to dissipate. In the opening he created, the minivan and the Cadillac close to within three or four car lengths. Since most cars pull over to the side of the road when an ambulance tries to get by, Jenny has been able, through excessive speeding and divine bonuses to Reflex saves, to catch up to within one city block of the other cars.

The two pursuing knight cars are getting closer when the ambulance takes a sharp left turn at an intersection. Not expecting to have to turn, the Knights almost get themselves killed. Madeline is able to brake to a stop, but Cai skids out into the intersection and has to backtrack to get on the ambulance’s trail again. Jenny’s able to catch up more here, because she saw her teammates nearly get killed, and adjusted accordingly.

Cai willingness to take risks and pass three cars at a time through oncoming traffic nets him the lead ahead of Madeline. Only six car lengths behind the ambulance, the only real obstacle now are two more cars. Though both moved to the side of the road to give the ambulance clearance, they’re moving back quickly now.

Iscalio shouts, “I’ll clear the way!” and begins to roll down his window. He pops out the window and shoots at the rear tires of the car ahead of them. The driver of the car fails his driving check and skids off the road to the side. Cai shouts at his brother to stop shooting, but Iscalio fires at the next car. The driver of this car rolls a 1 on her check, and in panic tries to get away from the maniac shooting at her. Her car flips and begins to roll, but it slams against a light pole and stops suddenly.

Jenny has realized that she can’t possibly catch up in time, so she follows as best as possible, shocked at Iscalio’s reckless endangerment of human life.

As Cai edges toward the ambulance, he warns his brother not to dare to shoot out the ambulance’s tires, or he’ll throw him out of the car. They’re at a loss as to what to do, because the oncoming traffic’s too thick to try to get in front of the ambulance, and it’s one lane in each direction.

Then Madeline peeks to the side of the ambulance, driving in the middle of the road. Oncoming cars swerve to avoid her, so she’s able to edge up beside the emergency vehicle and drive parallel to it.

Then Tagin decides to fulfill the requirements of a classic chase scene. Yes, he opens his door and jumps onto the ambulance, holding his pistol in pants pocket. Hanging onto the side-view mirror and standing on the running board, Tagin points a gun to the window and shouts for the ambulance to pull over.

The frightened driver swerves to his left, almost smashing Tagin between the ambulance and Madeline’s car. Madeline steps on the gas and pulls ahead of the ambulance, while Cai bumps the fleeing vehicle from behind. All of this makes it very difficult for Tagin to hold on, so he shoots the window out and hangs on despite the jagged shards of glass digging into his arm.

The chase comes to a Y-shaped split in the road, and the ambulance driver, panicking from having a maniac dangling onto the side of his car, swerves directly onto the grass and tips the car sideways. The siren stops with a whimper as the ambulance plows across the ground, tossing Tagin away to land in a heap.

Madeline, Cai, and Jenny all pull up next to the overturned ambulance, as does a small crowd of onlookers. Cai calls the Bureau for a clean-up crew while Iscalio tries to handle the cops and Jenny runs to the back of the ambulance. As she reaches to pull the door open, the white metal bulges outward suddenly, and the vehicle begins to shriek as its frame is stretched from within. Jenny takes a few steps back, about to run, but then remembers the ambulance drivers. She runs for the cab of the ambulance, calling for Madeline just as the rear of the vehicle bursts to reveal a 20-foot long, scaled bronze Dragon, its eyes closed.

Madeline and Jenny pull the driver and the paramedic in the passenger seat free (sadly, the one in the back of the ambulance was crushed against the wall when Dornankanir reverted to his normal form), then Cai comes to help drag the two emergency workers away while Jenny runs to heal Tagin, who was knocked unconscious from the impact. She gets him clear of the area, and a few moments later the sundered ambulance’s fuel tank explodes, engulfing most of the evidence.



Hours later, when the telepaths and mages finish cleaning up the area, wiping minds and deleting cameras of the event, and dragging away the charred corpse of a Dragon, it simply appears that the ambulance lost control, tipped, and exploded. Thankfully, some pedestrians must have pulled the paramedics to safety. The body of Max Dorman was so charred in the flames as to be unrecognizable.

Back at the convention center, Finagle was able to eventually sing the Gremlins to sleep so the Bureau could come pick them up. Apparently someone freed them from their cages and transported them to Atlanta without anyone noticing. The Chief has set people to scour the Bureau facility for clues.

Keira McCormick’s body was recovered without anyone finding her first. The autopsy confirmed that it was a Bureau arcane blade that killed her.

Dalavar Kineil was not found. The Bureau believes he was abducted or perhaps killed.

The autopsy of a dead Dragon is difficult, especially when the body is severely charred, and magical detection will not work because of the dead Dragon’s aura. However, blood samples verify the presence of poison in the Dragon’s system. Normally it wouldn’t even have harmed him in draconic form, but as a human, it was enough to induce a heart attack.

The knights return to the Bureau and heal up, and the Chief gives them their orders. Except for Iscalio, they’re to return to Savannah immediately and find Michael. He’s not answering his cel phone, and he was on patrol on the “graveyard shift.” They ask if the Chief thinks Michael was involved, because of the incident earlier when he was seemingly controlled by an outside force, but the Chief shakes his head.

“Keira and Michael were a couple.” He pauses, looking at them gravely. “He deserves to be told as soon as possible.”

Iscalio wants to know why he won’t be with the rest of the party, and the Chief tells him he’s suspended temporarily for flagrant endangerment of civilian lives. He wants Iscalio to write a report and give it to him before the night is over, but not to expect to be going back on field duty for a long time. With that, the Chief sends them off.

As Iscalio and the group parts ways, they wonder what could be going on. It seems obvious that someone in the Bureau is responsible for at least part of the problem, since the Gremlins were released, and the murderer used a Bureau sword. They have a few suspects, Michael being on top of the list, but with no real evidence to back it up, just hunches.

Jenny thinks it’s the church Dragon, Sexton, because of what Tagin told them about the Siren. The Siren was talking about how they can’t fight their instincts, and obviously Sexton is fighting his instincts by denying that he’s a Dragon.

Cai suspects the telepaths, though he can’t narrow it down to J’Qwuan, Autumn, or Neil (that’s what we all called Dalavar Kineil). J’Qwuan’s just creepy, and he let the Siren jump to her death. Autumn seems to taunt them a lot, but all she really does is hang around the Bureau. Neil, though, disappeared suddenly, and might even have left the Gremlins as a trap for whoever tried to come after him.

Tagin thinks it’s a demon, since apparently he possessed Michael (to insult Dornankanir) and Brian (to destroy the evidence of the tape) and the first murderer Jericho Wright (to kill a Dragon). But they have no clues to suggest a demon could even do that, so Tagin suggests that they do some research when they get back to the Bureau.

Iscalio leaves, and the party gears up to head to Bonaventure Cemetery in hopes of finding Michael. As they near the gate out of the Faerie World, Cai asks, “What’s the common link between all these victims so far? The Dragons, that tour guide, Keira, and Neil? What’s the connection?”

Jenny replies dryly, “Us.”

 

[Horacio]

A car chase with d20 rules!
More than a year before nobody tought about Spycraft d20 or Modern d20

Wow!