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High Fantasy Modern Storyhour - The Long Road (updated December 7)
- Thread starter RangerWickett
- Start date
RangerWickett
Legend
October 29, 2005
8:30 pm
"Thanks," Robert says with a wince. He sips his coffee.
The medtech dabs a bit more burn gel on Robert's neck, where the worst injury was. Amazingly, he was one of the few passengers of the Greyhound who was hurt. The same could not be said of the people whose cars were stuck next to the bus when it exploded. All told there were seven fatalities, and the road will be impassible for at least another few hours, until all the debris is cleared away.
The medtech shakes his head. "Man, we were real lucky there was that traffic jam. If your bus hadn't stopped, it mighta blown up on the bridge, and that woulda taken foreva to fix."
The pair of police officers in the room are getting impatient. "You done yet?" one asks.
The medtech, a black man, grimaces at the two white cops and nods. "Don't move your head around too much," he tells Robert before heading off.
Robert is alone with two cops in a meeting room inside the State of Texas Welcome Center, less than half a mile down the road from where the bus exploded. Lights of various emergency vehicles flash in through the windows. Outside, the scene is pandemonium. Injured people, burning wreckage, angry drivers forced to share a two-lane road with oncoming traffic. However, if not for the media blitz with its tons of cameras, Robert would almost wish he was outside.
One of the cops chews on something like he has an oral fixation. He's the tough one - hands on hips near his gun, a partial scowl, forearms like a baseball pitcher. The other one is more squat, more gentle and patient. He must be the catcher. Just two homoerotic white cops interrogating a black man, Robert thinks. This should be easy to talk his way out of.
"So," Robert chuckles, "how can I help you boys?"
They take his statement, his fingerprints, and a photograph, then brush his hands for gunpowder to verify his claim that, no, he didn't shoot the uzi at the bus's gas tank. They're *ssholes, but unfortunately they're cops, so as much as Robert wants to, he knows he can't touch them. Robert hates it when *ssholes go and become cops.
Robert was smart. He handed over the uzi first thing, as discreetly as he could, and then he waited around to cooperate with the cops and get as much suspicion off his back as possible. He's in a bad mood, irritable, and he knows that people in bad moods get sloppy. So even though he desperately wants to track down Scarpedin, Terry, and the others, he's
taking his time.
Free after the interrogation, Robert heads out, hoping no intrepid TV crew will catch him on film. On the way to the parking lot, he spots Missy, the bus driver, and he says a few encouraging words to her. She says she doesn’t know what the Greyhound company will do, but Robert assures her that he’s reconsidering the whole New Orleans trip, and that he plans to visit some friends while he’s in Texas. Robert figures this should be a good enough alibi in case he needs one.
The roadway is humid, and as he tries to look for a nice car to hitch a ride with he thinks he feels a mosquito getting stuck in the burn cream on the back of his neck. No doubt its suffocating, its lungs clogged with icy hot gel. Robert can’t help but laugh. Yet another casualty of this strange, strange day.
“Robert,” a voice says.
He jerks and turns in surprise, managing not to use his stun gun on John, who had snuck up on him. Belladonna and Terry are with John too, but the British man – Nathan, if Robert recalls correctly – and Scarpedin the gun-toting lunatic are nowhere to be seen.
“Jesus,” Robert says. “What are you doing here?”
Robert glances around. They’re in a dark end of the parking lot outside the visitor center, not quite close enough to anyone to be seen. It’s a struggle for Robert to retain his cool, but he manages.
Terry looks embarrassed. “We heard what Scarpedin did. Nathan got a vision that the bus was going to explode, and I guess Scarpedin didn't quite know how to deal with it. Things turned out better than they could have been, though. We didn’t know if you were in trouble, and we wanted to give you a ride if you need one.”
Robert lets a smile slowly creep onto his face as he looks at each of the three in turn. “Um, no thanks. In fact, you guys should get going. Discreetly, if you can manage it. I turned in the gun Scarpedin was shooting, by the way.”
“Why’d you do that?” Terry says, looking betrayed.
“Oh,” Robert says, “I’m sorry that I’m a law abiding citizen and I thought it might be a good idea to hand over the semi-automatic weapon to the police instead of carrying it around.”
John lights up and nods to Robert. “Uzis are full-auto, not semi.”
Robert holds out a hand as if presenting John as evidence. “Yet another reason I think I’ll go my own way. I mean . . . heh, thanks for saving my life, but trouble seems to follow you around.”
Belladonna smirks. “So you’re thinking not to be following us, then?”
“That’s my plan,” Robert says. “Now . . . you guys get out of here before some cop spots you. I got no hard feelings for you, but I don’t want to be seen with you, y’know?”
John rolls his eyes and heads away, muttering, “I told you this was a stupid idea.”
Robert waits for them to leave, then folds the straight razor he was hiding behind his back and puts it in his pocket. If they keep that kind of thing up, Robert thinks, he’s going to end up killing one of them.
As Robert walks along Interstate 10 toward New Orleans, he lets many easy prospects for rides pass by. He’s going to get a ride later, but he’s angry at himself, and he needs time to think.
This day Robert made many protestations that he’s a normal, decent, law-abiding individual, and in his mind that’s mostly true. He’s conscious enough that what he does is viewed as illegal, but he’s confident few people would think what he does is actually wrong. How exactly he got on this path he finds hard to remember, but with the money his family gave him to invest, he’s been able to keep it up for over a year now, skipping out on college, studying abroad, and wandering between cities, looking for people who the law won’t handle.
Robert has no formal training in crime scene investigation, but he knows people who do, and he has a cunning, analytical mind. And he watches a lot of CSI in his spare time. Usually he tries to stay out of the law’s way. He knows there’s no such thing as the perfect murder, but his current plan has been working well so far. He’ll breeze into a city to party, take his time enjoying the sights, and spend his evenings wandering the seedier places of society’s underbelly. He’ll find an *sshole – a rapist, a drug dealer, a thug terrorizing innocents – and he’ll take his time figuring out how best to kill the bastard and ditch his body so that he’ll be long gone before the police find it.
A dozen murders around the country, two in the Czech Republic, all of people whose death will bring relief to many – no police department will ever figure it out.
Only very seldom, though, does Robert think hard on the nature of his life. He’s rich enough to keep this up for a few years, and normally he just lives from murder to murder. Not much else in his life is meaningful, and while he could try to actually join some law enforcement branch, or even run for political office, he knows that would be the end of him. As cool and controlled as he pretends to be, there are times when he cannot deny that he’s obsessed.
How many people in the world have the power to kill whoever pisses them off? Only a few, and most of them are monsters. In the dark, cloying night that hovers over the marshland of Louisiana, Robert wonders if he’s a monster too. He can no longer even really convince himself that he’s doing this for others.
Boondock Saints, he thinks. People applaud the protagonists as heroes there. Robert’s not much different, is he? They killed for religion, as holy executioners. Robert’s anything but religious, but he views this as his duty too.
It irritates him that he has to work so hard to keep himself appear clean, off the radar of law enforcement, just because the government doesn’t like vigilantes. He was headed to New Orleans because he knew there were certainly people deserving of punishment there, but now he has met Terry, and so this whole new insane world of magic is stuck on his mind.
What concerns him most is that he feels an urge to kill Terry. It takes him a while to think through why, and eventually he realizes it is because Terry knows who he is. Except for the first, every times before when he’s helped people in trouble, he’s done so discreetly, slowly, unseen. But now because of Terry, many people might suspect him. Robert realizes that he doesn’t want to kill Terry because the man is an *sshole – though magic is somewhat irritating – but because Robert is worried of getting caught.
He’s becoming too much like a criminal. Whatever happens these next few days, Robert suspects he will have to make a choice that he doesn’t want to make. That, perhaps, is why Robert wishes he could just kill Terry.
It starts to dapple rain, so Robert throws out a thumb. Within a minute, headlights catch him, and he sees a van slowing down to pick him up.
A window rolls down, and a sweet-looking forty-something woman smiles out at him.
“Headed to New Orleans?” Robert asks, smiling back to her.
“Jesse,” the woman says, “open the door.”
From inside the van, a man grumbles, “D*mmit Linda, I can’t believe you want to pick up a hitchhiker. What kind of example are you setting for our son? Jesse, God d*mmit, close that door.”
The door was opened a crack, but Robert is only able to catch a glimpse of the young boy Jesse before he slams the door shut.
“Walter,” chides the mother, Linda. “You’d want someone to pick you up if you were stuck in the rain, wouldn’t you? Jesse, open the door. We’ll take him at least to a hotel.”
Robert hides a frown, but Jesse opens the door and moves aside for the bedraggled black hitchhiker. This, Robert thinks, is not helping his mood.
“Close the damn door,” Walter says.
He’s a big, ugly man in an air conditioner repairman’s uniform, and as soon as Robert closes the car door, Walter guns the engine and they speed off.
Then Robert hears Walter mutter, “Stupid b*tch. Can’t believe I let myself get told what to do by a fat b*tch like you.”
“Mom?” Jesse says. “Dad sounds angry.”
The kid’s only ten, the wife is trying to hide her tears, and Walter keeps grumbling, not even caring if his wife and son hear. Robert knows that, after getting caught in a bus explosion and nearly being fingered by the cops, he’s in an irritated mood, and irritated people make stupid mistakes, but Walter is certainly starting to sound like an *sshole. Despite himself, Robert finds himself slipping away from rational thinking, and drifting toward the cold, smug part of himself that takes over when he’s going to kill someone.
To be continued. . .
8:30 pm
"Thanks," Robert says with a wince. He sips his coffee.
The medtech dabs a bit more burn gel on Robert's neck, where the worst injury was. Amazingly, he was one of the few passengers of the Greyhound who was hurt. The same could not be said of the people whose cars were stuck next to the bus when it exploded. All told there were seven fatalities, and the road will be impassible for at least another few hours, until all the debris is cleared away.
The medtech shakes his head. "Man, we were real lucky there was that traffic jam. If your bus hadn't stopped, it mighta blown up on the bridge, and that woulda taken foreva to fix."
The pair of police officers in the room are getting impatient. "You done yet?" one asks.
The medtech, a black man, grimaces at the two white cops and nods. "Don't move your head around too much," he tells Robert before heading off.
Robert is alone with two cops in a meeting room inside the State of Texas Welcome Center, less than half a mile down the road from where the bus exploded. Lights of various emergency vehicles flash in through the windows. Outside, the scene is pandemonium. Injured people, burning wreckage, angry drivers forced to share a two-lane road with oncoming traffic. However, if not for the media blitz with its tons of cameras, Robert would almost wish he was outside.
One of the cops chews on something like he has an oral fixation. He's the tough one - hands on hips near his gun, a partial scowl, forearms like a baseball pitcher. The other one is more squat, more gentle and patient. He must be the catcher. Just two homoerotic white cops interrogating a black man, Robert thinks. This should be easy to talk his way out of.
"So," Robert chuckles, "how can I help you boys?"
* * *
They take his statement, his fingerprints, and a photograph, then brush his hands for gunpowder to verify his claim that, no, he didn't shoot the uzi at the bus's gas tank. They're *ssholes, but unfortunately they're cops, so as much as Robert wants to, he knows he can't touch them. Robert hates it when *ssholes go and become cops.
Robert was smart. He handed over the uzi first thing, as discreetly as he could, and then he waited around to cooperate with the cops and get as much suspicion off his back as possible. He's in a bad mood, irritable, and he knows that people in bad moods get sloppy. So even though he desperately wants to track down Scarpedin, Terry, and the others, he's
taking his time.
Free after the interrogation, Robert heads out, hoping no intrepid TV crew will catch him on film. On the way to the parking lot, he spots Missy, the bus driver, and he says a few encouraging words to her. She says she doesn’t know what the Greyhound company will do, but Robert assures her that he’s reconsidering the whole New Orleans trip, and that he plans to visit some friends while he’s in Texas. Robert figures this should be a good enough alibi in case he needs one.
The roadway is humid, and as he tries to look for a nice car to hitch a ride with he thinks he feels a mosquito getting stuck in the burn cream on the back of his neck. No doubt its suffocating, its lungs clogged with icy hot gel. Robert can’t help but laugh. Yet another casualty of this strange, strange day.
“Robert,” a voice says.
He jerks and turns in surprise, managing not to use his stun gun on John, who had snuck up on him. Belladonna and Terry are with John too, but the British man – Nathan, if Robert recalls correctly – and Scarpedin the gun-toting lunatic are nowhere to be seen.
“Jesus,” Robert says. “What are you doing here?”
Robert glances around. They’re in a dark end of the parking lot outside the visitor center, not quite close enough to anyone to be seen. It’s a struggle for Robert to retain his cool, but he manages.
Terry looks embarrassed. “We heard what Scarpedin did. Nathan got a vision that the bus was going to explode, and I guess Scarpedin didn't quite know how to deal with it. Things turned out better than they could have been, though. We didn’t know if you were in trouble, and we wanted to give you a ride if you need one.”
Robert lets a smile slowly creep onto his face as he looks at each of the three in turn. “Um, no thanks. In fact, you guys should get going. Discreetly, if you can manage it. I turned in the gun Scarpedin was shooting, by the way.”
“Why’d you do that?” Terry says, looking betrayed.
“Oh,” Robert says, “I’m sorry that I’m a law abiding citizen and I thought it might be a good idea to hand over the semi-automatic weapon to the police instead of carrying it around.”
John lights up and nods to Robert. “Uzis are full-auto, not semi.”
Robert holds out a hand as if presenting John as evidence. “Yet another reason I think I’ll go my own way. I mean . . . heh, thanks for saving my life, but trouble seems to follow you around.”
Belladonna smirks. “So you’re thinking not to be following us, then?”
“That’s my plan,” Robert says. “Now . . . you guys get out of here before some cop spots you. I got no hard feelings for you, but I don’t want to be seen with you, y’know?”
John rolls his eyes and heads away, muttering, “I told you this was a stupid idea.”
Robert waits for them to leave, then folds the straight razor he was hiding behind his back and puts it in his pocket. If they keep that kind of thing up, Robert thinks, he’s going to end up killing one of them.
* * *
As Robert walks along Interstate 10 toward New Orleans, he lets many easy prospects for rides pass by. He’s going to get a ride later, but he’s angry at himself, and he needs time to think.
This day Robert made many protestations that he’s a normal, decent, law-abiding individual, and in his mind that’s mostly true. He’s conscious enough that what he does is viewed as illegal, but he’s confident few people would think what he does is actually wrong. How exactly he got on this path he finds hard to remember, but with the money his family gave him to invest, he’s been able to keep it up for over a year now, skipping out on college, studying abroad, and wandering between cities, looking for people who the law won’t handle.
Robert has no formal training in crime scene investigation, but he knows people who do, and he has a cunning, analytical mind. And he watches a lot of CSI in his spare time. Usually he tries to stay out of the law’s way. He knows there’s no such thing as the perfect murder, but his current plan has been working well so far. He’ll breeze into a city to party, take his time enjoying the sights, and spend his evenings wandering the seedier places of society’s underbelly. He’ll find an *sshole – a rapist, a drug dealer, a thug terrorizing innocents – and he’ll take his time figuring out how best to kill the bastard and ditch his body so that he’ll be long gone before the police find it.
A dozen murders around the country, two in the Czech Republic, all of people whose death will bring relief to many – no police department will ever figure it out.
Only very seldom, though, does Robert think hard on the nature of his life. He’s rich enough to keep this up for a few years, and normally he just lives from murder to murder. Not much else in his life is meaningful, and while he could try to actually join some law enforcement branch, or even run for political office, he knows that would be the end of him. As cool and controlled as he pretends to be, there are times when he cannot deny that he’s obsessed.
How many people in the world have the power to kill whoever pisses them off? Only a few, and most of them are monsters. In the dark, cloying night that hovers over the marshland of Louisiana, Robert wonders if he’s a monster too. He can no longer even really convince himself that he’s doing this for others.
Boondock Saints, he thinks. People applaud the protagonists as heroes there. Robert’s not much different, is he? They killed for religion, as holy executioners. Robert’s anything but religious, but he views this as his duty too.
It irritates him that he has to work so hard to keep himself appear clean, off the radar of law enforcement, just because the government doesn’t like vigilantes. He was headed to New Orleans because he knew there were certainly people deserving of punishment there, but now he has met Terry, and so this whole new insane world of magic is stuck on his mind.
What concerns him most is that he feels an urge to kill Terry. It takes him a while to think through why, and eventually he realizes it is because Terry knows who he is. Except for the first, every times before when he’s helped people in trouble, he’s done so discreetly, slowly, unseen. But now because of Terry, many people might suspect him. Robert realizes that he doesn’t want to kill Terry because the man is an *sshole – though magic is somewhat irritating – but because Robert is worried of getting caught.
He’s becoming too much like a criminal. Whatever happens these next few days, Robert suspects he will have to make a choice that he doesn’t want to make. That, perhaps, is why Robert wishes he could just kill Terry.
It starts to dapple rain, so Robert throws out a thumb. Within a minute, headlights catch him, and he sees a van slowing down to pick him up.
A window rolls down, and a sweet-looking forty-something woman smiles out at him.
“Headed to New Orleans?” Robert asks, smiling back to her.
“Jesse,” the woman says, “open the door.”
From inside the van, a man grumbles, “D*mmit Linda, I can’t believe you want to pick up a hitchhiker. What kind of example are you setting for our son? Jesse, God d*mmit, close that door.”
The door was opened a crack, but Robert is only able to catch a glimpse of the young boy Jesse before he slams the door shut.
“Walter,” chides the mother, Linda. “You’d want someone to pick you up if you were stuck in the rain, wouldn’t you? Jesse, open the door. We’ll take him at least to a hotel.”
Robert hides a frown, but Jesse opens the door and moves aside for the bedraggled black hitchhiker. This, Robert thinks, is not helping his mood.
“Close the damn door,” Walter says.
He’s a big, ugly man in an air conditioner repairman’s uniform, and as soon as Robert closes the car door, Walter guns the engine and they speed off.
Then Robert hears Walter mutter, “Stupid b*tch. Can’t believe I let myself get told what to do by a fat b*tch like you.”
“Mom?” Jesse says. “Dad sounds angry.”
The kid’s only ten, the wife is trying to hide her tears, and Walter keeps grumbling, not even caring if his wife and son hear. Robert knows that, after getting caught in a bus explosion and nearly being fingered by the cops, he’s in an irritated mood, and irritated people make stupid mistakes, but Walter is certainly starting to sound like an *sshole. Despite himself, Robert finds himself slipping away from rational thinking, and drifting toward the cold, smug part of himself that takes over when he’s going to kill someone.
To be continued. . .
Last edited:
RangerWickett
Legend
Yes, Robert is probably the hardest character for me, both in terms of dealing with him in game and writing him. He's seductively friendly, and honestly kinda scares me. But yeah, every time I watch Boondock Saints, I can't help but feel a similarity between them.
By the way, you might be seeing this around:
I started writing Mythic Earth right as I was coming up with this campaign, because I really didn't like the style of magic in D20 Modern. Now that everything's been finalized and the book is on sale, I'm curious if people are interested in how the story and the rules developed together. I've enjoyed running this game on so many different levels, and I'm considering interspersing actual story posts with freebies for the system and comments about why the rules work the way they do.
By the way, you might be seeing this around:
I started writing Mythic Earth right as I was coming up with this campaign, because I really didn't like the style of magic in D20 Modern. Now that everything's been finalized and the book is on sale, I'm curious if people are interested in how the story and the rules developed together. I've enjoyed running this game on so many different levels, and I'm considering interspersing actual story posts with freebies for the system and comments about why the rules work the way they do.
Last edited:
RangerWickett
Legend
Errant post
Last edited:
RangerWickett
Legend
October 29, 2005
8:30 pm
“Okay,” John says, “time for answers.”
They’ve pulled off the interstate in Lake Charles, Louisiana. Nathan finds an empty parking lot behind a fast food restaurant that looks to have gone out of business during the hurricanes. They park, make sure no one is likely to interrupt them, and then open the trunk.
John pulls out the backpack and slowly unzips it. Scarpedin has his sword ready, Belladonna has a derringer in hand, and Terry is prepared to counter a spell if he has to. Nathan watches with curiosity, and a nagging sense that the air conditioning of his car might not be working right.
Inside the bag is just the raven, not the fox. Morgan, the man responsible for kidnapping Terry and nearly getting the rest of them killed, is stuck in raven form, thanks to a spell cast by Terry earlier that afternoon. The fox, who had been a nymph called Janis in her normal form, is missing.
“Figures,” Terry says. “She’s fey. She could just hop back to Gaia as soon as she woke up.”
Scarpedin says, “Let’s hope we were driving at the time.”
“You awake?” John asks the raven.
It blinks and looks up at them.
“Can you talk?” John says.
“Yes,” the raven says, and its voice sounds as Terry remembers Morgan’s voice. “My employer will be very unhappy if he finds out any harm came to me, so I caution you against-”
“Bullsh*t,” John says. “You failed on your mission, so your boss would probably be happier if you died and couldn’t finger him. Keep talking.”
“About what?” the raven asks.
Nathan can’t help but laugh. The group of them are gathered around a backpack with a talking raven in it, acting as if they were interrogating a terrorist. Of course, thinking back to the bomb that nearly destroyed a major bridge, Nathan supposes that’s not so incorrect.
“Tell us who you are,” Scarpedin says, “and who you’re working for. Talk, or else.”
“Or else what?”
John reaches into the bag. The rest of them can’t see what he does, but there’s the sound like a chicken bone snapping, and Morgan screams in pain. John pulls his hands out of the bag and waits for Morgan to stop whimpering.
Belladonna, Nathan, and Terry exchange sickened expressions, but they don’t say anything against what John did. Scarpedin seems to approve.
“That’s so much easier on someone as small as you,” John says. “So, who are you?”
“My name’s Morgan McCool. I . . . I work for a man called Mr. O. From New York.”
John smiles, amused. “ ‘McCool,’ ‘Mr. O’? Yeah right.”
He reaches into the bag and there’s another snap.
Terry grabs John’s arm and says, “Whoa, stop it. He’s a human being, okay? You can’t just go breaking his arms.”
The rest of the group looks around nervously as Morgan cries out in pain. The parking lot is still empty, but they’re nervous.
“I’m telling the truth!” Morgan screams. “I swear. Mr. O is a mage in New York, and he sent me to try to get in touch with Mr. Abrams here. Terry Abrams. I hired two local Knights of the Round to help me, and they got the wrong idea, which is why they attacked you.”
Belladonna frowns. “When they came after us, they said they wanted me to go with them. I don’t suppose you want to explain that?”
Morgan whimpers. “They’re morons. Apparently they thought I said ‘Terra,’ not ‘Terry.’ They knew I was looking for a magic user with unique powers, and I guess they just assumed a magical girl made more sense than a magical boy.”
“You son of a b*itch,” Terry says. “Let me get this straight. First you try to kill me, and kill Lin instead. And you somehow follow me to Texas, but you ground the planes by calling in a terrorist threat. Then you had your cat wreck our bus to get us to go where you wanted, then you kidnapped me, then tried to kill these guys when they came to rescue me. We captured you, and . . . and you blew up the bus? That doesn’t make any sense. How would you know we wouldn’t be on the bus, with you in tow?”
“What are you talking about?” Morgan seethes. “I didn’t blow up your bus, and I sure as hell didn’t kill anyone. Now I’m cooperating. If you take this spell off me and let me heal . . . hehe, I can’t believe you broke my arms.”
John snaps his fingers. “Hey, you talk to us, not yourself. We’ve still got questions. If you didn’t blow up the bus, who did? Does your ‘Mr. O’ have someone else on this case?”
“No,” Morgan says, “he doesn’t have that many operatives in this area. You’ve been very hard to track down, Terry. Let me explain, alright?”
John leans back, lights up a cigarette, and smiles. “Go ahead.”
“Alright,” Morgan says, “Mr. O is a magic-user. Some people say he might not be human, but he looks human enough. He’s the man in charge of . . . various illegal operations, mostly in the northeastern U.S. His people sell magic item sales, smuggle non-humans into human society, provide spellcasting for people willing to pay but who don’t want the Bureau to find out.”
“You’re the mob,” Nathan says.
“One of many,” Morgan says. “But we don’t kill people. We just realize that since we have magic, and most people don’t, we should take advantage of that.”
“F*cking Elves,” Scarpedin mutters.
“So why do you want Terry?” John says.
“Mr. O has connections to the fey court.” To their confused expressions, he explains. “They’re the most powerful magical creatures in the world, pretty much. You don’t need to worry about them, though. They normally don’t meddle in human affairs. You seriously are new to this, aren’t you?
“Anyway,” Morgan continues, “with the recent planar troubles, everyone’s been looking for ways to get to Gaia. One of Mr. O’s contacts told him that you could do that, Mr. Abrams, so he immediately set out his agents to try to track you down.”
“Wait a second,” Terry says. “What ‘planar problems’?”
Morgan groans again at the pain of broken bones, but he composes himself. “I guess you wouldn’t know. You can just do it yourself. But about two weeks ago, all the keys stopped working. People who normally could planeshift with their own spells can’t anymore. Even feywalkers – like Janis, the nymph we had with us – can’t do it anymore. Only you can, apparently.”
“Terry?” Scarpedin says. “Do you have something you want to tell us, Terry?”
“No,” Terry says. “And if no one can plane shift, where’d the nymph go? She was in the bag with you.”
“She said that she could do it while you were around,” Morgan says. “Like you being around fixed the problem. Mr. O didn’t explain how you could do it; I’m not sure if even he knew. I was supposed to contact you, invite you to meet with Mr. O, and we’d see about employing your very unique talents.”
“Yeah, well,” Terry says, “you kinda screwed that up.”
He zips the backpack shut and puts it back in the trunk.
“We have to talk to the Bureau,” Terry says. “Turn this guy over to them, and find out what the hell’s going on.”
“You know what?” Nathan says. “I just realized something, Terry old chap. If this guy isn’t on the side of the people who killed your girlfriend and blew up the bus, then that means somebody else is after you.”
The group looks around the parking lot nervously, then quickly gets into the car. It’s another four hours to New Orleans. Hopefully they won’t run into any snags before then.
Robert suppresses enough cursing to fill a Tarantino film. Standing at the edge of the swamp, soaked in blood, Robert watches Walter’s van burn. Irritated people do stupid things. Robert knew it would happen, and now he’s made his first mistake. He needs some place to hide.
Robert’s not the sort of person to put his trust in others, especially not those he has considered killing, but he doesn’t see any other choice. Terry’s the only person who can help him now.
8:30 pm
“Okay,” John says, “time for answers.”
They’ve pulled off the interstate in Lake Charles, Louisiana. Nathan finds an empty parking lot behind a fast food restaurant that looks to have gone out of business during the hurricanes. They park, make sure no one is likely to interrupt them, and then open the trunk.
John pulls out the backpack and slowly unzips it. Scarpedin has his sword ready, Belladonna has a derringer in hand, and Terry is prepared to counter a spell if he has to. Nathan watches with curiosity, and a nagging sense that the air conditioning of his car might not be working right.
Inside the bag is just the raven, not the fox. Morgan, the man responsible for kidnapping Terry and nearly getting the rest of them killed, is stuck in raven form, thanks to a spell cast by Terry earlier that afternoon. The fox, who had been a nymph called Janis in her normal form, is missing.
“Figures,” Terry says. “She’s fey. She could just hop back to Gaia as soon as she woke up.”
Scarpedin says, “Let’s hope we were driving at the time.”
“You awake?” John asks the raven.
It blinks and looks up at them.
“Can you talk?” John says.
“Yes,” the raven says, and its voice sounds as Terry remembers Morgan’s voice. “My employer will be very unhappy if he finds out any harm came to me, so I caution you against-”
“Bullsh*t,” John says. “You failed on your mission, so your boss would probably be happier if you died and couldn’t finger him. Keep talking.”
“About what?” the raven asks.
Nathan can’t help but laugh. The group of them are gathered around a backpack with a talking raven in it, acting as if they were interrogating a terrorist. Of course, thinking back to the bomb that nearly destroyed a major bridge, Nathan supposes that’s not so incorrect.
“Tell us who you are,” Scarpedin says, “and who you’re working for. Talk, or else.”
“Or else what?”
John reaches into the bag. The rest of them can’t see what he does, but there’s the sound like a chicken bone snapping, and Morgan screams in pain. John pulls his hands out of the bag and waits for Morgan to stop whimpering.
Belladonna, Nathan, and Terry exchange sickened expressions, but they don’t say anything against what John did. Scarpedin seems to approve.
“That’s so much easier on someone as small as you,” John says. “So, who are you?”
“My name’s Morgan McCool. I . . . I work for a man called Mr. O. From New York.”
John smiles, amused. “ ‘McCool,’ ‘Mr. O’? Yeah right.”
He reaches into the bag and there’s another snap.
Terry grabs John’s arm and says, “Whoa, stop it. He’s a human being, okay? You can’t just go breaking his arms.”
The rest of the group looks around nervously as Morgan cries out in pain. The parking lot is still empty, but they’re nervous.
“I’m telling the truth!” Morgan screams. “I swear. Mr. O is a mage in New York, and he sent me to try to get in touch with Mr. Abrams here. Terry Abrams. I hired two local Knights of the Round to help me, and they got the wrong idea, which is why they attacked you.”
Belladonna frowns. “When they came after us, they said they wanted me to go with them. I don’t suppose you want to explain that?”
Morgan whimpers. “They’re morons. Apparently they thought I said ‘Terra,’ not ‘Terry.’ They knew I was looking for a magic user with unique powers, and I guess they just assumed a magical girl made more sense than a magical boy.”
“You son of a b*itch,” Terry says. “Let me get this straight. First you try to kill me, and kill Lin instead. And you somehow follow me to Texas, but you ground the planes by calling in a terrorist threat. Then you had your cat wreck our bus to get us to go where you wanted, then you kidnapped me, then tried to kill these guys when they came to rescue me. We captured you, and . . . and you blew up the bus? That doesn’t make any sense. How would you know we wouldn’t be on the bus, with you in tow?”
“What are you talking about?” Morgan seethes. “I didn’t blow up your bus, and I sure as hell didn’t kill anyone. Now I’m cooperating. If you take this spell off me and let me heal . . . hehe, I can’t believe you broke my arms.”
John snaps his fingers. “Hey, you talk to us, not yourself. We’ve still got questions. If you didn’t blow up the bus, who did? Does your ‘Mr. O’ have someone else on this case?”
“No,” Morgan says, “he doesn’t have that many operatives in this area. You’ve been very hard to track down, Terry. Let me explain, alright?”
John leans back, lights up a cigarette, and smiles. “Go ahead.”
“Alright,” Morgan says, “Mr. O is a magic-user. Some people say he might not be human, but he looks human enough. He’s the man in charge of . . . various illegal operations, mostly in the northeastern U.S. His people sell magic item sales, smuggle non-humans into human society, provide spellcasting for people willing to pay but who don’t want the Bureau to find out.”
“You’re the mob,” Nathan says.
“One of many,” Morgan says. “But we don’t kill people. We just realize that since we have magic, and most people don’t, we should take advantage of that.”
“F*cking Elves,” Scarpedin mutters.
“So why do you want Terry?” John says.
“Mr. O has connections to the fey court.” To their confused expressions, he explains. “They’re the most powerful magical creatures in the world, pretty much. You don’t need to worry about them, though. They normally don’t meddle in human affairs. You seriously are new to this, aren’t you?
“Anyway,” Morgan continues, “with the recent planar troubles, everyone’s been looking for ways to get to Gaia. One of Mr. O’s contacts told him that you could do that, Mr. Abrams, so he immediately set out his agents to try to track you down.”
“Wait a second,” Terry says. “What ‘planar problems’?”
Morgan groans again at the pain of broken bones, but he composes himself. “I guess you wouldn’t know. You can just do it yourself. But about two weeks ago, all the keys stopped working. People who normally could planeshift with their own spells can’t anymore. Even feywalkers – like Janis, the nymph we had with us – can’t do it anymore. Only you can, apparently.”
“Terry?” Scarpedin says. “Do you have something you want to tell us, Terry?”
“No,” Terry says. “And if no one can plane shift, where’d the nymph go? She was in the bag with you.”
“She said that she could do it while you were around,” Morgan says. “Like you being around fixed the problem. Mr. O didn’t explain how you could do it; I’m not sure if even he knew. I was supposed to contact you, invite you to meet with Mr. O, and we’d see about employing your very unique talents.”
“Yeah, well,” Terry says, “you kinda screwed that up.”
He zips the backpack shut and puts it back in the trunk.
“We have to talk to the Bureau,” Terry says. “Turn this guy over to them, and find out what the hell’s going on.”
“You know what?” Nathan says. “I just realized something, Terry old chap. If this guy isn’t on the side of the people who killed your girlfriend and blew up the bus, then that means somebody else is after you.”
The group looks around the parking lot nervously, then quickly gets into the car. It’s another four hours to New Orleans. Hopefully they won’t run into any snags before then.
* * *
Robert suppresses enough cursing to fill a Tarantino film. Standing at the edge of the swamp, soaked in blood, Robert watches Walter’s van burn. Irritated people do stupid things. Robert knew it would happen, and now he’s made his first mistake. He needs some place to hide.
Robert’s not the sort of person to put his trust in others, especially not those he has considered killing, but he doesn’t see any other choice. Terry’s the only person who can help him now.
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RangerWickett
Legend
RangerWickett presents two sample antagonists for Mythic Earth, using the Modern d20 Rules. This is the dynamic duo, Hex and Rex. Their boss, Morgan, will be presented later.
Rex
CR 3
Human Strong 2/Charismatic 2
Medium humanoid
Init +1; Senses Spot -1, Listen -1
Languages English
AC 14, touch 14, flat-footed 10
hp 18 (4 HD)
Fort +4, Ref +3, Will -1
Speed 30 feet (6 squares)
Melee unarmed strike +9 (1d8+4)
Ranged silenced Beretta 92F +4 (2d6, 40 feet, 15 shots)
Base Atk +3; Grp +6
Combat Gear silenced Beretta 92F
Starting Occupation Criminal; skills – Knowledge (streetwise), Sleight of Hand
Abilities Str 16, Dex 13, Con 10, Int 12, Wis 8, Cha 14
Feats Brawl, Improved Brawl, Personal Firearms Proficiency, Point-Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Weapon Focus (unarmed)
Talents Melee Smash +1, Fast Talk +2
Skills Bluff +9, Climb +8, Gather Information +4, Intimidate +9, Knowledge (streetwise) +7, Repair +6, Sleight of Hand +6
Possessions Combat gear plus cel phone, two clips of ammo, concealed holster (Spot DC 18)
Tactics
Rex is a thug, plain and simple. He likes to pretend to be suave and charming, but he’s a violent misogynist who likes to brag about how tough he is. Before combat he tries to intimidate his foes into giving up, but if a fight breaks out he’ll try to punch for lethal damage. He loves his gun, but he’s not so cocky as to use it in public unless he feels truly threatened.
Hex
CR 3
Human Tough 4
Medium humanoid
Init +1; Senses Spot +1, Listen +1
Languages English
AC 14, touch 14, flat-footed 10
hp 41 (4 HD)
Resist DR 1/-
Fort +7, Ref +1, Will +2
Speed 30 feet (6 squares)
Melee stun gun +3 (1d3 electricity plus Fort DC 15 or stun for 1d6 rounds)
Ranged ranged touch +4 (varies)
Base Atk +3; Grp +3
Atk Options magic (gains a +2 bonus to technomancy Attack spells, and a +1 bonus to any Attack or Create spells if they relate to a song he’s playing on his iPod)
Combat Gear stun gun
Signature Spells
Starting Occupation Technician; skills – Craft (electronic), Knowledge (technology), Repair
Abilities Str 10, Dex 12, Con 16, Int 14, Wis 13, Cha 8
Feats Elemental Focus (spells must relate to music he plays), Great Fortitude, Technomancy, Toughness, Witchcraft
Talents DR 1/-, Robust
Skills Craft (electronics) +9, Knowledge (technology) +6, Repair +5
Magical Skills Attack +7, Charm +7, Create +7
Possessions Combat gear plus cel phone, technomantic iPod (+2 equipment bonus to Attack checks)
Tactics
Hex’s signature spells are all tied to songs he keeps stored on his iPod, and he treats the device as his familiar. The iPod plays exactly what song Hex needs at the moment, and while he has it on his person he gains all the benefits to having a familiar with him.
Hex’s ghost is that of a rap musician who sold his soul to a demon so he could sell his first record. He got his record deal, but soon thereafter the musician was killed, and the record was never sold. Unwilling to pass over to eternal torment, the ghost lingered at the music studio, until one day Hex wandered in and listened to the tracks, bonding with the spirit.
In combat, Hex favors straightforward fire spells, punctuated with the occasional created object to provide cover or give him an edge. He likes creating walls to keep non-spellcasters out of a fight. When going into a situation where he expects a fight, he’ll use charm magic to bolster himself and his ally Rex.
New Charm Enhancement
The following charm enhancement was accidentally left out of Mythic Earth. It is the Strong emotion version of Courage.
Heroic (5 MP): Heroic creatures gain a +2 morale bonus to attack rolls, weapon damage rolls, ability checks, saves, and skill checks. The spell also acts as a strong Calm against fear effects only.
Rex
CR 3
Human Strong 2/Charismatic 2
Medium humanoid
Init +1; Senses Spot -1, Listen -1
Languages English
AC 14, touch 14, flat-footed 10
hp 18 (4 HD)
Fort +4, Ref +3, Will -1
Speed 30 feet (6 squares)
Melee unarmed strike +9 (1d8+4)
Ranged silenced Beretta 92F +4 (2d6, 40 feet, 15 shots)
Base Atk +3; Grp +6
Combat Gear silenced Beretta 92F
Starting Occupation Criminal; skills – Knowledge (streetwise), Sleight of Hand
Abilities Str 16, Dex 13, Con 10, Int 12, Wis 8, Cha 14
Feats Brawl, Improved Brawl, Personal Firearms Proficiency, Point-Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Weapon Focus (unarmed)
Talents Melee Smash +1, Fast Talk +2
Skills Bluff +9, Climb +8, Gather Information +4, Intimidate +9, Knowledge (streetwise) +7, Repair +6, Sleight of Hand +6
Possessions Combat gear plus cel phone, two clips of ammo, concealed holster (Spot DC 18)
Tactics
Rex is a thug, plain and simple. He likes to pretend to be suave and charming, but he’s a violent misogynist who likes to brag about how tough he is. Before combat he tries to intimidate his foes into giving up, but if a fight breaks out he’ll try to punch for lethal damage. He loves his gun, but he’s not so cocky as to use it in public unless he feels truly threatened.
Hex
CR 3
Human Tough 4
Medium humanoid
Init +1; Senses Spot +1, Listen +1
Languages English
AC 14, touch 14, flat-footed 10
hp 41 (4 HD)
Resist DR 1/-
Fort +7, Ref +1, Will +2
Speed 30 feet (6 squares)
Melee stun gun +3 (1d3 electricity plus Fort DC 15 or stun for 1d6 rounds)
Ranged ranged touch +4 (varies)
Base Atk +3; Grp +3
Atk Options magic (gains a +2 bonus to technomancy Attack spells, and a +1 bonus to any Attack or Create spells if they relate to a song he’s playing on his iPod)
Combat Gear stun gun
Signature Spells
- Ring of Fire – Attack 6/Gen 1 short-range fire spell (6d6). This is a Witchcraft spell, not Technomancy. By Johnny Cash.
- Smack my B*tch Up – Charm 5/Gen 3 to make Hex and up to 8 allies within 10 ft. heroic for 10 minutes. By Prodigy.
- One Good Man – Charm 4/Gen 1 for a short-range simple telepathic command, which he typically uses on a woman. By Janis Joplin.
- Another Brick in the Wall – Create 5/Gen 1 for a short-range brick wall that can block four 5-ft. squares. By Pink Floyd.
- California Lovin’ – Create 7/Gen 0 to create a loaded Beretta 92F for when he wants to cap someone. By Tupac.
- Don’t F*ck With Me – Attack 10/Gen 1 for an overpowered sonic attack (10d6, 10-ft. burst centered on you), deals 2d4 Strength damage to Hex. Ghetto Boyz.
Starting Occupation Technician; skills – Craft (electronic), Knowledge (technology), Repair
Abilities Str 10, Dex 12, Con 16, Int 14, Wis 13, Cha 8
Feats Elemental Focus (spells must relate to music he plays), Great Fortitude, Technomancy, Toughness, Witchcraft
Talents DR 1/-, Robust
Skills Craft (electronics) +9, Knowledge (technology) +6, Repair +5
Magical Skills Attack +7, Charm +7, Create +7
Possessions Combat gear plus cel phone, technomantic iPod (+2 equipment bonus to Attack checks)
Tactics
Hex’s signature spells are all tied to songs he keeps stored on his iPod, and he treats the device as his familiar. The iPod plays exactly what song Hex needs at the moment, and while he has it on his person he gains all the benefits to having a familiar with him.
Hex’s ghost is that of a rap musician who sold his soul to a demon so he could sell his first record. He got his record deal, but soon thereafter the musician was killed, and the record was never sold. Unwilling to pass over to eternal torment, the ghost lingered at the music studio, until one day Hex wandered in and listened to the tracks, bonding with the spirit.
In combat, Hex favors straightforward fire spells, punctuated with the occasional created object to provide cover or give him an edge. He likes creating walls to keep non-spellcasters out of a fight. When going into a situation where he expects a fight, he’ll use charm magic to bolster himself and his ally Rex.
New Charm Enhancement
The following charm enhancement was accidentally left out of Mythic Earth. It is the Strong emotion version of Courage.
Heroic (5 MP): Heroic creatures gain a +2 morale bonus to attack rolls, weapon damage rolls, ability checks, saves, and skill checks. The spell also acts as a strong Calm against fear effects only.
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RangerWickett
Legend
October 30, 2005
7:00 am
Terry peers out the peephole in the door of his hotel room, wondering if he should cast a defensive spell. The two cops out in the hallway have a third person with them, and it looks like Scarpedin. Hoping he's ready for the worst, Terry opens the door.
"Terry," Scarpedin says, putting on a show of toughness, "tell the five-oh to get off me man. You and me, we was playing poker all night. Tell 'em that."
"What's this all about?" Terry asks.
One of the officers smiles at Scarpedin, then back to Terry. "We talked with the manager here. Said you and your friends came in last night, around midnight."
Terry yawns and nods.
"Well," the cop continues, "your friend here, a mister . . . Clarence Thomas . . . he didn't waste any time starting the party. We got reports from Tricou House – one of the clubs on Bourbon Street – that mister ‘Thomas’ here punched a dancer, then fled the scene. One of the other dancers chased him back to this hotel."
Terry laughs, then shrugs. "Well, y'know, I'm sorry you got up so early this morning officers, but I'm even more sorry you had to wake up me and my friend. I don't know if you can tell, but we had a bit of a late night, playing poker. And, well, y’know, drinking a bit. So unless Clarence went running off after I passed out at, oh, what was it, 4 am?"
"More like 4:30," Scarpedin says. "This man's a hell of a drinker."
"Yeah," Terry says, feigning a hangover. "So I don't know what to say, but you got the wrong guy. Hell, check room service. We were pestering them all night long."
“Nice try son,” the cop says, “but we spoke to one of the doormen who was on duty last night, and he corroborated the dancer’s story. Boy said your friend Clarence here came in at 2 a.m. ‘plainin’ ‘bout some. . . ,” he pulls out a notepad and reads the quote, “ ‘Son of a b*tch got what she f*ckin’ had comin’. Take my advice: don’t ever go to a club called Tricou House. They’re f*ckin’ f*cked up there.’”
“He,” Scarpedin says.
“What’d you say son?” The cop shakes Scarpedin’s arm.
Terry can’t believe it for a moment, but Scarpedin looks embarrassed.
“It was a he, man,” Scarpedin says. “Not a she. The dancer was a guy, okay homes? I could deal with that, but the son of a b*tch put his hand on my junk. I wasn’t gonna abide by that sh*t.”
The second cop laughs, lightly hitting his partner until he too starts laughing. Terry bites his lip, but he lets a few laughs out. Scarpedin glares at them all, waiting for them to finish.
“Alright son,” the cop says, still chuckling. “I can’t take you in for that. Hell, boy, you just made the day of every uniform who has to work Bourbon Street. Sh*t, keep up the good work.”
The cops laugh and walk away.
“So,” Terry clears his throat, “did that actually happen?”
“Terry, I don’t ask you about your life. I don’t tell you how to live, man. But if a dude puts his hand on your junk, you don’t stand by that sh*t, okay? You take that bastard down.”
“Sure thing,” Terry says. “Holy crap, that was not what I was expecting to wake up to. Agh.”
Scarpedin glances into Terry’s hotel room, then back into the hallway. “Any men in black around?”
“Not yet,” Terry says. He starts to go back inside and close his door. “The men in black don’t come until I’m showered and dressed. Meet me downstairs in half an hour.”
When Terry gets down to the hotel’s continental breakfast, Nathan is pestering John, Belladonna is smiling at their argument, and Scarpedin is watching TV.
They discuss their plans over breakfast. Belladonna offers them a place to stay at her own home, just east of the French Quarter, and invites them to a costume ball her uncle is hosting. Belladonna’s father, Adrien Lee, is a very wealthy New Orleans businessman, and Belladonna’s uncle Maurice is the man in charge of Mr. Lee’s shipping company. Tomorrow night a lavish Halloween ball for New Orlean’s upper crust will take place on the banks of Lake Ponchatrain, and Belladonna wants them to come.
The first order of business, though, is the Bureau. Terry finds a local phone book and flips through the yellow pages, looking for a particular entry – Brief Marketing Management. The Bureau for the Management of Magicks is easy to get in touch with if you know what you’re looking for. Terry calls, and after a bit of careful questions to verify that Terry is actually calling about magic, he arranges to meet a local Bureau agent in the French Quarter, at 9:30 a.m. He warns them that they have a prisoner they need to turn over - Morgan McCool, currently stuck in the form of a raven.
Terry tells the others that he couldn’t help but notice that the woman on the phone sounded nervous. Hardly a good sign.
With some time to spare, they start talking about their plans for the next few days. Scarpedin doesn’t want to get asked any questions, so he walks off and calls a biker buddy from New Mexico named “Whitey.” Belladonna just wants to repay them for saving her life, and to make sure that whoever was trying to kill Terry won’t keep on going after her. Nathan is just going to hang around until he gets his next vision. Terry has no idea what he’s going to do after talking to the Bureau.
When Nathan tries to get an answer out of John, though, the chain-smoker (currently stuck in a no-smoking section) is evasive and irritated at the question.
“I’m here on my own business.”
Nathan smiles. “Are you a priest? Fasting? Because you sure aren’t eating much.”
Terry sees that John’s plate only has two pieces of celery on it. John rolls his eyes at Nathan’s question, and then Terry senses magic at work. It’s subtle, a psychic energy, and Terry frowns as he realizes Nathan is doing a reading on John.
“That’s rude,” Terry says.
“What?” John asks.
“He’s reading you,” Terry says. “Doing a psychic thing, you know?”
John’s face takes on a look of repressed rage. “Get out of my mind.”
Nathan blinks and shakes his head. “Sorry chap. I wasn’t in your mind. I just read your aura. I was just curious, to see if you were trouble. And I have to ask John, why are your wings missing?”
“What?” John, Terry, and Belladonna all ask at the same time.
“I don’t know,” Nathan says. “I just had a vision, and I saw you were getting your wings clipped off. Are you an angel?”
Suddenly Scarpedin comes up behind Nathan and clamps a hand over the British man’s face. “Don’t look into his eyes. He might be a vampire!”
Everyone starts talking at once in a commotion, trying to figure out what’s going on, but then Nathan struggles free of Scarpedin and slumps face down onto the table.
A moment of quiet passes.
"Um," Scarpedin says, "I didn't do that."
Terry is just about to poke Nathan when he hears a shout.
“Oh hey, Terry!” calls Robert, staggering into the hotel’s restaurant.
Everyone turns and takes in Robert’s appearance. For some reason he’s wearing jeans a few sizes too large, held on by a belt that has a buckle in the shape of an oil derrick, and a workman’s shirt with oil stains. His eyes are bloodshot like he hasn’t slept all night, and his shoes are caked in mud. In one hand he holds several Walmart bags filled with clothes. Despite his cool exterior, Terry sees something almost frightened in the man.
“Robert,” Terry says, “I thought you never wanted to see us again.”
“Yeah,” Robert says, “I had a bit of bad luck, as you can see. Tell you all about it later. You guys still have rooms here? I could really use a shower and a nap.”
John pulls out his room key and tosses it to Robert.
“Thanks.” Robert smiles, and he’s gone before anyone thinks to ask what happened.
Nathan sits up stiffly, and everyone around him leans back.
“I had a vision,” Nathan says.
“Yay,” John sighs.
“Monkeys,” Nathan says. “And jaguars, and smoke. There were people smoking, and French people trying to buy a key, and then they started to shoot at each other. A man in a black trenchcoat came in, and so did all of us, and the French man shot Terry.”
“Better than his last vision,” Scarpedin says, slapping Belladonna on her back. “At least you’re not dead this time.”
John grumbles. “That vision is worthless.”
“It was very overwhelming,” Nathan says. “There are lots of ghosts here. It makes things a little hard to understand. At least we know we should avoid French people.”
“In New Orleans?” Belladonna laughs.
John grimaces. “Let’s just hope that this Bureau actually knows what they’re doing.”
Robert wakes up with a start, checking the balcony and front doors immediately. No one is in the room. He checks the clock. It’s just after nine in the morning. He’s in John’s hotel room, in New Orleans, having gotten barely an hour of sleep. At least the blood from under his fingernails is gone. He really needed that shower.
He hears it again. Thumping, rumbling, coming from the next room over. He’s pretty sure that room is one that was checked out to the group of people he’s stalking, possibly Terry’s. Before thinking, Robert is on his feet, opening the drawer next to the bed and pulling out his taser and straight razor. He gets dressed in the dark and considers his next move.
It sounds like someone is next door, rummaging through the room. He can’t ignore it, so his two options are to either go out into the hallway and just knock on the door, or to go out on the balcony and try to come at the person from behind and get the jump on him. Robert opens the balcony door slowly and tries to gauge that plan.
Below the balcony, Canal Street, the New Orleans artery that borders the French Quarter, rumbles with engines and shouts and the dull, distant sweep of waves on the Mississippi. Ten stories up, the noise and the sudden sunlight gives Robert a moment of vertigo. He shakes it off, and turns to check the distance to the next room over.
He’s not sure if he could make the five-foot jump, or if the balcony door into Terry’s room would even be open. And, on the off chance it’s actually Terry rummaging through his own room, jumping in and scaring the man would raise too many questions.
He mutters to himself, “Let’s not make another mistake today, okay Robert? Just play this cool.”
And then he’s back inside his room, out the front door and in the hallway. He tries to peer through the peephole into Terry’s room, but it’s too dark to make anything out. He tries the door, quietly, and the knob is unlocked but the door is deadbolted. He peers at the keyhole and sees the telltale scraping of an automatic key opener having been used.
Grimacing, he heads back into his room, intending to gather his stuff and make a run for it. He gets inside and closes the door before he notices that the curtain to the balcony doorway has been pulled shut. Robert flicks the lightswitch, and sees a black-clad man crouched in a dark corner of the room, holding a pistol.
Oddly, Robert can’t help but think the man looks a lot like George Clooney.
End of Third Session
7:00 am
Terry peers out the peephole in the door of his hotel room, wondering if he should cast a defensive spell. The two cops out in the hallway have a third person with them, and it looks like Scarpedin. Hoping he's ready for the worst, Terry opens the door.
"Terry," Scarpedin says, putting on a show of toughness, "tell the five-oh to get off me man. You and me, we was playing poker all night. Tell 'em that."
"What's this all about?" Terry asks.
One of the officers smiles at Scarpedin, then back to Terry. "We talked with the manager here. Said you and your friends came in last night, around midnight."
Terry yawns and nods.
"Well," the cop continues, "your friend here, a mister . . . Clarence Thomas . . . he didn't waste any time starting the party. We got reports from Tricou House – one of the clubs on Bourbon Street – that mister ‘Thomas’ here punched a dancer, then fled the scene. One of the other dancers chased him back to this hotel."
Terry laughs, then shrugs. "Well, y'know, I'm sorry you got up so early this morning officers, but I'm even more sorry you had to wake up me and my friend. I don't know if you can tell, but we had a bit of a late night, playing poker. And, well, y’know, drinking a bit. So unless Clarence went running off after I passed out at, oh, what was it, 4 am?"
"More like 4:30," Scarpedin says. "This man's a hell of a drinker."
"Yeah," Terry says, feigning a hangover. "So I don't know what to say, but you got the wrong guy. Hell, check room service. We were pestering them all night long."
“Nice try son,” the cop says, “but we spoke to one of the doormen who was on duty last night, and he corroborated the dancer’s story. Boy said your friend Clarence here came in at 2 a.m. ‘plainin’ ‘bout some. . . ,” he pulls out a notepad and reads the quote, “ ‘Son of a b*tch got what she f*ckin’ had comin’. Take my advice: don’t ever go to a club called Tricou House. They’re f*ckin’ f*cked up there.’”
“He,” Scarpedin says.
“What’d you say son?” The cop shakes Scarpedin’s arm.
Terry can’t believe it for a moment, but Scarpedin looks embarrassed.
“It was a he, man,” Scarpedin says. “Not a she. The dancer was a guy, okay homes? I could deal with that, but the son of a b*tch put his hand on my junk. I wasn’t gonna abide by that sh*t.”
The second cop laughs, lightly hitting his partner until he too starts laughing. Terry bites his lip, but he lets a few laughs out. Scarpedin glares at them all, waiting for them to finish.
“Alright son,” the cop says, still chuckling. “I can’t take you in for that. Hell, boy, you just made the day of every uniform who has to work Bourbon Street. Sh*t, keep up the good work.”
The cops laugh and walk away.
“So,” Terry clears his throat, “did that actually happen?”
“Terry, I don’t ask you about your life. I don’t tell you how to live, man. But if a dude puts his hand on your junk, you don’t stand by that sh*t, okay? You take that bastard down.”
“Sure thing,” Terry says. “Holy crap, that was not what I was expecting to wake up to. Agh.”
Scarpedin glances into Terry’s hotel room, then back into the hallway. “Any men in black around?”
“Not yet,” Terry says. He starts to go back inside and close his door. “The men in black don’t come until I’m showered and dressed. Meet me downstairs in half an hour.”
* * *
When Terry gets down to the hotel’s continental breakfast, Nathan is pestering John, Belladonna is smiling at their argument, and Scarpedin is watching TV.
They discuss their plans over breakfast. Belladonna offers them a place to stay at her own home, just east of the French Quarter, and invites them to a costume ball her uncle is hosting. Belladonna’s father, Adrien Lee, is a very wealthy New Orleans businessman, and Belladonna’s uncle Maurice is the man in charge of Mr. Lee’s shipping company. Tomorrow night a lavish Halloween ball for New Orlean’s upper crust will take place on the banks of Lake Ponchatrain, and Belladonna wants them to come.
The first order of business, though, is the Bureau. Terry finds a local phone book and flips through the yellow pages, looking for a particular entry – Brief Marketing Management. The Bureau for the Management of Magicks is easy to get in touch with if you know what you’re looking for. Terry calls, and after a bit of careful questions to verify that Terry is actually calling about magic, he arranges to meet a local Bureau agent in the French Quarter, at 9:30 a.m. He warns them that they have a prisoner they need to turn over - Morgan McCool, currently stuck in the form of a raven.
Terry tells the others that he couldn’t help but notice that the woman on the phone sounded nervous. Hardly a good sign.
With some time to spare, they start talking about their plans for the next few days. Scarpedin doesn’t want to get asked any questions, so he walks off and calls a biker buddy from New Mexico named “Whitey.” Belladonna just wants to repay them for saving her life, and to make sure that whoever was trying to kill Terry won’t keep on going after her. Nathan is just going to hang around until he gets his next vision. Terry has no idea what he’s going to do after talking to the Bureau.
When Nathan tries to get an answer out of John, though, the chain-smoker (currently stuck in a no-smoking section) is evasive and irritated at the question.
“I’m here on my own business.”
Nathan smiles. “Are you a priest? Fasting? Because you sure aren’t eating much.”
Terry sees that John’s plate only has two pieces of celery on it. John rolls his eyes at Nathan’s question, and then Terry senses magic at work. It’s subtle, a psychic energy, and Terry frowns as he realizes Nathan is doing a reading on John.
“That’s rude,” Terry says.
“What?” John asks.
“He’s reading you,” Terry says. “Doing a psychic thing, you know?”
John’s face takes on a look of repressed rage. “Get out of my mind.”
Nathan blinks and shakes his head. “Sorry chap. I wasn’t in your mind. I just read your aura. I was just curious, to see if you were trouble. And I have to ask John, why are your wings missing?”
“What?” John, Terry, and Belladonna all ask at the same time.
“I don’t know,” Nathan says. “I just had a vision, and I saw you were getting your wings clipped off. Are you an angel?”
Suddenly Scarpedin comes up behind Nathan and clamps a hand over the British man’s face. “Don’t look into his eyes. He might be a vampire!”
Everyone starts talking at once in a commotion, trying to figure out what’s going on, but then Nathan struggles free of Scarpedin and slumps face down onto the table.
A moment of quiet passes.
"Um," Scarpedin says, "I didn't do that."
Terry is just about to poke Nathan when he hears a shout.
“Oh hey, Terry!” calls Robert, staggering into the hotel’s restaurant.
Everyone turns and takes in Robert’s appearance. For some reason he’s wearing jeans a few sizes too large, held on by a belt that has a buckle in the shape of an oil derrick, and a workman’s shirt with oil stains. His eyes are bloodshot like he hasn’t slept all night, and his shoes are caked in mud. In one hand he holds several Walmart bags filled with clothes. Despite his cool exterior, Terry sees something almost frightened in the man.
“Robert,” Terry says, “I thought you never wanted to see us again.”
“Yeah,” Robert says, “I had a bit of bad luck, as you can see. Tell you all about it later. You guys still have rooms here? I could really use a shower and a nap.”
John pulls out his room key and tosses it to Robert.
“Thanks.” Robert smiles, and he’s gone before anyone thinks to ask what happened.
Nathan sits up stiffly, and everyone around him leans back.
“I had a vision,” Nathan says.
“Yay,” John sighs.
“Monkeys,” Nathan says. “And jaguars, and smoke. There were people smoking, and French people trying to buy a key, and then they started to shoot at each other. A man in a black trenchcoat came in, and so did all of us, and the French man shot Terry.”
“Better than his last vision,” Scarpedin says, slapping Belladonna on her back. “At least you’re not dead this time.”
John grumbles. “That vision is worthless.”
“It was very overwhelming,” Nathan says. “There are lots of ghosts here. It makes things a little hard to understand. At least we know we should avoid French people.”
“In New Orleans?” Belladonna laughs.
John grimaces. “Let’s just hope that this Bureau actually knows what they’re doing.”
* * *
Robert wakes up with a start, checking the balcony and front doors immediately. No one is in the room. He checks the clock. It’s just after nine in the morning. He’s in John’s hotel room, in New Orleans, having gotten barely an hour of sleep. At least the blood from under his fingernails is gone. He really needed that shower.
He hears it again. Thumping, rumbling, coming from the next room over. He’s pretty sure that room is one that was checked out to the group of people he’s stalking, possibly Terry’s. Before thinking, Robert is on his feet, opening the drawer next to the bed and pulling out his taser and straight razor. He gets dressed in the dark and considers his next move.
It sounds like someone is next door, rummaging through the room. He can’t ignore it, so his two options are to either go out into the hallway and just knock on the door, or to go out on the balcony and try to come at the person from behind and get the jump on him. Robert opens the balcony door slowly and tries to gauge that plan.
Below the balcony, Canal Street, the New Orleans artery that borders the French Quarter, rumbles with engines and shouts and the dull, distant sweep of waves on the Mississippi. Ten stories up, the noise and the sudden sunlight gives Robert a moment of vertigo. He shakes it off, and turns to check the distance to the next room over.
He’s not sure if he could make the five-foot jump, or if the balcony door into Terry’s room would even be open. And, on the off chance it’s actually Terry rummaging through his own room, jumping in and scaring the man would raise too many questions.
He mutters to himself, “Let’s not make another mistake today, okay Robert? Just play this cool.”
And then he’s back inside his room, out the front door and in the hallway. He tries to peer through the peephole into Terry’s room, but it’s too dark to make anything out. He tries the door, quietly, and the knob is unlocked but the door is deadbolted. He peers at the keyhole and sees the telltale scraping of an automatic key opener having been used.
Grimacing, he heads back into his room, intending to gather his stuff and make a run for it. He gets inside and closes the door before he notices that the curtain to the balcony doorway has been pulled shut. Robert flicks the lightswitch, and sees a black-clad man crouched in a dark corner of the room, holding a pistol.
Oddly, Robert can’t help but think the man looks a lot like George Clooney.
End of Third Session
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RangerWickett
Legend
RangerWickett
Legend
Morgan McCool
CR 9
Human Charismatic 6/Fast 4
Medium humanoid
Init +3; Senses Spot -1, Listen -1
Languages English
AC 20, touch 20, flat-footed 20
hp 51 (10 HD)
Resist evasion, uncanny dodge
Fort +5, Ref +8, Will +4
Speed 30 feet (6 squares)
Melee unarmed combat martial arts +9 (1d4)
Ranged various firearms +5 (varies)
Base Atk +6; Grp +6
Atk Options magic, disarming (d20+9 against foe), captivate (DC 18)
Combat Gear none
Signature Spells
Starting Occupation Adept; skill – Diplomacy; bonus feats – Arcane Skills and Witchcraft
Abilities Str 10, Dex 16, Con 12, Int 13, Wis 8, Cha 15
Feats Agile Riposte, Animism, Arcane Skills, Combat Expertise, Combat Martial Arts, Defensive Martial Arts, Dodge, Elusive Target, Improved Disarm, Iron Will, Weapon Finesse, Witchcraft
Talents Captivate, Charm (women), Evasion, Favor, Uncanny Dodge
Skills Bluff +11, Concentration +10, Diplomacy +17, Knowledge (arcane lore) +6, Spellcraft +7, Tumble +10
Magical Skills Attack +7, Charm +13, Illusion +7, Summon +13, Transform +7
Possessions Combat gear plus cel phone, finely-tailored suit with white rose in lapel
Tactics
Morgan has trained to fight against large groups of opponents. He does best when he can move into the midst of his opponents and use them as cover against each other. One of his favorite tricks is to move into melee combat with a gunman, then reach in, disarm his opponent of the gun, and then shoot the man with his own gun.
Morgan will turn his enemies against each other by dominating the mind of one with his evil eye, and if things look bad he will turn invisible or turn into a raven and flee. If he has time to prepare before combat, he’ll summon a fey cat with displacement abilities, and then enhance his melee attacks. Only rarely will he use his attack magic, and when he does he likes to cast the spell still and silent by expending his magical focus, so that he truly can seem to slay with a gaze.
Of course, Morgan recognizes the value in taking captives, so his Witchcraft attack spells deal mental damage. His animism spells, however, deal cold damage.
CR 9
Human Charismatic 6/Fast 4
Medium humanoid
Init +3; Senses Spot -1, Listen -1
Languages English
AC 20, touch 20, flat-footed 20
hp 51 (10 HD)
Resist evasion, uncanny dodge
Fort +5, Ref +8, Will +4
Speed 30 feet (6 squares)
Melee unarmed combat martial arts +9 (1d4)
Ranged various firearms +5 (varies)
Base Atk +6; Grp +6
Atk Options magic, disarming (d20+9 against foe), captivate (DC 18)
Combat Gear none
Signature Spells
- Castigate – Charm 4/Gen 4 for a short-range subtle two-word verbal command that can affect up to 8 targets within a 20-ft. radius.
- Catclaws – Attack 4/Gen 0 for a +2 enhancement bonus to unarmed attack and damage.
- Evil Eye – Charm 10/Gen 1 for a short-range subtle standard telepathic command.
- Hypnotic Gaze – Charm 8/Gen 1 for a short-range subtle charm to render a creature helpless.
- Lingering Look of Lust – Charm 8/Gen 0 to give Morgan +16 to Bluff checks for one minute, typically used to seduce someone he fancies.
- Mad Eye – Illusion 4/Gen 1 for a phantasm that affects a single creature within 30 ft., making it see and hear a standard illusion.
- Ravenflight – Transform 4/Gen 0 to transform into a raven.
- Ravenflight Eclipse – Summon 3/Transform 4/Gen 0 to transform into a raven and summon a swarm of ravens for you to hide in.
- Shadowcat Guardian – Summon 10/Gen 3 to get an obedient cat beast with displacement powers for one hour.
- Unseen Escape – Illusion 7/Gen 0 to turn invisible for one minute.
- Withering Glare – Attack 5/Gen 1 for a short-range blast of ill will, dealing 5d6 points of mental damage.
Starting Occupation Adept; skill – Diplomacy; bonus feats – Arcane Skills and Witchcraft
Abilities Str 10, Dex 16, Con 12, Int 13, Wis 8, Cha 15
Feats Agile Riposte, Animism, Arcane Skills, Combat Expertise, Combat Martial Arts, Defensive Martial Arts, Dodge, Elusive Target, Improved Disarm, Iron Will, Weapon Finesse, Witchcraft
Talents Captivate, Charm (women), Evasion, Favor, Uncanny Dodge
Skills Bluff +11, Concentration +10, Diplomacy +17, Knowledge (arcane lore) +6, Spellcraft +7, Tumble +10
Magical Skills Attack +7, Charm +13, Illusion +7, Summon +13, Transform +7
Possessions Combat gear plus cel phone, finely-tailored suit with white rose in lapel
Tactics
Morgan has trained to fight against large groups of opponents. He does best when he can move into the midst of his opponents and use them as cover against each other. One of his favorite tricks is to move into melee combat with a gunman, then reach in, disarm his opponent of the gun, and then shoot the man with his own gun.
Morgan will turn his enemies against each other by dominating the mind of one with his evil eye, and if things look bad he will turn invisible or turn into a raven and flee. If he has time to prepare before combat, he’ll summon a fey cat with displacement abilities, and then enhance his melee attacks. Only rarely will he use his attack magic, and when he does he likes to cast the spell still and silent by expending his magical focus, so that he truly can seem to slay with a gaze.
Of course, Morgan recognizes the value in taking captives, so his Witchcraft attack spells deal mental damage. His animism spells, however, deal cold damage.
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