First Sight: A d20 Modern Story Hour (Updated 01-03-2008)
Lamprolign
First Post
036
Joshua awoke to the sound of the old man in the bunk beneath him snoring. Once conscious, the sounds of people all around breathing, mumbling, snoring, and coughing, even the creaks as they shifted in their sleep, grated like nails screeching across a chalkboard. Bile rose in his throat at the thought of the power being wasted to help this worthless trash. He closed his eyes and imagined the ways he would kill them all, starting with the snoring wretch beneath him.
Below, the corner of the old man's blanket twitched and began to move. Like a serpent it inched upwards. With the barest tickle it wound itself around his neck.
They should all be purged, he fumed, but first their guardians would need to be eliminated. To do that he had to stay inconspicuous, gain the fools' trust and learn their secrets. Karin's instructions to him were simple: lay low and observe, then pass everything on to her. Joshua did not know exactly what it was she was after and honestly he didn't care. She was just a means to an end.
The blanket-snake tightened in silence. The old man's eyes popped open and he made a small gurgling sound.
! Joshua's gloating machinations ended abruptly when he realized his secret was about to be revealed, in a big way. Strangulation would leave obvious signs but he couldn't let the old man go about spouting tales of being attacked by his blanket either. He smiled when the solution sprang into his mind: asphyxiation wouldn't leave marks...
Another corner of the blanket clamped firmly over the old man's mouth and nose, while the length coiled around his neck loosened. Instantly the rest of the blanket wrapped tightly about his arms and legs. His eyes bulged as he strained against his woolen assailant, then he lay still. Joshua looked around quickly. No one else in the bunk room stirred. Well, that was easy. The blanket unwound itself from the man and settled across him as gently as if spread by a mother's hand. What a shame, the poor old codger just passed away in the night... Joshua rolled over and drifted to sleep, grinning like a child after his first Christmas.
****
A piercing whistle emanated from the burnished copper kettle suspended over the roaring fire in the Sister's hearth. The kettle levitated off its hook and floated to her waiting, mitt-covered hand. She poured the vigorously boiling water into an earthenware teapot made in the oriental style: a straight handle molded into the vessel separated by ninety degrees from the spout. A small amount of fragrant steam escaped before she placed the tight-fitting lid in place. She released the kettle and it floated obediently back to its hook, which had swung away from the fire. Traveler sat in one of the overstuffed chairs slowly leafing through a weighty tome.
"For the first time in three hundred years a novitiate, much less two are presented to us and both are lost," the Sister said as she sat in her accustomed chair, her face betraying great weariness.
"Mary may yet be saved."
"You believe the old books survived?"
"Until very recently I thought not, but I have suspicion that a sanctuary lies sealed near the peak of Sutay Uul, in the Altai." Traveler's gaze turned to the window and the forest of gravestones beyond. "I will depart once I collect my assistant."
Several moments of silence passed before the Sister spoke again. "It nearly happened again," she spoke slowly, staring into the flames. "When I banished Abrams' demon from Gabriel he nearly took Mary's soul with him."
Traveler closed the book that she held before her. "You cannot continue to blame yourself for what happened then," she turned a stern gaze on the Sister. "Unlike Mary, she brought her fate upon herself. She was no newly initiated sorceress, she knew the dangers inherent in calling on those powers and she knew the inescapable fate of all who do so."
****
Gabe smelled char, then he heard the muted sounds of traffic and sensed bright light though his eye lids. What the hell happened? He inhaled experimentally. His chest felt bruised and stiff, but the stabbing pain was gone. He opened his eyes. Sunlight pouring through windows stabbed directly into his brain.
"Rise and shine."
He found himself lying on his own couch. There was a strange woman in his house. Well, this hasn't happened since college... She was wearing faded blue jeans and a flannel shirt of muted browns and greens. The shirt was open revealing a black t-shirt with ' you' printed across the front in large friendly letters. Her left eyebrow was pierced thrice by small steel bars. She looked young, curvy and solidly built, but not unattractive.
"Who the hell are you?"
"That's no way to greet the lady who just saved your ass," she replied from her roost on the edge of his cluttered coffee table. She stood, pulling her dark reddish-brown hair back into a tight pony tail that ended between her shoulder blades. With her arms raised, Gabe clearly saw a black Kevlar holster holding a HK Mark 23 pistol tucked under each arm. She noticed the direction of his gaze.
"Nice guns, huh?" She winked, turning to show her profile.
"Uhm," Gabe said, thinking, not bad.
"Gabe!"
He sat up and grimaced. He noticed that his clothes were matted with dried blood and coated with grime and soot.
"Vampire one, Gabe zero," Mary dryly intoned.
Do you know this person? he silently asked.
"I've never seen her before in my life. Or in my afterlife, or whatever this is, for that matter."
"I patched you up the best I could under the circumstances, but you’ll probably want to see your friends at the old church if you’re concerned about little things like scarring." The woman now stood directly in front of him with her arms crossed. "You did all right for a rook mixing it up with an old vamp. In the future, don’t start something you can’t finish."
"Thanks, I think." After a moment's delay Gabe's mind latched onto the old church. "You know the Sister?"
"We've crossed paths. She's not fond of my methods." She patted one of her pistols as she said the latter. "So I tend not to visit often."
"Okay, back to who and what are you?"
"My name is Ri, and I guess you could think of me as a roadie. Lucky for you I was in town last night." She gave him a lopsided grin and a wink. Flinging her coat over her shoulders, she swept through his kitchen and out the back door without another word.
He sat scratching his head, utterly perplexed. "Where do these freaks keep coming from?"
****
The temperatures that day had risen above freezing again and a slow drizzle from a weak cold front dampened every corner of the city. The sun was just disappearing over the horizon and dropping temperatures turned the drizzle to light sleet, coating the wet pavement in ice. Poe was lost in the myriad reflections and colors of light caught and morphed by the ice. She knelt on a rooftop, beside the building's droning HVAC unit. The steady rumble of the fans drowned out the mixed noises of the city, creating a sort of roaring silence.
Her thoughts wandered back, over two decades ago, before. . . .
********
It was three weeks almost to the day since she had been fired from Tommy's Diner and her money was gone. Elle Hokoma sat at one of the far back tables inside The Mill playing with the strings of the black leather bracers she wore on each arm. She didn't feel much like joining the revelers pounding in time to the punk rock music. Only four months had passed since the fight with her parents. She had left their comfortable middle-class home in the suburbs and never looked back. Yeah, look at me, I'm so much better off, she thought, skewing her delicate features into an ugly grimace.
"Such a pretty face, don't ruin it with such an ugly expression." A young woman with finely chiseled features and hair the color of newly fallen snow slid gracefully into the seat across from Elle.
" off." Her expression darkened even more. "Who asked you to have a seat?"
"I like you. I can tell that about people at once you know," the woman said as she leaned across the table. In the dim lighting her face seemed as devoid of color as her hair. She wore a deep red corset and a skirt that revealed far more than it covered. Her arms and legs were covered in black fishnet which terminated under fingerless gloves and shiny black leather boots.
"Who the are you?"
"I'm your new best friend."
"Listenhead, I don't need any friends."
"Such a severe child," the woman said, completely oblivious to Elle's responses. "Whatever shall we call you?"
Elle sat staring at the strange woman, for once without a quick (if never particularly well thought-out) retort. The crowd shifted and the woman looked over her shoulder. Her gaze followed a trio of young men drifting toward the exit.
"I really have to go now, but I will see you tomorrow night." With preternatural grace she rose and disappeared into the crowd.
********
The crunch of a heavy step on roof gravel brought Poe's attention back to the present. A large shadow fell across her face and she looked up at Kifaru's giant form.
"Are you ready?"
© 2004, Austin Hale
Joshua awoke to the sound of the old man in the bunk beneath him snoring. Once conscious, the sounds of people all around breathing, mumbling, snoring, and coughing, even the creaks as they shifted in their sleep, grated like nails screeching across a chalkboard. Bile rose in his throat at the thought of the power being wasted to help this worthless trash. He closed his eyes and imagined the ways he would kill them all, starting with the snoring wretch beneath him.
Below, the corner of the old man's blanket twitched and began to move. Like a serpent it inched upwards. With the barest tickle it wound itself around his neck.
They should all be purged, he fumed, but first their guardians would need to be eliminated. To do that he had to stay inconspicuous, gain the fools' trust and learn their secrets. Karin's instructions to him were simple: lay low and observe, then pass everything on to her. Joshua did not know exactly what it was she was after and honestly he didn't care. She was just a means to an end.
The blanket-snake tightened in silence. The old man's eyes popped open and he made a small gurgling sound.
! Joshua's gloating machinations ended abruptly when he realized his secret was about to be revealed, in a big way. Strangulation would leave obvious signs but he couldn't let the old man go about spouting tales of being attacked by his blanket either. He smiled when the solution sprang into his mind: asphyxiation wouldn't leave marks...Another corner of the blanket clamped firmly over the old man's mouth and nose, while the length coiled around his neck loosened. Instantly the rest of the blanket wrapped tightly about his arms and legs. His eyes bulged as he strained against his woolen assailant, then he lay still. Joshua looked around quickly. No one else in the bunk room stirred. Well, that was easy. The blanket unwound itself from the man and settled across him as gently as if spread by a mother's hand. What a shame, the poor old codger just passed away in the night... Joshua rolled over and drifted to sleep, grinning like a child after his first Christmas.
****
A piercing whistle emanated from the burnished copper kettle suspended over the roaring fire in the Sister's hearth. The kettle levitated off its hook and floated to her waiting, mitt-covered hand. She poured the vigorously boiling water into an earthenware teapot made in the oriental style: a straight handle molded into the vessel separated by ninety degrees from the spout. A small amount of fragrant steam escaped before she placed the tight-fitting lid in place. She released the kettle and it floated obediently back to its hook, which had swung away from the fire. Traveler sat in one of the overstuffed chairs slowly leafing through a weighty tome.
"For the first time in three hundred years a novitiate, much less two are presented to us and both are lost," the Sister said as she sat in her accustomed chair, her face betraying great weariness.
"Mary may yet be saved."
"You believe the old books survived?"
"Until very recently I thought not, but I have suspicion that a sanctuary lies sealed near the peak of Sutay Uul, in the Altai." Traveler's gaze turned to the window and the forest of gravestones beyond. "I will depart once I collect my assistant."
Several moments of silence passed before the Sister spoke again. "It nearly happened again," she spoke slowly, staring into the flames. "When I banished Abrams' demon from Gabriel he nearly took Mary's soul with him."
Traveler closed the book that she held before her. "You cannot continue to blame yourself for what happened then," she turned a stern gaze on the Sister. "Unlike Mary, she brought her fate upon herself. She was no newly initiated sorceress, she knew the dangers inherent in calling on those powers and she knew the inescapable fate of all who do so."
****
Gabe smelled char, then he heard the muted sounds of traffic and sensed bright light though his eye lids. What the hell happened? He inhaled experimentally. His chest felt bruised and stiff, but the stabbing pain was gone. He opened his eyes. Sunlight pouring through windows stabbed directly into his brain.
"Rise and shine."
He found himself lying on his own couch. There was a strange woman in his house. Well, this hasn't happened since college... She was wearing faded blue jeans and a flannel shirt of muted browns and greens. The shirt was open revealing a black t-shirt with '
you' printed across the front in large friendly letters. Her left eyebrow was pierced thrice by small steel bars. She looked young, curvy and solidly built, but not unattractive. "Who the hell are you?"
"That's no way to greet the lady who just saved your ass," she replied from her roost on the edge of his cluttered coffee table. She stood, pulling her dark reddish-brown hair back into a tight pony tail that ended between her shoulder blades. With her arms raised, Gabe clearly saw a black Kevlar holster holding a HK Mark 23 pistol tucked under each arm. She noticed the direction of his gaze.
"Nice guns, huh?" She winked, turning to show her profile.
"Uhm," Gabe said, thinking, not bad.
"Gabe!"
He sat up and grimaced. He noticed that his clothes were matted with dried blood and coated with grime and soot.
"Vampire one, Gabe zero," Mary dryly intoned.
Do you know this person? he silently asked.
"I've never seen her before in my life. Or in my afterlife, or whatever this is, for that matter."
"I patched you up the best I could under the circumstances, but you’ll probably want to see your friends at the old church if you’re concerned about little things like scarring." The woman now stood directly in front of him with her arms crossed. "You did all right for a rook mixing it up with an old vamp. In the future, don’t start something you can’t finish."
"Thanks, I think." After a moment's delay Gabe's mind latched onto the old church. "You know the Sister?"
"We've crossed paths. She's not fond of my methods." She patted one of her pistols as she said the latter. "So I tend not to visit often."
"Okay, back to who and what are you?"
"My name is Ri, and I guess you could think of me as a roadie. Lucky for you I was in town last night." She gave him a lopsided grin and a wink. Flinging her coat over her shoulders, she swept through his kitchen and out the back door without another word.
He sat scratching his head, utterly perplexed. "Where do these freaks keep coming from?"
****
The temperatures that day had risen above freezing again and a slow drizzle from a weak cold front dampened every corner of the city. The sun was just disappearing over the horizon and dropping temperatures turned the drizzle to light sleet, coating the wet pavement in ice. Poe was lost in the myriad reflections and colors of light caught and morphed by the ice. She knelt on a rooftop, beside the building's droning HVAC unit. The steady rumble of the fans drowned out the mixed noises of the city, creating a sort of roaring silence.
Her thoughts wandered back, over two decades ago, before. . . .
********
It was three weeks almost to the day since she had been fired from Tommy's Diner and her money was gone. Elle Hokoma sat at one of the far back tables inside The Mill playing with the strings of the black leather bracers she wore on each arm. She didn't feel much like joining the revelers pounding in time to the punk rock music. Only four months had passed since the fight with her parents. She had left their comfortable middle-class home in the suburbs and never looked back. Yeah, look at me, I'm so much better off, she thought, skewing her delicate features into an ugly grimace.
"Such a pretty face, don't ruin it with such an ugly expression." A young woman with finely chiseled features and hair the color of newly fallen snow slid gracefully into the seat across from Elle.
"
off." Her expression darkened even more. "Who asked you to have a seat?""I like you. I can tell that about people at once you know," the woman said as she leaned across the table. In the dim lighting her face seemed as devoid of color as her hair. She wore a deep red corset and a skirt that revealed far more than it covered. Her arms and legs were covered in black fishnet which terminated under fingerless gloves and shiny black leather boots.
"Who the
are you?""I'm your new best friend."
"Listen
head, I don't need any friends.""Such a severe child," the woman said, completely oblivious to Elle's responses. "Whatever shall we call you?"
Elle sat staring at the strange woman, for once without a quick (if never particularly well thought-out) retort. The crowd shifted and the woman looked over her shoulder. Her gaze followed a trio of young men drifting toward the exit.
"I really have to go now, but I will see you tomorrow night." With preternatural grace she rose and disappeared into the crowd.
********
The crunch of a heavy step on roof gravel brought Poe's attention back to the present. A large shadow fell across her face and she looked up at Kifaru's giant form.
"Are you ready?"
© 2004, Austin Hale
Broccli_Head
Explorer
Lamprolign said:
Cool. Vampire fight.
"For the first time in three hundred years a novitiate, much less two are presented to us and both are lost," the Sister said as she sat in her accustomed chair, her face betraying great weariness.
"Mary may yet be saved."
"You believe the old books survived?"
"Until very recently I thought not, but I have suspicion that a sanctuary lies sealed near the peak of Sutay Uul, in the Altai." Traveler's gaze turned to the window and the forest of gravestones beyond. "I will depart once I collect my assistant."
Cool stuff Lamp! I've been waiting for the quest to return Mary to her body to be chronicled. Sounds like a great adventure is in store for Traveler and her companion. Of course, while they are off in the Altai, I'll be wreaking havoc with Gabe & Co. in the First Sight: Witch Hammer story arc.![:]](http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/devious.png "Devious :]")
Be afraid. Be very afraid.
"Mary may yet be saved."
"You believe the old books survived?"
"Until very recently I thought not, but I have suspicion that a sanctuary lies sealed near the peak of Sutay Uul, in the Altai." Traveler's gaze turned to the window and the forest of gravestones beyond. "I will depart once I collect my assistant."
Cool stuff Lamp! I've been waiting for the quest to return Mary to her body to be chronicled. Sounds like a great adventure is in store for Traveler and her companion. Of course, while they are off in the Altai, I'll be wreaking havoc with Gabe & Co. in the First Sight: Witch Hammer story arc.
Be afraid. Be very afraid.Lamprolign
First Post
My apologies for posting without a new update, but Hanasays just finished a First Sight wallpaper image which she's posted over at Deviant Art. http://www.deviantart.com/view/13213874/ I think it's pretty darned cool to say the least.
Lamprolign
First Post
My apologies for the long absence folks. The evil, time draining monster of work keeps stealing both writing time and energy. Rest assured though that eventually I'll be back. There is a First Sight Blog (http://www.deadjournal.com/users/lamprolign/) where I whine about the lack of time to write without raising false hopes by posting said whines to the forum. Thanks for the feedback, it does a soul good to be missed.
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