Metropolis (The World in Waiting) - Chapter One

[D20Dazza]

Seeing the half orc has the large beast in hand Ghost moves to where the warriors battle, singing at the top of his voice, hoping to inspire courage in the beleagured group.

 

[Phoenix]

OOC: [sblock] Sure go on, break my heart here why don't ya [/sblock]

"Cindee, of course I am here to rescue you. Now think hard, what words did they say to open the locks?" say the Jackal as patiently as he can. I need help he thinks. He grabs the oldest boys again. "Listen, you need to head down the other cells, I am looking for some of my own kids here" and Jovik rattles off the list of his boys "Go ask in the other cells, and see if you can find them, they can help me go faster" As he waits for Cindee's reply of the words, a thought that has been slowly gestating in the back of his mind begins to stand up. If I killed Zsath, does that make me the new Zsath? Am I a god now. The sword did weird thing on me, was that me or the sword.? Time to test it out. And with a mighty breath, the Jackal summons every once of power he can muster in his body and points his sowrd down the hall and shouts "I, Jovik the Jackal, Slayer of Zsath do command these locks to open!"

"I cun member, we tried ta say dem, but the din work..."

Jovik stood in the corridor for a few seconds with his sword in one hand, staring at the locks that stubbornly refused to open. Some of the children had stopped and looked at Jovik in that strange, 'you are a lunitic' kind of way.

Now that the noise had died down a little bit, a small voice called from the far end of the cells. "Jovik, up here!" Looking up the corridor, and along the point of his sword, Jovik could barely see the face of Wasp staring at him through a crowd of other children.

 

[Phoenix]

[sblock]Initiative Order:
Taran (and Twitchy and Cujo the Dire Wolf) - 19
Rogue Group - 17 (Holding doors)
Ba'aktar - 15
Warrior Group - 13
Ettin - 12
Ghost - 9
Yellow Robes - 5

Combat Rolls:
Dire Wolf attack roll (Cultist - AC 13) +15 - Hit
Dire Wolf damage roll - 15pts (-6/18hp)
Twitchy attack roll (Cultist - AC 13) +29 - Critical Threat
Twitchy critical confirmation (AC 13) +14 - Hit
Twitchy damage roll - 10pts (-2/18hp)
Cultist Reflex save (DC 16) +10 - Failure
Taran lightning damage - 14pts (-5/18hp)
Ba'aktar attack roll (Ettin - AC 14) +20 - Hit
Ba'aktar damage roll - 14pts (51pts total)
Yellow Robes attack roll (Dire Wolf - AC 14) +16/+19/+18/+6/+8 - Hit/Hit/Hit/Miss/Miss
Yellow Robes damage roll - 5pts/8pts/5pts (27/45hp)
Inspire Courage takes effect (+1 to hit and damage/+1 vs Fear Saves)[/sblock]

With the giant on the ground, Twitchy and the newly formed Dire Wolf charge the remaining cultists, allowing the badly beaten warriors to withdraw from combat. A rabid hacking noise comes from the giant as Ba'akatar slashes desperately at the creature's throats, making good headway into hacking them from its shoulders.
A lightning strike smashes one of the robes to the floor as Taran targets from the walkkway above, two more robes following quickly as the two beasts claim their victims. With only five left in the chamber, the wounded warriors move to help bar the doors. The cultists choose to surround the Dire Wolf, attempting to take the large creature down.
The clear voice of Ghost begins to ring out in the room, encouraging the invaders to swiftly finish off the remaining defenders.

 

[Bront]

Taran, 33/33 HP, AC: 18 (16 Charging) (No shield, but +2 for Barkskin)

Taran finaly strides into battle purposly, drawing his full spear, he charges into battle beside Twitchy, hoping to help out the wolf.

OOC: MW Spear(2H) +6,+2 Charge,+2 Flank,+1 Courage (+11 total)/ 1d6+1,+1 Courage/ 20x3

 

[Fenris]

"I cun member, we tried ta say dem, but the din work..."

Jovik stood in the corridor for a few seconds with his sword in one hand, staring at the locks that stubbornly refused to open. Some of the children had stopped and looked at Jovik in that strange, 'you are a lunitic' kind of way.

Now that the noise had died down a little bit, a small voice called from the far end of the cells. "Jovik, up here!" Looking up the corridor, and along the point of his sword, Jovik could barely see the face of Wasp staring at him through a crowd of other children.

"Alright Cindee, Stay with me right now OK? Come down here with me, what were they words they said?." Jovik heads down the corridor to the cell where Wasp is."Oh, So now you know who I am? Now you care?" as Jovik works the locks to free his pupil. "Are the other boys down here? Do you still have your tools? We need to work fast to get all the doors open. This girl says she heard them using words as keys, what did you see and hear about that?"

 

[Phoenix]

"Alright Cindee, Stay with me right now OK? Come down here with me, what were they words they said?." Jovik heads down the corridor to the cell where Wasp is."Oh, So now you know who I am? Now you care?" as Jovik works the locks to free his pupil. "Are the other boys down here? Do you still have your tools? We need to work fast to get all the doors open. This girl says she heard them using words as keys, what did you see and hear about that?"

Wasp looks at Jovik with calm eyes. "Shut up Jackal, I really don't need to hear your whining at the moment, this is serious. You, are supposed to be dead, obviously you're not. I was calling to you before but you couldn't hear me, most of us have turned already, meaning that if we are going to pick out Avatar, it may, unfortunately, have to be you. Pass me some tools and I'll help get us out, there is no way that we will be able to use the cult's 'magic words' to open these cells, unless suddenly you became trained in the mystic arts since I saw you last..."

 

[Fenris]

Wasp looks at Jovik with calm eyes. "Shut up Jackal, I really don't need to hear your whining at the moment, this is serious. You, are supposed to be dead, obviously you're not. I was calling to you before but you couldn't hear me, most of us have turned already, meaning that if we are going to pick out Avatar, it may, unfortunately, have to be you. Pass me some tools and I'll help get us out, there is no way that we will be able to use the cult's 'magic words' to open these cells, unless suddenly you became trained in the mystic arts since I saw you last..."

"I see incarceration has taught you some manners Wasp. I could leave you here you know." says the Jackal half seriously as he hands over some of his picks. "You owe me some explainations Wasp. All hell broke loose after you left, and I want some answers since you seems to know so much. Why I am supposed to be dead huh? Did you sell me out to Rashul? And what do mean 'most of us have turned'? And what the name of Zsath is picking out an Avatar?" Jovik is nearly yelling by the end, but still focused on getting the next lock open.

 

[Phoenix]

"I see incarceration has taught you some manners Wasp. I could leave you here you know." says the Jackal half seriously as he hands over some of his picks. "You owe me some explainations Wasp. All hell broke loose after you left, and I want some answers since you seems to know so much. Why I am supposed to be dead huh? Did you sell me out to Rashul? And what do mean 'most of us have turned'? And what the name of Zsath is picking out an Avatar?" Jovik is nearly yelling by the end, but still focused on getting the next lock open.

OOC:
Dear Players of Metropolis,

I am going to take this moment to point something out. Below is a stat block for Jovik the Jackal from his old friend Wasp. Now, usually there will be a note to say it's just for him, then we all go in to read it to find out what is going on behind the scenes.

I will give you fair warning then before I mention that the below is for Jovik. The following stat block is a Spoiler, a really, really, really, big spoiler. Now, I'm not telling you not to read it, I am simply mentioning that if you would prefer not to know what is really going on, don't read it. Really don't.

And without further-a-do:

Jovik the Jackal:
[sblock]The children in the cells about Wasp suddenly go quiet, staring at Jovik with a sort of focused glare. The only noise now wafts from the battle out in the main chamber. Wasp steps up to the bars in his cell and looks out at Jovik.
Some of the children nearby shriek, causing Jovik to look around reflexively. The children go pale, their hair shrinks back into their head, their bones slide in their bodies, their skin shrinks back painfully across their forms. The children seem to be getting forcibly younger, some of them turning into babies.
A concussion wave eminates from the children, identical to the one that Jovik had seen coming from the yellow robed man that was hunting Wasp before. The sounds from the battle seem to warp, as if they were slowing down, and finally stop completely.
"Jovik the Jackal, you are supposed to be dead." The look on Wasp's face is far from young, behind his eyes lay an eternity, an immortality that had seen secrets that are hidden to mortal men.
"Jovik the Jackal was supposed to die that day in the warehouse. I know of this because I have seen it before, I was there the first time it happened. You need to know this Jovik, because few of us are left, we have mostly turned."
"We are the last. Metropolis is dying, she can feel it even now. Before she died though, she found us, the last generation of children to be born in a sterile world. She empowered us to live our lives backwards, to experiance everything again, but this time in reverse. We were supposed to come back to our childhood, choose a point in our lives when we believed that we could stop what was happening.
"Unfortunately as we grew younger, we became younger as well. It was harder and harder for us to choose, to make decisions, to actually do anything to alter the city. So we searched for people to help us, the Men in Yellow. Their leader we approached in the 'future', he discovered that he could harness our powers and travel backwards with us, moving back and forth through the time-stream even.
"We cannot stop him, though it may not really matter since the city is dying. To make things worse, when we reach a certain age we begin to forget, our bodies and minds are turned around in the timestream and we revert to our younger days once more, forgetting everything of what happened.
"Jovik the Jackal, you being alive today proves that our influence can change things, major things. If you are alive than you have cheated Zsath in his domain, it proves that people like you have the capability to help us. We have little time left, but few of us remember what is to come..."[/sblock]

 

[Fenris]

Likewise, those players who love to see the twists and turns Phoenix so loving puts in his games should avoid reading this post as well since it will refer to the above spoiler block.

Phoenix, Master of Metropolis:
[sblock] Jovik's head reeled. Had it even been twenty-four hours yet since this had all started. His head raced to process all that Wasp was telling him. He wasn't stupid, you don't survive in the alleys, being stupid, but he wasn't used to thinking on this scale, this magnitude of time and space. But at least Wasp seemed to have answers, and that was good. He didn't yet know all that was going on, but it was slowly crystalizing in his head and he had Wasp, or at least the boy (or man, he wasn't sure now) that used to be Wasp and could get more answers.

"Alright Wasp, you seem to know more about what is going on around here than I do. But I will tell you why I am not dead, which may frighten you more. When Rashul and his cronies came in, I tried to bribe them. Suddenly the room grew pale and a mist arose. Mighty Zsath appeared and told me I was dead, that Rashul had slit my throat. Well you know how well I must have taken that. I refuse to believe him and argued with him. I grew angry that he was taking me and drew my sword and struck at him. I didn't know that it should have been a futile attempt to strike a god. But I had had it up to here with magic that day and didnt really believe it was Zsath, I hadn't heard of him. So I struck at Zsath with my blade. Ever seen a god die Wasp? I have. Boy was he surprised. I managed to crawl back and find my body, somehow fusing my soul with it again. I had no mark nor scar no wound to indicate I had been attacked. So I figured that it wasn't Zsath, but some other mystical hallucination. Well, later, come to find out people aren't dying. You cut 'em, stab 'em and they just stand there like nothing happened, and they keep coming. Like these damn yellow men here, you have to stomp 'em into goo to keep them down! So it seems that I have killed Zsath the Banker of Souls. There, that ought to age you a bit " say the Jackal with a smile.

"Now, there are a whole bunch of people back there slaughtering yellow-robes. But seems like we need not to attack the body but the head. Do you know where, hell or when we can find the head guy or how to stop him? If you remember what is to come we can stop it from happening right? Since things are different now?"

"You know I had a crazy thought, remember that weird street preacher we kept stealing coins out of his hat? What was that he talked about? Reinforcement, No reincarceration, definitely No. Reincarnation, yeah that was it. Well maybe Zsath takes all these souls away and once there the come back to be re-born as babies. Maybe since I killed him they can't come back? Or maybe since I have killed him he can't remove the souls from Metropolis anymore and the souls can find new homes in little babies and the city won't be sterile?" Jovik smiles a bit at his metaphysical epiphany.

As The Jackal works the lock to free Wasp he says "So what do I need to do to help you? To help Metropolis?"
[/sblock]

 

[Festy_Dog]

Ba'aktar continues tearing into the creature, moving onto the cultists once the creature's heads are removed from its shoulders.