Demiurge
And so, another week, another scene.
1: There will be combat in this. You probably expected that.
2: Since it's late, it would be good if we could try to post in a timely fashion.
3: You know the drill by now. If anything in the scene makes you uncomfortable, don't hesitate to let me know.
4: Fun times, woo!
Kalen Holliday
[Nightmares]
Dice: 6 d10 TN7 (1, 1, 5, 6, 7, 9) ( success x 2 )
Demiurge
[I should totally do some Awareness here]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 8, 9, 9) ( success x 3 )
Sid Weston
[maybe i should do that, too]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 9, 10) ( success x 3 ) Re-rolls: 1
Kalen Holliday
[Everyone is doing it!]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 3, 5, 5, 9, 10) ( success x 2 )
Demiurge
It
was late the following morning by the time Ian rode back to the house.
The sun was bright and full in the wide Colorado sky, and likely Kalen
and Sid were both awake and going about whatever business they needed to
attend to. Wherever they were, they'd hear the tell-tale sound of
hooves beating a cantering path down the road, and soon enough Ian's
horse drew to a stop on the front lawn, its dark coat gleaming with
sweat in the late summer heat. Ian hopped off the saddle and stroked his
hand down the mare's neck calmingly.
Almost, he called out to
catch Kalen's attention (wherever he was.) But something had changed
since the last time Ian had been here. A new resonance hung about the
property - something that carried hints of verdant growth. It wasn't in
itself cause for suspicion, but it had been so long since Ian had even
encountered another willworker besides Kalen, and this particular one
was unfamiliar to him.
So he hung back, led the horse to a shady spot beneath a tree and looked around, checking for signs of trouble.
Sid Weston
After
getting herself cleaned up in the nearby river the night before,
including her clothes, including what belongings she had that needed to
be cleaned, Sid found a place to bunk for the night. She slept wherever
there was room, on the floor if she had to, pack for a pillow and
whatever Kalen had on hand for a blanket. Maybe he had an actual
blanket for her. Point is, she got what rest she could.
The next
morning was spent making preparations. Water was gathered from the
river, as much of it as she could carry to the house. Kalen mentioned
something about fire to boil the water to purify it, but with Sid on
hand that sort of thing is no longer necessary. She purified it
herself, eliminating the harmful microbes while encouraging any that
might be helpful to their digestive cycles. Then she checked over her
equipment again, checked that her blades were good and clean and free of
rust and as sharp as they needed to be.
It's a little later in
the morning now, and Sid is outside with her own horse. The ghostly
grey-white thoroughbred mare that has been her companion these last few
months stands stolidy in front of her while Sid works her over with a
brush and checks her hooves for stones. She releases one of Lovelace's
forehooves when she senses the unfamiliar resonance of another and she
straightens. Her long red hair has been pulled back to the nape of her
neck, and she's weaering the same things she's been wearing for ages.
T-shirt beneath a light jacket, tattered jeans, boots. She lifts a hand
above her glasses to shade her eyes to watch for the newcomer. Cunning
and elegant, sly and, well she just wanted to be sure she saw this one
coming before it was too late.
When she sees him her hand lowers to her side, but she continues to watch Ian warily as he dismounts.
[this
is because i mentioned it: purify water/harm microbes or whatevs: Life 2
coincidental, she would've taken her time, threshold uh, let's go 3?
Target+Effect+1]
Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (4, 5, 7) ( success x 3 )
Kalen Holliday
Kalen,
who may have gotten slightly more hopeful by the end of his initial
conversations with Sid, was quiet after that. There were things to
consider, new and different and uncertain things that he wasn't sure
were better or worse than being caught in a zombie apocalypse. At least
if there still is another world and they can get back to it he will not
be condemned to stale coffee beans. Or, worse, instant coffee?
Ian
comes close enough that Kalen can sense him and hear hooves on the road
and he does not go flying out to meet Ian in that very instant because
Ian is not his. Not to Name and not to greet with equal parts relief
and radiant joy and not to keep much past today in any sense at all. So
he waits until he can let some distance dim anything that says that
this means everything.
You cannot expect to lay those things on Ian and have it go well than you can expect to put boots on a cat.
So
it is a moment before he comes outside, steps off the small porch and
walks toward not Ian, but Sid. He does raise one hand and wave to Ian,
which hopefully he will take to mean everything is alright and come to
join them.
Demiurge
The first time Ian met his
horse, it had looked at him the way a horse might look at a domesticated
predator - wary and skeptical, as though it wasn't entirely sure if it
might need to be concerned for its own welfare. Because Ian looked and
smelled like a person, but he felt like something else.
They'd
gotten over that. It was used to him now. Even, one might say, fond of
him (in much the same aloof manner that Ian himself was fond of her.)
Perhaps Sunshadow still gave him a side-eye now and then, but she seemed
to have adjusted to his presence as well. For Lovelace, he was still an
unknown entity. Maybe she'd be wary of him, maybe not. They'd all had
to get used to stranger and more dangerous things than him.
It was
Sid's red hair that caught Ian's gaze initially, and the two of them
regarded each other with wary silence as Kalen left the house. Kalen's
behavior seemed to indicate that Sid's presence was not an unwelcome
thing, so Ian nodded toward them and set about pulling the tack off his
horse (Kalen heard him call her Dusk once, but the majority of Ian's
communication with the mare seemed to be nonverbal.)
When he was done, he gave her a pat and she trotted off to the river to get a drink as Ian approached Sid and Kalen.
Sid
had never seen Ian in his other life. When he'd been polished and put
together like a fashion model. So she wouldn't have any frame of
reference to compare with the picture he presented now. His hair was
buzzed to a fine layer, and he looked as rough and worn as the rest of
them (though at least he'd shaved the day before.) The summer sun had
given his skin a noticeable tan, and his clothes (a white t-shirt, black
army pants and boots) sported a couple of fresh stains from the dead
he'd encountered on his trip. Like Sid, he was well equipped with
weaponry: a pistol strapped to one thigh, a knife on his belt and a
sword on his back.
"Kalen, I have to talk to you."
Ian gave Sid a long, measuring glance, as though weighing the merits of letting her in on the news.
"Friend of yours?"
Sid Weston
It's
Kalen coming to stand near to her that is the signal Sid needs. This
is not some other survivor roaming free, looking for targets. Sid has
had her fill of men like that throughout her adult life, she has no
patience for them in this one. But Kalen raises his hand and Sid, she
looks Ian over once more, eyes narrowed as she takes in his appearance,
the weapons she can see, before she returns her attention to Lovelace.
If the horse showed any signs of skittishness at the approach of the
stranger, Sid soothes it away with a touch. One might be amazed how
comforting a touch from Sid's warm hands can be.
She runs her
hands down over the horse's forelegs, feeling for any soreness, any sign
of injury that needs to be repaired before checking her hooves for
stones.
She moves around to Lovelace's far side when Ian asks if
she's a friend of Kalen's. Sid looks at the Orphan from over Lovelace's
back and says, "We don't hate each other." Like that's the only way
that question can be answered, really. Isn't it, though? One night Sid
stretched herself across Kalen and Lena on a couch. She'd been hurting
that night, just as she hurts most nights anymore. And when she saw
him on the porch yesterday she threw herself into his arms, happy just
to see a familiar face that wasn't grey with death. But close? But
friends?
Hm.
She continues working on her horse. If Ian is insistent he speak with Kalen separately they can move.
Kalen Holliday
Kalen
blinks and then says, voice quiet and not-quite actually calm, "Yeah, I
missed you too." Except to anyone who has been around Kalen more than
five minutes, that is more something uneasy and anxious than Kalen being
upset by a lack of greeting. Because he still doesn't really
understand more now than yesterday what to do. He half told Sid, like a
practice run, but tucked into so many other things he's not sure she
understood the significance. And now Ian wants to talk. He played off
coincidences just last night to Sid, but so much of his magic is wrapped
up in Fate....
'We don't hate each other.' Kalen only flinches a little at that. His explanation is slightly more committal.
"This
is Sid. She's in my cabal. Maybe we're all that's left of it. I
don't-" He stops, sudden and mid-sentence, but it isn't grief. It
isn't fear. Not this time. It's that same gnawing uncertainty as
before. He doesn't understand what's happening to them anymore.
"But,
if-" He shrugs. He'll go with Ian to somewhere else or talk here. It
isn't so much that he is indifferent as that he has confusion and a
problem he can't directly solve and he's content to let Ian decide where
they speak. And who is present or not present.
Demiurge
It
was obvious from Ian's body language that he wasn't sure what to think
about Sid. That another person might be waiting for him here on his
return had honestly never crossed his mind. (Though given Kalen's
propensity toward collecting people, Ian probably shouldn't have been
surprised.)
We don't hate each other, Sid replied, and
were the circumstances any different, Ian would have probably been
amused. But the anxious coil of tension in his body wasn't about to get
chased away that easily.
Kalen offered up more details. Sid was in
his cabal. They knew each other. Maybe that was a good sign. It seemed
the closer they got to Denver, the more people they picked up.
That initial comment from Kalen... it got a veiled look, but no overt response.
Finally
Ian let out a breath. "Ian," he introduced himself to Sid. Then to both
of them, "Something fucked up is going on here. Not just what we can
see. All of that shit that happened to me in New York... it's not real.
Like I fucking dreamed it."
Ian's agitation in that moment was obvious. A telling thing, given his propensity for caginess.
"I
checked out the edges of the city. It's pretty bad, but if we go around
the long way we can get to the Chantry, if that's still where you want
to go."
Sid Weston
[awarepathy: have you lost your mind?]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 4, 6, 7, 7, 7, 8) ( success x 5 )
Demiurge
[Manip+Subterfuge - this is specifically regarding the look he gave Kalen. Everything else he isn't trying to hide.]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 4, 5, 5, 6, 9) ( success x 2 )
Demiurge
[Ian may or may not have lost his mind, but from what Sid can tell, he at least seems
quite sane. He isn't lying to them right now. He believes very much
what he is saying. He doesn't know what to believe anymore. He's tense
and suspicious, not of them specifically but of... everything. Sid is an
unknown entity, and he isn't sure yet how he feels about her. His
reaction isn't totally hostile, but neither is it accepting. Likely
he'll need time to form a more solid opinion.
As for Kalen... Ian
wasn't thrilled with the greeting he got, though it did instill a brief
flicker of guilt (so clearly he's aware that he maybe could have handled
that better.) There was a little irritation there, and impatience. Like
maybe he didn't think it the appropriate time for whatever Kalen was
trying to tell him.]
Sid Weston
Kalen
introduces Sid as his cabalmate, and at that moment she's hidden by
Lovelace and so neither man sees her reaction. They don't see her at
all until she's made it around to oh so carefully check the mare's hind
hooves. She and Lovelace have a bond now, but she is still a horse and
this is still a dangerous area. Sid wasn't born on a farm, in fact the
nearest she's ever been to one was months and months ago, when an
Etherite invited her to one.
She straightens when Ian introduces himself, gives him a nod of acknowledgement because Kalen had mentioned him.
"You
were in New York?" she asks abruptly. Sid heard stories about New
York. They're why she's avoiced cities up until now. "What do you
mean, you dreamed it?"
It's crazy, right? It's crazy to say that
he dreamed up what happened there. But Ian, he seems to be a few
things, but crazy isn't one of them. Sid looks to Kalen. Kalen who
said what he remembered happening has become as insubstantial as what
hasn't happened yet.
Kalen Holliday
Kalen lets out
a shaky breath and nods. "Okay. So it isn't real. And I'm not going
crazy and trying to just not believe...." Ian, at least, knows what
Kalen would so much want not to believe. "At least, not conventionally
world we had before real." And if it was just him, just Ian, maybe he
would have said something else. There is a certain ridiculousness to
pretending not be overwhelmed in front of someone who was holding you
while you were very definitely broken not even a week ago. But Sid is
here and he spent more than twenty seconds last night giving her a brave
we save the world because it's what we do speech.
"If this isn't
really the world, I don't know that we should be looking to save it.
Not unless we're planning to stay. But, I guess saving it was never
the entirety of our plans, only mine. Still...whatever our
plans...unless we're planning to stay, it is probably time to
reevaluate." He half-smiles, but it doesn't hit his eyes and it is grim
enough that there should be a word for it that isn't actually smile.
"Unless either of you is really interested in staying in a horror
movie...?"
Sid Weston
[i am totally cool with this revelation: manip+subt (hidden emotions)]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 3, 6, 6, 9) ( success x 3 )
Demiurge
You were in New York?
"I thought I was. Now I don't know what to think. This. All of this... this is real."
Ian gestured at the trees, the grass, the horse standing in front of
him. He knew as well as Sid just how alive all of it really was. This
wasn't a dream, at least... if it was... it wasn't any kind of dream
he'd ever experienced.
But maybe it wasn't so much a matter of real or not real. (Maybe it was more a matter of whose reality it really was.)
"You
remembered?" He asked Kalen, and there was a flicker of relief in his
voice. "We lost time. Everything that happened before, like, a week ago.
That wasn't real."
There was a beat, and Ian scrubbed
the faint rasp of stubble on the bottom of his chin. "I want to go. I
want to see what we'll find at the Chantry." But it wasn't only his
choice, so Ian looked between Sid and Kalen expectantly, waiting for
them to weigh in with their opinions.
Kalen Holliday
[Sid! What are your feels?]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 9) ( success x 5 )
Sid Weston
A
dream. She looks around, across the brown, grassy expanse of eastern
Colorado. She has felt that grass. She has felt Lovelace moving
beneath her, she has felt the weight and pressure against her wrist as
she shoved a knife into a zombie's eye. She has felt this world. She has sensed it.
And
she has been questing across it for one purpose and one purpose alone.
To find the ones she loves, the one she loves. If he's alive, make
amends, put the past behind them, work together for the future. And if
he's not?
Kalen is right in saying that saving this world was his
plan. It was never hers. She would go with him and his friend until
her own quest came to an end. If she didn't find the person she was
looking for whole and healthy and alive? One can imagine given her
state of mind these last few months how that would have gone.
But
it's not true? She takes a breath to steady herself, to maintain a
demeanor of wary calm. She's not sure she should believe them, but it's
two against one. Two of them who believe that the world is not as it
seems with one who knows that it is. She's not going to challenge
them. Not here, not now.
"Why?" she asks, just as she asked Kalen
yesterday. Why look for The Message, what purpose do you think it'll
serve? "What do you think you'll find at the Chantry? If this is a
dream. If this is a dream, we need to find a way to wake up."
She hms to herself, and she hms
very quietly, feeling for the vibration of the note in her skull until
it resonates. With what? She's not even sure she'll find out.
[Watch dat Weaving, yo (i can't imagine anything'll come from this but she would try it): Prime 1, practiced]
Dice: 3 d10 TN3 (4, 5, 9) ( success x 3 )
Kalen Holliday
"Maybe
there will be something there. If any other Magi are here, maybe they
are trying to get there too." Kalen shakes his head.
"And because
as much as I agree that we need to find a way to wake up....I don't
know what it would be. If this world is representational enough, there
may be answers in the library at the House. Finding those or anyone
else we know who might be trapped here...I don't have a better plan than
that. I was trained to hunt monsters.
"Whatever this is...I don't know what to do."
Demiurge
Sid
looked for some sign, some hint the world might not be what it seemed.
But she found nothing. No tracks of mystical manipulation. Just the
grass and the sky and the horse's heavy, reassuring heartbeat beside
her.
What did they think they were going to find at the Chantry?
"Honestly?"
Ian answered. "I don't think we're going to find anything. I don't
think we're going to find a damn thing in the city either, except death
and decay and more of those things."
So then why did he want to go? Why did he want to see?
"I
just want to see something familiar. To see if it's the same." Ian
glanced down at his horse, who was now standing in the shade, using her
tail to swat away the flies hovering around her flanks. She'd need a bit
of a rest, and he needed something to eat, so he walked back to where
he'd left his things beneath the tree and opened one of the packs on the
saddle. Inside it were cans of food he'd picked up from a mostly-bare
convenience store.
"I'm leaving after lunch. You guys can come with me or not."
Sid Weston
If
they are trapped in a dream by magical means, the sense of it is
probably outside of their dreaming minds. The Tapestery here is...well
it's exactly what it's supposed to be. Or how it seems it should be.
Sid's memories of the last three months are solid, real. But the notion
that this is all fake casts all of that in doubt.
Ian walks away to grab food. Sid watches him, but all she says to him is, "There's fresh water inside."
She
turns to Kalen. "Yesterday we talked about the likelihood of the three
of us showing up in the same place within a week. If this is a horror
movie. Kalen, we could be being driven toward a...a final end boss
fight." She looks up then, out across the plains toward the west, where
she knows the city is. The horizon line is faintly jagged, the sign of
their nearness to the mountains.
They were drawn here for a
reason. "Could be we'll find whatever's making us dream...all of this
in there, too." There is still doubt in her voice that this really is
just a dream. She will keep herself adaptable to either scenario, but
this one before her is the one that she analyzes.
She shrugs.
"Whichever, we stick together. Nothing good ever happens when the party
splits. To the Chantry or to some other part of Denver, my goal's the
same."
Kalen Holliday
"Yeah. I know. It's like
we were meant to be here together." He takes a deep breath. "I'm not
exactly loving where we are but...if nothing else, I can try to keep us
from being eaten by zombies until we figure out a better plan. Same
world as we had before or not...I'd rather we not find out what getting
eaten by those things is like." Eaten, he says. Not bitten. Not
turned. Real or not real, he's not sure he could handle shooting Ian or
Sid the way he did Seth.
"The thing about only having a
hammer...." He smiles faintly. "Is that you have to go see if you'll
need an axe. If you'll excuse me, I'll be off to see if divination is
still a real thing. Come get me before you leave."
Kalen Holliday
[Time/Entropy
Divinations on significant moments of most possible futures - WP - and
extending - D=4 -- 2(Sphere)+3(standard)-1(taking time)]
Dice: 2 d10 TN4 (7, 10) ( success x 3 ) [WP]
Kalen Holliday
[Same thing, but +1 D for extending = 5]
Dice: 2 d10 TN5 (4, 5) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Demiurge
[This
is what Kalen sees when he opens his mind to the possibilities of the
future. Of fate. He sees himself alone on a horse, riding and riding for
miles. Endlessly alone and surrounded by death. He sees himself dancing
in a room with Sid and Ian and a girl he's never seen before. And they
almost look happy. He sees himself being torn apart by walkers. He sees
himself die.
There is no fate here. There are only choices. Some will lead one way, some will lead another. The future is uncertain.
But
then he sees the image of a glowing two-headed ouroboros, and
everything goes white. And he sees himself in a hospital bed. He sees
himself unconscious, then he sees his eyes open.]
Demiurge
It
was decided then. They were going home. (At least, to what remained of
it.) Though Ian had never considered Denver to be his home (that ranking
belonged to a different city he didn't have the heart to see.)
Ian
took just enough time to eat and rehydrate and get himself cleaned up.
When he was ready, he re-saddled his horse and waited silently for the
others to join him.
He didn't talk much after that, as the three
of them rode out onto the road and began to make their way toward
Denver. The safer route was the longer one - not through the city but
around it. If they moved quickly, they'd reach the Chantry by sundown.
There
were walkers on the way, wandering aimlessly around the edges of the
city in slow-moving groups, but as far out as they were, they were easy
to avoid. No sense putting themselves at risk when they didn't need to.
The
landscape here was heart-breakingly familiar. It was the same Denver
they knew... and yet, it wasn't. Empty and broken and crawling with the
dead. There was no sign of any survivors.
It was late evening by
the time the Chantry property appeared in their field of vision. The sun
was starting to set on the horizon, painting the sky in brilliant hues
of pink and gold. It was almost picturesque, if one didn't know what
else lay out there.
Maybe they were expecting some worst-case
scenario. That the house would be in shambles or occupied by something
monstrous. But from a distance, it looked exactly the same. There were
no cars in the driveway. No signs of life at all.
Sid Weston
[let us double-check that: Matter 1/Life 1 scan the property, practiced]
Dice: 3 d10 TN3 (2, 2, 5) ( success x 1 )
Demiurge
[Life 1 - cause Ian be scanning too]
Dice: 2 d10 TN3 (4, 9) ( success x 2 )
Sid Weston
While
Ian ate and got cleaned up, Sid continued her own preparations. She
made sure that the horses were well and healthy and able to make this
journey. She made sure she had packed up rations and food. The
pillowcase full of seeds she wraps up and tucks away inside her pack.
And then they're off.
Before
the house appears in the distance Sid slows, frowning as she looks down
at the ground. Things are overgrown, which they shouldn't be. There
are signs of drought, which there shouldn't be. Her rote protected a
five acre swath of land with the house in the center. The plants there
should be resistant to all forms of weather.
"This is wrong," she says. "The rote I cast should be in effect for another month. At least."
That's
when she looks up to see ahead of them, alert to anything else out of
the ordinary. Any dangers unseen. She opens her mind and casts her
senses wide in hopes of finding any other signs of life, any other Mages
they knew that might have already made their way here.
Or any of the undead crawling all over this area.
[extending because she wants that sense to last the scene]
Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (2, 4, 10) ( success x 2 )
Demiurge
The
house looked the same, but not everything about the property was as Sid
remembered it. The verdant growth instilled by her effect had vanished.
She could sense life (trees, grass, insects, even a few birds) but it
no longer resembled her healing touch.
And there were no people
nearby. Not in the house, not wandering the hills around the property,
not in the woods. The place appeared to be vacant.
But there was
something out there. More than one of them. In the woods behind the
house. Ten... no, fifteen. That she could sense. They were heading
through the trees. Toward the place where the node
should be.
Kalen Holliday
Kalen is quiet too.
He
doesn't know what he is supposed to do now. This place, this reality,
whatever it is...it offers him no answers when he reaches out to the
currents of fate that thread through and around and between everything.
But
it gave him a symbol. It gave him the image of waking in what he hopes
was the world they've somehow left behind. Been cast out of? He
doesn't know. Still, it is enough that he asks them to tell him if they
find a two-headed ouroboros, and then stays quiet. He isn't sure if
the symbol is going to appear or the symbol is a sign or....
He
doesn't know anything and the people he delighted in forging unknown
paths with were...from another life. Not just from that other world,
but another time in another world. So he stays close to Ian and Sid,
particularly Ian because even if they are not falling into bed together
right now, even if they are not like were and they are in some other
world...Ian has almost always calmed him down. That hasn't changed.
"Everything is wrong," Kalen murmurs. "We're in the wrong place."
[Perception+Alertness: Sp. Sensing Danger]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (3, 5, 5, 7, 7, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 5 ) Re-rolls: 1
Kalen Holliday
[Awareness]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (3, 4, 6, 7, 7, 7, 9, 10, 10) ( success x 7 ) Re-rolls: 2
Sid Weston
[percept (paranoid as bananas) +alert (Kalen if you STOLE ALL THE SUXX >:[[[[[[ ]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 4, 5, 5, 8, 10) ( success x 2 ) Re-rolls: 1
Demiurge
[Awareness]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 5, 5, 6, 9) ( success x 2 )
Demiurge
[Alertness]
Dice: 5 d10 TN4 (2, 4, 10, 10, 10) ( success x 4 )
Demiurge
[Sid cannot yet see or hear the walkers. Not from this distance, but it doesn't matter much. She knows they're there.
What's
more unnerving, perhaps, is that she also cannot feel the Chantry's
resonance. That well of Rejuvenation that normally springs from the
node.]
Demiurge
[As aware as Kalen is tonight, he
could sense another mage coming from half a mile away. But he doesn't.
He doesn't sense his friends, or even a stranger. Nor can he feel the
familiar well of Rejuvenating resonance that ought to be spilling forth
from the node.
Ian was more right than he knew. There is nothing here.
Nothing
except the dead. It's hard to make them out at this distance, but Kalen
can hear a couple of twigs snap. The familiar shuffle of something
moving through pine needles. And once or twice he thinks he can spot a
shadow flicker between the trees behind the chantry.]
Demiurge
"There's something in the woods."
There
were other things out there too. Or more precisely, the lack of things.
Things that ought to have been there, but were not. But these things
were less pressing than the encroaching threat. These things they could
mourn when they had the time.
Ian urged his horse forward with a
nudge from his knee, moving slowly toward the house. Toward the trees
behind it. he had one hand on the gun at his leg, snapping open the
holster in case whatever lay out there proved to be faster than
anticipated.
Sid Weston
Sid does not dismount,
though there is an instinct in her that she should get off her horse and
be prepared to run. It's an irrational thought, one she shoves aside.
Lovelace is stronger and faster on four legs than Sid ever would be on
two. Still, it might be helpful to have heightened reflexes.
"They're in the woods. Moving toward where," she pauses, frowning. "Where the Node should be." Should
being the operative word. "I count fifteen walkers. The magic here's
gone," she continues, looking to Kalen. Her voice, for the record, is
kept quiet and low.
She pulls a pen from the pocket of her jeans.
Her other means of focusing her Life magic is too, ah, dangerous in
this world. But she can still draw without drawing the masses like a
shark.
[Life 3: Increasing dex (hopefully), coincidental, -1 Quint
to lower diff. Droppin' WP because what else is WP7 for but to be
spent like candy?]
Dice: 3 d10 TN5 (1, 3, 7) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Kalen Holliday
Kalen
nods. "Yeah. I couldn't count them but...I can tell what isn't here."
His voice is soft, uneasy. He doesn't like not sensing the Node here.
At all.
He separates a little from them only now as they
approach, not much farther but a little. He rests a hand on his rifle,
and waits to see something he can target.
Demiurge
Ian
prepared himself for the possibility of an ambush, but luckily none
came. Still, the dead were out there, and they were heading right for
the chantry. For the node, if it was even still there.
And where was the node's guardian in all of this? Surely she would consider the undead a threat?
But Callisto did not appear, huge and terrifying and beautiful.
And the dead kept coming.
When they started to filter out of the trees, Ian pulled the sword from his back and charged forward.
[Inits!]
Sid Weston
[+7]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (10) ( success x 1 )
Demiurge
[Ian +7]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (8) ( success x 1 )
Kalen Holliday
[+5]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (1) ( fail )
Demiurge
[Zombies all get one. +2]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (6) ( success x 1 )
Demiurge
[And the order is:
Sid/Lovelace: 17
Ian/Dusk: 15
15 Zombies: 8
Kalen/Sunshadow: 6]
Kalen Holliday
[Shoot a zombie!]
Demiurge
[10 zombies continue walking
2 zombies try to bite Dusk
1 zombie tries to bite Ian's leg
2 zombies close distance to Sid and Lovelace]
Demiurge
[Ian split targeted sword to the head on the zombie biting him / then another on one of the ones attacking Dusk]
Demiurge
[Dusk kicks one of her attackers in the head. Maybe.]
Sid Weston
[Reflexive: "No! Run! I'll lead them away!"
Sid action: Draw a knife and slice open her own arm, Prime baby, Prime!
Lovelace action: Run]
Sid Weston
[Prime 2, vulgar as fuck diff is 6, dropping WP, -1 Quint to charge for damage]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (3, 4, 7) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Demiurge
[Dex+Melee -2, +2 diff, spending WP because seriously]
Dice: 5 d10 TN8 (1, 2, 3, 4, 8) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Demiurge
[1 zombie down, 14 to go]
Demiurge
[Dex+Melee -3, +2 diff]
Dice: 4 d10 TN8 (1, 6, 7, 8) ( success x 1 )
Demiurge
[2 zombies down]
Demiurge
[Dusk Kick, Dex+Brawl, +2 diff]
Dice: 3 d10 TN8 (3, 5, 5) ( fail )
Demiurge
[remaining zombie bites Dusk]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (1, 8, 10) ( success x 2 )
Demiurge
[damage?]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (3, 10) ( success x 1 )
Demiurge
[All of the other zombies keep walking]
Kalen Holliday
[Dex+Firearms d=8]
Dice: 4 d10 TN8 (1, 2, 3, 7) ( fail )
Kalen Holliday
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 3, 3, 9, 9, 9) ( success x 3 )
Demiurge
[WP check for Dusk not to freak the hell out and bolt after Kalen shoots her]
Dice: 3 d10 TN8 (1, 2, 4) ( fail )
Demiurge
[Now there's a surprise]
Kalen Holliday
[Fuck
it. Forces 2; Life 1 Force Shield on Ian because Sid's horse is
running; His skin needs to be zombie teeth proof - extending - WP]
Demiurge
[1 zombie tries to bite Dusk
4 more zombies close distance to Ian/Dusk
The rest follow Sid]
Demiurge
[Dusk rears up and runs the fuck away]
Demiurge
[Ian split action
1: Jump off the horse
2: Katana closest zombie in the head]
Sid Weston
[Extension! Plus more WP. If possible, dropping a quint to keep the diff at 6]
Sid Weston
[Prime 2]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (3, 3, 6) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Demiurge
[Dex+Athletics -2, I'm gonna say diff 8]
Dice: 5 d10 TN8 (1, 3, 5, 6, 10) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Demiurge
[Dex+Melee -3, +2 diff]
Dice: 4 d10 TN8 (2, 4, 5, 7) ( fail )
Demiurge
[Dusk runs! Zombie bites thin air]
Kalen Holliday
[2+3=5 D - WP]
Dice: 2 d10 TN5 (4, 9) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Kalen Holliday
[Extend and pray Ian can get away from zombies one round]
Demiurge
[2 zombies reach Ian and try to bite him
2 zombies still closing distance to Ian
9 zombies closing distance to Sid]
Demiurge
[Ian split Katana those two zombies in the head]
Sid Weston
[Sid action: Dismount and head for the house.
Lovelace: Keep running? I guess?]
Sid Weston
[redeclare!: Sid action: Blast some zombies, 4 suxx = 2 down
Lovelace: Same, keep running]
Demiurge
[2 more zombies down]
Demiurge
[Ian Dex+Melee -2, +2 diff]
Dice: 5 d10 TN8 (2, 3, 6, 8, 9) ( success x 2 )
Demiurge
[Dex+Melee -3, +2 diff]
Dice: 4 d10 TN8 (1, 2, 4, 7) ( success x 1 ) [WP]
Demiurge
[2 more zombies down, woot!]
Demiurge
[Remaining zombies be walkin']
Kalen Holliday
[Extending, D=6 now - WP]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (3, 5) ( success x 1 ) [WP]
Demiurge
[Ian is shielded!]
Kalen Holliday
[Close some distance on zombies following Sid, hope a few head in his direction.]
Demiurge
[2 zombies try to bite Ian
4 zombies continue to follow Sid
3 zombies break away and close distance to Kalen]
Demiurge
[Ian does the katana thing again, twice]
Sid Weston
[Go into the Chantry / make some tea, play some xbox, head down to the library Maybe start charging up another Prime blast, cutting herself for more blood bait/focus]
Demiurge
[Ian Dex+Melee -2]
Dice: 5 d10 TN8 (3, 6, 7, 8, 9) ( success x 2 )
Demiurge
[Dex+Melee -3]
Dice: 4 d10 TN8 (3, 4, 8, 10) ( success x 3 ) [WP]
Demiurge
[2 more dead]
Kalen Holliday
[Prime
blast, target closest incoming zombie - D=5; 1Q -- hopefully Sunshadow
has not letting zombies eat them while this happens]
Kalen Holliday
[Sunshadow: Do not let zombies close. Evade.]
Demiurge
[3 zombies try to bite Sunshadow
4 zombies follow Sid into the chantry]
Demiurge
[Ian split
1: Close distance to Kalen/Sunshadow
2: Katana a zombie in the head]
Sid Weston
[Prime 1: Self-Sacrifice, taking Lethal to regain Quint]
Sid Weston
[Prime 1: Life is pain, yo: diff 4]
Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (3, 6, 8) ( success x 2 )
Demiurge
[Ian closes distance, Dex+Melee -3]
Dice: 4 d10 TN8 (5, 5, 7, 10) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Demiurge
[1 more zombie dead, 6 to go]
Demiurge
[Zombie bites Sunshadow]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (2, 10, 10) ( success x 2 )
Kalen Holliday
Dex+Ath
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (3, 4, 4, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 3 )
Demiurge
[Zombie misses]
Demiurge
[Zombie 2 bites]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (4, 4, 6) ( success x 1 )
Demiurge
[Damage]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (1, 6) ( success x 1 )
Kalen Holliday
Prime blast D=5
Dice: 2 d10 TN5 (3, 7) ( success x 1 )
Kalen Holliday
[Kalen: Fuck it. Shoot a zombie. WP
Sunshadow: Dodge]
Demiurge
[1 zombie bites Sunshadow
1 zombie bites Ian
4 zombies close distance to Sid (they will hit her next turn)]
Demiurge
[Ian splits: Katana 1 zombie (not the one Kalen's aiming at) and runs into the chantry]
Sid Weston
[Prime 2, charge up that blast, -1Quint to charge it for damage, dropping WP, extending once]
Sid Weston
[Kame!]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 8) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Demiurge
[Ian Dex+Melee -2]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 9, 9, 10) ( success x 3 )
Demiurge
[5 zombies left, and Ian runs into the chantry]
Demiurge
[Zombie bites Sunshadow]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (3, 3, 8) ( success x 1 )
Kalen Holliday
Dodge, Sunshadow!
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 6, 7, 9, 9) ( success x 4 )
Kalen Holliday
Dex+Firearms+WP
Dice: 4 d10 TN8 (1, 2, 6, 8) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Kalen Holliday
[Dismount and run into house!]
Demiurge
[4 zombies left, all of them in the chantry with Sid]
Demiurge
[4 zombies bite Sid, nooooo]
Demiurge
[Ian does his katana thing to 2 of them]
Sid Weston
[Hame! (extension! releasing this round to take out everything she can possibly take out)]
Sid Weston
[Ha! Oh man, forgot to declare this, but dropping 2 remaining Quint to lower diff to 5]
Dice: 3 d10 TN5 (4, 7, 7) ( success x 3 ) [WP]
Demiurge
[A large chunk of the ceiling falls onto the zombies. And Ian. And
Sid. 2 Zombies get their heads crushed, two more are now prone and
partially crushed. Rolling for damage to Sid and Ian]
Demiurge
[Ian is right in the mix so we'll say... 5]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (5, 6, 7, 7, 7) ( success x 4 )
Demiurge
[Soak! Gee am I glad I just bought him more stamina]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (2, 9, 9) ( success x 2 )
Demiurge
[Ian takes 2B]
Demiurge
[Sid is a little out of the way so we'll go with 2]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (4, 10) ( success x 1 )
Sid Weston
[soak!]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 9) ( success x 1 )
Demiurge
[Ian will be annoyed, but he will continue to katana the zombies. They are prone, so it's an auto-hit to both, and they are dead.]
Demiurge
[In recap:
Kalen: All good
Sid: 1L
Ian: 2B
Lovelace: All good
Sunshadow: 1L
Dusk: Somewhere out in a field at 4L
ALL ZOMBIES DEAD]
Demiurge
[Cut to forum post for aftermath.]
