Jeremiah[1. There is no post order, but please post once for each post I make unless I tell you otherwise. Also, do you best to post in 10-15 minutes or less.2. You are free to multi-task, as long as you keep with the above time limit. If you repeatedly miss your 'deadline', I may ask you to leave one of your scenes out of respect to the other players in this one.3. This is a low-risk scene. So far. Sorry, Hector, probably no battle scar today. :[4. Please PM me now if you have any phobies, triggers, or off-limits themes that you don't want to deal with in your RP (if none, no need to tell me 'none'). If you're uncomfortable with it ending up on a transcript, it's okay to IM me instead.5. Please PM me any merits/flaws I should be aware of (nightmares, phobias, moon-bound, et al).6. Setup post forthcoming! Start thinking of why your character is at a dive-ish bar on Evans.]
Jeremiah[1. There is no post order, but please post once for each post I make unless I tell you otherwise. Also, do you best to post in 10-15 minutes or less.2. You are free to multi-task, as long as you keep with the above time limit. If you repeatedly miss your 'deadline', I may ask you to leave one of your scenes out of respect to the other players in this one.3. This is a low-risk scene. So far. Sorry, Hector, probably no battle scar today. :[4. Please PM me now if you have any phobies, triggers, or off-limits themes that you don't want to deal with in your RP (if none, no need to tell me 'none'). If you're uncomfortable with it ending up on a transcript, it's okay to IM me instead.5. Please PM me any merits/flaws I should be aware of (nightmares, phobias, moon-bound, et al).6. Setup post forthcoming! Start thinking of why your character is at a dive-ish bar on Evans.]
Jeremiah[1. There is no post order, but please post once for each post I make unless I tell you otherwise. Also, do you best to post in 10-15 minutes or less.
2. You are free to multi-task, as long as you keep with the above time limit. If you repeatedly miss your 'deadline', I may ask you to leave one of your scenes out of respect to the other players in this one.
3. This is a low-risk scene. So far. Sorry, Hector, probably no battle scar today. :[
4. Please PM me now if you have any phobies, triggers, or off-limits themes that you don't want to deal with in your RP (if none, no need to tell me 'none'). If you're uncomfortable with it ending up on a transcript, it's okay to IM me instead.
5. Please PM me any merits/flaws I should be aware of (nightmares, phobias, moon-bound, et al).
6. Setup post forthcoming! Start thinking of why your character is at a dive-ish bar on Evans.]
Sam Evans[oh right Nightmares!]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 4, 5, 5, 8, 10) ( success x 2 )
Echoes of the Lostre: 4, BRING IT ON. (I mean 'none.')
re: 5, Hector has Persistent Parents. Prob not relevant but one never knows.
Erich Storm's Teeth[berserker! perfect balance!
strict carnivore!]
JeremiahChampion of Honor has been catatonic since Still Waters, Dances with the Hurricane, and Thunder's Cry brought him back from a small studio apartment in Glendale. His mind is not in his body; his spirit is being traced and tracked as best his pack can while he lies unseeing and unresponsive.
The boy named 'Kelly' broke quickly when brought to Cold Crescent. He hardly knows what he is. He, too, has been sent to Forgotten Questions to be cleansed from traces of corruption and terror along with Fern. Both of them were seduced from their loneliness by the Beloved Horror, one turned murderess, one turned guard for the stolen. Kelly was never so far gone as Fern, though; word is that he's adapting quickly to the sept, that they are teaching him that what he was told before are lies.
you are not really a monster.you are not meant to destroy the world.you were chosen, as your ancestors were chosen.you are a protector. you are a warrior.
The sept is shaken, though; no one is sure what has been done to Champion of Honor, and neither Kelly nor Fern could even guess. It is, to some, worse than death. He twitches sometimes, breath rattling in his nostrils, terror shaking his limbs. Wherever he is, whatever he sees, it is enough to turn the stalwart Fianna into a quivering mess.
Keisha, Ingrid and Thomas were at once dressed down thoroughly and praised for finding him. It was drilled in, repeatedly, how easily they could have gone right into the hornet's nest, how easily they could have died. Still: they found him. They brought him back. They found a lost cub in the process, which is one more young one brought back from the brink of the Wyrm's maw. It doesn't feel like the victory it really is, but then: many real victories don't feel like it, without blood shed.
--
It's a lazy Sunday midafternoon. Tommy T's has food, or else no one would come here for lunch. Then again, the people who come here for lunch don't care much about the food. There's a bank down that way and a Winchell's across the road and a closed-down K-Mart nearby, and though the area outside is constantly flowing with both auto and foot traffic, most businesses in this stretch don't tend to do very well. Even the grocery store around the corner closed last winter.
There are a few motorcycles outside of Tommy T's. It's 2-for-1 'steak' today. Later, there will be karaoke. It has a real juke box that today happens to be working. And though there's a handful of people in the bar -- the tender, the woman with platinum-blonde stringy hair sitting near the jukebox, her man (they own the hogs), a bristly guy in a leather jacket at the bar, a woman who for some reason has her stroller with a sleeping baby in it over in a darker corner -- it looks and feels empty and dim.
Buenos Dias Argentina by Marty Robbins is playing.
Erich Storm's TeethErich isn't always the most up-to-date when it comes to major Sept events. That's what happens when you don't really live nearby -- or rather, when where you live can be upped and moved at a moment's notice to, say, an idyllic mountain pasture. Or the tip of Baja California. Or the mass-combine cornfields of Nebraska. He does hear some stuff, though, and as he was unwinding last night from totally kicking ass with his new kickass buddy there were bits of conversation, bits of information, bits and pieces pieced together until he knew, more or less, what was going on with Champion of Honor. And the Beloved Horror. And all the horrible, horrible, insidious things going on there.
Still: that's sort of just background info to him. Erich himself has never tangled with the Beloved Horror. He has not seen what they do, and he didn't really know Champion. So today,
right now,
he's not thinking about Champion, or Beloved Horror, or very much at all except maybe the way the light falls through that new skylight in his tinyhouse, and the way the wildgrass smells at dawn, and --
-- ooo, meat. It is 2-for-1 steak day, and two steaks have just been set down in front of Erich. He flashes a grateful smile at a waitress seasoned enough, toughened enough by years of drunkass bikers trying to karaoke that she doesn't even flinch. Just winks at him and reminds him there better be a good tip on the table later, honey.
Erich hopes he has enough spare cash to cover whatever she might consider a 'good tip'. And also: he picks up his first steak in his hands and starts to gnaw at it.
Echoes of the LostHector manages not to stare at the motorcycles for so long that anyone walking past would think he was working out how to boost them. Not that anyone in this neighborhood would do anything. Most of the people in this neighborhood appear to just be passing through.
So he strolls on into the whim-chosen bar and pauses a moment in the doorway to orientate himself. One can see the decision to stay far away from the bristly guy pass over his features and then he sees Erich and he goes from oh hey I know that guy! to I am so not going to bother the Ahroun when he's eating in a matter of seconds.
He wanders over to the bar and orders a glass of their finest...
"Actually, I don't know, do you have orange soda?"
Sam EvansSam was here for lunch. 'Was' being the operative word. She's still here, sitting in a booth off to the side, a plate empty of all but crumbs and the reddish bloody fluids of her gone medium-rare steak, and some specks that might have been soggy vegetables of some kind. There's a glass to the upper left of her plate with about a thumb's width of beer remaining.
The bantam kinswoman isn't looking at her plate, though. She has a laptop and that laptop is open in the empty space to the left of her empty plate. She's dressed as she usually is during the summer: black t-shirt (AC/DC BACK IN BLACK), denim shorts, boots. With her dark blue eyes lined with thick dark liner and her ears full of piercings, she looks like maybe she belongs with the people who own the hogs, but no. The red Mazda in the parking lot is hers, not the junkers or any old motorcycles.
The wi-fi in here is not the greatest, it's not that kind of place, but she doesn't have to be connected to the internet to write a code.
She glanced up briefly when Erich entered, offered him an upward nod of a greeting, then went right back to her work. Deadlines or something.
Thomas DelacroixFrom the busy street, mostly empty looked like a good thing to Thomas. There should be space inside to breathe. Dimly lit dive bars aren't a familiar kind of place to Thomas, but there is a definite advantage to limiting the number of people around him for at least a little while.
So into the bar he goes, trying to tone a prowl down into a stroll like there is nothing dangerous about him. Nothing more than a little frayed about his nerves from all the people. No wild, unpredictable energy pooling under his skin.
Once inside he looks for a place away from people and spots...Sam? He smiles a little and heads over to her booth and drops easily into a place across from her. "Surprise." He speaks quietly, gently, but he doubts there is much chance she'll be surprised by the time he gets there.
JeremiahThey do have orange soda. In cans. That look like they're from the 1980s. It's room temperature, but they do give Hector a cloudy glass to go with it.
Samantha stands out, primarily because of the computer. The wifi does go up and down, and then it goes down, down, down. Which is fine. Until, for no damn reason whatsoever, there's an electrical surge and then her laptop, too, goes down, down, down.
At the bar, the guy in the jacket sips from a glass of watered-down whiskey. The jukebox has flickered, and the lights have as well, but they all come back. Only Sam's laptop seems blacked out completely. When the music stirs back up, the song playing is Jolene. The man at the bar chuckles; his teeth glisten whitely. The waitress-slash-bartender looks at him, her eyes steady, then cutting away quickly, her jaw tensing, hunching her shoulders a bit as she turns to wipe out some glasses.
Echoes of the Lost"Oh, you are awesome, thank you," he says to the bartender and he really truly without-a-hint-of-sarcasm means it because this is going to be a hilarious story later. That cola can looks older than he does.
He lingers at the bar so he can crack open the can and pour it into the glass and save everyone the effort of transporting the aluminum around later. Lingering affords him the opportunity to survey everything going on. Try though he does Hector ends up looking at the laughing fellow and then glancing between him and the nice lady who gave him his antiquated beverage.
Hector isn't exactly rolling in cash after settling up but he leaves an extra piece of green paper beneath the empty can anyway. Then he steps back with his glass of high fructose corn syrup and tears his attention away from the guy in the jacket.
Erich Storm's TeethGnaw. Gnaw. RIIIP. Chew, swallow. Gnaw.
This is what occupies Erich's attention. It's not that he doesn't know how to use a knife and fork -- of course he knows how -- but it's just so much more satisfying this way. People move about, they chitchat, they drink sullenly, they drink loudly, and once in a while he sees people he recognizes. Like that chick from Giant Jenga. She gets a nod up while he's wolfing down meat. And hey, there's that guy from the moot. And that other guy from the moot. One of them's a Shadow Lord! That one gets a greasy-fingered wave.
When the lights flicker, he hardly notices. When the jukebox cuts out and comes back playing something else, Erich does notice. He kinda liked that last one. He puts down his half-eaten steak and wipes his hands on his napkin, calling out to that tough old battleaxe of a waitress/bartender,
"Hey, can we get that last song back on?"
Sam EvansPeople come in. Sam glances at the first young man, the second she doesn't. It's not until he's a little closer that she becomes more aware of his presence, and not until he's sitting across from her that she's aware it's Thomas. Her head lifts and she smiles at him. "Hey. Uh, hang on," she says, and she looks back at her laptop.
Which is when the power surges and the lights flicker and the voice from the jukebox slows and lowers and draws out before lifting back up into Jolene.
"Uh." Sam hits the power button once, but nothing happens, her laptop's screen remains blank. That's when her hands lift to her face to cover the lower half of it and pull down down down on her cheeks, giving her an exaggerated D: face. Her dark eyes are wide and filled with horror. "Shit," she whispers, the last five minutes' worth of work are most likely gone. She sighs a sigh of defeat, snaps the device closed and slides it into her messenger bag. Nothing she can do about it here.
Sam glances around, at the ceiling lights and at the bartender-waitress and the other man at the bar, the one not ordering a soda.
[percept+empathy (emotional states)]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 3, 3, 5, 5, 9, 10) ( success x 2 ) Re-rolls: 1
Thomas DelacroixThomas glances around as the power flickers, catching sight of the weird exchange between the bat tender and the guy drinking whiskey and of Erich and Hector. There must be some really odd City Father mystical stuff going on in Denver, because all he does is run into Garou and kin. It's not even weird anymore. Both Erich and Hector get waves, though only Hector's comes with a quick flash of a smile.
"Hey," he says with a little frown at Sam's interaction with the laptop. "Everything okay? I don't have to stay here. Just thought I'd say hi."
Sam Evans[second verse same as the first (dude times)]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 4, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, 10, 10) ( success x 5 ) Re-rolls: 2
Jeremiah[Kay the bartender:
1. She's freaked out by the guy at the bar.
2. Not just because he seems like the mean sort; it's like she has experience enough to know not to look him in the eye.
Jeremiah the guy at the bar:
1-5: First of all, even without tapping into primal urge, that many successes gives Sam the hint that this guy is probably not human. Something supernatural is going on; it hangs on him like a corona, and it's hard to blame Kay for being freaked out by him even if this WERE the first time she met him.
Sam can also tell that he's pretty pleased with himself at the moment.]
JeremiahNobody answers Erich at first. After a few seconds, the bartender -- let's call her Kay -- glances over at him. "You got a quarter, hon?" Because that's how you change the song back. You go change it. She turns away again, as though she just feels better with her back to the world.
Sam is distraught, at least momentarily, by her laptop apparently deciding to feed worms today. It gets put away. She'll fix it later, she's that sort, but right now it's useless. Somewhere in there, the platinum-blonde and her man get up and head out, calling a goodbye to Kay. The woman in the dark corner of the bar rolls her baby's stroller back and forth, back and forth, numbly, as though that will keep the infant asleep.
Sad country and sadder country rankle the air with steel guitar and near-yodeling and driving drumbeats all mashed together. The volume is low, though, just enough to claw at the edges of one's perception. The man at the bar taps the surface, then side of his glass, asking for another. He then pulls a cigar out from the inside pocket of his jacket, half-smoked already, and starts flicking his lighter. Strictly speaking, he shouldn't be smoking in here, but Kay doesn't even bat an eyelash. She just shudders slightly.
Sam Evans"No, it's fine, I just-" she says as she's glancing around, but she stops when she sees the the way the woman is looking at the man. Her eyes flick to him, the one grinning so whitely, so pleased with himself and so smug. She catches herself staring and she tries to let her gaze slide away from him all nonchalant, but Sam is open. She's honest. She does not hide things well, she has no gift for subterfuge or guile.
So the fact that she's suddenly distressed for an altogether different reason than her laptop is very obvious. Her shoulders tense. Her feet shuffle. One hand lowers to her bag, the other stretches across the table toward Thomas, either to take his, or simply to catch his attention.
Turning her head she looks the Shadow Lord straight in the face, this kinswoman seemingly untroubled by things like Rage or accidentally offering up challenges by daring to look Garou straight in the eye. "Something's happening," she says, keeping her voice low to just the pair of them. Then, very deliberately, she shifts her eyes back toward the bar, and back to Thomas.
She swallows hard.
Erich Storm's TeethDamn it, everything costs in here. Biker bar or not, two for one steaks or not, this was turning into a splurge after all. A whole quarter just to change a song! Erich debates whether or not to invest.
That's about when dude-at-bar starts lighting up. Erich looks outraged. He looks to the waitress/bartender for support! But to no avail: Kay, tough-as-brass Kay who demands quarters and tips from Ahrouns, just turns away. Erich wears the expression of one whose world-supporting pillar just developed a fatal crack.
And then he stands up.
"Hey." He's calling out to cigar man. "Hey, take that crap outside. No one wants to breathe your lung cancer fumes."
Echoes of the LostThomas receives an answering wave-and-small-smile but Hector's retreat from the bar is thwarted by the antics of Mr. Bristly Leather Jacket Man.
He sets down his drink and watches him play with his cigar and his lighter. Glances to Kay's back and finds her hunched and ignoring everyone else. He looks over at the guy again and before he can embarrass himself Erich stands up and delivers the request way better than a scrawny-looking Californian could have.
"It's true," he says. Yeah Erich. Totally got your back, bro.
Thomas DelacroixIt is definitely true that Thomas cares more about humanity in the abstract, largely owing to the fact that it's a little difficult for him to do much interacting with humanity on a more personal level. But even Thomas had begun to catch the odd vibes at the bar as something that was edging toward something to concern himself with. Sam's response to it seems to cement his resolve to at least determine now if it his problem.
He squeezes the hand that Sam extended across the table, then releases it. If this goes sideways, they'll need their hands, after all. He doesn't engage the smoking man, Erich and Hector have that already. Instead his eyes sweep the bar for new movement then settle on the man.
[Perception + Empathy: 'Should I be worried about this guy?' | D=6/Sp. Hidden Motives]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 5, 5, 5, 6, 6, 10) ( success x 3 ) Re-rolls: 1
Jeremiah[Yes. Yes you really should. He could eat you in a gulp and would pick his teeth with a knife afterward.]
Sam Evans[percept+PU on THE ROOM]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (3, 4, 5, 8) ( success x 1 )
Jeremiah[Hector is Garou! OMG!]
JeremiahSome people
do not move like people.
Some people move like panthers or lions, like gorillas, but that man in the jacket does not move like anything so warm, so familiar, as any of that. He shrugs his shoulders slowly back and his spine straightens like it is unrolling. The lift of his head is like a hood opening; the turn of his neck to look over at Erich is sinuous and slow-moving, sluggishly cold. He bites his cigar, holding it out the corner of his mouth. His eyes are a muddy color flecked with green that doesn't show up too well in this lighting-or-lack-thereof, but it's there.
Drawing up a hand wet and cold with condensation from his glass, he scratches idly at his jaw. He gives a low, grating, huffing laugh. Then he lifts his hands up to either side, a mocking don't shoot! gesture, plucks the cigar from his mouth, and
puts it out against the side of his neck. He hisses, and then chuckles, holding the now-unlit cigar while that circular burn on his throat glares like an ugly red eye at the room. He is still grinning. Turns away to ignore them again, then looks at Sam.
Kisses the air at her. "Good t'see ya again, doll," he drawls.
Echoes of the LostGiven all the stories that are floating between the two Septs and the reticence of the elder Gibbous Moons and the warnings, always with the warnings, that a pack of abominations has plucked off so many of their Garou over the years that they ought to maintain caution if not distance one would think that a situation like this would be a good opportunity for the Cliaths to demonstrate some wisdom.
Hector grimaces when the stranger puts out the cigar on his neck and makes an "Eugh" noise. He glances back at Erich to see what the Shadow Fenrir is doing and then glances even further back at Thomas and Sam.
The expression on his face is briefly confused. Like Which one of you is 'doll'? Doesn't matter. He turns back around to address the guy.
"You don't get out much, do you?"
Sam EvansInside the confines of Sam's skull she is flailing mentally at Hector and Erich. She doesn't know what that thing is, but she has a pretty good feeling it's not human. And there they are, asking it to put out its cigar like it might actually listen to them. Like it doesn't give that tough as weathered concrete waitress the fucking willies.
The fact that there are three werewolves in the bar makes her feel a little bit better.
Then the man is looking past the Rage of a pair of Cliaths and straight at her. He kisses the air and she is disgusted.
He says Good t'see ya again, doll, and for a second her brows constrict. She's sure she's never seen that face before. She would remember him if she had.
But Sam is a clever young woman. Smart, a quick thinker, cool under pressure. It doesn't take her long to go through the possibilities, and when she gets to the most likely one - No no nonononono please Gaia no - her hands clench suddenly. Her skin feels prickly and cold all over and she goes white as a sheet.
She swallows hard, lifts her chin a notch as she looks at him, because scared as hell as she is, the short Glass Walker kinfolk is tougher than she looks. Hector can probably figure out which one is "doll" when Sam, her voice more than a little strained, says, "Can't say the same about you."
Erich Storm's Teeth"Eech!"
Erich can't help making that noise when cigardude -- well, to be honest, he wanted to start making that noise when he starts to move. That strange, reptilian motion, the articulation of spine and muscle; it's all so wrong wrong slimy wrong. That's how Charlotte would put it, anyway, and that is how bad he feels about this dude: so bad that he's thinking about him the way Charlotte thinks about, like, Los Angeles. He manages not to go eech when cigardude starts moving, though. And he manages to be polite enough not to go eech when he scratches his jaw. He even manages to not eech when cigardude puts up his hands in that mocking little gesture, but
when he puts that cigar out
ON. HIS. NECK.
that is when Erich can't help himself. He goes eech! He makes this face, this look of abject disgust, which twists up all the more when cigar-dude air-smooches at Sam.
"What the hell, man," Erich complains. About ... just everything. "Maybe I'm being an ass and you're really a nice guy with poor social skills, but why are you so creepy." He turns to Sam. "Do you know this guy? Is he creepy, or am I being a jerk?"
Thomas DelacroixThomas slips into a position to be able to move from as he watches the man. There isn't really any of the bristling or easily visible aggression that he has displayed in the past when he thought something might be a threat. It isn't even until the man speaks to Sam that Thomas' lips twitch a little baring just a hint of teeth, eyes going suddenly focused and cold. He doesn't reach reach for Sam, or direct her, he know what kind of training she's likely had. She doesn't need him to warn her. Hell, she'd been warning him. Sam can handle herself.
And so, though he would love to fling himself between that creepy thing and Sam, he slides out of the booth, leans in to murmur very quietly in Sam's ear, and then settles on one of the chairs of the tables next to their booth.
"Pretty sure he's creepy," Thomas says to Erich, in a low, tense voice.
JeremiahOf those who are pure of heart and strong of spirit in this room, of those who have been neither corrupted nor broken by the degredation of the world, Samantha Evans is the only one who has come face to face with the Beloved Horror. All of them, all at once. Not their remnants, not their leftover toys or blood-soaked rooms. She held the cub Fern tight in her arms and prepared for death with the thought in her mind that if she was going to be ripped from life, her last moment in that life would be spent giving comfort and solidarity to someone in terror, someone in pain. It says a lot about the sort of person Sam is that she could walk away from that night without being a little bit mentally shattered; she was inches away from the meal that the Dancers were making of Wind on Concrete, and she could hear her screaming as they ate at her, and she had no way of knowing if that was what would become of her or if it would be quick, merciful, bloody, over, done.
When he looks at her and tells her it's good to see her again, welcoming the fire to his neck, she knows. Call it instinct or something else, but she knows. He wore a different face, a different form, but he liked fire just the same, he still had that hungry look, and he was just as frightening.
Can't say the same about you she says. And he grins. Or sort of smirks.
--
Hector and Erich make noises of disgust and perhaps bewilderment. "I get out plenty," he says, an aside, as he scoots his chair back and leans against the bar. "Kay, you know I get out plenty, right?"
Kay flinches. She nods, tightly, from behind the bar, hands shaking. "See?" says he, thumbing at her. "I'm a friendly guy. I got lotsa friends. I gots friends in office buildings and fire stations. I gots friends in churchs and schools. I gots friends like --"
he gives a sharp whistle at the woman in the corner. That woman doesn't flinch. She turns slowly, dazedly, beaten, to look over at him, blinking dark eyes slowly. "What's your name again?"
"Don't r'member, baby," she says, thickly, like she's got a mouth full of cotton.
He frowns, disgruntled. "What's the brat's name, then?"
"Wh'ever you want, baby," she answers to this, with no more emotion than before, no more volume. By tone alone, she may as well have just said the same words over again.
The man is scowling, still unbothered by the burn. He turns to look at the wolves again. "Y'see? I ain't a creep. I'm a fuckin' family man. An' like any family man, I gots t'make things better for the next generation, right? Bigger and brighter and happier." He thumps his middle finger, second finger crooked, against the bar. "That's what family means, yeah? Y'just do what you gotta do, an' if what ya gotta do is burn the whole world down so yer babies can make what they want of it when they're all big an' strong, then that's what y'gotta do."
He sniffs. "Fuckit, I'm drunk." He turns and there's his half-done whiskey still there. He picks it up. "I dunno what you fuckers got against family," he mutters to the glass, taking a drink. "Live an let live, right? Get outta the way an' let us take back what's ours an' stop... y'know. Stop fuckin' with our kids."
He finishes the glass, thumps it down, balls up his meaty fist and thumps it on the bar. Kay bites back a yelp.
"Family!" says he, like he's punctuating anything about his own rambling that makes sense to him.
Thomas DelacroixIt isn't the explosive ranting that crosses Thomas' threshold for more than he wants to fuck with right here in this bar, it's the woman who can't answer questions like anything resembling a proper, functional person.
He rises again, offering one arm out in an invitation to Sam. He doesn't say anything, he doesn't even look at her, he just expects that she'll understand what he wants and do it.
He looks away from the creepy madman only long enough to catch Hector's eyes then nod at the door, and then to repeat that process with Erich.
It has become time to get the hell out of Dodge as far as Thomas is concerned.
Echoes of the LostThat takes the wind right out of his jesting sails.
Hector isn't paralyzed with fear but he still isn't sneaking towards the door like a normal person would be. Even if his pack were here with him they wouldn't stand much of a chance of doing anything other than possibly drawing more of Them out of hiding. Thomas catches Hector's eyes and finds them uninterested in blinking. The other Galliard nodnodnods.
"You're not looking so good, dude," he says, creeping backwards until he's come abreast of Erich. "How're you getting home?"
Erich Storm's TeethThe other Shadow Lord, perhaps wisely, is signaling for Erich and Hector to gtfo. Erich, however, isn't really in a headspace to heed him.
See, Erich's been listening to creepydude. And he's been listening to the ranting about family, about burning the world down to let the babies make of it what they want, about stop fuckin' with our kids like hey, maybe they can just shake hands and draw a line and just coexist peacefully. Erich's been watching the woman in the corner and her dead voice and god only knows what's in that stroller. Erich's eyes are darting back to creepydude when creepydude slams his hands on the bar; flicking to Kay as she flinches; coming back.
And Erich
quite abruptly
decides he's just had it.
"Stop fucking with your kids?" he yells. "Live and let live? When you're talking about burning the world down -- the same world we all happen to live in? How the hell does that work? Fuck you! Fuck! You! It's on! Let's take it outside or I'll put your head through the bar right here, right now!"
Echoes of the Lostp>Hector says, "Shit."
Sam EvansDo you know this guy?
Sam shakes her head very, very, very slightly, not taking her eyes off the man. "He's dangerous."
She remembers that night. She sees it in her dreams sometimes, sees it more than she does the day her brother Changed. The fear is different in those dreams. When Henry changed her horror and her fear had been for the things he'd done, the things he would do and he would face. The other dreams, though, they're different. Different colors, different taste. They leave a different film behind inside her brain. She was sure that she would die that night, and when she didn't it was like a strange weight had been lifted from her shoulders. A veil, too. One doesn't come that close to their mortality and walk away unchanged.
But for all that Sam is nice and friendly and charming and kind, she is above all a survivor.
She'd looked away while the man was talking. She couldn't help it, as soon as she heard that woman's broken, dead voice Sam looked over at her and her heart snapped in half inside her chest. She wonders if there's anything that she can do, what they can do. While the Dancer mutters and finishes his drink, she thinks of a dozen different options for action, and about a hundred different ways for them to die.
One of them, coincidentally enough, has the Ahroun of the group exploding out at the man. Sam's eyes widen. "No," she says, and she's rising and she's grabbing her bag as she rises, but she's not taking Thomas' offered arm.
"You can't," she says, and her voice is quiet, and it is pleading. And it is haunted. "You really really can't. Look, we're going to go." This to the man with the burn. She tosses an apologetic look at Kay. She steps closer to the Lord and the Uktena, coming up beside Erich and a little in front. It puts her a little closer to the man, but so be it. If he wanted to kill her he could have done it when she was in her booth. He could still do it when she gets outside. She doesn't move so that her back is to him, but she looks up and up at Erich.
"Please. We have to go."
[charisma + empathy on Erich, please to be moved by scared kinfolk.]
Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 3, 3, 4, 4, 6, 9) ( success x 3 ) [WP]
Erich Storm's TeethIt's not that he's unmoved by the frightened kinfolk, because he is. It's not that he isn't full of dread and creeping fear himself, because he is. It's just that --
It's just that this guy wants to burn down the world. Make room for whatever abomination he's got in that baby stroller over there. It's just that this guy would, if he weren't taking a day off right now or whatever the hell he's pretending to do right now, very gladly pull apart everything and everyone that matters to Erich. And light it on fire.
So Erich turns to Sam. Just for a moment. He locks eyes and he shakes his head.
"You should go," he says. "I can't."
JeremiahThomas decides it's time to go. Time to get Sam and get out of here.
Hector decides Thomas is a brilliant strategist and edges toward the ahroun. And the door. Thereabouts.
Erich... does not agree with this plan and informs the man with the cigar burn that he can go get fucked, and they can either go outside or he'll just put his head through the bar.
Shit.
Erich's repeated shouting of Fuck you at the guy hasn't gotten much of a reaction, at least not from the guy himself. It has, however, woken up the baby, who is bawling just like any baby does. God knows what's in the stroller, but... well, it sounds like a human (or at least homid) infant with hearty lungs and a good wail built up. That sound rakes at the senses, stabbing at the primitive brain, demanding attention and action and help. It must be miserable to be a newborn, so half-formed and set out in the cold and bright and dry world. It must be more miserable still when your mother's brain is slowly turning to mush and your father is...well. The sort of creature who puts cigars out on his neck.
Sam pleads with Erich, and tells that man they're gonna go, and the man frowns at her like hey, wait, what? and she gets in front of Erich, begging him to back off.
But he can't.
--
"I'm fine," says the guy, half-slurred, to Hector. "I'll jus... take the... the whatsit. The twenny-one or sumthin'." The baby is crying, and he cringes, then glowers, his head snapping around to bark at the woman who birthed it to
"Shut him up!"
"S'a girl, baby," mumbles the woman, only half-audible as she starts reaching into the stroller to gather up the infant and pull it to her chest. The man sighs and turns back towards the wolves, seeming to be surprised they're still there.
He remembers: that one with the pale hair was yelling at him a second ago. His brow furrows and he scoots his stool back, getting up. He's actually not very tall. Broad, though, imposing in the way that gangsters are imposing, with steely eyes and no remorse. He doesn't entirely remember the logical questions of things, but then: everything he said did sound half-remembered, parroted from one more eloquent, the ramblings of a madman made holy by someone madder still.
And he starts walking over to Erich.
Kay has shrunken behind the bar, hiding, and if you can hear her through the wailing of the baby, she is weeping.
please don't take him even though you can
The man sways a little. "You woke... the baby."
Erich Storm's TeethYou woke... is sort of as far as the guy gets, because that is when
Erich headbutts him. Just... goes for it, man, snapping the hardest part of his forehead against the creepydude's nose. Or as near to it as he can manage, anyway.
Echoes of the LostThomas and Sam can't see the look on the Uktena's face but they can see him decide not to leave Erich. He holds his shoulders straight and his hands shake for a few seconds when the baby starts wailing because that sound does something to him and they can't tell what's going through his brain at the moment. Tamsin would tell them they're lucky.
His hands stop shaking.
And the man starts walking over to Erich. Accuses him of waking the baby. Starts to anyway. Erich moves to headbutt him and Hector leaps out of accidental-striking distance.
"Kay!" he says to the weeping woman. "Go! Run!"
He doesn't heed his own advice.
Sam EvansHe can't. Sam looks at him with such sorrow. There is more sadness than should ever be seen on a face that is usually so warm and friendly. But she nods. It's stupid. It's the worst decision in the world. He'll fight this guy and what?
An ant has no quarrel with a boot?
The line threads through her mind, but she'll never say anything like that to Erich or Hector. Sam nods. She accepts it even though she doesn't like it, and with that nod she says farewell to a wolf she only met once. They had fun, though, right?
Meanwhile the man is answering Hector. Sam moves away from all of them, she starts heading for the door, lifting her bag up over her head as she goes so that it falls across her body, the pouch resting against her hip. A few steps from the door she looks over at the woman and her stroller one last time.
Behind her, Erich headbutts the shorter man and Sam stops. She looks at the fight, eyes wide, and she looks at the woman, eyes wide.
And she gets the worst idea in the history of bad ideas.
She hesitates at the door, and she waits to see just how much attention that man pays to Erich and . If it's not that much, she'll leave. If it's a lot, though...
Thomas Delacroix"Fuck," Thomas says, softly enough not to really be audible over the weeping and wailing going on. Leaving, that was the best plan. He is going to hear so much about how he needs to be less reckless. Again. Well...if they live.
And he would have retreated. He so would have. But he isn't leaving Erich, because even if your family is crazy and starts ill-advised bar fights, you don't abandon your family. And he's not abandoning Hector either, because Hector will play and do ridiculous entertaining things and make offhand comments about maybe joining his pack, and people like that are not to be abandoned either. At least it looks like Sam is getting clear.
He circles through the bar, not jumping into this quite yet, instead getting into position to flank.
JeremiahAll right.
The Fenris-born grandson of Thunder headbutts the guy who is way out on the corner of Fucked-Up and Evil. And Hector steps forward because you know what, fuck it. And Thomas steps forward because you know what, fuck it. And Sam gets a bright, dangerous idea because you know what:
fuck it.
--
Combat the Wyrm Wherever It Dwells and Whenever It Breeds.
For that is the law.
--
Kay hears her name and just lets out a shriek; she is, at least, behind the bar. She should be okay. Unless the bar catches fire. The mother of the Dancer's young holds it, but does not shush it, patting it awkwardly, then seems to get tired. She puts the infant back in the stroller to scream, and scream, and scream.
And the man, who we know as Jeremiah though he has not given that prophet's name to the Gaian Garou and Kin who face him today, he
gets his head clocked. Nice and hard, firm and smooth like Erich's done it a thousand times because Erich probably has, look at him, smell that breeding on him, we know where he comes from. He looks briefly dazed, but briefly: his forehead has a solidity and hardness that leaves a pink mark spreading across Erich's brow.
Jeremiah blinks. He rears back, eyes flying open. He chuffs a hard breath and says: "Fucker."
--
And the room erupts. With a flash of the Dancer's eyes, the green flecks flaring to life, he throws his arms down and to his sides and lets out a ROAR that fills the room and seems to shake the walls. It sounds like the cry of something inhuman, for it is. It sounds like the howl of something with cold blood and a sallow heart, for it is. Two women scream, hands to ears, and the child's shrieking takes on that ear-splitting note of pain and need that is literally, physically painful to the human ear.
As he changes, in a sudden ripple of blossoming wrath, the fur that grows across his body is turning leathery, full of seeping holes, full of pustules that glisten with the liquid inside, greenish-brown and brownish-black as though he is covered in both mold and drying blood. Horns burst from his flesh, but not just his head, where they protrude and grow in curling, forward-facing ram's horns, but from the backs of his arms, growing into two-foot-long bony spikes far larger and longer than his own claws.
The beast that waits for mortals in their dreams of hell drops to all fours, larger than any of them are in crinos, larger than a man of that size should be in crinos, and he opens his maw to let out another thunderous, wall-shaking howl. Erich and Hector, right in front of him, can see the fire like sloshing, sputtering green magma at the back of his throat.
Jeremiah[- To keep things moving, focus on the story, and frankly to increase odds of survival, most if not all combat in this scene will be cinematic. Tell me what you want to do [via your post, IC or OOC depending on how much time you want to spend on it]. My posts will tell you if it's successful or not. I may be doing some behind-the-screen dice on your behalf, so don't feel bad about reminding me [in the scene chat] about modifiers that may come into play when you post your character's intentions. If you're uncomfortable for any reason with doing it this way, I will not take it personally if you back out and I hope you sign up for my next dicey one-shot.
- Keep track of your own health and tempers. If your character is injured cinematically I'll tell you how many HP that is in a brief OOC post.
- There is moderate to high chance of character death/psychological torment/maiming in this scene, though some of that will be mitigated by the cinematic combat. If you're uncomfortable for any reason with that, I will not take it personally if you back out and hope you stay to watch and cheer the other players on (or hold their hands).]
Erich Storm's TeethWelp. Now they are committed. They are locked-in, their course of action is set, and if Erich feels just a little bad that he's prevented three other people from escaping with their hides intact --
well. That's mitigated by the surge of righteous wrath rushing through his veins right now. That's mitigated, too, by the comfort he feels to be surrounded, backed up, by two wolves and one kin.
He sees the size of his opponent. It's mindboggling: how did such an average-height, stocky-squat dude turn into such a colossus? And he sees, too, the green flame boiling at the back of his maw; knows instantly that this is no run of the mill Dancer. Even Erich, goodnatured and easygoing and a little bit ignorant, has heard enough stories to hear of the Green Dragon. Even Erich knows this one is touched, chosen, blessed by one of the strongest totems of the Wyrm.
Not that any of that changes the fact that
they are now in for it.
--
"Go!" He shoves whoever's nearest to him -- Thomas or Hector, whichever is in reach. "Flank him! I'll take him head-on. HEY, FUCKER! I BET THAT BABY ISN'T EVEN YOURS!"
-- and on that near-suicidal note: Erich lunges forward, bursts mid-step into his own hulking dappled-grey direwolf form. Rage sizzles through the air, an acrid scent, a taste of metal at the back of the throat. He weaves, he dodges, his hindclaws leave gouges on the floor when he leaps, and his foreclaws seek purchase in the Dancer's hide. Somewhere; anywhere.
Thomas DelacroixOut of the Dancer's direct line of sight, Thomas shifts to hispo. His plan does hinge on not being directly observed, but even so a very low growl, so soft it is more vibration than audible sound, vibrates through him. He takes a breath and then launches himself at the Dancer's back as Erich charges into its face, aiming to clamp his teeth down on the Dancer's spine at the neck. And then, whether or not he has secured a hold on the Dancer's spine, he rakes his claws over the Dancer's awful hide (or tries to).
[Translation, for mechanics purposes: 1 Rage/shift to hispo/1 Rage for 1 extra action - normal action: bite/Rage action: claw-claw | (Because in battle, like in stories, some Galliards always go for the dramatic open....)]
Erich Storm's Teeth[breaking it down a bit!
- Erich is popping 1 rage for hispo
- using 1 rage for city running (-2 diff for athletic craziness in urban settings)
- has perfect balance
- is probably using his normal action to dodge/close distance with the benefit of his crazy athletic-ness
- using a rage action to spur claws (-1 add'l R)
- two rage actions to attack (probably close-quarters grab-and-bite, doing his best to keep a grip on dude's head so he doesn't get BREEFED ON).]
Sam EvansErich and Thomas decide to stay and fight beside their packmate-for-the-moment. Only one of them has a pack, but here, now, they will work together to fight this burning Horror because that's what they do.
Sam isn't like them. She's kinfolk, the bridge between the supernatural and the mundane. Her place isn't at their side in combat, though she can do that if the situation calls for it. She can take up arms if she has to, but right now she has something else in mind.
Thomas leaves, which means she's on her own, and she has to think fast. Think, Sam, think! Have to get that baby out of danger, have to--
That's it.
Three Cliaths face down an abomination that may or may not have been the one to rip an Adren Garou apart. Sam darts for the woman with the child and she hopes. She hopes that this woman is not so far gone that her mother's instincts have all rotted away in the mush of her brain.
"Hey," she says, leaning in close, putting one hand on the woman's arm and the other on the stroller. "We should get out of here, it's not safe."
Which is true, but she's scared, because that's not the end of her intentions.
[charisma+empathy+WP, c'mon, Mom lady, be a mama wolf in there somewhere, protect your cub!]
Echoes of the LostNot that he wouldn't be thrilled to turn around and run out of the bar right about now. He does not. That thing contorts into an abomination the likes of which he will struggle to describe at the next moot if it doesn't tear his heart out of his stupid chest and eat it before he can even finish shifting.
Erich shoves him forward and he doesn't stumble but stalks.
I BET THAT BABY ISN'T EVEN YOURS!
The Galliard laughs a scared-sharp barks of a laugh and shifts. He doesn't look like much in his birth form but then he punches into nine feet of battle-lean muscle. Jewelry and tattoos dedicated to his form but not a scar on him. Stood before the horned and hellfire-spitting monster he looks doomed.
Fuck it. He goes for the throat.
Echoes of the Lostdeclare-translation: flanking and then going to drop a Rage to claw him twice. Be a called shot to the neck.
JeremiahDice: 1 d10 TN6 (8) ( success x 1 )
JeremiahDice: 1 d10 TN6 (8) ( success x 1 )
JeremiahDice: 1 d10 TN6 (2) ( fail )
JeremiahDice: 1 d10 TN6 (7) ( success x 1 )
Jeremiah[Director's notes: I've done this before, but each roll is basically assigned to a character and is a rapid gauge of 'how well did that go for them?' In this case, it's Erich/Thomas/Sam/Hector, by order of posts, and while Erich, Thomas and Sam are doing stellarly, Sam is scraping by. Or is going to be when I write something.]
JeremiahThough not bound by blood or by totem, the three young cliaths launch themselves as one at the enemy who, in many ways, is an avatar now of the Beast of War. Thomas leaps for its back, Erich dances faster than anyone would think one of his tribe and auspice could around the Spiral, and Hector goes in the front door.
They are lucky so far. The Dancer does not open his throat and unleash toxic fire on them just yet. He saves it. He holds onto it. They aren't worth wasting it on today, are they? Erich's taunt doesn't seem to disturb him; after all, when you're participating in orgiastic procreation rites featuring five, six, seven players at a time, who can really say who fathered who?
That's the Dancers, though. These are the Garou. They are a pack tonight, at least for tonight. They will live or they will die, but they will do it together.
--
That hide is fucking impenetrable. Or nearly: their claws do slice through it, but only the first layer or two. No blood is shed. No pain is howled. Thomas is all but shaken off like a fly with a mighty roll of Jeremiah's shoulders. It feels like nothing, when their teeth and claws do so little, but here is the thing:
they also do not die. Not yet. And none of them may yet know what that says of their prowess.
They do not die, but they are wounded: with a snarl, their enemy slashes his head towards Hector, those curving horns catching the Uktena across the face, shredding open his lower jaw and tossing him several feet away, crashing into a table. Simultaneously, as Thomas is being thrown off after snapping his jaws at the beast's back, one of the spikes from his arms goes stabbing toward Erich, missing him by a hair. Literally; a tuft of grey fur goes wafting to the ground.
Erich's claws are stuck in the thing's hide, digging into his arm, but the creature hardly even seems to notice. He growls, threatening, shoulders heaving.
--
Sam escapes notice. She goes to the stroller, the woman, puts her hand on both. The woman just stares at her, bland and blank-eyed, a little bit of drool collected at her mouth. She stares uncomprehendingly as the father roars, as the baby cries.
"Mmm," she says, and shakes her head. "Told me t'stay."
Which isn't a no...
Jeremiah[Hector: Let's say 3A]
Erich Storm's TeethStorm's Teeth stays close. It's dangerous, it's terrifying, it's nauseating being this close to a creature carved out of leather and balefire and nightmare, but it is also paradoxically safe here. Safe because he's within the sweep of those deadly horns; he's close enough to that horrid firebreathing maw that if he needed to, he could grab the jaws, clamp them shut, twist them away, something. Try, anyway.
So: he stays close. He twists nimbly away from that strike, and he loses a bit of fur but that's nothing, nothing, and a pump of survival-exhilaration rushes his blood. He laugh-barks, but a moment later Hector goes soaring, Thomas goes flying, and
for a few seconds at least,
it's just him.
--
Somewhere inside Erich, chains creak; a bulging door rattles in its frame. Fear sparks off panic sparks off rage. He clamps down on himself, though. He keeps control.
--
"Focus!" Back in the moment. He's barking at his today-pack, rallying them back, back, come back. There are enough similarities between the Garou language and the Dancer that the beast might understand; this is a chance he has to take. "Stay behind him! Aim for the same spot! Chew a hole through the bastard and rip out his spine!"
And as for him: he stays where he is, up front, up close, personal. Dancing amidst tooth and claw and spike, dodging a strike, staying in range. He's ready, the next time 'Jeremiah' sweeps that bony spike toward him. He steps into it, opens his jaws, grabs it between his teeth
and bites down as hard as he possibly can.
Thomas DelacroixThomas lands heavily on the ground, scrambles up, and charges right back for the hideous Dancer. He gives no true sign that he heard Erich, but his teeth snap back for the same spot, at least one more time.
[Translation: Bite. Hopefully really hard.]
Jeremiah[+2 Rage]
Erich Storm's Teeth[so for this round: he's splitting a normal action to dodge/dance about, and then ... i dunno what it would be considered. a block, maybe? he's basically blocking the spike-sweep WITH HIS TEEF. and then hanging on with tooth and claw, and chomping down in an attempt to crack it off entirely. divvy that up into actions/rage actions as you see fit! he'll dump all 3 rage he has right now into extra chompery.]
Echoes of the LostThe table catches the Uktena and splinters beneath his bulk and the force of the throw and he gets back up.
Even in times of peace Echoes of the Lost can be a persistent little shit. Doesn't know when to drop a line of questioning or cease pursuing a joke sometimes. He ought to just lie there and bleed and wait until the beast that split his jaw like kindling gets bored and ambles off but their rules of engagement don't work like that.
He can't exactly work his mouth to howl properly but his throat is still unstoppered and as he gets to his feet he lets out a pain-crackled FUCK YOU snarl. Hurls himself back towards his comrades.
This time he doesn't go straight at the beast's throat but circles around behind him to join Thomas in digging out its spine.
Echoes of the LostAfter moving: dropping 2 Rage this time, still clawing.
Sam EvansSam's good heart breaks a little more for that face, so vacant and empty and gone. She doesn't waste much time on it, though, because there is no time. Glancing back, she sees Hector go flying, sees Erich clinging to the creature's arm. She shifts gears.
"It's not safe here," she repeats, and adds, "but you can stay outside." She straightens, pushes the stroller forward and away from the woman. With her other hand she reaches down to her. "Come on, I'll help you," and she means it. More than she's meant anything in her life, Sam means what she says to this broken, battered woman. She will help her, even if helping her means only getting her child out of harm's way.
She doesn't implore her a third time, though. Though she wants to save them all she knows that could very well be impossible. The important thing is to live, to survive, to fight another day. And the most important thing to her right now, right here, is to save this one innocent life from death or being raised in corruption.
Either Samantha Evans pushes a baby stroller to the nearest exit with the child's mother, or without her.
[one last char+emp+WP]
Jeremiah[Erich: Dex + Dodge]
JeremiahDice: 1 d10 TN6 (9) ( success x 1 )
JeremiahDice: 1 d10 TN6 (1) ( fail )
JeremiahDice: 1 d10 TN6 (2) ( fail )
JeremiahDice: 1 d10 TN6 (6) ( success x 1 )
Jeremiah[Erich, Thomas, Hector, Sam]
Erich Storm's Teeth[erm, most twinked roll ever.]
Dice: 8 d10 TN2 (3, 3, 4, 5, 5, 6, 7, 7, 10) ( success x 9 ) Re-rolls: 1
JeremiahThat baby stroller is getting out of Tommy T's whether Jeremiah's babymama agrees or not. But her brain is mush. Her will is broken, her spirit sleeping. She looks drowsily at Sam, that bit of drool escaping from over her lip and hanging in a string across her chin. She moves like her joints are stiffened with cement. She walks with a limp, some injury done to her left hip that is hidden under her dress. She flaps a hand aimlessly at the stroller, but misses it, and just lets Sam push it. They don't have a clear path to the front exit, sadly; that is where the beast is. There is another exit behind the bar, but on the other side. Kay is still back there, shuddering, hiding under the bar. The beast's back is to them, but they creep that direction.
Just in time to see Thomas hit the back wall, one ripped-off bone spike shoved through his torso.
--
See, what happens is this:
They bite and they claw, they dance and weave, but they are not up against a normal Spiral. They are not even up against a normal Spiral with an unbelievably powerful totem and more experience in war than all of them put together. He is something else altogether, touched somehow, blessed. How else could he turn so quickly, ripping off his own spike, stabbing Thomas in the gut with it and throwing him across the room? How else could he then turn on Erich and vomit forth a great plume of liquid green fire that Erich slides underneath without so much as a singe?
And when Erich escapes him thus, how else could they explain the way he shrugs off even the deepest of Hector's claws at his spine, his back, claws that should rake across bone and tear muscle but seem to do nothing more than itch the surface of his flesh?
The beast grabs Hector with one clawed hand, the one bearing a broken-off horn, digging its own claws into his chest, lifting him up over his head, snarling. His maw opens as though he will breathe again, breathe out, consume the Uktena since he could not consume the fucker who headbutted him.
The back exit opens and closes. But no stroller goes through it. Just a small woman, darkhaired and wearing a fantastically scary ear spike, holding a wailing infant. An infant whose mother is standing behind the bar, eyes rolling back, as a brain-melting voice resounds through the bar.
They cannot understand it. But she can. And so can their enemy.
The beast holding Hector also has a Shadow Lord hanging from his arm, snapping at him, biting, starting to get through flesh though it tastes of pus and poisons his throat, but he stops. He snarls something, then draws back his hand and smashes Erich to the ground. It's enough to knock Erich back a moment, enough for him to realize he tastes blood -- FINALLY -- amidst the pus.
The voice speaking a language they do not know speaks again. Sam has heard it before, but Sam hit the fuck this point as soon as mama's eyes went white and bolted.
He is only a boy, Jeremiah.
The children are our future.
Even their children.
He growls, right in Hector's bloodied face, and throws him to join Thomas, Kay, and the blanked-out kinswoman at the bar. Then he turns on Erich, taking a floor-cutting step towards the Ahroun.
JEREMIAH.
The step halts. He growls, and then
he breathes fire.
--
This time he does not aim it at any of the wolves. But the door. The walls. The bar-made-of-wood. The fire is thick, viscous stuff, clinging where it lands, eating away at objects like acid while engulfing them in flame as well. He belches it forth once, twice more, in rapid succession, until it roars at his feet, licks up the walls towards the ceiling. The smoke alarms are already melting. The fire begins to circle him, climbing ever higher, til all that can be seen is the beast, war-formed and horned, staring at them from the core of the flames.
And then not even that.
JeremiahDice: 1 d10 TN6 (2) ( fail )
JeremiahDice: 1 d10 TN6 (8) ( success x 1 )
Jeremiah[oh hell no]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (3) ( fail )
Jeremiah[Hector: 2A to the chestThomas: 4A from the spike-to-torsoErich: 3A from biting poisonous pustules you might wanna get cleansed actually everyone please get cleansed also don't die in a fire]
Jeremiah[LINE BREAKS JOVE COME ON]
Erich Storm's TeethThe truth is: Erich didn't really expect to win. He didn't even really expect to survive. Not after those first dizzying instants when they rallied, they charged, they plunged into the fray and they did everything right -- and discovered it made no difference at all.
But by then it was too late. They were committed, he was locked in. He thought briefly and sorrowfully of Charlotte, of Melantha, even of Ingrid-who-pretends-she-doesn't-care; he thinks of how sad they will be, and how sad it would be for them to never really know why he left to get 2-for-1 steak one day and never come back. He thought of these things, but they go by in a flash, and they do not make him quail or falter because
he is a goddamn Shadow Lord, and he is born of Fenrir, and neither of those tribes has any rose tint left in their glasses.
--
So: in he plunges again. Staying close, staying right in the face of the monster. He tries to tear a spike off, but the monster does it instead and impales his friend on it, so Erich goes for the arm instead. He digs his teeth in and he hangs on and he chews, chews, chews like a terrier on a bone. Last night those teeth of his shredded zombies, tore them into little fetid piles, like razors through tissue paper. Tonight: it takes all his might, all his effort, all that time it takes the monster to fling his allies around like toys
to just break the skin.
So no. He doesn't expect to survive. But that doesn't mean he gives up, either. That doesn't mean he doesn't laugh, savage and half-battlemad, when that great gout of green napalm comes splashing at him and he just slides under it like it was standing still. That doesn't mean he isn't scrambling to leap at the monster again, again, when the monster --
well, shit, what does he do? Erich can't even tell what the fuck is going on, only that the bar is resounding with something's voice, and he doesn't understand a word, but there's fire everywhere and none of it is aimed at him and then the monster lights himself up and vanishes.
What. the fuck.
That's what's going through Erich's head for a stunned moment. What: the actual fuck. And then -- a pile of burning wood collapses on his head. He jolts into action. Most of the mundanes in the bar have long since fled screaming, as they're wont to do at the sight of Garou in warforms, but: Kay, Kay is still behind the bar. So Erich grabs her. Like a rag doll. Puts her over his shoulder, kicking and screaming; rears back and kicks down a section of wall and stumbles out coughing, eyes streaming, turning around to yell into the chaos:
"Hey! You guys all right?"
Sam EvansSam makes it out the back minus the mother, but she doesn't turn around and go back for her. In one arm she holds the baby close, walking and bobbing as she walks and shhhhing. In her other hand she holds her cell phone and, as quickly as she can with one phone, she fires off a message to Cold Crescent. It goes a little something like:
HELP B HORROR AT TPMMY T'S ON EVAND 3 WOLVES FIGHTING CANT WIN SEND BACKUP PLZ
And she hits send. And she tries not to think of the wolves left inside, or the mother left behind, or poor Kay stuck in the crossfire. She tries not to think of what she'll have to tell the sept if those wolves don't come back. She tries the hardest not to think of what she'll tell her brother.
Fucking boys. Fucking stupid boys. Stupid Spirals and their stupid corrupting ways.
She's trying not to cry because she's trying to get around the building and to the nearest bus stop to wherever so she can make it to the next checkpoint and the next until she gets to Cold Crescent with this little squalling baby girl child.
If the others come out, though, she'll stop, and she'll be so relieved that a couple of the tears she's been fighting off will fall anyway and Sam will let out a sob and a laugh at the same time. Then she'll get her act together and she'll lead them to her car around the front, because there's no way all of them are going anywhere using public transportation. Someone else will have to drive because under no circumstances is Sam giving a crying baby to a bleeding werewolf.
[Sam's car is a Mazda CX-5 which should have seating enough for three Garou and a battered Spiral kin and maaaaaaaybe a freaking out mortal but why?]
Thomas DelacroixThomas staggers up to his feet, shaking his head to clear it. Pain. Fire. Everywhere. No. Not quite everywhere. He can still make out a few things. The door. Erich pulling out Kay. Hector. Unresponsive Dancer kin. Fire.
For a few seconds everything is a mess of snapshots and fragments. And then he shifts back to homid and shoves the Dancer kin toward the door. "If you want to live, you have to move," he says, right by her ear. Because even to Thomas, leaving anyone to burned alive is a little more than he is really ready for. But if the Wyrm has eaten enough of her mind that she can't respond to that...well...he'll let her go. Maybe she won't notice burning alive? She's probably beyond saving either way anyway.
She'll move or she won't. After a quick check that Hector is making his way out too, Thomas will get the hell out of the building.
Sam Evans[whoops, that text would say something like HELP 1 B HORROR...]
Echoes of the LostThis is going to make a great story at the next moot. Hector is practically composing it in his head as he's slamming into a stationary yet not-entirely-solid object for the second time in however many seconds.
Okay, okay, I got a joke for you: two Shadow Lords and an Uktena walk into a bar and start a fight with a Black Spiral Dancer.
That's it. That's the joke.
His fucking face hurts and his fucking chest hurts and it occurs to him as he's pushing himself to his feet slower than the last time that the room is on fire. If he's going to go running out of here he'd better do it in his birth form.
Melting back into his human skin leaves him with his hair all bedraggled and his face and chest and arms gone bloody and it's all his blood. The smoke makes him cough. He might find some of the monster's dead hide-skin under his nails later but right now he's staring into the fire and the woman left standing inside of the fire and the flames dance in front of his eyes.
He's a terrible liar on the best of days. Today is not a good day. When Thomas glances back to find him Hector is debating whether he's going to let another living thing burn alive.
The Shadow Lord pushes the dead-eyed woman out of the place. The Uktena is the last one out of the building. He would have let her burn.
Jeremiah[Wrap up:
- Fire department and Guardians are on their way. They'll sort that out.
- Babymama will go with them but she's pretty much catatonic an can be put in holding at the sept.
- Sam has a baby. See me later about that.
- Kay probably gets dropped off somewhere screaming and terrified and the mortal authorities can deal with her totally insane stories she's making up to cover setting the bar on fire.]
