The Deer Lady IC

[Ichneumon]

{table=head]Player|Character|Sheet Link|Auspice|Tribe
Jesse Drake| Hector Villalobos |
Here (http://sheetgen.dalines.net/sheet/8580?message=true)| Cahalith | Hunters in Darkness
Kuma Da| Jonathan Wake |
Here (http://sheetgen.dalines.net/sheet/8581?message=true)|Elodoth| Bone Shadows
Edge | Bran Davies |
Here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=10006436&postcount=19)| Rahu | Hunters in Darkness
Blakkmonk| Lamar Beanard |
Here (http://sheetgen.dalines.net/sheet/8589)| Ithaeur | Iron Masters |
The Kings Raven| Jeffrey Pinney |
Here (http://sheetgen.dalines.net/sheet/8595?message=true)| Irraka | Iron Masters
Jamini| Richard Tiff |
Here (http://sheetgen.dalines.net/sheet/8604)| Elodoth | Storm Lord
[/table]

Jonathan and Bran: run-down highway rest stop

You, Jonathan, arrive at a run-down highway rest stop some time after sunset. The rest stop itself is on a stretch of I-25 south of Denver. It is a small area with some dirty picnic tables, a few parking spaces, and a bathroom that might have been cleaned once, but not recently. A breeze from the forested area behind the rest-stop carries with it fresh mountain air, however, clearing the stink from your highly acute senses. There is also a small store where you can buy magazines, posts cards and refreshments like snacks and soda. The half moon hangs high in a clear night sky. You glance one more time at the hastily scrawled directions on the back of an envelope. The rest stop is just where mr Roman said it would be. Nobody else is there yet. You double check the directions, squinting to read in the faint light from the picnic area. There’s a brief moment of anger when you think that you’ve gone to the wrong spot. Then you look up at the moon, and her half-hidden face calms you. You’re in the right place. You’re just the first to get there it seems. Then, you notice there is someone in the store...

You, Bran, are inside the store, buying some stuff [you decide what it is, maybe a soda or a map or magazine to kill time?], you arrived a lot earlier and have been having a talk with the shop’s owner, a man named James Parker. He’s a nice guy, but wary and careful, as, and so he tells, he’s been robbed twice. He doesn't earn much, lives a few miles away from here. Every day he sees tourists come and go to Manitou Springs. He asks how you’re doing and where you’re going, but he’s not incredibly nosy and its easy to evade telling him stuff you’re not supposed to be telling.

"Hope you're having a good time at Manitou Springs! It's a great scenery this time of the year!" [OOC: It's summer]

Suddenly, just before you were about to leave the shop, you start feeling dizzy and for a moment your vision blurs. You start hearing the sound of wind blowing through trees, even though you're inside the store. It's unclear where the sounds come from, but when you try to listen to them closely, you can almost hear a voice in the sound, but it's too faint. The sounds quickly disappear. When you look up at James Parker, he pretends not to have noticed anything odd about you, just re-organizing some stuff on the shelves, but you did notice a short but clear grin on his face and his eyes showing a strange wickedness.

Lamar

You’re in your car just ten minutes away from the rest stop. You’re late because you hadn’t been sure what road to take: staying on the Interstate 55 or taking a “short-cut” onto a smaller highway, route 22. You decided not to take the short-cut, because the map you have is a bit unclear on how the roads go in that area, but looking back it might have been wiser to do so anyway, as you’re now a few minutes late.

The radio is off, but suddenly you hear a woman’s voice coming from the radio: “Watch out, werewolf! The hunt has began.” In the background you hear the faint crackling of fire (maybe of a fireplace?) and a woman crying. You hear a sound like the sound you get when something is stomping on something soft, bones breaking and a terrible bloodcurdling shriek of agony and pain. "Aaaaaahhhaaahhaa!!!" At that moment, you arrive at the high-way rest stop.


Richard and Jeffrey: both in Richard’s car

You’re late. You two met each other mostly by coincidence half a day ago and decided to continue the journey together. You’ve been on the road for nearly two hours, and conversation ceased some time ago. You are each lost in your own thoughts, watching the road, the cars, the scenery fly by. It’s still about 30 minutes driving to the run-down highway rest stop where you agreed to meet. You’re excited about meeting the others of your pack and this famous, but mysterious Max Roman. You, Richard, pull off of Interstate 55 onto route 22, a smaller highway that will eventually lead to the correct highway stop.

Twenty minutes go by, the trees grow thicker, and none of you have seen any man-made structures since turning off the main freeway. Then, up ahead on the left, you see what looks like a gas station and diner. Four cars are parked out front and one more at the gas island, but you don’t see any people. The lights inside the building are flickering and as you approach, they die entirely and you hear a terrifying bloodcurdling shriek of pain and agony
from inside the building. "Aaaaaahhhaaahhaa!!!"

Almost out of reflexes, you stop the car in the middle of the road. Your eyes are fixed on the what's going on the diner. You can see movement inside the diner. Someone — a woman, judging by the height and shape— is pacing back and forth in front of the counter. Judging from her movements, she must be pouring some kind of liquid on the floor. As you watch, she turns toward you and steps forward so that you can see her face. A wild savage face, covered in blood. Long black hair. She walks to the door of the diner, opens it and a few seconds later she appears outside. She's dressed in a long black dress. Her eyes gazing straight at you two, angry, furious, confident. In her hands she holds a box of matches, she takes one out, fires one and throws in inside the diner. The grow quickly and within a few seconds the the entire diner is burning and the flames come dangerously close to the gas station.

She ignores most of it and the only thing she does is walking slowly, menacingly in your direction, not moving a single muscle in her face. Until she starts laughing and shouts: "The hunt continues!"

Hektor: on the road

Your voyage has been delayed as well. You ignore all speed limits, hoping not to make a bad first impression by being the only one who’s late. You are on the same road as Richard and Jeffrey and in the distance you can see their car slowing down near the gas station, stopping and a few moments later you see the diner bursting into flames... You see a woman walking towards the car.

[You may assume you at least know the names of the other people of your future pack.]

[Edge]

Bran Davies; Hishu
The Welshman quirks an eyebrow in response to catching the store owner's malicious grin in the corner of his eye, but otherwise keeps his face an impassive mask. He forks a few bills over for the photography magazine he'd picked out before exiting the store and taking a seat at one of the picnic tables. He opens his newly-acquired magazine briskly, turning pages occasionally.

However, the Rahu's mind is elsewhere. He keeps turning his memories of his lessons from Blaidd Drwg over and over in his mind, trying to remember what Evan Sky's Reach had told him about spirits crossing the Gauntlet - because whatever whisper he'd just heard, it damn well wasn't natural.

<****'s sake.> he mutters to himself in Welsh.

[Jesse Drake]

"What's going on here." Hector mutters to himself. As he pulls closer, he looks for some sort water tap- a well, a hose, anything. As he approaches the woman and the car, he begins "Hey- what happ-"

[Ichneumon]

There is a water tap, 20 feet away from the road, near the gas station, still far enough from the flames to be reachable. (Used for cleaning cars) There is also a hose, but it isn't connected.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jon adjusts the straps on his backpack for what must be the five hundredth time today. The last ride he'd hitched took him most of the way to Manitou Springs, but for whatever reason the old couple in their sedan didn't want to get too close to the place.

He didn't mind walking, really. It felt more fulfilling to be traveling under his own power, at his own speed, rather than being rushed about in quaking metal carriages like the bewildered pea in some interstate shell game. Besides, it gave him time to get in tune with his surroundings.

By the time the rest stop hove into view, he was about as tuned as he was going to get, and more than ready to take a break.

While Bran does his shopping, Jonathan sits down at a picnic table, props his feet up, and begins to pick bits of gravel out of his shoes. Casually, he lowers his eyes and sweeps the area with a death sight. It's not a thorough search. His eyes go milky white for about as long as it takes him to blink, but there's no harm in being cautious.

When Bran emerges with his purchase, Jon waves a friendly hand towards him. "Don't suppose Roman sent you?" It's not exactly what James Bond would do, but there probably aren't going to be too many random travelers here at this time of night.

[Edge]

Bran Davies; Hishu
Bran snaps out of his reverie as Jon asks his question, and looks up at him from his seat.

/Yes,/ he says, using First Tongue to make absolutely sure he wasn't being had, /Max Roman, Iron Master famed in deed, is the reason I am here to meet with others of the People. I am Raven-strikes-the-Wind./

He stands up and offers Jon his hand.

"Also known as Bran Davies. Good to meet you."

[Jesse Drake]

Hector will head for the water pump, and kick it open. Using a point of essence, he'll close his eyes... moving his hands like water flowing, he'll then start grabbing at the pump, drawing the water out. As it flows out, his hands are still making fluid motions- and then he looks at the fire. "Okay-" he says. "Let's see what I can do."

He tries to direct the water at the fire.in an attempt to quench it.

[roll0]

Gulp... I've angered the spirits...

Dramatic Failure: Earth-spirits recoil at the werewolf’s
fumbling. Any spirits of earth or stone become more
hostile. Social rolls made toward those spirits suffer a –2
penalty, as do Gift-activation rolls or rite-activation rolls
made within 24 hours that involve such spirits.

[Ichneumon]

Only one small droplet slowly falls out of the tap on the ground.

[The Kings Raven]

Richard. Hishu -> Urhan

Richard watches with interest then the sort of relaxed horror you feel when you know something is seriously messed up, but it's not affecting anyone you know and you only care about others when it's not too much trouble, fortunately for anyone still alive checking things out was not that much trouble.

Woah, bummer for the people inside. I suppose we'd better see if anyone's still alive, yeah. You take care of the crazy lady and I'll go look. It should be like no problem, we're like the big bad wolves man.

With that Jeff takes a moment to change into Urhan then makes a full sprint around the bloodstained woman towards the burning house.

Rolls
Stamina (3) + Survival (1) + Primal Urge (1).
[roll0] (if he fails use the next roll to see how many turns it takes before he's shifted)
[roll1]
[roll2]

When he gets to the building a perception roll to sniff out anyone alive. He'll do so at a window and only dive in if it's ambiguous or someone's clearly alive.
Wits (3) + Composure (2) + Urhan (4)
[roll3]
for tens [roll4]

[Ichneumon]

You successfully shift into Urhan form, running around the blood-stained woman and to the burning diner. There is no-one left alive. There are 3 corpses, one of which was a wolf-blooded female, you can discern from the smell.

The woman doesn't seem shocked at all from seeing you shift and doesn't seem effected at all by lunacy.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey, Urhan to Urshul

Satisfied that he's done what basic decency required and that there's no one here to turn to Lunacy in the midst of a fire Jeffrey again begins to change, growing bigger and more muscular taking the Urshul. Slowly he approached the blood-soaked woman with a constant deep growl, trying to focus her attention on himself and away from Richard. He only hoped the Elodoth would realise what he was doing.

ooc:
Stamina (3) + Survival (1) + Primal Urge (1)
[roll0]
[roll1]
[roll2]

Not to sure what to roll for growling. Nothing in the Shapeshifting section mentioned it and I'd assume a giant wolf should get some bonus to being noticeable. I'll just guesstimate Presence + Intimidation, ulp. Feel free to roll for me if you think that's a bad choice.

Presence (1) + Intimidation (unskilled, -1)
[roll3] Ah well, at least not a dramatic failure.

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

"What's up wolfboy..." Hector reaches for his chakram and stares at the wolf. He waits to see if that creepy as hell woman makes a move before striking, but he gets a bit closer to see what's up.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey, Urshul

Jeffery could smell that this new person was a Werewolf, that was probably good news. When Hector spoke Jeffrey gave a bizarre wolfish shrug. Couldn't he see that the others were supposed to sneak while Jeff held it's attention, then quickly as that he got over it and continued his slow growling advance.

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector takes another look at Jeffery, and heads for his bike- but doesn't start it, nor does he let go of his chakram.

[Blakkmonk]

Lamar steps out of his Land Rover, his eyes darting from left to right, trying to see where the sound came from and searching for movement. He unhooks the safety catch of his holster and makes his way to the back and grabs he gear.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

/I greet you, Raven-Strikes-The-Wind, and I offer my name in turn./

Jon meets his handshake. "I'm Jon Wake. Pleased to meet you." The skin of his hand is faintly leathery, but warm. He looks about nineteen or so, with ripped khakis and a faded gift-shop shirt. His hair's short and black, and he has a couple days' stubble on his chin.

"It's getting pretty late. You don't suppose the other guys were held up?" Jon has a calm, even tone, although at the moment he sounds tired and a little distracted.

OOC: No blips on death sight, Ichneumon?

[Ichneumon]

[OOC: That's my first mistake! Forgetting about describing what you see with your Death sight!]

Jonathan Wake

As you perceive the area, you see nothing unusual... except for a strange glow coming from the shop. As if there was some kind of ghost activity inside.

[Edge]

Bran Davies; Hishu
Bran returns the handshake with a strong grip and a sardonic smile.

"I dunno, Jon. With something like this, I fully expect Murphy to be hard at work."

He releases Jon's hand and gestures towards the picnic table.

"We've got something to think about as it is, though. There's something up about this place, and the guy behind the counter in the shop."

Bran takes his seat again and, assuming Jon sits down as well, he leans in and begins whispering.

"I was just finishing up buying this piece of crap magazine when I heard something. It was faint, but it was weird. Almost as if it were coming over the Gauntlet. And as I turned to look for where it was coming from, I swear the guy behind the counter grinned and gave me an evil eye."

He glances around to make sure that their conversation is still their own.

"'Course, I've not got anything solid to go on, and I don't even know if a sound coming over the Gauntlet is possible. ****, I'm a Rahu, not an Ithaeur."

[Jamini]

Richard Tiff: Hishu

Richard frowns as his companion dashes from his car, taking a few seconds longer to make sure his vehicle is stopped before stepping out himself. He glances at the diner before fixing his eyes on the woman who was slowly approaching.

"I've got a bad feeling about this Jeff." he mutters as his companion suddenly shifts to Urhan form at his side, leaving him alone with the woman. Awkwardly he raises his hands and backs up a step, staring the woman down coolly.

I am spending a willpower to activate my Dominance gift "Warning Growl". It will only work on humans, wolf-blooded, and other werewolves with 2 or less Honor Renown.

((Rolled here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=126564) because I fail at using the forum die rollers))

(([roll0]))

Success gives me +2 defense bonus against the woman (who I'm thinking is probably a member of the Pure.) This bonus lasts for the scene.



"I don't suppose we could talk this out, ma'am?" Richard says slowly, a trace of a growl edging into his voice as Jeffrey emerged from the building and shifted into Urshul. "No? Pity."

With that he swiftly throws off trenchcoat and shifts to Urshul.

Didn't you say it's the half moon right now? Actually?

Rolling Stamina(3)+Survival(-1)+Primal Urge(1), but I automatically can shift as a reflexive action without a roll or point expenditure if it's my Auspice Moon. (Half Moon)

((BAH, rolled it wrong. I'll post it here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=126564) ))

[roll1]

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Something's been bothering him since he sat down. He couldn't quite put his finger on it before, but when Bran mentions the shop, Jon's whole body swivels to orient on it like a compass seeking magnetic north.

"There's definitely something in there. A ghost, or a spirit maybe. It's not hiding itself very well." He can feel the hairs prickling slightly on the back of his neck, but he fights to keep them down. No sense in getting worked up as long as it stays over there. "Might be better just to let it lie."

[Ichneumon]

Richard, Hektor and Jeffrey

The woman doesn't respons at all to the warning growl, as if she didn't "get" it.
Richard quickly shifts to Urshul form, aided by the fact that the current phase of the moon is his Auspice.

The woman does react to that. She seems frightened. Not lunacy-frightened, but more a "I am outnumbered"-kind of fright. She stumbles a bit. "I ehh. Guess that's the only trick you werewolves have, save primitive beasts. Brawl and physical combat, are that you're answers to everything?" She fakes a smile, pretending to still be confident, but it's quite obvious she feels far less secure, now that it turns out there are 3 of you.

"If that's the case, killing your pack will be even more easy that the previous bunch. Good day!" With those words (that sounded quite fake and rehearsed) she bows in a very theatrical way to all three of you. Seconds later her body starts to twist and turn and falls apart, disintegrates, in a group of crows. Her dress and clothes merging into their bodies. The murder of crows quickly flies away into the forest, making loud noices sounding a bit like laughter.

The fire has spread to the gas station...

Jonathan, Bran and Lamar

Nothing interesting happens for 10 minutes. In the distance you see James Parker closing down the shop. He turns off the lights. He closes the windows. He locks the door, turns around to all of you in the distance: nods, smiles and he kindly waves with his hand, greeting you all.... then his body splits into a big cluster of spiders that quickly spread and crawl away from the highway rest stop in many different directions.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey, Urshul -> Hishu

Jeffrey had assumed there was no way she could escape when surrounded by werewolves on three sides. He was wrong. As soon as he realised what she was doing Jeffrey charged at a full sprint, snapping his jaws at the fleeing crows, making enormous leaps to try and snatch one out the air.

OOC: Well that took both me and Jeffrey by surprise. I know he can't kill an entire flock of crows before they fly out of reach but if he managed to get a bite on even one that should give him tracking bonus for having tasted blood. Here's a brawl roll, I don't know their defence but you can just lop dice off the end.

Making a Charge Attack as per WoD Core. I don't think I'll need Defence this turn.

Strength (2+2) + Brawl 2
[roll0] for tens [roll1]
Ok, unless they have Defence 6 I got at least a bite :)

[Ichneumon]

There are a total of 12 crows. The crows visibly panic when you attack them. Feather fly through the air as you try to bite everywhere you can. You manage to kill 1 before it can escape. It drops dead on the ground. You also manage to bite a few others. (They all taste/smell EXACTLY the same)

[Edge]

Bran Davies; Hishu

<Luna's ever-changing teats!>

The Rahu reaches under the picnic table for the instrument case with his klaive in, and starts fiddling with the awkward locks on the container.

"Not a spirit or ghost. A goddamn shartha. Freaking Azlu. Don't see many where I come from - get more trouble from the rats. Figures first thing we run into would be a spider host."

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey, Urshul -> Hishu -> Urhan

In a blur of fur and fangs, snapping teeth, flying feathers and panicked caws Jeffrey emerges victorious, several black feathers adorn his body and a crushed crow no more than a bundle of broken bones, blood and feathers sits in his mouth. In a few deft gulps he swallows the remains before shifting back to human and addressing the other werewolves.

"You think we should, run?"

He's noticed that the gas station is about to blow and points in it's direction to the others before once again changing form. If the others go for the car he'll jump onto the rooftop and hold tight, if they run on foot he'll do the same.


Nice! Irraka trackers get the goods!

Shifting back to human.
Stamina (3) + Survival (1) + Primal Urge (1).
[roll0][roll1][roll2][roll3][roll4]

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector looks at the distance. Then he looks back to Jeffrey. "Was anyone alive in there?" He'll ask. Hector will start getting on his bike to get mobile.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffery, Urhan

Jeffrey shakes his head in response to Hector's question.

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector hangs his head a bit, and gets on his 'cycle. "Okay... I'm out of here." He says. "I've got places to go. Well, brother wolf- our paths may cross again." Then he's off.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jonathan watches the spiders go. As long as none of them head his way, he won't make any moves against them.

Once they're properly dispersed, he turns back to Bran. "I've seen Azlu before, but never properly fought them. From the looks of it, this one's been disguised here for a while. Maybe we can come back to take care of it when we have a full pack."

"I don't think it'll leave the area for good. You saw how confident it was."

[Ichneumon]

Richard, Hektor and Jeffrey

[OOC: If you decide to continue you ride to the highway rest stop, you may assume the journey goes without further difficulty and that you arrive there within 10 minutes.]

EDIT:

Jonathan

The spiders don't move in your direction, but away from the highway rest stop entirely.

[Jamini]

Richard: Urshal

Richard blinks as the woman flees, squinting as his companion leaps for one of the many crows. For a moment he rakes his brain, trying to identify what exactly it was they had run into.


Intelligence + Occult : [roll0]
Re-rolled the ten here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=10033319#post10033319) (Failed)
I'm thinking it's most likely a Shartha based on crows, however it could also be a manifested spirit/spirit posessing a person, or something else entirely. Either way, it's hostile to us.



A few seconds later he closes his eyes and begins to shift again, the moon glimmering off his silver-flecked fur as his limbs straighten and his face becomes more human. He stops the shift when he reaches Dalu and rises. Afterwards he picks up his discarded trenchcoat and shrugs it on.

"We should go Jeffery, we're already late." He says nearly fluently in the first tongue to the tracker before turning towards Hector, "What is your name, Stranger-Friend? You have the smell of the Forsaken on you. Are you local?"

[Jesse Drake]

Hector stops for a second, and stares at the othe wolves. "I am a Rider, and I fear I may be late." Hector replies in the spoken tongue. Then, he starts up his bike. "But some call me Hector." He shouts, in English, right as he's leaving. His plates say Arizona, so if that's his bike, he's not a native.

[Jamini]

Richard

With a nod to Hector, Richard opens the back door to his explorer, motioning to Jeffery to get in. "I already said last time you tried this, you can't ride on top of the car as a wolf. Get in, I'll drive." He shouts to Hector in English as the other mounts his motorcycle, "My name is Richard, nice meeting you." before getting into the driver seat of his car.

Assuming no other delays, he'll then drive to the meeting point.

[Ichneumon]

Richard, Jeffrey and Hector

Richard doesn't remember ever hearing specifically about a shartha based on crows, nor about such hosts being specifically active in this area, but other types than spider and or rat certainly do exist. Elders consider it very likely that other forms of shartha exist in the world, but devote most of their efforts to staying hidden from werewolves. It's also not that uncommon for hosts to take on the form of swarms of animals: think of Azlu hosts that frequently take on the form of spider swarms, or Beshilu hosts that take on the form of a group of rats. So it's certainly possible it's a kind of shartha, and given the fact that this place hasn't seen a Uratha pack for a while, it's likely that spirit activity has risen. However, legends also tell of other supernatural creatures shapeshifting, including into swarms: Vampires, magicians, but even normal mortals called "skin thieves".

There are no delays and you arrive at the meeting point.

Jonathan, Bran and Lamar

Eight minutes after the shopkeeper "swarmed" away you see a motorcyclist arrive at the rest stop, followed a few minutes later by a car with two passengers.

[Blakkmonk]

Lamar breathes out slowly and shifts his perceptions over into the shadow to see if we are being observed by anyone else. He will turn a slow circle as I look into the other side.

[Jesse Drake]

Hector steps off of his motorcycle, and smiles. It seems Richard and his friend were on their way here too. He stands by his cycle, and waits to see if anyone says anything.

[Ichneumon]

Lamar breathes out slowly and shifts his perceptions over into the shadow to see if we are being observed by anyone else. He will turn a slow circle as I look into the other side.

There is no one else watching you, not here and not on the other side, in the Shadow Realm. When you do peek across the gauntlet, you notice a lot of extra tree-spirits though, growing where there are no trees in the physical world, which appears to be causing some “bleed-over” effects: A tree-spirit growing in the middle of a sidewalk has caused the sidewalk in the physical realm to crack as if a tree’s roots were splitting it.

[Jamini]

Richard: Dalu

Pulling the collar of his coat up high on his neck Richard turns off his car and exits, opening the back door for Jeffrey before turning to look at the other four people gathered outside of the closed rest stop.

The first thing he noticed was the scent. Each of them smelled very differently; Hector, for example, had the acrid smell of motor grease and rest-stop cigarettes ingrained into his clothes from months of travel on the road. The others had varying degrees of different lifestyle choices written all over their bodies. Underneath it all, however, was the faint (or not-so-faint, in the case of himself and Jeffery, he realized.) musky smell of wolf-kin. Each of them were children of Luna; and likely future members of the pack that Max Roman had organized to retake the Rockies.

"Thought so." he muttered as he approached the group, the last arrival sans the conspicuously absent puppeteer behind this gathering.

"Sorry we're late, there was a problem a ways back on the road." He flicked at his collar as it slipped a bit, revealing his currently lupine ears. Absently he wondered if he should have bought a fedora to complete his somewhat dated ensemble. "You were all sent by Roman, correct?"

He paused for a brief moment and dipped his head congenially towards the werewolf he had met a few minutes before, "Hector."

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey, Hishu

A problem? She killed three people man. Some crazy lady knifed three people, she said she was trying to hunt werewolves but she split when I made an issue. Oh, here I saved a few feathers so if you want to like, take a look that's your parog.

As Jeffrey speaks he takes a seat and begins leaning back dangerously, hooking his feet to the underside of the table to keep his balance. As for the other people with him, he can smell the Wolf on each, he's sure he could smell more but it's safe enough to assume Roman sent them. Why think when you could just wait for everyone's introduction?

[Blakkmonk]

I see it has been an eventful day for some already. Roman seems not one to exaggerate on things by bringing us together does he? I am Lamar or rather as Sings-the-Word. I will take those feathers. I know a trick or two that may help us. Lamar walks toward the rest stop. I don't see any thing else that seeks to interfere with us so far but I will keep my eye out.

[Jesse Drake]

Hector nods to Richard. "Richard. I was indeed summoned by Roman- he told me I was to meet with my new pack." He turns to the rest. "My name is Hector Villalobos."

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey, Hishu

You too? We're pack buddies man. It's Jeff.

[Ichneumon]

Merry Christmas!

Your conversation and introductions are interrupted when a black Cadillac quickly drives up into the rest area. The car idles for a moment, and then shuts off. The drivers’ door opens and a man steps out. You recognize him from your descriptions of him: Max Roman. You’ve seen a predator’s eyes before—you see them every time you look in the mirror. This is worse. He looks like a well-built rich guy, wearing clothes that cost more than most people make in a year, but that’s a mask. The outfit is just sheep’s clothing that barely hides the wolf. He looks at the group of you and smiles a closed-mouth grin that’s supposed to put you at ease. Either he’s positive that the five of you are trustworthy, or he knows he can take you all. A moment’s thought convinces you it’s the latter. Max is holding a small leather folder.

“Hello, all of you,” he says. “Sorry I'm a bit late, had some Azlu-related problems on the way. I hope you’ve had a chance to get to know each other. If not, look at each other closely now. These are your brothers and sisters. You will become closer to each other than you ever were to your birth families. You will hurt when they hurt, bleed when they bleed, love when they love. You may take a wife or a husband someday—you may even have children—but they will never understand the bond between you and your packmates. They can’t. They’re only human.”

"The six of you are particularly blessed. We call packs whose members comprise each auspice ‘blessed’ packs, because they possess all of the possibilities that Mother Luna blessed us with. I have faith in you — faith that you will one day shake the pillars of heaven and help lead our people into a new promised land where we can finally take our Father’s place.”

He pauzes, to let the words sink in, but not long enough so let any of you interrupt him.

“But enough speeches. If I were in your shoes, I’d be anxious to get on with it.” He opens the leather folder and hands it to Jonathan, along with a pen. “Sign your names where it’s marked and then pass it along.” He looks at the group and smiles again. “When you do, you will all be co-owners of a house in Manitou Springs. It will be the heart of your new territory."

“You might not know this, as some of you aren't from around here....", while saying this he particularly looks at Bran. "But many years ago, a dark spirit called Gurdilag drove the werewolves from Denver. Its power was greater than any single pack could dream of facing.” When Max says this, he shudders, and you think about that for a moment. If he intimidates you just standing there wearing a business suit, what was so powerful that it still disturbs him after all these years?

He continues. “When I gathered the packs of the Rocky Mountains to face this creature, not all of the volunteers survived. One such pack was a pack of Bone Shadows led by Stephen Meers. His pack claimed Manitou Springs as their territory. They were wise and powerful.... But they disappeared mysteriously a while ago. Died it seems. Since then, no pack has reclaimed that territory."

“But I see an opportunity here—both in you and in this territory. So now you own the house, free and clear, along with whatever’s left inside. I purchased it from Stephen’s heirs. This year’s taxes are paid. Everything else is up to you. I believe that Stephen’s locus was in the house itself, or somewhere on the property, but I haven’t been out there to look for it. That’s up to you. When you've settled you should find a totem spirit and I advise to try to find out why and how Stephen and his pack died... so that the same doesn't happen to you."

“So, there you have it. You have a place to start—more of a chance than many packs get. Don’t screw up. Because if you do, you lose not only this opportunity, but my favor and generosity as well.” Max holds out his hand for his copy of the papers.

The papers you are given are deeds and titles for the property. All of the characters are listed as co-owners, even the minors. There is also a printout of a map to the house, as well as a city map of Manitou Springs, and a list of important phone numbers for the town (like the police department, the main church, the mayor office, hospital etc). One of Max’s business cards is tucked in as well, as well as the number of the law firm that drew up the papers. A set of keys to the house for each character is in an envelope as well.

[OOC: I'll later post a list of places and stores in Manitou Springs, when you head in that direction, which you can find on the map. I don't plan on making an actual map, don't think you'll need one. But with the list you can get an impression of the town and the places you can go.]

[Jesse Drake]

Hector looks around. He smiles a weak smile. "I guess there are worse situations to fall into." He says with a chuckle. "A place to stay, boon companions for life, the mystic powers..." He signs his name without hesitation. He was missing something, and he knew what it was, but the only way to tell would be to look into his eyes- which are shielded by his shades.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jon sits quietly, eyebrows slightly raised, as the other wolves introduce themselves. Apparently the area has bigger problems than a bold-as-brass Azlu.

When Max arrives, he manages to quickly pass his name on to the pack, and then turns to give their beneficiary his full attention. After a minute of Max talking, Jon is wearing a blatant frown on his face. He signs the offered documents nonetheless, but as soon as he's done he turns his attention back to Max.

"We won't disappoint you, sir, but is there anything you can tell us about the local spider-hosts? Bran and I just met the one that runs this rest stop, and he knew exactly what we were."

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey, Hishu

You might think Jeffrey would do the lazy thing and sign without reading but that's not how the man rolls. He reads carefully, a moment's effort to catch a bad clause now could save months of effort later but if there's any catch Jeffrey's untrained eye can't find it. Before long he's signed.

You had trouble too? I feel for you man. We ran into something just a few miles back, some woman knifed three people then turned into a bunch of ravens when we took issue. I only managed to catch one.

[Ichneumon]

Max Roman reacts shocked to this. Although he tries to "keep his cool", not showing his shock to the younglings, it's visible that he's concerned. "They knew of you? That's worrisome."

"The Azlu have always been strong in this area, but nothing special. I was attacked by one them on my way here. They prepared an ambush. It seems they've grown in numbers and strength in the past few months with the disappearance of Stephen's pack. It's something you'll have to deal with, but I wouldn't think it would be too difficult for you. More worrisome is it that the expected you. I also don't know what to think of that raven-woman. Better watch out. We still don't know what happened to Stephen Meers' pack. If they attacked me on the way here and already attacked you and showed signs of knowing who you are, you can expect they also know where you'red going."

[Blakkmonk]

Lamar also signs his name. In my experience, no plan survives contact with the enemy. I think that we should treat this as if they do know we are coming. After all, this place has not had anyone to enforce the law for a while. The level of control we will bring will be unwanted by certain entities, that we can count on. We will need to tackle this problem on our own terms, my brothers. With that being said, Lamar proceeds to quickly assemble his rifle and load a magazine into it and sling it across his body in its combat sling.

[Edge]

As the others arrive, Bran introduces himself to them, giving them his name in English and his deed name in First Tongue. When Roman shows up himself, he gives the Iron Master a bow of the head. He remains silent as the others talk about the problems they now face, but interjects when he sees a pause in their speech.

"Typical. Leave Britain and you trade rat infestation for a spider one. While I agree we need to lay down the law here, I think first we should get to know our territory and decide on some internal matters. A pack is not a pack until it knows the terrain which it guards like the back of their collective arses and has a strong alpha to provide direction."

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jon nods as Lamar talks, head bobbing a quiet rhythm of approval. "He's right. We should take things slowly and carefully until we have a better idea what the lay of the land is like."

When Bran speaks up, he swivels on his picnic bench to face the other wolf. "I'm not sure any of us know the others well enough to select an alpha yet, but it will come in time. We should also consider seeking out the aid of a totem. If the problems this territory faces are largely agitated spirits, having at least one spirit in our corner might help settle some of them down. The Azlu and the crow lady we will have to hunt, but it would be far better to pacify the rest."

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector speaks softly after Jon. "I don't envy whoever ends up as Pack Leader." Hector says. "But I can assist in the familiarization of the land."

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

"I'm not so sure I would want to be alpha either. That much responsibility would run me ragged." He half-yawns, but quickly swallows it before anyone can take offense.

"I have a knack for speaking with spirits, though. As long as they're not trying to rip me apart, they usually listen. Once we're all settled in, I can start asking around. Find out who the local lords are." Idly, his hands start tapping a rhythm out on the table. The sound is a lot deeper and mellower than it should be, and it seems like it might be carrying across the gauntlet. "Before we do any of this, though, I think we should find the house. Make sure nothing else's settled in there. After all, if whatever got Meers knew he owned it, it might be watching the property just in case."

"Mr. Roman, is there anything else we should know about the territory before we set out? Was Steven Meers in regular contact with any other packs before he vanished? Was the Gurdilag the sort of spirit that might have left its progeny behind? Any problems that we fail to contain here could spill over into adjacent territories. I want to make sure we get this right."

OOC: Merry Christmas, all.

I'm just about ready to get this show on the road. Anyone else have questions they want to ask Roman, or should we set off for Meers' old house?

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey, Hishu

Hey man, chill about the Alpha. We're all friends right, why dose anyone have to go ruin a good thing by putting ranks around. Now a totem, I get that. If you want a totem I can track one down, no problems.

[Ichneumon]

Max doesn't intervene in the discussion, if the young pack can't handle a little disagreement on their own, they can just as well forget about the whole thing.

"Stephen Meers was always very secretive and protective with his land. He didn't share much with other packs from what I've understood. So to be honest, I have no idea what you'll find. I would think it is likely that the Meers protected their house with traps and other defenses, so be careful. I don't think you have to worry about Gurdilag though, he's dead and gone." Those last words were spoken with extra pride in his voice.


When the pack is out of questions, Max wishes you the best of luck, reiterates his confidence in you all, and leaves.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

"How did Gurdilag die? The passing of such a powerful spirit must surely have effected the spirit world. Perhaps the repercussions from it are linked to the current state of the territory. There would have been a power vacuum left in its wake, at the very least, and that may have been what Meers was trying to deal with."

[Ichneumon]

"I discovered Gurdilag's ban. With that knowledge I was able to unite many of the packs of the Rockies to fight Gurdilag together. We led as many of them on a crusade against Gurdilag and after liberating loci after loci, taking back the Rockies, we tracked down Gurdilag himself too its layer and managed destroyed it. It's certainly likely this created a vacuum for other spirits to grow. The packs needed to make sure not another powerful spirit would simply take over and fill the niche. It's possible the Meers didn't see such a power growing, until it was too late. I checked though, and the other packs haven't noticed any spirits becoming extraordinary strong or something like that. If there was such a spirit forming a more global threat, I'm sure other packs would have noticed it as well."

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

"Who are the nearest packs? Unless a serious situation emerges, we probably won't be coming straight to you for aid. If we need the cooperation of another local pack, who should we look to?"

[Ichneumon]

"There are two packs you can look to. The first are the Knights of Jade, their alfa is Zackary Newsreader. They are a young idealistic pack, full of dreams, full of hope. I watched over them myself, they were two years ago where you are today: Forming their own pack here in the Rockies. Although they might still be a bit unexperienced and still very young, you can rely on them, that's for sure. If you need help, they'll come. No rewards asked, no favors. I've already told them about you. Their territory lies a bit more south."

"The other pack is an older pack, more experienced. Alfa calls himself Vince, or Gazes-into-the-fire. They're strong, have seen a lot of different stuff. Although I would be certain of a victory if they'd be fighting besides me, they don't often grand help unless there is something in it for them. Their territory is more North. They call themselves the Warriors of Terror."

[Blakkmonk]

At least we have good allies guarding our flanks. I think the only way to get started is to get started. Let us head to the old Meer place and see what we can find. I think any questions we may have will be answered there. Considering how remote the area is, we shouldn't have to worry about humans interfering in pack business.


I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas or holiday time period if you dont celebrate Christmas.

[Ichneumon]

"Okay. Then I say Goodbye and Good Luck! I am certain you will do fine and succeed. We can expect great things from your pack."

Roman shakes your hands, one by one, smiles and gets into his car and leaves.

You get inside your vehicles and start driving. The map and directions Max gave you are quite clear. You drive a short too the town of Manitou Springs, but quickly take one of the minor roads, traveling up and away. Behind you, you can see the town sprawled out below you. Up ahead lies the heart of your territory, if you can claim it....

You almost miss the small turnoff and mailbox. There’s a locked gate (to which you have a key), and a road that turns into the forest.

The property is 10 acres of wooded land with a cabin nestled in the middle of it. The land is on a slope facing the town of Manitou Springs. The forest is thick; full of pines, alders and firs. The clean smell of the forest is a treat for the Uratha in any form. The smell in somewhat ruined though by the foul stench of rotting meat coming from the forest. The sounds of birds carry through the trees. There is a small dirt trail from the road to the house. It winds back and forth, with thick trees bordering the road, presumably so that it would be difficult to just zoom in, and the werewolves would have plenty of time to hear any company coming in a vehicle.

There are many ways of approaching the house, if that's what you want to do: you can take the trail straight to the house or walk through the forest. Or there might be something else you want to do, preparing yourself for entering or whatever.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey. Hishu -> Urhan

"Time to check out our new home. Says Jeffrey stretching as he gets out of the car, his stretch fluidly shifts and ripples into the Urhan and he's off vanishing quickly into the underbush.

Though a bit antisocial of him to move without the group Jeffrey's sensitive Urhan nose and ears remained vigilant for any trouble and he remained confident that he could return to help the group in a matter of moments if needed. His approach was simple heading directly towards the cabin in a zig zagging path that kept him invisible to only the keenest of eyes.


Stamina (3) + Survival (1) + Primal Urge (1).
[roll0][roll1][roll2]

Dex(3+2) + Stealth (4) (3 successes)
[roll3] for tens [roll4]

Perception: Wits (3) + Composure (3) + Urhan Bonus (4) (4 successes)
[roll5] for tens [roll6]

[Ichneumon]

The grass is wild and thick with weeds. To the side of the house stands a small garage/utility shed. Behind the house is a vegetable garden, now overgrown. Looking at the house, one can see there are plenty of windows, though all of them are currently shuttered.

The moment you change into urhan form and point your nose into the air, horror fills your body, as you recognize the smell of the rotting meat coming from in the forest and away from the house: it's uratha.

[Edge]

Bran Davies; Hishu to Dalu

After exiting the car and starting up towards the house, Bran shifts into Dalu, taking care to stay behind and downwind from Richard, or at least the area he guessed he was, so as not to disrupt his search. As he walks, he slings the instrument case on shoulder round to his front to open it, which he manages to do after a few moments. Once the case is open, he removes his klaive from within and puts the case down carefully on the ground.

"Not taking any chances," he says to the rest of his new pack, "The previous pack's missing and the whole area stinks of meat. If there's even the slightest chance that something's in that house, I want to be ready for it."

He continues on up the hill for several paces before turning around to the others.

"And if there's any fighting to be done, I don't want any of you running in like madmen. I'm Rahu, so it is my duty and honour to take scars so the rest of you don't have to."

Bran looks slightly uneasy as he says this, apparently not used to being so outspoken.

"Now, y'know, enough of talking. Urum da takus."

Shapeshifting Roll: Stamina (2) + Survival (2) + Primal Urge (1) - [roll0]

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey, Urhan

Jeffrey was slowly doubling back to warn the others when he caught wind of Bran's warning. They already knew, good. With that he turned around, this time he sticks closer to the pack, hidden in the bush around them Jeffrey makes wide circles sniffing for anything that may come. Idly he wondered if the ravens that threatened earlier might have been responsible.

Usually when I make a Stealth, Perception or similar roll I try not to reroll it unless the situation changes. So let me know if you ever need another roll :)

Meanwhile one situation did change, Jeff is now going to take a quick moment to sniff around to see if the ravens have been around in the past. Afterwords he gets back to circling.

Tracking by Sent (Just looking for a sent, not actually trying to follow it)
Wits (3) + Survival (1) + Urhan form (1) + tasted blood (4) (two successes)
[roll0]
for tens
[roll1]

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector doesn't change shape- he likes his shades where he has them- at least for now. He draws out his Chakram and walks forward with Bran, carefully keeping an eye out for any signs of an ambush.

[Ichneumon]

Jeffrey's tracking scent-stuff:

On the ground you notice traces of somebody puling and dragging a corps from the house to somewhere in the forest. The scent of it is still fresh and moves in that direction also. The dragging occurred less than an hour ago. The corps was already long decomposing and rotting. The corps, judging from the smell of it, belonged to a Uratha. The one dragging the corps had the same smell as the "raven lady" you encountered earlier.

The house

Once you all get closer to the house, you can feel that you are within the area of influence of the Meers pack’s former locus. The air feels electric and alive, and the Shadow Realm seems much closer. The characters’ spirit halves align and react like iron filings to a magnet. [OOC: To find the locus itself, you'd have to roll Wits + Investigation + Primal Urge to get a bead on it, I think.]

[OOC: I'll now just give you a description of the house, all of it that you can see by opening 1 of the doors, which aren't locked, and doing a few steps inside and glancing in.]

The Meers house is a large, two-story wooden cabin. The walls are thick, heavy wood, as are the shutters and the front door. A porch extends across the front of the house. Lawn furniture, a heavy wooden porch swing, and a pair of rocking chairs lay knocked over and strewn across the porch.

The doors (one in the front and one in the back) aren't locked. The screen doors in front of them have been knocked off, and the screens themselves are all ripped apart. The room smells musty, with a faint hint of dank decay. Dozens of small scents emanate from the house,
a crazy patchwork of smells that makes no single one identifiable.

The main floor has four rooms. The front door opens into a large living room. The furniture is covered with sheets, and a thick layer of dust covers everything. One would think that, with the open doors, the house would be home to all sorts of forest critters looking for a new nest or den, but there are no animal scents in the house and no signs of animal waste. The living room has a couple of long couches and a big easy chair. Paintings adorn the walls, all of which are nature scenes apparently done by the same artist. A brick fireplace stands in the center of the room, which when lit would radiate heat to the living and dining room. A staircase leads up to the second floor.
On the far side of the living room is a large wooden table, surrounded by wooden chairs, all covered with sheets. Along the back wall is a china cabinet. A bar (and barstools) separates the dining room from the kitchen.
The kitchen is modern, but classically done, with dark wood cabinets that match the rest of the décor. The cabinets are all open, and various plates, glasses and dishes are set out. Some even have rotten food on them, though no flies or other vermin seem attracted to the food. Next to the kitchen is a full bathroom, complete with a shower.

The living room, dining room and kitchen form an “L” around the remaining room. The door is closed and locked.

[Blakkmonk]

Lamar==>Hishu-Dalu
Lamar stepped out of his landrover, placing his combat pack on, magazines within easy reach. He loads and racks his SCAR-17 and as he approaches the door he shifts into Dalu. He performs a military trained sweep left and right of the area, his rifle transversing the area for targets with Bran. I understand your duty Bran, but I have done this dozen of times. It is easier and safer to enter and sweep the room together. he says in a whisper, knowing Bran's keen ears will pick up his voice. Let's clear the room, two by two. I will cover you to each entrance. Lamar nods his chin to the door, signaling his readiness to bran and lefts his weapon to the ready position....

Spending one point of essence to auto shift to Dalu

http://www.fnhusa.com/support/images/dynamic/m/FNM0153mb.png

[Jamini]

Richard Tiff - Dalu

Richard gets out of the far side of the car from Jeffry, his nose wrinkling as he caught wind of the dead. Without flair he reached into his pocket and withdraws a handkerchief to cover his nose. "Urgh, horrible. Poor guys. Max wasn't kidding when he said this place needs a pack right away. " As Jeffrey returns he bends down and places his face at eye level with him, muttering in a very understandable mix of wolf-speak and first tongue. "What do you smell? your nose is better than mine."

Normally communicating in first tongue in Urhan requires a Manipulation + Expression roll for the speaker. I'm hoping you will let me circumvent that with Jeffry that since I have the First Tongue Merit and since we are members of the same pack. ((Or maybe let me substitute Wits + Empathy for his roll to communicate a complex idea.)) Trying to stay useful, since Richard is pretty spotty in combat. Not that he sucks at it, per-say, but it is defiantly not his forte.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey, Urhan -> Dalu

You could sneak around indoors but doing so would make it easier for any assailants to separate Jeffrey from the pack, if they could spot him. The young werewolf didn't want to take that risk. As the group began entering the house Jeffrey's Dalu form dropped from his hiding spot in a tree.

I know who killed the Werewolves, Locus is that way. Having said his bit he drops casually back into the pack, others could do the thinking.

OOC:

[edit] Whew pretty bad rolls. Successes on the Shapeshifting. It took two turns to get the spear out the Fetish and only one success to notice where the Locus energies are coming from. Still one was enough.

Shapeshifting
Stamina (3) + Survival (1) + Primal Urge (1)
[roll0]
[roll1]
[roll2]

Drawing the spear from the scarsheeth
Harmony(7)
[roll3]
[roll4]

Determining the location of the Locus.
Wits (3) + Investigation (3) + Primal Urge (1) + Irraka (2)
[roll5]
for tens
[roll6]

[Ichneumon]

The locus seems to be somewhere beyond the closed door, the one room on the first floor that's locked.

[Blakkmonk]

Nodding to his Jeffery and the rest of his newfound pack mates Lamar positions himself to the rightside of the locked door, rifle trained and ready"Let me take care of the door first and then we can go on three...
Left Handed Spanner Wits+Crafts+Purity 2010-12-28 18:07:33 Lamar Beanard rolled 6 dice to "Left handed spanner" 5,4,8,5,4,1 (1 successes) http://sheetgen.dalines.net/wiki/WikiDiceRoller?hash=08546e5b
"1, 2, 3..

[Ichneumon]

The door breaks easily. Violently you break your way into the room.

You find yourselves in a library or office of some kind. The walls are lined with bookshelves, though some of the shelves are covered with old scrolls, maps, or other knickknacks. To one side is a writing desk and a small worktable leans along one wall. This room has no windows. Under a heavy carpet, rolled back a little so you can see what is underneath, is a trapdoor that leads to the basement. Jeffrey's senses tell him that the locus must be in that basement.

Between you and the trapdoor however, stand 4 figures. They're the old inhabitants of this house: the Meers family. They're dead though, before you stand four zombies. Their corpses are rotting and horribly mutilated: Their limbs and faces are crushed, as if somebody or something stomped on it multiple times. In fact when seeing the wounds, the first thing you can think of, are hoof prints.

The zombies are uratha, but all, of course, in human form. One of them, male, seemed to have been middle-aged, with long white hair, wearing a smart suit. Another, a black girl in her late 20's. The third a young man and the fourth a woman in her late 50's. They all stand there, shambling and shuffling, however, when you enter the room they seem to be triggered and they start move towards you, most likely programmed by strange magical forces to kill you.

[OOC: It's time for combat!, likely... Just to make sure it stays organised and orderly: We use group initiative, so all characters act in the order in which you players post. So, all of you get to act now, then I post the actions of the zombies, you get another turn, etc. You are of course free to do something else than just brawl into them, but they are hostile and attack you. It's just that you are so much quicker, you'd have initiative to attack them first. Just to make it a bit more visual and comprehensive, I'm from now on going to name the Zombies: Samuel, Jessica, Bobby and Monica.]

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey, Dalu

Jeffrey just looks at the zombie, he'd gotten his head around Spirits but this was new. Hey man, I'm a pacifist you shouldn't be doing this. You don't think they're alive do you? I mean, they might be spirits in there?

The zombie's make no sign of paying any attention so Jeffrey tries to hamstring the closest Zombie which happened to be Jessica.

You didn't give a Defence score, I'm guessing they don't have one because, well they're Zombies. Incidentally Jeffrey has a defence of 4.

Strength (2 + 1) + Weaponry (2 + speciality) + Spear (3) + Called shot to the leg (-1)
[roll0]
for tens
[roll1]

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

At the first sign of danger, Jonathan lets his mind go empty. That way, when the fear washes over him, it doesn't find anything to sweep away. He's calm and poised and ready.

He trails Bran and Lamar as they move into the house, doing his best to stay unobtrusive in case another pack member has to charge snarling past him. When the door to the locus explodes open, he's only a few steps back.

"Back away. I think those are the Meers'. If we shred them, we won't be able to tell what they were made by." Following his own advice, Jonathan retreats. His eyes go milky white as he slips out of the house, and he sweeps the area for lingering ghosts or stains of death.

OOC:Activating death sight. Are these guys being ridden? Did they die in the study? Are there any noticeable stains on the property?

I'm probably gonna go instantly blind from all the horrors that went down here, but this is still the best way to find out.

[Ichneumon]

Jonathan Wake


Death Sight: They're not ridden. Their rotting bodies are stitched together by ectoplasm and possessed by 4 ghosts, resulting in a a zombie-like hybrid, allowing the ghosts a physical presence without needing to manifest. You can't "see" the identity of the ghosts, but you are certain it aren't the ghosts of the Meers themselves.

They Meer family died in this room, violently. The room is full of stains, showing a big fight in this room and the entire house. The house was cleaned afterwords though, to erase most of the traces, but mystical evidence is still there for your death sight to see. Many people were slaughtered here, in this house and in this room, many weeks ago.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey, Dalu

"Not killing, that's good. I'm right behind you Jeffrey dosn't leave yet, but remains behind as a rear guard.

OOC: Can't leave yet, I don't have initiative until the others post

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jonathan turns his head to the side, blinking to clear the afterimage from his eyes. He coughs, and his voice is raspy when he speaks. "There was a massacre here." And then it's all around him, the heady weight of death. He can almost feel the blood seeping between his fingers when leans against a wall for balance. Thick and warm, it runs down his arm and--

He flinches, snapping death sight off. "They've been possessed. I'm not sure by what, but there isn't a trace of the Meers in there anymore. If we can get a handle on one of them, we might be able to find out what did this."

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos- Hishu to Dalu

Hector removes his sunglasses and places them in his jacket pocket. Then he stares at the Zombies ahead for a moment. "Okay." He mutters- as his body starts changing, rearranging the muscles and bones within him.

He doesn't rush into combat, but he holds his chakram tighter than ever now.

Shapeshift roll [roll0]

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

He's not sure he can pull this off, but it needs to be done. Somebody has to open up a dialog

Jonathan faces the hazy area around the bodies where the ghosts should be. He leaves his death sight off, and draws in an unsteady breath. "I can see you, and I think I know what happened here. Talk to me. Tell me what killed you, and we'll find it."

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey, Dalu

I told you man, I know who killed them. The Raven Lady was here just a few hours ago, dragged their real bodies into the forest.

[Ichneumon]

A few seconds later, you all hear 4 voices: "Get out, you spawn of Satan!" "Go back!" "We shall not let you get to the well!" "Go back! Shape-shifting demons! We will protect these gates of Hell!"

While you all hear the voices, the zombies stop moving and Jonathan sees 4 figures appear, each flying above one of the zombies, as if the ghost can't command the zombies and speak at the same time. The ghosts are all white men, well in their 60s. All wearing hiking gear, shorts and Manitou Spring T-shirts. They quickly disappear again though and breathing life in the zombies again.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jonathan's eyes flick back at Jeffrey, then return to the corpses. "****. We'll deal with her next, but I don't think she killed the Meers. The stains here are old. A couple of weeks at least, assuming they're human, and someone tidied up in the meantime. The ghosts in those bodies are new. If this was set up as security, I think we're going to be finding articles about abductions in the local paper."

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey, Dalu

Not one to abandon an old idea when creating a new one required thinking Jeffrey let his mouth do the talking.

She knew we were coming, she killed them weeks ago then came back here to set a trap. She was dragging bodies around, made a big trail.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

As soon as the spirits speak, they confirm his suspicions. He addresses them as calmly as he can, holding his hands open at his sides. "Easy there. We don't want to get to the well. Whatever you're guarding, it's safe from us. I just want to talk with you, to find out why you're here. You were tourists, right? Something ambushed you out in the wild."

"We can find it."

"We can stop it from ever killing again."

He pauses a moment, gauging their reaction, and then whispers to Jeffrey, "The bodies she was dragging belonged to these guys, sure, but from what you told me, she never actually attacked you at the gas station. She has to be chasing her own goals or else she'd have come at us directly, soon as she thought she could win."

[Ichneumon]

For a moment, the zombies freeze again, but this time the ghosts themselves manifest, so all of you can see them.

"We were hiking."
"On our holiday, to the springs."

"Suddenly we died, didn't see how or who did it. We were murdered somehow, or that's what she said."
"We woke up here, in the well below, in the water and mist, next to our bodies. The raven-woman told us where we are and explained everything."
"This is Hell and the only way to get to Heaven is to protect the gates, the well itself, that's down there, from demons like you! Preventing you from escaping to the real world. If we fulfill our job, we get to go to heaven! She gave us these corpses, of demons like you, killed by her, she said, so we could posses them and use them to fight against you and freighten you!"
"Don't tell them everything, you fools! That way we'll never get out of here!"

You all notice that they all have gaping stab wounds in the middle of their backs, continually dripping spectral blood. The ghosts look mostly confused and sad about their situation.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jonathan quietly shakes his head. "Doesn't it strike you as a little strange that your heaven leads down into the earth? Don't trust me if you don't want to, but I think you've been duped. There's another side to this story." He takes a step forward, but remains outside the library. "Can I look at one of your backs? Just one. Don't all of you turn. I want the rest of you watching me, so that if I were to try something you'd be able to jump in and stop me. Whatever got you, it gouged right into your spine. Maybe with a knife. Maybe with a beak."

"The woman who woke you up--the raven lady--three of us met her on the way over. She was slaughtering everyone inside a gas station. Look at me. Listen to my pulse. I'm not lying."

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey, Dalu

"They're guarding hell man, not heaven. Of course it leads down. And the raven lady totally wanted to attack me, it was three on one, I called her bluff she ran.

[Jamini]

Richard - Dalu->Hishu

"I can't imagine your version of hell, but everything I have heard about it makes me think that is likely looks nothing like this. Who thought hell looked like the interior of an old cabin deep in the woods?" Richard interjects, his posture neutral as he shifts to Hishu and removes his trenchcoat. "I can say that I've met your raven woman. As my friend said, she has murdered at least three people. Humans, not our kind."

He pauses a brief moment, allowing his words to sink in to the ghosts before continuing. "She would have tried to kill me before, had I not been with my friends and armed. I also do not think that she would have hesitated to kill you four, just so that she could use you to keep us from what you are guarding."


Persuasion Roll, trying to convince the ghosts that we are not their enemies.
Persuasion + Presence
[roll0]

[Blakkmonk]

Lamar is going to use "Two World's Eyes" to have a look around for anything unusual while this is going on
Two World's Eye 2010-12-29 16:58:23 Lamar Beanard rolled 8 dice to "Two World Eyes" 7,3,8,5,4,8,3,7 (2 successes) 2010-12-29 16:58:23 Lamar Beanard rolled 8 dice to "Two World Eyes" 7,3,8,5,4,8,3,7 (2 successes)

[Ichneumon]

The ghosts look at each other.

"You know..." one says to the others.

"I'm not saying I'm buying anything of this, but...."

"It would explain a lot, though. Yeah, I know."

"I already thought that girl that kept changing into a deer wasn't an angel, like they told us."

"She did had a wonderful face though."

"Yeah, and a wonderful rack too!"

The ghosts start laughing, ignoring Jonathan's request completely. There is something really sad though about the whole thing, everything about these persons is just "dead", even their sense of humor. They really are just mere reflections of what they once were.

Lamar doesn't notice anything special in the Shadow. [OOC: I'm sorry, I checked my books, but as far as I know, ghosts have no special bond to the Shadow right? At least none that I could find. So the ghosts themselves show nothing special.] There is no special spirit activity. Everywhere you look though, in the house, you sense the Meers. This was their home, their territory, and it really feels like it too.

One of the ghosts doesn't laugh, but listens to what Richard has to say and while listening, he just nods his head.
When the others have finished laughing, he starts to speak:

"I'm willing to believe you. But if you aren't demons, and if the well in the basement isn't a gate out of Hell... then what are you and what is it?"

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jon half-smiles, the corners of his mouth wrinkling. "Would you believe werewolves?" There's something incredibly funny about the situation, even if he can't quite put his finger on what. It could be that he's trying to convince a ghost of the existence of the supernatural. Or it could be something totally different. Nonetheless, the smile lingers for a few seconds before seriousness folds it back up and puts it away. "We're medicine men. Border patrol. Diplomats. Soldiers. The word that describes us best is Uratha," he rolls the first tongue syllables into a low growl. Not a warning. Just a statement. "But you won't have heard it before. When something like the thing that killed you breaks into this world, we're the ones that hunt it down. I'm sorry we couldn't get here in time for you, but we can keep it from claiming anyone else."

"The well in the basement is a Locus. It is actually a well, of a sort, but it collects energy instead of water. It's part of what makes this property important, and I'd like to use it if I can, but I won't until you can trust me."

After he's said his piece, Jon turns to the other ghosts. "Deer girl? Can you describe her to us?"

[Ichneumon]

All others keep quiet, except for the one that asked the question, who keeps nodding, until he can speak: "I see, yes, I can. Brunette, sweet face. Kept crying, didn't say anything. Around 17 years old I'd say. She just came with the raven woman and left with her too. Ever watching her, and everytime morphing from girl into deer. There was something odd though, she had the same kind of glow around her as we do...."

He looks at the others.

"So, I'd she was a ghost, like us. The raven woman kept calling her 'her poor angel'."

"Follow me, I'll bring you to the eh... locus, that's what you called it right?"

"Are... are you sure that's a good idea?"

"Yeah, I trust these guys better than that woman. Besides, I think we would have lost a fight with them anyways.":smallamused:

The other ghosts look at all of you, judging you.

At that moment, the zombies all fall down on the ground, as unanimated corpses.

The ghosts move down, through the trapdoor. One of you opens it and follows them into the basement.

The basement is a wide square room with brick walls holding back the earth. The floor is bare earth, and a little moist. Trophies of the Meers pack’s adventures once adorned the walls, though they are now wrecked and smashed. In the center of the room is a small ring of stones that surrounds the well. The well itself is only a couple of paces across, but it is quite deep. In fact, even though the water is clear and still, no one can see the bottom of the well without dropping some sort of light source into the still, chilly water. From below it's not only water that bubbles up into the well, but Essence too. This is the Meers locus.

If Jonathan uses his death sight, he sees the room is covered with blood and the entire atmosphere of the room is poisoned by the horrors that happened here. This room and the room above, is where the Meers pack was massacres, slaughtered. You don't know exactly what happened, but judging from the way the blood stains are distributed and judging from the bodies you saw above, their death was a most savage. one

[Blakkmonk]

OCC: Am I picking up anything from my Two world sight? I want to make sure nothing is trying to walk over from the shadow
"I can't help but feel how sad all of this was.""We have to do a better job of this, we can't make this our legacy to others."
Lamar starts to examine the room and draw in its details to see if there is anything left useful to the pack.

[Ichneumon]

Lamar picks up "tracks" or "spiritual food prints" of many spirits, different kinds, different kinds leaving and entering the shadow through the locus. Once the Meers pack perished away ago, the spirits that had once been afraid of being hunted by the pack were free to use it for their own purposes. Now though, there is not a trace of any spirit nearby. Something seems to have frightened them, or warned them of your coming.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey is pretty happy that this has been resolved peacefully but having nothing to add at this point follows the pack towards the well.

[Jamini]

Richard smiles to the ghosts, his blue eyes still warily watching them as they lead his pack through the trap door. Satisfied he follows the others, descending the ladder last. At the bottom he looks back towards their escort and inclines his head respectfully.

"Thank you." He takes a brief glance around the room, noting the circle of stones around the well. The locus was small and manageable, possibly because of recent predation by spirits. Still, before his pack could make proper use of it they would need to do some housekeeping first.

"You said you woke up in the well next to your bodies, right? I think the first thing we should do is pull them out. I'd like bury your bodies properly, if you don't mind, and find out who it was that killed you. Some revenge may be in order."

[Ichneumon]

"I... I think we'll be fine if you bury us properly, I'm sure we could get to rest that way. But please, can we help you in any way take revenge? Any questions you might have? I think we've told you everything that happened, but maybe there is something more?" He smiles.

[Jamini]

"One thing. My friend found a trail outside that led from here, made by the Raven women. We think she took a corpse from here to make it. Did you see or hear anything about it?" As he speaks Richard walks up to the well and peers down, trying his best to make out anything that might be lurking inside.


Perception: Wits + Composure. Trying to see if I can make out anything in the well.
[roll0]

While here I'd also like to try and determine how much essence is within the locus as well as its strength. Using Intelligence + Occult.
[roll1]

[Jamini]

Rerolling tens

[roll0]

[Ichneumon]

"She took, dragged the body of one of the demons... eh.. I mean werewolves outside. She said it was their leader. Don't know why."

You see no movement at all, you do get a few glimpses of silhouettes, most likely the corpses.

It's a level 2 Locus. There is currently 5 Essence stored inside the locus.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jonathan flicks death sight on as he enters the cellar and sharply recoils. He turns it off just as quickly and tries not to heave. Whatever came after the Meers, it tore them apart. There aren't too many things that can do that to a forsaken, let alone an established pack. Even worse, it didn't leave behind any stains of its own. It slaughtered them all before they could hurt it. Before they could flee.

The last spirit in the area that could do that was the Gurdilag.

Shakily, Jonathan walks over to the well and rests his hands on the edge.

"The man who gave us this property said that the original owners had left behind a handful of traps. We haven't seen any of those yet, but they shouldn't be able to hurt you. Could you check the house and grounds while we recover your bodies? It might take a few minutes to pull them up."

OOC: How deep is the well? Does it look climbable, or are we going to have to hunt around for some rope and a hook?

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey, Dalu

Jeffrey agreed wholeheartedly with the idea of dragging the bodies to the surface and giving them a proper burial. Which is why he immediately tried to weasel out of manual labour. Only the knowledge that he would be living with this pack for a long time prevented him from simply vanishing.

Good idea, but I don't want that trail to go cold. Why don't I take a couple of the guys hunting while you honour the dead?

[Ichneumon]

The ghosts look at each other, all of them looking confident and self-assured. They nod. "We will check the entire house for traps and report back to you."

The well is about 30 feet deep. Its climable, but not easy [You'd get a -2 modifier on your rolls. You can also try using a rope or some tools, which would negate the -2 modifier.]

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector assists in the moving of the bodies. He's not the strongest, but he's strong enough.

[Ichneumon]

I'll require 5 successes in total for you guys to the climb down the well and get the corpses out of there. I advise you to use the teamwork rules, which can be found on page 134 of the WoD core rulebook. If you use these rules, first assign a primary actor and remember that he should roll last.

[Blakkmonk]

Lamar moves to assist the pack.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

"Hold on a moment. I'm not so sure we should be clambering blindly into the dark. Let's find some rope first, at least. I'd rather not risk dropping the bodies, and if there's anything else down there, I'd rather we be able to get back up fast." He eyes the sides of the well skeptically. "The tourists should be back in a minute or two. Maybe they'll have seen something we can use."

[Blakkmonk]

"This is a lodge, there has to be rope of some kind.""Let's see if we find a flashlight to use also."

[Ichneumon]

The ghost remain away for quite a long time, but after a minute or ten they return, looking a bit confused. "We found no traps of any kind sir. Some places smelled really bad, like somebody had urinated on it, but there were no traps we could see."

You guys start climbing down the well, trying to get the corpses out.

The first two to climb down are Richard and Lamar. Lamar manages to grab an arm and a leg and giving them to Johnathan, he manages to drag the two corpses out of the well. You notice there are in total 5 corpses, 4 tourists and 1 Uratha, lying in the well. Hector manages to pull out one of the other tourists and the Uratha, but with the last tourist, an arm breaks off.

[If I saw it correctly, you have a total of 3 successes, you need 2 more]

The bodies of the tourists show scratch marks of twigs, bird claws and beaks. The Uratha is almost unrecognizable due to the mutilation. Almost the whole face is gone. It was a girl though.

After looking around for a few minutes, Lamar finds a flashlight and a rope. [If you use it to climb down again, negating the -2 penalty]

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

"Ugh. There are more down there." Jonathan hunts about the room for something to secure the rope to. If he comes up empty, he'll stand by the mouth of the well, holding one end and playing the rest down into the dark. "Let's get the last one out."

When the ghosts return he acknowledges them with a smile and a nod. "Thanks. For what it's worth, if any of you are uncertain about passing on, you're welcome to remain here as long as you'd like."

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector grunts and groans as he finishes lugging a couple bodies up. "I've had to clean some nasty things from some apartments before moving in, but damn. This takes the cake." He looks down. "I guess we should finish up before they go bad."

[Ichneumon]

Most of the ghosts didn't seem to hear Jonathan's invitation to stay. Their eyes are fixed on their own dead bodies. One of them, responds: "No eh.... no, I think most of us will want to put all of this behind us for good. But thanks for the offer."

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

"Of course." As soon as the last body is recovered from the well, Jonathan will carry them outside as carefully as he can, selecting a plot of land by the side of the house and shifting into Urshul to dig them graves.

OOC: We can roll again for that last body, but at this point I think it'd mostly just slow things down. We managed a bunch without the rope, it might be a lot easier to just skip the dice this time and recover the last tourist.

Here's my shift into Urshul: [roll0], [roll1], [roll2], [roll3], [roll4],

[Ichneumon]

I agree. This isn't worth the delay

You manage to get the corps of the last tourist out as well. At that point the ghosts thank you and disappear, after having said they'd like to be buried somewhere in the forest.

[Blakkmonk]

"I think we can wait for burial detail until after we clear our new home." "I would hate to bury anyone, even humans, on unhallowed ground." We need to track this thing down ASAP."

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jonathan nods awkwardly in his gigantic wolf body, then orients himself towards the trail the crow lady left by. As soon as the others are ready, he'll lope off into the woods alongside them.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey Dalu -> Urhan

With the hard work done Jeffrey reappears from his hiding spot. We off? I have her sent and the trail should take us past the bodies too.

Putting his spear away Jeffrey returns to the Urhan form and sets off on a slow and steady pace, his sniffing nose lead the way.

ooc:
Putting the spear away.
Harmony (7)
[roll0] 1 success
[roll1]

Shapeshifting
Stamina (3) + Survival (1) + Primal Urge (1)
[roll2] 1 success
[roll3]

Tracking by sent (extended)
Wits (3) + Survival (1) + Urhan form (1) + tasted blood (4)
[roll4] Roll 1: 4 successes
[roll5]
[roll6] Roll 2: 3 successes
[roll7]

[Jamini]

Richard: Dalu -> Urshal

Richard shucks off his trenchcoat piling it in a corner of the basement. Underneath he is wearing a tight white tee shirt and sweat pants, clothing suitable to shift into Dalu without destroying it. His nose is twisted into a look of disgust. "Yuk.. I foresee bleach in the future for his poor coat. I hate bleach, makes my nose itch."

With a glance to the others he shifts to Urshal, his fur rippling from a dark gray to a pale silver. He quickly slips out of the rest of his clothes before falling over onto his front paws. He steps from from the swaddling pile of cloth and watching Jeffry as the younger werewolf circles a second, catching the scent. Without hesitation he will follow, his own eyes gleaming with excitement for the hunt.

[Blakkmonk]

Lamar=Dalu

Lamar straps his sidearm to his thigh and tightens his pack back. He checks to make sure his mags are secure and available and is ready to set off behind the others to provide support.
"Lets take back what rightfully belongs to our pack."

[Edge]

Bran Davies; Dalu to Urshul
Throughout the dialogue with the ghosts, Bran remains silent. Whilst the restless dead were incredibly common in Britain, there never really had been many in Blaidd Drwg's territory. He was out of his depth with them, so he let the others do what they could, listening carefully all the while.

As the pack finish up with retrieving and burying the bodies, Bran goes to recover his instrument case and places his klaive back in it, locking it tightly and leaving it near Richard's coat.

"Goes without saying, Lamar. Urum da takus. Let's do this the old-fashioned way."

With that, he begins to shift to Urshul, he dedicated set of clothing blending into his body as he does so.

Shapeshift to Urshul: Stamina 2 + Survival 2 + Primal Urge 1: [roll0]

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector chuckles as the others take stronger wolf forms. He considers it, for a moment, but doesn't bother. He grips his chakram and smiles. "I'll tell you what Richard. If we survive this, I'll buy you a new coat."

[Ichneumon]

As you all follow the trail into the woods, your nose catches other scents as well.

You notice Uratha glyphs and smell faded traces of scent markings, only detectable by your supernatural senses. Loosely translated, the glyphs mean “Uratha live here,” or, “Trespassers will be eviscerated.” (Actually, those two phrases mean pretty much the same thing...)

Anyway, the longer you follow the trail of scent, the stronger the stench of the rotten meat becomes.

Up ahead, under the dim light of the half moon, you see the source of the stench. The naked body of the alfa of the Meers pack, Stephen, lies on the ground, already very much decomposing. Its stomach has burst, and maggots and flies are squirming in its guts.

The Raven lady left the corpse here... judging from the scent.... less than an hour ago. Her scent is all over the place. There is a small piece of paper, lying on the ground, secured by a few pebbles from flying away by the wind. On it, there is a small text, written in a terrible hand writing:

"Welcome to Manitou Springs werwolves. Be assured that our vendetta will continue. I'll make sure your deaths will be bloody and painfull. I'll never forget what you things did to my daughter. NEVER!

The Raven Lady"

EDIT: The scent of the raven lady herself seems to suddenly become very faint, like if she flew away? Its still possible to follow though, it leads in the direction of the village/town of Manitou Springs.

[Blakkmonk]

"Well ****." "Sorry, sailor's mouth and all.""I think some of us need to drive into town as to not look odd while at least two can continue to track this thing by nose." "A classic wolf tactic on envelopment.""What do you say my brothers?"

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jonathan's flesh ripples as he shifts back to human, spine snapping link by link until he's upright and furless. His backpack and pants emerge from the shaggy coat, but his shirt still lies in shreds somewhere near the house. Unbothered, he hauls a spare out of the pack and shrugs into it. After a moment, he turns to the other wolves.

"I think this trail is cold for now. We'll lose any advantage we might have had by chasing her down before we're ready, and there's too much to do here."

"I think we need to bury these bodies--all of them--and get a feel for the layout of our new lodge. We need to speak with the local spirits, see if we can find out more about the local lords and any problem spots that have developed. We need to know who this raven lady is, and why she thought the uratha wronged her daughter. And maybe we need to find the deer girl that the ghosts were talking about as well."

"We need to reconnoiter the town. There's at least one spider host living in the area that we'll need to take care of, and there may be more."

"If we just chase after her, she's going to lead us wherever she wants. She knows Manitou Springs better than we do, and we have no idea how strong she is or what she can call into play. If we just keep after her without stopping to think, either we're going to get in a lucky shot or we're going to get snuffed." He folds his arms, as if to punctuate the point. "If you all say chase, I'll chase, but I think we need to plan this one out first."

[Jamini]

Richard | Urshal

Richard is silent as he reads the note, his yellow-green eyes closing slowly as he finishes. A sudden howl suddenly rose from his chest: A spontanious, mournful cry for the pack that had fallen before them. To human ears it was long and drawn out, a howl of seeking, of lost packmates .

To the other Urathra it held a special meaning, it was a prayer to Luna in the First Tounge. Words that were not words, asking her to watch the spirits of the departed as they passed on. As he finishes he bows his head before the fallen Alpha and silent for a moment before turning back to his pack and addressing them in first tounge.

"I agree. All of them, the humans too, should be properly buried and put to rest. Roman mentioned that some of you know the rites. I trust you will do it, for I cannot."

"When we finish, I would like to cross the gauntlet. There are spirits here who we must befriend or master. If anyone knows who and what exactly this Raven Woman is, they will. Tomorrow, when it is light, we can go to the town and find out more from the locals. It will require a little digging, but I know we can make this work. We must."

[Ichneumon]

[Alright, you may assume you can burry the bodies without any effort. Some of you have indicated you plan on going to town and question the locals next morning. Unless some of you wish to do something before that, we'll skip to that now. Everybody agree?]

[Blakkmonk]

To Town!!! In other words I am good with that,

[The Kings Raven]

OOC: Town works for me. Expect Jeffrey to keep an eye out for a suppler of weed. He's only got streetwise one though so I don't expect him to actually find one.

[Jamini]

[I was hoping to be able to do some investigating of the immediate area in the shadow, if nothing else to make sure we don't have too many hostile spirits trying to draw from our new locus while the pack before us is gone. If there isn't anything to find I understand.]

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

"I agree. I would also like to see the rest of our lodge. I doubt the Meers have left much in the way of supplies, and it would be nice to know what we need to buy while we're in town."

"As for the bodies, I will bury them with as much dignity as I can manage, but I was never taught the proper rituals. I hope that will be enough."

"I was taught, however, a simple ceremony for binding items to us. With a little bit of time, I could ensure that you all have clothes or weapons that shift with you when you change."

OOC: I've actually got a list of things to do before heading to town in the morning.

-I want to scope out the rest of the house, see what's been left for us. What supplies we have. If there are any traps the ghosts missed.

-I want to offer my rite of dedication to the other pack members. Anybody who wants to keep an object of a set of clothes when they shift can have that dedicated by Jon.

-I agree with Jamini and want to make contact in the Umbra. Try to bargain for information with some of the local spirits.

-I think our three heaviest hitters should take a point of essence from the locus. They're probably going to need it, and there's no sense in letting it sit there.

[Ichneumon]

You bury the bodies and go to sleep in your new home.

The next morning, 10 o' clock, you guys drive to Manitou Springs. You drive by a Super Store called "The Best Super Store", selling cheap goods for cheap prices. They also sell guns and weapons. Colorado has very lax gun laws. Only an instant background check is required—one that all of you would pass without any problems. A few blocks away you see a folksy little restaurant, called "The Best Folksy Diner". Furthermore, Manitou Springs is home to numerous quaint little shops, designed with the tourist in mind. The stores are clean and homey, with a “shabby chic” eye to design. The wares are clearly displayed. In the distance, you hear the sound of a church.

[Edge]

As the pack drives into town, Bran sighs.

"I wonder if everything in Manitou Springs is 'the best'. Hell, I imagine we're driving along on The Best Road Layout as I speak."

The Rahu slumps back into seat as much as he is able, before muttering further.

"So, any plans of campaign? Do we introduce ourselves to the locals? Just keep a low profile and get what we need? Do we want to concoct a cover story in case anyone asks what we're doing together?"

[Blakkmonk]

Well I think we should do what normal people would do. Go shopping and get a job." "At least some of us or it will look odd. We don't need to draw unwanted attention to ourselves." "As far as our cover story, we can say someone inherited the place and we are out here to help him move in, do a little but of hunting that kinda thing." "We need to buy a street map too. Plus there is another pack around and we should meet them." "At the very least to know their territory's boundaries.""Its the right thing to do and we have enough issues without a turf war on our hands."

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jonathan is lounging in the back of whichever car the group decided to take, picking traveller's grit out from under his fingernails. He looks a little bit rumpled, having only just woken up before the pack left, but seems relaxed. "We can tell the other pack about the raven woman while we're at it. They deserve a heads up in case she tries to come at them."

"Other than that, maybe we should just walk around for a bit. Get a feel for the place. Buy some supplies for the house. It's possible that someone here knows the Meers, and they might be able to tell us a little more about the what happened. Or, alternately, it's possible that there's another of the spider hosts in town. If anything looks off, make a note of it and we'll come back to check it out later."

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector rides along to town, yet he does so in solitude. Strapped to his back is his guitar, and beneath him his rumbling bike. He just looks ahead, trying to scope out where he could buy Richard a coat.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey

Why is everyone in such a rush? If the killers were so strong they would have made a real move already not sit on their asses while we get prepared. The way I see it we've got time, get a bite to eat. You hear what I'm saying?

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

He chews over Jeffery's words for a moment, then shakes his head. "We're just as much an unknown to them as they are to us. Maybe they know we're a new pack, but they don't know what we're capable of. That could be why they haven't come after us directly. They haven't seen us fight."

"Besides, who says we're their first target?"

Jonathan studies his nails. There's still some dirt trapped under the beds, but they look better. "Food sounds good, but let's not lose track of why we're here either. That diner's as good a place as any to meet some of the townsfolk."

[Blakkmonk]

"We are here to bring this area back under control. He do need intel but we also don't need to stick out like a sore thumb." "We do need a reason to be hanging together or we invite unwelcome visitors." "Wouldn't you find it odd that a bunch of guys are living together without being part of the community?"

he pauses to gather himself.

"I would rather not give anyone an idea why they should pay more attention to us than not." "Our activities can get loud at times, if you know what I mean."

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jon narrowly suppresses a snort. "You're right. We do need some kind of cover. If only to keep people from dropping by unannounced."

"What if we pose as new age-y types?"

You'd get them at the res every so often. People who treated the phrases 'communal living' and 'getting back to nature' like they were holy commandments. They were the first in line for the t-shirts, and usually had dream-catchers dangling like bling from the mirrors in their hybrids. It wasn't impossible that a few of them might pool their resources and 'live off the grid', trying to sustain themselves on goodwill and handcrafted kitsch.

"We already look kinda ragged. If we say that we're artists who bought a house together, I don't think anyone's going to question it."

[Ichneumon]

About the house: Since it seems logical that you would have searched through the entire house before you left, here is some more information about the house: The second floor is largely open, overlooking the living room area. On a normal floor plan, the house would have at least two bedrooms, perhaps three. This house’s space has been converted, however, so that the upstairs is one large room with three walk-in closets. In the middle of the room lies a bed made up of four queen-size mattresses placed together. Large pillows and blankets cover the bedas does a fine coat of gray- ish dust—and a custom-made coversheet keeps sleepers from falling between the cracks. In addition to only one bedroom, there is only one bathroom up here, though it contains a large Jacuzzi tub, two showers and two com- mode rooms, as well as four sinks.
(Note that werewolves in tightly knit packs often sleep together, as the Meers pack apparently did, but werewolves hardly ever “sleep together.”)

The town:

You make your move to "The Best Folksy Diner", planning to get some food and make contact with the locals.
At the entrance you can find a stack of new newspapers. One of the headlines reads: "Gas explosion! Three deaths!"

The diner serves unexceptional but tasty fare. There are around 20-30 customers. Around 50% seem tourists. The tourists talk loudly and pore over maps, either planning wherever they might be going that day or boasting about what they did the other day. The townies talk quietly to each other and watch outsiders suspiciously.

When you enter, the waitress glances over from the table that she’s serving and tells you to go ahead and take a seat. When she gets to you, she greets you and takes your orders with a smile on her face. She’s friendly and chatty, though her attention is split between your table and all the others. "How you doin', strangers? What brings such a group of gorgeous guys like you to Manitou Springs? Come to taste some of my famous cherry pie, have you? It's the best in all of Colorado." She says in playful flirting way, winking provokingly at Hector, but the comments were directed at all of you.

She is in her late twenties and has blonde hair that’s now cut short in a practical pageboy cut. She looks like she used to be a total stunner, and her beauty has remained, maturing to make her a very attractive woman instead of a pretty girl. She does seem to be wearing a lot of makeup to hide bags under her eyes, though. The name on badge reads "Sarah Hagen".

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Out of habit, Jon glances down at his menu, hiding his eyes as he flicks death sight on. It's only for a fraction of a second, but there's always the chance that something spooky could get caught in the camera-flash of supernatural attunement. With nothing apparently wrong, he lowers his menu and looks back up at Sarah.

"I'll have the hash browns and, um, actually just the hash browns. Maybe a water, too." The little pile of coins in his pocket is depressingly small. It jangles forlornly when he checks to make sure it's still there. "We just bought a house here. It seemed like the perfect place to set up a studio, and the price was pretty reasonable with all of us splitting the cost."

"We haven't gotten to see much of the area, though. I've heard there are some wonderful sights in this part of the Rockies. Are there any you could recommend?"

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector chuckles in amusement at the cover story, as he flips through the menu. "Steak, rare, and eggs over easy." He says. "Is your orange juice from concentrate, or is it freshly squeezed. If it's the fresh, then I'll have a glass. If not, I'll have water too."

Hearing the jingle of coins, Hector's mother's voice rings in the back of his head. "Potatoes are no meal to start the day off with. Go ahead everyone, order a real meal- I'll cover you guys this time. After all, we are celebrating a monumental occasion here."

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

"Two stacks of blueberry pancakes, please." Hector's words are barely even out of his mouth."You're right. This is positively landmark. Thanks, man." Jon grins, looking like a cat who just found out how to drop onto mice from orbit.

There's only so much granola you can eat on one cross-country hike, and he'd long since passed that limit.

[Edge]

Bran Davies
"More landmark for some of us than others, I'd wager." Bran says, not making any attempt to hide his accent.

"I'm guessing it's too much to hope that you do tea here?" the Rahu asks the waitress, before briefly pausing to think. "Hmm. I'll go with scrambled eggs, bacon and toast. Bacon well-done, please, and a coffee to go with it."

[Blakkmonk]

"An ham and cheese omelette please and you have sold me, a slice of that cherry pie too." "This seems to be a nice place." "The exact opposite of the Southwest Asia." Lamar flashes his best smile Any advice for a sailor pulling into his final port?" "Maybe a good club or bar perhaps?"

[Ichneumon]

She smiles, reacting a bit surprised to hear you aren't tourists. "You're here to stay? That's great! In that case, your first meal will be on the house!"

She writes down all your orders, not really listening to Jonathan's explanation.

" mmm ugh uh, right, uhu", too busy writing everything down.

"Well, our church in a national treasure, very old. That might be worth seeing. Some people say that the crucifix there cries blood sometimes. But if you ask me, it's just paint. I don't trust those priests one bit. Worth taking a look though. Otherwise, just go enjoy the wildlife, we've got a lot of great wildlife here. Lot's of wolves though I've heard. "

"Tea? I could make you a cup, if you want?" she says in a very motherly way to Bran.

In reply to Lamar: "Well, there is always Joey's Lodge, a real British style pub. Would that be what you're looking for?"

[Edge]

Bran Davies
"I'll be fine with coffee. Don't hassle yourself on my part."

At the mention of the pub, Bran stifles a snort.

"I doubt that it's very authentic, but I'll reserve final judgement until after I've been. But if they do real ales, there may be hope for it yet."

[Ichneumon]

Bran Davies
"I'll be fine with coffee. Don't hassle yourself on my part."

At the mention of the pub, Bran stifles a snort.

"I doubt that it's very authentic, but I'll reserve final judgement until after I've been. But if they do real ales, there may be hope for it yet."

"Sure thing, hun." She nods at all of you and walks away. A few minutes later she returns with all that you've ordered.

[Blakkmonk]

"Well if you plan on going, it might just be the place I am looking for after all." Lamar kicks Bran in that "dont screw this up for me with your snorting" kinda kick, to the shin.

[Edge]

Bran Davies
The Welshman turns to look at Lamar, one eyebrow raised and a slight smirk on his lips.

"Really, Lamar? You're trying to 'cleave to the human' already? Ambitious of you, if you ask me."

[Jamini]

If we had time, Richard would have accepted Jonathan's offer to perform a quick rite of dedication to bind an undershirt and shorts to himself.

Richard picks up one of the papers and nonchalantly follows the rest of his new pack towards the diner. Slightly miffed about the scruffy comment, considering the time it had taken him to get ready relative to the rest. He didn't particularily care that his neatly pressed shirt and tie were a little at odds with the clothes worn by the others. On the way, he'd taken a tiny bit of time to pick up a pair of low sunglasses.

As they sat down, he mentioned off-handedly, "Actually, I've got a job here already. As consultant at an accounting firm not far off. Good pay, flexible hours, and a chance to meet the local Bureaucrats." He pause for a moment, then mused, "I suppose you could style me as a friend you roped into doing your finances. If we file with the company I'm working for, that would help our cover even more."

I hope you don't mind if I incorporate this into my background to help explain my dots in the Resources merit.

After speaking he opend the newspaper, reading the first few stories as the others placed their orders. Right before the waitress left he spoke curtly, "Coffee, Black. Nothing else please."

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jon tears into his pancakes. You're pretty sure you hear shredding noises as he demolishes first one stack and then the other. When he's cleaned both plates, he sets them aside with his silverware in a tidy little pile and turns back to the other wolves.

"That sounds like a good idea. Maybe we should split up after breakfast. We all have different errands to run. I know I want to check out that church. And the town's not too big, so if someone runs into trouble we can all find each other quickly enough. We can cover more ground on our own, and afterwards we can meet over at Joey's for lunch and touch base with the other pack."

"I suppose it's possible that the pub isn't run by Uratha, but I'm prepared to bet my bag of granola if anyone thinks otherwise."

[Ichneumon]

The meals taste good, although not exceptionally good, it's not the best you've ever tasted, but it's not entirely out of the realm of possibilities that this is, indeed, the best folksy diner of Manitou Springs.

If you guys decide to leave, Sarah says goodbye with a warm smile and hopes you'll enjoy your new home.

[You don't have to leave, you can also question some of the locals in the restaurant, like Kuma Da originally planned, otherwise, please indicate what you want to do if you guys decide to split up.]

[Blakkmonk]

I dont mind leaving now if I leave with a phone number. You never know when you make a new contact,

Lamar plans to and find the local chapter of the VFW. His figures the best place to find a job and to find out the goings on about town is there. All the older former military community has to do is gossip. I want to question them about the town and get the real dirt on things.

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector finishes his meal with moderate satisfaction. The steak was good enough- a little salt and pepper and it was no worse than any other steak. As he finishes, he sops up the last bit of juices with last bit of meat, and thanks the woman. He leaves a nice tip, directly handing it to the woman. He does so so he can ask her if there are any local coffee houses with open mike nights or any other venue where he could play his guitar on the open stage.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jon politely waits to leave with the rest of the group, making small talk until the meal's done. Once everyone's ready, he heads out the door and sets off in search of the church. It's rather a nice day for a walk, and there's no telling what else he might find on the way over.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey Pinney

Jeffrey enjoys his meal, everything tastes better when someone else is paying for it. When the pack heads their seperate ways Jeffrey will go for a walk around the centre of town with no particular aim in mind but keep a nose out for any another Locus. After about half an hour he heads to the nearest green space to lie down and enjoy the weather for a few hours.

[Ichneumon]

I'm taking a bit of liberty here with assuming Hector and Richard join Jonathan in taking a visit to the church and that the other's are on their way either scouting the city or going to the pub. I'm struggling a bit with how to organise this on play by post, whether to take initiatives like this and deciding things for you or not. Sometimes it seems a bit pointless to let the game delay for a simple "yes", but some things can roll the wrong way for you If this is out of line, please say so. :smallsmile:

Hector

Sarah thanks you for the tip. "That's very kind of you, thank you sir!"

"You can always try Joey's Lodge. They have an open mike night on fridays."

When you all part, you decide to go with Jonathan to the church, as it's relatively close by.

Jonathan, Richard, and Hector

After maybe five minutes of walking you reach the church. You hear the sound of crows (or are they ravens?) and see a murder of them circling the church's tower. Your acute senses pick up strange smells coming from the tower: the smell of rotten leaves and burning plant remains.

There is a graveyard next to the church.

When you enter the church you see a pastor sweeping the entrance hall. When he notices you, his eyes fade away. He stands motionless, ignoring you completely for a few seconds and then, while still standing almost perfectly still like a statue, he starts vomiting live spiders: Hundreds of them start crawling out of his mouth and climb down his body, covering it completely. Beneath the swarm of spiders, you hear the pastor's evil laughter.

At that point, the heavy doors of the church close behind you, you hear the "click" of the locks. You're standing face to face with an Azlu, spider host.

Bran, Lamar and Jeffrey

[Blakkmonk, I am a bit unsure what you mean with 'leave with a phone number'? Do you mean you would have asked Sarah for her phone number, or one of the guests? Both is fine by me.]

Walking around Manitou Springs, you spy on Manitou Spring's citizens. When passing a deserted parking lot, you see a few thugs, three actually, standing near a car 40-50 feet away, trying not to be noticed, likely trying to break in, when nobody is looking. Both wear jeans, baseball caps, and sun glasses. Around their necks they wear gold bling bling and one of them is smoking and looks high. The smoke coming from the cigarette doesn't look normal though. For a few seconds, you see a face in the smoke. The face looks inhuman, insectoid, and appears to be glaring at you. The thugs don't seem to notice it and one of them picks a knife out of his pocket and starts messing with the car's lock, ignoring you two completely. They seem to move unnaturally, like puppets in a puppet show.

The face quickly dissolves a few seconds later. Something tells you, these men are claimed.

[If you decide to ignore this, please say so, and then you go your own ways. In case you want to know, you're only 10 minutes away on normal human walking distance from the Church.]

[Blakkmonk]

I am referring to Sarah.

Shifting his sense of sight into two world's eyes olled on: 2011-01-15 13:19:42.522097

1d10 → [5] = (5)
1d10 → [3] = (3)
1d10 → [4] = (4)
1d10 → [7] = (7)
1d10 → [8] = (8)
1d10 → [6] = (6)
1d10 → [9] = (9)
1d10 → [9] = (9)

"Bran, Jeffery." "I see that those two are ridden." "Ready to clean up the place and make our mark?"

[Ichneumon]

I am referring to Sarah.

In that case, she gladly gave you her phone number.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey Pinney

Ridden, that means we can cure them right?

[Edge]

Bran Davies, Hishu

"Yep, Ridden can have their influencing spirits dissuaded, discorporated or destroyed. Claimed are the ones without any hope. But anyway, plan for the matter at hand? Can't exactly access the spirit as-is. D'you have citizens arrest over here in America? Is so, I suggest we pull one off and call in the cops. Keeps 'em in place, then we pop over the Gauntlet afterwards and deal with the spirit face-to-face."

[Blakkmonk]

"Bran, thats a great idea and yes we do." "I think you and I can detain them if you want to make the call Jeff." "I am former military, cops usually have some respect for that." "Tell 'em your Navy buddy is making a citizen's arrest."

Lamar moves over towards them.

[Edge]

"All right, how d'you want to approach this? Going in swinging doesn't seem like a great idea, and hell, I guess they could have weapons hidden somewhere. Other than the knife, that is."

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey Pinney, Hishu

No weapons man, they're innocent. I say we use the Urhan, it's too public for Urshul but don't fight them. Keep your distance, growl a lot and turn human just before the cops get here. If they run, tackle them. Pass a phone will you, I lost mine when I spent a few weeks living furry.

ooc: Nice to see there isn't an instinctive distrust of the cops :smallsmile:

You haven’t said how public this area is, I'm assuming it's just us and them since crimes are pretty noticeable. It's a pity we aren’t using any combat hacks. Feral Defences would let Jeffrey's Dodge total hit ten. Easily enough to toy with them until the cops arrive.

BTW could someone remind me: Does the wolf form have any Intimidation bonus?

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

He doesn't care too much for the signs, but he walks into the church anyways, staying just a foot or two off of Richard's flank. Keeping his eyes low, he flicks death sight on and off. Holy sites sometimes draw the restless dead, and this place is already pretty spooky.

He's only half surprised when the priest dissolves into spiders.

Jon's eyes narrow, and his irises fill with white as he re-engages death sight. His voice changes over to the rolling syllables of first tongue. "I can see you've hunted here before, Azlu. The earth is stained." He lets his voice echo in the enclosed space, bouncing off walls and columns, little bits of sculpture. "Normally, I'd mock you for ambushing a pack of Uratha. For going in against three times your number and thinking you might win. That's not the worst of it, though."

"You know how long it can take a spider to finish it's prey. Days, maybe weeks, of suspension wait for it in the web, being slowly drained all the while. That's a lot of time to marinate in fear. In agony. In desperation. To meet all the conditions that can lock a mortal soul to this world. Do you know how many ghosts you've created?"

"Do you think they're happy with you?"

Jonathan shakes his head pityingly and switches back to english. "You'd better hope none of them have stuck around here, because we're about to give them an opportunity to settle their scores."

Jon's raising his voice intentionally, on the off chance it might draw one of the spirits of this Azlu's past victims to the entryway.

Also, I'd like to know what the interior of the church looks like with deathsight. I'm assuming it's not all that nice, but I'd like to know how bad it is.

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector chuckles as Jon speaks. "This is an awful big church." He says silently. "If it were an ambush, I'd wager he didn't come alone." He clenches his fists tight. "Though, I'd love to be wrong on this one."

[Edge]

Bran Davies; Hishu
"Sorry, what? You want us to go Urhan in the middle of day and have a metric ****-ton of wolf sighting in the middle of a town? Two reasons why that's stupid: one, people being paranoid of wolves makes our lives more difficult in general. Two, Nu Bath Githul - The Herd Must Not Know. Shifting like this is just too damn risky, and I don't want us to have to deal with Lunacy victims on our first day here. If we're doing this, we do it in Hishu, or not at all. Plus, this way may end up looking like fairly civic-minded newcomers."

The Rahu sighs and massages the bridge of his nose between his forefinger and thumb.

"Look, let's keep this subtle as we can, and if they aren't Ridden, but Claimed, then we crack out some more obvious stuff."

[Blakkmonk]

"Then crack some skulls it is." "Its not like the knife can really hurt us."

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey Pinney, Hishu

Right behind you.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

"Maybe there's more hosts inside, but that isn't going to do him any good. He's the one face to face with three Uratha."

"I wonder if he's thought of that. How he's almost certainly going to die without backup." Jon studies the spiderhost intently, daring him to reply. "I bet you are alone. Or else your friends hung you out to dry."

[Ichneumon]

Bran, Lamar and Jeffrey

The area you're in is quite deserted. It's an empty parking lot. Although you periodically see a car in the distance or an old woman walking her dog, it's quite empty.

The thugs continue to ignore you, the one with the knife just managed to break open the lock of the car. Instead of quickly getting inside, he just stands there with his knife in his hand, confused about what to do, like if he just wanted to "break in", like if he was just an actor playing a part and not knowing the next lines. Confused he looks at the other thug, who slowly walks to the door of the car, opens it and sits down.

Jonathan, Richard, and Hector

[OOC: Just to remind you, we use group initiative here.]

Jonathan: There are many ghosts in this church. You feel the death almost chocking you. You get visions of ritual sacrifice and torture. Most of it, going back ages, but some of them quite young and fresh.

The monster speaks, excited when he hears Jonathan say he can see that the earth is stained: "Oh really? So you are a see'er? I am the one who killed the see'er of the last pack that came here. They didn't expect us at all, didn't know what happened to them. To be honest, it wasn't a real ambush. One stormy night, they had been chasing some deer woman, or so they said, to the church and they just stormed inside. Hadn't expected us at all. Of course, they knew we were in town, but hadn't found us yet. They just bumped into us, we managed to kill one of them that night. We did expect you though. We just thought we'd try again..."

From behind the alter two more Azlu appear and a third appears from behind a row with benches. One of them has a bloated, black body covered with stiff, wiry hair, two legs, but six arms. Another is more like a "centaur spider": a huge spider body with instead of a head a human torso with claws as hands and a spider-like face. The third looks like a giant man's head with spider claws growing out of his chin, .

One of them shouts: "I wonder how many of them we'll manage to kill now."

Looking at Jonathan the former pastor says with an evil grin: "I say we'd go for the see'er again." and he throws himself on Jonathan and all the spiders covering the pastor try to bite him everywhere where they can.

[OOC: I'm treating this as a kind of brawl attack, meaning Strength + Brawl - Jonathan's defense, which would mean he gets a dice pool of 6, yes, brawl deals bashing damage and yes Uratha can regenerate 1 point per turn.]

[roll0]

The other three race towards Richard and Hector, but aren't speedy enough to attack before you get a chance, although they can attack next round.

The church is large, there are a lot of benches and a big altar. Multiple pillars. Cathedral glass. In first sight there are 3 other doors, 1 is standing open and is somewhere in the middle of the church, you can see a stairway leading up to the tower. The other two doors are closed, one is in the back and the other is also in the middle, but at the other end. Closed as well.

Now it's your turn.

[Ichneumon]

10'again: [roll0]

[Ichneumon]

This doesn't look good.... another 10' again: [roll0]

Some of the spiders start covering Jonathan clothes and some try to eat their way through his flesh. Dealing a total of 3 bashing damage.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jonathan throws his spindly arms up, desperately trying to ward off the spiders. He falls back under their weight, scraping and brushing at the chitinous tide. And then there's a popping noise. His arms bulge, jointing and re-jointing like there's a big bubble of pressure traveling down the meat to the tips of his fingers. Tips which are now curling into claws. His jaws drop open, past where they should normally fall, and his teeth lengthen like knives.

"Guard thy throat, spiderhost." The first tongue rumbles out between snaps and flashes of yellow-white. And then he's on the Azlu, a maelstrom of hate, shredding spiders with his claws.

OOC:Spending a dot of essence to shift to gauru instantaneously, then attacking with claws. Feel free to do the rolling off-forum, if you'd like. I trust you, and having to post everything with the forum roller and then re-configure your post around it can be a lot of extra work. I know from experience.

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector shifts to Dalu form quickly, and runs to the far end of the church- Hector's plan is to get to the far side of any one of the enemies, so that there are none of his or the spiders allies are between or behind him (Hector).

[roll0] For Ten Agains, if needed [roll1]

[Ichneumon]

Simple quickly drawn map of the church:
http://img39.imageshack.us/img39/909/churche.jpg

Same drawing with roughly the location of everybody: in red the Azlu, Jonathan in green, Richard in blue and Hector in Brown. (If Hector wishes to change the direction in which he moved, now that I've pinpointed the location of the Azlu more carefully, he may do so freely.)

http://img202.imageshack.us/img202/673/church2e.jpg

If I understand Kuma da correctly, he wants me to roll his attack for him as he indicated he'd attack with his claws, but didn't roll himself? (If I'm wrong, don't get angry, it's just a communication error and you may ignore the rolls in this post.)

Claw attacks: Streng + Brawl + Gauru bonus dice - Pastor's defense

Jonathan's strength is 2 becoming 5 in gauru form. His brawl is 1 and he gets +1 to claw attacks and it deals lethal damage. The pastor's defense is 4. Meaning you get 5 + 1 +1 -4 = 3 dice for the claw attack: [roll0]

The pastor screams, as you deal 1 damage.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jonathan is a blur of frantic activity, claws gouging at the air, raking across the Azlu. One of them impales a big tarantula--just slightly larger than a kitten--on its nails, and Jon pauses to flick the spider away.

In the back of his head, rationality is curled up in a fetal ball. It knows it has no control over the wolf state. All it can do is wait, and pray, that Jon's anger spends itself before he runs out of hostile targets.

Ichneumon: I figured it would be a little easier to hand some of the rolling over to you. You know all the hidden modifiers that might apply to one of my rolls, and you can roll and react to that roll in the same post. Some people typically don't like someone else rolling dice for them, but I have absolutely no issue with it, and for convenience's sake, I'll usually indicate what I'm planning to do in spoiler text at the bottom of my post.

If this makes a bunch of extra work for you, I'm happy to do my rolls instead, but I'm thinking this might help speed up the game.

[Ichneumon]

OCC: I'm okay with it. It keeps me sharp, so if you think this speeds up the game, go ahead.

[Jamini]

Richard Tiff | Hishu -> Urshul

"What a mess this place is." Richard states as he throws off his coat, his body rapidly expanding through his outerwear. His small muscles tripe in size as he rips free of the shirt and pants and let's himself fall forward onto the two massive paws that had once been his hands. His dark hair spreads down his back and arms like weeds, rippling as it changes from a dark black to a silvery gray, and back again in the space of less than a second.

Before any of the Azlu could blink he had already moved from where he had been standing before and was on top of the Pastor, claws and teeth flashing as he rent into the numerous spiders there.

Assuming it's still my Auspice moon, Richard shifts into Urshul freely as a Reflexive action and leaps on the Pastor to the west, spending a Willpower point on his attack to do so. Brawl Attack - Strength + Brawl + 3(willpower) for a total of seven dice. Please take away his defense starting from the right of my roll.

[roll0]

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector throws his first chakram at the azlu nearest to him. His battle plan is to try to single it off, keeping him away from the others, and making it unlikely that he'll be ganged up on.

Okay, the three dot (pillars?) on the left, Hector will be on the lower left side of the middle dot (pillar).

[roll0] Chakram (1) + Athletics Sp. Throwing (4) + Dexterity (2), subtract defense from the right.

[Ichneumon]

Jonathan, Richard, and Hector

Richard tears at the pastor's limbs covered with spiders. Surprisingl the force knocks the pastors right arm off. There doesn't seem to be any blood though, in fact, the entire arm seems to be... gone.... Only a pile of spider crawling out of torn pieces of clothes. [You deal 1 point of lethal damage, defense was 4]

The pastor smiles: "Tell me, are there any more of you? We'd like to know if we have the place for ourselves again if we kill you three, or whether we have to deal with other wolves first. "

The pastor looks a bit confused on who to attack now that he's attacked by both Jonathan and Richard. After a second of thinking he chooses to go for the Gauru: he tries another brawl, with a wave of spiders covering Jonathan. Some of them try to crawl into his mouth, into his ears.

[roll0] (It counts as bashing damage)

The one with six arms runs at Richard, trying to grapple with him and pinning him to the ground:

[roll1]

"Tell me, where is your locus?"

The other are focused on what Hector is doing. [The dots are indeed pillars]

Hector's chakram hits the centaur-spider right in the forehead. It remains there, blood flowing heavily. The creature screams loudly in agony as it charges toward Hector, trying to bite him with his sharp fangs:

[roll2] If it hits, it deals 2 Lethal damage points, max.

The giant spider-head crawls towards Richard as well, laughing, but the laughter doesn't sound human at all. While the six-armed Azlu tries to grapple with Richard and pin him down, he tries to bite him as well:

[roll3] If it hits, it deals 2 lethal damange points, max.

It's your turn again.

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector rolls back over the back of the pew behind him. Then, he pops up, a chakram in each hand. Then he tosses at the "centaur" once more.

[roll0] Chakram Strike

[Ichneumon]

You hit him, this time in his torso. He continues screaming in pain. [You've dealt a total of 3 Lethal damage]

[Blakkmonk]

Lamar coughs in a way to draw attention to himself. "Gentlemen, I dont think you want to go to jail over something like this." "Why dont you leave now and go home, I am talking to you." In an effort to let the spirits he saw know that he was speaking to them. "This whol process will be...uncomfortable for you.' "So go on and leave them here, and all of us can go our own way...."

[Jamini]

Ichneumon, are you using the same method for determining attacks as I did (roll all the dice, remove dice from the right for defense?)

Right now I'll write this as if that is the case and only take 1 Lethal, since I have 3 defense in Urhan or Urshal (additionally, this would mean the grapple failed on me) I've also temporarily boosted my health for being in Urshal by 3 on my sheet.

Richard Tiff

Richard leaps aside as the six-armed Azlu attempts to grab his hind leg, the spider host gathering only a few dark gray hairs from the werewolf. However he dodge brought him in line with the spider-head, which viciously bit into his flank as he slipped past.

Growling with blood flowing down his flank from the wound Richard dances away from the brawl, focusing on dodging and keeping the attention of the two spider hosts attacking him while his companions handled their own foes. As he moves he growls as menacingly as he can to keep the two Azlu attacking him distracted.



I am moving NE about 10', using the dodge action to double my defense. I'm attempting to use Intimidate + Presence to keep the two Azlu focused on me while the Hetor and Jonathan work on downing their own opponents.

Intimidate
[roll0]

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffery stands close to Lamar and tries to look scary.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

The unfortunate thing about trying to attack a werewolf through his mouth is that you're trying to attack a werewolf though his mouth. Flattening his ears into spiderproof hatches against the sides of his head, Jon bites down and listens for the satisfying crunch. All across his massive frame, the tiny pockmarks left by the spiders start to stitch themselves closed.

Attacking again with a bite. Also, if I'm correct, I should have regenerated one point bashing last turn and one point this turn. This leaves me with only one point of damage.

[Ichneumon]

Bran, Lamar and Jeffrey

Both of the man suddenly look at Lamar and then at Jeffrey. Terror can be seen in their eyes. They start speaking to each other in the First Tongue. "They're Uratha!" "They have returned."

Both seem very intimidated, especially by Jeffrey. One quickly steps out of the car, knocking his head very hard. The other almost trips over his own feet. "We eh, don't want to... yeah eh... please... eh. don't!"

"We didn't know you returned. We just thought you'd left, for good!"

Jonathan, Richard, and Hector

[OOC: About the dice rolling and the defenses. It has been a bit confusing. In my own rolls I try to count your own defesens in already, so you don't have to remove the dice from your right. In this post, I'll continue doing so. I've been inconsistent in doing so however, which is wrong. For example, I didn't do it with the attacks on Richard. From now on, I will. So, from now on, you can count on not removing your defense from attack rolls I do, I've already done so. Sorry for the confusion. Such battles are still a lot to keep track off.]

Both of the Azlu, the giant head and the six-armed dude, keep their focus at Richard, who gazes intimidatingly at them. [Richard succeeds in keeping them focussed at him.]

The six-armed Azlu runs at Richard, "Come and give daddy a hug!", trying to pin him to the ground once more. [roll0]

The giant head meanwhile starts gnawing at Richards right leg:

[roll1], dealing lethal damage

Jonathan manages to cope very well with the attacks of the pastor. He regenerates much of the damage. [It's just like you indicated.]

The pastor roars angrily, there is not much of a man left and the voice now sounds more like a collection of thousands of tiny voices, spread around the swarm attacking you.

You attack them again though, with a bite.

Streng + Brawl + Gauru bonus dice - Pastor's defense, which means 3 dice (see previous post for numbers) [roll2], dealing lethal damage

I'll post the results of this roll (and the response of the Pastor in a post after this one, please don't post anything before I post that.)

The "centaur" looks like it's going to drop, starting to look around confused, like if parts of his brain are damaged (most likely due to the big weapon of Hector cleaving through his skull). It looks like part of his sight is damaged, because even though he swings his arms at Hector, he seems less coordinated.

[roll3], this deals lethal damage

[Ichneumon]

Jonathan, Richard, and Hector

The ex-pastor Spider swarm doesn't seem affected by your bites at all, and now in synch thousand voices scream: "Uratha! Do you feel angry? You haven't seen real rage yet!"

All the spiders now start biting more angrily at Jonathan's flesh. Trying to eat through his flesh. This will deal lethal damage: [roll0]

The "centaur" miraculously hits Hector, even though he seems to act drunk and half blinded. (Another roll for the 10'again [roll1] And just in case there are more 10'agains: [roll2])

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector grunts as he takes the hit. "Not too shabby." He says, tossing the chakram in his other hand.

[roll0]

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jonathan shakes, shedding spiders like loose fur. "No, I have not." He snarls, forcing the words out of his misshapen mouth. "I'm just getting warmed up."

Spinning, he torques his entire body into a roundhouse swipe, aiming for the center of the pastor's mass.

Spending a point of will to claw at the pastor. Assuming I still have death sight on, are the ghosts in any way participating in the battle?

[Jamini]

Richard

Despite his determined evasion, Richard finds himself unable to shake the Spider head Azlu, which swiftly leaps onto his flank and tears off a large chunk of flesh. Richards side muscles spasm as they are suddenly exposed to the cool air, a large gout of blood staining his winter coat a dark red.

Seeing Hector striking a finishing blow on his opponent, Richard leaps to the offensive. Doing his best to ignore the flaring pain as the spider head comes away from his flank with another peice of his flesh,. he turns and leaps towards the six-armed Azlu snarling, "Enough from you!" . His blow sails harmlessly past, as he resumes ducking and weaving he shouts over his shoulder, "Any time, Hector!"

Using a standard Strength+Brawl this round. Hopefully Hector can give me a little help soon. I can't really take much more of the pounding I'm taking here.

[roll0] - Remove dice from the right for defense please.
-Attacking the six-armed Azlu, not that it matters.

I am kind of confused by what you said and what you are rolling. Last round you rolled 5d10 and 7d10 against me, an you said you did not take into account my defense that round (which was 3). However this round you said you ARE taking into account defense, but only rolled 2d10 and 4d10. Since I was using full defense my defense would have been doubled (to 6) for last turn's rolls.

So either
A. I should have taken full damage and gotten pinned last round
B The 2d10 would have been reduced to a chance die and the 4d10 to 1d10

I'm not trying to be difficult here, just trying to ensure things stay as accurate as possible.

[Ichneumon]

First of all, sorry for the late response. The answer to Jamini's question can be straight forward, it's option B. It seems I'm much more prone to making mistakes in combat in pbp than I thought. Therefore, I'll more accurately describe how the dice pools came to be, be more transparent so to say. :smallsmile:

Jonathan, Richard, and Hector

Hector's chakram hits the spider-centaur in his abdomen, to which the centaur respond by falling down, unconscious and dying.

Jonathan notices that most of the ghosts are absent from the battle, they seem occupied by something and somewhere else in the church, somewhere up in the tower...

Richard's attacks don't really do anything good this round, the six-armed Azlu doesn't seem happy though, he seems shocked by the death of the centaur.

Jonathan claws at the pastor, squashing at least some of the bugs (more detailed description follows after I've seen the results). WIth the disintegration of the pastor it seems that the individual bugs have also lost some of their vigor, (resulting in a lowering of their defense from 4 to 2)

Claw attack: Strength (5) + Brawl (1) + Gauru bonus dice (1) - Pastor's defense (2)= 5 dice

[roll0], dealing lethal damage...

[OOC: next post will contain the results of Jonathan's action and the actions of the NPCs]

[Ichneumon]

Jonathan, Richard, and Hector


You hear thousand voices of the Pastor laugh when Jonathan just goes through the swarm with his claws without damaging the swarm at all. However, there sounds fear in their laughter, in response to the death of the centaur.

The six-armed Azlu, now turns his focus at Hector. Letting Richard go, he runs towards Hector and tries to hit him with his fists.

Strength (5) + Brawl (3) - Hectors defense (2) = 6 (If it's less, subtract from the right)

[roll0]

The Pastor tries to flee the scene, running to the back of the church, in the direction of the altar.

The spider-head Azlu seems scared as well, but continues biting Richard:

Bite attack, dice pool is 10. I THINK Richard's defense is still 6, but I'm not certain, so I'm just rolling 10 dice and would like some confirmation from you guys.

[roll1]

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector grunts as the six-armed-spider-man-thing runs at him. "I'm too good for my own good." He mutters, hurling his fourth Chakram at the azlu.

[roll0]

Ten Again Pool (Use only as needed) [roll1]

[Ichneumon]

The Chakram causes a deep jagged wound in one of the Azlu's shoulders, making him unable to use the corresponding arm. [You deal 2 lethal damage]

[The Kings Raven]

OOC: Oh sorry! I didn't see your post thereJeffrey Pinney, Hishu

Well this was nice, clearly these spirits respected what a Werewolf could do. Perhaps this could be solved without violence at all. Jeffrey liked the sound of that. Ask them nicely and this little interruption wouldn't need to take more than a minuet. Jeffrey wasn't an expert on the first tongue but he reckoned he knew enough.

Yeah man, we're Uratha but hey you've got nothing to worry about. I'm pretty chilled, I mean you're on the wrong side of the gauntlet and it is our job to make you go back but why does that have to make us enemies? The way I see it, you climb out of those bodies and return to the Hisil, promise not to misbehave again and we can let bygones be bygones.

Peace?

Manipulation (2) + Persuasion (-1) + Willpower (3)
[roll0]
for tens
[roll1]

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Not peace. Not peace at all.

His claws go through the holy man as if he's made of so much sand. Jonathan screams in futility as the man turns to flee, dragging his shifting, scuttling body towards the exit.

There's nothing in reach to hit, and charging across the church after the pastor requires actually having the presence of mind to do so, so Jonathan's instincts settle on something halfway between chasing his target and venting his rage. He heaves a pew off the ground and hurls it overhand after the Azlu.

Then, depleted, his body melts back into the wiry frame of a kid.

OOC: Um, Ichneumon, I spent will on my last attack. I think that should've meant three more dice to my pool.

I'm burning will again this round to all-out attack the pastor (str 5 + brawl 1 + will 3 + all out 2,) then shifting back to human.

[Jamini]

My defense was 3 because I attacked. From now on why don't we just roll all of our dice pool and subtract defense from the right. Seems like it's easier when we don't know what each other's defenses are.

Richard

"AGH!" Richard screamed as the spider head azlu tore into his abdomen this time, pulling free a long strip of flesh from his side. Underneath his skin a number of torn muscles spasm, and blood splashes freely from his wounds.

Suddenly his body shakes and begins to meld, his bones cracking as they shifted to a bipedal stance. Even as he swung them his paws transformed into crude hands, spiked with long wicked claws. Before the shift to Gauru even finishes he leaps from the floor, transforming in mid-air as he lunges towards the weaker of the two spider host.

"You die NOW"

Last round I attacked, my defense was 3. I took two damage and you need to roll the 10 again.

This round I am shifting to Gauru as a reflexive action (thank you moon) attacking the six-armed azlu with a full attack (So my defense will be zero) and spending a willpower to do so.

Strength 4 + Brawl 1 + Willpower 3 + All out attack 2 = 10

[roll0]
Rolling for potential 10's
[roll1]

[Ichneumon]

Bran, Lamar and Jeffrey

The two thugs look start nodding heavily. And than, suddenly fall down unconscious, the spirits having left them. Gone telling the other spirits that the Uratha have returned and... that they come in peace.

Jonathan, Richard, and Hector

Jonathan throws himself at the swarm of pastor-spiders, tearing as many spiders as he can apart.

OOC You are correct, my mistake. Because it would disrupt the story, I'm not going to let you roll them for the past round, but I am going to give you the 3 extra for your attack now. Also, I agree with Jamini's suggestion. We'll now roll all the dice and subtract from the right.

Jonathan's attack (str 5 + brawl 1 + will 3 + all out 2 + 3 Ichneumon's mistake= 14) [roll0]

My reroll for 10'again (and possible more 10'agains): [roll1] (EDIT: this menas you get only 1 damage)

The six-armed Azlu doesn't see you coming and you deal 1 damage. He can't really defend himself well with the hurt shoulder and now he has to spend both time on you and on Hector.

[rest of the attacks follow in the next post]

[Ichneumon]

Jonathan, Richard, and Hector

As Jonathan roars and rages he savagely squashes all the spiders around him and you hear a thousand voices scream their last words, they die away. The pastor is dead.

Now, only the six-armed Azlu and the spider-head remain. The six armed Azlu, now attacked by 2, tries to flee. He runs to the door, leading up into the tower. "I eh.. I must ehh ehh esc... escape... we did wrong... they're much stronger and wiser than the Meers" he says while breathing loudly.

The spider-head courageously jumps at the the Garou Richard, biting him with all the power he has, he knows he's likely going to die, but he just doesn't care anymore and tries to make it as painful for you as he can. Biting you with his poisonous fangs, if your defense is 0, this is the roll:

[roll0]

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

His arms ache. Standing there amidst the wreckage and squashed bugs, he tunes out the sounds of combat nearby and looks down at his hands. They're shaking, just slightly. He's been in Gauru form before, but never quite like this.

Usually he prides himself on his neutrality. His objectivity. Not his ability to tear an old man in half, spilling spiders across the carpet.

He remembers throwing the pew. He remembers charging after it. He remembers the crackly popping noises that little exoskeletons make. It's only a couple seconds later. He remembers those things with perfect clarity.

Come on. Get it together. You're not done yet. Stop the Azlu, and then you can freak out.

His hands are trembling slightly, so he makes them into paws. Shifting into Urshul, he drops to all fours and orients on the six-legged host.

OOC: Shifting to urshul, then attacking the fleeing spiderhost. Specifically, trying to harry him with bites at his flanks while my other pack members move into position.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey Pinney, Hishu

Well this was turning out to be a nice territory. The ghosts were open to diplomacy, the spirits were open to diplomacy. What could possibly go bad today? Not what Jeffrey planned to do next, that's for sure. "I'll catch you back at the house."

With that Jeffrey skipped item one on his day plan and went straight to number two: find a nice park to relax in.

OOC: Good luck fighting the hosts, Jeffrey will just nap until it's time for the two groups to rejoin

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector smiled as the azlu tried to flee. That was a good sign. But Hector didn't like letting his prey get away from him- even with Johnathon on it, he couldn't rely on someone else to kill his foe.

[roll0] - Subtract defense from the right-

[Ichneumon]

Jonathan, Richard, and Hector

Rolling for Jonathan (fluff comes later with other posts in this scene): Strength (4) + Brawl (1) = 5, so [roll0]

Jeffrey

You leave the others, [OOC: the others can go on their own business] and you go to a park. You find a nice restful park with nice grass, a small hill, a few bushes and trees. You lie down, enjoying the sun warming your skin. You close you eyes.

After a few minutes, you wake up. You hear someone approaching, taking big steps and breathing hard and slow. You see a jogger. You recognize him, as you guys saw him yesterday evening when you drove to the house. He looked tired and in pain, but that is typical for joggers. Now though, his shoes are worn through, and his feet are bleeding severely. On his back rests a big red manifested fox-spirit. Laughing and in joy shouting: "Faster! Faster! Go Faster!" While hitting the man on his bald head with a walking stick. The man looks so tired, that he doesn't even respond to the hitting and doesn't notice Jeffrey as he passes him.

[OOC: The other two character may decide to have joined Jeffrey. Otherwise, indicate where you would have gone.]

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey Pinney, Hishu

Jeffrey gives a bark of frustration, it's an unusually wolfish sound for someone who acts so human. The sooner every spirit in this territory behaved themselves the sooner he could count on some quality R&R but if he wanted that to happen he'd have to deal with this spirit.

Despite wishing it was otherwise Jeffrey knew that the spirits being scared of him gave him the edge he needed, this time he was on his own and despite being a Werewolf Jeffrey wasn't actually that scary. What was the key to this fox spirits, if not respect than, obedience?

A fox spirit, it clearly liked running fast and foxes were known for their running as any fox hunter could have told you. That probably meant that simply catching him in a foot chase might win it's respect, but then again foxes were known for cunning it might consider him a narrow-minded fool if he just started running after him. What aspect of foxes did this spirit embody?

It's nice to put Jeffrey in a situation where he has to think rather than just drift along with the flow. It's interesting watching him do a 180 turn from Sloth to Prudence.

Before he commits to an action here's a general perception roll:
Wits (3) + Composure (3)
[roll0] tens [roll1]

To answer the following questions:
How fast is the guy running in both Speed and his Foot Chase Dicepool?
How much cover is there for sneaking and how many people are around?
Is the guy following a path and if can you can you save time by cutting across?

[Ichneumon]

Jeffrey

How fast is the guy running in both Speed and his Foot Chase Dicepool?

His speed is 6 and his food chase is 4

How much cover is there for sneaking? Is the guy following a path and if can you can you save time by cutting across?

The park is circular. You're sitting somewhere in the middle of the park and the jogger is running on the brick road in a circle around the park. So, he's running in a big circle around you. Around the park are big bushes that you can hide in and wait till he has reached that point.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey Pinney, Hishu

Jeffrey comes to a decision. He's no Ithaeur and he's got no way of knowing what this spirit would respect. So he decides to play to his strengths, he probably could catch up even in Hishu but he'll find it easier to sneak up and it would give him the element of suprise, so that's what he'll do.

Finding a suitable hiding spot Jeffrey creeps into position.


Dexterity (3) + Stealth (4)
[roll0]tens[roll1]

And I'm going to combine mundane Stealth with the Blending Gift:
Wits (3) + Stealth (4) + Cunning (2)
[roll2]tens[roll3]

New post coming based on the results of these rolls.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey Pinney, Hishu

Twice hidden Jeffrey waits for the runner, as soon as he is within arm's reach Jeffrey jumps from his hiding place and throws out one arm above the runner directly in the path of the manifested spirit itself.


I think it's safe to call those rolls successful.

Trying to grapple the Spirit itself.

Strength (2) + Brawl (2) + All Out Attack (2)
[roll0]tens[roll1]

[Ichneumon]

Jeffrey

You grab the spirit of the man's back, he drops the walking stick. The man falls on the ground, he's so exhausted that doesn't stand up, but he seems relieved he doesn't need to run anymore.

The fox looks confused, baffled mostly. He hadn't expected to be tricked at all. He stopped laughing and now examines you curiously.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey Pinney, Hishu

Jeffrey carries the spirit away from the collapsed man, it occurs to him that he should leave a bottle of water or phone for help but then he remembers he dosn't have any water or a phone. So much for that. But the spirit he can deal with, Jeffrey carries it off until he's out of earshot.

"I think we can understand each other, you want to have a little fun on this side of the gauntlet. I'm Uratha and I have to stop you. Way of the world man, but right now I just want to have my nap and you just want me to let you go. So how about a little deal: you show me how you got across the gauntlet so I can stop you Spirits from crossing over during nap time and I let you go?


I hope there's a situational bonus to Persuasion here because I probably will need it.
Manipulation (2) + Persuasion (-1) + Willpower (3)
[roll0]tens[roll1] Oh, maybe I don't need it...
That's twice I spent Willpower just to get only one success on the first die. Lol.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Jonathan picks a leg and sticks there, hanging on hard to the fleeing Azlu. It's much, much harder to run when you're dragging a gigantic wolf from your ankles.

OOC: Trying to use my attack to latch on to one of the Azlu's legs.

[Jamini]

My one point of Armor for being Gauru doesn't help me against that attack, so I take two more lethal damage. Right now I'm taking a penalty of -1. Reflexively, during the turn of the attack I am going to spend an essence to regenerate a lethal wound during THAT turn. Then on my turn I'm going to spend a second essence to regenerate another lethal wound.

At the end of my round I have taken 6 lethal damage and have six remaining health. (My normal health is 8 (5 size, 3 stamina) and I currently have +4 health from being in Gauru form (+2 size, +2 more stamina)) Fortunately I've been spared having to roll for Death Rage by a single point.

I can stay in Gauru form for five more turns (Max of 6. Stamina 3, Primal Urge 1, Honor 2 because of auspice moon).

Richard

Beyond the point of pain, Richard howls furiously as the spider head continues to worry at him, drawing his attention from the six-armed monstrosity. With uncanny speed he spins towards it, his inhuman yellow eyes filled with rage

"You are next. Run prey." He screams as he blocks the Azlu's path towards the back of the church.

Full Defense, spending my last willpower on it. I subtract 9 dice from the spider-head Azlu's attack pool (3 for defense, 3 for full defense, 1 for armor, 2 from willpower) on its next turn. Additionally, I am making an intimidate check to attempt to case the Spider-Head to flee towards the front of the church.

Presence + Intimidate = 7d10

[roll0]

Roll to avoid going into death rage for NOT attacking Resolve + Composure - 2 = 2d10

[roll1]

[Jamini]

Rerolling 10's, from the left

[roll0]

A total of 3 successes on my Intimidate. Also, I will enter Death Rage next turn.

[Ichneumon]

Jonathan, Richard, and Hector

The spider-head for a moment seems paralyzed with fear, but then starts running fast to the front of the church. He seems too afraid to attack and looks around trying to find an exist. [You succeed, he's even to afraid to attack at all]


The six-armed Azlu falls down on the ground due to Jonathan's attack. He shouts in fear, moving his arms, trying to crawl away from you savage beasts.

[It's your turn again. Good luck, Richard!]


Jeffrey

The fox reacts disappointed and with a very child-like voice anwers: "awww, but I was just playin! Not fair! Fine, I got through the gauntlet at a locus in the basement of that night club, Joey's.... something." He quickly laughs again: "My name is Plays-With-His-Own-Tail. What's yours? You're funny. You want to play some more? I like you!"

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey Pinney, Hishu

No Jeffrey did not want to play, he wanted to nap. Even the thrill of realising he had uncovered a new locus in his territory didn't change that. But he had just negotiated with a spirit and got something very valuable for his troubles. The Elunim and the Hisil itself would have his hide for a fur coat if he betrayed it now. He could just say no and set himself back spirit relationships but forward one Locus or, an idea occurred to him. A way to possibly make this triumph even greater.

He forced himself to sound causal, he was talking about a game not trying to trick more out of the little spirit. "My name is Jeffrey, and we can play. Do you like to play race? But we can't play on this side of the gauntlet, if you lead me to the Hisil I can turn into Urhan and I'll be fast enough to race. But it's harder for us Uratha to cross, we need a Locus" This could be for nothing, if Plays-With-His-Own-Tail goes to Joey's or even their own well he'd be obligated to race around with a spirit for just a touch more good will from the Spirits. But a second Locus in one day, a Werewolf could dream.


A wildly optimistic plan from Jeffrey, but trying to make it sound like being led into to a Locus is him doing a favor for Plays-With-His-Own-Tail: Manipulation (2) + Subterfuge (2) + Casual Indifference (1)
[roll0]
tens
[roll1]

One success, here's hoping his contested roll goes badly.

[Ichneumon]

Jeffrey

The spirit listens to you, he seems excited about the idea of racing, but he doesn't buy it and sees through your real motives:

A big grin appears on his vulpine face:
"Ha! I'll lead you to the locus, but only AFTER we've raced, Jeffrey, and only if you win. If you're too scared to race now, I guess I have won already, haven't I. If you do race, and I win, you'll have to do me a favor, okay?"


It seems he's not just playful, but a fine negotiator as well.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey Pinney, Hishu

Foiled again! Curses! In truth Jeffrey was actually happy enough with this turn of events. He was confident enough in his ability to race the spirit. Jeffrey makes an exaggerated face "You insult my honour, I must redeem myself, through racing."

"You have a deal, I'll even let you pick the track but only on two conditions: This is about speed, no cheating and saying we're racing through a tunnel I'm too big to fit through. And two: we can't race where humans will see us."

[Jamini]

Richard. Gauru. Death Rage.

Seeing the spider-head Azlu run triggered an instinct in Richard. As the last of the spider host ran his vision clouded with red. His injuries and concern were wholly forgotten in the face of a new feeling: Rage.

Pure, unadulterated rage.

The Elodah let loose a furious howl as his prey escaped. Without care or concern he lunged forward towards the enemy who had been harrying him, his teeth flashing as he lept for its back. His teeth flashed as dove for the spider host's exposed flesh, tearing at the monstrosity just as it had been tearing into him just a moment before. As he struck, his wounds hissed and steamed with spiritual essence. The muscles re-knitting themselves and the skin sealing as if the injuries had never been, sans the blood that matted his coat.

Even in Death Rage I can spend a point of essance to regenerate lethal damage reflexively right? I will do so. Then I will CHARGE(all out attack) at the spider-head and lunge at it with my bite attack.

Strength(1) + Brawl(1) + Bite Bonus Dice (2) + All out attack (2) = [roll0]

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

There's really not much else to do when you have the leg of a rampaging hellspider locked in your teeth other than bite down harder, so that's what Jonathan does.

With regards to any further actions I may take against the Azlu: I kill it 'til it ded.

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector throws his chakram at the frightened azlu on Richard- John had the other one taken care of for now.

[roll0]

[Jesse Drake]

[roll0] For ten again, and in case of more. Nada.

[Ichneumon]

Jeffrey

The fox smiles and just nods. Then, he starts running away, fast. In human form you have trouble keeping up to his speed. He seems so.. so fast and agile. He leads you out of the town and into a forest. After 20 minutes of running, him not responding to your shouts to slow down, but him always making sure you don't actually lose him, he stops when you reach a large grassland. In the middle, you see a large dead tree.

"The rules are simple, Uratha Jeffrey. Who ever gets to the tree first, wins." He allows you to shift forms, but as soon as you have shifted, he starts running.

Plays-with-his-own-tail has a dice pool of 5. Jeffrey has a dice pool of 7, I understood, so who'ever throws the largest amount of successes, wins:

Plays-with-his-own-tail, [roll0]

The spirit runs fast and seems completely fixated on getting there first. His visage alters, transforms, adjusting to the new aspect of "the fox" he takes on, instead of "the trickster", "the fast hunter" aspect surfaces. His body becomes more aerodynamic, he vulpine face more triangular. These changes are just small, but to someone trained in spirits like a Uratha, they certainly are recognisable. Moments during the run, his identity seems to fade away, becoming more and more an abstract personification of a concept like "speed" or "dedication". But will it be enough? Who will be the fasted?

Jonathan, Richard, and Hector

As a furious beast, Jonathan jumps at his helpless prey. The Azlu doesn't have a chance of surviving.... and he doesn't. His last words remain unfinished and unspoken, being interrupted by screams of pain. [The six-armed Azlu dies]

The spider-head Azlu is last spider crawling, mercilessly attacked by the raging Richard [he deals 2 damage], he tries to escape, only to run right into Hector's chakram, [he deals 2 damage also].

As soon as the chakram hits the Azlu's body though, the spider falls on the ground, motionless. He's body quickly shrivering and supernaturally drying out fast. Seconds later, a swarm of spiders crawl out of the body, evacuating in all directions. Apparently, he doesn't want to die yet.

If you want, you can try crushing all of them. If you don't you they just escape.

At that moment, you're alone in the church. The three of you.

[End of the scene, you guys may assume Richard is able to calm down, although he may well try to attack the fleeing spiders first.]

[Jamini]

Richard

Seeing his target melt away in an attempt to flee, Richard lunges at the ground. His teeth gouging the floor as he snaps at any spiders he can reach heedless of his surroundings.


Bite:
Brawl Attack: 4(Strength)+1(Brawl)+2(Bite)+2(all out) = [roll0]

...
I just realized I forgot the add my strength bonus from being in Gauru to my last attack roll. Oops. [roll1]


As the last of the host fades away he raises his bloodied muzzle to the air and let loose a piercing howl at the top of his lungs. The Furious battle cry reverberated throughout the entire church, echoing in every corner and edge. He turned towards, his eyes filled with murder. Just as he bundled himself up to leap, however, the Elodath suddenly shifted back into Hishu.

"Oh" he said almost supernaturally calm, still posed for his leap. A heavy sway in his posture a clear indicator of his recent exertions. "So that is... Kuruth" he spat out part of the thick coating of spider ichor that lined the inside of his mouth, also dislodging a heavily chipped tooth, before promptly collapsing to the ground.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey, Urshul

And immediately the chase is on. Jeffrey's muscles pound as he puts everything he has into this one moment. A little extra effort now could save a spirit's favour worth of effort latter. Of the two he is the faster but the little fox has more practice running and seems to naturally know it's terrain. Will Jeffrey's speed be enough?


Stamina (3+2) + Athletics (1) + Speed Bonus (1) + Willpower (3)
[roll0]
tens
[roll1]

This was kinda fun, the two canines ran across the ground, seeing Play's With His Own Tail begin to pull ahead Jeffrey gave a wordless bark, it spoke of fun, of friendship, of rivalry and of him soon making the playful fox spirit eat his dust. With a surge of effort Jeffrey began to overtake and pull ahead.

[Ichneumon]

Jonathan, Richard, and Hector

Richard manages to kill all the spiders.

Jeffrey

Even though the fox spirit is fast, Jeffrey is just faster and reaches the tree a second or so earlier than the spirit. Plays-with-his-own-tail stops running. With a sad face: "Aaaawwww! Not fair!":smallmad::smallfrown:

"two out of three?"

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

"Whoa there." He rushes to Richard's side, and helps him out. "You want to drive him" Hector asks Jonathon.

[The Kings Raven]

Jefrey Urshul > Hishu

When Plays With His Own Tail offered two out of three Jeffrey just playfully scratched behind it's ears and chose to play it safe. "I won fair and you know it"


If the others have finished their scene I'm happy to say this one is over too. Jeff will scout the Locus(es) he's uncovered and if it's safe he'll top up his essence but unless there is any threat on either side of the gauntlet that can be handled OOC.

If the others want to continue scouting the church then exploring the Locus IC seems logical.

Stamina (3) + Survival (1) + Primal Urge (1)
[roll0]
[roll1]

[Ichneumon]

Jeffrey

"Fine, I guess you're right. I'll bring you to the Locus, but you want to play some other time? You're fun. I like you."

After the conversation, Plays-with-his-own-tail will bring Jeffrey to the locus. Depending on whether the others return home or stay in the church, we'll do it IC or I'll just give you a summary, as you suggested. I think it would be good to regroup soon anyway.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

In the silence after the fight, Jonathan becomes aware of the blood pounding in his ears. He's alive, and his heart is hammering the fact home. He stoops by Richard's body, inspecting the other wolf. Making sure that's he's not dead. After a long, tense moment, Richard's chest moves, and Jonathan heaves a sigh and stands up.

"We're going to have to put the church back in order," he surveys his surroundings. Bits of shattered pew and crushed chitin are scattered across the floor, splashed liberally with ichor and blood. Hopefully the local police didn't hear fight.

Something else nags at his mind, too. "The Azlu were trying to reach something during the fight. I think we should go see what it was. Anything they thought was more important than a pack of Uratha at their door has to be worth investigating."

"Hector, could you watch Richard?" He starts towards the back of the church. "I'll be right back."

OOC: Heading in the direction the Azlu were going, to see what all the fuss was about. Also popping death sight on and watching for ghosts.

[Jamini]

Richard

"I'm fine" Richard mumbled as he shakily sat up, his breathing shallow and his skin pale from blood loss. The deep gashes the Azlu had left in his side has finally stopped bleeding and were slowly beginning to knit closed.

Once he was sitting up he used his right hand to wipe some blood from his lip where the dislodged tooth was slowly beginning to grow back. "It takes more than a demonic spider burrowing through my gut to wipe me out. I mean, we're Urathra right? The children of the biggest bads in the spirit world. It takes more than a few little spiders to keep US down."

Activating my Inspiring merit.

Presence + Persuasion = [roll0]
On success, both of my allies within earshot who have not been targeted by this merit this story regain one willpower.


"Now," he continued, using his left hand slowly regain his feet. "Let's all go back there together. Don't worry about me, I'll be fine. It's safer this way."

As I stated before, trying to activate my virtue to refill my own willpower pool. Afterwards he'll continue after Jonathan.

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector chuckles at Richard's speech. "It sure does- one time, I actually had a room fall on me- I crawled myself out and got on my motorcycle and as far from that inn as possible." Before he goes with the others, he gathers his chakrams from around the church.

[Ichneumon]

The guys in the church

Everyone regains one willpower and Richard successfully "activates" his virtue.

When you go through the door behind the altar in the back of the church you enter a small room, used for Bible school. Posters with inspirational photographs or cute children's drawings and Bible verses adorn the walls, but judging from how faded and frayed they are, they haven't been changed in years. The linoleum tiles in the floor are cracked, and although most of the room is clean, the corners are filthy. A tarnished silver crucifix hangs over the door through which you just entered, wobbling precariously, moved by the tremors of you entering.

The ceilings though are covered with huge webbings and large sacks of webbing filled with eggs. If you guys had arrived a few weeks later, you had encountered thousands of Azlu, instead of the small number you faced now. From the ceiling also hang 3 corpses of men and woman, likely to be used to feed the young.

Close inspection though, reveals that they aren't "dead", but just paralyzed, so to prevent rotting. These people were meant to be eaten alive.

Jeffrey

The fox spirit brings you to "Joey's Lodge", a pub and night club. There aren't many people in the pub, which is decorated in a very "English" style with lots of old wood. There are paintings and photo's on the wall of Australian wildlife.

The other people in the pub don't pay much attention to the fox. They've seen stranger things enter from time to time. Plays-with-his-own-tail leads you to the back of the pub, moving past the restrooms, you get to an old door. The door opens onto an empty staircase that leads down into a basement. The fox gestures you in ahead of him. The stairs deposit you in what appears to be an old steam tunnel. Dripping pipes are mounted on the walls in a haphazard fashion, and the whole place smells of stagnant water and mold.

The fox takes the lead and hurries off down the tunnel. You catch him playfully reaching up to gently stroke a pressure release more than once.

The tunnel gets smaller and smaller as more pipes diverge and come together. The lighting also becomes worse and worse. After ten minutes of walking though, you find the locus, the hall just... stops, Perpetual darkness, there is nothing deeper inside the tunnel.

You feel the mystical energies around this place. It's weaker though than the locus in the house. (It is a level 1 Locus, generating 3 essence per day. It currently has a storage of 6 essence available.)

The fox spirit smiles: "I guess you want me to go to the other side? I really enjoyed our game, maybe we can try again sometimes?":smallsmile:

[The Kings Raven]

Jefrey Hishu

"You guess right little buddy, from now on you play on the other side of the Gauntlet."

When the fox had finally departed Jeffrey stretched out and gave a truly epic yawn. The little thing had energy, he'd give it that. He looked around at the warm quiet dark tunnel, it was unlikely that anything would disturb him if he had another try for a nap down here. But after all that effort he felt like treating himself to a little finders reward. Gently he began to feel his suroundings and sense across the gauntlet.


Using Dual Senses to see across the gauntlet
Wits (3) + Empathy (-1) + Primal Urge (1) + Irraka (2) It lasts only a turn, so Jeffrey will do it a few times to be prudent. You'll have to lop the gauntlet strength from the right.
[roll0]
tens
[roll1]

[roll2]
tens
[roll3]

[roll4]
tens
[roll5]

And I'd like to roll to see what the Resonence for this Locus is but I can't find what I should be rolling. Here's five dice, just take however many are correct.

[roll6]
tens
[roll7]

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

Richard's words echo behind him as Jonathan walks to the back of the church. He isn't entirely convinced of his own indestructibility, but it's good to know that someone is.

He's not expecting to find people when he reaches the classroom, but he rushes over to the bound bodies the moment he sees them. "Hector, I need one of those blades you carry. There's people in here, and they need to get to a hospital right away."

[Jamini]

Richard walks in behind Jonathan, limping heavily as he enters the classroom. His eyes go round as he spies the large sacks of eggs on the roof.

"Well... crap."

As Jonathan works the people below free of their webbing he walks around to the edge of the room, gingerly tapping at the webs.

"That is a lot of them. Once we get these people free we might consider just burning this whole place down. With the pastor the way he is it'll raise questions anyway, and I doubt we will get everything no matter how careful we are. I would rather not take any chances."

He withdrew his hand, plucking at the sticky strands that came free of the wall with it. "Also, once those folks are awake I'd like to er... talk with them. If you don't mind."

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector nods to Jonathon's request. He hands over one of his chakrams, taking in what a horror this was.

Sorry, I didn't see your post Kuma.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

"I'm not so sure we should burn it. That's as good as sending up a signal flare to any other Azlu that might be in the area, and the spirits of fire and panic that the burning will stir up will be another nuisance for us to deal with. We do need to dispose of the egg-sacks, though."

"And we should figure out what to do with the victims. I might be able to bring them around, but maybe they'd be better off if we cleaned off the webbing, left them in a public place, and called an ambulance. They may be better off dismissing this as a hallucination."

[Jamini]

"We aren't going to burn down half the city Jonathan. One small fire does not make a spirit, and with so few people nearby I doubt we'll cause much real panic. Either way, it's a better alternative than potentiay missing a single Azlu egg. You've seen what they can do." He shook his head at the webs, frowning as he ruffled his trenchcoat a little.

"As for these people, I'd prefer to make sure they are going to be ok. We can say we found them in a ravine near our place, hiking or something. I suspect they've been missing for some time."

"We might be able to use this rescue as a means to make ourselves a larger part of the human community here. If we want to enact any long-term changes in the spirit world here, we need to pioneer them in the mortal world. As leaders, not as pawns in some Raven Lady's game."

[Jesse Drake]

Hector Villalobos

Hector tries not remember the last time he spoke with the water spirits. "If we could find some water, I could keep the fire contained- not letting it spread past the webbing... it will take a nice sized body of water, and some major focus though."

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

"It's less the size of the fire that worries me than its significance. We'd be torching a major pillar of the community. That's going to have a ripple effect on the people in town, and through them the spirits in the area." Jonathan frowns and begins to detach egg-sacks from the walls of the classroom, laying them on the floor in a moist pile. "If we take our time and search the area, we'll find just as many eggs as the fire would get. That won't, of course, mean that there aren't nesting sites elsewhere in town, but another advantage of not igniting anything that we don't have to is that we'll have a grace period before the other Azlu in the area realize what we've done."

"I think I agree with you, that 'finding' the bodies and rescuing them ourselves might do some good for our standing in town. However, if we attract too much attention, it's going to be harder to keep the flock from knowing what we are."

[Ichneumon]

Jeffrey

When the fox is gone, you look across the Gauntlet:
The air feels like strange, a burning discomforting pressure all around you. Although there aren't spirits near the Locus, they were here very recently, in large numbers. Likely, they've been warned of your coming, by the claimed thugs you faced earlier. The most common spirits in the area seem to be conceptual spirits of Commerce (fueled by the constant flow of tourists), Deprivation (fueled by the large number of relatively poor families in the area), natural spirits of animals like foxes, rabbits, deer and wolves. Strangely enough you also feel an enlarged presence of Wrath and Death spirits, their origin remains unexplained to you.

The resonance of the locus is "urban". [OOC: I'm uncertain how resonance really works, so if this is an odd answer, please say so and we'll change it into some more more logical.]

The others

You guys release the prisoners. They don't react to you at all, they're paralyzed, unable to move and seem to be in a kind of hypnotized trance.

[Jamini]

"You seem to be forgetting some of the activities that happened in this church" Richard replies, waving his hand at the trussed-up people.

"Violence, Pain, Fear."

He waved towards the front of the church, to the skin of the pastor.

"Suffering, Horror, Death."

He pointed towards the front door, indicating towards the heavy locks bolted across the inside.

"Paranoia, Anger, Hate. Spirits of all of those could have been made here, thanks to the actions of the Azlu. Do we really want to leave such a testament standing? Questions about the pastor vanishing will be raised too, should we leave the church here."

He shrugged and bent over, plucking an egg from one of the sacks Jonathan had placed in the middle of the floor. He gently rolled the sticky egg between his fingers for a second before smashing it between his index finger and this thumb.

"What if they laid them in the walls? Underneath furniture? We would need to tear this place apart to be sure to get them all. That will take more time than we have."

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

"Then we won't search alone." Jonathan's eyes roll back in his head, exposing only the whites. His vision blurs and distorts for a moment as he brings his death sight back up.

Tilting his head up towards the ceiling, he addresses the ghosts of the church. "Can you hear me?" He waits for a response.

"Just because horrible things have been done here doesn't mean the building's lost. We can choose to purify, instead of destroy."

"This country killed my grandfather's people. Killed his way of life. He never spoke of killing in return. Sometimes there's a greater power in the mending of things."

"If we have no other alternative, then I'll help you burn the church, but I believe we can do more to combat the spirits that the Azlu helped evoke by restoring it. Turning it back into a place of faith."

OOC: Trying to contact any ghosts that the Azlu might have directly or indirectly caused.

[The Kings Raven]

Jeffrey Hishu

Jeffrey wondered why the spirits would have fled, normally they'd defend a Locus from a lone Werewolf. He considered that they were hiding and waiting to ambush him but was confident he would have caught them if they were. Besides he wasn't going to be there long.

Pushing through the Gauntlet felt harder than he expected but it gave anyway, that was worrying but Jeffrey just decided to act quickly. His first attempt to draw from the Locus was rushed and only gave a single point of Essence, this pushed him into rushing even more and nothing came. He took a second to calm himself and on his third attempt filled himself to the brim. Right time to get out of here.

Jeffrey pushed back towards the material realm and, he felt like he was wondering lost within the Gauntlet until he was suddenly spat out in the spirit. Scared he immediately began to try and escape again only, nothing. He couldn't even feel the Gauntlet.

The thing to do here was not to panic. This was a Locus, a well known spot for spirits. Best to vacate the area. Twisting into the Urhan Jeffrey began to sneak away.


Oh. Crap. Looking at the source book, I think I got a Dramatic Failure (it's -2 for the day. A 1 dot locus is +0 and the gauntlet is almost never better than -1!) And am trapped inside the spirit world until night time. If that's true Jeffrey's going to make full use of his stealth to lay low and try and make his way back to our house on the spirit side. If not I'll edit my post.

Poor guy, will he ever get his nap? This is seriously weird, the others are all in a life or death battle followed by uncovering a horrific scene of kidnapping and would be painful human eating. Jeffrey's bouncing from one odd but (so far) harmless situation to another and all he wants is to have a nap. I admit the charachter is turning out exactly the way I wrote him :smallsmile: but it's weird that even the dice are reinforcing it.

So he crosses the Gauntlet, takes nine seconds to draw Essence, another three to fail to cross and another three to shapeshift into Urhan.

(Oh, and Urban seems fine for a Locus. It just means that only building spirits, streetlamp spirits, Urban things, will draw from it)

Crossing the Gauntlet.

Intelligence (2) + Presence (1) + Primal Urge (1)
[roll0] (if he fails)
[roll1]
[roll2]

Draining Essence (he's only going to take 3)

Harmony
[roll3]
[roll4]

Crossing the Gauntlet.

Intelligence (2) + Presence (1) + Primal Urge (1)
[roll5] (if he fails)
[roll6]
[roll7]

Finally Shapeshifting
Stamina (3) + Survival (1) + Primal Urge (1)
[roll8]
[roll9]

[Ichneumon]

The group minus Jeffrey

It takes a few seconds, before Jonathan hears the sound of a crowd slowly moving in your direction. It's difficult to pin point where they come from, then, you see a group of ghosts appear in the room, between 10 and 15. All of them are children ranging from 4 to 9 years old, most of them girls. All look sad and angry, very angry. Most of them are dressed in their nightgown. Their faces and clothes are covered in blood. Their throats are slit and they have big stab woods on their back, similar to what you saw with the tourist ghosts in the house.

They don't say a word, but look at you in a very hostile and angry fashion.

Jeffrey

You have crossed over to the Shadow Realm in the company of your teachers and mentors and other Uratha many times before, but now you are on your own and you're trapped. At the other side, the tunnel still looks like a regular tunnel full of pipes, like it used to, but it doesn't feel the same anymore. The shadows feel like they are touching you, slowly infiltration into your soul. The place feels much colder, much more hostile.

It's a dark place, empty. Not a place where you would like to stay for long, alone. When you go up, the pub/night club seem much the same. On a second glance though, you see the painted Australian animals on the wall move and look at you in a manner that suggests insanity, slowly following you. When you're outside, the city looks much darker, dirtier and.... bussier? Although the streets are deserted, it doesn't feel like you're walking in a small town any more, but more like you're walking in a metropolitan city like New York. There are more street lights, more concrete, more parked cars. The street lights shine bright, but their lights seem distant, hollow and cold. Life in the city is hard, merciless, there are those that win and those that lose. It's a place of wealth and a place of poverty.

Thick clouds mask the sky.

Still, the streets seem deserted, no spirits where ever you look, mostly the city has the same plan as Manitou Springs, but some buildings have changed size and appearance (small shops have becomes large malls, small offices have changed in large buildings... etc.)

Do you have any place you particularly want to go to or do you plan to just scout the area?

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

"I take it back, Richard. When we're done here, we burn the ******."

Jonathan drops to his knees before the ghosts. "Oh, god. I'm sorry."

[Ichneumon]

The group minus Jeffrey

They start shouting at you, angry: "The spiders hunted down the hunters. Bullied the bullies. You hunted down the hunters of the hunters. You bullied the bullies of the bullies!" They really sound like the young children they are. They surround you. They are angry children and seem to blaim you guys for killing the Azlu. Although they seem hostile, they aren't physically violent, but in numbers they are quite intimidating.

[Kuma Da]

Jonathan Wake

"Yes, we did, because your protectors were monsters too. They were just bigger ones." Jonathan stays at eye-level, not making any threatening movements. Barely moving at all, except for the occasional blink. "We're here to deal with whatever killed you, and to make the town safe."

He hesitates for a moment, inhales, and then asks "was it the crow woman?"