As we play, occasionally we'll close a thread and open a new one to keep the size of threads (and relative complexity) down to a dull roar. Here's where we store the closed posts from the history of Errant Road.
AdamZero wrote:(ooc: no real set posting order? NICE.)
[OOC: Yeah, we'd never make any leeway if we had to wait for some of the stragglers to catch up... it's kind of "Oh, look, someone replied... is it a logical time for my character to make a response to that?" instead.]
Lucas wasn't shaken by the skeleton so much... his time with Grope travelling the inbetweenlands to the north had almost completely ground all ability for surprise, let alone horror, out of his system. He'd also been Kureji's lab partner in Summoning 101, at the time of the much-rumored Gothic Vampire Penguin incident, so 'Boris' as the boy called him was unsettling but not really all that creepy...
What WAS creepy, however, was the aura he was picking up off of the door. Whatever Boris had driven back wasn't gone, it had just retreated back into room 12b13 their room. He just hoped the rent-an-exorcist kid knew that too. His eyes caught a small talisman broken on the floor next to the door... "Our stuff, our room, our boobytrap by the looks of it. It looks like someone tried to seal this thing once already... my guess is the owner told the bellhop to remove the ward when he brought our luggage up... then called you to come clean up the mess after whatever that thing is did it's job before it wrecked the entire place."
"The kid is in the hotel, and Jamie is on the way," the hooded figure panted (she'd been running full tilt, after all) into the speaking grille at the entrance to the warehouse on Linden Street.
"Good. Were you observed?" a commanding female voice inquired from within.
"I don't think so. The tour group was doing something weird and magical that I couldn't make sense out of. You should have seen the crazy illusion Jamie had on."
"I did." Another commanding voice, this one male. "You're sure you weren't observed? There was an Ensigerum guy keeping an eye on them at Geno's. We'll have to take care of him."
"No, I didn't see anyone but the tour group, and they didn't see me. Them and the guy at the desk, and he's on our side, right?"
Simultaneous snorts from the voices at the other end of the speaking tube, then the female voice spoke again. "It doesn't matter whose side he was on. Okay, nice work. Press 1, 3, 5, 2 on the key pad and then come in. Don't screw that up, need I say?"
"But who's watching 'Marcus' now?" the hooded woman asked.
"I think there'll be plenty of witnesses that we can ... interrogate ... later," the commanding male voice chortled. "Now get in here so we can re-arm the traps. Jamie isn't far behind, and a little girl out on her own is going to attract bad company, don't you think?"
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Back at the hotel, there was a muffled explosion behind the desk, as the large coin the clerk had stuffed in his pocket detonated, driving a small but very sharp blade neatly through his femoral artery.
Because old is wise, does good, and above all, kicks ass.
Marcus was rather glad the man didn't act in a 'mundane' way toward the spirit's effect on world around them. Ment he didn't have to expound as much. He rolled his shoulders as he eased forward, until he faced the door.
"I did my research, last owner of this place locked up his adoptive daughter in here...I'll cut out the dirty-ugly bits...long story short she kept her nails long and filed them to blade lengths. Slit his throat, but not deep enough, he managed a shot with an old piece of iron and clamor...and the coroner never removed the iron." He held up a small metal ball the sort that used to be used in revolvers. "I did. Posthumously." he tossed the ball once in the air and caught it. "Still, everything has energy, so I need to remove the spirit of the bullet before I can set her to rest...and then send him to Hell..." He sighed as he brought his staff foreward.
"Spirit that lurks beyond here. I am one who travels along a path paved with grave soil and bone, dispel your glamor on this place so that I might parley with you without misconceptions or deception."
there was a long silence.
"Well...that went better than last time." He said to Boris. The skeleton spun its head on its neck vertebrae. "Yeah and you still have your arms attached too."
He sighed as he reached a hand for the door, looking over some boxes at the man. "You coming in too?" he asked.
Roger was staring out the open door after Jamie, and was half-considering following when he heard a muffled bang from the office behind the front desk. Crossing the room with quick strides, he rounded the desk and placed his ear to the door. A low moaning accompanied by a slippery squeaking could be heard coming from somewhere in the next room.
Turning the knob, Roger took a deep breath before flinging the door open and rushing in. He immediately skidded across the floor, almost losing his footing, but he was able to catch himself before he fell. It was a good thing too, because he would have had a hard time trying to explain those stains. The floor was covered in blood, the ruby liquid streaked from the furious thrashing of the clerk. He was clutching the inside of his thigh, and in between gyrations of his legs, Roger could see spurts of crimson gushing from between the man's fingers. Severed femoral. Nothing for it. The man was already dead, he just hadn't caught on yet.
With a final spasmodic twitch, the man slipped into unconsciousness and went limp. Turning the man over, Roger proceeded to rifle through his pockets, carefully avoiding the ever expanding pool of blood. The left hand pocket was intact, and contained a few small coins and some handrolled cigarettes, which Roger took for himself. "Waste not, want not" he muttered under his breath. The right pocket of the man's pants was blackened and shredded. Something had burst in there, and ripped open the man's leg. Letting go of the corpse (for it was now a corpse, he had stopped breathing) Roger made a quick search of the room.
It was unsatifyingly quick. Nothing in it except for a small table with a chair, and a couple of empty shelves. A small door led out to the back alley behind the building, but there was nothing there but garbage and dirt. Roger was about to head back to the entrance, when he spotted something out of the corner of his eye. Embedded in one leg of the table was a chunk of something.
Bending down, Roger proceeded to pry it out. It looked like a piece of a large coin, but it was hollow. The edges were covered in some sort of residue, and were warm to the touch. Pocketing the piece, he made his way out to the "lobby" and stole a box of matches from the front desk.
Lighting up one of the deceased clerks cigarettes, Roger made his way towards the staircase at the end of the hall.
[OOC: Some time early the next morning -- this is not synchronized with events in the World Traveler, but I gotta find some way to get Grope to Lorrel; back IC:]
At the dock in Kiyoka, Grope, Keyes and Mr. Stagpoole were making preparations to sail for Port Lorrel.
"I cannot pay you, Mr. Stagpoole," the troll rumbled.
Mr. Stagpoole fixed him with a stare. "Nor would I take your payment if you had any. At least not until I've repaid you for five saved lives, two of them twice. You know that, Grope. I owe you and Zhbrigeeul big time. Speaking of whom, where is she? I thought you two were inseparable."
"She died," Grope said, matter-of-factly. "And now she is here." He patted the Many-Fathers-God-Wisdom-Robe. "I must go home to take another mate."
Just like that? the others wondered, then decided not to pursue it. Trolls' beliefs were, ahem, different, and their family dynamics ... well. Mr. Stagpoole continued, "We'll make another high-speed run; I have other reasons to get to Port Lorrel quickly. But that means I really can't take you beyond Lorrel. Is that okay?"
"Yes," Grope replied simply, noting out of the corner of his eye that Keyes was struggling with a broken rope. Apparently he'd used up his magical mana doing the magical Mending required after two consecutive high-speed boat trips across the Farrel Sea. Without thinking, Grope said, "Let me help you, my friend," touched the Robe with one hand, pulled the frayed rope ends away from Keyes with the other hand ... and suddenly the rope was repaired, Mended.
That was a stupid thing to do, Grope thought to himself, as he felt the same strange fatigue that he'd experienced earlier when he healed his small wound -- but he also felt the astonished stares of Keyes and Mr. Stagpoole as though they were physical contact. "How did you do dat?" Keyes asked incredulously. In response, he could do nothing but shrug his massive shoulders...
Because old is wise, does good, and above all, kicks ass.
"Eisenfaust... Eisenfaust... Eisen... Why the hell don't they label the buildings around here?" I looked up and down Linden street, trying to see which part in particular I needed to be at. All I could see were dark and foreboding warehouses. Mostly unlabeled warehouses. "Is it too much to ask that secretive underground conspiracy types come with proper labeling? Maybe a little sign saying 'Secret meeting here.' Bah." I shook my head.
Then I caught a whiff of something. A very powerful (but not particularly high quality) liquor rotting. Sniffing, I walked into the light breeze until I was standing next to a warehouse entrance. Looking down, at my feet, I could see broken glass, where it looked like someone had dropped a case of smuggled rotgut, and just swept the wreckage aside, too rushed to clean it properly.
That had definitely been rotgut in the beer.
I stuffed my hands into my clothes, checking all my hidden weaponry for readiness, then nodded my satisfaction. Ready, I knocked.
The man and two women looked across the street as Jamie knocked at the door of the opposite warehouse. This wasn't starting well ... but on the other hand, they hadn't really gone to much effort to advertise their presence. The two women looked at each other and rolled their eyes, then one leaned to the voice tube and said loudly, "Ahem ... Jamie! OVER HERE!"
Because old is wise, does good, and above all, kicks ass.
"Oh ferfugsake..." I turned and looked across the street. "What? You're rotgut smuggling rivals are across the street? Must make turf wars entertaining. 'I'm going out for a smoke break. Hand me my pistol, gonna take a few pot shots while I'm out there.'" I shook my head. "You people know who I am?"
"You people know who I am?" The three people inside the warehouse all sighed; building trust was always such a difficult thing ...
A hurried conversation, and a decision was made: time to take a risk. (Of course, risk-taking when an entire arsenal was trained on the street outside was different than when the risk taker was on her own, but still.) One of the women stepped through the door, leaving it slightly ajar, and pulled back her hood.
"Jamie, do you not know who we are?"
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Back at the hotel, three men wearing uniforms and badges also stepped through a door, the main one to the lobby. Two were carrying guns held at the ready; one carried a Tsuirakuan crystal ball that he kept close to his mouth. One of the gun-toting men shouted, "Police! Keep your hands in plain sight. We're investigating reports of an explosion here."
Because old is wise, does good, and above all, kicks ass.
Graybeard wrote:"Jamie, do you not know who we are?"
Calling from across the street may have risked letting something be overheard, but I didn't want to get close enough to get grabbed if they were less friendly then I'd have liked. As such I remained where I was, and shrugged. "You're the Eisenfaust. Rival's to the Gewehr. Less of the professional shooting and shaking people down shtick and more of the professional smuggling and entertainment nature, but still rivals." I'd heard of them a time or two. In some areas they and the Gewehr had a wary peace going, since the Gewehr were more into violence based rackets, and the Eisenfaust tended to eschew that for (illegal) wine, women, and song. Well, not so much the song bit. The Veracians hadn't quite figured out how to turn music into a black market commodity worth beans. Not even the song they'd banned for it's rather lengthy description of Luminosita's drunken night with a randy sailor. But the fact that the Gewehr and the Eisenfaust weren't actively killing one another in some areas did not make them friendly. And they certainly were killing one another in other places.
The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Or so they say. I say the enemy of my enemy is simply an unknown element that may be interested in turning this into a three way that would leave me more than just a little sore.
I eyed the woman who dropped her hood to reveal her face. Something seemed familiar about her, but I couldn't quite tell. So I decided to probe further. "You didn't answer my question. Just how is it you know me?" And just how is it you don't know Roger, the other Gewehr hit list hero? I didn't add.
