Turn 3
Calla"I will not force you either way, whatever you decide I will try to help you, even if its only comforting"
To the people outside "How confident are you that the sacrifice of my sister will stop this?, You had better be VERY confidant that this is necessary, because when she dies, I am coming for you"
'I... thank you,' Sophie says. [1] 'And goodbye. I hope the world will be kinder to our kind once this is done. Spread the word, tell everyone what happened. Don't... don't let these people dictate our history.'
There is nothing else to say. You take your leave, marching back into the candle-lit corridor. There you pause for a moment, feeling cold sweat on your forehead. Apprehension and outright fear mull around in your stomach and seem to lock your feet into place. You don't want to leave Sophie to her fate, don't want to let her face what's coming alone. After several minutes, you move on.
The crowd outside stands impassive, dozens of eyes fixed on you, curious, pitying or blandly emotionless. An unearthly silence hangs upon the rig. The clouds you saw earlier have moved faster than you thought, forming a foreboding black curtain over the sky. Light rain splatters down on your heads, and you hear the rumble of thunder somewhere in the distance. Not a good time to be on the metal platform, but you guess prophecies don't wait. The weather was probably included in the texts as well.
You face the crowd and feel anger welling up inside you. 'How confident are you that the sacrifice of my sister will stop this?' you demand. 'You had better be
very confident, because when she dies, I am coming for you.'
You ignore the shocked gasps and expressions of surprise and storm through the crowd, which seems to have tripled in size from when you went in. On the outer edges, Captain Stirling and various scientists familiar to you detach themselves and take steps for you before your wrathful gaze makes them reconsider. Feeling the need to get away from these people, you head up the stairs to a walkway crossing the top deck, with a good view of the preparation chamber doorway - and, you realize, a path to a control room stuck in the side of the second tower. You can practically see the old men and their accomplices gloating and uttering their ridiculuous cryptic statements to eachother inside. You lean against the railing and wait.
A few minutes later, they bring Sophie out. Clad in her blood-red robes, oiled and adorned with myriad amulets and symbols - looking perfectly comfortable under them - she walks, and the crowd moves aside. The two acolytes guide her across the deck, slowly, while the stormclouds gather in yet greater numbers. She doesn't look at you when she passes the steps to your walkway, moving nearly directly above you. The crowd trails behind, back in excited conversation. It's bad enough to suffer the apocalypse, but you have to do it in the presence of people with no sense of respect for the event.
The acolytes stop and begin chanting, and Sophie continues all the way to the edge of the platform. You spot a raised dais that wasn't there the day before. Sophie steps on it, lighting flashes, and the world seems to hold its breath.
What happens next happens fast. You become aware of something painfully vast and ancient, trespassing into the world of mortals. Reality bends and ripples under its presence, all color seeming to drain from your vision. Sounds fall away, becoming distant and muffled. Everything seems to slow down, and your mouth opens to shout a warning you will never finish.
Then everyone on the platform except Sophie, you, and a handful of armed guards, including Captain Stirling, lets out a piercing shriek and topples over, clawing at their skulls. Their bodies twitch and shake, snaking in place on the platform floor.
Gauguthun, the Doom of Atlantis, Master of the Deep and Harbinger of the Return, arises with the vaporization of thousands of tonnes of blackening seawater.
Boiling water shoots upwards in a stream hundreds of meters long and over half a kilometre in diameter, generating a hissing shockwave that sends you sprawling against the railing behind you. You fall and slam your head into the metal. When you look back, it surfaces.
Over a kilometre of gleaming black chitin broken only by vast, white-glowing eyes set deep in a bloated, triangular skull that seems to shift and melt in front of your eyes, like made out of liquid bone, rising from a living mountain of a body, its sheer size making its shape impossible to judge. Tsunami-scale tidal waves break into being and the entire rig shakes, metal groaning. You see the boats below flown hundreds of meters to the open sea or simply smashed apart into a million jagged pieces.
[1] There's a sound like tortured metal from deep inside the Abyssal, impossibly low. Your mind is filled with overwhelming primordial terror -
flee, flee, flee! - and you lose control of your body. Before you can tell what's happening, you've fallen off the railing and are heading head-first for the platform surface. [3][BP:2] Burning pain shoots out from your upper back as you impact, [Damage:5] bones audibly breaking. Your breath escapes through your lips, accompanied by a healthy bout of blood, and you can't seem to get any more of it in. You fight unconsciousness, forcing your head to turn towards the edge of the platform. There, you see Sophie.
[3] She's on her knees, her entire body shaking violently. You watch helplessly as she raises one foot, then the other, standing on wavering feet. You feel her mind bursting with barely-contained mental power she's forcing her body to move with. Sophie raises her head, her eyes fixing with determination on the mind-bogglingly huge and powerful being reaching towards the still-shaking rig with a pair of immense cragged tentacles, adorned by thousands of prominent scars and wounds.
Something streams from Sophie's mind towards it.
[3] The creature pauses, the tentacles splashing down with enough force to generate another burst of tsunami-like waves that crash into the rig's supports below. It offers a cursory thought towards Sophie. You feel her mind crack under the terrifying strain, nearly overwhelming her completely. She staggers back, falling on her knees. But the stream remains, touching upon the being's incomprehensibly vast mental barriers. Something washes over you, an emotion totally alien in composition - but, you know with mindnumbing fear, not in content. The weight of being on the edge of this creature's thinking nearly throws you to blissful unconsciousness.
Amusement. Cruel, bemused amusement over the efforts of its distant spawn.
Sophie collapses with a scream, directly in front of you on the edge of the platform. Captain Stirling, still alive and sane by some miracle, shouts something to you, and begins running for one of the helicopters on the other edge. And the Deep One watches, motionless as in stasis, water running down the lenght of its body like cascading waterfalls. The entire drilling platform shudders, deafening groaning of tortured metal signalling imminent destruction.
Calla - Abyssal Hybrid
Health: Torso: Heavily Wounded!
Inventory: Empty
Traits and Powers:
*Beyond Human (As an Abyssal half-breed, you possess incredible physical and mental capability. You are capable of mental 'psychic' warfare and considerable thought suggestion, and of easy genetic manipulation by touch on-the-fly, even to fatal extremes. +1 to mental power, +2 to mutation and genetic alteration)
*Aura of Terror - INACTIVE (You share the Deep Ones' incapaciting presence, which causes deep fear and anxiety in the mortal psyche. You are currently suppressing your aura.)
Current Effects: None
Location: Ritual Preparation Chamber, Fellowship HQ
Alex murrmed in the Titan's general direction "Well fuck you too..." He got to his feet unsteadily and looked at the cultists. In his mind he communciated with the Fae "Look, I know that you would prefer to be out of my head and doing whatever giant monsters made from the earth do on their free time. But if I get shot and killed we both die,something neither of us want. So come on", Alex cracked a small smile, "Let's see what this fuckers head looks like on the inside." Alex lept at the cultisst, putting all the forced he dared into a puch at the cultist's face.
[3] There is no response from the Fae, but you didn't really expect one. You keep your head low as the helicopter falls back to the boat's side, the remaining attacker [4] raising his rifle to fire again. A burst of high-caliber shots [5][Dodge:6-1=5] slams into the hull beside Lucia. You can see the girl is terrified out of her mind.
[5] While he fires, you jump. Springing off the side of the boat, your superior physique sends you racing for the open door of the helicopter. The cultist only has time to turn his gaze [2] before you're upon him, crashing head-first into his bulk. Both of you go sprawling in the cramped space, and you bounce back, nearly falling back to the boat. Theo shouts at you.
[3] You see a flicker of movement as the cultist hybrid detaches himself from the back wall, [Dodge:4] offering a clumsy kick that you evade by twisting back to your feet, throwing yourself backwards against the wall. [1] You catch your breath, looking both opponents over. The hybrid, by far the more dangerous one, slams the helicopter door closed in one swift movement, blocking you from the boat. The ordinary cultist backs slowly, levelling his rifle
at you in the cramped space. Both opponents are at a hand's reach.
CombatantsFirst Cultist
*Unharmed
*Assault Rifle [18/30 - 1] (Fires six shots per turn, -2 to Damage)
*Squishy Mortal (+3 to taken Damage, -3 to physical Damage)
Sol Hybrid
*Unharmed
*Beyond Human (As a weak lab-born Star God hybrid, possesses crude understanding of his Nexus Field and possesses the superior strenght and toughness of all hybrids.)
*Nexus Field - OFFENSIVE MODE (+1 to Damage. Incapable of using alternative modes.)
Theo
*Out of Sight
*Unharmed
*Heavy Pistol [4/5 - 2] (Fires one shot per turn, -3 to Damage)
*Veteran Agent (+2 to Combat Rolls, +1 to Dodge, -1 to Enemy Dodge)
*Squishy Mortal (+3 to all taken Damage, -3 to physical Damage)
Agent Rodriguez
*Out of Sight
*Unharmed
*Heavy Pistol [4/5 - 1] (Fires one shot per turn, -3 to Damage)
*Trained Agent (+1 to Dodge, -1 to Enemy Dodge)
*Squishy Mortal (+3 to all taken Damage, -3 to physical Damage)
Agent Deronda
*Out of Sight
*Unharmed
*Heavy Pistol [4/5 - 1] (Fires one shot per turn, -3 to Damage)
*Trained Agent (+1 to Dodge, -1 to Enemy Dodge)
*Squishy Mortal (+3 to all taken Damage, -3 to physical Damage)
---
Alex Vondgas - Imprisoned TitanHealth: Unharmed
Inventory: Empty
Traits and Powers: *
Immortal Prisoner (In the back of your mind, ever-raging, ever-moving, lays 'the Fae', a Titan from before the dawn of history. By tapping into its power, you can take on incredible physical and mental capability. The more of yourself you give in, the more powerful you become, but the higher the risk
of losing control is. Your current control level is High. +1 to physical damage, -1 to all taken damage)
*
Slow Regeneration (Your control over the Titan grants you slow wound regeneration. Heal all wounds by 1 on a 3-6.)
Current Effects: None
Location: Floor of a luxury yacht, just off the coast of Thailand
Turiel picked up the transceiver again, "Command, with all due respect, I see this is a danger to all of us who would try to engage it, I barely survived as it knocked out the aircraft's systems. Bombard it with long-range missiles or I shall be forced to attack.
Over."
Follow command, observe from safe distance. Try to examine surroundings. Fly to a higher height.
[4] There is a long pause before you are answered. 'I understand your concern, Operative, but that is not really for you or us to decide. Moscow will escalate arms on its own terms, and we will not advise anything either way before we have determined the full capabilities of this thing. You are not cleared to engage. Maintain radio silence unless absolutely necessary.'
You circle around, feeling totally useless. The Titan continues, leaving massive craters in its wake. The earth looks like the ground zero of a carpet bombing, or the aftermath of a nuclear blastwave. You can still feel the tremors through the air, soaked up by your Field.
Rising higher and moving away per your orders, you keep your long-range scans running. After nearly ten minutes, you're rewarded by a distant trio of air force signals. You make sure you're not sending anything out and keep to the clouds, watching the fighters close the distance between them and the Titan. You wonder what's going through their minds right now. They probably didn't wake up this morning expecting to fight the very earth itself. There's nothing else for you to do than wait.
Three triangles of steel and machinery, packed full with weaponry capable of reducing armoured companies to flaming wrecks, sweep in across the gutted steppe, approaching the six-hundred meter giant with textbook precision.
[3+1=4] In unison, the three fliers release missiles with a whip-crack boom that [Dodges:4-1-1/5-1-1/3-1-1][BPs:3/7/3] race forward in wide arcs. In rapid succession, their lights are devoured by the massive bulk of the Titan, the tiny weapons impacting on its lower back and leg. A few seconds later, explosions bloom against its skin.
[Damages:2-2/2-2-1/3-2+1] Even from this far away, relying on the KOSCHEI's in-built systems, you can see their effect. The first two hits leave absolutely no mark, and you doubt the creature even notices them. The solidified earth on the Titan's back remains as smooth as ever. The third doesn't exactly fill you with confidence, either, but you feel a strange satisfaction seeing a tiny gust of dust accompany the explosion, leaving a miniscule blackened mark. It proves you can, indeed, hurt this thing. The three fighters veer away. You can practically taste their utter astonishment and frustration.
[5] The Titan moves onwards, seemingly ignorant of its new opponents. You wonder if it even has anything like a nervous system or pain receptors. Its vast fleshy eye stares fixed ahead.
CombatantsSteppe Titan
*Left Leg: Minor Crater
*Lumbering Monstrosity (-1 to Dodge)
Fighter Formation *Unharmed
*30mm GSH-30 Cannons
[-] (Fire nine shots per turn. -3 to Damage)
*RUS Guided Missiles [9] (-2 to Damage, -1 to Enemy Dodge)
*
Fragile Machines (+2 to taken Damage)
*
Military Aircraft (+1 to Combat Rolls, +1 to Dodge)
---
Status: Unharmed
Location: Russian Airspace, Western Siberia
Equipment: *
30mm GSH-30 Cannon [-] (Fires three shots per turn. -3 to Damage)
*
RUS Guided Missiles [4] (-2 to Damage, -1 to Enemy Dodge)
Special Traits: * Field Booster (Capable of co-opting and considerably enlarging a pilot's Nexus Field.)
* Fragile Machine (+2 to taken Damage)
Turiel - Star God HybridHealth: Unharmed
Inventory: Empty
Traits and Powers: *
Beyond Human (As a Star God half-breed, you carry within your veins incredible physical and mental capability, but more importantly, innate knowledge of Star God technology and powers, including rudimentary control of your Nexus Field.)
*
Nexus Field - DEFENSIVE MODE (You have the power to control a personal force field that can be used to redirect and turn away attacks, supercharge fired projectiles, energy weapons and physical attacks, or knit together wounds or mechanical damage. Only one mode can be active at once. Defensive: +1 to dodge. Offensive: +1 to damage. Regenerative: Heals all wounds/damage by 2 on a 3-6.)
Current Effects: None
Location: Inside the cockpit of the KOSCHEI Modified Jet Fighter, Western Siberia
"Alright, stay here and if anyone tries to use it stop him. I'll take the stairs and look for the others." Erik points at the elevator and heads for the stairway doors. Head towards the area the cultist mind described as altar chamber.
Alexei sighed at the fanatic's sheer stupidity and crushed his head against the wall with a elbow strike before advancing with his team.
Tourigny's one remaining companion is beyond grateful at not having to follow, acknowledging his orders with his eyes averted, and closed, just to be sure. The hybrid wrenches open the stairway door and is gone, the room seeming to brighten without his presence.
[5] Erik follows the map scavenged out of the cultist's head, taking the stairs down. A warm red glow and the smell of sweat and blood intrude upon the industrial-sterile air as he descends, growing stronger and stronger. He doesn't need the map to know the door at the bottom leads to his destination, candle-light flooding in through the glass. Erik opens the door and steps in.
[6] And knows he's in the right place. The wide and long, high-ceilinged chamber is obviously a converted storage space. Like in a church, assorted chairs and benches scavenged from a variety of locations and owners surround a raised platform with a stone slab on all sides. Candles crisscross through the rows, the only, though large, source of illumination. Erik sees a body on the slab, writhing against its restraints, with a shirtless cultist standing at his side. Another dozen cultists occupy the space around him, holding knives and cleavers. They are not quite inside your 'aura' yet.
The leader's head snaps to Erik's direction the moment he steps inside, and an impossibly low, booming shout escapes his lips; 'More of them! Kill him! Quickly!'
Meanwhile, still in the offices, [1] Alexei lets the other agents finish off his opponent, [6+1=6][Dodge:3-1-1=1] which Agent Zelenko does happily. [BP:5][Damage:6+3-3+1=6] The cultist goes sprawling from the force of the shot, his arm nearly blown apart.
[2][3][3] Darkin and Mihailov follow his lead, pumping lead into the wounded cultist. [Dodge:5-1-1=3][Dodge:4-1-1=2][BP:5][BP:1] The first agent's shot rips into his shoe and [Damage:1-3+3-1=1][Damage:5-3+3=5] the other hits him right between the eyes, painting the floor with his brain matter.
[3] With the threats neutralized, Alexei orders his team to advance. They move quickly through the empty offices, rushing past empty cubicles and rooms. [4] It seems the cultists vacated the majority of the area, already, though. The team soon comes to elevators and a stairway up and down. The offices transform into empty corridors and continue to the side, too.
Combatants (The Offices)Agent Zelenko
*Unharmed
*Heavy Pistol [3/5 - 1] (Fires one shot per turn, -3 to Damage)
*Trained Agent (+1 to Dodge, -1 to Enemy Dodge)
*Squishy Mortal (+3 to all taken Damage, -3 to physical Damage)
Agent Kaminski
*Unharmed
*Heavy Pistol [3/5 - 1] (Fires one shot per turn, -3 to Damage)
*Trained Agent (+1 to Dodge, -1 to Enemy Dodge)
*Squishy Mortal (+3 to all taken Damage, -3 to physical Damage)
Agent Darkin
*Unharmed
*Heavy Pistol [4/5 - 2] (Fires one shot per turn, -3 to Damage)
*Trained Agent (+1 to Dodge, -1 to Enemy Dodge)
*Squishy Mortal (+3 to all taken Damage, -3 to physical Damage)
Agent Mihailov
*Unharmed
*Heavy Pistol [3/5 - 1] (Fires one shot per turn, -3 to Damage)
*Trained Agent (+1 to Dodge, -1 to Enemy Dodge)
*Squishy Mortal (+3 to all taken Damage, -3 to physical Damage)
---
Alexei Zielkov - Experimental Superman
Health: Unharmed
Inventory: Compact SMG [18/18 - 2] (Fires six shots per turn, -3 to Damage), Heavy Pistol [5/5 - 0] (Fires one shot per turn, -3 to Damage), Flashbang [1]
Traits and Powers:
*Genesculpted Superhuman (Your extensive genetic modification and training have made you superior both physically and mentally to any other human being alive. The Shackled, on the other hand, are another matter entirely. +1 to all Damage taken, -2 to physical Damage, +1 to Dodge.)
Current Effects: None
Location: In the offices, Warehouse 59, Vladivostok
Erik Tourigny - Abyssal Hybrid
Health: Unharmed
Inventory: Empty
Traits and Powers:
* Beyond Human (As an Abyssal half-breed, you possess incredible physical and mental capability. You are capable of mental 'psychic' warfare and considerable thought suggestion, and of easy genetic manipulation by touch on-the-fly, even to fatal extremes. +2 to mental power, +1 to mutation and genetic alteration)
*Aura of Terror - ACTIVE (You share the Deep Ones' incapaciting presence, which causes deep fear and anxiety in the mortal psyche. You are currently not suppressing your aura. -3 to Combat Rolls around you, fear checks every turn)
Current Effects: None
Location: Just inside the altar chamber, Warehouse 59, Vladivostok
Attack the thing I smashed into, pierce its skin, and fuse some of my life force with it to form a combat doll to aid me.
[6] You spring back forward, fixing the mutation form with your gaze. The world seems to slow down and focus, your enemy filling the entirety of your senses. [Dodge:6] You launch yourself into the air, readying a punch - but the brute moves on as well, lowering its bulk, and you overshot and fall heavily on the ground behind it. [2+1=3] It spins around, its strange skin-muscles shifting and twisting, and [Dodge:6][Dodge:5] tries to catch you in a deadly embrace you roll away from. You are quick on your feet, and facing the creature again.
[5] You are faintly aware of another, smaller hostile arriving just behind the bigger one's back. You notice it's mouth first of all, a circle filled with razor-sharp spikes and moving, jagged teeth, with a sickly pale worm-like body following it. It snakes along slowly, tension building up in its body like it's readying to propel itself into the air. You don't want to imagine the feeling of those teeth against your skin.
CombatantsHeavy Mutation Form
*Torso: Moderately Wounded
*Multi-armed (Extra attack in unarmed melee)
*Towering Brute (+1 to Enemy Dodge, +1 to Combat Rolls)
Serpentine Mutation Form
*Unharmed
*Swarm Form (-2 to Damage, +2 to Damage taken, +1 to Combat Rolls)
Approaching Mutation Forms
*Several dozen, varied speeds and times of arrival?
*Multiple types?
---
Alfonz Wulfric - Imprisoned ReaperHealth: Torso:
Moderately Wounded!Inventory: Empty
Traits and Powers: *
Immortal Prisoner (Drawing from the Reaper in you rhead, you are physically and mentally superior to any normal human on the planet. You have innate power over the life forces of living beings, and can draw, give and imbue it at will. Your current level of control is high.)
*
Life Force [3/6] (You can imbue objects and living beings with life force to create more potent weapons and combat constructs. You will regain spent life force automatically over time, and by devouring others - though this bears the risk of harmful energy damaging you. You can also draw the life force of others and imbue it as long as you also include some of your own.)
Current Effects: Strenghtened Physique (+1 to speed and charge rolls, 2 turns remaining)
Location: Middle of the Runway, Lakefront Airport
---
mcclay, if you want to reduce Control, do say so. The Fae is extremely unlikely to help you out just like that.
Caellath, man, I rolled your combat roll three times, but it always came up 1. Then I just decided the universe didn't want you to succeed.
Author
Topic: Their Coming Is At Hand - an Eldritch Horror RTD (Turn 10! Spots open!) (Read 33645 times)