"Sure, sounds good. Let me just clean up and check the mail first."
Clean up. Check the mail here. Drive Alin to the bank so she can retrieve some of her money.
Name: Sean O'Malley, Phd.
Appearance: A trim, short man in his mid-40s, with a jovial expression and short reddish-brown hair.
Backstory: After completing his doctorate in Philosophy, he found his life unexpectedly limited after promoting some rather nonstandard views, after discovering and investigating some minor secrets. His position was since removed, and he no longer commands the respect he once had among his peers.
Physical stats: (list in order)
Strength: d4
Dexterity: d6
Speed: d8
Endurance: d8
Awareness: d10
Guile: d6
Knowledge: d12
Willpower: d6
Occult stats:
Corruption: 0
Madness: 0
Favor: 1
World Stats:
Connections: d6
Possessions: d6
Money: d6
Standing: d6
Inventory:
$450
Bicycle
Drafting Board
Datsun Maxima
Metal Rod
Green Moth.
You wash up and check the mail. Nothing in particular, beyond an ad for a pizza place and some flyers for school events that were probably mass posted to every box on campus. You wait till Alin is ready and then take her to the nearest bank.
Buy some bait and a fishing rod. A nice, sturdy one. Price is irrelevant, I just want something that will last.
Then go to the bank to withdraw money for the darkroom.
Name: Ailn
Appearance: Wrinkly, frail, and raggedy. She's actually not very old, and much faster than she looks, but certainly has an unhealthy look about her. Dark hair and eyes.
Backstory: Child of wealth, persistent illness, oddly unbreakable will. She left, of course. She doesn't see much use in money, though her family makes sure she has plenty of it. She'd like to be able to cure her illness, and maybe make some sense of this crazy world. Maybe going a little crazy will help, if that's what it takes.
Physical stats:
Strength: d6
Dexterity: d8
Speed: d8
Endurance: d6
Awareness: d6
Guile: d10
Knowledge: d6
Willpower: d12
Occult stats:
Corruption: 0
Madness: 0
Favor: d6
World Stats:
Connections: d4
Possessions: d6
Money: d12
Standing: d4
Inventory:
old messenger bag
coffee mug
pair of dice
key ring
notebook
pen
tools (v. sharp and professional!)
trash bags
$774
[11]
You spend 80 bucks for a good amount of bait and a sturdy, middle range fishing pole. That done you head to the bank with Sean and withdraw 1100 dollars in nonconsecutive 20's, 10's and 5's.
Start the translation of the old german, and copy the translated version on the other side of my notebook.
Name: Micolash Cage
Appearance: A man with messy curly black hair and an eternal grin on his face.
Backstory: He used to work as a librarian, in which he found a book about the occult, and decided to join a cult for fun and knowledge. Fascinated in learning and gaining insight of the world and the cosmos.
Physical stats:
Strength: d4
Dexterity: d6
Speed: d6
Endurance: d6
Awareness: d8
Guile: d8
Knowledge: d12
Willpower: d10
Occult stats:
Corruption: 0
Madness: 0
Favor: 0
World Stats:
Connections: d10
Possessions: d12
Money: d4
Standing: d4
Inventory:
$197
Notebook (Contains part of the german book "Geschichten des roten Gelehrten")
Pen
Flashlight
"Necromancer" Book
Many partly read Books
[11]
This translation will take until sunset, but it will be complete and accurate for the text you copied. It will take a few turns but when Sunset hits, you can act again.
However, I can say that as you translate you learn a few things.
1. The scholar is one of a set of what the author calls "Perfect" beings, though the translation isn't perfect. Rather than perfect as in flawless, the connotation is more of the best version or the imagined version of something.
2. These beings apparently reside in the same place, a place that uses that same untranslatable "Perfect" word to describe it. They interact with our world for various reasons, all of them personal to those beings and none of them shared among the others. Some are at odds, others are neutral, and two in particular seem to have some sort of pushing-pulling opposites attract kind of relationship. He doesn't use names you're familiar with but he connects them to the sun.
3. Cults for these beings have sprung up all across history seemingly in waves when these beings, for one reason or another, begin to interact more with the world.
4. He states that our world is not as we assume; that the truth is hidden from us not by governments or individuals or even other beings but due to our own incapacity to grasp it. He eludes specifically to "Imagined Curvatures" and "assumptions based on the idea that laws of reality exist in a universally homogeneous state"
5. He gives a warning regarding the servants of "The Silent One", who apparently seek to harass, assault, kill or otherwise inconvenience those who worship the other beings.
"Dang it Bobby, how'd you manage to sneak these back home? Don't get me wrong though, I approve of all kinds of trophies. D'you remember who these belonged to? Was there anything particular about them that you snuck them back home, or did you just choose them on a whim?"
Converse with Bobby. Take a closer look at each head, do I see anything particularely interesting or odd about one or more of them? Do any give me a feeling or hunch that the Scholar might be interesting in them?
Name: Walton J. Murphy
Appearance: A man of 64 years old. Walton sports a bald head and a grey beard. Not as fit as he used to be. His body is marked with a variety of scars.
Backstory: Walton joined the military when he was 18 years old in 1939, just in time for WWII to ramp up. He has since served in the pacific theater in WWII, the Korean war, and the Vietnam war. It was in 'Nam where he was gravely wounded for the last time, effectively ending his military career. He currently works a desk job for the local government, a fact that does not particularely please him.
He's been in a world war, a cold war, a drug war and a gang war. Now, seeing the appalling amount of respect veterans get from younger generations, he's decided that he wants to add a holy war onto his résumé.
Physical stats: (list in order)
Strength: d4
Dexterity: d6
Speed: d6
Endurance: d6
Awareness: d8
Guile: d10
Knowledge: d8
Willpower: d12
Occult stats:
Corruption: 0
Madness: 0
Favor: 2
World Stats:
Connections: d8
Possessions: d8
Money: d4
Standing: d8
Inventory:
299$
Leatherman multitool
Notebook&Pen
Bicycle
Duct Tape
Flashlight
A bible
unlabeled black leather bound book, some kind of diary
a pencil
a crucifix
about a dozen Morgan Dollar coins
He tells you that they were the heads of some kind of "Buncha dog fuckers" from Vietnam. Said that near the end of the war it got easy to sneak just about anything out. He says he still has grenades and all manner of munitions. You kneel next to the low shelf they're on and look at them. You get the feeling the Scholar might like them, for one reason or another. As you look them over you notice that one of them has a tattoo on his neck, right near where he was decapitated. It looks like this.
Just because someone dressed like a PI comes to your hotel tailing a suspicious guy doesn't mean they're a PI!
...
Okay, maybe it does. But they doesn't mean he has to go ahead and think like that!
Anyway, looks like there's something interesting going on there. I wonder what it is. I'm sure just a peek won't hurt.
Should I reduce my money or am I expected to pay when I leave?
Is there any way I could eavesdrop better? Maybe a shared vent I could reach with a chair? Or some glass I could use on the wall?
Or some way I could peek into their room? Maybe climb from my balcony/window to theirs?
If neither of those are available, maybe get the sheets and towels from my room and use them to pretend I'm the stereotypical stubborn foreign cleaning lady that doesn't understand English to get them to open the door?
Or maybe pretend I'm an annoying desperate prostitute if there's a lack of clean sheets in my room?
I dunno, use whatever means available to gain more information about what's going on in there.
Name: Helen Hywater, though she insists on calling herself "The Recorder" during cult related activities
Appearance: A young girl (that looks more like she's in her late 20s) with short dark hair and green eyes. Tends to wear a dark brown trenchcoat and fedora during cult related activities to avoid suspicion.
Backstory: Has a fascination with recording stuff for posterity and specifically cameras. Makes her way through life doing odd jobs and videotaping things, sometimes things she probably shouldn't record. She's even managed to make some short films. She's a bit weird and she knows it but she doesn't care. As for why she's with the cult, she mostly just wants to record stuff and then sell them for fame and loads of momey. Maybe she can make the world's first real found footage film.
Physical stats:
Strength: d4
Dexterity: d6
Speed: d10
Endurance: d8
Awareness: d12
Guile: d8
Knowledge: d6
Willpower: d6
Occult stats:
Corruption: 0
Madness: 0
Favor: d4 (The Scholar in Red)
World Stats:
Connections: d10
Possessions: d4
Money: d4
Standing: d8
Inventory:
Clothes
A high-end handheld camcorder with flashlight and infrared nightvision capability
Rented grey sedan (6 days left)
80$
Its pay by the hour so, pay when you leave. Alternatively, stiff the guy but he does have your driver's license.
You quietly dig around and find a glass in the bathroom, next to the sink. You put it up against the wall and it does let you hear better.
There's no balcony here. Pay by the hour man, what you expect? You should be glad you don't have a blacklight or haven't looked under the bed. Unless you have a pin vise to drill a hole with or something, getting a visual without being seen is gonna be hard.
You settle for the glass and listen in. There are several voices there: you can make out 4 male and 1 female distinctly and the semi-audible noises of a 6th that seems very out of it. They're talking about the events of last night; the wave and a being called "Flux". They say its Flux's fault for the wave and the chaos, alluding to some kind of "Avatar" that was seen. They identify the 6th member as a cultist worshiping Flux, who they caught on the beach that night before the wave hit. The are apparently going to interrogate her and judging by the calls for rope and a chair, it won't be a friendly talk.
See if I can find more promising artists who'd be willing to pay me for referring them, actually refer them and the ones before, I wouldn't want to lose an easy source of revenue due to needlessly scamming them.
Name: Richard Reed
Appearance: A well dressed man in his mid-twenties, he sports short brown hair and a well kempt mustache.
Backstory: Richard discovered the cult when one of his less prestigious connections informed him about otherwordly beings and of the knowledge these beings possess. Intent to learn this secret knowledge, he set out to join the cult.
Physical stats:
Strength: d4
Dexterity: d6
Speed: d6
Endurance: d6
Awareness: d8
Guile: d12
Knowledge: d10
Willpower: d8
Occult stats:
Corruption: 0
Madness: 0
Favor: d8
World Stats:
Connections: d12
Possessions: d4
Money: d6
Standing: d8
Inventory:
Notebook
Pen
Drawing of the sigil and the visions
Borrowed anatomy and medical books
$814
The area is tapped out for now, but you refer them as you promised. Maybe if anything comes of it for them, it will grow your rep and get you more "Business"
"What rotten luck," Alexis muttered bitterly. "Anyway, let's try again."
Buy two more toads and vivisect them as planned.
Name: Alexis Ledbetter Cromwald
Appearance: Early thirties. Comely appearance and figure. Back-length curly blond hair. Coppery eyes. Wears an apron with pockets on the front.
Backstory: A former teacher who is the housewife of a domineering businessman, Alexis oftentimes fantasized about dealing with her husband Michael in brutal but creative ways. However, murder is social suicide in the age of improved forensics and profiling and divorce is out of the question as her husband provides her 'income' in the form of allowances. However, her chance encounter with the darkest mysteries of the world may very well give Alexis the power she craves... or it could send her plunging into a fate much worse than slaving to her idiotic brute of a husband.
Physical stats:
Strength: d4
Dexterity: d8
Speed: d6
Endurance: d6
Awareness: d8
Guile: d12
Knowledge: d10
Willpower: d6
Occult stats:
Corruption: 0
Madness: 0
Favor: 2
World Stats:
Connections: d10
Possessions: d6
Money: d4
Standing: d8
Inventory:
$389
Purse
[2,1]
The first one gets away from you on the way back to the lab. The second one makes an ungodly screech as you tie it down and it so startles you that you jab yourself right in the palm with the scalpel.
So it probably came from the ocean, whatever 'it' happens to be.
Follow it back to find the other end of the chain of destruction. Observe the response efforts on my way. Anything particularly out of the ordinary there?
Name: Alexander Sill
Appearance: A well-built man in his late thirties, who walks with a slight limp.
Backstory: A career soldier, though that career was brought to an abrupt end after the invasion of Grenada left him discharged with a shiny medal and a leg wound which will probably never fully heal. Since then he has struggled along, through a series of short-lived, dead-end jobs, searching for a new purpose in life. He now seems to have found one.
Physical stats:
Strength: d10
Dexterity: d8
Speed: d6
Endurance: d12
Awareness: d8
Guile: d6
Knowledge: d6
Willpower: d6
Occult stats:
Corruption: 0
Madness: 0
Favour: 1
World Stats:
Connections: d8
Possessions: d6
Money: d6
Standing: d8
Inventory:
Murphy's Shotgun (Remington 870, shortened barrel, pistol grip; loaded), pocketfull of shells.
Toolbox (wrench, pliers, jeweler's saw, tire iron)
Kaiser Jeep M715 (dark blue)
Newspaper
$376 cash
As you walk back, the water cuts off. Apparently someone at the water company finally decided to just cut the connection to the whole block. Took them long enough. You follow the line of torn up hydrants for a while and finally find the last one. It looks like someone tried to tear it out, but failed, its all warped and partially sticking free from the concrete. Its also the one furthest from the ocean.
Author
Topic: CULT (Read 76679 times)