At long last the Stars are almost Right. Soon Nyarlathotep's plans will come to fruition. Then the world will be changed irrevocably -- but not quite yet. Pesky human investigators have learned much, but can they survive long enough to make sense of what they know?
SuAside wrote:"I do not know the customs of your employer, but if you believe there's a chance the night watchman would not let us in on your word alone, maybe you could go in the front & we'll wait at the rear for you to let us in?" he suggests innocently.
Despite her problems Helen smiles mischievously, wiping away her tears with Timour's handkerchief, "Good idea, meet me at the back door in five minutes, I'll make sure the watchman is busy elsewhere."
coffee demon wrote:"Yes. Yes, we probably have a car. We can get one," he responds uncertainly. Then he looks away again, his brows furrowed like he's puzzling through something.
"Oh! Don't worry, if you don't have a car we could borrow Paul's as long as one of you can drive. I'm sure he won't mind under the circumstances."
Helen returns Timour's handkerchief and with newfound determination strides towards the entrance to the Penhew Foundation.
"You're most welcome, my dear."Timour replies "Nothing a broad shoulder to cry on couldn't fix."
"It's nice to make progress, let's not bumble this up." he says as he winks when using Caroline's word "We should probably wait for a moment before moving closer. We don't want to be seen loitering around the back entrance, acting all suspicious."
"Let's just agree for now that Helen's boss has not been entirely candid with us, and that has given rise to some suspicions of involvement with you, Caroline."Timour suggest "I'll play the part that suspect that Mr Gavigan is simply trying to protect the good name of his former boss and of the foundation, not knowing who to trust with any further information that he might possess. And probably does not understand the relevance of this information himself."
"I, of course, do suspect more is afoot, but we shouldn't expose our hand, even if Helen is sympathetic to our cause." he further explains, as he nonchalantly but carefully inspects his surroundings and the people on the street "Andrei, any input on the current situation and how we'll handle it further? I'm not entirely sure we should rush in all three of us. If we get into trouble, we might need someone that's able to make a diversion or spring us from a well layed trap... That said, an extra set of eyes on the inside can also yield results."
"I don't intend on leaving until we have a chance to prove Gavigan is guilty."Andrei swallows and looks at his two companions, then quickly glances away, continuing to talk as he eyes the back side of the Penhew Foundation.
"I want to look in his office and I want to see what's in the room downstairs. If we have to wait until later tonight, so be it. After that, I want to drive to Misr House and pull Gavigan out into the cold in his nightrobe and shove the evidence in his face."
"Whether he is raping and killing these women and threatening Elizabeth's life, or if he is telling someone else to do it, it must stop. Tonight. I don't care."
"I told you that I would kick down every door in that place to get some answers, and I mean it."
I should never have showed that woman my face, he thinks, cursing his lack of foresight.
"I'll stay outside."
He gives the two a solid look; his decision is made.
"For now. Tell that woman... tell her I.. just make up some excuse. I'll go wait over there." He points to the opposite side of the small park, to a dark corner of a building within sight of the rear of the Penhew Foundation. "Good luck."
Without waiting for the others to respond, he heads off in the direction that he just pointed.
Caroline just stares after Andrei, as she seemingly has done so many times before in recent days. While she was troubled by his fragile mental state, exacerbated by exhaustion and worry, at least a small part of her admired the man's obvious dedication to her own dear friend Beth. Would I go to the lengths he's prepared to go to help her? she wondered to herself, afraid of what the answer might be.
Turning to Timour, she says, "Well, I suppose that's probably for the best. The edge of his feelings is a little too sharp for poor Helen, I fear. We must try to get from her what we can without endangering her if at all possible. I'm still shaken by the fact that we couldn't protect poor Gwen."
Behind the Penhew Foundation 7:35pm - Thursday 29th January, 1925
After a couple of minutes the back door of the Penhew Foundation opens and Helen cautiously pokes her head out. Spotting them waiting by the railings, she waves Timour and Caroline over.
OOC,There is no way into the loading area other than climbing over the railings (or using the front gate), as the back gate is securely chained and padlocked.
However the railings are an easy climb despite their decorative spikey bits, so no skill rolls are necessary on the way in. If you need a quick exit for any reason then a roll will probably be required then.
I'll assume that you do as Helen wishes until you're safely inside in order to avoid needless posts getting through a door. :)
If you disagree with this then just make a suitable IC post and I'll edit this one.
When they reach her Helen looks surprised that Andrei is not with them, but doesn't mention it. She whispers urgently "Quickly, the guard will be back down in a few minutes!"
Once the investigators are inside the door Helen closes it gently.
Coffee Demon,I'll deal with Andrei via PM for the time being (I sent one after your previous post). Andrei sees everything that happens above this spoiler, but nothing that happens below. :)
Inside the Penhew Foundation 7:36pm - Thursday 29th January, 1925
The back door is at the end of a long corridor that runs right through the middle of the Penhew Foundation ground floor, at the far end Timour and Caroline can see the entrance foyer and an empty desk where the night watchman would presumably have been sitting.
"I sent him upstairs to fetch some documents," whispers Helen as she leads the way quickly along the corridor. She opens the third door on the right, labelled "library", the previous door was labelled "archive" while the first was labeled "goods receiving".
On the opposite side of the corridor from the door that Helen opens is a door labelled "Mr Edward Gavigan, Director".
The Penhew Foundation library is a large room containing about a dozen large bookcases, all crammed full. Tall windows look out onto the park where the investigators met Helen. Two reading tables stand in the centre of the room, while a smaller desk sits in one corner. Helen switches on the lights and immediately moves across the room to another door leading to the archive. She unlocks it and says, "Wait in the archive, I'll join you when the guard has been back."
Timour tries to make note of whatever features of the rooms that would aid their escape if they had to run or a bottleneck where they could hold their ground. Just to be prepared... After the weird encounters of late, one can never be too careful. He especially does not intend to shoot at the night watchman, but sadly the human element is not the only thing to keep in mind.
In the archive he turns his attention to anything that might relate to Jackson Elias, the 'lost' expedition or The British Museum (Wilson/Gwen).
OCC: Can you give us a decription of the windows? The pictures earlier do not show them barred, but neither did it show the fence.
The archive room has two entrances, one leading to the library, the other to the central corridor. There are a large number of filing cabinets around all four walls and two tables stand in the center of the room, one stacked with wooden boxes. It would be relatively easy to barricade either door, or to obtain cover within the room.
The room's two large windows are boarded up on the inside, apart from their uppermost sections, but Timour thinks he'd be able to break through relatively easily in an emergency. None of the Foundations ground floor windows are barred, but all of the windows on the upper floor are barred. The railings and night watchman appear to be the Foundation's main defense against burglary.
Looking around the cabinets Caroline sees that they are arranged in chronological order; the Carlyle Expedition has a cabinet all of its own. The boxes on the table have been sent by "The Clive Expedition" which appears to be currently in Egypt.
OOC,A little more description. The ceiling of the rooms on the ground floor is about ten feet high. The windows are about seven feet high, starting three feet above the floor and reaching almost to the ceiling. The lower four foot section of each window in the archive room is boarded up. The three foot arch at the top is not boarded.
The windows in the library were not boarded at all.
Individual glass panes are held together by lead frames, so they will offer little resistance to violence, and the boards used on the archive are thin. They provide privacy and keep out sunlight, but offer little additional security.
Caroline reaches for the Carlyle Expedition file. Realizing that there's no time to read the whole thing, she intends to look for anything related to the expedition's final fate first, and then work backwards if time permits. She nods to Timour in a way meant to suggest that she's found something and then gestures toward the door, hoping that Timour will keep a lookout for Helen's return.
Timour nods at Caroline's unspoken suggestion, and lingers at the door. He listens attently for any signs of someone approaches, but at the same time slowly looks over the labels on the cabinets near the door.
The Archive Room - Inside the Penhew Foundation 7:40pm - Thursday 29th January, 1925
Inside the Carlyle Expedition cabinet, Caroline finds a folder dedicated to events in Kenya. Flicking through it though, she is disappointed. It would take a few hours of study to be sure, but it looks like the folder contains no useful information about the fate of the expedition. Caroline can see nothing explaining the purpose of the diversion to Kenya, other than newspaper cuttings telling the same story that she's already read in the New York papers.
There are transcripts of the trial of the tribesmen convicted of the massacre, but given Jackson Elias' findings that the trial was nothing less than a travesty, the value of the trial notes is questionable.
Other files in the cabinet look like they deal with the logistics of the expedition, and the excavations in Egypt.
The labels on the cabinets closest to Timour suggest that they contain contain documents relating to the Foundation's scholarship of archaeology students. Other nearby cabinets are labelled with pre-war dates, likely cataloguing the activities of the Foundation when Sir Aubury Penhew himself was running things. Dates begin from 1905.
As Caroline finishes flicking through the Kenya file, Timour can hear the night watchman enter the library. Helen thanks him, and Timour hears his leaving again. Then he hears Helen's footsteps as she walks towards the archive room door.
As Caroline is already covering up her search, Timour simply patiently waits at the door until Helen enters as he does not wish to act too soon and cause the night watchman to become suspicious if he overhears a voice other than Helen's.
The Archive Room - Inside the Penhew Foundation 7:40pm - Thursday 29th January, 1925
The door opens and Helen comes into the archive room, "He shouldn't be back for a while now, we should be able to talk as long as we are quiet."
She looks nervous, but is obviously also glad to have found people to confide in, "How do you think that Paul's disappearance is linked with the deaths and disappearances that you speak of? Do you really think that Paul is in danger? Your friend thinks that Mr Gavigan is a bad man, but are you sure? Couldn't he be in danger as well if your friend is wrong?"
"Well, Helen, I'm afraid it's quite convoluted and I'll have to cut a few corners to be able to explain it quickly enough."Timour replies making positive eye contact with Helen "Don't hesistate to ask clarification if things get too complicated."
"First of all, I'd like to stress that we have no evidence at all that Paul might indeed have gotten caught up in this, nor do we know if Mr Gavigan is in any way involved at all." he says "Some of my friends are eager to jump to conclusions. As Mr Gavigan has not been honest with us, they assume he is involved. I don't necessarily think so. Rather, he might be trying to do what's right for the foundation or he might be afraid of the consequences of speaking out, but at the same time his silence or lack of cooperation might endanger people. As for Paul, he might have been involved in research that relates directly or indirectly to the disappearances. Perhaps he did not know this himself..."
"But let's start from the beginning."Timour suggest "We were drawn into this when investigative writer Jackson Elias asked our friends to come to him in New York. He was investigating the Carlyle Expedition in Kenya in 1919, which as you well known was massacred. Before they could speak to Jackson, he was murdered. It was Jackson's opinion that the Carlyle expedition massacre was a cover-up, and indeed, one expedition member had even been spotted alive & well in Asia after the supposed massacre. His death was presumed to be an effort to silence him and his theories."
"There appear to have been two cults involved in violence & disappearances, both here and in New York. Much of this seems linked to the Carlyle expedition, or whatever it ran across." he explains "The Cult of the Bloody Tongue and the Brotherhood of the Black Pharaoh. Are these connected? Are they the same? Are they opposing factions? We do not know, but we know for a fact that the Brotherhood of the Black Pharaoh -and it's supposed leader Tewfik al-Sayed- is actively making people disappear in London. They are also going well out of their way to murder anyone who appears to be taking an interest in the Carlyle expedition and everything that surrounds it. The socalled Egyptian Murders are most likely their work. The police however seem to be unable to track down the perpetrators."
"A personal friend of ours, from the British Museum, has been taken recently and we are desperate to get her back before she turns up dead as well. I refuse to believe she is dead already."Timour says with a clenched jaw and fire in his eyes.
"I hope these ramblings explain our predicament. And that I haven't drowned you in all this information." he then says as he tries to shake his anger, and tries to produce a sincere & hopeful smile "Unless Caroline has something to add, I would very much like to hear your own story..."
