Play@YSDC

Cynthia shows the note she found in the coat pocket to the others. "It's a list of the crew," she says, "both the original crew of fifteen and the thirteen who replaced them. That's a very ominous number. The replacement crew were all in on it, including the captain...but who killed him?"

Henry reads over the note that Cynthia found, trying to make sense of all that they have seen since awakening. "Perhaps these madmen have turned on one another. That might explain the shouting and gun fire we heard earlier."

"Let's check the next two cabins," suggests Cynthia, "starng with the one next to the Captain's cabin."

OOC,That's Cabin D.

"I'll be right behind with the crow bar. Step aside if there's any trouble."

Cabin D

The door to the cabin is locked, but opens easily with the pass-key. Upon opening the door you can see the following. Inside, suitcases are stacked on the four bunks and a fifth bed has been made up on the floor. A quick search reveals US passports belonging to the band. There is also enough clothing for each man for a fortnight and three bottles of John Power& Son’s Special ‘Three Swallow’ Irish whisky, one of which is empty.

A business card bearing the likeness of Thaddeus Grant is under one of the full bottles. Written over its printed details are: ‘Welcome to a more civilised country, boys! Enjoy! Proper accommodation tomorrow night I promise.’

Cabin C

The door to the cabin is locked, but opens easily with the master key. The cabin contains two sets of bunks and two wardrobes. The crewmen’s personal effects are in kitbags. If these are searched, investigators will discover four robes of the kind found in Crew Cabin B concealed beneath rough working clothes.

Henry searches through the crewman's bags and, upon finding more robes, says: "Something must have went wrong here for the madmen. Why would they go through all the trouble of bringing these robes and then not use them?"

"You're right," says Cynthia, checking inside the wardrobes. "That is odd. We've already been through the next two cabins, so let's proceed past them. We could look inside the water closets, just in case someone's hiding there, and then go on to the next two cabins."

Water Closets.

These were quite lavish water closets with enameled cast iron fixtures manufactured by Kohler. The doors are now ripped from their frames and the toilet bowls splashed with blood.

Cabin 2

Once more the door is locked, but with the master key opens smoothly, despite the gore splashed across the outside panels. The cabin is obsessively tidy. Photographs of a young man adorn the bedside table and chest of drawers. If the large valise tucked under the bed is opened, they will discover a packet of love letters from “Your loving J” tied with red ribbon.

From the evidence of the letters ‘J’ and Mrs Berringer are having a passionate – and secret – relationship. One line, “your grief is our veil” suggests that Christine Berringer’s anguish may be a pretence.

As you are leaving cabin 2 you hear a heavy object fall, a sudden clatter followed by a slow creaking from within cabin 1.

Cabin 1

As you push the door aside, the body of a heavily built man, Tony 'Big T' Laine from the The Driskill Mountain Jazz Band, swings in front of you on a rope made of the silk belt of a bathrobe. A fallen chair lies beneath his feet and he seems to be fighting the impulse to pull the cord from his neck. His body spins slowly, revealing a purpling face, bulging eyes and protuberant, lolling tongue. A mucus-thickened bubbling comes from his throat as he chokes to death.

"Hold him up!" cries Cynthia, hurriedly righting the chair and placing it under his legs to support them.

Tommy grabs the man with all his might, hoping it is not too late to save his life.

Henry will try to assist Tommy in holding the hanging man up.

STR: 40%
[dice]0[/dice]

"Oh my God! We need a knife... something to cut the rope!", despite his best efforts, Father Mason finds himself paralyzed, the act of taking one's life abhorrent to a man of God like him.

Looking around the room you can see a letter opener on the dresser table and what looks like the handle of a pocket-knife sticking out of the pocket of a jacket thrown on the bed. Also I do believe that you got a rusty pocket-knife from the pilot's cabin.

"Oh God in Heaven, Please hurry he's still chocking." says Melissa from the corridor opposite the open doorway.

Cynthia snatches up the letter opener and reaches to try to saw through the cord.

Due to the tension on the silken belt, due in no small part to Tony's weight, it parts smoothly enough. He falls heavily onto the bed and once he is given time to recover he will relate the following to you in a halting, raspy voice.

"We had done the first set and were resting up when y'all came back from the firework show." He coughs and rubs his throat which is red and scored by the bathrobe sash. "Anyhows, we joins in with the toast with Thaddeus Grant when ah suddenly had stomach pains and fainted. The next thing ah know, was ah was laid out like chicken on a butcher’s block an’ there was this here woman standin’ over me. Never seen nothin’ like it, boy. Her head was all shrivelled up an’ her hair was fallin' out like she had some damn disease." Tony pauses and rubs his throat once more. Once he composes himself he then continues;

"Then ah seen her hands. Nothin’ like no normal hands, neither. Had mouths in ’em. Mouths in the palms. An’ she was gonna bite me with them hands. Ah ran. The whole place seemed fulla corpses. They was everywhere. Ah run up them stairs like the devil hisself was after me. There was people screamin’ and hollerin’. Hell’s opened up, boy. Ah tell you, Hell’s opened up."

Cynthia shivers at his description. "We haven't seen anyone like that," she says. "I think the people who did this have already left the boat. We're looking for other survivors, and then we need to find a way off ourselves."

Tony waves his hand and coughs. "Has anyone got anything to drink?" After a drink of water from the table he continues.

"Thank you. now where was ah? Oh yeah, so, ah ran in here. Thought ah’d try hidin’. An’ then ah heard her comin’. Heard her slitherin’ an’ slidin’ up them stairs after some poor fella screaming his head off. Ah sat in here and listened to him die. He didn’t die easy boy, ah tell you. Ah thought ‘bout doin’ it, you know, ‘bout hangin’ m’self for a long time, long time. Then ah decided: no bloodsucker’s gonna git me. Took me some time to pluck up courage mind, but once ah was decided… Ah guess that’s when you found me.” Tony snorts, looking into the distance.

“They spiked our drinks, boy, I tell you. The crew. They’s were in on it. This seemed like such a sweet deal when Mr Grant invited me an’ the boys over here, but we should never have left the Mississippi.”

Tommy figures there must have been kind of crazy dope in their drinks to cause a hallucination like that. He tries to calm the man down.

"You're safe now. Stick with us and we'll get out of this mess. Safety in numbers, you know. We've got to keep exploring, find others we can help."