The Vanishing of Abigail Wright

[Silver Priest]

"No, not that I know of?' Is this a religious thing? Because if so, I'm sorry but I'm not interested." She looks ready to close the door.

HUMINT,She's telling the truth, best as Vanessa can determine.

[Mr. Handy]

"I'm sorry," says Vanessa, and she truly is, as she draws her pistol and shoots her.

OOC,HUMINT roll (57% skill) about [b]Deborah Ann Gomez[/b]: [dice]0[/dice] Firearms roll (72% + 20[point blank] = 92% skill) shooting [b]Deborah Ann Gomez[/b]: [dice]1[/dice] Damage: [dice]2[/dice]

[Silver Priest]

Vanessa knows as soon as she shoots the gun that's it's not a good shot. In her haste and hesitation she fired at Deborah's elbow, likely causing only a painful flesh wound but nothing that would kill her. Yet somehow the bullet moved as if it had a mind of its own. It struck the woman dead in the chest. For a long second, Deborah looked confused. Then she clutched her stomach and fell to the ground.

"Why..." She asked, and Vanessa saw she was looking straight at her, Into her, as if she could explain why this happened.

Jose pointed his gun at fired, ripping out a large chunk of her scalp. He turned towards Vanessa. "We need to go!"

If Vanessa does not resist, they race back to the car and drive away.

"I don't think anyone saw us." Jose says. But it feels like cold comfort. A few minutes later, Vanessa's phone rings.

"Well done, Agent. Consider your debt paid in full. Unfortunately, Agent Silasvuo will be unable to return to the land of the living. He refused my offer. Headstrong even in death, I suppose. You can return the book to your organization and declare this mission a success. And remember, if you ever have need of my organization, all you have to do is call ." He hangs up.

"All that... And we didn't even get him back."

[Mr. Handy]

Vanessa doesn't waste any time getting away from there. "Alzis didn't even really need us to do that," she says. "He adjusted my aim somehow. I hadn't really wanted to kill her, so it wasn't a great shot, but the bullet got redirected to her chest. Otherwise, it just would have winged her. I'd prefer to have no more dealings with Alzis in the future. Nothing good ever comes of it. One day he'll have to answer for this. There must be some way to turn the tables on him, but I have no idea what it is."

[Silver Priest]

"Yeah. You and me both," Jose says. "But if the time ever comes that we can take Alzis down, I'm all in."

***

They head to the Greenbox, turn over the book that had caused all of this. In a debriefing, McRay tells the the situation is being dealt with and arrangements will be made to ensure the Macallistar will not pose a risk to anyone else. He doesn't elaborate.

Vanessa goes home. Her new dog waits there for her, and it hits her that she may have to explain the situation to Malcolm. He loved Rex, but having another dog suddenly show up might be an issue for him. Then again, like her he was a soft hearted when it came to animals. And she'd have to make sure it was up to date on its shots and take it to the vet. Then there was where she found the animal; could she trust that it was safe for her to have around? She knew what Delta Green would say, if they knew. But they don't.

***

Regardless of the resolution with the animal, Vanessa finds herself curled up on the couch, watching television with Malcolm later that evening. He was telling her about his day, sharing an amusing story of one of his coworkers that Vanessa was really only half able to focus on. If he had picked up on her discomfort, he had not commented on it, but maybe that was just proof she was getting better at hiding it.

The evening news came on, the two stern faced anchors throwing it to a reporter. They covered the Macallistar suicides, as they were already being called. Malcolm shook his head.

"I'll never understand artists."

Vanessa recalled they had the suicide note Abby wanted them to give to her father, if she wanted to bother doing so. Perhaps it was better to let sleeping dogs lie.

The scene went back to the studio. The male anchor began to speak. "We're also following a developing story tonight. A brutal shooting leaves a young woman dead-- but what police find inside her home makes the scene even more chilling."

Deborah Ann Gomez's face flashes on the tv. The news reporter details how she had been shot twice when coming home, her body left right at her front door. Neighbors rushed to help but nothing could be done. Police soon arrived on the scene and found her live in boyfriend dead inside the house.

"Police say the boyfriend, Nikolas Siilasvuo, thirty two, left a note confessing to the killing before turning the weapon on himself. Siilasvuo's employers at the FBI have no comment at this time, pending an internal investigation."

"Huh," Malcolm said, looking over at Vanessa. "Did you know him? What a monster, to do that to someone you purport to love."

[Mr. Handy]

"I thought I knew him," says Vanessa. "I just can't believe it." She says this in a tone that indicates that this is just a saying, not that she actually means it.

Vanessa explains that the new dog is a collarless stray that she found, and that he befriended and followed her. Reasoning that the dog may have actually wandered into the MacAlllistar Building when it turned into the Broadalbin, or belonged to one of the dead artists, and going through the motions regardless, she reports that she found the lost dog and puts out a notice with a picture of him in case his owner recognizes him and decides to reclaim him. Of course, there's always the chance that the dog really did belong to that other world, but she has her doubts. In any case, if nobody claims the dog, she'll gladly adopt it if Malcolm is okay with it.

[Silver Priest]

Malcolm agrees to keep the dog, provided no one comes for it. And no one does; Vanessa takes it to the vet a few days later, and it's given a clear bill of health. It's an older animal, likely to only live a few more years, if that, but hopefully they can be good ones. The still unnamed dogs gets along with everyone, and Rex learns to tolerate it in short order, though seems a little dissapointed that it's not as energetic as he is.

In other news, Vanessa's wedding is coming up-- they're planning for one in middle January. Malcolm seems excited about it, but whether she was is up to her to decide. At work she is interviewed about her late partner and asked the same questions over and over again. Had he changed recently? Had he ever expressed violent tendencies, etc.No suspicion had fallen on her, at least. McRay was terse about the whole thing, merely telling her this was why one did not make a deal with Stephen Alzis. But any attempts to figure out a way to deal with the man are quickly cut off-- it's quite apparent he's not interested in doing anything that could risk a conflict starting.

So it's a bit of a surprise a few days later when Vanessa walks out to her car after a long day of work and finds a note attached to her windshield.

We have a mutual enemy in A. Dinner at Heisenberg's tomorrow, 9 pm. Reservation for Mr. Green. This is a one time offer.

A quick call confirms Jose received the same message. He's torn on whether they should go, having seen the sort of retribution Alzis favored. But he also wanted payback for Nik. The question was if Vanessa felt this was worth the risk or she would prefer to be cautious.

[Mr. Handy]

"I'd like to go, but this could be a trap," says Vanessa. "Let's run this by McRay first and see what he thinks."

[Silver Priest]

McRay's reaction is rather vehement.

"No way. Don't even think about going to this meeting. We just avoided war with Alzis-- I'm not about to let you pull us into a new one. Don't go to the meeting. In fact, take the note and give it to Alzis. We need to show him good faith, and that we had nothing to do with it."

[Mr. Handy]

"Will do, sir," says Vanessa. She turns to Jose. "Feel like going with me to see Alzis again?"

[Silver Priest]

Jose frowns. "I understand the danger, but this could be our only chance to get justice for Nik. And not only are we not doing it, we're helping the man who killed him? But I guess we don't have a choice now, do we?"

OOC:   Vanessa is planning to take the note to Alzis, then?

[Mr. Handy]

"All right, let's go," says Vanessa. "No, there's no choice. This person just claims to be an enemy of Alzis and doesn't necessarily have any means of bringing him down. It could even be Alzis himself who left us the note to test us. He's one of the few people who actually knows what we have against him, after all. Let's go."

OOC,Yes, that's the plan.

[Silver Priest]

The pair return to Club Apocalypse,and are quickly let inside. Alzis seems happy and vaguely amused to see them.

"I did not expect after our last meeting you would be returning here so soon. But it's not unwelcome. Please, what can I do for you today?"

Once the note is handed over, Alzis scans it. Then he looks up at the agents with a smile.

"It would appear my organization requires a bit of restructuring. Thank you for bringing this to my attention-- I will deal with it. Really, you offer people everything and it's still not enough for some. But this too can be an educational opportunity. But you don't care about any of that, I'm sure. You brought this to me as a show of good faith after our recent difficulties, which I appreciate. So I believe a small token of my gratitude is in order.

"I can either offer you a weapon that may be of use in your missions, or a favor, free of charge, to be called in sometime in the future. The choice is yours."

[Mr. Handy]

"I'd like the favor, please," says Vanessa without hesitation. They have weapons of their own already, though his would undoubtedly be special, but a free favor could be used for anything, including bringing back the dead. A weapon would just make someone dead, and there'd been enough of that.

[Silver Priest]

"A wise choice. Though I must caution you,I offer my favor within reason. Even my abilities have limits. But anything I and my organization can do for you that does not negatively interfere with our own operations is yours.

"If there's nothing else, it has been a pleasure. And I thank you, once again. This show of faith is rather pleasing to see. Here is to many years of fruitful cooperation."

The unnerving smile is back.

OOC:   And that's the end of the scenario. If you have any questions about things or comments feel free to put them in the ooc thread. San rewards and penalties. Let's start with the penalty. Vanessa loses 1 point for murdering an innocent woman in cold blood. (It would be more, but she's hardened to violence. While it may upset her, she's mentally in a space where she can do it without most of the trauma associated with it.) She can gain 1d3 for resolving the Abigail Wright situation, and another 1d3 for locating the book that started all of this. I'll also roll these for Jose. In the ooc thread you can decide what you'd like to do with your two downtime activities. The next scenario will likely start in a few weeks,s o if you want we can play these downtime scenes out or you can give a brief summary of them.