Ch.16d The House of God (Lawrence & William)

[Bullfrog]

"What in the hell is he..." Lawrence mutters, backing away from the light. This has got to be some kind of natural upwelling of oil- but what will happen if it isn't put out? Nashoba must have chosen this spot for a reason.

Natural History (51%): 1d100

[Philulhu]

The pools look a bit too regular in shape to be naturally occurring.

[Mr. Handy]

"Well, he wanted attention," says William quietly. "This will get it. Where are Alex and Ivy? They should be here."

Natural History roll (10% base skill) about the pool of oil:
d%

[Bullfrog]

"William, run back to town and tell anyone you can that there's a fire." Lawrence harshly whispers, drawing his--Jerry's--pistol. "I'll handle the old man myself- I'm not shooting unless I have to, but sometimes a man's got no choice."

[Mr. Handy]

"Be careful," whispers William, nodding. He runs back to town.

[Bullfrog]

Lawrence steps through the gap in the fence, approaching Nashoba with his gun visibly drawn, but not yet aimed at him.
"NASHOBA!" Lawrence bellows. "I think you ought to sit still and explain yourself, Chief. This is a hell of a thing for a man to stumble on, you know that?"

[Philulhu]

Nasoba turned around, laughing. ”I told you! I told you I’d do it! They won’t be able to deny the damage these oil pits do now!” he said, waving his arms in the air in celebration.

As Lawrence watched, something struck him as a bit odd. Nashoba was between him and the flames and yet his shadow appeared across the burning oil. He had mere moments to try to put this together before the ‘shadow’ bulged and burst forth from the surface with a piecing shriek, an unholy apparition of tentacles slathered in burning oil, writhing in the night air!

SAN check please!

William could see the village in front of him start to light up as people pushed open their doors to see what the commotion was. As he ran, he heard a piecing shriek which rent the night air!

[Bullfrog]

SAN 39: 1d100

Lawrence shrieks like an animal and, knowing no other solution to his problems, starts firing at Nashoba.

Handgun 57%: 1d100

[Mr. Handy]

"Fire!" shouts William as he runs to the village. "Oil fire!"

[Philulhu]

SAN loss = 1d3 (1d6) = 1 point loss.

Nasoba ducked as Lawrence’s shot flew well wide. ”You’re no different from all the other whites!” he snarled. “You say you’ll support us but resort to violence when you don’t agree with our actions!”

There was a sudden outbreak of shouting and screaming from the oilfields and some of the doors in the village closed as quickly as they had opened.

Then William heard a shot behind him…

[Bullfrog]

"I have looked on the face of Mordiggian, old man! I have seen the future and past and what's in between! We are NOTHING TO THEM!" Lawrence raves, his teeth chattering and hands shaking with some sickening mixture of fury and terror. He takes aim again, this time at the thing in the oil pool, and fires.

Handgun 57%: 1d100

Damage 1d10+2: 1d10+2

[Mr. Handy]

The first thing William does instinctively is take cover, a habit he picked up during his brief stay in 1918 France. Then he draws his own pistol and carefully looks back the way he came.

[Philulhu]

Nashoba yelled in fear and anger as Lawrence’s bullet sped past him, whereupon it struck one of the oil tendrils with a kind of ‘shlup’ noise, before exiting the other side without doing any apparent harm!

Nashoba frowned as it dawned on him that Lawrence hadn’t been shooting at him at all! He spun around and staggered back at the sight that greeted him! ”Nakka mur!” he cried!

1d100

… …followed by Lawrence bellowing about Mordiggian before another shot was heard!

As William starred back the way he had come, he could see his friend now silhouetted against the flames, along with another man, presumably Nashoba. Behind the Native American, the oil burned, flames flickering towards the sky, roiling and twisting like… like… like thick, oily tendrils that flailed like some hideous octopoid creature made flesh… …

SAN check, please. Lose 1/1d3 depending upon whether you pass your roll.

[Mr. Handy]

"Not again..." moans William.

Cool, I didn't know that Spoiler-Button tags could be nested like this! With the old buttons, you used to not be able to do this.

Sanity roll (current level 39) for seeing the tentacled horror:
d%
How close am I to the boarding house? I'm thinking of grabbing our rifles.

[Philulhu]

William loses a point of SAN.

Running there and back to your lodgings will take at least ten minutes.

The nesting is pretty useful, unless you accidentally delete one of the square brackets and it gets all messed up and you end up having to track down where the missing bracket is…

[Mr. Handy]

Since there's not enough time to get the rifles, William turns and runs back toward Lawrence and Nashoba to get within pistol range. He's a better shot with a pistol anyway, but he doesn't expect his little peashooter to have much effect on the monster. Nashoba, on the other hand, could be vulnerable.

Already took care of the lost point.

The problem with missing brackets reminds me of hunting for missing parentheses when coding.

[Bullfrog]

"You don't know? God almighty!" Lawrence cries out, realizing that he's just tried to shoot an innocent man, for his own now-warped definition of innocence; not only that, but his gun is worthless against this thing of living oil. What can he hope to do against such a thing?

Fight fire with fire, of course. He must think of the unthinkable...
"RUN, damn it! Get out of here before you get killed!"

Cthulhu Mythos 6%: 1d100

I swear this is gonna work someday.

[Philulhu]

Tentacle: 1d100

Damage: 1d6

As William ran up to the pool, an oily tentacle whipped out from the burning mass and caught Nashoba across his back with a resounding wet ‘slap’ as the Native American turned to run. The force of the blow sent him staggering forwards, almost colliding with Lawrence as a second tentacle reared up and struck out in the direction of the young farmer! It missed but burning oil sprayed around him, causing some of the dune grass to catch fire.

From the direction of the oiler’s camp, shouts of ”Fire!” could be heard and they could see a group of men running in their direction…

Tentacle: 1d100

[Mr. Handy]

"We have to go back to the boarding house and grab our rifles!" William tells Lawrence, leading him away from the monster. "And we have to get the villagers to turn back! Pistols won't help against that thing, and they don't have the range either! We can't afford to get close to it!"

[Bullfrog]

"The thing's made of oil- a gun's not going to do a damn thing! I saw my bullet go right through it-" Lawrence shouts as he starts quickly backing away, coughing on the fumes and smoke from the many fires. If it's made of oil, maybe the thing can be burnt to nothing- it only emerged when Nashoba set it on fire!

Does the fire appear to be reducing the oil-thing in any way?