IC - 2- Day 2 - Dame Marie Sunday - Everyone

[Mr. Handy]

Let's see if we can find a camion.

[SunlessNick]

Florence agrees with Laurent's suggestion.

[Mephistophilis]

Laurent is very familiar with the St Joe camions, spending much if his time fixing the unreliable beasts. They walk back up into Dame Marie and find one idling on the main stretch. Brightly coloured and crammed with passengers.

The driver indicates he is heading back towards Cap Matelot so will be passing near enough to the Azagon Hotel. The camion hangs around for another twenty minutes until it is full and begins the bone jangling journey over the dirt roads.

Belching diesel fumes it is crowded with stems of bananas, sacks of produce, and unwashed passengers. Trussed-up chickens squawking incessantly. Almost unbearably hot and stinking both Laurent and Florence are nursing aching backs and upset stomachs before they have even passed the sisal plantation outside Dame Marie.

Looking out they can see several half naked men working the fields.

If you roll me 1d6 I can tell you what you know about the Azagon Hotel - I'd say Laurent can have 2d6 as he services their vehicles

[Mr. Handy]

Laurent knows all about the hotel.

Roll to see what I know about the Azagon Hotel (human die, occupation die):
2d6

[SunlessNick]

Florence knows a bit, but not much.

Rolled a 4.

[Mephistophilis]

Laurent looks at the men working among the tall sisal plants. They're near naked, with grey skin and empty eyes. Mechanically going through the motions of cutting down the leaves, no sign of comprehension behind their eyes. Like they're drunk, or drugged, or something. Like their ti bon ange, their spirit, has gone, and all that is left is their gros bon ange, the basic biological functions, like the old stories of the zombi.

OOC:   Test Insight

The Azagon Hotel is something of a white elephant. It was built by a rich American architect as a resort hotel and initially reinvigorated the town, providing extra work with the building and then running the place. But it never attracted many guests, and why would it? Named after the Gede Azagon, loa of death and cemeteries, and without even a proper paved road to get there from St Joe City.

A few years ago it foundered and closed down, sat there empty in the middle of nowhere. Then in the last year it reopened, this time as some sort of hospital. It is said the millionaire owner had built it here because his beautiful new actress wife thought it would be a nice place to relax when she wasn't making pictures. Well, the beautiful wife becomes an alcoholic and gets saved by an American doctor, when the place closes down he gives it to the doctor, a nice quiet place where rich white people can come and get away from the stress among the poor of St Joseph Island.

No one knows much about what goes on there but a few people from Dame Marie have managed to obtain employment as cleaners and servants and the like.

-----



Approaching the Azagon Hotel, it looks out of place in the surroundings. Three stories tall, it looks vaguely like pictures of the Palais National in St Joe City. Like the National Palace it is painted white, a new coat since Laurent and Florence last saw it. A broad front lawn and an elaborate entrance with wide steps, double front doors, and a bell.

[Mr. Handy]

"Zombi," gasps Laurent when he sees the workers in the fields. He has heard of them, of course, but it's quite something else to see them.

Insight roll (current level 1):
1d6
Insight (finally) increases to 2.

[SunlessNick]

Florence looks where Laurent is pointing and gasps. "How much evil do we face?"

[Mr. Handy]

"More than I thought," says Laurent. "Old Pierre probably knows about this already, but we should ask him the next time we see him."

[SunlessNick]

"There was something about him, when we spoke. For a second, I thought he looked like a dead man. I wasn't sure I was really seeing it."

[Mr. Handy]

"Maybe you had a premonition," says Laurent. "He could be in danger."

[Mephistophilis]

The grounds of the hotel are pretty deserted but they see a middle aged man in black trousers and a white shirt walking along a path beside the lawns.

[Mr. Handy]

"Let's go talk to him," says Laurent. "We can ask him if he's seen that American."

[SunlessNick]

"Wait a moment," Florence says - "is he controlling the zombis?"

[Mephistophilis]

The strange looking men were working the sisal plantation which was just outside town, you saw it from the bus, this guy is in the ground of the hotel, another maybe 10min away by bus

[Mr. Handy]

"We have no reason to think he is their controller more than anyone else," says Laurent, "and they are far away from here."

[SunlessNick]

Sorry, I misread things (bit of a crisis happening at my end). In that case, Florence would have made no objection to speaking to the man.

[Mephistophilis]

Laurent and Florence walk up to the man and get his attention. He turns and gives them a smile. He's dressed in black trousers and a spotless white chef's jacket and looks to be in his early forties, a slight waft of garlic comes off him. 'Bonjou compères, can I help you?'

[Mr. Handy]

"Bonjour," says Laurent. "We're looking for an American we believe is staying at the hotel." He describes the man they saw on the beach the other night. "Have you seen him?"

[Mephistophilis]

The guy you met or the guy you chased after?