The Vanishing of Abigail Wright

[Silver Priest]

OOC:   That's actually a crit! roll damage again, anything more than a 1 and you kill him. Even if you only get a 1, it's likely he falls unconscious.

[HoneyDog]

Firearms Damage,[url=https://orokos.com/roll/797627]Firearms damage[/url]: [u]1d10[/u] [b]1[/b]

[Silver Priest]

Vanessa, not feeling like being trapped in this nightmarish realm, lets out a mighty kick. The door gives reluctantly, but gives it does, and the team finds themselves back in the Smoking Lounge.

Mark Roark looks up in alarm, halfway through his glass of whisky. "What the hell's all this racket,then?" His eyes widen in surprise as he sees Abigail, and a lecherous grin appears. "Abby! Didn't think I'd be seeing you anytime soon. Come sit down, have a drink with uncle Mark."

***

Nik's shot explodes into Castaigne's thigh, destroying bone and muscle. The little man lets out a pitiful yelp before he collapses on the ground. Nik can see that he's still breathing, but it's a grievous wound; if the agent does not bother to take the time to stabilize him, he is almost certain to die.

The man on the bed's restraints are easy enough to undo. Nik can see that his chest is covered in cuts. None of them seem to go very deep, but the fear in his eyes suggests the experience had been incredibly painful.

"Oh God man, get me out of here please! This guy's crazy! This whole place is!" He looks like he can walk, at least.

OOC:   Nik, please roll luck.

[Mr. Handy]

"I'm afraid there's no time for that, Mr. Roark," says Vanessa. "We're leaving, and you really need to come with us. It's too dangerous to stay here."

[Silver Priest]

Nik,The luck roll was to see if you were interrupted, and I'm happy to say you won't be. Nik can get the man up and lead him out of the room if he likes. I presume you are leaving Castaigne to his fate?

[HoneyDog]

"Come with me" Nik tells the man. "Quickly!"

He goes to the door to check the corridor.

[Silver Priest]

"Why would I leave?" Roark asks. "I'm booked at the Broadalbin for the next week. No no no, can't leave not before I finish my business," He lights another cigar. "Now get lost, I'm very busy." He continues to mutter under his breath.

Abigail shakes her head, as if to signal that Roark is a lost cause. He seems to have grown attached to this place, for good or ill. The doorway out of here was still open, and stairs led down. But did the agents want to leave without Nik?

***

The man does not need to be told twice. He follows, crying and mumbling words of gratitude. "My name is David Langford, I've been trapped in here for months! I had to eat stale hors d'oeuvre and flat champagne, and there were all these weird people! And then I happened upon this room-- the guy was nice at first, but he went crazy when I saw a book he was reading! He's been keeping me here for God knows how long and mutilating me!"

Nik exits the room with the newcomer in tow, and is relieved to see that none of their pursuers have caught up with them yet. But he spies two of them on the stairs and rapidly descending. They'll have caught up with him in seconds, so he knows his time is short.

[Mr. Handy]

"Nik, you coming?" calls Vanessa back the way she came, ready to lay down fire to cover his retreat if needed.

[HoneyDog]

Nik pushes Langford in front of him towards the stairs.

"Head down to the lounge!" he shouts. "Move your ass!"

[Silver Priest]

Langford does not have to be told twice.He and Nik soon join the others. The terrible music is getting louder, but the group waste no time in running down the stairs that had brought them to this place. The last thing they experience is a brief inescapable moment of doom, and the sight of a tattered figure in yellow rags in their peripheral vision, before everything goes black.

***

And then they find themselves on the second floor of the Macalister Building. The entrance to the stairway that led up is closed. Perhaps it now leads to the roof, like it should-- or perhaps the Night Floors were still there, waiting. Did any of the agents dare to find out?

David Langford collapses on the floor, weeping with joy. He now has a shirt back on, advertising him as a worker for a local cable company.

The dog puts its head down on the floor and looks like it's planning to take a nap; it seemed like that was the most exertion it had in sometime. But it seems otherwise unharmed.

Nik and Vanessa both find themselves gripping one of Abigial's hands. But when they turn to her, they find a marionette in her place. It looks exactly like her, and her expression is a mix between sadness and acceptance. Whether through her own power or something else, Abby Wright stayed behind.

Both agents find that a note had been slipped into the marionette's hands, and they can read them.

Nik,The note is simple, written in steady, careful handwriting. [i]I'm sorry. Don't blame yourself-- I saw that all paths led here. Please give the other note to my father and grant him some peace It's better he thinks I'm dead then this I don't want to see him condemned either. Thank you for trying. -Abby.[/i]

Vanessa,Before [b]Vanessa[/b] can read the note the horrors of what she experienced hit her. The way a simple play had corrupted this entire building and destroyed the lives of its residents was something she couldn't shake. It reminded her of the equation-- but at least that had to be understood by people well versed in math. This seemed able to be grasped by everyone-- and anyone could be a vector. [ooc]It's time for Vanessa indefinite insanity to hit. It's fear and hostility to The King In Yellow and all aspects of the unnatural related to it. Vanessa has a choice here-- she can chose to let her fear overpower her and decide that her response to all of this is to flee the building. In the future this means unless and until she's cured she would need to make a check everytime she encountered something alone these lines, or she'll need to escape from the yellow king related oddity. Or she can decide that her insanity manifests in a hostile reaction, in which case, she decides to destroy everything related to the "infestation." This means she would want to kill all of the others tainted by the play (thankfully not yet including the agents) and maybe destroy the building as well. You should decide on how the insanity manifests now, but if you like Vanessa can try to resist it. In that case, roll willpower, 1d4, and subtract that much from your total. As long as you have at least 1 WP left, then describe a bond you are projecting onto and how they are helping you maintain a hold of your sanity during the current situation. Reduce the bond score by the same amount as the WP roll. Then, lastly, make a sanity roll. If it succeddes, you can act normally-- otherwise you give into your disorder and need to let it dictate your actions.[/ooc]

OOC:   Nik and Jose can make san rolls for helplessness 0/1d3. Vanessa's broken enough she does not need to roll, luckily for her.

[HoneyDog]

Nik looks in despair at the marionette, despair both for Abigail and for himself and the role he played in causing this. As he reads the note, his sadness turns to anger and he makes a grim resolution to himself.

“I’m going to take that bastard down. Whatever it takes.”

SAN,SAN 54: [url=https://orokos.com/roll/798887]SAN[/url]: [u]1d100[/u] [b]61[/b] [url=https://orokos.com/roll/798890]SAN loss[/url]: [u]1d3[/u] [b]2[/b] Now 52

OOC,I thought it was Night Floors! ;)

[Mr. Handy]

OOC,By willpower, do you mean POW? I don't want to lose any more points of that. It's fallen too low as it is.

[Silver Priest]

Mr.Handy,No, Willpower is its own stat, though it's equal to your POW score. So you have 9 POW so you would now have 9 willpower. Willpower is used when you try to project onto a bond or suppress an incidence of insanity. If it goes to 2 or below your agent begins to lose motivation and is unable to do as much, but willpower comes back every time you get a full rest at a rate of 1d6 points. So there's really no risk from you deciding to try and suppress the insanity now on the willpower front since you will get those points back. The bond you use will suffer though, and you may want to just deal with the insanity episode so you don't harm them. Hope this helps. I've posted about this in the rules thread, but if you have anymore questions let me know and I'll try to answer them for you. :)

HoneyDog,Just curious, but have you been keeping track of Nik's san losses due to Helplessness? If he's lost san from Helplessness 3 times without going insane he's now hardened to it, which means he takes min. damage from those sources of insanity in the future. This also means you lose 1d6 points of Pow as your agent 's personal drive suffers.

[Mr. Handy]

Vanessa can't take it any more, and she finally breaks. She flees from the building as fast as she can.

[HoneyDog]

Nik is startled by Vanessa’s flight.

“Stay with him!” he tells Jose, indicating Langford. He runs after Vanessa.

OOC,Yes, Nik lost lots of SAN. I think he will now become more interested in taking down Stephen Alzis than anything else. [url=https://orokos.com/roll/799245]POW Loss[/url]: [u]1d6[/u] [b]3[/b]

[Silver Priest]

OOC:   I can already tell this is going to have some interesting repercussions!

Nik takes off after Vanessa, who is screaming her head off and fleeing.

OOC:   Okay, I would like both of you to make athletics roll. If both of you fail, Vanessa wins. If both of you succeed, the agent who rolled a lower success or a crit wins.

[Mr. Handy]

Panic gives Vanessa more speed.

OOC,Athletics roll (52% skill) fleeing the building: [dice]0[/dice]

[HoneyDog]

Nik puts his head down and soon catches up with Vanessa, and grabs her arm.

"Marchand!" he shouts. "It's me!"

Athletics,Athletics 37: [url=https://orokos.com/roll/799566]Athletics[/url]: [u]1d100[/u] [b]3[/b]

[Silver Priest]

Nik is able to catch Vanessa as she reaches the stairs leading down. Turning the other agent around, he sees her eyes are wide with panic. She seems to want to get as far away from this place as possible.

Vanessa for her part recognizes Nik as a friend, but she finds it very difficult to do anything other than continue to flee.

OOC:   You both can make Str*5 rolls. As before, if you both succeeds, the one with the lower success wins. If you both fail, Nik wins. Nik can also attempt a persuade roll to calm Vanessa down for a time.

[Mr. Handy]

"We have to get out of here!" screams Vanessa, struggling to get free.

OOC,STR x 5 roll (40% stat) trying to get free: [dice]0[/dice]