Supercape

GM FIve men with machetes and guns. On youngster. She might have a strange metal on her hands. But they looked like they had seen stranger. Maybe the stranger things they had seen were hallucinations from some psychoactive substance. But still. What confused them was that anyone would hold their ground. They weren't cowered, not exactly, but a primal instinct kept them from being too bold. Some primal instinct that said hold on... this ain't right... They laughed. They shuffled forward an inch. Maybe two. They tapped their machetes against their thigh, the palm of their hand, and in one case, over a set of four golden teeth. "You be know wa' we gonna do?" "Chop chop! Big meal gangsta styl' fri wit' onion ring and spicy spicy!" "Makin zombi' out of dem bones, fewl..." "Whi yanow run? Hoppy hoppy lil' bunny, go run!" "Yathink we scared? We no evan need bang bang... jess' slicy slicy thra de dicey!"

GM The Casino was solid - bricks, paint, windows. Its front face looked considerably more ostentatious than the dingy sides, where the fumes of cooking and the hiss of steam came. It was three stories high... and presumably it was the top floor where the big boys (and girls) played with big monies in private rooms. Plenty of noise - music, chatter. The Windows were reinforced, but Luke would have no problem smashing them. The alarms however, would need a different approach. Side doors? Yes, plenty. Some locked. One, outside the kitchens, kept open with a fire extinguisher. A young, lad with a thin moustache and a chef's hat stood outside, grabbing a cheeky cigarrette. He hadn't noticed Luke. Not yet. Luke could see a few ventilation shafts. Squeezing through would be difficult... or get him stuck. How many pizza's and Cherrybomb! lollipops had he had recently? If he tried squeezing through, that question might become very pertinent...

GM "That... is a lot of questions. A lot of demands. And are you... trying to taunt me? Hahahaha... a mortal trying to taunt a demon. I was born when the first hammer struck the first anvil. I am the fire of the infernal forge, bound by sorcery, bound by chains. Do you think me a coward?" The pale smoke swirled some more. Juan cowered. "Even the word... demon... devil... do you know what that is? They are just words. Words that describe something not here. That which should not be, but is. Something malign? Everything is malign, in the right light, in the right machine...." Now the shadows swirled more, and flames lit them. From out of the ether, fire appeared. Living fire; thin, spindly, small. The creature was two feet high, and looked like a skeleton made of smoke and burning bones, like a skeleton of a rat or a wolf... it was hard to say. But living fire it almost certainly was. "La Puma. See me. Now, let me see you.., the real you..."

GM Machete's were drawn. Clearly one girl was not worth expending bullets on. Maybe they weren't quite with it. Pupils dilated, swaying bodies. No, one would have to say they were pretty spaced out. But that didn't stop them tapping a machete on an open palm, or grinning like a dog who had found a nest of rabbits. "Boddy? 'Ere be no body, not being not boddy but ya. Oo ya bein, cum da 'ere 'n askin Kwestyon like dat. Ya know oo we are? We be being Machete Max gang. We not be knowing nuthin boot boddy." Another piped up. "Oo told you bat boddy? U be earing frem sum Street Snitch, oo be telling u bat boddy?" Another rolled his eyes and the stupidity. It looked like even sober these were not the brightest bulbs on the Christmas Tree. But they were pretty large, in a lean, snake like way. And the machetes did look pretty sharp.

GM The smoke swirled to La Puma's right, then to her left, then started circling her, agitated, excited. "Demonnnnnn!" said Juan, swirling in time with the smoke. "I am not some mere puppet, you know! I have protection! My magical candles of magic!" He gave a theatrical sweep of his arm, showing the dripping wax and pale smoke that he had surrounded the organ with. the demon paid it no mind. Its attention was focussed on La Puma. "Why should I show myself? How would that help?" it laughed. there was a kind of mirth to the laugh. Not joy, but more relief. A lightness, like one unchained and revelling in the sun and the air. "No no. I prefer to be unseen. Unheard, too, but your presence invites questions..." The voice seemed to reverberate and ricochet around the church. Not the easiest place to echolocate... "And my questions you will not answer. Unless I answer yours. So what say you, beast girl? I answer, you answer, and on we go till one of us becomes bored? Well I shall start, as a show of trust. I have not done anything with the kids. Kids annoy me, but I pay them no mind if they mind me not. Let them mature and rot, and then they may be fuel to my whim...." "And no answer, if you dare. What manner of creature are you???"

Rev Alcoholic? Was Pete hitting the booze? or worse? Probably... She just had to hope he had enough guts left in him to pull himself out of the gutter. He was a gutty man. But booze, drugs... they were guttier than many gutty men. She took the pamplet. "Thank. I better gut, I mean I better get going." She saluted the guard with the pamphlet. It was probably tripe, full of vapid statements. But she was out her depth, and pretty sure she would do no better - and quite possibly even worse. Rev turned heel and strode back to her buggy, firing up the engine and making for Stone Ridge. The storm was coming, and rain was falling. Damn, I'm going to seize up... She forgot to put lubricating oil in the Buggy. How kicked herself now, feeling stupid, but... even she had, the rain was going to wash it off in moments once the storm properly hit. She was going to be grinding like a wailing banshee until she got back to the chop shop and took an oil bath...

GM Creaaaaaak! This was loud enough to wake a comatose pig. And the Yardies heard it. Five of them, smoking roll ups, playing cards. Guns and Machetes on the table. Reggae coming out of an impressive speaker system, synched to a wide screen TV plaing a live concert. they heard it, but when it came to reactions they were as fast a soporific Glacier with arthritis. They looked around. They were wearing shorts, sandals, open shirts, and dark sunglasses. Tattoo's adorned various body parts, often showing skulls and what looked like arcane symbology. Plenty of regular guns and regular knives. A few had scars. Several had gold teeth. Eyebrows were raised, hands started to reach for weapons. "Hoo d'ell be yooo? Gettin oota 'ere or be trubble!" A Jamaican accent? But laced with a particular dialect - like a thieves cant.

GM The door rattled. Not the jarring clangs that would be testament to an intruder. The light touch of Chimera was like a feather, gently seeking out the lock, the resistance, the pull, the tension. A rattle. The door was not locked. Presumably no thug would be stupid enough to walk in a bunch of smoking Yardies ready to smoke you. The music was loud to the point of being obnoxious, although it did have a fine groove; drum, bass, mumbled and rumbled lyrics that resonated well. Over the notes and beats a few voices could be heard. Laughs, sometimes. But was that due to a comedic situation or a comedic cigarette? There was no doubt that the headless corpse had been dragged in here. It would be hard to imagine doing so without anybody noticing. It wasn't really a comedy situation, was it? The fumes of heavy drug use grew stronger by the minute. The Yardies were smoking some serious stuff...

Rev "Lost as an Emiskimo in a desert. As loast as a Camel in a snowstorm. As lost as a... Rev paused, running out of things to say. "As lost as a taxi driver in a lavatory. Yeah, I got lost. Sorry...." It was a weak bluff, and she knew it. "Look, I came here to pick up a ride and I kinda got to pick him up. Pete Moss. Do you think you could help me out? I mean, I dont want to cause a mess. Hell, I know the sound of brown matter hitting a rotatory air circulation device. I really dont want a mess. But if I can't pick up Pete, I'm in a whole soup of trouble. And not a nice pumpkin soup either. More like a soup made from a Silage Farm. Really messy..." She might have blabbed better, but the grinding sound her limbs made when she gesticulated was like nails through her pretence. Not good. She really didn't want to get shot. She really didn't want to punch the lights out of this guard. I mean, guys (and girls) who keep toilets so sparkling clean couldn't be all bad, right?

GM Boots.... Boots on the ground. Or rather, the footprints. The burgular had been effective but not subtle. And he (or she) had to have dragged a corpse. Corpses, Chimera knew, where heavier than they looked. Perhaps a superhero could have lifted the corpse straight over head, and danced away as if the thing was as light as a feather... But no. The corpse had clearly been dragged, with some effort, by a mere mortal. And that mean a trial. Not easy to follow, but not hard either. Chimera could follow a twisting trial through back alleys, through the discarded and forgotten paths of Freedom City. To a run down area and a broken biulding, its bricks laying scattered around a dump of a garden. The only habitable place was the bottom level, below ground level. Rusty Iron stairs lay down to an illuminated lair from which loud reggae music and strange (and illicit) aroma's wafted. This had all the hallmarks of a Yardie lair. And Yardies, everyone knew, carried guns, knives and machetes....

GM And so... ...later.... ...at the Casino From the outside, it was fabulous, full of gold and marble and lights. On closer examination, the gold and marble was paint, and chipped paint at that. It was an illusion, but was it any less magnificent for the scar tissue? Black tie and black dress walked in and out. The dress code was somewhat leniant, perhaps even unforced, for no businessman it his (or her) business to turn away sources of income. But there was no doubt that turning up in sneakers and jeans would catch a lot of attention. And if one turned up in rags and spent not a coin, one would probably be ejected. If unlucky, one would be ruffed up and ejected. Or worse. Outside the entrance were two big men with bigger suits that could easily conceal firearms. Dark glasses, bow ties, shaved heads, and a few strategic scars, broken noses, and cauliflowe ears. They looked like thugs painted with respectability, and they looked like that because that was exactly what they were. The sun was setting, and as it did, the excitement of gambling rose to take its place. Inside, dice were being rolled, cars were being drawn, and tears of ruination were falling from faces. But who cared? Money was being made by crunching on the bones of the desperate, so it was all good...

GM "Why?" The voice came from the ether, intangible, ethereal, invisible. A voice like hot cogwheels crunching and grinding against each other. "Why do you seek it? Why do you seek me?" Juan swooned to the point of fainting, banging his head against the organ keys. Blrrrrrrrr! Came the cacophony of sound. The candles belched more pale smoke in time with the music The impact stunned Juan back to life, who then cowered with fear. "Oh great and mighty demon! Have pity on my soul and don't roast me alive in a pit of burning fire... wait.... does fire burn? can it burn? is it always burning?" The semantic question drove a quizzical finger to his confused lips, the riddle temporarily distracting himself from his fear. "Not you, candle maker... her! Why do you come? What do you seek? Why do you seek me?"

Luke knows the Southside Palace, and knows the rumours it is controlled by mobsters. Can maked a DC 15 Streetwise check DC 20 Streetwise DC 25

GM Billy Wiggins was fast asleep, and the nudges of Luke only made him briefly rouse and fall back asleep again, muttering a dribble of words each time. "Gnfff...Southside Palace..." "Gnnnf....Fowered Aarmmm...." "Gnnff...Smashngrablffniwibble..." Billy turned over once more, shouted "Walrus! Two Times! With a Pencil!" in a shrill clear voice, some random artifact of booze-sozzled dreams, before falling into a deep slumber once again. Huckleberry Sin leapt from foot to foot with excitement. "Whaddya think? Whaddya think? Grabber Gibbons going to steal a heap of gold and make us all rich, eh?" He looked around the trailer park, the detritus, the flotsam and jetsam, the garbage bin of humanity. "I mean... screw this place, right? Gotta get out somehow, and school sucks!"

GM "Gamblin' I mean... gamblin'... I mean... Gamblin' casino..." belched Billly Wiggins, happy smile on his face. The two solitary talents Billy Wiggins had was firstly absorbing every rumour in Freedom City, and secondly acting on absolutely none of them. Unless you could count drunken blabbering as action. "He gonna rob a Gamblin' casino! Stealing from thieves, that's what it is. Like robbin...flirgrin hood! That will show em, the thievin' scum!" It was entirely clear if Billy Wiggins was talking about politics; for he had often rambled upon how the rich preyed on the weak, the wealthy on the poor, or if he was talking about actual crooks. Organised crime had plenty of stranglehold on the Gambling joints of Freedom City. One could make an argument that Billy Wiggins was talking about both. "Gonna rob the vault tonight! Got himself some flamchy shlupershlzzzzzszzzzz" And then Billy Wiggins felt asleep from booze and exertion, and started a profoundly tremulous snore.

Stealth [url=https://orokos.com/roll/980911]Stealth[/url]: [u]1d20+3[/u] [b]5[/b] Must be the rain on the limbs....

Rev Hey, maybe the Iron Talon ain't so bad? This toilet is cleaner than a Carburetor straight out of the factory! All shiny and chrome! Rev put a hand on her hip and stopped to think for a moment. The fingers of her drummed. Maybe she should have cleaned up - she was still grimy from a day of working on engines. But Rev liked the dirt - nobody was clean, not in Bedlam - it felt kind of deceptive to present otherwise. She looked around the toilet again. Nobody's that clean, are they? The clock was ticking and Pete was in trouble. She didn't have the time for a full blown investigation. Something was up, but she couldn't put her dang finger on it. It wasn't enough to start throwing fireballs at the security guards - they were just mooks, doing their job. She crept out of the toilet, seeing if she could sneak past the guards.... Grrrrnnnnth.... a grinding metal noise stabbed through the air. The rain on her limbs had washed of the lubricating oil. Yeah, it did that sometimes. Had to be now, didn't it?

GM "The Cantos devil stick," replied Juan. "Forged by Carlos Cantos, a sorcerer, thirty years ago. Able to bind demons to its will." He gave a guilty smile. "I looked it up on Wikipedia, so it must be real..." Once again, his eyes scrutinised the shadows of the church. "This demon wants to break it, free himself. Fair enough, I thought. Who wants to be kept in chains? You got to have sympathy for the devil haha..ha.....ha....ha...." he laughed weakly, every punctation and repetition enfeebling the chortle more. "Look, I...we... look, if we found this stick, then we would have bartering power, right? Then I... we... could bind demons to our own will and be real heroes! Think how much we could steal, I mean save! Gotta be worth a shot, right? Its a lot better than roasting for infinity on a pig stick in a lake of lava?"

GM Juan clapped his hands together and made a crucifix sign at the same time. That shouldn't work, of course. But somehow Juan, bristling with nervous agitation, made it happen. He then paused to scratch the oily chaos of his long black hair. "In, out, out, in, in, out, shake it all about..." he muttered. "These candles are for my protection, you see. I can control the smoke.... BEHOLD!" With a wave of his hands the candles exhumed a great plume of smoke. In but a moment, the pale smoke consolidated, writhing into one form, with colour slowly manifesting. In front of La Puma stood... ...La Puma! The smoke had formed an exact copy! Juan waved his hand through the illusion - for that was what it was. "Not real, but cunning, eh? I bet there is not a single hero in Freedom City, Southside, that has the same level of mastery of candlesmoke as me!" he said, with evident pride. "So I need the candles. Without them, I am powerless!" His hands laced together once more and he hunched forward. "The demon... I didn't summon the demon. He came to me. Wants me to help him find something. In return, he gave me power!!!"

GM "Deal, I didn't make a deal? Pfft the very thought. No deal. Deal, no. I made absolutely no deal, and no deal is what I made." His shifty eyes shifted left and shifted right. "Yes, you are right. I made a deal. I don't know with whom. But he was burning and smelled of sulfur. So probably a demon. Shifty little bastard, I can tell you. Look, this is Freedom City... every week we get an alien invasion or a super powered madman threatening to turn us all into chickens. I'm fed up of being a scared candlemaker... I'm not going to be bullied like I was by Cedric Frattleworth at high school. I didn't have a day go by without getting my head flushed in a toilet or my pants pulled down for girls to laugh at. No more! I'm going to protect myself!" "You understand, right? A bit of power, just so you don't have to be scared?" "But...ahahahahaha.... it kind of went a bit wrong, didn't it? kind of blew up in my face, ahahahahaha.... all my magic candles went a bit chaotic, and all because I trusted some demon to light them with his magic fire...."

Rev "Shoot" cussed Rev. Then she remembered the Iron Talon. Shoot was not a wise or prudent thing to say. From what she had heard, these goons had a tendency to do that first, ask questions later - if at all. What the hell, she asked herself. Maybe she should dry off. And see if she could spy the HQ. Sounded like Pete was in trouble. What kind of trouble? She didn't know, but she guessed it wasn't the good type. This kind of trouble smelled like a dark room with a single raw bulb, a ragged dentist chair, and a selection of tongs. "Sure. Thanks," she said, giving a thumbs up. She tried to walk slow enough to be noncholant, fast enough to be fast. Once inside the facilities, it would be time to snoop. Any graffiti on the walls? Any cracks? Any windows she could peer through? Or would she have to do this the hard way, and smash through the walls with her mighty mechanised fists?!

Rev Stepping out of a car - any car, let alone her Dune Buggy - was always acompanied by a drop of lamentation. The smells of the engine, the vibration rippling through the body, the sound... like a storm wrapped in silk. It was still a thrill. She hoped it always would be. Rev hoped the guards wont so trigger happy to fire bullets just for the hell of it - but this was the Talon, and you never knew. Rev was armoured, Rev was metal - bullets would spark off her body, but not forever. Fire enough bullets and she would look like a pepper pot, and be just as alive. She knocked. It was polite. "Taxi for Pete Moss. Taxi for pete Moss! Hello?" It was the beginning of rain, but worse was surely to come. "Hey guys, taxi for Pete Moss. Don't want to get stuck in the rain..." The Dune Buggy didn't look anything like a taxi, unless you were in the Gobi desert. But what the hell... Talon guards were there to keep people out, not keep people in. Right???

Rev Grrrl - that didn't sound right. Maybe it was because it used to sound right when they were together. There were better times, right? she tried to remind herself. But it wasn't easy. Those memories were buried behind the wall of the war. Am I kidding myself? Were there good times? "I got ya back, Pete. Always." That much was true. She couldn't rewrite the past. But she could write the future. Or at least try to. "I'll be right there..." She hung up. Took a deep breath. Whatever the past, she wasn't going to stand by and let a bad situation get worse. Besides, what was life for, if not for some action? Better a day as a Lion.... She pumped some fuel into her net ports. Belched. The smell of methane mixed in with the ubiqutous smell of engine oil that pervaded the chop shop. She felt the rumble of her internal mechanics start to refine the fuel. More methane. Well, it's not like I smell of roses and perfume normally... She fired up the engine of the Dune buggy. Open topped, but what the hell. Wind and rain didn't bother her, quite the reverse - it ripped through her hair and made her feel alive. The Dune buggy rumbled, powerful motors, thick tyres. She would drive fast. Hell, break a few speed restrictions. Who cared? This was Bedlam. Police had bigger fish to fry than traffic violations. The Dune Buggy ripped out of the Chop Shop, fire and smoke from its exhaust. She put her foot to the accelerator and streaked through the streets of Bedlam City... ...to Stone Ridge. It wasn't the Police that worried her. No. It was the Iron Talon. At least the Police had to pretend to stay within the law. The Iron Talon didn't even seem to bother with pretence.

Rev Pete Moss... Maybe they had never been right for one another. He was army. She was a punk. They had cars in common, maybe that was it. Maybe that shared interested had drifted them together. Rev pressed her forehead with her finger, trying to drill some sense into her skull. The thing was - maybe they hadn't been right for one another to begin with, but when Pete Moss came back from Afghan, they were even less right for each other. They had drifted apart faster than she would have liked. She had broken it off. That came with a bit serving of guilt. Rev didn't like feeling guilty, and if there was something she could do to diminish that feeling, then hell yeah, she would. Some would try to forget about it with cheap beer or cheaper moonshine. But not Rev. She threw down her spanner - harder than was reasonable. Frustration - that was it. Frustrated at herself. But that didn't sit well with her. She became frustrated at her frustration. Still greasy, still oily, still smeared with dirt of every kind, Rev picked up the phone and answered it. "Pete..." She didn't know what else to say. She left it at that - waiting for Pete to speak.

GM Jaun interlaced his fingers, but that did not stop them writhing about like a nest of snakes. "Sulfur? What sulfur? I can't smell sulfur. Its only sulfur. Did I say sulfur? I meant sulfer. I mean sulfer..." he gabbled before slapping his forehead with both of his hands and burying his face. "Gawds! It is sulfur! I admit it! I am trying to ward of the devil!" Juan grasped at La Puma, trying to plead his case by tugging at her clothes and falling to his knees. "The devil! The devil made me do it! I am a candlemaker, you see... some vile demon has got it in for me - I don't know why! I am trying to ward him off with my candles. Yes, yes, I confess, I know a little sorcery. I know a little of the occult... maybe thats why I am being persecuted. The candles, they are for my protection! You have to understand...." Again, the pale eyes scanned left and right. "Be careful! Even now, the devil himself may be spying on us! He could send any one of his infernal minions to tempt and torment us! And I do not fancy being stabbed betwixt my buttocks with a red hot poker. No, no I do not!" A shifty eyebrow raised as he scrutinised La Puma. "Can you help? Can you save my soul?"