Moloch's Champions (OOC)

[Avenger Assembled]

Harrier's Terminus Awareness detects the bomb underneath the podium. He counters the blast with his pike, but it's not enough to keep the crowd from getting damaged.

As the cops show up, Nick notices that is not a dead body at all: it's a fake one, and a magically fake one at that!

More rolls will get you more info.

[trollthumper]

Nick is stunting the following off of his Super-Senses, and spending an HP to negate the Fatigue:

Super Senses 12 (Death Awareness [10 ft.], Detect Magic Acute Analytical Ranged 2 [100 ft.] Tracking 3) [12 PP]

[Avenger Assembled]

Now that I know what you were doing, have an HP for the Fiat. He teleported away, Nick doesn't know where.

[Avenger Assembled]

Give me an Arcane Lore check, TT.

[trollthumper]

That'd be a 22.

[Avenger Assembled]

TT:

There is the legend of Die Kindersdieb, The Witch Who Walks Between Worlds, who takes children back to her realm and transforms them into fiends or simply devours them alive. Some people have connected her to the ur-myths of the child-stealing witch, but it's hard to say if that was her or if she's just representing that particular cultural archetype as a conscious choice. It would explain some things if she's from the Terminus, given how mighty she is against even other mystics, and that would explain how she's managed to be active for so very long. She's very bad news.

[Avenger Assembled]

Miss A:

The church was purchased last year by William Shepard, heir to the Shepard family fortune (they own several artificial sweetener factories, as it happens) along with his twin brother Thomas. They're also joint heads of the Black Onyx LLC, a limited liability corporation that's recently become active on the Freedom City real estate market. They're very young, just barely twenty-one, which fits the age of the dead evangelist pretty well, and the pictures she finds seem to match. Being the mentor of a Claremont student, Miss A remembers the scandal of some years ago when William and Thomas were expelled as freshmen under a cloud of something to do with running a cult on campus...

[Avenger Assembled]

Miss Americana finds that:

Citizen pops into her headquarters and uses the security camera linkups, but there are no security cameras inside the church! There is a webcam in what looks like an office, but it's pointed at a closed door rather than anything particularly incriminating. No one that Citizen can see has gone in or out of the church today, but of course that's just a mundane traffic camera across the street and who knows what it might have missed with the proper use of superpowers?

[trollthumper]

All right, time for another power stunt! Where before Nick's jacket had Protection 10 (Extras: Impervious Toughness 12) [22 PP] and Immunity 3 (heat, cold, pressure) [3 PP]. it now has:

Protection 10 [10 PP]

Nullify Entropy Effects 12 (Extras: Nullifying Field) [12 PP]

Immunity 3 (heat, cold, pressure) [3 PP]

Spending an HP to negate Fatigue.

[Avenger Assembled]

The church is a lovely place with a well-maintained interior, clean bathrooms, and beautiful stained glass windows. There's lots of art on the walls; a dark-faced woman in red embracing weeping children and comforting them: elsewhere a lamb and lion lay their heads down at her feet, here goats and sheep graze contentedly beneath a tree she has planted for them. The sanctuary is clean and bright, racks stuffed with pamphlets on each side; there's even a daycare center behind it well-stocked with toys. There are holy texts in the few pews, and a church library well-stocked. Down in the basement, there's even a fully-stocked kitchen.

The church is a hellscape of the mind. Nick can see the titles of the books in the library and they're not pretty; Mein Kampf, the works of Pol Pot, and the Conqueror Worm's grim manifesto share space with crowded accounts of their most terrible deeds, while the section on comparative religion is a recitation of the grimly murderous deeds of all creeds and all faiths with power. The pretty drawings on the walls of the children's playroom show that same dark-faced woman, now with no features save a too, too white smile, lifting smiling children up into her bosom in a red-tinted sky as the world beneath them burns with a cheery flame. This is a place designed to teach congregants, especially children, that the world means nothing, and that its passing will be a blessing.

Sitting in front of the altar is the white-haired man in green Nick saw earlier, but he's not praying. He's drinking, and cursing; from the empty beer cans in front of him, he's been at this a while.

[Avenger Assembled]

Search check time:

Harrier: 15

[Electra]

Skill Mastery 30

[trollthumper]

10. Nick sees nothing.

[Avenger Assembled]

Miss Americana:

You find what appears to be Billy Shepard's diary on the computer in the pastor's office. Scrolling through it (using your formidable Mental Quickness) you find the story of a deeply alienated young man whose already-warped perspective on life begins to take a very dark turn in the last few months. He speaks of an apocalypse that sounds very personal, gloating over the imminent demise of his "Other Mother and Father", while at the same time writing in detail of the dreams where "the Dark Lady, my mother" clasps him to her bosom and tells him that everything will be well, that he will be loved and happy once he has crossed over to the other side. He speaks sneeringly of his brother "blinded by cocaine and whores", and it's not hard to tell that only one brother will get 'redemption' from the Black Madonna. There's no talk of magic in here, he must use a physical grimorie for that. He ends on an ominous note in an entry from yesterday of "Sacrifices must be made. The wheat will be separated from the chaff. And I know just how to do it now."

Harrier

sits in the children's nursery and, paradoxically, has his self-control restored by all the horrible messages all around him. Coming out, he feels a renewed sense of purpose.

Nick C.

finds little scorch marks here and there! The corridors, the sanctuary, the bathroom, the offices: it turns out it's a result of Tommy's entropic speed.

[Avenger Assembled]

Initiative time!

Harrier goes on 22

Billy Shepard is this guy, upped to +13 ATK/DMG and +13 TOU/DEF

He goes on 7. Ouch.

He does have a surprise in place for the heroes, as Nick can see: there's a magical booby trap built into the floor!

[trollthumper]

Nick goes on 18.

[Electra]

Miss A goes on 15

[Avenger Assembled]

Harrier: 22

Nick C.: 18

Miss Americana: 15

Billy Shepard: 7

Harrier's going to go ahead and intimidate this fool. DC 30 is beyond his ability to match, so he is flat-footed vs. Harrier's attack:

15 Just barely hits with a flat-footed DEF +13 and Dodge 4

Tou vs DC 27

16

That's a little much, so I'll take an HP for Harrier and give him a bruise.

[trollthumper]

Move Action: Nick attempts a fast Demoralize. As he does not have the Challenge Feat, that's a -5. 19.

Standard Action: Nick unleashes a blast of Ignis Fatuus, the Blast 12 w/ Will save. That's a 19, so DC27 Will if it hits.

[Avenger Assembled]

29 vs. 19

OK, he's not flat-footed, so that blast misses. Miss A is up.

[Electra]

As a move action, Miss A is going to land in front of the parents, putting herself between them and Crazy Billy. I'll also spend an HP to stunt interpose so that she can actually make the reaction save if necessary.

Standard Action, LASER BLAST! 1d20+14=24. DC 29 Toughness save if it hits.

[Avenger Assembled]

32

Boo.

[Avenger Assembled]

OK, Billy is up.

He'll try and cut Harrier down to size.

DC 20 Feint for Harrier

He passes with Skill Mastery

16

He misses Harrier

Harrier's turn.

Startle again: 16

He is startled

Harrier is through playing nice.

All-Out/Power Attack with his staff

14

Of course!

Harrier rerolls

29 with the HP

DC 12+15+5+3=35

15

I'm trying to run down the number of threads I'm running, so if no one objects, i'll take that one. For now...