[Ground Rules + Caveats:
- To keep things moving, focus on the story, and frankly to increase odds of survival, most if not all combat in this scene will be cinematic. Tell me what you want to do [via your post, IC or OOC depending on how much time you want to spend on it]. My posts will tell you if it's successful or not. I may be doing some behind-the-screen dice on your behalf, so don't feel bad about reminding me [in the scene chat] about modifiers that may come into play when you post your character's intentions. If you're uncomfortable for any reason with doing it this way, I will not take it personally if you back out and I hope you sign up for my next dicey one-shot.
- Keep track of your own health and tempers. If your character is injured cinematically I'll tell you how many HP that is in a brief OOC post.
- There is no post order, but please post once for each post I make. Also, do you best to post in 10 minutes or less.
- You are free to multitask, as long as you can keep up with the above stricture. If you repeatedly miss your 'deadline', I may ask you to leave one of your scenes out of respect for everyone in this one.
- There is moderate to high chance of character death/psychological torment/maiming in this scene, though some of that will be mitigated by the cinematic combat. If you're uncomfortable for any reason with that, I will not take it personally if you back out and hope you stay to watch and cheer the other players on (or hold their hands).
- Please PM me now if you have any phobias, triggers, or off-limits themes that you don't want to deal with in your RP (if none, no need to tell me 'none').
- Please PM me with any merits/flaws I should be aware of (nightmares, phobia, moon-bound, et al; again, if none, no need to PM me at all).
- Setup post forthcoming!]
Sam[nightmares]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 4, 5, 5, 5, 8, 10) ( success x 2 )
l'horreur bien-aiméeFor three weeks, the Warder of the Sept of the Cold Crescent has hardly left the holding cell where they've been keeping that girl. After the first few days he learned that she calls herself Fern. He and those who have guarded her and questioned herhave discovered that she has screaming, self-clawing nightmares whenever she falls asleep, which may be why she falls asleep so infrequently. Pieces of information trickle out of that room and through the sept and city now and then. Her presence, her corruption, is a dark cloud resting at the top of the tower.
--
After the first week, it's learned that she was trying to impress The Beloved Horror, or its surviving members, with her murder of River of Clouds and the humans. She threatens to kill all of them. She tells them that she's going to eat their hearts and piss their blood back out out. She tells the Warder that she ate River of Clouds' heart, that she rubbed his entrails all over her flesh. The Warder tells her:
you're trying to get me to kill you.
it isn't going to work.
The girl nearly frenzies.
--
After the second week, it's learned that she killed one mortal for each member of The Beloved Horror: so there are still six. River of Clouds was for her. River of Clouds was for their Alpha, a Ragabash named Th'nak'vis. Many in Cold Crescent remember him. Those hooded eyes, that hungry smirk, that shocking black hair that River of Clouds did, in fact, have in common with him.
who next? the Warder asks. why the lupus? He doesn't need to ask who D'stok was, the bearded Philodox who he also remembers. Th'nak'vis's beta, of a sort. Every wolf but the alpha is the omega, in a spiral pack.
Fern will not tell him. She stares sourly at the seam of the ceiling and the wall, and in an act of defiance that is simultaneously a revelation of how gradually she is being broken, urine begins to trickle away from her across the floor. She begins to cry, and the Warder asks her the question he has danced around since he started this:
why do you want to be one of them?
--
After the third week, they decide to send her to the caern. There are more wolves there, ones with a deeper connection to the spirit world and to Earth. Maybe they can tap into the earth's long, long memory and help her. She does want to be helped. No wolf is meant to be alone, and she has been. No wolf is meant to go mad from their own rage and isolation, and she has. Maybe they can bring her back.
The Warder, of course, cannot go with them. He sends Champion of Honor and Circuit Runner and Wind on Concrete. He sends The Right Hand and Law in War. He sends an Adren with them, too, a tall and dark Ahroun who wears a dark suit and does not speak but whose shoulders are nearly as wide as two or three Ferns. His name is merely given as Slaughter. The Warder sends the girl out wearing a collar and manacles of silver, and Slaughter's hand is heavy on her shoulder as they leave the sept.
Sam Evans got a phone call: we need a driver. And that is how she came to be driving an 8-passenger van from downtown Denver towards Roxborough Park, with the rage of six ranked garou and one almost-spiral cub behind her. She learns an important lesson, and maybe next time she sees that phone number and recognizes it as the Warder's, she won't pick up.
--
Calden drove to downtown to meet Eva for dinner. There's nothing romantic about it, which is perhaps one of the reasons they do find some enjoyment in one another's company. They are driving north past Blackrock Lake, back towards downtown to get Calden back to his truck, when they see the dark, gleaming passenger van coming south.
Eva's headlights wash over the darkness just enough to show the thing on top of the van, a hulking shadow within shadow, its eyes as reflective as mirrors, its body as
large as
a crinos-formed werewolf.
Law in War[ I hear with my little ears... Perception + Alertness. ]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 2, 4, 6, 7) ( success x 2 )
l'horreur bien-aimée[Jack is aware of the other car coming toward them and may or may not recognize the car as one he's seen at 1999 Broadway, but he's unaware of whatever is on top of the car.]
The Right HandA summons from the Warder was delivered to Marjorie surprisingly easy, for once. She had several preferred hang-outs-- an apartment building along East Colfax Avenue, a junkyard several miles away from there, and several stops in between. She didn't claim territory, though, so it couldn't be guaranteed that she would be any of those places. She didn't have a cellphone, so if she wasn't there you would need to send a spirit to fetch her.
This time, though, she just so happened to be in one of the little kitchenettes within 1999 Broadway itself. She was noticed in passing, gestured to come along with, and filled in on the details of the mission itself. Naturally, the teenaged Philodox was all in.
Some time later she was packed into a passenger van along with too many other Garou to count on just one hand alone. She sat in the far back, beside her Tribemate Rabid Jack. She wore thin layers of clothing-- a lacy white camisole overtop of a heather gray T-shirt, and a floor length bohemian-style skirt that was a mess of colors and swirling patterns that spoke of springtime and mayhem. She was barefooted, with trinkets laced about her ankles, and her long dusty hair was hanging over her shoulders, down her back, and about her face as was the norm.
She was content to sit in quiet, smiling vaguely despite the 'precious cargo' that they were tasked to carry and the deeds that this cargo was responsible for.
SamSam was at home, sitting cross legged before her oddly placed television set, an arrangement of strange metal pieces set out on the floor in front of her, when her phone dinged to alert her of a new message.
we need a driver.
A few minutes later she was being taken to the van, where she would await the loading of a prisoner. The drive has been a tense one for her. The collective Rage crowded inside that vehicle presses up against her back, sends fingers of electricity up her spine. Every now and again she shrugs, loosening up her shoulders again. She may be small, she may be mighty, but even a kinfolk of her experience would have trouble keeping calm in that van.
She does, though, sitting in the driver's seat with the seat pushed almost all the way forward, her bag resting on the console between hers and the front passenger seat. She keeps her cool, and she tolerates the suffocation. And she keeps her eyes on the road ahead, only occasionally checking the rearviews for signs of pursuit before looking ahead again.
Law in WarJack shifts in the backseat, managing to look cramped thanks to his bulk and the fact that all the room in all the eight passenger vans in the world wouldn't make up for the fact he isn't on his bike, isn't out on the road or on four paws in the wilderness, isn't even in the concrete canyons of the city. Instead it is a tin can they are packed into, murderous sardines preserved in rage, and his eyes instead burrow with intensity into the back of the thing that calls itself Fern's head. It isn't malice, not the kind many at the Sept might have, but it is grave nonetheless.
And Jack gives up a quiet prayer to the Mother for an expedient and uneventful journey, because one can hope. And pray. And hope some more.
He looks across the car, then, as he prays, because maybe he shouldn't be staring down the back of a Black Spiral Dancer in a cub's cocoon waiting to blossom into full evil whilst doing so. Maybe he'd considered talking to the woman hurtling them down the road, the woman from the other night, but he hadn't. And maybe he hadn't because there was an Adren around. But when he spots that car heading toward them, he sniffs, a sound that to the lupine meant he'd noticed something, even if with his eyes, then more groans then growls.
"Know that car. We got an escort for prom, Slaughter-rhya?" His chin juts out even more than his underbite usually does, toward the car coming the other way, as he asks the question.
Eva"Did you see that." Éva to Calden, her hands firm on the wheel of her Lexus sedan. The car is quiet and conservative and boring and expensive and keeps out the washing noise of the road and the headlights are a bright wash over the passenger van. Coronal flare that sparks and fades and the sudden wash of adrenaline that leaves her swallowing back against a brief and sure breathlessness.
The kinswoman's dark gaze flares at Calden's profile. Her pulse rate has increased but she holds the tension in so well that it is only the sharpness of her gesture - the cut of a chin rising upward toward the van - that speaks of it. Perhaps another hundred feet down the road, Éva makes an illegal U-turn and starts following the van.
"My phone is in my bag." To Calden. "Text Jane Washington and tell her where we are and what you see. Give her the license plate number."
l'horreur bien-aiméeBetween them, an Adren ahroun, a Fostern galliard, a Fostern philodox, a couple of Cliath philodoxes, and a Cliath ragabash should be able to handle one ahroun cub if she should get rowdy. That is why the Warder sent so many of them. And he sent a majority of half-moons, in fact, lest the garou of greater rage forget that they are trying to help this girl, reconcile her to Gaia, and lessen bloodshed rather than increasing it. They have orders from the Warders of both sept and caern to deliver her.
Jack notices the other car, a familiar one that he's seen at the sept before, and asks Slaughter about it. Slaughter just stares at him, wordless, as the Lexus in question passes them by. It's Fern who answers him, hunched over where she sits in clothes borrowed from the sept. "It's going the other way," she says, her voice low and flat.
--
That Lexus makes a U-turn, and Sam sees headlights in their rearview. The garou in back see them, too. In the van, the Fostern Galliard called Circuit Runner gets a ping on her phone. She opens it up, the blue light illuminating her face as she reads a text.
"Stop the car," she says, about two seconds later. Lifting her head, she directs her attention to the Adren. "Just got a text from 's widow. That's her car, and she says she saw something on top of the van."
Even as she's speaking, Circuit Runner starts texting back: Stay back but in area. Kin in van will need extraction.
l'horreur bien-aimée[missing text: Andraj's widow]
SamStop the car, the woman says. Sam's head comes up, but already she lets her foot off the gas, allowing the van's speed to ease a bit before she steers it toward the shoulder. It'd be no good slamming down on the brakes, with this much Rage a sudden jarring stop would be like detonating a bomb. A bomb with her at the epicenter.
The van comes to an easy stop along the shoulder, but Sam doesn't cut the engine. And she doesn't immediately hop out, either.
"Did they say what it was?"
The Right HandThe exchange of words was listened to, but not commented on. The Right Hand just sat quietly with her hip not too far from the Lupus's, buckled in and sitting with her hands folded in her lap.
Know that car.It's going the other way.Stop the car.There's something on top of the van.
"Well," chirped the teenager pleasantly, "I can't say I'm too shocked." She reached down and unbuckled herself with one hand, then started to tie her hair back at the nape of her neck, securing it with a simple black elastic that was kept on her wrist. "They've probably been watching and waiting for us to move her."
Then, this directed at the girl in silver shackles: "You'll want to sit tight too, honey. We wouldn't want you to have some moral crisis while we're having a talk with your old friend."
With the van pulled over, motor rumbling in idle on the shoulder of the road, Marjorie twisted about to access the doors at the back of the passenger van. She didn't exit it yet, no no. She would wait for Slaughter or Circuit Runner's word.
Law in WarThe Mother answers his prayer in her own way and Jack is unperturbed by the announcement.
Momma's Rule #2: You can't always get what you want.
He leans forward, itching at his wrists under the hooded sweatshirt he has on, itching at arms so hairy as to be a pelt. He looks over to The Right Hand, a woman with some impressive momentum to her career in the Nation, and then past her, out the window. His head bobbles left then right, out the windows of the passenger van and out into the darkness, ears twitching as they first strain to hear in such a form.
And suddenly, the stop twitching, a stillness to his body. His hands stop itching one another, resting at the ready on his sides, and the mountain of a man threatens to become an avalanche.
But is held only at or unleashed on the next words spoken by the Adren in front of him. Though as The Right hand moves toward those rear doors, he does turn again in his seat, ready beside her to spring out and up.
EvaIn the quiet of the Lexus, Calden relays the return text to Éva and the Shadow Lord hums quiet acknowledgment in the back of her throat. The radio is tuned to NPR and it is late enough that they have returned to playing classical music. Baroque tonight, the precise and regimented movement of strings in concert. She is not a keen driver; is careful with her speed, slowing and watchful.
As the van slows, so does the Lexus behind it. They have a few moments to exchange another few words, and Éva conveys very briefly to Calden that Jane Washington is a Guardian in with the city sept. She does not offer any other context for their friendship, but even a brief glance at the history of messages between the numbers will tell Calden that they have lunch at least once a week.
Usually take out.Last week was Thai.
Eva pulls over to the shoulder as well, the brake lights gleam. Her tension is easier to read now, alive and electric in her frame. She leans forward over the steering wheel peering into the darkness. Reaches across the console to open the glove box and pull out a weapon. And a pair of leather flats instead of her heels.
"Tell me you're armed tonight. Do you see anything else?"
[Per + Alertness. Any other lurking shadows?]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (4, 4, 4, 10) ( success x 1 )
l'horreur bien-aimée[Can I get a Per/Alert from Calden as well?]
Calden[percep+alert!]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 6, 7, 8, 9) ( success x 4 )
l'horreur bien-aiméeSam slows the car, and stops it lawfully and safely, pulling onto the shoulder. It idles, and it shakes a little, but none of them hear or feel anything else. The Adren is looking at the roof, as though he could stare through it. Champion of Honor, on the other side of Fern, is tense. The girl snarls at Marjorie, but it's half-hearted. She curls up, knees to her chest, bowing her head and closing her eyes. She wants to weep, but doesn't.
"No," Circuit Runner tells Sam, staring at her phone to wait for another text. Wind on Concrete is wide-eyed, chewing her lower lip, staring out one dark window.
The van rocks gently from impact on the roof. In the Lexus, Eva pulls over, and she just barely catches the rocking of the van that may very well be making everyone inside panic. Calden, however, sees the thing atop it leap off, nimble as the shadow it resembles, and vanish into the brush by the roadside as though it were no more corporeal than wind. And he sees more besides.
l'horreur bien-aiméeOther shadows in the dark.
Coming out of the water of the lake to the east side of the road. Slipping down the hillside from the west. More than three, less than a dozen?
CaldenIn your average rom-com -- the sort that one might watch while bored on a long flight, for example -- one would expect Calden and Eva to tumble hilariously and sappily into romance. The ingredients are perfect: working single mother with something of a History; rugged modern cowboy, a hollywood epitome of individualism and freedom.
Sadly for fans of rom-com, it's not to be. Calden and Eva are leaning into a strange, pleasant little friendship. They meet for dinner, and this time it's not to discuss Business; it's not to discuss What's Going On With The Denver Sept(s). It's just dinner. Where they talk about Ellie, and Ellie's attempts to wrangle horseback riding lessons out of her mother, and Calden's nephews and nieces, and
quite innocently, quite without ulterior motive,
whether or not Calden wants kids of his own someday. (He does.)
Now they're driving back to his car. He parked blocks and blocks away, because -- well; there's some reason, surely. And Eva is giving him a lift, and then she says did you see that, and he says see what but then she sees his head turn, his eyes widen; he saw that.
He texts the contact she names. He has no idea who it is. He gets her gun out of her handbag, and she's hoping he's armed, and he
gives this vague, grim laugh. "I have a rifle in the truck." He's said that before. Didn't she tell him to get a handgun? "I haven't had a chance to buy a semiautomatic yet." His eyes are on the outside, the night and the shadows -- he sits a little straighter suddenly. "There's something out there," he says. "Coming out of the lake."
EvaThe Lexus is now in park and the lights are still on. Calden gets the weapon from her handbag along with the phone and is offering it to her perhaps when she reaches across him and opens the glove box and pulls out another.
She is sufficiently armed for the both of them. There's no recrimination right now except for a faint, exasperated sidelook as she takes back her phone and texts back to Circuit Runner.
[i]Two of us here. Both kin. Armed. Something is coming out of the lake.[/i]
"Check the clip," a moment later to the Fianna. "There's spare ammunition in the glovebox."
l'horreur bien-aiméeAfter that van gives a rock, Slaughter speaks for the first time. His voice sounds ragged and grating, shrill and barking, and the philodoxes in the van can see why he was so quiet before anyone else gets it: Voice of the Jackal. No one has mentioned what he was being punished for, but punished he was.
To Sam first: "Stay." And to Fern, and to the Cliaths and Fosterns: "You all stay."
He moves, leaving his seat, shifting around the front ones to open the side door. He opens it slowly, steps out, and slides it shut again behind him. Through windows they can see it. From the Lexus they can see it: the great Adren growing in his dark suit to crinos, snarling into the darkness to the west side. Circuit Runner's phone dings again and she swings her head around to the east side of the van, looking through the windows. "She says something's coming out of the lake. Shit, rhya --"
Those on the right side of the van see Slaughter's head slam into the window, blood spraying from his opened neck from one end of the van to the other. The spirals set up a howling outside, rousing and horrific, maddening,
delighted,
as the Adren's body is yanked by the ankles into the underbrush.
A half-second later, Eva and Calden see that other shadow rushing from the lake to the van, slamming its hand-paws against the windows on the left side. The face of a black-furred crinos with gleaming eyes grins savagely at those inside, got you now. It curls its paws, nails raking across the glass.
Fern begins to scream.
l'horreur bien-aimée[For reference: all PCs are now aware of at least 1 or more spirals on the right side/west of the van and 1 on the left side/east of the van. Eva and Calden have the best view and can see that there are actually three coming out of the west underbrush who ripped Slaughter's head off and dragged him off, possibly 4. They can also see another one coming from the lake-side toward the van.]
Sam[Slaughter said stay, Sam assumed IN THE VAN, no one said the van had to stay. She will drive them off. Maybe some people get out first, I don't know.]
EvaNo more texting. Éva hits connect and calls Circuit Runner. Gives the Fostern a controlled if slightly breathless description of their circumstances.
"Jane. Three or four to the west. At least one more to the east."
She thumbs off the safety, checks the clip of her own weapon, leaves the line open and the phone synced up through the onboard system. Sounds from the van come through in stereo, the magic of handsfree.
The Right HandSit and stay is the name of the game. The giant Ahroun Adren with the voice of shameful, twisted metal and yipping puppies told them all to stay put. Even with that voice and all of its implications, nobody disobeyed. They all stayed still.
But then, quick as a lick, the Adren was gone, leaving nothing behind but startled spikes of adrenaline and Rage and a splash of his blood on the windows. Then:
Wham!Slam!
The van rocked, and there were crazed eyes and vicious maws pressed up against the glass and staring in. Panic licked throughout the metal walls of the van, and the young Philodox's face steeled. Her eyes were wide and pale, but her hands were still and her voice was clear and steady when she called to the Kinfolk in the driver's seat. "No!" She could see that Sam was reaching for the gear shift once she regained her bearings.
"Slaughter-rhya might live. There's as many of us as there is of them."
She glanced hurriedly between their captive training-wheels Spiral and the Fostern in the car, then grabbed hold of the handles of the back door of the van and chirped in a voice that was oddly whimsy, even in these circumstances, but difficult to dismiss none the less. "We all ready?"
The Right Hand[Oh! Also: Spending one point of WP for Resist Pain somewhere in this mix.]
CaldenCalden's a guy who grew up around guns and trucks and various pieces of heavy machinery. All the same, he's a little hesitant with the handgun. Isn't used to its compactness, its balance -- its unadulteratedly homicidal intent. Every gun's made to kill, but these are made to kill people. There's a difference.
Nevertheless: he ratchets the slide, chambers the first round. And palms the spare clip too. "Are we just -- "
-- it happens so fast Calden doesn't have time to react beyond a sucked-in breath, a under-the-breath fuck! Someone gets out of the van, someone grows into Crinos, someone gets yanked into the undergrowth and something comes slamming out of the darkness.
"What did your friend say?" He's nearly barking at Eva. "Are we supposed to just sit here or should I start shooting?" He has a finger jammed on the window's down button; the window is coming down. "I'm gonna start shooting in about three seconds unless I hear differently."
Law in WarThe whining of the door opening, mechanical and crisp, cuts the silence where only breath and Circuit Runner's voice had before. His ears twitch again, angrily, and the door slams shut. Again he is silent. Quiet.
Maybe he even smells the blood before he sees it, the tiny particles that taint the air, harbingers of the spray, through the cracks of the door and the window. Jack had felt so cramped and so trapped in the van, and as Slaughter's lifeblood vandalizes its side, the solemn quiet of his form all fades away.
In the same moment, a beast overtakes one window of the car, threatening and menacing, taunting along with the anthem of sickly entertained howls that fill the night.
"Too ready," his answer to the other Bone Gnawer, the other Philodox.
And in that moment, Jack becomes something else. A brute of a Hispo, roiling muscles that heap onto one another in unsightly mass and strength, fills what room is in that backseat as The Right Hand readies herself near the back door.
And its head crashes out of that side window, where its fingers and hands had been scratching the glass, trying to grab the black-furred Crinos' arm and rip and tear it into the van, like what had been a trap is now truly sprung, but on their attackers.
Law in War[ Oh. Resist Pain. Yeah. That too. Specialties: Brawl (Biting) and Strength (Limb-from-Limb). ]
Sam[Sam hesitates before driving clear away, especially since someone turned hispo and is trying to drag in a Spiral, but she'd look to the closest fostern for direction.]
l'horreur bien-aiméeNo more texting. And Circuit Runner doesn't pick up. She and Champion of Honor are now the highest-ranked in the van, and her rage is only eclipsed by that of the cub they're escorting. In a snap, Jane has taken over the van. Sam slams on the gas and Circuit Runner doesn't stop her. Marjorie yells No! and Circuit Runner, already in glabro, says roughly: "We'll jump. Keep driving!"
The spirals, hotblooded and eager for murder, howl in joy for the chase and start to barrel after them down the road, their bodies eating ground. Jack, who smashed his head through a window, nearly gets it cut off with the jolt forward of the van and the grabbing hands of the spiral. At least they are moving away from Eva and Calden, who -- at least so far -- the spirals seem to have no interest in, guns or not. At least now they can make out the exact number: five spirals, chasing down the van.
"Stay with the kin and the cub," Circuit Runner tells Champion of Honor and Wind on Concrete. But all of this is happening quickly, snapping from voice to voice, as the van is picking up speed. "The rest of you with me," and a second later, to Marjorie whose hands are on the rear doors. "Now!"
SamSam reached for the gearshift, and she grabbed it, jerked it into drive, but she paused when a commanding voice from the back said No! She paused and she looked over at the other wolves, twisting if she had to in order to see the others, the ranked ones who were left.
We'll jump is all Sam needed to hear. A shadow looms on her side of the van, claws scrape, and she's slamming her foot on the gas, tires spitting loose rock and dirt from the shoulder as she fights to get the vehicle back onto the road.
CaldenNo answer on the cell phone. Maybe no texting either. Calden's leaning out the window, bracing his gun hand with the other, but before he pulls the trigger something occurs to him and he turns his head --
"Are you better at shooting or driving?"
Shooting, it turns out. So he reaches under his seat, pulls the lever, slides the seat back as far as it'll go. "Switch with me," he says. "You shoot, I'll run those bastards over."
The Right HandLet's nevermind that initial bit about Slaughter possibly still living. It was clear that this wasn't a possibility.
However, there was plenty of life left in that van, including the Girl That Was Their Mission and a Kinfolk-- both things that had to be protected, valuable in their own special ways. The Fostern Circuit Runner took over, shouting orders, and being well aware of Rank Marjorie relented and did not protest when the van took off driving.
Rabid Jack had gone Hispo, effectively cramping up his still-Homid sister (both of Moon and Tribe), and when the van lurched forward and his weight rocked back she made a noise of protest when his back leg bumped heavily into her flank. No harm, though, and no foul.
They would jump, it was decided. Two would stay with the Kin and Fern, and the others-- Jack, Jane, and Marj, would fly into battle.
We're outnumbered, murmured a voice in her head. It was shushed, and when the 'Go!' was shouted Marjorie threw the doors open and launched out the back, form blurring in a split second from Girl to Monster.
[Spending 1 Rage to snapshift to Crinos]
Law in WarJack's jaws close on air and snaps back in whiplash a moment later as the car lurches then sprints forward. He yelps and growls again, then pulls his head back into the car and turns toward where Marjorie has been ordered to open the door.
As soon as they fling open he launches himself out and upon the closest Black Spiral Dancer, jaws snapping and tearing at his throat, once, twice, three times. If it's the one he missed before? All the better. This Bone Gnawer holds a grudge.
[ Splitting for a bunch of bites. ]
Eva"Fuck." This will be the first time Calden has ever heard Eva curse. She does it beneath her breath. "She's not picking up."
She gives Calden a sharp and weaving look; takes in perhaps the way he is holding the handgun. Reaches across her body to undo her seatbelt and then lift herself up over the console. She is fit because she works to keep herself so: every morning at five a.m. she is out running.
"You drive. I'll shoot."
They exchange places.
"We're going to make ourselves a target. See that you keep us moving. There's a kin in the van and we're supposed to stay back in case she needs extraction."
Her jaw tightens, Eva is not wholly in her right mind about this, here, tonight.
"But if you can, try to hit one of those bastards."
[Shooting the fuck out of one of the Spirals while Calden takes over driving.]
l'horreur bien-aiméeThe van roars and jerks forward. And Champion of Honor is, in his mind, yelling at Circuit Runner the exact thing that Marjorie is thinking. They're outnumbered. Against spirals who nearly destroyed the entire sept. He's calling for every Guardian he can at the same time, but the man himself is silent. He won't undermine the pack-sister who outranks him in battle situations, and he won't leave the kin alone with just a Cliath Ragabash and a fucked-up cub.
The rear doors fly open. Two crinos and one hispo fly out of the back, hitting the dusty, drought-ridden road, catching the spirals between a Lexus with two firearm-wielding kin inside and three angry garou, one of whom launches himself instantly at the first spiral to come close enough. Circuit Runner tries to shout at him to warn him, but
the spiral cackles, shrill and yipping, as it whips its head around and douses Jack with a burst of green fire from its maw, fire that comes out almost liquid and erupts across his face, his ruff, catches on his fur and sets him alight. That spiral keeps running, but the next one catches a sharp bite on the leg from the Bone Gnawer, a twisting, snapping bite that nearly breaks through bone. That one pauses, whirls on him, and takes another bite to the foreleg. With a roar, it backhands Jack, burning or not, and sends him skidding several feet down the road from the impact.
The spiral who breathed fire, and the spiral who bit Jack, simply resume running after the van.
--
Circuit Runner and The Right Hand have their own problems. Of the five chasing the van, one has decided to stop and tangle with them. It is a tall, gaunt, long-limbed creature that holds them both off, clawing, leaving raking marks as good as it gets. They can't seem to get a grip, with tooth or claw, no matter how much the two of them, both leaders, fall in together to tear it apart. It laughs at them. It yanks at their fur with fists, pulls it out in fistfulls, taunting.
--
The Lexus snarls down the road after the van, after the spirals, its engine a work of art. So, too, in their way, are the occupants: Eva leans out of the passenger side, leveling her firearm. Three rounds bark out of the end of the semi-automatic, skimming the fifth spiral to chase the van. It yelps through the night air, whirls around,
and gets slammed into by the car with a hard thud into its midsection.
--
Sam has darkness ahead of her. Where the hell is she going to go? She can't drive into Littleton tailing spirals. Fern behind her is rocking, keening, screaming occasionally until Wind on Concrete holds her hand down over her mouth just to shut her up.
A man appears in their headlights. His frame is strong, almost regally so. His hair is black as a shadow. His eyes are sunken and hooded, his face wearing a stoic and yet eager smirk. And when the van comes hurtling toward him, faster now that it's missing more than half the weight it was carrying before, he simply thrusts out his hand, grabs the grill when the van collides with him,
and stops it. The wheels spin in midair as he grins, pushing it backward. He looks
so hungry.
l'horreur bien-aimée[Jack is at -2 and on fire. Marjorie is at -1.]
l'horreur bien-aimée[Aggravated. Cuz fire and Spiral claws.]
The Right HandThey all three fall out of the back of the van together, and collide with the pack of Black Spiral Dancers that were going precisely the opposite way. The Right Hand's wolfborn brother was all jaws and teeth, snapping and tearing at anything that got near enough for him to reach. One Spiral belched green flame at him, but he kept on going, putting teeth into another Spiral that sailed by to try and persue the van.
Marjorie and Circuit Runner paired up against one of the Corrupt that had stopped to fight. But no matter how they struggled and tried and attempted to flank, the damn thing wouldn't keep still long enough for either of them to get a hold. Its claws would rake past them, pull out fur and taunt and tease.
The Right Hand, a tall and lanky creature that was as strong as any other Crinos ought to be, but more long and clean of limb than bulked up with muscle, grew frustrated. She gnashed her teeth and flashed her claws right back at the fiend, and pale eyes against mottled brown-tan-gray fur cut toward the van-- just in time to see it very suddenly stop.
There's a roar from the teenaged Half-Moon, a warning to the other two. Don't fight here-- defend the van. The Spirals were all persuing it anyways. That's where the fight was happening, and that's where they needed to be.
So, with much hope and faith going into her extended reach in this form, Marjorie slashed one set of claws toward the Spiral that she and the Fostern were fighting, up toward his face and eyes. This was followed up by her throwing her weight directly at it, trying to shoulder it to the ground, out of her way. If it dodged and sent her sailing past-- that was just fine too. She'd use the momentum to lope up the road on all fours, sprinting full tilt toward the van.
EvaEva breathes out hard and fast and adrenaline punches through the whirring movement of the night. She knows how fast Garou can move; she remembers the burn of rage in the summer night but it has been months it has been seasons since she felt anything light this. The air around them seethes with movement but there is this: Black Spiral Dancer on the hood of the car. She shifts forward in the seat and changes her aim from the side view to the front. Lets loose another three round burst, mentally counting the bullets let in the clip, and takes in the van ahead slowing, brake lights not on and no; it is moving backwards.
There is not enough space in her mind for all of this information. She does not cut through time and space the way they do.
But she is suddenly, starkly furious.
"Back up and run it over again."
Law in WarJack yelps again as he is knocked around like a pup, a pup that is still alight with the baleful fire, but as he skids across the road he tucks his legs into his belly and actually rolls along with the momentum that slap gives him, tumbling from flank to back to flank in an attempt to put out the fire. His nose fills with the smell of burning hair and flesh, trying to put it out, and when he finally grind to a halt regains his footing and begins tearing after the Black Spiral Dancers.
He does not stalk, but tries to keep his paws light as they hit pavement, this time attacking and maintaining a vicious offensive from the rear, if he overtakes one of the Spiral Dancers in the faster Hispo form, trying to not allow another frontal spit of fire.
[ Spending two rage. Try to put out the fire. Run after him. Bite from behind. ]
[ Activating Resist Toxin. ]
CaldenIn the movies you can run the bad guys over with impunity. Not so in real life. There's something called physics; laws of momentum and inelastic collisions. A Black Spiral Dancer in warform has mass, has weight. So does a nice, couple-year-old Lexus sedan. A little boring, maybe, but very Shadow Lord lawyer.
That sedan mows into the yelping, whirling, shot Spiral. The collision knocks the bumper askew, buckles those collapse-zones in the fenders and the hood. Dissipates the energy so that the passengers don't take the brunt of it, but frankly:
Eva's car is going to need some serious body work after this.
Not that Calden's done. The Spiral's sort of stuck there, grotesque, legs scrabbling and dragging on asphalt; damage it doesn't even seem to feel. It's clawing up the hood. It's trying to claw its way up the hood, and by the time Eva says what she does
her partner in crime is already slamming on the brakes. Throwing the car into reverse -- a short, choppy snarl of the transmission, a hard jolt when he pushes it straight back into forward. Not Drive this time. First gear. More torque. He steps on the gas. Again.
SamSam is busy trying to think of a route that will get them to the sept - or at the very least merely away from the Spirals - when the figure appears in her headlights. Too late, she tries to maneuver out of the way. Too late, she throws the steering wheel to the side. She's no expert at getaways, and it's a van, not the most nimble of vehicles in the best of times. And this, this is hardly the best of times.
And so another kin adds a quiet expletive to the air of the evening. There's nothing to do but brace for impact. Luckily, this van has air bags. Sam gets thrown forward into one, thrown against the restrictive strap of the seatbelt. Something slams into the back of her seat, Fern or one of the other Garou behind her.
Sam sits up, pushes her hair back from her face. She allows herself to feel groggy for only a second, then she's unhooking her seatbelt with one hand, grabbing up her bag in the other. Then it's back into the back of the van, where she grabs one of Fern's hands.
"Can you get this off her?" she asks, indicating one of the silver cuffs. "Just one."
l'horreur bien-aiméeMarjorie is the first to see it -- or if not the first to see it, the first to voice it. The spirals don't give a fuck about them. They're after the van. And she yells it, shouting, roaring at the others that they need to get back to the van, first and foremost. Marjorie's shout is punctuated, suddenly, but a blast from Eva's firearm right at the spiral being dragged along in front of her car. The spiral that takes the bullet in the shoulder, is jerked back, then just roars at her, clawing up the hood.
It's smart.
It just opens the hood up, splitting the steel like it's cheese. Calden is already slamming on the breaks, jerking them into reverse, but the spiral's claws are already latched into the metal and the reverse motion only drags those claws through it further. The spiral then gives forth a roar of the same green fire that its brother released on Jack. The engine of the Lexus is not long for this world, as liquid-venom flame curls through its innards.
Calden slams the car forward again, right into the spiral, who sees it coming this time. It jumps atop the hood, grinning at them through the windshield, blood dripping from its legs and its shoulder. It puts a bloody, enormous paw on the glass, like a lover reaching through the window at a prison. Flames rise all around it, not seeming to touch the spiral even as they devour the engine.
--
Marjorie claws upward on the spiral between herself and Circuit Runner, even as Circuit Runner is biting at the spiral's hamstring. And in a burst of frustration, the spiral whips around, blood dripping from its face, and grabs Circuit Runner by the back of the throat. In one solid motion, it swings her off the ground, crinos or not, and throws her god knows how many feet. Marjorie slams into it as Circuit Runner goes flying, hitting the ground with force that would shatter human bone. The spiral wheels on her, faces her, muzzle to muzzle, and fast as lightning, reaches under her and grabs her stomach.
With its claws. They dig in, though she feels none of the pain. She does feel her blood leaving her. She feels the claws closing, tightening, while the spiral's breath rushes over her face. It lifts her. Throws her, too, and she hits the ground near the road, several feet from where she wanted to be, but closer to Eva and Calden's location. And the water.
--
Jack knew when he was only a wolf that fire is a great danger brought on by lightning and humanity. After his change, after his mind began to adapt, he learned other things. You can put fires out. Dust, for example, does a wonderful job, and though the green flames he was doused in are harder to put out than natural fire, it does eventually work. His flesh is raw and bleeding and coated with dust, but he scrambles to his feet again and starts tearing down the road at the enemy. He leaps again, grabbing the spiral who breathed fire at him and yanking on its rear leg, tearing it open. The spiral yelps, even as its brothers and sisters are running, running, coming after Sam and the cub and the two garou with her.
"SHIT!" Champion of Honor yelled, when the van was halted. "SHIT." Sam is getting out of her seatbelt, grabbing at Fern, and the garou look at her like she's insane.
"Are you insane?" Wind on Concrete actually asks, right as one of the spirals catches up to them and slams their hand through the broken glass left by Jack and grabs her by the hair. Glass slices open the Ragabash as she's hauled out, even as she's shifting. There is nothing to be done for her. There are two spirals on her, so much older and so much stronger than she is, and they are tearing her limbs, they are opening her belly, they are eating her and she is screaming and Champion of Honor is red-eyed, his body is erupting into crinos, and he is frenzying, leaping out, opening the side of van with his claws, going at the spirals as though he has a chance. Fern covers her face with her hands, and screams
and screams.
--
Their Alpha holds the van in place. He watches the chaos. His expression never changes. His strength never wavers.
Inside the van, where Sam is stuck with a shrieking cub, she hears his voice thoug his lips seen through the windshield never move.
Fern. Fern, shh. Shh, my darling. We forgive you.
l'horreur bien-aimée[Jack has another -1 due to fire while he puts it out. Marjorie takes -3 and then some *handwave* bashing. The Lexus's engine is on fire and has a spiral sitting on the hood.]
Calden"Fuck!"
So Calden's heard Eva curse once. She's heard him curse -- well; not all that many times. But more than once tonight alone, at least, and with vehemence and verve that speaks of plenty of practice when not in mixed company. Maybe she can forgive him: there is, after all,
A SPIRAL ON THE HOOD.
Which he tries to deal with the way anyone instinctively would: by accelerating -- the engine screaming as its metal begins to melt, as its pistons drive against ever-softening cylinders -- and by twisting the wheel, lashing the car back and forth, laying down long arcing peels of rubber.
"Stay in the car!" he yells. The tires are screeching; his knuckles are white, wrenching the steering wheel to and fro. "Don't go out there, he'll tear you apart!"
The Right HandMarjorie was a Half-Moon. A judge, a leader, an interpreter of Great Laws and rising voice of her people. This did not make her a warrior, not necessarily. All Garou fight, of course, they were built for it. But Marjorie didn't have the same battle-lust that the more martial tribes of the Nation possessed. She didn't feel the same ripping thrill of battle.
What she did possess, though, was a profound sense of Duty.
This, not battle lust, is what has her black lips curled back and teeth snapping at the Spiral even as its hand pierced her abdomen and wrenched at her guts. She felt a ripple of numb go through her lower half, felt the hot rush of blood flooding down her legs and pooling at her toes, but it did not slow her. The Spirits taught her to ignore pain and injury beyond any reasonable, natural level. So while this should send her into shock, she instead is raking teeth at the Spiral's muzzle before she goes flying through the air and thumps heavily on the pavement, wrenching her shoulder but not breaking anything.
There's a car with a Spiral on its hood, and both are engulfed in toxic green flames. There's a woman hanging out the passenger window, shooting a handgun of some sort.
But then there's the van, and another Garou dead, and a third asking for death by blindly hacking and slashing and biting and frothing his way through the beasts that killed his Family and surrounded the van.
Screams. Gunshots. A car on fire whirling its way haphazardly up the road.
Marjorie pressed one palm flat against her belly, covering the hole left behind and making sure that nothing would try and fall out, and rolled herself back up onto her feet, once again loping her way on legs and one remaining hand toward the van.
[Intent: Dive INTO the van, through the back doors. If possible. Hail Mary!]
Law in WarJack can hear things, can hear through the chaos. The chirping of crickets, the wind through the grass and the trees, the sound of small pieces of dirt and pebbles lodged in his mottled hair shaking loose and skipping across the paved road, the shouting in the High Tongue from another Half-Moon over it all, and even pick out the words of that man, whoever he is, cooing to the cub within.
And he is on Marjorie's tail as she runs, the bite only a moment's hamstringing, as he turns and leaps past and forward, all his might in reaching that van and getting through it to Fern. Shouldering, snapping, and then, those jaws open, seeking where her head meets her neck in that curled up ball she has become.
Ready, in the next moment, if he can get to her, to end her. To end her misery and deny the pack what they seek.
Law in War[ Spending two rage for three actions. He'll still have one left for the next turn. ]
EvaThe curse Eva breathes out this time is neither audible nor understandable to Calden. In truth, she herself knows the sparest meaning to it. The language is old and not Slavic and she heard it from her father's mouth the day he was arrested for treason.
She was nine.
She grits her teeth against it, gives Calden a sideglance and a sharp note of direction. "I'm not going anywhere. Drive for the lake." They are, after all, on fire.
She does not exit the Lexus, but leans out the window and steadies herself. Remembers the last time she saw Andraj's body, lashed to the earth and decomposing. The skin eaten through, the white bone of his jaw, the roots of his teeth visible.
One more three round burst. Called shot to the spiral's head.
Then she's changing the clip and readying herself for the next burst.
SamShe'd just wanted the one, not to unleash the girl completely, just one bit of silver to maximize her chances of survival. But then the Ragabash is being dragged out of the van and her brother is frenzying after her. So there went that idea.
They leave Sam alone. Outside is death. Inside is, well, probably more death. The bantam Glass Walker looks around, thinking thinking, trying to think of some way to get out of this alive, her heart sinking as no solution comes to her, and breaking as the screams go on and on and on.
Sitting next to Fern in the middle seat, Sam puts her arms around her and, unless the cub struggles or pushes at her, she pulls her close. Runs her fingers through the girl's hair. And she whispers to her in a voice full of all the empathy, all the kindness she can muster. Even though it's all her fault the others have died, are dying, will probably die.
Shh she hears, and she looks out the window to where the man stands, the man who stopped the van - in homid - with one hand. Sam sees that man, and she assumes she's looking at her death already.
[all the empathy on Fern to calm her down.]
l'horreur bien-aimée[eva]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (3) ( fail )
l'horreur bien-aimée[marjorie]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (10) ( success x 1 )
l'horreur bien-aimée[jack]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (5) ( fail )
l'horreur bien-aimée[calden]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (3) ( fail )
l'horreur bien-aimée[sam]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (3) ( fail )
l'horreur bien-aiméeThe Lexus is not long for this world. But what time it has left, Calden makes the best use he can out of. He tries to whip that spiral off, and the spiral laughs. If it were weaker, if it were merely an animal, it would thump the glass again and again and again to break it. As it is, it breaks it with claws, grabs hold, holds on despite shattered glass digging into its palm. Blood rolls down the interior. Glass breaks over the kinfolk. And the spiral's laughter fills their ears, as though it feels no pain at all. As though it never could.
Eva sees him, but
her mind sees Andraj.
Her finger squeezes the trigger, aiming at the spiral's skull. One of the rounds catches; the other are sent flying as Calden whips the car as best he can. There's a yelp, shrill as a hyena's shriek, as the spiral leaps over the top of the Lexus suddenly, letting go. And yet: it does not bleed fear into the air. If they can sense anything but their own need for survival, they can sense enough of this shit as the spiral finally leaves them be.
--
If the spiral who threw Circuit Runner aside and dug into Marjorie's belly had not let her go, she would never have children. She would never see tomorrow, or the end of this night, but meet an endless one with no moon in the sky until she found her way to the homelands.
Her palm pushes to her belly. No entrails are hanging out. Blood pours, though, the wound sucking and deteriorating. She rolls to her feet. She pushes herself up. She uses three limbs instead of four and goes on. It is what the philodox do. It is what children of Rat do. It is what she does.
As with her tribe-brother, there are multiple spirals between her and her goal, but they are swarming toward the food that Wind on Concrete has become, the playtime that Champion of Honor now is. They are certainly enjoying fighting with him, batting him between themselves as two, then three, then four spirals meet at the van that a fight is holding back... still, and then no more, as Sam has given up trying to drive it, as no gas goes toward the engine. He takes his hand off the grill. He brushes his hands off, palms smacking and skimming across palms, and begins to slowly stride around the van to the other side, to the passenger side.
--
Jack has decided to run through the spirals. He and Marjorie are headed for the same place, soon running alongside one another, but with a sudden push of her hind legs, it is Marjorie who soars through the air in one solid leap, through the half-open back, tearing doors from their hinges if necessary and landing inside the van, grabbing a hold of the cushions. She sees Fern, nearly catatonic with horror and conflict, sobbing, while the kinfolk moves back to, if nothing else, find some company in her death. To do something worthwhile, something good, something decent, with her last moments. Because that's who she is. Ultimately, the wry, sometimes-snarky, roll-with-the-punches kinswoman is one of the few good-hearted people in the world. It isn't about warmth or softness or sentimentality. Her brand of goodness is pragmatic. But it is also pure. She wraps her arms around Fern, who lets out a heavy sob and leans into the embrace, shaking horribly against the much shorter woman.
Marjorie sees Sam stroking Fern's hair. And Marjorie, now, too, can hear the voice of the Alpha. Jack, a few steps if anything behind Marjorie, gets to the van but not through the back doors. He does not go unnoticed. One of the spirals, holding a piece of Wind on Concrete's spine in her jaws, drops it from her maw when she catches sight of him and, as fast as any of the spirals have moved tonight, slams into him and takes him to the ground. She spits the dead Ragabash's blood into his face, pinning him. Rage surges up in him, though, and he throws her off only to have her slam into his side, this time not pinning him but raking claws down his back, pulling off patches of already-charred fur.
Marjorie sees that, too. Jack is going to be murdered behind her. Perhaps Champion of Honor beside her, and Sam and the girl before her.
The voice resounds inside the van again: Interesting that they had to break your spirit before they would give you comfort. We only ever reveled in your strength, child. We watched you with pride. We did not have to make you weep in order to care for you.
Fern chokes on a sob, trying with bolted hands to shut her ears, block him out. She can't. The side of the van rocks as the spirals grip Champion of Honor's limbs and hold him to the side. They don't kill him. They hold him there, while he foams at the mouth. Through the window, Sam can see him tossing his head, see the frenzy holding onto him while the spirals restrain him. Almost like packmates would.
"Make him stop," Fern is whimpering, begging, pleading, as though Sam could do anything. "Please make him stop."
--
The side door of the van opens. Marjorie at the back. The black-haired man at the side, with only Sam between him and Fern. He smiles at her.
l'horreur bien-aimée[Calden and Eva have some very minor scratches from breaking glass and some bashing from all the car's whipping around. Jack takes -3.]
The Right HandWe should have known.
This is all that Marjorie can think as she regains her bearings. She had pushed with mighty wire-muscled legs from the pavement and cut past the circle of Spirals munching on one fallen comrade and merely playing with the Frenzied Fianna. Through the grace of Gaia she somehow made her jump into the back of the van, and landed with a 'thump!' in the space at the very back of the long vehicle.
She scrambled about, splashing blood on the floor and walls and scratching claws against the interior as she righted herself. Sam and Fern didn't know much of what she looked like in Crinos, but given the healthy fluff of gray/brown fur and the lack of joy or madness on her face, it could be easily assumed that she was Gaian.
As she righted herself, the front of the van was released and the black-haired leader, whose name she still remembered from the first time these attacks happened, walked calmly to the passenger side of the vehicle. Light hazel eyes jumped about, from Fern and Sam to the sliding passenger door to the lack of the door on her left.
In a split second, as the passenger door was still sliding open, Marjorie pushed her bulk through the van, up past the seats, and wrapped both girls up in her arms. With another push of legs that were slick with blood but ignored the reason why, she was launching herself out the hole in the driver's side of the van and making to escape with both Precious Commodities.
Law in WarFor a moment Jack is given pause by not the pain, but the lack of function inflicted to his form. He knows what that means. Can feel the leaking of blood, the wet feeling on his legs running down to his paws, from where arteries had been seared shut by fire and are now again erupting the liquid, the necrosis setting in elsewhere as skin sloughs off in the woman's claws.
He knows what this all means. He knows it means he is near his end, near death, as he had been only nights before. He can hear Fern sobbing, that is something he can hear above the joyous hyena's laughter from the pack of bastards, the roars of frenzy, the solace Sam tries to impart.
And he takes his life in his own claws, his own fangs, his own muscles that have so long served him to again, The Right Hand takes up treasures.
And the left? The ugly left, the animal left, the other side of a coin or the side of the tree where moss grows. That is Jack. The left puts itself out, willing to be cut off in sacrifice, to block The Right Hand's path of retreat.
"Go!"
"Run!"
"NOW!"
Teeth bared, jaws wide and fat, jowls punched and the bulldog folds of fur that hang beneath trembling with a growl as he roars at the ready.
And any who come after The Right Hand? Must get those teeth if they wish, and his life if they want to follow.
Law in War[ Spending all the rage and all the willpower. Last ditch effort, full stop. ]
SamSam doesn't stop, doesn't let go of the girl whose face is a ruin of fear, her voice ragged from screaming. She just holds her, rocking a little with her, her hand moving over the girl's hair. It's something her mother used to do for her when the nightmares came, after Henry's Change. Sometimes she woke up just like this, screaming and crying and being rocked with no memory of her mother coming into her room. Maybe that's what started her on her own path of empathy.
"Shhh," she says, when Fern asks her to make it stop, make him stop, like she she could do that. And maybe she would try. She's already turning toward the monster in a human skin, the man standing at the side of the van, the man whose voice keeps sliding into her mind like an oil spill. She's looking at him and she's gathering all of her not-inconsiderable willpower for her last words to be something defiant.
Stop it, you're scaring her she wants to say, but then the van is shaking with the weight of a Crinos wolf. Sam doesn't take her eyes off the man, not until she has to, when she finds herself and Fern in a pair of powerful, furry arms.
Then all she can do is make herself less of a burden on their savior. She curls herself around Fern as best she can, to make them one thing to be carried and not two bodies.
CaldenThat windshield was supposed to be shatterproof. It's supposed to fracture into a complex web of cracks, but never actually burst apart. But then, it was never supposed to withstand an attack like this.
The Spiral reaches back. It punches through. It claws the hole wider and wider. There's blood running between its fingers and down the glass, condensation forming around every livid streak.
That's when Calden stops trying to throw it off. Fuck the lake, fuck the trees, fuck whatever he might have tried next: that's when he slams the brakes. That's when the bumper falls off the front, when the hood caves entirely, when the engine block melts through its moorings and drops with a kaKLUNK on the asphalt. The car dies. Not their guns, though. Not the one in Eva's hand, and not the one Calden snatches up from wherever he'd tossed it, grabs up so roughly that they're lucky it doesn't discharge before he's even pointed it. There's a monster leering through the windshield, and Calden doesn't have a mate to think of, dead or otherwise, but
he does have a father, brothers, friends. It's in their name or for their sake or for the sake of their inevitable grief that he opens fire, hopelessly and furiously, not aiming, bellowing, wordless, open-throated. The sound is lost beneath the report of the semiautomatic until the chamber runs empty. The trigger clicks-clicks-clicks. Then it's just Calden roaring in the face of his death, an instant away from hurling that empty gun at the Spiral because he has no other weapon left.
Except
it's not the face of his death after all. He and Eva aren't even worth the time it would take to kill them, in the end. The Spiral laughs at them. And then it simply vaults over the ruined car -- smacks a dent in the roof as it goes across the top -- runs for the van that was its target all along.
Leaves Calden behind, panting, wild-eyed, teeth bared. The emptied gun clutched in his right hand, blood -- his own, or maybe the Dancer's -- bright across his knuckles, his forearms. His shoulders move with the effort it takes the breath. He whips around to watch the Spiral go, and then
he turns to look at Eva. He looks shellshocked.
EvaThe impact throws her strongly back against the leather seat and the glass is shattered and the night is coruscant with green flames and Eva has a fresh clip and she's opening fire, flat-out like Calden, until there is nothing left.
Then:
The Lexus is dead. The Spiral is gone. Glass is shattered all over her; cuts on her face, blood on her mouth and more on her hands. Does not really see the Spiral leap off the Lexus but feels the car rock with its moving weight and Calden is shell-shocked but Eva is in fucking motion.
Two more clips from the glovebox; her phone from its cradle.
The car's on fire and Calden's staring at her, shell-shocked.
"Get out. We have to run."
She is in fucking motion, already opening the door, climbing out into the cold night air, finding a number on the phone and hitting it. Not Circuit Runner. The Cold Crescent's version of 911. Someone somewhere will have to come and recover their bodies, and they can triangulate from this signal if they have not already had a similar signal from the van.
Eva does not say any prayers because she does not know and believe in Gaia the way the Garou do. She knows and believes in Garou, perhaps, but only sometimes. What she says, under her breath, are three names. Again and again and again the whole time she's in motion.
Outside she slams one more clip into the fucking semi-automatic handgun. There will be no more after this. It is the last she had.
If the Fianna is still sitting there she circles to his side and pulls him out of the Lexus. If he can move, she gives him the other remaining clip. That will be the last he has.
She does not believe they will live.
Turns in a swinging movement and stares at the scene around the van. Sees the not-yet-dead Garou strung up on its side, and considers the distance and considers the shot and is shaking inside but raises her weapon from this distance and gauges the moment.
She looks like she is going to try to put Champion of Honor out of his misery before she starts running.
"I'll save a bullet for you."
She tells Calden, before she opens fire.
"Save one for me."
l'horreur bien-aiméeDice: 1 d10 TN6 (6) ( success x 1 )
l'horreur bien-aiméeThe Alpha of the spirals opens the door. There is his prey, his darling, his cub. Like the others, he seems to have minimal interest in Sam Evans, or any of the kin. In fact, he barely even seems to notice Marjorie. Marjorie is not, after all, in his way yet.
Slaughter was. And Slaughter is dead.
Circuit Runner was. And she is lying somewhere, perhaps broken, perhaps dying.
Wind on Concrete was. And she is in pieces.
Champion of Honor was. And for some reason, they are not killing him.
Yet.
--
The Right Hand lets go of her midsection, bleeding still, and gathers up the tall, thin cub and the petite kinfolk in her arms. She holds them close and leaps from the van, away from the black-haired spiral, right into the eager hands of the others. She does not see it, but the Alpha behind her is no longer smiling. His eyes darken with hatred, bitter hatred. His pack turns on her.
And Law in War is there. Between his tribemate and the spirals, between kin and cub and death. He roars, fur bristling up his back, and he dares them to go after her. He dares them.
They, holding Champion of Honor to the side of the van as he spends all his rage trying to fight them off, look from Champion to Law to Alpha.
Their Alpha glances at the philodox they're holding, then simply gives a sharp nod. He slams the sliding side door shut, and one -- not four, one -- of the spirals holding Champion of Honor turns on Jack, grinning ear to ear, licking its maw.
"Fire fire fire fire fire," it snarls, taunting him, stalking toward him.
Jack leaps, all teeth and rage. The spiral catches him, and they tangle.
--
Calden lowers his arm. He is shocked. He has a tremor suddenly, like a feverish chill taking over his entire body. It passes. It has to pass. He's not dead. He's not dead. Eva isn't dead. Eva is getting out of the fucking car, calling the sept, and there is noise on the other end, loud and frantic, someone yelling
WE'RE ON OUR WAY
to a phone she isn't holding to her ear anyway. And they are. Circuit Runner and Champion of Honor were calling them. Wind on Concrete's last thought was calling to them, her packmates, the guardians, come. please come.
Eva is possessed. By memory, by grief, by the sight of what is happening before her: metal torn to shrapnel, coiling green flames behind her and ahead of her, a headless body here, a torn-apart one there, a bleeding crinos trying to escape with a cub and a kinfolk. This is chaos. This is war. And no matter what the generals say, there is no order to it. There is no grace, and no honor, in this.
There is precious little hope.
Champion of Honor can't hear anyone, see anyone. He can't hear anything; his mind is awash in frenzy still, red and white and black all over. He jerks against the side of the van, howling in sorrow. There are few humans anywhere near to hear it, but those who do will be haunted by that sound.
--
The Alpha is climbing into the driver's seat of the van. Which makes no sense, until the pack starts to drag Champion of Honor into the van. All but one of them, who is fighting with Jack, tearing at him with fangs and claws, threatening him with licks of fire. And Jack is dodging, Jack is biting back, but Jack is
about to die.
Eva lifts her firearm, and so does Calden. At once, the two kinfolk open fire on Jack's assailant, letting go every last bullet they have (but two). It shrieks, yelps, while its brothers and sisters are clambering into a van, cackling and dragging not a cub, but a fostern, in with them. No one is chasing Marjorie now. She goes to the side of the road, past the burning Lexus, clinging to Sam and Fern, now soaked with Marjorie's blood. She finds Circuit Runner there, unconscious and in homid but alive. Barely. Bones stick through flesh here and there. She breathes raggedly, but she lives.
As do Sam and Fern. Because of Marjorie.
And Jack.
Jack, who
they all watch die.
--
This is how it is: you do not go toward the light. The light comes toward you, and it is green. Bullets are slamming into the spiral in front of him from behind, from the kin who are still fighting, who will always be fighting because they were born to it. The spiral opens its maw and tries to kill him, and it works. Green fire erupts around him, engulfs him, surrounds him. Its warmth is like a fever, and it is the last thing he knows.
That is, until he feels a swarm of rats climbing around him. Not to feed, not to nip at dying flesh. They just gather around him, as though to keep him company, as though to let him know he's not alone. They can't be real. There can't be that many rats out here.
So, Jack knows, he must be dead.
--
The light from Jack's death illuminates the whole area. Five spirals suddenly drive away, carrying Champion of Honor with them, as though he was the target all along. One spiral remains behind, throwing Jack's burning body to the ground. It wheels on the kin, who run out of bullets. And -- bizarrely -- it gives them the finger. With both hand-paws, defiant and -- if anything -- annoyed.
But before they can reload, something changes in the air. The water itself begins to whip upward in a torrent, a whirlwind of spiritual energy lifting it upward. The last spiral, abandoned by his pack, sees it coming toward him and bolts, going down on all fours again and running in the direction of the van now speeding away as best it can with some front bumper damage. The whirlwind of water surges out of the lake toward him. It douses the fire burning through Jack's corpse and chases the spiral, but does not catch him. He grabs the back of the van and jumps atop it,
as the calvary arrives. Raspberry Sky commands Water itself, her face a mask of focus beneath a wash of pink hair. She only sees Jack when the fire is put out, and then she's running toward him, horrified. He's her tribemate, too. She skids to her knees next to him, hands going instantly to burnt, sticky flesh, and they can all see that he's reverted to a wolf. He's gone.
--
The guardians are many, and they came from both septs. They come from the umbra and on foot and a few of them in a car from the north. They go to the kin and to Circuit Runner. It's a wholly different form of chaos. People are touching Calden and Eva and Sam, trying to see if they're okay. Someone is asking Marjorie if she has any gourds, then lending her one of theirs. There is another Theurge kneeling beside Circuit Runner, laying on hands to at very least bring her back to consciousness.
And there is Raspberry Sky, holding a wolf's charred head in her lap, weeping over him, holding her hands on his skin, whispering to him, praying for him, praying to Luna and Gaia and Rat and, hell, Water and Air and even Fire as though it might undo what it did.
It isn't Jack's rage, considerable though it is, that brings him back. It's Raspberry Sky, her prayers and her tears and her hands, and she is the first thing he sees when he realizes
there are no rats nestling close to him to comfort him in death. There is, however, a daughter of Rat, pouring her energy over him in wave after wave until she veritably glows with Gaia's grace.
--
They are alive. Champion of Honor is lost. Fern is catatonic, staring at nothing, sitting to one side while the guardians care for their own. Slaughter and Wind on Concrete are dead. Circuit Runner will need days to recover fully, even after healing, but she shrugs off any more talens or gifts. Someone is asking Calden and Eva and Sam, through the fog of chaos and shock, where they live. They'll be escorted home. Or to the septs, if they'd like.
Raspberry Sky is looking at Jack, but she is not smiling. She couldn't save Wind on Concrete. And Wind on Concrete was her sister.
l'horreur bien-aimée[A few last notes: I am incredibly grateful that you guys let me ST this for you. You showed a lot of trust, a lot of patience, and even when the scene was chaotic and moving along quickly and as late as it got, you took the time to play your characters with investment and emotion. You gave a LOT to this scene and it made it very gratifying to run it for you (not to mention all the overwhelming positive feedback in the scene chat). So thank you very much; I had an absolutely blast tonight.]
SamThere are people touching Sam, checking her for injuries, and she submits to it for a while. They just want to make sure that she, that the other kin, that they're all okay, they're assessing for damage so they know what to do to help. Finally, she puts her hand on someone's hand and says, "I'm fine, it's not my blood." She's looking around then, to thank Marjorie, and to check on Fern.
Fern who is scared beyond words and locked in silver. She remembers the words of the fallen one. ...they had to break your spirit before they would give you comfort... She didn't know about Fern until tonight, she didn't know who she was, really, or what she'd done to deserve her fate.
When she has a chance, she goes over to the girl while the Guardians look after their people, while Raspberry Sky sees to the lupus wolf. And she just sits there, beside the girl. Both of them covered in blood, both of them in a place neither probably expected they'd be an hour ago, if Fern had thought of anything at all.
Someone comes over, asks Sam where she lives, lets her know that she'll be escorted home safely, and Sam closes her eyes and shakes her head. "If it's alright, I'd like to stay with her until she gets where she's going." They could say no, and if they do, she'll go home and she'll wash up and she'll call her brother and sit with her cat while they chat on the phone for the first time in weeks. And if they say okay, she'll do those things, anyway, just a little later than planned.
CaldenShock. That's exactly what it is -- a complete but transient stunning. Calden is snapping out of it the instant Eva moves, before she even tells him to get out, long before she comes around to pull him out. She comes around all the same. She comes around to push something into his hand, and it's a clip, and somehow his unfamiliar hands find the latch, jettison the emptied cartridge; he slams the fresh one home.
Save one for me, says Eva.
Calden looks at her. Drawn cheeks, blazing eyes. Suddenly and inexplicably and fiercely, he wraps a hand behind her head, presses his brow to hers. It is not a gentle thing. It is not tender. It is ferocious, martial, and it leaves a livid mark on both of them. Like a brand, a badge of honor or identity, a mark of a vow.
His hands are a little more familiar on that gun when he pulls the slide and chambers that first round. Perhaps they should run. They would run if they were less courageous, or more cunning, but
they fire instead. Shells clatter to the ground at their feet, rolling copper-bright on stained asphalt.
Later,
much later,
the day is saved. Maybe. If you count so many dead and injured as a victory. If you count a kidnapped Guardian as a victory. If you count the departure of those Dancers some sort of retreat, when it is so very obvious
that it was not. Not a victory for them. Not a retreat for their foes. But still: at least, a lull in the storm, the ravaging horde gone again to whatever hole it is they came from. And there are Guardians everywhere, Gaians, swarming and touching and checking and healing and grieving. In the confusion he loses track of Eva. He doesn't get a chance to give her gun back. He has a glimpse of her answering questions to some Guardian maybe half her age, and then he's answering questions of his own.
Calden has to say it over and over again: they're okay. They're fine. They're fine. He doesn't want to go to the Sept. He doesn't want to go home. He doesn't want to be coddled and followed and escorted and driven, but
in the end he relents. He accepts a single escort, and they take his truck. He drives. He tells the Guardian what he saw as they drive. It's a short trip. It ends not very far from the Cold Crescent Sept, at the foot of some fancy hotel-and-condominium highrise, right there in the glittering expensive heart of the city.
Calden[thanks again! i had so much fun :]]]]] ]
No comments:
Post a Comment