Amelia

GM

Hawthorne sighed and slid the suitcase full of cash off of the counter. "Well, I can see how you would have trouble maintaining your private collection, with such...limited facilities. A sudden windfall like this would have helped with that. Might have taken this quaint little boutique to the next level. Oh well. At least you brew a fine cup of coffee." He turned around, in a manner no doubt practiced and calculated to maximize the billowing of his overcoat behind him. "Patentibus." The door opened on its own while he was still several steps away. When he reached it, he turned back around and tipped his hat to Lynn. "If you come to your senses, you have my card. Lehitra’ot." He winked at her before sauntering back out onto the street.

Once Lucien Hawthorne had left the store, the espresso cup he'd been levitating dropped to the floor and shattered.

GM

Hawthorne clutched his chest in mock pain, then picked the bundle of cash back up off the counter and bounced it in his hand. "Deceit! M'lady, thy treachery hast cut me to the bone!" He smiled wide. "Well, I guess I'll just have to put this back in its place." He lifted his briefcase up onto the counter, flipped open the catches, lifted the lid, and turned it halfway around so that the contents were visible to Lynn. It was filled with more fresh cash. The bundles were stacked in a two-by-two-by five arrangement, with one missing. Hawthorne dropped the bundle into the empty spot. "Well, look at that. It brought friends." He closed the suitcase, snapped the buckles shut, and turned it on the counter so that the handles faced Lynn. "Two-hundred thousand dollars. Four times what you could get at auction in your wildest dreams. Forget paying your electric bill. I'll buy you a house."

Heritage:

Per Grimalkin's Knowledge check results:

GM

"Resurgemus." Lynn heard the sound of wind chimes, and caught a flash of light from the corner of her eye. "Volant." The espresso cup glided up into the air and gently fell into the outlandishly-dressed visitor's waiting hand. He sniffed at it appreciatively before taking a sip. "Delicious." He let go of the cup, and it floated beside him as he walked back to the counter, his hands still full with cane and briefcase. When he reached the counter, he took his hat off and swung it through the air in front of him as he bowed, his every gesture exaggerated to the point of parody. "Lucien Hawthorne, at your service. And you must be the lovely and erudite Miss Lynn Epstein." He extended his hand to Lynn, as if to shake hers, but then tried to bring her hand to his lips for a kiss.

"We are cut from the same cloth, you and I. For I too am a purveyor of the occult, a collector of secret histories and forbidden knowledge. Recently, it has come to my attention that you have in your possession a certain book, a hand-written volume of Scivias dating back to just after the fall of Constantinople, though the recycled parchment upon which it was written is far older. It is a niche item, to be sure. I doubt there is much call for it here. But it would be the crown jewel of my personal collection, and I would pay handsomely to indulge a lifelong dream." He reached into the opposite breast pocket from where he'd stashed the money clip, and this time withdraw a bundle of fresh hundred-dollar bills that looked like it had just come out of the bank vault. The paper wrap hadn't been broken yet. With another flourish and another smug grin, he fanned the bundle with his thumb, and then he set ten-thousand dollars in cash on the coffee shop counter. "What say I just go ahead and pay your utility bill for the next year?" He raised an eyebrow, leaned back, and sipped at his drink, which hovered obediently at his lips.

Actually, even though it's not quite time for you guys to come in yet, @Gizmo, @trollthumper, go ahead and give me the same skill checks for Temperance and Set. Knowledge: Arcane Lore, Current Events, History, and Theology/Philosophy, raw Int if you don't have skill ranks.

I'll edit the opening posts in the IC and OOC threads to add more character tags as more PCs join the story.

Heritage, if Grimalkin is in the store, then I'm assuming that, with her Extended Hearing, she can hear the "gentleman" whether she's out on the floor or locked away in her office. If you decide for whatever reason that she's not in the store, let me know, and I'll roll with it. But if she is, then give me some Knowledge skill checks, for Arcane Lore, Current Events, History, and Theology/Philosophy. If she lacks skill ranks for any of them, just do a raw Int check for those.

GM

The man who walked into Silberman's Books could best be described as "goth pimp with hipster garnish," the unholy union of a failed stage magician and an even less successful pick-up artist.

He wore a long black velvet overcoat with puffy faux-fur trim, also in black. His slacks, suit jacket, and long-sleeved collared shirt were black as well, while his waistcoat and necktie were splashes of red. His dark hair was tied back in a braided pony-tail which almost reached his waist, peeking out from beneath a wide-brimmed black Stetson hat with a red ostrich feather stretching a foot and a half above and behind him. His beard was almost as long as his hair, waxed and styled in a pseudo 19th century fashion. He wore several fine chains around his neck, from which hung a giant gold pentagram and several different crystals. All of his fingers were covered with mis-matched rings. A pair of black snake-skin boots, polished to a high gloss shine, completed the ridiculous ensemble.

The man clicked his walking stick on the floor as he strode up to the counter, swinging a briefcase with his other hand. The red-lacquered wood was topped with a silver handle shaped like a coiled dragon.

He tipped the brim of his hat to the employee behind the counter and gave them a smug grin. "I'd be much obliged if you could point me toward the restroom, and if you could have a double espresso macchiato and your manager waiting for me when I get back. Assuming the beans are fair trade, of course." The man reached into the breast pocket of his suit jacket and pulled out a metal calling card case, and a money clip bulging with a three-inch thick stack of folded bills. He pulled out an embossed white business card, and a hundred-dollar bill, and slid them both across the counter. "Keep the change. Buy yourself something nice." He winked.

The business card read "HAWTHORNE BOOKS & ANTIQUITIES," with an address in Bedlam City, Wisconsin.

Quote

She turned to him, blue eyes glaring out from under her cowl. The glare became sharper as he licked a drop of her blood off his knuckle.

"Another drop of that and next time I'll decapitate you and throw you in the sea."

"And I wouldn't hold it against you. I might even thank you. But you still don't understand. Voices echo. Steps leave footprints."

Most of them, anyway.

"And actions leave their mark in the blood. The psychic resonance in yours was the quickest way to make sure you were telling the truth, and to find out what happened to them."

The man in white allowed himself a half-grin.

"Besides, it's not like you would've wanted it back."

Quote

"And in future bear in mind that mob assassins do not wear this," Osla pointed her thumb at the white hawk icon on her chest.

The man in white waved a hand across his own torso.

"For whatever it's worth, they don't generally dress like this, either. Neither imagination nor theatricality come naturally to the type of mind the Mafia attracts."

Quote

"Also perhaps it would be best not to try to roughly use mesmerism on capes when you're inside a dead man's vehicle."

"I wasn't using it on 'you.' I was using it on everyone. Get over yourself."

Quote

"What intrigues me, is what you mean by 'not normal'. And how on Earth you figured that out."

"By 'not normal,' he means the man in white with the big smile. And yes, I understand how that looks. As for how he knew that...I'm curious myself."

Mister Strix's black eyes glared downard to the ground floor where the thugs were pouring into the apartment building.

His body dissolved into a cloud of mist once again. The fog seeped into the girl's apartment through the cracks in the poorly-seated window, and just as quickly, it condensed back into the man in white. Everyone in the apartment felt a sudden chill.

He ran into the center of the apartment. "They're coming!" he barked, with the same deep reverberation echoing under his voice. "Right behind you, at least as many as before!" He glanced at the couch, saw the unconscious woman, and hefted her up over his shoulder. "Hold them off as long as you can. I'll get them to the roof, then I'll come down to back you up."

The man in white addressed the rest of the group as the exited the church. "Lead the way. I'll let you know if I see anyone following." With that, he turned and leaped into the air, over the roof of the neighboring building to disappear on the other side.

Once out of sight, before he hit the ground, Mister Strix relaxed every muscle in his body, going completely limp for a moment, before his body dissolved into a cloud of mist. He flew up into the air and back around, settling on a cruising altitude a couple stories above and slightly behind the group. He kept his gaze moving, trying to spot potential ambushes from all sides.

When they reached the apartment complex Sam called "home," the human-sized cloud soared up to the top of the building and circled around it once, checking the roof and the adjacent buildings. Then it descended to the floor of the apartment Mister Strix had seen in the hired killer's blood. Beside the window, the cloud condensed back into a man in white, whose hands and feet clung to the outer wall like an insect. He leaned an ear toward the window and listened.

Mister Strix, Notice check: 21. Hit me.

The man in white turned to the girl. "Keep your money. You need it more than any of us. And I am not for sale."

Then he turned back to Judex. "You're right. We stopped these killers, but there could always be more. Alright, we'll extract her brother first. Then the dealer in the Park. Then the warehouse."

Finally, he began rousing the unconscious thugs. "I don't see any way of securing the lowlifes. Not physically, anyway..." He pulled one up to his feet by the man's neck, and slapped his face until he stirred. Then he held the man's jaw in a vise-like grip and forced the man to look him in the eye. "Stand still and do what I tell you. Frankie's just a middle-man, and when he finds out you messed up this job, he's going to tell the scary people who hired him, and they're going to kill you, just like you were going to kill those kids. The only way you'll stay alive is in prison. When I tell you to go, leave this place and turn yourself in to the nearest cop you can find. Confess to every crime you ever committed. Everyone you ever hurt, every dollar you ever stole. Answer every question they ask you, and when you go to court, plead "Guilty" to everything they charge you with."

He left the man standing, and then he repeated the process with the other eight.

Mister Strix will burn a Hero Point to get rid of the Fatigue from the Extra Effort. Then he will attempt to use his Mind Control power on all nine thugs.

Mind Control checks (opposed by Will saves): 26, 18, 25, 22, 18, 27, 19, 9, 19.

I rolled raw dice and added his power rank manually after the fact, because I needed (1d20+8)x9, not (9d20)+8.

The effect has a duration of Sustained (Lasting), so it persists even if he swaps to another AP in the same array, and anyone who fails the save gets a new save for every interval that passes on the Time Table, with a cumulative +1 bonus. So the next save happens in 1 minute, then again in 5 minutes, then in 20, then in an hour, and so on. Depending on their Will save and how they roll, it's entirely possible that they'll be following his last command for weeks or months to come.

The effect is Distracting, so if any of them successfully save and decide to attack him, he won't have his dodge bonus.

Mister Strix will also attempt to Intimidate the thugs as a group.

Intimidate check: 25.

When Arrowhawk and the Tattered Man completed a circle around the Camaro, they realized that the man in white was no longer laying on the pavement. Before they had a chance to react, they heard the unearthly reverberation of his voice behind them.

"I don't...eat people."

Don't I? Is it a distinction without a difference?

His previously shattered face was completely intact. Only the marks on his mask gave any indication of the injuries Arrowhawk had inflicted.

"I don't know what a 'draugr' is. But I'm not what you think I am. I didn't kill these people."

He brought his knuckles up to his mouth, and licked a drop of Arrowhawk's blood off his fingerless glove. His tongue, like his mouth and his fangs, was also two or three times as long as it should have been. When the blood hit his tongue, he shuddered and closed his black eyes for a moment.

"And neither...did you. You were...hunting them."

He walked slowly around the car. His boots didn't make a sound or leave a print, even when he stepped through a puddle in the gutter, breaking the thin layer of ice that had formed on top of it and freeing the liquid beneath. He traced a bare finger along the broken glass of the passenger window, then along the blood spatter on the driver side. Then he placed the finger in his mouth and sucked the blood off of it. He shuddered again. 

"It was a cop. A cop...and something else."

As the man in white spoke, both Arrowhawk and the Tattered Man realized that, not only was the air around the Camaro noticeably colder than anywhere else in the city they'd been this night, because of that they could each see their own breath, and each others...but neither of them could see any mist coming from the unnaturally large mouth of the man in white.

GM

The forensic evidence the Tattered Man saw matched the more coherent details of his vision. Arrowhawk didn't find much of it on her own, but she noticed most of it on a second look over the Tattered Man's shoulder.

The man in the passenger seat of the Camaro had a hole with approximately the same diameter as the Tattered Man's thumb in the middle of his forehead. When he walked around to the passenger side of the car, he could see that the entire back of the man's skull, and the passenger window behind him, had both been reduced to bloody, jagged holes. The sidewalk was covered in blood and chunks of broken glass and human brain and bone. The bullet had probably been a high-caliber magnum round with a hollow point.

The driver was curled into a fetal ball on the ground, behind the driver door. His hands were still cuffed behind his back. His body was covered in so much blood and so many bruises, and so many of the man's bones were broken, that he was almost unrecognizable as human. The shape of the bruises were intimately familiar to the Tattered Man, the kind made with a police issue wooden baton. He could even see a couple of wood splinters stuck in the dead man's skin, pained black on one side. The driver side of the car was covered with tiny dots of blood spray.

Strangely, while a great deal of the man's blood had leaked out onto the pavement beneath him, the person who beat him to death managed to avoid leaving a single footprint in it.

Nothing had been stolen. Both of the dead men still had their wallets and jewelry. The driver licenses identified the driver as "Michael Donaghy", and his passenger as "John Doyle". On close inspection, Arrowhawk immediately recognized Jimmy Doyle, Donaghy's right-hand man. Both wallets were still filled nearly to bursting with cash, several thousand dollars each in hundreds and twenties, and Donaghy also had a separate money clip in his pocket with a few thousand more.

The most subtle clue the Tattered Man found, but also the most striking, were the tire tracks. A second car had been parked immediately behind the Camaro recently, possibly the police cruiser he saw in his vision. The recent rain had dredged oil up from the pavement and turned dirt into mud, and the second car's tires had picked up both, along with spots of blood and bits of broken glass. Along with the occasional stain of burnt rubber, it all mixed together and formed a broken, but consistent trail. But that trail didn't make sense. It didn't go around the Camaro, but through it. There was a T-junction a couple blocks ahead, and the trail led up to it, and through it. The tracks continued onto the sidewalk, right up to the (intact) outer wall of a boarded-up empty storefront.

Nevermind, that last IC post from TK works well enough.

Search check for Mister Strix: 6. John's definitely taking the lead here.

And Ecal provided enough of a boost to make it an even 30. Cool. Go ahead and do an IC post, TK, and then I'll get an IC and GM post up.

Amd there's Ecal's post, so go ahead TK.

@Thunder King If you're planning to examine the scene after the precog trance, feel free to post the Search check here in advance.

Let's get an IC post from Ecal ending the fight he started and describing his own investigative efforts, inept though they may be, and an IC post from TK describing his reaction to his vision and his examination of the scene. I'll skip Strix's "turn" and do an IC post for him getting back up after those, and then I'll do a GM post describing your findings.

There's a quick GM post about the Tattered Man's postcognitive vision. No reason to screw myself out of an IC GM post.

GM

When the Tattered Man closed his eyes, his mind was flooded with a series of vague, semi-coherent images, like a waking dream.

He sat in the driver seat of the yellow Camaro, where he saw the flashing lights of a police cruiser in the rear-view mirror. He pulled over.

The uniform worn by the police officer didn't look right, not like any uniform John Smith had ever worn. It looked more like a Halloween costume or something out of an old movie. He couldn't get a good look at the officer's face. The brim of his cap cast a shadow the streetlights couldn't pierce.

John heard the driver offer a bribe.

"Is there a fine? Can we just take care of it right now?"

He heard the cop's reply, detached but oddly upbeat.

"Step out of the car, please."

He heard the driver threaten the cop.

"Do you know who I work for?"

He saw the cop handcuff the driver. The passenger muttered an obscenity, then reached into his jacket for the 9MM semiautomatic pistol John somehow knew was in there. In the blink of an eye, the cop drew a massive revolver - magnum, it must be - and put a bullet between the passenger's eyes before the 9MM cleared its holster. Then John saw the cop go to work on the driver with his baton. The passenger died instantly, but with the driver, the cop made it last. The driver died, eventually, but first, he suffered. He pleaded with the cop, and the cop talked, but the cop didn't really reply to anything the man was saying. He talked past the man, rather than to him. The cop never raised his voice. He never even used profane language. He seemed almost cheerful as he beat the man to death.

The last thing either the driver or the passenger of the Camaro saw before he died was the blurry image of an inhumanly pale white face. John couldn't tell whether the white man was the cop, or a second person. He couldn't make out any facial features, except for a big smile. Too big to be human. Almost too big to fit on his face...

John gets a series of vague, dreamlike images.

The men in the car were pulled over by a cop. His uniform didn't look right, not like any uniform John had ever seen when he was a cop. It might've been a cop costume from Halloween or an old movie, or it might've been a real uniform, but anachronistically old. The brim of the cop's hat casts a shadow over his face that obscures it throughout the vision.

The driver tried to bribe the cop, then threatened him. When the cop cuffed him, the man in the passenger seat went for the pistol in his jacket. The cop drew a magnum revolver and put a bullet between the passenger's eyes before the passenger could even pull his own gun free from its holster. Then the cop went to work on the driver, beating him with a baton. He didn't make it quick. He made it last. He never raised his voice. He never even used profane language. The man pleaded, and the cop spoke, but it didn't seem like anything the cop said was actually a reply to the man he was beating.

The last thing either man saw before he died was an inhumanly pale white face. The image is blurry. It's not even clear whether the white man is the cop, or a second person. It doesn't seem like they could make out any facial features, other than the big smile. Too big to be human. Almost too big to fit on his face.

Sounds good to me! Thanks.

GM

When Arrowhawk kicked the man in white, it felt like kicking a stone statue. There didn't seem to be any give to his abdominal muscles, and the kick definitely didn't seem to throw him off-balance. Her words, however, momentarily stunned him. He stopped flailing at her, and opened his mouth to speak, but she didn't have time to consider his reaction before the bow-strike combination she'd spun her body into connected.

Her palm didn't just shove the side of her bow against his face. She shoved the enchanted wood into his face, carving a gash diagonally across his skull, several centimeters deep. She had to pry her bow free, and when she did, he collapsed onto the pavement. His mask couldn't hide the fact that there was now a concave pit filled with shards of bone, teeth, and cartilage where his face used to be. He didn't move or make a sound, and he didn't bleed.

He gets a 10 on his Toughness save. That's a fail by 13, so he's Injured, Dazed, and Disabled (no Con means all damage is lethal). I think we can step out of combat rounds now.

The damage isn't from one of his weaknesses, so assuming someone doesn't keep hitting him, he'll be back up after a round of rest and a recovery check.