The Creeping Killer(s)

[Dr Archeville]

[[ 3 days later, no one's posted anything, so I'll move things along a bit. ]]

Suddenly, Nightshyfts' well-trained ears hear an odd sound. It sounds like rain falling through the leaves of the trees, though the evening sky is clear, and no rain is seen. Concentrating for half a moment, he can determine that the sound -- a focused dripping -- is coming from about 10 feet behind Catherine.

[spectrevk]

Catherine walked around the edge of the crime scene, her brow furrowed in concentration. Slowly, she waved her hands in front of her, her lips moving slowly in a silent chant.

http://invisiblecastle.com/roller/view/1564287/

As the ritual came to a close, she let out a deep breath and waited, hoping that it would work.

[CollateralKid]

Imposter not really feeling like putting any form of effort ino his disguise broke character as he saw Kato start some kind of incantation..

" Dude, what are you doing?!" said the hobo now with a valley accent..

He knew something was going on, but couldn't tell what so to be safe he put himself on the defensive while trying to stay alert.

(Imposter will add +3 to his defense and -3 off his attack rolls with defensive attack)

[Nyrath]

Alex whistles softly when Nightshyft makes his entrance. His trick with the darkness isn't all that impressive to her, she's seen stuff like that a lot within her rather extended family. But rather it's the well-toned body just noticeable within his outfit, for a moment her mind starts too drag away her attention into the realm of fantasy, fantasy which would likely end up being classified as "not suitable for minors". Luckily she manages to reign it in as the vigilante looks over her and the others present.

While she doesn't notice anything wrong with the apparent 'bum' she guesses that it's simply due to not having been around long enough to pick up the local little quirks which'd help in a case like this. Having arrived less than twenty-four hours ago does have its bad sides as well.

When the other female starts walking around the circumference of the scene the winged ones attention focuses on her for a while as she tries to work out what is going on. After a few moments she realises it's an incantation, though she figures it'll take a moment to figure out what it's meant to do, and what it ends up doing.

Mongrel Angel's attention shifts again for a moment or two as the fourth person at the site clearly breaks with his previously established character. She decides to go out on a pair of limbs, both sturdy, but still limbs. She takes a step or two closer to the man before speaking though.

"It's an Incantation; she's a mage of some sort." With the first bit said she leans in a little closer before edging out a little further on her metaphoric limb and says in a low voice, not quite a whisper for whispers carry far and attract additional attention.

"Shapeshifter, am I right?"

[CollateralKid]

Imposter saw this winged person come down from the sky and his stance went from a staggering hobo to that of a defensive martial arts pose uncharacteristicly.

After she asked if he was a Shapeshifter, the hobo winked and laughed and slowly morphed back into the guise of a muscular teenage kid with a Claremont Academy uniform still on.

"Yeah how'd you know? I think the fact that i showered gave it away..haha, but what's going on over here? I just hurried over to see what i can do.."

[Nyrath]

Mongrel Angel smiles softly as her suspicion is confirmed. As the hobo reverts to what she presumes is his natural form, or at least the one he habitually uses. Then again he could be a she; it's just so hard to know with some shapeshifters. Ah well, hopefully she'd find out at some point.

"Smell tends to be somewhat overlooked and is in any case tough to replicate, but actually it was because I've lived for other shapeshifters most of my life, and it was still mostly guesswork. As for what's going on; I guess most of us turned up as a responce to the news. Right now the lady mage's apparently trying out an Augery Incantation of some sort to try and find out what happened."

[Nightshyft]

The suspicious noise causes Travis to tense for a moment...swirling towards it, Nightshyft stops short when he notices that the woman who had been puffing up the path from behind them turn and begins to murmur under her breath. He stops just behind her, taking a defensive position. Waiting till her murmur's stopped, he leans down and whispers "Got your back...any idea?" Even as the last syllable slips from his lips, his gaze shifts back for a second to the other two...they are still talking and seem to be in complete disregard that something dangerous might be just beyond the wizardress...well, maybe they could serve as a distraction if it came to that...

[Dr Archeville]

The dripping sound Nightshyft heard started the same round as Catherine's ritual; unless she stops or he makes her stop she'll be murmuring and drawing circles in the dirt for four rounds. It is currently the second round of her ritual (I'm keeping round-by-round track of things for now since there is a time constraint, due to the ritual being done).

Would he try and stop her after a round or two?

Would she let him stop her?

[Nightshyft]

Nightshyft would stand stoicly with patience and vigilance....

[Dr Archeville]

As Imposter and Mongrel Angel catch one another up, and Nightshyft moves to defend Catherine from... whatever that dripping is, Catherine's mind races back in time...

[[ I'll need a Notice and/or Search check from Catherine to determine what she discovers, please. ]]

[spectrevk]

Catherine's mind tensed, her eyes focused intently on the vision of the past before her, seeking clues, wherever they might be.

Search Check: 19

http://invisiblecastle.com/roller/view/1569777/

[Dr Archeville]

[[ 19, eh? That works perfectly! ]]

As Catherine's mind races back through the corridors of time, her mind's eye sees nothing but blue light at first. Slowly the light fades so it is but a border around her vision, and she sees the same spot in the park, but many hours earlier. The sun is high in the sky and shining bright, though the absence of any sound adds an eeriness to the scene.

Catherine soon sees a woman jogging by, and though the vision was not as clear as she would have liked, the street-smart sorceress could tell it was Alex McGee. The young blonde coed seemed to be enjoying a routine jog (though how anyone could enjoy running was lost on the donut-loving occultist), and so entranced by the endorphins of her run and the music blaring through her iPod that she did not notice the five small forms approaching her. They were the rough size of large dogs, or perhaps a pre-teen child, though the vision did not reveal anything beyond the rough size and the creatures dark green coloration which blended well with the abundant foliage of the park. The creatures soon swarmed and were on her, bringing her down by their sheer weight, and though Catherine heard no scream she could see the jogger's face twisted in agony. The silent mauling continued as the things wriggled and squirmed over her body, leaving trials of a glistening slime behind them. Here and there she could see between the creatures and to the burned flesh and exposed bone of the victim as they devoured her.

Though the creatures were far from done with their meal, the vision closed, and Catherine's mind reeled back through the red-limned corridors of time to the present.

[[ I've edited the first post in the OOC thread to reflect current health conditions and Hero Points. ]]

[Dr Archeville]

drip... drip... drip....

[spectrevk]

Catherine's eyes blink open, and suddenly she's back in the present, in the dark and surrounded by a strange mix of superhumans. Sucking in a deep breath to calm herself, she straightens up and addresses the group.

"She was eaten by a pack of...things. I couldn't see what they were, exactly...maybe some kind of animal, or something more humanoid. About five feet tall though, and terribly vicious. And...green. They're green."

[Nightshyft]

As the sorceroress' eyes open and she staggers for a moment, Nightshyft reaches out to steady her. "Pack of humanoids...green...five foot tall. Did you see what direction they came from? Were they alone?"

[Dr Archeville]

The dripping sound that Nightshyft (and now Catherine) hears seems to be getting closer. The tree branches above them rustle softly, but it is impossible to tell whether that's from something moving among them, or simply from the light breeze that's blowing through the area. Similarly, a soft moan can now be heard, though again it is impossible to tell if it's from something up in the trees or simply from the wind.

[spectrevk]

As the sorceroress' eyes open and she staggers for a moment, Nightshyft reaches out to steady her. "Pack of humanoids...green...five foot tall. Did you see what direction they came from? Were they alone?"

Catherine took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "They were alone...well, if you call a pack of them "alone". And they came from that direction." she said, pointing to where they had snuck up on the unfortunate woman in the vision.

"Oh, hey...what's that dripping sound?"

[Nightshyft]

"I hear it also..." states Nighshyft. Slowly, Travis slides away from the Sorceroress...making sure not to bunch up and present an easy target.

Looking back towards the others, "You two...can you hear that dripping?"

[Dr Archeville]

[[ Since CollateralKid hasn't been seen in some time, I'm using his character Imposter as a "victim." Nothing I do will have any long-lasting effect on Imposter, and if CK comes back before the end of the adventure, he will of course immediately get the character back. I'm also taking one liberty with Mongrel Angel, which I hope the player doesn't mind. ]]

Mongrel Angel turns to respond to Nightshyft's question, but before she can open her mouth to speak, she sees Catherine's eyes go wide in shock, and Nightshyft shift his footing.

As Mongrel Angel turned her head to respond to Nightshyft, Nightshyft's keen ears (and Catherine's not-as-keen but directed-by-Nightshyft ears) detected that the odd dripping sound had stopped. Before Mongrel Angel opened her mouth to speak, they both saw... something fall upon Imposter. It was about the size and shape of a large grocery bag, but glistened slightly in the dim light of the setting sun & 'street'lights. It was also very clearly squeezing around his head, and from the sounds of Imposter's muffled screams, it was doing something incredibly painful.

[[ Initiative time, folks! ]]

[Nightshyft]

The muffled yelp that the "shapeshifter" made as the "bag thing" engulfed his head did not cause Nightshyft to hesitate...However, the the fact that striking at the attacker MIGHT hit the victim, did make Travis somewhat wary. Even as the victim bobbed and weaved in an attempt to dislodge his attacker, so did Nightshyft....with an almost dance-like move, Nightshyft slides forward and strikes out at the creature...trying very hard not to hit the young shapeshifter

[spectrevk]

Catherine cried out in surprise, freezing up as she tried to figure out what to do about this...this THING without hurting the kid it was attacking.

Initiative: 7

http://invisiblecastle.com/roller/view/1587585/

Hitting upon an idea so crazy that it just might work, Catherine furrowed her brow in concentration and approached it gingerly, her hands crackling with magical energy.

http://invisiblecastle.com/roller/view/1587599/

[i would like to use Extra Effort to use her teleportation spell on the monster...since the range is usually Personal, I *think* this means she would have to succeed in a melee touch attack to do this (I'm hoping that the fact that it's grappling him will help as well). Let me know if this isn't possible. She wants to teleport the monster halfway into the ground if possible.]

[Nyrath]

The, thing, dropping onto the shapeshifter from above surprises Mongrel Angel somewhat. Within moments though she's moving and trusting somewhat in her own durability tries to grab the attacker intending to throw it to the side.

[Dr Archeville]

Nightshyft bobs and weaves closer to Imposter, and as he does it looks almost as if the thing on the man's head is bobbing and weaving, too. In a flash, Nightshyft lashes out, just as a sizable portion of the 'bag' is bunched up at the front side of its victim's face. In a move that would make Muhammad Ali proud, Nightshft uppercuts the thing with enough force to not only tear it free from Imposter's face but also send it flying some twenty feet into the air! It falls with a wet SPLAT right at Mongrel Angel's feet, causing its thin membranous skin to split open and the internal contents to spill out.

Looking at Imposter -- who is still screaming, though not as urgently -- Catherine can see that his face & neck look like they've had a very bad sunburn. Some of his skin is still peeling away, as are a few small clumps of his hair.

[[ Nightshyft needs to make a Toughness save. DC... muah hah hah ]]

[Dr Archeville]

Nightshyft suddenly realizes there's something terribly, terribly wrong with his hand. It's not in pain, it doesn't feel like anything -- and that's the problem, because he's usually very aware of the position of every part of his body. Looking down he sees that secretions of the... thing that he had hit did a lot more harm to him than they did to Imposter. His heavy glove is almost completely burned away, as is most of the skin from his hand, which is still curled into a fist. Were he to examine/flex his hand, he would find that it was not so damaged that he could not open his hand (and would see that palm/interior of his hand was fine), but doing so was extremely painful.

[[ Nightshyft has suffered one bruise and one injured condition. ]]

[Nyrath]

Mongrel Angel's eyes snap between the rather, disabled, creature at her feet and the two males with rather painful looking acid burns. Her thoughts likewise shift between either making damn sure the "acid-bag" is dead and trying to do something to help with treating those injuries. Gathering her soulfire within her hands her mind suddenly stumbles upon something which might heal the two in front of her. Putting thought into action she sweeps up her arms and sends what seems like a wave of silverish white fire over the burned ones.