Post by Cassian on Feb 3, 2023 0:30:02 GMT -6
Desires for the Night:
- Jack: To gain an audience with the Duke
- Harri: To find and check up on Allison Shaw
- Cassian: To connect with Desireé
- Jack: To gain an audience with the Duke
- Harri: To find and check up on Allison Shaw
- Cassian: To connect with Desireé
December 22, 2004
La Noxe, Ashton Park District
11:03 p.m.
La Noxe, Ashton Park District
11:03 p.m.
- Jack Wallace, Sr. sees his son, and tears of blood well up in his vampire eyes and stream down his face. Balthazar gloats and Jack is encircled by three other men.
- Jack fails a Fury Check! He uses Willpower to bolt out the front door, ducks into an alley and dives into a heap of trash bags. He screams in anger and covers himself in filth.
- Jack receives a text: My penthouse. D.
- Jack gets in his BMW and heads straight to the Duke’s private office.
December 22, 2004
Canterbury Apartments, Calexico District
11:17 p.m.
Canterbury Apartments, Calexico District
11:17 p.m.
- While driving in his Suburban to St. Jude’s Cathedral with Alanna’s journal, Cassian checks his voicemail and finds a message from Desireé.
- Cassian calls Desireé. Her voice is strange. He senses she’s pleading for help without actually saying it.
- During the call, Desireé masks the sound of another (male?) voice in the room with her.
- Cassian drives straight to her apartment in Calexico, a middle-class neighborhood. He notices that Desireé’s car is not parked out front in the usual spot.
- Cassian walks to the back of the apartment building and uses Premonition. He sees a vision of a car crashed into a pole. The damaged pole is nearby. The back door to the apartment building is locked.
- Cassian moves to the front of the building and pretends to deliver a pizza to apartment #204 located one floor below Desireé’s. The tenant buzzes him in.
- Cassian sneaks to Desireé’s door and listens. He hears a t.v. and maybe another voice in the apartment. He smells blood from the apartment.
- Realizing he’s famished, and not willing to put Desireé in danger, Cass forcibly steps away from her door and moves to apartment #204. Pretending he’s delivering a pizza, Cass knocks and uses Compel to gain entry.
- Cassian feeds on an obese man, passes a Frenzy Test and slakes two Hunger. He leaves the fat man alone in the apartment. No pizza.
- After feeding, Cassian returns to Desireé’s apartment and knocks on the door.
- Desireé looks tired, glassy eyed. Cass realizes right away that she’s high. She is with Henry, who she says “needed her help” — just like Cass once did after his injuries.
- Cassian makes her promise to meet him for dinner tomorrow night.
December 22, 2004
Marshall Manor, Marshall Campus District
11:22 p.m.
Marshall Manor, Marshall Campus District
11:22 p.m.
- Harri receives a call from an unknown number. It is Rachel Rierson. She says she got Harri’s number from Angel Eyes. Rachel proposes a meeting at a downtown restaurant, La Maison de Velours. Harri accepts and, mustering his best charm, sets the meeting time at midnight. Rachel agrees.
- Harri calls Julio’s number and gets D’Angelo. Harri asks for Mama. Ten minutes later Angel Eyes calls Harri back. Harri asks if Rachel contacted her for his number. Angel Eyes confirms this and also tells Harri that Rachel is a powerful Toreador.
- Harri hops in his K car and leaves for the restaurant.
December 23, 2004
La Maison de Velours, Little Paris District
12:02 a.m.
La Maison de Velours, Little Paris District
12:02 a.m.
- On his way to La Maison, Harri receives a call from Morgan County Medical about Petey. He has recovered from his wounds, but is in the Psych Ward for observation.
- Harri arrives at the restaurant: it is high class, beautiful, serving fine French cuisine and rich Bordeaux wine.
- The maitre d’ leads Harri to Rachel who is staring out a window. After greetings and formalities, Harri orders a scotch.
- Rachel says Jack has committed a grievous crime by making Blakely his ghoul. She offers resolution via two options: 1) Allow the Prince’s court to hear the case at the next Elysium (she says Jack will definitely lose the trial), or 2) Jack will allow himself to be Blood Bonded to Rachel starting tomorrow.
- Harri agrees to deliver the message to Jack. In Rachel’s presence, he has the most peaceful, enjoyable dinner he has ever had.
- Rachel gives Harri her number for Jack and Harri to use.
Duke Almengore’s Penthouse
12:07 a.m.
- Jack meets with the Duke, who is not pleased with Jack’s latest actions. The Duke says that Jack’s target was to be Royce McVaigh and not Blakely.
- The Duke warns Jack of Rachel Rierson’s retribution: The D.A. is also under Rachel’s protection and the Duke forbids violence with law enforcement. He explains that Rierson’s interests are diametrically opposed to those of the Invictus.
- Jack tells the Duke that Brujah bikers attacked Blakely. This noticeably angers the Duke.
- Jack offers to tell Rachel about the Brujah involvement in the Blakely attack.
- Jack asks about Balthazar turning his father. The Duke says it is unfortunate, but Balthazar followed the laws of the Prince to make his childe. He offers Jack hollow sympathy.
- The Duke tells Jack to call off the raid on the Ardelinos on Christmas Eve.
- The Duke says he will “have a word with Masuko” on Jack’s behalf. (This is a boon recorded by Fr. Rhegga!)
December 23, 2004
Marshall Manor, Marshall Campus District
1:30 a.m.
- The neonates regroup at their haven. Harri tells Jack about Rachel’s offer.
- Jack calls Rachel to try to reason with her, but she is unswayed. She gives Jack 5 minutes to make a decision.
- The vampires discuss. Cassian suggests offering Rachel someone more important to the Invictus than himself.
- Jack thinks quickly and calls Rachel back. He offers to deliver Assyrian Corporation Regional Manager Edgar Phillips instead of himself.
- Rachel considers Jack’s offer but counters: Jack will bring “White” Frankie Ardelino, capo and son of Emilio Ardelino to her.
- Rachel says that the Ardelinos are protected by the Invictus, so Jack will be at risk. Jack understands and agrees to her revised offer.
- Jack receives an awkward call from Dr. Thomas Moore telling him that Jack Sr. has been discharged by a nurse. Jack asks for the nurse’s contact info.
- Thomas sends Jack the discharge form revealing that the nurse is Anna Neal, RN and that Jack Sr. was released at 7 p.m. on 12/22 into the custody of “X”.
- Jack calls Blakely and tells him to call off the Ardelino raid. Blakely says it’s already postponed until early January and the D.A. is on it.
- Jack tells Blakely to meet him at the Museum of Modern Art tomorrow at 8 p.m.
- The neonates decide to check out Johnson Industrial and investigate the source of the mysterious dye.
December 23, 2004
Johnson Industrial Factory, The Yards District
2:32 a.m.
- The neonates arrive at Johnson Industrial located in an industrial, middle-class neighborhood replete with factories and smokestacks.
- The nearby chemical plant bleed-off seeps insidiously into the local water supply.
- A guard with a German shepherd patrols the building perimeter, following a well-worn circuit around the building.
- The factory and parking lot is surrounded by a chain link fence. The main, 3-story factory building is lit by security spotlights.
- The vampires cut the fence (Jack leaps over it) and stealthily approach the building.
- Jack uses Soaring Leap to access a second story landing and climb to the third floor. He ties a rope to the ventilation stacks and pulls Harri up. Cassian remains on ground level near a locked back door.
- Jack and Harri enter through open ventilation louvers. Once inside, they see a large factory floor surrounded by a suspended gantry. Large vats on the factory floor steam and hiss. Two large double doors are on either side of the floor. Stand-by lighting illuminates the interior.
- Harri makes his way down to the ground floor and lets Cassian in. They both head toward the set of doors that read “Specialty Plant”.
- Jack examines the vats and finds them filled with red dye. He heads through the doors marked “Main Office” and sneaks past a guard watching “I Love Lucy” reruns.
- Harri and Cassian join Jack and break into the main office.
- In the office, Jack finds some tax and financial documents showing that Johnson Industrial ships product all over the country.
- Harri finds a patent for synthetic rubber with an annotation indicating that a particular rubber compound/formula fails when put under extreme pressure.
- The neonates check out the warehouse. In the shipping containers they find red gloves and molded spill mats.
- One container is addressed to Shenanigans, a local Newcastle costume shop. They note the address and then open the container and find rubber clown masks — the exact same one that Cassian saw in his vision of Carter’s torture! Cassian again hears the chant ring in his head: “The intensity of the wish gives me power over another, said the First. Though the wish is unexpressed, said the Second.”
- The security guard enters the warehouse and the vampires scatter into the dark like roaches.
- Cassian is discovered, but uses Mesmerize to make the guard take his hand off his radio and remain quiet. The guard obeys and shuts his mouth but draws his pistol.
- Cassian uses Compel to make the guard holster his weapon. The guard turns and bolts!
- Harri leaps from the dark and trips the guard. Jack pins him down. A voice of another security guard on the radio begins asking what’s going on.
- Harri uses Mesmerize to force the guard to report that he dropped his radio but everything is fine.
- The guard pisses himself. Harri uses Cloud Memory to make the guard forget he ever saw them.
- The neonates leave the factory without further incident and head back to their haven.
The vampires each earn 2 Experience for this session.
- Harri: To check on Allison Shaw
- Jack: To meet with Blakely and Nigel Fontelbain, butler for Royce McVaigh
- Cassian: To have dinner with Desireé and find out what’s really going on with her