Reba woke up the morning after the pool room adventure, to the sound of oddly repetitive wingbeats outside her apartment window. They looked out and found a taxidermized African Gray Parrot, mindlessly beating its wings to hover right outside their window. They let it in, and it dropped a message on the floor.
NASH DINO TRACKS
MIDNIGHT
YOUR PAL YANCY
This was the meeting of food trucks in the region that Reba had asked the Courier Yancy Smoke for. The moment Reba put the scroll down, the mecha parrot devoured it, taking a chunk out of the table with its razor sharp beak. Reba penned an acknowledgement letter and handed it to the bird, which flew away immediately.
The group met up and went over the plan for the meeting with the police which Rachel had arranged the previous day. She needed to clear the truck's name with law enforcement, who might believe they were involved with the KFC fire. She also needed to gather information about what actually happened. Any transactions she could arrange would be a bonus.
The meeting was at Salem's Bewitched Park at 1:00 PM. DBD arrived early in the morning to scout out the site, climbing up on a nearby rooftop that overlooked the park. He brought his rifle, a trash bag to hide inside, and a second trash bag to conceal Scooby, Rachel's unspeakable servant. The park was empty at 6:00 AM. DBD lurked in the trash bag, using his military experience to sit quietly and observe rather than becoming distracted and blowing his cover. Things heated up when a woman came out the door to the building's roof access staircase. She was obviously a plainclothes cop. She walked right past the pile of suspicious trashbags without investigating, pulled up a box to the edge of the roof, and sat down with a pair of binoculars. She was obviously there for the same reason as DBD.
Reba and Tal parked the food truck a safe distance away from the meeting site. Rachel walked to the park and sat down on a bench. Officer Walker's arrival was presaged by the rain cloud that followed him everywhere he went. He wore his civilian raincoat rather than his police hi vis. He sat down next to Rachel, soaking her with rain. They went across the park to the pizza place and unfolded one of those table umbrellas at the outdoor seating.
Over pizza and beer, Walker listened to Rachel's offer. She could help him deal with the cursed raincloud following him around, share memories of the KFC incident, and help him figure out who was really responsible. He made a counteroffer: tell him where the KFC workers went - the real ones, not the ones who corporate subbed in right before the fire, or he'd arrest Rachel. She wasn't intimidated. She offered proof that the Bao Down food truck wasn't involved, if she "bought" the memory off him. He gave her a twenty as a gesture of contempt, and she passed him the memory of where DBD was during the KFC fire: playing a set at Bread and Roses. Walker didn't buy it. He thought the "pyromancer" must have used a time pencil, or mosquito coil, or just a cigarette stuck in a book of matches to delay the outbreak of the fire while he got to a safe distance. Rachel offered to transfer DBD's entire memory of that day. Walker was fine with that, he'd just place her in "protective custody" until the fire mage showed up to make the swap. Which it seemed like he was planning on doing anyway.
Rachel decided to switch gears. She asked why Officer Walker was so interested in finding the KFC staff anyway. He explained that the KFC gave local police the "good shit" whenever they needed a little extra juice for a difficult operation. Rachel bought the memory of the last order he ever made at the place. In that memory, Nadia, the lady with the red ascot and the Tokarev that the cabal met in the pool tunnels, was working the counter. Walker asked for a special order, she gave him a charged chicken sandwich and he ate it. A few minutes later the rain cloud started following him around. That was the last time he ever saw Nadia.
Rachel said she had Nadia's phone number. Walker offered to leave the Bao Down cabal alone, if she would call Nadia and lure her into a meeting. Rachel agreed, and also bought 5 percent of Walker's Bad Cop identity as part of the trade.
The cabal arranged a scheme: Rachel would tell Nadia that she had an artifact that would negate unnatural phenomena, making it easier for Nadia's crew of cave explorers to get around in the pool tunnels. Tal would lurk nearby, and if necessary would secretly use their catapsi ability to shut down some minor magick as a demonstration of the item's power. Nadia sounded hung over on the phone, but agreed to meet in the park in 45 minutes. Walker removed himself from the scene, Tal and Reba got out of the food truck and came to the park. Tal and Reba debated whether Rachel was really on the level, or if she was planning on selling them and the Brethren out. They ultimately decided they didn't have anything to fear from her, and agreed to table the issue when Nadia arrived.
Nadia was late, and clearly miserable when she arrived. She sat down across from Rachel, made some light conversation, then got up and ran when she saw Officer Walker approaching. He had chosen the wrong side of the park to approach from and given away his "ambush". Rachel had Scooby the unspeakable servant use its single significant unnatural phenomena of the day to prevent Nadia from escaping by magickally lengthening the distance she had to run, leaving her stumbling forward without moving at all, as the cop closed in.
Meanwhile, on the roof, the overwatching plainclothes officer shouted and drew her gun on the fat guy climbing the fire escape with a duffel bag: Matt, the ex military guy they met in the pool tunnels with Nadia, had apparently had the same idea as DBD and Officer Amy: overwatch from the roof. He just got there a little late. Amy told him to drop the bag and put his hands up. He ran back down the fire escape, out of sight. Amy chased him, leaving the concealed sharpshooter and the unspeakable servant alone on the roof.
Down below, Nadia realized she wasn't going to escape, and pulled out her gun. Rather than pointing it at the advancing police officer, she raised it in the air and swore to God she would do it. Walker drew his weapon in response. DBD, sensing disaster, downed some of the Dominican hot sauce he bought at Bread and Roses, and cast a spicy spell that transferred that heat onto the taste buds of both Nadia and Walker. The unexpected heat caused them significant impairment, and Reba piled on further. They fucking hated cops, and had the ability to debuff people by swearing at them. They shouted expletives at Walker in Yiddish, reducing his odds of success in the pending gunfight further. Walker tried to squeeze the trigger, but couldn't bring himself to fire. Something made him flinch every time. Tal grabbed cover before the shooting started. Rachel tried to look like she wasn't involved, but had Scooby further impair Walker's weapon as a minor unnatural effect.
David Ben David went down the fire escape, intent on intervening at ground level. A car pulled up and a third police officer stepped out, accompanied by a flock of doves that got caught in his coat and made it difficult for him to draw his gun. Walker tossed his apparently-malfunctioning service pistol and drew his backup, a five shot revolver in .38 special. Nadia raised a hand and negated his weapon with a spell, spilling the cylinder and bullets across the pavement. DBD ran through the back door of the Blue Fez, a Lebanese restaurant, as a shortcut to reach the square. He attempted to snag a spicy tomato for a quick charge and collided with a guy carrying a load of dishes. Rachel realized that keeping Nadia from escaping was just prolonging the awkward standoff, and allowed her to escape. The fulminaturge fled the scene, pursued by Walker on foot and the weird dove cop in the car.
A couple gunshots echoed a block or two away. DBD wanted to cast a spell and eat Officer Walker's discarded service weapon with hot sauce, but Rachel picked it up, hoping to buy a favor by returning it later. A lost weapon was one of the few things a police officer would actually get in trouble for. Reba was incensed at the possibility that the Kentucky Fed Cops had put an APB on the Bao Down truck. They loaded everyone into the vehicle (including Scooby the unspeakable servant, who retrieved DBD's rifle from the roof) and drove off.
Reba was almost hyperventilating with rage, but calmed down when Tal told them to relax. DBD had accumulated enough significant charges from consuming hot sauce in inconvenient situations to cast a divination spell, but needed restroom access to it. Reba pulled into a gas station parking lot, and David went inside to take a shit. He succeeded in shitting, but struggled to activate the divination spell. With his head in his hands, he didn't see where Jim the Gremlin came from, but the little guy appeared to offer him another present. The gremlin was evasive about who the gift was from, or who he was working for - he liked to freelance, a little work for GP here, some visiting mages there. If DBD had something he wanted delivered, Jim would be happy to help him too. Inside the box was a little spray bottle, labeled THE GOOD SHIT. The instructions said to apply directly to the eyes. Jim told DBD that a squirt of the substance would fix his casting difficulties. The gremlin had never steered him wrong before, so David Ben David squirted it directly into his eyes. It blinded him, but for the duration of the blindness he could activate his magick powers flawlessly. He finished shitting and directed his psychic vision to the subject of the KFC.
Information flooded his mind. Nadia, Orlok and Mick were a local Colonel's Secret Cadre outfit operating out of Lawrence, MA. They discovered the pool tunnels and reported them to the brass, who identified them as a powerful logistical advantage due to their ability to cross vast distances with a short trip - provided the explorer had some form of magickal navigation. HQ instructed the Cadre outfit to abandon their store and switch to full time exploration and exploitation of the tunnels. The Karst Finding Cavers torched the store and put the word out that the Bao Down truck were responsible, hoping to shake the increasing attention they were getting from the Brethren of the Curb so they could investigate freely. Spiking the Kentucky Fed Cops with unhappy meals beforehand was just a bonus, to really give them a reason to want the Cavers found - and therefore a reason to pursue the Bao Down team. Finally, DBD learned that the Cavers had actually considered taking Rachel up on her offer to bring Scooby the Shoggos Boy into the pool tunnels with them. Specifically to feed him to some kind of creature that lived down there.
Jim disappeared while DBD was blinded, but when the team heard the news about the pool tunnels, they decided controlling them was vital to making Salem a new Tortuga - not to mention the huge logistical advantage it would grant the Brethren.
Rachel took Tal aside and asked if they wanted to sleep at her house for a while. Rachel could see through the eye that she gave to Scooby, so she knew that Tal had been sleeping in the food truck. Tal agreed, and the cabal celebrated with a round of Merchant min/maxing, using Rachel's identity trading ability to grind their new Bad Cop identity.
Coming up next, the Bao Down cabal will do one or more of
- Attend the meeting of the food trucks at midnight (to build solidarity against a Court takeover)
- Find someone to sell them lots of eyeballs (to make more Unspeakable Servants)
- Explore the pool rooms (to figure out how to control them and bend them to the Brethren's will)
No comments:
Post a Comment