Verna Gardner
Verna's on her way out of the physics and astronomy building looking like the champion that she really isn't. She plays the role of person-who-is-not-being-hunted rather well, though. Always looks crisp and sharp, even if her eyes are tired and she looks a little pale from not getting enough sun this winter. Tonight's outfit is a complicated blue sweater with lacy arms and cables everywhere, like someone was attempting every stitch in the knitting vocabulary in one sweater, and a pair of slacks. A white lab coat, carefully folded, rests over her arm, and she carries her books away with her using a rolling briefcase. Boots complete the ensemble, because heels are not lab-wear according to the university, and besides -- Jon Marc might be out there.
There's wariness about her, as if she expects her enemies to jump out of the bushes every time she leaves the 'safety' of a place with locks on the doors. She does expect that. It lends caution to her. Makes her check the shadows.
It's okay. It's been okay ever since she started back to school. It's just another walk to the parking lot, right? Right? She takes a deep breath, and continues on.
Verna Gardner
[Perception + Alertness = wary Verna]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 4, 6, 7, 8) ( success x 3 )
Verna Gardner
[Intelligence!]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (4, 5, 7, 7) ( success x 2 )
David
The moon wanes. Ganymede trails darkness across the face of Jupiter. Mars and Venus drift apart. The heavens are dark, but not as dark as a university campus parking lot. Verna is not lowest on the totem pole, but neither is she important enough to have a shot at a decent parking space. Cars that shouldn't be parked in the visitor's spaces are regularly towed, and Verna has perhaps overheard security guards (or at least some of her students, classmates) discussing a racket the guards have going, where they get a cut of the tow money if they report it. Consequently, the cars of legitimate visitors are as safe as any car ever is with the watchful eye of campus security there as often as it can turn toward. Verna may have also heard that over the last year security has been bolstered, although the reason for that is much-speculated on. A serial rapist. A frat boy? Worse.
But groups of students going to night classes tend to move in little clumps, so even if she finds herself caught in a momentary bubble of solitude (more and more likely when she lets herself get out so late), she is unlikely to be entirely on her own. Last night the temperature was just a degree above zero but tonight is almost balmly in comparison, with the temperature approaching the mid-fifties.
She has a ways to walk to get to her car, and Jon Marc (nor his friend, Mister Clean) seems to be lurking in the shadows.
But a young man is approaching her. Verna does not yet know that the young man's name is David, and she may never know. He looks like one of the older students, short blonde hair wanting to wave but cropped too short for that, a natural furrow between straight dark eyebrows and a trimmed beard. He has a backpack. Verna recognizes him from the Physics and Astronomy building; he was talking to one of the astronomy professors, and through the pale gray of his rather thin shirt there was the ghost of a tattoo on his bicept.
He seems to be making right for her, though his pace isn't rapid. A steady stroll, with just a touch of catch-up-to-you speed.
David
ooc: ahem, and Jon Marc DOES NOT seem to be lurking in the shadows. Yeesh, Jon Marc, wait your turn.
Verna Gardner
She's just down the steps to the building when she notices him. Notices, and then appraises him with a question to her body language. What do you want? Looking for me?
There are students out this late. There are always students on campus during semesters, at all hours of the night. All night cram sessions are a thing, and the student lounges and restaurants and labs have hours to suit. Sure, it isn't the mass of human bodies that resembles a river that tends to occur during the day, but the flow never stops entirely. It just slows to trickles. Here and there you can see them, shadows illuminated by bluish LED lamps, trudging down the sidewalks or flying by on bikes (now freed of having to deal with pedestrians, the wheeled vehicles reign supreme).
But right now, Verna's alone. Alone and aware of that fact.
So she gives the approaching man her best impression of a woman who has her bearings about her. A woman who will fight if pressed.
David
The young man clears his throat when he is within hailing distance. His shoulders are bowed, as if he's carried too many heavy books for too long.
"Are you Verna Gardner? Gaiman's TA?"
Verna Gardner
"Yes? May I help you?"
She replies, but she doesn't bother with a smile. It's late, she's tired, and lately her life has been so frustrating, so pulling-out-hair exasperating, that her Rate My Professor comments have ranged from 'sucj a biotch' to 'Should not be allowed to procreate, nonetheless teach.'
Someone stole her research, and Dr. Andrássy's idea. Stole it and didn't credit them. As if she didn't have other things to worry about. Life isn't fair, they say? Perhaps not. Perhaps it just gives to some and takes from others, and Verna keeps giving and giving and giving...
David
"I'd like to ask you a few questions about the lab, and anything strange you might have experienced."
He has the kind of eyes that always seem to be squinting hard at something just beyond the horizon, not because he is nearsighted, but because in another life he might've been a ship's captain; might have looked intently at a problem laid out on an examination table, forgotten the passage of time, just like that.
There is a little piece of nut or rodent bone on a chord around his neck and he isn't wearing a jacket and he has rings on all four of his left fingers.
A little wind comes skirling, plucks at Verna's hair and whirls and whirls. Somewhere near but not near a girl's laughter rises high and transforms into a shriek; the shriek just melts into laughter, dissolves into the shadow she and her lover throw against a nearby building's brickwork.
Verna Gardner
Uhh, aside from strange guys approaching her at night with tattoos and rings and bones around their neck?
"Strange things? Nothing strange, no. If you'll excuse me, I have to be going home now."
Curt and to the point, that. There's nothing exactly strange about people with doctorates stealing the work of grad students now is there? That's ridiculously common.
David
"That was the prelude," David replies. He doesn't seem pleased at coming up against the glass wall of curt and to the point, but he doesn't seem taken aback or as if he has been made wrongfooted by it either.
If Verna is brushing past, he lengthens his stride to reach her side and get her attention, only going so far as to hold his hands up and step in front of her if she doesn't look at him. "You may not have realized what you were seeing was worth notice at the time. On your way to your car? Let me walk you, and we can discuss this further."
It isn't cold enough for the lack of visible breath in the air to be something anybody would notice, even if they didn't look for it. But he isn't breathing, and this is where the young man who is not a man tries to mesmerize Verna.
He doesn't want to take all night.
[Dominate 2. Leadership + Manipulation. Diff: Verna's WP.]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (3, 3, 4, 4) ( fail )
Verna Gardner
Verna's rather nonplussed, and she glares at him. "Honestly, you don't look like a cop. Who are you and why do you want to know about this nebulous 'strangeness'?"
Then, she sighs, looks down the sidewalk -- lovely sidewalk that will take her to the lovely parking lot that holds her lovely car, so she can get away from creeps.
"And no, thank you, I don't need a walk to the car."
Not from you...
David
He looks rather nonplussed, as well, and his gaze skims across her face, across her collar, down to her shoes and back. David doesn't exactly rock back on his heels, but he does tip his head back as though he'd just received a blow. Hands are still up when he sketches a shrug.
"And you look like a nice girl, but here we are. It will just take a few moments, Verna, and then I'll leave you alone."
[Why didn't that work? Auspex 2. Perc + Emp, Diff 8.]
Dice: 6 d10 TN8 (1, 1, 1, 4, 5, 6) ( botch x 3 )
Verna Gardner
[Awareness!]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (3, 3, 4, 5) ( fail )
Verna Gardner
"'And you look like a nice girl?' What's that supposed to mean?" Oh, he has thoroughly stepped on all her nerves, hasn't he? She gives him the nastiest look. Definitely not looking like a nice girl now.
"If that's the way you ask people for things, I'm afraid you'll never have a career in politics. Or anything that involves using your words. Good night."
With that, she turns to stomp off. Of all the wretched random people to try following her? He's so rude.
David
His eyes grow wide and he hisses on a sudden inhale, those old remnants of humanity one never quite gets rid of unless one tries. He can't go pale, but if ever anybody looked like the other shoe just dropped, it's David; David, who flinches when Verna turns to stomp off.
Back to the building, or simply around to take one of the meandering paths which will let her approach the parking lot from another angle?
"I'm sorry, but no," he whispers. Maybe she isn't looking at him by this point; maybe she's already on her way, unstoppable Verna Gardner, who is having a very bad year.
Verna Gardner
Verna is turning and stomping off to her car. She wouldn't go back, wouldn't call campus security or anything. After all, the man has, as yet, only been very rude, and that's not a crime. She's not the kind of person who can snap her fingers and summon authorities to remove such horrid little people from her presence for being a pain in the neck.
She hears him whisper something. Probably consoling himself with vulgarity thrown in her direction. Whatever. It wouldn't be the first time.
She does pick up the pace, hurrying along with the speed of indignation.
Verna Gardner
[Perception + Alertness!]
Dice: 6 d10 TN7 (1, 5, 5, 8, 8, 10) ( success x 3 )
David
Verna is stomping off to her car, down this path if she is avoiding David while trying not to let him see where exactly she is going, or down this-a-way if she just turned to stomp around him, stomp, stomp, while her wheely briefcase dances behind her, but she is alert. Perhaps it's because of how frequently she's been a target. The police never did find out who was responsible for breaking all of the glass -- never gave any indication that they were taking seriously her allegations about Jon Marc -- and it's not as if her students like her. So even though she is walking away, putting David behind her, she can hear the rustle of fabric, as if he takes something out of his jacket, and she can hear his own pace quicken behind her. This is what it's like to be hunted, but any woman who goes around alone at night knows what that feels like, knows the extra alertness which sharpens up when somebody might be right behind.
There are people on campus, yes. But just at this moment, nobody is nearby, except for the making out couple, and they've already begun to drift away accompanied by the sweet earthy scent of pot.
Verna's car is quite a walk, certainly, but it's not the furthest walk she's ever had to make in the hunt for parking; she can't see it yet, but if she gets to the grassy knoll a street's width away she'll be able to look down the hill and stairs and see where her car is parked, and anybody else who's intent on going home tonight.
Verna Gardner
The man is following her, catching up to her, and she can hear that little rustle of his jacket. She chances a quick glance behind her, and perhaps David can see the cracking of her facade. She's angry -- but also tired and afraid. Something tells her he's about to threaten her with a gun.
What on earth is so important about his 'strange things' that he feels the need to do this? Was that just a ruse to get her alone?
David
It's not a gun.
The young man is carrying something about the length of a ruler, give or take an inch or so, something that has been polished and worried over and tucked up in his bag or his coat or where ever it is he can tuck something ever since '12. He has used it once before. He thinks he has to use it again. Her façade is cracking, but the glimpse of his face is a mirror; anger and fear, and determination.
He's holding a wooden stake with a very sharp point. He's got it at ready. He's holding it like it's a stabbing weapon. When he sees her looking, as he strides after her, what he says is a nervous "That'srightIknownowyouhaveto Stumble!"
And he tries to put added oomph into the Stumble, though there's a thread of worry in his voice; he doesn't think it will work.
[Attempting Dominate 1: Stumble a bit, Verna. Diff: Verna's WP.]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 6, 6, 7, 10) ( success x 4 )
Verna Gardner
[Perception + Awareness!]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 4, 8) ( success x 1 )
David
A trickle of something other than adrenaline, or fear, or whatever it is she feels when she sees what he means to do slips up and down her spine something tickles a hunch an uncanniness she has felt before.
cruor
[Meanwhile, Perception + Awareness #1. Specialty: Hey, Hey, Do I Hunch With My Little Hunch Somebody Using A Discipline?]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 2, 7, 7, 8, 9) ( success x 4 ) [Doubling Tens]
cruor
[Perc + Awareness #2. What's that?]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (4, 4, 7, 10, 10) ( success x 3 )
Verna Gardner
Verna goes down. The wheeled briefcase tries to keep on going, momentum and all that, but with her iron grip on the handle, it swings around in a little semicircle and hits the grass. She's not even wearing heels. Something about this, that tingling hair-raise reminds her of how Jon Marc could just command her. Like that. It's enough to drag a terrified, uncontrolled wail out of her. Not again. Not this. Not again.
She pulls her briefcase close, puts it between herself and the absolutely insane person in front of her. She's fishing in a pocket for something. And she hopes that this time, this awful man won't force her to drop it.
"Help!" she screams out. "He's going to stab me!"
Verna Gardner
[Init = 5 +]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (2) ( fail )
David
[Init +6]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (1) ( botch x 1 )
cruor
[Nice Lady. +7]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (6) ( success x 1 )
cruor
[You Might Know Me As René Jacobs. +6]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (4) ( fail )
Verna Gardner
[Tiebreaker +5!]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (9) ( success x 1 )
David
[-_-. How humiliating can this night get? +6]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (1) ( botch x 1 )
David
[Ask a question, receive an answer.]
cruor
INIT ORDER:
Nice Lady
You Might Know Me As René Jacobs, hereafter known as Jacobs
Verna
David
David
Verna goes down. She looks so fucking human to David right now, but he knows better; doesn't he know better? He's seen into her soul, after all, has seen the colours it paints around her. He has to just get through it. He has to. The briefcase is close and she's fumbling for something, but he's not paying attention; caught as he is on the verge of closing his eyes and a determination not to do so, he is paying attention only to one thing.
His purpose. Bring the stake down through Verna's heart.
1. Stake Verna.
Verna Gardner
Verna goes for the gun she's got stowed away in her briefcase in an attempt to scare him off. Perhaps staring down that barrel will make him stop. And if it doesn't? Well, she did just let everyone in hearing range know that the man was coming for her with a... stabbing implement.
What delusions does this freak suffer that make him think she's Dracula?
She's never killed anyone. She might have set into motion bureaucratic principles that might have eventually led to an untimely demise or two, but nothing this immediate. Cipriano's lessons come back to her. Remember to breathe. Don't be angry. She can't stand right, because she's not standing, but surely he will back off, right?
cruor
Somebody did hear her scream, sweet, sweet poetry in the night makes the evening hum those warm and cozy winters just like sire used to talk about with cattle lowing shrill and panicked hunted, ah! Such a night; somebody did hear her scream. Two somebodies.
Two somebodies who were, by sheer chance, already on their way to investigate something, for whatever reason.
One of them would be familiar to Verna, if she were in a position to see him as he lopes up the grass, closing the distance between the parking lot and the sound with a bit of preternatural swiftness (or that's the idea, anyway). The grumpy Belgian, handsome as a devil but always frowning always fucking belegeured not a nice guy and he disappeared back when Stephen Andrássy disappeared disappeared and there was blood wasn't there and the police have him down as a missing person, case still very active.
The other is a six foot something woman, pale as a vampire and somewhat horrifying because of it; her humanity does not soften her features, does not give her any tie to her living self, and her cheekbones are sharp and her lips are thin and red and red like a wolf's and her hair is white-blonde and she's dressed in leather pants and a tanktop with skulls on the chest and a leather vest and she's fucking wearing sunglasses and she looks not at all like the kind of person Verna would ever want to talk to.
But they are who is coming to help her.
---
Jacobs:
1. Close distance to Verna and David. -1 BP for Celerity to double time this action.
Nice Lady:
1. Ditto, but without Celerity.
Verna Gardner
[Dex+Ath = drawing gun!]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (6, 8, 9) ( success x 3 )
David
[Should've been diff 7, so two suxx! Still good. :)]
Verna Gardner
[Charisma! (0 intimidate, so up diff by 1) = I am totally capable of this, I am cool, calm Verna]
Dice: 4 d10 TN7 (4, 7, 8, 10) ( success x 3 )
David
[David, willpower not to waver.]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )
David
[Stake to the heart, diablerist, who is very good at acting like a human for some reason, pfah. Melee + Dex. Diff: 9.]
Dice: 5 d10 TN9 (5, 7, 8, 8, 9) ( success x 1 )
David
[Damage. Strength (2) + 1 (Stake) + 2 (Heart-targeting!)]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (4, 6, 6, 7, 9) ( success x 4 )
cruor
The doppelgangar, the René Jacobs who is here, who will answer to that name, who will know who Verna thinks about sometimes when she is sad; he is fast. He is fast. He is in the lead. He wasn't fast enough, and: both Jacobs and the cold larger-than-life biker woman Hell's angels it's a joke see the crucifix at her throat didn't have a chance to stop David from bringing the stake down.
He wavers. Verna looks like she means business: the gun might give her that with some people, but not David. No; it's the expression in her eyes, the intent that he reads there. Verna is terrifying, and he has to control his hand. He knows what she could do to him: He read it on her fucking soul. He still doesn't realize anybody else is coming when he brings the stake down and --
-- the wood pierces skin and bone and finds Verna's heart and it hurts it hurts it hurts more than anything that's ever happened to her, physically, it hurts when the thing goes right through her.
---
Round Summary:
Nice Lady: still coming.
Jacobs: Ready for the next round!
Verna! >.> 4L to the heart. In desperate need of medical attention.
David: Holding a stake in Verna's heart.
Verna Gardner
He advances, and the sight of the gun doesn't stop him, and it all happens so fast. Verna's not used to battle. He's upon her, and the barrier she made with her little briefcase is nothing. He just keeps going. Time slows down, she can see the sharp pointed arc of the stake coming for her, and she's got her finger on the trigger, but it's not quick enough.
Oh, David. Your mistake should now be so obvious. Vampire hearts don't beat like this; they don't cause blood to spurt in furious bright red rhythm. Watery blood, not thick, rich vitae. She is no diablerist, but a scared, young, living thing with a gun to your chest. You could have killed her a lot easier than this.
Her scream is a wild thing, eyes tightly shut with the pain, teeth bared -- but no fangs. It takes all of the air out of her lungs and trails out with a creak at the end, reflex trying to get the pain out -- but there's so much pain and so little air.
The gun goes off by itself, as all the muscles in her flinch and clench and squeeze.
[Dex + Firearms - 2 wound penalty = 1... Diff 4 = point blank. Spending WP because she really doesn't want to die.]
Dice: 1 d10 TN4 (7) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Verna Gardner
[Light pistol = 4 damages + 1 success]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 3, 6, 9) ( success x 2 )
David
[David, soak.]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (1, 3) ( botch x 1 )
David
[First a Perception + Alertness, to see how up David is on the current situation omfg that is mortal blood. -2 diff for Auspex.]
Dice: 5 d10 TN4 (2, 2, 3, 8, 10) ( success x 2 )
David
[Self Control: WHAT HAVE I DONE? DON'T FLIP OUT.]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (3, 7) ( success x 1 )
David
David is hit by the bullet. It hits his shoulder, and although they always laugh off shoulder wounds in moves and television a shoulder wound can be a terror, can be nasty. It hits his shoulder, passes through it, but leaves no lasting mark on flesh which knits up immediately as if it had never been damaged as if there had been no gunfire no bullet. There's a bullet hole in his shirt. There's nothing on his flesh but a dull bruise which will fade before morning comes. If morning comes for him.
That is not by any means certain.
His jaw drops in horror, and it is different from the fear earlier, from the anger when he thought she was a monster; this is personal horror, the kind which will etch itself on a face for an eternity, the kind which kickstarts the old dead heart and makes it yearn to beat so it can express how entirely fucking horrified it is.
She's human.
"Fuck," he says, "Fuck, fuck, wait, don't die," but there are two others to worry about, aren't there? He is no longer holding the stake in Verna's heart. He pulls it out and, kneeling beside her, tries to put compression on the wound; that's what you're supposed to do, right?
And he looks at Jacobs, first, Jacobs who has slowed to take in the scene. And means to deliver a Command.
--
[and now we re-init everybody]
David
[I have no rating in Medicine. Sorry, kid. :(]
Verna Gardner
[+5 Init!]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (7) ( success x 1 )
David
+6
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (6) ( success x 1 )
cruor
[Nice Lady +7]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (2) ( fail )
cruor
[Jacobs +6]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (10) ( success x 1 )
Verna Gardner
[re-init, +5!]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (4) ( fail )
David
[+6]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (6) ( success x 1 )
cruor
Init Order is:
Jacobs
David
Verna
Nice Lady
cruor
A gunshot. Jacobs, snorting this soft sound she recognizes as laughter. A delicious dish of blood, blood spilling into the grass. A stake, and the heretic kneeling beside her.
The biker lady throws her head back and laughs; it's a wild sound, as shrill in its way as any shriek, for it is a sound that is defined by how it cares not and yet nothing without passion could laugh so. Contradictions; she opens her sinewy arms wide and calls the darkness.
[1. Get thee some Obtenebration 3, Arms of the Abyss.]
Verna Gardner
It's hard to concentrate on much of anything anymore. The stake is pulled out, and that just causes the blood to pool in the cavity left behind. Ribs are broken, making it hard to breathe, but she labors at it in order to scream -- softer now that she can't get enough air to do so, but still just as wild with pain.
There are people laughing at her. That much registers. Is that René? Is she hallucinating this?
Her murderer tries to put pressure on her chest, and this confuses -- what is he trying to do?
Don't die, he says. Like he's trying, now, to save her. It's hard to make sense of that. But he's not stabbing her anymore, is he?
Is he? She levels the gun at his chest again, with one arm, to shoot him if that stake hand moves.
Verna Gardner
[Don't stab me again, you freak. Or I'll shoot you again, I swear.]
David
"Go away," David tells Jacobs. "Just go away, and take your friend with you, this doesn't concern you, just go!" And he imbues his voice with that air of Command that he does not yet wield with confidence; when he first locked eyes with the Belgian, darkly handsome but oh so world-weary, no matter the mind behind the eyes the marks of weariness remain, when David first locked eyes with the Belgian (?), he thought that they were humans coming to help, that if only he got them away he could fix what was happening somehow. The woman is laughing like a banshee at a battlefield; maybe they're not so mortal after all.
[David is gonna keep, uh, pressing on Verna's wound annnnnnnd
1. Dominate 2: Mesmerize Jacobs!! Go away and take your friend with you kplzthnx. He will spend WP on this.]
cruor
The creature with René Jacobs' face doesn't intend to let David's voice compel him. He's surprisingly strong beneath his sportscoat, and he's fast besides: he burns more of that speed now. The better to draw a knife he has hidden in his wolf's polished modern man about town coat and slash it across David's throat. Can't order him around if one can't speak, can one? The quicksilver push of blood burnt gives him time to do another pass of knife, this time a casual slice rather than an aim to make the poor Ventrue or Malkavian or whatever the fuck he is smile.
[Declare! -1 BP for Celerity Action.
1A. Draw knife.
1B. SLICE YER THROAT. NO TALKIES. (-2 dice for split.)
Celerity Action:
SLICE YOU FOR FUN, DAVID. LOL. HALPING HUMAN AHAHA.]
cruor
[Melee + Dex + C -1 die for Celerity -2 dice for split. Diff: 4. +2 small target.]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (7, 9, 10) ( success x 3 )
cruor
[Damage! Strength +1 +2.]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 4, 5, 8, 8) ( success x 2 )
David
[David, soak.]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (2, 10) ( success x 1 )
David
[David Dominate Power! +wp. Diff, Jacobs' WP +1 because MY THROAT JUST GOT CUT AAH.]
Dice: 4 d10 TN7 (2, 6, 6, 9) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Verna Gardner
[Perception + Awareness]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (7, 7, 7, 10) ( success x 4 )
Verna Gardner
[Self Control]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (4, 6) ( success x 1 )
Verna Gardner
[Dex + Ath -2 Wounds = 1, +1 penalty for changing action = gather her phone! Spending WP because she really does not want to die (2 wp spent)]
Dice: 1 d10 TN7 (5) ( success x 1 ) [WP]
cruor
[Nice Lady: C'MON ABYSS. Manip + Occult.]
Dice: 5 d10 TN7 (4, 8, 8, 9, 9) ( success x 4 )
cruor
[Celerity Round! +1 diff, Change Action. Dex + Athletics. Grab Nice Lady, Drag her away. Can't split it so it's really just a rush and a grab which we'll roll +1 diff.]
Dice: 6 d10 TN7 (1, 3, 5, 5, 6, 9) ( success x 1 )
cruor
[Should have been 8. Just pretend.]
cruor
This is what happens.
René (surely this is a hallucination; surely, René is dead; as dead as Stephen is; as dead as a nail that never jumped with electricity, that never felt the hammer) brings that knife of his in an arc through the air and cuts David's throat, cuts it open a long slim light, and a drop of dark and thick blood (vitae) sprays from the knife's arc and splatters across Verna's face, a drop lands on her mouth and oh, oh, the smell of it. The smell of it, along with all the pain; it smells like something she wants to lick; it smells like something she needs, an difficult to resist itch which works under her skin just stretch out your tongue and -
But she resists. And the air is thick with omen, is potent with strangeness, with hair-on-the-back-of-your neck lifting.
David is saying something over her head when Verna pushes herself, fumbling for her phone, where is it, where - there it is.
And even as Jacobs is wheeling around, about to unwillingly turning on his companion (but not so unwillingly that this is out of his wheelhouse, y'see, c'mon baby let's go far away from here), the darkness comes. Verna might think she knows what darkness is. Might think she's been alone at night before, might remember some trip out to the desert where there aren't any lights. That wasn't darkness.
This is darkness, a long arm of it peeling from her own shadow, lofting high a clotted must-not-be-real strip of shadow ready to strike. This is darkness, another tendril bleeding out of Jacobs' shadow, whipping through the air with a cold dead sound. And two more, trailing up the woman's legs, to dance over her shoulders, held back and at ready, an abyssal collar, a cloak, a throne, a frame.
This next thing that happens is too fast.
Jacobs, flinging himself forward, flinging himself away from David and Verna at the woman who just conjured shadow out of nothing, clinging himself at her an arm around her throat hauling her back come on let's go we need to go away from here.
Verna Gardner
[+5 Init!]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (8) ( success x 1 )
David
+6
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (6) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
David
[No WP, obv.]
cruor
Nice Lady. +7
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (9) ( success x 1 )
cruor
Jacobs. +6
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (3) ( fail )
cruor
This round's init order iiiiiis:
Nice Lady
Verna
David
Jacobs.
cruor
Jacobs' mind has fastened on one command, on the one order, that David gave him; he can think of nothing else. His arm can think of nothing else, for he does not balk at the abyssal tendrils snaking high over his ladyfriend's head, he only burns his store of energy further in order to push her, bring her away, tries to speak pleadingly -
Somebody snap the guy out of it.
[1A. Verbal Manip + Leadership, come on, Lasombra Lady, let's leave these crazy kids to it, I know I'm Dominated but it's just so Mesmerizing I can't fucking deal.
1B. Pull Lasombra Lady away.
-1 BP to strength.]
Verna Gardner
Verna's head is swimming with the violence of pain and blood loss. That's how she rationalizes what she's seeing. This shadow is her brain slowly failing, tunneling out into unconsciousness. It's her death coming.
René is here because he is dead. She's seeing the people who have "passed on and wait on the other side", like common hallucinations in the moments before brain death. She knows it isn't real, but why René? Why not her grandma? Why not Dr. Andrássy? Why couldn't his be the last face she sees? Why why why.
She's got her phone in hand, and she's not nearly as out of it yet as she thinks. She'll try to dial 911.
David
David is terrified.
A Lasombra. A Lasombra, here. Why couldn't she be the one he slipped the stake into? He still has the stake. He's still holding it. He swallows; the dark blood on his throat trickles further down toward his collar, draws the start of a wavering question mark. David is terrified, and he turns his eyes onto the Lasombra and tries again the trick that's served him well enough:
"LEAVE!"
But that's not all he does. He's kneeling beside Verna? He tries to lift her now. He knows it might and must injure her more, but not enough to kill her, right? And it is worse to leave her here, with them, where no help will come. Maybe oh maybe they'll leave and he can just --
[1A. Lift Verna.
1B. Dominate Lady.
-1 BP to Strength.]
cruor
No. The tall tall tall woman is cold as cold can be and though she may yet be forced back a step or two no slim and imperial in her tatty fuck off anarchist gear she reaches for Jacobs' arms and the two tendrils of darkness (Azrail, Azrail) bobbing over her shoulders like hooded cobras ah yes at ready they dart, seeking to coil around Jacobs' and separate him from her.
Of the other two tendrils, one seeks to trip David; send him sprawling with his charge. Oh yes, the lady lets him lift her up; she'll laugh harder to see him flat on his face, the mortal yet more wounded. What is he doing? The stupid Camarillan fool.
She does not think he'll be able to command her.
Look at him. Pathetic.
[Lady is Obtenebrationing all over here.
1A. Tentacles: DO YOUR THINGS.]
cruor
Tentacle #1. Get Jacobs. Flat Dex rating of 3.
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (2, 5, 10) ( success x 1 )
cruor
Tentacle #2. Get Jacobs. They're all Dex 3.
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (6, 8, 10) ( success x 3 )
Verna Gardner
[dex + ath - 2 wounds = call 911! Spending WP because dying, ohnoes.]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (5) ( success x 1 ) [WP]
David
[>.> Strength + Athletics. LIFTING VERNA. +1 die from BP strength. -3 die for split. Saving WP for Dominate.]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (1, 7) ( success x 1 )
cruor
[Tentacle TRIP!]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 10) ( success x 1 )
David
[Reflexive Dodge, 'coz omfg. +1 diff, carrying Verna, +1 more diff, totally distracted.]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (3, 5, 6, 6, 7, 7) ( success x 4 )
David
[Fail!]
cruor
[David has lost his chance to try to Dominate.
Jacobs' reflexive break outta this damned tentacle hold which I shoulda done before #1. Strength + Brawl.]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 4, 6, 9, 10) ( success x 3 )
cruor
[#2.]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (3, 3, 5, 6, 10) ( success x 2 )
cruor
[1]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (7, 9, 10) ( success x 3 )
cruor
[2]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (7) ( success x 1 )
cruor
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (1, 2) ( botch x 1 )
cruor
[A'ight. NOW Leadership + Manip.]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (3, 3, 3, 8, 8, 9) ( success x 3 )
cruor
[Lady: WP to be all nyet.]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 4, 4, 6, 9) ( success x 2 )
cruor
[Ground Damage Verna.]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (8) ( success x 1 )
Verna Gardner
[Soak!]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 9) ( success x 1 )
cruor
Her last moments aren't silent moments.
They're painful moments. They're strange moments. The pale woman's pet shadows pour over her shoulders and seep around Jacobs' torso one after the other and they wrench him from his task: pull the pale woman away, away; drag him from her. He struggles free slips one of the shadows from him easily, easily, though the other still holds him fast holds him tight not tight enough not as tight as it could be, but
Jacobs is speaking. His voice is unaccented. Does Verna remember René's voice? He's not pleading, but he's giving his own brand of command -- let's go, he says, let us go, let's leave this fucking pup to his own mess, we can come back and rub his nose in it later stupid thing won't it be funny to watch what happens come on let's go this isn't one of Them this is what we're looking for.
Verna may not be listening closely to whatever René is saying. He is a poor psychopomp for her, if that is what he is; he is barely paying her mind at all. Verna may not be listening closely because right now her world is her body and her body is breaking:
First, David lifts her; then that impossible oil slick tenebrous arm whips across the ground and sends David falling, and he has no breath to rush from his lungs, but he makes a sound regardless, cannot keep hold of her quite; she hits him hard and oh, oh, oh, it hurts; her poor heart. They all fall down.
But she managed to dial 911. The operator is answering; she can hear the tinny voice which sounds recorded, though of course it isn't, it's a real person - she can hear it from the ground where she has once again fallen.
The pale woman, laughing, with her shadows; her laughter has begun to trickle away, because whatever Jacobs has said is sinking into her head isn't it just and though she wants to stay though she wants to keep on playing with
"Fuck. Yeah. Maybe you're right. We'll leave and come back. You're not fucking in your right mind right now, but that sounds pretty fucking good. D'you hear that, little Tower boy? Little dying girl? D'you hear?"
Verna Gardner
Her murderer lifts her up, she can sense the rising. It hurts, causes her to take a breath that hurts even more. And then he drops her to the ground, which forces that breath out in a screaming panic of more pain.
What is he trying to do? Torture her? Was the stake in her chest not enough? Did he try to save her life because he wanted to extend her agony? How does such cruelty exist?
The dream of René says something he would never say. These things are supposed to be comforting. Just her luck?
The 911 operator -- that's real. She has to believe in that reality. After the scream, she turns her head toward her phone.
"DU," she says, her voice thick with pain. "Between Nelson Hall and High Street."
She takes a bubbling, hard breath.
"Stabbed. Chest."
Another horrible-sounding breath. If David doesn't try to stop her by this point, she'll continue.
"He's killing me."
Verna Gardner
[Dex + Ath -2 Wounds = MY PHONE! NOT YOURS! MURDERER!]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (10) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
David
[Dex + Ath. GIVE ME THAT OMFG.]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 6, 6, 9) ( success x 3 )
David
[Don't freak out, David. So the Sabbat are probs gonna come right back. And you've got a Masquerade breach right here. And you stabbed a poor human girl, even if she was mean! It's fine. Self control.]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (1, 5) ( botch x 1 )
Verna Gardner
[Init +5!]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (2) ( fail )
David
[+6]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (7) ( success x 1 )
Verna Gardner
He took her phone away. That's to be expected, once he figured out what she was doing. Even the insane know how to protect themselves, usually.
So she takes a deep, painful breath, with her broken ribs prodding her lungs, and yells as best she can: "DU. Between Nelson Hall and High Street!"
This, while going for her gun again.
Let it not be said that Verna is a quitter. She holds on to her life like it is a very dear thing, for all that it has been emptied. She has lost her dreams and her research, a friend and a love. If they are coming for the last precious thing she has, they will pay. She will make them. All of them.
David
He might, at another time, admire her. He might admire her gumption and he might admire her will and he might admire her will to live. He does admire that, in a way, but so distantly he's not even conscious of it.
He's conscious of the breach. He's conscious of the phone, which he reaches out lightning quick to steal. Even with a hole in her heart, ribs cracked, body broke, pain a constant though adrenaline slicks through her she can't even feel herself shaking see, even with that Verna is almost faster than he is.
But he gets the phone, and she yells the address, she hunts for the phone, and the magnitude of what he's done hits him.
Exit, David. Enter, David's Beast, to make everything all right, to eliminate the problem, to blot it out, blot it out -- he loses his name and his ability to reason to try to be rational to fix anything. He loses it all; and he snarls. The fangs are out; they're sharp, and even here on the grass so recently visited by shadows darker than shadow they gleam.
He bites her. He doesn't fucking care where. He's just going for the blood. He wants it. He wants it all. It'll make it better.
[David bites Verna. It is a Kiss attack. Dex + Brawl.]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (4, 6, 6, 8, 10, 10) ( success x 5 )
David
David is precise in his madness, is neat, goes for the jugular, gets it, sheaths his fangs in her throat and opens her vein then makes his mouth a vacuum on the wound and sucks and Verna loses something of herself as well because it feels better than anything she has ever felt or dreamed of feeling. They call it the Kiss: but no Kiss was ever this good outside of childhood dreams. This is euphoria and ecstasy; this is addictive, would make rational men and women return and beg: please. He drinks from her and drinks from her and drinks and drinks and, oh, he drinks, and he will not cease drinking, no.
Verna Gardner
The moment his fangs penetrate her skin, the euphoria sets in, drug-like, as if any drug could duplicate this feeling. It infects every branching nerve until her entire body is involved. Orgasm is a pale pastel compared to this deep red that blocks her from reacting to the fear and pain in any way other than to gasp. He's pressing on her mutilated chest, and she doesn't care about what would have caused a scream before. Blood, warmth, and life races out of her, into him, and soon her pierced heart races in increasing, frantic strength, trying to keep her brain fed at the expense of all else. It only serves to hasten the process, even as it keeps her conscious for a while -- aware in some dim, distant fashion that her feet are cold, and that someone is violently killing her.
Soon, she's grasping at the air, trying hard to hold on to the ecstasy of dying as her consciousness slips away into hazy fog. Her mind ceases trying to make sense of any stimuli as neurons begin slipping away one by one in a cascade of starvation. The pleasure only stops because there is no longer a Verna left to feel it.
David
[Roll la la la.]
Dice: 4 d10 TN8 (1, 2, 3, 5) ( botch x 1 )
David
[Roll #2 la la la.]
Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 3, 5, 7, 7, 7, 9) ( success x 4 )
David
[Roll la la.]
Dice: 1 d10 TN8 (5) ( fail )
David
Nobody comes to save Verna in the end.
A gunshot, the screams, they weren't enough to summon anything but monsters who were already on their way, and the 911 call is cut short too quickly, and the night does not light up with the sound of sirens, and the strip of grass Verna and her murderer are tangled upon is not entirely in shadow, but from a distance they do not look like anything more than a pair of desperate students, seeking physical comfort, connection, proof that they are alive.
Verna is not alive.
Verna dies.
And then she is aware, again, of Hunger, and the taste of something sweet on her tongue, something rich and familiar and oh, addictive, addicting, impossibly good, something she might sate herself on, and the air is cold and her back is wet and she is very
very hungry.
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