Path of the Vampire forum

Title: Grey Wars
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Characters: Moria, Baptiste

Moria must post first, outlining a story on the following theme (feel free to get creative):

Setting: A smoggy factory
Backstory: The group ended up crossing paths as a result of some criminal undertaking (some or all characters).
Occurance: a crazed terrorist strapped with a bomb attack.
Variable: You feel something is amiss.

Participants: 2
ARES: yes
Speed: slow
Chapter: no
Minimum Words Per Post: none
Maximum Words Per Post: 1500

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This thread was generated via the Roleplay Matchmaking System.

Moria hid her face under a hoody as she walked, carefully, quietly. Glancing around every corner and crevice while carrying a somewhat large purse. And it was in that purse and that jacket one would find things that did not belong there, machinery parts, poisonous chemicals, sensitive documents, among other things. All packed away neatly under more easily explainable things. Stolen, almost all of them. It was what Moria knew, stealing was just what she was aware of.

The factory was hardly optimal, they were doubtless not making enough money to track her down and might not even notice their lose. She could handle the chemicals sure, regardless, she had a mask over her mouth still to help with he smell. And for her face.

But, there was just something. That didn't seem quite right. Some danger, or something. Just around the corner. Waiting.

"Well. This absolutely sucks,” he begins in a quiet voice; his eyes stare down the lens of his handheld camera to the thousand or so viewers currently watching this livestream. "But. I guess that’s why they call it a forfeit and that’s why I hate every single one of you for voting this in.”

It’s late at night and the torch of his digital camera is the only source of light by which his viewers are able to see anything. B has his back against the wall of a building and his hand is sheltering the top edge of the torch so that the light is squarely on him and not bleeding into the area. His blond hair stands neatly up like rows of maize even as his head whips to the left at the sound of nearby footsteps. He spares a look at the camera and presses an index finger across his lips as if to silence his audience from giving away his position by somehow vocalising any of the noise they’re making in the chat box. The section is flooded with comments: a cacophony of emoji, well-wishing, and challenges that B doesn’t have the time to answer or react to.

B has brought this on himself, but, he doesn’t like the weight of the blame on his shoulders. He foolishly promised his viewers that if he missed an upload last week then he’d be willing to accept a forfeit of their design. For one: B didn’t expect to have his schedule derailed by malfunctioning technology and lost hours of pre-recording jabbering as a result and for another: B didn’t expect that his viewers were this insane and that he would be out at midnight completing their evil schemes. His forfeit was simple on the surface: spend a night in an abandoned building and stream the event. The people wanted to know if monsters really did live in Harper Rock city and B was going to do his best to give them a show without revealing some home truths. He isn’t ready to reveal that he is the monster - not just yet

Moria kept on, there was only so much that one could take, but one more test, and she'd be good for now. She didn't realize just yet there was someone else here, because she couldn't see them just yet. But Baptiste, his viewers, and Moria, were not alone either.

"I got you I got you I got you shhhhhh." The words didn't came from Moria or Baptiste, but from a wide bloodshot eyed man stumbling about in a large jacket, Moria swallowed as she saw the weapon in his hand and the way his jacket seemed to have boxed edges too it. The mans face was totally distorting and changing emotions wildly and rapidly, "Boy I'm gonna show them, gonna show them good," he said letting out a laugh tossing the jacket on the ground and laughing all the louder revealing the bomb strapped to his chest.

The man was completely out of his wits.

Moria rushed down the pathway past Baptiste but heard the gunshot rung out followed immediately, "No no! We need bodies, they need to see that I care. Eheh, I care!!!" he shouted as he seemed to finally catch something with his eyes which seemed to drift away from her every two seconds into absolute nothingness.

"Hey, everything okay, can we just put the gun down friend?" She asked, her voice was sweet and seemed to drift through the air with a kindness to it, but there was fear in it too. A fear that was immensely more evident on her face. She hoped she could use her abilities as a Harpy to help her out here, she had run out of ammunition for the pistol in her bag and wasn't willing to risk that from way over here. Not to mention she already sucked at fighting.

The terrorist looked at her confused almost but just kept on muttering about something and fiddling with the gun.

==========AUTOMATED RANDOM EVENTS SYSTEM==========

Moria has an accident and damages something important.

A gunshot rents the still air - too powerful to be a backfiring car. The explosive sound reverberates in the ears and rings out around the nearby buildings. B doesn’t understand how, but, his brain does this automatic geolocation tracer for the shooter as the echoes die down. Then silence returns far more thickly than it was before the shot, as if everything around him is collectively holding its breath. B is starting to sweat; anxiety invades his thoughts and he fights to remain focused. This is no time to freak out or forget that he has a camera pointed at his face.

“Holy sh--”

B looks down at the camera. The red light blinks back at him.

“Well, I guess I’m being demonetised for this video.” B sighs. “Look. It’s probably not even a real--”

Before he can get the end of the sentence out, his camera is knocked from his grip as a person pushes past. She probably didn’t see him judging by the way she’s running head-long into danger. B frowns as he watches her back disappear around the corner. He has no idea why anyone would run toward danger, but, this isn’t his problem. He bends to fetch the camera; it isn’t broken beyond repair, but, the lens is cracked. B hits the off button and puts the camera away in his backpack; he’ll send out a tweet in the next few hours to let everyone know he’s not dead. It’s better not to hang about here.

“That’s wonderful. Thanks, Karen!” he calls after her. “She must be out of her damn mind.”

==========AUTOMATED POST==========

Moria attempted to convince an easy mark of something, and was successful!

Moria's head snapped as she heard Baptiste shout something at her, "Karen?" she mouthed to herself, but her attention returned to the terrorist as he kept on mumbling to himself and whatnot. Moria swallowed, ok, just get out of the way, just leave, just convince him not to detonate the bomb long enough to scram.

The terrorist waved the gun around wildly while bawling incoherently about something again, Moria was backing off slowly, trying not to attract attention but that if she did attract attention it wouldn't get too much of a reaction, "Let's just calm down, there's nothing to worry about," She said her voice sweet and carrying, "You don't want to hurt me do you?" she asked, as if pained by the thought.

She saw him hesitating in some way, his mind was totally off the rails. It was just a matter of if she could keep him calm, or at least confused in a way in which he would not act, long enough to be out of range of the bomb. The gun was one thing, it was something she had had to deal with in the past. The bomb made things a little bit more difficult.

The problem begins when B waits too long to leave and can hear a pair of voices around the corner from him. As the male voice mumbles something unintelligible, the female voice sounds like she’s trying to talk the man out of doing something crazy and violent. B’s mind races. He’s not thinking about the consequences of getting involved so much as he’s considering how much sleep he’s going to be able to get knowing that, by not intervening in some way, something awful happened to the woman as well as others. So the problem truly begins when B realises that his bad boy persona is paper thin and he just can’t stop himself from sticking his neck out to help other people. The thought of getting shot doesn’t deter him, either.

His plan is tenuous at best, but, he doesn’t get a lot of time to think about alternatives. He can only recognise his strengths, which just so happen to be few, far between, and reliant on instinct and luck more than judgement and determination. B steps away from the wall he’s been pressing his back against as if the floor below him would sink away, and he closes his eyes. The shadows wrap around him - thick and solid - and he disappears from view in an instant after the thought. B knows from experience that he has roughly two hours of invisibility with this power, but, it also only works so long as he’s passive and not engaging with anyone.

B makes his way around the corner to find Karen - Moira - with her back to him as she talks down a guy with a bomb strapped to his chest and a pistol in hand. He looks like he’s having a bad day - or maybe a bad life - still, it doesn’t justify what he’s doing right now. B frowns as he thinks about how he can stop this situation from escalating. He doesn’t want anyone to get hurt so his best bet is to take away this guy’s opportunity to do that; B needs to remove the man from his detonator and handgun. If he isn’t conscious, he can’t do ****, he thinks. He makes a silent approach to the gunman, coming up from behind, then makes his move.

The shadows pull back as B simultaneously wraps an arm around the man’s throat and grips a hand; pointing it to the sky in case the gun goes off as he squeezes his palms into fists.

“Go to sleep. Go to sleep. Go to sleep.”

The man is lifted off his toes as B arches backward; his own eyes are clenched shut. He can feel blunt nails digging into the skin of his forearm as the man struggles to break free, but can’t. There’s this snapping sound - like puncturing bubble wrap - that B barely distinguishes over the rapid pitter-patter of the gunman’s heart and the rush of breath that escapes his lips like a strangled scream. B doesn’t know that his superhuman strength has broken every bone in the man’s hand even as the gun slips free and hits the pavement with a clatter. The sound does, however, make him flinch and it’s that moment when he pulls too hard on the man’s neck.

Pop. Then silence: no frantic heartbeat, no panicked breathing, no nothing. B goes very still as the realisation starts to dawn on him and he keeps his eyes closed. He can’t pretend like this is some bad dream forever, though. Slowly, he lifts the lid of one eye and looks across to Moira.

==========AUTOMATED RANDOM EVENTS SYSTEM==========

Baptiste finds information about a secret meeting in support of vampires.