Fetzen

The Sunday Group - Bumps in the Night

@Rapid Reader
Oh she'll learn real good if she asks Clive for help. She'll also regret asking when he wakes her up at 2:47am with a glass of ice water to the face, tosses a cap gun in her lap, and yells "You're being attacked, defend yourself!" before coming at her with a broom handle.

@Jarl Coolgruuf

That sounds like a good ritual to get Mael into demon mode asap when you really need him.

The Sunday Group - Bumps in the Night

So I'd say Maël is in for a promotion!

Wait... does the Sunday Group have ranks ? There must be some method of letting people know officially when they've royally screwed up!

The Sunday Group - Bumps in the Night

For Maël, airports were a nuisance and an amusement at the same time. On one hand there was all the waiting, all the armed guards, all those security checks and scanners one had to go through just in order to be kept waiting afterwards still. On the other hand none of this was anywhere near being a tool appropriate in order to detect what they were really dealing with in his case. Maintaining his countenance, the frenchmen allowed the overabundance of uselessness to hold him in its firm grasp while he wondered how much it would cost to get the Sunday Group its own learjet or even something bigger for a fully mobile office and lab solution.

The outcome of his considerations was a rather negative though: First of all it simply was way too expensive. Secondly however the idea also held great potential for internal conflict. If one considered what the Sunday Group had done to a once innocent Chicago office building a fully customizable plane would probably turn out as a restored B-52 with a built-in shooting range and its empty bombing bay being used to get rid of alchemical experiments in the process of going horribly wrong.

Speaking of budget, it became quite apparent where some of that did go when Eleanor and Val turned for another part of the 737 than he had to. The creation of privileges without explanation was one thing, the seat he found himself to be cursed with was another. This was an airplane, the method of locomotion at least once associated with freedom like no other! And they were going to fly over the US, a country that valued 'freedom' more than anything else! And where was all that freedom now ? Faded away in a wisp of nothingness, probably just like that shit piece of crack Eleanor must have been smoking when booking this three square feet torture chamber without walls for him!

Reaching for his phone before service would become unavailable due to takeoff, Maël wrote a text message to his boss:

My knees feel like Han in the trash compactor, except I know there isn't any droid to save them. I hope the flight will be short enough for you not to explore all of that space you have in business class!

The stewardess walked by only to get her well trained corporate smile blasted out of her face by his stare. Maël knew she only tried to do a good job, but he was not in a good mood currently. He felt rather... wedged in. Maybe they could save even more money and still increase his traveling comfort by some out-of-the-box thinking ? Putting him into a large crate and sealing it with some magic to obfuscate its true contents might do the trick since cargo holds were pressurized. Or maybe his demonic alter ego had the potential to evolve if the desire was strong enough ? Now would have been a damn good time to grow a pair of wings in order to do some flying himself!

Summary

Maël settles in for hours of discomfort to come and would like to put Eleanor on a stretching bank until she's 6'4.

The Sunday Group - Bumps in the Night

[...]

@Fetzen I like the new avatar

@POOHEAD189

I shamelessly decided to use the same avatar I've been using on another roleplaying site I'm active on.

The Sunday Group - Bumps in the Night

While others did not seem to take long in order to get themselves ready for the journey ahead, Maël did take a different approach. Instead of vanishing into his office right away, the Franco-American reached for the coffee pot and the adjacent fridge containing the milk first. There was no point in waiting for a cab together, so why make a hurry out of getting ready ? The flight wouldn't go any time sooner because of them arriving super early.

Yet still there was another reason behind the man's strategy. It revealed itself once he stood in front of the cupboard containing his clothes and forced a temporary gap into the window shade using two fingers. Peeking through it he could see Edgar and Clive already waiting... always a good thing to know in advance what kind of disguise their wizard had chosen this time. It being a homeless man lightyears away from the last wash pretty much ruled out the coat and tie option, at least if one wanted to avoid stupid questions like 'Do you all belong to the same group ?' from the cab driver or airport personnell.

Instead of putting it on, Maël carefully dropped the thing into his suitcase just in case it might help making a good impression somewhere in Seattle. Along with it followed another trenchcoat just like the one he was currently wearing and, last but not least, his 'No more Mr. nice guy'-suit. The hooded leather jacket had a noticeably larger and wider cut than Maël's ordinary clothes and had been ripped open and patched together again using various pieces of scrap leather so often that it looked as if stolen right off a farmer's cliché scarecrow. The pair of trousers ? Didn't look any different.

Reaching for a few other items, none of them having any of the supernatural properties or sheer firepower that his colleagues liked to carry around, Maël was ready to go soon then. Didn't they have a cathedral with a large Flentrop organ somewhere in Seattle ? Maybe talking with the locals would yield the opportunity to play a tune or two on it.

The Sunday Group - Bumps in the Night

I'll try to get my frenchman post up today. Something tells me that, between fake homeless people and others carrying a bag full of firearms stuff, he might be an exquisitely boring individual.

Ravenloft, The Curse of Strahd.

@Tsar Gatto I tried to imply in my post that there already was a prolonged journey ahead of that last few miles to Barovia. Apparently I failed :(

So... shall I trash and rewrite my post ?

The Sunday Group - Bumps in the Night

Short question: Given that Poo currently has the lead in terms of evidence finding would anybody like to stick to some sort of posting rotation ? Just wondering :)

Ravenloft, The Curse of Strahd.

Vanjathar

Settlements... It had been quite a while since he had left behind the caravans of Narfell, but still it would have been nothing but honesty to say that the half-orc felt unfamiliar with, if not even bewildered by the concept of completely stationary life. The world had so much to offer, so why restrict oneself to one place for the majority of a lifetime ? Always ploughing through the same set of fields, hunting in the same forests or maybe not at all, seeing the same skies. The thought was quite a little horrifying for him. And then of course there were other problems that were caused directly by the aggregation of a high number of people in a more densely packed space. Admittedly some major cities had found the ingenuity and will to take effective measures against it, but the average town was bound to suffer from its inhabitants... biological end products. Living non-stationary did not bring with it such issues in the first place.

No part of Vanjathar was craving for these hotspots of civilization and it sometimes felt as if no part of so called 'civilization' had a particular desire for him either. The moment people saw the pair of tiny tusks sticking out of his mouth and his gray skin the curtain already fell in most of their minds, so who was he to harbor the desire for a daily dose of disrespect ? However, while he could do without beer and tavern brawls, he could not do without the occasional piece of scrap metal or a real blacksmith laying his hands on a sword having become blunt. Unfortunate circumstances simply were not entirely avoidable, he couldn't carry an entire workshop with him.

The rendezvous with his contact was rejuvenatingly different. The elderly man had opted for a small crossing in the forest, a few miles away from the border to Barovia, in order for a final briefing. It proved to be abundantly abstract though, basically only stating that this was going to be a 'prolonged stay' and that he should be 'careful'. While there was a certain awareness that Barovia was mysterious and dangerous alike, there was no such thing as an escape plan. Vanjathar was told about the Vistani and that they probably had the means to get him out most swiftly and efficiently, but that it would also be unlikely to be affordable. In other words: Vanjathar would be on his own, just as he preferred to be. The most challenging solution of all.

The remainder of the journey was a small hop compared to what he had already been through, but now he needed to either find a place and enough resources for himself or some kind of employment in order to keep his stomach filled. Doing the former was difficult if one had so little information at hand, but going for the second option could also yield some more insight about Barovia. Hunting down a pack of wolves and werewolves with an adventuring party sounded doable. Not much talking, but venturing into the forest instead.

The peacefulness of the walk ended for him with the sound of air flowing around his hammer. One could argue that this might not be the most appropriate weapon for enemies such as wolves which could be fast and nimble, but Vanjathar was not in the mood for a hit-more-than-once approach. They hadn't been ordered to bring back any kind of trophies as a proof of their work, had they ? So it didn't matter in which condition bones and teeth would come out of this fight. Also Vanjathar hoped that displaying ferocity was a language those feral animals would understand and maybe run away from it. Their primary target were werewolves, not ordinary wolves.

If only he'd been able to produce enough wind in order to get rid of the mist. Hardly being able to see what was coming felt bad by instinct and his instincts already seemed to be proven right. More than once he could see a beast make a run for him first, then turn around and escape into the fog only to come back a bunch of seconds later. That was... if it was actually the same wolf. The environmental circumstances didn't help with identifying details even at close range either.

The Sunday Group - Bumps in the Night

I'm surprised to learn that this is actually possible. I'd have thought that weapons/ammunition in general are not eligible as passenger luggage in any way. Not only because of intentional stuff but also because it would not be the first time for potentially volatile cargo to go haywire in the hold.

Sorry for my lack of knowledge...