Dramatis Personae
- Devin Broadhurst (played by Rob D.): There was a blurb here the entire time. But it disappears every time you look away from the screen. Tagline: “You saw it, but forgot it.”
- Gabriel MacAlister (played by Douglas Cole): Built like the natural athlete he is, he is tall, strong, and solidly good-looking, but deeply scarred from much combat. He’s missing his lower leg, which he lost fighting zombies. It is capped by a carbon fiber prosthetic that doesn’t seem to interfere much with his activities. A quiet and hard-working man, always ready to lend a hand with any work, which he will do without complaint or obligating the other person to respond. He is an expert martial arts teacher, and has been following in the footsteps of a carpenter for some time now. Emphatically not a pushover or weak personality, but also not one to purposefully show off. Has been in many horrible places and seen many horrible things; he’s a bit of a compulsive planner as a result, as well as always feeling that most folks don’t really know how lucky they are. He was cursed to carry a magical sword for a while, and gave into its Wrath before it was parted from him magically. He’s since given it up, in exchange for unknown burdens. Tagline: “To serve others is the highest calling; to protect the meek the noblest endeavor, and our works are judged by the effort that went into them”
- Kamali Blackshear (played by Merlin A.): Kamali is a young man in his late teens. He is healthy and is of mixed ethnicity of Caucasian South African and native South African. He is a determined youth who believes in a justice of his own, likening himself to the knight of the round table whom he has read deeply into. Just as they stood against the darkness of their age so too does Kamali seek to do the same. For his sister, for his friends, and for the world. Tagline: “A knight without a sword carrying a faith nobody believes.”
- Lorenzo DeModouco (played by Christian G.): A man with movie star looks and a voice that belongs on the radio. Slowly coming to grips with the fact that he isn’t exactly human, but a “Lupus Dei” – “Wolf of God” – otherwise known as a Benandanti. He’s still cheery and always trying to make others happy, but has become a shrewd student of human behavior, which he uses for the benefit of the rest of his team. Lorenzo’s recently joined the Boston Fire Department as a volunteer as a means to get access to places he normally shouldn’t be able to go as well as medical gear and information that might not be available to the public. He’s become a master of spear fighting and like the rest of his brothers is a highly capable combatant. Tagline: “You can take me to the gates of Hell, but I won’t back down and I won’t be turned around.”
- Markus Walker (played by Christopher D.): Only recently awakened to the world of Ceteri, Markus is a couple things. A survivor of Lorna Rd, an officer of the law, a physical mage. It’s hard to tell where each one leaves off and where the other comes into play. He tries his best to follow the law, but it’s hard when there’s no Massachusetts State laws on monster hunting. Tagline: “Honesta quam magna.”
Previously . . .
The last session ended with the boys killing a dragon, freeing a captive, and investigating the hoard. It’s fairly certain that the treasure is cursed. Coyote backs out of the portal home while everyone else is trying to decide how to split up the goods on the ground, Kamali, however, goes over to the captive and tries to detect what the collar is and if it’s affecting her speech. It’s magical, but there’s no idea how it does things, just that it was fae that put it on her. Gabriel asks god if it’d a good idea to remove the collar, not that any of them have any idea how.
Glarankaryx’s Lair Redux
Devin, Gabe, Kamali, Lorenzo, and Markus
The Lair of Glarankaryx
Sunday, October 22nd, 2000, 10:00 pm (time in the Inland is effectively frozen)
Somewhere in Underhill
They attempt to communicate with the captive by speaking louder and slower. They manage to determine that she’s speaking Old Frankish. She rapidly changes languages to try to find one that they understand but no one knows it. They speak with Coyote and he says it’s a nasty piece of work, and that it looks like she was being used as a Tiend, used as a sacrifice to hell to take the place of another. They can’t seem to figure out what they can do so they turn to the hoard again. Coyote, meanwhile, is shoving all the cursed treasure into the trunk of his Roadrunner while Markus has serious doubts that this man is actually a police officer.
At least some of the orphans try to figure out what’s going on with the chest in the hoard, which it’s supernatural shown through Devin’s goggles while Kamali manages to get a name from the Captive: Caoimhe (Keeva) Mac Lannageal. Lorenzo, in the meantime, skins the dragon before dragging everything back into the real world.
Firehouse, Firehouse
Devin, Gabe, Kamali, Lorenzo, and Markus
The Lair of Glarankaryx
Monday, October 23rd, 2000, 12:00 pm
Northern Avenue Bridge, Boston, MA 02210
Caoimhe (Keeva) is rather confused at the situation while Kamali tries to google her name, finding nothing on her. Apparently search engines are just too primitive. Instead, they set her up in the firehouse while they debate on how to kill the demon lord.
They learn that demons hate cold iron when incorporeal, forces them back to the material plane. They cannot get past salt circles. They hate running water, but when it’s incarnated then it’s not a problem. They get captivated by reflections in shiny surfaces. It’s vulnerable to holy weapons and regenerates rather quickly, and any killing attack that isn’t holy just shoves it back into hell.
Gabe’s phone rings and there’s bloody screaming on the other end and then Desiree comes onto the other end explaining that he was butt dialed and the screams were from a horror film. Gabe just tells her what they’ve managed to accomplish so far with regards to the sword and the adventures. She tells him to hold on while she researches it some more and she’ll get to him in a couple hours.
Thinking a bit more, they figure that Raum is a ritual magician like any Lord of Hell, with quite a bit of talent on its side. It’s also heavily resistant to attacks, Blessed silver only manages to get past it with any real ease. It doesn’t want to fight and would rather run away from battles. Known as the Deceiver, he’s mostly likely going to be using illusions.
Kamali finally decides to act by calling the ward caster that Desiree recommended and tries to convince him to make them a ward to contain the demon. Quoting them a fee of 10k for a regular ward or 30k for a reflective ward to take advantage of the demon’s narcissistic nature. Kamali pays the money for reflective and adds a retainer in case the guy can do something else for them. Back off the phones, they start checking their armory for what sort of silver rounds they have and what sort of guns they can get their hands on while Markus sits there bewildered.
The orphans make their shopping lists for heavy duty rifles and Gabe purchases them under the guise that he’s a firearms dealer. While they take time arguing with each other, Caoimhe has headed over and started to don armor and weapons, it looks like she knows what she’s doing. Gabe petitions to God for Gift of Tongues. The orphans can now understand her. She’s been held captive by the dragon for over 800 years and when told that they’re fighting a demon lord, she says that she’s the daughter of the greatest monster hunter that ever lived and in return Kamali accidentally insults her father, Al-Shams Mac Lannageal. She was trapped by the dragon as she searched for the sword, shocked that none of them know what the sword actually does, so she explains.
In the hands of the righteous, it deals more damage.
In the hands of the hunter, it strikes through their defense.
In the hands of those that brave fire, fire will not touch them.
In the hands of anyone, the supernatural hate them and draws them to the wielder.
Kamali tries to hand her a katana, but she has already pulled a silver sword from the wall of the armory. Shocked again, at Kamali’s responses that they’re rather poor monster hunters that don’t have any knowledge about the charms, surprised that she’s able to write down words in English and then asks for food as well. Gabe, deciding to double time on Desiree, asks her out for food while trying to inform her about how things have changed over time and that they can’t just walk around fully armed.
Buffet for Buffy
Gabe
Darryl’s Corner Bar & Kitchen
Monday, October 23rd, 2000, 6:00 pm
604 Columbus Ave, Boston, MA 02118
While on the “date,” Caoimhe exhibits a rather amazing tendency towards gluttony, putting away a large amount of food. However in the middle of dinner, she palms a knife and heads towards a nearby diner. Gabe tries to intercept her and she points out that the fellow diner is a vampire, in response Gabriel triggers his faith to turn him and the vampire backs away in terror and she suggests that they break a table leg and stake him in the back of the restaurant. Without waiting for more prompting, she snaps the leg off of a baby’s high chair, tells Gabe to go around the side, and then starts stalking the prey.
He barely even catches sight of Caoimhe as she drops from the ceiling, improvised stake at the heart and silver dagger at the neck, trying to interrogate it as to the location of its nest. It can’t answer to her satisfaction so that leaves him dead and a puddle on the floor. Caoimhe, calm and collected, goes back into the restaurant. Giving the other orphans a ring, Gabe tries to figure out where the shopping trip is going and Gabe describes what he’s doing. After some advice from Kamali, Gabe tries to get Caoimhe to understand how she needs to act in the modern world and what is going on. He tries to introduce Caoimhe to firearms, equating them to a crossbow and trying to convince him to get her a bow so she can be useful in the battle coming up.
Aftermath
Markus, tired of the people at the firehouse, has left the firehouse a long while ago, followed by a strange snake and Coyote. Pushed into his car, he’s made to deal with Coyote’s antics and insistence that Markus picks up the rather strange serpent, something called a Haietlik and could be considered a totem spirit for him. Markus believes that just as much as he believes that Coyote is a real cop. Despite wanting to go home to enjoy the rest of his day off, he’s driven back to the firehouse with a gold coin’s worth of Happy Meals in the backseat.
Markus insists on going home to get some sleep while Coyote threatens to get him in the morning. In response, Markus shoves a rather large chair against the door to barricade himself in. He could swear the Roadrunner was clinking and jingling ominously as it drives away.
Kamali and Devin stop by the hunting stores and buys some weapons and bows and everyone starts prepping to fight a demon lord in the morning.
After Action Report (GM)
So this session really frustrated me as a GM. It was essentially back and forth between Doug and Merlin with the occasional interspersal of Rob for about 25% of the time. We only play for four hours and even light digressions can be exceedingly problematic. I think the only reason I didn’t interrupt was the conversation was moderately valuable and on topic – just not inclusive enough. This is why the Discord server is for buying gear (that might take a while – small purchases or quick ones are fine) and the Hangouts is for gaming. Overall, the bit about Caoimhe going Buffy on a vamp was amusing.
I’m going to do my best in avoiding this next game session and all the ones thereafter.
Other Notes
Coyote will be spreading stories about how he tricked a bunch of suckers into killing a dragon for him so he could take the treasure. The treasure itself is cursed, but Coyote can’t get more greedy than he already is. The bonuses of being a semi-divine being.
Soundtrack
“Fire” by The Ohio Players (Opening Song)
“Try a Little Tenderness” by Otis Redding
“So Long” by Everlast (Closing Song)