brickyardbabe
Forum Replies Created
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What a sensible attitude!
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@adamu You’re sweet for saying so! Pretty sure the character I’m building for Texas Hold ‘Em is the first one that’s not a nuke in sheep’s clothing in my stormy waters cannon.
Alessandra…is not that.
@aria I did. It was more a general question about comfort. Some people like having godlike power on their side, some feels it cheapens the game. I thought I’d try saving us all some of the trouble that usually comes with my characters and just, y’know, ask.
But nooooo, you all have to be so nice and accomodating! :=D
I’ll work it out. It’ll be something like “godlike power, but with weird skill allotments! Like driving!”
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@adamu You mean beautiful minmaxed magical nightmares?
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Okay, open question for the room here. I’m building a mage. How much is “too much?” I don’t want to grandstand and make anyone else upset with my build because I went, say, WAY TOO INTO magic and initiations. What’s “reasonable” for an immortals game, in your guys’ eyes?
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@gilga Why not June of ’77? That allows it to run concurrently with other Stormy Waters games, and puts us into current-ish timelines.
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Gas station? Vegetables?
Misery turns to look behind her at the crates, and sure enough, they were filled with produce, actual, grown vegetables. Except for a couple of fancy parties she’d worked when she was…was…Misery shook her head. She knew she’d seen vegetables, but never in quantity, never as anything other than a luxury.
What the frag had she stumbled into? Nineteen fifty-three?
And what the frag is a muggle, anyway? That sounded like one of those weird literary references the hipsters in the West End liked to throw around to show how cultured they were, reading the classics no one ever thought of anymore.
As the car rolls to a stop in the antiquated service station- does his car actually run on just gas?- Misery turns to look at “Ben.” “Nothing personal. I expect the worst from everyone. I’m sure you have your own reasons for doing this, but that’s just it.” She exhales slowly through her nose, her mouth a tight line before continuing. “They’re your reasons. And all I have is a lifetime of training that says anyone with their own reasons for helping you is probably going to slot you off in some horrible way down the line. Innocent until proven guilty died with the last century, and any vestiges of trust I had died with my memory.”
Misery puts his contact details into her commlink under “That Guy.” She considers telling him that if he wants to imply that she’s a whore, he should just come out and say it, instead of saying he “suspects her” of combining sex with feeding. She’s done it, yes, with…someone…but its not her preferred method, she knows. Besides, if she’s not using her fancy powers, she needs to feed all of twice a year to keep going. She considers telling him all of this, considers pointing out that she has to kill with feeding to make more of herself, considers telling him a lot of things.
Then she shakes her head and opens the door. Softly, not ungently, Misery says, “The emotion was love, actually.”
Misery steps out of the car, glances at the service station, looks back at her unwilling companion. “I can find my way to your border town from here, and from there to ‘home.’ Feel free to come check in on me when you have time, but if I stay in this car, I’m going to snap. A couple hours’ walk in the dark will help me get my head on straighter.”
Misery reaches in back and pulls out her bag, withdrawing the credstick. Slotting it to her commlink, she creates an ARO for a thousand nuyen, from her funds, not the loan, and flicks it to Ben’s PAN. “Here, for the ride. Buy those kids you mentioned something nice. I’ll see you in a day or two.” She starts to turn away, then wheels back and leans in. “If you need further motivation, I’m serious. Give me what I need to get through this, and you can have that whole damn half-million nuyen apartment. Goodnight, Ben.”
Misery shuts the door and steps back, then turns and heads into the service station. She’s going to need a few things.
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Gilga is indeed! Not sure exactly when this is taking place. Some time after CoF, since Callista has been missing for a while. How long has it been since the disastrous run into London Below?
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“Stop the car.” Misery says levelly. “Pull over and let me walk, because this conversation is going nowhere.” Her tone is perfectly conversational, all the more unnerving after her explosive rage. “While you do, let me explain a few things to you.”
Misery begins to tick points off on her fingers. “Firstly, I am a mage who has survived quite a while under the radar. I do know how to mask my own power, thank you very much.” Another finger. “Second, I don’t have to kill when I’m hunting. If your friends are infected, you’d know that. I’ll pick up a couple at a bar, take some from each of them, wipe their memories, and they’ll wake up happy, with a memory of explosive sex with a stranger who must have left before they awoke, and then they’ll go home.” A third finger, and she resists the urge to flip him off again with it. “I can’t help but show my assets. Its how I was trained. I can’t stop it any more than you can stop looking like a paramilitary who just swallowed an entire soyplum.” A fourth finger goes up. “Finally, why would I owe you thanks? From what you’re saying, I paid you to do a job. You’re doing it. This is a business transaction, we are not friends.”
Misery shrugs one shoulder. “If I didn’t pay you to do a job, then I have no idea why you’re here, and I’d really prefer it if you weren’t. Whatever I thought I signed myself in for, this sure as hell isn’t it.” She can’t resist needling him a little. “And if a girl showing off and not wanting to sleep with you is going to make you angry, then you’re in for a lifetime of rage issues, dear heart.”
She looks out the window, her tone still pleasant. “Now, are you going to pull over the car, give me directions, and let me walk, or are we going to continue this pointless exchange? And so help me god, do not tell me you’re not going to let your ‘wife’ walk home alone.”
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“You prejudiced, mealy-mouthed, holier-than-thou son of a bitch!“ Misery snarls. “Am I fragging child? Do you think this is my first goddamn rodeo?” She pounds a fist on the dashboard. “I am well aware how most of your miserable kind sees mine, and I am well-versed in dealing with it. Do not presume to think yourself some noble man, taking the poor vampire girl under your wing despite her wicked nature!” She mimes crying. with her fists, then flips him the bird with one hand. “You don’t like me, fine. You don’t like HMHVV carriers, fine. Boo fucking hoo, man!”
Misery takes a deep breath, forcing her tone level. “Just because you know what I am doesn’t mean others will.” She gestures at herself. “I’m curvy, not emaciated.” She smiles, and manages to do it without betraying her fangs. “My teeth aren’t like a human vampire’s. I can walk in the daylight! I can mask better than most can see. What on earth makes you think I’d get caught?”
The level tone starts to disappear again as she continues, “And that’s another thing! You think this marriage is funny? You think it means something? It doesn’t! You’re a means to an end. Anything we might have had is either gone or was a lie in the first place! I love someone else! Someone who isn’t a preachy little bitch with the best ‘ware selling his freedom to a corporation could buy!”
Misery grinds her teeth. “If we are married, then I’m divorcing you. If we aren’t, then it isn’t a funny joke, and the sooner you stop making it, the less painful it will be when you push me too far.” She gestures out the windshield. “I’ll do your job. Not for you, not for your country, and sure as hell not for some rich asshole. For me. Just me. ” She turns her head, looking at “Ben” for the first time since she started ranting. “Find me a place near his lair, and a wrecked Westwind or something similar. One of the old ones, before ’64. It should only run eight or nine thousand for one that’s flooded or burned out. Put it on my tab. Then I’ll leave you alone, and you don’t have to see me again.”
She turns her gaze to look back out the windshield. “And the next time you want to say or imply that you’re better than me, that I’m weaker than I think I am, you pull over this car and get out, and I’ll show you how weak I am. And then I’ll bury your ass in the desert and make my own way.”
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Misery snorts softly. That’s awfully petty. Its also probably untrue. She has a keen idea of what she looks like, and even in casual clothes, with wet hair and minimal makeup, even coldly angry she knows she is beautiful. She may not be his type, but objectively, doing better would require him to bed a free spirit even more powerful than she.
Good luck with that.
She looks at the Gopher and snorts again, pushing back the hand proferring the key. “Pass, thanks. While I approve of your choice of manual transmission, tuners and ricers aren’t my thing, usually.” She doesn’t add that she could spot him ten seconds and probably chase him down on foot in that thing, if she called up a spirit to speed her steps. Instead, she says, “I also hate driving other people’s cars.” She doesn’t know if that’s true, but its a plausible excuse.
What’s she got against Japanese and chinese imports, though?
She shrugs- then notes that she’s doing that way too much- and steps out of the shade. There is a moment of trepidation as she steps out into the rapidly-fading sun, but her spellwork remains good and she doesn’t catch fire like most people think she would, or fall into anaphylactic shock, which is what would actually happen.
Instead, more to have something to say than to do anything useful with her mouth, Misery asks, “Is there a junkyard around here? Putting some hulk back together might occupy my hands when I’m laying low, keep me out of trouble.”
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Actually, she does speak Hebrew, along with every other mystical language used by the collective human race in the last three thousand years.
Admittedly, she doesn’t speak them well, but she’s perfectly conversational in it. She dimly remembers poring over Qabbalistic texts, desperately memorizing in order to avoid some awful punishment. She just can’t remember what punishment, or who was meting it out.
Come to think of it, the texts are pretty fragging hazy, too.
Still, she’s better-versed in at least some things than he thinks she is, though if he doesn’t know that, it behooves her not to tell him. Though if he doesn’t know she speaks his language, then how much does she really trust him?
Then what he says penetrates her brain, and she starts to snort…then her eyes fall on the robin tattoo on her forearm, and something hard and ugly uncoils behind her eyes. Purple lips draw back, fingers curl, and her head tilts slowly, a smooth, oddly inhuman gesture, like some kind of eldritch predator sizing up potential prey.
Which is, admittedly, exactly what is happening. Apparently there is a berserk button there, and “Ben” has just pressed it, as much with that shit-eating grin as with his words, and her tone is hammered-iron hard as she snarls, “We. Are. Not. Married.” Her hand rises to caress the robin tattoo at her wrist as she goes on in that same dreadful tone, “I. Do. Not. Love. You.”
“Ben” is, however, correct, and Misery takes a deep breath, forcing down the gut-level rage, but it is a struggle, and she’s still icy cold. “Fine. Lead on. The faster we are out of here, the less chance there is that I am going to do something terminally unpleasant for one of us. Explain on the way.” She shakes her head slowly “One thing, however. I hunt alone. This is a large city. There will be marks enough.” She gestures down the hallway in a mute invitation to lead the way, and cross her arms across her chest, one finger trailing over the golden treble clef before they come to rest under her impressive chest, which of course only coincidentally puts her hand only a few centimeters from her gun in case “Ben” has an adverse reaction to her outburst.
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A threat? A promise? Certainly a veiled attempt to push her into a course of action he favors. She sighs expansively. This is not the first time she has been manipulated, and there is a faint impression of it not going well before, either. But first…
Misery draws a breath, whispering a stream of liquid syllables as she pulls her power to her, wrapping magic about herself and spinning it into threads of potential, the ability to fell, to see beyond sight, to push her instincts above and beyond the merely mortal. It takes longer, takes more effort and will, but just like with the cigarette, her power responds.
She anchors the spell in place, holding the completed design in her head, and there is a surge of power, the backlash of a powerful spell well-cast. It washes in a wave over her spirit, clawing at skin and eyes and her deep fears, and then fades in the face of will and power. She pays it no mind, instead twisting the spell as it fuels her, warping its mana into a self-sustaining loop of power, quickening it to her.
Then, thus armed, she turns her gaze on “ben,” seeing him for the first time since she awoke in this hell, with nothing but a bag of painful memories and a stabbing sense of loss.
He is bright, his aura steady. There are black spots in his skull, along his spine, in his torso. The core of him is supported by bars of darkness, and the color of his aura is muted. She knows the signs, though she isn’t sure how she knows. The knowledge just floods in; synaptic booster, orthoskin, bone lacing, synthacardium, nephritic screen, muscle toner, muscle augmentation…
She feels her eyebrows creep up. Lots of…aftermarket parts., her brain supplies. But his aura is too strong for the amount of body- and head-ware he’s sporting. That means top shelf, waaaay above the pay grade of a guy watching over one unconscious damsel in a Tel Aviv shithole.
Corporate or military? She makes a bet with herself. Corporate. Who? Evo? Evo’s got a black clinic…
Misery shakes her head, amazed at the information. She can’t remember a damned thing of more than a year of her life, can’t remember her own name, but she can identify cyberware based on nothing more than a glance and remember who might have put it in.
She takes another drag on the cigarette. She’s going to go with him, she has no choice. He’s got her SIN, her commcode most likely, and if he is what his cyberware appears to indicate, probably watchers, a full tophat and tails job with magical and technical surveillance. She could get out, she could blow him into the next age if she really, desperately wants to- and she does want to, if only to set the tone for their relationship going forward- but without resources and the lay of the land, she won’t get far.
So she smokes her cigarette, one small act of defiance, and her purple lips curl up into something that, charitably and in dim light, might be called a smile.
“Misery. It is what I am and what I have. My SIN may say Dana, and my real name is lost to me, but Misery is as apt a description as any. Don’t call me Dana.” SHe takes another drag, blows the smoke out of her nose in twin plumes. “There won’t be any paperwork.” She puts a hand to her generous chest, her eyes widen, her shoulder roll back slightly, and she puts a little arch in her back, pressing out her chest and backside even as she assumes an expression of hurt innocence. Her voice picking up a quaver, she says, “Please, its just been so long, and I’m so very frightened. Please, sir, I’ll be ever so grateful and I’ll put it out right away! I’m just so worried…”
Its a damned convincing performance, even knowing she’s full of shit, and she smiles again as she straightens. “Let’s get another thing right out in the open. She may have trusted you, whoever the hell I used to be. But she’s gone, locked behind memory loss and drugs and whatever the hell this place has done to me.” Another drag, another shrug. “And you could have tried to kill me. HMHVV is an instinct hunter. No guarantee you’d have succeeded. As for why I’m still alive, blood magic requires suffering. Suppose you just wanted to wait until I was awake? Asleep I’d be no use for a blood ritual. Awake I’m a battery.”
The last bit is delivered in a flat tone, the voice of experience, even if right now it’s only in nightmares. She takes another drag, then pitches the smoke, crushing it out with a stiletto heel. “Nothing personal, ‘Ben.’ But I don’t know you from Adam, and I’ll be damned if I go to all this trouble to get a new life then hand it off to someone without a shred of caution.”
She waits a moment, then finishes, “Cautious doesn’t mean afraid.” She leans back against the wall once more. “As long as we’re exchanging notes, though, how about you tell me exactly who will depopulate a ward for one bloodsucking slitch with a scrap of magical talent, and what this nebulous entity wants with me?”
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Oh crap, I’m sorry, I didn’t realize you were waiting on me!
Yeah, I’ve got one.
Alessandra Shirei (Raise your hand if you spot the reference!), a blood elf blood mage who survived the ritual of thorns. It has left her…somewhat unbalanced. She is a sorceress par excellence, a gifted speaker and lover, and something of a social butterfly. Physically, she is breathtaking, using magic to augment her natural charms (which are considerable). Very pale, almost albino, with hair the color of aspen heartwood and vibrantly orange eyes, she has the build of a ballerina or a runway model, stands at a solid 178 cm. In the modern era, she tends to dress in very expensive casual clothing, more likely to be wearing hiphuggers and a babydoll tee or rapidtransit diamond than a nightshade dress. She has an easy smile and an infectious laugh, but it never seems to reach her eyes, and she can go from merry to murderous fast enough to give an observer whiplash. Her power is usually masked, but even masking can only go so far, and she tends to leak around the edges a bit, hinting at her frightening magical potency.
How’s that?
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Okay, assensing! She’s gonna power up her intuition first, warp it into stability, and then assense him.
She gets her 4 hits to raise intuition back up! Of course, it’s force 10, so the drain might hurt real bad!
It doesn’t! She soaks 7 drain on the nose, avoiding physical damage!
And finally, http://orokos.com/roll/675532
6 hits on assensing. Oh boy, tell me EVERYTHING!
Assensing table on 313 of sr5 says I get…gods, like half his character sheet.
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She spends a long time in the shower.
Water runs red, then pink, then finally clear. There is soap, and she uses it liberally, and a razor, and she uses that too. She washes again, shapoos her hair, and somewhere in all of that she’s crying again, silently this time.
The tears run with the blood, ending around the same time, and she sighs. She is not Dana, but she doesn’t know who she is]/i]. She must have had a name, had a life. Do people love her? She knows she loves someone, but she can’t remember who, and its agonizing. Its anguish, its pain, its torture, pure misery.
Misery.
She is Misery.
She may have been something else before, and maybe will again, but for now, she is Misery.
Something about this is fitting, and she nods to herself, turning off the shower. She steps out, drying her too-silky skin on a scratchy institutional towel, then wrings out her hair and wraps it in the towel. She steps into the panties, pulling them up her legs, and shivers as the cool, soft material slides along her skin. The bra goes on next, then the jeans and the cutoff t-shirt. There’s a black bolero jacket wrapped in in the cloak, and she pulls that on too. The tarnished brass buttons don’t close across her chest without straining, but in trying she finds a compact in one pocket, just basic foundation and primer and she paints it on, then finishes up with the lipstick.
Misery turns to leave, stops, shakes her head as her reflexes kick in and she reaches out toward the door with astral perception, hand going under her jacket for a gun that isn’t there. She freezes, blinks twice.
Gods, that is going to get weird. She thinks as her instinct-level reactions fade. She turns back for the shower, picks up the slivergun, and clips it to her jeans at the small of her back. She rolls up the cloak and lets her hair down, then steps out of the bathroom.
“Alright, ‘Ben.'” She says evenly. “I appreciate your help, I do. I think I do, anyway.” She shrugs one shoulder. “But if you think I’m getting in a car without on just your word and a suggestion, I’ve got some nice property in the Redmond Barrens to sell you.”She leans against the wall, ankle boots crossed, and fishes a pack of Parlies, menthols with green paper out of her jacket. She reaches for a lighter, frowns, then smiles slightly, showing a half centimeter of fang as she snaps her fingers, and the tip of her cigarette bursts into flame, then dies to a coal. Its nothing more than a party trick, and using it takes a firm mental nudge and a whisper along with the gesture, and Misery gets the sense that it used to be easier, that she’s out of practice.
It will serve, however, and the message is clear. Her power is present.
She takes a draw on the cigarette, watching the ash flutter down, then looks at Ben, waiting.
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Mercifully alone with her pain, Not-Dana lies on the floor, crying until the sobs turn to wretching with their force. Even then, she only turns enough to get on her hands and knees, head down, blood in her hair and on her gown and dry heaves until she fears something inside her will tear. Then its back to crying, whispering half-remembered phrases whose meaning is lost with the rest of her memories, all import gone except for the knowledge that they were- are– important.
Finally, after perhaps fifteen minutes, the tears start to ebb, and she strokes the tattoo of the songbird on her forearm, whispering, “…just in case.”
It is perhaps another ten minutes before she summons the strength to rise, her skin and gown coming up from the scarred flooring with a sticky, wet sound. She grimaces, tossing her head to get her hair out of her face and shuddering when bloody, sticky hair hits her bare spine with a slap.
“забей на это.” Not-Dana mutters. She reaches up and unties the gown, peeling it off her skin and wadding up, using the cloth to mop most of the blood from her hands and breasts, then casts it aside. The room is a total loss anyway, they’ll burn everything she’s touched. She closes her eyes, she can see it, men in Hazmat suits bearing red roman helmet emblems, attacking a hospital room with a flame gun, pictures and a stuffed bear going up in flames, a silver necklace with a music line depending from the chain melting into a pool of liquid.
Shaking her head to clear the vision, Not-Dana turned back to the bed, opening it up and dumping the contents out on the sweaty, damp sheets. Gently, with one bloodstained hand, she began sifting through all she had of her old life.
First, there are shoes. Impractical, high grey things, suede ankle boots with black platforms and thirteen centimeter heels. They’re undeniably sexy. Is that what she is? Some kind of joygirl? She thinks, trying to remember, but there’s nothing there, and she shrugs and sets them aside, then checks back when something inside rattles. Raising an eyebrow, she reaches in with two fingers and draws out a golden credstick, giving a low whistle. There’s a commlink, cheap and anonymous, and a quick check tells her there’s no contacts in it, no identification of any kind. It joins the boots. A set of lacy maroon panties and matching bra join it, then fingerless gloves, a stack of datachips, and an amulet with a golden treble clef that makes her fingers tingle.
She reaches out to lift the next article, a waterfall of pale grey synthsilk…a cloak, then drops it suddenly, recoiling. She cocks her head at the professional looking black holster thus revealed, and the sleek two-toned pistol. She stares at it for a second.
Viper, Ares Arms. Thirty round magazine, throws clusters of flechettes. Burst fire, silent. Smartlinked. This one’s grip will fit her hand perfectly, she knows, and the long, fluted barrel will help keep the recoil down. It is hers, she knows, a custom job. She has used it before.
So that’s what she is.
There are two magazines along with the pistol, and while she cannot remember for the life of her what she used the pistol on, or why, or when, the hands remember and she draws it, checks it, and charges it entirely by reflex memory. She holsters it and sets it aside.
There is a Vashon Island t-shirt, wine colored and chopped off just below her ribs and and black Spinrad jeans. Both are faded, and the synthdenim is soft with repeated washing. There’s something in the pocket of the jeans, and she fishes out a small, compact black cylinder with a single stud on the side. She debates pressing it, but considering the gun she’s not sure she wants to find out what exactly it does.
There’s a few more things, a battered copy of Carmilla, a black iron Claddagh, poison purple lipstick.
She takes the bra and panties, the shirt and jeans, and the gun and sets them aside, and shoves everything else in the bag. She turns her gaze to the parcel Ben brought. He said it had armor, but…she’s just not quite sure she’s ready to accept anything he gives her just yet. She leaves it on the bed, picking up the shoes and clothing, and walks to the door. Still completely nude, her long legs, athletic ass, and generous-though-bloodslicked chest on display, she breezes past Ben.
“Not a fucking word, man.” She says in English, her tone determined. “I’m going to shower. You can follow if you like, but so help me God, if you try to come in under the water with me, I will break your goddamn legs.” Then she sets off down the hall to the bathroom, sauntering in and setting down her clothes. The gun goes on the hook normally reserved for towels, and with a flick of her fingers she turns on the water and steps under the spray, sluicing steaming water over pale, bloody flesh.
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Right, cross threading systems. It has been a while.
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Composure roll time!
Four successes and five 1s.
Oh dear. Well, she’ll pull herself together, but, uh, not without a little collateral damage.
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Not-Dana nodded her thanks at “Ben,” taking the bag and setting it on the bed beside her, watching him carefully as she tries to figure his angle. Looking at him, she feels nothing. She may have led him on, may have helped him, may have fucked him even. But whoever he is, he means nothing to her, not now, probably not before. But if he doesn’t know that, she’s not going to tell him. Lovestruck, wary, whatever he is, she can use it.
She hopes.
A moment’s more studying tells her a little, but not much. He’s truthful enough, at least, and he doesn’t seem to know how to deal with her. He is…conflicted, for some reason. What had they done to make him this way?
She shrugs mentally. Fuck him. She’d burn that bridge when she crossed it.
Idly sipping the blood bag, she scoots to the edge of the bed, swinging her feet off the side. Taking a deep breath, she sets her feet down. The cheap linoleum is cold, smooth, almost greasy feeling under her small, bare toes.
Letting the breath out, she stands.
Then, abruptly, she is on the floor, dazed. There is blood in her mouth, and it takes her a second to realize she’s bitten through her lip. Her breasts are cold, and a brief, haphazard touch tells her she landed on the blood bag, its contents squirting all over her chest and stomach. She lies there a moment, cursing mentally, a seamless string of profanity in a handful of languages. Then she goes to lever herself up, planting her hands and pushing upward.
She stops, examining her arms.
They are pale, too thin, skin drawn and muscles too sharp.
They are also tattooed. Music notes, tattoos in Russian, symbols. A Robin.
A Robyn.
Not-Dana collapses again. She doesn’t know why. She cannot remember. She cannot recall. She cannot escape the sudden, crushing feeling of loss.
Curling into a ball, clutching her arm to her, she weeps, a wretched, broken sound that is, somehow, musical.