Endgame

Thanks, Duvors! I had an awesome time. I'll be sure to get my thoughts put together in the Mission Master's lounge.

Lock me in for the scanner in that case, then!

"That's fine by me, sir," Decker says, rooting around his person until he finds the notebook, passing it to the masked man. "He was a damn good notetaker, if some schmuck like me could pull off an exorcism with jus' what he wrote." Decker strokes his chin, perusing the selection of tools on display. "Hmmm... I don't s'ose you'd mind parting with that structural scanner? As long as you weren't eyeballin' that one, Ronin, of course."

"Dead, wouldn't ya know it." Decker says, casting his eyes down. "We were too late for him. They captured him when he was hot on the trail and used his blood for the ritual. He's in the same secret room that the Helldiver an' the sewer plans are... We can show you to him if you'd like, I s'pose. I imagine he'd want to be buried and such..."

"So his hair DID used to match his beard," Decker muses aloud. He had wanted to ask about it, but it felt kind of rude, considering the circumstances. "Ah, well, it's kind of a helluva story. I'd be curious to see if this lines up with what your society knows, Szizekh, maybe y'can fill in some blanks for us too. The long and short of it is, well, the sewer plans were missin' because they got nabbed. A group of cultists, led by some sort of... specter of a fella named Avery Mann, were conducting their business through the sewers. Avery had business with, or maybe enthralled, a local gangster and contraband dealer named Flatfoot Thompson. They smuggled a bunch of tech and occult whatsits into the sewer, enough to build some sort of horrible machine called a Helldiver." "Our guess is that Greg got bonked on the head during his work, got dragged off and hooked into the helldiver, where they did some sort of... awful ritual to channel some sorta demon into Greg. However, we recovered the belongings of an investigator, going by Machen, and were able to use his stuff to conduct an exorcism and get our boy Smiles here back in one piece, albeit with a new hair color." "As for us, we've uh... waded through a lot of sewage. A lot. And I think Ronin got punched in the face like, at least four times? It was... uh, unclear. Otherwise, though, the situation got resolved, without us having to fire a single bullet." Decker pats the gun on his back. Unless I see Avery Mann. Then that might change. "Oh! And there is actually a meat blob down there. Lots of eyes. Uh, you may wanna kill th' thing with fire." "Am I leaving anything out Ronin?"

"Oh, he was tellin' the truth alright. It's real and it's big and, well, supposedly it's weak to fire, but we never tested that..." Decker realizes that he was probably blaming the blob for more than it really did, but, the alternative was that... well, there was a chance that it was whatever was possessing Greg, Decker realized. Then again, there was a lot of stabbing going on with those killings, and whatever they just banished seemed more apt to just cave people's heads in with a knuckle sandwich. Decker bit his lip and kept his theories to himself. On the chance that Greg did kill those people under the spirit's influence, he didn't need that guilt... "Nobody can remember much about Avery, so don't kick yourself. There may very well be some loose ends for us agents to tie up, but what do you say we get you back to Arno first? In case we go back into th' sewers I'm guessin' you aren't eager for another jaunt down there so soon."

"Decker DaCabe. We're both agents from Heroica, sent to find you. You've uh, well, sounds like you've been through a lot. We're just relieved to find you in one piece, really relieved. We found the room that you were hooked up to a machine in... damn thing was called a Helldiver, in case you had any doubts about whether or not those people were sketchy. As for he hooded disciples... yes, we found them dead, as my friend Ronin just described. And that blob of meat in the sewers is now the size of a small elephant, so, uh, tell Arno to not send any more men back there, seeing as the meatblob could've very well been the culprit." "Do the names Avery Mann or Flatfoot mean anything to ya, friend? They were very much involved with you, well, becomin' a vessel for a horrible punchy demon."

Sorry for not being able to hop on to clarify - I got slammed with work related stuff yesterday. Decker similarly had to shield his eyes as the candle grew as bright as the sun. He was honestly shocked the maneuver worked; he had never really had to throw an object of such weight and shape before and it was kind of a clumsy toss. Still, he could hear the bell chime, and it was perhaps the sweetest sound he ever heard. Beneath his visor, Decker was grinning. The light cleared, and he looks around, for any trace of the strange demon remaining. Only an indent in the rolling door and one very shaken up sewer worker. He runs over to the man's side, holding his hand up to Ronin for a high five as he passes his comrade, before kneeling down besides Smiles. "Hey, hey, you back with us?" Decker says, reaching into his bag and uncorking a plasma potion. He holds it up to the man. "It's yours if ya want it, bud. You've kinda been through the wringer is my guess. Can you stand?"

"Ronin, my blessing means that I can't get close to this guy. Whatever whackadoo power he has, we all go teleportin' if we try to make him move his feet. But if he moves his arm... If he moves his arm, he moves his hand. Which means the bell rings. Which means this guy can't budge that arm for a little bit or he'll exorcise himself." Decker reached into a holster he kept on his hip and pulls out the unloaded pistol. His very first blunder when he joined Heroica, and not his last, but maybe it'd be good for something... "Hey, buddy! Catch!" Hoping to whatever god was out there that his theory was right, that the apparition literally couldn't dodge without destroying itself, Decker steps forward into C4 to close the distance and throws his unloaded pistol towards the hand clutching the Ghanta.

Does the book need to be used specifically for the exorcism in order to count as part of the ritual? "Did you hear that, Ronin? I think we got the bell to ring, I think we nearly got him!" Decker levels his shotgun at the creature, but then thinks on it. "Nah, y'know what?" he says, lowering the barrel of it. "That's not what has ya scared. You WISH I'd use that on you, wouldn't you? You body stealing prick!" He wasn't all bravado, though. He turns to Ronin, concerned. "You've been taking the brunt of it... how many more shots do you think you can take before the blessin' expires?" Decker asks, not in tune enough to realize that the protective barrier had already expired.

I can't get close to him now to rip the Ghanta away! And I already started the ritual. "In for a penny, in for a pound, eh, Ronin?! I hope what you're trying works!" I have to read from it. Right? I can't shoot him! The candle's lit! But maybe there's some way to assist... Decker reads from Machen's Notebook and directs his attention towards the apparition, hoping that the arcane chant would somehow further destabilize it and aid Ronin.

Noted! And if I move into melee range of ???, because I'm protected by the candle, it would kick in at that point, right?

Gah, knew it wouldn't be that easy! Why did Spatial Incoherence kick in when the candle was lit? ??? was not in the immediate range of it, so it wouldn't push him away or kick in the "moved against their will" clause, and it doesn't inflict Restrained, either. Human beings have some sort of instinctual response to feel repulsed by certain things. Things that carry disease, sickness. Dead things, rotting things. And whatever Decker saw, writhing beneath the veil of black shadows surrounding Gregory, sickened him to his core, more than anything else did. "Pretty pissed off, huh, aren'tcha?" Decker spits as he staggers to his feet on the shipping crate. "What's your deal, man? D'ya have one? Or are you just waiting for someone to let you outta here so you can go on a killing spree? Sounds like your kinda thingl."

Understood on the Warded bit! "Ronin, get next to me!" Decker lights a Holy Candle. "Did he take a swing at you or not...? I coulda sworn he did, then, I coulda sworn he didn't..."

@Yzalirk Decker nearly trips and falls as space shifts around him. But wait, this wasn't... How did... Decker shakes his head. Get your head in the game, guy, he scolds himself. "Whatever the hell this thing is, it looks like it has a mean left hook. I sure as hell don't wanna square up with this thing," Decker says, pumping his shotgun, before better judgment casts over him. He shouldn't need to fire a single shot to end this... "Let's banish this thing back, Ronin!" Decker hollers. "But I'm going to need your help. Get over to me!" That plan sounds pretty good! I think throwing might be risky, because I'm assuming that'd be a proficiency check and if we drop the Ghanta we may end up toast. I think this sequence should be good enough to pull off the exorcism? Turn 1: Ronin moves to D3 and hurls the sleeping capsule at ???. That'll debuff him in some way. Decker moves to D4 and passes Ronin the Ghanta. ??? will get a hit or two off, depending on what the sleep capsule does to him, but he'd have to roll perfect and we'd have to roll like complete crap for him to KO one of us. It's pretty low risk. Turn 2: Ronin equips the Ghanta while Decker lights a Holy Candle. Since Decker and Ronin are occupying a bottle neck, when the holy candle is lit, we'll have 3 rounds where ?? can't even get close enough to us to land a punch. But we'll only need 1, because... Turn 3: From the safety of their positions, Decker reads the notebook and Ronin chimes the ghanta. That ought to complete the exorcism and banish ???. What does Warded mean, out of curiosity?

"Mate, I've been seeing words appear an' disappear outta books for the last hour. I saw a blob of flesh galloping around the sewers. I saw a samurai ordering a pizza, and an elf whose brains were actually mushrooms, and a robot selling spare parts, which is kinda morbid if ya think about it. You haven't lost it and nothin' is crazy any more." Decker hears his footsteps clang in the empty warehouse. And then... it appears. The hair on the back of Decker's neck stands on end, and slowly he takes his shotgun off his back. He holds it in both hands, not pointing it at him. Not yet. "Ya got a mouth to talk with, Avery?" Decker snarls, with adrenaline fueled bravado.

"The hell was this guy thinkin'?" Decker wonders aloud. He swaps from the flashlight to Machen's notebook, figuring quick access to the occult text would be more useful. Surely a warehouse must have a lightswitch, worst comes to worst. "I think all those bizarro concoctions you got can stay on you. If I can't banish whatever it is, you might just be able to kill it outright. Say, though, you're gonna want this if a fight breaks out." Decker tosses Ronin a Plasma Potion. "Once more into the breach, eh, friend?"

Decker sizes up his own clutter of items. "They did the ritual with a triangle and 3 candles, right? I got a buncha occult stuff... Machen's book, the ghanta... plus two candles. If I had your third, Ronin, maybe I could do some sorta magic thing, a reverse of whaever ritual they did, banish this thing back to whatever pit it crawled outta." Decker pauses. "Can you hear me right now?" he grumbles. "I always thought this stuff wasn't real. Maybe it isn't, and we're just dealing with a half dozen nutters doin' nothin' in particular that's magical. But maybe not..." Decker grits his teeth as the tarp is flung away, and a familiar door is spotted. "I get the feelin' we'll be meetin' whatever chucked your sword, Ronin," Decker adds, checking the calendar to see if the "inauspicious day" (or any others) were highlighted, before flinging open the filing cabinets.

"The journal pages certainly line up with what we were thinkin'. The weirdo is writin' like they never saw the surface before, but weren't these all people recruited from Ebria? As for my thoughts, well I... Well, I think we're in some deep shit. I hope I'm wrong. But after everything we've seen? I think we're too late. Machen's journal seems to say that their inauspicious day was either yesterday or th' day before, and, well, the candles were burnt. Whatever ritual they did might already be done. Greg may not be Greg anymore, if he really is the vessel for whatever messed up thing these people are tryin' to do." Decker sighs and shakes his head. "Let's keep goin'." --- The duo eventually reach the "dead end." "You're lookin' a little encumbered there, Ronin." Decker notes. "I think I can consolidate some o' this stuff, so I would have room to take stuff outta your hands... I can also swap ya for anything. You're lookin' light on potions. And maybe ya wouldn't mind another holy candle?" Decker mounts the Telescopic Stock to his shotgun, presumably freeing up an item slot? Decker looks at the recessed outline of what he had to presume was a secret door. He sees a slight protrusion to the right of where the door would be... the rest of the walls in this sewers were flush. He inspects it closer and pushes on it.

Decker shakes his head to clear out the mental cobwebs as text appears and then vanishes before his eyes. This place was getting into his head, almost too literally, and he wasn't remotely a fan. "Maybe I spent too long next to Elfonn, spores screwin' with my head," Decker sighs. Decker begins pacing around the room nervously, processing the information before the text fades from his mind altogether. "Okay, place of darkness? That's this damn sewer. Inauspicious day, hell if I know why one date or another is of import... Channel, that's the triangle they drew. Because it's in Machen's blood, yeah? Um, um, the Offering... That's Machen. Poor bastard. The points, lights of purity? The points of the triangle? But there's... Wait a tick." In the dark room Decker realizes he may have missed a detail. He glances at the floor and tries to ascertain if the tipped over cylindrical white objects around the blood symbol (sans the discarded helmet) were candles, and if they were, whether they had been lit. "Bad feeling the Vessel is Greg. Words of the Nameless One, hell if I know what those would be.." Decker sighs in frustration, as his memory of the text already begins to fade around the edges. Onto the next evidence, Machen's notebook. "So Flatfoot is under Avery's control, eh...? And the Inauspicious Day is the 28th... Last entry was the 21st... Machen went missing 10 days ago, if we can still trust ol' Vinoq... Machen was last in public on the 19th... Shit, he wouldn't have been missing then. I think their ritual day already passed." Decker says as his face flushes pale. "I'm ramblin' at this point, Ronin, but I really hope I am dead wrong... And who the hell is the last person to write in this? Their handwritin' looks bigger than Machen's." The scrapper attempts to eyeball the two sets of penmanship, to see if it was the same person or not. Did Machen go nuts and start writing weird shit in his own notebook, or did somethin' else start writin' in his notes? Hushing himself, at least to quiet his own thoughts, Decker decides to check out this 'Helldiver.' He walks over to the two large computers and slaps his palm down on the keypad, wondering if the screens would wake up. "Maybe there's more on here... Helldiver. What a gods-awful name."

He achieved immaculately small handwriting. Rest in peace, Machen. :( Are those last two lines of dialogue something that our characters can hear in some capacity (with the source/direction being unknown), or is it something that was written into the journal? Trying to figure out how Decker ought to be responding.

"It's an Aetherdiving rig, I think. I've seen 'em in holovids, but, this one is... they're not going on VR Vacations with this, I can tell you... Gods, did they build this thing themself? And the blood. This ain't just tech, they're trying to do something magicky here. Of course, we knew Flatfoot deals in occult crap, so that's no surprise... This symbol is from Telahn, I think? I think they're the reincarnation fellas... I don't know much but I don't think dead people and meat blobs are their normal thing." Decker glances at the black-robed corpse. "There's our fifth, plus poor Machen. That leaves out... Greg, Flatfoot, and Avery..." He turns his attention to the documents scattered on the table near the robed corpse. "You find anything on the body? We may wanna try to log into the computers hooked up to the Aetherdiving rig, see what these guys were up to. Maybe they were kind enough to write all their thoughts into a digi-document."

The door groans open, and Decker groans as he rolls out his shoulders. "Rough on the joints, eh, Ronin?" Decker chuckles, his laughter dying in his throat as he sees the scene in front of him. His eyes are drawn to the green light, and then the... yep, that was a person. "I don't have a good feeling about this, Ronin..." Decker rushes to the person strewn across the table, reaching for their wrist to see if he felt a pulse. At the same time, he casts his eyes to the strange device on the floor, seemingly connected to the bed they were laying across - trying to figure out what he was looking at. "You with us, bud?" Decker mutters.

Decker's internal clock ticked faster, knowing that the wall of flesh was still... somewhere down here. With it's dozen eyes and awful sounds and... "Breathe, bud," Decker says, inhaling, then exhaling. His breath rattles around in his helmet, recycling stale air, but it still has the desired effect. "Let's try to be just a bit more deliberate about this this time 'round..." Decker hunts for the secret door's switch. Decker turns on his flashlight and paces up and down the immediate area, swinging it across the walls, ceiling, even across the surface of the water in case it was hidden at their feet. "If the door was jammed that tight, it was either locked, or some sorta mechanism was keepin' it sealed tight... there's gotta be somethin'..."

Duly noted on all counts. You've put a ton of work into this, and I've been enjoying it, and I want to see it completed too. So I'll keep things moving along! "Ah, jus' a concerned citizen is all. Wanted to make sure you were all set. Take care, alright?" Decker walks back to Ronin. "Ronin, I don't think there's anything left to squeeze outta anyone here. We know the Meat Blob has been grownin', so, that's not encouragin', but... well, we could head to the police station, but honestly? I don't feel cozy involvin' others in this. That just seems like we're setting people up to get devoured. If we've explored the whole network and still haven't found Greg, I think our only two options are that he got eaten by the blob, or that he's behind one of those secret doors. And I'd rather see what's behind door number two, literally. That blob o' lard didn't seem too fast. Let's head back down into the sewers, double back to that secret door, and take a closer look at it. If we combine our strength I bet we can pop it open." Decker hoists up the manhole cover and attempts to do exactly that.