Book Four: New Orleans - The Big Uneasy

[DadsAngry]

Marius:
"What are we going to do agent Skinner? There is to many for us to rush them. And doc here and this thing" Maruis loosens his grip on the crystal and allows it to hang away from his chest to display it to the agent, "has something to do with all this. Reginald and the other doc had a better understanding of it all. What I do know is how to hunt. Carcosa is our prey and this here crystal is our bait."

[SocraticLawyer]

Ignatius Skinner, BOI agent
How close are we to the cultists? Skinner doesn't want to discuss plans if they are close enough to be heard. If they are, he motions for the group to withdraw before discussing further.

I'm all ears. How can we bait Carcosa?

[Grognardsw]

The investigators tensely discuss options. They are behind trees and brush a hundred feet away, elevated about 20’ from the center of the ceremony. There is a lot of noise between the cultists, roaring fire, drums and occasional screams of the dying. They feel they cannot be heard or seen.

Agent Callahan clutches his Tommy gun.

[DadsAngry]

Marius:

Ignatius Skinner, BOI agent
I'm all ears. How can we bait Carcosa?

"I don't know exactly. All I know is this here crystal is important to him. He'll come looking for it soon enough. We should figure out why it is so important to him and then use it to bait him in a trap. Doc what do you know about this gem? Why is it so important to you?"

[Mant72]

Dr. Francis Morgan:

Dr. Morgan looks covetously at the crystal then breaks his gaze with some effort. ”The crystal holds secrets and bestows visions. You may think I’m mad, but I believe it might be a key or a gate that permits... time travel.”

He momentarily looks sheepishly at the ground then raises his head to lock eyes with the others, “I am not mad. While in possession of the crystal, I distinctly heard the voice of Raymond Randolph.”

[SocraticLawyer]

Ignatius Skinner, BOI agent
And who the bejeezus is Raymond Randolph?

Look, we don't have time to figure out why Carcosa wants the crystal. Let's try to find a safe spot from these yahoos.

[Grognardsw]

As the investigators dicker about how to deal with the horrendous ritual going on before them, the chanting reaches a crescendo. The flames of the bonfire leap up, the screams of the tortured and disembowled pierce the night. The sky above cracks open - a jagged rupture that lets out a darkness darker than the night.

Something is coming.

If Carcosa has come back around the circle, Frank doesn’t know as with the wrenching of the trapezohedron crystal he no longer has the mystic vision or voices in his head.

Agent Callahan clutches his tommy gun. “We have to do something!”

[DadsAngry]

Marius:

"Let's see if this will scare them off."
He fires his shotgun into the air hoping the loud noise will disrupt their activity.

[Mant72]

Dr. Francis Morgan:

“Raymond Randolph was a comrade that assisted with the investigation. He went...missing,” Frank replies to Agent Skinner.

As Marius rises and fires, Frank looks about with unbridled terror and anxiety. He wildly points his pistol at the whirling throng of cultists.

[Grognardsw]

Marius' gunshot rings out amid the roar of the fire, ululations of the cultists and noise of sucking wind in the jagged opening in the sky.

For several moments Marius thinks they didn't hear it. But then the investigators spy several cultists have stopped and are looking in the general direction of the investigators, who with distance, night and cover of vegetation cannot be seen. The cultists point, talk amongst themselves, and a dozen split off and head toward the general vicinity of the investigators.

Then something reaches out from the jagged rip in the sky, a murky, tendrous swirling mass of nightmarish otherness...

Investigators please make San. check. Yes=1d3, No=1d6

[DadsAngry]

Marius:

San Check (65%) [1d100] = 24
San loss [1d3] = 1

"What the hell is that?" he says while he clears the spent shell and replaces it with a fresh one.

[SocraticLawyer]

Ignatius Skinner, BOI agent
Sanity check (35) [1d100] = 75
Sanity loss [1d6] = 1
Skinner mutter some cajun curse words.

Agent Calahan, if you please, he says, hoping Calahan has the wherewithal to empty the contents of the Tommy gun into the creature. Skinner keeps his pistol ready to fire at any oncoming cultists.

[Mant72]

Dr. Francis Morgan:

Sanity Check (65); Current Sanity (35): [1d100] = 43

Sanity Loss: [1d6] = 6

Dr. Morgan stares mutely in abject horror.

Losing 6 sanity in a single roll... not good. /ooc]

[Grognardsw]

The investigators overcome their fear of the mystifying horror of that which is emerging from the rip in the sky. The whirling darkness undulates above the stone column and bonfire, the chanting cultists and dead sacrifices. The creature does not seem to be aware of the investigators.

Marius and Agent Callahan crouch and wait for the approaching cultists who split off from the main group to investigate the sound of Marius' shotgun.

Frank stands transfixed by the monstrosity swirling above and feels compelled to retake the trapezohedron crystal from Marius, whose attention is not focused on Morgan.

With the 6 San loss Frank is insane and must get the crystal, for it has the answers. Play accordingly.

The cultists arrive and are surprised by Marius and Agent Callahan. Their guns mow down the dozen men easily.


Agent Skinner watches the rest of the cultists and sees that the gunfire has now definitely attracted the majority of their attention.

Someone on the opposite side of the bonfire, out of sight, yells indecipherable orders. Twenty men break off, scooping up rocks and branch clubs, and run toward the obscured investigators.

The creature in the sky is growing more agitated.

As the creature is not attacking the investigators, I had Agent Callahan shoot the oncoming cultists not the creature (which is some distance away and not in range of the Tommy gun.)

[Mant72]

Dr. Francis Morgan:

A thin line of saliva hangs from Dr. Morgan’s mouth, and he brushes it away with the back of his hand. His dilated pupils stare vacantly into the depths of the trapezohedron crystal, and with tremulous hands he reaches out to reclaim what is rightfully his.

“You are the Eye of Eden, the lock and key...the apex, helix, and nadir,” he whispers to the alien stone.

“I cannot see without it!” he cries out to Marius and tries to wrest the crystal away but is unable to pry it from the hunter’s grip.

Grapple (50): [1d100] = 72

[DadsAngry]

Marius:

"Damn it! Not now you crazy fool. Someone get him off me or take this crystal." He says fumbling to craddle the crystal and his shotgun from Frank's advances.

[Grognardsw]

Agent Callahan is reloading and intently watching the oncoming mob of cultists as Frank and Marius struggle.

The hunter shakes off the professor and asks for help.

"I need both hands for Uncle Tommy," mutters Callahan, as he nods his head in disgust and keeps focused on the cultists and their imminent arrival. "Skinner sir?"

The cultists are less than a minute away.

The investigators keep focused on the cultists, trying to keep their eyes off the mind-bending monstrosity in the dark sky. There is a sucking wind that is snuffing out the bonfires. The men shiver and see their breath as a great cold settles upon the area. Small lightning arcs sputter from that which should not be.



The main group of cultists sway and chant and hold their hands up in the air in supplication.

Agent Skinner is startled to hear sounds behind the investigators, from the way they came. (Skinner please make Listen roll.) Is that a light back there, blinking and moving in the darkness of the swamp?

[SocraticLawyer]

Ignatius Skinner, BOI agent
This operation is going to hell fast, thinks Skinner. We're almost out of options. If the cultists are, impossibly, summoning that Thing, then they have to be put down.

Skinner can't make out the sound behind him, and remains instead focused on the problems in front of him.

Listen (25) [1d100] = 91

Calahan, take them down! he says, indicating the cultists. Skinner fires off two rounds at the nearest cultists if they are now in range.

Handgun (75) [1d100] = 36
Handgun (75) [1d100] = 69

[Grognardsw]

The group of 20 cultists who split off from main ritual approach the obscured investigators, who wait with fingers poised on triggers.

The ratt-a-tat-tat of Agent Callahan's tommy gun reverberates through the swamp as he mows down cultists, joined by Agent Skinner's pistol and Marius' shotgun. Bullets tear at flesh, pierce organs, explode faces. Blood sprays and skin flies, staining the ground red.

Callahan’s Tommy Gun ten-round [1d100] = 48, damage [10d10+20] = 56+20 = 76 across 10 targets
Skinner roll damage, Marius roll to-hit & damage. Frank can take an action; grabbing for the crystal again given his madness, with a +20% bonus given Marius is occupied shooting cultists.

The cultists are blown apart - most dead, some heavily wounded and moaning on the ground.

The cultists in the main ritual stop and turn heads as one toward the noise of the gunfire.

The creature undulating in the sky expands, a horrific hemisphere of thrashing blackness that seems sometimes tentacles and sometimes limbs and at other moments gaseous forms. It writhes downwards toward the ground, enveloping the now-snuffed-out bonfires and cultists. They disappear from view in the inky jet as a great sucking sound mingles with quick cries of pain, followed by silence.

The investigators hear noise from behind them, coming from the path they had followed. Guns are quickly brought to bear as the vegetation parts to reveal...

Skinner recognizes his fellow agents from New Orleans and heaves a sigh of relief. How did they get here?

They are equally surprised to see Agent Skinner and the investigators.

"What the hell is going on?" asks the newly arrived head agent. As he does so, the creature in the sky makes an ear-piercing noise and grows still larger. Freezing winds whip about. Blackness blots out the stars.

[Mant72]

Dr. Francis Morgan:

“You do not understand! It speaks to me! I can see Carcosa!” Frank pants and redoubles his efforts to rend the crystal from Marius’ grip. Compelled by the stone, the Miskatonic professor finds the strength to pull the trapezohedron free.

Grapple (50): [1d100] = 69

I forgot to add the 20% madness bonus, so Frank made it by 1.