GM: Sam Tillis
Players: Adrienne Mueller, Dylan Arena, James Lawton, Sean Nittner, Sarah Terman, Matthew Fisher
System: Call of Cthulhu 7th Edition
Content warning: body horror bits masked (like this)
Last session seemed like we were all going to perish at every turn. Thousands of cultists, two sorcerers, and the Bloody Tongue! But we survived (mostly). And in the immediate fallout, I had a list of priorities to achieve:
- Immediate: Administer first aid and medicine to Amos. He was just bit so the antivenom Iris has should have much greater effect.
- Immediate: Get away from cultists. Regroup with the riflemen and the guide we left behind and home that one-armed (but alive) he can lead us down the mountain.
- Immediate or Short term: Introduce Charles Morsely (Adreinne’s new character), a big game hunter in Africa to the group.
- Short term: Recover the Spear of Nodins and if possible slay M’weru. Catherine is connected to the spear so hopefully she can use precognition to find out where it will be. A truly diabolical thought she has had is that if she can find a moment when M’weru is Dreaming they could ask Old Bundari to occupy her while we visit her in the waking world, take the spear, and her head with it.
- Short term: Free the spirits of the remaining revenants at Endicott’s lodge. And if possible break the curse. Help Henry.
- Short term: Hold a funeral for Evangeline and the other companions we lost.
- Middle term: Help Bumption and the remaining riflemen make sense of what they say and hope that serious governmental action can be taken against the cult (assuming they haven’t all bamf’d away through gates).
- Middle term: Check on Jimmy to make sure he’s getting the care needed, and determine if we can safely move him.
- Middle term: Tell Johnstone Kenyata of Wachiru’s death and see if we can help him or the Kikuyu Central Association.
- Middle term: Get a new new dress for Catherine. She’s in nothing but her night shift now!
Escape from the Black Wind
Human mind. Fragile, but strong. Yet unshattered. Already we felt the capacity for compartmentalization. To normalize the experience that was abnormal by every definition. We have equipment and a guide waiting for us in the woods…if we can find them.
Catherine, pale, drained, with blood shot eyes and wearing nothing but a soaked through night shift “We need to tend to Amos. He’s just been stung but the venom is moving through him quickly.
Though cultists were surely after us, we had this moment of reprieve in the darkness and in the heavy rain. The bite was in his left hand and already we could see his veins blacken. Iris administered the antivenom while Catherine tied the tourniquet around his bicep; tight. Iris was able to stabilize him, but he would need medical attention soon. It would be better if he could rest, but that was not an option.
Colby, who had been observing the train on our way, navigated us down the mountain, and dawn broke as we moved through the woods [into hex 7.2]. He led us with urgency and care. “We took something from M’weru. She is not going to forgive us.”
Catherine, her fingers and toes numb from the cold, but adrenaline still running through her “She killed Evangeline. I’m not going to forgive her.”
On the way Anaïs and Francois were faltering from exhaustion but Colby rallied them to continue. We made it to where we dropped our gear and left the majority of the King’s Lions. The soldiers were there, at least most of the, but the gear was missing. The wind had blow it over the cliff edge. They all looked haggard by the wind and rain…and by the screams they heard.
Colby looked over the cliff edge, and some 20′ down he saw a pack still hanging. We took the straps from the rifles of the six remaining riflemen, and Anaïs expertly sowed them together [extreme success with needlework].
Amos and Colby lowered Iris down but as she reached for the pack, it slipped away and disappeared into the canopy below. Colby grumbled under his breath, but then reassured Iris it was okay.
The riflemen were not so calm. “You should just drop her down the cliff so we have one less mouth to feed.” Colby took up a defensive posture to protect Iris. Catherine berated them for the foolishness of arguing over non-existent supplies. “We have nothing to eat, how does one more person mean splitting up that nothing further? She’s not taking anything from you.”
The threw their rifles down in disgust, but continued to follow Colby’s lead (and grabbing their rifles which they had petulantly discarded on the way out).
Anaïs gave Catherine her coat. Bless you Anaïs.
We moved to where we had left the guide. His protectors had long since abandoned him and he was fading in and out of consciousness. He had lost a lot of blood (and an arm) and had not eaten.
Above us some thing flew through the air in lazy concentric circles around the mountain. We did not know what it was and we didn’t want to find out.
Iris, under heavy rain, exhausted, and starting herself, miraculously rigged up a blood transfusion so that Francois could give blood to the guide Makena [Critical success on First Aid].
Makena looked perplexed. “You gave your blood for me? Not to be rude, but usually it is the white man who takes our blood.”
Once he was adequately recovered we asked Makena which way he advised we go. Rather than backtracking to train line, he wanted to take a more familiar route through the mountain to N’dovu. Our investigators agreed with the plan, but the riflemen were at their wits end. They were mad about losing the pack, mad that we spent time resuscitating our guide, and infuriated that we were changing the plan and taking another route. Bumption was in no place to lead. Evangeline, who terrified them, was gone. The were nearly ready to mutiny.
Catherine approached the solider who had been talking for them, their de facto leader and reasoned with him that the familiar way to civilization was better than the unknown way back to a set of railroad tracks. We had a guide who could show us the way…but if they wanted to go their own way, Bumption (who she had just whispered into his ear and put her ear to his so lit looked like he was whispering to her) would discharge them from their service. For the first time they acknowledged us with some regard and headed off on their own. Bumption stayed with our party.
As we moved down the mountain [9.4] we were getting closer to edible vegetation but they were still hungry and tired and hurt. Catherine’s grumblings about white people causing all these problems eventually boiled over and she got into a fight with Iris about who was was to blame for the Black Wind, the cultists, colonialism, everything. Nails lost his temper and pulled a knife “everyone shut up” but Catherine was not deterred. “Or what Nails, are you going to stab us? Who are you going to start with?” Colby drew his gun and though he did not point it, he told Nails to stand down. After a few moments of tension, we all lost the will to keep arguing and went back to trudging down the mountain. Only our egos injured (at least in this altercation, we had plenty of other other physical injuries that we had just been powering through).
We made it to the base of a river where this was fresh water, figs, and other edible fruits and vegetables. Francois searched about and found a protected cave [Critical success at Spot Hidden]. We took shelter there.
Now finally in a place of relative security, Amos and Catherine tried to ease Bumption’s nerves. His hands had been shaking since the encounter at the Black Wind and though they had subsided marginally, he was still unable to do much more than just follow our lead. Amos comforted him by reinforcing his own self-delusions. Of course what he had seen was not real, there were powerful hallucinogenic in the drugs those cultists were burning, we were all affected by it. Bumption would never stop having nightmares about what he saw, but his conscious mind at least, would start building bridges over the tears in his psyche [extreme success on psychoanalysis].
Over the night Anaïs and Iris (who were on guard duty) heard sounds of people’s voices wailing and chittering as they passed by us in groups of ones and twos and threes. The first few times she heard them Anaïs (who was still terrified) woke Iris, but eventually she became accustomed to them.
We all had bad dreams, but Francois’ were haunted. He had visions of the Bloody Tongue chasing him (thanks to a spell cast by M’weru) and of a living star chittering a chant in his mid.
In the morning we could hear something moving outside our save. Animals noises and sounds like breaking glass. Catherine got close to Iris “If we’re going to die, I want you to know that I love you and I’m sorry for what I said last night. You’re not to blame for any of this.” Iris assured her we weren’t going to die, but trapped in this cave with some predator outside, we weren’t sure.
Colby snuck out to get a look at it. It looked like a bat the size of an elephant, sinewy and strong with darkness oozing off of it. It was sniffing the air and sensed us, but didn’t know our exact location.
Quickly we made a plan to sneak out to the mouth of the cave and open fire on it. However, when we saw it our inner revulsion kicked in and Francois fired a shot to early. Surprise was lost but not our will to destroy this creature!
Shots fired. Iris’s with deadly precision. Catherine grabbed the Sword of Dreaming (resting by Amos) and charged at it “You killed Evangline, I’m going to send you back to hell!” and then tripped over a vine and stumbled at its feed, barely dodging its grasping limbs. Colby chased out after to git its attention. Iris fired another deadly shot [Critical Success followed by Extreme Success] and Catherine, from underneath the beast, plunged the sword of dreaming into it’s belly, slaying the creature! Then it fell on top of her, broke all her ribs, and nearly crushed her to death.
At the same time, Francois was retreating to the warmth of the ring, soothed by the chants he heard in his head. Summoning it’s powers he engulfed himself in flames. Though they fires did not hurt him, they looked as though the were burning him alive. In the woods he heard sounds of people moving and saw one of them wearing the red cloth denoting the bloody tongue. He unleashed the flames and set the cultist ablaze. Colby fired a shot and killed the burning man.
More were heard in the trees however, their numbers unknown. Amos pushed on the beast but it would not move. Anaïs dug through the underbrush, grabbed hold of Catherine’s arm and pulled her forcibly from under it, scratching her to bits along the way. [Catherine took a major wound and was dying].
We heard a deafening gunshot in the woods, followed by another, and another. Cultists cried out as they perished and hunter stepped into the clearing: Charles Morsely, brother-in-law to lady Evangeline. He was a sturdy figure who bore horrible scars on his face from a jaguar attack.
Iris tended to Catherine and resuscitated her. To Catherine’s great torment, she regained consciousness and cried out against the horror of the servitor collapsing on her. Or she tried to scream out. Her ribs were broken and the most she could manage was a hissing wheeze.
Introducing Charles Morsely
Startled by the dead creature’s alien proportions, we flashed back to Charles visiting his friend Endicott and learning of Evangeline’s presence in Kenya. Endicott grumbled about telling her that she couldn’t take his favorite gun, but she took it just the same. Charles followed her trail and was guided up the mountain, through N’dovu with two other hunters.
Flashing forward he heard Catherine yell out “You killed Evangeline!” but it still took him a moment to accept that we were the companions she traveled with up the mountain, but she did not make it down.
Iris interrupted the introductions stating urgently that we need to get to N’dovu! On the way Francois told Charles that Evangeline was killed by M’weru’s cultists, but he had a hard time accepting it.
Arrival in N’dovu
With all the cultists coming down the mountain the village would have been cut off to us, if not for our guide Mekena, who vouched for us.
Iris tended to Catherine (yay, not dying any more, just a major would) and to Amos (who was recovering form the poison).
Charles asked for more details about Evangeline’s death and Catherine told him that it was her fault, she let Evangeline die. Though Charles grew cold to Catherine when he heard the news, Iris said that Catherine did it to save her. Complicated feelings all around.
Iris asked the local healer about the green mamba that bit Amos and told him where it came from. He was grateful for our efforts to thwart M’weru but said she could not know that the people of N’dovu helped us, otherwise they would suffer.
A terrible idea
That night Catherine proposed looking through time to see when M’weru would be in dreaming and then we could strike her down. Amos thought it was dangerous (he was right), but Catherine persisted that it was worth it and pushed herself to see the future.
As they all discussed plans in secretive whispers Charles asked Colby what they were conspiring about, and when told a mild version of the truth, asked for Colby to confirm that they were not a danger to themselves or others. Colby could not do that. Eventually Charles landed on the understanding that these same occult beliefs they held that made them dangerous, also drove them to fight Evangeline’s foes and gave them strength as well.
Catherine, under the effects of opium and Amos casting the spell Earthly Serenity, peered into the weave of time and what she saw filled her with horror. Francois alone in the mountain of the Black Wind, impaled by his own spear, jaw missing, bloody tongue waggling with a life of its own.
Charles arrived to see what he can do to help just as Cathine was rasping out terrifying warnings in Francois’ ear. She then lost herself in the reverie of the yith. “Time is a line moving forward 1,2,3. Time is a circle giving context, day and night, life and death. Time is being and becoming. The circle and the line meet in the spiral, moving ever forward in cycles. But what if you could jump the track to visit another cycle? What if you could move fast enough to escape the track all together? What if that was want the Yith did? Seeing in the 4th dimension, as objects move through time. Seeing in the 5th dimension as time moves through dimensions. Super-dimensional spaces. Hyper geometries….”
Ignoring this incoherence, Charles agreed to travel with us and help kill M’weru.
Night passes
That night, in Dreaming Amos looked for a way to save Francois from M’weru by researching in the Library of Dreams. He learned that
- She is using a spell on Francois every night to find him and to hurt him.
- She is probably casting the spell from within Dreaming.
- As long as she does this, she’ll know were Francois last slept.
- The spear must be the focus she’s using.
- A new spear could be made, but would Nodins bless it? Unlikely.
- Could she be tracked back through Dreaming…Yes, with the correct spell.
Meanwhile Charles stayed up late asking the locals what they knew of M’weru to determine if there was a way for find her. To trap the hunter. He learned people often disappear, taken by cultists or terrifying creatures, usually at night or dawn, and more so during the time of the new moon.
In the morning we started forming a plan to trap her in dreams. We would need Old Bundari’s help, but if he could guide us perhaps we could trap her there, as she trapped him, while others among us found her in the waking world and ended her.
We packed our few belongings and headed to Narobi with Charles in the lead. He noticed a jaguar in the trees that tensed when it saw him, but seemed to almost bow at the sight of Colby, and then slink away. Remarkable!
Farewell Anaïs
Anaïs prepared to get on the first train back to Mombasa and then a boat home. She has a tender moment with Francois and asked if he though Lady Evangeline would know the grace of god.
“These people, that are no longer human could reach her body, but her soul is out of their domain.”
“Is yours?”
“I am unsure. I feel what I do is for the good of the people, but my acts are not Christian.”
Anaïs was not shaken. She has built her internal resolve “I will not forget all of this. For better or for worse, I will remember it,”
Francois seemed resigned to his own fate but hopeful for their cause “I hope we will make it out this. If so we will find you and let you know what happened.”
“You’ll find me in France.” Anaïs seemed more interested in Francois finding her alive then any news he would share.
She then found Iris and pressed a stack of paperwork into her hands that had been entrusted to her by Evangeline. It appears Iris had inherited another Morsely estate [Credit Rating now 55]. “What am I going to do with all this money?” She asked with no irony at all.
Sheepishly Catherine asked if there was anything that Evangeline left for her. Anise remembered that deep down on his list was instructions to give Catherine the emerald necklace. Catherine took out her photo of Reggie and unfolded it, revealing Evangeline in the picture as well.
Bye Bye Bumption
Bumption first met with Colby to tell him he didn’t know what to do now. Maybe he would tell the truth. He didn’t believe he was capable of repeating the lies from the Carlyle expedition and blaming the atrocities on the local people.
He then met up with Catherine, just as lost. She encouraged him to work with Johnstone Kenyata. She took his shaking hands in hers and told him to do good with them.
Jimmy recovers
Iris checked up on Jimmy in the hospital. He was recovering alright and didn’t want to know about the the horrors we found, but wanted to hear the story of her almost falling off a cliff!
Also, he requested that we please, pretty please, go to a place where he can drive a car.
Old Bundari
Predictably, we found Bundari dreaming. The boy who kept him fed said that we would wake soon, so we waited, and waited, and waited. Five hours later he finally woke and looked at us gravely “Did you leave something very important with M’weru?”
Amos said “It was that or death.”
Bundari didn’t not seem sure we made the right choice, but was still here to help.
“You asked me to look for more information about the Eye of Light and Darkness. I met a man named H’san in Asia who has been researching the rituals needed to create greater sigils of protection. In particular he was studying pyramids and found that gods are attracted to such angles.”
We talked for some time about what this could mean. Could gods be lured? Could the be trapped?
Speaking of which, we shared our ideas about trapping with M’weru and he thought it was interesting.
“We know where her traps are. If you could go into Dreaming with friends at your side to aid you, could you catch her like a spider in the center of her web.”
Bundari agreed to help us doing this by preparing us for dreaming and teach us a spell to find her. He just advised that we not use it to often!
Suffering
Catherine wanted to be in Bundari’s hut learning the spell, but she could not lose the chance to talk to Colby. She found him outside and got very close. She whispered in his ear (her voice still weak) “When you find M’weru, I ask that you make her suffer.”
Colby nodded and said he understood. They then spent the next few hours working together so Catherine could show him how and explain why the Yithian artifact worked. Catherine spoke of flights of fancy that sometimes dipped into known physics, which gave Colby as handhold for understanding the process, if not the underlying principles of the device.
Revenge and Greed
Nails meanwhile was sizing up Charles Morsely. “Are you going on this expedition for revenge?”
Charles confirmed he was.
“It’s a tricky business revenge. It can lead to all sorts of things. I wonder what a man will do after his revenge has been met out. There’s only one pure motivation that us not sullied by passing exigencies, and that is greed. I do what I am paid for, and nothing else.”
Charles got the message and confirmed to Nails that he would be paid for his efforts. agian.
We sent the hunters off with sympathetic charms so we could reach them in dreams. Amos gave Charles as letter from Reggie and Iris gave him the Peruvian knife given to her by Edwards on their honeymoon. Then the headed out. They had two days travel ahead of them, back to the Black Mountain.
Bad Dreams for M’weru
Iris and Amos learned the spell Impartation of the Night’s Reverie (Iris first active participation in the Mythos). It was taught as a folk magic spell that involved herbal concoctions altering your state and entering dreaming, which was a chink in Iris’ armor against the horrors of the mythos. These things drew her in. She cast the spell which would both send M’weru a dream and tell us her location. To be as innocuous as possible she sent a dream virus of the squirming carpet.
Iris could see into her dreams and her surface thoughts. Roger Carlyle swooning over her and her loathing of him. Her pity, then loathing, and then finally envy of Hypatia Masters who served the Crawling Chaos an a manner she was unable to. She lies on a stone slab pulsing blue with power, inside the Black Mountain, holding Francois’ spear as it burns her hands, but she holds it still. Despite the crafty deception M’weru knew these were not her serpents. She stirred in her dreams.
In the waking world
Charles, Colby, Nails, and the two hunters in who accompanies Charles made their way through the forest. Colby gave them the clear instruction that if they found cultists along the way, they should be killed. “They murder for her glory.”
Preparation for Dreaming
Bundari trained us to fight M’weru and helped us find dreams of our own to combat hers. [Mechanically we drew from a circular deck of tarot like cards]. Iris received the dead end, worried that we would fail. Francois received the orphan, feeling that he had already lost pieces of himself and having seen the creature of chaos killing its mother as it was birthed. Catherine received the prayer, the mirror, and the nectar. Amos, most accomplished of us all in Dreaming received the stone, the venom, the shapeshifter, the animal, and the riddle!
Entering the Black Mountain
In dream Iris sent a message to Charles showing him what she saw of M’weru and where to find her.
Colby led the way back to the Black Mountain and with Charles, found a way in. Unfortunately, at every entrance there were Bloody Tongue wearing cultists guarding the path.
The sleepers (Amos, Catarrhine, Francois, and Iris) descended into Dream with varying success. Some arrived in their best form [fully HP] others were as bedraggled as their waking selves [Catherine at 3 HP. No problem].
We started in a forest of zoogs and at the edges we could see the edifice of M’werus dreamscape. Francois was drawn in…
Our first dreamscape was the Yellowing. A writing carpet of snakes trying to snap at Francois in particular. Catherine manifested a rake [1MP spent] to bat away the snakes.
[Mechanically our options in the dreamscape were to move a tile, investigate nearby tiles by spending MP, change the dreamscape with one of our dreaming cards, or to take other normal actions]
Francois moved deeper into the dream, into Darkening. He heard the cawing of crows swirling overhead as they blanketed the sky in darkness.
Nails, disguised as a cultist (with a bloody tongue bandana) pretended to have Charles and Colby captive (the other hunters watching from the bushes). The nodded them past and as soon as they got close, Charles and Colby pulled knives and slit their throats.
Iris, Amos, and Catherine dodged the snapping snakes and made their way to Francois, to he Darkness.
Francois felt a force (M’weru to be sure) trying to make him forget who he is, why he was there, but he held onto himself [Successful Power roll]. He crept along feeling out the nearby spaces and sensed ahead the Sap of the Moon Plant. There was Hypatia Masters with yellow eyes birthing herself.
Colby and Charles continued to advance quietly and slay the cultists as they spotted them. [Extreme successes on stealth and brawling]
Catherine shifted the dreamscape from Darkness into the Nectar. Bloody fruit came from the ground and the crows from above descended to feast on it, clearing the skies. Catherine claimed Darkness for herself! [5MP spent, not sure what that means, but we’ll find out]
Iris investigated the nearby dreams and found the Sun and the Blue Temple. The Sun was Egypt and terrible winds. The Blue Temple was a place of impossible geometries and timelessness.
M’weru changed the dream again. Nectar to the Golden Rose. Thorns surrounding the Eye of Light and Darkness. The very seal that we sought!
Francois sought to claim the seal, but the close he got the more the thorns tore at him [-3HP]. He bled sap instead of blood..
Catherine urged him to doubt the dream. “This is a trick. She is trying to lure you with with what we desire most” [Extreme success with Charm]
Iris and Amos moved to the Blue Temple and were attacked by bats!
Francois broke free of the vines and moved to follow Iris and Amos into the Blue Temple [Catherine wanted that badly, but never made it there]
Colby and Charles continued moving. Colby killed another guard, but Charles was startled when he saw the body of Evangeline. He called out here name and rushed to her. He tried to place her broken body in a more dignified posture but a guard noticed the noise so they were once again in peril [Sanity loss from seeing Evangeline after a failed stealth roll].
Catherine fight back against M’weru’s dream and once again changed the dreamscape to Prayer. Evangeline’s dead hand burst from the ground and from it flies and swarmed and consumed the thorns. If M’weru was in a place to be impressed, she might have been, but the hunt was still on.
Amos also changed the dreamscape, but his plan was a trap! He changed the Blue Temple (which he claimed as well) to the Animal. Hunters of Nodins, specifically. Gargoyles appeared and chased off the bats. Amos tickled the mind of the Lord of the Abyss [Success on a Cthulhu Mythos roll] who began to take notice of this conflict.
M’weru changed the world again. Splintering all of them but still focusing on Francois. He was fractured into thousands of selves [Dropped to 0 HP] but held himself together by expending the dream of the Orphan. Instead of forgetting himself, he forgot the world around him. Only he was real now. Fortune smiled on us though, Amos’ trap worked and M’weru revealed herself in the dreamscape.
Colby threw a barbed club and charged at the alert cultist!
Catherine entered the Sap of the Moon Plant where Hypatia Masters was dissolving into orange goo beneath her that she was also becoming. It was very unnerving [failed a sanity check].
Iris and Amos followed Catherine into the dreamscape to get closer to M’weru.
Hypatia’s eyes fired a beam of light that would have burned Catherine’s weakened form to ash, if not for her dream of the Mirror that reflected some of the rays [Also down to 0HP]. Like Francois, Catherine was barely holding on. We could also sense M’weru stirring. The noise in the waking world drawing her out of dream.
Francois fought to remain in dream and called M’weru closer. She could not resist the temptation! [Success after pushing a Dreaming roll. Hell yeah!!]
Charles rushed the alter that M’weru slept on and knocked her form it with the butt of his rifle, separating her from the pulsating stone and the power it provided. She began to stir.
Colby activated the machine and lightning coursed from it into M’weru, killing her instantly. We were all ejected from the horrible dream [17 HP damage, ignored armor. Huzzah!]. He cut off her head. It was a brutal affair.
The remaining cultists continued fighting but they were dispatched by Nails and the hunters. One of them falling into a pit of army ants and quickly carpeted him.
Relief
In the Black Mountain the hunters found a marine chronometer but little else. Charles gathered the body of Evangeline and made a prayer for her. He waved the whisk to scare away malicious spirits and found it was drawn to the stone alter, still glowing blue.
Francois woke screaming, still believing we’re all figments of his imaginate [-5 Sanity]. We all tried to support him. Catherine reminded him this happened before to Colby, who thought we were all wearing masks and that nothing was real. Iris lit him a cigarette. Amos encouraged him to rest and let his mind recover.
Bundari looked surprised “You have done well. I thought for sure at least one of you would have been a goner.”
On the way down the mountain, Charles and Colby told the M’weru was dead and they should destroy her lair so that other cultists cannot make use of it in the future.
Farewell Evangeline
We held a church service for Evangeline (though her body would be sent back to be interred in the Morsely family cemetary).
Charles spoke first. “She was a strong woman. I hope that she is in a better place now.”
Catherine followed “We didn’t often get along but I hope you respected me Evangeline. I respected you very much. I learned from you about speaking the truth regarless of the danger.”
Amos said that Reggie was an incredible man, and he was because of her raising him. She gave him great strength as well.
Iris reminded us that Evangeline never game into despair. Even when things were at their worst she wouldn’t give up.
Francois said “I’ve met four Morselys now. Each of them have given to us greatly. She gave the most.”
Jimmy said “She was a real broad.” Hah!
That night Charles passed around a flask for those who wanted to stay up and share stories of Evangeline that couldn’t be told in church.
The Seeds
Iris asked Old Bundari about the seeds she had taken from dreaming. “Would it be a bad idea to plant them?”
He winced a bit “It was a bad idea to bring them into this world.” He took one of the seeds in his mouth, chewed and swallowed “If you plant these in soil, they will not need water or light, but will be fed by thoughts, feelings, and emotions.”
“What will they become?”
“Trees? Big Trees? Who knows.”
Iris thanked Bundari for all his help.
“You saved me from M’weru when she had me trapped and I am grateful. You’re on a quest now but I’ll know where to find you and I’ll come if I can aid you.”
The Third Trip to the Mountain
While Colby and Catherine convalesced in the hospital, Francois, Charles, Iris, and Amos went to the mountain one final time. The found the blue stone still pulsing with life.
Frrancois perfomed the ritual of the Lord of Waters, the Lord of the Abyss. He told eveyrone there is a good chance this would all be very unpleasant for him, that he may lose himself again. Amos tried to help again by reminding him to hold something familiar that would remind him of who he was.
The stench of death in this place was terrible. Hundreds, maybe thousands had died here. Francois completed the ritual and plunged the Bonespear into the alter, which it cut into like it was flesh [-5 sanity for Francois, he’s having a very hard day]
Francois was no longer in the mountain but floating among the stars, above the sea. He heard a voiced that sounded pleased “You have done well. Very well.” [348 Power given to Nodins].
Francois replied “This power was taken from your enemy.”
The voice which came from nowhere but was everywhere responded “I sense that and I will grant you a boon for your service my priest.”
Francois asked for a weapon that could be used in a time of great need. He woke from his fugue state vomiting sea water, and knowing in the back of his mind the incantation to summon the Lord of Waters into the this world (“Bring Nodins Forth.”)
“Nodins is pleased.”
The stone was just a stone now, but it was blackened where the spear smote it. He knew somehow that he was now a priest of Nodins. The fire in the ring he wore faded.
Endicott’s Lodge
Knowing the symbols to pacify the undead and having the weapon to put them to rest, we ended the curse at Endicott’s lodge. Charles also returned Mrs. Garuthers to him, which he was greatly please about. He seemed to understanding, if a fragile one, that his wife Sarah and son Augustus had passed and they no longer haunted him.
A new, new dress
While Catherine rested she asked for another dress to be made. She wanted again to wear the Pan African colors, but opted this time to leave out the red. Black and yellow would suffice. The nurses at the hospital tended to her broken ribs and two weeks later she was released [Major wound recovered from].
Johnstone Kenyata
Before leaving Nairobi Catherin paid a final visit to Mr. Kenyata. She apologized to him that his guide did not survive the trek and thanked him for all his help. She pledged to keep helping him and his cause as well. In a back office she saw Bumption working away, performing some menial but meaningful task. She left feeling that much more hopeful. She respected both of these men greatly.
Cats of Mombasa
On our trek back to Mombasa Colby asked for any who knew of temples of Bastet. He got no answers but eventually noticed cats who were watching him. He followed after and the led him through alleys and twists and turns until they made it to a cellar filled with cats and a statue of Bastet. He held out the cat figurine he wore and said out loud “Thank you for this gift. IF there’s anything I can do for you, let me know know and I will do it if I can.”
Though none of the his companions knew about this trip, we would have all be boggled if we had!
Good Luck
Charles agreed to continue with us. After all the stories he heard he believed that instead of Morselys being doomed, that they were the ones who helped these investigators along and brought them good luck!
Stars
Wow, this was a wonderful game. I’m so glad were were able to stop M’weru. She was a nightmare (literally!)
- Matt, tricking M’weru into taking the Hunter and using that to find her was brilliant. Thanks for letting me borrow your sword! I’m very glad you survived the snake bite…I don’t think Catherine would have. Amos showed a lot of care, thanks for helping Bumption tell himself comforting lies.
- James, pushing your luck to keep her in Dreaming was clutch! Probably the difference between her head or ours! It was so wonderful to see Francois’ humanity and vulnerability as his mind fractured. I loved your scene with Anaïs before she departed.
- Sarah, it’s kind of amazing that Iris is the secret bad ass if the group. Not only dishing out the big hits but also keeping ALL of us alive. Snake venom, broken ribs? No problem. Also, you cast your first spell and it was so cool. I loved the use of the crawling chaos. And our fight! That was so good.
- Dylan, thanks so much for understanding Catherine’s anger towards M’weru and towards herself. She needed someone who wouldn’t question her in that moment. You were also a consummate bad ass infiltrating the mountain! I also loved how you explained our supernatural fixations with Charles. And you used the Mark 2 device! And you offered services to Bastet! A thing I would have never imagined!
- Adrienne, I just love Charles. The jaguar claw scar, the drinks after the funeral, such good stuff. His coldness to Catherine when she said it was her fault and then finding Evangeline and carrying her back was great. I also loved his entrance, killing off the cultists. He was also really open minded, at least about indigenous beliefs, if not mythos.
- Sam, as always a great game. I know you don’t like stars coming your way, but I’m still just very happy the Bumption went to work with Kenyata.
Thoughts for next game
I’m not sure. Research our notes on Ho Fang. Prepare for a long boat ride (sorry Iris). Find Brady?
