Session 22

← Session 21 | Session 23 →

The party sets an ambush, and works on making amends.

## Characters

* The Party
* Ramona Walz
* Rain Caudell
* 0-771534
* Nestor Shields
* Nate
* Na'arisiel
* Fillan Bailey
* Tressa Gillespie

## Summary

#### **Follow the Yellow Paper Road**

Sam makes it back to the apartment, where there is no sign of Ben. He does some basic first-aid so he isn't bleeding all over the floor, but isn't capable of much. Asa shows up soon after, followed by a text from Kuno asking: war or peace? When he receives an answer that amounts to "war", he arrives at the apartment with some homemade flashbangs and smoke bombs. Kuno leaves a sticky note on his front door, directing Walz to Sam's apartment. Colby and Nyx also arrive, and the party starts working on an ambush plan.

Nyx has the idea to move to the abandoned restaurant in her apartment building, which is in a rougher part of town and can get trashed with fewer consequences. Kuno suggests inviting Pax as backup, an idea which is considered but not followed through on. Colby blesses a collection of ammunition for the party to use, providing some bullets that occasionally crackle with holy lightning. The party successfully relocates from Ben's apartment to the abandoned diner in Nyx's building, with Kuno leaving another sticky note directing Walz to the diner. They clutter the entryway, making access more difficult, and settle down behind the counter. Kuno's sticky note trail continues, with one on the door to the diner saying hello.

#### **I'd Say Surprise, But we Did Warn You**

   It's a long wait. The party passes the time by occasionally chatting and playing cards, with Nyx pulling out her tarot deck to do readings.

##### **Tuesday, February 9th, 543:**

The next afternoon, after a long night spent on-edge, Nyx pulls the Tower from her deck--and there is a knock on the door. Kuno calls a greeting, and the door is neatly kicked in, to reveal Walz standing in the doorway, flanked by two more figures. Walz starts what is obviously about to be a monologue, when Nyx shoots her, kicking off the fight. Walz goes after Nyx, ending up against Sam, who had been waiting for her to enter arm's reach. Asa squares off against one of the other toughs, leaving the last to Kuno. The wolves take krov before entering the melee, but one of the toughs is slow on the uptake, and Kuno shoots their jaw off.

#### **Ding Dong, the Wolf is Dead**

The fight has been raging for a few minutes when the building's fire alarm sounds. Nyx tries to bolt out of the diner to do something about this, but between the cluttered entry and one of the toughs she doesn't manage to leave the diner. In the process, she gets shot, and her hip shatters. Kuno handily takes out the tough that had cornered Asa, but the building is starting to heat up. Sam, while still recovering from being injured, makes a good stand against Walz--which is disrupted when she bites his right hand off, taking his knife with it. With the building filling with smoke, and down one hand, Sam manages to suffocate Walz, who stops being a wolf when she dies.

#### **Brick by Burning Brick**

The room is full of smoke at this point, and the party bolts. Asa catches a bullet from the also-fleeing remaining werewolf, and he collapses just outside the building, but is quickly healed by Colby. Nyx's entire apartment complex is aflame, with a speed that only arson could account for. Nyx herself is unable to put weight on one leg, so Kuno digs up a shopping cart and heads in the direction of Nate's apartment. Colby texts ahead, only to hear that Nate is out, so Asa suggests visiting the revolutionaries.

#### **Magic First Aid**

At Ollie's apartment, Rain answers the door, and lets everyone in. Ollie is in the background, working on things, and Lyric is somewhere around. Rain patches up the party, through a combination of basic first aid and fae magic. Kuno helps where he can, and makes small talk with Rain, mostly about the man he found in an alley and is helping.

Kuno contacts an old friend of his who does underground prosthetics work, Dr. Nestor Shields. Shields is willing to do the work, but will need to see what he has to work with. Kuno sets up a meeting in a few days. He also offers Nyx his apartment as a place to crash, which she takes him up on, joining the man from the alley in the category of "supernatural entities adopted by Kuno Fernweh." The man from the alley is getting better at wandering the apartment, which Kuno takes as a good sign.

#### **Nyx Gets a Leg Up**

##### **Thursday, February 11th, 543:**

Shields lives and works out of an old garage, where there is also a young girl with some burn scars and mostly-constructed prosthetic limbs. He determines that Nyx's hip is a relatively easy job, but that getting Sam a functional hand will be trickier. He does some reinforcing of Nyx's hip on the spot, as well as providing her with a leg brace. Shields says he's going to need some parts to get Sam a hand, and Kuno takes a list.

Nyx is recovering for about a week, over which time there is still no sign of Ben. Kuno and Sam have been working on getting parts for Sam's hand. Kuno asks Ollie to let him know if Giles drops by, but given the engineer's unpredictable schedule Ollie can make no promises.

#### **Does Everyone Have a Tragic Past?**

##### **Sunday, February 15th, 543:**

One afternoon, on Valentine's Day, Colby gets a text from Nate, asking him on a date (though not in those words). The two go to a restaurant, and Nate suggests they spend some time on the roof of his building, where he has a spot. Nate had bought some wine, and the two share it on the roof of Nate's building. Later in the evening, Nate steers the conversation towards existentialism, asking Colby's opinion on what happens after death. Colby replies he thinks it's just the void, and Nate agrees that while it would be nice to think there's somewhere better the void is the most likely option. Continuing the existentialism, Nate brings up the idea of knowing exactly when you die. Colby isn't a fan of the concept, but Nate thinks it might be appealing.

After some silence, Nate brings up something that he shouldn't be talking about, but also doesn't expect there will be consequences for, since Colby is a public figure. He explains how, a year and change ago, he and some friends had a startup that Essence tried to buy out. After they refused, Nate found his mother dead, obviously murdered, but the police covered it up. It's been difficult for him to find a job, since he isn't going to work for Essence. Colby doesn't know exactly what to say, and can only offer commiseration.

#### **Wait We Needed that Bridge**

##### **Tuesday, February 16th, 543:**

A few days later, Nyx brings up the idea of going after Morena. The party meets up at Asa's apartment to work on options for a plan. With the location from Cat checked out, the only other vague lead is Bratva HQ, which isn't very helpful. They figure they ought to mend relations with Jamie and Tressa, as well as deliver the bullets they promised. Kuno makes some cookies to go in an apology package, and buys some nice whiskey. Nyx texts Fillan, who doesn't know anything about the party's last visit. He says he and Jamie are out, but that the party can drop things off with Tressa.

The bullet acquisition from Cat goes fine, and Colby takes a day off to bless them. These rounds take on the same crackly quality as before, occasionally emitting jolts of holy lightning.

Tressa answers the door, and lets the party in. Nyx apologizes, as does Kuno, but Tressa brushes them off, indicating that Jamie was far more angry than she was. The party sits and chats, relaying the fact they killed Walz as well as Sam's adventures that led to it. Kuno brings up the man he took in off the street, to which Tressa has an obvious thought. Kuno gives her some paper, and she writes that they found Fillan the same way.

After some small talk, Nyx asks why Tressa hates Morena, but that she doesn't have to answer if she doesn't want to. Tressa takes some time to formulate her thoughts, but the main point that gets shared is that Morena cut out Tressa's tongue. Kuno asks about the origins of the krov operation, and Tressa explains that it was mostly refinement after they found out upyr blood could be addictive. She also explains she used to do "negotiations" for the Bratva, and was very good at her job, but that she's clean now. The party explains they've basically run out of ideas for going after Morena, and ask if she would have any leads. After thinking for a bit, and getting an assurance the party is decently confident of their success, Tressa says she has a plan that Jamie won't like: Morena might be willing to meet with her. Tressa thinks she can get the party a location, but it would be secure, and Morena would bring a small army in backup. The party gets Tressa's phone number, to set up more details, before leaving to start planning.

Back at Asa's apartment, the party works on a plan to assassinate Morena. With everyone scrounging for possibly allies, Kuno suggests they could recruit Pax to help, and the idea comes up of getting a lead on Eldridge to give Pax incentive. With this decided, the party starts working on a plan to ambush Devereaux and get information out of him.

## Quotes

**Parker:** “Kuno has just perpetually had “my ex-wife died in a tragic accident” energy.”

**Kellen:** “You rush home after being a *fucking idiot.”*

**Kuno:** “Hey Walz, I’m at Sam’s apartment; thought I would save you some time.”

**Kellen:** “Kuno is my fucking lifeline in this campaign, everyone else is playing a college student I want to throttle with my bare hands. Colby is fine, but on thin ice.”

**Abby:** “Hey can I escalate the situation by shooting her?”

**James:** “Kuno’s good at gun now, that’s a ten!” | **Ezra:** “Asa’s not good at gun now, that’s a six.”

**Kuno:** “Do you want some more business? I think I might need you to lend me a hand.”

**Nyx:** “It did cost us an arm and a leg.”

**Abby:** “There there, we can’t all have braincells.”

**Kuno:** “We have more confidence than we have any right to.”

← Session 21 | Session 23 →