Worm d20: ⑨
Hey Paul. Nice hat.
Thanks, but it's not mine, it belongs to the Prop department but they let me borrow it for a play we're doing later in the semes—
Gimmeeee~!
It's not mine! I'm telling yo—Oi! Get your hands out of my personal space!
Mineeeee!
I give up. Take it. Just don't drool all over it or something.
…It really is a sweet hat, though.
ooo
The room was dark, lights barely filtering through the slats of my window shades. A warm mug of liquid courage was propped up between my hands. The kind of courage you could only get with some milk and a drop of honey.
My current client was one of them dames of the fiery-red persuasion. Long red hair and legs that went on forever. She'd approached me with a ready list of demands and tried to corner me into accepting them without question. But I knew better than to allow her that much. A quick trip back to my humble abode and a short 'discussion' later, and she was passed out in my bedroom from exhaustion. It probably wasn't the cleanest way to conclude a negotiation, but nothing about this situation was clean to begin with.
Wait… wait, what?
The city was drowning beneath the waters, as if God himself had gazed down upon the lands and wept for the stupidity he saw. But he couldn't settle for something as simple as rain. Oh no… they say the Lord works in mysterious ways—so when he decided to bawl out his feelings, they came in the form of a thirty-foot tall monstrosity that pulverized the land beneath waves of the sort Noah would have wished he'd had to live through.
Families had been torn apart and apparently Red's was no different. Her brother had gone missing. The current suspect was one of them gangs of junkies. They'd been bad news before the Endbringer attack and they'd only grown more bold in the aftermath. It was the same old sob-story. Folks sittin' pretty until a bunch of hooligans decide to crash the place and hold an impromptu party. The type of party that involved copious amounts of alcohol, bottles, and alcohol bottles being inserted into places where the sun doesn't quite shine.
I needed more information. Red had told me everything she could, but it wasn't enough to get me what I needed. For the rest, I decided to cultivate one of my… other associates.
Is that what I am now? I'm hurt.
Blondie was my go-to whenever I needed problems solved. She had connections. She had know-how. She had a way of putting puzzle pieces together that would make any detective or private eye green with envy.
Thanks to her efforts, we had a target—the collection of miscreants, addicts, and parahumans known as the Merchants. We had ourselves a location—the shopping center downtown was hosting one of their daily 'parties'. It was completely abandoned after the Endbringer attack, leaving behind the kind of scum that was so depraved even God would throw up his hands and scream, 'Fuck it, I give up'. We had an 'in'—Blondie had somehow managed to scrounge up a collection of wristbands and badges that would easily allow us the means to infiltrate the gathering.
Yes, 'us'. The best thing about Blondie, other than a deductive capacity that would drive Encyclopedia Brown mad, was that she had minions. I wasn't too proud to admit the degree of envy I harboured towards that realisation, but I made a mental note to rectify this oversight at the earliest opportunity.
…
Blondie's minions were the stuff of legend. Military contractors or something similar. Much better than just goons that simply knew not to point the loud end towards themselves.
...
Scratch that. Blondie's minions sucked. Especially that medic guy. What the hell was up with that?
'Dead weight?' I'll show him dead weight, that little pipsqueak… shove your first-aid kit so far up your—
You're getting a bit sidetracked there…
Sorry.
Stupid medic.
ooo
…Seriously?
What?
You want to save her by buying her?
It's a perfectly logical way to avoid catching attention. Would you rather I have your mook charge in guns a-blazing?
But… buying her from a… there isn't even a—
Not my problem. You're the one who wanted me to rescue the poor waif. I was perfectly content to ignore her and proceed with the mission.
Disregarding a potential recruit?
Whoop-dee-doo, I get a girl barely older than I am—if that—who seems to have experience dressing up as a skank and being scared of men.
I… I really, really need to find a way to make you do Will saves in real life…
ooo
The whole gig was a trap. Red must have planted the girl here, knowing she was a link to my past. She was a liability. She was—
You are not going to kill the girl. No. Way. In. Hell.
—going to have to keep quiet. I had Blondie's boys keep her safe and out of the way until I could deal with her later.
Yes, in a nonlethal implication of 'dealing', what more do you want from me?! Gawd. Do you want some cheese with your whine?!
Ahem. Completely disregarding this poor bird who apparently knew me from my highschool days and threatened the very foundation of my existence, of my secret identity, Blondie and I continued to case the area like a bloodhound looking for Scooby snacks.
...I don't know what breed Scooby is, lay off!
We found the mark surrounded by the very men that Red had described to us. Down to the exact details. The 'kidnapper' was just as ugly as she'd implied, but the way he and her 'brother' were buddying up with each other was too much to be coincidence.
The whole gig was a trap. Red had set me—had set us up. Sent us on a wild snipe hunt into the middle of Merchant territory in the middle of one of their 'parties'. Oh it was going to be a party all right. With Blondie and her little friends… and their little friends…
Yes, it's not what Sierra described. No, this does not mean you should immediately backtrack and take her out. You—Sarah, help me out here.
ooo
Taylor reached up and tore the fedora from her head, throwing it irritably in Paul's general direction. "This. Is. A. Setup!" she hissed. "They've got their entire parahuman contingent here, we've got me and the least offensive person on our team to counter that, plus four mooks with bullets who can possibly hold the rest of the crowd at bay while we… what? Take on two-to-one odds?"
Sarah reached up to massage her forehead. "Skidmark isn't even paying any attention to our little corner, and with the precautions I've taken it should stay that way unless we do something stupid. He doesn't know we're here."
"Or… does he?"
Colin obligingly rolled a die. "A fight breaks out—"
"Ah-HAH!"
"—over by the main stage. While you two were having your little catfight, Skidmark set up a contest of sorts." Colin leaned over and began to delineate a boundary across the map. "Crowd is here, you guys are here. A portion of the crowd is stuck in the ring and can't get out."
"Oh. So… it's not for us."
"No. But because you were shouting so loudly, Bryce notices you and makes his escape. He runs straight for the fighting ring and dives in."
"…What?" Sarah rolled a pair of dice. "Sense Motive check with my skill die for a bonus. Why's he pulling a runner?"
"Skitter was right about one thing, Bryce and the 'kidnapper' clearly knew each other. You get the impression that he and his sister see recent events a bit… differently from each other."
Sarah groaned. "Great, he's not a kidnapee, he's a runaway brat."
Taylor juggled her own dice thoughtfully. "So… fight broke out. Roll for initiative?"
"Do you really want to? The odds really are just as bad as you said they were. You sure you want to try to grab their attention?"
"This quest sucks."
…
"What's that Skidmark is holding?"
"Did you roll a—yes you did… You can hear him taunting the crowd, claiming that the reward for the last person standing will be 'Superpowers in a can'."
"Holy shit. They can do that?!"
Colin rolled his die, frowned and checked his notes, then rolled another die. "Skitter, Tattletale, roll a Will save versus a psychic attack."
Sarah grimaced. "Four."
Taylor pumped a fist. "Nineteen!"
"Fail. Both of you."
"What."
"Sarah, come over here for a sec. You've got five seconds to memorize this sketch I've made."
"What?"
…
"…ten… seventeen… six… eight… eight… fourteen… "
"Fuck Faultline," Sarah grumbled as she skipped her token across the board. "I was this close to figuring it out."
"…nineteen… three…" Taylor looked up from where she'd been recording her dice rolls. "Am I done yet?"
"That'll do," Colin confirmed. "You've got roughly seventy-percent of the papers, which is more than good enough for Tattletale to sort through it all."
"At least we came away with something," Taylor grumbled.
"You got to see the kidnapper dead," Sarah pointed out. "…Sort of. At least mostly dead."
"I didn't even do it! He got ganked by some NPC. I don't even get XP for that!"
"Speaking of XP, since you sort of quit halfway, you don't get any roleplaying experience for your little Private-Eye Monologuing."
"Screw you, Colin."
"Also… Newter has caught up to you guys. Way to fail your Perception checks."
"…what Perception checks?"
"Thanks for proving my point. Anyhow, he demands the papers you've worked so hard to collect."
"Oh, that's not so bad. I saved his life. He owes me one."
"You also used his blood to knock out and cut out the eyes of another person. Not only is he completely weirded out by that, but he'd probably see that as having been a fair trade. You're on equal footing."
"Fuck."
…
Sarah grinned. "Congratulations, you have your own pair of minions now!"
Taylor grimaced. "One is terrified of me and thinks I'm the Devil, the other keeps trying to call me 'Locker Girl'. Don't suppose you'd care to trade? Except for the medic. He sucks."
"Nah, I'm sure you can figure something out for them."
ooo
(a/n)—argh. i had trouble with this for some reason. that's what i get for browsing tvtropes' PrivateEyeMonologue and thinking it was a good idea. i got the first part done over... nearly two weeks. and then just gave up and hammered the rest out in a single evening after dinner. noir is apparently not one of my strengths.
