Episode 32 - Hunted

[00:00:01] Speaker A: You're listening to the all night society, an actual play podcast brought to you by Queens court games. Well, things were turning properly pear shaped when we last left our codery, so you'll have to excuse me if we dispense with the fancy introduction. You're being shot at. There's no time to waste. I don't understand why you're all being so chill about this. Get in the fucking car. [00:00:55] Speaker B: What do you think I'm fucking doing? [00:00:57] Speaker A: Right off the bat, calamity tearing towards the vehicle. Because as we've established, there's the sound of wearing helicopter rotors that by itself enough to throw Ivy back to time. She'd like not to remember. And I know we make fun of Alex for being dumb, but even he can see that when the spotlights start coming down from the sky and you hear the gunshots and the sound of animals being torn asunder, that it's time to go real quick. We know calamity's driving. It's her car. And there are rules about these kind of things, Ivy. What seat? [00:01:29] Speaker C: Seniority rules. I'm front passenger seat. [00:01:32] Speaker A: I like that even in times of crisis that you have the wherewithal to remember that you got here first. So you get to pick shotgun, obviously, which means, Alex, you kind of sit in Ivy's lap for the ride or hop into the back seat. And I understand that it's rather urgent, but propriety does still have a place. [00:01:50] Speaker D: Also, I don't think I could fit. I think I'd be kind of like a dog that's hunched know too big. So I'm going to go in the backseat, right? [00:01:58] Speaker A: Very, very well, then. Let's all have a good time and see how well this goes. Can I get a dexterity and athletics role from everyone? Now is not the right time to be ambling quietly towards the vehicle, grambling up from the ground, some of you others tearing out from under a pile of werewolf guts. So how is that going for folks? That's four with a crit success like hurdles, right? [00:02:30] Speaker C: Yeah, this is easy. Running is my specialty. [00:02:34] Speaker B: Well, that looks like four successes as. [00:02:38] Speaker D: I'm busy trying to piece together my body and my pride. That is three successes. [00:02:44] Speaker A: Awesome. There's two of you who know what's going on and have managed to get into the car in an ordinary fashion. Alex, I'm looking at your dice. They're telling me a slightly different story, buddy. Three successes, but they're all on your hunger. Die. Now, the rules don't say that. If you only get successes on the hunger, die, that something bad happens. But the other thing the rulebook says is that I get to make up when bad things happen. And in this case, I know two things about you. One, you're super, super hungry. And two, you don't deal very well with situations that aren't entirely in your control. So I want to pose a question to you. What is the normal method by which someone would enter a vehicle? [00:03:26] Speaker D: Assuming that they are entering into the backseat, they'd probably open up the door. They would slide their weight evenly, buckle up, and close the door. I think that's a normal way to do it, right? [00:03:37] Speaker A: I mean, that's how I normally do it. But I don't want to presume that the way I handle things is the way that they should go. But why don't you tell me, Mr. Three hungry successes, how you get into the car instead? [00:03:49] Speaker D: Wrenching the car door open, but not off the hinges, and one hand firmly planted on the roof, I hike up my legs in a giant drop kick motion, swing my ass into this car, and on the way in, slam it behind me. I'm currently just sprawled out, like when a kid goes down a slide and just loses everything. [00:04:12] Speaker A: Under a different set of circumstances, it would look like you were having fun, but I'm guessing the facial expression you're making does not line up with that experience. [00:04:21] Speaker D: I am in a pure panic. Not only did my strength fail me, my tactics failed me, I failed me. And now I'm in the backseat, sprawled out like a child, embarrassing myself yet again. And the only thing in my mind. [00:04:33] Speaker A: Is shit, shit, shit, shit. Got to get the fuck out of here. I mean, in your mind, out of your mouth. I'm guessing it's pretty loud inside this vehicle. Well, it's going to get louder. We have a situation where animals are being flushed out of the forest. I'm sure everyone has seen a nature documentary. You know, the scene where there's the forest fire and all the things come running out of it, right. This time it's not cute birds or deer that you have sympathy for. It is slabbering, slobbering monsters that are tearing at you. They were willing to wait before, but now circumstances have changed, and some of them have obviously disappeared into the woods to deal with whatever is coming in that direction. There are others that have decided to take advantage of this opportunity to make sure that you both go down. It's no fun dying alone. What they say. So, Clemmie, composure and drive, please. [00:05:31] Speaker B: It's fine. Everything is fine. This is fine. [00:05:34] Speaker A: We will see, because you are trying to get the keys situated, get the car going, get the shifter shifted, and all you can see out of the front windshield is the increasingly massive hulk of gray and fur and teeth and claws. And how did that role go? [00:05:51] Speaker B: Okay, that looks like six successes. Can we get the fuck out of here, please? [00:05:56] Speaker A: Having the six, yeah, you can. Got there in a pretty big hurry, not a critical. So you are not going to be able to prevent the next little thing they're going to talk about. But the good news is this isn't one of those horror movie situations where you've knocked the keys onto the floorboards and you're trying to deal with that. No. The car comes roaring to life. Detroit diesel. Almost enough to block out the sounds of the helicopter and the gunshots. Not quite, but getting there. And you rip the wheel around, dirt flying up from behind the rear tires. Is it a real rear drive? I'm not a car person, actually. Let's not go down that road. Let's go down the road that gets the fuck out of the woods instead. Yeah, what do you say? [00:06:32] Speaker B: Yeah, no, that sounds great. I am gunning it leather for hell. Like my daddy used to say. [00:06:38] Speaker A: That is how the phrase goes. Now, I did say something a little bit ago that you might have hinged on, which is a critical success. Not enough to stop the thing. Who wants to know what the thing is? [00:06:52] Speaker B: Just tell me. [00:06:53] Speaker A: Well, none of you want to know what the thing is. I'm going to guess because in terms of the soundscape, you have the roar of the engine, you have Alex panicking in the seat, you have ivy being weirdly quiet, considering everything that's going on. And then thonk as something big and heavy and hairy leaps onto the front of the car. So there's good news. With six successes on drive, you are going to make it out of here. You're not going to slam into a tree. You're not going to be stranded in the woods, surrounded by God only knows what's in the sky and what you know exactly is on the ground. But you have an extra passenger as you go screaming down this dirt road heading out of the park to. I don't actually think we've paused to determine what the destination is right now, but we have bigger problems at the moment. So we'll get to how you deal with this in a second. But right now I want to take the camera and have it do one of those slow pans around the vehicle so everybody can see in slow motion the facial expressions people are making as the first claw comes down into the hood, ripping out a hole right where you'd put one of those big, like, super turbocharger stacks, like it was that kind of car. And then the other one reaching up to grab just above the windshield where it connects to the roof. This beast is hauling itself up onto the car. Calamity, it's your car, and you are closest both emotionally to the vehicle and proximity to the creature. So let's start with you. [00:08:26] Speaker B: Yeah, no. This car has gotten me through a lot. It's survived several decades of chicanery and foolishness and usually come out the other side with generally original parts. But this strikes a chord. I am not happy, and I am not afraid to let this hairy bastard know that I am unhappy. There's a lot of swearing, a lot of language that would have gotten me swatted upside the head as a child. God, I just got it detailed too. [00:09:03] Speaker A: Oh, it's got all kinds of new and exciting details now. There's claw marks and fur. It's not drool because it's, like, too thick, but it's not foamy in the way you would expect. [00:09:16] Speaker B: It's kind of red. Yeah, no, it's fine. It's not fine, but this is fine. God damn it. Son of a bitch. [00:09:26] Speaker A: And then moving in proximity, order around the car, we come to Ivy. You've always wanted to get up close with werewolves. You missed out earlier, had to deal with regular wolves instead. But now, I mean, you can count individual hairs on this thing as the lower part of its torso is dragging up the windscreen. [00:09:47] Speaker C: So there are ideas that sound really good in the moment, but in hindsight, are really bad. And I think this is one of those ideas, actually, because it sounded great before. Now, I don't know if I ever truly appreciated just how big and dangerous these creatures can actually be, but having them so close to me with only these thinned pieces of glass and metal between us, I'm curious. But I'm also trying to hide my terror as I push back against the dashboard, trying to disappear into this leather bench seat. [00:10:27] Speaker A: Yeah, for sure. Roll willpower, and we'll see how well you're hiding it. [00:10:30] Speaker C: Oh, fuck. [00:10:31] Speaker B: If it makes you feel any better, then glass is definitely bulletproof. [00:10:35] Speaker C: Well, that's four successes. I'm fine. [00:10:39] Speaker A: Four successes. Inocritical at. Someday, you will have to explain to everybody else how you remain so Zen in the face of things that irritate you. Calm in front of Maya. Calm in front of werewolves. It's a theme, but it's good to have that skill set to fall back on in moments of crisis. [00:10:55] Speaker C: I've been trained very, very well. [00:10:58] Speaker A: Alex, you have the benefit of, at least for the time being, like, 20 to 26 inches of space between you and this creature that the women in the front seat don't have. That said, I mean, buddy, you're two weeks into knowing that vampires are real. Now, werewolves are real, and there's one right there. And Ivy was on to something earlier about things that are fun in the abstract. Like, everyone likes tigers. They're cute. They're fun to look at. But it'd be an entirely different experience if you were in the cage with a hungry tiger. And you can see where this metaphor is going. How you doing, bud? [00:11:34] Speaker D: Not good. I'm feeling a panic, a great and intense panic, and it's looking for an answer. My fighter fight is kicking in, and my fight wants to win, but I just need something to do. So I'm panicking as I'm trying to trace where this creature is and look at it and get a solution. And in that panic, I just start kind of slowly building with my mania. Give me a gun. Give me a gun. Give me a gun. Give me a gun. Give me a fucking gun. Give me a fucking gun. I can take care of this thing. [00:12:10] Speaker A: Calamity, I understand the urge right there, but this is a both hands on the wheel situation. There are going to be more drive checks. And everything that you do that is not driving is going to incur a penalty on that drive check. [00:12:22] Speaker B: Yeah, no, I need to drive. I need to fucking drive. Alex, there's something under the seat. For fuck's sake, shut up and get it. [00:12:28] Speaker D: Okay, which seat? Where is it? Under your butt or Ivy's? [00:12:31] Speaker B: Under Ivy's. Ivy's. Go fucking get. [00:12:33] Speaker D: Okay, okay, I'm looking. Ivy, I'm sorry. I'm just looking for a gun, and I immediately just dive down, hands croping in the darkness. Probably head bumping into your lower back, because I can't see shit from the panic haze that my brain is in. Storyteller, what weapon do I find? [00:12:51] Speaker A: Well, we know that the arsenal is in the trunk. We've established that. Canonically. We know that each of you was given a weapon to deal with. We know that calamity had the big sniper rifle that she was carrying with her. So the sniper rifle is somewhere in the car. But I refuse to believe that in this day and age, in this line of work, calamity doesn't have. You wouldn't call it a side piece. That's something else. Doesn't have a spare weapon hidden underneath the seat? [00:13:24] Speaker B: Of course not. I'm not a heathen. [00:13:27] Speaker A: Right. You are entirely too experienced to not have. Again, you can't hide like a rocket launcher underneath the seat, and you certainly wouldn't want the cops to find that if you got pulled over. So it's probably something smaller, like a nice 45 would do it, right? [00:13:45] Speaker B: Call it a dirty, hairy special or. [00:13:47] Speaker A: A sawed off shotgun might. Well, you mean sawed off. That's a felony. [00:13:51] Speaker B: Yeah. No, they don't like that in this part of the country. [00:13:55] Speaker A: So we'll go with a 45 caliber pistol of a make that I will be happy to specify if someone wants to sponsor the show. [00:14:03] Speaker D: In the panic, I grab it, I level the weapon. I have the moment where I look at my hand, I see the weapon. Growing up with action movies to kind of define my entire mentality and view of masculinity, I had this. [00:14:17] Speaker A: Whoa, no. [00:14:20] Speaker D: And I tried to level the weapon, find the creature, and pull the trigger. [00:14:24] Speaker A: To be 100% clear. Where are you aiming? [00:14:28] Speaker D: Running the weapon and tracking where the most weight would be in the vitals. Directly kind of above us. I'm going to fall down on my seat, raise my hand up towards the roof, and try to put about three shots where I think it could hit the creature in its chest. [00:14:45] Speaker A: A lot of chest. I like your ods. In this situation, I'm going to ask for composure and firearms, because you have to keep it together, not panic. I mean, the claws are coming through the ceiling of this thing. If you don't land this shot, if you don't do something to distract this creature, it's going to rip the top of this car open like a tin can and then eat all the yummy yummies inside. [00:15:08] Speaker D: And that's a messy crit with four successes. [00:15:12] Speaker A: Well, a messy, critical. Ooh, tons of consequences that could happen. I'm going to give you the best and the worst of this situation, because if you're ever in a firefight, there are two kinds of shooting that you do. There's the measured fire where you're picking out targets and actually attempting to put rounds into an enemy, and then there's just general fire to keep people's heads down, to cause disruption and so on. Normally, you'd be using an automatic weapon for the second one, or at least something more sophisticated than a revolver. But in this case, it's not panic that drives you to make this decision. It's just the use of force. Right. The beast loves force. And what could be more american and forceful than a. 44 revolver has six cylinders. So as you go, click, click on the trigger. It does not take you that long to get through all the ammunition, but I will roll some damage privately on my end, because there's no way you can aim that many bullets at something that big and not hit part of it. Now Alex is consumed in this moment by the joy of firearms. The others, you will be hearing the incredibly loud. I cannot overstate how enormously loud an open cylinder firearm in a closed space is going to be. I don't know if vampires have to regenerate their hearing with blood points. I'll look that up in between this session and the next one. But all you will be able to hear for the next four, five, 6 seconds is four, five, six thunderous gunshots. Calamity, you'll be able to pick up a little more because, a, you have higher awareness, and B, you love this car. So in addition to the gunshots, you swear in your bones you can hear the exact moment that bullet pierces through the roof, tearing through the custom metal you'd put up and then through the paint job that you'd had put on into the beast above. Ivy, you'll be more concerned with the splatter of werewolf blood, metal shards that come raining down into the vehicle, to say nothing of the strobe like muzzle flash filling up the cabin of the car. Good news, Alex. You did some damage. Bad news, it's a werewolf. So unfortunately, it's not mag dump. When you have a cylinder, your cylinder dump has not solved the problem. So I know that calamity is still driving. I know how Alex is spending his time. Ivy, this is normally the part where I ask you what you want to do, but you are also busy for a slightly different reason. The gunshots going through the roof have driven this beast onto one side of the vehicle, which makes it all the easier for it to try to reach in through the window to grab whatever happens to be in the passenger seat. So the gunshots are going off. Just the bright flashes, the incredible noise. Calamity is screaming, Alex is yelling. And then there's the shatter of glass as this. You think like a noise, this thing could just palm your head and pick it. Close your eyes for a moment, and then you think about you holding an orange in your hand, maybe, and then how big your hand is compared to the orange. Except in this sense, your head is the orange and the hand is the werewolf claw, and it is swiping in, grabbing and groping and clawing, looking to gain purchase on any little bit of vampire flesh. Why don't we call that Dexter? Athletics? [00:19:07] Speaker C: Yeah, we can do that. [00:19:10] Speaker A: Dexterity, for obvious reasons. Athletics. I'm giving you the benefit of flexibility there. I'm imagining that there's some amount of yoga esque pose that you're going to need to do to contort yourself into various positions as you attempt to avoid harm. [00:19:26] Speaker C: Does this count as a combat maneuver? [00:19:29] Speaker A: Yes. [00:19:30] Speaker C: Then I only have two successes. [00:19:33] Speaker A: I'm going to go off on a limb and said it's probably not enough, but despite its enormous dice pool, it does not manage a single success at all. I'm sure we tell the story later, it'll be about how cool you were and you're like, oh, man, it was like the matrix. I just used my tramier perfect understanding of the geometry of all and I was bending it. No, this is you in a blind fucking panic, cramming yourself into whatever spare corner of the fucking passenger seat there is and the claw swinging around and not managing to find anything. All that sad calamity. You hear the gunshots, you see the claw coming in the window, but you are, I hope, focused. You can try composure and drive again. I'm not going to make you crash the car based on this role, but if you fail to keep the vehicle under control, it will make your passengers have a slightly more difficult time as they attempt to get the werewolf situation solved. [00:20:35] Speaker B: Not my finest moment, but there's a lot going on. That's only two successes. [00:20:39] Speaker A: Okay, so you have not managed to maintain your full composure and drive while you are driving the vehicle. So why don't we say that you see the claw come coming in and it's a question of reflex, right? You try to get away with it. You're in the car, you want to get the car away from the claw. So what are you going to do? You're going to try to drive away from the claw. Doesn't quite work that way again, not so much that you throw the vehicle into a ditch or whatever, but everybody feels the back end of this vehicle sliding out from the little traction circle. You see Calamity's hands hand over hand, swinging the wheel back as it begins to fishtail. You get this moment where the car is sliding sideways down the road. So instead of open road in front of you, you just see a panorama of trees flying past and then the whip of the front tires grabbing again and the car straightening out. Ivy, you get to see that werewolf claw go real, real wide. [00:21:34] Speaker B: And there's a moment where you're like. [00:21:35] Speaker A: Fuck, yeah, it came off, it fell. Awesome. And then it comes swinging back in like one of those fair rides, the big pirate ship. You know what I'm talking about. Hope I didn't ruin that memory for you by associating it with what might be your imminent final death. Now, why did the tires manage to grab onto something on a gravel road, right? No, because you've been screaming forward and now you're on pavement. That's what's grabbed it. So we're going to get back to Alex in a second. I have a question about what you're going to do now that you're out of bullets. But, calamity, I got to know, where are we going? You can't take this werewolf home. [00:22:13] Speaker B: No, fuck. We got it. We need to take it somewhere where it's not going to hurt anybody but us. [00:22:18] Speaker A: Well, with full disclosure, my having not memorized the actual part of the city that we were in, we can say that a right hand turn would take you back towards civilization. The left hand turn will take you out more towards the suburbs, more towards the boonies. So the car is heading off in that direction. Worst case scenario, you just drive away from the glow, right? Like, there's the big city glow over there. But we're not going there. So we're going to go in the opposite direction. Yep. [00:22:43] Speaker B: No, we out towards the sticks. At least as far into the sticks as you can get in fucking Chicago. [00:22:49] Speaker A: Yeah, and it's super weird because normally when you're out this far in the boonies, like, the street lights aren't that bright. You might have the orange ones that are like every hundred feet or so, but in this case it's really bright white, like halogen style light. What's up with that? [00:23:04] Speaker B: I mean, it's probably that fucking helicopter because there's still that motherfucker. [00:23:10] Speaker A: All right. It's that motherfucker. I hadn't forgotten. [00:23:14] Speaker B: Of course you didn't, storyteller. Thank you so much. [00:23:17] Speaker A: It's not my job to forget. And as you are hurtling now, down pavement means speed limit here is probably 35, but you don't care about that. The car comes swinging out, throwing gravel behind it as it catches onto the main road. And then there's the swoosh of the rotors appearing over the tree line. This helicopter is only like 50 or 60ft above you. The spotlight swings around ivy. I don't think you have a super good view because your window is full of werewolf calamity has her eyes on the road. Alex, you are probably the one who sees the flash of gunfire coming out of the side of this helicopter. I don't think you're a helicopterologist, but this is a helicopter. Yeah, it's the kind with the rotors and it's got the back end that. [00:24:08] Speaker B: Goes whoosh, whoosh, whoosh. [00:24:10] Speaker A: But you can see somebody in tactical gear in the side of it with a real mean looking rifle. Again, not a scholar of firearms. It looks big. And suffice it to say that this person has a slightly better handle on how to use his weapon than you did yours. So now you have two problems. There's the werewolf, obviously. Yes. And then a burst of automatic weapons fire ripping from the helicopter above you. It scores four successes. And about two thirds of them hit the werewolf. The rest come punching down through the car. None of you hit so far, but that is even more splatter. That is even more gore. Alex, in the backseat. Now, if you're looking up, you can see these super bright pinpoints of light coming down through the ceiling of the car. And we have a whole new problem to deal with. So let's see. That's the first turn over. Calamity did not do a great job of driving. So the two of you who are not driving are going to have a slightly harder time doing whatever it is you're going to do. And that's the question I'm going to pose to you right now. [00:25:26] Speaker C: Well, calamity made sure that I had something that I could use should needs arise, and they have. So as I'm trying to avoid the werewolf claws, I'm going to reach down and grab that silver blade and I'm going to stab at the werewolf's arm. [00:25:43] Speaker A: Sure, I'll take dexterity and melee for that. [00:25:46] Speaker C: Two successes. [00:25:48] Speaker A: Well, you have a couple of problems. The first is that that is not enough successes. The second is all of those dice were the hungry ones. [00:25:58] Speaker C: Yes. [00:25:59] Speaker A: Okay, so talk to me here. A little miss about to have a perfectionist breakdown. Why don't you slow time down a whole bunch and give me that internal monologue as you go stabbing? Your mother would be embarrassed to watch this. You are at your blade recital, and thank God all the lights are shining and you can't see the audience because if you saw their jaws dropped with how bad this performed. This is the stuff of nightmares, Ivy. This is you clamming up, not knowing the spelling b word. Except the spelling b word isn't something difficult. It's like calendar. [00:26:38] Speaker C: I try and rationalize it at first, I was never taught to stab with knives. I was taught to slice methodically and how to do everything with precision. This is outside of the realm of things I learned to do. I was never taught to fight like this. And even though I try and try and tell myself that, no, it's fine, it's okay because you don't know how to do this, all of that washes away because I should know how to do this. Why don't I know how to do this? Why didn't I spend more time preparing for this? He's right there, right in front of me. This is literally a life or death situation, and I can't pull it together enough to do this. [00:27:29] Speaker A: No, that's going to bother a part of you that sits way deep down in the family tree. Because the compulsion for the tremere is perfectionism, which means, on account of your bestial failure, until you score a critical success on any role, doesn't matter, you will suffer a negative two dice penalty to everything for the remainder of this scene. Now, that penalty does decrease, so if you try the same thing again, it's only a negative one penalty. If you try it three times, it's a negative zero penalty. But you've gotten under your own skin in a moment of crisis, Alex. On the one hand, it's obvious to anyone looking that ivy is not making the kind of connection she would like to make in that blade to skin kind of way. But it has distracted the werewolf, or at least irritated it, paying more attention now to avoid it being stabbed by silver than anything else. It was up to calamity. [00:28:34] Speaker D: Listen, I need something big. The revolver, it wasn't, whatever, I don't know. I need something bigger. Can I get that big? Fuck off. Gun the back, damn it. [00:28:43] Speaker B: Fuck. Under driver's seat. Under driver's seat. I know it's storyteller, I know that's a bad idea. But last time I was driving through, I was driving through out of Tennessee and they're a little bit more lax about shit. There's probably going to be a sawed off under there. [00:28:56] Speaker A: It's your car. I accept that. It's a rolling violation of the National Firearms act. Judging by the helicopter, you're already in trouble with law enforcement. How much worse could it get? They're already shooting at you. [00:29:11] Speaker B: Under the driver's seat there's a goddamn shotgun. [00:29:14] Speaker D: Thank you. I immediately jump down, search for it. The minute I find it, I grab it, I put it in my hands, I try to angle it just right, and like an action hero I raise it at the exact same angle, looking to take this thing out by the chest again, if I can, while screaming, cease your fucking fire. Blackhawk down. We're inside this fucking thing and I just let it go. [00:29:37] Speaker A: I love that Alex thinks the people in the helicopter can hear him. That is the most endearing thing I have heard all day. [00:29:45] Speaker B: Bless your heart. [00:29:46] Speaker D: Sometimes, even though you know it's not a possibility, there's a voice inside you that screams and you were given a mouth to do so. I will scream. [00:29:56] Speaker A: It's not even about the guys in the helicopter. Who cares if they heard it? You needed to say it and you did. [00:30:02] Speaker D: Exactly. Look, life is full of madness that we have to internalize to survive. But sometimes that madness has to be just exhumed, sometimes through the mouth in the form of panic noises. And that's me screaming. [00:30:18] Speaker A: Well, on the topic of panic, I would like to panic because I'm going to ask for wits and firearms right now. It's very simple to aim this. It's not a question of strength, but you need to do some trigonometry real fast in that nugget of yours to figure out what you're aiming. With two successes, I mean, it's not that hard to aim a shotgun, right? It's the Macintosh of firearms. You have one button, you point and you click. And at this point you are eight inches from the things you're trying to hit. So long as you don't critically fail and accidentally blow the back of Ivy's head off, it's all going to go pretty well. So again, kaboom calamity. Is it loaded with slugs or is it loaded with shot? [00:31:01] Speaker B: Oh no, it's. It's slugs. It is big fuck off silver slugs. [00:31:06] Speaker A: Well, then, that gives you quite the result for one, Alex. If you were a lesser man, you would have felt your wrist snap as you try to wrangle this sawed off into position, you pull both triggers because that's what you saw in the movie. And the force that comes out of that thing, I mean, it's a whole lot of newtons, my dude, but we can add to the soundscape happening. There's the squealing of the rubber, there's the twirl of the rotors. There's the ratatat tat of automatic firearms. There is the kaboom of a sawed off, double barrel twelve gauge. And then the roar of an angry, horrible animal as hot silver punches up through the car and into it. Not enough damage to kill the creature. But you're well on your way to accomplishing that. Unfortunately, it is its turn. I'm just going to tell you, this pool is fucking disgusting. Like when you add in all the werewolf things together. I don't own this many. D ten. Oh, my God. [00:32:14] Speaker C: What is that a role for? [00:32:16] Speaker A: Well, I'll tell you what this role is for in a minute, but it has eight successes. A critical success. Ivy, would you like to roll dexterity and athletics for me? Far be it for me to make suggestions, but this might be one of those times when you want to blood buff, when you want to spend your resources. [00:32:38] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:32:41] Speaker C: Because I'm at a minus two penalty right now. Yeah, blood buffing is a risk, but we are in pursuit of perfection right now, so it makes sense. I passed my rouse check so I don't get any hungrier. [00:32:56] Speaker A: Thank God. [00:32:58] Speaker C: Three successes. [00:33:00] Speaker A: Okay, it's not trying to hurt you in a specific way. We're still in the reaching and grabbing phase. So this isn't a combat role, but as it manages to grab onto the side of you and then just like palming a basketball, rip you through the window. This is normally the part where I would say, do you want to use willpower? But all of your failures are on your hunger dice. So that's no bueno. Medium bueno. You do not get pulled entirely out of the car and flung into the side of the road. Right. The werewolf does not eject you from the scene. Heads or tails? [00:33:48] Speaker C: Tails. [00:33:50] Speaker A: Okay. So not enough successes to evade the creature's grasp, but still has a hold of you. You've managed to swing orient yourself enough, funneling the momentum of being grabbed and pulled, to actually kind of have one leg up on top of the car. And if you athletics hard enough on your next turn, you might be able to wriggle down onto the rear windshield. If something were to interrupt its grasp, you would be able to escape. But we've actually ended up in a really cool situation with the wrong person where there is an awesome fistfight happening on the roof of a moving car, but it's Ivy versus a werewolf, so it's kind of one sided. That said, alex calamity, it's kind of like watching paranormal activity, right? Where like one moment your friend is standing in front of the door and the next the ghost yoinks him and rips him out into the shadows. Except in this case, it's not a ghost or your friend. [00:34:56] Speaker B: Oh, God. Oh, shit. I knew better. I knew better. I fucking knew better. [00:35:01] Speaker A: Storyteller. [00:35:02] Speaker B: You know that thing that happens in the movies where someone's on the roof of your fucking car and you slam the brakes on real hard. [00:35:10] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:35:11] Speaker B: How do we feel about that? [00:35:14] Speaker A: You're asking a we question. I think you're looking for an I question, like, how do I calamity feel about that? Because I will mute the other two of them and shut their faces off and not let them interject at all. [00:35:28] Speaker B: Shit, I'm going for it. I'm slamming on the brakes. [00:35:33] Speaker A: Foot slams down on the brakes. Alex isn't wearing a seatbelt, so he goes from the middle of the seat in the back to the middle of the seat in the front. The car screeches down as all the weight pushes down the suspension like it normally does. But now you've got Ivy and a werewolf up there, and one of those things is really heavy, so it pushes everything down. You can hear the scrape of the metal as the front fender just grinds against the pavement. [00:36:05] Speaker B: That hurts me in muscle. [00:36:07] Speaker A: Alex, you'd have bruises if you were still capable of bruising. You'll be excited to find out later that you're not. Ivy, can I get a strength and athletics roll from you? One success, one not enough. So you are not able to grab onto some part of the car and hold yourself. So you were kind of half hanging over, draped over the back windshield. Now, as the car comes screeching to a halt, you go tumbling up, rolling forwards. You can hear that, like as Ivy bounces along the top of the car. Under other circumstances, you would have gone flying off the front of it like a Looney Tunes cartoon. But it turns out there's something in your way, and you're a lot closer to it. Now, this puts us in a terrible moment of crisis, and I'm going to say these things happen almost simultaneously. Ivy has tumbled directly into this thing. She is seconds away from having it dig its claws into her chest, crack open the ribcage like some kind of Thanksgiving meal, and pulling out the stuffing to get to the good parts. Alex, calamity, I will each give you one action before this happens. [00:37:29] Speaker D: I see the split seconds before me, and I need to do something fast. The handgun didn't cut it. The shotgun didn't cut it. There's got to be something bigger. There's got to be something fucking bigger. And that's when I remember Calamity's big fucking sniper rifle. I jump in the backseat. I scramble, I find it, I whip it around. It's awkward. It's clunky. I have no idea what I'm doing. But how the fuck could I miss this close and I pull the trigger. [00:37:52] Speaker A: How confident are you that you know which part of the car has werewolf and which part of the car has Ivy? At this point, I'm not. [00:38:02] Speaker D: And I just kind of have to guess. Also, he's a lot bigger, so hopefully a lot easier to hit. [00:38:09] Speaker A: Well, I mean, there's good news here. I want you to focus on this part, Ivy, that this is a good news situation. Because calamity is firing 50 caliber match grade. These are bolts the size of a closed fist, right? This is the kind of ammunition that Elmer fudd carries through the woods hunting for webbits. It can punch through a werewolf, it can punch through a car. It can certainly punch through a tremere. So Alex whips this sniper rifle, points it straight up, pulls the trigger, blows the windows out. With the amount of overpressure that comes out of this thing, it goes straight through Ivy. You'll take some firearms damage from that. We'll get it later. But you can feel the entrance and then the exit, and then into the werewolf and then the exit. You know, that bit of mass effect with the guys talking about how railgun projectiles just go forever. So you have to be really careful where you're aiming. It's obvious that Alec hasn't played that game. What's the first thing you experience is this gunshot, Ivy. And you see the creature roaring back, arms open, and you just know, this is it. I survived graduate school, and I survived my mother, and I survived the chantry, and my dumb ass decided that I was going to go do a fucking werewolf favor for Rosa Hernandez because of something that Rebecca did. And oh, my God, of course this is how it ends. Because all you can imagine are these claws now just coming down into your ribcage, ripping apart the expensive goth kid clothing and leaving you blood eagled on the roof of calamity's car. Which is why it must come as an incredible relief to you that Alex's shot has done enough damage to put the werewolf down. And the arms, as they are open, fall backwards, and the werewolf goes tumbling down onto the hood of the car. That said, you did get shot. [00:40:26] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:40:27] Speaker A: So you will take four superficial damage from the bullet entering and exiting. You. [00:40:33] Speaker C: Gross. [00:40:34] Speaker A: You are so close to making it unscathed. But, I mean, better to be shot by Alex than ripped apart. Werewolf homie has ten beat ivy up. Dice, you're really lucked out here. [00:40:49] Speaker C: Yeah, I just find it a little funny that I made it out of the first werewolf brawl without a scratch. And then it was Alex. [00:40:55] Speaker A: But where exactly did I get shot? Just so I know, honestly, answering that question is it's a little irrelevant because the entrance wound is going to be the size of, like a half dollar, but the exit wound is like the size of a softball that by itself bad enough, but you had tumbled almost all the way across the midpoint of the roof of the car into the werewolf. So when Alex shot you, that's where he got you. So find your liver on the right side arbitrarily and go about three inches up right now, draw a line that goes from your back to your front, and then put the diameter of a softball on that space. So that's how much of you has kind of been blown outward. The good news is you didn't need those organs, right? They're not important to you. The bad news is, growing that rib back in your sleep is going to feel so weird. Like there's a part of you as a trimming that's actually kind of excited because you've never had the opportunity to be like, I wonder what it would feel like if I had a rib that was not where it was supposed to be. And now I know that, and that's information I didn't have before. That's kind of exciting. And it's that train of thought that you can have because you don't feel, like, the pain of having had this happen to you. But that said, I would not look down. Like, you're not going to like it. [00:42:29] Speaker C: But, you know, I have to. [00:42:31] Speaker A: I mean, I know other people wouldn't. [00:42:34] Speaker C: Yeah, but that's the morbid curiosity of the tremere. [00:42:37] Speaker A: Emphasis on morbid in this case, because you see exactly what I have explained. Well, I'm sure there's a part of you that'd be very excited to be able to say, oh, cool, that's what a piece of my intestine looks like when it gets blown out of me. And I like it more when it was inside of me digesting burritos and have not. But, I mean, it still looks pretty neat out there. But that's not quite how the curse works. Your body is animated by forces that science does not understand or explain. But one thing we do know is that your body can only animate things like that if they are part of your body. So remind us again, when did you die? [00:43:16] Speaker C: 1993. [00:43:19] Speaker A: Okay, so you're coming up on 30 years dead, which means you don't see, right now intestines out there. You see intestine that has been left dead for 30 years out there. Say what you will. I think that's actually a little cooler. Right? Despite the fact that it reminds you of your imminent mortality in a moment that you thought would never come, but you not only get to see what it's like when your organs are on the outside, but what they would look like if you died. That's kind of cool. [00:43:53] Speaker C: It'd be cooler if it wasn't mine. [00:43:55] Speaker A: Hey, when life gives you lemons, you make a smoothie. For the purposes of the metaphor, the smoothie is your insides. Back to the point. We have solved the werewolf problem a little bit. It has caused injury abound among a lot of you, but it is dead and you are not. And that is cause for small celebration. Not too much celebration, though, because, calamity, you have slammed the car to a halt. The helicopter was not expecting that, but it is swinging around. [00:44:30] Speaker B: All right, well, I hate everything about that. Can I possibly reach out and grab Ivy and yank her back into the damn cabin of the car? [00:44:39] Speaker A: Yeah, I think you could do that. I think Alex could do that. I think Ivy could get in the car on her own, probably. [00:44:47] Speaker B: I mean, if she's busy staring at her insides that have recently become her outsides, I feel like she might be a little bit distracted, but I don't know. [00:44:56] Speaker A: Well, that's a question that I can't answer. Ivy, how into the in of you that is out of you are you very. [00:45:05] Speaker C: It's the morbidity and curiosity of it all. I haven't killed too many kindred in my time. And though I'm a scientist, studying the effects that this magic has on our mortal flesh wasn't exactly part of my curriculum. So this is fascinating. And now that the only threat that I'd been aware of has been dealt with, and the rush of the fight or flight is fading, I'm not thinking about everything else that may be happening. I'm sitting on top of the car, staring at this werewolf corpse on the ground in front of me and my innards out of me, just deep in this bubble where time is seemingly standing still. [00:45:48] Speaker A: It's going to make it real awkward when another set of claws comes reaching up from the car to grab you. [00:45:56] Speaker B: I'm fairly certain. I just sort of scruff her a bit and pull. [00:46:00] Speaker A: I understand completely, but, I mean, it's not even post traumatic stress. It's now traumatic stress of the claw problem. Still, being there give Ivy the benefit of the doubt that she can tell the difference between a werewolf's gigantic paws and calamity's gigantic pause. But all the same, should be enough to convince Ivy to get into the car under her own power. [00:46:25] Speaker B: I sure hope so. [00:46:27] Speaker C: Yeah. Feeling that tug at my hair, I snap back to reality and I will slide off the car and then back into the front seat once more. [00:46:38] Speaker A: All of that going very well. I think at this point there might be some confusion among the group where you didn't quite realize the extent of what was going on with the helicopter because it has come back. [00:46:50] Speaker B: Shit. [00:46:51] Speaker A: Ivy, you were saying just a little bit ago about the only threat that you knew existed had departed, and that much is true. But there's another threat you didn't know existed that is still here. Because Alex, the friend you were yelling at earlier, hanging at the side of the helicopter, either one of two things is true. Either he thinks that you are all werewolves and is continuing to fire, or he knows you're not werewolves and doesn't give a shit. [00:47:18] Speaker D: Guys, the fucking contrabird is coming back around. We need the fuck out of here. [00:47:25] Speaker B: I'm fucking working on it. Unwide your panties, God damn it. [00:47:28] Speaker A: Yeah, you're going to want to hop into a reverse or something, right? [00:47:32] Speaker B: Yeah, that's going to be a hard reverse with squealing tires and burning rubber. [00:47:36] Speaker A: And all that good shit. Of course, leave the carcass in front of you like a deer on the side of the highway. Your car kind of looks like you smashed in something that large. At least that's the story that you can tell Big Bob. I'm sure he'll believe it. But the helicopter is still in hot pursuit. Does not appear like it wants to leave you alone. [00:48:01] Speaker C: Who the hell are these guys? Don't they know we're not werewolves? [00:48:04] Speaker A: If you roll intelligence and awareness for me, three successes. Yeah. Every single airframe in the whole universe has a Federal Aviation Administration identification number on the end of it. That way, if you break airplane laws, they can say it was that one, it was na 7159, et cetera, et cetera. Those codes can be broken down like a Social Security number, into different components. So, for example, the first three digits of your Social Security number say what state or region of the Social Security Administration you were born in. And so, too, in this case. Does that number identify the office that it works for? And, Ivy, I bet you any number of american dollars that you would recognize the FAA identifier for the department of Homeland Security anywhere. That number is scorched into your brain alongside how many eyes of newt and gallons of whatever it takes to something something. The tremere chantry oh, fuck. [00:49:07] Speaker B: Fuck. [00:49:08] Speaker C: Fuck. Are you fucking kidding me, right? [00:49:12] Speaker B: Fuck. What? [00:49:14] Speaker C: Department of Homeland Security. Motherfucking si. [00:49:19] Speaker B: Oh, fuck me running. [00:49:21] Speaker C: What the fuck are they doing here? [00:49:26] Speaker B: There's no fucking way. Also, storyteller, I'm still definitely, like, doing the serpentine here. [00:49:31] Speaker A: Oh, no. I take for granted this conversation is happening as calamity slaloms in reverse down a frontage road, off on some piece of public land, dodging intermittent gunfire while Ivy explains that the person who called for help, finger quotes, apparently called the worst people on the planet, present company excluded. [00:49:54] Speaker C: I don't know what kind of sick fucking joke flyboy is playing at, but why the fuck would he call them? [00:50:01] Speaker B: Oh, the rat bastard. I'm going to rip that bastard's head off. [00:50:07] Speaker C: Not if I do it first. [00:50:10] Speaker D: Listen, we can both take turns ripping Flyboy's head off, but we need to survive the aerial fucking tank with the gun that goes brat, brat. Do you have a bigger gun, calamity? Because we got to kill that thing. [00:50:21] Speaker B: Listen, the raffle is the biggest thing that I own legally. The illegal shit is in a locker in Florida somewhere. [00:50:28] Speaker A: In fairness, the rifle would be more than enough to deal with the helicopter. I think you're giving helicopters a bit too much credit here. [00:50:36] Speaker D: Well, fine. Since you got all the good shit in Florida, we're going to use this big, bad motherfucker. And I take the rifle again. I get a new round into it, and I just try to get a good, clean shot at this thing right from the backseat. [00:50:50] Speaker B: What the fuck do you think you're doing? [00:50:53] Speaker D: Trying to kill a big metal fucking bird. [00:50:56] Speaker B: The fuck you are, boy. Take the goddamn wheel. [00:50:58] Speaker A: All right. [00:51:00] Speaker D: I awkwardly try to hand you the gun as I reach around to grab the steering wheel and take over. [00:51:05] Speaker A: This is a lot of fun for ivy to watch because the barrel on this thing is, like, 40 inches long. It is enormous. You are trying to essentially take a broomstick and maneuver it inside the vehicle creates a couple of interesting problems. That means that if we're doing this the way I think we're doing this, that means calamity is leaning out the driver's side window while Alex leans forward from the back seat to grab the wheel. And Ivy sits in the passenger seat, helpless to what is about to unfold. [00:51:39] Speaker C: I don't suppose we can stop the car. [00:51:42] Speaker A: You stop the car, they're going to have a much easier time shooting you. [00:51:47] Speaker B: No, we ain't stopping for shit. I don't want to give them a chance to get a good shot off. I like my head in the shape it is and not splattered all over the roof of my car, even though the roof of my car is already a mess. But we're not going to get into that. Right now. [00:51:59] Speaker A: Killing you is only the 17th worst thing that will happen if your bodies fall into SI custody. Ivy can tell you more about it if you survive. That said, there are two things I need. One. Mr. Alex Scott, will you make a dexterity and drive role for me? You'll be taking a negative two penalty from trying to do it from the backseat. No one likes a backseat driver. [00:52:26] Speaker D: Will do. [00:52:28] Speaker B: I swear to God, puppy, if you crash this fucking car. [00:52:33] Speaker D: You know calamity, sometimes when you put things out into the universe to have a habit of manifesting that is zero successes across the board. [00:52:42] Speaker A: Keep that in your pocket. We'll deal with that in a second. Calamity will be dexterity and firearms from you going to want to make this shot count. [00:52:53] Speaker B: Well, that looks like four successes. [00:52:57] Speaker A: Praise be to the father of all vampires because that is your target difficulty. There is the satisfying chunk of around entering the chamber. You don't need to take that last little breath to still your body before you pull the trigger because you don't breathe. Firing the rifle from this position would be strenuous, we'll say, for a living body, but you are stronger than most humans by a far shake, so you don't have to worry about that. There's a split second where you're not sure if you've hit anything at all. Not that the bolt takes that long to get there, but this scene is playing out in your head frame by frame by frame, which means when you look back later, you'll be able to memorize and call exactly to mind the moment when the bullet hits. Just below the tail rotor, there's that little fling of spark that is then followed by a little bit of a flash and some smoke, and then a lot more smoke. You don't know enough about avionics to understand that you've clipped one of the hydraulic stabilizing gears and that the smoke is coming from the liquid hitting hot parts of the tail rotor assembly and smoking the way that oil in a pan might. But you do know what a helicopter that has been taken out of stable flight looks like lurching hard to the left. Thank God the man inside is wearing the strap that keeps him in the aircraft or else he might have gone falling out. But the pilot is going to be spending most of his time keeping the aircraft under control, attempting to get it to the ground and now that they know that there is a credible anti aircraft threat on the ground, they begin to make quick distance away from you. We've got five rounds in a magazine like this. Alex fired one, you fired a second. There are three more if you'd like to finish the job. But after what you've done tonight, I don't think you want to add shooting down a helicopter to the list of things that will draw attention come elysium next time. [00:55:05] Speaker B: Now, fuck that. We're getting the hell out of Dodge. [00:55:08] Speaker A: So then it turns to removing Alex's hands from the steering wheel. Normally, that's something I would ask Alex to do, but having failed the driving role, you weren't the only one who was putting down fire. Alex. While calamity was making her roll, I was rolling for the gunner in the helicopter. And I know exactly how much health you had before I did that, which means I know exactly how much health you have now. Ivy and calamity. Alex Scott is torpid. His body frozen and unmoving, already beginning to take on the waxy power of a corpse. You know he's not dead. You'd be able to see the body already starting to decompose in the way that it does when final death claims somebody. But Ivy, if there was that moment, you're going to look back and make some kind of snarky comment to Alex or slap his hands away from the wheel. Maybe that's when it happens. And instead of the not warm but still human like skin, you instead get that waxiness and you can feel the mortise set in. That's when you're going to realize what happened. [00:56:30] Speaker C: As all of these pieces of information fall into place and I realize what's happening, I just let out and oh, fuck, Alex. And I reach over and try and steady the wheel while supporting Alex so he doesn't fall forward and down on top of me and calamity or to the side taking the wheel and the car and us in it with him. [00:56:55] Speaker A: Calamity, I know that the mental stats you have are not laid out charitably, but even you can deduce from what has going on with Ivy what has happened here. Fuck. [00:57:09] Speaker C: Cal, look at me. He's fine. He'll be fine. We just need to get him home. It's fine. Don't worry. It's fine. [00:57:17] Speaker A: Might be getting ahead of ourselves. I don't know that it is fine. I know it was fine when the night started. Calamity, you're the expert werewolf hunter. You're the one who plans for these kinds of things. You're the one who has all the weapons in the car. And I don't know how you feel about Ivy, except that some part of you obviously tolerates her presence. But I do know how you feel about Alex. So as you look down at his hands, no longer fidgeting as he tries to practice making cat's cradles in his head or thumbing around his iPhone, putting on another bit of his playlist so he doesn't have to listen to you and Ivy talk about magic. For someone who is so incredibly frenetic in his day to day life, the fact that he is cold, statuesque, utterly still right now, that's bad enough, but it was your job to make sure that didn't happen. And yet, here we are. I'm going to need you to roll willpower. For me, that is two successes. You know what? I was wrong. You're not responsible. You know exactly who was responsible for this. You did everything that you were supposed to do. And if it weren't for that fucking thin blood at the airport little pup behind you, he would still be all right. And thank God you got that shot off, because you know what happens. Torpet is one thing. Anymore damage to his body right now will turn him not into ash, because he's not old enough. He hasn't been dead that long. He's brand new. There's only one place where the rage welling up inside of you can go. Normally, when a car starts driving in this chronicle, the first question is, where are we going? But that's a question that Ivy gets to ask this time. But, calamity, you don't get to pick. You know where we're going, though? [00:59:27] Speaker B: Of course I do. [00:59:29] Speaker A: Why don't you tell the rest of us? [00:59:32] Speaker B: I get Alex's body off the wheel and I sit down in that fucking thin blood. And all I can think is, that bastard, that bastard, that bastard. And I'm going to put my car in gear directly towards that fuckers haven. [00:59:50] Speaker A: Well, the good news is we were already out near the airport, so it won't take that long to get there. [00:59:56] Speaker B: We're going nowhere now. [00:59:59] Speaker A: And so the car lurches into motion, tires squealing. At this point, it doesn't matter. The engine's making some interesting noises. The car is filled with bullet holes, little bits of werewolf viscera. Calamity is single minded. I'm guessing time is going to be a bit of a blur between now and the six or seven minutes it takes for you to circle back onto one of the airport access roads, arriving with great urgency in the parking lot and perhaps by fortune, parking in the same spot, a different version of this coterie occupied on their last visit. I expect this meeting will be heading in a slightly different direction than the path chosen by yet untested, yet unknown neonates. But to know for sure, we'll have to wait, because that's a story for another night. You've been listening to the all night Society, an actual play podcast brought to you by Queen's court games. If you enjoyed your stay, be sure to subscribe on your favorite podcast app for more content, including exclusive art and audio, follow us on Facebook or Instagram at Queenscorp games or on Twitter at queenscorp RPG. [01:01:41] Speaker B: It's close.