Nocturnum
Episode 2: Brave New World (Part Two)
Original Air Date: 7/17/2006Original Episode can be found here.
Special Guest Stars:
James Gandolfini as Joe Knonaem
Mia Kirschner as Sandra Stevens
Synopsis
The group heads home to sleep. After setting up a "watch" schedule for Cyan from amongst their gifted friends, John sees her safely in a non-ICU room and heads home to catch a few winks himself. On her turn, a young Pariah named Megan gets kicked out for pushing buttons, leaving Cyan alone for about two hours. In grand fantasy gaming tradition, they pass without incident. John talks with Drake and gets the lowdown on what the Cast learned at the Lava Lounge.
Meanwhile, Anita discovers that Cyan has commandeered one of the hallway closets in her house, had it walled up, and transformed Anita's bedroom closet into three rooms: one with her normal clothes, one with fancy evening/business clothes and skimpy lingerie, and one with weapons of every type and description. She squeals with delight at the weapons, but not half so loud as when she finds a "welcome home" gift from Klaus: a bottle of Jack Daniels. She puts on the skimpiest teddy Cyan bought her, throws a silk robe on, and proceeds to head downstairs to drink whiskey and watch awful, worse-than-B-film horror movies until she passes out. She has a nightmare that she is a cultist of Nyarlathotep, and engages in daily cannibalism. She wakes up screaming, "Ambrosia!"
The next day, Anita goes to talk to Cyan in hospital about the spell to make the Guardian corporeal. Cyan informs Anita that she's gotten a lot better, and can adapt that spell so it can be quick-cast, saving the Cast a great deal of beating. However, as the only witch in the party, Cyan is the only one who can cast the spell. She checks out of the hospital AMA and informs everyone of her intent to accompany them. Nobody likes it, but nobody can argue her logic.
The Cast loads up for bear and heads to City Books around 6:00 in the afternoon, after informing the SUSI office that they are on a case in the South Side. John gets whacked by the Guardian as soon as he enters. He and Anita notice movement in the stacks and fan out to explore. Cyan casts the spell and forces the Guardian corporeal just as Drake suffers a hit from it. Klaus goes monstrous and stands toe-to-toe with the giant lizard. The new owner of the book store leaps from a shelf and unloads on Drake, using a Sadicas-powered version of Drake's on Chi powers. Drake goes down under the initial onslaught. Anita attempts to use A Taste of Death on it, and is astonished to discover that it doesn't work; the new owner is a human-looking demon!
Not a problem for John, who shoots him in the head three times with his .50. The City Books owner goes down. Cyan kneels to use healing magic to stabilize Drake, who wakes up and grunts, "I think...I'm okay."
John and Anita are attacked by Deadites hiding in the stacks. They deal with the threat quickly, while Klaus struggles with the lizard. At that very moment, their nemesis, the mysterious Faceless Monk, steps out of a shadow, places his hand over Cyan's heart, and a light shoots forth from her chest into a globe (which Anita recognizes as an Orb of Thessulah) in his hand. He then vanishes back into the shadows. Cyan collapses to the floor, comatose.
Anita screams as she realizes that Cyan's soul is no longer in her body, and Anita can't get a read on the souls of the Twins either way.
The Faceless Monk steps from another shadow across the room, and seems to disappear into the floor behind the counter. Drake fires a crossbow bolt at him, which is stopped cold by what seems to be a Shield Invocation. John takes off after the monk and vaults over the counter to fall through a trap door and tumble down the stairs behind the counter.
Drake and Klaus notice that Cyan's water has broken. Drake grabs her, and with a feat of superheroic leaping (like the Hulk) gets her to the car, instructs Sandra (who they'd left in the car exactly as a quick getaway option for Cyan) to get her to hospital, and leaps back. Anita has already followed John down the stairs, in time to see him round a corner at the end of a long hallway. Drake comes barreling down the stairwell, having leapt down the trap door like John, and the two take off in hot pursuit. Klaus finishes off the Guardian and follows, not far behind.
John nears the end of a hallway and kicks the door open, then drops into a roll, avoiding a blast of black energy that would've taken off his head. He comes to a standing position just in time to see the Monk leap through what appears to be a portal to Market Square, leaving only one cultist behind to defend the room. John plugs the cultist once as he roars past and leaps through the portal after the Monk.
Anita and Drake burst into the room and are blinded by a bright flash of light as the portal closes. Anita suddenly realizes that John and Cyan's souls have apparently ceased to exist altogether, and falls to her knees in hysterics. Drake restrains her from beating the wounded cultist to death with her bare hands, until Klaus comes in and, noticing the Mark of Leviathan on the cultist, emotionlessly drives his claws through the cultist's eyes. When Anita tires herself out, they go to the hospital, where the comatose Cyan gives birth to her twins. From prior discussions with John and Cyan, Anita, Klaus, and Drake name the children: Katherine Marie Forsythe, and William Julius Forsythe.
Meanwhile, John emerges from the portal (which closes behind him) into Market Square, but not the Market Square he knows. Everything is bathed in a wierd green light, and the only person around is what appears to be a bum across the square. When John approaches the man, he discovers only a shriveled, dessicated corpse. As he takes in his surroundings, he sees a shaft of greenish light shooting down from the sky directly over Point State Park. Knowing it's suicidal, but reasoning that if he had stolen a soul, an open Hellmouth is exactly where he'd take it to make best use of it, John begins to head for the Point. As he slinks through the shadows, a newspaper blows past in the hot wind and strikes his ankle. John picks it up, reads it through, and decides maybe he's better off trying to get to the Hive to see if anyone he knows is still alive here. The episode ends with John walking through a futuristic, post-apocalyptic Pittsburgh, alone...
Great Quotes:
(Out of game comment):
Eric (on cell phone): Look, I told you I thought I only put pants in the dryer!
John: You still haven't told me what happened.
Cyan: I went for food, John!
Robert (Klaus's Player, OOC): Yeah, and so did the vamps!
John: I'm going to get some sleep, then go on a killing spree.
(Cyan asks about William Blake, which Sandra is reading)
Anita: You should read The Chronicles of Narnia, by C.S. Lewis. They're good children's stories, but are good for adults, too.
Sandra (without looking up from her book): I prefer The Screwtape Letters.
Anita: Of course you do.
Cyan (to nurse): Right, give me the AMA papers.
Anita: Yeah...I gotta go, now.
Cyan: If John asks, you were never here.
Drake: Do you know how to sew?
Anita: Uh, no, but I'll bet Dana does. She's kind of a hippie.
Drake: Right. Thank you. (hangs up)
(Drake takes off his trench coat to reveal two swords strapped across his back)
Anita: Holy Batman, Batman!
(Drake is standing in the middle of the Hive Arcana cafe, holding a belt of ammunition with two swords strapped across his back)
Anita: Uh...anyone want a bagel?
(Re: Anita driving Alan's Jaguar)
Anita: It's a nice car.
Daniel: Yeah, until you have to have it in the shop every month. It's a Jaguar.
Anita: It's a nice car! Alan never had it in the shop.
Daniel: Yes, he did. We just have lots of money so he got it out within a few hours.
Anita: He never said anything to me about that.
Drake: He never said anything to you about being the Black Sorcerer, either!
Anita: Klaus, you look so sad, what's wrong?
Klaus: Getting ready to fight.
Cyan: So much for a nice, peaceful pregnancy.
(Re: the Guardian)
Drake: Taken care of?
(Klaus rips its head off and it turns into noxious black smoke)
Klaus: Done. Let's rock.
Post-Game OOC Comments
Julie (to Director): I didn't think you were capable of mentally breaking me more than you already have...I was so wrong!
Jason (Director): It went almost as well as I'd hoped. I mean, I had actually intended you guys to fight your way into the basement before the soul sucking....