Synopsis
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October 2005 Game � Car Wars
After successfully pulling off the demise of the emperor and pulling the plug on Blistac�s little operation, the party undertook some research. They were approached my a man identifying himself as Rashid Multani. Multani was known to Yasmeen, but she didn�t really �know� him (nudge, nudge, wink wink). He discussed the Book of R�yleh (everyone who reads this gains another point of Cthulhu mythos) with the party and apparently had read it before. He espoused that Blistac was up to no good and needed to be stopped.
The party, being naturally trusting, turned on Multani like a pack of rabid dogs: �So why don�t you stop them?� �How do you know?� �Why tell us?� �What�s my favorite color?� �What�s the average airspeed velocity of an unladed swallow?� Then they looked into his background, and Frank even tried to look into his brain (this time he left it in Multani�s head, which was a large departure from his normal M.O.).
All this questioning and investigating didn�t get them real far. Seems Multani claims to be some type of tribal wizard but without sufficient resources or power to take on Blistac himself. He does travel a lot and is clearly well versed in the mythos, but he doesn�t really have any helpful thoughts to read. Frank�s not sure why this is, but it not necessarily suspicious in an of itself.
The party checked out Blistac a little as well. Found out they own property on a number of the sites identified as having nexus points in the Book of R�yleh, and that Jason Ha is its CEO.
Well, this is all far too complicated for them to process in a single sitting, so they decide to take some good honest work referred to them by a professor friend of Yasmeen. Seems the good professor Stolinofsky has made some significant finds regarding the origin of man that is upsetting to a group of evangelical Christians calling themselves the Knights Templar. He shared the results with a friend who put them on the net, only to wind up dead. Stolinofsky just wants someone to drive him down to CalTech so he can confirm and share his results. Road Trip!
So the party hires on, only to engage in the weirdest vehicle combat they�ve ever had; no second weirdest, no make that third weirdest . . . fourth? Well, it was weird by normal standards. (Nothing compared to Jaimie�s cyber-psycho rampage that served as an excellent diversion for a crossing over the Canadian border in a Cyberpunk adventure back in the days of yore. It�s not often that stealing an old lady�s Buick results in a jet fighter missile exchange). The key elements included a guy on a motorcycle, some sanity wracking beastie released by the motorcyclist that served as an excellent windshield screen and put Greg�s usual full-auto shenanigans on hold as he had to scrape the thing off with his chitin claws, shooting a guy on a motorcyle, making a serious effort to run over a guy recently on a motorcycle � now on the pavement, a nut job strapped the hood of a Winnebago with a heavy weapon, oh, and of course, let�s not forget Greg shooting the client as he cowered in the back seat of the car (let that be a lesson to you! Payment is expected up front!). Frank patched him up and the party delivered him in one piece, more or less. To everyone�s amazement the party got paid. This mission also made the party wonder whether they were fighting on the right side. It seems the good doctor�s evidence consisted of mythos-related DNA samples from a comet.
So much happened it makes your head spin. No, that�s just the Cthulhu Mythos points there racking up. But at least Vince doesn�t have to worry about that any more.
Having completed their road trip, they settle in for a long winter�s battle-induced coma, with Ray in his kerchief and Vince in his dermal plates. But it would have been better to stay awake. Greg dreams of a revolt at an insane asylum where a Dr. Sansini is letting patients out and arming them. The violence is staggering and watching them turn on each other is truly disturbing, even for Greg who believes its better to be homeless than wind-up back (did I say back? I meant just wind-up) in the funny farm. He sees one of the female inmates fighting for her life and just before she�s overwhelmed, she looks at him and says, �No more coincidences for you.�
Ray dreams of, well, for lack of a better word, let�s just say Mighty Cthulhu. He sees a vast black door opening and the emergence of a big nasty tentacled thing. And I mean big! It�s brought on by beams of light coming almost simultaneously from each of the 13 nexus points.
Vince dreams of his own death. No wait, that comes later. No, he dreams of a man in yellow, ratty robes standing before a large hole or pit. He chants and raises his arms and a Star Spawn of Cthulhu (as Yasmeen told you the thing emerging from the Bilstac pit was called) emerges along with a vast blue light that shoots into the sky.
Frank dreamed too, but didn�t wake from his. The party left him lying in his bed like a dreaming dog who continues to whimper and kick his leg in a futile attempt to wake up.
All this of course means SAN loss and Cthulhu Mythos points for everyone. Plus, some wet sheets. But all that is quickly pushed to the back of their minds when Yasmeen tells the party that she has the combination to the Delta Green group�s weapons locker. You�d think the circus was in town and that they�d set up their big top tents with the instant flag poles that developed. Needless to say, the boys got some big guns. Free. Coincidence? (see above for the answer to that question).
Multani calls and asks the party to meet, but he thinks he�s being followed by some cultists. No problem. We�ll just set up a little ambush for those unsuspecting cultists. OK, Multani, you just drive your Ford Extinction down this street and we�ll shoot them from the roof. They�ll never know what hit them! Apparently, neither will the tree. Don�t get me wrong, the party did a great job of killing the cultists. The enemy never even got a shot off. On the other hand, the success of the operation was somewhat marred by Ray�s decision to drive their new, very cool, black Lincoln into a tree for no apparent reason.
Well, now that the cultists were dealt with in the party�s usual fumble-addled fashion, it was time to talk to Multani. They asked him about their dreams. When asked about Dr. Sansini, Multani said he�d never heard of him but Vince believed him to be lying. Of course, Vince is dead now, so what does he know.
Since the party did not have World War II-era submarines at their disposal to block the nexus gates (plus the cost of hauling one by bullet train to Arkham would cut into Ray�s Mindwipe budget), the party asked Yasmeen how to seal up the damn things. Her answer, �how the hell should I know?� But she did think a book called �the Nameless Kults� (in German) might have the answer. The only good copy being at Miskatonic University in Arkham Mass., the party had to charter a jet. Couldn�t get all those guns through security. Well, they probably could, but Ray didn�t want to travel without his toenail clippers. Multani mentioned that he had been to the Miskatonic library and seen that book. Arkham was also the site of the Arkham Insane Asylum massacre from Greg�s dream and the site of a nexus point (owned by Blistac). Before leaving they wisely check out the Insane Asylum only to find out that about 5 years ago (shortly after Blistac bought it) it underwent major expansion to include a super secure cyber-psycho ward.
Once in Arkham, they dropped Yasmeen off at the library to let her get to work with the book reading � da boyz no likes to read, make heads hurt. Instead they decide to check in on Dr. Sansini. They go to his home, find him gone, and naturally decide to break in. Once inside, they steal all his beer and watch all his porn. Actually, they check out his computer and discover some art reminiscent of images from their dreams (i.e., sketches of Cthulhu) done by a Boston artist Paul Carrick.
Then Sansini comes home, all covered in blood, whistling pleasantly. Apparently, he�s just finished arming the prisoners as Greg had seen in his dream. After talking to the crazy man for a few minutes, just to confirm how crazy he is (talking about Mighty Cthulhu rising from his sleep, and about the terrifying dreams he�s had about helping bring this about � clearly utter nonsense), the party does the only rational thing � they turn him over to the police. Ha! That�d be the day. No, they cap him, of course
Then they rush over to the Asylum to gauge the damage done by Sansini�s lunacy. Through a clever bit of subterfuge, they manage to get past the police who are cleaning up the mess by dressing like morgue staff. They head for the new cyber-psycho ward only to find that it�s been broken in from the outside. Vince remarks that the structure of the walls is inordinately thick and unnecessarily strong. They then come across a huge (30� long) oozing mass with tentacles, eyes, mouths, and other unspeakable protuberances forming and reforming every few seconds. The thing appears to have eaten through some of the outside walls and trying to get through an inner wall that appears on the map to enclose an area with no doors.
A fight breaks out (I won�t say who started it) with the oozing monster. It may have been that the Bunker-Buster missile got its attention. It seemed to be able to do huge amounts of damage and absorb even more. So, when you are dealing with such a fell beast, what�s the only logical course of action? Lay down in front of it, of course! Alright, Vince probably figured out about 1 second too late, that maybe that really isn�t the best course of action � even if you do have a brand new big shootie bang-bang that shoots bullets the size of beer bottles.
Vince, �Die foul beast!�
Foul Beast, �Gurrrgglggllgeee�
Ray, �What the hell are you doing? Run you fool!�
Vince, �I can take �im!�
Ray, �Are you insane? Don�t answer that.�
Greg, �That thing�s going to flatten you.�
Vince, �Check out this gun! I�ll kill it dead. Die beastie, die!�
Beast, �Burrgfffrruuuggg�
Vince, �Hmm, it doesn�t seem to have died. It�s still coming, and I�m still lying on the ground in front of it. This is going to hurt.�
Ray, �Aw, crap!�
Vince, �Aw, crap. Talk to Ha. He�s the key to all this. Aw, cra----------�
Beast, Crunch, bite (the whole head, one bite).
That�s when the communications really broke down. Greg started to run. Ray politely suggested that he might have a slight problem if Greg ran and that Ray�s chances of survival might be marginally reduced under those circumstances. Greg agreed to say. So, a couple grenades and more shooting and the thing finally died. Ray and Greg mourned the loss of their friend, �this sucks, without his head and the man-machine interface, most of his cyberware won�t have much salvage value. Well, take what�s left of the flat corpse and we�ll get what we can for it.� So they threw what was left of him in the back of the car and drove off wondering whether the cyber-psycho ward was built to protect the Star Spawn hole for Blistac�s purposes or to seal it forever.
