Let's Play VtM: Night Empire

[oscar]

E)

 

[CappenVarra]

A Gay Bobby Pothead?
The perfect Codex choice.

 

[Running Fox]

Voting is dumb and so are the people who engage in it.

 

[laclongquan]

IT's been a week since the last update, was it?

 

[grotsnik]

Have you spent a lot of time in London, ironyuri? Occasionally you talk about it in a way that implies more than a 'holiday to see Buckingham Palace' knowledge of it.

Voting is dumb and so are the people who engage in it.

Never change.

IT's been a week since the last update, was it?

FOR THE LAST TIME, NO! Or...maybe. Probably.

EDIT - Well, the important bit's done but I need to, uh, work on the, uh, 'action' (lololol) and the next few days are going to be spent out of town, so gizzus a bit longer to update.

 

[Computer Gamer Refugee]

Come on Gotsnik,

I want to see what good comes from engaging in a footrace with a couple of Bujah as the sun comes up....

 

[Running Fox]

Never change.

if only i could
i just plunged
through the woods
found a big rock
ran around it
7 times
counterclock
and placed a burning
black russian stump
facing upwards
on top of that rump
made a wish

 

[laclongquan]

Damn it! Folks, start gathering torches and pitchforks! We are going to

 

[Hellraiser]

I, for one, will patiently wait for when BROtsnik delivers the update.M:

 

[Running Fox]

my wish came true

 

[laclongquan]

time to beat it some more

 

[grotsnik]

Sorry about that, I've been trying to buy a new flat so rushing about. The action scene...still isn't terribly good. To hell with it.




Chapter 6 - The One True Empire





Vogler stretches out his calves, flexes his hands, like an athlete preparing for a favourite event, the flesh and cartilage on the tips of his fingers writhing outward into the shapes of claws - and runs.

You flinch, yanking your sword-cane hurriedly out of its scabbard, and duck after him, keeping yourself low behind the lines of expensive cars parked along the right-hand-side of the street, out of sight. A slight clatter from above suggests that Cripps has made his way onto the rooftops.

The shovelheads have seen him; one of them yells out,

“Break!”

They scatter out in every direction. One of them raises a pistol and fires it, a savage rat-at-at, in Vogler’s direction, but somehow manages to miss. His delay costs him dearly; the Gangrel barrels into him, sending him flying back against the graveyard railings.

This was a mistake, you think; someone’s already switched on a light in one of the houses across the street. You’re too close to home, too liable to be spotted. You should have called Vogler off, before it was too late. Dammit...where the fuck have they gone?

A sudden, hysterical screech of tyres. Vogler, turning, cries out,

“Sommers!”

You throw yourself forward. The Sabbat van goes flying into the side of the BMW convertible parked on the pavement behind you, a fraction of a second later; the sports car crashes up onto the tarmac, creaking up onto its side.

The van rattles up onto the pavement after it, then attempts to reverse; the front bumper hangs loose. You reach into your pocket and close your fingers around your pistol.

Stumbling back up onto your feet, you turn, yanking the gun out and pointing it towards the fogged windscreen. Your finger squeezes at the trigger; the glass crackles outwards. You can’t be certain if you’ve hit anything, but the van continues to reverse erratically outwards, crunching back against a Porsche on the other side of the road. The door on the passenger side swings open as the van swerves back down the street, making for Vogler, who nimbly leaps aside, with a bullfighter’s grace, tumbling away into the darkness, as the shovelhead within stretches out the barrel of a submachine-gun -

The van hits the graveyard railings. And explodes.

The heatwave is enough, even at this distance, to make you stagger. A plume of pure orange flame swells up into the night sky.

As the black smoke begins to billow outwards, you begin make out two writhing, stick-men figures, dancing in silent agony in the van’s cabin. One of them tumbles out, wreathed in fire, and collapses on the pavement.

“Bloody hell,” you hiss, mildly aghast, then, more loudly, - “Vogler! Vogler, damn you-”

Vogler limps forward into the circle of light cast by the burning van. His sunglasses are cracked and hanging loosely, revealing the red irises to the world. Behind him, one-handed, he drags a fallen shovelhead by its collar.

“That was...that was interesting,” he says, a little unsteadily, as you scurry forward to meet him. “Fuck happened to the van?”

“Some sort of plastic explosive,” you hazard, snatching up the motionless shovelhead by its other arm. “I imagine whoever sent them just told them to ram us if they had the chance. Come on, we need to get back out of sight - and fast. The Kine will already have sent for the police. Hopefully Horn can get someone down here to stop them from looking too closely at the bodies.”

“Strange thing,” Vogler continues, as the pair of you haul the fallen Sabbat into the shadows of the Witanhurst wall. “What happened to your Nosferatu? I thought he was going to head them off.”

But Mr Cripps is waiting for you, patient and silent, in the long entrance hall. At his feet, a shard of broken plane-tree branch jammed into her chest, lies a female shovelhead, dressed in leathers, her pink hair raised in an absurd-looking mohawk.

“Two,” says Vogler, with an exhilarated grin. “Better result than we could have hoped for. Fuckers didn’t stand a chance.”

A sarcastic reply itches to rise out of you, but you manage to bite it down.

Stooping over Cripps’ captive, you grip the stake hard, nodding to the Nosferatu, who clamps his horrid bandaged hands down over her throat, and pull.

Her eyes open. She snaps, straining against Cripps’ vicelike grip, glaring up at you.

“Fucking pricks - better fucking kill me, ‘cos they’ll come for me - you hear me - they’ll come for me!”

You replace the stake, forcibly, and move on to the male shovelhead.

He does not bother, upon regaining consciousness, to struggle or to speak; he simply gazes up at you, smiling with quiet malevolence.

“What were you doing here?” you ask him, but he refuses to respond. You plunge the stake back into his heart.

“All right,” you say, getting to your feet. “Cripps, dump them both in the vault; we'll see about interrogating them when I get back tomorrow night. I’m going to make a few calls before daybreak.”


*


“...couple of them threw a firebomb into the conservatory,” Turcov says. “Hell of a mess but no damage. And it sounds as if they sent a van to Eda’s place on the waterfront, too. Wouldn’t be surprised if more of us call in tomorrow night saying they’ve been hit.”

You twitch the bathroom curtain to one side. Three police vans and an ambulance are parked in the street outside, forming a cordon around the burnt-out van. An officer appears to be taking a statement from a little old lady standing in the threshold of a nearby house.

“Probing for weaknesses,” you reply, clutching the phone to your ear.

“Could be. Look, Sommers, it’s almost dawn. I don’t want to call a council over this - Iacomo might think we were frightened by a few shovelheads causing mischief - but let’s a few of us meet soon and decide how best to respond to this, all right?”

A black Range Rover pulls up at the cordon; a suited man steps out, waving away the policemen who attempt to block his path, and addresses the officer. They argue for a few moments; the officer gesticulates furiously at the shell of the van, before apparently giving up, red-faced, and stalking back to his car. The suited man says something to the old lady, and then politely closes her front door behind her.

“All right,” you tell him. “A united front. Speak to you soon, Turcov.”

The police cars pull away, one by one, sirens blaring. They’re replaced, a few minutes later, by an ambulance; two men step quietly out of it and get to work removing the bodies.


*


The editor of the Telegraph, pudgy, with a comb-over and bushy eyebrows, frowns, and snaps into his intercom,

“What d’you mean, you’ve let him in? I’ve told you, Sophie, I don’t want to see any-”

“Good evening,” you remark, closing the office door behind you. “Burning the midnight oil?”

He gapes at you.

“How the fuck did you get in here?” he asks. “The security had strict instructions-”

“.said it was urgent-” bleats his secretary, on the other end of the intercom.

You smile at him, and take the seat opposite his desk.

“Why, I’m the news,” you tell him, warmly. “A little piece of it, anyway. Sit back down, please. You’ve got another hour until your appointment with Natasha and it’s only a short drive to the penthouse. Tell me about this story.”

You slide the ‘Grey Eminence’ excerpt across the desk towards him.

The editor opens his mouth to curse at you - but finds himself, inexplicably, returning to his seat. He glances down at the cut-out.

“It’s a gossip column,” he says, after a moment. “What of it?”

“Tell me,” you say, clearly, meeting his gaze, “who commissioned it.”

His mind struggles, limply and blindly.

“I...not sure what you...”

“Tell me who commissioned the article.”

The editor gulps.

“He...I don’t know his name,” he murmurs, broken, his glistening eyes meeting yours.

“Then what,” you ask, with a patient sigh, “do you know?”

The phone on his desk begins to ring.

He gazes at you, as if waiting for permission; when you nod, he lifts the phone to his ear, listens for a second, and then passes it across to you.

There is, you realise, a small black security camera winking back at you from the corner of his office.

Hesitating, you take the phone from him.

“Evening, blueblood,” rasps a familiar Irish brogue. “Boss asked me to ask youse, if you wouldn’t mind not yanking the poor man’s brain about too much? He has a heart condition, y’see, and he can’t handle bein’ bullied. There’s pills in his desk drawer, if you wouldn’t mind.”

“...Oscar?”

“Thought you’d remember me. Boss’s been waiting for you to come a-calling. Wants me to offer up an, uh, invitation. You know the Shard, don’t you? Seventy-second floor. Don’t worry about breaking in, the doors’ll open up for you. Oh, and he says to tell you you should come alone.”

“What does he want?”

“To talk to you, blueblood. Nothing else, I swear. Just, uh...best not to keep him waiting.”


*


The Shard stands out, a hideous, colossal streak of blue glass, towering over the twin towers of London Bridge.

The builders’ fence surrounding the unfinished skyscraper is seven feet high, to discourage thrillseekers attempting to scale the structure; skirting around, you discover that the padlock on one of the gates has been removed. The automatic doors in the lobby slide open for you as you approach.

The seventy-second floor, you know, stepping into the dusty service lift, is the highest floor. You’re headed all the way to the top.

*

The lift doors ‘ping’. It’s an absurd, childish noise, and it makes you flinch as you step out onto the deserted floor. Scaffolding and concrete lie scattered about, buried beneath plastic tarpaulins.

Ahead at the windows, framed against the burning night city far below, a figure is waiting for you.

“Anyone there?” you call.

The vampire turns.

A short, pug-nosed Nosferatu, dressed in a suit, a pair of large horn-rimmed glasses perched on its face.

And as it meets your gaze, it smiles, and its throat expands, the skin stretching out like an enormous and repulsive boil, before contracting back into its original position with a snap.

“Yes,” it says.

The lights flicker on, filling the floor; to your right, Oscar steps out from behind one of the pillars, waving his hands vaguely like a magician performing a trick. He gives you a slightly sheepish grin.

“Ta-da,” he says.

You don’t deign to respond to him. Instead, you yank the Grey Eminence article out of your pocket and hold it up in front of the strange new Nosferatu.

“Care to explain this?” you ask.

The Nosferatu smiles, and makes a small gesture that indicates you should join him at the window.

“You won’t have heard of me, Mr Sommers,” he croaks, in a whisper that you now recognise as distinctly Australian. “Call me Bullcracker. I’m a newspaper man. Keep a few of the bloody things. I was in town for a few months overseeing this monstrosity, and Mr Cronin told me about a juicy little story, I thought, ‘there’s a column in the Telegraph, it’d go down there a treat. I’ll even write it myself, send it on down to the editor, ask he run it as a favour to me.’ Bit of fun, ya know? Bit of a ‘craic’, as Mr Cronin might put it?”

“If you’re friends with Oscar,” you tell him, “perhaps he’s told you that playing silly buggers doesn’t wash with me. Once again, why have you been threatening me?”

“Threatening you?” Bullcracker answers, mildly. “Ain’t been threatening you. Wanted to see if I could pique your interest, that was all. Was hoping you’d come and find me without me having to announce meself to all and sundry, was all. Now, if I were to threaten you, Mr Sommers, I’d have - I don’t know - run an expose on you, four pages in, noting your closeness to the government while accusing you of having a hand in the disappearance of a prominent member of the Edgware Road Asian community last summer. Your friends amongst the Kine would run a fucking mile, and I wouldn’t even need to break the Masquerade to it. So you note, please, Mr Sommers, that I ain’t threatening you.”

“Who are you?” you ask, bewildered.

Bullcracker pushes one long-nailed finger up beneath his thick glasses and begins to dab with it at his eye.

“I’m the man,” he says, “who’s offering you a job.”


*


“Grew up in Adelaide,” Bullcracker says, conversationally. “Always liked Adelaide. Thought I might make something of myself there, was told, no, you’re too young, too inexperienced, come back in a hundred years and see if some poor bastard’s died his Final Death. Moved to London, would’ve been 1920. Worse here than it was there. Got to thinking. I’m a great believer, Mr Sommers, in the concept of evolution. Adapt and survive. And it occurred to me that I couldn’t win in any city in the world, not in the Camarilla, though I was certainly not inclined to join the Sabbat - but what did that matter? A city is only a city. You let yourself get too caught up by it and it’ll swallow you whole.

“So - I began to travel. Buying up newspaper shares, from abroad. Keeping myself moving, dealing with Kine, never with Kindred. When a business of mine failed in Singapore, I’d set up in Kiev - and come back thirty years later when all was forgotten. When the Prince in Sydney decided to enthrall the head of the PR firm I’d set up there, I let him, I stepped back - and like your bloody mythical hydra, I found another one that suited me better in Melbourne. I worked on your night planes, on yachts, on a beauty of a little island on the Barrier Reef. And, gradually, the world expanded to suit my perspective. I’d been an outsider in every city; on a globalised planet, you’d be astounded how little that matters. I belong to no city, no court, no Camarilla. And because you daft bastards don’t properly communicate, because you’re all so caught up in your own cities, your own feuds, your own...pettiness, there’s regular few who are fully aware of who I am. The one true empire, Mr Sommers, is the empire upon which the sun never rises.”

“You mentioned a job?” you prompt. He nods.

“I got a few like Mr Cronin working for me now,” he says. “Bright young things, like yourself, intelligent, ambitious Camarilla types - Nosferatu for running computers, Ventrue for running people. I offer them jobs, under me - and security. No more bloody scrapping over patches of turf, no more feuding with other Kindred. We work with Kine, we build our strength across the world, avoiding other capes, avoiding hunters, avoiding conflict. True freedom, true independence.”

“Mr Cronin,” you say, glancing back at Oscar, “sold me out to Samantha Eames the first chance he got.”

“Naturally,” Bullcracker says. “You weren’t his strongest option. I make it my business to be the strongest option.”

He turns, hands crossed behind his back, and stares out over the lights of Canary Wharf on the opposite side of the river.

“Work for me, Mr Sommers,” he says. “Don’t be afraid to say ‘no’, I won’t bite - if you want to stay in this damned city and try to duke it out, I can respect that, so long as you don’t try and get clever with me. But if you want to see the world - to hold it in your hands, to never again have to worry about some other Kindred waiting to stab you in the back - you come and you join us.”

“I’ve built up my own power base here,” you point out. “You expect me to throw that away to come and work as your hireling?”

Bullcracker grins.

“Your work with the bank is fine,” he says. “We could certainly use that. But your government contacts, your pet Toreador, this new Gangrel you’re messing about with - you’ll have to leave them behind, we can’t have anyone tracing you to us once you’ve done your disappearing act. Hell, we’d probably want to take you out of the city for a decade or two anyway. Where’d you fancy, Sommers? Stockholm? Cape Town? Rio?”

What will you do?

A) Agree to his terms.
B) Agree to his terms, but request to be allowed to see out the institution of the new Prince first.
C) Decline his terms, but propose some kind of alliance.
D) Decline his terms, politely, and walk away without trying to manipulate him.
E) Pretend to agree to his terms, and then see about exposing this independent Australian upstart.

 

[laclongquan]

Marvellous, old chap, just marvellous.

Well, at least that was not a trap for an investigation unit. And even if it was, Anthony could just wave it away as his very commanding presence. I wuv it.

As for the stinking offer, I thought not. For one thing, he has shown no card yet. He got Oscar, so he got a few intel on us, and design an effective threatening semi-blackmail to get our attention. Do note the whole damn thing cost him zip in term of resources: newspaper is local, intel is local. So it means we know absolutely nothing about his resource. Very slick, very smooth, very much like us if we go international Anarch. I see nothing worth being a hireling over, though. I mean, the ex-Prince or Samantha got plenty and we dont even want to be theirs, why on earth would we want to be a Nosferatus' bitch?

On the other hand, he got Oscar, so he know a bit about how we acted in the past. If we pretend to agree to his term, or propose an alliance, he may decide we are being our Ventrue self, after all, and may just manipulate us right back. I dont know about you but I dont think Anthony can play who is the best manipulator with him or anyone. The whole episode with Dubrik and Samantha spook me.

I may change my mind if you all present some interesting directions to go, but overall I think this is a test from this Down Under chap and decline to play is the most dignified way to show our
DDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD

 

[Hellraiser]

That was... unexpected. I do not like the idea of Anthony being his bitch however.

 

[Gondolin]

That was... unexpected.

Indeed.

 

[Kz3r0]

D) Decline his terms, politely, and walk away without trying to manipulate him.

 

[Excidium]

I'm on D) too, I don't want to completely leave London behind for some mysterious Nosferatu that came out of nowhere. Even though, considering the current situation of the city, it isn't such a bad idea...

 

[Omicron]

I think B would be the most reasonable choice. If we get to be Senechal (or 'just' keep our barony) we can just stay in London, if for some inexplainable reason all the scheming horribly backfires we have a chance to get away before the little upstart is kicked down.

 

[Running Fox]

An independent doggy delusion'ed himself that he is truly free if he sucks kine dick. Trolololol. He can go fuck himself.

D) Decline his terms, politely, and walk away without trying to manipulate him.

No more bloody scrapping over patches of turf, no more feuding with other Kindred.

Might as well join the Nos and live of rats.

there’s regular few who are fully aware of who I am

No one gives a shit, eh?

But if you want to see the world - to hold it in your hands

Whats there to see? Dirt and more dirt. Whats there to hold? Kine waste?



The whole beauty of organization is that the top dogs have unproportional power. Get rich or die trying. In our case, lower gen, more discipline points.

 

[Random Word]

All this talk of ignoring the old power structure and seeking unorthodox ways to live ones unlife made me wonder why no Malkavian had joined the Apollo program and declared themselves Prince of the Moon. Then I realized I had no idea what would happen to Kindred in space. Are they just in permanent Torpor? What if they were in a stable orbit which always put them on the dark side of Earth? If that works, then just how much shielding does one need before the magic of sunlight can't get through? If it doesn't, just how high in the atmosphere do you have to be before you fall into Torpor? All his talk of flights around the world made me consider the possibility of renting a private jet and outracing the sun indefinitely, allowing a Kindred to be awake 24/7 for as long as they could afford it - assuming the cruising altitude wasn't above the magic limit. If a Kindred goes to another solar system, are they suddenly okay all the time, or do they still need to hide from Sol? Personally, my new vote is for Sommers to start buying up private space exploration companies and find out the answers to these pressing questions. Inquiring minds want to know - and seriously, who doesn't want to be the Prince of Mars?

On topic, interesting proposal, but I'd hedge my bets and propose a variant on B where we we inform him that his offer is intriguing and that we'll strongly consider it and get back to him in a month or two, without mentioning that our acceptance is contingent on how the current situation in London plays out in case he decides he'd like to sabotage us in an effort to force us to accept his offer. Interesting as it sounds, we have absolutely no idea what his organization is really like, what its goals are, what our role would be, or even if the 'organization' such as it is extends beyond this fellow and Oscar. Much as his lifestyle sounds like something I might adopt in his situation, especially in this day and age, the lack of information makes any hard commitment inadvisable.

 

[Storyfag]

Anarchs gonna Anarch. D.

 

[Smashing Axe]

He's revealed too much information to us for me to believe he'd just let us go if we refuse him. E

 

[oscar]

D, fuck Anarchs.

If we'd really fucked things up I'd be tempted. But right now I don't think we have to sink to being an undead Rupert Murdoch.

 

[Hellraiser]

He's a nosferatu, if he thought the information that he gave us could potentially screw him over he wouldn't give it to Anthony. Well not without an escape plan at any rate.

D) is my pick. We have bigger fish to fry than some anarch nosferatu who gets chased out of everywhere by bigger players.

 

[Esquilax]

1. Anarchs

D) is my pick. We have bigger fish to fry than some anarch nosferatu who gets chased out of everywhere by bigger players.

Precisely. He's trying to paint himself as this modern Kindred who is free from constraints, building this "One True Empire", when the truth is he's got no choice but to leave as soon as someone with an ounce of real power comes knocking on his door:

“When the Prince in Sydney decided to enthrall the head of the PR firm I’d set up there, I let him, I stepped back - and like your bloody mythical hydra, I found another one that suited me better in Melbourne.

However, Aussienossie clearly has a great information network, which is something Anthony severely lacks. Why can't we synergise here by working an alliance? He has a great information network, but he lacks any stability - we have a power base in Whitehall, but lack any information network. I believe we could come to a very mutually lucrative arrangement here.

I propose we offer him aid in the form of our newly formed banking contacts, in exchange for help in ascertaining the location of the Hunters that Iacomo wishes found. As well as info on the Giovanni if we can manage it. While Bullcracker has specifically said that he tries to avoid politics and Hunters, he has also courted us and he wants our banking contacts in the first place.

More importantly, I believe that despite his image of a globe-trotting, and enterprising Kindred, he'd trade it away for some real power in Kindred society. The only reason he's in the line of work he's in is that, unlike Tony, he couldn't gain power through Camarilla channels. If he has a powerful Camarilla contact who is willing to work with him and not drive him out of the city at a moment's notice, it would be a serious advantage for him.

I want to be able to work something here to ensure that our discovery of Mandrake as a red herring wasn't just a complete waste of time. We have limited time to get to these Hunters before they decide to make a much more effective strike against the Camarilla. Oh, and trying to expose this guy is a bad, bad idea. He can find us a whole lot easier than we can find him. His entire unlife is built around running from place to place, and the only reason we are in front of him in the first place is because he wanted us to find him. So yeah, let's be on the level here.

C) Decline his terms, but propose some kind of alliance.

2. Shovelheads

He does not bother, upon regaining consciousness, to struggle or to speak; he simply gazes up at you, smiling with quiet malevolence.

“What were you doing here?” you ask him, but he refuses to respond. You plunge the stake back into his heart.

This guy looks like he might be a tough nut to crack. Unlike the female, who seems dumb as rocks, this guy looks like he might actually have something useful for us. I propose that we interrogate them in a Prisoner's dilemma situation: we'll offer freedom for whoever provides any useful information regarding Sabbat Dens/leaders, and a sunrise for whoever holds out. We can assure our captures that we'll follow through on our end of the bargain based on our dealings with Bishop Dubrik in the past.

If we have information on the location of a Sabbat leader and information on Hunters, feeding the location of the Den to the hunters via Bullcracker (if we form an alliance with him) seems like it could be a very shrewdly maneuvered Ventrue scheme (tm).