Clockwork Abattoir: Sordid Tales

[TheMeanestGuest]

[ooc][blockquote]Rolled 1d6 : 2, total 2[/blockquote][/ooc]

[Rose-of-Vellum]

[ic=Hadric] As Hadric dives, the shaggy beast throws back its horns, and catapults the shreeva with demeaning ease. Hadric flies over a shrieking Perse and crashes into the previously last-intant mirror in the shop. A shower of glass, scissors, combs, and brushes falls over him.

The wooly goat-thing snorts, as if laughing, then continues chewing its pompadour wig with triumphant fervor.

Adding insult to injury, several loiters have raced upstairs, attracted to by the tumultuous sounds, and now watch with irreverent voyeurism. The Farelige, however, are far from amused at the continued destruction of their shop, and shout furiously at man, beast, and goggling youth.[/ic]

[ooc]You take 2 damage (after AC). DC to grapple the beast is 4, DC 3 to dodge its attacks. These DCs are both elevated because you're trying to do them unarmed and non-lethaly.[/ooc]

[TheMeanestGuest]

[ic]Hadric regains his feet and dusts himself off, picking a bloody shard of glass out of his forearm with a wince. "Look goat." he says. The beast snorts at him loudly and irreverently. "..Goat-thing" he reassesses. "This would be a lot easier for the both of us if you'd come along quietly. There's just no reason to be eating all this hair. Your stomach is going to be tied in knots, and that's a recipe for indigestion..." he continues softly, slowly edging his way closer to the beast. Hadric suddenly grabs for the creature again, a triumphant smile lighting up across his face.[/ic]

[ooc]Hadric's blood is up, and he's thoroughly determined to get this goat. If only he was aware of the irony. I'll apply two levels of grit to the grapple roll for 3 Might, and one level of grit to the dodge roll for 1 agility. (This is assuming dodge is necessary regardless of the outcome of the grapple.)

Grapple: [blockquote]Rolled 1d6 : 6, total 6[/blockquote]

Dodge: [blockquote]Rolled 1d6 : 1, total 1[/blockquote]

Might: 5/13, Agility: 10[11]/14, Intellect: 6/9[/ooc]

[TheMeanestGuest]

[ooc]For my major effect, I'll have the goat-thing be stunned. Probably out of awe for the amazing hold Hadric just smoothly pulled off.[/ooc]

[Rose-of-Vellum]

[ic=Hadric]The tables turn swiftly for Hadric and the hairy beast. The former latches hold of the latter, and flips it over in one deft maneuver. Stunned, the goat-thing bleats in shock.

"Tie it up!" a Farelige shouts. The other scrounges through the wreckage. "Where are the thrice-damned ribbons!" she yells, "I'll find it -just, just hold it a little longer!" The first helps the second. "Here!" "No, that's lace -it'll tear." "The chartreuse?" "If you can get it untangled." "Wait, I've got, no, too short..."[/ic]

[ooc]DC 3 to maintain hold.[/ooc]

[TheMeanestGuest]

[ic]"Any time now!" Hadric yells as the thing starts to struggle against his grasp.[/ic]

[ooc]Hadric is still determined to see this through. Using a point of grit for the hold.

[blockquote]Rolled 1d6 : 5, total 5[/blockquote]

Might: 4/13, Agility: 10[11]/14, Intellect: 6/9[/ooc]

[Rose-of-Vellum]

[ic=Hadric]The goat-thing thrashes. It bites Haric painfully on the hand, but the man retains his grip. Infuriated, the beast defecates. It is messy... and Hadric is not spared.

Only after the odious affair ends do the Farelige emerge, long ribbon-strips in hand. They nimbly tie the ribbon around the creature's mouth, first muzzling it, then trussing its legs with silken fetters. It bucks and wobbles, but the beast is bond tightly.  

"Do you think it will hold?" Perse asks as she nervously backs away from the enraged animal.

"It'll hold," Carmine answers, wrinkling her nose at the stench that permeates both man and beast, "-the paduasoy is corded, and the faille, why it's woven thick enough to stop an arrow."

"And the tabinet?"

"Thrown in for good measure."

So reassured, Perse turns to Hadric. She has a willowy build, all limbs and fingers. Her eponymous, lilac-hued hair is tied up into a half-raveled bun, and a disheveled nightgown hangs limply from her shoulders. She regards Hadric with a gentle smile that touches her honey-cast eyes.

"Thank you, truly. I don't know what we would have done without you."

Carmine, meanwhile, stalks to the door and slams it shut on the noses of the still-goggling youth. She leans against the cool leather, then exclaims with exaggerated volume, "Yeah, those clowns have more grease in their spine than bone." She runs her tattooed hands through her bright-red hair and sighs heavily as she takes in the mass-destruction of her shop.

"Byleth's hoary sack," she moans, "Just, just look at this mess."

"I need a smoke," Carmine says to no one in particular, her dark eyes rung by sleep-smeared shadow.  

Perse, however, pays her no mind. All of her attention rests on Hadric. "However can we repay you, good sir -and oh! Your hand! Why the brute bit you -and oh, your clothes!"[/ic]

[ooc]You take another 2 damage, and your clothes are now soiled with capric feces. Ah, the wages of chivalry.[/ooc]

[Seraph]

[ic]For a fleeting moment, Mr. Nix allows himself the soft emotion of relief, but within minutes, his mind is once again reeling with worries, plots, and tangled webs of deceit.  They know where we live.  They will be coming for us.  We must know what we are dealing with.  Mr. Nix grabs Vex about the ears and stares him in those eyes like coal embers.  

"It is time."  He pulls the silver votive chain from a deep pocket in the recesses of his coat.
"Oh no master" the demon whines.
"Shut up!" Nix snaps at the hellhound, and begins winding the chain around its neck.  Vex, though apparently not physically harmed by this, howls and bays piteously, its ribs heaving with the effort.  "It tells us what it knows about Byleth" the diabolist commands, then suspecting trickery from the hound, adds "What it's seen, what it hears, and what is only rumor.  It tells us all of that."[/ic]

[ooc]Demonology Check to know "Byleth" by name.  I would argue that between general witchcraft and my demonology from my focus, He has mastery at this, but it's at least expertise.  He also uses a point of grit for this action.  [blockquote]Rolled 1d6 : 3, total 3[/blockquote]

Might 7      Agility 9/10      Intellect 13/15[/ooc]

[Ghostman]

[ic]
Xavier stands motionless and stone-faced, considering the words of this odd bird-man. A mild grin flashes on his face as he makes up his mind, and he clambers nimbly up to the jatayu's nest. "Well then, Sampati. I am known as Xavier. You say that you like secrets -- got any good ones about those Nine-Eyes' I just had to shake off my back?"

While he doesn't expect to gain much by chatting up the bedraggled avian, Xavier figures that it's worth a try. He'd hoped to learn something useful about the Nine-Eyes' activities by shadowing the thugs, but with those efforts having gone to waste he might as well spend a moment or two listening to whatever gossip this jatayu would share.
[/ic]

[Rose-of-Vellum]

[ooc]Make a persuasion/diplomacy check, Ghostman.[/ooc]

[Steerpike]

[ooc]Are the chandeliers suspended by ropes, or chains?[/ooc]

[Rose-of-Vellum]

[ic=Mr. Nix]Vex yowls. It convulses, snarls, and quivers. But to no avail. It cannot resist its master's command. Syllable by syllable, the hellhound's secrets are torn unwillingly from its frothing lips.[/ic]

[ooc]Combining what Mr. Nix already has heard with Vex's disclosures, Mr. Nix 'knows' the following:

Prince Byleth is a demon of great renown and speculation amongst the diabolists of Skein, and beyond as some would argue. Some say the archfiend was the familiar of Orlando Petrifax. Others suggest that Byleth's presence in Skein predates the Mad Magister, that he was first summoned and bound by the Moth-Kings or the entities to which they sold their souls; either way, he served as a royal messenger, a deliverer of secrets, a spirit who flitted between the monarchs' cocoons, crooning and hearkening to their sibyllic decrees. Others say Byleth was a naught but the infernal jester of a long-forgotten hellish warlord from the Membrane Wars. Some say Byleth was all of these, others say that such is slander and misdirection.

Most, however, agree that Byleth rebelled and now haunts the sewerscapes of Skein. They say he is tied to the Yellow Dragons, one of the four major syndicates. They say he is their ruler or their most miserable of slaves. They say he is dined on by a squabbling assembly of imps -the Diet of the Jaundiced Assembly- devoured each day and vomited out each night. A grisly, eternal feast, succulent, enticing, tempting, but sickening, ill-sitting, and never-filling.[/ooc]  

[Rose-of-Vellum]

[ooc]One chain per chandelier, Steerpike.[/ooc]

[Ghostman]

[ooc]
Persuasion/diplomacy check, applying Grit:
[blockquote]Rolled 1d6 : 6, total 6[/blockquote]

Stat pools:
Might 9/10 (0), Agility 8/14 (1), Intellect 10/12 (0)
[/ooc]

[Steerpike]

[ic]Catena eyes the chandeliers but decides against attempting to shoot one down - the chains klook to sturdy to pierce with a crossbow bolt.  Instead she drops her crossbow and readies her chain, sweeping it round in an arc to gather momentum before lashing out at the oncoming creature.[/ic]

[ooc]I'll apply a level of Grit to my attack (with Edge and Bloodlust, no Pool expenditure):

[blockquote]Rolled 1d6 : 2, total 2[/blockquote]

Might 5/13, Agility 7/12, Intellect 7/7[/ooc]