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Vitus vs. McGinty
15 years ago
General
Inane Rambling of a Demented Predator
Call of Cthulhu, opening the year with a bang. In which the players shoot a house and set fire to an enemy, and the opening salvoes in an intercontinental magical war between Vitus of Clan Scorpion and McGinty of Clan Mad Irish Bastard.
June 1924 - First half of Fred Behrendt's Mansion of Madness from Mansions of Madness. In which a collector of some really creepy paintings has gone missing, and they volunteer to track him down. It'll get Lancaster out of the house, for one thing, even though he's still just a brain in a jar.
Elsewhere, Agent Landing of the Office of Naval Intelligence has put together a brief file regarding one Jackson Elias, occult writer. According to the investigator's pet spook, he's just arrived in Nairobi, and has a subject for a new book in mind - apparently not all the members of the infamously ill-fated Carlyle Expedition are dead! And according to Elias it looks like a cult was involved!
Despite the difficulty of running your business when you're a head in a jar, word HAS reached Lancaster, via the rare book network, of an odd development in the trade. Somebody in Cairo is sending out standing orders for any rare or unique Arabic texts on Astronomy & Magic they can get hold of. And they're willing to pay a premium.
And McGinty also received word that somebody broke into his farmhouse/Warehouse 23 in Charing Cross. The burglars searched the house top to bottom but they weren't caught, alas. Nor did the the neighbours get a good description of them. By an odd co-incidence somebody bearing an exact resemblance to the minion used by the hyena-headed werewolf-thing that repeatedly kicked McGinty testicles up into his abdominal cavity, a few years back, came sniffing around Rondale & McGinty's Automotive & Electrical Repair shop whilst McGinty was out. They were apparently attempting to track down and purchase a unique Arabic text on Astronomy, Maths, and Magic they for some reason thought McGinty had acquired.
One thing McGinty has acquired - or at least acquired legally, with actual money and receipts changing hands - is a funeral plot.
McGinty : In case I need somewhere to hide a body in a hurry
GM : *headdesk* I'm sure you'll have no trouble finding someone to fill it.
He also blows $1400 on an apartment in Arkham for his friend Kelley and his vampire sibling Hal. And lets them stay there rent free. Thus turning a large pile of stolen gang cash into a tax write-off for himself.
GM : How does he keep doing this? He does things that at first glance seem outright insane, and they all turn out to be brilliant ideas.
Lancaster's player : He's a Drunken Master of life.
Back in Massachusetts it's good to know that the Boston Police are good for something - they've just broken up an occult group that was planning a human sacrifice! Too late for the victim, alas. Two of the members were taken alive by the police, but the leader apparently got away. In other occult news, Mina "Margery" Crandon, wife of a wealthy Boston surgeon and socialite, Dr. Le Roi Goddard Crandon was submitted as a candidate to Scientific American magazine, as a medium who could demonstrate telekinetic ability under scientific controls. Her séance circles include luminary members of the Boston upper class and Ivy League elite. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle gave her significant credibility. She's became so popular that her prayers are read by the US Army. And Committee Secretary Malcom Bird has leaked to the press that the Committee are leaning toward a positive vote - it looks like she's the real McCoy!
GM : McGi... Lancaster's Brain. I was about to say McGinty's Brain... but what brain would that be?
Rondale : I don't have any problems with my sister dating, I just don't want her dating any occult types or anybody remotely connected to the Mafia.
GM : So Irish gangsters, Jewish gangsters, Yakusa, Triads, and the Union Corse would all be fine?
Threatening to tell Lancaster's daughter everything that's happened to him if he doesn't agree to be sawn open like a tin of beans, reduced to calcined powder, and reconstituted as a probable vampire.
McGinty : *holds up Lancaster's jar* This is your father's brain. *holds on his head like a hat and dances around* This is your father's brain on McGinty
GM : What about your late brother, Amy?
McGinty : I could bring him back for you.
Amy : No! Just no!
McGinty : Not even to ask his ghost if he's happy?
Amy : No!!! I just hope he isn't lingering, that's he's gone to wherever people finally go when they die!
GM : I suspect he means he could bring your brother's ghost back whether it wants to or not
Amy : Oh god! *hugs knees and shakes*
Rondale : McGinty, let's not violate natural order today, ok?
Amy Wells : But McGinty casting any spells whilst sober is against the nature order!
To the considerable shock of the Detective Sergeant that's been handling both the kidnapping and the the cult cases, McGinty and company soon make significant breakthroughs in both, AND correctly identify the informant the police has been protecting with a false name. All this and still find time to play Lancaster's canister like the bongos. And are promised $2500 by seriously ill mob boss Zeke the Geek Crater if they can track down and return a stolen crystal carving.
GM : And having just expertly milked you of everything you know of the case without saying more then ten words, Crater continues.
Rondale : What's the difference between crazy & eccentric?
GM : About $20,000 a year
Lancaster's Brain usually occupies a hatbox on long-distance travel.
Rondale : It's got a lock on it.
Lancaster : It's the only hatbox in America with chains.
Lancaster OOC : Oh god, I asked her prop me up on the dashboard. I'm the first bobble-head in history.
Amy : Let's just get Lancaster's Resurrection over with, shall we???
GM : You really want to risk him coming back as a vampire, like Hal?
Amy : ... that may have been an accident....
On Star Trek sanitary facilities
Amy's player : The Enterprise plans show hundreds of crew... and one toilet.
Rondale's player : I guess the queue must get pretty long sometimes.
GM : Nah, after some of the things Kirk puts the ship through they just need the laundry
Amy player : Still it's better off than the Klingon ships. They have none.
McGinty's player : Guess that's why they call them Klingons
Everybody else : *facepalm*
Lancaster's player : No wonder they're so mean-tempered. They've been holding on since they left the homeworld.
Watching McGinty smoothly pretending to be a normal concerned citizen when somebody breaks into the Arkham house they've been illegally occupying.
GM : I still can't understand how, with all the things he does, he still manages to maintain a Credit Rating in the high 70s. It must his Irish charm. Or whenever people get near him they suffer catastrophic brain damage from the alcohol fumes.
Whoever broke into Bernie's old place ( or what WAS Bernie's place before McGinty frightened him into fleeing the country ) apparently searched it from top to bottom, finding one of the secret room... and punching a heavy steel door out of it's frame. McGinty leaps to the conclusion that it must have been the hyena-thing and his human minion, and digs out the voodoo doll that featured so horribly in the New York case. On the other side of the world, Vitus's leg suddenly breaks. Happily for Vitus, it's the work of moments to figure out where the attack originated ( yet another 01 roll! I must be getting two or three of these a session the last few games!) and dispatch a response in kind. Less happily, McGinty has had time to rig the saferoom with a crateful of grenades, whilst he himself heads back down to Boston and anticipates a phonecall from the police about his house exploding.
Amy and Lancaster's Brain have been having their own problems. Such a rather alarming thing that's been knocking on her apartment door. And third-storey windows, trying to get in.
The Thing is less than clear-spoken about its nature or mission.
McGinty : Hey! You! Where's Keetling!
Thing : Where the wish is father to the thought.
McGinty : An address would be nice
Rondale : Right! Let's go!
McGinty : t' wot?
Rondale : Muskrat Falls
McGinty : t' wot?
Rondale : In Pennsylvania!
McGinty : t' wot?
GM : You're just calling him that deliberately, aren't you?
But once interstate things start going slightly awry. For one thing Rondale empties a dragon's breath shotgun round into an unarmed woman as soon as he sees her. In front of a Sheriff. And then uses a normal round to blow a doorlock off and kick his way in. Which is when the room beyond unfolds into infinite space and impossible light poured down on them from above.
The session closed with Lancaster's view from the dashboard of the truck - McGinty & Rondale diving from a second storey window, Amy dragging a stupefied sheriff out the door by his collar, and McGinty & Rondale ignoring their injuries as they run around the house frantically firing incendiary rounds through every window....
For Fans Of The Foul Tempered Gnoll, a new tag - Sic Vitus Est. Revisit all your favourite stories about one of the Guild's more memorable utter bastards. http://drhoz.livejournal.com/tag/sic%20vitus%20est
June 1924 - First half of Fred Behrendt's Mansion of Madness from Mansions of Madness. In which a collector of some really creepy paintings has gone missing, and they volunteer to track him down. It'll get Lancaster out of the house, for one thing, even though he's still just a brain in a jar.
Elsewhere, Agent Landing of the Office of Naval Intelligence has put together a brief file regarding one Jackson Elias, occult writer. According to the investigator's pet spook, he's just arrived in Nairobi, and has a subject for a new book in mind - apparently not all the members of the infamously ill-fated Carlyle Expedition are dead! And according to Elias it looks like a cult was involved!
Despite the difficulty of running your business when you're a head in a jar, word HAS reached Lancaster, via the rare book network, of an odd development in the trade. Somebody in Cairo is sending out standing orders for any rare or unique Arabic texts on Astronomy & Magic they can get hold of. And they're willing to pay a premium.
And McGinty also received word that somebody broke into his farmhouse/Warehouse 23 in Charing Cross. The burglars searched the house top to bottom but they weren't caught, alas. Nor did the the neighbours get a good description of them. By an odd co-incidence somebody bearing an exact resemblance to the minion used by the hyena-headed werewolf-thing that repeatedly kicked McGinty testicles up into his abdominal cavity, a few years back, came sniffing around Rondale & McGinty's Automotive & Electrical Repair shop whilst McGinty was out. They were apparently attempting to track down and purchase a unique Arabic text on Astronomy, Maths, and Magic they for some reason thought McGinty had acquired.
One thing McGinty has acquired - or at least acquired legally, with actual money and receipts changing hands - is a funeral plot.
McGinty : In case I need somewhere to hide a body in a hurry
GM : *headdesk* I'm sure you'll have no trouble finding someone to fill it.
He also blows $1400 on an apartment in Arkham for his friend Kelley and his vampire sibling Hal. And lets them stay there rent free. Thus turning a large pile of stolen gang cash into a tax write-off for himself.
GM : How does he keep doing this? He does things that at first glance seem outright insane, and they all turn out to be brilliant ideas.
Lancaster's player : He's a Drunken Master of life.
Back in Massachusetts it's good to know that the Boston Police are good for something - they've just broken up an occult group that was planning a human sacrifice! Too late for the victim, alas. Two of the members were taken alive by the police, but the leader apparently got away. In other occult news, Mina "Margery" Crandon, wife of a wealthy Boston surgeon and socialite, Dr. Le Roi Goddard Crandon was submitted as a candidate to Scientific American magazine, as a medium who could demonstrate telekinetic ability under scientific controls. Her séance circles include luminary members of the Boston upper class and Ivy League elite. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle gave her significant credibility. She's became so popular that her prayers are read by the US Army. And Committee Secretary Malcom Bird has leaked to the press that the Committee are leaning toward a positive vote - it looks like she's the real McCoy!
GM : McGi... Lancaster's Brain. I was about to say McGinty's Brain... but what brain would that be?
Rondale : I don't have any problems with my sister dating, I just don't want her dating any occult types or anybody remotely connected to the Mafia.
GM : So Irish gangsters, Jewish gangsters, Yakusa, Triads, and the Union Corse would all be fine?
Threatening to tell Lancaster's daughter everything that's happened to him if he doesn't agree to be sawn open like a tin of beans, reduced to calcined powder, and reconstituted as a probable vampire.
McGinty : *holds up Lancaster's jar* This is your father's brain. *holds on his head like a hat and dances around* This is your father's brain on McGinty
GM : What about your late brother, Amy?
McGinty : I could bring him back for you.
Amy : No! Just no!
McGinty : Not even to ask his ghost if he's happy?
Amy : No!!! I just hope he isn't lingering, that's he's gone to wherever people finally go when they die!
GM : I suspect he means he could bring your brother's ghost back whether it wants to or not
Amy : Oh god! *hugs knees and shakes*
Rondale : McGinty, let's not violate natural order today, ok?
Amy Wells : But McGinty casting any spells whilst sober is against the nature order!
To the considerable shock of the Detective Sergeant that's been handling both the kidnapping and the the cult cases, McGinty and company soon make significant breakthroughs in both, AND correctly identify the informant the police has been protecting with a false name. All this and still find time to play Lancaster's canister like the bongos. And are promised $2500 by seriously ill mob boss Zeke the Geek Crater if they can track down and return a stolen crystal carving.
GM : And having just expertly milked you of everything you know of the case without saying more then ten words, Crater continues.
Rondale : What's the difference between crazy & eccentric?
GM : About $20,000 a year
Lancaster's Brain usually occupies a hatbox on long-distance travel.
Rondale : It's got a lock on it.
Lancaster : It's the only hatbox in America with chains.
Lancaster OOC : Oh god, I asked her prop me up on the dashboard. I'm the first bobble-head in history.
Amy : Let's just get Lancaster's Resurrection over with, shall we???
GM : You really want to risk him coming back as a vampire, like Hal?
Amy : ... that may have been an accident....
On Star Trek sanitary facilities
Amy's player : The Enterprise plans show hundreds of crew... and one toilet.
Rondale's player : I guess the queue must get pretty long sometimes.
GM : Nah, after some of the things Kirk puts the ship through they just need the laundry
Amy player : Still it's better off than the Klingon ships. They have none.
McGinty's player : Guess that's why they call them Klingons
Everybody else : *facepalm*
Lancaster's player : No wonder they're so mean-tempered. They've been holding on since they left the homeworld.
Watching McGinty smoothly pretending to be a normal concerned citizen when somebody breaks into the Arkham house they've been illegally occupying.
GM : I still can't understand how, with all the things he does, he still manages to maintain a Credit Rating in the high 70s. It must his Irish charm. Or whenever people get near him they suffer catastrophic brain damage from the alcohol fumes.
Whoever broke into Bernie's old place ( or what WAS Bernie's place before McGinty frightened him into fleeing the country ) apparently searched it from top to bottom, finding one of the secret room... and punching a heavy steel door out of it's frame. McGinty leaps to the conclusion that it must have been the hyena-thing and his human minion, and digs out the voodoo doll that featured so horribly in the New York case. On the other side of the world, Vitus's leg suddenly breaks. Happily for Vitus, it's the work of moments to figure out where the attack originated ( yet another 01 roll! I must be getting two or three of these a session the last few games!) and dispatch a response in kind. Less happily, McGinty has had time to rig the saferoom with a crateful of grenades, whilst he himself heads back down to Boston and anticipates a phonecall from the police about his house exploding.
Amy and Lancaster's Brain have been having their own problems. Such a rather alarming thing that's been knocking on her apartment door. And third-storey windows, trying to get in.
The Thing is less than clear-spoken about its nature or mission.
McGinty : Hey! You! Where's Keetling!
Thing : Where the wish is father to the thought.
McGinty : An address would be nice
Rondale : Right! Let's go!
McGinty : t' wot?
Rondale : Muskrat Falls
McGinty : t' wot?
Rondale : In Pennsylvania!
McGinty : t' wot?
GM : You're just calling him that deliberately, aren't you?
But once interstate things start going slightly awry. For one thing Rondale empties a dragon's breath shotgun round into an unarmed woman as soon as he sees her. In front of a Sheriff. And then uses a normal round to blow a doorlock off and kick his way in. Which is when the room beyond unfolds into infinite space and impossible light poured down on them from above.
The session closed with Lancaster's view from the dashboard of the truck - McGinty & Rondale diving from a second storey window, Amy dragging a stupefied sheriff out the door by his collar, and McGinty & Rondale ignoring their injuries as they run around the house frantically firing incendiary rounds through every window....
For Fans Of The Foul Tempered Gnoll, a new tag - Sic Vitus Est. Revisit all your favourite stories about one of the Guild's more memorable utter bastards. http://drhoz.livejournal.com/tag/sic%20vitus%20est
*shakes his head* okay, Vitus and the drunken sorcerer are both hunting for a rare arabian text involving astronomy and magic, and they got warned they may cause the end of the world... and they just opened a portal to somewhere unpleasent. is anyone else noticing a pattern emerging?:P
true, no need to jump to conculsions: But vitus no doubt wants to return to his own world, and gods know what'll happen if that occurs
*chuckles* ah, Vitus, such a character:)