Wonderland, Scene II (Daphne, Erin, Underwood)

"Well, well, a happy reunion?" Daphne muttered. Clearly, no. Othello looked about ready to lose all bowel control or flee the scene with barely a tail behind him.

And the thing was, Daphne really liked Othello. But this?

"Really, Othello?" Daphne chided. "Really?"

She didn't bother saying anything else, though, because Cinder ("Alice" did not fit well, that was for sure) was currently transforming into a hideous monster.

"Hmmmm....!" was all she could get out as she sidled up to Underwood and gave him A Very Significant Look.

Now, if wood could talk, and wood could smile, or bug its eyes out and hint at possible panic to another inanimate object like a typewriter, this would be the time.

"Well screw that!" was Erin's succinct response to Reynarde's proclamation. Othello was supposed to be at her wedding. He was supposed to be jolly and mischievous, with a grin and a twinkle in his eye. He was supposed to make people laugh. He wasn't supposed to be steeped in regret. It would ruin him.

The moth darted around the wagon, banging on the back door and yanking it open. "Maryyyyyy!" she called out. "Mary Mary Mary! I need a big favor! Pick up Othello and run him away and take him to the Guardians or Marduk or someone you trust with some sense!"

Before anyone cries foul I checked with the GM that this doesn't break anything pledgewise

Well, this was all kinds of unfortunate. On the one hand, Othello was going to be spirited away to someplace safe by a friend thanks to a pledge loophole, potentially saving himself from being mauled by an angry mid-transformation werewolf lady. On the other hand, that would leave an angry mid-transformation werewolf lady in the room with Underwood and his associates.

In short, there was absolutely no way that getting directly involved in this situation was going to help. The reporter said something that might have been “Oh, no, wait, stop” if it had had any syllables or if he had voiced any of the vowels or consonants. Sensing trouble, Sparky skittered off of Sergei’s shoulder and up into Underwood’s jacket pocket, hiding under the handkerchief.

Miss Mary Mack, all dressed in black (actually, brown and white), was in the process of washing her face in a washbasin when Erin burst in. The vampire looked up, frowning up at the moth. Something bad was in the air, something was going to happen, and even Mack could tell that. But to see Erin, the same moth-fae who handled everything in such a state unnerved the vampire.

"Alri--" There was a scream of rage from the front of the wagon. Time had run out.


Daphne and Underwood were not alone in realizing that danger was afoot. Sasha had unhooked the shotgun from beneath his jacket, lifting the thing into where he could get at it easily. Sergei followed his friend's lead, while Heather took a step back. She frowned, considering just what to do.

The strongest reaction was Reynarde's though. She lifted her nose to the air, sniffing the wind, and little flames erupted all across her flesh. A bright, crimson-orange fire, that burned without burning herself. Reynarde smelled blood on the wind.

"You really didn't know." Cinder said, her voice quiet. "Why? Why do it?"

"Because... I wanted to help." Othello said. His voice was small, defeated. And then he said the words that the werewolf could not bear. That Cinder could never bear to hear. "I loved you."

Cinder screamed. An inchoate screech of rage and fury and grief. There was just too much pain. Cinder could handle physical pain perfectly well. She survived it her entire life, she inflicted it upon herself as a means of testing her own powers. But this, this was too much. In short, Cinder lost it.

Cinder's daemon-clawed hand lashed out, and slicing across Othello's face. Blood spurted from his face, a spray of droplets, as the wound sizzled. He made no sound, but he fell to his knees, and Othello was sobbing, in pain perhaps, or grief, or gut-clenching terror. It didn't matter to Cinder. She raised her hand to deliver a final blow...

...only to be tossed backwards by a seventeen-year old girl in a half-open dress shirt and a skirt. Cinder went head over heels as Mary Mack cannonballed into her, knocking both women away from Othello. The cat-fey took that moment to scramble to his feet, running for the back door. He scrambled across furniture, past Erin, out that open door in the back.

In front of the wagon, violence was in the air. Mary Mack had fallen into a crouch, and she did not look human just then. Her mouth was open in a snarl of fury, and you could see fangs. But Cinder, Cinder was transforming. She was growing taller with every second, her arms growing longer, clothing forming into fur, her daemonic claws growing even more horrific. Things had just gotten very, very bad.

If you wish, you may Roll Initiative. Mack's Initiative is 20, Cinder's is 12. If you get 12 or better, you may act.

Cinder is at the moment in Death Rage, which is messy. You need to either subdue her or avoid her until it wears off. Her attacking you does not violate the pledge since she is not at present in her right mind. That said, you attacking her lethally would violate the pledge.

The Venatores will help subdue Cinder, but not to harm her.

Cinder has Defense 3, no Armor, and Health 13.
She has Resolve 4, Stamina 6, and Composure 3.

Wtf am I doing (Stone 1)
eat chance die, cat!

Erin tried to grab Othello's sleeve as he ran by, but she mostly got knocked back, spun around, and sent off the back step into the dirt. "Othellooooo!" she whined loudly as she picked herself up off the ground. "Hold still and let me heaaaalll yooouuu!"

presence(2)+persuasion(4)+hedgespun(3) because that will do a fat lot of good

"S***," is all Daphne could manage, while things flashed by. Oh well, scars can have their own charm, can't they?

“Ho-ly—” Underwood quite literally hung onto his hat while witnessing the assault and Cinder’s change: he had known a couple of Beasts back home, but this was something else. Once the initial shock had passed, though, Underwood reflected that this was now a more straightforward situation. For example, short of Keeper attack or spontaneous meteor strike, there were now far fewer ways in which it could get worse.

“Sparky. Hold my jacket.” There was a beep of assent from the jacket’s handkerchief pocket as Underwood shrugged the item off, throwing it onto a nearby hedge thorn in lieu of a coat hook. The reporter unbuttoned his shirt cuffs and started to roll up his sleeves. Beneath his bare skin, something rather interesting was happening.

There was a clanking noise, and the sound of ratchets. Underwood’s extremities never seemed quite real at the best of times: just projections from an old, monochrome film reel, and low-budget ones at that. Now, they were even less so. Under the surface of his forearms and face – now half-translucent – metal dowels extruded outward from the reporter’s torso. Typebars snapped into place. Jagged metal wire curved around his joints. Steel bearings, brass fittings, and spring-loaded steel plates popped into view, locking into a clinch to hold the apparatus together.

In short, Mr. J.T. Underwood was now a very stern typewriter-shaped dieselpunk monstrosity wearing a very ill-fitting reporter costume.

A monstrosity that had just dropped his shoulders into a defensive position. “With all respect, Miss Pleasant…you’ve just chosen to tango with the wrong crowd.”

3 Successes on Elements 2 for armor

And in a flash, Othello was back, and he was gripping Erin's arm, too tight, too hard. In all of her years, Erin had never seen Othello in quite such a state. He'd taken an attack of Privateers on the wedding with far greater equanimity.

"Erin. Get out. Promise me. I'll break the pledge right now, whatever she has you in." Othello said, his voice fast and desperate. His ears were pressed flat against his skull. But he had a Cheshire Cat grin on his face, entirely too mad, too manic. "But go. Alice is my problem. Please... Save yourself."

Cinder turned her head to regard Underwood, her face no longer even remotely human. Where Cinder had been, now stood nine feet of towering, malignant muscle. Claws like a nightmare, a slavering maw, all covered in long, russet fur. Underwood was perfectly monstrous himself, of course.

But the one who was the truest monster here was not Cinder and it was not Underwood. Perhaps Reynarde could lay claim to that title. But she had competition from an altogether different creature. Mary Mack was not some long-limbed horror from a primordial time, or else a dieselpunk abomination from a mad mechanic's mind. She looked like a teenager, a seventeen-year-old girl who desperately needed a haircut. Until, that is, she hissed, more like a furious cat than anything with a human throat, and she lunged at Cinder. She didn't seem to move, just slicing across the ground like a whip-crack, knocking Cinder back, wrapping arms far too strong for their slender appearance around Cinder's throat. She must have weighed one fourth as much as Cinder did, was shorter than her by almost half. But it didn't matter to the vampire.

"Chyort chyort chyort..." Sasha was swearing, sulperously, under his breath. All these problems, and him pledge-bound twice-over. He left his shot-gun where it was, and drew instead a long canister from his jacket. "Seryozha, cover me. If things go bad, put a bullet in her head."

He ran up towards Cinder, and when she was quite close, Sasha sprayed whatever was in that canister right in the rampaging werewolf's face. Now, this was not just any pepper spray. This was what they called Bear Mace. It was stronger, more concentrated, and was used, as a matter of fact, to make a rampaging bear reconsider its options. It could send a human being straight into anaphylactic shock. Cinder certainly felt it, howling in sudden pain.

Mack, being dead, couldn't care less.

Heather decided to add to Cinder's many problems now. She'd run after her boyfriend, even if she wasn't entirely sure what she was supposed to do. She paused for a moment, when the cloud of pain trailed in front of her, flashing lights and nerve-jarring noises. But Heather leapt past it, and she did what she was very good at doing. To wit, delivering a sharp kick to Cinder's hip, a flying leap from which Heather recovered much more quickly than the others. Were Cinder only human, this would've sent her crashing down. As it was, the werewolf grew only more enraged.

Cinder tried to snap at Mack, to bring those jaws to bear on something that she could hurt, but she couldn't quite manage it. The smaller vampire was too fast, too strong, and Cinder could only barely see now. She was a great bear, bedeviled by bees.

Mary Mack grapples Cinder.
Sasha uses Bear Mace on Cinder. She suffers a -5 to all rolls.
Sergei gets out his sniper rifle and starts aiming. He gets a +1 bonus to attack for each round he spends aiming.
Heather socks Cinder for 5B.
Cinder attempts to bite Mack, fails to deal any damage.

Burden of Life: Empathy(4)+Wyrd(5)+Willpower(3)
Talk about subpar rolling. Still, that's 4 Aggravated Damage healed - and if Othello had that much damage on him the Life Burden is activated. (If he had less than that, oh well, lucky me.)

"There's three of us, caught in her pledge, but she can't harm us in exchange," Erin replied, and she grabbed his arm as he grabbed hers. Her other hand she pressed against his cheek, and the tears on his face sizzled again, only now they glowed gold and melted away. Gold light seared out on Erin's face, in a mirror of Othello's former wounds, and then vanished as well. But as they did, the weight of mortality was lifted from Othello, and settled on Erin like a mantle - whatever doom might befell the cat in the next day, would be Erin's doom instead. That was her answer to him.

"I have seen how this ends," Erin said softly, "and it ends in her death, and your tears, and I cannot turn away from that. Outrun her for seven days, and we are free. If you use your magic to force us to go astray, she is not allowed to fault us for it. Do what you must, but we are safe for now. Just don't do anything that can't be undone!"

The moth snapped her head back towards the wagon, as Cinder howled, taking her eyes off Othello. It was reflex, but also a tacit acknowledgement, that she expected him to keep running, and wouldn't be watching him go.

Well, if Heather was going to run up there and kick a werewolf in the torso, then Underwood was sure as hell going to get in there as well. It was practically his duty as a red-blooded American male – and besides, even though the reporter thought Miss Harte was an okay dame, he still kinda wanted to show her up for having intimidated the pants off him during their first meeting.

So: to business, then. Underwood tossed his hat onto his “coat hook” and stomped deliberately towards the fray, clanking with every step. “Lady, I want to make apologies in advance, since I’m not the kind of guy who’ll hit a dame, but I make EXCEPTIONS—”

(Swing)

“…for WEREWOLVES—”

(Swing)

“…who go COCKEYED—”

(Swing)

“…STOP— …MOVING— …SO— …I— …CAN— …PUNCH— …YOU—”

A flurry of follow-up swings, all of which were terrifically executed – apart from Cinder never actually being at the end of them. Underwood paused for breath.

“…Oooh, you are going to get it.”

Burning a Glamour on Stone 1 and then utterly failing to punch Cinder.