Spitfire Quest (Worm x D&D) - Quest Thread 1

Well, I lied. I actually fell asleep and then didn't find time to write until last night.

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Tuesday, March 1, 2011 - Afternoon

You leave Mr. Gladly's class, shut the door behind you, and walk to the closest stairwell. Instead of going down to the nurse's office, you go up to the 3rd floor, then walk to the rear stairwell to get to the roof.

You glance in the classrooms along the way, and by chance, you happen to see Taylor: she's sitting at the desk nearest the door.

You think about her for a moment, and compare her to yourself. In some ways, she's the same as you: you're both social outsiders, you both wear plain clothes, you're both a little nerdy. But in many other ways, you're opposites: your wardrobe is plain but neat, crisp, and fits you well; hers looks baggy, wrinkled, and oversized. You wear light colors; she wears dark grays and browns. You always tie your hair back; hers spills out, always down.

Both of you seem to leave school pretty quickly once classes end, but in her case, she's probably running away. You are usually hurrying home — well, back to the orphanage, which is home enough. Most days you have to pick up some of the younger kids on your way back, and then you have to help out with chores, entertaining the younger ones, homework, and dinner.

You're busy with your own responsibilities. It's not fair that you're the only one who cares about thwarting the injustice which is blatantly playing out among the girls in your grade.

But that's the way the world is. It's not fair, and if you want justice, you have to make it with your own claws. Er, hands. Which you're doing right now, right here in the 3rd floor girl's bathroom.

You begin your quest to make justice with your own hands by wrecking one of the toilets.

You jerk the flush handles back and forth until one of them jams. Something inside snaps, and water is flowing continuously. Then, you take two rolls of toilet paper and wedge them into the toilet's chute with a mop handle. The toilet bowl begins to fill with water, which will spill out onto the floor. Now you have an excuse to talk to the janitor. Disable Device +6; rolled 12 = 18 vs. DC 15

You reach the rear stairwell and ascend to the roof. The door is equipped with an alarm, presumably to prevent students from casually using the roof to smoke — but the alarm is only attached to an unused lock bolt, presumably because a functioning door alarm would have prevented teachers and staff from casually using the roof to smoke. Just press the door literally anywhere other than the alarm bar, and it opens without triggering an alarm.

Warm air rushes out as you open the door and step onto the snowy roof. Gray sky above, damp snow below, the black tar of the roof showing through like tarnish on a silver mirror. The trampled-down snow around the door shows the area where staff and students usually stand, but none of them are here now. Maybe the delinquents leave school entirely after lunch. Maybe it's too cold.

Frustrated, you sigh out a cloud of steam, and warm wispy flames lick the base of the cloud. Fuck. You look around guiltily, but see nobody. Whew.

You walk to the corner of the snowy roof. There are a couple hidden slippery patches of ice, but your balance is good and you don't fall. From this vantage, you can see behind the 10-foot high walls of snow where the plow pushed nature's most recent act of spite. You see a couple of students smoking.

You walk to another corner. You can't see into the alley behind the gym, but you can see occasional puffs of smoke rising from it. That's probably the janitor. Mr. Ross? Is that his name? You think so. Int check +2 rolled 3 = 5 vs. DC 10; his name is actually Ross Riviera.

A shiver runs through you. Right, you didn't wear your coat, because you're just supposed to be going to the nurse's office.

You go back inside and pull the door shut behind you. You rub your cheeks: your fingers feel cold, and slightly stiff. You can't afford stiff fingers. You run down the stairs in an effort to warm up before you head back outside.

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Running down the stairs didn't warm you up much. You'll just have to be quick. You push open the back stairway's yard exit and hurry outside, then pull up short as you almost collide with a couple of guys. They're the students you saw from the roof, a taller skinny guy wearing a green wool cap, and a broader more solid guy wearing a puffy orange hunting vest. They're untidy, but they smell pleasantly of smoke.

"What there," the taller one says, "What's the rush?"

You take a step sideways, out of the doorway. "Nothing. Go ahead."

"Haven't seen you out in the yard before."

Well duh, you're not a smoker. You don't answer, you just want them to go away.

After a second or two of silence, he turns away. "See you around."

You start to walk quickly towards the back alley where you hope to find the janitor. When you hear the doors click shut behind you, you glance over your shoulder, and you're a bit relieved that you don't see the guys.

Not that you were worried or anything.

You could take them.

As distracted as you were, you don't even need to fake being clumsy as you bump into the janitor turning the corner. You bounce off him and fall backwards, catching yourself on your hands before your pants and shirt can get wet.

"Ow," you sputter, "I'm so sorry, I didn't see you."

"I ain't hurt, little lady," he replies, offering his hand, "Here."

"Thanks, Mr. Ross." His calloused hand is warm.

"Ross is my name, but you oughta call me Mr. Rivera."

"I'm sorry, Mr. Rivera, I'm bad with names," you say, mentally kicking yourself. "I was actually out here looking for you. There's a leak in the upstairs bathroom, one of the toilets." As he helps you up, you slip on the frozen ground, and take a chance on nabbing his keychain. He doesn't seem to notice. Sleight of Hand +5; rolled 18 = 23 vs. DC 14 perception / DC 20 lift a small object

You make a show of brushing snow off your backpack and slip the key ring into a side pocket.

"Alright, I'll take a look." He sighs. "I was goin' inside anyway."

"Thanks, Mr. Rivera."

You go inside with him. He leaves you at the stairs, plodding up one slow step after the other. You wonder if he has arthritis or bronchitis or if walking slow is just his personality.

Ow, your hands hurt. You look at them. Some abrasions, plus cold water. You resist wiping them off on your jeans, and head to the first floor bathroom instead.

You pass the door to the gym. You hear the thunder of twenty basketballs bouncing. You're glad you don't have gym today: dribbling with raw hands would suck.

You reach the bathroom and warm up your hands under the hot water, then dab yourself dry with the paper towels. You look yourself over in the mirror, and realize you're procrastinating.

Alright. Enough dawdling. Time to commit theft in order to prevent injustice.

You sling your backpack under your arm, with the top unzipped and facing front. You'll want to get whatever's in the locker out of sight as quickly as possible.

You quietly walk to the lockers. Surprisingly, you encounter resistance: the campus security guard, Mike something, is walking the halls. You detour through the second floor to avoid him. When you come down at the other end of the hall, he's gone. Stealth 5 + rolled 9 = 14 vs. DC 10

You look from one end of the hall to the other. Nobody. Great.

Forcing yourself to look casual, you walk to Taylor's locker. You remember the general area from the incident in January, and from this morning, and once you're in the right area, it's easy to identify her locker by the dents and graffiti.

There are twenty keys on the chain. Three of them are around the right size for a locker. You try one at random; nope. The second one fits and the door opens. There on the floor of the locker are two nice handbags and two wallets, all in good condition. They obviously weren't shoved through the air vents.

Weird.

You crouch down and stuff them one after another into your backpack.

You stand, and are dizzy for a moment. Headrush. You try to close the door quietly, but it clatters and doesn't latch. Your hands are trembling. Fuck. You take a deep breath and try again; this time, you manage to shut the locker door without much noise. Stealth +5; rolled 1 = 6 vs. DC not telling
Perception +4; rolled 12 = 16 vs. DC not telling
You hurry away, toward the nurse's office. That was way more nerve-wracking than you'd expected.

The nurse is in, talking to someone on her cellphone. She asks the person on the other end to hold on, and looks at you impatiently. You tell her you're having bad cramps, and you slipped on the stairs. You show her your hands. She tells you you'll be fine, gives you an ibuprofen tablet and a fast-food ketchup bag of topical antiseptic to apply. She waves you towards the cots and resumes her conversation.

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Your hands are sticky from the antiseptic, which is strongly colored, and claims to have iodine in it. You decide not to mess with the contents of your backpack while your hands are like this.

You lie back on the infirmary cot nearest the window and stare out, up at the dull gray sky. You force yourself to breathe slowly, to calm down.

Your eyelids feel heavy. You woke up pretty early this morning.

You watch the clock and try not to nap.

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You wake up with a jerk and your eyes jump to the clock. Quarter past two. Barely ten minutes before the bell announces the end of class. Fuck. You have to deal with the contents of your backpack.

You get up, wipe your hands clean, and thank the nurse, who is still on the phone. She scribbles on an infirmary slip and hands it to you: she's written CRAMPS in large red letters, along with 3rd period and date. Well that's mortifying, but at least it's a solid alibi.

You fold the slip in half and stick it in your jeans pocket. You'll give it to Mr. Gladly later.

You enter a school bathroom for the third time today, pick the second to last stall, sit down, and get to work.

In all, they have $170 in cash. You're surprised at the amount. You put $20 in your pocket, and stuff the rest inside your thick wool socks, around your ankles.

Each of them has a credit card, though you suspect some are just prepaid or debit cards. You've never had one yourself, so you don't know much about them. Into the toilet they go.

Business cards, receipts, a bus pass: into the toilet.

Two health insurance cards. You hesitate for only a moment. Plop, plot.

Sophia's wallet has some kind of weird electronic card with some buttons, a finger-sized square on it and a small LCD panel. Maybe some kind of high-tech kidnaping tracking device? Or is it even more advanced — could it be Tinkertech? Was that how they got the "stolen" goods into the locker? Weird to think of someone using Tinkertech for pranks, but if you had a Tinker friend, surely you'd find some practical uses for her gifts. Anyway, whatever it is, it is not something you want to keep with you. Into the toilet.

Julia's bag has her cellphone. It's one of the midrange clamshell models. You pop out the battery and drop it into the toilet. Plop. You feel a little bad: cellphones are expensive.

You toss the smaller makeup items into the toilet, but you pause at an eyeliner kit with a mirror, and snap off the mirror half of the case. That looks useful for checking around corners.

The phone and everything that's too big to get flushed, including the wallets and handbags themselves, go in the dirty hand towel bin.

You're just finishing up when you hear the bell for class, and not ten seconds later the door flies open. Search +3; rolled 9 = 12 vs. DC 10

You pretend to do your business in a stall, and leave with the crowd.

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It's 4:00 PM. Everybody wants to leave. Why aren't you being allowed to leave?

The hall is full, students shuffle forward slowly. You can barely make out the teachers at the other end.

"… chosen at random … please remain … next!"

A few people push past, but the crowd seems remarkably patient. You look around, thinking about who's here, who's not. Ah. The stoners and smokers must have gone out the side or back doors. The jocks have practice after school, and aren't here. So it's just the regular kids, the people like you.

You think about emulating the bad kids and heading for a side door, but when you glance back, there's something wrong. Something in the shadows moves. Your instincts warn you that there's someone hiding, but you can't see who or where exactly without looking way too obvious about it. Perception +5; rolled 9 = 14 vs. DC not telling

It takes a thief to catch a thief, maybe? You wonder if you're not the only unusually skilled person in the school. Something to keep in mind if you ever need to move around the school covertly again.

You hear Mr. Spenser's voice boom over the muttering of the crowd. "This is taking too long." Gym teacher: big guy, big voice.

"I have an idea," Emma says in the ensuing pause. "I'll call Julia's phone. If anyone hears a ring, that's the culprit."

It's kind of pretentious how she talks like she's a lawyer, but you guess that's just her mask.

"Alright. Everyone quiet. We'll try this once." The campus rent-a-cop sounds tired.

Emma holds the phone up triumphantly. For a couple of seconds, it's actually quiet enough to barely hear her the ringing from her ear speaker. There is no corresponding ring, of course, and you alone know why.

After that, the line starts to move a bit quicker. They must be letting more kids by with less scrutiny. Fine by me.

You get close to the exit. It looks like they have some of the long folding tables set up, and they've roped a few of the teachers into acting as impromptu security guards, for some reason. Mr. Spenser is bodily blocking the exit, looking each student over and deciding if they can go or if their bags will get searched. He nods at you and gestures at the door with his head. You nod back in thanks, and leave.

At last. That's fifteen minutes of your life which you won't get back. Oh well, mission accomplished at least, and now you've got a couple of hours to get something done.

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Mission Accomplished: 300 xp
+ Theft of significant value: 100 xp
+ Punishment of injustice: 100 xp

After School Activities, Day 1
Vote CLOSED​

Choose ONE or TWO of the following:

[_] Finances: Find a place to sell your gold coin.

[_] Shopping: A prepaid cell phone.

[_] Shopping: Sporting Goods: compound bow, some arrows, a hunting knife.

[_] Shopping: Self-Defense: metal baton, pepper spray.

[_] Shopping: Other (write in).

[_] Investigation: Take the bus to the PRT and ask about the Wards program.

[_] Investigation: Taylor probably left around the same time you did. Follow her home like a stalker with a crush.

[_] Investigation: Go to the library and research cape stuff. (Or research other stuff: write in.)

[_] Socialize: Track down Taylor and talk to her about the events of the day. Try to find out why she became "victim girl".

[_] Socialize: "Hey Julia, hey Madison. They said you got robbed? That sucks! What happened?"

[_] Territory: Walk around the Chapel Hill Orphanage neighborhood, saying hi to the shopkeepers, and look for signs of gang activity. Help locals if you can.

[_] Training: Yuu can probably help you find someone to train you in the skill you want: martial arts / firearms / driving a car / first aid / (or write in which skill).

[_] Larceny: Yuu can probably help you find a shady locksmith who will copy some of the janitor's keys, which are still in your pocket. This will cost a bunch, but you can probably afford it.

[_] Have A Party: It's your birthday! You don't care much, because you're 16 now and totally way too mature for that stuff, but the kids love cake and parties so you do your best to act un-embarrassed. (Note: If this option loses, then today is not your birthday.)

Draconic Aesthetic
Vote CLOSED​

Choose ONE of the following:

[_] Subdermal Armor: Your level 2 scales are subtle, but all over. People who see your body from far away might not notice, but anyone looking at your hands or feet closely will see that there is something unusual about your mostly-human skin.

[_] Draconic Stigmata: Your level 2 scales are obvious, but localized. People who see your knees, elbows, belly or the back of your neck will immediately notice your inhuman skin. A long-sleeved shirt will cover you fine.

[_] Mask of Scales: Your level 2 scales are very obvious, but you can make them disappear at will. Your scales cover and distort your face, hands, neck, etc., but you can make them disappear with a Standard action. Hiding your scales also deprives you of their AC benefit. REQUIREMENT: It turns out this is just a very limited application of the Lesser invocation Humanoid Shape. You are required to take that Invocation as soon as it is available, and never trade it out.

 

[X] 7 Territory: Walk around the Chapel Hill Orphanage neighborhood, saying hi to the shopkeepers, and look for signs of gang activity. Help locals if you can.: (Xilph, john doe, Piell, Karnven, Sheaman3773, Jack of Olives, 1986ctcel)
[X] 4 Larceny: Yuu can probably help you find a shady locksmith who will copy some of the janitor's keys, which are still in your pocket. This will cost a bunch, but you can probably afford it.: (john doe, Sheaman3773, 1986ctcel, Karnven)

[X] 8 Mask of Scales: Your level 2 scales are very obvious, but you can make them disappear at will. Your scales cover and distort your face, hands, neck, etc., but you can make them disappear with a Standard action. Hiding your scales also deprives you of their AC benefit. REQUIREMENT: It turns out this is just a very limited application of the Lesser invocation Humanoid Shape. You are required to take that Invocation as soon as it is available, and never trade it out.: (Xilph, john doe, Piell, Karnven, Sheaman3773, Jack of Olives, 1986ctcel, Guile) (Locked in, will happen as soon as we hit 2nd level.)

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Tuesday, March 1, 2011 - Evening

You sit on the bus as it travels north. It's only about a fifteen minute ride from school to home. The sun is low in the sky, and the skyscrapers of the west side throw long shadows across the river. Up north where you live is pretty nice, but not as nice as the west side's downtown.

You feel good about your activities today. You saw an injustice, and you punished the perpetrators.

On the other hand, it was a lot of effort, and you didn't actually solve any of the underlying issues. But you did get a bunch of cash. Taking the material wealth of evildoers somehow feels very right.

Taking the keys of the janitor, though, does not feel particularly right. You're going to have to return them. Maybe leave them in the Lost & Found, or drop them outside in the snow near where you bumped into him, or something. You feel slightly bad about taking them home with you. That was unnecessary, you should have planned ahead better.

Oh well. As long as you have the keys, you might as well put them to good use.

The bus pulls up to your stop, and you get off.

You walk up the familiar hill. Home, sweet home.

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Spoiler: Diplomacy

evildice rolled 1 die of 20 faces, total: 8+12 = 20

For: Diplomacy

Rolled on: May-03-2015, 06:01pm

See dice roll details

8

vs. DC 20 (friendly -> helpful)

PS: Guile, tell me if I am writing Yuu correctly.

"You're sure?" you ask Yuu, prodding him.

"Yeah. Yeah! I got this."

You smile sweetly at Yuu. "Thanks, Yuu. You're a champ."

"You know it! Aight, I'm out." Yuu gives a dramatic salute and jumps out the door.

He's such a kid sometimes. But still, that went well. He said the duplicate keys will only cost you $80, but you know he's notorious for underestimating costs, so you gave him $120 just in case. That still leaves you $50 ahead.

It's 4:45. You have about an hour of daylight left, if you count all the time that the sky is not totally dark as "daylight".

You drop your backpack off in your room, and move your remaining cash from your sock into your pocket.

You feel ready. You set out for a walk around the neighborhood.

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Spoiler: Abandoned Pizza

Woah, $7 for a large pizza. You can't even get a small pizza for that. No wonder they went out of business. I am 15 and what is inflation?

Other than Blank-o Pizza, your own very clever name for the signless and overgrown pizza joint, there aren't many empty storefronts in this part of town. The interstate off-ramps give a lot of valuable traffic, and the Walmart's always busy so that probably helps too.

There's not much to the north, just a Dunkin Donuts and the Town House Diner.

You turn away from the abandoned pizza shop and walk south, towards the larger mall, which sits right next to the interchange.

☲ ☲ ☲​

Walmart is more depressing than you remember. The employees are tired and unfit, and their smiles are fake. You decide not to buy their cupcakes. Maybe you could buy a mask here? Or sportswear? It's pretty low quality stuff, though.

You leave Walmart.

You look longingly at the Five Guys burger place across the highway. It's nice to sit at their outside tables, even though it's next to a major road, because of the flower shop next d— oh, the flower shop looks closed, empty. That's distressing. You don't like the idea of empty storefronts. That's what the south end is like, what Winslow is like. You don't want your neighborhood to be like that.

You turn around and walk into Super Stop & Shop. You're very familiar with this store, since it's the nearest supermarket and it's where they send you when you help with the shopping. Your idea of helping out the shopkeepers doesn't seem to fit very well with modern commerce.

As you pass through aisles of packaged food, you wonder briefly where your idea of helping out shopkeepers came from. It seems… quaint. Anachronistic. Like you're expecting a nice thatched roof bakery with an old lady behind the counter, but what you get instead is this strip-mall. It's nonsense.

Yes, it's nonsense: but you can't decide if you mean that your expectations were nonsense, or if the reality you live in is nonsense.

You leave the supermarket and enter the department store, Kohl's. You look longingly over the outdoors equipment: 200 ft. of synthetic rope, several kinds of multi-tool, a set of pitons and an ice-axe… all tagged with anti-theft devices. You ponder stealing something, but the store is very close to home, and you'd risk recognition if anything went wrong. You really don't want anyone at the orphanage to think of you as a criminal. Unfortunately, you'll just have to find a way to get more money, or you'll have to find another place from which to steal outdoors gear.

You leave the large department store and walk towards home, past the row of smaller stores: Bell Atlantic Cell, Tricare Veteran something, Payless Shoes, another empty storefront, New York Family Pizza, Sally Beauty Supply and the attached nails place, the very useful Dollar Tree, the discount clothing store Fashion Bug (still not as cheap as the Salvation Army), a mattress store, a liquor store, and finally a video arcade slash DVD rental store called Hollywood Entertainment.

Instead of walking along Route 12, you take the partially hidden cement stairs to Carter Rd., which is basically a glorified driveway for some average little houses. You give them sidelong glances across their snow-covered lawns as you pass, the light spilling from one window making an elongated box on the snow, like a demented cinema projector. A shadow moves across the light-box — someone's there — and your heart rate jumps, but it's just someone inside the house. The house with two cars and a snowman outside. The house where a family lives.

You shove aside the pang of jealousy and make your way back to your own family, a block and a half away.

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"Hello Emily!" Little Alice ambushes you upon your return. "Did you get powers today?"

"Yes, of course," you reply, dropping into a combat crouch and gamboling towards her with your hands extended menacingly. "Today I got a Striker power to tickle you."

"That's not a real pow— ah! Eeek! Aha ha ha!"

You gleefully menace Alice and the other smaller children until the dinner bell.

Yuu lets himself in and sits down about halfway through dinner, which is otherwise uneventful.

☲ ☲ ☲​

After dinner, Yuu wanted to have a quiet chat with you.

Yuu: "Hey, listen."

Emily: "What's up?"

Yuu: "My key guy. He wants to meet you."

Emily: "Yuu…"

Yuu: "I didn't tell him anything! But he knew these keys weren't mine."

Emily: "What did he say exactly?"

Yuu: "Okay. But you can't get mad."

Emily: "Talk. Now."

Yuu: "I didn't say anything, but he knew they were for a building. Like, for security stuff. And he wants a piece of the action."

Emily: "There's no action."

Yuu: "I know that! But he won't trust me, even though I told him that they weren't even for me."

Emily: "Right. Of course."

Yuu: "We can clear it up, we just go in there, and I know we can convince him."

Emily: "Let me think about it."

Yuu: "Sure thing!"

You reflect that you probably can convince this guy, whoever he is.

☲ ☲ ☲​

Evening Plans Vote​

Vote for ONE of the following:

[_] You want those keys tonight. Sneak out with Yuu and meet the locksmith guy.

[_] You want those keys tonight. Give Yuu your last $50 and make him go deal with it.

[_] You want those keys tonight: write-in regarding the key situation.

[_] You'll deal with the key situation by visiting the locksmith guy tomorrow after school, with Yuu.

[_] You'll deal with the key situation tomorrow after school: write-in how.


Vote for ONE of the following:

[_] You dream of the sea dragon's pearl.

[_] You dream of the generous thief.

[_] You dream of the barge of night.

[_] You dream of the prison cavern.

[_] You dream of the bridge to heaven.

☲ ☲ ☲​

If you haven't yet voted in the mechanics thread for all our other level 2 decisions — ability points, skill points, and a new breath weapon attack effect — please do so now!
https://forum.questionablequesting....-mechanics-discussion.1439/page-3#post-291255
Thanks!