Thread: It Can't Rain All The Time (Sabbat Battle 2-9-10)

OC: Thank you to all of you who sent your characters out to join us for this well plotted out offensive attack against the Sabbat. In all my years as a storyteller I've never had anyone go on the offensive against the Sabbat, such a shock!

So... in light of this fact we did a storytelling style for this scene which involved largely your declared actions and scripted story for cinamatic and dramatic effect (as opposed to stat results over rps) - it's up to each player to determine how much damage they want to have taken in the battle.

Obviously no one is in torpor or dead (as you'll read in the combat) but we encourage you to be creative in any wounds you may have taken. Obviously this is NOT a blow by blow but a narrative of events. It's like watching the movie version of the book.

I hope that I did as you wanted and if anything is GREVIOUSLY (meaning VERY) wrong please let me know but I don't think I strayed from what you instructed much if at all. Enjoy this story... add it to your own... and thanks for letting me help you weave this part of the chronicle. -Dee

PS: DON'T RESPOND TO THIS IN CHARACTER... FEEL FREE TO MAKE OOC REMARKS IF YOU WANT BUT THIS THREAD IS SET IN STONE. SCENES TAKING PLACE AFTER CAN BE STARTED ON NEW THREADS. THANKS!

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February 9th 2010 - 11pm CST

Biter cold whipped across the field and into the Westmoore storage units on the rural farmland border of Kansas and Missouri. The tin of the buildings vibrating slightly in the angry wind making a growl like that of distant thunder rising and falling across the land. In the sky the stars could be seen here, unlike inside the city limits and the clear sky made no promises of the snow that the east coast and other areas of North America had recently seen.

Caterina exited from the passenger door on a super cab pick up truck, her beloved Hell Hounds snapping and roaring for release shattering the peace of the evening. “Hush…” crooned the 8 foot tall alien looking woman. “Not much longer my sweets.”

“Archbishop?” A voice came from just behind her. Bastian had been very low on the totem pool until the recent betrayal of Keegan and his lackies in Lamar but, his sense of protocol was refreshing in one so young and so she’s placed him close to her at all times.

“Ductus.” She regarded him with an appreciative smile - his custom body works were some of her best in the last decade and truly resembled the mantis that he wanted to be modeled after.

“Scouts have returned, it’s as our contact revealed. The grounds appear empty, one body is inside the storage facility and from what Gillian says, he’s Lasombra.”

The childe of Lucita, dead, would be a prize that would win her notice even in Spain. For this she could write her own check… and should Lucita be also taken in the attempt, all the better. “Excellent.”

“Shall we move in?”

Nodding, Caterina reached her hand up and pulled the pin on the cage to her hounds causing them to leap at the door with their whole body weight and potence, splintering and shattering it until they were free at last.

“Loose the dogs of war.” She whispered, following the Ductus and 18 other battle ready kindred into the storage facility grounds.

+++++

　

The walls of the storage shed were rent and opened like someone ripping into a can of tuna fish, shreds of jagged angry steel bending outward and in as things both human and inhuman came into the building with one intention in mind… killing the lone kindred in the center of the room.

Suddenly inky black tentacles that challenge the minds of everyone who looks too long at them whip too and fro, whispers seeming to call from deep within them begging for blood and death. Romeo grabbed one then another and threw them for all his powers were worth, no emotion in his cold dead eyes. In a malice filled whisper Romeo taunted, “Let’s play…”

As the tentacles appear, so do all the kindred of Lamar who had come to be a part of Colonel Walker’s grand scheme. What might have once promised to be a minor skirmish had quickly become a true battle as hounds straight out of hell’s pit leap into the fray. Teeth angled outward, gnashing and slobbering, all too human eyes looking mad and desperate as they attempt to latch their vice like grips onto arms and legs of their enemies.

“YOU FUCKING SAINTS LOVING SABBAT!!!” The resounding of echo of steel bat making contact with the thin skull of Hellhound could make almost the strongest of stomachs lurch, but JTM didn’t let up with one the bat in one hand and a beer in the other. “TRY TO TAKE BARBIE TO THE DARK SIDE… I’LL FUCK YOU UP!”

+++++

　
“DO NOT FALTER BY BRETHREN!” Cahill called out above the din from his place near the door. “OURS IS RIGHTEOUS AND WE SHALL WIN THE NIGHT!” With a gleaming saber and mind as sharp, William cut into the bodies and minds of the creatures flooding into the room. Calhoun’s trench flaring out as he threw devastating punch after devastating punch into the undead flesh of the Sabbat forces who swarmed him and his best friend.

　

+++++

　
“IT’S A TRAP!” A thing that might have been a young man, were it not for the fact that he looked more mantis than kindred, screeched in a high pitched buzzing voice.

“BRING ME LUCITA’S GET!” Caterina’s excessively long finger pointed out the Lasombra in the center of the room to re-emphasis the point even as a Bear straight out of the ice age charged it’s full mass at her, a sleak timber wolf at his side.

　

+++++

　
A curtain of black hair separated Kalie’s animalistic glare from the gaze of what was very likely a Nosferatu, as they circled one another. The ugly thing towered over the middle eastern woman and it’s muscles could have won him an admirable place in a Mr. Universe competition. Flexing and growling he tried to unnerve the beautiful brujah with his visible strength and disgusting appearance; smiling, Kalie responded with her own taunt. Willing her blood into her fists and clenching them so tightly that the very vitae within her hands quivered at celerity induced speeds, it then created a tremendous heat that slowly became visible as a red haze that engulfed her fists. The Nosferatu’s eyes went wide, and in that moment of fear Kalie struck his distorted face with all the force of a mack truck.

+++++

　

“Watch and learn kid.” Maxwell muttered to Logan beside him as he hefted his battle axe and threw his weight behind the huge object, his leather clothing creaking and straining under the sheer mass, speed and strength of him. Gouts of vitae and splatter of broken flesh, muscle and sinew spray across the combatants all around the Brujah Primogen’s swath of death. Logan stood back watching as Maxwell moved, a force of nature unleashed on unsuspecting foes but even an elder can fail to see something ’beneath his notice’ and so it was that Logan got his first taste of combat, preventing a hellhound from grabbing Maxwell’s useless family jewels by putting a lead pipe into the skull of the malformed monstrosity. Realizing what nearly just happened, Maxwell paused long enough to give Logan an appreciative glance and Logan returned it with a ’Told You I Was Useful’ grin.

+++++

　
Outside Kendov, Lydia, and Maddelana came out of obfuscation and began to work. Lydia ran around to the opposite side of the building from her Prince and her bodyguard and giggled with a childish glee as she realized the Sabbat had made a back door exit. “Where’s there’s a way out…” She looked inside to find her target. Steepling her fingers together she choose a handsome man in gleaming silver armor to crawl into the mind of,

“There’s a way in… come here you naughty little boy…” Her fingers tangled the air in the way she imagined the truth twisting into his mind and as his mind shattered like glass toys falling off a shelf to a stone floor, Lydia grinned. The man howled and as she could almost feel him across the network she was SURE they were going to win this battle.

Then… she felt something, fear coursed through her veins as she realized Maddie was in grave danger and there just wasn’t time to get around the building. In vain she screamed out “KENDOV LOOK OUT!” knowing that her voice might never reach him over the din of the battle between them.

“A TISKET, A TASKET, A PRINCE’S HEAD IN A BASKET!” A cackling laughter announced the arrival of a woman who wore her insanity on the outside, backwards black and white clothing drenched in dried blood, hair that was messed and hadn’t been washed in months, and eyes wide and wild colored in two shades. Sword in hand the malkavian charged Maddie, either ignoring Kendov or not thinking much of him. Claws sprouting from finger tips, crimson blood falling to the remnants of white snow on the frozen ground, Kendov roared and lifted the malkavian off the ground with the force of his impact. The prince, still kneeling on the ground holding a mental link to the combatants, barely flinching as the creature was tore to shreds by the gangrel beside her.

+++++

　
“Behind you.” The ghostly voice seemed to whisper across the shroud as he let his gaze drift from one head of bright red hair and matching emerald eyes, to another. Sheathing her sword impossibly fast into the man in front of her, dropping low to the ground and spinning around as she pulled a gun out of each of her side holsters and discharged them into one and then another Hellhound as they leapt for her throat.

The man with her sword in his throat, an impossibly grievous wound to be sure, began to stir. “Emma…” There was no immediate reply to his relaxed warning but as the man pulled her sword free and looked intent upon returning it to her in a very meaningful way, his beast reared it‘s ugly head and took hold for a moment, “Emma!” He yelled his frantic warning across the shroud even as she struggled in hand to hand combat with a hellhound.

“Busy!” She grunted, clearly unable to break free of the two dogs on top of her with simplicity.

Turning to the man who was now raising her sword high above the struggling redhead, he reached a hand out towards the man and focused the energies of death until he could feel the only part of a kindred that really matter… a sweet purchase that wasn’t flesh or bone but something more. With it in hand he tugged until the soul of kindred came free and his body fell to the ground as lifeless meat. How funny it was to hear this filthy murderous Sabbat howl in terror! Looking into the soul before him, with a wicked grin that only someone so near his beast could possibly give, a gaze that promised all manner of suffering for having come near harming what was his… he whispered reassuringly to Emma, “Nevermind, Bella.”

+++++

Ash had a devil of a time trying to make use of the stakes he’d brought with him. Against flesh crafted monstrosities the stake had proven less than effective… and so when the nearly 3 foot long shaft of oak finally slid satisfyingly into flesh, the Toreador barely kept himself from howling his victory aloud like the beasts around him. Seeing an opportunity to make his way outside with his prize for later questioning he lifted the 300 lbs of corpse and made for an exit on the eastern wall, put their curtsey of the enemy.

Corin, whose claws sliced through the flesh of one and then another Sabbat member, watched as Ash made his way across the room. Why her eyes were drawn to him again and again she couldn’t say… perhaps it was instinct, perhaps it was fate but on the third glance she made note of the twitch of a hand that couldn’t have been the fault of the Toreador disappearing through the hole in the wall alone.

Ash put the body down onto the ground in what he considered to be a safe distance from the fray. For a moment he weighed the importance of keeping this one safe and alive vs. returning to help his friend inside, looking back he could see the battle raging on and the Irish gangrel woman, Corin, leaping out the hole behind him for some unknown reason. Preparing for the worst, a turn coat, he took a defensive stance.

Corin watched as the “staked” kindred behind Ash rose up, hissing she charged at him headlong and heedless of Ash’s clear misunderstanding of the situation. Leaping just a few feet short of Ash she flew through the air and collided with Ash’s “prisoner” and thrust her claws deeply into the beast again and again and again. Each strike a win over her former Sabbat masters, a ounce of personal strength reclaimed, a moment where SHE was the master and not the submissive victim. She roared with rage as blindly she struck over and over.

“CORIN!” Ash’s shout broke her from her from the place her mind had gone and she realized the thing had ashed under her moments ago and all she was stabbing now was the earth itself. “It’s dead.”

+++++

Benjamin noted with a detached sense of wonder that their bodies crashed into one another making an interesting cacophony of bone, steel, shell, and something else? It was very easy to not think of this THING as human… or kindred for that matter. It was as monstrous as his 9 foot tall bear form was and it’s hits nearly as devastating. Crashing through the mob they were the big kids on the playground, as some of his more modern friends might say… funny the odd things that went through your mind when you were pretty damn certain this fight might be your last.

Looking down at the wolf that came in and out of his line of sight again and again, Amanda Winters had proven herself as tenacious and determined as any kindred he’d known. Again and again she was thrown from the Tzimisce and despite the blood she was using and the wounds she was taking, she just kept coming. Twice he’d met her eyes and seen something there and felt exactly what Chavel had told him about… and he used that strength, silently thankful that such an alien and inhuman creature likely didn’t have such reserves to draw from.

When his paw finally broke under it’s flesh crafted armor, Benjamin could see the horror in it’s eyes and as he grabbed onto something soft and fleshy… less than she had been anywhere else on her body he knew that despite the wounds he’d taken, the battle was about to turn.

By God… they were going to win!

+++++

To the monster who Benjamin was fighting’s horror… someone in the Sabbat ranks called for a retreat. The thing bellowed and while there was hesitation some still found the strength to follow the orders of the mantis looking man but not all of them wanted to simply leave… some seemed to want to finish off a meaningful piece on the chess board as they went and so it was that four nasty looking fellows were charging towards Kendov and Maddie and with Kendov already engaging another, William knew that this wasn’t going to end well.

“CALHOUN!” He screamed out, lashing out with his mind and charging in with his sabre high even as Maddie pulled to her feet, aware that death was on it’s way. Nathaniel turned and joined William and Maxwell was quick to do the same but the whole ordeal was utter chaos and from where Torin stood, nothing good was about to occur.

In horror he watched the stake slide into Cahill’s back and he broke into a run. He didn’t know the man but he could see all he needed to know about him to make his decision. Falling in atop him to block the incoming blow which was meant to kill, Torin raised a hand and commanded… “STOP!” in his most ferocious voice and as if the man hit a wall, his weapon fell to his side and Torin was able to pull the stake from Cahill’s chest.

JD wandered into the fray as the insanity was spilling outside and he watched the red haired man sliding in to shield the other. Freeing a sword from his hip he waded into the fray. Like a skilled butcher the young brujah worked. Each motion purposeful and not wasteful, none giving an opportunity for exploitation. While some men’s art with the sword might be called beautiful or graceful, his was nothing short of expert and precise… a surgeon culling the rot of kindred society from the body of the earth. A flurry of blows and parries, a hand outstretched to knock aside one of the ghoul’d dogs sent it to the ground, and still he moved on like a man swimming upstream towards a target he did not know.

Torin looked up in time to see JD enter fray and come to fight at his side just as Cahill rose up with a thankful glance to his newest friend. Without a word Cahill joined the rest of the city in cleaning up the remnants of the Sabbat force and as horrible as it had been, it had been an impossibly fast task. Vitae on the wind, ash and rotting corpses all around the masquerade safe … the group took a moment to assess themselves in silence, the bitter cold winter winds howling across the plain.

JD leaned against the back end of someone’s car and lit a cigarette, looking around at the people he did not yet know. The man on the ground, Cahill - or so he heard someone call him, was putting on his hat checking on the woman who fit the description of the city’s Prince Maddalena.

The man called Calhoun was shaking the hand of the red haired fellow on the ground, Torin the man introduced himself as.

Maxwell, who he did know, was patting a woman he called ‘Red’ on the back and telling her to thank Mr. Giovanni… who, he noted, he did not see among the assembled.

A middle eastern woman, whom a young street kid called Mom, emerged from inside the barn looking like she’d seen better nights. Her smile at the young man would have named her his sire even if he hadn’t said it flat out. ‘Red’ called out to the woman… Kalie and the three… the childe Logan, joined one another.

A gangrel, who was a giant bear inside the structure, emerged as a man… and with him, a beautiful woman who was fussing over his arm that looked as though it was nearly useless at his side. Benjamin, that was what the gangrel who had been outside, called him and in return he was called Kendov…. They greeted each other as gangrel so often did after victory. Comrads and brothers in battle and victory.

A pretty woman came running around from the back of the building squealing for Maddalana, thus confirming it WAS in fact the prince, and he watched this woman named Lydia meet with the prince as if they were sisters.

Everyone seemed intent on finding someone they cared about in this group, confirming their allies and … could it be, friends? Were okay, all except one. A lone man, handsome and thin, dark hair and eyes… stumbled out and looked on the group as separately as he himself had.

It was a nice illusion … a pretty picture but, how long would it last?

　

+++++

“Mother gave chase… but I’ll be honest… we’re not likely to get the Archbishop back from whatever Lasombra grabbed her out from under you.” Romeo said to Benjamin and Maddie as he came out of the building. He shook his head sadly. “It’s not like following someone down a road when they leave through the shadows. The only good news I can tell you is that you definitely put the Archbishop into torpor. I sincerely think after this many of her men have fallen… and her own wounds… it will be a while before she darkens our door again.”

As Constantino appeared from behind the storage shed and came up beside Emma, his hand resting on the small of her back, she muttered in almost disbelieving tone, “We did it.” Smiling an overly emotional smile at her Sheriff Benjamin she half-chuckled, “Jesus H. Christ we fucking did it!”

And for once… the cheers the Camarilla Kindred gave weren’t darkened by the loss of friends or loved ones. For once the night, as terribly cold and lonely as it was, was theirs completely and uncontested.