Blades in the Dark Solo - The Pincers - Part 5

Last time, we left off just before the Engagement roll, so we can jump directly into that.

Score: Black Sheep

We’ve been hired to recover the deed to Dunvil Manor from Laudius Dunvil, the black sheep of the family.

☞ Engagement

Our starting lead is Laudius’s (ex-?) lover, a man named Corille. This is our connection for a Social plan. Adding it all up, we get 2d => 5, Risky.

☞ Score

Talitha puts on her most stylish clothes and meets up with Corille, an Akorosi man, in a radiant energy garden belonging to the Brochalla family. Small radiant trees grow between grapevines. Corille is sipping a glass of wine (not from these grapes, heh).

How does he react to Talitha’s approach? She’ll consort (Risky / Standard), so 2d (push) => 6. It goes quite well, and the two progress from pleasantries to a discussion about mutual friends she pretends to know (based on Dunvil’s information). Wicker wanders over to join in the discussion about the trees.

Let’s see if Corille knows where Laudius is. This will be a group consort, Risky / Limited, with Wicker leading the conversation.

• Talitha: 1d => 5 (1 stress)
• Wicker: 1d => 1

1 stress yielding success with a consequence. What’s the consequence? Does Corille get shy (likely) or are we just looking at heat from somebody seeing them? 1d => 6, so heat.

Corille has seen Laudius recently, yes. He doesn’t immediately disclose the location, though. I roll a quirk for him: Keeps detailed notes. That’s the hook we need.

While Wicker keeps him distracted (as an assist), Talitha tries to finesse the notebook from his pocket. But if he feels that, things will get bad in a hurry, so it’s Desperate / Standard, 3d => 6,6,6, critical (and the best KIND of critical)!

She gets the notebook, which has information on Laudius’s whereabouts as well as details of their little conspiracy. The two make their farewells and head to a drug den in Nightmarket, where Laudius is holed up.

It’s misting slightly and the air smells slightly of blood (perhaps a cult is performing some rite nearby). Talitha surveys the area to see whether it’s safe to head into the den, but there’s no current known danger so this is Controlled / Standard. 1d => 1, she jumps at a shadow. Probably nothing, let’s head in.

Inside, they find Laudius in a cellar. Is the young man conscious? 1d (unlikely) => 6, yes he is. Wicker decides to go for the hard approach, playing bad cop while Talitha plays good cop (this is an assist). Wicker takes a Devil’s Bargain: +1d for +1 Heat on a Risky / Standard command roll. This bumps us to a total of 2d => 5, mixed success.

He has the deed, but of course it isn’t on him right now. They go back and forth, and a couple of druggies take notice. Will they leave when Talitha commands them to? Risky / Standard on this, and she’s not very good at it, so 0d => 1, no. They pull weapons and things suddenly look very bad. Talitha pulls out a blade or two and skirmishes with them. Despite Wicker not being very good in a fight, he jumps in to help. But this could go bad, so we’ll call this Desperate / Standard, and so 2d => 4. Talitha takes level 3 harm, what would be a gaping stab wound, but marks armor to bring it down to level 2 harm, “Stabbed”. Good thing she came prepared. The druggies flee in shock and pain.

Laudius knows they mean business now. He’ll take them to an apartment he has nearby.

When they arrive, is he cooperative? Maybe, plus he’s seen Talitha fight… 3d => 6, yeah, he’s not risking it.

Corille shows up? Yes… he knows the jig is up. Wicker turns to him, threateningly. Tired and hurting, Talitha helps with the command (and Laudius is cowering a bit). We’re at Risky / Standard, as this is pretty much just how these things go, so 1d => 4, which is success with a consequence.

Corille is tied to some other faction (unknown which at the moment), due to his social standing. While he isn’t a noble, that’s enough to take -1 with somebody.

Actually, no, we’ll just add him as a Rival to the crew and figure him out later.

This is enough, and Laudius coughs up the deed. The crew makes a group prowl to leave without anyone seeing them. It’s Nightmarket, which is seedy in places (Risky / Standard), and Wicker will lead Talitha out of here.

• Talitha: 2d => 5
• Wicker: 2d => 5

No stress, and we’ll take +1 Heat as a consequence from somebody seeing us.

Payoff, etc

We’ll treat Laudius as Tier I, being part of a noble family, so that’s +3 Rep. 4 Coin - not a huge job, but -1 to the Unseen as per usual. 2 of the rest goes to Talitha, who’ll need a physicker, and Wicker just gets 1.

This was a pretty standard job, so only +2 heat. But we’re up to 7 total, with 1 Wanted, so 1d => 2, Flipped. Laroze is out now - why does Corille make him nervous?

Downtime will happen in the next session. It will need to cover Talitha’s physicker and that might take a while. Not much XP to go around this time.

Pending Questions

• Who is Corille?
• Who is the vampire working with Dunvil?
• Can the crew get a new contact?
• Who is the Fog Hounds’ patron, possibly opposed to the Reconciled?

We’ll play to find out!