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[5E IC] The Further Adventures of James and Illeana

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Tecumseh

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« Reply #60 on: <03-10-16/0136:34> »
James inspects the gear that's been retrieved from the swamp. While messy, none of it has been outright destroyed. His monofilament garrote is in bad shape, the handle cracked and threatening to no longer retract to keep the monofilament safely stored away between uses.

"Let me do that," Illeana insists, holding her hand out for the garrote. "If something goes wrong, it's better for me to be cut than you."

James can see that she won't take no for an answer, so he hands it over, reasoning that she's good with blades of all sorts - swords, daggers, throwing knives, chef's knives, wood-carving knives - and probably won't cut herself.

"A DAT CU MUCII-N FASOLE!" she shouts out of nowhere. James looks up from his work on the Desert Strike, alarmed. The baby behemoths panic and scamper off to a safe distance.

"ME CAGO EN LA LECHE!" she bellows, jumping up and down, her feet splashing in the muck. She's holding her left wrist tightly, which is bleeding profusely. James looks down and sees what look very much like her left hand lying in a puddle.

"FUTU-TZI COLIVA MA~TII!" she yells, scooping up her left hand with her right. She jams it back in place, then doubles over with a pained groan. James steps forward cautiously, hand extended in the universal sign of "wtf r u ok".

She straightens up suddenly, teeth gritted as she shakes out both her hands, as if she's trying to return feeling to them. James checks and double-checks and is quite certain that the left hand is indeed attached to her left wrist, despite both being quite bloody.

"Phew, okay," she says, hopping back and forth between her two feet before bouncing up and down again. "I'm okay I'm okay I'm okay. Oo, wow. Wow." She takes some deep breaths and puffs out her cheeks for some long exhales.

James is left to wonder if he saw what he really saw, or if this is some elaborate illusion to help pass the time, or if behemoth meat is actually a powerful psychedelic.

"It actually didn't hurt that much," she says, calming herself. "More the shock of it, really. Whew. Where were we?"

She sits down, then uses magic to telekinetically lift the monofilament garrote off the ground. Keeping it six meters away at all times, she makes sure that the wire is retracted into the handle before wrapping the handle tightly with a piece of wood that she had hollowed out from the cypress tree that the behemoth had bit in half.

"When we get back, I'll carve you a new handle out of a behemoth claw. Should be beautiful," she says, as if nothing had happened two minutes ago. "In the meantime, I'll use this sharp little number to make quick work of the behemoth hide." She wanders off toward the corpse, the garrote hovering safely away from her.

James resumes work on his Desert Strike, keeping one eye on Illeana most of the time. He has juryrigged a brush of sorts out of a long-straight piece of wood that Illeana carved for him and a generous helping of gauze from the medkit. It's a reasonably effective way to clean the barrel of the Desert Strike, albeit laborious without proper cleaners and solvents. Using elbow grease, James swabs out the barrel again and again and again and again until he's satisfied that it's as clean as he can make it.

"You want to sleep in your regular clothes?" Illeana asks to confirm. "I'll clean those up if you check the medkit or the survival kit for a space blanket. Maybe we can use that as a tarp or to wrap ourselves up so that we're not sleeping in puddles."

James grabs the survival kit and finds that it needs a through cleaning too. He gets to work while Illeana hums in the background. The campfire pulses, sending bright flashes of light across James' lap. He looks up and realizes that it is Illeana casting.

"Here we are," she says, presenting him with his clean and pressed clothes that bear no evidence of being soaked in swamp water like they were a few minutes ago. He shakes his head, adding it to the list of practical, domestic applications of magic.

James finishes his work on the survival kit and medical supplies while Illeana finishes skinning the behemoth.

"Ugh, this thing is heavier than an ork," she says, staggering as she holds up the skin. "Seriously, this thing weighs at least 200 kilos." She drops the massive skin in a huge heap, panting. The naked, flayed behemoth glows eerily in the firelight against the foggy background.

"What's next?" Illeana asks, rinsing off her hands in the swamp. She joins James, sitting next to him. "No marshmallows, I'm afraid. Should we swap ghost stories then?"

rednblack

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« Reply #61 on: <03-16-16/1153:50> »
"No marshmallows, I'm afraid. Should we swap ghost stories then?"

James insists on going first.  It's only fair, he reasons, as Illeana is the thing that goes bump in the night.  As he begins pulling branches and vines he sets the scene of a lovely house in the enclaves.  The house drones are glitching out and malfunctioning.  Even the comms are running some static, and the 'trix is out due to a late-night storm. 

James uses his cyber strength to split two straightish branches from a young bald cypress, and lashes them between two standing trees with the vines.  "And when they were finally able to trace the icon, they found out that the commcalls had been coming from inside the house."

Illeana is not impressed. 

James' next one is about Chicago, and an undercover Knights Errant officer working narcotics.  He doesn't remember where he got the story, only that it was told to him as happening to a guy who knew the guy it happened to.  Aren't they always?  By now, James has finished with the frame of the bed, and he's hanging large peels of moss over the fire, where he dries them for a few minutes before laying them out over the bed as kind of mattress.  As he works he explains how old Joe Tegan had gotten a taste for the chems he was trying to stamp out.  He made one trip too many into the city center, though, and got caught behind the quarantine zone.  No backup.  No contact, he did what any junkie cop would do in that scenario, and holed himself up in a flop house and a week's worth of deepweed.

"When the Fab III hit, he had barricaded himself in pretty good on the third floor.  I think he was a three, maybe a four time initiate.  Did a lot with Psychometry.  Said the bacteria clawed into him like hookworms.  He could feel it wriggling in his skin as it ate him away.  And he couldn't turn it off."

James gives the bed a test sit.  It's mostly dry, high up and solid.  He adds another branch to the fire, and it hisses and pops as it struggles against the flames.  "It's getting late," James says.  "We should think about turning in."
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Tecumseh

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« Reply #62 on: <03-17-16/0236:51> »
Illeana shivers at the mention of FAB III making skin wriggle like hookworms. She audibly gags, like a cat about to hack up a hairball.

"I can survive a lot," she says. "Pepper Punch? Good for a spicy meal. Gamma-Scopolamine? Makes for a crazy Friday night. Seven-7? It's like perfume to me. But FAB III will kill me as dead as dead can be. Ugh!" She squirms again uncomfortably. James catches her staring at the campfire like she might jump in it to cleanse herself.

They curl up for the evening, laying on the Spanish moss while wrapping themselves like a burrito in the space blanket. As he closes his eyes, the last thing James sees is the dark silhouette of their swamp guardian, sloshing quietly around the perimeter of their little island.

James opens his eyes to a different island. Instead of a swamp bed, he's on warm white sand, soft as talc powder. He's wearing a swimsuit, the sun pleasantly warming his belly and arms. The bald cypress tree has been replaced by a palm tree with three coconuts. Sitting up, he finds a chest of ice cold drinks next to him. He looks around for Illeana but only finds her abandoned swim suit. A moment later she springs out of the waves, skinny dipping in the tropical sea.

It's a dream, he realizes. No way Illeana would be caught in water any deeper than her waist. I can barely convince her to take a bath with me.

He doesn't fight it. The dream is a gift from Illeana, who has the magic to mold men's dreams to her wishes. She says she can use it to create nightmares too, but James has never angered her sufficiently to suffer that punishment. He returns to the dream, splashing around in the waves before returning to shore to roll around in the sand. Afterward, there's fresh coconut and cold drinks, and since it's Dreamtime even Illeana can eat.

James knows that the spell means that Illeana is awake though, as she can't sustain the magic while she sleeps. Stirred by the thought, he wakes up. Before he opens his eyes, he can hear rhythmic scraping. Opening his eyes, he has no idea what time it is. It must not be sunrise, because the misty room and the swamp sentry remain, but the lighting is so muddled and confused by the way the fog captures the camplight that it could be Anywhen.

Rolling over, James sees Illeana sitting by the campfire, carving one of the massive behemoth tusks with a small knife.

"Hey," he says, propping himself up on an elbow.

"Hey," she says back, glancing at him before returning to her carving.

A practical thought occurs to James. "How are you carving that tusk with that tiny knife?" he asks.

"Oh," she says, realizing that it probably does seem weird. "It's magical. It's not a weapon, per se, but it's a focus. I use it for my Centering technique. But the fact that it's a focus keeps it sharp."

James rubs his eyes. He's not sure the explanation makes total sense, but they don't always make sense when the root reason is "magic".

"I couldn't sleep," she says. "Well, I slept some. But I had nagging thoughts. Namely, the fact that the behemoth didn't trigger my early warning system for danger. I never really thought about it only applying to metahumans before. I always thought it would pick up any hostile intentions, but it seems that critters might slip through. That made me worry about shamblers, or whatever else might be out here."

James looks at the eerie guardian, then back at her, asking the silent question of "so what's the spirit for?"

"Oh, Billy is great," Illeana says, evidently having named the spirit. "It wasn't so much an immediate concern really. Just got the gears turning about other ways to design the spell formula, approaches that might allow us not to get ambushed by things like juggernauts and behemoths. I have a few ideas but I'm still working them out."

"What time is it?" James asks with a yawn.

"Just before sunrise. If you're not going back to sleep, I'll start breakfast and we can break camp soon."

She stands, setting down the tusk for the moment and pocketing the knife. "It might be a long day," she says. "I figure we'll have to levitate our way out of here. Usually I can only move at walking speed that way. If we skip the cloud cover and the fresh breeze I might be able to whip up a little spirit that could boost our speed, but that leaves you less armored and more exposed. Speaking of which, take your Rock Lizard Blood before you forget."

She pauses to think. "I suppose I could try binding a spirit so that we could have two at once. I'm not very practiced at it though, so the spirit would have to be small so that it doesn't elude me. Maybe half the size of usual. What do you think?"

rednblack

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« Reply #63 on: <03-17-16/1215:26> »
"Just before sunrise. If you're not going back to sleep, I'll start breakfast and we can break camp soon."

"Sounds great," James says, rubbing his eyes.  He pulls the space blanket back and sits.  With the height of bed he'd made, his feet dangle a little above the swamp floor, which feels oddly childlike.  He checks the inside of his boots at the foot of the bed, and satisfied laces them up tight.

He accepts the Rock Lizard Blood from Illeana and drinks it with a grimace.  "I'll go purify some water while you get started here."

Normally James would just use a UV light to purify water from a stream or some lakes, but the swamp water was far too brackish and cloudy.  It really taxed the filters as well.  Of course, he could reverse the intakes and use pressure from contracting a water bladder to push them a little bit further, but he's sure he'd only get a few days before they went completely kaput.  The sun isn't up yet to power the pump, so James has to manually fill the canteens and bladder before returning to Illeana and the smoldering fire.

She pauses to think. "I suppose I could try binding a spirit so that we could have two at once. I'm not very practiced at it though, so the spirit would have to be small so that it doesn't elude me. Maybe half the size of usual. What do you think?"

"Depends.  If we're just going home, I think a spirit to get us moving at a better clip will do fine.  If we're going to nose around this morning and see if we can still complete our objective, then another spirit would be helpful.  Have you checked things out from above at all?  It'd be nice to know what kind of a view we can expect," to motions to the tree cover.  "I'm sure we'd be able to spot most buildings, but anything smaller could be a problem.  My magnified vision will help, but. . ."
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Tecumseh

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« Reply #64 on: <03-17-16/1512:57> »
Illeana looks around at all their bags and gear and a couple hundred kilos of behemoth skin.

"Yes, 'depends' indeed. Hauling all this out will be a chore. I can't levitate it all individually so we'll either have to carry it or we'll have to consolidate it onto something I can levitate."

She pauses in thought. James swears he sees a little twinkle in her eye.

"I wonder if we could turn this behemoth skin into a flying carpet of sorts. Maybe I can levitate the skin itself, then we all sit on top of it Aladdin-style. Maybe you can lash together a frame - or maybe even reuse our bedding - to provide some structure?" She hums, pleased with the thought. "It works... in theory."

She gets to work on breakfast while James sets about his tasks. She uses some of the water that he filtered, boiling it over the campfire before using it to make a mushy "strawberry" creamy wheat out of the survival kit. It feels strange to be eating something hot in the swamp, but the pre-sunrise temperature is rather cool, especially with the fog and breeze.

James sits down with his pink slurry while Illeana sips at one of her pouches. "We lost refrigeration when the cooler capsized," she says, wrinkling her nose at it. "Between that and the limited capacity of water filters, we should make it a goal to get out of here soon. Let's push forward through the morning, and if nothing comes of it we'll turn back midday."

rednblack

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« Reply #65 on: <03-17-16/1609:03> »
"I wonder if we could turn this behemoth skin into a flying carpet of sorts. Maybe I can levitate the skin itself, then we all sit on top of it Aladdin-style. Maybe you can lash together a frame - or maybe even reuse our bedding - to provide some structure?" She hums, pleased with the thought. "It works... in theory."

"Good thinking," James says.  The frame for their bed is long enough, but he'd like to get a little more width for a comfortable ride.  He splits and trims another branch from a bald cypress while Illeana makes breakfast, and re-lashes them around the behemoth skin.  He keeps some of the moss for a more comfortable ride, and then sets to securing the survival and medkit.  "It'll do in a pinch."

"We lost refrigeration when the cooler capsized," she says, wrinkling her nose at it. "Between that and the limited capacity of water filters, we should make it a goal to get out of here soon. Let's push forward through the morning, and if nothing comes of it we'll turn back midday."

"Sounds like a plan," he answers, slurping the rest of his breakfast from out of its pouch.  He sets a timer on his internal commlink for noon, and motions to her meal.  "You gonna be ok on food through the day?  Anything I can do to make this summoning go a little easier on you?"
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Tecumseh

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« Reply #66 on: <03-19-16/0306:31> »
"Watch the perimeter," Illeana says. "We won't have any eyes on the outside once Billy goes, and I'm going to be tied up for a while recruiting our help."

'Billy' approaches. For a spirit of the swamp, it is surprisingly humanoid. It even appears to be wearing tattered blue jeans with rope for a belt and a bandanna knotted around one thigh. It has a large knife and a larger hat. James is left to ponder the imprint of the physical world on the astral realm, which evidently extends to the rustic fashion choices.

Billy tips its hat and wanders off into the sunrise. No sooner has it gone than Illeana has summoned up a small yellow-breasted bird. Illeana leads the bird over to the campfire, where they sit across from each other and seem to engage in a serious conversation in a foreign language. James sees Illeana empty all of reagents out of her pockets. Over the course of the next three hours, she slowly transfers these from her hands to the bird, who pecks at them.

James is left to pace around and finish the raft. With the departure of Billy, the fog lifts and he can see the surrounding swamp. There's not much of note, other than the behemoth corpse that is covered in bugs or the three behemoth babies that look up at James hopefully every time he makes a circuit.

The first hour goes by. Illeana and the small bird seem to be a deep huddle, not paying much attention to the rest of the world. James is left to wonder about his role in all this. Could she do this all without me? he wonders. Would it be more efficient? Am I slowing her down?

He had been the one to drop the behemoth, certainly. Her fireball had little effect on it, and her ammunition of fireballs was limited. Still, James can't help but feel useless as tits on a bull in situations like this, where basically the only way out is magic.

The second hour goes by. It's hard to be patient while the sun rises, heating the swamp air and bringing the local cold-blooded fauna to life. The behemoth babies bask in the early sun but James just knows that it means sweat and not enough armor.

The third hour goes by. Finally Illeana stands up. She extends a hand to the bird, which the small being shakes begrudgingly with an extended wing.

"Alright, I've contracted some help," Illeana announces. "Cost me all my reagents though. I hope we can salvage something out of this behemoth because I just dropped ¥1,500 of product on Chui here."

She turns to Chui and says something unintelligible. The bird rolls its eyes like a teenager but nods. Illeana scoops up the behemoth babies and steps on the raft. She whistles and Billy wanders back out of the swamp, this time wearing what looks like a tattered leather vest.

James joins Illeana on the raft. She closes her eyes and casts. The raft shakes and vibrates, the slowly lifts off the ground. Illeana holds her hands up in triumph. The raft begins to drift forward at a steady walking pace.

"Punch it, Chui," Illeana says, her hand upshifting an invisible throttle. A sudden wind rises, catching the raft from underneath and pushing it forward like a kite.

Illeana looks around quizzically. "It occurs to me that there's no good way to steer." She shrugs. "Not like we know where we're going anyway. Chui will make sure we don't hit anything."

The raft zips along, headed for a dense thicket of trees in the distance.

rednblack

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« Reply #67 on: <03-28-16/1136:27> »
While Illeana communes with her little bird spirit, James busies himself with the task of rolling up camp.  He organizes the survival kit, rations, folds up the space blanket, and stows his clothes.  On the one hand, it's nice to play support for a bit.  Illeana is always the one to make breakfast and take care of him; it's good to return the favor.  On the other hand, he's painfully aware that he could be truly fragged out here if not for Illeana's mojo.  He fingers the pentagram on his chest, thinking of her influence and how little the symbols and cosmology do for him compared to what power they bring to her. 

Could she do all this without me, indeed?

There's nothing wrong with him being there to provide fire support.  Even if he doesn't remember his history, it's a role that he feels comfortable in, right with, and it seems plenty noble, if there is such a thing.  It just also feels, well, limiting, and as far as he can tell, his vampire girlfriend over there talking to a bird from a different metaplane doesn't butt up against the same limitations.  In some sense, even limitations in general.

After he's packed up, there's still plenty of time to kill, so James spends it playing with and petting the behemoth babies.  They nip at his fingers, and one cocks its head in surprise when it tags James' synthetic index finger.  "Yeah, no breakfast there, Chombo."

When they take to the air, James switches between regular and thermographic vision regularly.  He doesn't have any luck spotting anymore trails.  From the height, it's difficult to put himself in the shoes of someone, or something, navigating the twists and turns of the bayou.  When they've gone somewhere between what James estimates is a quarter or half mile, he spots a small mound that doesn't look natural to the swamp.  For one thing, its shape is too regular.  For another, while it's still shrouded some by the canopy, there's no tree growing off of it, and it looks more camouflaged than growing.  And everything here grows.  He's pleased with himself that he spotted it.  It's an expert job to be sure.

"I've got something at 2:30.  You see that little mound?" he whispers to Illeana.

Switching to thermo, he looks for the entrance, a small hole off to one side.  He catches the heat signature of a leg first, then another, but thankfully the leg count stops there when he gets to the torso.

<<@Illeana [James] We've got a humanoid inside.  Let's take a closer look.>>

As their makeshift air raft begins to make a turn, James checks out the rest of the area in thermo as well, not wanting to be caught off guard when they make their landing.

<<@Illeana [James] Maybe we should go around, and approach from the back.>>
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Tecumseh

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« Reply #68 on: <03-31-16/0032:44> »
<<@James [Illeana] No need to go around back. We're not exactly being subtle here. The goal here is to make contact and maybe learn a thing or two about magic. No sense in sneaking around when a conversation is the whole point of the expedition. Besides, steering this thing is like flying a blimp in a hurricane.>>

The raft approaches the mound. As it nears, James sees the figure inside walk toward them.

The woman inside steps out but remains cloaked in darkness. By her silhouette, she is young and nubile, with a sensual hourglass figure, and completely naked. Her face and figure are shrouded in shadow; James can't make out any details even with his thermographic vision, low-light vision, vision magnification, and vision enhancement. He's left to wonder if she's really naked - he wouldn't necessarily blame her, given the heat or the humidity - or if it's the result of a spell designed to appeal to his baser natures. If James were with anyone other than Illeana, such an approach might work, but the witch is up against a world-class beauty.

Illeana sets the raft down on the water not far from the island that the mound rests on. She and James both stand, Illeana with her hands up in a "we come in peace" gesture. James sees the witch standing still, studying her visitors while toying with a sharp object of some sort in her left hand. Illeana sees it too and stiffens. It's an unusual reaction for her - the woman who coos at the dread beasts of the world - and James reasons that she has spotted something that could hurt even her.

Illeana comms a reminder. <<Don't kill her. Don't let her kill me, but remember that we want her alive.>>

The witch hisses like a cottonmouth snake; James can feel the hostility and territoriality rolling off her. Illeana extends an arm out in front of James, then uses it to gently herd him behind her.

The witch spits a sharp syllable. Illeana tenses and firmly says, "Dae'o." James can feel a flexing of the air around him, wavering in and out as if a shockwave had just wrapped around him and passed him by.

Illeana steps forward, right hand raised. The witch does not welcome the gesture and raises her own blade. Illeana's sword is out so quickly and smoothly James isn't entirely sure that he saw it being drawn, even though he is standing directly behind her.

The two witches face off. The other witch seems cognizant of her disadvantage in both armor and size of blade. She swings her sharp object in front of her. It's nowhere near Illeana, but Illeana cries out and doubles over as if she had been hit in the stomach with a cricket bat.

Illeana staggers a step or two to retain her balance, then responds with a savage swing of her own. The witch spins as if she were a piñata that had just been clubbed by a baseball player. The witch takes a knee and Illeana does the same. They stare daggers at each other, locked in some sort of psychic duel that James can only imagine. He flexes his fingers and forearm, ready to snap his Defiance EX Shocker into his hand via arm-slide should Illeana drop.

Illeana gasps suddenly. A splash of blood erupts violently from the other witch, as if she had been opened up by a zipper running diagonal across her front from her left hip up to her right shoulder. The witches pitches forward face-first into the turf and is suddenly still.

Dragging herself to her feet, Illeana moves forward decisively. She staggers to the opening of the mound, then slashes her sword across the entrance as if she were cutting an invisible curtain. Sheathing her sword, she turns around and stumbles back to the downed witch, who she scoops up in her arms. It's a testament to her strength that she can do so easily, even while heavily fatigued.

Illeana enters the mound with the witch and James gets the sense that he should do the same. As he passes by the witch's pool of blood, he looks down and sees her sharp object. It looks like a handmade blade made out of horn or a fang or something natural.

Inside, the mound is spartan. There are no obvious possessions, nor food, nor clothes, nor anything else that would indicate that it's a habitation. There's a low platform covered in soft moss that may or may not serve as a bed. Illeana places the witch on it.

"Can you patch her up?" Illeana pants, leaning against the wall of the mound. "Things got a little out of hand."

Amped on adrenaline and eager to be useful, James launches himself back toward the raft with his hydraulic leg jacks. He seizes the oversized duffel bag that holds the largest medkit and spins on his heel. He kicks off so hard that he momentarily wonders whether he has accidentally propelled the raft into the swamp.

Inside, he unzips the duffel bag and begins pulling out the contents. The conditions are suboptimal: it's dark inside the mound and not exactly sterile. The patient is Awakened, which complicates things.

James works quickly, his enhanced reflexes speeding the process. He puts on sterile gloves, then attaches the necessary tubes and electrodes to the patient. The medkit's Expert System begins a full diagnostic and starts churning out simple step-by-step instructions for James to follow. The approach is straightforward and well within James' training and comfort level. Before long he has sterilized the wound, sealed it shut with a generous sequence of medical staples and SpraySkin, and bandaged it up tightly.

Job done, he glances over to check on Illeana. She smiles at him weakly. "Good job, mate," she says. "Now we just have to wait for her to wake up. She's not in a coma, is she?"

rednblack

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« Reply #69 on: <04-05-16/1243:27> »
"No, she'll be fine," James says, taking the witches pulse -- again -- and triple-checking the spray skin, which doesn't seem in danger of being rejected.  That was always a danger with the awakened, even stem cells didn't always behave the way that they ought to with their "mundane" counterparts.  James mentally sets a timer on his link, and turns to Illeana.  "An hour or so, and she will probably start stirring around some.  That was, uh, interesting.  You ok?"

"Fine,"
Illeana answers, and she really does look it, another testament to the healing abilities of the immortal.  "So what now?"

"Now we see what there is to see,"
James says already examining the floor of the witches hut.  He can make out the faint traces of footsteps, all the same size and matching the witch.  It seems that she spends a lot of time in here looking out and probably practicing her mojo while she does so.  On the interior walls, James is able to pick out a jaw here, a few teeth there, the occasional rib cage and femurs from small lizards and birds.  Looking closer he's able to notice a few scratches in the mud, which look like some sort of arcane typology to James' only mediocre training.

"Hey, get a load of this," James says pointing them out to Illeana.

"Mm-hmm," she says knowingly.  "My bet is that this is her lodge."

"So, you weren't just cutting away the cobwebs when you came in here, then?"
James says with a smile, before adding, "She doesn't live here then?  No food scraps, no bedding."

"I'd imagine that she spends a lot of time here, though."
Illeana says, "Probably days at a stretch.

Tell me about it.  James has lost sight of Illeana for days, when she's been working on something big with Sam, or when she was doing something they referred to as Initiation.  Even when she was chanting in their RV, she was so rapt with her attention elsewhere that James ending up spending most of his time outside, or camping.

At first the lodge has James thinking that the woman laying unconscious on the floor of her lodge might be some sort of beaver shaman, but when he goes to examine her focus, he begins to doubt that.  Nature-centered is an option, but given its design, as well as the sigils he was able to pick out, he thinks it more likely that she's a druid than a shaman.  Or maybe a Wiccan, and a Goddess worshipper like Illeana.  But really, he couldn't knock out some of the darker arts as well.  Ah, drek.  This isn't my field anyway.

James makes a thorough check of the perimeter, looking for trails, or tracks, but comes up empty.  He is heartened to be able to see animals through his magnified vision out as far as he can, though.  If anyone was coming up on them, even as quiet as possible, even invisible, they would be bound to stir up some animals, and that doesn't seem to be the case. 

<<@James [Illeana] She's moving.>>

James pulls up his timer, which still shows thirteen minutes on the clock.  Impressive.  He hops from knoll to knoll until he's back on the witches island, and enters her hut to see Illeana standing -- really more of a hunch -- over the woman, as she starts to shake her head awake. 

"Hoi," James says.  "You can hear me, right?  Yeah, you can hear me.  Let's keep things a little more cordial from here on out, eh?"
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Tecumseh

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« Reply #70 on: <04-06-16/0202:25> »
Illeana goes back and forth on whether to use Mana Bind to restrain the witch. She eventually elects not to, figuring that it would 1) send the wrong message, 2) not be effective if the witch started casting spells, and 3) be unnecessary given James' ability to physically restrain her.

"I'm going to try to send her a dream communicating our intentions," Illeana says. "I'm not sure how well it will work, given that she's unconscious, not sleeping."

Illeana kneels by the witch's platform, bows her head, and casts. She stays there, concentrating on the spell, while James checks the perimeter. They switch places after half an hour so that Illeana can stretch her legs.

<<@James [Illeana] She's moving.>>

The witch's eyes snap open with alarm, as she turns and looks around the hovel in a panic. James pins her down by the wrists, grateful that the bandaging across her torso makes her less naked than she was before. Holding down a nude, struggling woman - especially one with this face and figure - would feel wrong, even if it was for his own safety.

The witch fights but is absolutely powerless against James. Illeana rushes back into the mound jams the local mana before the woman can cook James' brain from the inside out.

"Hoi," James says. "You can hear me, right?  Yeah, you can hear me.  Let's keep things a little more cordial from here on out, eh?"

"Ta gueule! Va te faire enculer, fils de pute!" the witch spits back as she twists and writhes. "Ferme ta gueule! Crétin! Imbécile! Nique ta mere! T'as pas de couilles! J'en ai ral le cul! Casse-toi! C’est des conneries!"

James and Illeana exchange a look. This might be trickier than they hoped.

"She might be mad about the wound," Illeana says. "Professional courtesy dictates that a witch's duel should be non-lethal. That was my intent; I just hit her harder than I planned to."

James nods. "You have a way with languages," he says. "Like the way you picked up the basics of Spanish from me one evening, then Japanese the next day."

"Mm," Illeana nods. She remembers it well, as the language lessons were when they were intertwined in various configurations around the RV.

"How long to pick up some basic French?" James asks.

"Normally about six hours," Illeana answers. "But I think I have a way that speeds that up while simultaneously calming her down."

The witch continues to fight against James' grip, which is about as effective as thrashing about against iron manacles. "Salope! Putain! Tu me gonfles!"

Illeana steps forward and takes a deep breath. The witch's eyes go wide and her demeanor quickly softens, then dissolves. She shrinks back and James has the impression that she would melt into turf if she could.

He looks back at Illeana, wondering what she's doing. She has a look in her eye that he has to admit is truly frightening. It's not the look of a monster or a vampire, but of controlled power and fury that could wipe the Earth clean. It's a look that might stop a juggernaut in its path, and maybe even give a dragon a moment's pause. He's glad he's not on the receiving end.

The witch recoils, curling into the fetal position. James hopes that the SpraySkin holds.

"James, please excuse us," Illeana says with a voice that might chill the blood of Damien Knight. James nods and is glad to step outside for some air.



Time passes as James checks the perimeter again and makes sure the raft is secure. Outside, he doesn't see much other than plenty of alligators. Inside, he can hear muffled voices. The witch appears to be speaking freely and quickly, likely trying to save her own skin.

An hour goes by. James starts to hear Illeana's voice more often. She occasionally interjects a simple question in French, which are usually greeted with a profusion of words from the witch. James' Spanish allows him to pick out the occasional cognate but most of it sounds like two birds chattering at each other.

James grabs a snack from the raft, settling on a BerryWow! ProteinPow! bar. He washes it down with some tepid water which isn't refreshing in the least. Thankfully Illeana's bound spirit is keeping conditions cool outside, but it isn't much company.

Inside, the language gets louder and more excitable. Illeana is speaking more frequently and more confidently in French. The witch responds in gushing paragraphs. Piqued, James decides to poke his head inside the mound.

Illeana looks up and smiles warmly. The witch looks completely different. Not physically - she's still bandaged up - but her expression is enthusiastic and eager.

"We made up," Illeana announces. "Birds of a feather. She's excited to have someone to talk to for the first time."

"Ah," James says, nodding. He supposes that's good and implies a positive exchange of knowledge. He also wonders if he has managed to become the third wheel... again. Memories of her spending days and weeks off with Sam flood his mind as he watches the two women return to their conversation that he interrupted.

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« Reply #71 on: <04-11-16/1356:06> »
James fingers the witch's focus in one of the pockets of his chameleon suit. 

<<@Illeana [James] Should we return her focus to her?  If we're all buddy-buddy now, it might make a nice show of good will.>>

Illeana's texted response is short and clipped, leaving James with the impression that the pair is beyond such social niceties already. 

The pair of witches resume their chattering, and James wonders absently if he'd be less left out if they were speaking English.  Probably it would be beyond him anyway.  "Let me know if you need anything," he says before ducking back out of the hut.

"You wouldn't know how to play spades by any chance, would you?" James asks the spirit out by the "raft."  "Yeah, I thought not."

Maybe I should take up smoking, James thinks as he starts re-evaluating their gear.  Through the cloud cover, he estimates the position of the sun, and then makes another estimation on the time.  Glancing back to the hut, he thinks, Well, she doesn't seem in much of a hurry anymore.

Slinging the Ares Desert Strike, James climbs a tree, and then uses his cyber spur to cut a few branches away.  In a few minutes, he's constructed a blind for himself, and uses another branch to stabilize his arm as he lines up shots on a few of the alligators about seventy meters out.  Plink, plink, plink.  He sighs, and waits for Illeana to finish up.
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« Reply #72 on: <04-14-16/1944:14> »
<<@James [Illeana] Yes, we should return the focus. I know I would be a meaningful gesture to me.>>

James enters the hut and returns the knife. The witch's eyes light up with gratitude.

James then announces his intention to go swimming in the swamp to go look for smugglers. Illeana gives him a look.

Well that's crazy, she thinks to herself. But what did I expect? He's dating a vampire. He's obviously not right in the head to begin with.

Illeana translates James' intentions into French for the benefit of the witch. The other woman clearly thinks there has been some confusion in translation. Illeana repeats herself and mimes swimming, nodding at the witch convey James' seriousness. The witch flicks her hand dismissively and gives an exasperated "pah!"

"I'll send the spirits with you," Illeana says. "The air spirit is bound and will do what you tell it to do. The water spirit won't, and will depart at sundown. Try to be back by then or I'll start to worry. Send the air spirit if you need help."

Before he goes, Illeana fashions a couple of healing preparations for James. The witches watches the process with intense curiosity and asks numerous questions throughout the enchanting. Illeana answers in her halting French as best as she is able.

"It's hard because I have the French of a five-year old," Illeana explains to James. "Who knows what I'm actually saying."

Apparently now convinced that James is serious, the witch pipes up and goes into a long and detailed description of the smugglers that completely flies over the head of Illeana's limited French. "She says go that way," Illeana summarizes, pointing to the north.

James makes his final preparations and steps into the slimy waters of the tiny island's north short. His boot sinks into the goopy muck, offering no resistance to his body weight. He slips on his ballistic mask and tips forward face-first into the clouded waters, trying to keep it out of his mouth. The Rock Lizard Blood will keep him healthy, but nothing's going to get that taste out of his mouth if he's not careful. He switches to his internal air tanks and endures the momentary discomfort of no longer having to inhale.

The waters are warm and James worries about overheating from exertion until he remembers that the air spirit will counter that. He takes his first stroke; the magic of the water spirit launches him forward as if he were a racing scull full of cybered-up rowers. He takes another stroke and the effect is the same. The effect is dependent on him to provide the forward locomotion, providing a curious fast-slow-fast rhythm to his pace between strokes.

He swims north, deeper into the swamp.

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« Reply #73 on: <04-20-16/1308:41> »
At his first step into the swamp water James feels the much sliding up to his calf.  Yep, out in the swamp looking for immortality, and going on a swim to find contraband while my vampire girlfriend unravels the mysteries of the universe with an almost as attractive naked witch.  In French.  I am fraggin' certifiable, if any hoop is.  He pushes off, and the tug of the spirit's movement power propels him forward at an inhuman pace.  He heasee ands in the directions Illeana had pointed to, and after about fifty meters he pulls himself out of the water and up a tree.  Scanning the horizon James can make out where some low-hanging branches have been cut back to allow for water crafts. 

Slipping back into the water, James continues on his way with more certainty now that he has a solid lead on the route the smugglers are possibly taking.  Too bad he's not on the ground.  All the other obvious reasons aside, with ground tracks James would be able to tell which direction they were heading.  Instead, he's got to make his best guess and just head inland.  A couple times James needs to reconnoiter his way around alligators, but he does well at keeping his eye on the tracks, and makes good time.  It's an unsettling sensation having the spirit propel him forward as he swims, his head just above the water and cutting a wake like a Mitsubishi Waterbug.  He's used to his own enhanced speed and strength.  At this point he's even used to how Illeana has improved his mental faculties, making him much more able to piece together patterns, social cues, and better read potential opponents and allies.  But the spirit at his back in a different beast altogether.  For one thing, when he tries to slow down or change directions, there's a substantial period of lag before the spirit adjusts as well.  For another, the cyberware and Illeana's spells feel as much a part of him as, well, he does; but the spirit is unmistakably a foreign influence.  Still, he's grateful for the help, and finds himself praying to Hecate as he swims that he will protect him and keep him clear of any mana ebbs, and surges. 

For the next half-kilometer, it's all swim, stop, observe, and swim again in concert.  At one point he finds a fisherman's hat, discarded and almost completely taken over by rot.  Hope the owner made it out better, he thinks to himself before continuing on. 
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« Reply #74 on: <04-20-16/1524:39> »
James proceeds forward, following the broken branches as he slaloms through the cypress trees rising out of the mire. The next stretch in front of him is a bit more open. Unfortunately that means fewer opportunities to rest, as well as fewer broken branches to follow.

If I were a smuggler, what would I do? James thinks to himself. Likely head for a section with a dense canopy to prevent aerial observation.

He spots some trees in the distance that match that description. He pushes off and makes his way across the clearing.

The trail of broken branches resumes. James follows it. He estimates that he's been swimming for at least 6 kilometers now, taking maybe an hour with the periods for rest and observation. He's lightly winded but feels like he could do the same thing ten more times if he had to.

There's a dull metal CLANG that catches James' attention. Something hitting the hull of a boat? he wonders. He slows his pace, doing his best to avoid kicking up a wake or making any noise.

"Oi! Double-time!" a gruff voice barks.

"Keep it down!" hisses another voice in response.

The dense stand of trees is making visibility tricky, but when he's about 120 meters out James' thermographic vision starts to separate some humanoid figures. They're difficult to distinguish against the hot swamp air, so he flips back to the regular spectrum now that he knows what he's looking for. He pulls up to a tree and grabs it to rest while he catches his breath.

Ahead, James sees the hull of what looks like a submarine. He estimates it to be roughly 20 meters long. On each end of the hull are sentries on the lookout. Two others - male orks he would guess - stand on top of the conning tower and use ropes to pull up shrink-wrapped packages from inside the sub. Then they toss them down to a couple folks (a troll male and a dwarf female) sitting in a pair of flat-bottomed air boats. The troll and the dwarf stack the packages for transport.

In addition, James sees an air spirit circling around above, likely on the lookout for intruders. It stays below the tree canopy and does loops around the sub. James pulls back behind his tree. Wondering what he can do to help stay concealed, he reaches down into the mud and starts painting his head, hoping that there's enough life in the muck (but not too much) to throw off the spirit. Then he yanks some moss of the tree and dangles that over his head for good measure.

"What's your carrying capacity?" one of the orks calls down.

"2400 to 2500 kilos total," the female dwarf answers with the same hiss that he recognizes from before.

James can see the orks doing the mental math of how long it will take them to haul up that much weight via rope. Their arms and shoulders look sore from here. The airboats don't even appear half full yet.

A slight flicker of movement catches James' eye. Above one of the sentries (a female human) on the end of the submarine, a small ball hovers in the air. Activating the vision magnification in his cybereyes to get a closer look, James spots a Horizon Flying Eye drone, apparently serving the same purpose as the sentry but perhaps from an elevated position.

James looks toward the other sentry to see if there's a drone hovering above him (an elven male), but he doesn't spot anything.