Red Flux: A New Weird Quest for Justice, Freedom and the Self

[X] Sneak around the perimeter yourself while Forresti goes to the door.



"Why don't you go and ask them directly. I'll go and check around the edge of the estate."

"There a reason you don't want to do an open approach?"

You rub your head. "I guess I just have a bad feeling. This guy is kind of a creeper. If he threw her out or something, she might be wandering around in this rain."

"Alright." Forresti says and puts the car into landing. The bunker tower is a high, extruded rock variety, thickly built and coated with thick metal. Around it is a large set of gardens and radiating skywalks. A small private park maybe. It's unfenced, so maybe not so private. The main defense seems to be the tower itself. Forresti aims the car for a landing outside. "Set your glass to silent. You have an ear bead?"

"Yeah." You plug it in and tuck the glass into your pocket then drop down into the seat well. Forresti hands you an umbrella as the car touches down, then gets out and walks up towards the gate. You roll out behind her and move around the back of the car, staying low. Maybe you didn't really need to sneak this much. Aren't you actually making yourself more of a target if you're spotted?

Maybe, but at the same time, walking openly around the edge of a noble's estate is not likely to be healthy. Indeed it's likely to get you accosted by security. You move around through the shadows as Forresti walks up to the door, and make the base of the perimeter wall quickly enough to see her reach the door, and begin to go along it. You quickly realize someone else has been here, and recently. The tracks of the kind of high stage shoes which Halna wears, steps irregular. Oh god.

You text Forresti, hoping against hope the security don't have some kind of detector to pick that up. <<Got high heel tracks along the edge of the estate towards the city>>

<<Something bad is going on here. They're claiming not to have heard of her at all. I'll call you back.>>

You follow the trail along the mud, then reach a paved road and duck back at the hum of a battery operated vehicle. A small electric car, like the ones people use to ride around Golf or Long Bowling courses rides down the path, two heavily armed men in the back.

"I swear I saw it on the sensor!"

"And I'm telling you you're seeing things. It's probably just that queer trying to get back in after the mistress had her thrown out."

Words carry back to you, then the car is away.


Oh no. There's no way that can be true. You follow the cart, staying in the shadows, and find that you're almost able to keep up with it, feeling like you can move so fast as to almost flow between one patch of gloom and another. The cart rolls to a halt

Forresti's voice comes in your ear. "They're still claiming they haven't seen her, but they're lying. They're really jumpy. I think they threw her out and don't want to say why."

"Why would they do that? She was tight with this guy right?"

"His wife is here, three glasses of scotch deep."

"Shit." You peer over an ornamental flower bed as the cart comes to a stop. The two guards get out, rain dripping on their slacks, shotguns up. "We should have tossed that Queer off the tower."

"Man, you're sick. Besides, the boss would be pretty mad if we had."

"Yeah, but his wife would have paid us extra. Besides, I hate that kind of…"

And then he's lifted up in the air, choking, hands grasping desperately at his throat. The other man turns, and shoots at something forming, still indistinct, beside them. Halna stands, revealed in the gunflash, in all her red soaked majesty. She's taller than she was, her hair a wild mane down her back feathery, eyes all iris and long moth antenna sticking from her hair. The front parts of her hands are armoured talons, perhaps from a bird.

She backhands the guard who shot her into the cart, and he collapses with a cry, leaving a red stain as he slides down it.

"Throw me off will you?" She hisses. "I don't think so."

The guard pulls his side arm, tries to get it to bear, but she pulls it out of his grip and tosses it away, then punches him in the face, hard enough to knock him out.

I can't just leave her. You step out into the pool of light around the pole. "Halna!"

She swings to face you, eyes wild. "Leigna… you came for me. I'm … glad…" she cries, then looks down at the guard hanging from her grip. "I'm so… so hungry." Her mouth, you notice, when fully open, looks like a mass of lamprey teeth. "I need... " she drops him and turns to look at you. "Your power…"

And then she's springing at you, absurdly fast. You jump back, avoiding her as she slams a long, impossibly graceful kick down on the cobbles, shattering them.

"I don't want to fight you!" panic fills your voice.

"That'll make it… easier."


[ ] Concentrate on dodging and try to reason with her.
[ ] Try to reason with her but attack if you have to.
[ ] Try to knock her out as fast as you can so you can get this over with.
[ ] The Watcher has been useful lately. What else can you do? (Write-In)

[x] Try to knock her out as fast as you can so you can get this over with.



Rain beats down, spattering your coat as Halna jumps towards you. It soaks into the cocktail dress she's wearing, turning the white substance vampish red. Her feet raise great wheels of water as she comes in, movements quick and bestial. In turn you glide back a step through the rain, the splashes you leave in puddles the only evidence of your passage, horns erupting painlessly from your head.

She slashes at you with her claws, then hammers a punch at you with the other hand. You dodge the first, block the second. She's really strong and quick, but you are, you feel, somewhat stronger and quicker. If you could only predict her jerky, inhuman movements you'd have a knockout.

"You're not of the rain." She says, slashing at you wildly then snapping off a kick that drives you back. "I sense something in you. Something… bad. Leigna. Are you a monster?"

You feel a stab of self-awareness, fists tightening. "You're not well, Halna. What happened?"

"They threw me out Leigna. His wife was there. She wasn't supposed to be here. When he found out he just threw me out without a word. Out into the rain." Halna sniffs and the wind blows a curtain of red between you, "I hurt myself horribly in a fall, and now I've healed all wrong."

"I'm sorry."

She pauses, claws dripping with the bloody downpour, head on one side. "Hey. You told me he was no good for me right. This is my own fault."

"No!"

You lunge in at her, feinting with your fists, then twirling to deliver a high kick to the face, hard enough to make water explode away from it in the shock. She skids sideways, but she has an arm in the way, the insect chitin around her hand not even crushed. You come after her again and she drives you back with a midsection kick. You catch the second with one hand and punch her twice in the face, knocking her backwards. She rolls back to her feet, stance low, arms hanging loosely, and leaps at you, lamprey mouth open for a grab. You meet her head on, grab her head and accept a painful slash to smash one hand into her stomach.

She coughs, knocks you free with another claw slash then falls over into the rain. A mass of crimson liquid pours from her mouth and eyes, pooling and sucking up into your shadow as you blink. Her mouth flickers, then returns to normal, with only sharpened, vampire like incisors to mark an abnormality.

"I don't want to hurt you Halna! Just stay down!"

Halna looks at you, eyes afraid, then bolts, running hard towards the house. You curse, and follow after her. There's no time for subtly now. You just have to hope that your combat form is too hard for the security to recognize. Halna crashes in through one of the big crystal windows and you hear loud screams from inside, then gunfire. As you reach the door, a security man is tossed out through the window, bleeding profusely.

[ ] Try to save the guy.
[ ] Go in at once.

Inside there's a series of louder screams and screeches, more gunfire and Halna's unearthly howling.

What should you do?

[ ] Go in fast, find her and finish this.
[ ] Go in more cautiously, in case of an ambush by her or house security.
[ ] Try to surprise her with an entry through the second story window.
[ ] Something else (write in)