DeAnno
Sometimes words have two meanings
If you go on the assassin spree it'll be a new episode and have lots of internal decisions to it about details like that. It's not a small task.
Successor (BTVS)
- Thread starter DeAnno
- Start date
- Mature
If you go on the assassin spree it'll be a new episode and have lots of internal decisions to it about details like that. It's not a small task.
So Buffy can go kill and pillage? Yay!!!!!
Temes1066
To Defy Gravity you must Let It Go
- Location
- Coleraine
Actually, that you seem to have confused your episodes. The demon got her to see her life from "another dimension" (Normal Again-verse), the therapist in that universe talked about how Buffy's support network in Sunnydale (her friends and family) who she made up (because she was just some mad girl in that universe), where keeping her there.
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It might only send Cyberwillow down an evil slippery slope! Regular Willow might be fine, and have plenty of ideas for how to make Cyberwillow 2.0 even better and definitely saner and not evil at all probably.
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S3.5E13: Might Makes Right I
DeAnno
Sometimes words have two meanings
[X] Buffy plans an all out assault on Wolfram and Hart's assassins in LA. If this war's escalation is inevitable, better to strike first, and Congressman Gold should at least be able to keep the LA authorities out of it.
You could take the girl out of Sunnydale, but you can't take Sunnydale out of the girl, Buffy thought idly, a little disappointed to be once again traveling by sewer.
And was it a little petty of her to appreciate Mayor Wilkins at a time like this? These sewers were cramped and filthy. She hadn't believed Cynthia when she'd been so insistent on a change of clothes for this, because all the sewers she'd known were well organized and meticulously laid out. I mean, sure, she'd known on the surface that Sunnydale had nice sewers, but there was a difference between knowing about it from a comfortable distance and having icky stuff coating your tall plastic boots. The dull, consistent light her fancy watch produced let her move a little more easily, but that didn't mean she had to like what she saw. It even seemed like there were more rats here, and that was really a feat, considering the diplomatic situation.
That it was distasteful didn't stop the plan from being sound though. She'd arrived with her team Sunday afternoon, now they'd slay vampire assassins, and then as it progressed to night they would move onto everyone else. The thinking was that between daytime and the newly paranoid stance of Wolfram and Hart towards electronic communications, it'd be hard for them to get the word out and they'd be able to maintain surprise for longer.
The first of those vampires had died relatively easily. He was a gun nut who lived in a basement apartment, and once Willow had verified his presence (apparently even word on high from WRH wasn't enough to convince the vamp to get off the internet), it'd been as easy as smashing down his reinforced door, dodging through a frantic spray of gunfire, and staking him deader. It hadn't even taken a minute.
The second (his name was Garg or Gwarf or something ridiculous like that) was regrettably more paranoid, thus the flanking maneuver in the sewer. The entire rest of her team was the other flank; she didn't want to split them apart any further considering that this guy supposedly had some kind of shadowy demon worm as a pet. Even as it was, aside from Harmony none of them were really melee bruisers, but she'd made her assault party small to move more quickly. And as annoying as Andrew could be about it, she thought he was right; spellcasters made more of a difference for something like this.
Harmony was there as the only other person she had she could trust to survive a serious fight close up. Giles was tougher than he looked, and might have some critical revelation about all the weird monsters they'd be fighting. Jonathan and Andrew were her more or less trusting the wargaming theory the SDCW was slowly coming up with. The versatility they could give her in this long string of battles would be worth more than more merely "good" human fighters like Xander or Sam, and Jonathan could mostly take care of himself these days anyway.
A balanced team called for ranged support too, but Giles was a pretty dab hand with a crossbow, and Buffy didn't want to test Congressman Gold's assurances by bringing down someone toting an AK47. It would be a little too obvious for a string of battles taking place in the middle of LA. The next time they had to bring a strike force into the desert they could bring all the guns.
Xander hadn't been thrilled about his own developing warbook being used to exclude him from a dangerous mission, but she needed him to hold down the Hellmouth and keep the SDCW secure against a counterattack. And as for Willow, she might as well be here, for all that she was actually holed up in the Crawford Street basement.
"It's a left here, right?" she said into her radio quietly.
"Not the clearest statement, Buffy." Willow replied with some amusement in her tone. "But yeah, left. The other group is passing their last intersection too, and the sun angle has all the manholes covered, so he should be trapped now." Buffy had gone beyond wondering how Willow could talk to their radios and track their positions while inside a sewer a hundred miles away. Her magic had been making leaps and bounds all summer.
Just as she was getting herself ready for a fight, she heard Andrew call from the radio instead, "Shadowurm! Shadowurm!" amongst a chaotic background of splashing and roaring. Buffy abandoned patience and took off forward at full speed. She'd hoped that the vampire's instinct to prey on the weak would influence it to go after the lone girl instead of the fourstrong party, but apparently her notoriety had spread too far.
Her watch seemed to sense her abandoning stealth and brightened up, casting enough light that she didn't have to worry about throwing an ankle or anything with the bad footing of the substandard LA sewer. The warhammer in her right hand whipped back and forth as she ran, and somehow the massive imbalance didn't give her pause or slow her down. She wouldn't have believed it before she held the thing in her hands. She was half expecting to run into the vampire himself making a getaway, but didn't see anything until she came upon the others fighting the demon worm in the intersection.
Even the intersections seemed tight down here, but it was working to their advantage. The Worm was huge, at least 15 feet long, but it was distracted by Andrew's giant salamander thing as Jonathan and Giles peppered it with crossbow bolts. They didn't seem to do much damage but they were at least sticking in, so that was something. Meanwhile, Harmony was wrapped up with the tail, but she was getting her teeth into it so she couldn't be doing that badly.
Buffy ran a little up the side of the wall, making space to pass by Harmony's struggles and get to the front. She was about to take a swing at its mouth and all those black needle teeth it had, but just before she did she noticed unexpected motion out of the corner of her eye. "Giles, down!"
She threw her hammer through the space he vacated, and before she could even see how that went she was diving to tackle the looming shape that had appeared behind Andrew. She heard a splash and a mumble of surprise as she shoved past him not-so-gently, and then she found herself wrestling an alligator in a foot of water.
It wasn't as tough as the alligator demon she fought a month ago, and there wasn't really enough water for it to take advantage of either. Still, Buffy was almost surprised how lame of a fight it was putting up. Knowing her freaky powers, maybe she'd just gotten stronger since then. In any case, she got her hands around its jaw, and then smashed it against the bottom a few times. There was the sound of bones breaking, and its struggles weakened, but she gave one last twist for good measure to make sure it didn't get back in the fight.
She emerged from her filthy bath immediately looking to Giles, but he'd dispatched the gator she'd hammer-stunned with some quick swordwork. Harmony was still wrestling with the tail, looking a little battered but fighting back gamely. The salamander, on the other hand, had breathed its last, and pieces of the minced corpse were rolling down the jet black worm's gullet.
Buffy grabbed up her hammer and ran forward to engage, but even as she did it was lunging forward at Jonathan, who was still bravely harassing it with his crossbow. Just when she thought she'd be rescuing him from its stomach, he released a blinding flash of light from his off hand, eliciting a terrible screech and driving the worm back.
KILL
She didn't waste the opportunity, closing before the flash even faded out and whipping her weapon into the side of its monstrous head. It rolled with the hit, seeming merely disoriented, but her backswing buried a spike in its mouth and tore a huge wound through it. Still not phased by the brutal maiming, it lashed at her with what was left of those long needle teeth it had and she was forced to dance backwards out of the way.
In the meantime, Harmony had finally gotten free. Now she dived astride its neck, tearing in with her teeth in full vamp form as it tried to buck her off. It was a pretty impressive display, but Buffy had no time to appreciate it. With Harmony occupying the front now, she flanked around the side and started to really lay into the body.
It was tougher going than she'd expected. Instead of just popping open like, well, like a worm, the flesh was tough and springy, and neither blunt nor piercing damage seemed to do that much. She kept working at it though, Harmony refused to be thrown off, and crossbow fire kept coming from the peanut gallery. It took a while, but it slowly ran out of stamina and finally fell. They beat on it for a whole longer after that, just to be sure, but it seemed to be really dead.
"So, did you get the actual vampire?" Harmony was trying to wipe off the gore, but it was a big job. Luckily Cynthia had towels in the van.
"I didn't see him," Buffy said. "He wasn't here?"
"Our force was caught up with the Shadowurm. We saw neither hide nor hair of him." Andrew was collecting a couple of the needle-teeth that had been knocked out. They probably had some gross and/or expensive use that Buffy didn't feel like asking about right now.
"Are you sure he wasn't hiding in the water? Or perhaps there was a secret passage?" Giles asked.
"Well, gee, I was keeping my eyes peeled during my mad dash to help you guys with the giant monster, but I didn't notice anything," Buffy replied sarcastically.
"I can't get him on any nearby cameras," Willow commented over the radios, butting into the conversation. "Of course, sun's still up, so there's a big chance he isn't even topside."
"Are we sure Gwarg's working alone?" Jonathan said. "His profile didn't say anything about alligator demons."
"They weren't demons," Giles corrected.
"What?" Buffy asked. "What were they then?"
"Alligators." Giles said, poking at one's corpse. "They certainly weren't acting very normally, and may have been trained or under some kind of control, but as far as I can tell they're of the mundane variety."
"Did we just kill an endangered species?" Buffy wondered.
"Not since 1987," Jonathan supplied. He got some looks. "What? Ecology is important."
"Whatever the status of his minions or even his allies, Gwarg is still on the loose," Giles said. "He could be hiding somewhere nearby, or could just have easily escaped down some undocumented passage."
"I have to admit, these records aren't as complete as the ones Wilkins kept in Sunnydale," Willow said. "It's not impossible."
"Yes, indeed," Giles finished.
"We defeated his familiar," Andrew said. "Surely he couldn't present much more of a threat."
"Sure he could!" Harmony said, looking human again. "He could go warning everyone else, and spoil our surprise. I've had surprise parties go that way before, it's always even lamer than you expect."
"If you take too much longer, it'll be dusk before you get to your next stop," Willow said.
"Raven, the sultry vampire black widow," Andrew described helpfully. "A creature of the night who kills those that least suspect her charms."
"That's the last vampire, right?" Buffy asked. It wasn't like she'd be conventionally tough, at least. Probably. Though pinning her down could be way more of a pain at night.
"Yup, the plan was for her to be the last day target," Willow said. "Then twelve more for the night."
Only one vampire (and a few nasty pets) dead, and they were already drifting off schedule. Buffy shook her head, and made the decision.
Vote: Do Buffy and her strike team move onto the next target or do they keep searching around to finish off Gwarg?
[] Gwarg could ruin their surprise if they don't get rid of him. It'll mess up their schedule, but they need to track him down and finish him off. It's still daytime, so hopefully he couldn't have gone too far.
[] With his Shadowurm dead Gwarg isn't much of a threat anyway, and a guy that lives in a sewer probably doesn't play very well with others. There are a lot of assassins to deal with, better to not get bogged down in a sewer.
S3.5E13: Might Makes Right
You could take the girl out of Sunnydale, but you can't take Sunnydale out of the girl, Buffy thought idly, a little disappointed to be once again traveling by sewer.
And was it a little petty of her to appreciate Mayor Wilkins at a time like this? These sewers were cramped and filthy. She hadn't believed Cynthia when she'd been so insistent on a change of clothes for this, because all the sewers she'd known were well organized and meticulously laid out. I mean, sure, she'd known on the surface that Sunnydale had nice sewers, but there was a difference between knowing about it from a comfortable distance and having icky stuff coating your tall plastic boots. The dull, consistent light her fancy watch produced let her move a little more easily, but that didn't mean she had to like what she saw. It even seemed like there were more rats here, and that was really a feat, considering the diplomatic situation.
That it was distasteful didn't stop the plan from being sound though. She'd arrived with her team Sunday afternoon, now they'd slay vampire assassins, and then as it progressed to night they would move onto everyone else. The thinking was that between daytime and the newly paranoid stance of Wolfram and Hart towards electronic communications, it'd be hard for them to get the word out and they'd be able to maintain surprise for longer.
The first of those vampires had died relatively easily. He was a gun nut who lived in a basement apartment, and once Willow had verified his presence (apparently even word on high from WRH wasn't enough to convince the vamp to get off the internet), it'd been as easy as smashing down his reinforced door, dodging through a frantic spray of gunfire, and staking him deader. It hadn't even taken a minute.
The second (his name was Garg or Gwarf or something ridiculous like that) was regrettably more paranoid, thus the flanking maneuver in the sewer. The entire rest of her team was the other flank; she didn't want to split them apart any further considering that this guy supposedly had some kind of shadowy demon worm as a pet. Even as it was, aside from Harmony none of them were really melee bruisers, but she'd made her assault party small to move more quickly. And as annoying as Andrew could be about it, she thought he was right; spellcasters made more of a difference for something like this.
Harmony was there as the only other person she had she could trust to survive a serious fight close up. Giles was tougher than he looked, and might have some critical revelation about all the weird monsters they'd be fighting. Jonathan and Andrew were her more or less trusting the wargaming theory the SDCW was slowly coming up with. The versatility they could give her in this long string of battles would be worth more than more merely "good" human fighters like Xander or Sam, and Jonathan could mostly take care of himself these days anyway.
A balanced team called for ranged support too, but Giles was a pretty dab hand with a crossbow, and Buffy didn't want to test Congressman Gold's assurances by bringing down someone toting an AK47. It would be a little too obvious for a string of battles taking place in the middle of LA. The next time they had to bring a strike force into the desert they could bring all the guns.
Xander hadn't been thrilled about his own developing warbook being used to exclude him from a dangerous mission, but she needed him to hold down the Hellmouth and keep the SDCW secure against a counterattack. And as for Willow, she might as well be here, for all that she was actually holed up in the Crawford Street basement.
"It's a left here, right?" she said into her radio quietly.
"Not the clearest statement, Buffy." Willow replied with some amusement in her tone. "But yeah, left. The other group is passing their last intersection too, and the sun angle has all the manholes covered, so he should be trapped now." Buffy had gone beyond wondering how Willow could talk to their radios and track their positions while inside a sewer a hundred miles away. Her magic had been making leaps and bounds all summer.
Just as she was getting herself ready for a fight, she heard Andrew call from the radio instead, "Shadowurm! Shadowurm!" amongst a chaotic background of splashing and roaring. Buffy abandoned patience and took off forward at full speed. She'd hoped that the vampire's instinct to prey on the weak would influence it to go after the lone girl instead of the fourstrong party, but apparently her notoriety had spread too far.
Her watch seemed to sense her abandoning stealth and brightened up, casting enough light that she didn't have to worry about throwing an ankle or anything with the bad footing of the substandard LA sewer. The warhammer in her right hand whipped back and forth as she ran, and somehow the massive imbalance didn't give her pause or slow her down. She wouldn't have believed it before she held the thing in her hands. She was half expecting to run into the vampire himself making a getaway, but didn't see anything until she came upon the others fighting the demon worm in the intersection.
Even the intersections seemed tight down here, but it was working to their advantage. The Worm was huge, at least 15 feet long, but it was distracted by Andrew's giant salamander thing as Jonathan and Giles peppered it with crossbow bolts. They didn't seem to do much damage but they were at least sticking in, so that was something. Meanwhile, Harmony was wrapped up with the tail, but she was getting her teeth into it so she couldn't be doing that badly.
Buffy ran a little up the side of the wall, making space to pass by Harmony's struggles and get to the front. She was about to take a swing at its mouth and all those black needle teeth it had, but just before she did she noticed unexpected motion out of the corner of her eye. "Giles, down!"
She threw her hammer through the space he vacated, and before she could even see how that went she was diving to tackle the looming shape that had appeared behind Andrew. She heard a splash and a mumble of surprise as she shoved past him not-so-gently, and then she found herself wrestling an alligator in a foot of water.
It wasn't as tough as the alligator demon she fought a month ago, and there wasn't really enough water for it to take advantage of either. Still, Buffy was almost surprised how lame of a fight it was putting up. Knowing her freaky powers, maybe she'd just gotten stronger since then. In any case, she got her hands around its jaw, and then smashed it against the bottom a few times. There was the sound of bones breaking, and its struggles weakened, but she gave one last twist for good measure to make sure it didn't get back in the fight.
She emerged from her filthy bath immediately looking to Giles, but he'd dispatched the gator she'd hammer-stunned with some quick swordwork. Harmony was still wrestling with the tail, looking a little battered but fighting back gamely. The salamander, on the other hand, had breathed its last, and pieces of the minced corpse were rolling down the jet black worm's gullet.
Buffy grabbed up her hammer and ran forward to engage, but even as she did it was lunging forward at Jonathan, who was still bravely harassing it with his crossbow. Just when she thought she'd be rescuing him from its stomach, he released a blinding flash of light from his off hand, eliciting a terrible screech and driving the worm back.
KILL
She didn't waste the opportunity, closing before the flash even faded out and whipping her weapon into the side of its monstrous head. It rolled with the hit, seeming merely disoriented, but her backswing buried a spike in its mouth and tore a huge wound through it. Still not phased by the brutal maiming, it lashed at her with what was left of those long needle teeth it had and she was forced to dance backwards out of the way.
In the meantime, Harmony had finally gotten free. Now she dived astride its neck, tearing in with her teeth in full vamp form as it tried to buck her off. It was a pretty impressive display, but Buffy had no time to appreciate it. With Harmony occupying the front now, she flanked around the side and started to really lay into the body.
It was tougher going than she'd expected. Instead of just popping open like, well, like a worm, the flesh was tough and springy, and neither blunt nor piercing damage seemed to do that much. She kept working at it though, Harmony refused to be thrown off, and crossbow fire kept coming from the peanut gallery. It took a while, but it slowly ran out of stamina and finally fell. They beat on it for a whole longer after that, just to be sure, but it seemed to be really dead.
"So, did you get the actual vampire?" Harmony was trying to wipe off the gore, but it was a big job. Luckily Cynthia had towels in the van.
"I didn't see him," Buffy said. "He wasn't here?"
"Our force was caught up with the Shadowurm. We saw neither hide nor hair of him." Andrew was collecting a couple of the needle-teeth that had been knocked out. They probably had some gross and/or expensive use that Buffy didn't feel like asking about right now.
"Are you sure he wasn't hiding in the water? Or perhaps there was a secret passage?" Giles asked.
"Well, gee, I was keeping my eyes peeled during my mad dash to help you guys with the giant monster, but I didn't notice anything," Buffy replied sarcastically.
"I can't get him on any nearby cameras," Willow commented over the radios, butting into the conversation. "Of course, sun's still up, so there's a big chance he isn't even topside."
"Are we sure Gwarg's working alone?" Jonathan said. "His profile didn't say anything about alligator demons."
"They weren't demons," Giles corrected.
"What?" Buffy asked. "What were they then?"
"Alligators." Giles said, poking at one's corpse. "They certainly weren't acting very normally, and may have been trained or under some kind of control, but as far as I can tell they're of the mundane variety."
"Did we just kill an endangered species?" Buffy wondered.
"Not since 1987," Jonathan supplied. He got some looks. "What? Ecology is important."
"Whatever the status of his minions or even his allies, Gwarg is still on the loose," Giles said. "He could be hiding somewhere nearby, or could just have easily escaped down some undocumented passage."
"I have to admit, these records aren't as complete as the ones Wilkins kept in Sunnydale," Willow said. "It's not impossible."
"Yes, indeed," Giles finished.
"We defeated his familiar," Andrew said. "Surely he couldn't present much more of a threat."
"Sure he could!" Harmony said, looking human again. "He could go warning everyone else, and spoil our surprise. I've had surprise parties go that way before, it's always even lamer than you expect."
"If you take too much longer, it'll be dusk before you get to your next stop," Willow said.
"Raven, the sultry vampire black widow," Andrew described helpfully. "A creature of the night who kills those that least suspect her charms."
"That's the last vampire, right?" Buffy asked. It wasn't like she'd be conventionally tough, at least. Probably. Though pinning her down could be way more of a pain at night.
"Yup, the plan was for her to be the last day target," Willow said. "Then twelve more for the night."
Only one vampire (and a few nasty pets) dead, and they were already drifting off schedule. Buffy shook her head, and made the decision.
Vote: Do Buffy and her strike team move onto the next target or do they keep searching around to finish off Gwarg?
[] Gwarg could ruin their surprise if they don't get rid of him. It'll mess up their schedule, but they need to track him down and finish him off. It's still daytime, so hopefully he couldn't have gone too far.
[] With his Shadowurm dead Gwarg isn't much of a threat anyway, and a guy that lives in a sewer probably doesn't play very well with others. There are a lot of assassins to deal with, better to not get bogged down in a sewer.
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- Location
- United States
[X] With his Shadowurm dead Gwarg isn't much of a threat anyway, and a guy that lives in a sewer probably doesn't play very well with others. There are a lot of assassins to deal with, better to not get bogged down in a sewer.
[X] Gwarg could ruin their surprise if they don't get rid of him. It'll mess up their schedule, but they need to track him down and finish him off. It's still daytime, so hopefully he couldn't have gone too far.
Even if this ends up missing the last camp it's still 2/3 and the bulk of the targets are at night anyway so it's more important they go well.
Even if this ends up missing the last camp it's still 2/3 and the bulk of the targets are at night anyway so it's more important they go well.
Lab_Accident
A 2D 1D4
- Location
- Your dreams
It seems obvious to me what the correct answer is: SPLIT THE PARTY!
[X] Gwarg could ruin their surprise if they don't get rid of him. It'll mess up their schedule, but they need to track him down and finish him off. It's still daytime, so hopefully he couldn't have gone too far.
If we had to ditch the black widow vampire to stay on schedule that is probably the best assassin to give a pass. She will kill more people, but she won't do it by attacking them directly, and the possibility of WRH attacking our people directly is the reason we are here.
If we had to ditch the black widow vampire to stay on schedule that is probably the best assassin to give a pass. She will kill more people, but she won't do it by attacking them directly, and the possibility of WRH attacking our people directly is the reason we are here.
- Location
- St. Petersburg
A sudden hit attempt is exactly the kind of thing that could drag an asocial vampire out of the sewer. Since we expect things to get even harder from there on, and we don't have much training in killing non-vampire demons, a surprise is an important factor in our assault. We should prioritize keeping it.
[x] Gwarg could ruin their surprise if they don't get rid of him. It'll mess up their schedule, but they need to track him down and finish him off. It's still daytime, so hopefully he couldn't have gone too far.
DeAnno
Sometimes words have two meanings
If you want to actively skip Raven to allay some lost time and not just delay the schedule, you should add a stunt to the Gwarg hunting vote.
[x] Gwarg could ruin their surprise if they don't get rid of him. It'll mess up their schedule, but they need to track him down and finish him off. It's still daytime, so hopefully he couldn't have gone too far.
- Location
- Internet
[X] Gwarg could ruin their surprise if they don't get rid of him. It'll mess up their schedule, but they need to track him down and finish him off. It's still daytime, so hopefully he couldn't have gone too far.
DeAnno
Sometimes words have two meanings
You could definitely make a write in vote to split up temporarily, though you only have Cynthia and her minivan for transport. But Willow could organize something where all the routing still works; Buffy and Harmony at least are very fast over moderate distances, and there are cabs and things too.
- Location
- usa
[X] Gwarg could ruin their surprise if they don't get rid of him. It'll mess up their schedule, but they need to track him down and finish him off. It's still daytime, so hopefully he couldn't have gone too far.
Lab_Accident
A 2D 1D4
- Location
- Your dreams
Let's split the party. Splitting the party always works.
[X] As the Leader of the Scoobies, it is your prerrogative, nay, your duty, to say this:
"Let's split up, gang".
[X] As the Leader of the Scoobies, it is your prerrogative, nay, your duty, to say this:
"Let's split up, gang".
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- Location
- my house
[X] As the Leader of the Scoobies, it is your prerrogative, nay, your duty, to say this:
"Let's split up, gang".
-[X] You and Harmony can take this Raven girl alone, while the rest of the group handles the defanged vampire
Harmony needs to be there so that when we fall for her wiles our jealous gf can break her neck
"Let's split up, gang".
-[X] You and Harmony can take this Raven girl alone, while the rest of the group handles the defanged vampire
Harmony needs to be there so that when we fall for her wiles our jealous gf can break her neck