Scion - Petro Campaign - Session 107
Okay...so, are we amazing or what? I mean, it's not every day you kill a mile-long dragon in the war-torn skies of 1945 Berlin! Yet again, we prove that there's a reason we're gods!
So, here's the deal. After reviewing his newly revised memories of history, Adam realized that Zvran had sent his forces to Berlin in 1945, during the fall of the Reich, to capture Odin's spear, Gungnir, which Hitler had brought to Berlin and hidden away in a bunker, thinking it was the Spear of Destiny. So we had to go get it first, not just to keep it out of Zvran's hands, but so that Adam could bring it back to the future and perform a ritual using our time's version of Gungnir to repair the time stream and get rid of all Zvran's meddling.
Of course, the fact that Zvran was messing around in Berlin in the first place meant he must have some people who aren't of that time held hostage there, 'cause that's the only way he'd be able to run rampant in the past. Of course, it could just be that Hachiman was running around there trying to assassinate me again, but maybe I'm just being paranoid. I gotta confess...I'm kinda looking forward to giving Himiko's arrows back to her and explaining how they came into my possession...
Anyway, we headed to Berlin, found a time anomaly, and headed back to Berlin. We mostly disguised ourselves as gestapo officers so that it would be easy to travel around within the last bastions of German defense, though I just dressed in a period pencil skirt and blouse and played myself off as Adam's gestapo moll.
The city itself was hell on earth, a blasted landscape of smoking ruins. But the first thing we noticed was the mile-long black dragon soaring over the city, its long, serpentine body undulating gracefully through the plumes of smoke as it rained searing, pitch-black fire upon the city. Upon its back rode Ahriman, Zvran's avatar, who had also taken on the guise of a gestapo officer with black skin and blazing red eyes.
He'd certainly dropped all pretense of civility, that's for sure. >_<
You know, I gotta hand it to those American bomber crews, though, because even with that dragon flying around, they were still cruising over the city, dropping explosive death on the Germans. That takes some balls. I guess they figured the dragon was on their side. After all, there was a lot of crazy divine stuff going on in WWII.
The other thing we had to worry about was the occasional tzitzimime, who were raining upon the city in small groups like shooting stars. But for the first leg of our mission, at least, we were able to avoid the notice of Ahriman, his dragon, and Zvran's other servants. At least long enough to track down Gungnir. Adam used his powers of magic and his ability to sense time distortions to triangulate Gungnir's position (I don't really understand how he did, but he did, and that's the important thing). It turned out it was hidden away in a secure, subterranean bunker within the portions of the city still in German hands.
We forced our way into the bunker, which had been abandoned by its mortal guardians, and descended into the chambers below. I realized that I recognized the place! In our time, It's been turned into an incredible industrial club called Gott-Maschine (lit. God Machine)! I've performed there several times! So cool!
But the titanspawn who were in the bunker trying to make off with the spear were not so cool. Fortunately we arrived just in time to stop them, and ended up having a big fight in the cluttered concrete halls. Adam sensed their presence before we ran into them, so we were able to prepare a bit before we attacked. There were only eight of them at first, a pretty sizable task force, but not really anything we couldn't handle. There were five deevs (brawny Babylonian titanspawn with the bestial features of wolves, bears, or sharks) and three drujs (Babylonian titanspawn who represent blight and famine and who resemble gorgeous women marred by cracked, blighted skin).
As soon as the fight began, I entranced the deev carrying Gungnir to make sure he wouldn't escape. Adam calmly took the spear from him during the fight, while the others laid waste to the remaining titanspawn. The only real hitch came when the drujs pulled some of my tricks and managed to compel Elisa, Pierre, and T-Bone, immobilizing them. About that time, there was a terrible crashing sound as several tzitzimime, alerted to our presence, came crashing through the bunkers doors to assist their comrades.
Fortunately, though, I was able to entrance the tzitzimime as well, keeping them at bay long enough for us to deal with the rest of the baddies. Meanwhile, Charles and Adam killed the drujs, ending their compelling presence and freeing the others from their allure. That done, we were able to fight off the rest of our enemies without too much trouble.
Once we had a little breathing room, Adam used magic to attune himself to Gungnir so that he could use its power if needed. Then we made our way out of the bunker. Of course, we couldn't leave the past yet....we still had to find and rescue whoever it was that Ahriman was holding hostage to enable his activities in 1945. But we decided that Adam should head back to the future to go ahead and begin preparations for the time-mending ritual.
Of course, we should have known that Ahriman and his immense dragon would be waiting for us as soon as we emerged. He didn't even try to negotiate with us! I really expected better of him, after the civil discussions we'd had in the past. I guess he felt that the time for clever deals had passed. So we were greeted by a hellish blast of black fire as we were leaving the bunker. Most of us weathered it fairly well, though not without some injury, and then the real fun began. There wasn't any chatter or monologuing or anything. Just a throw down fight! >_<
We split up immediately to prevent the dragon from hitting us all with the fire again. Adam flew into the air, borne by the divine winds. He rocketed toward the dragon and plunged Gungnir deep in its side, then he shot the dragon repeatedly at point blank range, hammering toward the creature's heart through the wound the spear had caused. Elisa took cover behind the ruins of a tank and some concrete barricades, and began pumping white-hot shots from her rifle into the dragon's vast body. Charles did the same, his revolver thundering time and time again as he blasted away chunks of the dragon's flesh, always aiming for the chinks in its armored hide. Pierre manifested his bird wings and soared into the sky to meet the dragon head on, his rock-solid fists smashing craters in the scaled landscape of beast's side. T-Bone flitted as a shadow onto the beasts back and ran down its length, finally plunging his staff into its skull with a triumphant call of "Nightgaunt" which refers to a what we can only assume is a metal band. And I gotta tell ya, he looked pretty metal perched on the dragon's skull with his staff impaled in its forehead! ^_^
Ahriman didn't pull any punches either. At first, he used his time-manipulation powers to speed the dragon, making the vast creature far quicker than it should have been. It was able to breath a near constant stream of fire on us. It blasted Elisa several times, and I had to pull off a Charles-meets-John-Woo style two-gun EMK (Emergency Medical Kiss) to heal her before she got blasted into oblivion (ummm...that is, I blew her a couple of healing kisses to bring her back u to full strength ^_^).
Meawhile, tzitzimime began raining down to join the fight. They crashed like meteors around us, arriving in pairs. There was no way we could deal with them and the dragon, so I pulled out all the stops. I leapt up onto a marble pillar jutting from the ruins of a building in the center of the battlefield and with a thought changed into sexier clothing - a tight-fitting red PVC top with matching black hot pants and fishnet. Manifesting the full impact of my appearance, I drew the attention of all tzitzimime as they arrived. And I made Adam skip a beat too, so I know he liked my get-up. ^_^ Anyway, the instant each tzitzimime showed up, she couldn't help but look upon my beauty, and then she was trapped by the snare of my allure, incapable of doing anything but gazing upon me while my allies fought her master. By time the fight ended, I probably had a dozen of them staring at me. But the important thing is that they weren't attacking the others.
Eventually Ahriman started to take matters into his own hands. He called a meteor down upon Elisa, but she managed to dodge it. Then, furious at me because I was preventing his servants from joining in the fight, he turned his powers on me. I could feel the now-familiar sensation of the crawling chaos begin to take hold of my mind. Usually, when things like the taotie masks try it on me, I can just shrug it off, but this time Ahriman was too strong and I feared I might succumb to the madness. >_< But that's when Adam called out to me and cast a quick spell granting me a measure of his own fortune. Thanks to that, I was able to shrug off Ahriman's madness. Whew! ^_^
Recalling the civil conversation I'd had with him in Hong Kong, I then pouted up at Ahriman and said "I thought you liked me!" I don't pout a whole lot. ^_^ But my pout is deliciously devastating. Echo's got me beat, though. She is absolutely the queen of strategic pouting. And Rose has learned from her. My gods, that girl has a pout that could melt even Adam's heart! ^_^
Um...so, what was I talking about? Oh yes, the fight. Basically, we prevailed. It took a hell of a lot of firepower and the fortitude and will to withstand Ahriman's onslaught, but we finally slew the dragon. It fell to the city with an earth-shattering crash, demolishing several blocks of German real estate in the process. But we didn't wait around to investigate the aftermath. Sure, we'd beat the dragon, but Ahriman was still a huge threat, and honestly, we didn't want to tangle with him any more directly than we already had for fear that he might a) win, or b) unleash one of his avatar forms and win. As the dust and shards of concrete and stone rained down upon us in the aftermath of the dragon's demise, Adam shunted us all out of time so that he could make it back to the time anomaly and return to the future while the rest of us tried to track down and rescue Ahriman's hostages...
To be continued...
So, here's the deal. After reviewing his newly revised memories of history, Adam realized that Zvran had sent his forces to Berlin in 1945, during the fall of the Reich, to capture Odin's spear, Gungnir, which Hitler had brought to Berlin and hidden away in a bunker, thinking it was the Spear of Destiny. So we had to go get it first, not just to keep it out of Zvran's hands, but so that Adam could bring it back to the future and perform a ritual using our time's version of Gungnir to repair the time stream and get rid of all Zvran's meddling.
Of course, the fact that Zvran was messing around in Berlin in the first place meant he must have some people who aren't of that time held hostage there, 'cause that's the only way he'd be able to run rampant in the past. Of course, it could just be that Hachiman was running around there trying to assassinate me again, but maybe I'm just being paranoid. I gotta confess...I'm kinda looking forward to giving Himiko's arrows back to her and explaining how they came into my possession...
Anyway, we headed to Berlin, found a time anomaly, and headed back to Berlin. We mostly disguised ourselves as gestapo officers so that it would be easy to travel around within the last bastions of German defense, though I just dressed in a period pencil skirt and blouse and played myself off as Adam's gestapo moll.
The city itself was hell on earth, a blasted landscape of smoking ruins. But the first thing we noticed was the mile-long black dragon soaring over the city, its long, serpentine body undulating gracefully through the plumes of smoke as it rained searing, pitch-black fire upon the city. Upon its back rode Ahriman, Zvran's avatar, who had also taken on the guise of a gestapo officer with black skin and blazing red eyes.
He'd certainly dropped all pretense of civility, that's for sure. >_<
You know, I gotta hand it to those American bomber crews, though, because even with that dragon flying around, they were still cruising over the city, dropping explosive death on the Germans. That takes some balls. I guess they figured the dragon was on their side. After all, there was a lot of crazy divine stuff going on in WWII.
The other thing we had to worry about was the occasional tzitzimime, who were raining upon the city in small groups like shooting stars. But for the first leg of our mission, at least, we were able to avoid the notice of Ahriman, his dragon, and Zvran's other servants. At least long enough to track down Gungnir. Adam used his powers of magic and his ability to sense time distortions to triangulate Gungnir's position (I don't really understand how he did, but he did, and that's the important thing). It turned out it was hidden away in a secure, subterranean bunker within the portions of the city still in German hands.
We forced our way into the bunker, which had been abandoned by its mortal guardians, and descended into the chambers below. I realized that I recognized the place! In our time, It's been turned into an incredible industrial club called Gott-Maschine (lit. God Machine)! I've performed there several times! So cool!
But the titanspawn who were in the bunker trying to make off with the spear were not so cool. Fortunately we arrived just in time to stop them, and ended up having a big fight in the cluttered concrete halls. Adam sensed their presence before we ran into them, so we were able to prepare a bit before we attacked. There were only eight of them at first, a pretty sizable task force, but not really anything we couldn't handle. There were five deevs (brawny Babylonian titanspawn with the bestial features of wolves, bears, or sharks) and three drujs (Babylonian titanspawn who represent blight and famine and who resemble gorgeous women marred by cracked, blighted skin).
As soon as the fight began, I entranced the deev carrying Gungnir to make sure he wouldn't escape. Adam calmly took the spear from him during the fight, while the others laid waste to the remaining titanspawn. The only real hitch came when the drujs pulled some of my tricks and managed to compel Elisa, Pierre, and T-Bone, immobilizing them. About that time, there was a terrible crashing sound as several tzitzimime, alerted to our presence, came crashing through the bunkers doors to assist their comrades.
Fortunately, though, I was able to entrance the tzitzimime as well, keeping them at bay long enough for us to deal with the rest of the baddies. Meanwhile, Charles and Adam killed the drujs, ending their compelling presence and freeing the others from their allure. That done, we were able to fight off the rest of our enemies without too much trouble.
Once we had a little breathing room, Adam used magic to attune himself to Gungnir so that he could use its power if needed. Then we made our way out of the bunker. Of course, we couldn't leave the past yet....we still had to find and rescue whoever it was that Ahriman was holding hostage to enable his activities in 1945. But we decided that Adam should head back to the future to go ahead and begin preparations for the time-mending ritual.
Of course, we should have known that Ahriman and his immense dragon would be waiting for us as soon as we emerged. He didn't even try to negotiate with us! I really expected better of him, after the civil discussions we'd had in the past. I guess he felt that the time for clever deals had passed. So we were greeted by a hellish blast of black fire as we were leaving the bunker. Most of us weathered it fairly well, though not without some injury, and then the real fun began. There wasn't any chatter or monologuing or anything. Just a throw down fight! >_<
We split up immediately to prevent the dragon from hitting us all with the fire again. Adam flew into the air, borne by the divine winds. He rocketed toward the dragon and plunged Gungnir deep in its side, then he shot the dragon repeatedly at point blank range, hammering toward the creature's heart through the wound the spear had caused. Elisa took cover behind the ruins of a tank and some concrete barricades, and began pumping white-hot shots from her rifle into the dragon's vast body. Charles did the same, his revolver thundering time and time again as he blasted away chunks of the dragon's flesh, always aiming for the chinks in its armored hide. Pierre manifested his bird wings and soared into the sky to meet the dragon head on, his rock-solid fists smashing craters in the scaled landscape of beast's side. T-Bone flitted as a shadow onto the beasts back and ran down its length, finally plunging his staff into its skull with a triumphant call of "Nightgaunt" which refers to a what we can only assume is a metal band. And I gotta tell ya, he looked pretty metal perched on the dragon's skull with his staff impaled in its forehead! ^_^
Ahriman didn't pull any punches either. At first, he used his time-manipulation powers to speed the dragon, making the vast creature far quicker than it should have been. It was able to breath a near constant stream of fire on us. It blasted Elisa several times, and I had to pull off a Charles-meets-John-Woo style two-gun EMK (Emergency Medical Kiss) to heal her before she got blasted into oblivion (ummm...that is, I blew her a couple of healing kisses to bring her back u to full strength ^_^).
Meawhile, tzitzimime began raining down to join the fight. They crashed like meteors around us, arriving in pairs. There was no way we could deal with them and the dragon, so I pulled out all the stops. I leapt up onto a marble pillar jutting from the ruins of a building in the center of the battlefield and with a thought changed into sexier clothing - a tight-fitting red PVC top with matching black hot pants and fishnet. Manifesting the full impact of my appearance, I drew the attention of all tzitzimime as they arrived. And I made Adam skip a beat too, so I know he liked my get-up. ^_^ Anyway, the instant each tzitzimime showed up, she couldn't help but look upon my beauty, and then she was trapped by the snare of my allure, incapable of doing anything but gazing upon me while my allies fought her master. By time the fight ended, I probably had a dozen of them staring at me. But the important thing is that they weren't attacking the others.
Eventually Ahriman started to take matters into his own hands. He called a meteor down upon Elisa, but she managed to dodge it. Then, furious at me because I was preventing his servants from joining in the fight, he turned his powers on me. I could feel the now-familiar sensation of the crawling chaos begin to take hold of my mind. Usually, when things like the taotie masks try it on me, I can just shrug it off, but this time Ahriman was too strong and I feared I might succumb to the madness. >_< But that's when Adam called out to me and cast a quick spell granting me a measure of his own fortune. Thanks to that, I was able to shrug off Ahriman's madness. Whew! ^_^
Recalling the civil conversation I'd had with him in Hong Kong, I then pouted up at Ahriman and said "I thought you liked me!" I don't pout a whole lot. ^_^ But my pout is deliciously devastating. Echo's got me beat, though. She is absolutely the queen of strategic pouting. And Rose has learned from her. My gods, that girl has a pout that could melt even Adam's heart! ^_^
Um...so, what was I talking about? Oh yes, the fight. Basically, we prevailed. It took a hell of a lot of firepower and the fortitude and will to withstand Ahriman's onslaught, but we finally slew the dragon. It fell to the city with an earth-shattering crash, demolishing several blocks of German real estate in the process. But we didn't wait around to investigate the aftermath. Sure, we'd beat the dragon, but Ahriman was still a huge threat, and honestly, we didn't want to tangle with him any more directly than we already had for fear that he might a) win, or b) unleash one of his avatar forms and win. As the dust and shards of concrete and stone rained down upon us in the aftermath of the dragon's demise, Adam shunted us all out of time so that he could make it back to the time anomaly and return to the future while the rest of us tried to track down and rescue Ahriman's hostages...
To be continued...