Chapter 112: The Damsel in Distress
Merritt paced back and forth, growing more distressed with each step. He muttered under his breath, cursing his brother, mostly. His hand never left his waistband where he kept his gun.
In the distance, I heard hounds howling and barking. I had heard them when we first arrived but had yet to see them. If memory served, I heard them on my first day in Carousel too when we passed Samantha.
The noises got closer.
Soon, Merrick’s attention turned to the large hound that appeared from around the other side of the bed and breakfast and jumped upon him, grasping his wrist in its jaws.
There were more hounds, at least six, most of which were larger breeds.
Bradley, the psychotic one, was aiming his gun at the dogs, warding them off with loud shots, even hitting one of them. Then he ran out of bullets.
One dog sank its teeth into Tanks thigh, another into his forearm.
He let go of Antoine in the moment.
Antoine seized the opportunity. He started to pull at his restraints with all of his might. We were on-screen, so if he was going to go Incredible Hulk and break out of his cuffs, that would be the time to do it. He had already said he was a weightlifter, after all.
He pulled.
At first, it didn’t look like anything was happening.
I had to shuffle around as the dogs attacked the men, letting loose haunting howls as they did so. I didn’t get a good view for a moment as I broke free from the man who was holding onto me. One of the dogs snapped at me but was clearly more interested in the other men. When I looked back, I saw that Antoine was making progress.
He wasn’t breaking the cuffs, no. He was succeeding in pulling his left hand out of its cuff, though the process tore his skin, practically degloving his hand.
He pulled with his greatest effort, and then he had done it. His hand was free. Mangled, but free.
With his hands free, one dripping with blood, he grabbed Merritt, who had finally gotten the opportunity to grab his gun. Antoine pushed him with all of his might. Merritt fell backward down into the storm shelter they had just let us out of.
“Don’t you touch him!” Bradley Speirs screamed.
He couldn’t do much. One of the dogs had taken to his ankle and opened a gash in it.
“Run!” a voice from up near the house cried out. It was the NPC Samantha.
She waved us to come toward her.
Antoine was preoccupied, in shock over Kimberly’s body. I grabbed him and pulled him away.
“We have to go!” I screamed.
We didn’t have long until the men had recovered from the surprise attack of the dogs.
Antoine put his shoulder into Tank and knocked him on his backside.
After breaking his gaze away from Kimberly and punching the fake sheriff in the face, he finally, got with the program and we ran back toward Samantha.
Antoine was hurling insults at the men the whole way, clearly distressed over what they had done to Kimberly.
Samantha whistled loudly. The dogs immediately took notice and stopped attacking. Some ran into the distance, perhaps back to whatever pin they had been let out of. Two of them ran toward Samantha. One lay on the ground, unmoving.
“Come on!” she screamed to Antoine and me. “We have to get inside. Trap them out here.”
Sounded like a plan.
She waved us around to the nearest entrance to the house and we followed. It was up a few steps and then we were inside. She slammed the door behind us. The two dogs that had followed us immediately sought Samantha’s attention. They dogs must have missed her.
“Dad brought them up here for the renovation. They haven't got to see me in a while,” she explained as she locked the door. “Help me move this,” she said, pointing to a large rectangular piano that was up against the wall.
Antoine jumped in to help. They moved the piano over in front of the door.
“They already boarded up most of the windows and doors on the first level to try to keep me from escaping,” she explained. “We need to get my dad from the basement.”
She led us away from the back entrance toward what looked like the kitchen area. It was kind of hard to tell with the renovations that were going on.
“Samantha!” I heard Bobby screaming. From somewhere in the house.
“Dad!” she screamed back as she ran for the basement door.
She opened it to reveal Bobby. His Wallflower trope had recast him as the only other non-enemy NPC in the story: Samantha’s father.
They hugged.
Antoine looked numb as he cared for his injured hand, but he still engaged in hurried conversation for the camera as he, Bobby, and Samantha talked.
I, however, was distracted.
I saw a piece of furniture in the corner of the room that I had seen in many hotels before. It was one of those brochure holders that were always in the lobbies advertising nearby resorts and attractions.
Something about it caught my eye.
I walked over to it and started shuffling through the brochures for plays, musicals, one-man shows, an amusement park, and more. Most of them had one thing in common.
As I shuffled through them, we went Off-Screen.
“What are you doing over there?” Antoine asked.
I pulled out one brochure after another, glancing at them before moving to the next. Even with my handcuffed hands, my fingers moved numbly, even if they did shake.
“Silver Dollar City,” I said, holding up one brochure. That was a real amusement park in our world. “Branson, Missouri,” I said as I ran through the brochures, I read one after another, "Branson, Branson, near Branson."
Antoine quickly walked over to the brochure stand and looked through them himself.
“So it’s true,” he said. “This story is from our world.”
“Wait, what?” Bobby asked.
“You’re from our world too, aren’t you?” I asked Samantha.
She didn’t answer, but a strange look moved over her face. It appeared an awful lot like she was ashamed.
A thought occurred to me. I ran into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator.
I started to laugh and grabbed a few dark red cans from the shelf and brought them back to the others. I couldn't explain the explosions of joy that overcame me from seeing something so simple, something from home.
I handed one to Antoine and another to Bobby.
I opened mine and took a swig.
It was Dr. Pepper.
I wasn't even much of a soda drinker, and yet seeing it there thrilled me.
Antoine wasn’t as excited as me. He had just finished wrapping his injured hand in a cloth he found, but he still opened his and took a drink.
“Those fake Carousel brands everywhere,” I said. “They aren’t fake. They’re just from different worlds!”
This storyline was from our world, so it had our brands.
I was right. I could have cried to finally be moving forward and gaining some understanding.
“You’re from our world,” I repeated to Samantha. “What happened? Why are we here?”
She was slow to answer.
“I’m sorry for bringing you all here. I was just scared. And now you’re here with us too. We’re never going to leave.”
She had told us that same line when we were On-Screen a few minutes earlier.
“That’s one of her lines,” Bobby said. “I’m not sure if they really understand Carousel. I’ve tried talking to NPCs about… my wife. They don’t seem to know what I’m talking about.”
We hadn’t brought Bobby up to speed yet.
“Can you explain?” I asked Samantha again. “This storyline is from our world. What are we supposed to learn here? Is there a way out?”
Samantha waited for a moment and then said, “We should go upstairs. There is only one stairway. We can more easily defend ourselves from up there.”
That made sense, but I was getting the dreadful feeling that she was ducking my question.
Then she said.
“Dad hired these men to do work on the house. They did for a while, but then… well, you can probably guess that things devolved.”
“I have lots of information on that,” Bobby said helpfully. “My Recast trope is pretty limited but that kind of stuff I can see on the script.”
We followed Samantha up the stairs. Once we got to the landing, she turned to me.
She looked me right in the eye.
“They said that if I went along with their plans, I would live. If I gave them what they wanted,” she said.
“Yeah,” Bobby added. “They want me to go to the bank to withdraw a bunch of money and then they'll let us go. That’s what they say at least.”
“Just a second, Bobby,” Antoine said.
I kept eye contact with Samantha.
“They told you to go along with their plans and you would live?” I asked.
She nodded.
“They wanted me… to be their perfect hostage. I was scared. I didn’t want to die… It’s my fault you’re here. I was afraid.”
Antoine and I made eye contact.
“Someone offered to let you live if you did what they said?” Antoine asked. “And that’s why we’re here?”
“They were looking… for a perfect hostage,” she said tearfully. “I’m so sorry.”
“The man on the top floor?” I asked. “Is that the person who made you the offer? He watches us through violet lights. He looks for dark stories?”
That was what the demon at the bar had said to Dina about the person who could help her save her son.
Samantha continued to cry. She didn’t say yes or no, but I felt I was not far off track.
“A plan,” she said. “A plan to save us. I’ve had all the time in the world… I will do whatever it takes to help you. It’s my fault you’re here.”
“A plan?” I asked. “The plan from our friends in high places?”
“There’s a way to survive,” she said in agreement. She had to use her lines to communicate. She didn't seem as good at it as Jack Goforth had.
“What is happening here, it’s almost like… you said that this storyline was from our world, that she was,” Bobby said. “Does that mean NPCs are real?”
I nodded.
“I knew it!” He said. “Travis always said I was being too sentimental.”
An idea struck him.
“Do you know what happened to my wife?” he asked. “She disappeared. Her name was Janette Gill. Do you have any information about her at all?”
Samantha gave him a look of sympathy.
“Mom?” she asked.
Bobby was playing her father. She had to stay in character. Calling Janette her mother might let her do that.
“I don’t know where she is,” Samantha said. “But I have to believe that we will see her again.”
That answer energized Bobby.
“But how?” Bobby asked. He had started to tear up. “It’s my fault that she came. She didn’t want to. He told me she would be safe.”
Wait.
“Who told you she would be safe?” I asked.
Bobby wiped the tears from his eyes. “Dropstone_Don. The man on the forum who invited me to the horror convention. His real name was Donny. Well… not really, I guess. We talked about it. He said that his wife didn’t like scary things either, that she was… frail. Like Janette.” He struggled to hold back his tears. “He said she wouldn’t have to do any of the scary events, that there were events for people who were afraid. He said she could hang out with his wife...”
He got quiet.
I couldn’t imagine the guilt he must feel. Samantha could though, she was crying at his story.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“What’s the plan?” I asked.
She took a moment to compose herself.
“They’re strange men, all of them, but that one is stranger than the rest. His interests are dark. When they found the cemetery on the property, they started digging, grave robbing, desecrating. Merritt didn’t like it, but it occupied his brother and that was a small miracle. Bradley took to it quickly. The others, they wanted jewelry and trinkets. Stuff they could pawn. Bradley, the sick fuck, he just liked to mess with the bodies. To use them for target practice. To defile them, to use their bones to make... art. He made an ashtray out of a woman’s skull…”
She stared into the distance.
“Wait a second,” Bobby said once he regained composure. “These are her lines, but… they aren’t right.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“I can’t see a whole lot, but there are different scripts for different versions of the same storyline. She’s saying lines from a different script. I can’t really get a good look at it.”
A different script?
“Like when a trope changes a script?” Antoine asked. “Or a Detective turning a storyline into a mystery?”
Bobby nodded.
“I hear them at night,” she whispered. “Dad tells me it’s all in my head, but I hear them crying out, begging, warning. I think tonight’s the night.”
“Honey,” Bobby said, “This is just a scary moment, and your mind is running away with it. Don’t lose your head. We’re going to be okay if we just do what these men want.”
It sounded like he was reading off his lines from his version of the script.
“Except,” he added, “This should be happening On-Screen.”
“So that’s the plan?” I asked. “To switch to a different version of the script?”
I thought we were going to get to see the real version of events for the storyline, but apparently not.
“How do we do that?” Antoine asked.
Without an advanced archetype or tropes, we were left with pure Improvisation to make the change and that hardly felt within my grasp. I was just now learning how to manipulate a story that way.
Samantha reached into her pocket with two fingers and pulled out a ticket. A player ticket. It was purple, which meant it changed the rules of the story. She held it out so that we could see.
The Captor is Captured
Type: Rule
Archetype: Damsel
Aspect: --
Stat Used: Moxie
Sometimes the only way for things to get better for the protagonist is if they get way worse first. Horror Films often have antagonists who are thwarted with the help of other, deadlier, antagonists.
Bigger Bad: This trope will pull in a Bigger Bad from potential antagonists suggested in the storyline.
The Bigger Bad must be set up before the midpoint of Rebirth. The Bigger Bad may target any character that fits the narrative, including players, unless acted upon by another trope but they will always clash with the initial antagonist.
With this trope equipped, the Player will be able to draw in an additional antagonist—a Bigger Bad—as long as there is a narrative foundation for them to do so and they help push the story in that direction. Can only be activated while the player is Captured or when capture is imminent. The Bigger Bad will attempt to, at least metaphorically, capture the enemy. If inapplicable, they will simply kill them.
Beware, this trope can summon enemies beyond the player’s level. There is no rule that prevents the Bigger Bad from attacking the Player or their allies.
Survive the Night, Kill the Enemy, and Give It What It Wants are now Win Conditions if narratively compatible.
Caution to the player: they say the devil you know is better than the one you don’t.
She was a Damsel, an advanced archetype that specialized in being kidnapped. A perfect hostage.
“I knew you level 50s had player tropes,” I said. I had seen Jack Goforth use Convenient Backstory. I was sure of it.
She tucked the ticket back in her pocket after we had gotten the chance to read it. So that was how we would do it. Activating her player trope.
We didn’t have long. The midpoint would start in around fifteen minutes.
And even if we succeeded, we would be awakening a Bigger Bad.
But why did we need to do it at all?
There was no time for questions.
It was time to raise the dead.
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