Chapter Thirty-Seven: Whispers in the Dark
I froze.
The Grotesque wasn't facing me. But even then, its hideous features were terrifying. Its wings were big and leathery like a bat and as it turned its head I could see its long jagged needle-like teeth sticking out of its human face. I could only imagine what this thing had been before it got infected by the Grotesque curse.
With the death of Roxie, my Savvy shot up 11 points. Reggie's highest stat rose a few points as well. I don't know if I had a bigger jump because my character was closer to her or because I was at such a low level. Whatever the case, the Grotesque in front of us had its own change in plot armor with the death of Roxie.
This one's Plot Armor had been 61. As soon as it landed, it dropped down to 53.
The 13 or so percent drop across all of its stats affected its Savvy to such a degree that between my buff and its debuff, I was able to see a few more of its tropes.
Grotesque
Plot Armor: 53
__________
Tropes
Progenitor
This creature has the ability to create duplicate offspring.
Whispers in the Dark
This creature can sense a player or NPCs vulnerabilities and manipulate them via impulsive thoughts that are perceived as whispers
Head of the Snake
The creature with the Head of the Snake trope is the Leader for the scene
It Plays with Its Food…
This creature spends time to toy with its victims. Often, it enjoys the playing more than the killing.
Where’s the Goat?
This creature can sneak up on players with implausible stealth but may not attack until the players notice some seemingly innocuous clue to its presence.
Jekyll and Hyde
This villain has multiple forms. Stone: Grit = 0, Living: Grit = 20.
One of the newly revealed tropes was called Whispers in the Dark. That explained how the NPC Donald had gotten wrapped up in all this. When he dropped off the box at the lodge he was speaking to the Grotesque. I was wondering how the Grotesque had been speaking to him if it was made of stone.
I had my answer.
The creature reared up and appeared to be howling but of course, it couldn't speak and made no noise other than its poorly formed teeth grinding against each other as its mouth moved.
I took one last glance trying to memorize the other new trope that this creature bore. Head of the snake. That one must have been given to it because of Arthur's own trope, cut the head off the snake. But the description had me concerned. It almost sounded like the leader would be able to change in this story.
That's when it turned around and looked right at me.
Riley.
I heard my own name in my head. A whisper.
While I was transfixed, Reggie was far more prepared. He grabbed me and started to drag me backward across the graveyard. Eventually, I snapped out of whatever fear or fascination had afflicted me and turned to run with him.
Without Roxie, our movement was slow. Fortunately, the period just after First Blood is relatively safe. There needs to be a lull in action so that the characters can react to what had just happened.
It was also fortunate that even though we had run what felt like miles across the cemetery, we were never that far from the church. Our entire chase scene occurred within walking distance of it. Carousel wouldn't care about that. It just needed good footage.
We ran back to the church. The flying Grotesque took back to the skies but it didn't attack us. Pretty soon after we started running, we were off-screen again.
When we made it back to the church, I half-expected it to be overwhelmed by Grotesques. However, as soon as we got there and opened the door I could hear Arthur and Valerie talking. They were off-screen too. We must have been in between scenes.
As far as I could tell they were planning out Valerie's character arc. For whatever reason they were whispering. They stood at the back of the church where the priest would normally go.
Whenever they heard us come in, Arthur acknowledged us with a glance and Valerie waved.
I kept expecting us to go on-screen so that we could have an emotional reveal of Roxie's death but it didn't happen.
Even when we got all the way across the building to them, we were still off-screen.
"The next scene is in there," Valerie said when we approached as if she had seen the confusion on my face. "I found Donald down there. You can hear him yelling."
Down where? I followed her gaze. There was a door at the back of the church. It had been covered up by a curtain but the curtain had been moved back and now I could see light flickering under the door frame. I could also hear Donald speaking faintly. It sounded like he was talking to himself.
"Where does that lead?" I asked.
"Catacombs," Valerie answered.
"I saw a couple more of the high-level Grotesque tropes," I said.
Arthur looked at me expectantly.
"It can talk to you in your mind and tempt you to do things."
“Well that explains a little bit what's going on down there,” he said.
“Probably a savvy check?” Valerie said with a high inflection at the end like she was looking for Arthur's input.
“Probably.”
"There was also another trope," I said. "Head of the Snake. It said that the creature with that trope was the leader for that scene. Is that how your Cut the Head off the Snake trope normally works?”
“For the scene?” Arthur looked away for a moment.
I think that threw him for a loop. It certainly had me.
“No, that's not how it normally works,” Arthur said. “That explains why Carousel's got you having a mysterious gift in this storyline. You have to identify which one is the leader. Normally there's an obvious leader and killing it will end the story or open up an opportunity for you to escape or something like that. Seems like Carousel had a different game in mind.”
That makes sense. It hadn't been clear exactly why my character needed on-screen psychic powers. Was I designed to be a character to burden the rest of the team? Making one of the weakest players on the team a character that has to make it to the finale?
"Be ready to run up to us as you come on-screen,” Valerie said.
“I know, I know,” I said back.
Valerie and Arthur had their guns cocked and ready. Arthur opened the door to the catacombs and Valerie breached. Soon they were both down the stairs and all I could hear were the echoes of their footsteps mixed with the whispers of Donald somewhere deep in the catacombs.
I sat and chatted with Reggie for a bit. He was explaining the technique they used to clear the bowling alley. Apparently, his sister Grace had come up with it. They had everything timed and planned out so that they could divert most of the omens that come nearer the alley and easily clear any remaining storylines. He said that he would show us some time.
Eventually, I heard loud voices coming up from the catacombs. I had trouble picturing exactly how big the underground must have been for it to have taken so long. Must have had a lot of rooms down there.
As time passed I could hear Donald talking louder and louder.
“No don't do it,” Donald screamed.
I could only imagine what he was asking Arthur and Valerie not to do.
“I have to finish. You don't understand I have to finish.”
Valerie and Arthur burst from the door with Donald hogtied. Arthur was carrying the man over his shoulder.
“My family shouldn't have to die too!” Donald screamed. “Don't you understand? There is no escaping.”
Just as the door had started to open we had become On-Screen.
We ran toward Arthur and Valerie as if we had just burst into the church looking for them.
“Arthur!” I screamed.
Arthur glanced over at us. He was preoccupied with handling Donald.
He glanced back again.
“Where's Roxie?” He asked.
I couldn't find the words. Not just my character I personally couldn't. How would you act in a situation like this?
“She…”
Arthur abandoned Donald and walked toward us, “Where is she?”
Reggie and I looked at each other.
“She was killed,” I said.
Arthur didn't say anything at first. He walked to the nearest pew and just as I thought he was about to turn and sit down, he kicked it, sending it flying backward and toppling.
“Why didn't you look after her?” He screamed. I didn't know if he was talking to me or Reggie. I suppose it didn't matter it was for the audience.
Arthur was breathing heavily and I could see him trying to cover up his tears (or cover up his lack thereof).
“Where is she?” he asked. He walked over to where he had left his duffel and started to unzip it to retrieve a firearm.
“Arthur,” I said, “She's gone.”
Still, he persisted, grabbing a shotgun.
He walked over to me and got in my face and asked, “Wasn't this the kind of thing we had you around for? To make sure things like this didn't happen?”
I had no answer.
“Arthur,” Valerie said. She walked to him and hugged him. While they had their character moment, I didn't know what to do.
After a beat, Arthur calmed down.
“We have to finish this,” he said resolutely. "That asshole has been manufacturing gargoyle statues down there. Hundreds."
He looked over at Donald lying delirious on the floor.
He was on him in a second. He lifted Donald up by his shirt collar and said, “Now you tell us everything. These things just killed the person I care about the most in the world. I don't have to tell you what happens if you don't talk.”
Donald didn't react fully to what Arthur said but talking was not a hard thing to get him to do. In fact, after a while, I was wondering if we could get him to shut up.
If I were to distill down everything that he said, most of which he repeated over and over again, this is what he had to say:
“If you know the world's ending, you know the bad guy is gonna win, doesn't it make sense to be on the winning side? Conventional notions of morality are for peacetime. But they have a war coming. They're going to kill us all. But if I help them, they'll spare me and my family. It wasn't an easy decision to make.
“When I first found the statue buried beneath the catacombs, I knew I had found something spectacular. I tried to resist. I really did. I tried burying it back but then it wound up on my porch the next morning. I tried smashing it, but then it would show up again in a different statue. It even took over one of the statues on my front lawn. There was no escape. I had to help it.”
“Why did it need your help?” Arthur asked. “If it can just infect new statues, what did it need you for?”
Donald didn't answer at first but instead grew a ghastly smile. For a moment his sanity seemed to slip through and a look of horror replaced the smile.
“Most of them are just too dumb,” he said. “Vicious terrible things.”
He raised his arms and showed the bite marks that littered them to emphasize his point.
“They were too noticeable. The biggest weakness of the Grotesque.”
What could that mean? The biggest weak—.
And then I understood.
“Oh my God,” I said.
Donald started to laugh.
“What?” Valerie asked.
“Motherfucker,” Arthur said. He understood too.
“He's been helping to breed only smart ones,” I said. “Culling all of the dumb ones before they can go attract attention.”
“It was hopeless. We would all have died either way, at least this way those that will remain will be able to be lenient,” Donald said. “To some.”
Arthur punched him in the face, sending him flying backward onto the ground.
If you were to ask what the biggest weakness of a Grotesque was the obvious answer would be the fact that it was completely vulnerable during the day in its stone form. A less obvious but perhaps more intelligent answer would be that Grotesques are weak because most of them are stupid. Most of the creatures I had seen so far on the red wallpaper had such low savvy that I could see all their tropes. That low savvy translated to being unintelligent, belligerent, and dangerous. That was good for killing a bunch of people, but it wasn't good in the long run. The stupid ones would attract attention from humans, and they would all be wiped out before they could ever have a chance to actually create the apocalypse they so clearly desired.
After all, only the smart ones had Progenitor--the ability to spread the curse.
Donald had been helping kill the ones that were too stupid so that all that would be left, at least initially, would be an army of intelligent Grotesques. All capable of spreading their curse; all intelligent enough to be discreet and to strike without detection. We must have stumbled onto this late in the game because they had already started spreading their curse en masse.
Noises started to come from outside. Skittering scratching. I could hear the grinding of stones.
Donald didn't react all that much to being punched.
In fact, he was smiling. As if he'd just been vindicated in his decision to join the Grotesques.
“He’s here.”
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