Ah, I forgot about the prone & cover. They actually "stack", so +4, and your roll is a 6.
Yes, there's a wallet with cash and credit cards and ID. No expensive jewelry on the body.
"If you found a wallet and you're going to be doing stupid things anyway," Nate says quietly over the comms, "check the name and see if she was a local."
Faith photographs the evidence of the bullet wound, the wrist abrasions, and the ID, as well as the cell phone call screens. All personal items are returned to original locations. Then she motions for Arlo to withdraw, trying to retrace their steps to avoid compromising any footprints found in the path into the cave. Once outside the cave, she sends the local police a text message. "Found a woman dead in the cave. She was shot. Team will await police at crime scene. Faith Sierra, Nitro Cable Scouting team."
To the team, she says, "This smells like a set-up, so look wary, but keep your hands away from your weapons. These LEOs are likely going to be concerned about our level of armament. None of our guns have fired and there is no-gunshot residue on our sleeves or hands, so unless someone is prepared to plant evidence, we shouldn't be suspects."
She scans to path leading to the cave for signs of the officers coming their way. "My guess would be the people trying to recruit monsters hope to get us out of the way and make it impossible for us to scout this location. Since this is park land, the local LEOs will not have jurisdiction, so we can use that to our advantage. Anyone remember seeing the woman in town?" Faith shows the pictures of the dead woman to the others.
She also pulls out the note and looks it over again, wondering if there was anything to indicate if this was a woman's handwriting or some other tip-off that the note was not written by the victim.
"Oh! I trip. Sorry, sorry. Is lots of brush here, da?"
Nate frowns. What's he trying to tell us? That he's coming in with them? That there are more behind the first group?
"Gavril," he says very quietly. "How many? Cough."
Her ID lists her address as the little town (no time to look it up, if I ever gave it). There's nothing on her person with handwriting, so nothing to compare the note to. No one in the group remembers seeing her, but that wouldn't be unusual.
"What?" Pause. "Ah!" Beat. "Uhah! Is TWO times I fall! So clumsy."
Faith speaks for the benefit of Gavril and the others listening on the earbuds, "Sounds like Gavril's on the move with two LEOs? If there are more officers ahead of your position, Gavril, take as many swigs of water as there are boggies."
Before Gavril can respond again, you hear the sound of multiple footsteps approaching.
As two police officers come in sight (with Gavril), they say "Freeze! Nobody move! We've been told there's a dead body here - why are you here?"
Faith holds up her hands with her cell phone showing a picture of the body in one hand, the open note in the other. Her hands still have the latex gloves on. "We got a note from somebody in town asking to meet us here. We just arrived, looked in the cave and saw the body. I just sent you a text message about it."
She figures it may take these guys some time to process so she doesn't say anything more.
BTW, these are the two officers Faith chatted with just a few hours ago.
The older one says to the younger "Clem, you keep all these here people here while I go check out the cave". Clem pulls out his gun, and motions everyone into a tight group about 10 feet away from him, and tells Gavril to join the group.
The older one goes into the cave for several minutes, then comes out and says "That's Daisy Mae, her old man runs the gas station. What a shame. She wasn't the brightest candle, but she was sweet. Whoever did this is gonna pay for it" looking right at all of you with a scowl.
"So, I see y'all've had plenty of time to plant evidence, or meybe re-arrange some things. Who knows, meybe y'all did this to generate better ratings for that TV show of yers."
Looking you all over carefully for the first time, he eyes widen, he pulls out his gun, and says "Tarnation! Since when did TV folk need to dress up for *war*??? I want y'all to VERY SLOWLY AND CAREFULLY drop your weapons, and pull out ANY other weapons you might have with two fingers, and drop them on the ground, NOW!"
-->Does anyone try to keep any kind of weapon on them?
Once that's done, he says, "In any case, we got you fer tamperin' with a crime scene, and if nothin' else, as material witnesses. I'm gonna to have to ask y'all to come back with us to the station". Altho it's worded like a request, you can tell it isn't.
"Now I want every one of you to empty your pockets into this sack that Clem has...aw, Clem, go get that sack from the car! Cell phones, keys, hell, even sticks of gum.
Once you've done that, take off them vests, SLOWLY, ONE at a time, and drop them on the ground."
Clem comes back in just a couple of minutes, slightly winded from running.
-->Does anyone try to keep any kind of items on them?
Oh yeah, trying to notice Nate (TN=6) :
Older guy
Clem
'Fraid the jigs's up for Nate...
= 7
Clem must have heard Nate shift slightly in the brush and break a twig, because he suddenly exclaims "Hey Jim-Bob, looky over here! Hey, you, come out with your hands up, or I'll shoot! 1....2...."
But Jim-Bob doesn't shift his attention from the group, and keeps his gun leveled at you.
-->What does Nate do?
Conversations to be continued once I know if anyone's holding any weapons/items back, and what Nate immediately does.
Please don't anyone say anything yet (Jim-Bob won't let you), just tell me what you're *doing*.
Nate curses mentally. I could take them. But shooting police is not in Nate's nature. He pauses for a moment to weigh the risk of his guns being stolen or rained on against coming out of the bushes loaded for bear. With a sigh he cautiously puts the Desert Eagle down in a manner he hopes won't be noticeable through the bushes.
"Dial it down a notch, Clem!" he calls out before standing. "I'm coming out unarmed!"
Nate slowly climbs to his feet. Hands half-raised, he cautiously comes out of the bushes and moves towards the group in a non-threatening manner, leaving both guns hidden behind.
"I want y'all to VERY SLOWLY AND CAREFULLY drop your weapons, and pull out ANY other weapons you might have with two fingers, and drop them on the ground, NOW!"
Faith leaves her hands in the air and simply says, "No." She keeps her eyes glued to Clem.
Gavril has begun complying, but only gets as far as slowly removing the shotgun sling from around his shoulders when Faith responds as she does. His eye widens for a moment, and he pauses, the strap held loosely in one hand. He slowly turns to keep his eye on Jim-Bob, and readies to try and stop the man if it looks like he's going to shoot.
Nate, if you started to talk any more after "I'm coming out unarmed", Clem would have said "can it, and come out real slow like..."
*I* missed the part where Faith said to holster our guns, so I'm going to say that John did too. He is also in the process of gingerly lowering his glock to the ground when Faith speaks.
I think we ALL need clarity here, Faith - are you saying "no" to Jim-Bob's command to drop all your stuff, or to something else he said?
If you are saying "no" to his demands, then his eyes will squint, you can see the muscles of his hand and forearm bulge a little as he squeezes the gun tighter, and he'll say "Say, *what*, missy?", and you can say what you want to say out loud now.
Otherwise, please explain the "no" to us, ooc.
Please nobody say or do anything else until Faith posts.
"My name's Faith and I'm an ex-cop. This is federal parkland, which makes it out of your jurisdiction. Protocol dictates you contact the park rangers and wait for them to come and take over the investigation. We give our weapons to them when they get there, not to you. Ask me why."
She keeps calm and keeps her hands up, still holding the cell phone and the note.
Result = 8
A smirky, superior grin slowly spreads across Jim-Bob's face as Faith talks. "Izzat so, missy? Well, in the first place I don't believe you're any more a cop than you are a TV producer. Next thing you'll be tryin' to tell us you belong to some secret gov'mint organization!
And in the second place, this here's park is so small they deputized *us* as park rangers, too, cause they didn't want to waste the manpower! Clem, get out your park badge and show them - you *did* bring your badge this time, didn't you Clem - but don't get to close to them, and stay out of my line of fire!"
Clem does so, showing you all what looks to be a perfectly valid park ranger badge/ID/whatever.
"Now, DROP YOUR STUFF! And no more backtalk! If you behave like good little boys and *girls* (looking Faith right in the eyes) we'll sort all this out at the station. But you do as you're told until we get there."
Arlo reviews the situation, and realizes that his knowledge of police work probably doesn't relate very well here, so he decides to shake things up a bit.
"Please. We didn't do anything., and looking at Faith, "You told me we were just going to film interviews and things, and now look what's happened. We find some dead body in the woods, and are suspected of murder. I quit"!
With that Arlo pretends to have a fainting attack and falls roughly to the ground.
Let see how these bumpkins deal with that.
Faith rolls her eyes, first at Clem and then at Arlo's stunt. She tries to ignore what Arlo's done, keeps her hands in the air, and says, "Why don't you just slow down and wait for the rangers you called in to help process the crime scene to show up? ... You did call the rangers to tell them there is a dead body on park land? They're on their way now aren't they? Let's just wait for them."
Then she says to John, "Be a dear, John, and once you've put down your weapon, roll the camera and make a record of how these guys behave."
She then begins to put one weapon on the ground at a time (this should take some time). But she's not going to let them put anything into a bag without pointing out how failing to properly bag and tag evidence will make it inadmissible. If they insist on taking us back to the station, leaving a murder victim's body in a cave as food for bears and coyotes, she's going to go limp and they'll have to physically carry her to the car. She'll order everyone else to do the same. And unless they put tape over her mouth, she's going to say a lot more.
After Arlo drops, and as Faith *begins* to speak (but before she finishes)...
Jim-Bob shouts "EVERYBODY SHUT UP AND FREEZE! I've had enough of this sh*t! You there" pointing the gun at John and tossing him some handcuffs "put these on her" gesturing at Faith "with her hands *behind* her back!
Clem, you handcuff the guy on the ground. If he so much as twitches, you can restrain him with whatever force you need to."
After that's done, he proceeds to get everyone else in handcuffs, using John to cuff Gavril and Nate, then Clem to cuff John.
Then he orders you all to sit down on the ground, so it will be very difficult to get up quickly.
Then he and Clem strip you of your weapons (but nothing else yet), and do a pat-down of everyone for hidden weapons. Clem pats down Faith, and he's obviously embarrassed, but does nothing more than a professional job of it.
"NOW : you have the right to remain silent, AND I SUGGEST YOU USE IT!" glaring at Faith, and he proceeds with the rest of your Mirandizing exactly as it should be done.
"Clem, check their phones and cameras" "to make sure they're not recording anything."
He takes off his hat, wipes his brow, takes a deep breath, and exhales slowly. Obviously straining to be semi-polite, he says "Now then - I received an anonymous tip that someone had been killed out here. I wouldn't call the rangers, the Parkersburg CSI, or the f*cking CIA..." he inhales and exhales slowly again "without checking the scene out myself first, would I? And what I found were a bunch of strangers who had already contaminated the crime scene AT BEST, and possibly planted or concealed evidence AT WORST. If they didn't commit the crime themselves, and were caught in the middle of covering it up.
So this is what we're going to do : Clem is going to stay here to guard the body. But first, I'm going to re-cuff you TO EACH OTHER, while Clem stands guard with his gun. Anyone twitches, he shoots. Then I'm taking you all to your van, and securing you in there, and drive it back to our station. Once I get you in separate cells, I'll empty your pockets and interview you each separately. THEN you can say anything you want to say.
THERE IS TO BE NO TALK BETWEEN ANY OF YOU AT ANY TIME, DO YOU UNDERSTAND?"
And he then proceeds to do exactly what he said. Fortunately, all the guns, ammo, equipment, etc. are hidden in secret panels in the van, so he doesn't see anything odd in there.
Does anyone attempt to do *anything* other than exactly what he orders you do at this point?
Arlo stumbles to his feet, mumbling,
Psionics
WD
XD Total of 8 Success with a raise.
He then phases out like an old Television, appearing next to the vehicle. (-6 PP?)
If the police cruiser is open with keys, he will jump in it and head back towards civilization ditching it at the first opportune time. If not he will disable the radio / slash a tire or two something to delay them, and jump in the SUV and head somewhere close-by to hide it and take time to think about what to do.
Clearly unamused by the podunk cop's gestapo tactics, Nate nonetheless complies. It's not like every government entity can't be expected to pull such stunts after all, so it's not as if he wasn't expecting it.
For location
Since the GM seems to expect us all to go peacefully back to the police station in handcuffs, here is in fact what Faith is thinking and how she is going to respond.
She has been trying to figure out why the perpetrators of this attempted frame job would do such a thing. She doesn't think they believe the group will actually be found guilty of anything, particularly with the way Jim-Bob is about to mishandle all the evidence. But as soon as it became clear that Jim-Bob intended to disarm and shackle the whole group, she saw a much more sinister point to it all.
She thinks that whoever has it in for us, fears us when we are fully armed and prepared for trouble. So getting Jim-Bob and Clem up to this isolated spot is a way to get the group disarmed and immobilized without the bad guys having to put themselves at any risk. She expects that if the group gets shackled and has no weapons, then the people who planned this will swoop down and take control of the situation. At that point, only John and Arlo, with their arcane powers, have any options.
So as soon as she sees a set of handcuffs about to go on anyone, she'll do something to try to prevent it. Just what depends on exactly where each person is, but charging Jim-Bob is a distinct possibility. She'd rather take one bullet and hope her vest protects her and maybe face a charge of assaulting a police officer later than to find our whole group handcuffed together with the only armed people these two dysfunctional cops. If this were in the city, she'd not feel the same concern and would cooperate fully. And if she is successful in keeping the group unshackled and armed, and if nothing materializes, she will call the forest service and explain the situation and cooperate fully when they arrive to secure the crime scene.
Ok, so briefly :
According to the posted order of events, Faith would have been cuffed before Arlo disappears. So are you doing anything before he vanishes?
Arlo disappears. He arrives still in woods, roughly 1/3 of the way to the cars, *still handcuffed*. By my calculations, it will take you 18 rounds of *walking* to get back to the cars.
So basically only the first 3 lines of Jim-Bob's post happened before all h*ll breaks loose. No one else would be bound at this point. Everyone would still have vests etc. on.
I'll remind everyone that the cops are on Hold with their guns drawn, and any sudden overt movement (beyond people just outright vanishing) will result in their immediately taking an action. You can guess what it will be.
Jim-Bob sees something change out of the corner of his eye, and says "Clem, keep your eyes on your prisoner!"
Clem replies "Uh, Jim-Bob...*what* prisoner? He was here just a second ago, I turned around, and now he's gone! No one can move *that* fast!"
I can't see that rolling initiative here would be any good, it sounds like too many people are going to act based on other people's prior actions.
Remember everyone's weapons are holstered (as per Faith's orders), except John's, which is on the ground.
So, everyone post what they'd do. If the action you have in mind depends on what someone else would do, wait until they post and then state what you're doing.
Be prepared to be interrupted in your action by the cops.
As soon as Arlo disappears and it looks like things are going downhill, Gavril moves. Since he's still unbound, he simply takes a step toward Jim-Bob, who seems the more dangerous of the pair, and wraps his arms around the man, pinning the cop's own arms to his sides and restraining him.
Once he has the man held, Gavril turns to Clem and shouts. "No move! We no bad guys. No shooting or I get angry. You no like when angry."
I will try to get a map up soon.
From the way I'm playing things out in my mind, Jim-Bob gave the order for everyone to drop their weapons, at which point Faith interrupted him, negating everything else in that post and giving no one any time to do anything.
Then after a short exchange between Faith and Jim-Bob, he ordered Clem to start cuffing people, at which point Arlo vanished, negating everything else in *that* post.
So, everyone has all their stuff on them, but holstered. Except Gavril had unslung his shotgun, and John had already dropped his glock right next to himself since he hadn't holstered it before the cops showed up.
I'll sort it all out later, but so far it appears that :
Arlo has vanished, and is presumably running for the cars. Will get back with an estimated number of rounds that will take.
Gavril dropped his shotgun and is attempting to grapple Jim-Bob.
Nate's on Hold.
John's on Hold (he's actually probably Shaken by the turn of events, I know his player is ;)
And Faith needs to post an action, after she checks out the Discussion.
Once I know who's trying to do what (or not), the cops will act.
-Posted with Wayfinder
Here's the PC's order of events according to posted statements above :
As John moves towards Faith to cuff her, she rushes Jim-Bob to grapple him.
Arlo vanishes.
Gavril drops his shotgun and rushes Jim-Bob to grapple him.
Nate and John are on Hold.
I am not accepting any further discussion about this.
Everyone is within one Move action of everyone else. I will try to get a map up today.
Jim-Bob, who is on Hold, fires off 2 fast shots at Faith, targeting her head (he *really* doesn't like her!) :
+1(2T) +1(tmkwpn) +2(marksman) -4(headshot) = 5 vs. TN=4 is a Success
+ 1(2T) + 4(headshot) = 11 vs. Toughness=6 is a Raise
At least one of the bullets grazes the side of her head hard, stunning her and drawing blood.
Faith takes a Wound and is Shaken
====================================================================
Clem, who is on Hold, fires off 2 fast shots at Gavril, targeting his leg (he's young and hesitant to kill) :
+1(2T) -2(limb) = 5 vs. TN=4 is a Success
+ 1(2T) = 22 vs. Toughness=9 is 3 Raises
But both bullets hit big muscles in his leg, ripping thru them.
Gavril takes 3 Wounds and is Shaken
=====================================================================
Jim-Bob bellows at the top of his lungs "EVERYBODY F*CKING *FREEZE*, OR YOU'RE ALL DEAD!"
What do you do? If even one person (other than Arlo) says they're going to take *any* kind of action, I'll roll initiative.
BTW, I want responses from every player as to what their PC is doing (or not) at this point. I will not proceed until everyone has replied.
John is putting his hands up in the air. His face looks even more pasty white than normal.
Map is up.
Cars and Arlo are way off to the NW.
Cave is just barely off-map to the S.
The bushes Nate where was are on the W edge, between the cops. Basically due W of where Nate is now.
There aren't any real grid lines, but you can tell from where the different-textured squares meet and from the icon sizes where they are.
I was Googling "cop" and "gun" and when I saw this icon, I *had* to use it. No apologies. :)
Arlo keeps making for the vehicles. He cringes at the sound of the gunshots, knowing that probably is not a good thing, but he is set on a course of action, and probably couldn't change the outcome of things back at the scene.
Soak Roll
No wounds soaked, still shaken.
From my (admittedly limited) knowledge of proper police procedure, they're generally authorized to use force "one step up" from a criminal or suspect or what-have-you. So if someone punches a cop--unarmed assault--they can respond with a nonlethal weapon like a nightstick or mace. Headshotting Faith is probably an understandable reaction, but it would likely earn a reprimand based on the situation (although her wearing kevlar vest and being equipped with various weaponry could affect that). Gavril, though? That's the one that could easily earn a lawsuit or other problems. Yeah, he jumped at a cop. But being that the cops don't know his history--and he in fact isn't a blackbelt or anything, so his hands are not qualified as lethal weapons, even if history suggests otherwise--shooting an unarmed attacker is quite unnecessary. That could cause problems.
Realistically, and within the scope of this game, I doubt legal repercussions would be all that big a deal. Especially in a podunk town like this the cops would probably suffer very few, if any, troubles for this. We're outside folk, after all.However, another point--Gavril's Toughness is actually 11 due to his Flak Jacket/Amulet combo, and I believe that actually becomes 13 against bullets (although I remember a debacle with kevlar-based armor in Discussion previously, and I don't know exactly how Flak Jackets work with those rules--they're listed as +2/+4, and I'm inclined to think the +4 is against bullets, but I might be mistaken). In any case, his Toughness is a little higher than 9, so at most he's taking 2 Wounds with his Shaken. And I'm going to try and Soak. (I think we all started this mission with 3 Bennies again?)
Soak: 1d8 ⇒ 4
Wild: 1d6 ⇒ 6 Ace: 1d6 ⇒ 6 Ace: 1d6 ⇒ 3
Uh, total of 15? Success and 2 Raises. So whether he took 3 Wounds or 2, he's actually okay. That said, Gavril's had enough of this, he's tired of the trouble and he's reached the decision that these cops are more likely to shoot his friends and hurt them all than to be helpful in any way. The fact that the shooting's now started just makes it worse. So he'll continue with his grapple. Not sure if you need another action.
Both Gavril and Faith are continuing, so...
Arlo :
Faith :
Gavril :
John :
Nate :
Jim-Bob :
Clem :
So in order : Clem, Faith, Jim-Bob, John, Arlo, Nate, Gavril
(Arlo, please continue to state that you're moving towards the cars, just so I know what you're doing. Gonna have to do some complicated math soon...)