Franklin blushed a bit at Joe's compliment, but smiled back at the big Caydenite. When one was used to only getting negative feedback, it took some getting used to. When the gnome commented on the goblins, the accountant chuckled, but nodded all the same. Another job with Docta G in the fold and not in the hold would be a better one, indeed.
He listened in suspense as Joe told of his previous night, meeting the mighty Cayden Cailean himself. Franklin wasn't very religious, but he found himself caught up in the older man's excitement and following intently, nodding at the slight pauses for him to continue. When the Caydenite finished, the accountant grinned and shook his head in disbelief.
Franklin wasn't too sure he wanted to tie himself up to the Caydenite religion, but then again, was that too bad a thing? It was pretty much the opposite of the life he had been living, so probably not. When Joe demanded he drink up, the accountant did so, the gentle burn of the wine in his throat rather pleasant as he drained the glass.
When Docta G pulled out the cape, Franklin grinned and reached forward, running his hand down the fabric. "Pretty slick, man. Gonna wear that on official business?"
When talk turned to jobs the group could complete, the young man had to admit that helping a hot Shelynite with a basement problem sounded like it could provide good dividends (in addition to sounding a bit naughty). However, Faith's comment made more sense. Defeating a giraffe-riding goblin would provide more exposure, possibly. "I agree with Faith...the giraffe goblin is exotic and probably high profile. Or at least makes an interesting story."
Brother Joe nods in surprise. "Hmm. Oddly enough, the job that so far has the most support is the 'odd' one. Unless anyone else wants to state a different case, I think the giraffe goblin is our next job." The caydenite smiles to himself, appreciating the natural way the group is coming up with the most democratic way to decide Last Call's next action.
The cleric noticed Faith's smile lessen with the 'fun size' comment. Oh no, think Joe, I better explain myself and apologize. I don't want my unique brand of humor to end the good vibes of this team. I'll talk more privately with her before we leave.
Franklin felt a thrilling rush as the group decided on a course of action. Never mind that it seemed ridiculous to speak about a goblin and giraffe combo causing havoc in the area, it was an actual job! And not one involving T-charts and ledgers. Or his family. The accountant chugged down a healthy couple gulps of beer, and started coughing almost immediately, reaching for the counter. Still, he wore a smile on his face as he pulled out his phone and started tapping on it.
Smiling, Brother Joe reached over the bar to place his hand on Franklin's struggling shoulder. "Baby steps", the cleric consoled quietly. "Your journey begins. Cayden's Wisdom will come."
"I'd like us to talk later, one on one, if you got some spare time."
With their course plotted, Franklin sends a quick text to Bibi. As Brother Joe gives Franklin some encouragement and Docta G shows off his cape's nice trim, there is the sound of breaking glass behind the counter.
As Joe doubtless turns to investigate the fallen tumbler, he finds that it is not in fact a dish at all.
It was apparently a glass jar.
Which, up until a moment ago, was filled with wasps.
Now they're free!
And pissed!
They make a beeline waspline for Joe's face!
Faith's eyes widened hugely at the sudden and mysterious appearance of an angry swarm of angry stingy. "Oh crap! Joe! Close your eyes!"
Flicker buzzed dominantly. She was a lot bigger than they were, after all.
Joe exclaims as he quickly ducks, grabs the collar of his shirt up over his head, crouches down and shoulder rolls down behind the bar toward the soda gun.
The wasps, clearly viewing Joe as the aggressor here, make their way toward him, but he starts moving before they get to him!
Everyone can make an action before the wasps start stinging!
Hearing the Indy theme in his head, and with seasoned hands, Brother Joe draws the soda gun and fires it at wasp swarm flying straight for him. "Subdue!" The caydenite shouts. "Kill only if necessary!"
Does Franklin like seltzer water? Because he just got a face full of it.
Maybe filling glasses with it doesn't translate to spraying wasps! Or maybe he'll have better luck next time.
Franklin hit the enter button on his phone to fire off a text, looking up quizzically at the sound of the wasps. His eyes widened as the spray nozzle in Joe's hand was aimed right for him, mouth opening to shout a warning before he started getting drenched in seltzer. "Jostppp!"
The young man hopped off his bar stool and quick-stepped away from the counter. He wasn't too afraid of wasps, but with Faith's bigger one buzzing about, better to be safe than sorry.
Doc presses play on his boombox and starts layin’ down some rhymes, ”Ay come on Last Call let’s beat these bugs, wipe their stupid bug grins off their stupid bug mugs!”
Faith fired off quick beam of cold while heading for the door.
The chilly beam causes a good handful of the wasps to drop out of the swarm and chitter to the ground, flash-frozen; the rest make their way to Joe.
Regardless, Joe is either smart enough not to open his eyes while covered in wasps or, if he is not, promptly gets his eyes stung. Either way, he is effectively blind. I'm rather hoping for the former.
Joe: 15/17 HP, blind, maybe Sickened.
Everyone else: Fine
Smallish Wasp Swarm: 3 damage so far
Brother Joe shakes off flecks of icicles from his beard that the cold beam left in it's wake. Still keeping his shirt up over his head, the caydenite fires once more at the wasp swarm.
Unsure of what to do in the almost comical situation, Franklin set his eyes upon a dirty bar rag and lunged towards it, getting ready to go over and start trying to swat the things out of the air. As he waved it about, he was rather startled to see that it trailed a flame through the air! Just before he dropped it, he remembered the gnomish rapper's previous song and how it had flamed his fists. He just hoped the rag would last long enough to do some damage.
Franklin's Flaming Rag of Fire certainly looks impressive-- is anyone recording?-- but maybe the fire is making it hard to judge the distance? One way or the other, the accountant flails ineffectually.
Since Joe is firing at his own face currently, I'm going to say his Miss Chance is actually 25% instead, which puts him just within the realm of Accomplished Soda Gunslinger!
Let's call this a... 1d4.
Dousing his own body with the soda gun, a good number of the wasps lose their grip.
The rest find that Joe is now deliciously carbonated, and take a nice, big bite. The sound of buzzing mingles with the sound of bar patrons screaming as they flee the scene, having now realized "Oh Shit, Wasps."
Joe: 12/17 HP, blind.
Everyone else: Fine
Smallish Wasp Swarm: 6 damage so far
Last Call is up!
Faith headed towards the door, firing off another beam of ice. "Time to leave the bar, it belongs to the wasps for now!"
"The Hell it is!" Brother Joe bellowed. "This is Cayden's bar! And I've been patient with Calistria's hissyfit, but enough's enough!"
Letting the soda gun fall from his hand, the caydenite begins to use the hands to slap and swat the wasp's away, killing if need be.
Franklin continued to flap around his flaming rag, though he kept dodging away from the fire-engulfed thing every time it got near to him, turning his attack into a weird spasm session that was probably pretty confusing to anyone watching.
Docta G keeps rapping, waiting for Joe to be able to get out of the swarm’s grasp.
Faith's beam pzzowt's smack into an expensive bottle of liquor. Thankfully, all it really does is make it chilled.
The flaming rag comes inches from doing any good, but Joe's quick, fiery hamboning manages to get a few off of him!
As crushed wasps fall to the bar floor, the remaining ones keep stinging and biting!
Joe: 11/17 HP, blind.
Everyone else: Fine
Smallish Wasp Swarm: 9 damage so far
Party's Up!
"The wasps think otherwise. This is why we have exterminators, Joe." Faith fired another beam of cold, noting that the first one would be nice and cool when it began to defrost. "Besides, this isn't a hissyfit. This is notice. If it was a hissyfit our new friends would all be Flicker's size." She fired another beam of cold. Maybe she could have two drinks?
"Well, I'm so sorry to think I could praise my god, IN HIS OWN TEMPLE!!" Brother Joe bellowed under his shirt as he hambones for his life.
Franklin looked at Faith in amazement, glancing at the huge wasp at her side. He had heard that Calistrians, both men and women, were super good in the sack...but if this was the kind of temper that came with it, it might be less than worth it. Focusing, he kept waving the repellant rag around, working it steadily closer to the small cloud of buzzing insects around the priest's head.
The most amazing part of all of this is, Joe's hamboning, the pshhhew of Faith's ray, and the subtle whooshing noise of a flaming dishrag all provide a pretty good sound for gnomesta rap, and Last Call is amazingly on rhythm. The last patron stops, the door ajar, and turns around.
"Oh f***," he says, "this is my "
As he begins to finger-tut along to the beat, wasps fall to the ground in high amounts until there aren't any left stinging. Most of them are on the floor, in various states of burnt, flash-frozen, gently-chilled, or crushed.
The threat, for now, is gone.
Once his head is safely uncovered, Brother Joe the bartender comes to the fore. The cleric quickly gets broom and dustpin and begins to sweep the insects up. With such care, the caydenite opens a side door and gently dumps the wasps outside. Once the door is closed, Joe gets a new bar rag and begins cleaning with bar, swiping up spills and other messes.
"Everybody alright?" Joe asks as he goes about his duties.
"I'm coolin' it like always. How bout you Brotha J?"
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"I'll be okay", Joe chuckles to himself. "These days, you can't really call yourself a true caydenite unless Calistra gets angry with you AT LEAST once."
The cleric finishes up cleaning from the attack. "So, Last Stand, what is to be our next quest?"
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"Don't worry, I'm sure she'll do it again if Cayden doesn't learn better courtship behaviour. With a little effort I'm sure Calistrans will be coming to such a place of miracles too! But I'm sure such...little...mistakes won't be a problem." Faith smiled cheerfully.
"I think we'd decided on the giraffe job. Because any job you can labour 'the giraffe job' is going to be great advertising."
Franklin whipped his head around as the wasps started falling to the ground, the Caydenite no longer in trouble, as the leaving bar patron exclaimed about the show the group was putting on. As Docta G laid down the sick beats, the accountant continued to wave the rag around dexterously, a wide smile on his face, until he realized the towel wasn't on fire anymore and the whole place was silent.
He looked at the bar top, face burning red, and gently placed his prized weapon upon the wood. Anxious to change the subject, he nodded enthusiastically along with Faith. "The giraffe and his goblin handler seem like a pretty good story, if nothing else." Honestly, Franklin was quite desperate for this adventuring gig to become lucrative enough to not have to labor for his family anymore. He didn't want to seem desperate, though.
Joe pours himself a stiff drink and continues. "So. I'm still shaky on the details on the giraffe gig. Can we attempt it tonight or start fresh in the morning?"
Franklin thought over Joe's words carefully, then said in a very mild tone, "Besides maybe gathering some things is there anything preventing us from going after this now? I kind of have a day gig already, at least for now..."
Franklin explains a few things, and with a few texts to Bibi, you get all the details you're going to have.
There's an old Toys 'R' Us that sits abandoned beside the Tide Light Rail, a public train that connects sections of the Hampton Roads area. It's not far from the residential area that Fang and Claw live in.
Of late, people have reported a goblin riding a giraffe moving late at night; no one thus far has followed them, so where or why they're moving about is currently unknown. Bibi was considering doing so herself... but has decided that it might be a good job for up-and-comers like yourselves. (She promises payment as well as any loot you can find is yours, and is forgoing any sort of "finder's fee.")
She suspects that this giraffe rider might be connected to the Blue Light Special, as well as a goblin duo who have taken the monikers "Sears" and "Roebuck."
Your job is to investigate and, if you see fit, take action.
Conveniently, there's a Light Rail station not far from the bar, and a stop not far from the old Toys 'R' Us.
"Sounds like the toy store is the place to start," Faith murmured out loud as she considered the job. She seemed to recall the old toy company had used a giraffe mascot, making any kind of online search unlikely to bring up anything but old adverts and creepypasta. She did google the address to make sure no one else had moved in or was going to soon. Breaking and entering an abandoned store was one thing, especially if you could argue greater good - like a minor illusion spell being used to make some noise inside - but entering an owned one on their own cameras was a bad idea.
Which reminded her - she needed to make an Amazon order. It was just a shame they never sent actual Amazon's to deliver her stuff. The wizards always looked so...formal.
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"I hear that all Toys-R-Us stores are haunted", Brother Joe chimes in, finishes up his cleaning duties to punch out for the night. "Think about it, if you were a ghost, where would be the most entertaining place to haunt?"
Faith considered, and replied with a shortlist of interesting clubs, most with a particular dress code which often involved not wearing a dress at all but being sure to use protective gears and spells.
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"Mo' goblins? Shiiieeeeet bruh. That ain't my jam. Guess we doin' this shiznit though."
He thinks briefly about Joe's question, "I'd haunt Snoop Dogg's mansion. I heard that dude's got magic weed so good it can make ghosts high. Sides, 'parently he's a werewolf so that'd be sick to watch."
Franklin nodded in agreement with Faith's decision to visit the old toy store. It was a shame Toys R Us had gone bankrupt...the novelty of the brick and mortar chain had left the accountant a little bummed out for a couple of weeks after the store went under, but with wizards putting together their collective spellcraft to get deliveries to consumers in ridiculous time at low, competitive prices, it was a wonder any physical stores remained open.
Franklin smirked as Brother Joe spoke of all of the stores being haunted, though his eyes widened as Faith detailed out where exactly she would haunt. Places like that existed? The young man decided to etch at least a couple of those names in memory so he could frequent them at a later date.
At the rapper gnome's reluctance to engage with goblins once more, the accountant could only agree. The last couple encounters had been a relative circus. Still, paid work was paid work, and any group had to start small and make a name for themselves. As they made ready to depart to the rail station, Franklin said idly, "I'd haunt my parents' business. Watching them pretend nothing was disturbing their perfect little world would be entertaining, to me."
With the group more-or-less in agreement, Last Call finishes their drinks and leaves the bar, making their namesake actually very relevant at the moment.
The train ride takes about fifteen to twenty minutes; the cars are about half as full as they normally are, since it's getting a bit late.
As the group steps off the car, they take stock of the situation. Just ahead is the back of a strip mall; according to Google Maps, it's just past there and a minor highway.
The strip mall is quiet at this time of night; not a lot of people want a haircut after 8PM, unless perhaps they've been confined to a quarantine for a long period of time. All that's open is a thrift store and a hardware shop; as you pass it, a pair of gnomes carry a ladder far too long for them towards a small vehicle.
After crossing the highway, you come across the Toys 'R' Us. The building lies abandoned in a shallow basin, its own parking lot providing some fair distance between it and its closest neighbors, a soul food restaurant run by elves who have been around long enough to really hone their craft and a small law office nestled toward the back.
The lights are out; currently, the only source of light is the street light near the entrance to the parking lot. The walls are a pale brick, with a squared rainbow above the windows in front beside the double-door entrance. Something has happened to the sign, as the Y is missing:
Aside from the sound of cars passing behind, it's fairly quiet.
"Hmm. TosR Us", Joe comments. "I suppose if I was British, I'd feel insulted. Anyway, I'm gonna have a look around. Look out for giraffe hoove prints, I guess."
Seeing the elven soul food restaurant Docta G's eyes light up, "Yooo, Mama Caladiel's? I've heard that place slaps. We gotta go there after messin' up the double G combo."
"Victory food is the best food," Faith agreed as she checked the area for possible entry's or signs of life.
Franklin held out a hand to try to stop Joe's progress momentarily. "Hold up a second...I'm coming with you." With that, the accountant moved with the Caydenite to inspect the area.
When Docta G mentioned the elven joint's name and reputation (he had no idea what slaps meant, but the context was clear), with Faith joining in, the young man felt obliged to concur. "Yeah, that sounds really good."
"One thing one of my homies told me 'bout it. Don't fill up on the lembas cornbread beforehand. They give it to you free but you gon' be real full after eatin' it."
Docta G follows along, quietly jamming to one of his friends latest tracks while looking for giraffe prints.
A survey of the area reveals that, while there are no giraffe tracks on the pavement, the surrounding area is not devoid of hoofmarks that might very well belong to a giraffe.
The hooftracks seem to lead to and from the residential area-- a simple grid of streets with plenty of middle-class housing in them, from what you can see from here. You also spot the occasional barefoot small humanoid footprint, missing a toe on the left side.
The front door, facing the street (and to a lesser extent, the highway) has a padlock on a chain over it; from the make, it looks fairly professional (if a bit on the cheap side).
The back door (facing the residential area) had a padlock and chain on it, but the chain is split and the padlock busted, both laying useless on the loading ramp.
Brother Joe motions everyone over to the back door. "Alright. We're in. Keep your eyes peeled." The cleric takes out his holy symbol from behind his armor, just in case there are any ghosts.
Noting the missing toe on the footprint, Faith said, "This is why you need to have armoured skin when you go barefooting. Or be a Halfling." She, more or less, did both.
Less concerned about ghosts and more concerned about security systems or Goblin rigged traps, Faith checked the doors before moving through.