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”It’s all about knowing your audience” James says from his new face down, prone position. ”The right kicks project wealth and success, whether on the streets or in the C-suites.” James continues his rejoinder as he picks himself off of the frozen ground before peering at a sleeve and freezing. Then shouting. ”Rick North, you owe me a dry cleaning you body snatching piece of s%$~!”
Grimacing with distaste at the damage he *knows* that it's going to do to them, James pulls on his Italian leather driving gloves while running for the ladder.
James keeps running, hoping that the motorcycle firing up isn't carrying the sheriff into the night.
Spotting the wake of Rick's passage if not the man himself, James heads south past the subway muttering under his breath. "Come to Chicago they say. It'll be fun they say."
Sorry for my slowness. Spent the holiday in the woods.
James continues to run after Rick. He can't have that much blood to burn. In an attempt to confuse the onlookers he shouts, "You're close, but that guys is a member of the Improv Olympic! Their outdoor shows are crazy."
"Let's head for that Quincy stop, then." James starts running (without Celerity) in the direction Dalton indicates (and I believe Victoria is already heading).
James watches Rick speed off into the night with dawning Horror. "Oh f~+# me..."
Not liking when people take decisions out of his hands, Primogen or Neonate, James attempts to position himself to catch Rick's eyes and use Dominate before he can run. "*Drop* the sheriff, Rick. We need to have a discussion here."
"This should be interesting." James quips before following in the Sheriff's wake.
James turns to the Sheriff, "Did you by chance see the note next to the chess table? It was in a woman's hand and refered to, apparently, the price as Custos? Do you think it's a veiled warning?"
James sweeps a hand in the direction of the bedrooms to signal his agreement with Kate, "By all means, let us continue the investigation."
When no one speaks up, James says, "It appears that the prince did indeed send a missive to Modius via Annabelle Triabell, but seems likely that the prince requested that Modius present himself rather than us. It may be that someone was trying to set Modius up. Perhaps someone looking to take over Gary or just use Modius as a slightly more believable patsy?"
"Derek, I assure you that I had nothing to do with your Master's disappearance. But I must now hand the phone to the Sheriff, who seems to think otherwise." James does his best to appear nonplussed, before handing the phone, pocket square and all, to the Sheriff.
"Fair enough, Derek. My name is James Sheridan, childe of Kevin, grand-childe of Lodin. I'm a neonate out of Gary. I came to the city two nights ago to present myself to the prince. Instead, I find myself in the middle of a ham-handed attempt to pin his disappearance and/or destruction on myself and a few other Gary neonates who were also in town to present themselves. All these presentations were precipitated by Annabelle Triabell dropping in on Modius's New Year's Eve party with a note supposedly from Lodin demanding that we do so." James tries to get all of this out calmly before the sheriff decides to interrupt. Turning back to the phone, "Anything you can tell me?"
James hears the ranting of the sheriff, but tries to remain calm, "Derek, as I said, my name is James and I'm investigating the Prince's disappearance. The shouting you may hear in the background is the sheriff. Can you tell me how you know the prince and if you have any information on his disappearance?"
James replies to the voice on the other end of the phone, "I regret to inform you that the prince is, in fact, missing. My name is James and I'm part of a team investigating his disappearance. Could I ask who you are?
Putting the letter down, James again employs his pocket square to attempt a trick that he's recently heard of. He picks up the phone and tries to dial *69.
Borrowing a move straight from his Gran-Gran's old murder mysteries, James gingerly picks up the letter with a flourished pocket square to examine it.
"Let's see what's behind door number two..." James, always conscious of keeping the blood from his kicks, heads towards the closed door to the west to see what's behind it.
Being careful not to get any blood on this Italian loafers, James examines the remains of Curt and checks the ground for any shell casings or other evidence of his murder.
While James doesn't know much about sign language, he gets Morgrym's point. He moves to that northern door.
"Any idea what Curt was shot with? It seems unlikely that a prince could be taken with simple firearms." James joins Morgrym to investigate the open (northern) door and the room beyond.
Spending 3 XP on the first dot of Occult that I should have prioritized at character creation.
, James tries to be gentle, but has a lot of questions, "Is there any evidence that the anyone else has been attacked? And who is Curt and how did he die? Any chance there is some surveillance of at least part of the building?"
Examining the Art: James is impressed. Under his breath he says, "No freaking way..." After a few moments of awe he quips, "Quite a step up from Modius's Scooby Doo mystery mansion." He turns his gaze to the newcomer and his voice becomes empathetic, "I wish we could meet under better circumstances, Natasha, but could you tell us what you do here?"
ST: "90 Minutes will be fine. I'll be heading inside shortly, so I'll meet you when I get finished. Keep your head on a swivel, hear?"
ST: First to his sire: "Sir. Long story but the head of our local sent me with some other apprentices to Chicago to carry a message to the shop steward up here. Only the steward is nowhere to be seen, and the local executive board has filed a major grievance against our group. We're framed for the old bastard missing work and set up to take the fall for it. If we can't figure out where he ended up, we're set to be forcefully removed from the Union in two days." Second to the ghouls. "Good to hear from you, boys. Had to go on an unexpected work retreat. I need you two to bring the car over to the Sear's Tower. Make sure the trunk has plenty of, uh, party supplies, yeah?
If James can't find a third payphone, he will wait until one already engaged is ready before contacting his ghouls and sire.
"Well catch me a catch." James will take 3 blood points.
James will definitely take advantage of a blood doll or two, depending on how well stocked the larder is. He is even more interested in getting in touch with his ghouls and getting ahold of his car phone in order to gather some information.
"Much appreciation for the snacks and the support." James ponders for a moment before asking, "Any chance we could get access to the Prince's social calendar or perhaps one of his assistants, if he has any? And assuming they haven't disappeared. Maybe interview them and his herd to piece together a timeline? Maybe they will have less of an agenda than his, uh, night time staff."
James shakes his head to the negative. "Most of my old haunts were more to the south"
"By all mean, let us be on our way. We've only got a short time to satisfy these gentleman that the true culprit is on the loose. We wouldn't want to waste valuable time and let them get away." He looks meaningfully at the large man before standing up to leave with Neally.
James drops his grin from the banter with Dalton and switches into business mode, "If you like, I can call my ghouls and have them bring receipts that establish our timeline. We can name or describe every kindred and kine that we've seen since coming into Chicago and you can confirm our presence with them to further establish our whereabouts for the last 48 hours. The bottom line is this, however: The more time you spend interrogating us, the neonate coterie who is extremely unlikely to have the power to take down a centuries old prince, the more time whoever did have the juice to do it can disappear into the shadows."
"I do seem to recall my lawyer using the word 'allegedly' a quite a bit shortly thereafter" James quips.
James surprisingly recognizes the supernatural effect and burns a willpower. He does *not* like having his mind clouded. After being accused of killing the prince, James laughs. "So let me get this straight. You think a couple neonates from out of town just strolled in, offed the prince, and then stuck around to get a daylight helicopter tour of Chicago? You must be scraping the bottom of the barrel to find somebody to pin this on."
James adjusts his tie and grins before saying "My kind of place." and entering.
James rises and addresses the sheriff, "Just trying to follow the forms and present ourselves, sir."
"Looks like the deluxe accommodations", James says sardonically. I'm not sure where we're at. I fell asleep in the helicopter.
I forgot about 1's. Drat.
James manages to sit calmly and ask, "How much longer is this flight scheduled?"
After seeing the success of Rick's Presence, James decides to give it a go.
He holds up his handcuffs as if to say, "Are these really necessary now?" Assuming someone takes them off, he will sit quietly, taking the time to ensure any potential mud from the frozen ground is removed from his pants legs before it sets.
Mindful of the mud, James smoothly gets down on his knees, fingers interlaced behind his head. The motion seems practiced.
"Feels more like a power play then a setup. Prince swoops his helicopter in at the last second after making us wait all night for him. I'll stick around for a bit longer." He holds his ground at center field.
Once out of earshot, James says to Victoria, "Smoothly done." He will drop the bits of his "worker disguise" off a the edge of the field in order to greet the prince in proper attire.
If you'll help a brother out, Victoria, I'll save up some XP for Thaumaturgy as well ;)
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