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The Lore Bear
Jan 21, 2014

I don't know what to put here. Guys? GUYS?!
Here we go trying to kill your computer again!

I'll probably post a thing tomorrow. A Professional, most likely.

EDIT: Also, your discord link is just sending me to the discord app for some reason. Please send help.

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Jen Knight, The Professional


I'll get the basic details out of the way. My name's Jen Knight, I was born and raised in Philadelphia, got a degree in Criminal Justice, a Taurus and I investigate paranormal events. If you've got any fun X-Files jokes, you should get them out of the way now. I've seen enough actual poo poo that I'm not a skeptic or a believer, I'm a knower. Been traveling between every small, medium and big city in this country that matters to the mystical. And just imagine whatever you've seen on TV, just uglier and more likely to murder you in your sleep, and that's what things look like out there.

This is my job now. Could've been FBI, police, something normal. You survive one stand-off with a werewolf without even having a single idea of the supernatural and the next day, you get a car parked in your driveway and a request on your phone to go to some little office in some nameless office building. The rest is history. Now I get a bunch of fake badges, a car filled with guns and a news feed of every strange activity happening in the United States. Bosses don't give me too much direction, but when they do, it's never anything easy.

Got any questions? Might not be able to answer some of them. You know how it is.

quote:

Look: Woman, Determined Face, Tailored Suit

Stats: Charm-1, Cool+2, Sharp+1, Tough+1, Weird=0

Agency: Helsing Initiative
A national private investigation firm with a specialization in mystical and supernatural events, funded by mysterious means and keeps its agents in small, unconnected cells. The leaders of the Initiative go by Ms. Harker and Mr. Seward, usually masked in shadow and mystery. The mission statement is to protect the world from the supernatural, but there's no rhyme or reason from higher up as to what they want or why they suggest certain things.
Resources: Cover Identities, Offices All Over The Place
Red Tape: Secretive Hierarchy, Cryptic Motives

Moves:

When you Deal with the Agency, requesting help or gear, or making excuses for a failure, roll +Sharp. On a 10+, you’re good—your request for gear or personnel is okayed, or your slip-up goes unnoticed. On a 7-9, things aren’t so great. You might get chewed out by your superiors and there’ll be fallout, but you get what you need for the job. On a miss, you screwed up: you might be suspended or under investigation, or just in the doghouse. You certainly aren’t going to
get any help until you sort it all out.

Leave No One Behind: In combat, when you help someone escape, roll +Sharp. On a 10+ you get them out clean. On a 7-9, you can either get them out or suffer no harm, you choose. On a miss, you fail to get them out and you’ve attracted hostile attention.

Medic: You have a full first aid kit, and the training to heal people. When you do first aid, roll +Cool. On a 10+ the patient is stabilized and healed of 2 harm. On a 7-9 choose one: heal 2 harm or stabilize the injury. On a miss, you cause an extra 1 harm. This move takes the place of regular first aid.

Mobility: You have a car built for monster hunting. The car is a fast, obvious car with concealed weapons.

Gear: Flak vest (1-armour hidden), Submachine gun (3-harm close area loud reload), 9mm (2-harm close loud), Hunting rifle (2-harm far loud)

1: How did you hear about Father Pryor's death and why did it interest you? Give me something strange or at least something potentially strange about it (other than the whole melting thing) that might have piqued your interest.

Look, when you get some intel that a preacher melts on a coroner's slab, it's hard to not stand out a little. Even if I couldn't verify it, the rest of the situation didn't match up with a normal death, natural or supernatural. No running, no obvious signs of demonic dealings that melting would suggest, no signs of struggle of any sort. Corpses that melt significantly after death usually means something big mojo-wise, and you do something like that to cover up what's going on.

What caught my attention was the time between melting. If you're covering something up, you melt the bastard legally by cremation. If you want to make a point, you melt him alive. It doesn't fit the usual MO of a murder.

2: What was your last brush with the supernatural? How did you resolve it - or did you? Maybe something's still lingering there, something that might come back to haunt you...

I'll tell you as much as I can tell you. We've got certain rules, but you seem to be in the know, so I'll just keep the details light. There was a rash of missing in the midwest, college town, one of the cities called springs, if you want to look it up. Turns out, this one was a simple one. Young vamps started up a roost.. a coven? Whatever you call a group of bloodsuckers. A half-dozen of them, looked like they weren't going to stop even when one of them ran into a local who knew what was going on. Some locals and I, we got rid of the vamps. Shot 'em up, burned their building down. Nothing could have survived that.

It's the problem with vampires, really. You can't really negotiate with them when they're all hopped up on human blood. No other way to deal with them. They have long memories, too.

3: What is your greatest regret?

You don't keep a job like this if you can't rally past regrets. It isn't like I have much choice. Worst regret? Got an ex-boyfriend killed. I mean, it.. probably wasn't that simple, but there are definitely some spooky sorts of wizards and witches in the northeast. Was just home for a weekend before following something up in the suburbs. Usually don't do investigations this close to home, but, well, sometimes you make bad judgement calls. Boyfriend.. His name was Matthew, used to call him Matty, he was.. well, he's a good guy. Deserved better than what happened to him. The wizard.. Warlock? Warlock I was chasing had some sort of evil eye on me, thought he'd find out as much as he could from my ex.

Found Matty dead, all sorts of signs of torture. Good news, he was the last one that fucker tortured. Put enough bullets through the warlock that he'd never get up.

4: Is this what’s finally caught your interest about Kochsville, or was there something else that has drawn you here? If so, who or what is it?

It's hard to say that I'm not investigating this because it's my job. But something like this, multiple supernatural events, multiple signs of trouble, disappearances that weren't confirmed meltings. Having to say confirmed meltings. It screams that this is something bigger than just some faerie having a laugh. This one's a big one. Probably life-changing. May even get a promotion if I bring in the big bad, dead or alive.

5: If you weren't, through circumstance, coercion, or choice, inducted into the bizarre life you find yourself in, what do you think you'd be doing now? If you were, for lack of a better term, normal?

I wanted to be a cop. You know, back before I got pulled into all this weirdness. Now that I've met a lot of cops, I think I'd be better being something not a cop. I mean, I doubt I'd just be a desk jockey or whatever. Get my master's, probably, maybe get into the FBI or something? I'll be honest, I haven't put much thought to it with everything that's going on. It'd have to be something exciting like this, no doubt about it. I can't imagine what it'd be like, waiting around for things to happen around me. It'd be absolute torture.

Maybe CIA? Get to travel the world.

6: What is the worst thing that you have ever done?

Is this some sort of psych eval? Look, I'm not proud, but I've worked with other hunters on occasion and sometimes hunts go badly. You ever seen a wendigo before? Antlers, giant, multiple animal heads, fur everywhere. It isn't an easy thing to hunt down for sure. Even if you can get it contained, finding a bone weapon that's properly treated is nearly impossible, and making bone-tipped bullets takes forever. There were some locals in the midwest, wanted to help, claimed they knew what they were doing and I didn't ask questions. Didn't plan to.

To kill the drat thing, I used two of them as bait. I didn't tell them that, but I knew. I knew they weren't going to make it out alive. They were older, sort of knew the risks. They said they were doing it to make their grandkids safe. But I.. I couldn't think of another way, not without letting the wendigo get away. So, I just left them out there to be eaten. I'm not.. proud of it. I wish I could say it taught me something, but all I learned is that I need to do better prep. Make a better plan.

The Lore Bear fucked around with this message at 03:26 on Apr 10, 2018

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The Lore Bear
Jan 21, 2014

I don't know what to put here. Guys? GUYS?!
Jen Knight

Have you ever had a partner, or have you habitually been a solo act?

We've got a partner system, but it's only for three cases: New recruits, probationary issues and special task forces. So, I've been part of the first, obviously, but was also on a six month job in Texas. I know what you're going to say, but it wasn't a chupacabra, or a Texas bigfoot or anything weird like that. Something called a Baykok, some sort of native skeleton monster that goes around murdering people for food. Reason you needed two people, at least, was because you had multiple investigations. You gotta find the bones and the skeleton.

Right, yeah, not always a solo act. We learn to work together. People are the best sort of help against the supernatural.

What’s your department like? What’s your boss like, I mean - but also what are the standard operations like?

Well, I don't have a boss exactly. Not in the traditional sense of someone who pays attention to what I do. It's all messages down from on high, percolating down the right strings. I've got a handler, he has his cell, and then the cells make territories, and then there's the big bosses up top. My handler, Wendell Harris, is the only member of the Initiative I talk to more than once a week.



He's my primary point of contact, and the person who I report to about old hunts and where I get new ones. Thanks to the power of cell phones, our operations are now pretty mobile and rarely need to keep people in the same places. The cells used to be more regional, but now with a combination of cheap office space and Amazon Lockers, you can pick up most anything special you need. Well, assuming you want to deal with the bosses or whatever they keep around to pay for all of this.

Is it all backstabbing conspiracies from the bottom up with shadowy cabals and half-truths, or are you more open, at least internally?

Nah, between agents and some of the handlers who see this as a duty more than a career, it's mostly rivalries and one-upsmanship. We've got to keep discretion a little bit, but the less you know about the dark dealings, the easier it is to just try and make a good impression. Helps that you have to survive a decade as a full agent before they even consider you for a handler position. Usually, you're too busy trying to survive whatever is coming for you rather than worrying about why someone might want you not to know about eastern Canada's Sasquatch population.

When you get past the handlers who'd rather stay handlers, though, well, it's pretty much where the half-truths and secrecy begins. Hell, you don't even know any of the territory chairs by name. They start getting code names at that point, supposedly to make sure that there's never any major leaks of what's going on if someone gets turned against the Initiative. I mean, I don't think there's much literal backstabbing. Or if there is, they do a good job with the deep cover codenames only changing when the person dies of natural causes or heroic sacrifices. I try not to think about it too much. Job's dangerous enough as is without looking over your shoulder for other agents who might think you've gone rogue or whatever.

The Lore Bear
Jan 21, 2014

I don't know what to put here. Guys? GUYS?!

Relentless posted:


Proposal: Rowena saved my rear end during the job where I got my book. We became loose acquaintances, and at a later date she came to me for help while being hunted by Jen, which was when I started taking this whole monster hunting thing a little more seriously.

I'm good with this, which means I'm good with the fiction that Deuces and Rowena talking it out convinced Jen that Rowena's probably not worth hunting down.

quote:

• Your relationship with them has romantic potential. So far it hasn’t gone further. Hazel
• They’re on the Agency’s watch list, and you’ve been keeping an eye on them. Jack.
• You are related. Tell them how close.
• You met on a mission and worked together unofficially. And successfully. Deuces.
• They’ve worked with the Agency before, and they’re well regarded.
• You were friends back in training, before the Agency recruited you. This could be military, law enforcement, or some weirder school: decide the details between you.
• They pulled you (and maybe your team) out of a terrible FUBARed mission. Percy here.
• You got sent to “deal with them” as a hazard to the Agency’s policies one time. Tell them how you resolved this. Rowena.

The Lore Bear fucked around with this message at 01:34 on Apr 24, 2018

The Lore Bear
Jan 21, 2014

I don't know what to put here. Guys? GUYS?!
Impressions:

Jen comes off as a bit non-chalant about her job when outside of the hunt, maybe even a little jaded. Once the job starts, she's fully engaged with what's going on. She's trained but tends to roll with the punches as they come rather than try and plan everything out. She comes off as a bit overconcerned with any team she worked with now, and tries to lead whenever given the opportunity with very mixed results. It doesn't take long to figure out that she's not exactly a people person in the traditional sense.

Hazel: Look, she's good at what she does. Makes an impression to those around her. I mean, it's not always the most subtle thing, but I own a H&K MP7, so who am I to judge? I trust her well enough that she knows what she's doing.

Jack: Good kid. A little weird. Has a weight on his back from whatever the hell dragged him into this. Can't say I blame him for being a little depressed given the whole situation. College is rough for everyone, even without everything we're into.

Percy: I'd be more surprised if he wasn't the real deal, to be honest. I've met liars and cheats, it goes with the territory, but either this is the weirdest long con I've ever seen, or he's genuine. Either way, he's really good in a fight and he's.. trying, I guess?

Rowena: Christ, she's a mess. I mean, I don't blame her, being a monster who's gotta deal with all this, especially since she's got the emotional maturity of a college freshman on a good day. Happy I didn't kill her, though. Most of this isn't her fault.

Deuces: They don't make them like Deuces much anymore. He's like the world's most likeable used car salesman. Still, best one in the group to just sit down and have a beer with. Also the only one who can keep up when I talk about the differences between forms of hardware.

The Lore Bear fucked around with this message at 06:01 on Apr 27, 2018

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