P3/Conclusion: The 19th Hole
E3 Conclusion: “Out of Sync, Out of Time”
Outside, Davey nervously waited. The unexpected bounce of the car had him look in the rearview mirror. Where he saw the enormous chest of Black Jamie!! [failed Sanity: 8 points. Bout-of-Madness: significant other]
Rory Shaw/’The Fence’ (Riley K) |
Red ‘Doc’ Gordon/’The Cleaner’ (Thom R) |
Davey Mould/’The Driver’ (Kent B) |
Lenny Dobbins/’The Bruiser’ (Bill R) |
Ian McDougal/Street Punk (Julian) |
Gramma? Davey was about to start the car and speed away, when he saw, “Gramma? What are you doing here?” Althea replied, “I brought your favorite…oatmeal raisin cookies.” Davey jumped out to protect her but turned at the sound of the car creaking more. He saw Black Jamie climbing higher on the car while dripping a bluish slobber. The hiss of acid accompanied the holes appearing in the car’s trunk and roof. “RUN grandma! I don’t want to get licked!” But he wasn’t fast enough as its long tongue lashed out and wrapped around his arm. “AAAAHHHH!” Acid burns blistered his arm. No mirror for him to realize he’d also aged 9 years. Black Jamie shook his head as if a foul taste in his mouth. The spittle landed on Davey inflicting more acid wounds. He collapsed unconscious. His last vision was Black Jamie climbing the clubhouse steps.
Behind Door#1: Lenny swung the crowbar against the brick wall. Façade as it was really wood painted like brick. It easily smashed, revealing a hallway. “Over here!” The warmer air inside the opening mixed with the colder storeroom creating a mist. The others followed Lenny as he didn’t even bother to listen at the door ahead of him that had a glow of light under the threshold. The smell of stale food, sweat, and urine assaulted their nostrils. 2 cots bracketed a table with chairs while a chamber-pot occupied the empty corner.
Lenny was drawn to the table with an unfinished card game, while Ian read the spine of books in a short bookcase. [Occult or Science-failed] “A bunch of pictures and diagrams but I can’t make out the language.” Rory found a small box of personal hygiene effects under the cots. Doc went for the other door that had a humming sound behind it.
Behind Door#2: Almost 65 degrees. Doc first saw the source of the noise. A strange machine with gears and dials and switches and flashing lights with a man slumped over it. His rich clothing implied him Arthur MacMillian with his cane caught between himself and the machine. Doc next saw 2 prone men each lying on a gurney. Doc grabbed the cane to roll Arthur off…
Outside, Davey slowly woke with a throbbing arm. He remembered the attack and quickly scanned the area for the black hound. “What the hell? What did you do to my car?!” Davey staggered into the clubhouse as he tried to regain his strength.
Door#3: Lenny/Rory/Ian heard a “thump” from the connecting room and rushed forward where they found Doc prone of the floor before the machine. Rory instructed, “Don’t touch anything” as he pulled out a golf-ball and threw it at Doc. It bounced off. Lenny was already in the room despite Rory’s stern “I said don’t touch…” Lenny tried to roll Doc over to check for wounds. Lenny collapsed.
Doc woke to the sound of men jabbering from the other room. As he stood, he stirred dust from the coal pile he was laying in. In the other room, soldiers in strange uniforms stacked rations in the corner. Bewildered, he exited down the narrow hall, into the storage room, freshly painted and with rebuilt steps. Confused and shaking his head for believed concussion, he climbed the stairs where he found more soldiers milling about the great hall. One soldier paused to look in his direction, at the basement door swinging closed, but then resumed his walking. “He didn’t even see me.” And that’s when Doc saw the calendar posted to the wall, “September 1939.”
Lenny woke, starring at Doc lying beside him and the now empty gurneys. Two men stood over him scolding. “You idiot! That man grabbed the cane that still touches the machine. Like a live electrical wire, both of you trapped along with us. We are doctors Lackey and Gilmore. We had a timer set to turn off the machine, till that fool MacMillian fiddled with it and shorted it. Now it’s stuck on.” Lenny was already up and reaching for MacMillian, “Just move him out of the way and fix the damn thing!” Except, Lenny’s hands passed thru the body as if it only an image. And that’s when he noticed his own body still lying on the floor, “What the hell?!”
Rory repeated his instructions to Ian, “I said don’t touch anything. Let’s grab blankets from the other room and go find Davey.” Ian followed him toward the storage room, where they ran into Davey coming down, holding a golfclub. “I stopped in the golf shop to arm myself. Black Jamie is real and on the prowl. He spit acid on me and my car!” Despite seeing the wounds, Rory mocked, “Right. Help us find the electrical box. We need to cut power to a machine we found in the secret room.”
Inside the Electrical room, Ian opened the circuit-breaker box and starred at the heavily modified panel. “I’m no electrician, but that sure doesn’t look to code.” He began unscrewing one fuse one at a time, listening for the spool-down of the machine in the other room. He pulled and replaced 3 before they finally heard the machine winding down. Phew. Relief. Till they heard it re-start. “There must be a backup generator.”
Doc flashed back into the present time, still in the grand hall, void of soldiers and calendar. He descended the stairs, returning to the storeroom where he saw the others exiting the Electrical room. “I’m back.” Ian cocked his head, “Did you guys hear something? That backwards record player sound I mentioned when I was in the kitchen.” Doc tried to shake Ian to get his attention, but his hands passed right thru him!
Doc returned to the machine room where he found Lenny talking to the 2 men. Dr. Gilmore greeted him, “I see you’re back with us. No need to threaten with your gun. Let me explain. Dr. Lackey and I built this dimensional machine that lets us travel the space-time continuum. We’ve been taking short trips thru time, relying on the timer we’d set to bring us back to the present. Except your Mr. MacMillian broke the timer! We’re all trapped, out of sync. You were brought back to the present when they cut the power. We were all physically in the present till the backup generator kicked on. Now, we’re stuck out of sync again.”
Doc looked at the body still slumped over the machine, “Then why isn’t Arthur back with us?” Dr. Lackey explained, “I fear when we time traveled, we attracted that beast you’ve seen running around. It found your Arthur outside and killed him. Thankfully, with the power on, the beast doesn’t come down here. So, we’re at least safe from it. So how does it feel to be a time traveler?” Doc’s answer was a fist to his face. “Oh, OW!”
They could only watch as Rory/Davey/Ian returned to the machine room and walked thru their space while inspecting the wiring, while ignoring the buzzing sound (Doc and Lenny trying to talk to them). Ian remembered, “There is a garden shed out back. Suppose the generator is in there?” But Davey cautioned, “Back Jamie is still running around! And you want to go outside?!” Rory tried to calm him, “Relax, we’ll take the basement door out to the grounds. The cabling leads that way.”
The trio exited via the basement door only to see Black Jamie at a distance. It seemed to ignore them. Until, unbeknownst to them, Lenny followed them. The hound began to sniff the air and looked toward the door. Davey ran back inside. As Davey ran thru Lenny’s space, Rory and Ian crept toward the shed. Relieved the hound ignored them; still focused on the basement door, Lenny just inside. It didn’t take long for them to find the brown brick shed as they could also hear the “humm” of its generator. (Can’t be too careful) Rory grabbed a rake and used it to flip the power switch on the generator.
Lenny watched Davey’s form fade and blink out as he was pulled back into the machine room. Yet Davey was still just inside the doorway; he’s never left. And was still standing there when Black Jamie charged! Davey had just enough reaction, hearing its snarl, to swing the golf club. A solid hit that loosened more acid- slobber from the beast. Davey collapsed, on the verge of dying. Fighting for his life as the hound stepped over him and entered the basement.
Back in their own bodies, Doc and Lenny stood within the machine room. It now silent. And Dr. Lackey and Gilmore frightened, “The machine’s off! That means that hellhound can enter!! We gotta go!!” But first, Doc instructed Lackey, “Grab MacMillians body and follow us to the car.”
Gilmore was first thru the sleeping room, running for the stairs. Where the others saw Black Jamie lash its long tongue at its victim. Gilmore screamed in agony. The others screamed in fright. [failed Sanity- 8 points: Bout of Madness- amnesia] Lenny shook his head confused, “How’d we get here? What’s that dog doing?” But Doc pushed past him, “Get out of the way you fool. We need to replace the fuse Ian removed and get the power back on the generator to run the beast off!”
Doc was already at the circuit-breaker box where he noticed the fuse missing, “Ian! What did you do with the fuse?! Throw it to me!” Doc caught it and fumbled to replace it as the beast turned its attention to Lenny, slobbering acid in its focus. Surprised, and unarmed, Lenny struck at the beast with his fist. A solid hit. That caused acid to spew onto his fist. [7 points, half his HP, CON save to not pass out] “AAAgh! Sweet-Mary-Mother-of-God, that burns!”
But that’s when the machine kicked on, back to life. And the beast yelped as it first blinked in and out of existence, re-appeared outside, then blinked out of sight again. Lenny was in pain as he tore off his t-shirt to wrap his bloody hand. Rory yelled, “What are you waiting for?! Get up the stairs and let’s get out of here! Ian, you drive.” As Davey stepped over the dead Davey just inside the basement access room, he heard Davey cough. “He’s still alive! Help me bandage him and get him to the car.”
Doc was already behind the wheel as Lackey dumped the body in the boot (trunk). Davey had left the car running; so, Doc floored it, “Quit screwing around! Get in because Black Jamie is coming!” [drive 07 versus Drive skill 20] Doc careened down the road, thru the gate, outdistancing the beast. While Lenny leaned out the window shooting with his left-hand. He didn’t care his aim bad… it just felt necessary. They didn’t even stop in town to check out of their rooms. Long hours of heart-pounding driving till they finally returned to London to report to the big boss.
EPILOGUE:
Doc and Lenny had the scent of time-travel on them. And Lenny had aged 14 years per his contact with Black Jamie. The Hound-of-Tindalos would be on their trail. They’d be dead within a year.
Davey retired from the mob, a wounded and broken man on the edge of insanity.
Ian graduated from the ranks of a rookie, firmly planted within the organization.
Rory climbed the ranks of the mob having successful led a team who recovered Arthur MacMillian, just not the mob’s money.
BEHIND THE SCENE:
The clubhouse was abandoned in 1921 after its use to house soldiers training for the great war. Doctors Lackey and Gilmore found it and used it to craft their space-time continuum machine. They made short time-travel trips back and forth thru time. Unaware they were attracting the hound that became locally known as Black Jamie. The insectoid...a dimensional shambler, also drawn to weakening parts in space-time. Meanwhile, desperate to make money to replace his stock market losses of the mob’s money, Arthur MacMillian entered the basement in hopes of finding something useful per the old blueprints he found that revealed secret rooms. He stumbled upon the machine. Literally stumbled… into the machine, breaking the kill switch. Which sent him into time. Where he faced the hound and lost his life.
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