3B - One flew over the cuckoo hut

After quickly getting the mittens on, trying his utmost best to fit them on his hands, Sun grabs the shears and slowly walks towards the nightmare. Not having any better plan or idea, he starts singing a lullaby while slowly approaching, using all his training to keep his heartbeat low and calm.

Sam inspects the strange device again. He's pretty sure, now, that that the suction cups somehow attach to the elf and that elf oil is produced from the elf into the vials when the crank is turned. But, he's never seen it done and so inspects it to figure out the finer details of how it is set up (e.g. where do the suction cups attach (maybe he can see some suction cup shaped marks on the elf), can it be done with the elf in the cage, or does the elf need to be brought to the machine, etc.

((I'm not sure what roll this would be. The initial roll to inspect the machine was just straight intuition, but I think this time Sam is trying to reason through logically based on prior knowledge. I'm not sure that it necessarily should get him the +2 analytical mind bonus, but I think it might and should at least be some logic based roll))

Stables

Sun approaches the nightmare, whose mane is made of pure flame and its personality appears to be made of pure rage. He opens the door and attempts to calm the creature and gets a gout of flame launched at him for his trouble. Luckily his newfound reflexes allow him to move out of the way and shut the door just in time to avoid a major degree burn. It quickly dawns upon him that even if he tries again and succeeds in shearing the hair, he will be holding fire, which doesn't seem to be the healthiest of things to do. He feels like there might be some part of the harvesting process he might be missing.

Holding Room
An inspection of the machine shows that it has wheels and is portable to any of the cages in the room. The elf is clearly weak and puts up no fight against Sam as he does a quick inspection. Shifting the elf's shirt aside, Sam finds several circular marks. He notices that wherever there is a mark, the flesh is shriveled as though the fatty tissue below has been rendered out of him. There aren't many moving parts on the machine. From what Sam can tell, it should just be a matter of placing the suction cup on an area of fatty tissue and turning the crank until the oil is collected unless some weird magical process is also involved, which is always possible, but not something Sam is going to worry about given that the team's mage is currently a frog.

Repeated draining and malnutrition is quickly causing the elf to run out of fatty tissue to drain.

Sam attempts to find some fatty tissue and connect up the machine to the elf, and start turning the crank.

Sun looks around the room, checking to see if there's anything he missed around here.

Stables

Sun finds nothing useful in the stables. If there is something to be found, it is elsewhere.


Holding room

It takes some searching, but Sam does find a place where it looks like there may possibly be some fatty tissue left. The emaciated elf does nothing to resist. The crank easily turns and the process begins. There is a lot of noise and suction, then the oil begins to drip into a pan beneath the machine. Eventually the machine stops dripping as the spot is completely used up, but only about half the required oil has been collected. Sam can try to find another spot to drain, but he is unsure if the elf will survive any more draining.

Sam's player can't decide if Sam would be okay with potentially murdering a defenseless elf who, as far as Sam knows, is perfectly innocent.

In the meantime, Sam begins to ponder how he might deal with the ghoul.
((I wasn't part of the home base adventure, and I haven't gone and read through it at all. And I don't have any background knowledge about ghouls. So, what would Sam likely know about ghouls?))

Sun rushes back to the garden, to fetch the satyr. On his way, he asks the satyr: "You don't happen to know the process for harvesting hair of the mare? Using the mitts and shears alone doesn't seem to be enough. I'm missing something here, but don't know what."

In the garden
The satyr glances nervously at Baba Yaga as she seems to be arguing with a ten foot tall Wujen. He says, "Um... She always puts the stuff in a special jar. No idea where it is though. You know, I'll just go ahead and follow you. I don't think I want to be around here if Baba gets angry."

In the holding room
The ghoul is in a cage and apparently blind and partially deaf from his time in here. It looks like the cages are all attached to chains on a rail system on the ceiling, making each cage mobile. Each cage also has a trap door. Theoretically one could move the cage over the meat grinder and drop the occupant inside. It looks large enough to accommodate something roughly human sized. The only problem is it looks like one has to move and open the cage by hand.

Sun rushes to the jar room and asks the resident gnome if he's seen any jar that could contain anything helpful for clipping animal hair.

Sam decides that their only way out of this is to juice this elf. He doesn't want to do it, but he's afraid the others, particularly WuJen, might not let him do it if they were here. So, he sets about trying to find more fatty tissue, attaching the suction, and turning the crank.

(ooc:Sam is right. Really, really right.

Hall of Heads
Sun makes his way to the Hall of Heads and does his best to speak with the gnome, who does not appear to understand Desian common. The gnome responds in Western common, which is unhelpful to Sun.

Holding Room
Sam reattaches the device to a different location and begins cranking. The elf releases a tortured moan before collapsing lifeless with a look of utter agony on his face. The elf's corpse will be useless for any further extraction, but luckily Sam is pretty sure he has enough.

Sam takes a moment to imagine that the elf was a murderer and a rapist. He secures the vial of elf oil and moves on to figuring out this pulley system. He tries raising the ghoul's cage.

Sun rubs his eyes and his vision clears. The person he was actually talking to, is the French maid-clad goblin.

Hall of Heads
Once Sun addresses the goblin instead of the gnomish head in a jar, it pauses dusting and says, "A jar that could contain anything helpful for clipping animal hair...? Hmmm... like what? scissors? Can't say I've ever seen a jar with scissors in them. Usually we keep scissors in drawers. That's a much more sensible place to keep scissors than in a jar. Do you need scissors? I suppose shears would be more useful for shaving animal hair. Did you try the stable? There might be shears there."

Holding Room
A loop of chain near the cage appears to be used to raise or lower it. Sam reaches for it and the ghoul immediately lunges out to grab Sam by the throat. It attempts to tear into Sam's larynx with its claws, but Sam manages to back away before any serious damage is done. It's nails instead merely graze his skin.

Looking over at the Satyr, Sun asks him: "You don't happen to know what that jar looks like, or where she gets it from?"

Sam stands astride the broom and tries to make it fly.

Hall of Heads
The satyr says, "I dunno. It looks like a jar. I suppose it's a bit smoky from all the fire she puts in it. No idea where she gets it from though. I didn't get much chance to wander about and she always just showed up with it in her hand whenever she was planning on harvesting."

Holding Room
Remembering to say, "Broom of spruce, let's vamoose!" Sam manages to get the broom floating. It is extremely difficult to control and Sam doesn't really have the skills to do it, but he manages to balance on it without falling off or crashing into anything. He can tell maneuvering around will be difficult.

Sam find piloting the magic broom to be more difficult than he had anticipated. He lands it and deactivates it.
Instead, he pulls out a gun and, from a close distance, but not close enough for the ghoul to grab him, shoots the ghoul in the face.

Holding room
Sam takes careful aim at the ghoul who is now pacing his cage wildly, sniffing for a piece of Sam. It is difficult to hit the moving target, but the ghoul seems completely unable to see that a gun is pointed at him. The gun fires, sending a bullet through the ghoul's mouth and out his cheek. He howls in pain, rattling at the bars and shouting profanities as blood drips down the side of his body. "Only a coward shoots at someone stuck in a cage!" he roars in Desian Common, "Open the cage and show me you are a man!"

Sam aims and fires again.

Sam Dekker carried out 6 launched of one d6 :

, , , , ,

Sam privately agrees with the ghoul's position Re: cowardice.

Holding Room
The second shot hits the ghoul in the chest, knocking him to the ground in a fountain of blood. He hisses and growls in agony, clearly dying, but not dead yet. One more shot should do it...