Lily carefully made her way to a spot where she could see and watch the proceedings, yet not be in a spot where she'd be considered in the way. Her blue eyes swept over the inscription on the ground. It seemed rather plain to her... she couldn't help but wonder why they needed it if it was so plain.

There was more in the room too... not exactly pleasant though. Her nostrils narrowed just slightly as she choose to lessen that air flow. Some humans had rather bad habits... hygiene and health for the ones that frequented this place apparently.

As the one man stepped forward and proposed his riddle, she tilted her head to the side, before letting her tongue loll out in canine laughter. That sort of thing she saw before, though not quite to the same level, in her drama class, and found it amusing. Humans were interesting to watch.

So, she decided to do just that. They didn't want anything of her, or so it seemed, so there was no real reason to do anything... besides, they were putting on an interesting show...

Tuesday June 1, 1999 (O -3)
12:00 AM – Heavy Rain, Intermittent Thunder and Lightning
Abandoned Hospital
Aaron drew both his handguns and stepped suddenly out in front of the door, drawing a couple confused looks. He took aim with his left and squeezed a single shot, point-blank, into the back of the knee of the man closest to him. With a cry of pain he collapsed to the ground, clutching his blown knee cap while the roaring echo of the shot faded, getting Aaron the full undivided attention of at least most of the room (specifically excluding at least one of the kneeling participants sprawled unconscious in some drug-high).

Aaron let the have a second to work out that they were not under attack yet, before offering his riddle. He made note of another door on the right wall at the back, then he noticed that one of the two figures in the back wore a black baseball cap under his hood, and the other had a distinct pentacle hanging around his neck. Target found—now it was time to play.

“From the beginning of eternity
To the end of time and space,
To the beginning of every end
And the end of every place,
What am I?”

There was a stunned silence, then Baseball Cap was the first to answer. “What the f***? Who the hell are you!? What do you think you’re doing here?”

As the man spoke, Aaron caught a glimpse of a handgun under his robes, holstered in his belt. The man sounded young—maybe about the same age as himself.

Behind him, Lily contented herself to watch proceedings from the safety of the hall, while Guy waited to see the outcome of the exchange.

Lily Full Essence (10 in use, 10 ambient)

(If there were any magicians in the group, I’d tell you that now officially begins the witching hour. As no one here can cast invocations or use necromantic powers, it is unimportant to you, save perhaps to Lily who has already used the energy in transformation.)

The riddle caught guy off guard. What was the man with guns doing? He was obviously no friend of the others in the room, have just shot one of them and then shouted a riddle at them... no this man seemed to be here for the same purpose as Guy, but he appeared to be better informed. No one had died yet which was rather strange considering the circumstance. Well almost everyone in the room seemed to be relatively harmless, but the scariest of the persons in the room was the man that was wreathed in energy. Guy didn't think that the riddle man had noticed this, and Guy had certainly never encountered anything like this himself. Perhaps the riddle man would tell Guy what he should do? The riddle seemed very simple though, what was it's purpose?

"You have been handed some rather unfortunate luck this night. I have been hired to wipe out *Target Name*. However, due to my own nature, I give each of my victims the oppertunity to save themselves. As it stands, your challenge is the riddle I have just given you. If you manage to solve it within ten minutes, I will walk out of here and you shall all have your lives. If the time limit is reached, or you give me the incorrect answer, you shall die. Only *Target Name* need worry about this challenge. Any one else who intervenes will be killed without hesitation. Other wise, stay silent and keep your miserable lives."

Was this his chance? well of the things that he was now very certain of, the integrity of this gun-man and the real danger that he presented, pointedly stood out. How to end this problem? well he had said that anyone who intervenes would be killed, but his only instruction to everyone other than his target was to remain silent. Guy thought that the assassin might let him walk, and if he could get close enough he could either incite the target to act hastily or, if the target did not view guy as an enemy right away, could share the wrong answer to the riddle and thus gain the shooter as an indirect ally. For this to work guy would need to move with purpose while keeping an eye out for any movement from the gunner so as to push the guns if he decided to shoot. He would only have to do that for a short while as he walked. If he were going to be shot it would happen fast. Then his attention would rest on the "target." He wasn't really sure what to expect, but it seemed that the chair would prove of little use, or maybe it would better serve as a distraction to cover his movements. Yes Guy would use the chair as a decoy! He need only look surprised as the chair floated around to avoid the shooters suspicion.

Tuesday June 1, 1999 (O -3)
12:00 AM – Heavy Rain, Intermittent Thunder and Lightning
Abandoned Hospital
“You have been handed some rather unfortunate luck this night. I have been hired to wipe out Marcus Daniel Anderson. However, due to my own nature, I give each of my victims the opportunity to save themselves. As it stands, your challenge is the riddle I have just given you. If you manage to solve it within the next ten minutes, I will walk out of here and you shall all keep your lives. If the time limit is reached, or you give me the incorrect answer, you shall die. Only Anderson need worry about this challenge; any one else who intervenes will be killed without hesitation. Otherwise, stay silent and keep your miserable lives.”
The young man with the cap poking out from under his hood turned in alarm and confusion to the pentacle wearer.

A more mature voice emerged from the hood in a smooth laughter. “You are meddling in affairs beyond your ken, hitman. You have stumbled into a world in which you are but a mewling babe among wolves.” This man was clearly the preacher who was speaking from before. With a quick flick he removed his cowl to reveal his entire face—the same as in the photo provided to Aaron.

“However,” he continued, “because I, too, am feeling rather magnanimous this night, and because your audacity amuses me, hitman, I shall forgive you your foolishness and allow you to leave before you humiliate yourself any further. Go now, before your life becomes collateral damage in the slaughter of our enemies that is to come.”

Guy forestalled his chair-related plots to see where things were going. This Anderson man had dismissed the hitman with a self-confident swagger, but somehow he suspected that wouldn’t be the end of the story.

(The crowd inside doesn’t seem to have spotted either of Guy or Lily, both of which remain outside the room, looking in.)

Lily Full (10 in use, 10 ambient)

All he had to do was give the correct answer, then he would be free from any and all harm... if it was correct. As it stood, he had forfieted his chance to live.

"My word still stands. Anyone wishing to live simply stay down and don't intervene!"

Both his hand guns were drawn. It was time for this man to take a bullet in the head. After the first shot was given, Aaron would take a quick jump back and hide around the door that he had just opened.

Tuesday June 1, 1999 (O -3)
12:00 AM – Heavy Rain, Intermittent Thunder and Lightning
Abandoned Hospital
“My word still stands. Anyone wishing to live simply stay down and don’t intervene!”

Guy didn’t even have the presence of mind to warn Aaron, much less the time. The hitman pointed his 10mm at the insulting man.

BLAM

Aaron fired a single shot with deadly precision directly at the offender’s head, but instead of going down like a sack of potatoes from that one fatal blow, Anderson merely flinched as a transparent bubble flared up at its edges with light, throwing ripples out from where the bullet had struck and mashed itself against mostly invisible barrier.

The hired killer had no time to wrap his mind around the absurdity he had just witnessed as the man to his right raised his arm toward him. Aaron’s military training kicked in and he remembered his original plan, not taking time to care that the Baseball Cap didn’t have a gun in his hand.

He dove through the door he just entered, whipping around into the cover provided by the one closed door and nearly running into the young man who had followed him, all while a column of fire erupted from the room nearly simultaneously, engulfing the torch and scorching the opposite wall.

Aaron Smith, professional hitman, hadn’t felt quite this alive since the last time he’d been the target of a job. Oh yes, this mark would make for an interesting game indeed.

He quickly realized that the inch-thick door at his back would provide only marginal cover at best, and so shoved the Indian boy and himself further down to solid wall before someone in the other room located their misplaced wits and sense and decided to draw a gun.

Lily Full Essence (10 in use, 10 ambient)
Aaron -1/-1 Gun cap (right fired)

(btw, Aaron rolled 30 dmg again, though this time from a roll of 6, not because point-blank bonuses)
(Begin Intention Phase of the next round of combat--that goes for everyone, even if your Intentions involve licking your nose and passively watching the excitement.
For clarification, Lily is by the left side of the open door, while Guy and Aaron are both on the right side of the closed door sorta like L|_|#|AG, if that makes any sense. Behind Guy is the way you came.)

Props go to Alacrity's game "Rocinante" which updated earlier and I had been using as partial inspiration for some colourful turns of phrase in my post

Aaron ignores the boy at his side. The native posed little threat as he saw no real wepon on him. If he tried anything to hinder the hitman, He would find some mix-martial arts headed is way followed by a cap in his ass.

With the wall at his back, Aaron decides that the best thing to do is to bring his right arm up and over his chest and head and away from his body, the gun will be pointed at about head hieght. the first man or woman to pass through the doors will find that they have entered the gates of oblivion.

hmm, well the gunman did appear to have neglected Guy, as well as not been able to see the shield that had arisen around his target. A warning might be in order all though who is to say that he wouldn't be dumb enough to stick his head out from around the door just to try and perceive it. Since the coming events were much closer perhaps another vision might be prudent... maybe there was some other way to surprise the people in the room. Guy was now very curious about this hit man. What would his reaction be to the warning? Without seeking a vision he acted. "There is a shield around him that you cannot see. You wouldn't have missed last time where it not for its presence." He spoke quietly to the man. "Do you know of any other entrances to that room?" He finished with this question, hoping that it might encourage some strategy making...

Tuesday June 1, 1999 (O -3)
12:00 AM – Heavy Rain, Intermittent Thunder and Lightning
Abandoned Hospital
Without the torch, the hall fell dark save for the light from the torches both within the room and at the hall’s entrance. The smouldering embers of what was once the torch stand continued to glow for a moment more.

The young therianthrope’s animal instinct balked at the fiery display coming so close to her and she retreated several steps up the hall, allowing her fur to blur and darken, camouflaging herself.

Aaron levelled his pistol at where a comer’s head would appear and waited for his first victim to come looking for a rough time. If they were smart, they would stick where they were, though a part of him quietly hoped at least one or two would try something stupid, just to keep things lively.

Beside him the high school student seer considered focusing his mental gifts, but decided against seeking insight. He would wait until his enemies came out to greet him before calling on his battle precognition.

The three’s keen ears picked up Anderson’s voice from the room. “Come, I will finish the binding. We will let the demon take care of them, then.” The next words were again from whatever pseudo-latin-ish language he had made up.

“Pactio mandato!” Anderson intoned. It all sounded like superstitious hocus-pocus nonsense to Aaron, but hey—where did that column of flame come from, after all? When he looked the first time he didn’t see any demon standing in the room, but he was hesitant to write off the possibility.

“There is a shield around him that you cannot see. You wouldn't have missed last time where it not for its presence.” Guy quickly explained to the hitman. “Do you know of any other entrances to that room?”

Aaron was just considering the possibility that the back door he had seen would make for an expedient escape for his mark when the air in front of him wavered quite suddenly. Over the course of a second the air seemed to congeal and solidify right before him into a humanoid form about eight feet tall.

In the scant light from the room Aaron could make out a thin but muscled demonic form with black-reddish-brown pebbled skin, a smile of interlocking teeth jutting out from its mouth, two slender horns that swept back, and cold, blank white eyes. It stood straight, but hunched at its shoulders, the tops of its horns brushing against the roof of the hall.

If Aaron had been anyone other than who he was, he might have become wildly panicked, dropping everything to run at a dead sprint as far away from this hospital as he could, straight to a nice, safe padded cell. As it was, Aaron was made of something tougher than most, with a gift for ballsy-ness. He raised his gun from human-head-level up two feet to demon-head-level and commenced with his original plan.

The hall roared with the report of another gunshot. The beast reeled back with the force of the point-blank shot, then caught itself and grinned at Aaron. Blood—or at least the equivalent thereof—flowed from the creature’s cheek where the bullet had penetrated.

It raised a decidedly oversized claw, “Stand aside, mortal, there are others far more delicious than you here,” and struck. Aaron easily ducked under the fiendishly quick attack, and then barely rolled aside a crushing blow from the demon’s other claw. It was fast, but so far Aaron was proving to be faster—if just.

A woman’s voice called from the end of the hall behind him. “Lure it out into the open!”

Lily -5 Essence (-5 camouflage, 10 in use, 10 ambient)
---Camouflage 0/12 rounds Aaron -1/-2 Gun cap (right fired)

Fiend -28 Life (-32 grazed headshot, +4 regen)

(By the way, both Guy and Lily succeeded on their OMGWTF Roll (read: fear test) and can act normally. As you might suppose from the cap Aaron just busted into the monster's face, he isn't much affected either.)

Lure it out into the open? How the hell were they supposed to do that? they were in a building... and in the basement. It would take to much effort to navigate back to some area worthy of being 'open'. Besides, Aaron did not take orders unless it came along with the promise of money.

The creature standing before him looked rather intimidating, had Aaron ever known fear, he was sure this thing would have invoked it. Since such a mortal and weak characteristic was not apart of him, he tossed the idea out of his mind. Anything could be solved with these guns of his. If one bullet did not do the trick, then perhaps a volly would be needed. Bringing his other pistol to his chest and pointing towards the monster at his right side, Aaron prepared to launch a full attack on the obstical in his path. He had to make sure that his target did not get away.

Guy couldn't recall ever seeing any creature he had encountered previously just materializing out of thin air, but it wasn't as surprising for him as it would have been for humans without his gifts.

what to do now that it was here though... the creature didn't look as though it could fly but that couldn't be ruled out simply by appearance in this situation. Guy still had the chair too. The obvious conclusion would be to chuck the chair at the demons feet in the hopes of either tripping it or finding out that it can indeed fly! (wouldn't hurt to put a little extra power in his throw with his gift and channeling)

Tuesday June 1, 1999 (O -3)
12:00 AM – Heavy Rain, Jets of Fire, and Lanky Demons
Abandoned Hospital B1
Aaron quickly shot up after the last attack. The demonic thing stood over him, claw already raised to strike. He had heard the woman but chose to ignore her, interrupting the monster’s attack with two quick shots.

BLAM, BLAM

The fiend flinched as it was struck directly in the chest by the first shot, but the second struck the roof somewhere behind it. With a roar of fury and pain, the fiend swept downward at Aaron.

He tried to throw himself back, out of the way of the attack, but wasn’t quite fast enough. The impact threw Aaron a couple feet, leaving him with the sharp pain of several cracked ribs and a few bleeding gashes running up his chest.

Aaron wasted no time putting another bullet into the fiend’s torso, forcing it to take a step back from the impact. Instead of recoiling from the blow, however, the fiend collapsed to one knee from the three bullets blasted into it. Despite the darkness, Aaron could see the shine of light reflecting of the blood beginning to pool beneath it.

The hitman stayed his next shot, and the darkness began to shift and dissolve. The fiend fixed Aaron with a baleful glare and its zipper teeth parted to release a slow, mocking chortle before those, too dissolved. The fiend was gone.

Guy, who was preparing to throw his chair when the demonic creature fell, quickly scanned the darkness for signs that the creature has merely concealed itself. He could see no trace that the fiend had even existed besides the black ichor on the floor. He did, however, see the camouflaged black form of the fox stalking past him.

A glimmer of recognition registered in the back of Lily’s mind as she approached the woman. She was a tall redhead with glasses, wearing a dark raincoat, hood down. Perhaps she had seen her around the shop? A memorable face from the mall? She didn’t know. The woman wasn’t looking back at her.

“Are you okay?” she called to Aaron. “That’s crazy, fighting an evil spirit face-to-face without protection.” She audibly released a sigh of relief. “What are you doing here, anyway?”

Lily -5 Essence (10 in use, 10 ambient)
---Camouflage 1/12 rounds Aaron -20 Life (-20 clawed)
>>> -3/-3 Gun cap (-2 left, -1 right)

Fiend -126 Life (-56 direct chest hit, +4 regen, -46 chest shot)

(Meant to post this before River had a chance. Oh well, it just means Guy gets to save his ammunition. The newcomer (and Lily, at a slight distance) is standing by the working torch at the entrance to the hall, back to the door that leads out to the elevator alcove. You don't have much time (she seems to recognize this, if you point it out) as the cultists are probably trying to escape by heading out wherever that backdoor in the room leads).

Too many people. It was getting annoying how many strangers were going out of there way to enter a damn abandoned hospital.

Aaron ignored the wentch that was calling from above. Something about her annoyed the piss out of him. It was probably a mix between her unrequested instruction, and her base concern which she voiced. Aaron hated to be looked down upon in any manner.

Putting his left handed pistol in its holster, Aaron cltuched tenderly at his ribs. He moved back to the room where his target initially was. Pain shot through his body, but he ignored it. There was no way in hell he was about to let some pitiful drug lord escape from him.

And as for the creature, well, Aaron would have to think about that after. Now was not the time to be worried about things that were already dead.