Mage - Eric

The vines covering the nest open of their own accord, as if they were waiting for you to approach. You are bathed in a brilliant, pure golden light.

[Spend one Willpower point to keep looking but suffer 2 levels of bashing damage]

Eric stares into the nest of vines, trying to make out where the woman and child are. The light sears his eyes and feels hot on his skin, but he knows that he needs to find them.

The child - if such a word could be used - has mottled skin that ripples and squirms like liquid, as if small creatures exist under it. It's small, the size of a large baby and sexless, the space between its legs smooth and featureless. Its eyes are wide and pure-pupil.

The woman is a young teenager, no longer than 15 with short hair and ebony skin. She wears robes the colour of freshly spilt blood. They look at you, their smiles widening as the heat intensifies.

And then you realise you are on fire.

[to be continued]

[Potentially daft question, but does the fire actually burn?]

[If it isn't some kind of really OTT metaphorical fire, I'll stop, drop and roll]

Your nostrils are filled with the smell of burning flesh and cloth.

[two levels of lethal damage]

Eric does his best to stifle the urge to start screaming, though not entirely successfully, and drops to the floor where he begins to roll about in an effort to extinguish the flames.

You trash around on the ground, your mind threatening to snap from the intense pain.

Slowly you become aware of hands on your body.

"Calm down!" a voice screams. "You're alright. Calm it down"

Eric desperately tries to crawl out of range of the hands, his eyes searching about for the source of the voice.

[Does it sound like a young girl, by any chance?]

It's a man's voice, gruff and tired. You see the flash of a London Underground uniform and can no longer feel the flames - or smell your flesh burning - anymore.

The man is backing away slowly now, hands spread wide in front of him.

"You alright, mate?"

Remembering his Mysterium training, Eric takes a moment to gather his wits.

He climbs to his feet, shaking a little from the shock of the recent experience, and tries to flash the man a smile. "It's okay, I was feeling under the weather, but seem to be okay now. Sorry if I worried you at all."

He doesn't look too convinced.

"You sure, mate? You were screaming your head off. Do you need me to call anyone?"

[You're alone with him on the platform, which looks normal]

"I'm fine, really. I think it might be best if I just get home, the wife will be wondering where I am."

Eric does his best to appear calm and collected, hoping that his demeanour would reassure the man - and, more importantly, stop him asking questions.

The man - his tag says "Bob" - nods slowly and begins to walk off.

"If you say so."

[Excellent. Are there still trains running? I'd ideally like to get home and sleep off the crazy adventure.]

[I'll hold off calling Jennifer until the morning if she doesn't call me first]

The last train is pulling in now. There's a handful of people on it and Bob is watching you closely

Eric pauses only to straighten his jacket, before boarding the train; taking a seat as far from anyone else as possible.

He took out his notebook and a pencil and began trying to sketch the things that he saw earlier that evening.

[Btw, am I still burned?]

[Your skin is untouched. Roll Dexterity + Expression, diff 9, each success inproving the quality of your work]

[Dexterity is 2, but he doesn't have Expression, so it's 1 die after the untrained penalty...

4.

hmm]

Eric does his best to sketch the horrific images that had previously assailed him, but found that due to a mixture of the sheer terror and his appalling artistic ability, he is limited to crude figures and swirling lines.

Frustrated by the results, he puts his notebook and pencil away, instead occupying his time by counting down the number of stops until he his home.

[I hate the untrained skill rules]

You arrive home without any further events. You are exhausted and leave your home station to find several missed calls on your mobile. All are from your cousin.

Sighing, Eric dials his cousin's number and wearily places the phone to his ear.

All he wanted to do was go home and sleep, preferably without either a tube station or his wife killing him.

[Waiting for Jennifer to pick up]

Before you dial, you listen to your messages:
"Eric... something just weird happened to me, and I'm worried... worried that the same thing has happened to you. When you get this message call me."

Then: Jennifer answers the phone, frantically "Eric! Are you alright?"

[Trying to be as cordial as possible, though more tired than angry...]

"Good evening Jennifer, I gather that you also had an... interesting evening. I'm so pleased to hear your voice. Especially after how you vanished into thin air earlier."

"I... yes... I've never had an experience like that before... visions of the dead, yes, but I saw the whole of London transformed into some sort of tortured bleeding hell... what WAS that?"

"Hmm, interesting... my experiences were of a different nature. There were plants, and a child, and fire..."

Eric pauses at the recollection of the unearthly child, and the flames that tried to consume him.

"I'll need to do further research, but my initial suspicion is that we might have strayed into the higher realms of being. Or the nearest two, at the very least."