TOPIC: Horror on the Orient Express - All Rotations

Garuda wrote:
I made the comment "Perhaps the patient on whom Delplace worked was killed at the same time...", but this wasn't intended as a reference to Guimart. Apologies for any confusion

As for the two write up posts mate, happy for you to tick a skill of your choice or take a bonus/penalty dice

Sarge wrote:
Thanks. Fixed my post.

Sarge wrote:
Ooooh you tease! Who can resist a tick eh?

Weds 16 Jan 1923

Poissy: In the grounds of Dr. Lorien’s property, we discover a blocked up entrance to the cellar of Fenalik’s mansion. It takes us hours to excavate. We descend the revealed steps and force open a steel door. Inside are rooms containing cages and torture devices and many skeletons of the unfortunates trapped here. This is their tomb. Vines entwine the bones and torture devices and bright roses bloom. Under a pile of bones, pulled into unnatural shapes by a tangle of vines and rose thorns dripping ichors, we discover the arm of a life-sized statue. Immediately, as Pierre retrieves the arm, a grey mist coalesces in the chamber behind us. It swirls around us all and then rushes away towards the exit.

Talking afterward with the Loriens; Dr. Christian’s scar, Veronique’s arthritic wrist and Quitterie’s scalded skin (all left arm afflictions) have noticeably improved. Thanking the Loriens, we depart Poissy that day with the left arm of the Sedefkar Simulacrum.

Left Arm (Sedefkar Simulacrum): In Paris we purchase a case to transport the arm as part of our luggage aboard the Orient Express. Pierre’s left arm begins to ache. The statue arm has patterns depicting many arms on it, but no iconography or writing. We realise that the arm could actually be worn by a human, like a piece of an armoured suit. Nobody tries it.

Paris, Gare de l'Est:: The Orient Express departs Paris at ten to midnight. The famous opera soprano Caterina Cavallaro is on the platform. Adoring Parisian fans gather to see her off as she boards the Express. Only this morning, Dr Lorien had mentioned seeing her perform recently.

Orient Express: As soon as we are shown our compartments we quickly change and gather in the salon for a nightcap. Cavallaro is there. We strike up conversation. She is quite taken with us and invites us to a performance in Milan. She recommends staying at the Hotel Galleria Vittorio Emuele (as her guests no less). She disappears for a while before returning in a striking gown and wearing a necklace with an ankh pendant. She sings an aria from the opera Aida. She gifts us front row tickets for her performance in Milan in three days (Sat 19 Jan). She retires to bed. It’s 2.30 a.m. We retire too. We plan to leave the Orient Express when it arrives in Lausanne in less than five hours from now.


Weds 16 Jan/Thurs 17 Jan

The Dreamlands: No sooner have we fallen asleep in our compartments than we find ourselves walking through the streets of Ulthar in a shared dream. Ulthar is a strange town, it feels older than our own world. A grand structure of strange architecture stands out from the buildings that surround it. This is Ulthar Station. On the platform a VIP section for cats is sectioned off. The cats receive preferential treatment befitting their status. There are no train tracks, just carpets of well trodden but vibrant grass stretching away to the distance in either direction from the station.

The Dreamlands Express: Henri, Banks’ 1893 Orient Express conductor (or at least an effigy of Henri) greets us with an inane grin. He presents us with golden tickets valid for the Dreamlands Express, all the way to its journey’s end at the Gulf of Nodens. Will we board?

A train (of sorts) glides in to Ulthar Station. It is both wondrous and hideous; formed of a mass of writhing tentacles squirting black mist in imitation of steam, and rows of legs belonging to what we can only imagine are unseen beasts that power the Express from beneath the engine and its carriages. The cats board first.

Between Henri’s sickly-sweet grinning, his words and the instructions of the golden tickets we learn that if we fall asleep aboard the Orient Express we may board the Dreamlands Express. (We are still debating exactly what this means). We also learn that at journey’s end we may return to the waking world. We are to unburden ourselves of our fears and afflictions by depositing our dream artefact at the Gulf of Nodens to achieve this. (We are also divided on exactly what this means). Henri confirms time passes differently in the dreamlands; days and weeks here may only be minutes and hours in the waking world.

With great dollops of trepidation we board the Dreamlands Express with no clear agreement on how far we intend to go.

A bonus dice again for you Paul, thanks mate!

Having reviewed the rules for spending and recovering Luck, there is no mention that Luck has to be spent to get an Improvement check on it.

This suggests that a characters Luck may potentially improve every session, which is actually a good thing given generally the grim outlook of the characters...

So this is what we will now be doing from now on, just need to remember to do it after every session

Everyone can have 2 Luck Improvement rolls this week as a way of an apology for my misinterpretation of the rules

Thurs 18th Jan 1923

Dreamlands Express: Some fellow passengers- Madame Bruja, Monsieur Karakov, ‘Mac’ McKenzie. First stop at midnight at Dylath’leen. Henri advises we do not get off here. Most of us get very drunk and pass out. We all wake up aboard the Orient Express as it pulls into Lausanne just before 7.0 a.m.

Lausanne: We take rooms at Beaurivage Palace Hotel. Lots of fez-wearing guests due to Conference of Lausanne which celebrates establishment of Turkey as a nation and the passing of the Ottoman Empire. We seek out Edgar Wellington at 50 Rue St. Etienne - a taxidermist shop. Edgar introduces us to his brother William Wellington, a non-verbal man with a strange face due to surgeries to treat his Great War injuries.

The Sedefkar Scrolls: Edgar acquired them from a French Soldier named Raul Mallon in the war. Traded rations and ciggies for them. Scrolls had been in Mallon family for years (Captain of the Guard who raided Fenalik’s mansion was named Mallon). Scrolls written in Turkish and Arabic. They’re kept in a bank deposit box. Edgar might sell them but there is another interested party.

Duc Jean Floressas des Essientes: The Duc, he of the 1893 diaries and known to Banks, arrives. He is the other interested party. He hasn’t aged a day. His presence is every bit as gracious and every bit as scary as the diary suggested. The Duc is now living in Lausanne. He escorts us around town. We visit cathedral and vault, museum and library. We discover the Deutschen Order is the order of Teutonic Knights. We have agreed to meet Wellington and the Duc tonight 7.30 to discuss scrolls.

Duc’s House: We find the Duc’s house and gain entry. No-one home, no furniture, lots of dust and a trail in the dust leading to an upstairs room containing just a chaise long and woollen throw. There is a door (the only internal door in house) carved with a hunting scene. We pick the lock. Beyond is another room identical to the one in which we stand, though for the room beyond to exist, the house would have to be larger. Hubert, and soon after Pierre, pass out when entering the room. We discover this door is a portal dividing two identical houses, in two identical streets that are centuries apart in time. One house is in 1923, the other of uncertain age. The Duc it would appear is a traveller in time.

Well, tonight’s dinner engagement should prove interesting.... .... .....

The usual Bonus dice for you Paul

A minor correction: 7:30 refers to the name they have given the ‘occult discussion’ club, not to the time you are meeting, which is 8pm

Also, at the Dukes house, the front door locked itself in the real world and only opened when the like ajar door in the world beyond the hunting door was closed