Ustuck: Get Recruited by Troll Mafia [Closed RP]

Kezria isn't wrong - pink light's peeking over the horizon, and it won't be long until the sun's high enough to cause some damage. Well. At least you know this area. "We should hurry. Magrat's shouldn't be far from here, she'll have space for us." You turn without another word and start walking north.

Magrat's, only two blocks away, is easy to miss if you didn't know about it already. It is a narrow building, short only in comparison to the two taller buildings it's tucked between. It's easy enough to mistake for an apartment building, as it's marked only by a narrow cross within an oval etched into the wood next to the door. As you approach it, you draw on all of the coquettish attitude your father has ever taught you - posture tall, shoulders loose, hips rolling, as if you didn't have a building headache. A tiny, knowing smile plays across your lips when you turn to the others and, voice dropped a fifth and obnoxiously giggly, say, "Leave all the talking to me! If you do anything but look happy to be here, I'll have your guts in a box!"

You open the door and push through without waiting for a reply. On the other side, there's a short, wooden-paneled hallway. A bulky brownblooded troll with jagged, pointed horns stands next to the door at the end. "Ms. H! Good to see you, as always."

"Thank you, B," you reply smoothly.

"Will P. be joining you today?" B asks, opening the door to let you pass.

"Oh, no," you say, chuckling like it's funny. It's not. "It's just us tonight."

On the other side of the door, a woman with curling horns, wearing what appears to be a short robe and little else, is sitting on the other side of an ornate wooden desk. Her frighteningly bright red lips twitch, and she jumps to her feet to greet you. "H! So good to see you, it's been too long." She leans over the desk and does that ridiculous air-kiss thing. You don't roll your eyes, if only because you're used to it. "No P today?"

"Magrat! No, I don't think so. He's...busy." You smirk. "It's just me and my...new friends today."

"Oh, of course," Magrat says, with an understanding wink. "Would you like only one of your usual rooms?"

You tap your finger against your lips, shift your weight from one side to the other in a slow roll, leaving one hip cocked to the side. "Better give me both. Just in case P decides to bring his party around. You never know, with him."

"P is...unpredictable." Magrat says, handing you two card keys from behind the desk.

"Too true." You lean a little closer to Magrat, shift your weight again, tilt your head so that your hair falls over one shoulder. "Do me a favor? Don't let any of your people come to help out? I think I have enough on my plate tonight." You toss your head towards your group, hoping none of them look too confused or frightened.

Magrat's eyes slide over your companions, then back to you. "Of course," she practically purrs. "But let me know if you change your mind."

You don't reply, just grin wickedly and stand up straight again. "Come along, friends," you call. You herd them into the elevator, giving Magrat one wink before the doors close. Three floors up, one left, and you're unlocking the door to room 412. You step through into a somewhat decadent sitting room and finally relax - and by relax you mean go right back to being as tense as usual. You shut the door behind your group.

"The room's soundproof, so you don't have to worry about being overheard," you say, sinking onto a squishy couch. There are two of those, a small coffee table, and an entertainment system. "Bedroom's through there, bathroom through there. Don't open the minifridge in the corner, don't turn on the screen. Trust me, you don't want to. 311's across the hall, it's set up the same way." You toss the key for 311 onto the coffee table. You look around the room, realizing you still don't know the names of the two strangers from earlier. "What did you guys find?"

 

WHERE THE FUCK has Iglora taken you?!?!

Seriously, what..what is this place?? The moment you stepped through the door Iglora started acting all weird and you really really really don't like the way that troll lady at the desk was looking at you. You tried to act happy to be there like she said, because guts and boxes, but you are almost certain you failed.

You knew this mission was going to take you out of your comfort zone, but you did not think it would end up going out of your comfort zone in this exact direction. This is...so many levels of not okay, surely there were actual inns you could have gone to instead? At this point you are genuinely considering taking your chances with the blistering Alternian sun. You'll be fine, probably.

Only the fact that Iglora's starting acting normally again (well, normal for her) is keeping you from flipping the fuck out on anything more than an internal level. You try not to make your discomfort obvious and say, "Well, um, we found some other trolls who had their lusii stolen. I didn't really talk to them much, though." That probably would have been a good idea. But even if you'd been able to pick out their faces or signs from the crowd, it had already been getting light by the time you got Keeler sorted out. Every troll with any sense was going home.

"I saw the brownblood from the group that took my lusus, though. She got away, but Keeler got a good look at her."

 

This place is decadent. There's really no other word for it.

You manage to keep yourself from gazing around in awe for the most part until you got up to the room, but from the smirk the curly-horned troll sends you as your group walks toward the elevators, you don't completely succeed. At least you manage to keep a smile grafted to your face, so you're absolutely sure you obeyed Iglora's orders completely.

You stop gazing around in awe only when you hear your name mentioned.

"Yeah! Definitely! You're absolutely right!" It takes a moment of everyone staring at you before you realize that they've all figured out that you weren't paying attention. "Sorry, what were we talking about?"

 

Oh please let that just be Keeler being Keeler and not actually the side effects of a concussion.

"The brownblood," you tell her. "My lusus. The--the mission, Keeler. You got a good look at the brownblood, right? Actually--" That reminds you of something.

You turn to Kezria. "Do you have that book, the one where you write down trolls' hemocastes? Do you think it's possible this troll might be in there?"

 

You do your best to play the part Iglora seems to want you to play. You twirl your hair and try to giggle in a natural sounding way while the troll at the desk looks you up and down. It's a little unnerving actually, the way she looks at you. You try to ignore it, though.

The room itself is pretty nice, though. You sit down next to Iglora and relax a little into the soft cushions. It's been a long night.

"Oh, hmm. I guess it's possible." You pull your book out of your organizer drawers fetch modus. It has a drawer all on its own. You put the book on the table and flip to the brownbloods section. "What did their sign look like, Keeler?"

The pages are divided into little cells with cards in them and each card has a spot to draw a troll's sign and place for you to write in the hex code for their bloodcolor, and a spot for their lusus. It's all very organized.

 

You pick up the book and start flipping through it. Every now and then you have to stop yourself from getting distracted by the sheer amount of symbols Kezria has managed to collect, but you manage to keep yourself focused for the most part and eventually you find it and point it out to the group.

 

You look at the symbol, leaning slightly into Kezria - and then you slump into her side. You feel like you're going to be sick. "Oh. I know that girl. Her moirail - her moirail was this oliveblood who was one of Papa's scortum for a time." You pluck the book out of the troll's - Keeler's? - hands and flick to the olives so you can pick out his jagged little symbol. You point to it, then flip back to the brownblood. "I had to threaten to kill the moirail to get her off my lawn, before Papa tried to take her, too. Her name was, Dectra? Something like that. Let me check."

You open the Trollian interface on your glasses. A lot of trolls are in your blocked list - for good reason - and this one was no exception. You pull up the chat window with all of her not-very-creative threats. "It's Dextra. Dextra Demilo."

 

Moirails, you think. It always comes back to moirails. And the book is open to the very start of the greenbloods. With that, and the moirails...you have a thought. Not about this mission, not about your lusus, but maybe a way to...check on how your ex has been doing. Where she's been.

You pull your eyes away from the book and try to focus on Iglora. Dextra Demilo. That's the name of one of the trolls who took your lusus. If you ask around about that, someone's got to have some idea who she's working with. It's a lead. A real lead.

But you can't do anything until evening, anyways. Well. No, you can't, she'll be hiding, anyone who knows where she is will be hiding, the sun is out, and you will need your sleep. Maybe Kezria and Iglora found some other leads themselves, but either way it'll be tilts before you can act on them. Nothing to do but wait.

"Hey, um," you say, "could I take a look at that book? It's just--cool, you know? Maybe I could flip through it a bit?" You laugh nervously. Yup, totally not suspicious there, Lukasz. You think even Keeler could see through that one. But, fuck, it's out there. You can't unsay it.

 

>Keeler: See through that one.

What? What are you even talking about? That has got to be the most cryptic command ever.

Anyway.

You feel better that at least someone was able to piece together useful information from the little you managed to get from the brownblood. Poor Lukasz is clearly beating himself up about it though, since he immediately tries to borrow the book to try to find more information about the other trolls you guys saw today. You make a mental note to thank him later for helping you, in order to boost his self esteem.

 

"Oh, uh, sure, you can look at it." No one usually likes your word collecting stuff. "Just don't move anything around, okay? I've got a system." You nudge Iglora so she'll hand over the book.

While he looks through it, you decide to share your information. "As for what we found, we managed to follow a group of trolling carrying something a ways into the woods. We had to turn back before we could see where they ended up, but they weren't trying to hide their trail, so we should be able to find where they went in the evening."

 

"That's great," you say. And you mean it. If there's a trail, you should be able to find these trolls tomorrow night. And if Keeler's right that your lusus was still alive when she talked to this Dextra...all Papillona needs to do is hold out one more day.

Please, you think. Please let her be alright.

That's not the only thought that's making you tremble as you flip through Kezria's book. You're worried what might happen if someone notices just which section you're looking at. Or worse, if your ex's sign is actually here. You're not sure what you'll do then. You don't have the money to make another move.

It's kind of astounding how many trolls are in this book. You didn't even know it was possible for a troll to know this many people. There might be--hundreds, of different trolls here. You can count the people you've had a real conversation with on your touchstubs. The section you're looking at is short, like you'd expect. Still a few here. But not Karmil.

You lean back in your seat and breathe a soft sigh, book still open in front of you. Okay, that's. That's a load off your thinkpan. You suppose that doesn't prove for sure she's not in the area, even Kezria can't know everybody. But it helps. It really does.

 

You're curious about what Lukasz seems to be looking for, but then you remember that you're supposed to be making battle plans here.

"Okay so we know the name of one of the trolls and we have an idea of where they're holed up. What do we do with that information? We need a plan of attack."

 

"I have a plan: attack!"

Striking first before the brownblood can tell them too much about you and let them prepare defenses seems to be the best way to go about it.

 

You glance over at Keeler. "That brownblood took you out last time you tried to fight her," you say to Keeler. "And she won't be alone this time. Kezria's right, we need a real strategy."

Keeler's psionics did seem powerful, from what little you saw before she got out of sight, and she certainly could move fast while she was levitating. There had to be a way to use that. Iglora's probably fine in a fight, but you remember her pulling out knives last time she got ragey. Probably she'd need to get close before she could do any damage. You're not even sure what Kezria's capable of.

"What are we working with here?" you ask. "What skills do people have that would be good in a fight?"

 

You can fight but you wouldn't say you were super good. You're pretty sure you can manage to stay alive though.

"Well, I have armorykind. It's kind if broken though because instead of letting me choose the weapon I use, it just spots a random one out and I have to deal. I think most of them are close range weapons though."

 

"Psionics and screwdriverkind, pretty much."

You've got other skills but you're not really sure that chemistry or engineering are particularly applicable to combat. You've been ok so far with just those two.

 

So you're just listing strife specibi, then? Fine. "Macekind. So I'd need to be close range, too."

So...three close-range fighters out of four. Against however many friends this Dextra Demilo has in whatever secret base they've holed the stolen lusii up in. You're not exactly a gamblignant, here, but those seem like bad odds.

"Are you better at long or short range fighting?" you ask Keeler. "How did Dextra beat you when you chased after her?"

 

You feel a flush of shame at having let Dextra get the better of you.

"I'm not awful with either. The reason she beat me was because I got distracted when I was trying to question her and she got me with her nunchucks. Turns out psionics don't work so well with head injuries."

 

You hum to yourself. Since Iglora has close range weapons as well, that makes 3 close range fighters and one long range fighter. You wonder if going in guns blazing is actually the best idea.

"Well, we should probably keep in mind that the Kingpin wanted this resolved peacefully if possible. I know that that might not be an option, but... Maybe we could try to sneak in or something? Get to the higher ups first and see what we can do from there?"

 

"Would that work?" you ask. You mean, you're all for anything that gets you Papillona back without the risk of you fucking things up with your complete lack of combat prowess, but...

"The trolls who went to take my lusus have to know who I am. It might be the same for Iglora. And Dextra knows Keeler now--do you really think we could get in without somebody recognizing us?" It's an honest question. Ironically, it is entirely possible that of this group, you're the one with the most experience in hiding your identity. You've been doing it for sweeps. But hiding from an ex is a bit different from what Kezria's proposing.