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Amelia Johnson, Chumley Metrodora, Drae Blitzen, Kiara Umbrielle
Jenny, Ryan, Drae's Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, Delta, and Epsilon teams, Two IDF/Mossad members, local Greek house maintainers.
[6:05 PM] GM: When last we left our intrepid heroes, the location is a lovely isolated Villa in Greece.
[6:06 PM] GM: People have gathered both Silkwood Showers, and the more enjoyable kind have been partaken of.
[6:06 PM] GM: Prisoners secured below.
[6:07 PM] GM: Two categories of them, two from the village, and four from the airport.
[6:09 PM] GM: In the US, in the 4th floor room is Drae and Amelia, backed up by Jenny and a few other team members of Charlie and Delta.
[6:10 PM] GM: In Greece is Chumley and Kiara, backed by Alpha, Bravo, and Epsilon.
[6:11 PM] GM: There are also two of the IDF or Mossad (you still haven't figured which) who are your hosts.
[6:12 PM] GM: There is also the Greek folks (family?) who maintain the place, who went off on vacation as soon as your arrival was settled in.
[6:18 PM] Chumley Metrodora: I believe Horror Show and Karma are performing interrogations, Millie and I are dropping in on them from time to time, to twist arms and help the blood flow as needed.
[6:19 PM] GM: That was the plan, but it should be verified, before we say "this then happens."
[6:20 PM] GM: Being that Karma is female, and, while her name has weight, the cultural disrespect might not be a deficit you want to start from.
[6:22 PM] Chumley Metrodora: I assumed after she introduced herself, and subsequently the subject to the table (nose first), gender would no longer be an issue.
[6:23 PM] Chumley Metrodora: Is there push-back from Karma or Drae?
[6:25 PM] GM: Generations of cultural conditioning don't easily get knocked out of someone's head. Give her a week or two, she could probably break them so they thought they were sheep and her the sheep dog, their only hope for safety from the wolf, but ... are you going to take that week or two?
[6:27 PM] Chumley Metrodora: Fair enough... Millie will lead interrogation in the second room.
[6:28 PM] Drae Blitzen: Sorry, I thought we already took Karma's name out of the hat.
[6:29 PM] Chumley Metrodora: I thought as we broke up last time, it was Karma and Horror Show, but I may be mistaken.
[6:31 PM] Drae Blitzen: Millie, Horrorshow, loosen them up. I'll feed you intel from what i see and offer pivots.
[6:32 PM] Drae Blitzen: Start watching the feed for tells and cross-referencing any info they offer.
[6:33 PM] Chumley Metrodora: I assume (considering who our hosts are)... there is an observation room/station somewhere handy.
[6:33 PM] Amelia: Also watching the feeds.
[6:34 PM] GM: Jenny has a blow up, of their micro-expressions on several monitors, as well as tickers for their capillary responses, breathing rates, heart beat, and other telltales that she normally watches on her humans.
[6:35 PM] Amelia: Is this what we look like to her? Hmm.
[6:35 PM] GM: Well, she probably knows you inside and out better than most, but ... yes.
[6:39 PM] GM: They start by pretending to not be fluent in English, but the telltales give them away immediately.
[6:41 PM] Drae Blitzen: Millie, verbally push and reiterate questions in English. Horo, feign frustration with threats of physicality. We want to see which points they twitch the most at.
[6:41 PM] GM: Millie and Horrorshow have worked together long enough that their questions, and even their tonality are almost in sync, even though they are in separate rooms, without confirming anything visually or auditory with the other.
[6:42 PM] GM: They switch tactics. Did you bother to distinguish between "Father" and "Uncle" or are you just going with "thing 1" and "thing 2"?
[6:46 PM] Drae Blitzen: We distinguish. want to know who's scarier in their minds.
[6:47 PM] Amelia: These two are "Father" and "Uncle", right? Or at least we think so. We might not want to show them that dignity yet.
[6:47 PM] GM: Oh, I mean, the two who were grabbed from the village, one was probably "Village Father" and the other "Uncle" who handled the non-local business.
[6:49 PM] Amelia: Then again, if we show we know who we have caught, they might respect their dire situation more.
[6:50 PM] Drae Blitzen: Good point.
[6:50 PM] Chumley Metrodora: I wonder if Father is relieved someone has removed Uncle from the play board,
[6:51 PM] Amelia: shrugs I kind of like the sound of "thing 1" and "thing 2".
[6:52 PM] GM: And, it is highly possible, since you kept the two of them separate the entire time, they might not know the other has been grabbed.
[6:56 PM] Chumley Metrodora: How sound proof are these interrogation rooms?
[6:58 PM] Chumley Metrodora: Would there be any value to yelling in the hall: "This one is not going to talk."
[6:58 PM] Chumley Metrodora: And then letting a round go (into some kind of target)?
[6:58 PM] GM: And the interrogation rooms in the basement are all you could wish for. Old, smelling of stale fear and sweat, with slight undertones of charred and rotting flesh, old stains that have not been bothered to be cleaned up, chairs and tables bolted in place, and other hard-points about. The thick stone walls insulate them from the wine cellars that are semi-adjacent. so they even have that touch of Cask of Amontillado feel to it, although it is Greek and not Spanish.
[7:00 PM] GM: So the sound wouldn't carry into the rooms. Of course, it could be played over the sound system, appropriately baffled from the 4th floor, but ... not done locally to any effect.
[7:00 PM] Chumley Metrodora: So much for adding drama from the hall way.
[7:01 PM] GM: True, but you could also add drama from where the US prisoners (who you did record, right) were, and feed that through the system as well.
[7:04 PM] GM: The local equivalent of the Wilhelm scream, as it were.
[7:04 PM] Amelia: That's just ambiance. It might help, but we have plenty of it already.
[7:05 PM] GM: Well, being that they are the ones from the village, itself, the voices might be familiar enough to add that special touch of ambiance ...
[7:08 PM] Drae Blitzen: Jenny, can you have the recordings from our interrogations go in and out of focus for the prisoners? make sure it's enough for the to know who it is, but then strain to hear what comes next.
[7:09 PM] GM: Jenny: Yes, I can do that. Any particular pieces?
[7:10 PM] Amelia: Focus on the screams, and less on the words. There shouldn't be any chance to piece together the actual conversation.
[7:10 PM] Drae Blitzen: That.
[7:10 PM] Drae Blitzen: High points of emotions.
[7:11 PM] Amelia: Allow the occasional desperate "Uncle will.."? looks at Drae
[7:11 PM] Drae Blitzen: Millie, Horo... Emphasize your caricatures when you see them distracted. let's see if we can shake them more.
[7:12 PM] Drae Blitzen: smirks Especially those, Amelia.
[7:17 PM] GM: Thing 2 starts a bit when the "Uncle will" bit goes through, almost as if he is responding to his name, according to Jenny's interpretation of the stats.
[7:20 PM] Amelia: Which person is interrogating thing 2?
[7:20 PM] GM: Millie.
[7:22 PM] Drae Blitzen: Jenny, The first person we interrogated, was in pain due to his injuries... take the rasping parts of his audio, and play them slightly quieter under whatever else you use. Like "background noise".
[7:24 PM] GM: Jenny: Not a problem ... Like this? (plays it a little too softly to be noticed by a human ear)
[7:26 PM] Drae Blitzen: Ooooh, nice. Just a hair louder.
[7:27 PM] GM: Jenny: Brings up the volume.
[7:28 PM] Amelia: Drae, we know who "Uncle" is now. He was our original target. What's the play now? Keep up the charade and see if he lets more information out while he thinks he's hidden? Lean into it, and let him point at others while we pretend to search for "Uncle"? Or just tell him he's not fooling anyone and then turn up the pressure directly?
[7:30 PM] Drae Blitzen: It's probably getting close to time to go in hard on him.
[7:37 PM] Drae Blitzen: Millie, call the target Uncle casually and start to press on him. Lets get some reasons for this madness.
[7:48 PM] GM: With what are you pressing?
[7:54 PM] Drae Blitzen: *The knowledge of the high-end crime he just committed on the United States, and how as the perceived mastermind of it all he'll be the one to take the full brunt of the fall unless...
[7:55 PM] Drae Blitzen: Our friend seems to like being the king of his little island. doesn't seem like he wants to play in a pond of sharks.
[7:58 PM] GM: He seems to think that the US is already either gone, or close to gone, so he seems to be projecting that sense of having won, even if he is caught.
[8:01 PM] Drae Blitzen: Let him know we are more than happy to deliver him to the US forces to find out for himself on US soil.
[8:01 PM] GM: That seems to shake him a bit.
[8:03 PM] Amelia: How is "Father" responding? No progress there yet?
[8:04 PM] Drae Blitzen: He really should give us a reason to consider leaving him with a team that will ask him questions with less patriotic zeal in a safer part of the world.
[8:08 PM] GM: He spits something out along the lines of "the Warmongers of the West and their whores will burn."
[8:11 PM] Amelia: It seems he knows what weapon was used. The prisoners in the US did not.
[8:16 PM] GM: The prisoners in the US, had the plan gone through, wouldn't have survived. So the likelihood of them knowing and continuing to follow orders would ... probably have been small.
[8:19 PM] Drae Blitzen: Tell him "And you'll be there to burn, if you don't share a bit more."
[8:21 PM] GM: He responds "You whore-keepers, with all your causes, there are a thousand holes for knives to strike you down."
[8:22 PM] Drae Blitzen: Amelia, Jenny... both of these leaders we've had long talks about have a lot to say about whores... would you double check to make sure that's just regional prejudice, and not a angered reason to attack?
[8:23 PM] Drae Blitzen: Millie, see which causes we have that annoy him the most.
[8:24 PM] Amelia: Does anything stand out about the way they repeat "whores" specifically, or does it line up just with what Amelia knows about the culture?
[8:26 PM] Amelia: Knowing "why" might give us leverage over him, but what we really need to know is "how". Who supplied the weapon and access? This guy doesn't have the resources to do those things.
[8:26 PM] GM: He seems a little more vehement about it than your understanding of his culture, especially since his village was christian rather than Muslim based.
[8:28 PM] Amelia: It sounds like a personal grudge?
[8:28 PM] GM: It could be, it could be familial as well, just ... seems a touch sharper than simply cultural.
[8:29 PM] Drae Blitzen: Mille... see if he's a bit made about the last time he was attacked by a US team... while he was engaging in kidnapping.
[8:30 PM] Amelia: twirls a piece of hair idly He really does seem to focus on that more than he should, though. This was a Christian village.
[8:32 PM] GM: Millie is happy to ask about how he knows they are whores, and starts talking about how they dress, and ... his heart rate goes up, and he is flushing.
[8:38 PM] GM: It is more a flushing with anger, rather than embarrassment, though, it's a harder spike.
[8:41 PM] Drae Blitzen: Keep on the pressure, Millie. Make it seem like he's aroused by the description. Call him out for needing those kind of women.
[8:43 PM] GM: Millie presses onward with the descriptions and mocking him for "getting hard" over them.
[8:45 PM] Amelia: Maybe the women in his village should learn to dress like that too? Hmm... Does he have a daughter?
[8:48 PM] GM: Millie passes that on, pretty much verbatim, and he is so angry, he has gone incoherent.
[8:48 PM] GM: A palpable hit.
[8:49 PM] Drae Blitzen: Jenny, we need to know who his daughter is... can you assist?
[8:51 PM] GM: Jenny: Insufficient data.
[8:51 PM] GM: Jenny: Up until a few moments ago, we didn't even know which of them was who.
[8:52 PM] Drae Blitzen: What data do you think would help you narrow the field?
[8:52 PM] Amelia: Drae, are you aware of another US team that attacked this village?
[8:52 PM] Drae Blitzen: Another team? No.
[8:53 PM] GM: Jenny: A genetic sampling of all the members of the village would be a good start, but if they are interbreed, even that might be tricky to unravel.
[8:53 PM] Drae Blitzen: Granted. Checkmate, there.
[8:55 PM] Amelia: Clearly there is some history between this family and US forces. We just don't know it.
[8:55 PM] Chumley Metrodora: Ask the other one about Uncle's family.
[8:55 PM] Amelia: Other one is probably an actual brother or cousin.
[8:57 PM] Chumley Metrodora: It's a small village. Most of them are probably related.
[8:58 PM] Amelia: How is Horrorshow currently doing with Father?
[9:03 PM] GM: Most of his probes are not hitting fertile ground. Father is ... concerned for his village, and for his people, but the larger world is not his problem.
[9:04 PM] Chumley Metrodora: Which is in line within the role of a Village Elder.
[9:05 PM] GM: True that.
[9:06 PM] Drae Blitzen: Jenny, play the audio of the leader in US behind Father.
[9:09 PM] GM: Jenny: At what level? Distinguishable? Or barely audible?
[9:10 PM] Drae Blitzen: Distinguishable
[9:11 PM] GM: Jenny: Starting with his spit? Or after you broke his arm?
[9:21 PM] GM: Jenny: The whole interchange around his mother cleaning up after yours?
[9:23 PM] Drae Blitzen: After the spit. When he comes to.
[9:25 PM] GM: Jenny: Will do.
[9:25 PM] GM: The sound plays in Father's room, as if it is slightly far away, but in real-time.
[9:26 PM] GM: Father reacts strongly to some of the insults but ... that might be cultural as well.
[9:27 PM] GM: There is a half-smile and a relaxation of tension when Uncle is invoked instead of him.
[9:27 PM] GM: And Father is surprised at the "America was to fall today".
[9:28 PM] Amelia: mocking smile, or mainly relief?
[9:28 PM] GM: And the disgust at him vomiting on himself is evident.
[9:32 PM] GM: Not so much relief as ... well ... he didn't call upon Father to solve it, but Uncle, so Father isn't honor-bound to do anything?
[9:32 PM] Drae Blitzen: Horo, push the point that his son was being sent out die without knowing.
[9:33 PM] GM: Horroshow thinks it might be a hard sell, with Father not knowing about the attack on the US.
[9:34 PM] Amelia: Drae, Father doesn't know about the attack. He is here under our threat because of Uncle's scheming. Done right, this news might make him tell us more.
[9:35 PM] Drae Blitzen: Noted. Horo... Can you press that angle?
[9:37 PM] GM: Horrorshow: Will do.
[9:38 PM] GM: Horrorshow begins to talk about what a shame that the village is to be targeted due to Uncle bringing attention to it, as a hub of dastardly deeds.
[9:54 PM] GM: There is some dismay in his demeanor after that.
[9:55 PM] GM: Anger at self, anger at another, but not anger at Horrorshow.
[9:59 PM] Drae Blitzen: interesting..
[10:00 PM] Amelia: stares at her fingernails False accusation, but we could say Uncle was using him and his village as human shields for his crimes.
[10:07 PM] GM: Not even necessarily false, at that, depending on your point of view.