2307/The Patients Run the Asylum

The Patients Run the Asylum
Date of Scene:	04 September 2017
Location:	Unknown
Synopsis:	Summary needed
Cast of Characters:	Vampirella, Voodoo, Rainmaker

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Vampirella has posed:
    George Andrews works front desk security at the Briarstone Convalescent Psychiatric Hospital in upstate New York. He's a man in his forties with an uninspired haircut, a spreading paunch he's embarrassed of and wishes he'd get taken off desk duty because all the sitting is doing him no good, and a crush on the green-eyed doctor with the strange accent. When she comes in and says hi, he gets lost in daydreams like a damn kid; one time he snapped out of some reverie after greeting her and found fifteen whole minutes had passed. If something had happened, he'd be lucky to keep even the crap desk job.
    The doctor is coming. He doesn't need to see her to know that; he can hear her by the telltale hollow clocking sound of her high-heeled boots on the linoleum. George would have those shoes are against regs, but she gets to keep wearing them. He smirks a little to himself. Maybe the upper-ups have a crush on her too and let her get away with stuff.
    "Hello, George," she breathes with an audible smile as she walks past the front desk. George's eyes are on the clock (12:14:17 AM), so for a moment the flash of pale pink and bright red nearly escapes his peripheral vision; but he looks up and holy crap she's dressed like a damn Victoria's Secret model and his mouth is dry and she's looking him in the eye and wait, how could he have thought she was wearing lingerie in public? Look at her! She's obviously wearing tartan slacks and a primly buttoned labcoat.
    Jesus. Maybe GEORGE needs to see a shrink.
    "Hey, Doc," he greets. "Running early for your shift?"
    The doctor smiles and nods. "Paperwork to check. Sorry to run, but it won't wait for me. Take care, George."
    George glances at the clock again as she walks away. 12:17:42. God. Definitely needs a shrink.
    Vampirella slips around the corner and heads down the hall toward the basement. George was good enough to give her directions while hypnotized, and thank Lilith for that; English words slip right out of her head sometimes.
    She's pretty sure something is going on downstairs in the electroconvulsive therapy room.

Voodoo has posed:
Outside the Briarstone Hospital, a purple custom motorcycle roars to a stop, the kickstand going down as the woman riding it kicks her leg over to stand, tapping something on her belt as she does so.

"Hi. This is Voodoo, checking in. Just route this as a message to the Director's voicemail, please."

There's a pause, and then she continues, the helmet's BlueTooth taking care of the call, meaning almost none of this sound needs be loud enough to be heard beyond the confines of the helmet. While the woman speaks, she is opening the saddlebags on the bike, pulling out a few items and putting them on her person. She has no idea what she's going to run into, here, so she's planning for every eventuality she can think of.

"Hi, Abby. If you're hearing this and you haven't heard from me, make sure to get the call coordinates from Central. I don't know quite what is going on. A duplicate of Rainmaker showed up to meet me this evening. As soon as I realized it wasn't her, I pummeled the crud out of it. When it decided to try to kill me, I killed it first."

Priscilla pauses for a few moments, and then continues. "I checked messages, found one from Rainmaker saying she was stopping here, that her phone battery had died but she was on the way home. Given the real her didn't make it home, I'm coming here to find answers. If you haven't seen me - the real goddamned me - then this is where you should start."

Finished, Priscilla taps the button on her belt controller, shutting off the call. Then she pulls the helmet up and off, tossing her mane of black hair back over her shoulder as she hangs the helmet. She checks the other gear to be sure it is concealed, and starts walking, then up the stairs to the entrance, pushing the button and waiting for admittance as she then approaches the front desk ... and George.

Vampirella has posed:
    UPSTAIRS:

    The glass double doors are locked, because of course they are at half past midnight. A desultory tug on the wide metal handles will confirm that, even assuming Priss missed seeing the rather large placard above the intercom that reads, "VISITING HOURS FROM 9AM TO 4PM." George, visible through the glass (and more visible through it than Priscilla is, from the glare of the inside windows) looks up, frowns at her, and looks down at his desk. Above Priss's head, a camera whirrs to aim down at her for a better look, and George's voice emerges from the intercom as if through a tunnel of crackling fire: "Can I help you, ma'am?"

INSIDE:

    George's key to the elevator (a gift he won't remember giving her) fits easily in the lock. It's a good thing Briarstone considers electronic locks too insecure to be worth installing; Vampirella has not yet been exposed to such devices, and would have been stymied by one. Lock and key, though, that she understands. She steps in and lets the doors close behind her, aware of both how thick they are and how hollow they sound. She could tear through them if she had to. For now, it's wiser to proceed stealthily. She presses the button George told her to press, the marked by a straight line with two half-circles growing from it, and the lift hums its way down into the dark places of the earth, where there will be no windows and no escape she can count on except through the way she came.
    The door opens into a short hallway immediately blocked by another heavy door. Multiple layers of security to get here. Did the dopplegangers want their lair well-protected, or was this home of madness always so reinforced against the inmates? The question probably doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is if her key fits the lock.
    It does. Tumblers purr into place and click when the key turns. Cautiously, Vampirella pushes the door open, and when she does she discovers it was sound-baffled: when it was shut, even her predator's ears couldn't hear the cacophony of agonized screams.

Voodoo has posed:
"Yes, you can help me." Priscilla offers, turning to look up at the camera, smiling warmly. She has no reason to assume George is part of the problem, and he's close enough she can read his emotions and surface thoughts; unless she picks up signs that he's a lying shapeshifting scumbag, she's just going to ride this out peacefully as far as she can, first.

"My friend stopped here earlier today. Her phone had died, she borrowed a phone here to call in. But she never made it home." All true, as far as it goes. No need to bring up anything else until she has to do so.

Priss continues. "I was hoping to speak to someone who saw her, to make sure she left, and perhaps when and what direction." The truth is, Priscilla could turn up the 'wattage' of her powerful attractiveness and try to suck in George; but right now, she just wants to find answers, not turn the poor guy into a drooling idiot. Besides, opening up her mind to other thoughts and feelings more than she has to in a place like this could be - quite literally - maddening.

Rainmaker has posed:
    DOWNSTAIRS:

    It's the screaming that wakes her, finally. The constant shrieks and pleading and moans from nearby, that reaches the ears of the pretty Amerindian sprawled across the floor in one of the cells next to the Electroconvulsive Treatement unit, where they keep possibly violent patients until they're ready for them. The room is plain...white padded walls, floors, even ceiling, the light coming from a fitfully flickering light recessed into the ceiling, covered by a protective hemisphere of plastic to prevent inmates from reaching it, or smashing it. Normally, it would be a nice, calm, sterile room, lit with natural light. Designed to calm. If it wasn't for the blood spray against the walls, that is.

    Sarah starts to stir, groggily at first, then her dark eyes pop open suddenly as she sits up, then sways, a bit dizzy, as a hand goes to her head. "...what.." She flinches when another scream comes from nearby, her eyes widening in alarm as she takes in her surroundings. How did she...? The last thing she remembered was that nurse leading her down to a restroom she could use, then a pricking pinch against the back of her neck.

    She must still be in the asylum. In a cell? And...and...

    She looks down at herself. "...oh COME ON!" she protests, to the powers that be. Because of course...whoever put her in here stripped her down to her undies, a dark purple bra and equally set of panties. Annnd that's it.

    She pushes herself to her feet, a bit wobbly, looking around. "Well, at least it's not a straitjacket.." she says slowly, then takes in her surroundings, covering her mouth as the smell of old, rotting blood from the walls sinks in, then moves over to the door, trying to peer out the view slit.

    She's got to get out of here....

Vampirella has posed:
UPSTAIRS:

    To a cursory empathic scan, George's primary emotions at the moment are relief and interest. Graveyard shift is always boring, and this lady will break up the monotony, maybe even be interesting enough to have a story to tell. He sets his smartphone down to make sure he loses no progress on Fruit Ninja and invites, "Come in, I can check footage for you."
    Technically against regs, but hell, the doors are all locked at night anyway. Unless Priss plans to hold him at gunpoint to steal his keys, it's not like she can get anywhere, and what are the odds of that? This ain't a James Cameron movie. The door's magnetic locks click as they release, and Priss has free entrance into a lobby lit a bit too harshly by the overhead fluorescents but is soothingly decorated with soft-looking chairs near wide windows and lots of harmless-looking, wide-leafed plants. From his spot at the desk, George is offering a friendly smile and calling, "Come on over. So your friend probably would have used the phone right here at the desk. What's she look like?"

INSIDE:

    Maybe Sarah belongs in an asylum. What she sees is definitely grounds for sectioning. The door's window, filled with a lattice of thin metal strips in case someone would succeed in breaking through what's no doubt a thick layer of high-tension glass, opens onto a scene of madness. Things--she can't call them people--things with no faces, just slightly lumpy, fish-white flesh wearing gore-stained medical scrubs walk up and down the hallways, pushing gurneys of screaming people naked except for the leather restraints binding them. Some of the gurneys ahave screaming people on them. The others have corpses that have been split open and peeled back like obscene flowers.
    In the madness, Vampirella's nose detects the scent of blood, and her eyes involuntarily shift from emerald to crimson. She can feel her teeth extend, and she doesn't fight the change. She lifts onto her toes as she walks to keep her boots from clicking while she stalks; her fingers pop as they stretch, adding three inches to the length of each, most of it talons. What she spots first will die--
    --except what if what she spots is human?
    Reluctantly, painfully, Vampirella fights the changes back down, taking on her human form... for now. Carefully, she moves door to door, checking each with a quick glance for its inhabitants, even rapping the bottom of the doors softly with her knuckles to make sure no one is huddled against it out of her line of sight. The cells are empty. The dopplegangers must be working their massacre today. Maybe it's a holiday for them.

Voodoo has posed:
When the door 'clicks', Priscilla opens the door and steps inside, eyes sweeping the area by instinct, noting the entrances from this location and the presence of potential choke points as she strolls over to the desk, extending her hand. "Hi. Thanks a lot." she offers.

When George asks, Priscilla provides a description: "Sarah is five-nine, Amerindian, long black hair. I have a picture on my phone, if that would help?"

While interacting with George, Priscilla is reading through him; physical contact enables her to get a tightly controlled telepathic read as well, enough to be sure that George is exactly who he appears to be, and nothing more. She does catch some flicker about someone else he finds as hot as he finds her, but nothing (yet) about lost time in those feelings.

This close, however, George will be subject to the whole power of Priscilla's aura, which she isn't trying to tamp down at all. It won't quite be a pole-axe like it would be if she were keyed up and stripping, but it generally makes others highly suggesible and biddable. For now, though, Priss just watches the video monitors; she has to know where to go before she starts pushing her luck.

Rainmaker has posed:
    Sarah gets a horrified look as she sees what out there, then quickly presses herself to the side of the door as one of the "doctors" walks by, feeling her heart start to beat rapidly, her breathing speeding as well as adrenaline flows into her. "Fuck, fuck, fuck..." she breathes. She looks down at the door...but there's nothing on this side to open it. Just the same padded cushioning, too thick and tough for her to claw through even if there was something on the other side.

    She takes a deep breath, to calm herself. Okay. She can't get out unless someone outside opens the door. So she needs to convince someone to come over to the door and open it. Then...then she can zap them and make a run for it. There's not a lot of water here for her to manipulate, but there's plenty of air...enough she's pretty sure she can blast a group away from her. Maybe she can get to a stairwell, or an elevator...anything is better than being in here and apparently being let to be part of....that. She shudders quietly.

    She risks another quick glance outside, swallowing, then tries to make eye contact with one of the vivisectors, putting on a vulnerable, scared look. It's not the first time she's pretended to be helpless in a cell...though last time it took a tall redhead ripping down the door to get her out.

Vampirella has posed:
    The hallway isn't camera-monitored. That's the good news. The bad news is, there's just the one hallway, with nowhere to hide, and nowhere to stretch her wings. It's apt to be a slaughter, then. That's fine. Vampirella can do slaughter.
    The hallway takes a sharp left turn toward the killing grounds. Enough blood has been spilled that Vampirella can see small puddles of it around the corner. She creeps up to the edge and pokes as little of her face out as possible, spotting a horror scene: the hallway widens into something nearly large enough to be a surgical room, and trays are set up near a gurney in the center, holding not just surgical equipment Vampirella can't identify, not just ritual knives and tools of the sort with which she's more familiar, but a number of implements of basic household and maintenance equipment. Right now, a doctor whose face has split enough to grow a mouth with which to sup is using a sharpened brick-laying trowel to agonizingly saw off the leg of a dead man who, to judge by the looks of him, has not been allowed regular exercise for some time. The color of the lights shift in Vampirella's vision as her eyes turn red again. There's no rescue mission here, not yet; she can't reach the cells without passing through the dozen or so dopplegangers to get to them. Her bones stretch and purr as she prepares for the kill.
    The latest victim (sacrifice? experiment?) is complete, and it's time for a new victim. A... thing, vaguely shaped like a woman, though that could be nothing more than the suggestion of the pillbox hat it's wearing... has no eye in its featureless face for Sarah to catch, but nevertheless seems to spot her. It walks directly, implacably to her cell with a keyring in hand, and as it walks it's silently flanked by a pair of its mates, then followed by yet two more pushing another gurney. The gurney is wretched and bloodstained, but the people using it don't expect to worry about infection.

Voodoo has posed:
Upstairs, Priscilla guides George, as they spot Sarah enter on a prior shift, talk with the guard on duty, then borrow the phone. She then speaks with a nurse, and heads down the hall to a restroom. Priss doesn't have to do much to get George to follow her on other camera angles; George is truly loving being a 'real cop' for once, investigating, and helping someone in need. It doesn't hurt the 'someone' is drop dead freaking gorgeous and makes him tingle all over.

Priscilla watches as the nurse follows Sarah into the restroom. A minute or so later, Sarah appears to exit. Priss notes the timestamp carefully, but asks George to please stay on that angle for a little while longer. This then shows an aide enter the bathroom. A minute or so later, said aide and the nurse exit, dragging someone down the hallway, their face obscured and wearing scrubs - the same scrubs the aide was carrying when she entered.

"George, I need you to follow those two and that patient. Where did they go?" Priscilla asks. She uses no force beyond the force of her personality. But when that long fall of raven hair slips into view as the victim is dragged into the elevator, it's a near thing.

~"I'm sorry, George. I need your keys."~ Priscilla's mind raches into George's more forcefully. She finds the memory, obscured, of him giving his keys away. Grimacing, she then has to plunder poor George quite thoroughly to figure out how to get down where she needs to get without those keys.

~"Sorry, George. You're going to need to take a nap. It's the safest place for you, sleeping right here."~ That done, Priscilla pulls out her blaster, checks the charge, and tucks it away. Then out comes the standard handgun - much better deniability - and she snaps open the collapsible baton. It's not as good as her sword, but it will have to do for now.

Without George to sound the alarm from upstairs there will be no warning for anyone, as Priscilla starts down the stairwell. She does not bother going the normal way, however; she does parkour masters proud, leaping from one rail edge to the next, covering floors at a time in single leaps and the power of gravity itself. The first door to get in her way and block her path will be the first alarm, as she blasts the lock to smithereens and then kicks the door off its hinges into the other wall. If not for the interruptions, this might have been even faster than the elevator. But as it is, it should not take her long to get to the bottom ... and the blood.

Vampirella has posed:
    The stairwell leading down to the ECT basement has a very gradual incline, and the door at the end of the stairs explains why: it's a fire door, so the stairway has to be slight, in order to drag patients up it in wheelchairs in case a fire makes the elevator unavailable. As expected, blasting it set off an alarm immediately, one that distracts the monsters in the basement for a moment, even the ones opening Sarah's cell...

Rainmaker has posed:
    Sarah steps back as the thing approaches, shifting to the side, keeping her right hand out of sight, as little arcs of electricity start to crawl along her fingers and the back of her hand. When the door opens, she brings up her hands as a *CRACK* of thunder booms across the room, as lightning crashes into the lead monster, jumping to the next to in line then grounding into the gurney the two at the back hold. It's followed by a tremendous howl of wind from the creature's left, blasting them to the side...and Sarah is out, slipping with a cry as her hands it the ground as she skids in the blood pooling on the floor, then pushes off, pelting towards the hallway as the winds gather around her.

    She pumps her arms, blowing by the distracted monsters as quickly as she can, dodging left or right and even throwing herself under one monstrosity that reaches with arms lined with teeth, sliding on the floor through the gore as she scrambles to regain her feet, bolting for the hallway outside as she quickly looks left and right for where the nearest exit seems to be...then sprints pell mell that way, looking like a horror show herself as the red blood drips down her.

Vampirella has posed:
    The blaring klaxon is hellish to Vampirella's enhanced hearing, and she can only knows it's an alarm from the way the dopplegangers perk in unison, freezing with hiveminded surprise. Down the hall, a witch is escaping--Vampirella can hear the snap of lightning and smell the ozone--and while Vampirella isn't fond of witches, she knows a victim when she sees one. The witch deserves help... but she'll have to take care of herself for a moment. She's on the wrong end of the room, and there are seven dopplegangers between Vampirella and the fleeing girl.
    Claws fully extended, Vampirella falls on the first doppleganger in a flash of crimson and eviscerates it. Its severed neck sprays a fan of white-blue fluid that must pass for blood among its kind, a foul stew she'd never let cross her tongue, let alone her throat. As one of their number dies, the others turn to look at her... and as they do, they begin to swell and grow. Mouths form (in more places than their faces), full of jagged razor blades that pass for teeth. Their awful, fishy muscles grow and strain with power. Five of them run for Vampirella, their multitudinous mouoths howling obscene paeans; the others charge for Sarah and the fire door that is, perhaps amusingly, on fire.

Voodoo has posed:
Priscilla winces at the noise, but she keeps moving anyway. She can smell blood - and worse - and knows she hasn't time to get squeamish right now. Her Coda training is on full display as she bounces and leaps through, moving with speed and what stealth she can muster, until she finally comes to the last of the fire doors. As with the others, this one is blasted open - adding to the cacophony - and the leather-jacketed raven-haired mulatto woman with the purple eyes comes rolling into the hallway of gore, and the midst of a deadly fight.

Met with the onrushing horde, Priss snaps out her baton and wades in, finding out quickly that despite her great strength and skill, blunt weapons and the punching power of a handgun are just not going to do disabling or ending damage to these creatures. Even spinning kicks do little more than get a stumble going, and using something other than a weapon gets her bitten, or worse. No poison, yet, but somehow she imagines that might be forthcoming. There's enough chaos going on that she has not yet parsed enough to realize there are any other fighters, let alone that one of them is her favorite weather witch.

Rainmaker has posed:
    Sarah skids to a halt as she realizes the door she's chosen is, well, on fire. "SHIT!" She whirls, looking for a fire extinguisher or something that she can use, but there's no time to grab it even if there is, as the creates come lumbering through the door, making gurgling, snarling noises. Only a few monsters have followed her out of the room...but they're already grotesquely distorting as they add on muscle...and fangs....and things she doesn't even want to think about what they'll use them for on her if they catch her.

    The scantily-clad Amerindian woman turns and holds out her hand, more electricity dancing down her arms, her eyes sparking as she fires a second blast of lightning down at the hallway, the blazing azure bolt slamming into the lead two creatures as they start to jerk and twitch, starting to smoke, before they fall backwards to spasm on the floor, which at least causes the others to have to shift around their downed hive members.

    And Sarah tries to use that...reaching up towards the pipes on the ceiling. "C'mon, c'mon, c'mon..." she murmurs in a desperate mantra, letting her power reach out to find water..and finding one. She takes a deep breath, then darts to the side of the wall, her bare foot landing on a bloodsoaked gurney parked along the side of the hall, pushing out as she leaps, then grabs hold of the pipe, jerking down hard with all her weight.

    There's a sharp *CRACK* as the old fixture gives, and water sprays out over Sarah, soaking her as she drops into a crouch, as the remaining creatures charge for her, a hand coming out, palm up, as the winds still whirling around her roar back down the hall, blowing them back again, trying to keep them at bay as the water from the broken pipe bends, spraying against the burning door as it starts to drench the flames.

Vampirella has posed:
    The dopplegangers have... unusual tactics. For one thing, they think nothing of forming mouths in their bodies to catch Priss's baton; the pain it inflicts on their teeth is transitory, after all, because they can make those mouths go away. For another, they perceive the disparity of numbers when Priss joins the fray, and two of them peel off from attacking Vampirella to join the fray against the others. If Priss is bothering to read them, there's not much there except outrage; a desire to punish the interlopers for interfering in their grand work before they're chased off by the inevitable rush of security guards. They're already strategizing their escape into the sewers. There's a drain in the washroom floor they intend to escape into.
    Vampirella knows none of this. She's only here to kill. The hungry monsters swarm at her (less a swarm in numbers than in size; they're expanding and flattening out, coming at her like sheets full of teeth, blown faster toward her by Sarah's winds), and she's tearing into them frenziedly. Her talons are beyond vicious, like she has five knives on each hand, and they tear jagged paths straight through the monsters trying to wind around her like a consumptive coccoon, but they're ready for her onslaught and push their protean forms to heal as fast as they can. You can watch the lips on the wounds she creates knot together like Play-Doh smooshed together, then smooth out as the healing completes. She makes no progress until she manages to seize one in both hands and rip it like a sheet of paper, letting its two halves drop, spasming, to the floor to die.
    Two left to go for her. More for Priss and Sarah.

Voodoo has posed:
And Priscilla is suddenly wet. Very wet. And beset upon by even more of the damned pasty white dopplegangers. If only she were a gamer, she might have some idea what to call these things. Instead, she just thinks of them as 'ew' and 'yuck' and 'gotta die'. After all, the only one she has met before now was pretending to be Sarah. Which is why when she spots a Sarah in just undies, struggling in the midst of all this, she pauses to actually read the woman, before she resumes fighting with a shout:

"Sarah! Over here!"

Bitten and bloody, Priscilla is forced to assume her current weapons are the wrong weapons for this fight. Her baton is lost, but is easily replaceable, assuming she survives. The handgun is shoved back into her holster in her jacket, and out comes the blaster.

~"Duck!"~ Priscilla shouts telepathically to Sarah as she raises her blaster, takes aim, and fires on the first of the dopplegangers to close on herself and Sarah, the energy beam rapidly superheating the thing until it boils in place and is seared away. It's an awful lot of energy expended, but it's a very permanent sort of end.

Priss has not yet spotted that there's someone else fighting from the other end of all this mess. Maybe a second's breather may offer her that chance. Assuming she gets that.

Rainmaker has posed:
    It's definitely true that the Sarah, now soaked, in her undies, and streaked with blood and some things she -really- doesn't want to think about smeared in her hair and over the rest of her, feels like herself to Priss's mind. Or at least, she lacks that hive mind vibe and falls more on the 'scared but will be the last girl in this horror movie, fuck you monsters!' frame of mind.

    At Priss's shout, her head snaps over to look at her. "PRISS!" Then dives at the order as the blaster comes up and vaporizes the nearest doppleganger threatning her as she scrambles back up and bolts for Priss. And if she promptly slides behind her and does a very 'damsel in distress' cling for a moment, hands on her shouldes as she peers back at the monsters, well...only Priss is here. And she IS her heroine, after all.

    "There's someone down in the room below that's fighting them too! They're outnumbered!" she says immediately, raising a hand as she summons another charge of electrcal current, then goes all Palaptine on the next creature stepping over the puddle of its predecessor, its whirling, starfish-like body jerking its toothed tentacles, its central mouth shrieking in pain as it starts to smoke. There's no 'join me'. Just 'die'.

Vampirella has posed:
    The two remaining dopplegangers attacking Vampirella are circling her warily now, after seeing one of their kin literally torn in half. They flow like warm taffy away from her claws as she leaps and strikes at them like a mongoose fighting a snake. The sprinklers overhead plaster her infinitely black hair to her back; beads of water sparkle in the light as they whip off her limbs with every vicious, animalistic swipe of her talons. It's a battle to a standstill, and though she doesn't know it, Vampirella will lose a standstill when the security guards arrive any moment now.
    If the dopplegangers plan to stay out of her reach, then Vampirella's course is obvious: her reach must extend. Her boots leave twin trails through the gore on the cement floor as she darts between the creatures to seize a gurney and hurl it like a javelin at one of them. Its doughy body is rammed into a wall and impaled there for a moment; the wound isn't fatal, and the creature is already trying to morph around it and reform when Vampirella falls on it, claws flashing, grabbing handsful of its flesh and tossing them over her shoulder like an obscene snowblower. Its mouths shriek their death agonies and eventually fall silent; but the moment it took to ensure the kill is a moment the final doppleganger had to wrap is toothy shroud-body around her. Her own scream is high-pitched and enraged as it begins biting her in dozens of places at once, its body too thin to pull off mouthsful of her flesh and only managing to pierce her skin. To draw blood as she struggles inside it like she's wrapped in a consumptive straitjacket.

Voodoo has posed:
Priscilla is the heroine, but Sarah is the one blowing things up with her outstretched hand and some attitude. Yep, that's a balanced worldview, there. The apparently well-armed and very wet ex-stripper growls, as she catches sight of the clusterf**k going on at the end of the hall.

~"Stay here!"~ comes the telepathic call from Priss, as she leaps over the still-sparking remains of the latest deceased doppleganger and then lands on her knees, sliding down the wet hallway with her blaster in both hands.

Priss gives no warning: she just dials down the blaster and fires, spreading the beam out wide, searing and cooking the toothsome and murderous shroud, while hopefully not doing lots of permanent damage to the figure she can tell is struggling away inside. Her hope is this will be enough to make the thing let go, before this blast kills this person.

What? You thought Priscilla fought with plans and forethought? No way!

Rainmaker has posed:
    Sarah, perhaps predicably, meets the directive to stay put creatively..which is to say she doesn't -completely- go back down the hall after Priss. Only partway. Where she can sort of see partly into the room, her eyes getting a bit wide as she sees the Part of this is just because she feels a bit safer closer to Priss, but also because she doesn't want to be too separated from her, in case there are more. And they come out of the walls or something. Or sewers. Wherever these fucking things came from!

    As nothing lunges out to try and eat Priss occasionally, she quickly jogs a bit closer, her eyes widening as she sees one of the people (who she assumes was on the tables) being devoured. She can't really flash fry it without hitting whoever it is though. And...she's not even sure if there's much to be done, if that thing has its teeth into whoever it is. But Priss has an idea...and she hopes it works. In case it does, and the thing lets go...she starts pulling on the air around her, a current blowing into the room, swirling...ready to separate the two if the creature lets go and to 'save' the woman by using the wind to pick her up and blow her back over to the doorway where the two women are standing.

Vampirella has posed:
    The doppleganger had arranged for all its vital organs to be at Vampirella's back when it ensnared her, so her claws would only tear through flesh as she struggled. Good strategy until someone comes along with a blaster and is willing to shoot a woman in the back with it. It shrieks its outrage and pain, and, knowing itself to be the last survivor of this group, seeks to flee. In a shapeshift whose speed is born of desperation, it runs like hot candlewax down Vampirella's body (she'll have a rash of angry red blisters scorching her flesh even if Priss is fast enough to stop shooting as to not hit her) and coagulating into something vaguely serpentine that oozes like liquid across the floor to squeeze under a door and into the drains heading to the sewers.
    It's been about thirty second since Priss activated the alarms. Everyone downstairs is lucky: the patients upstairs are being evacuated into the fenced-off back courtyard because none of the human staff knows there's anyone downstairs to evacuate. Vampirella is driven to her hands and knees by the pain of the burns, and it's that pain which keeps her teeth from Priss's throat... for now.

Voodoo has posed:
"F*CK!" shouts the leather-clad woman with the purple eyes, as she hops up to her feet, tucking the blaster away. She can already tell the thing she wants to kill got away. Her instincts are also telling her that she does not want to be armed and presenting a threat when this person -- this woman? -- recovers enough to take a look.

Yet again, Priscilla does not communicate aloud. For some reason, she keeps using her telepathy, and it's the most she has used it with Sarah, ever.

~"Sarah, I need you to turn around and go up the stairs from that fire door. Don't ask questions I don't have time to answer, even at the speed of thought. Just go. I swear to you, I will get you out of here safely. Now go."

Aloud, Priss comments, "Sorry. I'm guessing that hurts like an absolute b*tch. Rather, I'm not guessing. I know. But I had to get that thing off of you. I'm afraid that one got away." She's standing back, perhaps twelve feet from where Vampirella is on her hands and knees, hands out by her sides, unoccupied by any weapons. But she is visibly doing her best to fill the corridor and assure this woman cannot get around her to get to Sarah or the door.

Through her, maybe. But not around. And she's not going without a fight.

Rainmaker has posed:
    As the last creature drops away from the stricken woman, Sarah relaxes slightly, the swirling winds disappating. If the thing is running, she doesn't need to pull the other woman to safety...which probably saves her a nasty bite, in the vampiress's current condition.

    The Amerindian's heart is still beating a million times a minute, the way she feels, but at the telepathic push, the frowns, then slowly backs up. "Does she need help? There's got to be some medical gear here, I could try to find some..." Because it's what Sarah defaults to when someone else is hurt in an emergency...either defending them or helping. She can't do the first and obey Priss, but she does look around for an emergency first aid kit or something on the wall. Those are -always- in creepy asylums on the wall,l if video games have taught her anything!

    But she does retreat towards the fire door, a bit unhappy about it but listening to Priss otherwise.

Vampirella has posed:
    Another witch. The first summoned wind; this one summons fire. Vampirella's mouth is tightly closed against her instinct to feed; she can only communicate through her actions. She staggers to her feet, totters over to the nearest cell door (her fingers are shrinking back to their normal, human-ish size), and seizes the knob to rip it casually off. Without the twisted brass bars holding it in place, the woman inside, on her knees and covering her ears against the fire alarm as she weeps into her own lap, is now freed. Vampirella's hands are gentle as they encircle the woman's shoulders in her thin, drenched IV gown and helps her to rise. She keeps her back to Priscilla the entire time. If Priscilla strikes again, she can't summon enough magical fire to survive this time.

Voodoo has posed:
Priscilla scans the area thoroughly, looking for any others still alive down here, and then follows towards the open cell door. "I know it sucks. I know you're terrified. But if you go to the stairs and go up, there are plenty of folks who can help you." Priss offers that to the woman being released, as she watches the woman she burned.

"Listen. I'm sorry I hurt you. I honestly didn't want to, but I had to. I hope you can forgive that." Priss offers to Vampirella, and then steps back out of the way of the door, leaving the other woman free to move as she sees fit. Instead, the woman in leather moves to the next door with someone inside, draws her handgun, and blasts the door open. Time to set everyone free.

Rainmaker has posed:
    Outside by the fire door, Sarah listens. It's all she can do from this range, as she peers out the door. She's alert and a bit on edge, ready to run back if she hears the sounds of fighting resume...because yes, Priss can generally take care of herself, but that doesn't mean Sarah would let her fight alone, nonetheless.

    But there's nothing...well, save the quick padding of bare feet if the other prisoners starting heading her way. She's happy to wave them to her, and help them out the door to join the other residents upstairs who are being evacuated. No first aid kits anyway. Sigh. Though she imagines there's going to be a limited amount of time before the guards come looking, when people who are tracking human blood everywhere starts showing up.

Vampirella has posed:
    vampirella's thirst becomes more manageable as her back finishes healing. She trusts herself enough to open her mouth and shoot an amused glance (through green eyes, this time) at Priscilla. "You didn't want to do what you had to do?" she asks in her strange accent, and runs a hand over her face to wipe the sheets of water off it. "I accept your apology. We should leave now." And with that, she suits action to word, following the fleeing herd rather than have to guess which buttons to press on the elevator.

Voodoo has posed:
When the strange woman - who heals almost like Priscilla herself does - takes off, Priss turns and does the same, rapidly sprinting ahead to make sure she reaches Sarah, scooping up the undie-clad Amerindian as they rapidly ascend - on foot, this time, covering every stairstep - the passageway from the ground level. It's a long climb, and Sarah at least will spot that the mid-way fire door was also blasted clean off its hinges. Priss wasn't going for subtle, apparently.

On their way up, Priscilla will shuck off her leather jacket, and then wrap it - still wet - around Sarah's body. "It's going to be chilly up there. Bike's outside. I don't really want to stick around to answer questions ... but we might have to do that."

Rainmaker has posed:
    Sarah blinks as the oddly (even provocatively) dressed woman with the green eyes comes jogging towards her, with Priss right behind her, then lets out a faint startled squeak as she's scooped up by Priss, sliding her arms around her neck automatically for balance. "H-hey, I can walk..." she protests, grumblign a bit. But she doesn't complain much at all. And sighs a bit at the jacket, as the adrenaline is starting to wear off, leaving her trembling a bit as her body's strain catches up with her a bit. "Want some fog?" she asks the two women. "If you want to slip out...I don't know what's going on here, but I think you killed all those things...."

Vampirella has posed:
    "Fog?" Vampirella asks blankly, then remembers the wind. Weather witch. Of course. Her brow clears. "If you wish. I do not fear what they may see." She glances around at the patients milling about in the open. "It would be better to return these people to their places. They are sick, and must be healed before they can be released."

Voodoo has posed:
"Let's not bother." Priscilla offers to Sarah, appreciating that she has her wherewithall together enough to suggest it. "I don't want any of those who need to be here getting away because they can't be clearly seen."

Priss offers a nod to Vampirella, finding the outfit a bit much, even for her, but who is she to complain. "Glad you'll be OK. And that those things are pretty well gone." Well, except for the one who got away. Hopefully this chick will know how to hunt it down.

Rainmaker has posed:
    Sarah nods slightly, then rests her cheek against Priss's shoulder, just clinging to her as she tries to stop shaking. "Mmmm...right..um...maybe side door rather than front door then?" she suggests. "And...who are you?" she says to the other woman, looking at her curiously. "Were you captured here too?"

Vampirella has posed:
    Another rush of evacuees appears from the stairwell, and the patients, desperate for the comfort of having someone to follow, join with the herd. Vampirella watches them go and doesn't listen to their protestations of monsters in the basement: for now, at least, the doctors will ignore them as mad ravings, and the sprinklers have washed away any signs of blood that might lend the storie credence. They won't suspect until it's time to count the missing patients. Vampirella pauses until the latest rush of humanity is past, then explains, "I am Vampirella," with no discernable irony. "I was here to hunt. I had heard tale of the dopplegangers rising from the dark fissures of the earth, and my journey brought me here." She pauses, decides a little small talk won't kill her, and asks, "How are you called?"

Voodoo has posed:
"Well, they call me Voodoo. But I prefer Priscilla, or Priss." the purple-eyed woman offers as she diverts to a side door with her armful of Amerindian princess. "Vampirella?" She's rolling that name around in her head, trying to decide if she buys that. Is this lady some kind of vampire? Eek?

"So ... those things. Dopple-whatsis. They came from inside the Earth?" OK. not aliens. Not explicitly her job. But creepy as heck!

Rainmaker has posed:
    "Sarah. Sarah Rainmaker." the Amerindian still clinging to Priss a bit offers, before she's listening to the pair, frowning. "I thought it was a skinwalker for a moment..." she admits. "Mostly because we'd be screwed if they were." She does watch the other woman warily. "...that's your, like...codename or actually your name?" she ventures after a moment. Because seriously. Some people's parents.

Vampirella has posed:
    "These ones come from inside the earth. Their grandmothers' grandmothers came from the outer darkness, where the bells ring and darkness bleeds," Vampirella answers literally. "And Vampirella is the only name I have ever known." All these things are said over her shoulder as she watches the hall for a quiet moment with which to flee... "There. We should go now. 'ware the scrying eyes on the ceilings, if such things matter to you." They apparently don't to Vampirella, who walks forward toward the glass double doors quickly but confidently.

Voodoo has posed:
"Other darkness. Right. Gotcha." Priscilla offers. She's not really going to get that. Flowery language and such is pretty lost on her most of the time.

"Fog now, Sarah?" Priss inquires, waiting for that before she scampers through to the outside and heads for her bike. Apparently they're not sticking around. She'll report all of this later.

"Hey, For what it's worth, I'm sorry one of them got away. I hope you can find that one and finish it off. Fucking things are dangerous."

Rainmaker has posed:
    Sarah summons her abilities as you start to move the air solidifying quickly into fog. What's nice is that it also pulls a lot of the excess water from Priss and Sarah when she does to make it up...but it's enough to scamper through quickly while the cameras are blocked. Sarah hides her face against Priss's neck just in case though.

    Once outside, Sarah raises her head again. "Okay. So..you're, what, a monster hunter?" she says curiously."

Vampirella has posed:
    Out of the building, Vampirella seems surprised at the question, and answers cautiously, "Yes, I am. Such as they are my family, in a way. It is a shame on my bloodline that they are here, plaguing this world, who did not summon them forth." Then, because Sarah asked a follow-up question, Vampirella does her best to return it in kind: "And what do you call yourselves?"

Rainmaker has posed:
    Sarah sighs. "Well....that's kind of a long story....maybe we better, um, find a place to clean up first. You can follow us, if you got a bike? Or, well, I guess I could fly you...." Then watches as Vampirella takes off. "Oh. Well..." She ponders, then looks at Priss. "...I think I'll ride, if it's okay with you." And so, the heroes drive...or fly...off into the darkness...leaving behind some confused and horrified asylum personnel as they venture into the lowest levels...