The Turning Gears of London
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Camden Town

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Camden Town Empty Camden Town

Post by Admin Wed Aug 12, 2015 6:25 pm

Camden Town, often shortened to Camden, is an inner city district of London, 2.4 miles north-northwest of Charing Cross.

Laid out as a residential district from 1791 and originally part of the manor of Kentish Town and the parish of St Pancras, London, Camden Town became an important location during the early development of the railways and is also located on the London canal network. Its industrial economic basis has been replaced by retail, tourism and entertainment, including a number of internationally known markets and music venues that are strongly associated with alternative culture.

Crime is high, shops are varied and the people are as different as anywhere else in London.


Last edited by Admin on Sat Aug 15, 2015 5:44 pm; edited 1 time in total

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Camden Town Empty Re: Camden Town

Post by Admin Wed Aug 12, 2015 6:26 pm

Lawrence smiled weakly, the unexpected teleportation did no favors to his uneasy stomach. He wiped his sweaty palms on his pants, nervous at the sudden attention.

He'd never solved a murder before! Hell, he'd only seen a few dead bodies, and nearly threw up each time! Prof. Bell always said he was the worst necromancer in the path of Moros, only able to do the most simple cantrips in the arcana. It simply wasn't his field, dead things were gross. Give him some solid alchemy any day, he preferred nice, neat numbers, thank you very much.

Suddenly, a bolt of insight struck him, he may only be able to use the simplest forms of the Death arcana, but that was still heads and shoulders above most of the world's greatest detectives. If one of the murdered left a ghost behind, well, this case would become a lot simpler.

"L-let's see if we can get into a crime scene. I'm a necromancer, well, sort of a necromancer. I can do the basics."

At Sunday's surprised glance, he loudly defended, "I'm a great Alchemist though, one of the best!"

As he realized he was shouting about alchemy in front of the London Zoo, he started to panicked, quickly. 'D-did I just expose magic to all the Sleepers in London, oh, oh god. Sunday's gonna kill me, like, legally or something! Are there laws about that, do we have laws? How do I not know them! Damn it Prof. Bell, why didn't you make a more well-rounded education for me! Can I make appeals, do we have a court system? OH GOD! WHERE WILL I FIND A MAGICAL LAWYER!?! IDIOT! IDIOT! IDIOT!'

As his thoughts fell into a downward spiral of self-deprecation and terror, a woman walking her dog shot a sideways glance at the young man talking about magic and having a panic attack.

'What a loon,' she mused absently.







Sunday noticed her companion's panic. "Lawrence, you're fine. Masters Tolkein and Gygax have made magic something Sleepers talk about, though not snackurately. Magi have been working for generations making fake magic something familiar to sleepers: at least 25% of early Roleplaying Games were made by magi for that very reason. You're just fine, don't worry about it. Though, unless you want people to think you're a huge nerd, you should probably still avoid shouting about it"

Sunday smiled at the passing woman and waved, putting on a face of embarrassment and shooting an unsubtle sideways glance at Lawrence. The woman sighed and walked on, and Sunday pulled out her phone.

"When I saw the latest body I couldn't get time with it, the police were already taking it away. However..."

You hear her speak several long sentences in Atlantean, and, while turning away from the sidewalk, make a few quick hand gestures. You feel strands of magic be drawn down across the void and a quick explosion of mana, and a moment later Sunday turns back around with a smile on her face.

"I'll let you in on a little secret: if you resolve to write down all the events of the day 25 hours from now, then scry yourself while asking the question "what will I write down 25 hours from now", you get all sorts of useful information. I tried earlier "what will my future self scry when scrying my later-future-self asking the same question" to try and see what would happen at the end of time, but I just got teleported into the nearest body of water by something. No idea why, but it is an easy way to get into the bath if you're not handy with Space magic, provided you're ok with a ringing headache."

Sunday catches herself rambling, and returns to her initial topic. "Anyways, I saw the piece of paper, and apparently the latest victim is at the Kentish Town Police Station, which is just north of here. You go there, I'll track down another lead my future self gave me. We'll meet back here in two hours, and if you want to see the body tell the female receptionist, not the male one, 'I'm the detective Inspector Hamish sent'. She won't ask for identification from you, though apparently she did for me. Got it?" Sunday did not pause for an affirmative answer. "Good! See you in two hours. Oh, and try not to think about how I know that rote. I certainly don't."

She jogs off towards the south, leaving you alone in front of the zoo, likely more befuddled than before.







What.

No seriously, what. Lawrence wasn't a mage of Space or Time, but he was pretty confident that trying to scry like that would give you an aneurysm. Lawrence felt the small, background anxiety he usually possess gang up, and move in together. He decided to name that little migraine 'Sunday.'

With a newly formed migraine in tow, Lawrence went out to find a body.

Now...which way is north?

...

After transmuting an unattended brick into a compass, Lawrence ended up stumbling upon north, and meandered his way to the Kentish Town Police Station. The young alchemist was feeling pretty good about himself, he didn't throw up at the unexpected teleport, he ended up not exposing magic, and he was about to stop a magical serial killer, and finally get some prestige around the Tower. He wouldn't be a Master-less apprentice anymore, he would prove himself! And now that he had a compass, he could tell directions too! Honestly, today was shaping up to be a great day.


Last edited by Admin on Sat Aug 15, 2015 5:47 pm; edited 1 time in total

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Camden Town Empty Re: Camden Town

Post by Admin Wed Aug 12, 2015 6:48 pm

The Kentish Town Police Station is rather hard to find. You pass by it twice before eventually realizing it is there. It is a very stereotypical British building: light brown bricks and tall, thin checkered windows. There is a little ramp leading up to the door, complimenting the stairs, and a garage blocked by a rather worryingly old looking wooden garage door painted a flaking black. Inside the station, however, is a different story. White walls and light-blue tiled floors, with modern plastic and paper-fronted desks and cushioned chairs for those waiting. A pair of officers in the modern blue uniforms of the Met sit behind the large desk at the other side of the atrium, and soft pop music plays through the intercom. All in all, it looks dreadful, with the veneer of government-funded cheapness all over. The female desk worker notices you, and with a broad smile that suggests either newness to the job or incredible boredom, speaks to you cheerfully, in a tone people usually reserve for slightly senile old women.

"Welcome to the Kentish Town Police Station, can I help you?"


Last edited by Admin on Wed Aug 12, 2015 8:43 pm; edited 1 time in total

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Post by Admin Wed Aug 12, 2015 8:15 pm

"Umm, hi." Lawrence clears his throat. "Ahem, I am the detective Inspector Hamish sent," He ends with a not so subtle wink. The Constable smiles at the wink, slyly replying  "You know, you're not supposed to do that. I think I'll let you off this once though". She winks back, standing up from her work and turning to her partner.

"David, I'll show him to the morgue, you keep things locked down here, ok?"

David nods, and the constable opens a door leading to the rest of the station. "This way please, Detective...." she says clearly fishing for a name.  Lawrence blushes furiously, thinking she was conspiring with 'Sunday the migraine'.

"Oh, umm, Durand" He smiles nervously. "Detective Inspector Durand ma'am"

"Wow, it's not often I get to meet a Detective Inspector. Well, right this way sir."

The police station is rather spartan, and surprisingly empty. Lawrence only passes one person on his way to the morgue, a rather fat officer clearly off duty. Lawrence again blushes, he hadn't realized that was a different rank. In his mind he curses Bell. He nods to the officer, still nervous at being inside a police station unlawfully.

The officer does not nod back, and the walk to the morgue is uneventful and short, the hallways straight and sensibly laid out. The morgue is the last door on the first floor, and the smell of chemicals wafts unappealingly from it. The constable stops in front of the foul door, and turns to Lawrence. "Right in here, sir. Will you be needing any help? Doctor Clarkson's not in, but you should be able to get his reports off the computer. The passwords are the same everywhere, or so I've been told"

"Ah, yes, yes. Good, good. Hmmm. Ah, no, I won't need any assistance, PC, ummm"
"I'll let you get on with your work then, Inspector." She flashes another coy smile, then is off.

The morgue is similar to the rest of the police station: white, sterile, and cheap-looking. Two steel tables lie in the center of the room, only one occupied by a middle aged man, looking the characteristic pale white.

'Damn, the password' Lawrence thinks as the PC leaves, 'oh well, nothing for it.' Lawrence can sense the bitter tang of death, even through the chemical cleaners. He goes to the computer to see if Dr. Clarkson left the password on a sticky note, and is saddened by its absence. Unabated, mostly because of his unfamiliarity with computers, he finds a toetag on the sole corpse in the room.

"Horace McKnight, 44, date of death 8/4/15", no cause of death or any further information listed.

Lawrence runs through his small knowledge of the Death arcana. He tries to discern the cause of death, and on the second try he succeeds. A malfunctioning fan threw a blade which skewered him in the gut, causing him to bleed to death.

He checks to see if the man has come into any particular contact with Death, and finds nothing out of the ordinary. Finally, he prepares himself for a long and unpleasant shot, and tears a hole in the fabric of Twilight to check for a ghost.

The folds of twilight part for him, and through his magic he peers into the monochrome landscape of the Dead Real. The room is largely the same, but with the new addition of a single man, Horace McKnight, sitting on the table opposite his body, his ethereal form slouched and clearly depressed.

The ghost speaks with strange sadness and sanity, the madness of spectral existence obviously not taking its toll yet.

"Who're you? You don't LOOK dead, are you?"

"Ah, no, I'm alive. Um, sorry. About the whole, uh dying thing?" Lawrence trails off, horrified at his own attempt at sympathy. "Ahem, Mr McKnight, I'm one of the men looking into the case of you're...murder."

"It was a murder?" he chuckles with what can only be described as post-gallows humor "I don't think a ceiling fan can murder someone, myself. Though, I appreciate the effort"

"Ah, yeah...you'd think that, huh. But, umm, it was murder, like, a magic murder. Basically there's a magic serial killer and he's killing people by using their appliances to explode or something and as I say this I realize how unlikely that sounds but seriously I'm telling the truth I promise look I'm a mage too, see I'm talking to a dead guy, sorry that may have been offensive, anyway there's magic involved I promise, trust me, I'm a wizard.". Laurence takes a deep breath to stop himself, and mentally curses himself for explaining this while he is manifesting in Twilight.

"I find myself more open to believe strange things, being a ghost and all. As for the magical serial killer, I don't know how much I can tell you. One moment I was sweeping the kitchen floor, the next I had a fan blade in my stomach. I don't know why someone would want to kill me, but I guess everyone has enemies, though usually they're not magic or whatever"

"Hmmm," Lawrence hums as he considers Mr McKnight's predicament
"Did you meet anyone unusual recently. They didn't have to be an enemy, just someone you met, or saw, out of the corner of your eye."

"Not really, no. There've been no new people at work, and I didn't see anyone down at the Castle Bar who looked magical or strange. Just regulars and locals, same as always"

"Castle Bar, hmm. What about the fan, when was the last time you...uh, did maintenance? I'm sorry, wizard. We just magic us up a breeze."

"Like in Harry Potter or something? Somehow, that seems more bizarre to me than the whole 'being dead' thing. I haven't done any maintenance on it, but it's not that old, and I've never heard of something like this happening before"

"Yeah, me neither. Hmm, tell me more about this pub, what was it again?"

"Just the Castle Bar: real popular place, lots of regulars. Good food and cheap lager, right near where I work. Nothing special, I don't think."

"You work! Or did, sorry. Umm, what's your job?" Lawrence's sudden burst of insight came after finally noticing the work references.

"I'm a mechanic. Or, I guess I used to be."

"Er, right. Cars. Just love those. No strange customers or anything?" Lawrence asked, grasping at straws. He really, really didn't want to go back to Sunday with nothing.

"Not really. Normal people, all sorts, yeah? You could probably find their records at the shop if you want, my partner Jake would probably hand them right over if a detective asked."

"Detective, yeah, so what's your shop called exactly?"

"Lexington Street Auto Shop. On lexington street, obviously"

As if on cue, the doors to twilight slam shut, cutting the conversation short with some force. The strands of magic retreat, and Lawrence  is left once again in the morgue, alone with a corpse and the smell of antiseptic.

"Sorry, Mr McKnight. I'll talk to you later.", Lawrence intones to the empty room.

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Camden Town Empty Re: Camden Town

Post by Echosama42 Sun Aug 16, 2015 11:56 pm

Lawrence shivered as the cold emptiness of the Twilight Realm receded, replaced by the cold morgue. Strangely enough, returning to the morgue was a mighty relief. The physical sensation of filling an emptying the lungs was orders of magnitude better than the stagnant absence of the seat of Death’s power.

All mages experience their arcana differently, no two magi feel the same things when diving deeply into their arcana. No one’s totally sure why, but it’s probably some subconscious desire to make sense of the unknowable, to tame what man doesn’t, can’t, understand. Assign a sensation to something one is unable to comprehend, and suddenly one has the illusion of understanding.

For Lawrence, Matter made sense. It was neat, clean, and precise. There wasn’t room for error, but the few errors he had made has reasonable consequences, explosions of unstable chemicals, isotopes dissolving into their composite elements, chemistry, pure and simple. Forces was the same, understand how the universe works, lean on it a good bit, and change it.

Death, Death was different. It was…hungry. It was eager for you to screw up, always there, in the corner of the eye, just outside of perception, waiting. There was none of the clinical precision from Matter or Forces. It was arcane. Truly, actually magic. There was no other way to see it. Controlling the arcana of Death was looking into the abyss, and twisting. Although Lawrence was no stranger to Death, they weren’t old friends. The concept disgusted him. He didn’t understand it, didn’t understand how someone could use it, control it. He despised it, and despised using it.

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Post by Echosama42 Sun Aug 16, 2015 11:58 pm



Lawrence did his absolute best to avoid looking like a criminal. This was rather difficult for him, as, technically, he was a criminal. Leaving the Police Station was far more stressful than getting in, he considered as he tried to look as inconspicuous as possible while sweating far more than can be considered healthy for any human being. He was also desperately trying not to vomit, and succeeding by a very narrow margin.

Twilight didn’t agree with him. Every time he journeyed into Twilight, his teacher was with him. But Bell was dead, and there was work to be done. So he’d rolled up his sleeves and made the journey alone. He rather regretted it, considering how little information he gained.

‘Maybe Sunday can make something of it,’ he thought as he smiled at a passing officer’s suspicious glance.

He just needed a minute or two to calm down, and he’d be fine-probably. He really hated Death sometimes…

After racing through the station at what could barely be considered a walk, he saw the same PC at the desk he spoke with before, ‘God no, please, please, please God no.’

“Detective Inspector,” she started with a grin that could only be described as lecherous.

“SorrygottagoPolicebusinessyouunderstandveryimportantbye,” Lawrence stammered in a single breath as he broke into a run past the desk, and the flirty PC, missing the amused look she shot to the man at the other reception desk, he responded with a snort.

After his narrow escape from the terrifying PC woman, he leaned against a wall down a nearby ally to catch his breath. He emptied his stomach.

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Post by Echosama42 Sat Aug 22, 2015 8:50 pm

After vomiting, Lawrence felt a good deal better. He stumbled out of the alleyway and onto the sidewalk. He heard at least one mumbled, 'sloshed fool,' aimed at him, he tried to brush it off.

With his head freshly cleared, he made up mind. He had a man to talk to. He flagged down a cab off the street and hopped in.

"Lexington Street Auto Shop, please," Lawrence burst with renewed confidence.

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