MISSION FOUR

[crowmod]

Mission FOUR: The Snake House

what's up?

This mission will have to be done quickly. There’s still a person missing, after all, and there are still Aurors looking for her. But some information Sloan Silversmith acquired revealed the next place to look, late at night, when Hiro’s so tired something important slips out. It’s a location, someone’s house. They don’t know who lives there, exactly, but it’s the place they went to deliver the egg. A dead drop, apparate in, apparate out. They were there about two seconds, and didn’t go inside. But they’re pretty sure it was apartment E. Yeah. E. For Egg. They remember now. This was the last place they saw the egg.

Sloan has heard enough, and alerts the rest of the Aurors. Eleanor praises them, giving a rare smile, and then the authorization to search the residence.

The other Aurors are awakened in the middle of the night, summoned from their homes or rented rooms with a loud, blaring page to their mobile phones. Rory Howlan is still drunk from partying that night, but they’re able to apparate safely in. Healer Ashley immediately sees their state and slips them a sober-up potion, on the house.

The group leaves quickly after they’re all briefed on the amount of information they have. En masse, they arrive at a quiet, modern southwest decor, unassuming apartment building. The front door is mercifully propped open, and they file in quietly to the third floor, Apartment E. It’s about five in the morning, but still quiet. The duellists are instructed to clear the premises first, with Tech assisting. [TECH VOLUNTEER C] has some experience with lockpicking, and gets them all inside quickly, and silently.

[DUELLIST VOLUNTEER D] is the first in the door after it’s cleared, wand blazing, ready to hex anyone who’s there.

But no one is. The apartment is ornately decorated, warm walls and jewel toned furniture, a jarring departure from the stucco appearance of the outside. It’s like walking into a grandmother’s sitting room, if that grandmother was particularly into snake motifs in her carpet and cushions. There’s five rooms down a long, emerald-carpet hallway; a library, a bedroom, a kitchen, a bathroom, and a sitting room,The house appears to be non-magical to a point, so as to not attract attention.

It’s not safe, though. A cuckoo clock jars everyone, and spits out a series of venomous darts, embedding one in [VOLUNTEER E’S] shoulder. They pass out, and have to sit this mission out. It causes a brief kerfuffle, but it's quickly resolved, and [VOLUNTEER F] apparates them to safety. An irate Oddtree twin (actually both of them, at once, in tandem, disconcertingly) tells everyone else to not touch anything, and to stand back. It becomes abundantly clear that the DUELLISTS will have to clear the place out first. They’re encouraged each to pair up with a DETECTIVE in order to multi-task and hunt for clues.

how this works!

⬥ It's Tuesday I promise.

⬥This one's very point and click. Roughly, it's going to be based on specialty again, but divided into areas so everyone can work together. There’s some meaningful leads to be found,here, along with probably the EGG.

⬥SPIES are sent outside to do reconnaissance. They’re supposed to stop neighbors from coming inside with various excuses. Please work together to find a good reason, as several NPCs with increasing intensity will be visiting them throughout the night. The longer the spies can work, the longer the people inside can work!

⬥The rest of the team will be in the house itself. DUELLISTS can pair with DETECTIVES and clear various traps and enemies throughout the house in order to search for clues, people, or other interesting oddities. Once found, TECH experts will be able to help unlock, disarm, and decode the items or clues found by the detectives.

⬥No limits on actions, but everyone should pick one area of the house to be in! Try to make it an even spread! Spies are encouraged to be outside, but if they’d rather be in the bathroom looking for clues or something, that’s cool, they’ll just be working at a disadvantage, since their area of expertise is talking to people.

locations!

⬦ SITTING ROOM: The SITTING ROOM boasts hardwood floors, but the deep green rug covering it has similar serpentine embroidery to the rest of the home. A dark walnut coffee table is topped with a blue glass vase and some dead daisies. There’s no telling how long they’ve been there. An overstuffed sofa and two rocking chairs are the only other furniture in the room, barring a class curio cabinet filled with an array of knick-knacks that go from the morbid (no less than five snake skins) to the kitsch (there’s a lot of little baby angel figurines.) The wall is similarly lined with a cuckoo clock, a mirror, and several pictures, none of them magical by nature.

⬦ BEDROOM: It’s more sparsely decorated than the front of the house by far, and is clearly functional. A large steamer trunk sits at the foot of a simple, wooden double bed. The mattress is bare, but there’s a fluffy, worn grey quilt. An old-fashioned alarm clock looks like it’s very broken, and reads 12 noon, or midnight. The window in here is slightly open, and mint gauzey curtains blow in a warm breeze.


⬦ STUDY:
This room is tellingly more lived in than the bedroom. It’s hard to tell, as with the rest of the house, whether someone lived here a long time ago, is still living here, or left in a hurry and will be right back. The porcelain pot of tea on the walnut desk is empty, as is the nearby teacup, though there are still dregs of tea leaves in the bottom. There’s a shelf of mostly innocuous books, though it might be worth looking into it still. The desk has several drawers, all locked. The snake thing is a little milder here, but one little silver snake does dance on a silver inkwell.


⬦ KITCHEN: Very clean, probably rarely used. The appliances are all modern, including a fridge, stove, and a sink. Not much food in here, but a half-empty bottle of white wine is languishing on the counter.


⬦ BATHROOM:A simple bathroom, with a medicine cabinet, toilet, and full claw-foot bathtub. A closet, presumably full of towels and toiletries, but who knows. The little dish on the edge of the sink is full of distractingly adorable serpentine soaps.

⬦ APARTMENT, INTERIOR: Spies can station themselves immediately outside in the hallway, to see if anyone comes by to visit. It's just a normal hallway. There's only only two apartments on each floor, and it seems to be very quiet.

⬦ APARTMENT, EXTERIOR: The street is still dark, but a softer dark, with the promise of the sun creeping up as moments slip by. There's a single streetlight on the west corner, wrapping the rest of the apartments on this block in shadow. Several palm trees stand sentry, but it's a quiet neighborhood otherwise.

⬦ OOC - QUESTIONS, COMMENTS, CONCERNS!