gohKamikaze

TNT - The Nameless Tavern. (Always Open)

@Alisdragon911

Hardwick hadn't even realized that he'd been staring until the woman wiggled her ears. They're real! But... That can't be... That shouldn't be possible...

Suddenly, he snapped back into focus. 'The figures!' He exclaimed perhaps a little too loudly, and drew his gun cautiously on the oak door. Strangely, there was no noise of battering or howling screams coming from the other side.

He approached the door nervously and reached for the handle. Carefully, he swung it open - instead of an old brick and cobble alleyway however, the door opened onto a lush, verdant forest. He quickly shut the door again. This was all too much. He needed a drink.

He produced a small flask from his coat pocket and took a long swig of the whiskey inside. 'What IS this place?' He asked the pointed-ear lady.

TNT - The Nameless Tavern. (Always Open)

Hardwick groaned. The impact on the floor had done more damage then he'd expected, and his chest burned and contracted with pain.

A woman's slender hand reached down gently to help him. He grabbed it and with assistance slowly got back up on his feet. 'Thanks ma'am. The name's Hardwick, Private Investigator. I'm sorry for the intrusion, I'll be on my way shortly...' He trailed off as he looked up at the woman's face - it was too delicate and slender to be quite human. Two unnaturally large, pointy ears stuck up from the sides of her head.

TNT - The Nameless Tavern. (Always Open)

Heart pounding in time to the clicks of his shoes on the wet pavement, Hardwick ran frantically through the streets. No matter how many shortcuts he took, no matter how many side-streets he wound through, the shrill cries and bellowing that stalked him only seemed to get louder and louder. He was running out of options.

From his perspective, the street he was running down looked no different to any others - a mish-mash of apartments and shopfronts, the odd alleyway that led deeper into the murky underbelly of the city. There's no way I can keep going like this. I need to come up with a plan.

Hardwick's breathing was laboured as he came to a halt. The constant drizzle of the last hour was rapidly whipping itself up into a storm, filling the streets with a fine mist as the rain pelted down, the odd thunderclap drowning out the sound of his pursuers.

There was a garage further up the street with a weathered sign next to it that read 'H.P. Lowecraft Motors: With prices like these, you'll think you're dreaming!' More importantly however, there was a large chainlink fence that blocked the adjacent alleyway - that would buy him some time.

He looked back down the street. He could see the mob in the gloom now as their long robes billowed in the cold night air. He could just make out their blood-curdling shouts: 'There's the heretic, don't let him escape!' 'I will consume your flesh and offer your soul to the Old Ones!' 'You cannot outrun your fate forever, rat!'

Hardwick didn’t need much more encouragement than that. It wasn't long before he was over the flimsy fence and bolting down the alleyway, away from the ravenous crowd. But he slipped and fell on the wet cobblestones as, much to his horror, a hooded figure stepped out from the shadows and produced an ornate dagger. Even in the gloom, the maniacal yellow grin of the cultist was unmistakable - like a snarling beast about to make their kill. 'Yog-Sothoth will feast well this evening.'

The figure lunged forward. Hardwick's hand shot down to his holster and pulled out his revolver as the raised dagger in his assailant's gnarled hand glinted in the streetlight's glare. He brought the small sidearm up as the cloaked figure brought down his knife, and pulled the trigger.

The shot rang through the alley louder than the thunder above. In the brief moment of illumination provided by the muzzle's flash, Hardwick looked up at his attacker's face and saw... Nothing. A sinister impermeable darkness filled the hood, obscuring everything but the man's bloodshot, wild eyes and his sinister yellow grin. The knife dropped from his now-limp fingers as his lifeless body dropped onto Hardwick's.

It took a bit of effort to roll the dead cultist off him; beneath the slim profile that the robes portrayed, the man was deceptively heavy. No sooner than had he gotten to his feet, the chain link fence behind him began rattling and the deranged cries of the others began to echo down the alley as they began to scale the barrier.

Hardwick quickly resumed his sprint down the alley, turning down a corner behind the garage to find nothing but a brick wall and a single, heavy-set oak door. He looked back at the way he came - there was no other way out, and they knew it. 'Oh, to Hell with it' he muttered under his breath. He squared his shoulders and began ramming the door, pleading with it to give way.

The robed figures rounded the corner slowly, blocking off the way back. One figure, clad in red rather than black, stepped forward. 'Give it up, James. There's nowhere left to run. If you had just stayed in Arkham and kept your nose out of our affairs, you could have lived a long and happy life. But the Great Old Ones demand tribute, and it is not my place to deny them. Take him.' The figure gestured to his devotees who slowly advanced towards Hardwick, chanting.

Hardwick paid no attention to them. He could feel the wooden bolt behind the door buckling under constant assault. Just... A few... More...

With the loud crunch of splintering wood, Hardwick burst through the door into the mysterious room beyond and landed on the floor. The door, curiously undamaged from this side, shut itself behind him.

(OOC - Hardwick is now in the tavern. I won't be around for 8-12 hours but people can feel free to react/interact to him accordingly.)

TNT - The Nameless Tavern. (Always Open)

James 'Jimmy' Hardwick

Private Investigator



'Awful lot of strange things goin' on down Massachusetts way. I'm gonna get to the bottom of it.

Age:
32

Gender:
Male

Power Descriptions:
No superpowers, but has an incredibly keen eye for detail. He carries a small snub-nosed revolver and a few extra rounds for self defence.

Personality:
Once a young and eager cop on the streets of Chicago, Hardwick willingly left the force after a raid on an supoosed distillery turned ugly. The experience made him more cautious and jaded, and he took up an interest in the occult which led down many dark paths to forbidden knowledge no mortal should ever possess. While silver-tongued and quick to gain people's trust at a superficial level, Hardwick in fact struggles with neurosis and paranoia coupled with an often serious drinking problem.

Biography:
James grew up as most kids did in urban hubs across America - poor, dirty, and overcrowded in the streets and slums of Chicago. His mother was a Polish immigrant and his father worked the railways tirelessly to keep his family supported.

James was barely fourteen when his Dad left to fight in the Great War. Tragically, his tour - and his life - were cut brutally short during the Ypres campaign.

As the war drew to a close, James took on a slew of odd jobs to support his increasingly distant and grief stricken mother, who had taken to alcohol to dull the pain of losing the love of her life. It became harder and harder for her to hold down a job. Eventually she too was taken by her vices, two months before the Eighteenth Amendment came into force.

The pain of watching his mother waste away affected James greatly, and he became involved in a number of temperance movements. In 1924 and spurred by a desire to help tear down the growing bootlegging syndicates around the city, he joined the Chicago Police Department and worked as a detective for a few years.

This, however, was not to last. After an anonymous tip-off about a potential underground distillery, James led a small contingent of police on a raid on a run-down old building in one of Chicago's rougher boroughs. As James made his way into the basement, what he discovered instead filled him with eldritch dread - strange markings on the walls, blood-red candles arranged in incomprehensible patterns, signs of human sacrifice and, most horrific of all, a bloodied tome bound in a mish-mash of cured human skin.

Forever scarred by the events of that night, James immediately quit the force and sought solace in the very thing he had fought so hard against: drink. He wandered aimlessly across the States for a few years, trying to make sense of what he saw that night.

It was after a chance meeting with a man from the Miskatonic University in Arkham, Massachusetts that James finally began to understand the nightmares that had plagued him for so long. He settled down in Arkham and, with the help of the Miskatonic University, became a Private Investigator and researcher into the occult and forbidden knowledge, with the hope that he could help both himself and others understand the dark secrets that lurk beneath the thin veneer of society.

Likes:
Drinking, uncovering mysteries, drinking, reading, drinking, smoking, researching forbidden knowledge... Did I say drinking? He really likes drinking.

Dislikes:
Prohibition, thinking too much, being sober for extended periods of time, cultists

Fears:
Situations or cosmic circumstances beyond his control, idle & sober thoughts

Weaknesses:
Often pursues leads or cases with a fanatical devotion, regardless of personal safety or concern for others

Theme Song:
Does low pitched chanting in long-dead languages count as a theme song?