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Got the morbs.
✖ VICTORIA'S SECRET
Ⅰ. ARRIVAL & THE TEMPLE
You can read all about your character's arrival in the game lore.
The ferry pulls into port in the evening, when shadows are long and gas lamps burn through a veil of mist. Dozens of other ships are docked as well, with men unloading crates and boxes from their holds. Beyond the wet wood and lapping sound of the ocean, a city looms like a charcoal smudge on a purple sky. The air is smoggy and thick, and the river that flows from the sea into the city smells foul. Walk the cobbled streets and you will find that the city is crowded and filthy, but full of merchants, pubs, and theatres. Vast wealth and extreme poverty exist side by side.
In the center of the sprawling city is a temple with towering gothic spires and huge stained glass windows depicting all manner of beings that might be gods or angels or monsters. You could look for hours and still be finding new figures plucked straight from books of myth and religion. Inside, the main chamber has a grand vaulted ceiling, and dozens of pews line the aisle up to the altar, which is oddly anticlimactic compared to the lavish surroundings: just a plain stone table with a lit oil lamp in the centre. Two hallways branch off on either side of the room: one leads to private baths and a communal kitchen, the other to monastic style chambers with thin beds. Not the most comfortable place to stay, but it’ll do in a pinch!
Alternatively you can venture into the city and find yourself some other lodging - every Traveler has been supplied with some pocket money. Just be careful that it isn’t stolen by some street urchin. Travelers can also find an era-appropriate outfit that will fit them perfectly laid in the first sleeping chamber they visit.
Ⅱ. SEANCE
CW: grief, past trauma.
Perhaps you overhear talk of it at a pub, or maybe you’re handed a small card as you push your way through the crowded city streets. Maybe you just wander in by accident. However it happens, you find yourself being ushered into the parlour of one Miss Mary Price: Spiritualist.
You and several other people are instructed to sit at a round table in a very dark and musty room. The walls are covered in thick black curtains, and maybe you’re the type to suspect that there’s someone hiding behind them somewhere. Once everyone is seated, Mary Price herself enters the room. The lights are all extinguished save for a single candle.
Mary calls out to the spirits. They communicate through a series of knocks, or the movement of a Ouija board. Someone at the table is put in contact with a deceased aunt who reveals the location of a family heirloom. Someone else is able to say goodbye to a son.
Mary Price looks at you with eyes so dark they look black, and asks, “What haunts you?”
Maybe you answer honestly. Maybe you don’t answer at all, but that doesn’t matter because the spirit tapping around the room is more than happy to narc on you and tell the whole room what or who it is that you cannot forget.
You can deny it all you like, but the spirits don’t have a reason to lie. And if you try to mess up the seance, you will spend a month being hounded by an angry poltergeist.
Ⅲ. THE RIPPER
CW: murder, gore, violence.
You’re lost at night. Maybe you were in the pub too late, or maybe you were searching for more illicit fun - weren’t there opium dens around this time? - or maybe you just weren’t keeping an eye on the time. However it happened, you’re on the streets in the dark.
It’s very foggy; you can barely see a foot in front of you. The streetlamps look like dimly burning ghosts and when the odd person passes you they are felt more than seen, just a darker shadow in a world of shifting shades.
Very suddenly you hear a scream - short, and swallowed up quickly by the fog. Still, it’s enough to get you to turn and hurry down a narrow alleyway.
Sprawled on the ground amid a lake of blood is a body. It’s immediately apparent that this person is probably beyond help - their throat has been slashed ear to ear. Your appearance was not expected, however, and you can see that you’ve startled the killer: they’re running down the alley in the opposite direction.
You have a few choices: you can chase the killer and attempt to catch them, you can try to help the victim, you can get the authorities, or you can just walk away.
What will you do?
Ⅳ. RESURRECTION MEN
CW: dead bodies, grave robbing.
You’re not entirely clear on how you agreed to this. Maybe it was a barroom bet gone wrong. Maybe you’re broke enough that you need money fast. Or maybe you want to help some wannabe medical students. However it happened, you’re in the cemetery.
And you’ve got a shovel.
Time to rob some graves! You’ve convinced yourself somehow that this isn’t morally reprehensible, and so you and your partner are just going to get down to business! What corpse should you unearth? You feel like a kid in a candy store!
The problem comes once you’ve unearthed the body because it seems terribly familiar. Which is… creepy. Creepier still when it starts talking.
Maybe it’s a family member, or an old friend. Maybe an ex partner. Whoever it is, they immediately start telling your fellow grave robber about some incident from your past that you just. Can’t. Let. Go. Of. And even if you whack it with a shovel it won’t stop. Bad corpse! BAD Corpse!
Which of course is exactly what you have to try and do if you want this chatty Cathy of a corpse to shut the hell up.
Sometimes I can still hear his voice...
You can read all about your character's arrival in the game lore.
The ferry pulls into port in the evening, when shadows are long and gas lamps burn through a veil of mist. Dozens of other ships are docked as well, with men unloading crates and boxes from their holds. Beyond the wet wood and lapping sound of the ocean, a city looms like a charcoal smudge on a purple sky. The air is smoggy and thick, and the river that flows from the sea into the city smells foul. Walk the cobbled streets and you will find that the city is crowded and filthy, but full of merchants, pubs, and theatres. Vast wealth and extreme poverty exist side by side.
In the center of the sprawling city is a temple with towering gothic spires and huge stained glass windows depicting all manner of beings that might be gods or angels or monsters. You could look for hours and still be finding new figures plucked straight from books of myth and religion. Inside, the main chamber has a grand vaulted ceiling, and dozens of pews line the aisle up to the altar, which is oddly anticlimactic compared to the lavish surroundings: just a plain stone table with a lit oil lamp in the centre. Two hallways branch off on either side of the room: one leads to private baths and a communal kitchen, the other to monastic style chambers with thin beds. Not the most comfortable place to stay, but it’ll do in a pinch!Alternatively you can venture into the city and find yourself some other lodging - every Traveler has been supplied with some pocket money. Just be careful that it isn’t stolen by some street urchin. Travelers can also find an era-appropriate outfit that will fit them perfectly laid in the first sleeping chamber they visit.
Notes:
1. Unless this is your character’s first island, the High Temple and anything you may have stored there is off-limits this month.
2. Please remember to mark threads appropriately with Content Warnings when necessary.
3. The city greatly resembles Victorian London, and the technology and general way of life is all of that era. Feel free to explore the city! These prompts are a jumping off point - how they affect your character and their development is up to you.
4. Most food is safe to eat, and is consumable by non-human entities. Most. Some of it’s going to be pretty gross or cooked improperly, so be careful.
5. The people in the city are normal humans unless otherwise indicated. Killing them is possible and will affect the colour grading of your Scrywatch depending on the situation.
6. Have fun!
Ⅱ. SEANCE
CW: grief, past trauma.
Perhaps you overhear talk of it at a pub, or maybe you’re handed a small card as you push your way through the crowded city streets. Maybe you just wander in by accident. However it happens, you find yourself being ushered into the parlour of one Miss Mary Price: Spiritualist.
You and several other people are instructed to sit at a round table in a very dark and musty room. The walls are covered in thick black curtains, and maybe you’re the type to suspect that there’s someone hiding behind them somewhere. Once everyone is seated, Mary Price herself enters the room. The lights are all extinguished save for a single candle.Mary calls out to the spirits. They communicate through a series of knocks, or the movement of a Ouija board. Someone at the table is put in contact with a deceased aunt who reveals the location of a family heirloom. Someone else is able to say goodbye to a son.
Mary Price looks at you with eyes so dark they look black, and asks, “What haunts you?”
Maybe you answer honestly. Maybe you don’t answer at all, but that doesn’t matter because the spirit tapping around the room is more than happy to narc on you and tell the whole room what or who it is that you cannot forget.
You can deny it all you like, but the spirits don’t have a reason to lie. And if you try to mess up the seance, you will spend a month being hounded by an angry poltergeist.
Notes:
1. The spirit can communicate through knocks, the Ouija, actually vocalising through the medium, or via ectoplasm.
2. What haunts your character does not have to be the memory of a dead person. It can be an event - maybe they’ve never gotten over losing that science fair in grade three. It is the feeling of being haunted that is important.
3. If you choose to trash the seance, the spirit will follow you for the rest of the month. It can range from annoying to actually dangerous.
Ⅲ. THE RIPPER
CW: murder, gore, violence.
You’re lost at night. Maybe you were in the pub too late, or maybe you were searching for more illicit fun - weren’t there opium dens around this time? - or maybe you just weren’t keeping an eye on the time. However it happened, you’re on the streets in the dark.
It’s very foggy; you can barely see a foot in front of you. The streetlamps look like dimly burning ghosts and when the odd person passes you they are felt more than seen, just a darker shadow in a world of shifting shades.
Very suddenly you hear a scream - short, and swallowed up quickly by the fog. Still, it’s enough to get you to turn and hurry down a narrow alleyway.
Sprawled on the ground amid a lake of blood is a body. It’s immediately apparent that this person is probably beyond help - their throat has been slashed ear to ear. Your appearance was not expected, however, and you can see that you’ve startled the killer: they’re running down the alley in the opposite direction.You have a few choices: you can chase the killer and attempt to catch them, you can try to help the victim, you can get the authorities, or you can just walk away.
What will you do?
Notes:
1. The inspiration for this prompt is Jack the Ripper but you do not have to use that case as a basis for your killer.
2. You can get as involved with this as you would like. You can have your character catch the killer in a chase, or form your very own detective squad and hunt them down that way.
3. Naturally, walking away from a potential serial killer might not be great for your Scrywatch grading!
Ⅳ. RESURRECTION MEN
CW: dead bodies, grave robbing.
You’re not entirely clear on how you agreed to this. Maybe it was a barroom bet gone wrong. Maybe you’re broke enough that you need money fast. Or maybe you want to help some wannabe medical students. However it happened, you’re in the cemetery.
And you’ve got a shovel.
Time to rob some graves! You’ve convinced yourself somehow that this isn’t morally reprehensible, and so you and your partner are just going to get down to business! What corpse should you unearth? You feel like a kid in a candy store! The problem comes once you’ve unearthed the body because it seems terribly familiar. Which is… creepy. Creepier still when it starts talking.
Maybe it’s a family member, or an old friend. Maybe an ex partner. Whoever it is, they immediately start telling your fellow grave robber about some incident from your past that you just. Can’t. Let. Go. Of. And even if you whack it with a shovel it won’t stop. Bad corpse! BAD Corpse!
Which of course is exactly what you have to try and do if you want this chatty Cathy of a corpse to shut the hell up.
Notes:
1. If you do NOT let go of this past event, the corpse will follow you the rest of the night singing Henry the Eighth I am, I am.
iii
Maybe he'll be listened to, and maybe he's just gotten Malcolm and himself arrested as suspects. It could probably go either way.
no subject
"Actually, we're here to clean up the scene," Malcolm says, changing tack. "We work for the morgue." The police officers might be more inclined to believe that, if Malcolm wasn't dressed so posh. He hopes that they'll choose to ignore his outfit.
The fact that cleaning up a crime scene is gross works in he and Connor's favor. The police are just as happy to turn the job over to them. As the officer hands Malcolm the mop, Malcolm asks him if he can try to keep the crowd back. "It'll help us get the job done faster."
He lets out a slow breath as the police leave he and Connor alone with the body. "Thanks," he says to the android.
i've been sick, i'm so sorry this took so long!
"Yes, the morgue. Don't mind my enthusiasm, I'm just a bit of an armchair detective. I might be a little envious of the real ones." His smile is shaky, and he feels that he's saying too much and trying to hard to convince the officers here. He winces inwardly and is tempted to slap his own forehead, but he's able to stop himself before it gets to that point. Still, it doesn't seem that any harm has been done, as they were all too happy to leave he and Malcolm with the clean-up duties.
Now that they're alone with the body, he nods to Malcolm in acknowledgment and crouches down before Malcolm can use the mop- he assumes they'll have to make a show of cleaning, at least -and sticks two fingers into the blood pool, bringing them to his mouth. In Detroit, with Cyberlife's servers, the identity of the victim would be known immediately with the information obtained from the blood. He's not sure how much good it will do here without that database at his disposal, but the pull of programming is strong.
that's okay!
At first, Malcolm thinks that Connor is about to move the body. "Oh, don't-" Then he sees the android dip his fingers in the blood and put them in his mouth. For once, Malcolm is stunned into silence.
"Uh. What?"
no subject
Hank had finally and reluctantly gotten- no scratch that, Hank had never gotten used to the bells and whistles that Cyberlife had included in their design of Connor, but he'd come to sort of accept them, so it's a bit of a surprise to note that Malcolm is eyeing him like he's grown another head. ...Or just tasted some blood. Connor stands, absently wiping the remaining blood on his jeans as he shrugs at Malcolm.
"I was analyzing the blood. I can check forensic samples in real time. I should have warned you first, I'm sorry. I don't even know why I did that, it's not like there's a database here to tell me the identity of the victim- or the perpetrator. But he must have cut himself, there was some male DNA mixed in." Okay, that might not necessarily have been from blood. Right.
"We should keep investigating."
no subject
"It's not uncommon for perpetrators to accidentally cut themselves when they're stabbing someone else," Malcolm says. He's fascinated now. "No databases, but maybe you can tell me something about the blood? Blood type?" Then he has another idea. "If you tasted the blood of a suspect, would you be able to match it to that blood?"
Connor is a walking DNA test.
no subject
"So it would seem." He contemplates the body for a long moment, attempting to use his reconstruction software to try to determine what happened and how the woman ended up in this unfortunate situation, but they don't have enough information yet. It's throwing up messages to that effect across his HUD, much to his annoyance as he blinks them away. So much for that idea.
"O positive." It's barely more than a murmur, still trying to analyze the details of the scene, but he turns his head to Malcolm and nods. "It wouldn't even have to be blood. Anything containing DNA would do." In other words, yes.
no subject
Malcolm kind of hates to think of him that way, after his experiences with Chloe. She is definitely a person to him, and he doesn't want to treat Connor any differently.
"You know Chloe, don't you?" he asks. "She and I are friends."
no subject
He can't help smiling softly at the mention of Chloe. "I know her. Wait- I think she might have mentioned you to me." He peers at Malcolm now, placing him into this new context of being Chloe's friend. "I'm glad she's been making friends here." His gaze sweeps over the scene again. "You're a detective, I take it?" It might be obvious, but it's for Connor's own clarity.
no subject
"I consult with homicide back home, so yes," he continues. "Technically, I'm a forensic profiler." Malcolm still catches killers, albeit in a different manner than other detectives.
no subject
"Really? I've never worked with a profiler before. The only case I worked on back home concerned deviant androids, and there wasn't any reason to consult with a profiler. I don't think any had studied android psychology anyway- before deviancy, there wasn't anything to study." He looks to the body, then back to Malcolm. "Is there enough info here to start constructing a profile of our killer?"
no subject
A case involving deviant androids sounds fascinating to Malcolm, but that's a conversation for another time. "An outline, yes, though I'll have to gather some more information before I can make a full profile," he responds. "I think to say that we're looking for a white male is rather obvious." Looking around... they're surrounded by white males here. "If I had to guess, he stalks his victims. He's an organized killer. She wasn't a random victim."