Tiffany looked from one side of the room to the other, clearly hearing the intrusive noise. She got up, moved towards the hallway and then turned back around, frozen in the room as if unsure where or what to do. All thoughts of searching were gone as she quickly moved into the closet and shut it, vanishing from view.

Shawn's hands fiddled in third drawer.


There were the cassette tapes. Or at least 'cassette tapes' for who knew what was on them. They were just thrown casually into this particular drawer. Some of them had little white labels that read 'lesson 3' or 'lesson 8' on them. There was no box containing them, and reaching into the drawer felt like reaching into a junk drawer, the kind that Mom had all over the house and kitchen. There was a plastic clattering as the cassettes knocked against each other. Who knew how many there were? At least twenty may be as many as thirty.

Shawn heard the front door of the house close and knew that whoever had entered was now inside the house.

Shawn knew he didn't have time to go through them cassettes and carry them out, so he just pulled the drawer out of the makeup table and tossed it in the open suitcase he'd pulled Mr. Clayton out of. Then he tossed Mr. Clayton in on top of it and closed the case. He knew it'd make a noise, but that might buy him a little time; he knew from experience if someone heard a noise in their house when they weren't expecting it, they'd stop and try to hear where it came from. He picked up the suitcase and tossed it out the open window - he followed immediately afterwards, glad there hadn't been any stairs in his house.

The tapes clattered out in a rain of plastic into the briefcase. Shawn heard the sound of increasingly frantic footsteps at the sound. Closing the case, and now whomever was there was running down the hall towards the room.

Out the briefcase went through the window. And then Shawn followed it.


Flurghffff...

The sound of Shawn's feet hitting the soft dirt of the garden and then sliding into the weeds, mounds of dirt reaching up to his ankles. And then Shawn's back, off-balance touching the brick siding of the house's exterior.

Shawn could see by the moonlight, the case was open, cassettes strewn about, Mr. Clayton lying on the grass a few feet away like someone had cut his strings in the middle of an act.

Shawn heard the door of the room open inside, someone clearly having entered where he had just jumped out the window.

Shawn tossed Mr. Clayton into the suitcase and started feverishly tossing the cassettes into the suitcase. He knew he didn't have long, but he had to gather as much as he could or this whole breakin would've been useless.

Shawn shuffled the cassettes in and then closed the briefcase just as before. As he did, her heard Bradford's voice from inside the room behind him.

"Mr. Clayton. Mr. Clayton. I'm home."

"Mr. Clayton? Mr. Clayton why aren't you answering me?"

Shawn barely breathed as he realised Bradford hadn't actually noticed that he was there. Carefully, he picked up the briefcase and headed away from the house, trying to put as much distance between himself and Bradford as he could.

Shawn managed to get about thirty yards away, feet shuffling through the grass as the crickets chirped their nightly chorus in unison during the final days of summer.

The scream tore through Shawn like a great shard of glass. He heard it come from Bradford's house through that open window and into the still night. Involuntarily, Shawn's felt the briefcase jolt slightly as if something was awakened, as if Mr. Clayton had stirred. The scream was certainly loud enough to wake anyone alive up. And possibly loud enough to wake the dead.

Before Shawn was even aware of making a conscious decision, his legs continued to pound furiously on the uneven grass, my ears straining from the sound, more certainty that the where it had come from....and whose it was:

Tiffany

Shawn considered turning back...or at least, he told himself that he did. In truth, he knew that Tiffany would probably be caught the moment he jumped out the window. He wished he could go back to help, but instead he continued to pound across the grass, wanting to put as much distance between himself and the house as he could.

Shawn stalked through the night, weaving through bushes and around white, picket fences that glowed brilliantly against the moon. He heard his own breathing as he ran and the rattling and click-clacking of cassette tapes Mr. Clayton's briefcase from within.

With Bradford's house far, far behind him, Shawn came to a tree just on the outskirts of the development, where the road met the nearby highway which was just about a hundred meters away. Headlights blared past, the sound of trucks and traffic moving in the night, the city still awake despite the midnight hour.

Shawn eventually slowed to a halt. When he was sure Bradford wasn't following him, he leaned against the tree to catch his breath and gather his thoughts. He needed to catch back up with his other self - he had an idea, but he needed help to do it. Hopefully he'd be in bed by now and easy to find. Plus, he knew he had a tape player back at home, the kind Mr. Worthington made him use to practice his enunciation.

Still, as he prepared to set out, he remembered the jolt inside the suitcase. He couldn't just let that past - if Mr. Clayton was awake, who knew what he could do? He had to make sure nothing had happened. Gingerly, he set the suitcase down on the ground and opened one clasp. He carefully prised open one edge open a crack to look inside, ready to slam it shut at a moment's notice.

A Shawn opened the first clasp and peered inside, he saw two puppet fingers, squirming their way out of the box. Or at least trying to. There was a muffled, sound. Like something yawning.

Shawn immediately slammed the suitcase shut and closed the catch. He sat down on the top of the suitcase to try and hold it shut as he tried to keep calm. He tried to tell himself this was fine, this was part of his plan. It could all work out if he just stayed calm and brought Mr. Clayton to the other Shawn.

'Click!'

The metal clasp shut the suitcase and all Shawn could feel beneath him was brief, fluttering movements from within. The suitcase moved around a bit, like some kind of animal was inside. But then, after a few moments, the movement stopped.

Leaning against the tree, the night was silent except for the Shawn's harsh exhalations. The crickets seemed to have stopped all of their chirping. And the screams coming from Bradford's room so far away no longer rang out.

Everything was still except for the rush of cars nearby.

The moon glowed bright and strong, casting its ominous shine across the highway and the tree and the distant neighborhood.

Shawn waited a little while longer, until he was sure the movement had completely stopped and wouldn't suddenly start up again. When he'd regained some small measure of calm, he got to his feet and picked up the suitcase. He set out for his home, though he did choose a route that avoided passing near Bradford's house.

Shawn set out for home, going the long way, cutting through a nearby lawn and keeping a safe distance from the house. The crickets still weren't chirping and with the noise of the nearby highway now fading into the trees, a quietness settled around Shawn.

But just up ahead, there was a large shadow lurking.  Another person. They were walking down the road. Not an adult.


A fat kid.

Shawm slowed a little as the shadow got closer and he squinted into the gloom, trying to see who it was. Bradford wasn't really fat, but Shawn was feeling generally paranoid right now. He sized up his escape routes - he could probably break for the trees, or if his house was close enough, he could make a beeline for that.

Either of those was an option and Shawn spotted that both were available. But the shadow was actually closer than it had appeared. And now, in the moonlight, Shawn could see it was a fat girl.

"Hold it right there." She said in a southern twang that wasn't from around LA, but rather from somewhere in the Deep South.

And she was pointing a gun at Shawn as she emerged from the darkness into the moonlight.

Shawn wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting, but a girl with a literal gun wasn’t one of those things. He froze in place. “Please don’t shoot.”

"You just keep your hands good n' raised where I can see' em." The girl said, still very much pointing the gun at Shawn.

"First question: are you a monster or a friend of monsters?"

Shawn carefully complied, keeping his hands visible and not making any sudden movements.  "No, I'm not?" He hoped it was the right answer. And really, when he thought about it, if Mr. Clayton was telling the truth about Griffix, Shawn didn't have any monster friends. Not anymore.

The fat girl nodded her head.

"I ain't a fixin' for a fight, but I'll just the same shoot you were you stand. So think real carefully about what you're about to say next. You think long and hard before you answer this next question. Real carefully? You got that?" The girl's fingers tensed, gripping the stock and the trigger as if getting ready to shoot.

"Real careful.  You got that?"

OOC: Shawn decided whether or not to answer, then rolls Wits + Composure

Shawn nodded carefully, not wanting to upset the girl by speaking out loud before she answered her question.

OOC: 07:48, Today: Shawn Cramer failed (no successes) using 4d10 with the World of Darkness nWoD system with a target of 8, rerolling 10s with rolls of 5,5,7,7. Wits + Composure.

"Alright." The girl said. "My name's Kristin. And I'm the one that asks questions here. I'm a monster hunter." She said, taking on the tone of a Sheriff in an Old Western movie. Shawn was familiar with the tone and role, having been on so many sets and seen so many props from his own experience.

"What are you doin' out so late?"

Shawn could tell she was playacting the part of a sheriff, and immediately tried to match her energy like in his acting classes. "I'm just trying to get back home. I was at a friend's house and I didn't notice how late it was." He tried to sound hapless and a little worried, just like the sort of townspeople a sheriff would help in those old movies. "You must be really brave, hunting monsters and everything. Do you think you can walk me home? I'll bet all the monsters would be scared of you."

OOC: Shawn Rolls Manipulation + Expression + Striking Looks with the following results

0 Successes: 'BANG!' Something went wrong with Shawn's explanation. Not only was it not sufficent, it somehow convinces Kristin that Shawn is a monster. Kristin decides to shoot first and ask questions later. She pulls the trigger.

1 Success: Kristin is not convinced. She moves forward and asks a question. After she does, Shawn rolls Manipulation + Expression + Striking looks -3.

2-3 Successes: Kristin is convinced. She continues with the interrogation, without the gun pointed at Shawn.

4-6 Successes: Kristin is convinced. She ceases the interrogation of Shawn

7+ Successes: Kristin is more than convinced. Shawn adds Kristin to Character sheet as "Ally"