Act 34: Madness, Family, And Ink Removal

--- Joshua ---

Shaking his head, he backed away from the mannequin and the gun he definitely wanted to take a second look at.

He wasn’t sure what was going on there but whatever it was had pretty much locked the museum in as his choice of target for the time being. (Meaning I need to focus on looking around this place for an escape route.)

With that goal in mind he turned away from the Cheshire Killjoy’s exhibit and moved to follow the rest of the tour group that had begun to leave him behind.

“Over here we’ll be passing through a recreation of the famous Last Call bar, the speakeasy base of the Barons made using old photos of the group.” The tour guide told them, gesturing to a bar with a number of bottles behind it on their left and a stage on their right, each with a set of stairs going up next to the bar and down by the stage.

What really caught his attention though was the fact that if you ignored the arrangement he could’ve sworn the bar and stage were more clean versions of the ones in the cabaret. Something that gave him a headache as he mentally compared the two.

(I prefer the Cabaret’s layout… It’s better if they see the stage the moment they walk in. That’s what people are there for… Here the bar was the main attraction, but the stage… They could never take away the power of the stage… So they split it, covered the back wall in pictures of the old gang since the crew… After all, the crew was the most important part of The Baron’s Last Call…)

He blinked, before once more wiping the blood from under his nose as they walked through where the wall covered in pictures would’ve been. (But how did I know the wall would be covered in… Of course it would, heh, every bar covers its empty walls in pictures.)

(...)

He wasn’t reassured by that thought in the slightest.

“Now while the Cheshire Killjoy was the leader and founder of the Barons that doesn’t change the fact that as one of the first Mask gangs they had a number of infamous individuals in their midst.” The tour guide continued, taking them down a hall lined with a number of figures dressed in old timey suits and dresses, all looking like they’d stepped out of an old gangster film.

“Over here we have the famous Deadmen duet Papa Sammy D. Bones and Mama Bridget.” His vision turned black and white for a moment as for just a second he swore he saw a skeleton with a single glowing green eye dancing with a beautiful redheaded woman with a pale blue tint to her skin as the sound of old swing filled the air before realizing it was just two mannequins one a skeleton with two eyes and the other a more healthily colored woman with red hair.

He swallowed realizing the weirdness wasn’t over just yet.

“Here we have the enforcer and wheel man James Griffith, formerly a member of the rival gang-” A muscular man, with an exasperated but fond smile as he stuck with the boss, still playing bodyguard even if it meant being kicked out of the family.

(Don’t stop yet…)

“Former champion boxer Thomas Donovan-” An old man with gray hair but a still solid build as he taught the youngsters how to throw a punch and shoot a gun, his kid cheering in the background.

His feet moved on their own as he put a hand to his face, trying to stop his bleeding nose.

“The second generation witchdoctor Cassandra Jackson-” A dark skinned woman with tattooed skin, keeping their insanity grounded despite seeking bloody vengeance as she hexed entire families in black magic.

(Almost there… Just a little further…)

“And of course we can’t forget about the stars of the stage-”

Static filled his ears as he stared at the next exhibit, or rather where the next exhibit should’ve been.

Standing in front of him was a massive void of black, whatever the exhibit was supposed to show having been covered in scribbled lines of inky black that floated in the air despite a lack of canvas, as if they’d been painted onto reality itself.

“Oh, god!” Someone screamed as the static began to fill his thoughts and the world around him began to spin, before he felt himself start to topple over.

As he fell the floating ink seemed to spread across his vision, completely consuming it as he lost consciousness save for the distant sound of swing and warm laughter that left him longing for what he couldn’t have. What he’d never had.

Scene Consequences

-Joshua has taken heavy damage due to Madness bleed with ????.

-Attempts to remain in Museum canceled for this Turn.

--- Alt Scene Triggered ---

When he came to, he found himself lying on a couch of some kind.

“Josh!” A voice cried as a blurry figure came into his vision.

“Chris?” He frowned before grimacing as he felt a spike of pain through his head as he moved to sit up. “Wha… what happened?”

His brother grimaced this time before shaking his head. “They said you passed out with a nosebleed. They called an ambulance to come and get you.”

“Then… then why aren’t we in the hospital?” He asked, looking around what appeared to be a study of some kind.

“Since you looked pretty young they checked your phone for emergency contacts and called me.” Chris explained.

“Okay… that explains why you’re here but… not why I’m here?” He blinked, feeling something in his head twitch, almost like he was feeling an air current blowing from somewhere nearby. (What is that?) (Killjoy’s Gun.) (We’re still at the museum…)

“I, uh, I got here before the ambulance.” Chris admitted, looking a little uncomfortable with that admission.

“How?” He wondered before realizing, “Oh.”

While it rarely came up in practice, neither of them had forgotten that Chris had powers. And when he’d gotten the call about Joshua being hurt, (he must’ve used them to get here as fast as he could…)

“Yeah…” Chris nodded, not looking happy with the fact he’d used his powers in what was probably a very public manner to get to the museum so quickly, before shaking his head again. “But that doesn’t matter. All that matters is whether or not you’re okay.”

He considered himself for a moment before admitting that, “I’ve got a headache but not much other than that.”

“Should’ve figured…” Chris mumbled, sounding frustrated as he ran his hand down his face before leaning forward. “Josh I’m going to need you to do me a weird favor.”

“O-kay?” He asked more than answered.

“I need you to stay away from this museum.” Chris told him.

“Why?” He frowned, pretty sure that he already knew why but wanting his brother to confirm it.

“There’s uh… the museum has this cursed object here, and it seems to be interested in you.” Chris answered after a moment.

“I thought museums checked to avoid that kind of thing or keep them contained?” He pointed out, already having a few ideas of why the Killjoy’s Madness would be interested in him.

“They do but…” Chris pinched the bridge of his nose. “Look Josh, this thing is dangerous and I can’t exactly prove it’s dangerous without outing myself as a Deviant again. I just, I need you to promise me that you’ll stay away from this museum until I… somehow deal with this thing… if I can deal with it…”

Some part of him wanted to argue that (I can’t stay away!) but the larger part of him could tell that whatever was going on here was messing with his brother’s head. Something he hadn’t seen to this extent since…

“Alright… If you don’t want me coming here I won’t.” He (promised)/(lied.)

Scene Consequences

-Grown a bit closer to Chris.

---

It took him a few days after that mess to get Chris to let him out of the house again, and while he still wasn’t quite at a hundred percent his healing factor seemed to have taken care of the worst of the damage brought on by (whatever the fuck happened at the museum.)

Still rather than jumping head first into everything, he decided it’d be best to run a few relatively simple experiments with his Ink. (Experiments I really should’ve done a lot sooner.)

First was the more easily tracked value of how many tags he could leave active at one time. Which came out to a relatively small four, as demonstrated by the handprints all over the wall.

“Well that’s disappointing…” He could’ve sworn he’d left more tags in a day before, but thinking back he couldn’t remember if they all remained active during that time.

Deciding to test that point he started to walk away from his tags, and found to his satisfaction that he could travel much further from them than his early attempts would allow. Though once he crossed a certain threshold he found his connection to the tags had greatly diminished.

Curious about something, he took a few steps back and felt his connections to the tags reestablish themselves. “Good to know.”

Walking back out of range, he placed his hand on a nearby wall and found that he could make another tag once the connection to the rest had diminished.

With the confirmation that his tags weren’t limited by a number per minute factor, he turned back to his older tags and started walking forward, “Now let’s see if I can use this to work in extra- Nope. Only four at a time.” He frowned, feeling only three of the four tags he’d placed some distance away.

He tapped his foot as he considered the matter before shaking his head. “If it’s anything like distance I should be able to increase my tag limit as I go. Though I guess a Malice vial will confirm or deny that. But first…”

After his encounter with the Burning Man and the discovery that his Ink was explosively flammable, he figured it’d be a good idea to figure out any other weaknesses his Ink may possess. Or at least the ones he could test with a quick detour to a store on his way to his current training site.

Which is why he pulled out a few bottles of water, white-out, ink remover, bleach, and baking soda from his backpack.

“Right, so first thing’s first water.” He poured some of the water on his nearby tag and noted that while there were a few small trails of ink running from the tag, it was in no way equal to the amount of water he was pouring.

With the confirmation that water wouldn’t just wash away one of his tags he started pooling a bit of Ink into the palm of his hand before adding water to the mix and discovering that his Ink mixed in pretty quickly with the water. A quick application of this Inky water to the wall also told him that he could not use it to form a tag, though he was able to place one by producing more ink on the wet wall..

“Okay, so water doesn’t stop my ink powers but it does mess with my ink… so probably won’t affect my Hole In The Wall either but… might affect my Ink Blot and Equip Ink.” He told himself, running a hand through his hair as he tried to figure out if he could reasonably test his moving Ink or the Ink construct without more water than a few bottles could supply. “I’ll just test that when it’s raining or something.”

While he hadn’t been caught in it, there’d been some parts of the city damp with an on and off rain the day after Halloween, (meaning I shouldn’t have to wait too long on that one for an answer.)

Shaking his head, he forced himself back onto topic as he opened the bottle of white out next and used it to draw over his tag. An effect that he could feel on his connection to the tag as each stroke over the ink shook his connection until it finally snapped when he’d covered about three fourths of the tag.

“Okay, so white out can kill my connection to a tag… though that might just be the fact that I painted over the ink rather than anything involving the white out itself.” He admitted, before applying a bit of the white out to his palm and quickly overwhelming it with his Ink. “Yeah, less the white out itself and more the painting over my tags.”

Pulling out the ink remover he made a new tag before applying the remover and feeling a similar shakiness to the connection as he did when painting over his tag. Only this time he felt his connection snap after only two swipes with the remover.

“Alright, ink remover can mess up my tags and probably my Hole In The Wall too.” He nodded before moving to apply the remover to some loose ink in his hand. “Wait.”

He checked the bottle as something occurred to him and found a little warning label telling him not to apply to get the mildly acidic substance on his eyes or skin. Which, now that he thought about it, his hands were starting to itch and burn a little. Not painfully so, but definitely enough to make him wary of dumping the stuff on his hand.

“Right… so just like bleach I am not going to dump this on my hand.” He told himself, his self-preservation kicking in for once as he set the bottle back down.

For the final step for this round of testing he made another tag before pouring a bit of bleach over it. Something that while making the Ink run significantly more than water, was not enough to outright kill his connection to the ink.

Pulling out a pack of rags from his backpack he tore one out before scrubbing at the tag a bit, something that did significantly more damage to his tag than simply dumping bleach on it.

“Okay, so if that’s how that worked then you’d probably have to actively scrub the ink off to remove it, but at the very least this means nothing should just passively wash it off without a bit of effort.” He nodded in satisfaction at his base results before reaching into his backpack once more.

“Now it’s just time to see if I can grow out of these issues.” He said, twirling a vial of red malice between his fingers.

Scene Consequences

-Gained (1+D6/2=3) XP to both Ink Tags and Ink Production.

--Currently: Ink Tags Lv. 4 (7/10) and Ink Production Lv. 5 (10/12).