RP:Joliette Thorne and the Bath Toy of Doom Part 2

The Hanging Corpse

Jolie was relaxing at the bar in her horrible floral robe. Drinking whiskey. She finally offered Derry a scant glance. "That was terrible."

Derry raised a brow to Jolie," What do you mean by that?"

Jolie sipped her drink and put it down. "You fought like a girl." That she was such a creature herself did not enter into it, apparently. "You need the Guild. Or to shake that spell-book like an annoying infant. If you're to be bar staff here, I expect far more..."

Jolie blinked. "I believe I just hired you."

Derry grinned towards Jolie, "I knew you'd come around to the idea of having me around." Glancing to the book, Derry sighed," I said I'm unskilled without it.. I'm just worried about fulfilling the contract..."

Jolie shrugged. "Making it work its arse off might even things out a bit, no?" She eyed the tome. "I think it's a very lazy book."

Valentin tromps into the tavern, looking somewhat scuffed and disheveled. His Bowler hat has a few new dents in it. His shadow appears to have taken the form of a laughing anchor.

Jolie said, before she sipped again, "Doesn't mean it ought not work harder for you. Or it's not a fair deal. And learning to better channel what magics it offers you cannot hurt, on the off chance you ever become independent of it." The tome was offered another sere look. "Like.. say.. if it were to perish in a mysterious fire."

Derry glanced towards Edan, it just floated there, silent as ever," Yeah well..." Derry turned his head to his left arm, and the bone that still stuck out from his forearm. The butcher had walked in by this time. Noticing Valentin, Derry offered a wave with his right hand, but went straight back to his arm," I am just glad it stepped in when it did."

Jolie greeted the shadow first. "Ahoy." She was drunk, at this point. "And Muttonchops, too. Have you seen Daath?"

Valentin trundles up to the bar, touching the brim of his hat in greeting to Derry before responding to his guildmistress. "Evenin' mam'selle. I saw him yestereve when I met your spider-lady-thing." Perhaps when Jolie was drunk would be a good time to ask "D'ye reckon the spiderlady'd eat gravewyrm? I still haven't found a buyer for th'meat.

Jolie's brows rose, then lowered at the question of the wyrms, and she grumbled, "Just ... keep 'em away from me."

Derry waved to the two of them," If you two don't mind me... I'm going to crawl in one of the beds upstairs and hope that my bone is back in my arm by the morning..."

Jolie said to Urghdak, "Please follow that vampire. Set the bone, or whatever it takes to stop him complaining."

Valentin grunts "Pansy. It's just a fleshwound."

Jolie then waved at Derry. "See you for morning shift."

Derry did some sort of vulgar gesture for the both of them before he climbed up the stairs.

Urghdak followed suit. Once the two were upstairs, a large cracking noise was heard, and a scream of "By Xalious's ghost!" before Urghdak came downstairs, a satiated grin across his face.

Valentin looks dourly at Urghdak before settling onto a chair.

Jolie burped softly. "I had the best sleep last night.." she blinked. "Don't recall actually going to bed."

Jolie's chief of security winked smugly at Valentin, for a couple of reasons.

Muzo huffs, a sharp and somewhat satisfied blast of breath. For the second time today, he emerges from the cellar with a burlap rag, wiping his hands clean.

Valentin scratches at his jawline "Tha's... fascinatin' mam'selle." The butcher's shadow continues its anchor-shaped mummery while the butcher continues to ignore it.

Jolie waved to Muzo. "Been busy, I take it?" She was looking a little fuzzy around the edges. An effect somewhat aided by that hideous robe.

Muzo nods. "Quite." He plops into a chair beside her, looking a bit frazzled. "Trust you are well?" There's a bit of sly guilt in his eyes as they slide over to her.

Jolie did not miss that hint of guilt, but could not fathom its cause. "Yes, I was just saying how well I slept.. And I think I'd like to run that test, fairly soon, if you think it's ready?"

Valentin calls out to Steadman "Kitchen sink, guv, bloody top shelf." As Steadman grudgingly acknowledges his comprehension of the butcher's order, Valentin comments "You're alright, y'are guv."

Jolie slid a suspicious look between the naga and Trollson, and Valentin would not escape it either, but she had other things to think about. Fortunately for all concerned.

Urghdak grinned yellowly and stalked back to his understairs cave.

Muzo looks up to the butcher and gives him a polite wave. "Evening, Mr. Guv." The greeting is purely a courtesy, for his attention is immediately back on Jolie. "Ready when you are. Loaded test mine with paint to observe dispersal. Suggest we use zombie to activate trigger, if convenient."

Jolie looked vaguely disappointed. "We're going to.. paint. A corpse." She had rather hoped for something more... meaty. "As you wish," she acceded, however, "I have a fresh one made just yesterday. Ought to be good to go. Ready when you are. The arena, perhaps?"

Valentin touches the brim of his bowler in greeting to Muzo as he takes a sip of his wine-diluted elven claret.

Muzo tiredly stands and stretches, a gentle tremor running from the tip of his head to the tip of his tail. "Need to fetch it. Meet you there?"

Jolie stood. "Need to get changed, then. Meet you there." She glanced to Valentin. "Are you an art appreciator, Muttonchops?"

Muzo disappears into the cellar, soon re-emerging with what appears to be a papier mache flask with roughly the dimensions of a slender forearm. He slithers out the door with it.

Valentin glances at Jolie "Can't say I've ever traipsed 'round a gall'ry, mam'selle"

Vailkrin Arena

Jolie arrived at the arena sans horrid robe, clad in slightly less eye-watering scarlet leather. Behind her shuffled an ungainly man, too fresh to have begun rotting in any meaningful way.

Muzo is digging a simple hole. Jolie's arrival earns a glance. "Won't be much longer." The naga is a little pale, and it wouldn't take a trained eye to sense his tension. "Somewhat unsure of mine's safety. Some concern of premature detonation." Very, very, *very* gingerly, he lowers it into the hole and begins covering it with dirt.

Jolie took a few steps back, almost treading on the undead's toes. Not that he'd feel it. But she muttered an apology anyhow, out of habit, before offering the naga a wary look. "Is there any way to stabilise it?"

Muzo fills in the hole until only the topmost bit of the mine is visible. He then procures a wooden trigger rod from his satchel and slips it gingerly into place. "Yes. More time to address that issue once proof-of-concept is complete. This is only a prototype, after all." With the mine thus completed, he gently packs the last of the dirt in place, rendering the weapon all but invisible. With a clawed finger, he draws a circle in the dirt around where he buried it, then hurries back several tail lengths. "Ready. Send the zombie out. Will measure dispersal after test, see how much body area the paint covers. Should give us good idea of potential weapon effectiveness."

Jolie studied all of this with close interest - as close as her tippy-toe leaning over to peer at it would allow, anyhow - a grip taken on the swaying undead keeping her upright securely. "Fascinating... oh, right." She released her hold on the revenant corpse, and stepped back a little further, crackling the air with a few muttered and terrible words. The corpse drooled some sort of unpleasant fluid and obediently set off in a beeline for the buried contraption.

Muzo lowers his goggles over his eyes and slithers back a little farther before settling in and watching intently. The corpse begins its approach, and without realizing it, Muzo holds his breath, fingers tightly interlocked behind his back. Three steps away. Two steps away. One step away. The zombie's foot descends... and the air is completely rent. Where once was a corpse, there is only a tall plume of dust, some of it slightly blue. A repugnant, corpseish stench soon follows as zombie bits rain down about them. Muzo wipes the dust from his goggles and looks skyward to the zombie-mist slowly rising away from them. "Ah."

BOOM!'

a massive flock of startled bats floods out of the Vailkrin portal, swarming the air for miles around

Jolie ducked a few of those startled bats. "Oh, what a pong!" she shouted, unable to hear herself over the very loud ringing in her ears.

Jolie was also covered in blue paint.

Muzo looks over at Jolie, rubbing the side of his head briskly. "What was that?"

"About two in the morning, I think!" Jolie checked the time by her hourglass, just in case.

Muzo said, "Thought it was rather exciting myself. Somewhat..." he looks skyward again, "unexpected results. Safe to assume we can reduce black powder charge."

Jolie then peered at the smoking stain that had once been a reasonably serviceable corpse and shouted, "Perhaps a few more tests? Don't fancy being on the end of that."

Muzo shouts back. "Agreed. Need to find right measures."

Jolie, spattered head to toe in colourful zombie-remnants, replied, "Treasure?" She peered back at 'ground zero'. Blinked. Looked to Muzo doubtfully.

Muzo gives his head another brisk rubbing before slithering closer to the charburst of a crater left behind. Stooping down, he inspects it. "Hardly a trace of blue." He looks back to Jolie, only now noting her rather cerulean tint. "Ah. Found it. Unpredicted dispersal as well."

Jolie made that squinty face people make when they can't quite gel to what somebody is saying. "I just had a bath!" she yelled, woefully. "I look like a blueberry!"

Jolie shouted, in addition, "But what a blast! I think we can safely say the experiment was a success!"

Muzo notes Jolie would have likely been better off wearing that hideous thing she had on eariler. Easy to throw away afterward. Gradually, the ringing in his ears begins to subside, and just as he is about to gather up a few samples from the soil and the corpse bits, he detects a faint whistling noise that slowly grows louder. "Do you hear a-" The zombie's head lands between them with a sickening, splattering crack, spraying them both with brainy-bits and leaving a little red crater to keep the larger black one company.

Jolie used her cerulean-spotted fingers to sluice brain-mush out of her hair, her flesh-gobbed face screwed into an un-necromancerly expression of disgust.

Jolie stared through the brain-bits at Muzo.

Muzo is, for the moment, speechless. Finally, with a discouraged sigh, he lifts his goggles away, revealing his eyes to be the only unblemished portion of him. Eventually, he speaks. "You said something about a bath."

Jolie said, "I believe that poor fellow has quite lost his mind." She grinned at her own joke, and replied, "No, no. I don't have a scarf! But if you're chilly, we can go back to the Corpse! I really ought to have another go in the tub!"

Jolie was putting it mildly.

Muzo looks the red crater. "At least zombie didn't have much mind to begin with. Or," he pauses, a little confused, "was statement in reference to myself?" Taking his handy burlap rag, he begins wiping off his face, neck, and shoulders. "A little shocked, mostly discouraged. Assumed design would have smoother beginnings. Should have expected setbacks. Normal in all research."

Muzo nods emphatically. "Me too." Turning, he begins slithering that way.

Jolie followed, admitting, "Yes, I do - a yellow one. It has a squeaker." She gave the crater and its shallower, gory exclamation point a last moment of perusal and turned for the path to the pub. "I call him 'Quacky'."