The Resurrectionists: Arkwright Cemetery

[Seryna]

Maxwell was studying the area where you had come from. As Conner speaks, he follows Conner's gaze to where the figure vanished. The man is purposeful as he scans for movement. The ghoul's own movement is slow and steady, carefully avoiding twigs to snap. The stocky man had great domain awareness. He gestures to his own eyes and then to the left, indicating that he would watch that side of the path. The ghoul proceeds with care.
You continue to move until Maxwell drops to his knees. He makes a slow press of his hand down to the floor behind him in Conner's direction. Maxwell carefully sets the shotgun down behind a gravestone. Maxwell does not look back at Conner. His eyes are locked at something out in the darkness of the gently sloping hill. Something that you cannot see. You see only headstones half - swallowed by grassy ground. Long swathes of deep shadow, untouched by light.
Maxwell slowly and deliberately flips the safety tab on his knife sheathe and draws the spear head size dagger into his right hand.
The radio remains silent. The silence seems to stretch over the damp night.

5 successes

Date	Action	Roll	Result
2021-09-10 22:22:55	Storyteller: rolls 7 to Maxwell's Awareness (10 Again)	3, 8, 10, 10, 8, 1, 4, 9, 3	5 successes

4 successes

Date	Action	Roll	Result
2021-09-10 22:22:09	Storyteller: Sneaks rolls 8 to Contested roll (10 Again)	1, 5, 7, 3, 8, 8, 10, 9, 3	4 successes

[Conner Wells]

Conner follows Maxwell's lead, stooping low behind a gravestone. The silence on Vincenzo's side of the radio is a bit chilling, though Conner chalks it up to the question not being relevant to the task at hand. Then we do have someone up here unexpected. This could be very good, or very bad. He sees Maxwell set down the gun and prep his knife. Good, something quick and quiet. Still, every delay meant an easier time for the rival Coterie.

1 success

Date	Action	Roll	Result
2021-09-10 22:49:12	Conner Wells rolls 6 to Proceed Stealthily (Dex + Stealth + Vitae) (10 Again)	1, 7, 2, 6, 3, 8	1 success

Conner burns some blood to advance under the cover of the various gravestones as he continues up the hill. There is a brief hesitation as he considers the peril of leaving Maxwell's gun unattended, or of running into an innocent human. Please God, not that tonight.

[Seryna]

Another voice, not Vincenzo's, sounds over the radio. "There may be someone here." There is a pregnant pause before the voice comes again.
"Vincenzo is chasing someone who was watching us. Yet. Ah. The person is not. Natural."

Maxwell doesn't speak, and stops moving. He is watching a location that Conner and Maxwell come abreast of. Maxwell gestures for Conner to continue forward. Maxwell appears to be waiting. Listening.
As Conner moves along, he notes some areas are a bit different. A touch of new construction, or perhaps something left behind by Pope's cult? Conner can see an obelisk coming up that he and Maxwell are about to pass.

4 successes

Date	Action	Roll	Result
2021-09-11 18:38:40	Storyteller rolls 8 to Sneaks (10 Again)	8, 1, 5, 4, 10, 8, 3, 8, 5	4 successes

3 successes

Date	Action	Roll	Result
2021-09-11 18:38:04	Storyteller rolls 7 to Maxwell's Awareness (10 Again)	4, 8, 3, 8, 4, 6, 9	3 successes

[Conner Wells]

Conner's grimace goes unseen by the radio voice. It was true: no plan survives contact with the enemy. Except now we may actually have an enemy. One that's less interested in talk.

Still, the fact that the figure was so close to them, and the fact that Pope's interment at Arkwright was long after the cemetery's official construction was starting to turn some wheels in Conner's mind. He'd gone off the guess that either Pope or his cypher's purpose would be found in with one of the mausoleums at the top of the hill, but maybe Pope's people didn't have time to put him in one of the buildings.

3 successes

Date	Action	Roll	Result
2021-09-11 23:36:26	Conner Wells rolls 10 to Examine the Grounds (Wits + Investigation + Willpower) (10 Again, WillPower)	7, 10, 3, 1, 6, 10, 6, 2, 4, 7, 7, 9	3 successes

With Maxwell watching the flank, Conner decides to take a risk and take some time examining the obelisk in the midst of the more recent construction. If there was any chance they'd stumbled upon something significant, Conner wants to be sure before he moves on and potentially walks right by it. He calls upon his greater senses of sight to grant darkvision as an additional caution.

[Seryna]

Conner looks through the signs of money - expensive obelisks and tomes. He locates something different than all the others. A broken obelisk, with its top propped up next to it, upside-down, on the ground. A yellow arrow painted on it indicates “Up.”
Conner gets the distinct feeling that there is something more here in Waterlow Hill. This obelisk seems to be a discreet signal to only those in the know - such as Pope's cult! Perhaps if Conner spends more time searching in Waterlow Hill, he can find a sign of Pope's hiding place.

Wits + Investigation roll to locate any clues

[Conner Wells]

Conner spots the broken obelisk and his unbeating heart soars like he was an old-school adventure archeologist. Thank God for the un-subtelty of cultists! He briefly checks in with Maxwell behind him to see if the ghoul had moved from his spot, then begins examining the obelisk in earnest.

1 success

Date	Action	Roll	Result
2021-09-12 12:51:21	Conner Wells rolls 7 to Look for Clues: Obelisk (Wits + Investigate) (10 Again)	6, 6, 2, 8, 7, 1, 5	1 success

Conner focuses especially on the lower half of the broken obelisk, checking the top if possible to see if something had possibly been hidden where the top of it had been. Like checking trees for easter eggs.

[Seryna]

Maxwell is not in sight... perhaps fetching his shotgun. Or perhaps pursuing the unknown figure.

Conner locates something just beyond the obelisk. As though the up had been pointing to it.

A tall stone pedestal topped with the carving of an empty stone chair. At the foot of the chair, a pair of stone shoes lay on their sides, empty. Everything is stained orange now from fallen leaves and needles. Etched across the front of the pedestal is the name
"Jeremiah" in Roman letters. Below it, cut in a cursive typeface, is
a passage of poetry attributed to Richard Coe, Jr. (1850):
Many parents, kind and good,
Lost to them their little brood,
Bless their Maker night and day,
Though he took their all away!
Shall we, therefore, murmur, where
Stands, unfilled, one vacant chair!

[Conner Wells]

Conner looks at the stone chair and can't avoid visions of trap doors and secret hiding places. But of course that wouldn't make sense. That would take time and resources Pope's people wouldn't have had. But the obelisk message was purposeful, and the design of the tombstone elaborate enough to warrant further investigation.

3 successes

Date	Action	Roll	Result
2021-09-12 17:34:21	Conner Wells rolls 7 to Investigate Tombstone (Wits + Investigation) (10 Again)	10, 6, 6, 9, 3, 5, 2, 9	3 successes

The name on the tombstone does catch Conner's notice, and as he examines the area around the tombstone to see if it had been more recently disturbed than the rest of the sites he also pulls out his pocket bible to review Jeremiah, one of the prophets of exile. A fitting reference to the tombstone's message...or perhaps the other way around.
And while he doesn't sit in the chair, he does lay hands on it to see if it or the shoes have any give or directional clues.

[Seryna]

Conner does not see any other recently disturbed sites. Yet there was a flaw there. Recently.
Pope had gone into hiding in the 40s. His cult had hidden his Torpored body decades ago. The carving of the chair is too small to sit in. There do not appear to be any directional clues.

Jeremiah did not seem to bring out any relevant information.

Give me an academics + intelligence roll

[Conner Wells]

I guess it was too good to be true...

The site had too much going against it to be a worthwhile burial ground for Pope anyway; too exposed, and the grave was already occupied.

So Conner turns inward for answers, abandoning rabbit trails and searching through his own training and memories.

2 successes

Date	Action	Roll	Result
2021-09-12 17:47:20	Conner Wells rolls 5 to Rack Brain for Answers (Int + Academics) (10 Again)	2, 8, 9, 6, 7	2 successes