The Glitch V: Taste of Fear (Episode 1)

[LadyTevar]

LizBet, who had been told repeatedly she looked so much like her mother she'd gotten tired of hearing it, looked from her uncle Jack to the white-haired, horribly scarred man and back.

"Matt....? Who's Matt?"

[B4UTRUST]

"An interesting theory," admitted Poe. "I'll keep that in mind and once we go through the reports and get the times and dates in order we can see if we can find a center of the attacks."

Poe sighed.
"You know, the more I think about this, the more confusing it gets, the more possibilities we end up with. Is it one man, is it two? Is this thing human? Not human? An animal? We need to figure out how to narrow this down without eliminating every possibility just for the sake of convenience.

"So, Malkamar. You're a warrior, right? Ever have to hunt down and track a target? Anything there that might help us track 'em down?"

[SirNitram]

"In one or two cases, I've had to hunt down a target." Malkamar mused. "Not many times, and not in a truly overpopulated city, though." The Light Of Dawn rubbed his chin. "On the other hand, eating people is gonna make you host of all sorts of pestilence. That'll make it easier. Hopefully, my powers and experience will mess well with my counterpart."

[B4UTRUST]

"Speaking of," started Poe. "If we're going to take this thing down, assuming we find it, we need to have some sort of idea of what we can do to make sure it doesn't get back up. I've got a few aces up my sleeve that can help even a playing field, but what can the pair of you do? Or do you know yet, Jer?"

[SirNitram]

"I'm highly skilled in the creation and infliction of diseases of a supernatural nature, along with skill in usual ones." Malkamar shrugged. "And I can command the corpses of the dead to rise again to fight. Beyond that, it's just me and the axe."

[frigidmagi]

"Speaking of," started Poe. "If we're going to take this thing down, assuming we find it, we need to have some sort of idea of what we can do to make sure it doesn't get back up. I've got a few aces up my sleeve that can help even a playing field, but what can the pair of you do? Or do you know yet, Jer?"

"I'm just a guy, I'm no super hero. At least I don't feel like I got any super powers. I got my pistol with me though and I'm still a good boxer. Good enough for government work at least." Jeremy said.

[B4UTRUST]

Poe looked at Malkamar, one eyebrow raised.
"You make people sick and you raise the dead? Wow. Okay. That's... that's really... something. Alright. Wait.. You raise the dead. And I assume they're under your command, right? Could they tell you who killed them, or at least draw a picture or something? Or do they just fight?"

[SirNitram]

"Their motor skills are limited, but I think we can put them to good use to find their killer, yes. Nothing stays with the dead like their killer." Malkamar nodded simply. "It should be simple to get one to lead us."

[B4UTRUST]

Poe smiled. It was not a nice smile.
"Now we just need a corpse."

Poe looked over at Jeremy.
"Most of aren't superheroes. I'm no superhero. Hell, I'm not even a hero. I'm just someone who does the right thing because it's the right thing to do. I just happen to have a few more ways to do it than your average Joe."

He shrugged.
"But then you're fresh off the boat, so to speak, you may not have figured out if you've got something extra yet. Like I said, it took me awhile before I figured out mine."

[frigidmagi]

Jeremy grunted at Poe's speech. He was trying to hold down the reaction to Malkamar rather causal announcement that he could make zombies and call down the plague. If it hadn't been for everything else he had seen he would have denounced him as insane or a liar. Course the medieval plate armor and huge axe should have a been a clue that he wasn't normal. If there was a normal here. Where ever here is.

"Maybe we should try the morgue? Or would the cops here stop us from trying?" He asked.

[General Havoc]

Gregory entered with no small amount of trepidation. His mind flashed back to a conversation he'd had not a week before with Ramza and Ender, when they had tried to convince him that if he was actually set on gallivanting about Old Town, then he should take an actual weapon with him. He had turned them down, with the (he thought) totally reasonable explanation that he had no idea what to do with a gun, let alone with something like a sword that required great physical skill and dexterity, something he was not exactly possessed of a great supply of.

Nevertheless, he was starting to wonder if they had known what they were talking about.

The white-haired scarred man named Matt seemed to know Lizbet and her Uncle Jack, which at this point didn't exactly mean anything. Still, there was no going back now, or at least he told himself that.

He surreptitiously straightened his coat and hat, and waited for someone to make some kind of sense as to what the hell was going on here. Surely this was not how quests normally worked.

Was it?

[B4UTRUST]

"Morgue is a no go," Poe began, looking over at Jeremy. "I was just there. Normally CCPD wouldn't give two shits about Old Town, its problems or its corpses, but the last vic was someone important to someone. So cops have a rather large angry crowd in the morgue so security is tight.

"We might have better luck finding out if any of the more unimportant bodies were taken to another mortuary or are already buried.

"Alright, so we've got a list of things here. One, find and talk to this Alchemist. Two, find a body of one of the vics we can possibly use. Three, find and tag the order of the murders and see if that gets us anywhere. Am I missing anything?"

[Charon]

Matt glanced back and stopped. "No, actually. I'm Samus. This is just a new suit I got." Matt grinned and started up the stairs. "Anybody want drinks?"

The downstairs was an organized hermit collection. Knick-knacks and trinkets, some of them perhaps useful, most of them likely not. There was one area that had been cleared of things that had several simpler and more common weapons hanging on a wall. Nowhere to be seen was Matt's iconic weapon and armor.

[Agent Fisher]

Jack looked back at LizBet then at Matt when he responded. Jack had to chuckle, shaking his head. "God, I hope not. I much preferred Samus when she wasn't in her suit." He said then looked at LizBet again.

"Matt's a friend from the old, old days. A ghost." He looked over at Matt again. "Where have you been for the past few years, Matt?" He asked.

[Charon]

Matt stopped at the top of the stairs and looked back down at Jack. "Hey, there are young ears here Jack, keep things PG." He grinned. "As for where I've been. Dead, and loving it. Last call on food and drinks. I may not look it but I'm a good cook, I swear."

[frigidmagi]

"Alright, so we've got a list of things here. One, find and talk to this Alchemist. Two, find a body of one of the vics we can possibly use. Three, find and tag the order of the murders and see if that gets us anywhere. Am I missing anything?"

"Nope, that seems about right Poe. Do you know where we can find this Alchemist person?" Jeremy asked. He liked this, getting back into the saddle. Poe was a professional which was good. Hell Malkamar was a profession to, at whatever it was he did and he was being helpful. It was good, calming. It helped that doing this was actually getting him closer to Mary to.

[B4UTRUST]

"He's somewhere inside of Old Town, but that covers a decent amount of area. So no, not exactly. But I've got a few 'information brokers' that I deal with that I can drop some credits to. See if they can tell us his usual haunts and watering holes or if anyone has run into him lately."

[LadyTevar]

"I'd like something to drink, please," LizBet replied politely, absently falling back on the graces Princess Peach had taught her. It covered the way she was looking from Uncle Jack to Matt and back as her thoughts raced over everything her parents had told her about the war and a 'Matt'.

There wasn't much. Just enough to narrow it down.

"You're the Berserker?"

[Charon]

There was silence from up the stairs for several seconds, finally Matt's disembodied voice rolled down the stairs. "Not for a long time."

A minute later he came down with two glasses with what looked like orange juice in them. Smiling some he held one out to LizBet.

[LadyTevar]

LizBet accepted the glass with polite thanks. She was still the very image of her mother's Avatar back in the old days -- petite, curvy redhead with wide soulful eyes. "Does mom and dad know you're alive?"

[Charon]

Matt didn't look at all surprised at the resemblance. He drank some of his orange juice. "No, and considering the circumstances around my death I'm willing to say they're better off not knowing." He looked from LizBet to the others. "Speaking of which, there aren't all that many people that do know I'm alive. So who told all of you?"

[General Havoc]

The apprehension Gregory had felt before was dialing itself down and being replaced with awkwardness, as it was clear that everybody present knew one another except him. That much, at least, he was used to, and knew how to handle.

He had heard of the Berserker, just as he had heard of the Alchemist, though the stories in this case were significantly less well-attested, and he knew only rumors of world-destroying disasters and shattered game-verses that went along with that name. He had no idea if they were true or not.

"He did," said Gregory, pointing to Jack the Alchemist. He stepped forward, trying his damnedest to cover his limp, something he could manage so long as he wasn't going more than a couple of steps.

"I'm Gregory Colwell," he said, for what had to be the fifth time today. "Ascended Commander." Once more, he was grateful that the title sounded impressive at least. "I've... heard of the Berserker before." He dredged one bit of rumor he had heard concerning this man up from his memory. "Are... you the one that destroyed Ivalice?"

A second too late, he realized how that sounded.

[LadyTevar]

LizBet looked over at Gregory, frowning at how rude that was. "Actually, Greg, if you recall, it was The Guy in Black that gave us paper that had his address. So he knew where Matt was, and we just followed the address."

[Charon]

Matt looked from Gregory to Jack and then to Lizbet as the two discussed who had sent them. When Gregory brought up his past he simply frowned and took another drink from his glass. "Yeah, that was me."

[Agent Fisher]

Jack frowned, about to answer Gregory when Matt beat him too it. He looked down at then to Matt.

"The Shadow Don told us where to find you. He just gave us this address. I think he wants us to do something about the Cannibal."