More Baker's Delight… OK people, you can quit it with the Donut Shop Debacles! Honestly, it's enough to make me swear off the things for life! Several Alert Readers regaled me with their sundry tales of horror and stupidity in bakeries and all night donut shops, but this one takes the cake (no pun intended J), as much for the character involved as the actual goings on. Sigh… The character involved was a "twisted Arsonistic Psychopath" named Ryan Kobain (no relation to the singer). His visage is a simple one, a long-haired, uncharismatic, brown trench-coated, Reasonably well scorched human that had serious behavioural aberrations. On a good day. His partner was a Rubber Chicken named Juju (cybered out through Intelligent use of Aluminum Foil and a Matchboy toy cyberdeck), who had recently been joined by an unfortunate roadkill cat named Bixby (preserved with a Taxidermy skill and strangely dressed in superhero garb). After a very tricky file extraction from a well known corporation… GM: OK. Your friends get into the getaway car and are speeding on their way away from you to the group hideout. RK: Good… good. I walk down the road awhile until I find a doughnut shop. GM: Doughnut shop? I suppose. OK. You find one two blocks down. You look inside and see the cashier and three customers. Two of the customers, both women, are at a table chatting. The other, an extremely overweight woman, is at another table. RK: OK, I enter the shop and go to the register to order my food. GM: (rolling) Before you make it to the counter the big woman gets up. You accidentally bump into her. She gives you a cold stare and walks up to the counter in front of you. RK: Boy, she looks pissed. I suppose I could entertain her with my rubber chicken or my, errrr, flat cat, but then I would have to take them out of my duffel bag. OK, I take the cat out. Don't forget I put preservative in it, along with the - (player twitches) along with my pyro charge. GM: (looking nervous). The woman seems to be taking a long time to order, she can't make up her mind over some such by what you can hear. RK: OK this is getting me annoyed. This walking billboard doesn't know WHO I AM??? How Dare she!!! I tap her on the shoulder. GM: She turns around and bellows 'DO YOU MIND!' RK: I pull out my stim patch! GM: What are you doing? RK: I give it to her right on the forehead! GM: (mouth gaping). Wha…? OK (rolls) You nail her on the forehead and the meds take effect. She sways, starts to shake, and collapses, grunting and twitching. RK: OK! Yeah! I take out my flamethrower! GM (Cursing that no one was watching and noticed the serious bulge). You hear someone say from behind you, "Freeze. Lone Star!!" It's the two women who were chatting at the table. They must be off duty officers. And they have pistols. RK: Damn! OK, I throw Bixby at one of them! GM: WHAT??? RK: YES!!! "Out of the night and into the fight it's BIXBY!!" Then I throw him at one of the women! GM: (gaping) OK, you hit one square in the face (she is stunned by revulsion), and the other opens fire with her pistol. RK: I dodge by jumping over the counter, then I set the Pyro charge in Bixby to go off with my remote controller! GM: Awwww God! The firebomb goes off. The two women start screaming in agony, along with the rotund woman who had just barely managed to crawl to the doorway. You see the clerk crouching down behind the counter about three feet away from you. "Hello! 911? Yes, we need-" RK: BURN HER!!!! GM: (mourning his two hours of prep time for the next run going up in smoke, literally). OK, no contest, she is burning like a kindling log. She stumbles to the back door, gets it open, and falls through. You catch a glimpse of a propane tank as she finally passes out underneath the hoses. Oh, and the fire is spreading mighty quickly seeing as how you ENGULFED THE ENTIRE SHOP IN FLAMES!!! RK: Awwww crumb. OK, I run for the front entrance.. GM: As you run out you see several Lone Star patrol cars just pulling up. They spy your flamethrower and open fire (various rolls, resulting in near deadly damage, from which RK almost goes down -gotta love dermal plating!). You dive behind the rotund woman, and you hear a deafening explosion. (more rolls) You manage to not suffocate from the roasting flesh of the 350 pound woman which was pushed on top of you by the blast. You hear screams as the Lone Star patrolmen are caught in the blast. (holding his forehead and asking for aspirin). What do you do now? RK: Well, I get out from under the woman and go to a phone booth. Call my buddies. GM: You call them up and ask for a pickup? OTHER PLAYER: I'm sorry, you have the wrong number. RK: Oh &%#!! GM: You hear more sirens, approaching fast. RK: Looks like it's just you n'me, Juju. There's not much you can say after that, eh? Take a few minutes to quiet the stunned nausea before attempting anything that takes concentration. Ciao for Now, Karen Karen - karenmr@shadowrun.html.com