Completed By Any Other Name

[Inoadar]

Inoadar went through a series of drawers until he found a screwdriver. He held it up, "Do you know what we call these where I come from? A jaw spreader." He mimed the motions as he described. "We set it against the defendant's cheek, where we guess the teeth to meet, then we hammer it across and out the other side. We have found most people are only too eager to open their mouths willingly, rather than have their cheeks and teeth maimed in a futile effort to keep from having a prybar inserted in their mouth. I mean, once it's there, we can pry their mouth open anyway."

He made a face mocking the concept of sympathy for the imagined plight of the victim. "So tell me you're not going to force me to do that." The Kelvic woman's eyes narrowed hatefully, but she opened her mouth. Inoadar popped a small, pasty, brown lump into her mouth. She spit it out. Inoadar sighed and gave her a look of taxed patience as he bent and picked it up. He made a pointed gesture of putting the screwdriver in his mouth and said though his gritted teeth, "swallow it, please."

The hate on her face slid a little into the realm of fear as she took the lump from his hand and swallowed it. "There's a good girl. Now..." he held up the vial, "This is an antitoxin for what you have just consumed. Now don't panic, it won't actually kill you. I don't think that is what you fear. A few chimes of pain and then a strangely peaceful and satisfying oblivion knowing you have denied your enemy the information they seek. No, that wouldn't frighten me either. But then..." he looked into her eyes with sheer malice, "...I'm not in love."

[Inoadar]

Now her face paled slightly and her eyes widened. "What have you done to him?" her expression was a mixture of the need to know and the fear of what she would hear.

"Him?...you mean your 'Harvek'?" Inoadar asked innocently. "I have done nothing to him. Well, when he tried to sap me, I turned the tables on him, but he'll survive. He's unconscious outside." he waved a thumb over his shoulder to indicate the back door. "The question is, what are you going to do to him."

At her suspicious look, he went on. "Are you going to spend a sweet 'happily ever after' with him, or are you going to persist in withholding information from me." She pouted defiantly and he rolled his eyes. "Yes, yes...your defiance is admirable, but a pretty face is a major consideration when a man decides on a mate..." he eyes narrowed into slivers of cruelty, "bonded or not..."

"He LOVES me!" she snapped, just a hint of doubt tainting her voice.

"Oh yes, I'm sure..." Inoadar's voice was sing-song with mockery. "I'm sure he says that all the time. A handsome young man, drawn to a pretty, young and inexperienced little dish like you. I'm sure it's easy for you both to get your eager little hearts all a-flutter with arousal." he leaned in, his voice a hiss as he stalked around behind her. "But what about if you were ugly." a sudden concern broke across his face. "Ooh, don't scratch that, it'll spread."

"What?" she popped, surprised, pulling her hand away from below her ear, where a small lump was forming.

Inoadar stepped around in front of her, "You heard me, what if you were ugly. What if your face broke out in boils?" Something about how his focus was not on her eyes, but her face alarmed her and she put her hands to her face. Her eyes grew with dread as she began to feel bumps forming all over it. "Yes, what if great hideous cankers bubbled and popped all over that sweet, smooth skin, leaving weeping craters, oozing bilious discharge that dried to a thick foul-smelling crust. Do you think he'd still take you in his arms? Do you think he'd risk having his handsome face turn into a festering sewer-scape of lesions, by kissing...that."

Horror gripped her as she found a wet drop of something on her fingertips. Inoadar's voice was syrupy with mock sympathy. "Oh, I know. That's how it starts. Then it starts to really itch. But if you scratch it, it makes it worse." He walked casually away from her, tossing more taints over his shoulder, "Of course, it's going to get worse anyway. Much worse." He spun with a hand held mirror and shoved it in her face. For all his cruelty, he was not exaggerating.

Her reserve broke and she started to cry. Inoadar pushed all the harder. "Oh don't cry! That's the worst thing you can do. The salt in your tears makes it itch to madness. Then you pop them quicker. The discharge makes it spread...yeah...eww...just like that." He was rewarded with an unrestrained wail of anguish. He turned back and grabbed her arms, beginning to demand information, but stopping halfway with nauseated disgust. "Oh my gods, it may be too late already." He made a gesture of having to keep from gagging "It acts faster on some than others. Do you know what it is?"

Her sobbing leveled to a soft whimper, muffled by her hands, which were starting to drip fluids. "It's called 'Hag's Mask'. It's not going to kill you. But it IS going to make your lover shudder at the thought of touching you. Oh yes, you'll have a nice long life with your face covered in dried, cracking, bleeding sores." He let a single chuckle escape his lips. "Why, they won't even let you into a leper colony!"

She was nearly cried out, her head hanging in hopeless despair, thick, stinking ooze staining her Kelvic collar and the neck of her tunic. "Of course, if you would be interested in an antitoxin..." He held up the vial. A spark of hope found its way back to her face.

[Inoadar]

This secondary hope was the key. It was all well and good, and necessary, to crush the victim's initial hope, the hope they have when you first arrive. The hope that you won't break them in the first place. But too often, by the time a subject realizes that they ARE willing to talk, they are too far gone. There's been too much shock and trauma, too little reason to care anymore.

This girl had seen that it was over for her. Her lover would not allow himself to be saddled with a hideous crone with a diseased looking face that brought nausea upon sight. And she would never EXPECT him to. She had lost all purpose, she had felt every wretched step of the descent into black hopelessness.

But now...Could there be a way back? Now she had the perspective to truly weigh what would be gained against what would be lost, from a standpoint of having experienced it first hand. Inoadar held the vial just out of reach. "Now, it's important you understand the difference between an antidote and an antitoxin. An antidote will reverse the effects, whereas an antitoxin will only stop them from getting worse."

He tossed her a towel. "If you wipe your face off you will see it's not that bad...yet. Oh dear, did I say this was an antidote? My mistake. I'm terribly sorry, but this is only an antitoxin, so you need to decide quickly if you are going to tell me what I want to know. Because soon it WILL be that bad, the pits and the scarring, the disfigurement..." He shuddered dramatically with a pained expression.

She set her jaw, but her eyes spoke of inner conflict. "There...there's nothing...to tell. I don't know...what you want." her voice was husky from crying.

Inoadar looked at her for a few seconds, then sighed sadly and shrugged. "Damn...Well, that's too bad. I can see why your Harvek was attracted to you...WAS attracted, anyway." He made his way to a sink, popping the cap off the vial, as a slow whimper of realization came unbidden from her throat. He held it over the drain and started to turn it with agonizing delay. "I don't know who you're protecting, or what you think they need protecting from."

He started to slowly pour the liquid from the vial. Chains rattled and the sound of struggling vied to be heard over her steadily rising wail. "Nooooooooo!"

"All I wanted was my money." he quipped as he upended the vial, dumping the last contents down the drain. She shrieked pitifully, her cry breaking into sobs as she fell back, a dead weight, hanging in chains. Tears streamed down her face to mix with the bilious fluids from a newly popped boil on the side of her nose. That was it. Life was over. She would die alone, unloved, hideous to look upon. Seconds passed as oblivion began to look ever more like salvation.

"Now, to business. Are you ready to deal?" His voice was cold, but held an odd tone, a tone of confidence. She looked up, the embodiment of misery and despair, her eyes red crescents of pain and self loathing. They widened suddenly as she saw another vial in his hand. 'Third time's the charm' he thought triumphantly as she nodded her head eagerly.

[Inoadar]

She broke, and information poured out like water. False names, true names, clueless supervisors' names, schedules, routes to be taken, keys copied, stashed supplies, boats to be met. Inoadar fed her tastes of the antitoxin as she fed him data.

Harvek had been a mid-level researcher. He had stayed late, against institutional protocol to work with one of the messenger bird subjects and had felt the beginnings of a bond. He had found he liked it and began sneaking time to spend with his lover-to-be. His department head, Dr. Gaius Alzelin, had begun to suspect and discharged him unceremoniously. Harvek had conspired to blackmail a colleague into copying some of the good doctor's keys, and the scheme was hatched.

No one was innocent in this. The girl, whose real name was Cawleena, had pressured Harvek's stooge into including a host of others into what ended up being a major breakout. This accomplice was due to be rotated out in short order and that was when it was to occur. For his part, he refused to go any further unless someone else was set up to take the fall.

Enter Inoadar, unsuspecting odd-job taker. Inoadar, paranoid betrayal detector. Inoadar, resourceful assault transposer/information gatherer/blackmail implementer. He wished Cawleena luck, leaving her in her chains and walking out of the back door to slap Harvek awake. "Okay, pal, listen up. I know everything. And if you don't want me to spill the beans to the Vitrax or to Doctor...Azelus...in there, you are going to pay me 25 gold mizas a week." He pulled a dagger and put it to the cringing researcher's throat. "Or, you can try to kill me right now, but I think we both know that's not gonna happen. Your girl, Cawleena, will be okay, but you damned well better appreciate what she went through for you." He emphasized the girl's real name as a quick means of establishing that he really did know what was going on.

He held Harvek's gaze until he recognized complete submission in the man's eyes. He stood up and sheathed the dagger. He continued to absently straighten aspects of his appearance as he continued. "Normally, I'd only go for the 50 gold I was supposed to get, but since I now know there won't be any payment back at The Spot, and since you tried to set me up for an endless interrogation, I'm expecting compensation. I suppose there will come a time you will figure a way out of the mess you've gotten yourself into, and then you'll stop paying me. I will, of course, rat your nancy ass out to the Ebonstryfe and you'd better have an escape plan then, cause I don't care two nuggets of shyke what happens to you. Are we clear?"

Harvek swallowed, "Where do I drop your gold?"

Inoadar pondered a moment. "Okay, that's a reasonable question...Tell you what, drop it off at Tarsin's Boarding House. Tell the desk it's for Mr. Carver. In fact, make it 30. It's only fair for the desk to get its holding fee...Oh, and be assured that if you ask them any questions, I will turn you inside out and hang you out to dry."

They maintained eye contact for a few seconds until Harvek looked down and away and nodded. Inoadar leaned down and picked up the length of wood he'd left laying there. "Oh, and just one more thing..." There was a swish and a thunk, "I can't have you following me."

A few bells later found him astride Handy, the sun rising across the lake as he began to travel the western arc of the lakeshore, heading for The Southern Trading Post. If he didn't run into any preachin' wolves, he might make the night run of the ferry back to town.

[Inoadar]

The next day, Inoadar returned to The Spot. A few glances preceded subdued nods of recognition. He was getting known here. There was a downside to that, but the upside was far more significant to him. If someone wanted to search him out here, they would know better than to actually confront him here. He was observant enough to detect most anyone but a master spy watching him. And if such a man was watching him, his curiosity would override his caution anyway.

He made his way to the bar, receiving a similar nod from Bohir. Inoadar made a slight sidelong nod to bring the barkeep over for a quiet talk. When the man arrived, both men wore expressions indicating an unresolved issue. "This is not to lodge a complaint." Inoadar began. "I understand the "as is" nature of these tasks. I just wanted confirmation that I was not going to be compensated here."

Bohir's look was guarded, "I'm not sure I follow you. Are you saying the contract reneged?"

"The job was a set-up." Inoadar quickly waved a gesture of unimportance. "But it's all good. I got my pay out of him. I just wanted to be sure I wasn't mistaken about it."

Bohir looked mostly relieved, but there was a hint of anger at the deception on the part of the job contractor. "I'm very sorry. You've been very reliable and deserve better than that."

Inoadar chuckled, "Naw..HE'S sorry. You've got nothin' to be sorry about. Part of bein' 'reliable' is bein' able to deal with surprises. I dealt with his surprises, and then I dealt with him." He and Bohir shared a grim laugh.

"I did have one question though." Inoadar leaned on the bar and swung one arm back to indicate the job board. "Good things tend to come in threes. This is my third job from the first board. I was wondering if the jobs on the second board were available any time soon."

"Well, just enjoy the rest of your day, and the next time you come in, I'll see if I can come up with something for you." Bohir poured an ale and slid it to him. "In the mean time, have this one on the house."

Inoadar accepted it with a grin, lifted the mug in a salute, and sat himself down in the corner, back to the wall, to enjoy the rest of his day.

[Verilian]

. . Thread Award . . Inoadar +1 Riding +4 Tactics +1 Wilderness Survival +2 Trapmaking +1 Crossbow +1 Subterfuge +5 Interrogation +1 Brawling +1 Stealth +2 Rhetoric +1 Poison You Question My Logic? : You didn't really put much description into your riding, so I couldn't give you much for it. Also, while not really a traditional trap, I couldn't think of anything better to award for the fire trap you made, so I gave you trapmaking. Expenses: -121gm (For purchase of Handy, ridding saddle, pad, bit, bridle, and saddlebags) (The fees for stabling should be paid at the beginning of each season, along with living expenses) Loot: 1 "Handy" (Aka, a Zavian Horse), 1 Ridding Saddle, 1 Pad, 1 Bit, 1 Bridle, 1 set of Saddlebags, 90 Gold Mizas (Explained in the notes) Lores: Creating a Fire Trap, Wolves are Afraid of Fire, Horses are afraid of fire too, Location of the Kelvic Research Institution, Magic Chainmail Shirt?, Cawleena the Kelvic, A Scheme at the KRI, Interrogation Technique: Crushing Hope and Giving it Back, Setting up a Payment Arrangement, Notes: First off, great thread! I enjoyed it a lot, and nice try trying to set up some long lasting residual income. However, after the third "week" (note, there are no weeks in Mizahar) the payments stop coming. Efforts to locate Harvek will reveal that he fled town, though there is no information on the Kelvic unless you try to investigate the KRI itself. Also, I don't normally grade threads out of order, but I was reading this one anyway for Marcus so I figured I'd might as well attach a grade to it as well. Notice As per the request of the Founders, threads cannot be graded unless your CS is up to date. This means you need to add threads to your thread list when you make new threads, keep your skills up to date, ledger, living expenses, ect. If you aren't up to date, you'll get a PM from me before i grade your thread. If you are up to date, disregard this notice.