Session 19 – Love and Inhumanity

This is a session recap for a Kult: Divinity Lost roleplaying campaign. Jessy Button is played by my wife, who also does the art, and I am the game master.

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Marie Ericson-Buckle, Jessy Button’s mother, is a shadow of her former self. She is on her knees, back twisted out of shape and legs bent in ways legs should not bed. The clothes she was buried in are rags, slashed and stained garments. Marie has cuts all over her body, infected wounds with dried blood and pus filling them. Long strips of skin and flesh have been cut from her arms, she’s bruised in blue and yellow, and exposed reddish bone sticks out of the wounds on her hand. Jessy’s eyes fill with tears as she runs through the filthy basement, overwhelmed by the sight of her mother. She was dead, never to be seen again. Jessy lost the only person she could trust when her mother died, leaving her life confusing and directionless. The left side of Marie’s head is caved in, exposed bone and hair tangled up with blood and brain. In Marie’s remaining right eye, Jessy still recognizes her mother’s green luster. It really is her. Jessy reaches down to hug her mother, whose outstretched arms wrap gingerly around her daughter despite the obvious agony. Why is Jessy there? Her mother speaks in fragmented, confused sentences, shuddering from pain but refusing to let go even as her ribs shift under Jessy’s embrace. Their conversation is slow, interrupted by long periods of wordless sobbing. Jessy was brought there by her grandmother, she admits, and Marie fills with dread. So she has gotten to Jessy too. They both know Angela well, better than either would like to. Jessy cannot explain half of what has happened to her, but in mentioning the ring Marie stops her with babbled interruptions. Why use the ring? Her disappointment and outright fear makes Jessy’s stomach sink. She thought her mother wanted her to have it. Marie swears, cursing out her own mother with a twitching kick to the ground that ends with a sad, wet thud. Jessy should have remembered what Honey told her after he had stolen the ring. Her mom didn’t put it in the will. She never wanted this. The realization is nauseating. Her mother hates the ring. Through broken teeth Marie spits out a rant about how it makes people bad, it ruins them and turns them into something so much worse than they were. Jessy’s grandmother wasn’t always how she is. Marie’s voice cracks. The cruel voice in her head is what the ring made of Angela, and it will do the same to Jessy.

The only thing Jessy had left of her mother after she passed, the one heirloom to care for and remember her by, was a poisoned gift all along. Its inclusion in the will was Angela’s doing, and Jessy used it without reservation thinking it was what her mom wanted her to do. What use is it, if it’s not that? For so long she sought influence and knowledge, played the world to get what she wanted, did all that was best for her. The ring became an instrument to conquer her own life, a final blessing from her mom. Jessy hates having to accept how deceived she’s been, betrayed not even by her own actions but simply because Angela needed a tool, someone to carry the ring for her until she could come back for it. Marie begs her to take it off, and she cannot find a reason to defy that. She pulls the gorgeous golden jewelry off her finger and tosses it onto the blood-stained floor. No more. If she could toss it to the bottom of a stream, throw it into a volcano and watch it melt, she would do that for her mom. Jessy stands up and steps over to one of the strange black spheres left by Angela for some unknown purpose. It is metallic, heavy, and icy cold.

She is done listening to her grandmother, done defending herself and the ring, done disappointing her mother. Jessy is determined to smash it, and her single minded focus frightens the voice in her head. Angela’s presence flickers with rage1, but Jessy only channels those feelings towards the ring itself. The flickers turn to flames, and Jessy’s body freezes in place as a fight erupts in her mind. Angela won’t allow her to destroy the ring, not now, not ever. She is strong, the crude indents and faded red circles on the walls offering Angela a sense of familiarity which Jessy lacks. This is her domain, her temple, and Jessy will not outdo her within it.

1 Haunted Hold spent

The metal orb crashes to the floor, flinging shards of stone against Jessy’s robe and at Marie’s face. Dragged away from her own form, Jessy sinks into gray emptiness and can only watch from a distance as Angela takes control. She moves differently, speaks differently, uses Jessy’s body all wrong. Marie immediately recognizes what is wrong and crawls back towards the dark corner she came from, cowering before what was once her daughter. It is Jessy’s voice which laughs at Marie, mocks her for the failure of a daughter she left behind. She hoped for Jessy to be good? With all her knowledge of Jessy’s misdeeds, Angela scours their combined memories to tell the trembling and crying Marie about Carl, who Jessy strung along carelessly to leech for money until his marriage crumbled. She explains with glee what happened to James, how Jessy broke him for the simple joy she feels at seeing a knife plunge into flesh. She helped kill the man, too. Jessy has made deals with demons, double and triple crossed every poor soul she’s come across, and all the while enjoyed a life of luxury off their backs. Jessy screams and thrashes in the void that holds her captive, cursing out Angela and blaming her for the way things turned out. Jessy wouldn’t have done a quarter of those things were it not for the ring, which is only hers because of Angela’s deception. It’s not her own fault! The verbal abuse turns physical as Angela kicks at her daughter, Marie still begging for mother’s mercy. None comes, Angela forcing bare dirty feet into the open wounds adorning Marie’s body and battering her bloodied head around.

From the distance, Jessy recognizes Angela’s joy. Were it any other day, she’d share it, revel in the whimpering and the sense of control, but her mother sagging to the ground and wheezing out Jessy’s name now only disgusts her. She refuses to give up2, desperate to take control of her muscles and crush Angela with the full strength of her soul. Laughter turns into a wordless scream of rage, Jessy and Angela’s minds crashing against one another. Her grandmother is strong, but it is Jessy’s body and Angela still cannot have it3. The contested body falls to the ground, screaming and thrashing, until finally Jessy sits up and almost feels like herself. She reaches for her mother, begging forgiveness.

2 Stubborn Full Success 3 Stubborn Edge spent Break free of a supernatural effect

She will get her mother out of there. Angela’s torture and experimentation, using Marie for horrible rituals which linger on the walls and in the air, it has to stop. Jessy makes a promise, and for the first time in memory she intends to keep it. They’ll escape together, get back home and… Marie stops her, refusing again and again, telling Jessy through her tears that it can’t be done. There’s no escape from this place, not for her. Raging at the back of Jessy’s mind, her grandmother’s voice is eager to tell her why. It’s because Marie is dead. Dead to the world, dead in every sense of the word. The words hurt, but Jessy tries to remain defiant. Angela is supposed to be dead, yet she kicked and screamed her way back into the world of the living. Jessy can give her mother the same chance. Marie cannot believe it, the thought of escape has been beaten so thoroughly out of her mind that it’s become impossible to imagine. Instead, she asks about all the things that Angela told her. Were they true? Jessy has to admit that, yes, she did all those things. She tries to blame it on Angela, on the ring. Marie shakes her head too violently, an infected wound in her neck spurting droplets of blood through the air. She blames herself. It is Marie’s fault that Jessy went down the path she did. As her mother, she should have helped her more, should have talked to her. None of this would’ve had to happen. Marie apologizes, clinging to Jessy’s cult robe with a weak grip. She doesn’t understand, Jessy always saw her mother as a beacon of light, as the only person she could talk to, who would love her no matter what.

“What Stephen did was unforgivable.” – Mom

A hundred memories come flooding back, half forgotten and unaddressed since she was a child. All the times posing in bikinis for her uncle, the money and candy he’d give her to strike a pose, his tight hugs and sweet words of encouragement as she took her clothes off. How can she respond to that? Jessy’s stomach tightens into a hard knot as Marie continues to sob out an apology. She never talked to Jessy about it, never tried to explain what had happened after they cut contact with Stephen. They’d just moved on and left it in the past, it was what her father had wanted. He hated his brother after that, but couldn’t bring himself to think any more about it. Marie should have said something, though. Jessy deserved that, and she never got it, and now… tears stream from her one good eye, the other just a blackened boil, and Angela continues where Marie left off, telling Jessy all the thoughts and feelings shared with her daughter through the years.

Her own mother thinks that she is a ruined person. That Jessy is broken, failed, damaged because she never talked to Jessy about Stephen and how he abused her. Her anguish amuses Angela still watching from the shadowy depths of their shared psyche. Marie did nothing, and it ruined Jessy. Made her a cold, vicious whore. Her mother’s words4. Jessy can’t stand it, knowing how her mother sees her. She collapses onto the floor, her face against the blood and dust. She could have been better, she always knew she had a choice. Jessy never had to be a bitch, didn’t have to lure people to her and use them. She could have been good and she wasn’t. Once her mother died, it was all she knew. Jessy admits she took it too far, but she was so scared and she didn’t know what to do. She still doesn’t.

4 Keep It Together Partial Success Endure Trauma reduces Stability loss

Time passes, in the city under the black sun it is hard to tell how much. Jessy cries, hugs her mother, and cries some more. She can’t accept that they’re stuck there, if Angela could get out then so can Jessy. But Angela had years and years of study, violent rituals and blood sacrifices. Through all her hate and fire, all she had managed was to briefly possess a corpse and later embed herself into Jessy’s own consciousness. What would it take to escape, then? Marie is sure of it, the dead must stay dead. Angela is suspiciously quiet, providing only a distinct sense of unease and inadequacy to Jessy’s thoughts. This is all she amounts to. Rolling in the dirt, Jessy wails and agonizes as Angela seeps further into her mind. Each bit of hope relinquished is replaced with her grandmother’s cruelty, perhaps forever. If Jessy doesn’t get off her ass and find a solution, impossible as it seems, Angela will take her. There is nothing to do for Jessy but to sit up, wipe her tears, and squeeze her mother’s hand. She will come back for her. Marie doesn’t belong in this hell, she deserves so much better. The ring is picked up from the floor and, reluctantly, put back on. It should be destroyed, but if Jessy wants the slightest chance of saving her mother she must use it. It feels good to wear it again, and the sensation flushes through Jessy with a shudder. Marie looks up with fear in her one eye, and Jessy curses herself for loving the ring’s subtle agonies and the power it brings. She kisses Marie, gives her one last gentle hug, and stands to leave. 

The streets outside feel all the same to her, yet Jessy tries to retrace the steps she took to find Angela’s temple. Alone, she feels lost, but if Tan is still within reach then he could help her. They left on poor terms and she knows that, but she can think of no other option. Collapsed homes, bullet-riddled facades and overturned streets lay empty save the distant howling of unknown beasts and soft notes carried on the wind. Jessy dare not think to follow those sounds. She yells out for Tan, but the desiccated corpses nailed to walls and strung up with metal wire won’t tell her where he is. Their carefully positioned arms, hands gnawed off, point in different directions every time she looks. She is soon lost within the stone city’s labyrinth of silent streets and alleys until she sees a familiar sight at the far end of a massive plaza where the once majestic fountains now only pump out a bubbling stream of brown, murky water. A chipped and beaten statue takes the shape of a goat-headed ruler sat on a throne of black stone. Behind it is a tall, narrow building with all its windows shattered and many rune-etched pillars cracked and broken. If the Twins are present within this dead city, Tan would seek them. Jessy picks up the pace, runs across the plaza and sets foot within the temple to Dehu and Mil with a loud echoed footstep. Tan is prostrated before a relief of black stone, gleaming in the diseased light shining from a hole in the ceiling. It portrays a holy scene featuring the two goat heads of Tan’s faith, naked humans in chains and copulating, and writing in a script Jessy cannot read. He rises at the sound of Jessy’s entrance. Why is she there? Tan screams for Jessy to leave, but once he sees her cowered stance and anxious glances around the hall as she begs for him to listen, he slows down. There is a modicum of courtesy he could show her. She’s crying, telling Tan that she’s lost. How is he supposed to help with that? She doesn’t know where they are or how they got there, and she has no idea how to leave. She’s telling Tan this, why exactly?

It’s her mother. Jessy begins rambling, trying to tell Tan everything that happened in the time they were split up. She needs to escape, and she needs to save her mom. He interrupts her, trying again to push her away, but the whimpering and panicked crying makes it impossible for Tan not to listen. He’s furious with her and he’ll never forgive Jessy for what she did, but they are equally fucked in this situation. He tells Jessy what he has found in the temple and the streets outside, other than partially eaten corpse decor. He can hear the braying of Dehu and Mil, the Twin God whispers in his ears. His word is in every stone and shattered statue in this place, his ancient proclamations on the relief behind them. Tan can feel the lingering secrets in this place, and knows that he could hold power here. If only it wasn’t so dead. Has Jessy heard the distant singing? She answers yes, almost surprised that the sounds weren’t all just in her head. Without people to exert power over, there is no use for it. Tan suggests they seek out whoever is singing and hope that they know this place better than he and Jessy do. He sees no other chance to escape. He invites Jessy to pray with him before leaving. They who are the least, Tan prays, must also recognize and understand their position. They have nothing and they are nothing, but through the Twins’ guidance they might yet rise again. A warm, foul smelling wind sweeps the plaza as they exit, and hearing nothing there is little to do but wander and try to avert their eyes from the black monolith on the horizon.

The ring makes people bad, Jessy tries to explain to Tan. Her mother told her as much. He seems uninterested in listening more to her. He will put up with her, but not entertain her madness. She thinks out loud, hoping for Tan to bite, wondering what would happen if someone who was already bad used the ring. Tan curtly responds that good and bad are not valuable concepts by which to measure people, though when Jessy mumbles about herself being a bad person, he doesn’t disagree with her. Tan prefers to see the world through power and weakness, knowledge and ignorance, truth and falsehood. He cannot fault Jessy for acting how she did, she believed it to be in her best interests. Jessy agrees. She really did think that she was doing the right thing for herself. Tan wastes no time mocking her efforts, still angry with Jessy and eager to scorn her for thoughtlessly bowing to the demons of Golachab the Torturer. Willingly. Does she not realize that is what she’s done? Tan could have given her so much, yet she chose to be a slave. The barbed wire necklace, invisible to everyone but Jessy, still tears at her throat. She’s gotten used to the pain. Jessy cowers pathetically and admits that she doesn’t even understand everything Tan’s saying. He pities her, but she doesn’t want pity, she wants guidance. Tan knows so much, and she thought she knew better than him but she doesn’t. Up until today Jessy was so sure that Tan had it wrong, but she admits to him that she wants his truth. She wants to follow him, really listen this time. Tan only scoffs. It is far too late for that. He ignores Jessy’s sobbing, marching ahead with a determined scowl. The two follow what they think is the sound of music, but the tune dissipates into nothing. Headless corpses sit comfortably on the sides of the street, cross-legged and with their hands folded in prayer, surrounded by chewed bones and rusted swords and daggers. Footsteps nearby. A procession, at most a few streets away. They approach with care, coming upon another extravagant and bombed out plaza like the one in front of Dehu and Mil’s temple. One end of the open space is entirely dominated by a massive building, somewhat like a cathedral with its impressive columns and single tower reaching up towards the black Sun. Much of it is collapsed, the same ruin seen across the city having also befallen this place, but its gaping entrance, crude and defaced gargoyles, and one of its many spires remain intact. Standing on the steps of this monument to gods forgotten are a small crowd. Jessy watches from a distance and tries to stop Tan from approaching. She senses the danger, but he is undeterred and asks if she still has the knife she stole from him. Their only weapon.

These are broken people. Most who can walk instead of crawl do so with hunched backs, weighed down by years of abuse and heavy chains hooked into their shoulders, clattering against the cobblestone with each step. Some are missing limbs, others have merely had theirs mutilated and broken. One of them has been pushed up against the wall of the cathedral as Jessy and Tan arrive to the scene, and so their first impression of these wretches is of them lifting a heavy stake of metal and collectively forcing it through the belly of their chosen victim, who remains still even as they are speared to the wall. Another from the crowd is pushed up next to them, and another stake is produced. Jessy can see on the ground a whole heap of these crude weapons, more than enough for the whole group. She is in disbelief that Tan would approach these twisted people, but what other option do they have? The plaza is too loud with the sounds of agonized prayer to hear Tan’s quick footsteps, but he is soon spotted and a contingent of them break loose from the crowd. Hair clumped with blood and vomit, clad in rags or nothing at all, they approach shouting for Tan and Jessy to leave. Some brandish the stakes as a threat to the intruders, others have to use them as support for their hobbled walk. Jessy joins them in trying to get Tan away, grabbing at his robes. He shakes her off and gives a command. Give him the knife. She passes it to him, whose face is a grim mask. He does not look forward to what he has to do, but his god will guide him. As their yelling adversaries come close, Tan stands straight and holds his left hand out as if to stop them. The knife comes up, slips in between Tan’s splayed fingers, and holding back both screams and tears he cuts his little finger off clean. His voice wavers briefly before speaking loud enough for the whole plaza to hear. Everything stops.

His is the voice of the Twins. These streets are his and all who walk upon them also. Those who still have eyes stare at Tan, first in disbelief and then in frustration, while the rest tilt their heads and listen carefully. The laws of the land take hold of their souls. Tan demands they do not oppose him, lest Dehu and Mil crush them beneath their hooves. There is muttering, but most lower their weapons and respect Tan’s word for the moment. He hands the knife back to Jessy and suggests she do the same. Tan made the sacrifice seem easy, yet when Jessy lifts her hand and places the bloody steel against her finger5, she barely breaks her skin before dropping the weapon and admitting defeat. She can’t do it. The crowd howls at the display. Jessy has made no claim of being above their punishment, and someone screams for her to go up against the wall. In an instant, the group mobs Jessy and grabs at her. Tan shouts commands to them, they must serve the Twins. Jessy will not be harmed! The Twin God will annihilate any who would attempt it, all their efforts for naught. For a moment it seems as if the filth-covered attackers listen to Tan, elation coming to Jessy’s mind for just long enough to truly appreciate the pain6. She looks down to see the gleaming shaft of metal piercing her robe, her skin, her ribcage. Right through her. The attacker laughs, and Jessy falls to the ground with her vision blurring.

5 Keep It Together Failure 6 Endure Injury Failure Critical Wound

Splotches of black cover her vision whenever she can manage to open her eyes. Blood spurts out around the wound with each beat of her pierced heart, Jessy’s fumbling hands grabbing at the stake but lacking the strength to nudge it. In the distance she hears braying, two distinct voices coming through to her. Violence erupts over her body as the attacker is destroyed by his former peers, bashed and stabbed into oblivion. A two headed goat watches in the distance, Jessy sees it as if shining a light through the rapidly imposing darkness of death. Her screams turn to pleading. The goat tells her that she will not die, but not through its own decision. Dehu and Mil have no interest in her suffering. It is Tan they are watching. 

Jessy has barely a mind left to think by the time she is brought to her feet and the heavy weapon is dislodged from her body, accompanied by a wet sloshing noise and a stream of blood. Somehow she can stand, somehow she can recognize Tan’s face among the mangled and rotting survivors of the city. Even Angela’s presence is distant compared to the open wound and the unfathomable pain coming from it. Her thoughts, what few break through the cloud of agony, spiral downward. What will become of her? What will become of her mother? Tan is speaking to her from somewhere outside her mind, telling her to hang on to him and walk. He’s been told that they must reach the top of the cathedral’s remaining tower. They will find escape from there. Every step Jessy takes stains her robe more, soon she’ll surely have no blood left. What will happen then? Even if she returns to the world she remembers and leaves this all behind as some insane nightmare, her body has no chance at survival. Still she lumbers onward, and when Jessy is too weak minded, Angela intrudes and continues the climb up the dark spiral stairs within the once majestic building. They are not yet done. More than once do they fall on the filth-caked steps. Tan urges Jessy on, giving her no rest but not leaving her behind. He is intent to help her at least this far. Harsh winds batter them both and carry the stench of the dead and dying as they emerge at the small, open platform atop the tower. There must have been walls there at some point, but now all they can see is the sickly yellow sky above and the broken city below, held together by the grotesque and enormous citadel in the distance. Tan lets go of Jessy, who steels herself against the wind and miraculously stays upright. He approaches the edge and looks over it, to the ceremonial slaughter still going on the cathedral steps. Jessy follows, whimpering at the impact of each step, and watches as the hellish world before them becomes one with the world they remember. Toronto’s sleek, cold streets are the same as the cobbled paths stretching out in every direction, cars moving soundlessly between realms like toys, unaware of the collapsed facades and dead bodies around them. Their own world waits at the bottom of the tower, but the only way there is down. It is a long drop.

Tan is the first to speak, wondering aloud what happens if he jumps. Jessy, wobbly on her feet, focuses her hazy eyes for long enough to appreciate how high up they are. Death. Certainly, death is what would happen. Tan disagrees with her. He feels like death is what is currently happening, death is where they stand right now. They must be dead and Jessy killed them, or else the fools celebrating their own abuse below spoke the truth and this is their only escape. It makes no sense, nor does it matter. Tan sees but one choice. Jessy listens slackjawed, too hurt to appreciate the weight of what he’s saying but confident that he’s right. Whether dead, dying or horribly alive, Jessy knows she can’t make it out of this place without Tan. She’ll follow him. Tan scowls at that and pushes Jessy away from himself, away from the edge. He shouts over the howling winds to stop her fucking lying. He’s over it. Jessy can’t respond, she tries but her mind is such a haze that thoughts are left half-formed and aborted. Angela’s fury and fear boils within, but neither of them want to inhabit Jessy’s wounded flesh. Tan says something, but the words reach Jessy’s consciousness too late to respond. He tried to love her. He doubts it’s even possible to. She wants to respond, desperately wishes she could have Tan’s love again, but he has already jumped. His robe flaps and snaps loudly in the rushing winds for a moment, and then he’s gone. What else to do but follow?

This is a session recap for a Kult: Divinity Lost roleplaying campaign. Jessy Button is played by my wife, who also does the art, and I am the game master.