Bubble No. 70: Deflowered!

     That’s right: the Ouse of Hasslap has been officially tabletop gaming deflowered! *laughing*

     Yesterday was, by far, one of our best nights so far. ^_^ It started off slow, as with three tired people it usually does. Okami’s home (*squee!*) so he, Neko and I hung around the house until about eleven. (Okami’s computer is on the frizt, and the guys have been playing with mine, trying to upgrade. We had computer parts everywhere.) Hunger took over, so we trundled down to Pizza Hut. (One of the best reasons for living in the city: everything is readily available!) Lunch was amusing with Parmesean fights, spitwads and lots of Garou jokes. (Long story.) We headed back to the Ouse until about one fifteen, then Neko and I packed up and headed off to snag Oni-chan and Ibu.

     The drive was nice, going everywhere and back. Neko filled my gas tank for me. ^_^ (Can’t you see one of the myriad of reasons I adore him? ^_^ Such a darling love…) We snagged drinks, then got Oni-chan, who was delighted to be "kidnapped" for the night. A quick zip over to where I work and we got Ibu. (In itself highly amusing, as I was trying to play Tetris on my spify new pink Razr, Neko was lying in my lap and pawing at me for attention and Oni-chan was talking to both of us at once.) Ibu clocked out and we trotted out to the parking lot. (Interesting note: we may have a ghost or something in the apartment. I’ll post the picture later, but looks like we may have snagged a digital pic of a …thingy.) Of course, I just had to back into that poor red car. ^_^ (Don’t worry, it just gave us a tiny nic on the plastic bumpers. Pah! Nothing to worry over.) Dash to Ibu’s, let him grab some clothes, then off to the Ouse.

     The drive itself turned into a fascinating discussion of porn stars. *laughing* Hey, three guys, one girl-one-of-the-guys… What do people expect? It was interesting to watch them pass Ibu’s spify new Razr around with his myriad of girlie pictures on it. I was laughing the whole way home. We arrive, distribute our various males around the apartment and toss character sheets at Ibu and Okami to start making their characters. (Neko’s running a Hunter: the Reckoning game. It’s really one of his best games to run, and we have a hell of a good time playing.) Fenshae arrived in short order and flopped down with Oni-chan. She ended up getting dragged into playing, (despite having role-played online for ten years, she’d never role-played tabletop,) and ended up with my cross-referenced, tabbed Hunter book and a character sheet. (You can so tell I’m an English major. All of my core rulebooks for the games are tabbed and cross-referenced. Seriously.) Crimson Iris, one of Neko’s friends that I totally adopted, came over. Poor girl who’s never role-played in her life got dragged into making a character.

     One of the day’s highlights was the arrival of Fluffums. For anyone who remembers two years ago or so, Fluffums is one of my former co-workers from the Pilot I work at. He was my dearest girly man and favorite punching bag. We had a great time working together, and we became pretty good friends along the way. Well, he’s working at the Pilot again, and he was in Las Cruces, so he swung by. ^_^ Joyous! He and the motley hit it off fabulously. (Fenshae now wants to know if everyone knows about her before they meet her. *grin* I say "Yep!") Neko ended up playing Resident Evil 4 while helping C. Iris with her character sheet, and the rest of us stood outside on the walkway, smoked and goofed off. Somehow this developed into Okami going down to his Bronco, Phantom 715. (We have three Ford Broncos: Ivy the Bronkie, Phantom 715 and the Pale Rider. The first two are female, but Rider’s male. Neko owns Ivy and Rider, and Okami has Phantom. Incidentally, the Pale Rider’s the "weekend" truck, and although Neko protests, I still call him my play truck. ^_^) Okami dug around and pulled out about five Subway aprons and hats and put ICP on his CD player. Then he started throwing the hats up at us on the breezeway. We spent a good twenty minutes catching them and throwing them back at him. Then the Ass Slap Tag Line began. ^_^ Random ass slapping is just part of life at the Ouse. No ass is sacred. *snerk* Everyone was lined up along the rail, so I ran down and slapped every butt there was. I tagged Ibu, and he ran down the line. He tagged Oni-chan, who tagged Fluffums, who tagged Fenshae. *laughing* Glorious fun, than.

     Incidentally, we now have five Subway hats, five aprons and a neon pink fly swatter on the roof.

     Of course, Fluffums couldn’t just leave. He has far too much class for that. So after we said goodbye to him and everyone goes back inside, he calls my cell and tells me to come out. We all dash outside, and he’s sitting in his car blasting Stephen Lynch’s song "If I Were Gay" at the top volume. What made this utterly priceless is the way he and Oni-chan began lip-synching the words to each other, making gloriously dramatic gestures and overblown emoting. We nearly died laughing. Fluffums then played Aqua’s "Butterfly" for me, and I played pad-less DDR on the walkway. We waved him off and went inside glowing.

     So after a quick soda run, as we go through those like there’s no tomorrow, we settled ourselves about the living room and toasted the deflowering of not only Crimson Iris and Fenshae, but the Ouse itself. The first table top session commenced! (Of course Neko had to cringe in his chair after we toasted the deflowering and shriek "The walls are bleeding!" My response was to laugh and say "Well, a little blood is normal the first time.")

     The game begins, and we’re all describing our characters, where we are and what we’re doing. My character is a drop-dead gorgeous ice queen, black and a pathologist named Pembrooke. In game terms, she’s also a Visionary. Okami’s playing Nathaniel, an abusive Filippino surgeon who hadn’t yet Imbued (become a hunter.) Ibu, in one of his traditional methods, has a red-haired Japanese porn star named Katsu

mi. (Also a hunter, but an Avenger.) Oni-chan had to pull the "crazy old guy," so he’s Darian Smoke, a grizzled, scarred man in his early seventies who once worked for Millenium, a company that distributed nasty stuffs. (Long story, but Darian is a Martyr.) Crimson Iris did a rather nice job of making an ex-military man who was a Judge and fascinated by studying the supernatural. Fenshae did a recycle on one of her anthro characters, and made Rosco, a snarky vigilante social worker who was also an Avenger. We’re playing in Detroit, Michigan, and it’s night time.

     So the game begins with… Ibu’s Katsumi being fired from her porn star work for back-talking to the director. Dazed, she wandered out of the studio into the street and was nearly hit by Nathaniel. They get into an argument as to why Katsumi was in the middle of the street, and Nathaniel slaps her.

     Now, one thing to note, is that White Wolf specifies in their Live Action Role Play that absolutely no touching of other players or Storytellers is allowed. That being said, apparently in table top rp, anything goes. ^_^ We’re a theatrical lot, and we tend to gesture and emote as our characters do. (It adds to the game.) Well, Okami and Ibu were face to face and arguing loudly (note: playing their characters, not actually arguing,) and Okami swung at Ibu. All well and good, but Okami actually connected. Wha-BAM! Right on the bridge of poor Ibu’s nose. He had the most pitiful look of "What did I do?" on his face. Okami looked more shocked than the rest of us. Then Ibu’s nose started bleeding, and Okami lost all the colour in his face. I bolted for toilet paper, an ice pack and a pillow while everyone flat out dies laughing. We couldn’t help it. Ibu was laughing and wincing, Okami was apologizing and laughing, the rest of us were just laughing. We get Ibu’s nose bleed under control, and I looked at Okami and said "You know, when I said a little blood is normal, I didn’t mean that literally."

     Yep, we all died laughing.

     Thankfully, Ibu’s nose is okay, just a little sore. The game continued, even if Crimson Iris had to bolt. (I loathe her family. They’re horribly selfish and constantly demand all of her time. I want all of her time! Me! ME!) Fenshae gets into character really well, for all that she’s shy about being a bit theatrical with others, and we end up working together to kill a zombie, save a mortal waitress, Nathaniel gets Imbued and we end up in Pembrooke’s apartment. So far, so good, and the group of hunters has been established! It was a very good game. Everyone contributed, everyone got some limelight, and there was a ton of character interaction. (Which is my favorite part.) Ooo, and Okami’s made his Rain-of-Sorrows werewolf and Neko’s translating his vampire Arbalest’s sheet. They’re going to play in Brandenburg!!! WOOT!

      Fond breezes and a sharp slap follow you, from the Ouse!