Despite plenty of historical precedent, the upper classes never seem to expect the lower classes to revolt.

  The look of shock on Benjamin's face was worth the price of admission as Brom casually stood up despite the two serving ghouls trying to stop him.

  In order to open up some space around him, Brom knocked both of them away by smashing his elbows through their sternums. The scent of iron filled the air, the ghouls' wheezing a nasty gurgling from their crushed chests. He kicked backward, sending the chair behind him flying, and at the same time leaned down with his hands to shove the heavy, long table forward. There was a groan from the solid wood, then a whine, then the table snapped in the middle and sent the candles toppling. The room's light level plunged to a decayed gloom that left Brom stumbling and smashing his knees against things as he tried to put distance between himself and the cultists.

  He ducked, avoiding a flying glass thrown from somewhere at the corner of his vision, sidestepped, and reeled off balance as a table leg caught him mid shin. Brom toppled forward right into the arms of the cultist lady with the perm, recoiling as she smiled up at him with rotting yellow dentures. Her pretty pink nails ripped into his back, and she clung to him with unholy strength for her bony frame. He kept moving forward, grabbing her by the waist and pushing, trying to pry her off of him. There was a wet rending noise followed by a meaty pop, and suddenly the woman spun away from him, disarmed, her limbs still clinging to him like barnacles.

  HP: 575/600

  "Really, Linda? Pull yourself together. We can't have you falling apart during an 'all hands on deck' situation like this!" Benjamin's voice was brusque and clipped, clearly displeased with how things were going.

  Brom didn't hear Linda's reply, busy divesting himself of her unwanted hands. Her cane, though, he kept, swinging it hard at a serving ghoul that lurched out at him from the direction of what he thought was the exit. It hit the thing mid-bicep, crushing its humerus and carrying through to shatter a few ribs. The serving ghoul was tossed to the side like a rag doll by the force, and Brom stepped over its legs to advance. Another serving ghoul dove out to stop him, and he raised the cane like a club, staving in the thing's skull and dropping the serving ghoul like a stunned animal, leaving it twitching on the floor.

  Benjamin's voice called out to him with a slightly plaintive note. "Please, Mister Jones, won't you even consider our offer?"

  Brom had reached the doors where TJ and the rest had been taken. The doors where the serving ghouls had been coming and going with dishes all night. He reached out to discover that his fingers went straight through the handles, as if they didn't exist. No, as if they were painted on, part of the texture, cleverly shaded to look like handles when there were no handles at all. A shove against the doors proved that they were firmly locked. Not interactive. Not an exit he could use.

  He turned, gaze marking the cultists and serving ghouls that were still in the center room at the edge of the gloom. Brom's grey eyes scanned around, trying to take note of other exits. The empty frame of the front door they'd come through was still there, but he didn't think backtracking was the answer. The only other difference in the walls he could see was the large bay window to his left that provided a stunning view of Cold Harbor. One of the soft lamps still flickered merrily on its sill.

  "Mister Jones?"

  "Look, maybe you can just give me some literature to look over? A cult doctrine manual that I can peruse at my leisure and get back to you on later?" Stall for time, Brom, stall for time. Try to sidle around the edge.

  Benjamin sighed, clearly not appreciating his answer. The old man's body began to glow with a blue light, subtle at first, just a bruising in the air around him. But like a blowtorch kindled to cutting power, the center nearest him heated to a bright blue-white. "What can we offer you to come back to the table, Mister Jones? There are many things available through the power of lord Yacht Sothoth."

  "All hail!"

  Hands reached out from the non-existent doors to grab him, many serving ghouls dogpiling him in an effort to drag Brom to his knees. He stumbled, body listing slightly to the left under the sudden weight, and began slamming himself back against the wall in an effort to dislodge them. He hammered hard enough to shake dust from the ceiling and for wood and bone to crack. Rib ends burst out of them, scratching into the meat of Brom's back as slowly they let go, one by one.

  HP: 568/600

  +5 XP

  +5 XP

  +5XP

  "Look, I'll be honest with you, Benjamin, it would all be negotiating in bad faith. I have no intentions of joining the CHYC. Now or ever." Brom flinched as a charger plate flew out of the gloom near Benjamin's glowing figure. It smashed into the wall next to him, exploding into shards that rained down. He ducked, getting his shoulder under one of the nearby tables, and picking it up like a shield as he made his way toward the bay window. More plates were hurled and exploded against it as he covered the hundred or so feet between the two points.

  "It's unfortunate you feel that way Mister Jones. You're putting on quite the performance tonight. Your vigor is exactly what the CHYC needs! All this raw power and energy would go a long way in our lord's service!"

  He heard the onrushing footsteps of the group of ghoul servers and, with a flex of his shoulders, he heaved the table he was carrying at them. They crashed to the ground in a tangle of limbs, largely unharmed, but their advance had been stopped. Another charger plate hurtled past, close enough for the wind of its passage to caress his cheek, then blew out through the bay window. Tinkling shards of glass rained down, crunching under Brom's steps as he glanced toward the cultists. "I am not interested. Now or ever."

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  Benjamin sighed. "Really, I do need you to control yourself. The destruction of property was charming at first, but it's getting out of hand." He gestured, watch glinting with the motion, and a bit of that blue-hot aura coalesced into a bolt that shot across the distance.

  It hit against Brom and harmlessly vanished with a soft pop.

  - Hostile Magic Negated.

  The look on Benjamin's and the other cultists' faces instantly changed. They squared up abruptly. Benjamin raised a hand in a gesture, commanding the serving ghouls to stop what they were doing. Slowly, the members of the CHYC gathered at a respectful distance away.

  Brom stood with his back to the shattered window, the chill breeze off the bay digging its fetid touch into his wounds and making his skin crawl. He watched them all array themselves into a semi-circle at the edge of the light that filtered in from outside. He didn't like the suddenly appraising look on all their faces. Like they were staring at something worth far more than they'd bargained for.

  Benjamin's aura was brighter than ever, and the other cultists' auras began to seep out of their bodies, bleeding blue light as well. Feet shuffled. Canes thumped in rhythmic unison. Even limbless Linda was doing her best to follow along with the motion despite her newly acquired handicap. With a messianic spread of his arms, Benjamin took a half step forward. Enough to separate himself from the rest but not enough to breach the respectful distance they'd opened.

  "We must insist, Mister Jones. You are an asset that we here at the CHYC simply cannot allow to slip through our fingers." He bowed his head in a supplicating gesture, procuring the melon scooper and holding it out toward Brom on his bare, upturned palms. "We implore you one last time, join us. Tie your fortunes to our lord, make your power his power, climb to newfound heights!"

  That melon scooper made Brom do a full-bodied shiver. "Not just no, but hell no, Benjamin, that is my final word on your offer."

  Benjamin's head snapped up, and he carelessly tossed the scooper over his shoulder. "Well, in that case, you leave me with no choice." His arms were raised high, his aura rising into the sky. Behind him, the other cultists began to wail a pulsing chant, their heads thrown back. "OH GREAT LORD! YOUR SERVANT BRINGS UNTO YOU A REPAST FIT FOR YOUR DIVINE DARKNESS! COME FORTH AND SINK THE BLESSED METAL OF YOUR MAW INTO THE FLESH OF THIS DEFIANT HEATHEN! TAKE FROM HIM HIS POWERS AND MAKE THEM YOUR OWN! WE CALL TO YOU! YOUR SERVANTS BEG YOUR PRESENCE, LORD YACHT SOTHOTH!"

  "ALL HAIL!"

  The whole building vibrated. A single ripple. Then another. Another. A low whine, like distressed metal, was carried on the ever-strengthening wind and set off an ache in Brom's molars. That stench that had permeated the harbor began to grow, the wind turning warm, and the light from outside dimmed. Brom wanted to run, but any step he took forward was menaced by the assembled ranks of the cult. They had him cornered, herding him like rodeo clowns herded a bull into a chute, leaving no one part of the semi-circle weak to him.

  Benjamin returned to his place in the ranks, all of them taking three measured steps back, leaving Brom alone by the bay window. A beautiful smile transformed Benjamin's face into a look of profound joy. "He has come."

  [Warning: 5:00 left to complete Stage Three!]

  [Quest Stage Three: Escape the Clubhouse! 0/1]

  Brom knew it was there. Yacht Sothoth, the monster behind the cult, was literally breathing down his neck. He turned to face it, watching as it opened its maw with the screech of metal, finally tearing away. Those lifeless porthole eyes flickered back the light of that single lantern, still in the window, and then it brought its teeth down on the CHYC clubhouse. He realized that was why the cultists and their ghouls had stepped back, they were just out of the bite radius. All he could do was watch as those triangular teeth of severed steel dug into the wood of the building. The shark-ship tossed its head in a motion familiar to any who watched shark-themed programming, it was using the force to help shear off a chunk of its prey. Only, instead of whale blubber, it was the piece of a building that had Brom inside.

  He stared straight ahead, at the throat of the monster, the walls rippling and writhing. Those wormy things, he realized belatedly. They were part of the monster, not just its guts but its very flesh, the rusted, oily steel just its outer husk. As they squirmed, he could see flashes of a glow, deeper in the bowels of the beast, the source of the pounding heat rising from its core.

  [Warning: 3:00 left to complete Stage Three!]

  [Quest Stage Three: Escape the Clubhouse! 0/1]

  Brom hated to admit it, but there really seemed to be only one way out. Through that broken bay window. The only problem was that jumping through it now would land him straight into the guts of Yacht Sothoth. The shaking of the building intensified, the behemoth thrashing and driving its teeth toward its meal with ever-increasing speed. He could stand here and wait, or he could take matters into his own hands.

  "Benjamin, you want to feed me to this damn thing? I hope you keep watching while I choke it to death, you eyeless fuck."

  With that, Brom took a running step, put his foot on the frame of the empty bay window, and hurled himself straight into the maw of madness.

  [Quest Stage Three: Escape the Clubhouse! 1/1]

  [Stage Complete!]

  [Quest Stage Four: Survive the Beast 24:00:00]