Maxwell will contact Detective Patel and tell him that he has found the source of the drugs, but it is something that cannot exactly be addressed by the legal system. If they send police, there will be worse consequences and police men will die needlessly.
Max will ask Detective Patel to go with Max to speak with the Professor.
Patel meets up with Max at the Varsity downtown, discussing the situation over yells of “What’ll ya have?” I assume Maxwell lays it out in his usual blunt, direct style (although not going into supernatural details). The detective listens carefully, and then shakes his head. “I don’t know. I had to file a mountain of paperwork over that homicide scene you and your friends were at a few weeks back. I need to know what’s really going on here, what I’m getting into. If there are bad guys, I want to get them, but I need to know why my men can’t back us up on this.”
I cannot tell you if you should bring them or not. I cannot take that choice from you. What I can tell you is that this thing, this monster is not a man. Not any longer. The drug is creates destroys the sanity of those who take it and the origins of the drug are in the world that the Law was never meant to consider.
All I ask is that you make an informed decision. We need to make sure that the moster is not in his lab and then you and I can confront him. If he makes himself out to be a man, human, rational, then your Law prevails.
If he is, as I know he is, a monster, then we fix that problem without the procedures.
He looks at Maxwell for a long moment. Finally, he carefully takes a badge out of his jacket pocket and puts it into a duffel bag at his feet. “I believe you. Part of me thinks I shouldn’t, but I do. As long as this thing is on your side of the fence, we’ll play by your rules, but as soon as it’s on mine, you’ll let me handle things my way.” He tone doesn’t sound like a question, but he waits for a response anyway.
Maxwell will agree easily as he wants it that way. The best way to ensure you are not becoming a monster is to ensure you can allow decisions like this to be made.
And thus the agreement is forged.
Patel suggests that they go to talk to the Professor that night — if he’s the night owl he appears to be, it’ll be better to talk with him alone. Maxwell opens a bag of his own, revealing crosses borrowed from a local church, garlic cloves still in the plastic bags from the grocery store, and some thick wooden dowel rods from Home Depot that Maxwell clumsily cut to points. Patel is skeptical. “Vampires? Really?” But he goes along with it, dividing up the gear between the two of you.
Patel gives Maxwell a ride in his unmarked car, and they make their way back to the lab, Maxwell giving directions. The process is almost a mirror image of the night before, with the exception that the same student that Michael seduced required no nudging to hold the door open for the two men.
Back up to the lab, Professor Griffin is doing much the same as he was doing before. Maxwell notices, though, that his stance is a little more crooked, like his spine is slightly deformed or frozen in an odd shape. He looks up, but this time his eyes are suspicious. “I suppose you have forgotten the way to the restroom again, young man?”
Patel stands back a step, letting Maxwell lead and keeping an eye on the door.
“No, sir. I have not forgotten you.”
Max will be calm, polite, but clearly uneasy.
“We have tracked the creation of Red Essence to this campus and, specifically, to you. I would like to ask that you come with us and allow officers to search the lab.”
It is clear he is expecting an attack.
The professor looks confused for a moment, and then start screaming. “No no no NO NO NO NO.” He leaps forward and attacks, his eyes wide, his mouth open wide.
Patel instinctively pulls his gun — combat training is hard to break. He fires at the professor, and the side of Griffin’s shirt immediately fills with blood. The wound seems to rock Griffin a little, but he keeps coming.
Default to standard tactics too. Holy touch and punch the fsck out of him. Advantage is that it counts as his catch. Wade in and try to protect Det. Patel as best he can.
Maxwell channels his connection to God, thinking about the people he needs to protect, and hauls back and hits the professor with a haymaker. The heavy blow lands on his chin, snapping his head back. Unlike with the demon-possessed people, however, there’s no mark, no burning flesh or shrinking flesh from the mark of the righteous. He just falls down like an old man punched by a boxer would.
On Griffin’s turn, he lowers his head and runs into Maxwell, trying to get him out of the way. When Griffin hits, his strength is INCREDIBLE, and it actually staggers Maxwell out of the way.
Patel recovers and remembers the tools. He reaches for the garlic and throws it at Griffin. The garlic bounces off the professor’s head, to no obvious effect.
Although Maxwell’s Lore is mediocre, he did refresh his memory on the plot of Dracula while gearing up for this. He remembers reading about Dracula’s minion, Renfield, who wasn’t a full vampire but was very strong. Maybe Griffin isn’t a vampire, but a minion of one?
Maxwell will yell “He’s not the guy, he’s the minion. We need him.”
He will continue to try to pummel Griffin into submission to be able to try to capture him. He is willing to take consequences to do so.
Patel grumbles something about proper information and switches from the gun to hand-to-hand.
At this point, two people who knowledge of fighting will be able to take down one guy who doesn’t, no matter how strong he is or how much damage he can take. In the end both of you are really beat up (a minor consequence each of “Had The Shit Beat Out Of Me”, but it’ll be gone by the next session), and you’ve managed to tie the professor up. You’re far enough away from other people that the scuffle doesn’t seem to have attracted much attention.
Well, now to interrogate him. Max will mostly do that by offering him redemption and a way out from a fate that will surely end up in a dark, black hole.
If possible, Max will try to get him some food and coffee.
The combination of violence and caretaking is really throwing the professor off, especially as Patel naturally moves into the role of “bad cop” and barks vague threats at him. For a while Griffin just hisses and fights against the bonds, more animal than man, but over time he calms down. Slowly, the two men tease out the story: he is a slave to Esmeralda Vorhis, a vampire of the Black Court. She is using Red Essence to get money, and Griffin is making it for her. He doesn’t seem to know much more, but it’s clear that his will is gone — he is a broken man, and probably has been for a while.
Max will try to convince Patel to get the man into some sort of Witness Protection (though secretly believes the man is as good as dead and it bothers him).
He will try to get a location for Esmeralda Vorhis.
Patel can put him into a cell for Intent to Distribute without a problem, but then it becomes a police issue. Otherwise, he can keep him in a hotel room somewhere, but it’s not nearly as secure. He’d prefer the cell idea, though, since stripping the supernatural stuff off of this still makes a pretty clear police case.
She generally comes to his office or his home, but when she first converted him, he remembers her mentioning someone called “Gupton Jones.” “Gupton Jones” isn’t a person, but a place — specifically, the Gupton-Jones College of Funeral Service.
Max will not try to stop him, but will caution him that the people involved have no issue corrupting police procedure. He will likely take a hell of a lock of flack for this.
Max will thank him and ask if he can stay in the police area. If there is something to get the professor back, they may not be afraid of killing some cops to do it. Especially since this is about to make a lot of rich people slightly less rich.
Patel goes ahead and risks police custody. Griffin agrees.
And yeah, this might be a good point to bring to the other characters next session.
