Black-Eyed Kids
“Please ma’am, we just need to come in for
a moment to use your phone. You needn’t be afraid. We’re just little children.”
ST NOTES:
Encountered at the Stanley Overlook Hotel etc. by Panoptes, Witness and Chimera
-
Suspected children (larval form) of strange extra-dimensional beings
the Men in Black from the MtA 1.0 Summoners book.
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These little buggers definitely invoke the Uncanny Valley… hard. When you look to close, notice the eyes, you
also notice the features are just… off.
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What do they want? No idea…
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Why do they make people disappear?
Why do they need to come inside?
Do they actually need help or is that a trap? No fricken idea.
-
Why am I imagining them opening doorways in the houses, becoming
nexuses for future extra-dimentional intrusion.
-
Are BEKs and MIBs from the Lower Depths? Maybe.
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New Ability: Fear Area
o Cause Spooked
and Shaken Tilt
o Unfortunately
they can’t seem to control this Fear aura which is actually a disadvantage to
them as people get creeped out and shy away from them.
o Maybe as they
age and interact with people they learn to control this more but still are
pretty creepy.
Background: Though they echo older tales of monsters that use innocent guises
to prey on the unwary, Black-Eyed Kids are a recent phenomenon. Stories of
encounters with strangely articulate, menacing children first surfaced on
Internet message boards devoted to paranormal phenomena. According to the predominant
narrative, the children appear unexpectedly in a place they shouldn’t be — in a
parking garage at three in the morning, at the door of a farmhouse miles away
from anything — and ask for assistance, usually in the form of a ride home or access
to a telephone. The witness finds herself overcome by intense feelings of
dread, and the longer she resists acquiescing to the children’s’ requests, the
angrier they seem to get. The story culminates with a sudden realization that
the children’s’ eyes are solid, unrelieved, black, at which point the witness flees.
So far no one has posted a story in which the encounter ends with someone
actually helping the children, so naturally the Internet assumes the worst.
Description: Black-Eyed children
look to be anywhere between seven and 13 years old. They almost always appear in
pairs, or sometimes groups of three, and usually look dissimilar enough from
each other to discount the possibility that they’re related. They’re usually
dressed in dark-colored hoodies, jeans, and tennis shoes, though the
older-appearing ones are sometimes described as looking vaguely “goth” or as wearing
suits or formalwear. They’re uniformly pale or ashen complexioned, and they
speak very precisely, with a confidence not often heard from children talking
to strange adults. As the name suggests, their most distinctive feature is
their solid black eyes, undifferentiated across sclera, iris, and pupil.
Storytelling Hints: Given their pallor,
adult mannerisms, and frequent insistence on being invited into homes or cars, Black-Eyed
Kids are often identified as vampires. They’re not. You’ve heard of Men in
Black, those strange, probably not human visitors who show up in the wake of
paranormal experiences and threaten witnesses into silence? Black-Eyed Kids are
the juvenile form. A few years ago, an accident breached one of their brood
nests or spawning chambers or wherever the Men in Black come from, and about a
dozen or so larval Men in Black stumbled blinkingly out into the sunlight. (Despite
the name “Men” in Black, the Black-Eyed Kids are equally divided between boys,
girls, and androgyne children.) They really do just want someone to take them
home, or at least make contact with whatever passes for a controlling intelligence
among the Men in Black. The problem is that
MIBs are specifically designed to give off a psychic field of
fear, revulsion, and menace, the better to intimidate people into silence, and
the kids don’t know how to turn that off. Every interaction with them thus
becomes a horrific experience, and the kids grow more and more frustrated as
their simple requests for aid go unheeded. If they ever find someone who can
overcome their fear and actually get them home, though, it’s anyone’s guess how
the adult Men in Black would react.
Mental
Attributes: Intelligence 3, Wits 4, Resolve
3
Physical
Attributes: Strength 2, Dexterity 3, Stamina
2
Social
Attributes: Presence 4, Manipulation 3, Composure
1
Mental
Skills: Occult 1
Physical
Skills: Athletics 1, Stealth 3
Social
Skills: Intimidation 3, Subterfuge 2
Merits: Pusher, Striking Looks •
Potency: 1
Willpower:
4
Virtue:
Determined Vice: Impatient
Aspiration:
To get home.
Initiative:
4
Defense:
4
Speed:
9
Health:
6
Bans:
Black-Eyed Kids cannot enter a home or vehicle
without being invited.
Banes:
Salt
Dread
Powers: Hypnotic Gaze, Madness and Terror,
Surprise Entrance
Prerequisite: Persuasion ••
Effect: Your character tempts and bribes as second nature.
Any time a mark in a Social interaction accepts his soft leverage
(see p. 82), improve your
Impression as if you’d satisfied
his Vice as well as moving the impression up on the chart.
MADNESSND
TERROR
Dread Power: Horror
& Madness - The monster’s gaze (or
perhaps its voice, touch,
or toxic blood) induces madness and terror in its
victims. By expending 1 Willpower and making a roll
of an appropriate dice pool contested by the victim’s
Composure, the Horror may inflict one of the following
Conditions on the victim: Guilty, Shaken, or
Spooked. For 3 Willpower it may instead inflict the
Broken, Fugue, or Madness Conditions.
Dread Power: Hypnotic Gaze - The creature’s gaze can charm and
beguile. When meeting
the
target’s gaze, it can spend 1 Willpower and roll Presence
+
Persuasion contested by the target’s Composure. If successful,
the
creature counts as having a perfect impression against
the
target for Social maneuvers until the end of the scene.
Dread Power: Surprise Entrance - The creature’s gaze can charm and
beguile. When meeting
the
target’s gaze, it can spend 1 Willpower and roll Presence
+
Persuasion contested by the target’s Composure. If successful,
the
creature counts as having a perfect impression against
the
target for Social maneuvers until the end of the scene.
The Men in Black They are not from a movie. They are not government
agents. They are not men at all, despite the name.
They appear in regards to overt supernatural displays.
Yes, they appear during and after supposed “UFO sightings,”
but they also appear when Paradox affects this
world, whether it be from Havoc or from a Paradox
Anomaly or, most likely, a Manifestation born as a
result of magic gone awry. In fact, any other dramatic
summoning (especially a summoning where a Sleeper
witness is present) runs the risk of eventually drawing
the Men in Black.
These enigmatic characters show up, seemingly out
of nowhere. Sometimes, they walk up out of the woods,
or simply appear at one’s door. Other times, they drive
a matte-black sedan — something large and boxy, an
older Cadillac or Oldsmobile. They may show up at
the time of a “supernatural event,” but most likely
reveal themselves hours, even days after the event has
come and passed. They never show up alone: always
two, usually three, rarely more than four.
The figures seem… peaceable enough, at first. They
like to ask a lot of questions, initially circumventing
the topic of the supernatural event, talking around
it in a notably clumsy attempt to “get to the point.”
Soon, they start to hone in on questions related to
the topic, trying to find out more about what the individual
saw or that person’s responsibility related to
the event. Their questions may have few if any segues
to connect them: a series of non sequitur questions
is common. At some point, they offer their names,
but never any identification — and their names are
usually strange, taken from colors or objects or other
simple factors (“Mister Door,” or “Agent Clock,” or
merely, “I’m Gray”).
All the while, they act like the inhuman attempting
to masquerade as human. One might ask for food
or a drink, and then stare at what’s handed to them
like it’s the most wondrous or most grotesque thing
they have ever seen. They eat and drink, but seem
confused as how to properly do so — even after finish-
ing a glass of water, the Man in Black might lick the
glass or gently rub his fingers along the rim, seemingly
mystified by the sensation.
Another might ask for a pen, and then let the ink
bleed into his white shirt. Sometimes, they perform
a seemingly normal action that is inconsistent with
their supposed positions as “agents of the government”
(which they often claim to be): the Man in Black will
get up in the middle of questioning and wash his face
in the sink, or he’ll begin folding or shredding paper
napkins with trembling fingers.
It’s not long before their real inhumanity starts to
show itself. One might start to shake — not violently,
but like a drunk with the DTs. Another wipes his
mouth with the back of his hand and his lips pop like
ticks, leaving a bright red smear of blood across his
cheek (and the enigmatic stranger will seem utterly
unfazed by this). A third tugs at his ear, and it comes
off, plopping onto the linoleum floor.
It becomes clear soon enough: these figures are
ill-made mockeries of man. They are not human,
not at all. And when the subject of their “interview”
recognizes this, well, that’s usually when things get
really interesting.
Dark Tools
So, the cars, the strange stabbing picks,
and even their suits — what to think about the
physical objects that accompany the Men in
Black?
They are actually extensions of the Men
in Black themselves. Destroying the stranger
destroys all that comes with them: the matte
black cars, their weird weapons, their clothing
and sunglasses and fake lips and plastic
fingernails. All of it.
Unless… once more, magic is a way to get
creative, isn’t it? A mage might be able to
use a combined Spirit/Time spell to “keep”
one of their weapons or black cars in this
world. These items work flawlessly, to the
tune of a +3 bonus. However, those who use
them begin to go slowly mad, gaining one
mild derangement per week of use. The good
news is: the character is able to recognize the
source of his nascent insanity, and after the
second derangement is almost certain to get
rid of the accursed weird objects. Bad news
is, the derangements are only conquered
through therapy (magical or otherwise) —
they do not fade on their own.
Silence, One Way or Another The Men in Black seem overly concerned with
silencing their victims. The level of their intense
zealousness toward this goal appears driven by just how
connected the victim was to the supernatural event.
If the victim was merely a witness, the Men in Black
only seek to convince the individual to “admit” aloud
that what they witnessed was a hoax, hallucination or
otherwise falsified and imagined. If the target vocally
agrees and repeats their assertions, they leave. It’s that
easy. It’s not so easy, however, if the target refuses to
acknowledge that the strangers are correct. That’s
when the Men in Black get violent.
They resort to torture. They attempt to grab the
victim and hold her down. They begin to hurt her.
Little pain, at first, with an always odd, off-kilter brand
of torture: the figure might begin with small but hard
pinches. He might advance to bending back fingers
until they break or tugging on an ear until it starts
to come off. The stranger might bite her, or try to fill
her ears and eyes with things he finds underneath
the sink (dishwashing fluid, Windex, drain cleaner).
If at any point the victim will admit to the Men in
Black being right, the torture stops. The strangers
wipe themselves off, maybe get a drink from the refrigerator,
then leave, either getting into their matte
black cars or simply wandering off down the street,
in search of their next victim. If the individual later
speaks of the supernatural event, the Men in Black
return (see “Brain Death,” below).
It’s a whole different bag of tricks if the Men in
Black encounter someone who had any kind of responsibility
for a supernatural event (say, for instance,
a mage). To those with any kind of responsibility, they
are not so kind.
Brain Death They attempt to abduct those who have responsibility
in a supernatural event. They’ll swarm a character,
grapple the individual, and throw him in the trunk
of their car or drag him bodily to a remote location
(which may be five minutes or five hours away).
Once there, the Men in Black attempt to incur some
manner of brain death in the victim. This may not
be a total brain death, and may instead be something
akin to a lobotomy. It isn’t a perfect science: the Men
in Black have long metal picks with black handles
that they use to do the “operation,” which more or
less consists of holding down the victim and pushing
the needles into various parts of the victim’s face and
head — corners of the eyes, temples, up the nose, and
so forth. This may kill the victim. It may turn the
victim into a drooling vegetable. It may simply ruin
just enough of the brain to stop the mage from, say,
performing magic. Again, it’s not a perfect science: the
Men in Black are imprecise, and when they perform
this task it’s always like they’re doing it for the first
time (it may call to mind a child who has a bug trapped
under a glass — growing fascinated as it plucks off legs
or sears the poor thing
with sunlight through a
magnifying glass). If for
some reason the person
is resisting enough that
the Men in Black cannot
get the sharp picks
into the victim’s skull,
they’ll resort to brutal
violence: punching and
kicking the target until
he is dead.
Abilities The Men in Black have
the following abilities:
Never Die: A Man in
Black suffers from damage
as does any physical
object or organic lifeform:
the stranger’s body
breaks down and once
it has taken a Health
track full of lethal or
aggravated damage, it
perishes immediately,
literally falling apart
into a gaseous, bloody
disruption (often leaving
behind something
else that looks like runny
makeup or melted plastic).
However, the Man
in Black is reconstituted only one hour later. He
doesn’t arise from the strange and grisly remains, but
instead appears much like they all do in the beginning
— driving up in a car, walking out of the woods,
coming in through a closet door.
Spatial Certainty: The Men in Black have some
provenance with the Space Arcanum. A Man in Black
has a sympathetic connection with his quarry: he can
roughly track it anywhere. He may not know of a
target’s location, but he always knows (without a roll)
the direction in which the target awaits. In addition, a
Man in Black also has the Spatial Awareness spell as an
innate ability (p. 233, Mage: The Awakening). This
must be activated with rolls, as per the rote, “Trailing
the Long Stride” (Intelligence + Occult; the Man in
Black has no actual Space Arcanum).
Weaknesses The Men in Black are still frail creatures in some
fashion, though, and are beholden to the following
weaknesses:
Ill-Made Masquerade: The Men in Black aren’t
human, and they don’t do a very good job at pretending
to be human. Even at a distance, any Perception
rolls made regarding a Man in Black’s falseness gain
+2. Up close, such a roll gains +4, instead.
Temporal Limits: The Men in Black are curiously
limited by, and vulnerable to the march of time. First,
each Man in Black has a “time limit” in this world
equal to 43 hours, 17 minutes and 21 seconds. Once
that limit has been reached, the shadowy stranger is
simply no longer. A character blinks, and nothing
remains of the Man in Black that was pursuing her.
There exists a wrinkle to this, however: any time a
Man in Black’s body is killed (see Never Die, above)
and returns, it restarts the clock, setting it back to
the odd deadline. The second temporal limit suffered
by a Man in Black is magic from the Time Arcanum.
Any time a spell from Time is cast in the presence of
a Man in Black, it seems to make him dizzy: he suffers
a –1 penalty to all rolls for every Time spell cast
(cumulative). This penalty remains for one hour.
Weapon Confusion: The Men in Black are capable
with Brawl rolls and with Weaponry rolls made to
utilize their long needled picks in combat. Other
weapons, however, utterly confound them. A Man
in Black can pick up a pistol or a baseball bat to use
against a target, but attacks are clumsy and slow — the
stranger suffers a –5 to use any such weapon.
Storytelling the Men in Black
First and foremost, the Men in Black are not
to be played for comical effect, but certainly
their behavior can seem comical and, initially,
harmless. One of the strangers washes
his hands in the fish tank, while another
bites his thumbnail down to the bloody quick
while asking questions. Strange. Anything
weird that they do should be given eventual
contrast, though, when it comes time to solicit
information or “silence” the target — they become
an unstoppable, nightmarish force.
And that’s the key to Storytelling the Men
in Black: nightmare. Like in a nightmare, they
represent an enemy that keeps on coming.
Yes, you can destroy them physically but they
always return (and in fact, destroying them
physically only lengthens the duration of the
nightmare, really). The story one gets out of
the Men in Black is, effectively, a chase story:
look to movies like Duel or The Terminator
for this idea. It’s about running. About getting
away. About escape at any cost. All too often,
game players have the idea that (often accurately)
they just need to find a way to kill the
bad guy, need to find the “mini-boss’ weakness,”
except here, that won’t work. The good
news is, the Men in Black seem programmed
on a time limit, so they cannot come ceaselessly
until their victim is dead. Because of
this, the characters merely need to hide and
survive. It should humble the characters a bit:
not everything they witness or conjure can be
so easily put back down.
Summoning the Strangers One may summon a Man in Black a couple different
ways. First, a mage may utilize the Outer Channel spell
(p. 144), with a few notable tweaks to the process.
First, the target number is different. The Men in
Black seem to have no resistance to or concern over
the Gauntlet, and so the target number is now twice
the mage’s Wisdom (for the mage must overcome
her own sanity and moral scale to invite such inhuman
anomalies into this world, even temporarily).
Second, the mage who summons the Men in Black
is subject to a mild derangement during the time that
the Men remain in this world. This derangement is
usually Fixation or Vocalization (pp. 97–98, World
of Darkness Rulebook).
If a mage or other character is not using the Outer
Channel spell, then the Men in Black can be summoned
during a Manifestation Paradox. An Abyssal
creature still enters this world (be it a snarling Imp
or some dark Angel), and when it does, the character
can expend a Willpower point and that character’s
player can attempt a Composure + Subterfuge roll.
Success on this roll brings the Men in Black into this
world, though they do not appear immediately, usually
showing up within 24 hours of the Manifestation.
The bigger question is, why summon the Men in
Black at all? Some mages have done so in an attempt
to bring the Men in Black to bear against their
magical enemies. Upon summoning the strangers
close to a supernatural event, the Men in Black
enter this world and hone in on the witnesses to
and those responsible for that supernatural event.
(If several such events occurred recently and in
the vicinity, they will endeavor to “deal with” all
parties related to all events.) If the summoner was
not strictly responsible for any such event, the
hope is that the enigmatic strangers will now dog
their enemies. This can certainly work, but it’s a
bit like setting loose a rabid dog in the direction
of your foe — yes, the dog may leap for your adversary’s
throat, but when he’s done he may come
back and bite off the hand that feeds him. Many
mages have summoned the Men in Black only to
have the strangers assault them for some spell gone
awry weeks before.
It should be noted: a character never summons just
one Man in Black. They always appear, as mentioned
earlier, in twos, threes or fours.
Story Hooks
• An ally of the cabal comes to them,
panicked: he’s being followed. They come
in a dark sedan that glides quietly along the
city streets. Men in dark suits and crooked
sunglasses come for him, and he always
must flee, but he knows they’re here for him.
Can the cabal help him? They poke around,
and someone high above them tells them, the
way to be rid of them is to destroy them utterly.
Except, that’s a lie. It only resets the clock
and keeps the strangers in this world. Was
the lie intentional? Are they being messed
with? What happens to the characters when
they try to help the target of the Men in Black
— do they become targets, too?
• One of the cabal misuses magic, be it
intentionally or by accident. Paradox is the
result, however small or large — Sleeper
witnesses are present. Within 24 hours, the
Men in Black have arrived, but preceding
them is a letter slipped under the character’s
door. Penned in elegant script on an
embossed card is this message: “You made
a terrible error, and I have capitalized upon
it. They are coming for you.” Has someone
summoned the Men in Black to hound the
cabal? The Sleeper witnesses have now
gone missing. The Men in Black are ceaseless.
But the real question is — who’s the one
with the axe to grind?
• An ally or even one of the cabal’s own
mages has gone missing — they find blood on
the floor at his home and a pair of black sunglasses
with one lens shattered. Neighbors
describe the Men in Black who visited him.
That’s horrible enough, right? It gets worse.
Months later, the cabal does something
wrong, and the Men in Black come to “correct
the error.” Except now, their friend seems to
be among them. He’s different. Off-kilter, but
it’s him. Can they save him? Is it really him,
or just a mockery? He seems to know quite a
bit about them…
Theories Just what are the Men in Black, anyway? And from
what strange realm do they hail?
One theory is that the Men in Black are the
heralds of “true” Paradox, perhaps even hailing
from a realm of pure Paradox or a place where
sanity holds the laws so dearly in its grip that it’s
actually, well, insane. The theories suggest that
Paradox exists to prevent the molestation of the
Tapestry, keeping its threads mostly unharmed
and connected. Except, Paradox now seems to
hail from — or at least get filtered through —
the Abyss. Paradox doesn’t really right anything:
in fact, it might create a derangement, cause an
electrical grid to go haywire, or force the summoning
of some many-mouthed Abyssal larvae.
Magical indiscretions are not punished. Rips in
the fabric aren’t really fixed. Paradox only seems
to exacerbate the scenario, doing little to prevent
a mage from causing such trouble again.
The Men in Black, however, show up for a time, punish
witnesses and transgressors, and potentially even
damage a sorcerer’s brain so much that the mage can
no more call on magic (or possibly go to the bathroom
by herself) anymore. Doesn’t this imply that they are
perhaps true “Paradox elementals,” hailing not from
the Abyss but from the distant reaches?
It’s these distant reaches that mages believe
could be the home of the enigmatic figures. If a
place exists far off the normal cosmological maps,
it might be home to plainly inhuman gods who
judge mankind’s deeds through a far-off (and probably
distorted) lens. The Men in Black, say some
theories, are these gods or are instead agents of these
gods come to Earth to… make adjustments as the
divine powers feel necessary.
Man in Black Quote: Might I have a cup of water? I feel… parched.
Tell me about the events of two nights ago. Did you know
that water vapor can sometimes simulate a paranormal
experience, the manifestation of such may appear to be
a ghostly entity? Thank you for the water. Ah. I will
enjoy it.
Background: As above. The Men in Black are
inhumans masquerading as humans. They seek to
“convince” witnesses they did not see the supernatural
event they believe they saw, and they also seek
to “correct errors” when it comes to those who may
have been responsible for such a supernatural event.
Correcting an error means, of course, a cruel lobotomy
or death outright.
Description: At a distance, they might seem human.
Up close, that impression fades swiftly. Their skin may
appear plasticene, or painted on. They wear dark suits,
always, and sometimes wear dark glasses (whether in
lens or in frame), dark shoes, and dark gloves.
Storytelling Hints: Basically? Act weird. The Men
in Black do not react normally given certain stimuli.
When transmitting bad news or making a threat,
the stranger may wear a broad smile. When giving
a compliment, the figure may frown or be watching
the ceiling fan revolve or be looking at his own hand
as if it’s a marvel of nature. They ask odd questions.
They interrupt others and themselves. They speak
sometimes in non sequiturs, as if trying to mimic
human conversational patterns (and failing).
Mental Attributes: Intelligence 2, Wits 4, Resolve 4
Physical Attributes: Strength 6, Dexterity 2, Stamina 3
Social Attributes: Presence 2, Manipulation 1, Composure
4
Mental Skills: Investigation 5, Occult 5, Science 1
Physical Skills: Athletics 3, Brawl 3, Drive 1, Stealth
5, Weaponry 3
Social Skills: Intimidation 3
Merits: Direction Sense, Fleet of Foot 3
Willpower: 8
Wisdom: n/a
Virtue: Justice
Vice: Wrath
Initiative: 6
Defense: 2
Speed: 16 (with Fleet of Foot)
Health: 8
Weapons/Attacks:
Type Damage Dice Pool Special
Steel Pick 1(L) 10 Armor Piercing 1
