THE BLACK HEART, PART ONE

"The Black Heart" is a role-play set in the city of New Babbage.  See the trailer here.  

The port city of New Babbage lies on the Vernian Sea, in a world in the grip of its industrial revolution.  I find that I have an affinity for such eras on various worlds, and frequently return to New Babbage to visit a tailor there.  It was on just such a trip, shortly after my second encounter with Arabella Miran, that I heard the ghastly tale.  The entire city was abuzz with it.

The Port at New Babbage

Apparently an archaeologist of minor fame discovered, in the city's Clockhaven district, an ancient statue buried beneath the flagstones.  A curious and disturbing piece of work, it looked ill-formed and inauspicious.  But stranger still, from within it came the slow and steady sound of a beating heart.  Apparently, while the archaeologist rather unwisely spent the night alone with this relic, something horrible occurred.  The next morning the statue was found...open, like a cocoon, and quite empty.  The archaeologist was missing.

At first, I ignored the tale.  I had come for a new suit after all.  But it began to eat at me.  Perhaps the favor I did Uchida Kenji had softened me, prompting me to intervene in the life of Arabella Miran and now, inexplicably, this.  Whatever the excuse, I understood that a Time Lord might be able to see what others could not.  Cursing myself for behaving like the bloody Doctor, I decided to intervene once more.

First I went to the scene of the crime, and then managed to lay hands on the archaeologist's papers.  Scouring them, I found references to an earlier dig site, one that led him to this one and the statue.  I knew I had to seek it out.

The Crime Scene

After wretched hours scouring the city sewers, I uncovered the previous dig site.  Here was a runic inscription that not even my Time Capsule's psychic translation circuits could make plain.  Puzzling indeed!  But I did recover behind the stone an ancient scroll, laden with Alchemical symbols.  I have no idea if this will lead me to the archaeologist, or whatever was released from that stone prison, but the hunt is on...

The Sewers of New Babbage

The Runic Stone and the Alchemist's Scroll

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