Play Report: Festivities of Fear and Loathing

Habrá Sangre was on Sunday, the player characters were:

El Mini Grande - The leader of Lucha Libre Sin Fronteras' mini locker room and one of the head trainers, he was once the compatriot of El Grande - the promotion's perennial champion.   Having sacrificed his mask to save El Grande's martial pride, he now feels betrayed and gone rudo y yanqui in retaliation.  No matter where the LLSF pitches its tent, El Mini Grande has a malicious legion of black hearted little people at his beck and call.

Tornado Rosado -"Rose Tornado"- El Grande's daughter and bearer of his legacy, Tornado wishes to reunite her father and El Mini Grande.  Driven by a strong sense of justice, Tornado Rosado is a role model to her Tornado Scouts and wears the Mask of the South Wind.

Tobillo Largo -"Long Ankle"- A relative newcomer,  she earned her ring name after she gained the upper hand in her debut match with El Diablo Abismo and retired him after he refused to submit to her ankle lock.  Under the mask she is a medical doctor raising money to keep the doors of her family's free clinic open. Her iron grip is not to be trifled with.

 El Chupacabra - "The Goatsucker"- Literally the legendary cryptid.  While he rarely wins, the creature in funerary garb doesn't fail to entertain. The last of his kind, he seeks the attentions of Tobilla Largo as a salve to his loneliness.

The Game:

After the city of Monterrey is wracked with tremors from the collapsed Aztec temple previous, the scions Alonzo put on a free show to bolster the city's spirits. A trios match was announced featuring El Mini Grande, El Chupacabra and the Mad Monk against Tobillo Largo, Tornado Rosado and Aguila Ayudas.  Initially framed as a match betwenn the tricolor and yankee traitors, the Mad Monk's vicious catechism reshaped the match into a battle of the sexes.  Aguila Ayudas had his masculinity mocked in the opening exchange, a nagging jeer with repercussions later.

Flinging their bodies at high velocity, the luchadors inspired the audiense to new heights of hope and fear: deep arm drags, lariats from hell, shotgun knees, and eye rakes abounded.  Ina particularly vicious exchange, Aguila Ayudas and Tornado Rosado attempted a stereo dive onto the Mad Monk and El Mini Grande, but the rudos countered with synchronized steel chair shots.  Knocked loopy, the technicos managed to regroup and apply pressure once more.  Unfortunately for them, Aguila Ayudas turned against his teammates, combined with El Chupacabra supping on Tobillo's essence and mimicking her iron grip.  With a suplex into a small package, the ashen ghoul placed his weight on her injured elbow and won his first match, though Tobillo won his cadaverous heart.  Seeing their heroes defeated so angered all the mothers and abuelitas in the crowd that the air was soon full of flung chancletas and rolling pins.

Shamed by the matronly rebuke, Aguila Ayudas is convinced by El Mini Grande to retire his eagle regalia and adopt the vulture's carrion plumage as the Buzzard. 

Powdering out of the tent, the luchadors were sent to a nearby pulqueria for a meeting with Carlos Alonzo, the shiftless middle brother.  He informed them that he had been contacted by a  wealthy retired wrestler, Dorrance Blanchard, who had requested that Carlos send some of LLSF's rising stars for him to meet and possibly mentor.  Carlos selected Tornado Rosado, Chupacabra, and Tobillo Largo as representatives for LLSF's future, and El Mini Grande, the Mad Monk and the Buzzard as examples of the promotion's adaptability. Blanchard's mansion was located outside of town, a towering tubular eyesore called La Casa de los Tubos haloed by ominous storm clouds.

 Lucha libre legends La Dama del Silencio, Cyclone Anaya, Xochitl Cuahtemoc, and El Rey Plomo had arrived ahead of time. Greeted at the door, Blanchard's butler took their capes and accessories, ushering them into the dining room where a banquet was all laid out. Assured that Blanchard would be along shortly, the luchadors were encouraged to dig in. Two other luchadors arrived after the party, Zapato de Muerte and El Ciclope; disgusted with Tornado's presence Zapato derisively compared her to Eva Maria.

Restrained by El Mini Grande from assaulting Zapato, Tornado swore on her family's honor to avenge the slight.  El Mini Grande slipped her a steak knife and advised her that revenge is best when allowed to chill, a murderous glint in his eye.  Dorrance Blanchard emerged from a side room once nearly all the guests had helped themselves to the repast laid out, the Mad Monk refrained since he'd sworn an oath of deprivation.

Blanchard informed them that the future of LLSF was murky, and he was looking to form a core of talent to help him lead the company into the future. Once they'd cleared up any questions regarding the inheritance and Vincente Alonzo's death.   Cyclone Anaya stood up and toasted Blanchard's vision, as he gulped the last of the wine he keeled over apparently dead - eyes split apart like flowers mid-bloom.  Blanchard informed everyone present that they'd been poisoned with Black Lotus Powder (a toxic hallucinogen) and that this was an audition not an open casting call - 4 antidotes were hidden in the locked down manse. You survive the night, you're in.

 

Panic overtook the guests, Tornado Rosado tried to void her stomach, but all that came up were mewing kitten heads and sadness and Zapato de Muerte snapped his shin kicking the door.  El Mini Grande quickly threw himself to consuming as much charcoal as possible, before pinning and scalping a helpless Zapato de Muerte.  Tobillo Largo consumed activated charcoal she kept in her medical bag and scanned a small handbook for common antidotes.  El Chupacara's alien digestion delayed the onset of side effects.  The various luchadors then scattered throughout Blanchard's bleak manse seeking the secreted antidote: El Mini Grande racked up a game in the Billiards room to discover a secret passage to the Lounge, Tobillo Largo found the empty container of Black Lotus Powder in the Kitchen, El Chupacabra investigated the Library which was connected to the Studio, and Tornado Rosado clutched the mewling kittens to her as she checked the light fixtures.  Las leyendas and others scattered to other rooms.

El Chupacabra came upon Xochitl, Rey Plomo, and La Dama Del Silencio fighting in a barbed wire roped wrestling ring over an exquisite vase, ostensibly storing the antidote. His entrance distracted Rey Plomo for an instant, allowing La Dama to drag his throat across the top line of barbed wire and chainsawing through his flesh.  The drugs hit El Chupacabra in that instant, transposing Rey Plomo's with a great horned goat's head - yearning and hunger overtook him completely.  

In the lounge El Mini Grande came across the butler smothering the maid on a divan as the Buzzard slowly stalked them both, all three bearing the telltale unfurled eye.  El Mini Grande convinces the butler that if he gives Mini Grande his antidote, then Mini Grande can call off the Buzzard.  Taken in by the mini's silver tongue, he produces a vase which Mini Grande promptly snatches up and runs into the Hall - leaving the butler to the Buzzards tender bladed ministrations.  Entering the Conservatory Tobillo Largo discovers that was now a green space for cultivating Black Lotus, but the portion used to create an antidote was already cut away.  Beneath the surface of the water she spotted a corked vase, retrieving it she found one of the antidotes.  Consuming the contents, she headed towards all the ruckus.  Tornado Rosado clutched the largest kitten and entered the Hall, in the Ballroom El Ciclope called out to her - holding a vase in one hand and a rose in his teeth.  El Mini Grande quaffed a portion of the potion, the lotus' grip released  he saw El Ciclope holding a large cactus and several spines piercing his mouth while Tornado Rosado clutched a vase of the antidote like she would a tortured pet.

In the Studio Chupacabra's voracious lunge wrenched free Rey Plomo's head - his last words: "You're beautiful" before his eyes unfurled, releasing his soul.  In the ring La Dama hit a gory neckbreaker on Xochitl and released her, reeking mortal injury on her opponent.  Chupacabra witnessed an angel vacate Xochitl's body, pulled through the ceiling in radiance.  Sensing an opportunity, La Dama launched herself in a suicide dive at El Chupacabra which he dodged at the last minute.  Rey Plomo's head rolled into the vase, which Chupacabra lost sight of.  Following his nose he was able to find the vase and scramble downstairs into the Hall. Eager to save the life of his new discovered love, Tobillo Largo.

El Ciclope implored Tornado to split the antidote with him so they would both have a chance at life. Not taking her silence as a refusal he took a face-full of cactus spines, attempting to administer "the antidote" mouth to mouth. as he leaned in to "give her some sugar" he caught half a Chelsea grin & a flanged tongue for his trouble.  Staggering back with the knife caught in the meat of his neck, El Mini Grande slipped in and whispered in Tornado's ear as he administered the potion: "I am a greater man than your father." Chupacabra caught up with Tobillo at the stairwell and proffered his vase, calling him a pendejo she forced its contents down his gullet.  Amused by the carnage on display, the Mad Monk applauded Tornado's bravura and joined the other characters in the Hall. The butler's choked death scream rang out of the Lounge preceding the Buzzard's gore caked entrance, knife brandished and eyes blooming. 

The earnest butcher grinned wide in anticipation, a rictus grin he'd wear into death as his skull exploded into chits and brain fragments.  Dorrance gripped the smoking gun, gloating that only the most ambitious and ruthless luchadors were worthy of his enterprise. This moment of triumph was cut short as Cyclone Anaya's 1946 Chevrolet crashed through the Ballroom's large window, pulverizing Blanchard.

Three floating feminine forms silhouetted against the stormwracked sky.

This whole session was a lucha libre/exploitation/melodramatic/horror remix of Clue.