Rocky Mountain Horror [Samantha, Vanessa, Hope]

[Augustine]

A small town in the very depths of Idaho called High Peak City, sure as hell didn't look like any city though, it was questionable if the population even went above a thousand.  Aside from raising cattle, the place was nothing but a tourist trap, offering tours of an old, long depleted silver mine.  If one wasn't interested in cows, that was about the only reason to come out here, and frankly it wasn't much of a reason.  However, it was a 'city' that a particularly wealthy rancher and oil tycoon had set up his home in, a man by the name of Burt McGilligan, a proper multi-millionaire who'd sold off the oil reserves his family had for a veritable fortune and then went on to start a cattle business, and with the capital he'd had, it wasn't hard to just buy enough cows, bulls, land and ranchhands that it'd take some real stupid effort to fail, and by all accounts, he wasn't terrible at operating his ranches.

Three particular Devil Hunters were expected in the small town, quite odd for a place that most would expect hadn't ever even seen a demon before, even after the tears opened up.  However, according to Mister McGilligan himself, there were devils about in this sleepy Western town, and not just one devil hunter would do.  He'd called in three, one of them from all the way in Europe!  The pay he was offering was enticing, he had deep pockets after all, and professed to care very deeply about this mountain town he'd chosen to build his primary home in, even if he did always leave when winter came around for a summer home in Texas. 

Hope Winchester, Vanessa Kaneko, and Samantha Augustine.  They were told when contacted that they wouldn't be the only ones showing up, at least hopefully not.  Each was contacted by Burt's butler, Thomas Edmiston, and if they'd agreed, a short call with the extremely enthusiastic and boisterous cattle baron himself, promising to see all expenses paid to get them out here, although not giving a lot of details about the job.  They were getting paid to at least show up though, so that was nice, right?

For Samantha Augustine it was a bit of an odd request to put it politely.  Some rich fucko from the United States of America contacting her and Tolya through their private e-mail, offering to pay for the expenses to transport them from Austria all the way to the middle of the Rocky Mountains in bumfuck Idaho.  Even weirder was that apparently she wasn't the only devil hunter being hired to help this rich weirdo, and they were both local to the States!  Frankly Elizabeth smelled something foul, but the man seemed about as clear and open as a US born millionaire could be, and he was offering an awful lot of money.  So she'd accepted.  If it was a trick he was probably a demon or in cahoots with them and she could thusly, shoot him in the face.

If this was just some weird rich guy prank she'd just punch him in the face.

She and Tolya were even the first ones to arrive, their big, renovated bus driving into the sleepy town and to the given address.  The given address was...not Burt's house, but a strip mall in the town, and she had to just wait for the others to show up before she'd get any answers, and thus, did Samantha sit outside of her bus, on a fold up camping chair, heavy boots with baggy khakis tucked into them, in a long-sleeved shirt rolled up to her elbows the front emblazoned with a skull and crossbones wearing an eyepatch and a pirate hat.  At least there was a shaved ice stand just at the edge of the parking lot, so she was having one of those while she waited under the bright sunlight of a cool autumn day.

Whoever the fuck else was joining her on this job had better get here soon, or she was going to drive her bus through this prick's fancy front door and demand to know where the hell the demons were, if there even were any.

[Jade]

For the third time in as many hours, Vanessa was having to remind herself exactly why she'd bothered coming out to this sleepy town. It was the pay, of course, a sum one couldn't really turn down - even if the contact who'd mentioned it to her and her dad had both said that it was the kind of money for a job with such scant details that it wasn't worth taking. Of course they were probably right, but they couldn't bounce back from what should have been lethal blows.

So here she was, driving some crappy rental car and following her GPS to the given address for the meetup, further northeast than she'd gone in her life - not that it was really that far from her "home turf", in the grand scheme of things. Vanessa rapped her fingers against the steering wheel and was bouncing her left leg a little to the rhythm of the music she was listening to, to try to get rid of some of the pent-up energy from the long drive. "C'mon..." she grumbled, voice dripping with frustration directed at the equally crappy car puttering along the road ahead of her, going well below the speed limit. "Move it or I'll move you..."

It was an empty threat, of course. As the turn into the mall's parking lot came up on her phone's screen, Vanessa edged ever closer to the bumper of the car ahead of her - and when she finally got to take the turn, she went perhaps a little faster than she'd intended to take the turn. The rental car's tires screeched as she tore in, practically racing through the near-empty parking lot.

She was here to meet up with some devil hunters, which meant looking for the biggest weirdos she could find. Nothing like the boring cars one would expect for a town like this- And, bingo, there was a big old bus parked a little ways from the building in an otherwise mostly empty section of the lot. Vanessa pulled her car around, still going faster than she'd really intended, and drifted to a stop a dozen yards or so away from the bus. She kicked the front door open, grabbed her trademark black jacket off the passenger seat, and finally got out of the car. Vanessa stretched her arms over her head, eyes scrunched up, and then kicked one leg at a time out in front of her.

Once that was all done, and her jacket had been tossed over her shoulders, she finally turned to the woman sitting in a folding chair and eating some shaved ice and raised a hand. "Yo! You here for the job too?"

[Vio]

^{Hope #1}

---

“Well, isn’t this just the sweetest li’l town~!” Miss Winchester said, to nobody in particular. Not that curious ears could have heard such idle utterances over the engine of her motorcycle as she rode through High Peak City, its rhythmic beat of three distinct to any enthusiast as the same engine of a Harley Davidson. The sights and sounds of an unfamiliar vehicle drew the cautious eyes of a handful of pedestrians and other drivers—including the old fellow behind the wheel of a dated Chevrolet that had seen far better days—as she chugged along, her own inky hues taking in the combination of rustic and urban scenery that such a place presented.

“This must be the place,” she mouthed, kindly allowing another car to pass before taking the turn into the parking lot. A quaint strip mall that didn’t seem all that busy by the very few vehicles that populated its spaces. A couple of cars and a bus of sorts seemed to be keeping their distance for the most part, save for the sight of the driver’s side door of one car being shoved open. Taking everything in her stride as always, Hope simply rolled in and slipped her bike into an out-of-the-way end of the lot, dismounting, shutting off the engine, and gathering her gear at her own pace.

Taking a moment to somewhat discreetly secure her holsters, both concealed beneath the pale brown trench coat, and to exchange an old style motorcyclist’s helmet for her Stetson, the tower of a woman turned to give her surroundings a once over. Everything about High Peak City screamed simple, isolated, and unimportant. The perfect kind of place to kick back and relax from time to time, but here she was on ‘business’ by request. She knew she wouldn’t be alone. In fact, she was quite excited to have the chance to work with others in ‘the business’, rather than flying solo.

“Well, hi there y’all,” she chirped and waved as she walked the length of the lot, taking particular note of the odd characters who seemed to have made it here before her. A woman at rest upon a camping chair enjoying some shaved ice, perhaps more greatly resembling a teenager’s ideal of a pirate than anything, and another with a black jacket draped over her shoulders who seemed to have engaged in conversation with the former. “Beggin’ your pardon, but I take it that both of you are here because of Mister McGilligan, too? My name’s Hope Winchester, pleasure to meet you…!”

[Augustine]

They had until Samantha finished her shaved ice before she went busting down this rich bastard's door and demanding answers, she was about halfway through when a car came screeching into the strip mall's parking lot. That thing was moving fast, she was half-expecting to hear sirens in the distance, but nope, it just tore through the lot before parking near her bus, Samantha lifting an eyebrow as the door opened and out stepped...one of the other devil hunters clearly.

"Pffft, yeah, not sure why though." Well she did, demons weren't so common that she was spoiled for choice, it was either take this job or just hope something back in Europe turned up. "Not sure why anyone else'd show up either, sounds like bullshit if you ask me, smells like it too." The little plastic spoon was brought to her mouth after she said that, the shaved ice having a nearly radioactive green color to it...and then here came someone else. A motorcycle peeling into the parking lot and coming to a stop as one more person made themselves known.

What were the odds that someone wanted to do a little shopping on a motorcycle? Probably not very fucking high in Samantha's estimation, and the woman came right over, cheerful and friendly as could be. Samantha would even lift her little styrofoam cup in greeting. "Yeah this is the place. Been waiting for like...twenty minutes? Dumb bastard said to wait until we were all here. Name's Samantha Augustine. Job's probably a load of crap, but hey, always nice to see other hunters out and about. Guess now we just call the bastard." She'd get up out of her chair and walk up to a door in the middle of the bus, yanking it open she'd shout inside.

"Oi Tolya! Call up that rich fuck up and let him know we're all here!" She had been told it'd be three all together, so this was all of them. Then she'd walk back to sit in her camp chair, and swallow another mouthful of shaved ice. "So, you two are actually based in the States, right? Get many jobs like this?"

[Jade]

Another woman came in just after her on a motorcycle - seemed to fit the bill of the sort of weirdo you'd expect to see on a job like this, so Vanessa ticked the "devil hunter" box next to her mental file on this "Hope Winchester". "Yo," she called out to Hope. "And yeah, McGilligan job, that's us."

The other woman (by the name of Samantha Augustine, Vanessa noted as she introduced herself) was all too eager to express her negative opinions of their prospective employer and the job they'd been gathered for, mirroring what the folks back home had told Vanessa. She crossed her arms with her eyes shut, tapping her foot, while she considered what to do with this new information. It'd be too much of a pain in the ass to just get back in the rental car and drive back, especially given she'd be out the expenses of the rental... And gas...

It was only when Samantha returned from shouting into her bus and asked a question that Vanessa snapped back to reality. "Huh? Oh. No. I mostly do contract work for the gangs and crews, really. Could use the cash, though, so... Here I am." She shifted in place, eyeing the first arrival's shaved ice with clear envy before even more obviously tearing her attention away from the cool treat. "Doesn't matter much if it's 'too good to be true' or whatever. If it is, we can always just shake the jack*ss down and teach him why you don't f*** with devil hunters."

She went quiet again, and then suddenly stiffened and glanced between the two other women as she had a realization. "... Vanessa Kaneko, is- That's my name. Sorry, spaced out and missed the whole introduction thing there."

[Vio]

^{Hope #2}

---

“So, you two are actually based in the States, right?” asked Samantha, acting at least a little more amicable after expressing her displeasure at the manner in which the job had to be delivered. “Get many jobs like this?” In all honesty, that wasn’t a question that Hope had expected to be asked of what she assumed was some level of veteran hunter. In this world of slaying the supernatural, age and appearance seldom had meaning, nor did gender or origins. You were either good at your job, or parts of you were strewn about like leaves scattered a fall breeze.

“Hm-hm-hm~!” Miss Winchester giggled, one hand softly over her mouth to hide the exertion, regarding the third woman’s odd yet seemingly shared opinion. Devil Hunters seemed to have a universal hatred of the rich and powerful, seeing them as little more than a handy windfall every once in a while—a perspective that many average folks wished they could have in its entirety instead of in half-measures. That was normal people, though; and ‘typical’ hunters, neither of which could be used to categorise her.

“Well now, aren’t you two just absolute bundles of joy,” she chuckled, making it rather obvious that she was jesting. “I’ve gotta say, this isn’t exactly the kind of job I’d normally take on, but I usually just mind my own and get along with whatever happens to come my way,” Hope answered, tipping the brim of her hat back a little as she smiled up to the sky above for a second or two.

“Vanessa, hm? Good to know,” she nodded, taking note of the much more foreign surname before drawing her focus back to Miss Augustine. “Again, do pardon me for askin’, but whereabouts are you from, Samantha? Can’t quite seem to place your accent… Oh, and who’s your friend?” The name ‘Tolya’ being mentioned previously, she had to safely assume the blonde had at least some kind of travelling companion, though whether or not they had any direct stakes in the hunt wasn’t exactly her business. She simply wanted to say hello…

[Augustine]

Well, at least Samantha wasn't alone in thinking this job seemed like a fat load of bullshit. The blonde hunter laughed at Vanessa's comment, throwing her head back. "Hah, I like your style. Damn right that's what we're gonna do if this turns out to be some vanity bullshit."

Another mouthful of shaved ice, before Hope asked a question. "Well, before I got messaged by the rich fuck, I was in Austria, before that I was in Norway, then France, then Egypt, then Italy, then the Netherlands." So somewhere off in Europe, didn't seem like she stayed in one place for all that long. It also indicated that she didn't seem to feel like answering that question, or did she have one? "As for Tolya, they're my armorer, they make the guns, I pop heads with 'em."

As if on cue, that middle door would open again, and the other two would get an actual look at this armorer. Dirty jeans, a T-shirt for some band the name written in Russian, with a work vest over it, various tools hanging off of it or put into pockets. His black hair though was surprisingly well kept, slicked back in spikes, with a single long, thick lock hanging slanted across his face. All of it set upon a wheelchair. "The American rich bastard's on his way." That was a thick Russian accent.

From beneath the bus, an electronic ramp was moving and then lifting into place, so he could wheel himself down and onto the asphalt as Samantha just gave a thumbs up towards him without turning her head towards the bus. "Don't forget, you owe me a hundred euros if this turns out that he's being blackmailed."

Samantha snorted in response, "Hope, Vanessa? This is Tolya."

"Privet! Nice to see other devil hunters. If all I gain is a hundred euros and a chance to speak to some of our fellows, I think this trip is well worth it." Well he seemed a lot more positive than Samantha that was for sure.

However, it was at this point that another vehicle would come towards the parking lot. A quite large, bright red truck, clearly expensive and kitted out, would turn into the parking lot, and come to stop not far from the group. Samantha would sit up as she looked towards it. "That him? Awfully fast, isn't his mansion out on the edge of town or somethin'?"

The door would open, and out would step a large swarthy man. In a black and gold suit, with black cowboy boots, and a white hat, he was tall and rotund, with a thick moustache on his face, a truly impressive thing, it was a light grey in color. If any of them had bothered to look up the man before coming here, they'd recognize that this was indeed, Burt McGilligan, oil baron turned cattle baron. He'd lift a hand to wave boisterously to the group as he came walking over, and Tolya would remark quietly. "I checked maps while we were on the way. There's a hotel a short ways from here." Why would this rich millionaire be out over there though?

"Ladies, and gentlemen! I'm pleased as a wallowin' pig that y'all could make it out here. Burt McGilligan at your service, and may I say again what a delight it is to be talkin' with you fine folks. Doin' gods work ya are!" Then he'd laugh at his own joke, a classic texan style accent on this guy, "Ahah, but I'm sure y'all have plenty of questions."

[Jade]

Vanessa leaned against her rental car with her arms crossed while Hope inquired further about the European hunter - and the "armorer" that was her companion. It didn't take long for this Tolya to show his face after, either, almost like the duo had practiced this sort of thing or something. The idea of having someone who followed you around, working on weapons and such, was a fascinating one; some of the groups she'd worked with had someone to fill that sort of role, though it was normally more on the maintenance side than creation. All of it went way over her head, though, and it wasn't like she'd ever used a real weapon before either.

Lost in thought and apparent brooding, Vanessa was a little slow on the draw to respond to Tolya's greeting - she started again and gave a quick half-wave, just in time for some new element to get thrown into the pot. She leaned back against the car and tracked the loud (both in volume and in color) truck as it rolled into the lot, parking close to their little group. And once it'd parked, an equally loud man stepped out. Vanessa's eyes went wide before immediately narrowing again; the man looked more like a caricature, something out of a cartoon, just made flesh.

"Doin' god's work, ya are!"

"Trust me, god has nothing to do with it," she shot back. Sure, it was a joke, but her flat delivery wasn't going to make that very obvious to anyone who didn't know her already.

The question of... Questions was posed to the group. Vanessa scanned the group quickly and then nodded, standing up properly as she took a step away from her car. "I think it's best if we just cut to the chase. Point us in the direction of what needs taken care of, and I'll smash it." As if in demonstration, she brought her hands up in front of her, pushing down on her fingers to crack her knuckles, and then the same thing with the other hand.

[Vio]

^{Hope #2}

---

“Pleased to meet you, Tolya,” Miss Winchester waved, beaming at the man in the wheelchair as he guided himself down from the ramp of the bus and onto the blacktop. His accent was strong, but his English was crisp. Certainly not a hunter by Samantha’s information, though he looked every bit the tinkerer, what with the variety of tools about his person. Introductions didn’t last all too long however, as a bright red truck wheeled into the area and came to a halt, door opening to reveal a swarthy and gaudy man.

^{“Burt McGilligan,” he introduced:
“At your service…!”}

“Trust me, God has nothing to do with it,” Vanessa remarked rather sharply at their patron’s jest, before focusing on the matter at hand with a certain level of haste. “Point us in the direction of what needs taken care of.” Hope’s eyes didn’t really stray away from Burt, but her ears certainly registered the impatience held within the cracking of those knuckles. Of course, she could appreciate the eagerness—they were here for a reason. That reason, however, didn’t dissuade her from social cues.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you in the flesh, Mister McGilligan,” she announced, stepping forwards and offering a hand to the businessman. She had a strong grip, he would find if he accepted. Now, Hope had a southern twang, so Burt’s accent wasn’t at all jarring to her. However, the drastic difference between their accents and speech patterns was almost a tangible thing. “Now I agree with Vanessa here on gettin’ straight to business, but if you don’t mind me askin’, sir, why’d you call us out here of all places? People in need of our services don’t tend to call us out to parkin’ lots to talk about it, is all…”

[Augustine]

"Aye, tell us why the hell you flew me all the way from fucking Austria." Samantha chimed in, in full agreement with the other two hunters assembled here.

"Ahah, of course, of course, no doubt y'all are curious. As for the location...well it's nearby and easy to insure no one's listenin' in." He gestured at the big parking lot. "Folks know somethin's up, but they don't know what, and I aim to keep it that way, I'm sure folks in yer line o' work can understand." Burt would adjust his had briefly, "Th'thing about it is...well. Mah own home's been hijacked by devils, the mansion utterly infested." He'd reach into his jacket to pull out a tablet. He'd fiddle with it a moment. "Just a second...Ah think it's better fer everyone iffen ya see it fer yerselves."

Then he'd turn it around, playing security camera footage, pretty good cameras, but he was a rich bastard and this looked like...the hallway of some rich wealthy mansion. In it, some kind of large spider with a vague suggestion of a human torso emerging from the head was seen chasing down a servant, hurtling after them off screen. He'd quickly move to put the tablet back after the video played. "It started in the old mine. I called in a devil hunter already and they...uh...vanished, I'd assume dead but o'course, not many folk willin' to venture in and try ta find the poor soul."

"That wasn't a mine." Augustine said bluntly as she finished her shaved ice.

"Quite right, quite right. While I was lookin' fer...let's say a replacement, my own mansion was attacked, was forced to flee for my life! Been stayin' in the hotel just down yonder. I figured, well...iffen one devil hunter couldn' crack it, how about three? So that's the run down...my mansion, and presumably still the mine are infested with these spidery devils an' lord knows what else. Fat payday for clearin' 'em both out! As we discussed in the E-mails."

"Yeah alright, sounds good.  I'm just gonna take a wild guess and say you want to clear out your mansion first, so whatever."  Samantha it seemed wasn't super interested in further discussion, standing up from her camping chair and picking it up to collapse it.  Of course others might have questions, and Tolya was clearly thinking about what had been said.