CoC: DCotE - Innsmouth

My adventures in madness continued the other night as I fired up Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth once again. While I wasn't able to play as long as I had hoped, my next challenge became clear.

I took a bus ride to the port town of Innsmouth to investigate the disappearance of the grocery store manager. The driver made it abundantly clear that the town was not amenable to strangers. I arrived to find only a few stragglers roaming about town.



Being let off in front of the hotel. Wandering in, I approached the gentleman behind the front desk only to find that he didn't look too good. His complexion was a greenish gray and his eyes were sunken. In fact, just about everyone in town looked this way.



The innkeeper said that he had no idea if there were any rooms available and basically told this palooka to bugger off. I approach several people on the street and asked for information but was told to either fuck off or that they couldn’t be seen talking to an outsider. Hey, I know first-hand about the xenophobia of small towns but this was something different altogether. It was less distrust than paranoia. I found the grocery store managed by the disappeared man but the front entrance was blocked and the alley leading to a side door was being guarded by a copper.

The only person I ran into that hadn't taken to the zombie chic was this comely dame.



Although normal in appearance, she too was exceedingly apprehensive about talking to me Still, I could tell that she knew more than she was letting on and that I'd have to approach her again. I take my previous statement back. There was one more individual that had somehow avoided the zombification process. I met him as he urinated outside a gin mill. Unfortunately, he was completely zozzled and demanded a bottle of hooch before he'd answer any of my questions. This leads to my challenge.

Checking out the town square, I noticed that the copper guarding the grocery store would occasionally walk inside. So, I waited for him to go inside and I followed him. In an exterior hallway, there was a stack of barrels in a niche which provided good cover. So I crouched down there until he walked back out to the street. This gave me time to get to the back door for which I had the key. I managed to get inside and find a bottle of rum and a wooden handle in the store office. That rum will get the drunk talking but I have no idea what the handle is for yet. Probably the busted-up front door. So far, I've been caught by the guard each time I've snuck in so I've gotta make some haste when I'm poking around in there.

So, we'll see what the drunk tells me and I'll go from there. I haven't found any weapons yet but I'm thinking that'll happen soon as it can't be long before these folks decide to do something about the outsider in their midst.