Session 0 - Ziggy's Gone

The first session zero of the campaign Echoes 2.

Summary
Two priests at the Stone Center, Builder Brightwood, and Elias open the church for the day and discover a young woman named Seren there. Seren is there mourning the fact that her brother, Ziggy, has been kidnapped. A man named Themus enters the church, he is hired by Seren through his contact Dumont to help her track down her brother. Seren explains that Ziggy has had a hard life, and was in many different criminal circles in his time, saying that she suspected the Keggers being involved in the incident. She asked to meet in the church since the last person to possibly see Ziggy before his disappearance may have been Builder Brightwood. He explains that Ziggy had been having a problem with the drug Dust for quite some time, and frequently came to the Stone Center to seek wisdom after kicking his habit. Builder Brightwood gave Ziggy a necklace of the Builder after a month of no drugs. On the day of his disappearance, Ziggy came to the Stone Center as usual and said to Builder Brightwood that he would surprise his sisters Seren and Joy with chocolates and flowers from downtown in Lady’s Square. Elias had heard of a place similarly themed called Blooming Bites, and figures that might be a good lead. Builder Brightwood asks Elias to accompany Themus in his investigation to find where Ziggy went. He agrees, and the two leave the Stone Center and head for Blooming Bites. When they arrive they discover that one of the workers there, Ciara, had seen Ziggy on the day of his kidnapping. He had tried buying flowers and chocolates from her but didn’t have the coin to pay, so Ziggy decided to head to his old bookie Mapes McKay to square away his books and get a payout. Ciara points them in the direction of Black Door Alley which is an illegal fighting pit within the Gullies where Mapes can be found. Upon arriving at the Alley the investigators are stopped by some thugs, and Elias notices one of them has had severe head trauma and decides to make a salve to help him out, heading over to Maven’s Hut and purchasing supplies from Quigs. She promises to continue applying this salve for the next week. Themus beats the other guard in a game of cards, both of them cheating in their pursuit to win. The two investigators speak with Mapes who is organizing a fight, and he explains that Ziggy came to the Alley looking for some money, and to get cleared from his books. Mapes said he needed to have one last fight in order to get his money, Ziggy agreed to the deal, losing badly in a fight against Batts. Ziggy’s body was dragged to the end of the Alley with his coin strewn about the road, and when the guards arrived to break up the fights they took Ziggy to the local stockade. Themus and Elias head to the Stockade and meet with some of the guards there. The guards check through their reports and find that Ziggy was taken here, was held in the stockade for a day, was then brought into the sewer entrance by Captain Kincade, and supposedly brought back out and let go. The guard knows that Kincade likes to sometimes beat the prisoners kept here, and brings them in the sewer to do so, but the guard doesn’t remember Ziggy coming back out. Themus and Elias decide to enter the sewers and try to find Ziggy that way. Themus stops by a bistro quick and gets some fresh cuts of meat. The two head for Maddux Brewery which has poisonous ale and a hidden sewer entrance. Themus uses the meat to attract Qrax, another of Dumont’s inner circle, who guides the group through the sewers. Eventually, the group runs into some Keggers in a waystation between the sewers and Bottom City. They fight the group and find out afterward that the Keggers are keeping ZIggy in their base in the Bottom City called The Hole. They were going to give a ransom note to Seren and Joy, stating that if they collect 1000 gold pieces they can have Ziggy back. Themus and Elias head back, with the ransom note, and Ziggy’s necklace that the Keggers had, and enjoy a drink at the Jaunt, the pub owned by Seren and Joy.