Buffy Unisystem: Keeping Up Appearances

Friday Noon: Keeping Up Appearances: Buffy Unisystem

This game was sent in the Buffyverse, after seventh season, but with none of the characters from either Buffy or Angel. Nope, we played a perfectly ordinary family of demons trying to fit into human society, and a couple of their perfectly ordinary friends.

The demons were exiled demon royalty. They were Opportunity Demons. Well, the royalty weren't themselves Opportunists, but they had, nevertheless, stockpiled luck. Luck was what they collected instead of souls. They aged a bit more slowly than humans, which meant that it was prudent to move around a lot, before the people around them became suspicious. That aside, they did a fairly good job of passing for human.

GM: Debby

Alia: The demon queen in exile. Her brother Ren had usurped the throne. Fortunately, she had saved enough luck to get herself, her mother, her consort, his brother, and two of her children out. Alas, her middle child, Gemma, was lost. Alia joined the Methodist church to fit in, but found solace in the religion, taking it to heart.

Ben: Alia's consort. He dealt with taxes and finances, and with jousts. He was a big sports fan.

Tavi (played by Jason, whose last name I don't know): Alia's mother. Long part of court, having to act in particular ways, playing a role. Now, she got to define her own role, and thought that she had the Role of Grandmother figured out. Her cooking could be eccentric, but she made good cookies. She had lots of handbags and a Very Scary Car.

Danny: (played by me): Alia and Ben's son. Policeman, good at figuring things out. Had the disadvantage No Sense of Humor.

Viv: She was a baby during the escape. Currently, she is a 20-year-old in high school, looking as young as a typical high school student.

Shen: Ben's brother. Alia believes he was responsible for her ousting. Ben believes Shen. He's Uncle Shen to the kids. Danny was quite sure that Shen was Up to Something.

Carlene: Half Jamaican, half British. Californian. The preacher. She came to town 6 months ago and became friends with Alia.

Sascha: Carlene's ward. She seems to be 16. My notes say that she was in her junior year of college, but that might have been a mistake, as she was close friends with Viv, and indeed, anti-social except with Viv. Both girls were athletic. Sascha had purple hair and tended to make fashion statements.

The players of both Ben and Alia were male.

Ben's player: I'm not holding your hand.

Alia's player: I'm okay with that.

It was time for Sunday Dinner with the Family, and with their friends, Carlene and Sascha. The meal was to be pot roast.

Ben: You mean no meat loaf?

Alia: We're. Having. Pot Roast.

Tavi: Perhaps you could make it yourself.

Ben: Sure. Where's the kitchen?

Danny: I'll show you around later, Dad.

GM: Biggest kitchen you could get, and he can't find it.

Viv: We're not even Italian.

Someone: Who here has a cell phone?

Someone else: Who knows how to use it?

Someone else: Who knows how to use it for anything other than phone calls?

Someone else: I thought we were playing Buffy, not Vampire: The Masquerade!

Shen seemed to be eager to return to his room in the basement, so Danny followed him. Carlene and Sascha arrived, and various folks went various places, leaving poor Alia alone at the table without the rest of the family. She was Not Pleased about this.

Danny figured out the Shen was talking with another Opportunity Demon. Shen explained that he was working on a way to get everyone back home, and that he'd just been given a gift. No, no, he hadn't paid for it -- it was a gift, to open negotiations. Fruit from home. And he insisted Danny try some. Danny didn't want to offend Uncle Shen, now, did he?

Reluctantly, Danny tried the fruit, and found that it was very good. He insisted that Uncle Shen take him to the next meeting with the others, but agreed not to tell the rest of the family about this.

Unfortunately, Shen's friend was spotted, and Ben captured him, perhaps with help from Danny -- it's been long enough I'm vague on the details. The prisoner was handcuffed and brought inside, and alternately questioned by Ben and fed pot roast, which he seemed to like.

And, somehow, during all of this, the fact that Gemma was alive came out. Well, it wasn't a surprise to Ben, Alia, and Shen. I'm not sure about Tavi. But it was a surprise to Viv, who didn't even remember Gemma, and to Danny, who'd thought she was dead, and who yelled about this.

I'm not sure what Carlene made of all of this. Alia was unhappy. Shen shared the fruits, which the demons all liked.

Out of character, we were all having a blast with this, making the game half larp, as the demons tried very hard to Be Normal. Eventually, everyone went to the rendezvous point, in two or three separate cars, with much jockeying of position to see who had to go with Tavi in her Very Scary Car. Shen made sure to pack up pot roast and cat jerky in Tupperware, as a potential gift.

Alas, at the house where the rendezvous was to take place, their captive's friends were found very messily dead. I think by now the captive had been released from the handcuffs, but he was horrified and terrified, having no idea what was going on. I'm a little vague about where the following dialogue fit in:

Shen (about Carlene or Sascha): I don't trust her, so I'm gonna follow her.

GM: You follow her outside?

Shen: Outside? I go to Tavi, cuz I don't want to go _outside_!

Someone: How do you know what that is?

Someone else: She was probably nerdy about it.

GM: As a matter of fact, she _was_ nerdy about it! Funny you should say that.

Regardless, there was some terrifying creature with wings and claws that attacked. Eventually, it was killed. Tavi recalled stories about such creatures, the Remnants. The Opportunity Demons had marks by their shoulder blades, and legend said that the Remnants used to be their wings.

And, Tavi was quite sure that there were three or four more Remnants in the basement.

Someone: You're good with basements, Shen!

Everyone went into the basement to deal with the Remnants/

GM: What a coincidence -- you have a Demon Glowstick!

Me: Demon Glow Stick!

Carlene: Actually, Demon Glow Globe.

Tavi: Come on, little birdies!

And, with that, the aged Tavi did a flying jump kick off the stairs.

Danny: Did you know she could do that? I didn't know she could do that!

Tavi: A little exercise I did when I was a girl.

Carlene stayed out of danger, but her ward, Sascha, acquitted herself quite well. Out of character, those of us playing demons thought Sascha was likely a post-seventh season Slayer, and Carlene her watcher.

In character, we realized that there was an open gate to a demon dimension, and that was what was drawing the Remnants. The gate led not to just any demon dimension, but to the one Alia and her family had been exiled from!

Former Captive: Um, yeah, you can get a good tan.

Danny: There's no sun.

Former Captive: Exactly!

Once everyone went through, they encountered a demon army -- and an unexpected plot twist. Sascha was not, in fact, a Slayer. She was Gemma!

And, she was very angry at her family, whom she believed had left her behind and never tried to rescue her. Ben and Alia protested that they had. Danny, who started to draw his weapon, only to freeze, realizing that a) he couldn't attack his sister and b) his sister's army had something to say about that, tried to convince Gemma that it wasn't as if she'd know, when she was a prisoner, about any attempts to rescue her.

Carlene asked if she might return home, and Gemma agreed to hold the way open, but said that it needed to be closed quickly, lest more Remnants go through. Uncle Shen started feeding the troops pot roast and cat jerky. Viv squealed with delight at the idea of having a sister who was already her best friend, and Gemma embraced her. After all, Viv was a baby when her family fell from power, and Gemma held nothing against her.

Uncle Shen tried to point out the benefits of combining forces -- er, such forces as the family itself was with Gemma and her army.

Uncle Shen: Could be pretty sweet -- we could make a deal.

Alia: I take off the royal robe and hand it to her.

Gemma put it on, and considered her family.

Gemma (to her army): We are going to destroy Ren. Follow me.

Alia and Ben fell in behind her, and Danny behind them. Viv, of course, was by Gemma's side, and Uncle Shen was happily making deals, and probably very smug about being vindicated, as he had never (as far as I know) betrayed the family.

Carlene went back home, and the gate between dimensions was sealed. And there the game ended.