The Richard family is in the most immediate danger, you decide.

On foot it will take you almost ten minutes to get there, but in the city streets you're faster than any horse or even the new motorcars, and you still haven't managed to get the jetpack working properly (you have yet to find a way of making it small and light enough to carry its own weight, let alone yours as well) so you have no choice but to take the risk that whoever set off the alarm system will already have been gone by the time you get there.

There is a short tunnel that you dug years ago, leading out of your workroom and coming out in the sewers. Originally you had thought they would be the perfect way to move around the city undetected, but there were too many dead ends, blocked passages and flooded tunnels. As well as that, the smell was unbearable and you have no idea how many diseases could be lurking in the brown sludge that fills them.

In the end you simply found the nearest exit onto a dingy backstreet and use the rooftops to navigate the city. You scramble up the side of a building. Missing stones and badly cut edges make it easy to find handholds. Here in the poorer quarter you can jump from rooftop to rooftop with ease. The buildings are crammed in together and badly built.

As you get closer to the higher district where the rich and powerful live, it gets harder and harder to make it to the next rooftop until you have to make your way to street level and run past walled in mansions. Luckily for the Richard family it's so late at night. You would never come here in daylight; the police that patrolled the streets would be after you in an instant. An unfortunate incident last year between a few of the city's heroes and a government official had left all heroes and vigilantes outlawed within the city limits.

When you make it to the Richard family's house--small in comparison to the others in the district, although a palace compared to your own home in the slums--you swing a grappling hook over the wall and haul yourself up. You jump down the other side; your armour absorbs most of the impact.

From inside the building you can hear the alarm still going off, but it is strangely quiet. There are no guards to be seen in the grounds, either, and only one light on inside.

With no guards in sight it is easy for you to make it to the servants entrance and let yourself in. The door isn't even locked. The light you saw from outside is coming from the kitchen. Expensive electric lights are glowing in the ceiling and the main cooking fire is burning brightly. You can smell something burning.

The source of the smell is behind a bench; a batch of bread that has been in the oven for far too long. The cook, however, is unable to do anything about it. You find her body beside the oven. Someone hit her on the back of her head, probably with the heavy cast iron skillet lying on the floor nearby. You check for a pulse; she is dead, and has been for a while.

You're suddenly worried about the family members and other servants.

Who should you check on first?

The other servants-- they probably don't have any guards in the servant's quarters, and one of them has already been killed.
Lord and Lady Richard-- If this isn't a burglary, they are almost definitely the intended targets.
The Richards' children-- There are four of them, and they all sleep in adjacent rooms. The cook has been dead for a while; it's possible the Lord and Lady are already dead, but you may still be able to rescue their children.

Poll: [link]

Notes: Sorry this is so long. There was no place I could end it sooner.

Also, something I find highly amusing: Shortly after I posted the first part of this, *seangordonmurphy started up a CYOA story of his own using the same system of journal entries and polls. I've never, ever seen anyone do one of these before. Some coincidence, huh?

Check his out: [link]