Story seed (and input needed) - The Manchurian Werewolf

[Cadd]

A throwaway scene in a book I read gave me the idea for a story. I'm not entirely sure which way to take the story, so I figured I'd share the idea and get some input while maybe giving someone else a cool story pitch.

The genesis of this was a three-faced porcelaine doll of Little Red Riding Hood / Grandma / Wolf; twist the head to switch the face.

The idea is that the doll is used to control a werewolf (most likely a young woman, to fit LRRR). The werewolf does not know her condition, instead experienceing fugue states. She contacts the players after waking up from her latest (or latest few) blackouts with large amounts of blood. She needs help finding out what happens to her! The blackouts does not follow any set pattern - various times of day, time of month, different moods, places etc.

I have two directions I'm thinking of taking the story.
Option A) The straight-forward version - a sorcerer has for some reason cursed her, probably by binding some kind of wolf-spirit to her, and uses the doll as a trigger to let the spirit take control of her.

or
Option B) She's actually a Lycanthrope, but the wolf-spirit within her was bound into the doll at an early age by a parent/caretaker, seeking to ease her burden. Now someone else has gotten hold of the doll, and when the spirit is temporarily released it has enough unspent rage and energy to actually force a shapechange on her.

In either option the person who controls the doll is using her as a Manchurian Candidate-like "assassin", engineering situation where the werewolf and the target will run into each other, and then from a safe distance trigger her change and trust the following carnage to kill or maim the target.


Now, things I haven't decided yet:
The three faces - of course LRRR is "default", regular human; and the Wolf is shapechanged (basically a Hexenwulf, but just as uncontrolled as the Loup-garou), but what should Grandma do? I'm currently thinking "fall asleep" to assist in placing/removing her, or making sure she doesn't connect her blackouts with specific times, but it feels a bit... weak...

And second: I need a rationale for option B to even have the switch to release the spirit. I like the possibility that the doll is actually a help rather than a curse, but it seems to me that building in a switch that can undo it all (and actually worse than before) is a stupid risk to take if you're going to bind a spirit, so what could have made it necessary?

I hope you enjoy the story idea, and appreciate any input - most of all about the two things above!

[Sanctaphrax]

For option A), Grandma is actually the sorcerer, and when that face is used the girl's personality is replaced with the personality of the doll-maker.

For option B), the switch is necessary to avoid the power building up and exploding the doll. Original idea was to use it under controlled circumstances to relieve pressure. The grandma face lets the doll-holder, originally the girl's grandmother, contact her telepathically.

[Cadd]

Awesome ideas! I knew I'd get some good input here Super thanks!

[sdfds68]

The doll is an experiment by a member of a supernatural faction. The grandma (who gets killed by the wolf in the story) face is the self destruct option for the handler to use in an emergency. When used, the cursed girl is possessed by the spirit, who then forces her to tear herself to bits.

Furthermore, if this test is successful, the doll is going to be mass produced.

[g33k]

Note that the genesis for your item was the LRRH/Wolf/Gramma doll... but it doesn't have to remain exactly that.  There's no reason you couldn't make it a 2-faced magic item, invoking Janus the 2faced god (though he is more look-to-the-past / look-to-the-future in aspect), or simply Jekyll-and-Hyde notions... or a 4th face & 4th state, wherein the girl is more of a zombie-like puppet, moving at the will of the sorcerer.