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Pax: Word had traveled, and it had traveled quickly. "100 Beshilu" came the whispers. "Dozens kidnapped." And not just that, but more, strange jars meant to steal the souls of the sacrificed, an Alpha Host with shrewd intelligence, a human ally, and massive, giant spirits wading across the city. And so a plan had been hatched.
Someone with deep pockets (or Fate magic) must have gotten involved, because the war room for the exploratory team lacks for nothing. Replete with dossiers, secure computers, a conference table, seating, grave dirt, coffee, something that is definitely not coffee but which Floretta might find suitable, and so on. It's more than enough.
All that was left was to do the work.
Nevermore Usher: Nevermore's wrestling two framed pictures as they enter, looking around and unabashedly gawking a bit at the war room. "Wow..." They step inside when they realize there's people behind them, and look for wall space on which to hang up Dethroned and The Sage. For morale.
Floretta Williams: Floretta arrives, wearing a leather jacket, jeans and heavy boots. Given her bright green hair color, she seems a little bit more of a streetwise kid than an investigator or even a shrewd occultist. Her dog is not with her at this time, but she appears alive in every mundane way. Her curiosity is piqued at the blood, she sniff it, trying to determine its origin, the dirt seems just a little confusing at first too. "A little less hands-on than I was hoping for."
Jeremiah Hamilton: "Just as important, though." Jeremiah chimed in as he made his way into the war room, letting out a low whistle as he saw the collection of tools they had at hand. "Got a lot to work with, at the very least...need a hand with those, Nevy?"
Nevermore Usher: Nevy nods. "Please! Can you get this one?" They hold out The Sage. "I think it would good on that wall over there."
Pax: In the dossiers, recaps of what's been learned so far, as well as informational gaps are outlined . Some of them include:
- Beshilu have been using tunnels underneath the city to kidnap people in an attempt to sacrifice them in a burrow antechamber in Centralia, and capture their souls in soul jars. The burrow is decades old but the bloodied altar, less than a year. Rescue hopes for a better understanding of the burrow's tunnels, and how to get in and out.
- They can Discorporate, splitting their bodies down into dozens of rats, and if even a single one escapes, the Host will take root again in another body. Learning more about what abilities they've been seen having would cover some bases in the rescue.
- Human allies are working with them, at the very least ones who made an order from Kenco, a company that specializes in prison grates and cell enclosures. At least one very well-dressed man has been seen coming and going from time to time, speaking with the Alpha Host. Finding out who those allies are could be a huge boon.
Floretta Williams: "I wonder if the human ally we got reported is actually just human, like a cultist or something more like a Wizard or maybe even Rihat?" Floretta comments thoughtfully as she reviews the little notes she took on her phone and the ones provided right in front of her. "I did try to fit into one of the tunnels as a swarm of spiders." she tilt her head. "I found some trace of sulfurs and materials that suggest they're everywhere. I'm pretty sure there was coal too, from a mine."
Jeremiah Hamilton: Jeremiah stepped up to help with hanging the drawings, an eyebrow arching a touch as he looked back towards Floretta. "Rihat? Not familiar with that one off-hand. The coal and the sulfur makes sense, though, since we're talking Centralia."
Nevermore Usher: Nevy nods. They hesitate, then walk up to Jeremiah and murmur, "Do you know who owns this place? All of this... it must have cost a lot, and that message did warn us to be careful about 'false friends...'"
"If I were doing something nasty like this, I'd want to keep an eye on the enemy."
Floretta Williams: "Rihat's probably a problem for my kind only." Floretta comments, waving it off easily and then moves forward "Do any of you two know of any spot where tunnels would be still open? Or do we know of a way to access the coal mines, or the place where the prisoners are?" Floretta wonders as she keeps looking through the notes for a potential point of access mentioned in the notes "If not, that sounds like a pretty decent starting point."
Pax: A moment or two of rustling through the dossier from previous investigations would yield some coordinates, the last known location of a victim's phone.
40°48'02.7"N 76°20'13.6"W
Jeremiah Hamilton: "Someone with the Arrow, from what I know." Jeremiah replied just as quietly, thinking a moment. "Could set up a network so we don't have to say what we find. Up to you, though."
He tapped his temple briefly, then looked towards Floretta and gave a nod. "Not off-hand, but starting there sounds like an idea."
Nevermore Usher: "Do you trust them?" Nevy's just as quiet before they sigh and speak aloud. "I was able to talk with... someone who was locked up there. They said that there are ventilation shafts set up - it's possible those might be a place to get in."
Floretta Williams: "Hmm." Floretta shows that page to the two others and smiles. "Here, where would that be on a map I wonder ?"
Quinn Tolliver: Quinn bursts into the War room; he blinks at the others, as if he's surprised himself. "Hello," Quinn greets the other three, smoothing his t-shirt. "I came to see if I could help. I am good at looking things up, if you'd like." He gives the three a nervous, but no less enthusiastic, smile.
Floretta Williams: Floretta waves at Quinn as she approaches the library, she startles a little bit when he burst in, but keeps her focus on the library afterward. "I'm not all that good at using a computer for more than basic text function, but I can look up where those coordinates are."
Jeremiah Hamilton: "I do, yeah." Jeremiah nodded, pausing as Quinn burst into the room and giving him a small smile. "We're just getting started, so fine by me."
He looked over the coordinates when they were shown and gave a nod. "That'll work. Also...don't think we've met yet. Folks call me Jay."
Nevermore Usher: Nevy smiles to Quinn. "Hey, Quinn. I'm glad you could help." They look around. "Oh! Right. You, um... you all know me." They indicate. "That's Quinn." next. "This is Floretta." And finally, "And this is Jay."
Quinn Tolliver: "If you use the computer, I'm very good with manual research," Quinn explains, sliding his bag from his shoulder to leave near the door. He glances around slowly, turning in a complete circle to take it all in. He's methodical about it, gaze moving from top to bottom, left to right. He nods once, briefly looking through the dossiers. "Okay." He drums his fingers on a table, looking at the dossier on the allies. "I wonder where they had the grates and cells sent. I would bet it's where those coordinates are." He folds his arms, pacing; one hand is lifted, moving as he works through his puzzle. "We should look up that company and see what kind of payments they take. If they don't take cash, there could be a record of the sale. Do we have any funds for bribery, or means to otherwise convince the company to give us that information?"
Floretta Williams: Floretta smiles over the edge of her book "Hi, I'm Floretta." She nod toward a particular container. "Don't drink that. It's blood." then turns her attention back to the book. "Maybe, but maybe not. Do we know who that phone belonged to? Do we have this phone with us?"
Pax: The location is easily found, it's just outside a place called Odd Fellow Cemetery, near the Centralia Coal Mine ventilation shafts, or at least that's what it says on the map.
All signs point that Godric Cowell is the person whose credit card processed the purchase of the prison-grade materials being used in the Burrow. High Society and Crime connections, bounced around from sweet corporate gig to sweet corporate gig, often forcing his employers to settle massive lawsuits in his wake. Intelligent, monied, ambitious, and without scruples.
What he has to gain by working with the Rat Hosts isn't clear, but creating trouble for him would probably prevent him from interfering with a potential Rescue.
Floretta Williams: Floretta takes a note both on her phone, with the Transflag case, then let the name of the place onto a piece of paper onto the table along with other information gathered by Quinn, then moves over to the Library that holds occult knowledge. "Hmmm, wonder what I can find there...." she look over her shoulders. "Is that guy someone with powers? Can any of you tell that from here?"
Quinn Tolliver: Quinn sits at the computer for a long time, fingers moving rapidly over the keys. His eyes skitter over screen after screen in analysis, and then he speaks up. "Godric Cowell. So, the night of the rescue, there needs to be a diversion elsewhere for Mr. Cowell. As he is involved with several outstanding members of local crime organizations, perhaps he would be preoccupied if we swatted him."
Jeremiah Hamilton: "Not familiar with the name off-hand." Jeremiah mulled a moment, looking over the tomes as well. "Could try and get eyes on him, though, see what he's up to at the moment."
Nevermore Usher: Nevy winces. "That's dirty fighting," They say. Then, "I kind of like it - as long as he doesn't have friends who could turn it around on us." They glance around at the group, then go to see what that grave dirt is about. That's interesting.
Quinn Tolliver: "You should do that," Quinn agrees, drumming the fingers of one hand on the table. "I don't fight fair," he tells Nevy, unapologetic. "And I am very adept at covering my tracks - or know who can do so. If Jay can find a location he's likely to be, I have no qualms." Quinn's voice is calm.
Floretta Williams: "I think the grave dirt could be for me, if we spend too much time in here, I can maybe like... merge with it an avoid the effect of the day on me." Floretta explains "At least, I think that's what this is." she chuckles. "Hmm... I could try to rattle this guy's bones enough using my influence maybe? On the night of the rescue, making him so busy with weird interference." (could I use a status action and possibly my allies to mess with the guy enough that he'd be distracted from the rescue?)
Floretta Williams: "Hey, so any of you have some ... help they could lend me for this?" She looks around to them "I'm not exactly the most socially convincing person ever, but I could get the rainbow squad all up in his grill." she looks to Rook and points toward him.
"I have money I can spare if you need to buy or convince people a bit."
Jeremiah Hamilton: "I could, yeah..." Jeremiah nodded to Floretta, smirking a touch. "Got contacts with some of the LGBT outreach groups."
Nevermore Usher: Nevy's eyes widen and they look around at the group. "Do any of you have a way to summon ghosts? If this place is so close to a graveyard, and if we can call up any of the inhabitants, they might be able to get us some useful information." They frown. "Actually, I can ask some of the local ghosts about this Cowell guy, too. If he's as nasty as it sounds like, some of them might know something." They smirk slightly. "It's be even sweeter if we can SWAT him for crimes he's really done.
Quinn Tolliver: "Good," he tells Floretta. "I know how to cause a distraction - or more accurately, who. But we have to pay him. I can get us a good rate, though." Quinn pats his pockets; to the observant (namely, Jay) he withdraws a cell phone that looks nothing like the phone Quinn typically uses. He begins rapidly texting. "I didn't think if the police showed up to his home, they'd find him inside doing a bible study."
Jeremiah Hamilton: "Not so much on the ghosts, no, and the person I can think of off-hand who can is handling other aspects of this at the moment. Good idea, though." Jeremiah nodded with a smirk. "Probably not...give me a sec and I'll see if I can get a window on him now."
Floretta Williams: "Who?" She asks to Quinn
Quinn Tolliver: "Who, who?" He asks Floretta, and then waves a hand. "Doesn't matter; if you mean my associate, I don't name names. If you mean for bible study, I was responding to Nevy regarding Mr. Cowell." Quinn closes his eyes, shaking out both hands. "Nevy, walk through this with me. What brings a ruthless, rich bastard to the point of acting on behalf of these rats...." Keep his eyes closed, Quinn moves both hands as he speaks. "I'm the upper crust," he drawls; his voice even sounds different. "I move from job to job, mostly by using others as a stepstool. My firm has to continually move me along, but they don't fire me. Why? Leverage? Connections. The last name.."
Floretta Williams: "Okay, I will need to know how much money and where." Floretta tilt her head to the side. Then look toward Jay "I was more thinking of a magical kind of help, but it's okay if you can't do that." She looks around. "But I'll welcome the contact if you can."
Jeremiah Hamilton: "Ah...yeah, I can handle that, too. Can be very persuasive when the need arises." He smirked at that, giving Floretta a nod.
Nevermore Usher: "They promised him something," Nevy says, frowning. "He's working hard to get... money. Power. Access. Whatever it is he wants, they've convinced him they can help him get it. Maybe they convinced him he'd become a god once the ritual went through? It's the kind of thing his sort does."
Quinn Tolliver: "He's a Sleepwalker, basically" Quinn murmurs, after glancing at his phone. "Doesn't know about Mages, but knows about plenty about spirits and hosts."
Pax: Profile: Like most privileged douchebags, Godric tends to fail up, and probably got lucky through his money or his connections and stumbled into Awareness, and thought he was smart enough to take advantage of the situation, or of a Spirit/Host. He's probably way in over his head, but still believes he has the upper hand.
Jeremiah Hamilton: "A proper lion, then." Jeremiah frowned quietly at that, looking between Nevy and Quinn. "Power for its own sake, which is always dangerous."
Nevermore Usher: Nevy grimaces. "He's giving people like me a bad name. And he's probably going to get people hurt doing it." They glance around. "Would it, um... bother you guys if I tried to... erm... *'call' some of my contacts to see if they've heard anything about him?"
They glance at the grave dirt significantly.
Floretta Williams: "if this was any other city, I'd have something to tempt him with." She tap her cheek for a moment, shaking her head "So, Quinn? How much money do I have to fork over, where do I put it?"
Quinn Tolliver: Quinn tells Floretta to set aside an amount equal to about 4 resource dots! He shakes his head to Nevy. "I can't imagine I would be bothered by your contacts. Anything that will help, we should exhaust every thought and path that pops into our heads."
Jeremiah Hamilton: "Go for it." Jeremiah made an 'after you' motion towards Nevy. "Don't have enough on him here and now to open a window, unfortunately. While you're working on that I can start looking through the info here to see what we've got on what these rats can actually do for the folks heading in."
Floretta Williams: She sigh and deflate a bit "I'm not that rich, unfortunately."
Quinn Tolliver: "Well, lucky for us, swatting is free. Shall we move on?" Quinn looks to Jay. "You have my notes on that too, yes?"
Nevermore Usher: Nevy nods, goes to the bag o' dirt, and starts meditating. ((making the occult spectral equivalent of a cellphone call to my Ghostly Contacts!))
Jeremiah Hamilton: "I do indeed." Jeremiah nodded, eyeing the occult section of the tomes as he pulled a bronze serpent pendant from under his shirt. "Let's see what we can do..."
Floretta Williams: "Hey, if you're going to start looking into the occult, let me help, this is actually something I'm good at."
Jeremiah Hamilton: "You got it." He smirked, motioning Floretta over.
Floretta Williams: Floretta pulls her phone out and starts hitting the numbers "I think I could help with learning more about the host and spiritual stuff, I know people in my group that might help." she set the phone on her ear as she begin to look through the library
Nevermore Usher: Nevy starts whispering, a quiet question: "Did he kill any of you? Tell me the story."
Floretta Williams: "Okay, so, I'm researching some kind of rat host thing. They're spiritual in nature, so you two are the first one I thought of calling. Care to share what you can? With the notes I left?" She speaks on the phone and her phone vibrate a little bit. As she speaks on the phone, she helps jay along, guiding him to other, different spots in the book, using what she got from the people on the phone.
Nevermore Usher: If anyone can see ghosts, they see a middle-aged man wavering above the grave-dirt, half his head disturbingly concave. He murmurs to Nevermore, who sighs and nods to him.
Anyone who can't see ghosts feels a chilly draft in that corner of the room for a few minutes.
Eventually, Nevermore rises from their meditations. "If he has killed anyone," They say, "It wasn't directly. Sorry - came up blank on this one."
Floretta Williams: "So here's what I got from my colleagues and I think Jay found a little more stuff with our search." Floretta jots down the notes on pieces of paper and onto her phone too when the call is over. "This is a damn good library."
Dread Powers: Armored Hide 2, Burrow, Discorporate, Gnaw Gauntlet, Monstrous Resilience, Natural Weaponry 3, Venomous Ichor, Warp Shard
Jeremiah Hamilton: Jeremiah was going through the various tomes rather quickly all told, putting every fiber of his currently-enhanced intellect to good use. "Got something...I'm seeing different classes of the rats, or categories at least, beyond the Alpha designation we know about. There's ones that actually build the tunnels and can change them in a hurry, ones that can throw fire around and sometimes have fire elementals tag along with then, ones that go the full ninja route and then the juggernauts. Armored skin, regeneration, damage reduction, the whole shebang."
Nevermore Usher: Nevy blinks, then grins. "Okay. How about this." They look at the ghost. "Have any of you been through the tunnels? Can you show me how they're laid out?" They pull out a piece of paper and a pencil.
Quinn Tolliver: Quinn listens avidly to his teammates, keeping notes in a notebook as they share; he's pretty fantastic at transcribing what they find and what they share almost verbatim.
Floretta Williams: "I tried , but they were blocked. I'd love to find out more about the tunnels, I feel like I'd be the best equipped for that, but I'd need like, an entry point to visit in the flesh." She comments. "And I don't know how safe that would be even for me."
Nevermore Usher: Nevy glances back at Floretta. "I was talking to George," They say, gesturing to... apparently empty space, unless Floretta can see ghosts.
Pax: The ghost doesn't pick up the pencil, but takes hold of Nevy's hand themselves to guide it to trace out a map that runs the length of the city. It's quite similar to the SEPTA lines, and many of the branches of the Rat Host tunneling system run underneath or parallel to them, using it like a framework to develop snatch points in the city. Some of the routes, the ghost is not certain about. But the grab points, those, the ghost is most familiar. As complex as the tunnel system is, it all reduces to a single route just north of the city, and runs along the highway in the direction of Centralia, the constant thundering of the cars on the pavement hiding the sound of burrowing back and forth.
Floretta Williams: "I could if I needed to, but it's an exhausting process for me." Floretta comments and goes to checks about the tunnel, she takes a picture of the drawing, making sure to keep Nevermore out of the picture. "Hmm, that seems like an interesting exploration... Do you think that'll help the rescue team?"
Jeremiah Hamilton: Meanwhile, Jeremiah passed on the descriptors for the types of Hosts for his notes - slim but powerful jaws and hands for the tunnel-builders, built as all get out for the tanks, small and darker-furred for the spies.
Nevermore Usher: Nevy closes their eyes, then their hand moves apparently of its own volition, drawing a map of the rat-creatures' tunnels. Once it's done, they open their eyes. "It couldn't hurt them." They look at George. "If anyone hears more from someone who's been to Centralia, have them let me know."
Pax: George nods his strange head and pats Nevy on the wrist affectionately before dematerializing.
Nevermore Usher: Nevermore takes a deep breath. "Okay. Do you buys mind if I hop in to help with some of the occult research? I know some weird old poems and burial chants that might come in handy."
Quinn Tolliver: "Not at all; we should all look together, as a team. At least, that's my opinion."
Floretta Williams: "Come in, maybe we can figure out how to outsmart the power that makes them go in a thousand rats. Maybe I can get something out of it." She looks around and point to jay.
Pax: Discorporate takes effect when Beshilu have suffered damage that would kill them. Attacking them with non-lethal damage that stuns them does not trigger this Dread Power. Tossing them into incinerators, superheated plasma, or any ol' source of high heat is enough to destroy Beshilu in its entirety, shard rats and all
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