Project MONUMENT 077-078: 30 October-12 November 2010, Paris, Cairo, Siwa Oasis
INTERNAL MESSAGING - LEVEL 4 CLEARANCE REQUIRED - EYES ONLY
To: O5-3/780
From: SCP-780
The subjects (and Brother Lazaro) met on Saturday morning at Dr. Freund's clinic just as they had planned, with the exception of Souna (who had left a message saying that she had important changeling matters to attend to) and Bo (who chose not to face the others just yet, and went to the battleground to commune with her spirit mentor instead). Notably, Robert was present for the first time in almost a week. He explained that he had still owed a favor to Damiane in exchange for the permanence effect she had placed on the bottle containing Roland's insanity, and she had called it in to deal with a major "breach of the Veil" in which a large number of humans were exposed to evidence of Awakened magic. Specifically, a young football player had Awakened during a match and displayed impossible physical abilities in front of a crowd of thousands of witnesses. Robert had spent the past several days helping Damiane's order, the Guardians of the Veil, to determine who in the crowd had seen and remembered magic and to modify their memories accordingly, and to concoct a story about a terrorist plot being foiled in order to explain the massive cover-up that had taken place.
Robert was shocked to learn that the Nazi had been killed after being questioned, particularly when he realized that this decision had been made unilaterally by Bo instead of agreed upon by the whole group. He said that even though the young man had espoused Nazi beliefs, there must have been a way to confine him instead of simply killing him. Josette was also angered by the outcome. Roland defended Bo's actions, while Aðalsteinn did his best to stay out of the entire debate. The subjects argued about what had happened for a little while longer (with Josette eventually getting frustrated and leaving the conversation altogether) until they realized that nothing they said would change what had happened, and that they should just focus on moving forward now.
At this point, Lazaro spoke up and said that he felt he had gathered all of the information that he needed to file a report on the subjects' activities, and that he intended to do so in a way that convinced Malleus Maleficarum that the subjects should be left alone if not supported. Though he still did not agree with all aspects of the way their group operated, such as their intense reliance on magic, he had also recently seen that they could function without it. In fact, he thought that the work they were doing was important enough for him to operate as more than just an observer, but an active ally. Lazaro offered the subjects two options: He could return to Rome to file his report and attempt to change attitudes there, or (if the group was willing) he could remain in Paris and help the group more actively even though this might make him less able to turn Malleus Maleficarum's aggression away from them. The subjects said that they needed some time to discuss this, and that they also wanted Bo to be there to add her input. Lazaro agreed to leave for a while, and Roland called Bo and persuaded her to come to the clinic to talk.
Lazaro caught up to Josette not long after she left to have the private meeting she had requested. Josette wanted more information about exactly what had turned Malleus Maleficarum against the group, since none of them had been very forthcoming on this matter. Lazaro told her about Robert's run-in with Sister Philip, explaining that Sister Philip felt that Robert had tricked her and made her look foolish, and that she believed that any mage who could put one over on her was a major threat that needed to be dealt with. Josette asked how influential Sister Philip was, and Lazaro responded that she was one of the highest-ranking members of Malleus Maleficarum who had sole jurisdiction over most of western Europe. Upon learning this, Josette became determined to mend the rift between Robert and Sister Philip, and asked to write a letter for inclusion in Lazaro's report that would vouch for her knowledge of Robert's moral character and for the subjects' utility as an ally to Malleus Maleficarum.
Bo arrived at the clinic shortly thereafter, and Josette returned to discuss the Lazaro situation. All of the subjects agreed that they liked Lazaro and thought his skills had been an asset to the group on its most recent hunt. They also felt that he had been straightforward with them throughout the observation process and that they could trust him. However, opinions differed on whether it was a good idea for them to stay. Josette thought his willingness to collaborate with the subjects would speak louder than words to Malleus Maleficarum about their validity as hunters, while Robert was concerned that Lazaro's alliance might just cause Malleus Maleficarum to believe that he had used his mind control powers on Lazaro. Ultimately, the subjects decided that Lazaro's help was worth the risk of being misunderstood by Malleus Maleficarum. They called him back to the clinic and told him they wanted him in their group, for which he was grateful.
To show that they now trusted Lazaro, the subjects showed him their body dumping site in the catacombs (where they disposed of the dead Nazi) and their safehouse nearby. Lazaro was amused by this and noted that his own catacombs safehouse was very nearby, although it was not as large and well-appointed as the subjects'. The subjects then sat down to discuss their next moves, and agreed that acquiring the second torch and lifting its torch should be their highest priority. In order to achieve this, several smaller tasks had to be accomplished. First, the subjects would need to find a larger place to store the gold they had collected - not because they had a huge amount of gold, but because the space needed to be large enough to stage an ambush for Michael Martucci and his allies, since the subjects still believed he held the second torch. Second, Aðalsteinn stated that the subjects would need to find at least one more cache of gold to bring back in order to make a big enough "signal" for Robert and Damiane to amplify with their magic. The torch was still pointing to somewhere in Egypt or Libya, and Lazaro observed that with the growing political unrest in that region of the world, it would probably be best to go there soon and without splitting up. Only after those tasks had been accomplished could the subjects lay their trap and regain the torch.
Since these tasks were quite complex and some of the subjects were still recovering from injuries, they took things slowly and spent a little more than a week working on various projects. Aðalsteinn, Bo, Lazaro, and Roland focused on finding a new site for gold storage. It took them about five days of exploring the catacombs to find what they were looking for: a large, circular room that had formerly been a cistern, with a single large pipe with a strange bend in it leading inside. They figured that they could design a large door that would slide down from the ceiling and cover the pipe once the vampires were inside, therefore depriving them of access to the only corner (the bend in the pipe) that they would be able to enter from. The subjects spent another day designing the door and its mechanisms and hauling materials to the catacombs, and three more doing the actual construction. After building the door and smoothing out the floor of the cistern, they moved the gold inside and proclaimed it secure enough to gather more gold from northern Africa.
The subjects also spent time on their individual projects. Aðalsteinn met with his superior in Aegis Kai Doru, Anaïs, and gave her a full report about Brother Lazaro's visit. She seemed pleased with its outcome and said that Aðalsteinn had represented Aegis Kai Doru well. He also wrote up reports for his group telling everything he had learned about the Hedge, mages' capabilities, and the connections that seemed to exist between mages and changelings and where their magic came from. The people who saw the reports seemed impressed by all the new information he had managed to uncover, and he could tell that his star was rising within Aegis Kai Doru.
Bo continued to deal with the spiritual disturbances at the former site of the Vel' d'Hiv. She wanted to continue suppressing the spirits herself, but her spirit mentor urged her to let someone more experienced take care of it, since the spirit worried that Bo was still too susceptible to emotions like fear and despair in her own life not to be adversely influenced by the site. The spirit put out a call for help, and a more experienced spirit worker named Mariette came to Paris to assist. Bo showed Mariette around the site, and Mariette seemed impressed by what Bo had managed on her own. However, the strength of the spirits involved made it more efficient for Mariette to take care of the site for now, which she was happy to do. Mariette also taught Bo a ritual that she could use on her own to strengthen pre-existing protections on a site of spiritual turmoil. Bo also arranged a meeting with Robert in which she talked to him about why she had made her decision to kill the Nazi (basically, because she felt that doing so presented the least risk to the group she had promised to protect, and she didn't want anyone else to have to do it); by the end of it they both seemed to understand each other a little better.
Josette stayed busy at work, but also resumed a project from before her time in Spain that she had not told anyone about: researching her mother's mysterious disappearance. Josette had previously learned from her mother's old day planners that she often met with a man named Henry Routhier when she traveled to New York City on business, including on a trip she made right before she disappeared. Through further research, she discovered that Henry Routhier was a professional oboe player who had been born in France but became an American citizen upon joining an orchestra there. But the strangest thing she learned was that according to the Social Security index, Henry Routhier had been dead since 1975 - long before Marie-Julie's disappearance. Josette soon hit a wall with her research and decided to ask Roland for help, since his abilities from VASCU allowed him to check public records so easily. Roland soon told Josette that Henry Routhier had been declared dead after going inexplicably missing a few years earlier; he had left a rehearsal to go home, and never arrived. Roland also found an article that Marie-Julie had written for a magazine at the beginning of her career in which she interviewed Henry and two other up-and-coming classical musicians in New York City, which would explain how she knew him.
Robert focused both on his job and his magely studies. From Damiane, he learned the rudiments of how to identify and affect magic himself, which he was beginning to realize would be necessary if he actually wanted the job of Hallow custodian that he had volunteered for. He also learned that a meeting of the Consilium would likely soon be called to address this matter, and that he should be ready to defend his claim to the position.
Near the beginning of the week, Robert got a phone call from his contact Sloan, who said that he was ready to collect on the favor he was owed. Robert and Sloan met for dinner, and Sloan told Robert that the definition he was seeking was "the changes you have observed in the Hedge." Robert was surprised that Sloan knew about this, and willingly shared the information without betraying any confidences of the rest of the group. He then asked Sloan what his interest was in knowing this, to which Sloan responded that he and his allies had been observing and monitoring the changes in order to implement a plan of action later. (It basically sounded to Robert like Sloan had had much less direct involvement and experience in the Hedge than the subjects had.) Robert asked whether Sloan might be willing to join forces with his group to continue the investigation, and Sloan said he would, under the terms of "a favor for a favor" that they had previously agreed upon. Robert later told the other subjects about this, and they did not seem as interested in dealing with Sloan under those terms as Robert did - particularly after Robert admitted that he did not really trust Sloan.
Roland met with Patrick from VASCU, hoping that he might have gained some sort of useful knowledge from VASCU's ongoing investigation of Doorknocker-esque crimes throughout Europe, or that the United States government might be able to help the subjects gain access to countries in Africa that were in political turmoil. Patrick tried to change the subject, but ultimately ended up admitting that his VASCU cell had never been operating in Paris with entirely official status as far as the FBI was concerned; pretty much, they slipped by under the radar because nobody really liked them or believed in what they were doing. Roland was not entirely pleased to learn about the less-than-legal nature of his affiliation, but realized there was nothing he could do about it now. Patrick said he would be happy to have his people help with the investigation remotely, but that they could neither leave the country nor help the subjects get to where they were going.
Souna continued to focus on her music, including spending time at a local university and trying to befriend the music students there. She also continued to help with the changelings' investigation. She and Uncle Pierre met with Midas, the Spring King, and it went fairly well; Midas was cooperative and identified a total of 17 members of the Spring Court in Paris, making it the largest Court in the city. He seemed very friendly and dedicated to helping find the culprit. However, the investigation did not get much farther than that before Pasteur called a meeting and said that the motley that had been victimized had called to his attention the presence of someone moving in on their former territory, dealing drugs, scaring the populace, and basically doing the same thing that they had been given permission to do. Since this person seemed to have good relations with the local gangs and a fair amount of firepower, and since no one on the committee was renowned as a great combatant, Pasteur's suggestion was to recruit help from the Summer Court to bring the new gang leader in for questioning. Souna agreed that this was a good idea - though she became somewhat suspicious when she learned that the Winter King wanted to delay meeting with her and Uncle Pierre until the current situation was resolved.
On the evening of November 8, the subjects met in the catacombs to figure out how to proceed with retrieving the gold. Robert's magic had narrowed the location of the gold down to Egypt, and he had used his influence in the mayor's office (and on the mayor's presidential election campaign) to justify an excursion there to meet with some of the mayor's contacts and report back on the sociopolitical situation. However, this did not solve the problem of how to bring the necessary weapons into the country. The group's body armor and Aðalsteinn's knife and torch would not pose a problem, and Lazaro's crossbow could be disassembled into harmless components and reassembled once everyone arrived. However, the guns favored by Bo and Roland would probably be next to impossible to smuggle in. Robert suggested using magic to conceal the guns, but a few group members (particularly Lazaro)were against this plan because of the consequences if the magic failed. Finally, the subjects decided that the easiest thing to do would be to purchase guns on the black market upon arriving in Cairo, despite the admittedly morally questionable aspects of doing so - although Josette strongly disapproved of this action and refused to be involved. For transportation, since they would likely need to go to isolated areas of the country and possibly even travel in the Sahara Desert, they decided to purchase a jeep and a dirt bike upon arriving as well. The subjects all pooled their savings to be able to afford all of this gear, then set to packing and preparing.
The next day, the subjects all flew into Cairo and checked into the hotel Robert had arranged. Aðalsteinn checked the torch and saw that it was pointing to the southwest, meaning that the subjects would definitely have to go into the desert. Further use of magic by Robert revealed that the closest area of civilization to the gold's location was the western Siwa Oasis. While Robert and Souna preserved the cover story by meeting with various locals, and Lazaro reassembled his crossbow and formed new bolts for it, the other subjects went out to shop for their vehicles. Josette took the lead on this task, and was able to get a very good deal on the jeep and the dirt bike by flirting with the car salesman. (However, this led the salesman to ask Robert to dinner the following night to ask for his permission to seek Josette's hand in marriage, which was somewhat awkward but did leave Robert with a new contact in Cairo.) While shopping, the subjects also noticed that policing in the area was very stringent, and that they needed to be particularly cautious to avoid attracting too much attention.
November 10 was the day on which Aðalsteinn and Roland went to purchase guns on the black market (with help from Robert, who magically enabled them to speak Arabic for the day and pointed them in the right direction of where to start), while the rest of the subjects gathered the necessary survival supplies for an excursion into the Sahara. They made the purchase of a handgun for Bo and a rifle for Roland without too much difficulty, then rejoined the group to help pick up some last-minute supplies. While walking through the marketplace district, Roland saw a woman leaving a building in the company of two unfamiliar men, and recognized her as the woman who had attacked and nearly killed him and Bo on top of an under-construction apartment building while they were observing Eliot April almost a year earlier. Roland split off from the group and tried to follow her, but quickly lost track of her. He went back to the building she had come out of and saw that it was a travel agency specializing in excursions into the Western Sahara, and that the clerk inside inexplicably appeared to have no memory of her ever having been inside.
Roland and the others caught up and he told them what he had seen. The subjects were quite concerned by this development because although they had never found out who sent the woman to attack Bo and Roland, they had always assumed that vampires (specifically Eliot Abril) were behind it because they had been actively and intensely interfering with his plans at that time. Now the subjects worried that the vampires would beat them to the gold if they did not hurry. They resolved to leave as early as possible the next day, and spent November 11 driving an isolated stretch of highway that took them through the desert to the Siwa Oasis.
On November 12, the subjects embarked into the desert south of the oasis, using Aðalsteinn's torch to guide their way. After about two hours of careful and unpleasant driving, they arrived at an area where the torch suggested gold would be found on the opposite side of a large dune. They could also see smoke from a small fire rising from nearby, behind another dune. The subjects decided to ignore the smoke for now and followed the torch, only to see more sand and the torch pointing directly downward. They concluded that they needed to start digging, and most of them pitched in - with the exception of Robert, who went back to the jeep to astrally project toward the fire and see what was going on. He noticed about six men and a few vehicles and tents nearby who appeared to be repairing and modifying a variety of heavy weapons; however, these men did not appear to have noticed the subjects' approach. Robert and Roland decided to remain on top of the dune and keep an eye on the camp, to be ready to react if anyone there realized their presence.
The other subjects spent some time digging and soon uncovered what looked like the ruins of an ancient structure, with three lines of writing in hieroglyphics visible. Robert was called over to magically interpret the hieroglyphics. The first line identified who was buried in the tomb, the second line warned of a curse, and the third line began, "The tomb will only be opened when..." The subjects agreed to focus their digging on uncovering the third line to see how they could gain access before anybody else showed up.
MALUS SYLVESTRIS, 05-3/780, PERSONAL LOG - LEVEL 4 CLEARANCE REQUIRED - EYES ONLY
DATE UNKNOWN
I'm sure the Administrator would be happy to know that after being cut off from the Foundation's network, my perception of time has become skewed enough to no longer be able to reliably date this entry in my log. No matter. Someone, somehow, has seen that I still receive Peach's reports as they arrive. For that, I am grateful. It allows me to understand that things are still proceeding apace in the outside world - that the subjects are doing something about the thing that nobody else seems to care about in the same way that they do - in the way that I want them to. That is all I ever really wanted from the project, after all.
I spend a lot of time looking at It these days - it's not as if there is anything else to do for most of the time I spend here. It never moves, It never changes. I suppose I should be grateful for that. What would it mean for me if It really did speak, or alter Its position? Would it mean that the future we have feared, the message I still swear I didn't send, was here? Or would it mean that a different future was now approaching, one that none of us had foreseen? I don't know which option frightens me more.
When I get out of here, I swear I will tell them everything.
Two sessions in one here, since last weekend was busy and session 77 was mostly downtime anyway.
Lots of housekeeping going on in session 77: outstanding favors dealt with, dangling plot threads wrapped up, and the like. It was high time to get some of those minor issues put to bed, since I do want to have this game proceeding toward its ultimate conclusion in a fairly direct fashion by the time we take a break for me to have a baby and all. As for Brother Lazaro joining the group, I saw that the players seemed to really enjoy the character and to have a good time interacting with him, so I decided to give them the opportunity to add him to the group as a recurring NPC. As you can see, they quickly decided that they wanted to have him around, which opens up some fun possibilities for future plots that I'm sure we will enjoy coming up with. (c:
Session 78 saw the PCs getting out of Europe for the first time this game (depending on whether you see Russia as a part of Europe or not, I suppose - which I understand is quite the historical and geopolitical debate). Things I particularly enjoyed about this session included the results of Josette's flirtation, and how nobody but Josette (who still has Morality 6, compared to the rest of the group's 3s and 4s) really cared at all about potentially buying weapons from terrorists. Good times.
What is this?
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To: O5-3/780
From: SCP-780
The subjects (and Brother Lazaro) met on Saturday morning at Dr. Freund's clinic just as they had planned, with the exception of Souna (who had left a message saying that she had important changeling matters to attend to) and Bo (who chose not to face the others just yet, and went to the battleground to commune with her spirit mentor instead). Notably, Robert was present for the first time in almost a week. He explained that he had still owed a favor to Damiane in exchange for the permanence effect she had placed on the bottle containing Roland's insanity, and she had called it in to deal with a major "breach of the Veil" in which a large number of humans were exposed to evidence of Awakened magic. Specifically, a young football player had Awakened during a match and displayed impossible physical abilities in front of a crowd of thousands of witnesses. Robert had spent the past several days helping Damiane's order, the Guardians of the Veil, to determine who in the crowd had seen and remembered magic and to modify their memories accordingly, and to concoct a story about a terrorist plot being foiled in order to explain the massive cover-up that had taken place.
Robert was shocked to learn that the Nazi had been killed after being questioned, particularly when he realized that this decision had been made unilaterally by Bo instead of agreed upon by the whole group. He said that even though the young man had espoused Nazi beliefs, there must have been a way to confine him instead of simply killing him. Josette was also angered by the outcome. Roland defended Bo's actions, while Aðalsteinn did his best to stay out of the entire debate. The subjects argued about what had happened for a little while longer (with Josette eventually getting frustrated and leaving the conversation altogether) until they realized that nothing they said would change what had happened, and that they should just focus on moving forward now.
At this point, Lazaro spoke up and said that he felt he had gathered all of the information that he needed to file a report on the subjects' activities, and that he intended to do so in a way that convinced Malleus Maleficarum that the subjects should be left alone if not supported. Though he still did not agree with all aspects of the way their group operated, such as their intense reliance on magic, he had also recently seen that they could function without it. In fact, he thought that the work they were doing was important enough for him to operate as more than just an observer, but an active ally. Lazaro offered the subjects two options: He could return to Rome to file his report and attempt to change attitudes there, or (if the group was willing) he could remain in Paris and help the group more actively even though this might make him less able to turn Malleus Maleficarum's aggression away from them. The subjects said that they needed some time to discuss this, and that they also wanted Bo to be there to add her input. Lazaro agreed to leave for a while, and Roland called Bo and persuaded her to come to the clinic to talk.
Lazaro caught up to Josette not long after she left to have the private meeting she had requested. Josette wanted more information about exactly what had turned Malleus Maleficarum against the group, since none of them had been very forthcoming on this matter. Lazaro told her about Robert's run-in with Sister Philip, explaining that Sister Philip felt that Robert had tricked her and made her look foolish, and that she believed that any mage who could put one over on her was a major threat that needed to be dealt with. Josette asked how influential Sister Philip was, and Lazaro responded that she was one of the highest-ranking members of Malleus Maleficarum who had sole jurisdiction over most of western Europe. Upon learning this, Josette became determined to mend the rift between Robert and Sister Philip, and asked to write a letter for inclusion in Lazaro's report that would vouch for her knowledge of Robert's moral character and for the subjects' utility as an ally to Malleus Maleficarum.
Bo arrived at the clinic shortly thereafter, and Josette returned to discuss the Lazaro situation. All of the subjects agreed that they liked Lazaro and thought his skills had been an asset to the group on its most recent hunt. They also felt that he had been straightforward with them throughout the observation process and that they could trust him. However, opinions differed on whether it was a good idea for them to stay. Josette thought his willingness to collaborate with the subjects would speak louder than words to Malleus Maleficarum about their validity as hunters, while Robert was concerned that Lazaro's alliance might just cause Malleus Maleficarum to believe that he had used his mind control powers on Lazaro. Ultimately, the subjects decided that Lazaro's help was worth the risk of being misunderstood by Malleus Maleficarum. They called him back to the clinic and told him they wanted him in their group, for which he was grateful.
To show that they now trusted Lazaro, the subjects showed him their body dumping site in the catacombs (where they disposed of the dead Nazi) and their safehouse nearby. Lazaro was amused by this and noted that his own catacombs safehouse was very nearby, although it was not as large and well-appointed as the subjects'. The subjects then sat down to discuss their next moves, and agreed that acquiring the second torch and lifting its torch should be their highest priority. In order to achieve this, several smaller tasks had to be accomplished. First, the subjects would need to find a larger place to store the gold they had collected - not because they had a huge amount of gold, but because the space needed to be large enough to stage an ambush for Michael Martucci and his allies, since the subjects still believed he held the second torch. Second, Aðalsteinn stated that the subjects would need to find at least one more cache of gold to bring back in order to make a big enough "signal" for Robert and Damiane to amplify with their magic. The torch was still pointing to somewhere in Egypt or Libya, and Lazaro observed that with the growing political unrest in that region of the world, it would probably be best to go there soon and without splitting up. Only after those tasks had been accomplished could the subjects lay their trap and regain the torch.
Since these tasks were quite complex and some of the subjects were still recovering from injuries, they took things slowly and spent a little more than a week working on various projects. Aðalsteinn, Bo, Lazaro, and Roland focused on finding a new site for gold storage. It took them about five days of exploring the catacombs to find what they were looking for: a large, circular room that had formerly been a cistern, with a single large pipe with a strange bend in it leading inside. They figured that they could design a large door that would slide down from the ceiling and cover the pipe once the vampires were inside, therefore depriving them of access to the only corner (the bend in the pipe) that they would be able to enter from. The subjects spent another day designing the door and its mechanisms and hauling materials to the catacombs, and three more doing the actual construction. After building the door and smoothing out the floor of the cistern, they moved the gold inside and proclaimed it secure enough to gather more gold from northern Africa.
The subjects also spent time on their individual projects. Aðalsteinn met with his superior in Aegis Kai Doru, Anaïs, and gave her a full report about Brother Lazaro's visit. She seemed pleased with its outcome and said that Aðalsteinn had represented Aegis Kai Doru well. He also wrote up reports for his group telling everything he had learned about the Hedge, mages' capabilities, and the connections that seemed to exist between mages and changelings and where their magic came from. The people who saw the reports seemed impressed by all the new information he had managed to uncover, and he could tell that his star was rising within Aegis Kai Doru.
Bo continued to deal with the spiritual disturbances at the former site of the Vel' d'Hiv. She wanted to continue suppressing the spirits herself, but her spirit mentor urged her to let someone more experienced take care of it, since the spirit worried that Bo was still too susceptible to emotions like fear and despair in her own life not to be adversely influenced by the site. The spirit put out a call for help, and a more experienced spirit worker named Mariette came to Paris to assist. Bo showed Mariette around the site, and Mariette seemed impressed by what Bo had managed on her own. However, the strength of the spirits involved made it more efficient for Mariette to take care of the site for now, which she was happy to do. Mariette also taught Bo a ritual that she could use on her own to strengthen pre-existing protections on a site of spiritual turmoil. Bo also arranged a meeting with Robert in which she talked to him about why she had made her decision to kill the Nazi (basically, because she felt that doing so presented the least risk to the group she had promised to protect, and she didn't want anyone else to have to do it); by the end of it they both seemed to understand each other a little better.
Josette stayed busy at work, but also resumed a project from before her time in Spain that she had not told anyone about: researching her mother's mysterious disappearance. Josette had previously learned from her mother's old day planners that she often met with a man named Henry Routhier when she traveled to New York City on business, including on a trip she made right before she disappeared. Through further research, she discovered that Henry Routhier was a professional oboe player who had been born in France but became an American citizen upon joining an orchestra there. But the strangest thing she learned was that according to the Social Security index, Henry Routhier had been dead since 1975 - long before Marie-Julie's disappearance. Josette soon hit a wall with her research and decided to ask Roland for help, since his abilities from VASCU allowed him to check public records so easily. Roland soon told Josette that Henry Routhier had been declared dead after going inexplicably missing a few years earlier; he had left a rehearsal to go home, and never arrived. Roland also found an article that Marie-Julie had written for a magazine at the beginning of her career in which she interviewed Henry and two other up-and-coming classical musicians in New York City, which would explain how she knew him.
Robert focused both on his job and his magely studies. From Damiane, he learned the rudiments of how to identify and affect magic himself, which he was beginning to realize would be necessary if he actually wanted the job of Hallow custodian that he had volunteered for. He also learned that a meeting of the Consilium would likely soon be called to address this matter, and that he should be ready to defend his claim to the position.
Near the beginning of the week, Robert got a phone call from his contact Sloan, who said that he was ready to collect on the favor he was owed. Robert and Sloan met for dinner, and Sloan told Robert that the definition he was seeking was "the changes you have observed in the Hedge." Robert was surprised that Sloan knew about this, and willingly shared the information without betraying any confidences of the rest of the group. He then asked Sloan what his interest was in knowing this, to which Sloan responded that he and his allies had been observing and monitoring the changes in order to implement a plan of action later. (It basically sounded to Robert like Sloan had had much less direct involvement and experience in the Hedge than the subjects had.) Robert asked whether Sloan might be willing to join forces with his group to continue the investigation, and Sloan said he would, under the terms of "a favor for a favor" that they had previously agreed upon. Robert later told the other subjects about this, and they did not seem as interested in dealing with Sloan under those terms as Robert did - particularly after Robert admitted that he did not really trust Sloan.
Roland met with Patrick from VASCU, hoping that he might have gained some sort of useful knowledge from VASCU's ongoing investigation of Doorknocker-esque crimes throughout Europe, or that the United States government might be able to help the subjects gain access to countries in Africa that were in political turmoil. Patrick tried to change the subject, but ultimately ended up admitting that his VASCU cell had never been operating in Paris with entirely official status as far as the FBI was concerned; pretty much, they slipped by under the radar because nobody really liked them or believed in what they were doing. Roland was not entirely pleased to learn about the less-than-legal nature of his affiliation, but realized there was nothing he could do about it now. Patrick said he would be happy to have his people help with the investigation remotely, but that they could neither leave the country nor help the subjects get to where they were going.
Souna continued to focus on her music, including spending time at a local university and trying to befriend the music students there. She also continued to help with the changelings' investigation. She and Uncle Pierre met with Midas, the Spring King, and it went fairly well; Midas was cooperative and identified a total of 17 members of the Spring Court in Paris, making it the largest Court in the city. He seemed very friendly and dedicated to helping find the culprit. However, the investigation did not get much farther than that before Pasteur called a meeting and said that the motley that had been victimized had called to his attention the presence of someone moving in on their former territory, dealing drugs, scaring the populace, and basically doing the same thing that they had been given permission to do. Since this person seemed to have good relations with the local gangs and a fair amount of firepower, and since no one on the committee was renowned as a great combatant, Pasteur's suggestion was to recruit help from the Summer Court to bring the new gang leader in for questioning. Souna agreed that this was a good idea - though she became somewhat suspicious when she learned that the Winter King wanted to delay meeting with her and Uncle Pierre until the current situation was resolved.
On the evening of November 8, the subjects met in the catacombs to figure out how to proceed with retrieving the gold. Robert's magic had narrowed the location of the gold down to Egypt, and he had used his influence in the mayor's office (and on the mayor's presidential election campaign) to justify an excursion there to meet with some of the mayor's contacts and report back on the sociopolitical situation. However, this did not solve the problem of how to bring the necessary weapons into the country. The group's body armor and Aðalsteinn's knife and torch would not pose a problem, and Lazaro's crossbow could be disassembled into harmless components and reassembled once everyone arrived. However, the guns favored by Bo and Roland would probably be next to impossible to smuggle in. Robert suggested using magic to conceal the guns, but a few group members (particularly Lazaro)were against this plan because of the consequences if the magic failed. Finally, the subjects decided that the easiest thing to do would be to purchase guns on the black market upon arriving in Cairo, despite the admittedly morally questionable aspects of doing so - although Josette strongly disapproved of this action and refused to be involved. For transportation, since they would likely need to go to isolated areas of the country and possibly even travel in the Sahara Desert, they decided to purchase a jeep and a dirt bike upon arriving as well. The subjects all pooled their savings to be able to afford all of this gear, then set to packing and preparing.
The next day, the subjects all flew into Cairo and checked into the hotel Robert had arranged. Aðalsteinn checked the torch and saw that it was pointing to the southwest, meaning that the subjects would definitely have to go into the desert. Further use of magic by Robert revealed that the closest area of civilization to the gold's location was the western Siwa Oasis. While Robert and Souna preserved the cover story by meeting with various locals, and Lazaro reassembled his crossbow and formed new bolts for it, the other subjects went out to shop for their vehicles. Josette took the lead on this task, and was able to get a very good deal on the jeep and the dirt bike by flirting with the car salesman. (However, this led the salesman to ask Robert to dinner the following night to ask for his permission to seek Josette's hand in marriage, which was somewhat awkward but did leave Robert with a new contact in Cairo.) While shopping, the subjects also noticed that policing in the area was very stringent, and that they needed to be particularly cautious to avoid attracting too much attention.
November 10 was the day on which Aðalsteinn and Roland went to purchase guns on the black market (with help from Robert, who magically enabled them to speak Arabic for the day and pointed them in the right direction of where to start), while the rest of the subjects gathered the necessary survival supplies for an excursion into the Sahara. They made the purchase of a handgun for Bo and a rifle for Roland without too much difficulty, then rejoined the group to help pick up some last-minute supplies. While walking through the marketplace district, Roland saw a woman leaving a building in the company of two unfamiliar men, and recognized her as the woman who had attacked and nearly killed him and Bo on top of an under-construction apartment building while they were observing Eliot April almost a year earlier. Roland split off from the group and tried to follow her, but quickly lost track of her. He went back to the building she had come out of and saw that it was a travel agency specializing in excursions into the Western Sahara, and that the clerk inside inexplicably appeared to have no memory of her ever having been inside.
Roland and the others caught up and he told them what he had seen. The subjects were quite concerned by this development because although they had never found out who sent the woman to attack Bo and Roland, they had always assumed that vampires (specifically Eliot Abril) were behind it because they had been actively and intensely interfering with his plans at that time. Now the subjects worried that the vampires would beat them to the gold if they did not hurry. They resolved to leave as early as possible the next day, and spent November 11 driving an isolated stretch of highway that took them through the desert to the Siwa Oasis.
On November 12, the subjects embarked into the desert south of the oasis, using Aðalsteinn's torch to guide their way. After about two hours of careful and unpleasant driving, they arrived at an area where the torch suggested gold would be found on the opposite side of a large dune. They could also see smoke from a small fire rising from nearby, behind another dune. The subjects decided to ignore the smoke for now and followed the torch, only to see more sand and the torch pointing directly downward. They concluded that they needed to start digging, and most of them pitched in - with the exception of Robert, who went back to the jeep to astrally project toward the fire and see what was going on. He noticed about six men and a few vehicles and tents nearby who appeared to be repairing and modifying a variety of heavy weapons; however, these men did not appear to have noticed the subjects' approach. Robert and Roland decided to remain on top of the dune and keep an eye on the camp, to be ready to react if anyone there realized their presence.
The other subjects spent some time digging and soon uncovered what looked like the ruins of an ancient structure, with three lines of writing in hieroglyphics visible. Robert was called over to magically interpret the hieroglyphics. The first line identified who was buried in the tomb, the second line warned of a curse, and the third line began, "The tomb will only be opened when..." The subjects agreed to focus their digging on uncovering the third line to see how they could gain access before anybody else showed up.
MALUS SYLVESTRIS, 05-3/780, PERSONAL LOG - LEVEL 4 CLEARANCE REQUIRED - EYES ONLY
DATE UNKNOWN
I'm sure the Administrator would be happy to know that after being cut off from the Foundation's network, my perception of time has become skewed enough to no longer be able to reliably date this entry in my log. No matter. Someone, somehow, has seen that I still receive Peach's reports as they arrive. For that, I am grateful. It allows me to understand that things are still proceeding apace in the outside world - that the subjects are doing something about the thing that nobody else seems to care about in the same way that they do - in the way that I want them to. That is all I ever really wanted from the project, after all.
I spend a lot of time looking at It these days - it's not as if there is anything else to do for most of the time I spend here. It never moves, It never changes. I suppose I should be grateful for that. What would it mean for me if It really did speak, or alter Its position? Would it mean that the future we have feared, the message I still swear I didn't send, was here? Or would it mean that a different future was now approaching, one that none of us had foreseen? I don't know which option frightens me more.
When I get out of here, I swear I will tell them everything.
Two sessions in one here, since last weekend was busy and session 77 was mostly downtime anyway.
Lots of housekeeping going on in session 77: outstanding favors dealt with, dangling plot threads wrapped up, and the like. It was high time to get some of those minor issues put to bed, since I do want to have this game proceeding toward its ultimate conclusion in a fairly direct fashion by the time we take a break for me to have a baby and all. As for Brother Lazaro joining the group, I saw that the players seemed to really enjoy the character and to have a good time interacting with him, so I decided to give them the opportunity to add him to the group as a recurring NPC. As you can see, they quickly decided that they wanted to have him around, which opens up some fun possibilities for future plots that I'm sure we will enjoy coming up with. (c:
Session 78 saw the PCs getting out of Europe for the first time this game (depending on whether you see Russia as a part of Europe or not, I suppose - which I understand is quite the historical and geopolitical debate). Things I particularly enjoyed about this session included the results of Josette's flirtation, and how nobody but Josette (who still has Morality 6, compared to the rest of the group's 3s and 4s) really cared at all about potentially buying weapons from terrorists. Good times.
What is this?
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