Massachusetts mission summary

Solace, Faith O., Lissa D., Phineas, Sydney S., Thoster

The team was briefed about a minor celebrity who believed she was being stalked by an obsessive fan with some kind of Shadow abilities.   The Knights had been hired to act as bodyguards at a dinner party she was throwing, where they would pretend to be guests while investigating the matter and keeping her safe.  They created covers for themselves and went to meet the semi-famous Callista Pendergast, a spoiled bratty young woman who explained that she'd been receiving 'stalker notes' for months, but she had just found one in her bedroom before calling them.  She showed them the note, which was overflowing with flowery romantic angst and promised they would 'make her see'.  

After making a plan to contact one another if they discovered anything, the team moved to the ballroom to meet the guests.  lissa spoke to an attractive young man named Roy who turned out to be another celebrity whom Callista was a fan of.  He didn't seem to know anything about Callista's stalker, however.  Thoster spoke to Claudia and Erika, "friends" of Callista who actually couldn't stand her.  They'd been told all about her stalker, but explained that it was her fifth 'stalker' this year, claiming she liked to exaggerate the truth and blow things out of proportion, to get attention, because her parents never gave her any.  They believed that if some guy went off the deep end over her that she'd probably driven him to it on purpose.  Thoster enlisted their help in trying to find the guy.   Sydney spoke to a Shadowkind theologist who was more interested in talking about his studies than the party.   Thoster moved on to speaking to Callista's angry uncle, who considered Callista spoiled rotten.  He too implied that she lured men along on a string, and disposed of them like Kleenex.

Some of the Knights heard a scream in the hallway and went to investigate, realizing that one of the guests had gone out that way earlier.  They split up, and Faith and Thoster came across the body of the woman, who had two puncture wounds in her neck.   Meanwhile, Phineas and Lissa found themselves confronted with the vampire... who was invisible.  Solace and Sydney discovered an open window and Faith and Thoster called for everyone to gather up, warning them about the vamp.  

It was too late for Phineas and Lissa however, as the vampire accused them of trying to get between him and Callista,  Phineas threw a dove at the vampire's face in a fit of panic as the others raced to their aid.  The vampire slammed Lissa against a wall, rendering her unconscious, as Phineas tried unsuccessfully to fight him off.  They all converged just as Callista appeared, recognizing the vampire as "Shaun" and seeming disgusted that he wouldn't recognize that 'it was over.'   Shaun moved towards her, trying to dominate her, stopping as Thoster mesmerized him with a fragment of song... but Phineas ruined it by slamming into the vampire from behind, breaking the spell.  He whirled on the binder, ready to kill him, when Faith unleashed a crushing psionic attack that destroyed the vampire's brain.  Solace finished the job by evaporating his remaining body.  

Callista did nothing but complain about her 'rescue', and the team chastised her for her lack of gratitude and cowed her attitude, begging them not to tell her father about this.  They did so anyway, and convinced him to have the grounds warded against further attacks.

France mission summary

Christos, Anastacia, Emma S., Lila, Faye, Felicity

The Knights were briefed on an elven councilwoman who had been recently elected to office in Paris.  Since her election, she had met with political resistance, even to the extent of assassination attempts.  She had hired the Knights to look into discovering who these enemies were, and to protect her from such attempts.  

Traveling to Paris, the Knights met with Councilwoman Taenya Farstorm, in her office, who explained that others believed her ideas were too radical, because they threatened certain corporate interests.  She explained that her proposal was to tear down a large expanse of city property to make a nature preserve.  Most of these properties would belong to the Renault Group, and would be industrial complexes, which as Lila pointed out, would lose a lot of jobs on top of stopping pollution, a fact which did not seem to bother the elf.  Taenya explained that the last attempt had involved cut brake lines, but that she'd been healed by a cleric since the incident in order to not let them think they'd done any harm to her.  She also accused the police of being in the Mayor's pocket, indicating that he was clearly on the side of corporate interests in this.  As they shared information over tea, Lila grew suddenly ill, and they realized abruptly that she'd been poisoned, drinking tea that was probably intended for Taenya.  In the resulting chaos, Felicity pocketed the cup, while Taenya explained that the tea was specially imported from an elven settlement, and called for a cleric.  Lila was afraid that the cleric might be in on the assassination attempt, but they healed her fully and she expressed her theory that one of Taenya's enemies might be a woman, given that they tended to favor using poison over men.  Taenya named Elode Olympe, one of the Mayor's greatest supporters.

Meanwhile, Faye and Felicity had gone to find Christos with the cup.  He explained that he had gone to spy on the mayor, and discovered he had some kind of diabolical plans regarding relocating Shadowkind in the city, involving a shipment coming in soon.  Christos had snagged the dock number, and so the girls started off that way to try to discover what he was up to.  The shipment was in progress when they arrived, and they managed to get a look inside, where they saw large tanks of some kind of toxic gas being unloaded.  They were spotted by some of the workers and made their getaway.

Christos checked out the poison traces in the cup, and learned that it was from a rare African spider.  Lila recognized it was strange that they could have gotten the poison from Madagascar in the 48 hours before it would lose potency, and Emma concluded that the spider itself had to have been shipped here.  Christos pointed out that it had likely been someone the Mayor knew well enough to trust, and informed them that the shipment would have to have been in the past year, given the spider's lifespan.

Emma and Lila headed to the Mayor's office, where the latter pretended to be asking about construction permits, dropping in an implication that one of the employees there had been to Madagascar recently, and discovering that it was, in fact, Madame Olympe, Chair of the City Planning Commission.  Lila talked her way back to see her, and found her to be a rather cold young woman, who was in no mood to talk.  Lila did, however, notice the spider in her office.  Meanwhile, Emma recovered phone records and records from her trip to act as further evidence.

Regrouping at the hotel, they discussed their plan of action.  Emma, Christos, and Faye decided to head to the docks since Felicity had been spotted and might be recognized.  Lila, Felicity, and Anastacia went to try to break into Elodie's office.  

Felicity employed her experience at breaking and entering to get them in, but they ran afoul of an old security guard, who Lila convinced she was looking for a lost earring.  He helped her look for it, while Felicity snuck inside.  Together, they took pictures of the spider as further evidence.

At the docks, Emma broke open a window and snuck inside to trip the fusebox, Christos used the cover of darkness to take care of the guards, while Emma and Faye discovered the shipping manifests.  The manifest confirmed that the canisters were some kind of chemical warfare, so they took photos as proof, and headed out.

That night, the team headed to the Mayor's home, where Emma, Faye, Lila, and Christos scaled the fence.  After Christos horrified everyone by killing a sleeping guard dog, while Emma disabled the alarm on the home security system.  They snuck upstairs and found the Mayor in bed with Elodie Olympe, They threatened the pair with the evidence they'd discovered, but Faye lost patience with them and set their bed on fire.  They convinced them to find a safe place to dispose of the barrels, to lay off Taenya, and to leave the Shadowkind in the city alone - as well as to resign from their posts.

A press conference held the next day announced their resignations, and Taenya thanked the team for their help, announcing her plan to run for the Mayor's spot.