heartless mission arc
Feb. 12th, 2014 11:38 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wynnPart One: The Peterson Counterstrike
Val'drin, Helen, Francesca, Eric, Lila, Tia, Grant
The Knights were briefed at the downtown office on a problem unfolding in London: a hostage situation involving the Knights' archival curator, Grant Peterson. Wynn played a video for them in which a man demanded 10 million dollars in unmarked bills, the original manuscript of a German text, and a helicopter to depart from the penthouse where he was holding Grant, his wife Audrey, and their guests hostage. Wynn identified the man as Peter Jayson, a member of the Children of Chaos cult, a group run by Nicholas St. Andrew, known thief and con-man. Wynn ordered them to infiltrate the penthouse and rescue the hostages. The scene, however, was swamped with police and media, and Wynn had the feeling that this was meant on some level to potentially expose the Knights. He leveraged their connection to Anastacia O'Keefe's husband Jared, the London Chief of Police, to grant them authority to act.
The infiltration team landed with the requested helicopter as Wynn, Val'drin, Helen, and Jared watched from across the street. They called and had the security system disabled and Francesca broke them in. Inside, they saw many artifacts on display in the private office, and fought their way through a few of the guards. Francesca and Lila moved into the penthouse and found a guard watching over a person tied to a chair. They took down the guard and rescued the woman, who turned out to be Grant's wife, Audrey. She explained that the others were locked in the safe room and gave them the passcode, asking if it was safe to leave. Lila grew suspicious of Audrey immediately, and convinced her to stay with them. She sent word to Eric to free the others, as Francesca questioned Audrey more. They rejoined Eric, who had been unable to get pass the bungled access panel, but Francesca did so, as Tia shifted uncomfortably at Audrey's presence. Lila immediately questioned Grant as to why his wife was out as a hostage when they had been threatening to kill him at that appointed time. He wasn't sure but suggested they leave soon - and then one of the 'hostages' drew a gun, shooting another in the back and grabbing someone as a human shield. Lila talked him into letting everyone else clear out, but Francesca first gave her the necklace that she had been given as a gift from Val'drin - the one that could keep her from dying, which Lila had recognized from her own world.
Lila was left alone with the man and his hostage. The man revealed himself to be Peter Jayson himself, as Francesca treated the wounded hostage in the hallway. Tia tried to talk Grant into waiting (with Audrey) but he insisted on getting the hostages out. Lila tried to distract Peter with conversation, and then took a dangerous shot at him behind the hostage. The others heard in the hallway, and after Audrey was gone, Tia explained that the woman's thoughts had betrayed her - she knew something about this, and it was some kind of set-up for a robbery. She also explained that it seemed Grant had no idea of his wife's plan. They warned the others across the street, and Helen & Val'drin booked it down to the medical station to try and intercept Audrey. Eric burst into the room where the shot had come from, only to find that Lila's shot had killed Peter Jayson - but he had taken the hostage down with him.
Val'drin and Helen found Grant and Audrey, who was complaining of heart problems, and insisting on being taken to a hospital. When Helen insisted on caring for Audrey as a doctor, the professor's wife withdrew a bottle of pills, claiming to have forgotten to take them. She slammed the whole bottle, and then apologized to Grant that things had "gone this way". With the mysterious statement that she had done what she had to do, she vanished into a gaseous form. The team reconvened and Tia explained that the hostage situation had been a mere distraction, to allow Audrey to steal some of the artifacts that her husband collected. Grant insisted that was ridiculous - she was his research assistant and had access to his artifacts at all hours. He said they could catalog what was missing and he came up with a list of what was missing - either destroyed or stolen. Helen and Val'drin put together that two of the items were from the same century and location - Barrik the glutton's fetish and an idol of Ventyr, the emaciated. Helen noted that both objects also had to do with food. They were left with more questions than answers.
Part Two: Blood Sugar (recorded on Skype)
Carol, Archer, Lydia, Cora, Sydney B., Helen | Oct 2014
The Knights were invited to the downtown London office on Halloween by Wynn and police captain Jared O'Keefe to respond to a situation at a local candy factory, which had been padlocked shut, the employees missing, and the scene of a police officer's death. There was a recording played from another officer who had been on the scene, talking about some kind of zombie like monster. They headed to the factory, and checked out the area, finding a mix of white powder and blood outside the main loading doors. Carol broke them through the padlock into the loading bay, and they noticed tire tracks of a vehicle that had left the area in the last few hours, as well as a missing semi truck.
Seeing movement between some crates, Cora led them into a storage area, where they found a dead body of a local worker, their face smeared with the same mix of blood and white powder. Cora was then attacked by a zombie worker, who was leaking the subject out of his orifices. Lydia hopped on a fork lift as Archer shot it, causing it to leak more of the blood sugar mix as Carol shocked him by flying around to fight the thing. Lydia moved the forklift to trap the zombie where it was and they defeated it.
Checking out the manufacturing area, they found a small wooden idol on the floor, of a naked obese man and a mask or disfigured face. There were words carved on his stomach in a bastardized version of Sanskrit. Lydia sent pictures to Helen and Sydney noticed that if the machinery wasn't turned off soon, the factory might explode. There was a trail of blood sugar leading from the westernmost machine into the men's locker room, and Archer saw camera wires heading into the manager's office. Lydia and Cora headed there, while the others headed into the locker room.
In the manager's office, there were 15 people bound and gagged. Lydia and Cora freed them and they tried to all run away. Lydia managed to calm them down and they asked if the 'men in robes' were still out there. Lydia received a text from Helen that said that she could decipher the writing on the picture. It read: "Sugar and the blood of Vengeance/ Feeds the Spirit/ So that He may return/ to do his chores/ Unholy".
Meanwhile, in the locker room, Sydney, Archer, and Carol they followed the trail out into the time clock area. Just inside the door was the body of the police officer also covered in blood and sugar.
Lydia took Cora out of the office to tell her what she had learned from Helen: that she had recognized the idol from the Peterson Counterstrike mission. One of the idols they found on that mission was stolen - Barrik the Glutton, a diablerist and murderer who used some kind of item to kill people in the 4th century.
Archer insisted they check the women's locker room as well, but there was nothing wrong in there, so they headed back to meet up with others. Lydia told them what they had learned and Sydney pulled out the supervisor to question. Helen texted Val'drin to answer their question about whether the idol could be destroyed. The supervisor told them about how weirdos in yellow robes showed up, armed, gathered up the employees except for the security guard and tied them up with duct tape, closing the blinds, and then doing some kind of ritual on the plant floor. They heard the candy machine start running for about an hour, and then the mechanic heard one of the company trucks start up, idle in the loading bay for half an hour, and then it pulled out. After half an hour, there was screaming and shouting and they became terrified, but no one showed up.
In the reception area, the phone was ringing, and it turned out to be the local paper trying to figure out what was happening inside. They checked out the security tapes and watched the cultists entering. They saw another robed figure enter from the loading dock and padlock the doors. Later, the policeman entered and then ran out in fear, followed by the security guard zombie and broke his neck. Another tape, from the factory floor, showed the cultists herd the workers into the office, and then carry the security guard inside, pour sugar over him and half-bury him as he twitched, and then they prayed around him, scooped the powder off his body and into the machine, and began making candy. They loaded the candy up into boxes, and then the guard was raised as a zombie. Hours later, the policemen appeared and confronted him. Archer recognized them as members of the Children of Chaos cult.
They sent info about the truck to the police and the Knights to try to track the truck, while Lydia tried to research Barrik and came up empty. Nor could she find a way to reverse the ritual. They did more research on the cult, which worshiped the Roman god Janus, and the idea of chaos. They offered sacrifices in the form of destructive violence in public. They were gathered in a loose coalition and had been held for a lot of charges, especially last year, when they had taken the Peterson penthouse hostage and demanded a ransom. Helen told them about what had happened, and how it had been some kind of a ruse involving Grant's wife, Audrey. She gave them a list of all the items that had been stolen from the penthouse.
Lydia learned that there was a big Halloween festival going on downtown, so they decided to check it out just in case. Some of them got into Halloween costumes (Sydney was Alice, Lydia was Raggedy Ann, Carol was in superhero costume, and Archer dressed up... as a member of the Children of Chaos cult) and headed in in pairs - Lydia and Cora, Archer and Sydney, and then Carol up in the air. Running through the crowd were tiny candy golems creating chaos and chasing children but not actually hurting anyone seriously. The cultists were holed up in the Sweet Tooth factory truck, so Archer shot out a tire while Carol and Sydney fought the candy golems. Lydia ran for the truck and got shot, prompting her to back off. Sydney got swarmed by five golems, while Cora turned into a werewolf (which Archer thought was just a fantastic costume) and shielded Lydia, who used a candle from a jack-o-lantern and a can of hairspray to set cultists on fire. Carol tried to lift Sydney free but she was held down tightly by the golems and they continued smashing them up. After Lydia was shot a few more times, she played dead while Cora and Archer continued to fight cultists. One of them tried to run away and Carol caught him. Then a fifteen foot tall giant candy golem broke out of the truck and they forced to fight that too and it landed on Sydney.
After taking everything down, they asked the cultists where they got the idol from and they explained that it had been given to them by the High Priest of Disorder, their leader. They didn't seem to know his name or where to find him. They had been sent messages anonymously and secretly, but didn't know how to return contact, and given instructions of how to proceed. They had no idea what would be coming next, because their entire order was about chaos. They were simply set to activate the idol and use the cursed sugar to create panic somewhere. The activation required a blood sacrifice. Interviewing them proved to be a rather pointless exercise but they learned that some in the cult believed the High Priest to be Janus himself. They turned the cultists over to the police, and they put together that it was possible that the other idols or artifacts could be used, so they would be policing the holidays closely...They also learned about the High Priest Nicholas St. Andrew, the con artist involved in the Peterson Counterstrike.
Part Three: The Final Feast (recorded on 8tracks)
Sam, Rose, Faith O'Keefe, Fiona (mission leader), Will | November 2014
The team was invited to NYC, to keep an eye on any Thanksgiving festivities, after what had happened with the Children of Chaos on Halloween. At their briefing, Wynn asked what they knew about the cult, filling them in on what they didn't and about the missing artifacts from the Peterson apartment. There was another idol like the one that had been used on Halloween, one called Ventyr the Emaciated. It had been presented at a feast to a sultan in the distant past, and by the end of the meal, everyone had either wasted away to nothing, or eaten themselves to death.
They flew to America, and Faith and Fiona made everyone make paper turkeys on the way to "broaden their cultural horizons" (Sam's was the best). Fiona sat on Sam's lap while he helped her make hers, because she had no idea how to do it. Fiona prepared her spells, and Faith started planning Thanksgiving dinner for them.
They arrived in New York City, and went to their hotel which was near to the police station. They were provided with a police radio as well. They ordered Chinese food for their own Thanksgiving dinner, after Sam made salad of all things, disappointing everyone. They unboxed the food and decorating the table with their hand turkeys. Rose got a burger and sent a picture to Dean. While they were eating, Faith and Fiona totally forgot that they were supposed to be listening to the radio at all, and kept a TV on. While there were a lot of events happening in town, nothing weird seemed to be happening. Just as they were preparing to sit down to feast, a dispatcher came over the radio, asking for assistance. For a moment, they all just sat there, but finally Sam picked it up and responded. They explained that there had been a reported riot and they'd dispatched cruisers who said that it was actually "zombies looting the bodega". Fiona started eating everyone else's food, while they asked clarifying questions. There were at least twenty different reports of zombies, but some of them were breaking into homes, and others were stealing food and eating it. There were no casualties - at the moment. The zombies were in a place called "Crow Row" which Rose knew used to be a nice neighborhood, but had gone downhill. Everyone except for Rose realized that the "zombies" weren't eating people, and weren't fast enough to "riot". Sam suggested they didn't jump to killing them.
With that, they headed down there, led by Faith, who knew the area. The situation had calmed down by the time they got to Crow Row, which the police had cordoned off. They scoped out the area, which was centered around the Food for Life pantry. The block was quiet, and there was no movement as they headed up the street, but it was littered with food wrappers from the bodega, which was stripped clean. Occasionally, they noticed bursts of activity above the storefronts in some apartments, but they couldn't tell what. The ranking officer told them that had been going on for fifteen minutes and that the zombies had gone into the buildings or gone into the parking garage, and potentially through to the park. He also explained that the zombies had looked to be "homeless individuals". They realized that the Food for Life pantry had been serving food to the needy at about the time that the riot broke out, so they decided to check that out first.
As they headed towards it, a parking garage door opened and a homeless "zombie" staggered out, moaning "Food... so ... so hungry.." and then collapsed in a heap. Sam went to check him out and found that he was dead. Fiona leaned down to check his pulse, and then his body started twitching. She lifted his arm and his eyes snapped open, suddenly colorless, and he tried to bite her but she pulled away. Sam blew most of its face away with two shots and Fiona kept her cool, and punched it in the face while Rose came up and kicked it back. It lunged at her and Faith accidentally shot Fiona. Will got another shot that slowed the thing down, and Sam finally took it down.
Will asked them to step aside, so that he could investigate. He figured out that the man had been sick but alive when he came out, and that perhaps there was some kind of horrible malady going around. The man died, and then transformed into some kind of monster. This meant that it was a bad idea to use deadly force against anyone who was infected, because if they died, they might come back as zombies. Faith used her psionics to get the bullet out of Fiona.
They cut down the alleyway and found the creepy building in the courtyard. It had been clearly broken into and was labeled "Food for Life". Inside was a large open dining hall with rows of tables and chairs set out. All the windows had been painted black (freshly, noticed Will) and it was decorated for Thanksgiving. There were still people under the tables, mostly catatonic or rasping for food. Fiona punched out a window to test how they'd respond to light but another person died and turned into a zombie. Sam shot it in the head before it began spasming and Rose destroyed it.
The Knights were briefed about two killings in London the night before, of people mauled by a large carnivore. Will examined the crime scene photos to get a better idea of what the thing might look like: large claws, and a wide bite radius, some kind of predatory feline that had subdued its victims before eating them. The victims were a white middle aged dock worker and a young latino teen. Helen suggested they split up: Will and Sam check out one scene and she and Dean the other. Dean wasn't happy about being split from Sam, but Helen wanted their expertise on both halves of the mission (and Will accused them of being codependent).
At the docks, Will and Sam put their heads together to realize that whatever the creature did to subdue its victims didn't require physical contact, or it had planted some kind of mental suggestion. They talked to some sailors who had heard about the incident, who had heard that the victim was drinking heavily that night and shouldn't have been out by the docks at that time. They mentioned he was a weird guy who talked about the Roman god "Janus" often.
Meanwhile, in the alley where the teen had been killed, Dean found graffiti indicating they were in gang territory. They checked out a nearby condemned building where they ran into a young gang member who was friends with the victim. The boy told them that the victim, Emilio, had been mixed up with a religious group called the Children with a High Priest who he called "Father". He also told them about rumors of wild animals growling in the streets. He mentioned that Emilio had taken his stuff and moved out awhile ago but couldn't find a place to stay because everyone thought he was a religious nut.
They met back up with Sam and Will and compared notes. Helen's phone rang with a call from Police Captain Jared O'Keefe, alerting her that more bodies had shown up with the same cause of death. There were 3 more victims, and Helen clicked that perhaps the "Children" mentioned were the Children of Chaos, who several of them had run afoul of before. They discussed their various past experiences, realizing that this time the cultists appeared to be the victims, not the perpetrators.
They headed for the nearest crime scene, at the University of East London. They talked to Jared about the victim: a local college student. They discovered more fur on the crime scene, and saw that the body had been torn in half, bitten and clawed. Helen located a small needle mark on the victim's neck. Will realized that the victim had been waiting here for someone who had surprised her by stabbing her in the neck with the needle. The tox screen that they had ordered on the other bodies came through, and all victims were found to have high levels of sodium pentothol in their blood - truth serum. Sam knew that it could also put people into a coma-like state for a bit, and Helen also speculated that it could have been used to kill them before the maulings. Sam called Wynn to update him and Wynn suggested they get a tail on known members of the cult.
They checked out the other new crime scenes, and discovered that they all fit the same pattern. They also noticed that the chest of all victims had been torn open, and the heart removed. They headed back to see what they could dig up in the castle libraries about rituals involving heart removal, or the god Janus.
In a flashback, Julian Sark, who had been working for the Children of Chaos to recover artifacts for its leader, Nicholas St. Andrew, had a meeting with the man, who admitted that the ranks of his cult were made up of short-sighted idiots who he was using for his own goals. At that moment, Audrey Peterson entered in the wake of the Peterson Counterstrike, talking about everything that had gone wrong in their attempt to discredit Grant. Together, they worked up a plan to clear Audrey from suspicion. Afterwards, Sark decided to cut ties with them, realizing that St. Andrew was involved in something far above his pay grade.
Flashback to now, where Wynn called together everyone who had been involved in the Children of Chaos related missions, to meet Julian Sark, who had gone turncoat on St. Andrew and agreed to help the Knights stop him. Sark recognized Sydney and learned that she didn't remember him at all. When everyone had entered, Sark introduced himself and Wynn recapped everything that had occurred in the last few years. Sark explained that the artifacts combined made up a third ritual that would grant St. Andrew some kind of godlike power. The combined inscription read:
Val'drin, Helen, Francesca, Eric, Lila, Tia, Grant
The Knights were briefed at the downtown office on a problem unfolding in London: a hostage situation involving the Knights' archival curator, Grant Peterson. Wynn played a video for them in which a man demanded 10 million dollars in unmarked bills, the original manuscript of a German text, and a helicopter to depart from the penthouse where he was holding Grant, his wife Audrey, and their guests hostage. Wynn identified the man as Peter Jayson, a member of the Children of Chaos cult, a group run by Nicholas St. Andrew, known thief and con-man. Wynn ordered them to infiltrate the penthouse and rescue the hostages. The scene, however, was swamped with police and media, and Wynn had the feeling that this was meant on some level to potentially expose the Knights. He leveraged their connection to Anastacia O'Keefe's husband Jared, the London Chief of Police, to grant them authority to act.
The infiltration team landed with the requested helicopter as Wynn, Val'drin, Helen, and Jared watched from across the street. They called and had the security system disabled and Francesca broke them in. Inside, they saw many artifacts on display in the private office, and fought their way through a few of the guards. Francesca and Lila moved into the penthouse and found a guard watching over a person tied to a chair. They took down the guard and rescued the woman, who turned out to be Grant's wife, Audrey. She explained that the others were locked in the safe room and gave them the passcode, asking if it was safe to leave. Lila grew suspicious of Audrey immediately, and convinced her to stay with them. She sent word to Eric to free the others, as Francesca questioned Audrey more. They rejoined Eric, who had been unable to get pass the bungled access panel, but Francesca did so, as Tia shifted uncomfortably at Audrey's presence. Lila immediately questioned Grant as to why his wife was out as a hostage when they had been threatening to kill him at that appointed time. He wasn't sure but suggested they leave soon - and then one of the 'hostages' drew a gun, shooting another in the back and grabbing someone as a human shield. Lila talked him into letting everyone else clear out, but Francesca first gave her the necklace that she had been given as a gift from Val'drin - the one that could keep her from dying, which Lila had recognized from her own world.
Lila was left alone with the man and his hostage. The man revealed himself to be Peter Jayson himself, as Francesca treated the wounded hostage in the hallway. Tia tried to talk Grant into waiting (with Audrey) but he insisted on getting the hostages out. Lila tried to distract Peter with conversation, and then took a dangerous shot at him behind the hostage. The others heard in the hallway, and after Audrey was gone, Tia explained that the woman's thoughts had betrayed her - she knew something about this, and it was some kind of set-up for a robbery. She also explained that it seemed Grant had no idea of his wife's plan. They warned the others across the street, and Helen & Val'drin booked it down to the medical station to try and intercept Audrey. Eric burst into the room where the shot had come from, only to find that Lila's shot had killed Peter Jayson - but he had taken the hostage down with him.
Val'drin and Helen found Grant and Audrey, who was complaining of heart problems, and insisting on being taken to a hospital. When Helen insisted on caring for Audrey as a doctor, the professor's wife withdrew a bottle of pills, claiming to have forgotten to take them. She slammed the whole bottle, and then apologized to Grant that things had "gone this way". With the mysterious statement that she had done what she had to do, she vanished into a gaseous form. The team reconvened and Tia explained that the hostage situation had been a mere distraction, to allow Audrey to steal some of the artifacts that her husband collected. Grant insisted that was ridiculous - she was his research assistant and had access to his artifacts at all hours. He said they could catalog what was missing and he came up with a list of what was missing - either destroyed or stolen. Helen and Val'drin put together that two of the items were from the same century and location - Barrik the glutton's fetish and an idol of Ventyr, the emaciated. Helen noted that both objects also had to do with food. They were left with more questions than answers.
Part Two: Blood Sugar (recorded on Skype)
Carol, Archer, Lydia, Cora, Sydney B., Helen | Oct 2014
The Knights were invited to the downtown London office on Halloween by Wynn and police captain Jared O'Keefe to respond to a situation at a local candy factory, which had been padlocked shut, the employees missing, and the scene of a police officer's death. There was a recording played from another officer who had been on the scene, talking about some kind of zombie like monster. They headed to the factory, and checked out the area, finding a mix of white powder and blood outside the main loading doors. Carol broke them through the padlock into the loading bay, and they noticed tire tracks of a vehicle that had left the area in the last few hours, as well as a missing semi truck.
Seeing movement between some crates, Cora led them into a storage area, where they found a dead body of a local worker, their face smeared with the same mix of blood and white powder. Cora was then attacked by a zombie worker, who was leaking the subject out of his orifices. Lydia hopped on a fork lift as Archer shot it, causing it to leak more of the blood sugar mix as Carol shocked him by flying around to fight the thing. Lydia moved the forklift to trap the zombie where it was and they defeated it.
Checking out the manufacturing area, they found a small wooden idol on the floor, of a naked obese man and a mask or disfigured face. There were words carved on his stomach in a bastardized version of Sanskrit. Lydia sent pictures to Helen and Sydney noticed that if the machinery wasn't turned off soon, the factory might explode. There was a trail of blood sugar leading from the westernmost machine into the men's locker room, and Archer saw camera wires heading into the manager's office. Lydia and Cora headed there, while the others headed into the locker room.
In the manager's office, there were 15 people bound and gagged. Lydia and Cora freed them and they tried to all run away. Lydia managed to calm them down and they asked if the 'men in robes' were still out there. Lydia received a text from Helen that said that she could decipher the writing on the picture. It read: "Sugar and the blood of Vengeance/ Feeds the Spirit/ So that He may return/ to do his chores/ Unholy".
Meanwhile, in the locker room, Sydney, Archer, and Carol they followed the trail out into the time clock area. Just inside the door was the body of the police officer also covered in blood and sugar.
Lydia took Cora out of the office to tell her what she had learned from Helen: that she had recognized the idol from the Peterson Counterstrike mission. One of the idols they found on that mission was stolen - Barrik the Glutton, a diablerist and murderer who used some kind of item to kill people in the 4th century.
Archer insisted they check the women's locker room as well, but there was nothing wrong in there, so they headed back to meet up with others. Lydia told them what they had learned and Sydney pulled out the supervisor to question. Helen texted Val'drin to answer their question about whether the idol could be destroyed. The supervisor told them about how weirdos in yellow robes showed up, armed, gathered up the employees except for the security guard and tied them up with duct tape, closing the blinds, and then doing some kind of ritual on the plant floor. They heard the candy machine start running for about an hour, and then the mechanic heard one of the company trucks start up, idle in the loading bay for half an hour, and then it pulled out. After half an hour, there was screaming and shouting and they became terrified, but no one showed up.
In the reception area, the phone was ringing, and it turned out to be the local paper trying to figure out what was happening inside. They checked out the security tapes and watched the cultists entering. They saw another robed figure enter from the loading dock and padlock the doors. Later, the policeman entered and then ran out in fear, followed by the security guard zombie and broke his neck. Another tape, from the factory floor, showed the cultists herd the workers into the office, and then carry the security guard inside, pour sugar over him and half-bury him as he twitched, and then they prayed around him, scooped the powder off his body and into the machine, and began making candy. They loaded the candy up into boxes, and then the guard was raised as a zombie. Hours later, the policemen appeared and confronted him. Archer recognized them as members of the Children of Chaos cult.
They sent info about the truck to the police and the Knights to try to track the truck, while Lydia tried to research Barrik and came up empty. Nor could she find a way to reverse the ritual. They did more research on the cult, which worshiped the Roman god Janus, and the idea of chaos. They offered sacrifices in the form of destructive violence in public. They were gathered in a loose coalition and had been held for a lot of charges, especially last year, when they had taken the Peterson penthouse hostage and demanded a ransom. Helen told them about what had happened, and how it had been some kind of a ruse involving Grant's wife, Audrey. She gave them a list of all the items that had been stolen from the penthouse.
Lydia learned that there was a big Halloween festival going on downtown, so they decided to check it out just in case. Some of them got into Halloween costumes (Sydney was Alice, Lydia was Raggedy Ann, Carol was in superhero costume, and Archer dressed up... as a member of the Children of Chaos cult) and headed in in pairs - Lydia and Cora, Archer and Sydney, and then Carol up in the air. Running through the crowd were tiny candy golems creating chaos and chasing children but not actually hurting anyone seriously. The cultists were holed up in the Sweet Tooth factory truck, so Archer shot out a tire while Carol and Sydney fought the candy golems. Lydia ran for the truck and got shot, prompting her to back off. Sydney got swarmed by five golems, while Cora turned into a werewolf (which Archer thought was just a fantastic costume) and shielded Lydia, who used a candle from a jack-o-lantern and a can of hairspray to set cultists on fire. Carol tried to lift Sydney free but she was held down tightly by the golems and they continued smashing them up. After Lydia was shot a few more times, she played dead while Cora and Archer continued to fight cultists. One of them tried to run away and Carol caught him. Then a fifteen foot tall giant candy golem broke out of the truck and they forced to fight that too and it landed on Sydney.
After taking everything down, they asked the cultists where they got the idol from and they explained that it had been given to them by the High Priest of Disorder, their leader. They didn't seem to know his name or where to find him. They had been sent messages anonymously and secretly, but didn't know how to return contact, and given instructions of how to proceed. They had no idea what would be coming next, because their entire order was about chaos. They were simply set to activate the idol and use the cursed sugar to create panic somewhere. The activation required a blood sacrifice. Interviewing them proved to be a rather pointless exercise but they learned that some in the cult believed the High Priest to be Janus himself. They turned the cultists over to the police, and they put together that it was possible that the other idols or artifacts could be used, so they would be policing the holidays closely...They also learned about the High Priest Nicholas St. Andrew, the con artist involved in the Peterson Counterstrike.
Part Three: The Final Feast (recorded on 8tracks)
Sam, Rose, Faith O'Keefe, Fiona (mission leader), Will | November 2014
The team was invited to NYC, to keep an eye on any Thanksgiving festivities, after what had happened with the Children of Chaos on Halloween. At their briefing, Wynn asked what they knew about the cult, filling them in on what they didn't and about the missing artifacts from the Peterson apartment. There was another idol like the one that had been used on Halloween, one called Ventyr the Emaciated. It had been presented at a feast to a sultan in the distant past, and by the end of the meal, everyone had either wasted away to nothing, or eaten themselves to death.
They flew to America, and Faith and Fiona made everyone make paper turkeys on the way to "broaden their cultural horizons" (Sam's was the best). Fiona sat on Sam's lap while he helped her make hers, because she had no idea how to do it. Fiona prepared her spells, and Faith started planning Thanksgiving dinner for them.
They arrived in New York City, and went to their hotel which was near to the police station. They were provided with a police radio as well. They ordered Chinese food for their own Thanksgiving dinner, after Sam made salad of all things, disappointing everyone. They unboxed the food and decorating the table with their hand turkeys. Rose got a burger and sent a picture to Dean. While they were eating, Faith and Fiona totally forgot that they were supposed to be listening to the radio at all, and kept a TV on. While there were a lot of events happening in town, nothing weird seemed to be happening. Just as they were preparing to sit down to feast, a dispatcher came over the radio, asking for assistance. For a moment, they all just sat there, but finally Sam picked it up and responded. They explained that there had been a reported riot and they'd dispatched cruisers who said that it was actually "zombies looting the bodega". Fiona started eating everyone else's food, while they asked clarifying questions. There were at least twenty different reports of zombies, but some of them were breaking into homes, and others were stealing food and eating it. There were no casualties - at the moment. The zombies were in a place called "Crow Row" which Rose knew used to be a nice neighborhood, but had gone downhill. Everyone except for Rose realized that the "zombies" weren't eating people, and weren't fast enough to "riot". Sam suggested they didn't jump to killing them.
With that, they headed down there, led by Faith, who knew the area. The situation had calmed down by the time they got to Crow Row, which the police had cordoned off. They scoped out the area, which was centered around the Food for Life pantry. The block was quiet, and there was no movement as they headed up the street, but it was littered with food wrappers from the bodega, which was stripped clean. Occasionally, they noticed bursts of activity above the storefronts in some apartments, but they couldn't tell what. The ranking officer told them that had been going on for fifteen minutes and that the zombies had gone into the buildings or gone into the parking garage, and potentially through to the park. He also explained that the zombies had looked to be "homeless individuals". They realized that the Food for Life pantry had been serving food to the needy at about the time that the riot broke out, so they decided to check that out first.
As they headed towards it, a parking garage door opened and a homeless "zombie" staggered out, moaning "Food... so ... so hungry.." and then collapsed in a heap. Sam went to check him out and found that he was dead. Fiona leaned down to check his pulse, and then his body started twitching. She lifted his arm and his eyes snapped open, suddenly colorless, and he tried to bite her but she pulled away. Sam blew most of its face away with two shots and Fiona kept her cool, and punched it in the face while Rose came up and kicked it back. It lunged at her and Faith accidentally shot Fiona. Will got another shot that slowed the thing down, and Sam finally took it down.
Will asked them to step aside, so that he could investigate. He figured out that the man had been sick but alive when he came out, and that perhaps there was some kind of horrible malady going around. The man died, and then transformed into some kind of monster. This meant that it was a bad idea to use deadly force against anyone who was infected, because if they died, they might come back as zombies. Faith used her psionics to get the bullet out of Fiona.
They cut down the alleyway and found the creepy building in the courtyard. It had been clearly broken into and was labeled "Food for Life". Inside was a large open dining hall with rows of tables and chairs set out. All the windows had been painted black (freshly, noticed Will) and it was decorated for Thanksgiving. There were still people under the tables, mostly catatonic or rasping for food. Fiona punched out a window to test how they'd respond to light but another person died and turned into a zombie. Sam shot it in the head before it began spasming and Rose destroyed it.
Sam moved on to check out some doors in the back of the building, one of which led to a bathroom, and the other leading to a large stainless steel kitchen. There were metal lockers whose doors had been pulled off their hinges, and they could smell turkey. There was debris and evidence of looters, all food stuffs in the kitchen completely emptied. Two people were hunkered beneath a cabinet, fighting over a can of pork and beans. Sam told them to put their hands in the air and Fiona moved to take a selfie with them in the background because she thought it was hilarious. When she got closer, they lunged but Rose jumped in the way and stopped it from biting her. Fiona summoned a pair of golden handguns into her hands and plugged them full of bullets. She took one down as it charged at Sam, and it fell against him.
They headed further into the building, and found a small office, full of a dozen men and women bound and gagged on the floor. They ungagged them and found out that people in robes had tied them up and painted the windows black. They had heard the people in the kitchen preparing food and chanting something about meat and hunger and Ventyr the Emaciated. The manager told them that the people had signed up to be volunteers and provided them with a list of names and addresses, but they assumed they were fake. Realizing they had to get those people out of there, they decided to escort them out. However, back in the dining room, at least sixteen people had turned into zombies and were eating the other people, which was causing more zombies to be created. Rose slammed the door shut and they went back.
They wondered what had happened to the idol used to start this mess, and Faith pointed out that no one had left, according to the police. They helped the other people escape through the window, and then found 3 windows leading into the area they hadn’t explored yet, reaching them by climbing on a dumpster (that they first checked to make sure it wasn’t alive). They decided to bust out all 3 windows at once and found themselves looking into a chapel, where a yellow-robed figure stood in the pulpit, holding a wooden idol aloft in one hand, a shotgun in the other. He cried out that it was too late and Will saw four bodies twitching on the carpet. The priest said that Ventyr had been fed, and that they had eaten the meat and would give their lives for chaos. Will shot him and Rose jumped inside, knocking down the priest with a flying kick. Sam shot the idol, sending it skidding beneath a pew. Fiona finally got her hands on it and recognized the writing on it as ancient Sanskrit, deciphering the message: "Meat makes a man boil in hunger/leaving him empty after death/with the power of gods". She also knew that if the idol were smothered in food, it might temporarily stop the curse. Sam got bit twice by a zombie and a protracted fight ensued. Fiona wanted to shove the idol in the dumpster but was worried she would lose it. Still, she shoved it in and it began eating. Sam was infected by an empty calories curse that filled him with an incredible hunger. Eventually, a mass of hungry zombies started migrating into the chapel... and then a flash of light in the eyes of the idol stopped it, and everyone turned to normal, even the dead people. Just the ones they had killed as zombies were actually dead.
They debated what to do with the idol, but figured out that if they kept feeding it long enough (for 12 hours), and decided to bring the idol to Thanksgiving dinner and take turns passing it around and feeding it. Fiona renamed it Bruce and then made 'special' brownies that everyone ate. They all got high and things got really weird. Sam lost his shirt, Fiona did some stoned eBay shopping, a lot of people lost clothes, Faith kissed Rose, they wished themselves into a karaoke bar, Sam sang Taylor Swift (and sexted Glasya), Will and Fiona made out, and they literally wished Dean overseas to join them. It was a time that they would never... remember. Luckily.
Part Four: Dead of Winter
Part One:Sam, Helen (mission leader), Dean, Will| February 2015
Part Two: Cora, Lydia, Sydney (mission leader), Sark, Sam, Will, Francesca | February 2015
They debated what to do with the idol, but figured out that if they kept feeding it long enough (for 12 hours), and decided to bring the idol to Thanksgiving dinner and take turns passing it around and feeding it. Fiona renamed it Bruce and then made 'special' brownies that everyone ate. They all got high and things got really weird. Sam lost his shirt, Fiona did some stoned eBay shopping, a lot of people lost clothes, Faith kissed Rose, they wished themselves into a karaoke bar, Sam sang Taylor Swift (and sexted Glasya), Will and Fiona made out, and they literally wished Dean overseas to join them. It was a time that they would never... remember. Luckily.
Part Four: Dead of Winter
Part One:Sam, Helen (mission leader), Dean, Will| February 2015
Part Two: Cora, Lydia, Sydney (mission leader), Sark, Sam, Will, Francesca | February 2015
The Knights were briefed about two killings in London the night before, of people mauled by a large carnivore. Will examined the crime scene photos to get a better idea of what the thing might look like: large claws, and a wide bite radius, some kind of predatory feline that had subdued its victims before eating them. The victims were a white middle aged dock worker and a young latino teen. Helen suggested they split up: Will and Sam check out one scene and she and Dean the other. Dean wasn't happy about being split from Sam, but Helen wanted their expertise on both halves of the mission (and Will accused them of being codependent).
At the docks, Will and Sam put their heads together to realize that whatever the creature did to subdue its victims didn't require physical contact, or it had planted some kind of mental suggestion. They talked to some sailors who had heard about the incident, who had heard that the victim was drinking heavily that night and shouldn't have been out by the docks at that time. They mentioned he was a weird guy who talked about the Roman god "Janus" often.
Meanwhile, in the alley where the teen had been killed, Dean found graffiti indicating they were in gang territory. They checked out a nearby condemned building where they ran into a young gang member who was friends with the victim. The boy told them that the victim, Emilio, had been mixed up with a religious group called the Children with a High Priest who he called "Father". He also told them about rumors of wild animals growling in the streets. He mentioned that Emilio had taken his stuff and moved out awhile ago but couldn't find a place to stay because everyone thought he was a religious nut.
They met back up with Sam and Will and compared notes. Helen's phone rang with a call from Police Captain Jared O'Keefe, alerting her that more bodies had shown up with the same cause of death. There were 3 more victims, and Helen clicked that perhaps the "Children" mentioned were the Children of Chaos, who several of them had run afoul of before. They discussed their various past experiences, realizing that this time the cultists appeared to be the victims, not the perpetrators.
They headed for the nearest crime scene, at the University of East London. They talked to Jared about the victim: a local college student. They discovered more fur on the crime scene, and saw that the body had been torn in half, bitten and clawed. Helen located a small needle mark on the victim's neck. Will realized that the victim had been waiting here for someone who had surprised her by stabbing her in the neck with the needle. The tox screen that they had ordered on the other bodies came through, and all victims were found to have high levels of sodium pentothol in their blood - truth serum. Sam knew that it could also put people into a coma-like state for a bit, and Helen also speculated that it could have been used to kill them before the maulings. Sam called Wynn to update him and Wynn suggested they get a tail on known members of the cult.
They checked out the other new crime scenes, and discovered that they all fit the same pattern. They also noticed that the chest of all victims had been torn open, and the heart removed. They headed back to see what they could dig up in the castle libraries about rituals involving heart removal, or the god Janus.
In a flashback, Julian Sark, who had been working for the Children of Chaos to recover artifacts for its leader, Nicholas St. Andrew, had a meeting with the man, who admitted that the ranks of his cult were made up of short-sighted idiots who he was using for his own goals. At that moment, Audrey Peterson entered in the wake of the Peterson Counterstrike, talking about everything that had gone wrong in their attempt to discredit Grant. Together, they worked up a plan to clear Audrey from suspicion. Afterwards, Sark decided to cut ties with them, realizing that St. Andrew was involved in something far above his pay grade.
Flashback to now, where Wynn called together everyone who had been involved in the Children of Chaos related missions, to meet Julian Sark, who had gone turncoat on St. Andrew and agreed to help the Knights stop him. Sark recognized Sydney and learned that she didn't remember him at all. When everyone had entered, Sark introduced himself and Wynn recapped everything that had occurred in the last few years. Sark explained that the artifacts combined made up a third ritual that would grant St. Andrew some kind of godlike power. The combined inscription read:
Sugar and meat makes
the blood of a man boil in
Vengeance . . . Hunger.
Feeds the Spirit. Leaving Him empty
So that He may return after death
to do his chores with the power of
Unholy Gods
the blood of a man boil in
Vengeance . . . Hunger.
Feeds the Spirit. Leaving Him empty
So that He may return after death
to do his chores with the power of
Unholy Gods
They threw around theories about what St. Andrew was up to, and Wynn showed them a message from Jared O'Keefe about a pizza delivery guy who had come across one of the killings in progress, describing a "giant tiger on steroids" and "guy in a long black coat holding a softball". Wynn selected some of the Knights to head out, hoping the trail was fresh enough that they could follow it.
They arrived at the crime scene, where Sydney and Sark realized that the heart had been removed with a scalpel, the chest covered in arcane markings, which Sam realized would keep the heart beating while it was removed. When Cora caught the scene of wet fur, she deduced that they might have been moving around through the sewers. Francesca talked the city office into telling them where the local sewer entrances were. Will relived the scene in his mind's eye: the cultist recognizing their "high priest" St. Andrew, who stabbed them with the needle while the beast snuck up, Nicholas removing their heart via his ritual ...
Cora picked up some tracks, and they headed into the sewers, where they ran across some gang members. They told them that a guy came through there sometimes with a beast in tow. They bartered with them for information by giving them Sark's expensive shoes, and told them that the man had a hideout down here, but to watch out for alligators. The boys led them in the right direction to the hideout, where Sark rattled the door loudly enough to alert St. Andrew to what was happening. They headed inside, finding Nicholas St. Andrew in the midst of a ritual involving a pentagram decorated with human hearts, another in his hand. He triumphantly yelled that they were too late, and that the ritual was nearly already complete, something Sam recognized was true: the conduit to the power was opened. St. Andrew sicced the gigantic Beast on them, while casting a wall of stone around himself. Sark ran outside and called emergency services, telling them there was a hostage situation with a terrorist. Lydia recognized that St. Andrew was healing himself inside the wall and she discovered a side room that seemed to be full of idols and tomes.
[Skyped finale of the mission:] They finally took down the beast, and Lydia created a bomb to break them through to St. Andrew and they finally took him down too. They discovered that the woman chained in the room and under a magic sleep effect was actually Audrey Peterson. Sark wanted to kill her, but the others stopped him and took her back to interrogate. They were forced to leave St. Andrew's body behind, to keep the Knights involvement secret, given the attention on the situation by the media now due to Sark's phone call. Audrey Peterson was taken into police custody for interrogation and impending trial.
They arrived at the crime scene, where Sydney and Sark realized that the heart had been removed with a scalpel, the chest covered in arcane markings, which Sam realized would keep the heart beating while it was removed. When Cora caught the scene of wet fur, she deduced that they might have been moving around through the sewers. Francesca talked the city office into telling them where the local sewer entrances were. Will relived the scene in his mind's eye: the cultist recognizing their "high priest" St. Andrew, who stabbed them with the needle while the beast snuck up, Nicholas removing their heart via his ritual ...
Cora picked up some tracks, and they headed into the sewers, where they ran across some gang members. They told them that a guy came through there sometimes with a beast in tow. They bartered with them for information by giving them Sark's expensive shoes, and told them that the man had a hideout down here, but to watch out for alligators. The boys led them in the right direction to the hideout, where Sark rattled the door loudly enough to alert St. Andrew to what was happening. They headed inside, finding Nicholas St. Andrew in the midst of a ritual involving a pentagram decorated with human hearts, another in his hand. He triumphantly yelled that they were too late, and that the ritual was nearly already complete, something Sam recognized was true: the conduit to the power was opened. St. Andrew sicced the gigantic Beast on them, while casting a wall of stone around himself. Sark ran outside and called emergency services, telling them there was a hostage situation with a terrorist. Lydia recognized that St. Andrew was healing himself inside the wall and she discovered a side room that seemed to be full of idols and tomes.
[Skyped finale of the mission:] They finally took down the beast, and Lydia created a bomb to break them through to St. Andrew and they finally took him down too. They discovered that the woman chained in the room and under a magic sleep effect was actually Audrey Peterson. Sark wanted to kill her, but the others stopped him and took her back to interrogate. They were forced to leave St. Andrew's body behind, to keep the Knights involvement secret, given the attention on the situation by the media now due to Sark's phone call. Audrey Peterson was taken into police custody for interrogation and impending trial.