Season Eleven

https://wikiawoo.queer.me.uk/index.php?title=Season_Eleven&action=edit Summary of Events. Also Todo List

2023-10-23

Everyone is at the Pack House, Ariane has just called Diamond Annie, gotten mocked, but hired an infiltrator to the New Catholic Church.

Lydia suggests talking to Bell, Jules and Ariane to go along, Holly and Carlie to take it easy. Bell is sat around looking miserable, who says she can't hear from one of her daughters, specifically the one they've taken over, Jules tells her its an Umbral church thats been cooperating with Wyrm creatures (Vampires) and has some kind of bubble, we peer and can see the faint flickering of the forcefield. Bell says she's suddenly just cut off, she hears from most of the bells most Sundays and her quiet daughters less frequently, did say something about people coming around to restore and play her every Sunday. She says its happened several times in the past and normally she can see the fire that occurs and its never good when she loses one to fire. Bell says she's never really heard of the Umbral church, she knows there are those out there that claim to belong to a church but knows very little about them. Jules asks if there's anything else we can do in the meantime and Bell just asks her to find out. She offers to play for us to recharge our essence and we reassure her we just like hearing her - and get a melancholy tune. Lydia asks her what our pack is for and told we're for protecting Southwark as we are the Southwark Belles from The Wyrm and things that would destroy, we should "create and thrive, do art, grow strong!". Lydia asks why art? And is told it provides meaning that sways hearts, and hearts shape the Umbra, and that shapes her, and she shapes the Umbra and hearts back - its the only really meaningful thing. What would happen to you if Southwark wasn't here? I'd die. Apparently it'd be bad for her, her daughters and her sisters.

On the way back Lydia asks Jules what she thinks we should do, is told protect the Umbra from the Wyrm and make things safe. Lydia: Do you think you're doing that? Do you think you could do better? Do you think we could do better? Talk of maybe and depends if people are willing to give up their lives, Lydia says she doesn't have any distractions and thinks other people should give up their lives and that careers, partners, art, etc will all be gone in a few years. Lydia asks "do you think you'll have a career in 10 years when the planets burning." Ariane attempts to explain that being a lawyer will help her shape the collapse of the government and its important for Jules to make art to keep inspiring people because fighting for peoples hopes and dreams keeps them from falling to the Wyrm. Lydia argues for a need for a strategic vision to essentially hunt down the billionaires running the world and deal with them and Ariane suggests it would be "werewolf justice" and Jules says we can't just hunt people down and kill them. Ariane suggests Lydia talk to Steven Thompson who she writes off as a useless compromiser.

Lydia calls out Jules as a weak leader with no plan and vision and lays down a challenge - Jules then goes to punch Lydia (and misses!) who then fails to shift up the first time and manages the second time, Jules snarls "How dare you say I have no vision!" and throws a punch thats evaded. Ariane observes! Lydia hits Jules harder than she expects so Jules switches up to Glabro then punches Lydia. Lydia wrestles Jules to the floor, getting the upper hand! Jules fails to escape and Lydia growls "Yield!" at her which gets the response "Bite me!" then shifts Lupus to evade out of the hold! Lydia says "Jules I'm not trying to kill you!" and goes to kick her, Jules dives in and shifts up to Glabro inside her guard and punches her hard. She gets a good hold on Jules to pin her and Jules tries to break out by sheer force of strength and fails, Lydia growls "Fucking quit already I'm not trying to hurt you!" and goes to choke her out. Ariane spots a huge dog-wolf spirit watching, 6-7 foot tall at the shoulder while sitting, keeps half an eye on it and half on the fight. Jules flips up to crinos form and breaks the hold! Then goes to claw Lydia who dodges, then shifts up to crinos, Jules manages to get a solid hit in (5 points of lethal) and the large wolf spirit howls, Jules roars yield and Lydia rolls over and shows throat.

Ariane attempts to hold up Jules arm as a victor and Lydia tells her that she's been putting her neck out and breaking herself for Lydia and there isn't a grand plan there's just her attempting to make sure everyone gets to live their lives and if its not good enough for her she can fuck off. She goes to leave and the huge wolf comes padding over and tells her "Nice speech" in first tongue. Greets Lydia as "God Botherer" (see Season Seven) and says it was here to witness history which Ariane greets it and greets it as friend wolf, says she was because Jules defended her history. The wolf talks about Jules ancestors, a great line of ahroun behind her applauding her punching a nurse. She has a Tells her her name is "Red Talon" or "Call of Blood" and Jules recognises that this thing is probably the patreon of the Red Talons tribe and clocks that Lydia's talking points line up with their philosophy and it says its been watching Lydia a while because she had interesting ideas last they met and her ideas have bloomed like flowers in the spring. Lydia says there isn't a better tribe for her because she was born human, it says it is willing to bend the rules for her and extract a price and she would be the only one in London, the only one south of Birmingham, she says she may end up in Birmingham after her course and it says there's always some humans who need culling and her beautiful flower will bloom into great fruit at some point. She says there's some humans who are nearly there and it says there's some non-humans who need culling, she clarifies she has tried to explain it to some humans and she says no they're mostly Wyrm tainted not doing it for the Wyld itself, it wants her to kill some things that look like humans to get her hand in. It asks Ariane to pass on her regards to her mother and she assures her she will, it asks Jules to look into her background one day.

Jules stalks away, The Red Talon fades out, Lydia has a few claw marks. Ariane offers her an arm to lean on and asks if shes talked to it much but is told just the one time at the pond at her house and that the Children of Gaia retreat wasn't a place it hung out. Ariane suggests that the Red Talons aren't an effective path as its been tried. Lydia says what we've been doing at the minute isn't enough. Jules goes to blow off steam and Lydia and Ariane get back to the Pack House.

Ariane drops Lydia on the sofa and goes to make her a big cup of tea and fetch her first aid kid. Carlie and Holly look on and she tells them it was Jules and she lost because she wasn't trying to kill her. Ariane says it was an accepted challenge, and Holly shouts about how there's an invasion going on, Ariane fills them in on the fight and how Red Talon was there, both Carlie and Holly have heard of it, Ariane attempts to defend this as something to respect cautiously from a distance, Carlie wants to know why its hanging around and paying attention, Lydia tells her about the first time she met it and Carlie says it clearly saw the anger in her. Carlie goes to leave for a walk and is clearly angry. Holly packs up her journal notes (had been working out the route - they're probably coming via Templar which comes direct to earth) while Ariane fills her in on the meeting with Bell. Talk of how they got back, the object they gave us was destroyed, Ariane asks Sunny to talk to the Stargazers about if they brought things back, Holly moots that the geas was brought back but then diffused. Get Lydia to check in with Celeste who says she was in The Umbral Church last night (so not coming in through there), Ariane talks about ways to Templar and Holly's notes say that it connects to The Temple Church in England and various knights of different religions, faiths, philosophy, and background come to test their mettle against each other, putting their faith, beliefs, and lives on the line, its in central London (guarded by Dragons on the perimeters and the territory of Samantha Wallingford's vampire sect).

2023-10-30

written by Gareth, age 28

• Holly agrees to accompany Sunny to her sponsorship meeting with Sarah Hawkins of Tate & Lyle at a local "upmarket" cafe
• Sunny begins to plan making that massive batch of charity cookies for the True Londoner taximen
• The sponsorship meeting: upon first meeting Hawkins, Sunny definitely (and Holly somewhat) pick up that Hawkins is kinfolk
  • Hawkins is very enthusiastic about cakes and other confectioneries
  • Sunny and Hawkins agree to a branding deal: Hawkins' company will supply Sunny with ingredients for the big bake and some cash for her troubles in exchange for some shots of the products in Sunny's videos and some "suggested lines" and materials to promote
  • Hawkins is also trying to make connections to Sunny directly about casually bringing up her "uncle Laurent" (who tells strange stories about remarkable far off places) disappearing - in a way where she's definitely trying to provoke some kind of reaction out of the two of them
    • Laurent is currently back on another adventure with his very good Stargazer friend into the deep umbra to track down "the source of COVID" (again)
  • Sunny also talks the cafe owner to give her the recipe for the key lime pie that everyone had at the meeting
• On the way home, Sunny and Holly chat about various things - where all the Stargazers seem to be, the importance of having hobbies (while directly bringing up Lydia), what to do about the Eternal Church in London, that it's probably a bad idea to try to gather all the Garou into one place to talk about said Church, and that they should go to Robert Laffrey's wake at The Guild (which Holly is already working at and Sunny thinks about bringing key lime pie to)
• Sunny phones Ariane's mother (Janice Primrose-Morton), gets Mr. Robinson the butler - Janice is busy, so Sunny asks him about Stargazers - not much luck, but Alice the maid chats with Sunny about her videos and wants her to make a wedding cake for her (and Penny Primrose??)
• Jules goes on a trip in the near Umbra to take a look at the bubble
  • Has a stealthy investigation nearby
    • The church itself is exactly the same in both umbra and real
    • Big shimmery bubble, slightly distorting what's inside it; no array; couple of spirit guards (Order of Red?) with swords
    • Jules tries messing around with the bubble as a wolf, which causes some sort of flash inside the church itself for a moment then settles back down
    • Jules spends some amount of time messing around with the barrier trying to find a soft spot to potentially break through one way or another
    • Cannot sense the Wyrm beyond the barrier - the barrier seems to block it
  • Jules then decides to turn to a more direct approach - she approaches the front door as a human where there are a couple of the church's monks with swords standing guard
  • Another guard with a different sword eventually comes through the barrier (parting it with their hands) and has a tense chat with Jules
    • The guard offers the "warhounds" (his way to describe wolves) of London to join The Eternal Church
    • As he disappears back behind the barrier, Jules hears the subtle sound of an arcana array activating - she then parkours her way around to find three glowing lights (like fireflies) nearby, the lights appear to try to gently pull Jules through the Gauntlet - she resists, but looks through herself to see…
    • Some of "London's finest" (21st Tactical Reconnaissance Regiment) in a stakeout overlooking the church trying to put out a fire on an array - Jules beats a retreat
• Carlie will be focusing on tracking down the vampire that showed up at the church using Sergeant Limehouse's video tape collection
• Ariane was mostly catching up on homework during this (Tabitha was on holiday)