Season Six

Summary of Events. Also Todo List

2022-01-17

Things opened with Ariane climbing to the roof of the pack house to deliver a howl about our Umbral trip, disovering new realms and places, rescuing the Stargazers and an ally of the garou (Liz), it is, a mediocre howl and maybe she should have slept first.

Holly preps for an interview at The Guild that night. they tell her its house/barstaff, she meets Mr. Benson (Maître d'/manager), a tall lady smoking a cigarette (probably The Lady of Kowloon), also 3 gym bros, a librarian lady (big jumper, glasses, books), and a raven haired lady working the bar. Told the place has duelling room (for swords, and mages, and judo mats and its strong enough for garou) and is taken into Benson's Office (a huge desk, with knick-knacks, pictures, kid's drawings. It's a basic interview until she's asked how she feels about mages, gives a broad answer being as she's worked with Liz, but also aprehended David Vasiry and helped kill Ben Valis) then goes for an interview with Sir Robert Laffrey who's desk is even bigger and office even swankier, the lady with the cigarete is there too. Laffrey tries to claim the Belles jumped to the rescue of Liz and if he'd know he'd have cared and gives "personal thanks to your pack leader" which Holly will pass on. He says the cost of rescuing her shows that we have dedication to garou/mythic relations and peace and order in London. The job is mostly bar work with occasional "other" work (i.e. contracts for the guild) and is "tier 1" with opportunity for advancement, also 36hrs/week, £25k/pa. They return to Benson's office, do the paperwork, and Holly asks how they timed everything so well, Benson says they realised the Belles may not anticipate the time dilation so lent on a Tescos manager known to a Guild mythic to get the amicable firing. He also says not to worry, Lydia's attack was unusual and they normally do potentially violent meets offsite.

Back at the Pack House: Holly is happy with the cash but openly nervy about The Guild and trusting them, there is then a long argument about puns on geas, geece, doom, and if Lord of the Rings is satanic or not.

Jules gets on with her paintings, which start badly but then she gets into the swing of it, gets an email from Dr. Becky Clout her fine art lecturer who wants some pics for a show. Carlie reads The Werewolf Bible until she works out its a regular bible with a few tweaks, also swaps romance/werewolf books with Ariane, Sunny checks in with Lottie who deflects a lot before arranging a visit, Lydia is a bit miserable and spends time visiting churches but can't find one she likes, tries to visit the Barrel Vaulted Rave Church and The Angel Islington but the doors are always locked, eventually puts a note under and gets an address and time for a werehouse party in the East End docks tomorrow night sent to her, arranges to take Sunny and Ariane.

Lydia and Sunny have a whole discussion about how Sunny feels Lydia doesn't listen to her and wants to know if its because shes a dog, but Lydia says its because she doesn't listen to anyone, except god, part of something bigger, Sunny attempts to suggests the TV says god helps those who help themselves but Lydia deflects that not in her faith. Lydia again quotes her higher duty of care than everyone else and how she has to look after everyone, Sunny recommends podcasts about selfcare, they talk about afterlifes (Sunny's visited hers) and the conversation turns in the pack to discussions of what everyone's wishes are after they die, eventually people post contact details for next of kin in the kitchen along with funeral wishes. The party then bickers about Saints.

• Ariane says get the family sword, then her head, and any other relics a bonus
• Carlie tells everyone to never ever talk to her family even if she dies, also says no to prayer or therapy with regards this
• Jules is unsure

So at the Warehouse for the rave: There's a bunch of 40 year old ladies in a corner, Lydia chats to them and they say they're here because the D.J. cures covid/protects from covid (Lydia produces her nursing times article about Islington rates), they say its the power of Jesus being funnelled by an Angel and a nearby church is funding the raves, and they're being subtly advertised via facebook, so they're here for godly care. Meanwhile Ariane wraps Sunny in glowsticks (collar and paws), gives some to Lydia, warns everyone to be careful of the fairies and wishes she had some ecstasy.

2022-01-24

Continuing the warehouse rave: there are drugs, booze, and a bar running out the back of a van. The earlier DJ is DJ Eastboy. Ariane buys (hopefully) ecstasy from outside, and has her own water, to get into the vibe of dancing, and also accidentally gets the crowd chanting for music changes at one point. Sunny has fun dancing even when people try and grab her paws to dance like a biped, her licking of their faces doesn't stop them. Lydia is hanging with the church ladies who are breaking into two groups (A) is drinking and thinking about dancing and (B) is tutting, thinking about praying, and being judgy. Lydia is with group B, and manages to get a lemonade that probably doesn't have vodka in it, before being bothered by Ariane who she clocks is high. DJ Eastboy swaps out for The Angel Islington who of course opens with God is a DJ, Lydia checks Ariane's eyes before she goes off to dance with the church ladies of Group A.

Lydia goes to poke around the temporarily bordered off "backstage area" in one corner of the warehouse, sneaks around to use the back door and meets Eddie a scruffy, slightly pudgy programmer type who is being audio engineer and smells heavily of weed/tobacco. She introduces herself with a jammi dodger and they chat about the Angel, he claims not to know much about her, claims her angelic presentation is part of an image she sells, then tries to claim that covid is a ruse, talks of the weird church people who keep showing up, for another jammi dodger she gets let in "because it may rain" and notices his hand is very cold when she touches him, he tries to brush it off but when she checks his pulse/circulation she finds he has none. When she queries this he essentially teleports to the door to shut it then asks her why a werewolf is sniffing around because "they have a problem with him", and "something about the wyrm", he asks her a few times how many werewolves there are but she dodges it by saying her pack are on the dance floor. He explains he's working with The Angel to keep the herd clean, when Vampires feed on sick people they can feed sick, so they want to keep their feeding population safer. He also clarifies he does actually think she's an Angel. They talk about if the effect could be made more useful and used on others, he says it depends on the essence as its a rite/ritual where someone needs belief and reverence and a connection to her for it to work, needs energy for cleansing, Lydia curses about how this probably won't work in an ICU. He tells us he needs a pint of blood every few weeks (more if active) and Lydia starts talking about arranging raves near hospitals. She asks him if he attends church (which could tell us about the cross thing) and he says "only this one", she talks a little about how she's searching for an accepting church.

Meanwhile the Angel grows literal wings on the dancefloor, the music is mana from heaven, Ariane at least experiences her as light, glory, and music of the gods and a being who should be worshipped. Lydia notices the glow and Eddie asks her if she wants to meet the Angel, which just makes Lydia deny her angelicness, she can feel the divine/perfectness and music/dance energy radiating off her but keeps her resolve, telling Eddie to beware the wide and easy path, he disputes this and she says he needs sound biblical teaching, but he just tells her as a Vampire his soul won't go to heaven, although Lydia assures him he can repent like all the others.

The set winds up with the crowd picking up a chant of "God is love, love for all. God is music, and music is the Lord" and then there's a blinding white light from the stage with a last wage of love and adoration, Lydia feels this in the backstage area and writes "this is a trap" on her hand to remind herself. There's an end of "Praise Jesus, let the Lord into your soul" and The Angel vanishes off stage into the backstage area. Eddie gets her coat and stuff, Lydia and her chat and she introduces herself as "Sera". Lydia asks her what shes doing and when she says she's spreading gods love she tells her she needs to be giving proper teaching. Sara says they'll remember the feeling of god and the music, maybe go to church, maybe pick up bibles, or just pass on a smile or a handshake and be kind to others and spread gods love and joy, she balances up the alcohol/coffee/drugs as not a huge detriment to people and judges by the end result. Confirms she can cure covid, tried to get into hospitals to try it out but was thrown out and kept away, says her powers need a connection to people who hear her song, shes not tried zoom but is happy to. Lydia is told to use the Islington Tube station as a contact point for her. When asked if she's an angel she unfurls her light wings and confirms, says she's doing missionary work with Vampires and that Eddie will come around in time. Tells Lydia that God gave everyone free will, loves you, and is sorry for the things you've been through and the hard disappointments yet to come. Says she can sort of talk directly as she's a member of the Seraphim, but is stuck on earth because she failed a divine mission by falling in love with someone and being stuck in the material is her penance, hopes to return by doing good works like this. Lydia says she just needs salvation and acceptance but Sara says that's for humans and Angels have to work and agrees that Lydia's zoom call may help.

Eddie returns with her coat and they leave to drink her favourite wine because she's exhausted from doing the angelic-magic. Lydia asks what she's taking from people, Sara says its like Lydia's "godly works" (although Lydia disputes this) that people have a divine spark or gift and can temporarily gift parts of it to people, she takes a small fragment from everyone, pools the power, then adds her "knowledge and love of god" and sends it back through the love of god to cleanse them, the energy she says is freely given painlessly on the dance floor, says this isn't vampiric but just what a priest does on a Sunday. They part on good terms with Lydia going to look for her friends as she's worried about them.

Meanwhile Ariane gets Sunny to look for Lydia, and she follows her outside, they chat in first tongue (which Sara can apparently speak), she smells on sunlight, honey, etc, everything good. Ariane catches up and asks if she can stroke the Angels wings (throwing a point of gnosis to her to make it work) and Sara actually feels them which makes her shudder a little. Ariane goes to tell Lydia all about touching an Angels wings and Sunny watches her and Eddie walk away with Sara literally vanishing.

Back at the Pack House: Everyone fills in Carlie, the raves definitely help, its some kind of magic, there's a vampire doing sound tech, there's a plan to do zoom raves via headphones to see if that helps the ICU. Carlie asks the obvious question of: How much can we trust Sara? Lydia suggests even if shes not an angel if it helps a patient live longer they'll have longer to accept Jesus - a general debate about the point and length of life ensues, Holly arrives to hear about the unsound theology! Also we hear the vampire smelt of weed and Carlie wonders if this helps mask wyrm scent. There's talk of afterlives, vampires (do crosses and garlic work?), wyrm. Carlie wonders if involving Sara will summon Eddie. Ariane suggests Lydia may need to dance in the ICU to power things and she wants to test with just headphones first before that happens.

2022-01-31

Jules art show is coming up in 2 days (on Friday), meanwhile... Lydia sends a sorry note and flowers to Derek Watford, Lottie texts Sunny that she wants to hang out on Saturday and Sunny arranges for her to come over for dinner with the pack. The Stargazsers send Sunny a long at the back baggy black hoodie, it swamps her dog form but is considered an almost uniform to spending long nights outside watching the stars, they also send a thank you note apologising for vanishing but they checked on us and needed to get home to their Bell (???) and rest, and they invite Sunny to meet them at Greenwich Observatory to talk about joining their tribe in a weeks time (next Wednesday).

So at the Fine Art Building - The Art Show. The deadline is noon, andd Jules like others is there ready and early looking smart with the other 8 students. Present is the Man Cursed By God A Little who Dr. Becky Clout says is "A Patreon", there is also the building sparky arguing with Sally an artist/engineer almost (overalls, oiled fingers, etc) who is trying to hook up a metallic moving face made of weird plates to the power, eventually its hooked to a UPS, smells a little of burning electronics but also works. Another student has a film on a projector of a creepy doll staring at the camera backed by screams (the external face we must present to the world and the screams to let our primal essence out that we must keep within!), they eventually move up to dissecting dolls on camera.

Jules has 5 paintings but notable are:

• London Through The Shadow (emotional reflection of history/shade/darkness of the London skyline). Dr. Becky Clout queries about hope in the image, Jules says its lit at the front, we bring hope, Clout wants more abstract sculpture/line work version. The Man Cursed By God A Little likes it and asks if its taken from Southwark because he recognises landmarks, wants the piece in some sort of show and Jules invited.
• The Web (connection in strange ways, interactions of people link things)
• A portrait (liked by Dr. Clout) and 2 others.

After Jules does a little happy dance Sally gets her to ask the face a question, she asks if it'll rain on the way back and it tells her "I only speaks the truth, the answer is yes". Sally asserts its never wrong. On the way home Jules gets hit with a bucket of water from a 3rd floor window (your humble scribe missed the deets, please fill me in).

Back at the Pack House, there is talk of sandwiches and wine, others tell Jules about the Angel rave in the warehouse, get her to sit down, she mentions she had Liz visit during her working on her art and makes reference to "The Good Nose" (i.e. Lupus form). After all this Carlie ges out to punch punching bags in the training warehouse, Ariane meanwhile bores Jules into a nap with contract law and Sunny naps on her.

At the werehouse Diamond Annie appears looking happy, asks for a favour "from an old friend" and points out Carlie is so bad at keeping friends that 6 months makes her an old friend. She hires her to rob the back of an Ethiopian Church that is functioning as a refugee centre because she'll blend in better, was stashed by someone pre-covid, is a 6x6x4 inch box and she'll owe a favour to the Belles for it. Carlie agrees but is pissed off. She heads back to the Pack House, tells people she's stealing something to help us out and needs disguise clothes, Lydia threatens to call the cops, Jules gets woken up by all this and takes stew up to Carlie. Upstairs Carlie complains that no one else stops Lydia constantly working against them, Jules tells her shes tried but spends time trying to herd the pack, Carlie is super pissed off about the racist shit in the job description and Jules is pissed off once she's heard, Carlie is also pissed off that Jules is doing okay with her degree whereas she flamed hers and decides to call Ariane for a lawyer if things go wrong.

At the Ethiopian Catholic Church, Carlie heads in, keeps her head dwon, passes staff and the brew station and slips into the back storage room, 2 boxes are there (one with the scroll work, one plain) so she bags both. Back in the van Annie takes both boxes, fishes out "goods for the cause", 2 carved wooden fetish sticks from Ethiopia with spider spirits in, imported for someone else and diverted to her, the second box has another one in that she gives Carlie in part payment. She then takes her to the Dog and Duck to drink (she sends Jules an OK text on way). She catches Annie up with gossip: TL;DR she had to hang out with rich people all summer, and the deep umbra sucks, shes still learning the ropes she feels. Annie asserts she's a woman first, garou second because misogyny is a big problem, Carlie wonders if society is fucked. Annie reveals this was a test job and she had Brianna watching her and Carlie assumes this is blackmail and Annie assures her not because she is now an inside agent. She gets in at 4am and naps on the sofa.

Meanwhile Holly is working at The Guild, everyone is friendly except the core members (Sir Robert Laffrey, The Lady of Kowloon, etc) who get exclusively served by Mr. Benson and a few others. There seems blurred lines between staff and member, (possibly because its really a mercenary outfit?). She meets James and Stewart who are the Mythics with muscle, and also practical jokers. She notes the Librarian Lady wears a necklace like Ben Valis did. Also apparently a rogue mythic (a Geomancer who can throw rocks) is coming into Heathrow tomorrow and they'er going to arrest them and drag them straight to the US embassy for $150k in bounty (for stolen artifacts). They start to speculate what kind of mythic Holly is and with a smile Mr. Benson sets up a betting pot, if no one guesses it she gets the pot and its £100 a bet...

After her shift she comes back giggling, tells Carlie about this, gets a high 5, and worries it'll piss people off. She gets to touch the stick and can feel the spirit shifting about inside, Carlie asks her what it is? (cliffhanger!)

2022-05-07

Holly identifies the stick as holding a snake spirit, one that will offer a gift to those who befriend it, she and Carlie talk about how this is basically how a lot of garou magic works (bribe, befriend, force spirits to do things for you)

Carlie sleeps, and as she does so has a dream of a grey-brown dusty realm with a dusty red its a little like purgatory but different and she can tell she's dreaming a feeling of here-not-here. There is however a large humanish size snake, with a red diamond and 2 horns on its head. It asks her if she is its new possessor and says its name is something like "Gog-var-oh-cogh the serpent" (???), and it will willingly bond to garou to aid the tribes and has for many years, been held by many tribes such as the Hei--- (???) hero of the Coliquai (???), and Ts--- (???) the Coliquai (???) god. It asks for a bite of blood to seal the deal and explains its not a geas its a spot of spirit to seal a pact (pact not geas so... deal not compulsion?)

Carlie agrees and is bitten, she wakes in a cold sweat feeling the bite on her shoulder and gains a gift (ooc: spend 1 gnosis, roll int + occult and get invisibility while moving from people, animals, devices, spirits. Difficulty 4 if unobserved, 6 if not deliberately observed, and 8 if directly watched)), also has a small mark on her shoulder, its hard to spot but she can see its changed.

On Saturday: Lydia and Sunny are up early, Ariane asks Sunny if she needs help and then when the answer is no she curls up on the sofa with a book, Jules makes plans to dodge Lottie and go hang with Liz, Holly tries to ID some magic swords, but can't get to grips with them today, maybe later.

Around 16:00 Lottie arrives in a screech of tyres, Carlie gets the door and she is not looking instaready, instead she's in a hoodie, tatty jeans, trainers, and slouching, looking kinda depressed. She says she not doing okay and heads to the kitchen to see Sunny, who is making delicious chicken, she brought wine. She tells Lydia she's not feeling herself had a shouting mach with The Major, then her dad, then her aunt, then her dad again. She's angry, and arguing with people. The Pack in general suggest this could be a result of her (noble) werewolf heritage. Lydia tries to nudge the bible on her and gets told she thinks its crap, Ariane finally comes in to say hi, Sunny offers to teach people how to cooking things. Lottie then complains she wants news from people because she wants the vicarious werewolf life (full of meaning! And adventure! And destiny!) and Ariane tries to reassure her that her life is exciting and can be full of meaning and suggests she join XR (she was thrown out of a meeting for arguing with the anarcho-primitives). She continues to bemoan the emptiness of her life and people keep trying to reassure her.

Then she spots Maneki-neko in the microwave door waving to her and taunting her, we indicate this is a spirit cat not really there, it keeps on taunting her, there is a discussion of how long until dinner just in case and then Lottie flips into wolf form (she's very Alsatian like), struggles out of her clothing and races out of the door, Carlie feels a strong compulsion to chase the cat but fails to shift so does in human, and uses her city running gift and knowledge of the layout to take a shortcut to the cathedral, Ariane and Holly get in pursuit. Once we arrive Carlie deflects her anger with the infectious laughter gift, then goes to fetch the car. Holly and Ariane watch a big wolf stalking through the grounds towards us (the Unknown Ahroun probably) and Lottie says it's been stalking her since midsummer. It tells Holly "Tell Sunny our deal is done" and then dissipates.

Everyone gets back, Lottie tries to borrow clothes from Lydia and gets talked to about the bible again, Lottie leans into "but the gays" and Lydia talks about those "struggling with same sex attraction" who need to realise that sex is a gift from God for those in a het marriage. They talk about words vs. belief (salvation is by belief and words of acceptance, not random deeds), and Lottie says the words are easy the doing is hard, Lydia suggests accepting Jesus will make you want to transform your life to perform acts of gods love, Lottie suggests theres a lot of christian bankrobbers and drug dealers, and Lydia says they're doing it wrong by not transforming their lives. After this she gets Ariane talking about ancestor connections (relics are good, but stories, pictures, memories, and names are helpful) and also romance novels.

Eventually! The pack gets to the meal, and its pretty excellent actually, however the chocolate dessert is absolutely heavenly (ooc: like 5 successes good). Holly spots that Lottie accidentally drops in a word in spirit speech she'd heard from Maneki-neko ("flea-bitten") and checks and finds she can talk in the language of spirits. Before she goes she makes Ariane promise not to tell anyone until she's ready.

After the meal Lydia then talks about if she should do ancestor work to connect to her birth parents since she knows so little about them and Ariane tries to suggest its a good idea to at least set up a focus around the picture of them and remind herself of the story she knows of them and pray there. She voices the idea she'd just get spirits and she and Carlie talk about how scatty spirits are (Carlie reminds her the deep-umbra ones are very present but she asserts they're also very catholic).

Meanwhile... at Liz's place: Jules is holding a chicken by one lg, and Liz is threatening twiggy with a spatula that she will fireball her roots... tune in next week for more Garou Misadventuuuuuureeeess