Season Three
Summary of Events
2021-03-15
Payment was made, the pack made £14285 each. It's now Late July 2020. We all donate letters to Sunny to form a name and she calls herself Sunny Enpeem-Kaj and Ariane helps arranged forged documents for her. Brexit has happened early (July 1st is now Independance Day), we cleaned up the Wyrm Spirit Factory that Big Ben told us about offscreen. Watched an open air production of A Midsummer Nights Dream at the Hotel, they're now working on The Merchent of Venice. Sunny learnt some humaning, the rest of the Pack learnt some wolfing. Ariane got her sword repaired and paid for extra quiet.
At 10am on a summer morning we get a note saying "I know what you did last March, I am watching from the shadows, naughty puppies", all typed up on a typewriter (Maybe Ben Valis's friend David Vasiry?), we get fingerprints from the door and track it to a delivery van. There is first aid and self defence training. Holly goes to the local Bone Gnawers' moot/curry and social evening at Abdul's, run by Sanjeev, also present Abed and Clark (police clerk, doesn't like Watford), Alan Garren (a bonegnawer courier reveals someone is ordering silver and mercury). They engage in the Worship of the Rat Ritual which involves offerings to rats. We hear the Stargazers are arranging a Deep Umbra moon bridge ritual to try and hunt for the source of covid in a month (worth watching for impressive magic possibly failing).
Also Sunny makes a quiche from a recipie to practice both cooking and reading. Lydia meets Margareeth / the Old Lady again (who knows the True Londoners, lives with Jim under Westminster Bridge) who says that Jesus and the Seraphim appear once a month or so at services at Islington Tube Station at 9pm Sunday.
Jules and Ariane stakeout the Pack House in the Umbra to watch for spirits, we see weird skittering spiders watching us from the distance, feels like the ones seen at parliament? We go to bed to tell the others in the morning.
2021-03-22
The Pack shares information about Margareeth, the Spider. There are two stations The Angel (Underground) and Islington Station (Overground). Carlie and Ariane (as lupus) sniff around churches near The Angel and find nothing suspicious. Jules & Sunny goes tagging, Sunny gets takeout, Jules gets chased by police. Holly sees the spider-spirit. The Pack has a picnic on the roof to spot for it, Holly gets Sunny to chase it towards her, she gets an idea of it (Weaver Spirit - Rage 0, Gnosis 2, Willpower 7) before it vanishes into the concrete leaving a very cold hole, Ariane pokes a paw in and Jules sticks her whole head in - icy cold, lights and spiders riding a web. Goes to draw it.
Sunday we head to the stations, split up, Margareeth arrives at The Angel and we gather, she gives a knock code (3-2) takes us through a service door with a hidden bouncer, down 5 flights of metal stairs, downstairs is a hidden rave and we're greeted by Emily who smells inhuman like Margareeth. The Vicar is "the sound of music and the beat that gets us to god". Inside is a Barrel Vaulted Rave Church with some pews, a DJ setup on the altar. Lydia is unhappy with the dancing and drinking, its too loud for Sunny but she bounces from the Umbra (gauntlet 5). Half the room is inhuman. The DJ welcomes everyone (including the Garou) and bigs up DJ Sera very not human, Sunny licks her (taste of sunshine and joy, has white wings with flaming feathers) and goes human, dancing naked. Lydia resists that before being hit with a direct mind whammy and seeing the figures wings, Jules and Ariane manage to hussle people out after we get drained of gnosis. Everyone a bit unhappy with the situation and we leave before anything else happens (Lydia "It's wrong!" re: free will)
2021-03-29
Everyone heads back to the pack house for sleep. The next day woke up late, Jules made coffee, Carlie made a fry up. Lydia is unhappy and grumpy. We talked of clothes for Sunny, talked of the night club - possession? Drugs? Good spirit feeding? Bad spirit feeding? How did they know we were Garou?
Holly realises she's late for work so Jules gets her a sandwich and she heads out at speed! The rest of us bicker about religion (mostly Ariane and Lydia). Jules phones Jimmy The Drug Dealer to score some acid/cartoons, they also chat about finding Ben Valis's head in a river.
Lydia calls David Chetstow (Bishop of Southwark) asks about the underground church, directed towards the Church of Our Lord the Saviour aka Grace Life who do a lot of music/church outreach. So Ariane and Lydia head out to church, meet a blonde woman with a bob who answers the door, inside there's offices + a church and its very corporate/US republican. Meet Elder Pastor Tom Drion who doesn't know about that specific underground church and recommends his own with patriarchial leaflets. Head back via The Angel tubestation, the door smells non-human but is locked. We spot the woman with the bob is tailing us but leaves once Lydia says hello politely.
Back at the pack house Jules is painting, can see into the Umbra a little, sees a large Weaver spirit below through the floor, leans in to see it and gets the face coldness, also sees tiny golden sparkling spiders in the electrical cabling. Also becomes fixated on large purple elephants as the key to everything.
Holly arranges a meeting with her parents for Next Thursday to talk about spirit rituals and maybe the Angel Islington.
The evening at the Pack house a house goes up from the Dagenham Deadbeats (they killed a wyrm spirit in a factory, also some masked men immune to the delerium shot at them), Jules appears - tries to explain her work, takes us to see it, the elephant one isn't useful, the spiderweb one really is. Ariane checks for cabling where she saw the Weaver spirit, Holly checks the Umbra for anything that could be parsed as an elephant, nothing. Ariane suggests putting Jules in a hot air balloon. Pack debates plans - talking to the spider? leaving note for the note-leaver? sending spirit email? Holly talks to The Bell of Southwark who explains to talk to Weaver need a messenger spirit (small Spiderling) who live near tech boxes, or Glasswalkers have specific gifts. Pack plans a message ("meet us on the rooftops late in the evening") and agrees to at least for now go by the pack name of The Southwark Belles and Holly sends that with a spiderling.
2021-04-05
The pack prepped for Packnic II: (This time it has Tesco's Finest) by sending Holly to the shops with her staff discount in the hope that whatever shows up will be friendly and they can make friends with it. Then in the Umbra about 23:55 there is almost an earthquake, the building shakes and Jules can see flicking in the road below, with an effect like tearing a seam of fabric a huge Spider spirit emerges head first (the road healing up behind it) - The Weaver of Laws and Rituals aka The Mother of All Parliaments. Ariane tries to consult her ancestors for advice and gets a general "use caution" for weaver spirits, Holly meanwhile just talks to the spirit, introducing the pack formally and acting as a go between. The conversation includes these key points:
It's here to get to know us because we got a boon from its Bell pledging ourselves to defence of the realm and it wants to know what we can do that isn't just killing Wyrm influence (which is what Garou are normally good for). It notes we discussing things more than other packs and asks if we are a democracy (it likes those). It notes we got read of Ben Valis (a non Wyrm threat to the country) but wonders if we will finish the job of persuing David Vasiry ("The Alchemist") and if we will kill him or deliver him to it's "Agents of Enforcement" (The Met). It wants us to follow the right "processes rites and rituals" to have a judgement passed on David Vasiry (Ben Valis already had a judgement passed by MagiPol). If we do just kill him outright then it will judge us for how and why we do it (i.e. we need to get the Grandese to sign off on his death or have a very good excuse and be willing to stand trial). Also it approves of the New Testament that Lydia offers it because it is a "higher power for the people that helps them find moral fortitude". It tells us that in the future instead of sending a Spiderling to it we should seek it out at the Palace of Westminster.
Ariane tries to explain to Sunny why the English don't eat horse meat (Jules brings it up in conversation) and comes down on horse cults and dislike of the French then has to try and explain countries. Sunny is baffled by human sillyness. The discussion is that memory loss and possibility of having eaten demon-horse is worse. Sunny discusses how she doesn't recall the first time she turned human well either (shape shifting can be traumatic in general probably) and Ariane suggests the pack can come hunt deer on her families land in the summer once Covid has died down (and Lydia talks about preaching the good word).
So on a Thursday in June there's does a Research Montage (Jules, Sunny, Ariane, and Lydia): Ben Valis and David Vasiry met in Washington D.C. and before Valis was preparing for death, but Vasiry did something that gave him hope, they joined several people in doing something before it went wrong (MagiPol worked out they were murdering people for immortality?) and they had to flee the country. There is a gap of a few years before David joins Ben in London at which point the diaries get more vague. We discover that David has a reliance on quinine.
Carlie hits the net and discovers that David Vasiry has been posing as a prep school chemistry teacher and "retiring" every 30 years since the 60s, working for very rich schools that include things like research trips to Israel and Egypt. She tracks down its the same man in the photos each time.
Holly meanwhile goes to see her Parents, they talk about how it feels to be Garou, and its revealed her Great Uncle went by the name of Harold Styles as a Stargazer. He told them tales of meeting a great bear spirit, transformed in front of family members to save them in the war. Holly talks to them about Bell and the other spirits shes met, they talk about their pagan religion being around feeling the spirits but they know they can't directly contact them. Thave have heard of the Barrel Vaulted Rave Church, a DJ (DJ Sera?) shows up there 1-2 times a month and everyone at the events is cured of Covid and protected from it, this was witnessed by Angela's Kids who took Angela there and her cough went away. An old lady (Margareeth?) managed to get into a Zoom call they were in on where a Reverand was giving a service and talked about the DJ, she then said that sometimes Jesus appears there and was kicked from the call. They pass on a scroll from her Great Uncle and ask for a translation. Holly then goes to the Bone Gnawers meeting, where Alan Garren gives her the address for David Vasiry who is the one who has been ordering mercury and silver (Holly owes him a favour now). She also learns the Stargazers are going from Hampstead Heath. They have heard of The Angel Islington as a figure who shows up, does magical things then vanishes. She once interuppted a brewing fight between Vampire clans by making them all perform singing in the rain.
The pack reunites at the Pack House and makes plans to stalk and hunt David Vasiry.
2021-04-12
The Pack formed various ideas to track David Vasiry: Umbra scope out the house, physical scope out the house, check the teachers register, see if we can feel silver at any possible property. Decide to start with an Umbra stalk of the house (about an hour away). David Vasiry's House is a detached 1930s place in a line of semis, 2 bed, kitchen out back, garden, bay windows, no magical aura. Discussion about how art vs. science magic is with Jules asserting its quite precise chemistry, not just following a recipe. We talk to an Elm Tree Spirit out back that's been there since the 1930s, Ariane tries a florid introduction without effect but Sunny scent marks it and it starts to talk in groaning tree language and Holly plays interpreter for the pack. It's called "Tree", says no one has climbed its branches for 15 years and it misses it. It can't really help us, senses only extend to bark and branches. Jules respectfully climbs the tree to get it back in touch with how that feels and it likes it. From there the inside of the house seems illdefined to her, hears that the young man who used to climb it did for 10 years or so 15 years ago, the last time he climbed it he spent some time up there enjoying it (probably the kid of the last family to live here before Vasiry bought it?). Sunny sniffs the garden, smells of weird fertilizer and plants, very natural.
Carlie and Jules go into the back of the house. Inside they met a strange silver wyrm dragon serpent thing? Had wings, no scales, a button nose, wrapped around the bannister watching them, it blinks in response to conversation but nods in response to being asked if it spoke English, when asked if it minded their presence it trilled and watched. They took a small mirror to peer into the front room, involved looking through a hard to pierce Arcana Array, the front room was redone a few years ago, generic (TV, DVDs, gaming console, etc). They moved to the back room and the silver spirit creature trilled, looped in the aira and faded out. Back downstairs room they saw a woman exercising on a bike, talking to Carl Rodrigos who takes her place, there's no romantic tension, but a professional edge. Upstairs they fail to see in the front bedroom, back bedroom is military cots and the woman is seen servicing a glock pistol with silver bullets.
The Pack bails on the area, Holly moots the idea these may be the headhunters who are immune to delerium. We put out a howl with the address and details in, back at the Pack House we get communications from Derek Watford, the Dagenham Deadbeats, and Diamond Annie and arrange a meeting at 10pm at The British Museum. Before we go in we see a Rodriguez (a mediterranean guy in a suit) who Watford is scared of (by scent). Sanjeev is there as the rep for Dagenham Deadbeats and Annie for the Forty Elephants, Watford for The Guild but also Grandese of London. Jules holds the chair position for the meeting - fill them in on killing Valis and how Vasiry and Carl Rodrigos are known accomplices. Sanjeev says Dagenham want them killed because 2 of their pack are laid up with silver injuries, wants Watford to assure us that the Grandese will authorise us killing these mythics in retribution. Watford reveals the garou on the Grandese coucil is Sir Robert Laffrey, alpha of The Guild. Lydia reminds everyone The Mother of Parliaments wants us to bring people in for due process and Ariane concurs. Sunny sneaks out during the bickering which ends in Dagenham telling us we have a week to construct a plan (they'll help) before they just roll in the front door and kill everyone. Everyone agrees to go for Chinese and Annie takes a leaflet from Lydia to mess with Jules who bet a dinner on it.
Sunny meanwhile snuck out into the wider museum, tracking Watford's scent to an office, smells the ozone/burnt electronics smell of the person we met in Lee Ho Fooks in Season_Two#2020-12-14 and meets Rodrieguez (who looks totally different), listens to him moving around in his office through a crack in the door, then gets chatting and introduces herself. He says he works here, refers to her as a "talking dog" (the person we met in Lee Ho Fooks knew we were garou), and invites her into the main museum building to smell an old wooden box (scent of rosemary) which helps him determine its use. He offers to bring her back for future smelling of interesting objects and she licks his hand before leaving (taste of leather, steel, and a tiny electric shock).
2021-04-19
The Pack was relaxing at Lee Ho Fooks with Diamond Annie (who it turns out is friendly with Maneki Neko). Ariane tries to convince people that wimbledon and cricket are glorious English rituals, and also about the Prophecy of the Phoenix and is largely ignored, there is talk of souls and who has them and if Ben Valis was putting them at risk with demon work. Diamond Annie reveals she has been trying to get the secret of the Beef Chow Mein recipe and its effects for years and will pay handsomely if someone can provide it.
Two of the Dagenham Deadbeats arrive: Bill Stone and Kyle Waters, Sanjeev fills them in on events and they are very angry and rage filled, Jules makes it clear that they can come along if/when we go into the property. Diamond Annie checks her phone and says one of her people watching the house has spotted another watcher, asks if its ours (its not), shows us a photo of a chinese woman in a car watching the house. Plan is to go check it out, Kyle (another Lupus) shifts into something much like a red setter and Carlie drives him and Sunny to go on a scouting mission. Diamond Annie also leaves and hands Lydia a note saying "If you can teach me something I'll teach you something" and a time/location for a week ahead.
On the scouting mission: the two dogs split up and head along the street, Sunny notices the car smells of liquor, beer, jasmine, and gun oil - barks a warning. The woman starts to look out, spots them and realises something is afoot, she tries to chat to them but Kyle plays dumb, they notice she has ammo clips and something weird and silver on her belt (almost a ball) and has a glowing tattoo on her wrist. Sunny goes to lick the tattoo and the woman steps back very quickly (in a weird way) and is wary, she goes for her jacket, ignores distractions and starts trying to interrogate the two garou. The strange silver wyrm dragon serpent thing uncoils from her belt and trills. Carlie moves the car up, honks the horn to signal to the wolves their escape route is available, the woman spooks, makes a dash persued by Kyle, she turns and shoots him with an airsoft gun and he falls unconscious, yellow paint on her muzzle. Carlie talks her down and says the dogs are with her, they agree to talk things out and use Carlie's car (they load the unconscious Kyle in the back).
The team reconvines at the warehouse we did the Alpha Games at, we learn she's Sun Wang Lee aka Liz a mythic specialising in Spiritalis who's a guild member. The strange silver wyrm dragon serpent thing is Yan Shee her spirit companion, it knows we're garou and is capable of sometimes manifesting the in physical world, it chats to Holly who butters it up a little. She tells us her guild was gearing up to take down Ben Valis but was beaten to it, currently has a £5000 contract for Carl Rodrigos (alive) for theft of arcane objects/artifacts (some silver bangles) that are "ori amlifico" (?) devices, each amplifies a physical blow (bare hand or with tool), he ordered them then stole them when he couldn't pay. Her job is to bring him in to a police station where she'll give a specific case number and Derek Watford will come and collect him. She doesn't know who the woman in the house is, and is in general feeling out her depth, has thought about attempting to just knock on the door and stun them with her gun but realises she may die. Reveals the yellow paint stuff is a contact sleeping potion that works for about a day on mythics.
Holly calls Sanjeev and asks what to do about Kyle and he agrees to come pick him up in the Abduls restaurant van. Lydia tries smelling salts and similar but he opens his eyes a fraction then goes back under, so Lydia washes it off carefully and wakes him up, he's groggy and we fill him on events before he's loaded carefully into the van with Sanjeev. About 2:30am The Pack returns home, with talk of possibly teasing Kyle in a friendly way, Lydia reveals she has a brother called Adam possibly in conversation.
The next day Diamond Annie texts Jules with "Nice take down not subtle", Lydia gets a delivery card with payment due, so goes to fetch it with Sunny, its a bunch of her leaflets that Diamond Annie stole and posted back with extra rocks in and insufficient postage ("Thought you might like these back, sorry for the cost"). Jules does some research into wards as we want to see if we can set one up to find out how hard they are to break but its 10s of hours to get even a small one going. Lydia and Ariane go of to watch the house from the Umbra, and Jules plans to Contact Liz.