Session 16


(Lol sorry this took so long I am such garbage)

 

June 20th, 2015

 

So ever since we got Hades’s head in a box, I’ve been trying to call Clementine since well, she was the one to warn me to stay a changeling or else he’d invade Earth or some shit. So what the fuck happens now? Then there’s also the question if Hades is actually, truly dead. Is he? I mean, it sure looks like he is, but Leo has “aspects” of himself that are all a part of him and the Duke had mentioned an “aspect” of himself having been murdered but he’s still a thing? What the fuck is going on? Well, back on the subject of calling Clementine, I’ve been trying, but each time I call the number she gave me, I get something different. I’ve gotten a florist, a small child asking if I’m his mom (that’s a little worrying), some clicking bug noise and then there’s screaming like someone is getting murdered. Now this morning I got two pizza places. I decided to be cheeky and order ‘clementine pizza’, send one to Meridian’s, and the other I had delivered to here. With that done, I figure now to go and talk to Leo, ask him what he can tell me about… True Fae and their aspects shit. Basically it’s all super weird. He tells me that while Hades is also… well, Hades, he is also the the Underworld realm itself, like the land, servants and what the fuck have you, that a True Fae controls EVERYTHING about their domain. From what Leo was saying, I guess True Fae like to take humans and make changelings cause it’s something that isn’t them?? But in any case, it’s likely that even with the Hades I and Rowan know as “gone” he’s still not dead, and another True Fae could have absorbed that “aspect” of Hades and changed to be a bit more like him. So. Great. I remember before Ways booped us outta there that Orpheus, the Duke and the White Queen (Winter Queen? Ice Queen? Fucking whatever) were all there too. Ugh. I do let everyone know about this, that ‘hey Hades may still be a sorta threat and he’s probably pissed a part of himself got axed so, just be on the look out.’ Yeah a collective sigh was had by all.

Anyway. We’re all getting ready for the party or just killing time before the party. Ava and Rowan (along with Karen) are out to get Ava something nice, Jacob has been like… helping around the clinic. Sweeping or petting the puppies or some shit. I’m about to head out to get a glamour fix when I see this woman wearing black with short cropped hair coming up. I recognize her as… fuck… what was her name? ...Right. Striding Grass Monk. She was there at the big supernatural conference. She says she wants to talk to me so, okay, sure, I take her up to my place. She says she wants to know about Jessica, and I tell her she’s a bitch, but apparently that isn’t enough information (why the fuck not?) but okay. I tell Monk that Jessica wants to “cure” me of my changeling-ness due to my glorified sperm donor Zerxes, and that Jessica is in cahoots with the Winter Queen. Winter Monarch. Whoever the fuck leads the Winter Court. I also try to explain about my… honestly random and sporadic friendship with Clementine, but that she’s against Jessica which is cool. I show Monk the card that Clementine gave me to call on. While I see it as one number, Monk sees it as some kind of punch card. Alright. Weird magic bullshit, whatever. Monk wants to take a better look at it, so I let her. She seems to be focusing on it real intently and then just… disappears. Well alrighty then. I call Clementine again and this time I get some creeper heavily breathing on the line so I hang up. Get a knock at the door and it’s the pizza I had ordered. I pay the guy and take it in. Clementine pizza with ricotta, it was actually pretty good. What’s weird though is that the phone number on the box, the area code? It’s for one nowhere near here, and when I look it up, it’s for someplace called Murias. Fucking what? Monk then reappears, I welcome her back. She somehow wasn’t ware she disappeared. Alright. I ask her why she’s trying to look into Jessica so much. The deets are that Monk is concerned Jessica may be up to some shady and illegal mage business, that Jessica may be illegally looking into becoming an archmage without having told anyone she was doing so, which is apparently a major no-no. Monk also explains how mages are connected to a particular kind of magic that is linked with “watchtowers”, and that Monk is connected to a watchtower that’s in the realm of Stygia, which is like the Underworld (real Underworld??) so she’s a necromancer associated with death and all. Jessica’s though, is from Arcadia, so that explains her creepy fondness for fae shit. I explain to Monk too that there was someone we know that Jessica had perhaps did some magic shit on to make them less fae, so I guide Monk to talk to Leo. Alright, so Leo shedding off his aspects wasn’t totally Jessica’s fault, but he’s still not… True Fae or such any more, that he’s more like us now, a changeling. Monk thanks us for our time, leaves some contact information and goes, and I finally head out to get my glamour.

Guess not long after I had left, Jacob hears some tinkering in one of the patient rooms of the clinic. Instead of looking into it, he calls Rowan with the main vet phone and they proceed to head on out back to the clinic, since they and Ava only walked down the block to get some clothes. Jacob hears a male voice and lo and behold, it’s Clarence, holding a fucking syringe and telling Jacob it’ll only hurt a little. Jacob of course fucking bolts. When Rowan sees Jacob run out of the clinic, they start making a beeline for it. They notice that someone had clearly been through, rummaged through the equipment and stole some tranquilizer and a syringe. Rowan tries to find where the culprit went but no cigar. So they instead look on the camera’s. They see Jacob and what happened with Clarence, and after Jacob ran for it, Clarence was about to go after him, but instead took something out of his pocket, squeezed it and disappeared, then Rowan came in. Rowan does get Jacob to come back, but warns that Clarence may still be lurking about.

Meanwhile back with Ava and Karen, they’re still out shopping in Buffalo Exchange when Ava notices there’s been someone hanging out by a rack of clothing for a rather long time. She tries to see if there’s any weirdness coming off of him. The guy himself isn’t weird, but he is CARRYING something supernatural. Ava let’s Karen know what’s up, she goes and walks close to the guy and comes back around, having Ava go into a fitting room to show her that she had nicked the guy’s wallet. Nice. Find out that the dude is British, from London and his name is Kieran Price. Also that is fucking loaded as far as credit cards go. So Ava picks out some clothes and the pair head out to see if creepo follows them. He doesn’t, but a blond woman does instead. Ava let’s Karen know and Karen says she has an idea. They duck down an alleyway and Karen takes out this baton. When the woman comes around the corner, Karen fucking knocks the damn wind out of her, and even hard enough to have lifted her off her feet. I know Karen ain’t exactly a normie what with being Liz’s assistant, but she really clearly AIN’T A NORMIE. Karen then pins the woman down with her shoes and says they have some questions. She tries the whole ‘oh I’m not at liberty to tell you’ and Ava informs her that well, bitch, ya kinda are now. So they’re tailing Ava and that they’re looking for Leo but are not affiliated with Georgina. That it’s “family business”, “his family”. They’re descendants of Leo. Awwh shiiit. That’s fucking awkward. The family elders wish to speak to Leo about some fucking destiny he has to fulfill or fucking whatever, then Ava gets the woman’s contact info and her name (it’s Mathilda Bradley). They let her go but tell her to stop following them, and that ya know, maybe just asking up front would yield better results than being a creeper, ya know?

So Ava and Karen head on back to the clinic, and I’m getting back there too just as they are. Rowan let’s us all know about the Clarence situation and Ava tries to Detect Wyrd, picks up some powerful faerie magic. As well as mint and armpit sweat. Gross. We figure that it isn’t safe to remain at the clinic since Clarence may still be around nor do we wanna compromise the Hollow, so we all opt to crash at other peep’s places. Rowan, Ava, Leo and Jacob opt to go with Liz. I don’t wanna add to that crowd so I say I’ll go with Dmitri, even knowing that fucking Zerxes is there. Ava does mention about the encounter with the woman but Leo doesn’t have a clue about this family business or this “destiny” he has. So that’s news to him too. Well, I pack up some stuff and head on over to the houseboat. And look who greets me it’s fucking Zerxes. He tries to hug me but I ain’t fucking giving him one. But I do pointedly give Dmitri one when I see him. I try not to bug him too much since he’s doing some coordination shit for the ongoing war against the Pure, so I play video games, Ava arranges with these Leo descendants to meet up and we all get ready for the Spring Fling tonight.

It’s the Farewell to Spring party, which as is always the case with Meridian’s parties, fucking over the top. He also has a betting pool going on to see ‘who crashes it first’. Angels? Vampires? Werewolves? True Fae? Orpheus? SOMEONE NEW? WHO KNOWS? IT’S A ROULETTE. Ava is playing music, people’s are mingling, I’m dancing with Dmitri, it’s all going pretty well but then I notice something scuttles across the banquet table, it wasn’t too large, maybe the size of a rather small cat. I urge Dmitri to come over so we can better investigate. He says the best he can smell is crickets. We let the others know what’s going on and Dmitri suggests that Liz may get a better idea about what’s happening than he can. She makes a teasing jibe how that’s racist before going to check out the banquet table. She eventually goes over to a heating grill with the cover popped off, then turns into mist and goes on up. Fucking cool. Then that’s when the bad shit happens. Me, Rowan and Jacob are feeling nauseous and some people just collapse. Meridian, Leo and some other party goers. Dmitri is still up as are some others. Rowan and Jacob check in on the people that conked out, and it’s clear that they’ve been drugged with some kind of poison that neither of them have seen or heard about before. So the banquet table had been fucking poisoned. Great. We start to try and evacuate those that we can, since clearly shit is going down. Dmitri is taking off his clothes so he can hulk wolf out and we hear a splintering sound and booted feet coming up the stairs. Liz comes out of the heating vent and reforms, cursing a bit as she does. Ava begins to rock out with the playlist she had compiled in the hopes of getting some of these motherfucking angels to fall and stop attacking us, the music inspiring hope and rebellion. The jack-booted thugs that come up are, of course, Homeland Security. They pause at hearing Ava’s music and start arguing amongst themselves. Some are under the thrall of the music, some not. Liz and Dmitri duck out a back door to see about “culling the herd”. Be great if I could help, but ain’t no way I can when I’m barely able to stand. Jacob and Rowan had conked out themselves due to the poison and I’m stubbornly staying awake. I try to drag Jacob and Rowan to somewhere a little safer, the thugs back out and someone else comes up, Ava senses they smell like motor oil so clearly and angel. They’re rather ambiguous on their gender and are wearing a suit, looking a little annoyed. They go to the vent and this… cricket/frog hybrid comes out and hops onto their shoulder before going to stand in front of Ava, watching. Ava ask in a bit of her snarky way if they’ve got any requests, and all they say that this was rather unexpected. That they want to abduct and hunt us and that the “higher ups reeeeeally like us” but I don’t think it’s in a way we really are thrilled about. The angel dude asks what this is all for, and Ava states she will explain… with the power of rock. So she plays on, the angel then just turns and leaves. There’s an explosion then from outside and I go to check it out. It’s a fucking mess outside. Bunch of SWAT gear discarded, bodies around with their throats torn out. There’s some people sitting in a fetal position crying their eyeballs out, with a scorch mark around them on the sidewalk. I don’t see Liz or Dmitri anywhere so I go on back up. Then they’re just coming on up, looking like bloody messes. Liz looks peachy and Dmitri well… he’s all wolfy at the moment. They say that the guy in the suit had gone out, clutched their face, there was a bright light and he fucking exploded. So nice. Ava killed with the power of rock. So, well… with that, we all proceed to head on back to our respective places to crash for the night.

 

June 21st

 

Well I guess I should have figured one of us was gonna wake up in someplace that isn’t where they went to sleep at, and guess who it is? It’s meeee. I wake up, naked, in a concrete room. Floor, walls and all, with a bunch of creepy voodoo symbols on the wall or some shit. I dunno. I don’t fucking recognize them. I see that I am also on some slab, bound down. I think for a moment on how to get out and remember I have a Contract that can help. I use it and whoo, free from the bonds. I can’t get the door open though. I try to see if I can make a gateway to the Hedge anywhere, but no, fucking can’t. So I am god damn stuck. With nothing better to do, I fiddle with the camera’s.

In stark contrast, everyone else wakes up just fine, if slightly hung over from the poison or drug or whatever the angels spiked the banquet with (I also got word that Meridian wants the caterer killed, that it’s in their contract. Also I will be bringing my own snacks to these parties from now on.) Ava explains to Leo briefly what had happened last night and he’s rather surprised at having experienced becoming drugged and hung over. She then tries to call me but surprise, doesn’t get me. Someone does pick up, but they don’t say anything. Eventually though, after much pestering from Ava, they say they’re not authorized to tell her what’s going on and Ava asks who the fuck are they. They only say that I’m indisposed for research (what) and Ava asks for who but gets hung up on. I think we all know for fucking who. Next she tries calling Dmitri, but it’s not Dmitri that picks up. It’s fucking Zerxes. So back from the top, Ava is asking what the fuck has happened to me and Zerxes claims “I’m fine” and Ava rightfully calls him out on being an asshole and that ya know, kidnapping your daughter and forcing her to change ain’t exactly how you win affection points with said daughter. No fucking shit. He hangs up. Next, Ava calls Geoffrey, and this time she actually gets who she’s calling for. She asks him what has happened to Dmitri and is told that he’s in trouble, because he had attacked Zerxes and defied his authority when it came to the whole deal about me (bawww, best boyfriend ever!!). Geoffrey says further that Dmitri is to be punished for his defiance. Ava assures him that there has got to be some sort of misunderstanding happening and that she wants to help. Apparently Zerxes has a few bases scattered all over the place, five in total, and provides the addresses. Rowan is googling them and getting a street view of the places, finding out that there’s one in Duvall, Auburn, Carnation, Concrete and the last one is in Everett. Ava thanks Geoffrey for his help, and he asks her to make sure that their “help” doesn’t cost them Zerxes’s alliance in helping with the war against the Pure. Ehehehe, yeah, we’ll try dude. But no promises. Not that Ava really said those exact words, I don’t think. I hope. Rowan manages to hack into traffic camera’s around these safe houses to try and get an idea where Dmitri and I have been taken to. Several hours later, the locations in Auburn and Everett haven’t yielded anything noteworthy, so it’s narrowed down to the other three. Opting to try the safe house in Carnation first, the rest of the group takes one of Liz’s SUV’s along with Karen tagging along. At the property, it in a wooded area, fairly secluded with hardly any neighbors close by. Rowan notes that there are… things in the undergrowth, with fingers pointing to them being wolves (gee who woulda thought?) They’re trying to get a sense of what the place is like, checking on their phone to see if there’s any fences around the house and luckily there isn’t. As they’re doing that, a pickup truck drives by, slowing down and clearly scoping out the place. It’s noted that there’s a Confederate flag flying from the back. Three guesses who these fucks are and the first two don’t count. Rowan finds a stray cat wandering around and dubs them as Patches, asking if they saw either me or Dmitri taken into the house. They didn't see me, but they did see someone that they described as “looking like a dog but not.” It's a bit vague, but it could be Dmitri. Rowan sees of trying to get a closer look while everyone else hangs back with the car, just then Leo gets a text from someone by the name of Burlap Jack, who's from the Autumn Court. He apparently has something of note to share.

Meanwhile, back with me, the little slot on the door opens up and who else could it be but that bitch Jessica? I remind her about a little thing about basic decency and human rights and how she is kinda, sorta, breaking both super hard. But she doesn't give a fuck. I could feel this pressure on my head as she's telling me to sleep again, but I'm doing my best to resist. Then, the pressure stops, and it turns out Clementine has arrived to save my ass, and thus also pisses Jessica right the fuck off. While she is doing that, I can hear her being on the phone with someone, from what I can make out Clementine is on the phone with Ava and tells her (and by extension me) that we're on Queen Anne. She hangs up. Rowan had got some Intel from the werewolves at the house that who they had captured last night WASN'T a Pure, so that has got to be Dmitri. Awesome, go and save him. Except they don't, they turn around and come back for me. God dammit! I'm fine! Fucking fuck!

Ugh, well, they do manage to get to Jessica’s, which is some swanky house, but then another car pulls up. It's that Striding Grass Monk lady from the all supernatural huddle group. And what a coincidence, she is here to see Jessica too. Someone asked about Clementine (I forget who, hey I wasn’t there, don’t judge me) and Monk says that she’s an urban legend among the mage community. Iiiiiinteresting. Wonder what she’d have to say to that? Anyhoo, there’s a bit of a fiasco in getting into the house. Ringing the door bell, no one answers it, Ava can’t pick the lock, they even break the glass of the door and unlock it and STILL can’t get in. So clearly there’s some magical bullshit ward or whatever keeping intruders out. Luckily though, we have faerie bullshit to help us out. Ava manages to get in with some Contract , but she couldn’t bring anyone else in. She’s taken a note from Leeroy Jenkins and goes on in. Rowan and Jacob manage to find a window to crawl through in order to get inside. Some shenanigans later with some animated statue later, Ava gets downstairs and hears Clementine and Jessica having a rather loud argument. Ava calls out to Clementine and she so helpfully fetches Ava, bringing her to some… fuck man, pocket dimension? I dunno, the deets I got was that there’s some gateway to the Abyss in Jessica’s basement and it’s all kinds of bad hoodoo. Way out of my knowledge and comfort zone. Ava finally, FINALLY, finds me and busts me free, after having looked through two others doors where one contained a dead changeling and the other some… Hedge beast that looked like a pretty boy that could turn into a swarm of butterflies, whom we let out after making him promise not to hurt us. But hey, Jessica is free game. While heading out, I find a box with my stuff in it and get my clothes back on, find my phone and call that piece of shit douchelord of a sperm donor Zerxes. I demand that he let go of Dmitri right the fuck now but he’s all ‘oh I might consider your opinion if you were a werewolf and I was trying to fix you so you could reclaim your true heritage’ and all of that fucking horse piss. Fuck you Zerxes, you can’t fix what ain’t broke, I ain’t damaged. The fucker hangs up on me so Rowan calls him instead, again demanding to release Dmitri and hey, did you a solid in that we haven’t sicked the Pure on your candy asses. Rowan jumps the gun a bit and tells Zerxes to get the fuck out of Seattle, which he gladly does… and taking all of his posse with him and leaving Dmitri behind wherever he’s been keeping him. Okay. I want Zerxes gone or dead, but I wanted that AFTER we got Dmitri back safe and sound! Dammit Rowan! It’s a mad dash to get to where Dmitri is and rescue him. Ava calls up Benji to say we had done goofed and we could really use some assistance. Thankfully, he’s sending help our way and I can only hope that Dmitri is okay. If he’s dead, I will come for you Zerxes. You’ll regret this.