The fight outside SubTerranean is over. The three new friends decide to call it a night after exchanging cell phone numbers and goodbyes, but not before agreeing to meet back at SubT the following night. Saorshe and Justin went home for the evening. Liam, however, decided a trip to the hospital would be best since he was impaled by a demon’s antler during the fracas.
Liam makes it to the Emergency Room without passing out, gets patched up and is told to spend the night for observation. While there he overhears talk amongst the staff about three people brought in last night that have the doctors all confused…
It’s the following day, and Saorshe reports to work at the library on time as usual. Sissy is waiting for her at the front desk and tells her that she is to re-organize the Occult Books that weren’t destroyed two nights ago as well as deal with a children’s party in the afternoon.
Saorshe heads to the Occult Section to discover that her Glamour Spell that she has cast on her family books is wearing off for some unknown reason. Did it have something to do with that Spirit from the other night? Regardless, preparing a new spell will take a day or two so she continues along performing her duties.
In passing, Sissy tells Saorshe that she needs to “catalogue the security tapes. You know… from the security system you keep forgetting to turn off every night.” It then dawns on her that the cameras might have captured something from the night she was attacked. She heads to the back room and finds the tape from two nights ago. She pops it into the antiquated VCR and scans through it looking for answers. What she does see is while everyone was standing around the front desk talking before leaving for the night, Sissy slips by everyone unnoticed toward the Occult Section…
Justin is still a shambles after his “Baby” got trashed during the fight last night. The roof of his charger now has a massive hole in it thanks to Saorshe’s backfired spell. He makes a few calls and finally reaches his old pal Ben “Punchy” McTiegue, who is a mechanic who will most likely be able to get him a good deal on the repairs.
Justin heads over to the shop and is told that the repairs will cost $500 and that his car will be finished in about a week.
Saorshe’s shift is now over, and on her trip home she receives a call from Intel. He says that after she left with her new friends last night a strange, pale woman came in asking about her. Something about her seemed “off” and she looked severely out of place, but wanted to know about her and her pals. Naturally he told her nothing, being the good friend he is.
She immediately calls Justin and Liam to tell them this new development and not to forget to meet up at SubT tonight.
Liam checked out around the mid-afternoon hours due to some fast healing on his part. The doctors thought it was a little strange that he showed nearly a week’s recovery in the space of 12 hours. Feeling fit enough to go home, he left the hospital and is now resting semi-comfortably at home.
Once home he begins to notice other strange oddities, such as the fact that his senses seem to have increased by about 200%. He can hear the couple fighting three stories above his apartment, he can see “more”, everything he touches is a new tactile experience, and he can smell something strangely familiar in the air rolling in through his open window. He can taste it too… blood.
He follows the scent outside to the garbage dumpster in the parking lot. It’s there that he is overwhelmed by not only the smell, but by the sight of a body that has been basically turned inside out. The interior of the dumpster is bathed in gore… and his enhanced vision can see three distinct blood trails heading off into the distance.
He follows each trail, but they all lead nowhere. They just end cold after a few hundred yards. Disturbed by the fact that yet again another corpse has been found in his vicinity, he makes an anonymous phone call to the police from a nearby pay phone before heading off to SubTerranean to meet up with his new friends and discuss his find.
Justin is relaxing at home watching, funnily enough, a show about a couple of demon hunting brothers. He’s cradling a warm beer and keeps checking his watch, counting the minutes until he meets up with Saorshe and Liam.
Restless, he rises from his recliner to get ready to leave when he sees some movement in a nearby mirror. He can see the reflection of someone watching him through his living room window right next to where he was sitting just a moment before. He runs to the window, but the person is fast and runs away before he can get a good look. All he saw was a pale face and dead eyes…
10pm rolls around and the three friends meet up outside SubTerranean and head inside together. Even though a demon was killed right outside last night, it hasn’t scared away the crowds. The place is busier than ever. They weave through the mass of people and find an area next to one of the speakers to stand and talk. Before they can, Intel comes up behind them and motions for them to follow him.
Intel takes them into the back room, down a long flight of stairs into the “Green Room”. There are a few musty old couches, a table littered with worn playing cards and a large metal tub filled with expired beer, bottled water and a few sodas atop a bath of mostly melted ice.
Intel says, “After last night’s scuffle I didn’t want to leave you three visible in the club. You never know who’s watching. And from now on if you need a place to hide, crash, take a nap, drop a deuce… don’t come to my place. Just come here. I’ve already talked to Pete [the owner] about it and after I told him what you all did outside last night, well, consider this place your unofficial HQ for now. He’d be honored to have you.”
They all agree that this is an awesome thing Pete has done, and proceed directly into talking about their experiences during the day; Liam’s corpse and bloody scavenger hunt, Justin’s prowler and Saorshe’s security footage discovery.
Saorshe asks Justin if she can hold his hand in order to use her psychometry ability and possibly get some additional info on his stalker. He agrees, and all she sees is what he saw; someone pale with dead eyes.
Saorshe then asks Intel about the woman who was asking about her earlier. “She was about 5’4”, early thirties. Dressed like a power player. Auburn hair, dark eyes… really dark eyes. She looked like she hadn’t slept in weeks. And she was carrying around a long tube, like something you’d keep a rolled up poster in, only slung across her torso. She didn’t ask much; just wanted to know your name and how long you’ve been practicing the magicks. You know me… mum’s the word” he replies.
This info is not sitting well with anyone, and Intel can see it. He acts accordingly by saying “Look, there’s definitely some messed up stuff going on in the BT and you all are going to need some protection… and I don’t mean Coney Island Whitefish.” He walks to a nearby section of wall that looks like ordinary cinderblock, but opens up like a cabinet. A cabinet full of weapons! “I’ve been told that I can give each of you one of these sacred weapons. Choose what you take wisely.”
“Why are they sacred?” Justin asks.
“They’ve been blessed with a powerful spell that allows them to remain invisible until they are needed. Comes in handy when you’re walking down the street looking for a fight and don’t want to cause a riot and shit.” Intel responds.
Liam takes a large sword, Justin an axe and Saorshe a pointed quarterstaff.
“So, there’s been a change of opinion when it comes to the murder, well, murders.” Intel says. “I made a few calls and the consensus has switched their votes from the “werewolf” column to the “other” column. Those In The Know don’t have any concrete answers and neither do I. I do however find it incredibly suspect that each of these dismembered bodies was found in the general vicinity of the American Werewolf in… America.”
Liam isn’t amused.
“All I can say is to watch your backs. Something or someone is out there and they’re not playing fair.” Intel warns.
Liam can sense something isn’t right, and looks to the door. He sees someone hiding behind the door frame watching them… a pale woman. The rest look to see her run up the stairs and out the back room to the dance floor.
Intel proclaims, “That’s the woman who was asking about you!”
Justin also realizes that this woman is also the same person he saw outside his window.
They pursue her up the stairs, into the club and out the front door. They see her slip into an alley across the street and they give chase. Once they reach the alley they see her standing at the opposite end, facing them. She reaches into the poster case slung across her midsection and pulls out a very nasty looking katana. She discards the case and points the sword at her three pursuers. They brandish their new weapons and move in to do battle.
Saorshe makes the first move and performs a simple levitation spell, which makes the woman hover in the air a few feet off the ground. Once she stops ascending, the woman points her sword again, this time past the three and at something behind them. They turn to see a short, chubby and naked creature standing behind them with a bow slung across its shoulder and holding a spear… an Allanni demon.
It attacks, distracting Saorshe and forcing her to loose her concentration on the levitation spell. The woman falls to the ground hard, but is up in a flash and runs at the demon. The others get in a few random hits on the creature, but Saorshe manages to unleash one of her Bolt of Light spells, which slams into the creature full force, throwing it a few feet across the alley and into a nearby cinder block wall. The impact from the point blank blast is so powerful that the demon explodes into a bloody mess… and reforms as two separate Allanni demons.
The demons attack and cause some minor damage to the heroes. Justin manages to critically would one with his new axe. The woman lands a brutal slash with her sword to the other. Saorshe levitates the one the woman is attacking while Liam manages to land a fatal blow to the other. Justin hurls his axe at the floating demon, killing it in mid-air. However, the corpse splits in two and a new duo of Allanni demons fall to the ground ready to pounce.
Soarshe touches the remains of the one complete fallen demon, and using her psychometry gleans that the reason the demons are duplicating is through the use of her own magick. If they are killed through non-magickal means they will not split into two separate beings. She relays this information to the others, who proceed to pummel the living crap out of the demons until they are dead, dead, dead.
So now the three heroes stand before this mystery of a woman, who says with a slight smirk on her pale face, “You’ll do.”
“Do what?” Liam asks.
“Help me.” She replies.
“Who are you?” Justin asks.
“The name’s Cherice. Cherice Carpenter.”
“Help you do what, exactly?” Saorshe asks.
“Help me find my killer.”
“Your killer? So you’re saying you’re dead?” Saorshe inquires.
“Yeah.”
“Haha, dead.” Justin laughs. “So that would make you a…”
The three take a step back. They’ve seen way too many horror movies to not know that she just said she’s a zombie.
“Relax. I’m undead, not a zombie.”
“And the difference is…?” Liam asks.
“Well, I don’t eat people for one. I’m just… alive. Even though I’m technically dead. I can see how this can be a little off putting.”
“Umm, yeah.” Saorshe interjects. “And you want us to help you find the person who did this to you?”
“Well, I really don’t know if the person who killed me actually did this to me or not. Regardless, I want answers and the three of you are going to help me get them.”
“There’s something else you’re not telling us…” Saorshe says, reaching out her hand to touch Cherice. “May I?”
Cherice doesn’t seem to care when Saorshe takes her hand and uses her psychometry ability to see what happened when she was murdered. She can’t see much outside of a shadowy figure standing above her gloating… but she can feel what it did to her. Saorshe pulls her hand back and gasps.
"Whatever it was, it didn’t just kill you…”
“No, it didn’t. It raped me first.”
No comments:
Post a Comment