Character Sheet: Colonel Lloyd Davies
Appearance
Prelude

Journal Entries:

Thursday, June 1st, 1995
Friday, June 2nd, 1995
Saturday, June 3rd, 1995
Sunday, June 4th, 1995
Monday, June 5th, 1995
Tuesday, June 6th, 1995
Thursday, June 8th, 1995
Saturday, June 10th, 1995
Friday, June 23rd, 1995

Name: Colonel Lloyd Davies
Player: Chris Johnson
Status: N.P.C. (Player Resigned)
Chronicle: Santa Cruz/Mage
Essence: Questing
Nature: Surviver
Demeanor: Judge
Tradition: Akashic Brotherhood
Mentor:
Cabal: Eselen

ATTRIBUTES:
Physical: Strength-2, Dexterity-4, Stamina-4
Social: Charisma-2, Manipulation-3, Appearance-1
Mental: Perception-3, Intelligence-2, Wits-3

ABILITIES:
Talents: Alertness-3, Dodge-2, Intimidation-2, Subterfuge-2
Skills: Do-2, Firearms-3, Leadership-2, Meditation-2, Melee-2, Stealth-2, Survival-2
Knowledge: Investigation-2, Linguistics-2, Medicine-2

SPHERES:
Correspondence-2, Forces-2, Life-1, Mind-2, Prime-2

Backgrounds: Arcane-2, Destiny-2, Dream-1, Mentor-2
Merits & Flaws: Addiction: Caffeine (-1), Dark Fate (-5), Medium (+2), Nightmares (-1), Spirit Magnet (+3)

Arete-4
Willpower-7
Quintessence-0
Paradox-2

Appearance: He is a lean man, about 5'10" in height, with a face best described as weatherbeaten. His skin was permanently burned a nut brown by his hours of training and his outdoor lifestyle. His hair is kept long and tied back, sometimes braided, and he keeps a well trimmed beard. These serve to make him very difficult to recognize to his former employers, who are used to him clean-shaven and with a strick military buzz-cut. He moves smoothly and with precision, waisting as little motion as possible. His voice is a rough baritone, pitched quietly for the most part, though capable of astounding volume when necessary. Force of habit cause him to keep a gun concealed in the fatigues he customarily wears. His shirts are generally loose fitting and colored in bland earth tones. He always carries a walking stick, his weapon of choice for meelee combat, and his foci for applicable spheres, which he will try to pick up given time.

Prelude:

Colonel Lloyd Davies was a member of Army special forces, specializing in infiltration and counter intelligence activities. His record was distinguished and quite varied, though his role in the latter part of his career was mostly C&C; (Command and Control). It led to a few of his formidable skills becoming slightly rusty.
He became a scholar of the "Art of War", "The Five Rings" and other words of Eastern Philosophy relatively late in his career, around the time of his promotion to Captain. The elegance of these theories appealed to Lloyd. He began to see past the boundaries of their themes and into the power of the philosophy as a whole. It attracted him as nothing other than Love of Country had before. He devoted himself to studying it in his time off.
His career proceeded, taking him to Viet Nam, Grenada, Iran, and several other places that never made the news. He began to feel that his life lacked a moral certitude. Surely the Way was never meant to justify murder by stealth. Surely his country could think of better ways to handle its problems. His dissatisfaction and moral quandary grew, though he never let it show to his men. There had to be a wiser course. There had to be battles worth fighting.
It was in the Philippines that he finally cracked. His squad had been sent in to deal with a potential nuclear threat. It was a blind kill, no reconnaissance permitted. His men were ordered to access the target compound, neutralize all hostiles with minimal traces, and retreat to a Landing Zone some five miles distant. The mission went like clockwork. Lloyd waited outside the compound, keeping watch and coordinating the movements of his men. They left without firing a single shot, thirty-five corpses in their wake. The retreat went as ordered as well. It was when the LZ was reached that it all went terribly wrong. The 'copter opened fire on the squad, killing almost everyone. Lloyd managed to get out of the line of fire, though the blood of his second was sprayed all over him. It turned out to be for the best. The 'copter surveyed the scene with a spotlight, saw in Lloyd what appeared to be another bloody corpse, and left.
Lloyd met an Akashic Brother, who saw in the war scarred veteran a spark which needed only to be fanned. Lloyd trained for a few years, a surprisingly short time to learn even the basics of Do, and learned the rudiments of many Spheres. He lives in a small house in Santa Cruz, attracting as little attention to himself as possible. He has found a purpose now, however. The Ascension War is a battle he considers truly worth fighting. Tired though he is, Lloyd is still at heart a soldier. War - he hopes one day to be able to live with that.

(Internal Technocracy Memo:)
Sir,
As per your request, I have collated my data on the man called Lyle Henries. If you need anything else, let me know.

Daniel

Subject Name: Unknown
Reliable Photo Surveillance: NOT AVAILABLE

Alias: Lyle Henries Aprox Height: 5' 10"
Aprox Weight: 190 Lbs
Apparent Age: Mid thirties

Data on this individual is sketchy at best, contradictory at worst. To all but the casual researcher, Lyle Henries is a 35 year old retired importer living in the hills outside Santa Cruz, California. He has no living relatives, no strong ties in the area, and lives off a generous pension provided by his company. He has only a few parking tickets on his record.
It is 99.996457% probable that this information is false. Subject displays an advanced understanding of tactics and covert ops. He has thwarted several abduction attempts at great cost to our operations. (See attached reports.) It is highly likely that this individual is militarily trained, very possibly to Special Forces standards. Assuming this, it is highly likely he attained an officer's rank. He shows a high degree of competence in the direction of small teams.
We are certain the subject is a Mage. He has used several Procedures during our contact with him. We believe him to be an Akashic Brother, based on his combat style and skill. This suggests the following scenario. Subject was employed by a military or paramilitary organization, probably the former, based in the United States. It seems a reasonable supposition, given his present affiliations, that he was a student of eastern philosophy. His patterns of action thus far are consistent, for example, with the teachings of Sun Tzu. At a certain point, the subject became disillusioned with his employers. Perhaps he had some sort of moral crisis.
This is only theory.
There is little else to add at this time. As we gather more data, it will be incorporated into this report.

Thursday, June 1st, 1995 12:08 p.m.

"Colonel? Colonel? Are you home?" Ken continued to knock loudly on the door but there was no answer. He checked his watch. It read just after noon. They were supposed to get together at noon sharp, and the Colonel being late like this was not right. It just wasn't his style.
Ken checked his watch again and sighing, sat down on the doorstep. He waited another fifteen minutes and then, taking matters into his own hand, knocked once more and after no answer, walked around the house back into the backyard through the side gate. He walked past the empty cottage in back and walked onto the deck where the covered hot tub sat gurgling noisily. Then, as Ken saw the hole blasted into the glass door, he stopped. He didn't have a weapon and so was ready to back down, but as everything seemed quiet, he crept forward, the hair standing up on the back of his neck. There was a smell in the air, like burned cinnamon and walking through the round hole in the back of the Colonel's house, he noted that the glass wasn't cracked, but melted and where whatever it had touched the wooden siding of the house, it had left a burn mark. There was no sound at all but the ringing of the chimes from a slight breeze, that arrived to briefly tickle Ken's skin and take the edge off the heat that lay heavy on the day.
The inside of the house wasn't much better than the melted entrance. Scorch marks lay across everything, like someone had taken a broad blowtorch and marked up the walls, while the kitchen counter had been blasted into bits of paneling and wood. Ken's eyes only danced over these features for a moment. The most engaging thing that captured his eye right away was the sight of the Colonel, sitting unharmed in the midst of destruction all around him. He was sitting in a lotus position, his eyes closed and his back arched back in a pure meditative pose. The Colonel's lips were moving and creeping forward to hear the what was said, Ken was surprised to hear the repeating drone of a mantric chant being repeated quickly, over and over again.
"Colonel? Are you alright?" Ken asked.
"Quite alright," the Colonel's voice responded, but not from where Ken was seeing the Colonel. In fact, he wasn't sure where the voice had come from, but looking at the Colonel, he could see that the man still seemed involved in his mantric chant, and seemed oblivious to everything around him. Still, Ken bent down and addressed the meditating man, though the answers continued to come from elsewhere, Ken was never really able to get a lock on the direction.
"Colonel, what happened?"
"Well Ken, it's a long story," the Colonel's voice continued, obviously disembodied. Ken began to suspect it was appearing in his mind.
"That's very good, Ken," the Colonel complimented him. "You've hit it right on the mark! I'm really developing a healthy respect for the Sphere of Correspondence. I'm going to have to work on mastering some of its secrets myself."
"You mean, you're not the one doing this?" Ken asked, this time not speaking aloud, but concentrating on conversing in his head.
"No," the Colonel confessed, "I'm being allowed to channel my thoughts through another. My `guest' had been giving me a tour of the Umbra when we were attacked."
"Who attacked you?"
"I'll come to that," the Colonel sharply replied. "Ken, do you remember when I told you about the Technocracy?"
"Yes," Ken nodded. "You said they were the enemies of all freedom. That they were our greatest enemies and would seek to destroy us."
"Very good, Ken. Well, like all organizations, the Technocracy is made up of individuals. And as much as the Techs would like to squash that individuality into conformist mush, that shard of awareness that marks all of us still lies in them as well, though they've seemed to have forgotten how to turn into themselves to find truth. Anyway, and I'm sorry I didn't tell you this sooner, but I wanted to protect you in case this didn't work out"
"Protect me from what?" Ken asked.
"For some time now," the Colonel told him, "I've been in touch with a Technomancer named Simone Kaufman. She's a type of Technomancer called a Progenitor."
"Geneticists," Ken nodded. "But you said you were in touch with one? You mean, you had willing contact with a Progenitor?"
"Her name is Simone," the Colonel corrected the Orphan Mage. "And yes, I've had contact with her for over six months. She's wanted to leave the Technocracy for some time and she chose me to help her."
"And why, may I ask you?" Ken thought, unable to masque how his suspicions coloured his mental voice.
"She observed me through the Umbra. She's attracted to the Akashic philosophy, and she thought I might be able to help her. So, now, after learning about each other, she came to me today. Unfortunately, she had been suspected and she was tracked here."
"So they attacked you," Ken nodded looking around. "I still don't understand why you're still alive. Did you drive them off? And where is this Progenitor of yours?"
"You mean Simone?", the Colonel again corrected Ken. "She's down the hall.
This revelation surprised Ken. "Walking cautiously forward, he peered down the hallway that led to the three bedrooms in the Colonel's house. There, burned into the carpeting was the vague outline of a female form. The Colonel's efforts it seemed had been for nothing. The Progenitor defector was dead.
"Ken," the Colonel called back to the Orphan, "I want you to meet Simone."
Ken's eyes opened wider. Checking again, he looked back down the hallway to confirm that the burned remains of the Progenitor were indeed real. They were.
"Simone, this is Ken," the Colonel's thoughts announced.
"Hello Ken," a feminine voice, touched with a European accent came into Ken's head. Ken backed against the wall, preparing to flee.
"But, you're dead," he couldn't help thinking.
"Yes," she replied. "In a manner of speaking. But as a Progenitor, I took the precaution of growing spare bodies - clones - in which to house my psyche. I'm afraid that most were discovered and destroyed, along with the one you see in the Colonel's house. I am in the only one I have left. If I am found, they will kill me - this time for good."
Ken's thoughts began to swim.
"Ken," the Colonel reached back out to him, "When the technocrats appeared through their portal, many of them were fried outright by Paradox. But that didn't keep them from coming. I tried to hold them off, but Simone convinced me it would be a useless fight, so she used her considerable skills to protect me, shielding my physical body and bringing the rest of me into the Umbra. She sacrificed one of her only remaining bodies to save me. You can see how talented she is. I think you understand why the Technocracy wants her dead. She was never meant to be with them anyway. It's as if she's had a reawakening and she needs our help. She could be a great asset to the Brotherhood."
"It could be a trap," Ken warned. "She could be a spy, trying to infiltrate the Brothers, or the Hollows, or anyone here in Santa Cruz."
"Ken," the Colonel's voice came back, "I know her. I know that isn't true. Now, I have to help her. I was hoping you would help me."
Ken turned toward the open door. He just wanted to flee. But the Colonel was his friend - and his teacher. If he was ever going to be worthy of the Brotherhood, he had to respect his sensei.
"What do we have to do?" he thought.
In return, an image formed itself in his head. He saw the amusement park - not the Boardwalk, but Great America. And from there, as if he was flying, he saw himself leave and head for a nearby building - an industrial warehouse.
"That's Santa Clara!," he shouted aloud. "That's in the heart of the Technocracy. You want us to go there, over the Hill?!"
"Yes," the Colonel answered. This time his voice was for real.
Looking over, Ken saw the Colonel open his eyes and stand up. Lloyd Davies had returned. "I'm back Ken. Now, I have no contact with Simone. It was her power that allowed us to communicate in the Umbra. Now, she's returned to her body and she doesn't dare call to us from there."
Ken didn't like the way Lloyd said "there."
"And since I don't have Correspondence yet," Lloyd continued, "we'll have to find her on our own - Or I will, that is, unless"
"Don't worry," Ken nodded, "I'm going along. Maybe some of the Hollows as well. They're even more stupid than I am."
"Cmon Ken," Lloyd placed a sympathetic hand on the Orphan's shoulder, "Let's go and bring Simone home."

Thursday, June 1, 1995, 12:15 pm

Ken couldn't help but admire the way the Colonel moved. The man flowed from one action to the next, leaning down to retrieve a small pendant lying on the floor, rising, reaching for the Desert Eagle handgun on the remnants of the counter, checking it's action and holstering it in the small of his back. It all happened so *smoothly*. There was no wasted motion, no pause between moves. "There is some spare ammunition in that drawer there, along with some spare clips," he said, gesturing at a small section of floor. "Gather up what you can, quickly. We don't have much time." He spun and walked toward his bedroom.
The Hollow One bent quickly to his task, his brief stint with the Army reacting immediately to the man's tone of command. The Colonel was a man one didn't argue with. If he gave orders, they were to be followed. "What do you mean, we don't have much time?" he asked.
The Colonel's voice echoed down the hall. "This attack was risky. Fighteningly so, in fact. The odds that the mission group would be neutralized were far too good. My bet is that these were the first wave, and that a follow-up force is on the way by more conventional means."
"Are you sure?"
"I'm still alive. That alone is reason enough. That, and they will assume I know where she is." He strode into the kitchen, carrying two ponchoes and a holstered .45, which he put on the floor next to Ken. "Here. Put these on. Did you drive, or take a cab?"
"Cab." He handed Lloyd two full clips and perhaps a dozen loose bullets, then shrugged into the poncho and grabbed the holster. There was a spare clip in it, already loaded.
"Damn. We're on foot then."
"Why not. . ."
"A cab is dispatched by radio. Too risky. Get some food. It's going to be a long walk." He turned and got a pair of canteens from the wall hook they were hanging on, filled them quickly with water. Ken grabbed a couple packs of rations from the fridge, and a bag of dried fruit.
"What, were you expecting this? You're all stocked for a bivouac here!" he said.
"Foresight is as much a weapon as any gun." He reached over and grabbed his staff, a worn piece of hickory perhaps six feet long and two fingers thick. Leather was wound around the middle and ends, forming handles. "Let's go." He held out a backpack for Ken to stuff the food into, attached the canteens to the web gear he now had around his waist, slung the pack over his shoulder, and flowed into the remaining poncho. Then the pair left through the hole in the wall, moving at a quick jog toward the underbrush around the isolated house. It was then that Ken spotted the sleek black car coming up the road. It was still some distance away, perhaps two miles.
"Stay as close to me as you can," the Colonel whispered, his staff swinging in a gentle arc around the two of them. "Within the circle, if at all possible."
"Why?"
"Light bends. That's why." ((This is a coincidental Forces 2 effect intended to completely cover their retreat form a visible or IR scan. Lloyd is blending the poncho's natural color into the landscape by changing the frequency of the light reflecting off them, and leeching any IR into the ground and surrounding area, making it difficult to impossible to locate and track. This action assumes you accept my premise that the pair are in imminent danger. If Lloyd has reason to believe otherwise, he will not risk the paradox. In fact, if you think Lloyd has the wrong impression of events and would believe otherwise this whole course of action is moot.))
The pair faded into the landscape, and were gone.

((Room for other actions by the enemy. If we are engaged, Lloyd's primary aim will be to neutralize their ability to follow us by whatever means necessary, then be away as fast as possible. Fight only until our own ability to move is dangerously impaired. Objective is to get away!! ASAP!!))

Thursday, June 1st, 1995, 2:30 p.m.

Lunch on the run was a unique experience. The two had eaten in silence, the Colonel apparently deep in thought. They had covered almost six miles at a grueling pace, and Ken was nearly exhausted. The Colonel seemed completely rested, the bastard. The path had been quite winding, leading through several streams and backtracks. All things considered, Ken thought the Colonel was playing it just a shade paranoid. ((I'm using Survival as a navigation skill here. Acceptable?))
They had drawn up under a tree near a highway, a rest area visible some distance away. "Rest," was all Lloyd had said, then he flowed into a lotus. Six miles of running through the goddamned wilderness, and the man could still flow. Ken's legs were burning, and he was sure the gun had gotten at least four times heavier. The last mile had been a trial of one foot in front of the other, a mantra of "Step, step, you can do it." "I think we can risk a ride now. We should be able to get one there. We can also call those Hollows of yours from those phones." The Colonel's head inclined toward the rest area.
"Was this really necessary, Colonel? I thought your Progenitor was in danger."
"My parents died almost eight years ago. It would be very difficult to endanger them further. As for Simone," he placed a careful emphasis on the name, " if they knew where she was, they would not have come to the house. I consider it likely they believe her to be dead, or at least badly inconvenienced." He took a swig of water, passed over the canteen. "No, I think she is better off for our detour. I hope we have put them off her scent for now. Besides, she already knows the rough outline of my plans. I let her know them before, when we were in contact."
"Colonel, do you really trust her?"
"Of course not." The answer was simple and matter of fact. It caught the Orphan totally by surprise.
Ken exploded. "THEN WHAT THE HELL ARE WE DOING?!!?"
"I never said I trusted her. I said I believed her, a different matter. She could be just a dupe in a larger plan, and it would not change her honesty in the least. So, while I do believe what she tells me, I cannot trust her. There is too much I don't know."
"Has anyone ever told you you have a suspicious mind?"
" 'The man who assumes he knows everything is bound to lose.' Master Sun Tzu was wise indeed to say this."
"And you, thinking this might be a trap set by someone else, are prepared to walk into it calmly?"
The colonel smiled. "Yes. Calmly. Centered. Aware. Giving the appearance of weakness will lead the enemy to assume we are weak, when in fact we are prepared. Besides, I may be wrong. Let's go." He floated to his feet. Ken climbed laboriously to his. He was going to regret this little walk tomorrow. He could tell.

"Mike, gotta talk quick. Can you and the guys maybe meet the Colonel and me at Great America?" The third phone he had tried worked, but the mouthpiece reeked of stale beer and bile. The smell was nauseating. All in all it was the perfect addition to a perfect day.
"What for?" Mike sounded dubious, his nasal voice a little higher than usual. Ken could almost see his weasel face crinkling nervously over the stained tie-dye he always wore. The Colonel was an imposing man, and Mike hadn't made a very good impression on him the last time they had met. It probably had something to do with the stolen car.
"Don't ask. Just don't ask. Look, I could really use your help, and Lily's too. We need to scope out a place, and maybe jam in it. Not sure which."
"Is the Authority Figure gonna ride me again?"
"This will get you on his good side faster than anything else you could do."
"I don't wanna be on his good side. I wanna be on his blind side."
"I'm not sure he has one, Mike. I'm really not. Look, will you help, or won't you?"
There was a long suffering sigh. "Yeah, I'll be there, and you can count on Lily, too. I'm not sure about the others, so don't count on them. And, Ken?"
"Yeah?"
"You owe me big for this! Vehrstehen?"
"Jawhol. Ich Vehrsten." (("Yes, I understand.")) "Now can we drop the German before I run out of words?"
"Get lost. Expect us there in thirty."
"Make it forty five. We took the long way," Ken replied.
"Right. Bye." Mike hung up.
The Colonel strolled up, a dark haired, oily fellow in tow. "Ken, this is Darrel. He's going to get us to town. Ready to go?"
"Yeah, I guess." They headed off toward the truck.

Friday, June 2nd, 1995 11:30 a.m.

Lloyd twisted the mini-louvers rod until the blinds cracked open just a bit, enough for him to see out to the parking lot below him. The sun had already started to hammer down upon the asphalt, and that plus the hazy brown blanket of smog that coloured the sky, was making the heat unbearable outside. Inside, the air conditioner continued to blow noisily, but not loud enough to drown the shallow din emitting from the television. Ken, Mike and Lily were all glued to it, watching some talk trash show on dysfunctional families.
Lloyd shook his head and turned off the air conditioner, at once drawing protest from the assembled Orphans.
"Hey, what the fuck you doin? You want us to fry?!" Mike got up and switched the air conditioner on. He stared at Lloyd, as if daring him to turn it off again.
"We don't need that," Lloyd tried to explain patiently. "It's hot outside. That's the truth of it and we need to be in this world, not try to control it with machines. That, and that," he nodded at the television, "is the way of the Technocracy."
Mike stood up straight, puffing himself up like a fighting cock, his orange and green spiked hair looking more comical than menacing. Lloyd tried hard not to laugh. Running his hands over his own hair, it had been tempting to take some shears to Mike's points, but that wouldn't have been very accepting, he decided.
Pink haired Lily, her nose and lower lip both pieced with rings that were linked by a chain, got up to back Mike up. Hollows stuck together.
Ken shook his head and turned off the television, showing that he stuck with the Colonel. Lloyd didn't like the way things were shaping up. He needed the Hollows to be with him. Opening his hands to show non-hostility, but not acquiescence, he went on.
"You want to fight. That's good. But the fight's not here, Mike."
He tried to remain respectful. He knew that Mike just didn't want to look weak in front of Lily. Mike, placated by the Colonel's smooth voice, nodded, and turned off the air conditioner himself.
"Fuck the Technos," he nodded his head and brought up a fist in a weak imitation of a power salute. Lily smiled and nodded with him.
Lloyd checked his wallet, making sure he would have enough to get them all into the park. Then, opening the door, he walked out. Mike and Lily turned to glance at each other, and then at Ken.
"Let's go," Mike stated, leading the way. Lily and Ken followed outside to the motel walkway and down the steps to Darrel's truck.

Friday, June 2nd 9:00 p.m.

The nightly summer fireworks display shot off overhead, while the crowd's murmur and crush of bodies pushed Lloyd and Ken off to one side. Elsewhere, Mike and Lily and Darrel, who searched alone, were like them looking for Simone. Lloyd knew that she had planned to leave her sanctuary and search them out, joining them in the park. Not even the Technocracy, she figured, would do anything overt in such a mass of sleepers. If they did, the Paradox repercussions could be enormous, so at least, even if they were detected, it would be more of a duel, one on one.
Ken saw her first. Lloyd saw her then, but as he saw Ken wave and call out to her, he tried to stop him, but it was too late.
"Hey, Colonel! There she is." He pointed at Simone and waved, remembering her from the image implanted in his mind. Simone waved back and watched them from a distance.
Of course, it was too easy.
Simone walked up and her jacket parted, a gun protruding.
The Colonel's own gun fired back, hitting her in the arm. Several in the crowd screamed and a panicked stampede ensued.
Simone, spinning from the impact of the bullets, tried to fire back, but the dart from her gun simply impacted against the post bordering a restroom stall.
Ken ran up to her. She was dying.
Lloyd, coming up behind him, grabbed his arm and yelled, "Clone. Cmon, we have to get out of here."
Taking Ken's arm, they ran past the track of several security cameras. Off in the distance, security guards, running with an athletic capability that seemed inhuman, which it was, could also be seen closing in on them.
Overhead, the fireworks continued to entertain the crowd of sleepers who in other parts of the park were oblivious to the battle that occured near the covered bridge leading to the New Orleans Square.
Ducking behind a hot dog cart that had been abandoned when the shooting began, Lloyd and Ken both missed being peppered by a hail of bullets that shattered the cart's side and whose impact pushed the shredded steel of the wheeled thing against them.
Tapping Ken on the shoulder, the Colonel led the way, jumping over a barrier and splashing into the boundary of a stagnant pool of water that was used for a boat ride, they hid behind the ticket counter of the ride. Lloyd had kicked one of the boats free in passing and then, ducking down, Lloyd used his knowledge of forces to cloak them once more as they hid behind the counter. He hadn't acted too soon, as the large shadowy bulk of a two security guards appeared near the border. There was a whirring sound and their eyes appeared red as they looked around. Lloyd thought Ken had stopped breathing in panic beside him. The water around the coasting boat erupted into violent white foam as the boat disappeared in a literal hail of exploding bullets. Tracking the water for signs of their demise, the guards ran past the counter, off toward one of the roller coasters.
Lloyd grabbed Ken and the two of them continued off, nonchalantly, and disappeared into a milling crowd, who had been drawn by the gunfire. Using the crowd to mask their movements, they boarded a city bus and made their way back to the motel.

Friday, June 2nd 10:43 p.m.

Mike and Lily curled up together, watching a horrour movie rerun while Darrel and the Colonel conferred. Ken, his hands still shaking, tried to eat some of his chili dog, but with only mixed success.
"I take it you didn't have any luck," Lloyd commented.
Darrel shook his head. "I saw someone who looked like her," he told the Colonel. "I tracked her for some time, but she didn't seem to be heading anywhere, just milling around. Then I saw someone else who looked just like her and I knew it was a trap."
"I wonder how many of them there were," the Colonel mused.
"So, what do we do now?" Darrel asked the obvious.
Lloyd shook his head. "I guess we wait, until she contacts us again."
"Plan B, eh?" Darrel smiled.
Lloyd nodded, wishing he knew what plan B was.

Saturday, June 3rd, 1995 12:23 a.m.

The Colonel stayed awake, watching. Sirens could be heard in the distance, but nothing that couldn't be ascribed as a normal Friday night in the city. Stretching off below him, he could see the concrete world of Silicon Valley, which seemed to go on forever, lit up with the greenish glow of flourescent light. It was eerie, he thought, watching the passing traffic.
The news that night had reported a "gang fight" at the Great America Parkway. That had drawn peals of laughter from the two Hollows. Ken had just gone whiter, reliving it all.
Then, something below him caught his eye. A man, dressed in jeans and a 49'er's coat paced back and forth. He was looking up at the motel, at the very room that they were in. Lloyd thought his heart must've skipped a beat. The face staring up at him was his very own.

Saturday, June 3, 1995, 12:24 AM

"Damn." He studied the clone carefully, observing his movements. (Perception + Do, difficulty 7, three successes rolled) He was untrained in the Art, but carried himself like a fighter. Some combat skills had obviously been programmed in. If he possesed all of the Colonel's natural ability he would be a difficult opponent for the others to beat. Of his own victory, Lloyd was certain, barring traps.
He scanned the rooftops and surrounding area. The room had been chosen specifically for its commanding view of the area, and Lloyd had reconnoitered the area extensively in weeks past, for just such a contingency. A safehouse is only as safe as you make it. (Perception + Subterfuge, difficulty 8, to spot hidden watchers, including cameras and high-tech listening devices. Two successes rolled.) There, crouching in the shadows of a rooftop, and another ducking into cover by a dumpster. The black sedan was about half a block away, parked on the other side of the street. No cameras he could see, yet, but they would come. He assumed they had laser mikes and other listening devices trained on them. Quickly, he moved to the desk and opened it as silently as he could. There was a pad of hotel stationary there, and a pen. Lloyd wrote quickly, his blocky printing neat and uniform.
"Ken, I have been compromised. The enemy has used DNA from my house to make clones of me. There is one here now, across the street, and at least two other hostiles. Assume we are bugged, and say nothing important. Nod if you remember the signs I taught you a few weeks back. We will use them as a recognition code. Each time you lose sight of me, no matter how long it may be, look for me to make a sign from the Forms. One sign each time, in the order I taught them to you, then backwards throught the same order. I will expect the same signs from you. You have spent enough time in my house to have been compromised as well. If there is ANY DOUBT AT ALL that you can remember these codes, shake your head! No false bavado. This is important. Wake the others, quietly, and show them the next note. Take NO action without consulting me."
On a seperate page. . .
"Say nothing! We are being watched. Once you loose sight of me, DO NOT trust me unless Ken okays it. The same rules apply for Ken. Look to me for confirmation, or invent your own recognition codes. I will detail the plan in a moment. Take NO action without consulting me! Let's not tip our hand. We have the initiative, and I want to keep it."
Moving up to Ken, Lloyd gently put his hand over the sleeping mage's mouth, then shook his shoulder. The young man woke quickly, a frightened look in his eye, and Lloyd quickly put his finger to his lips. When Ken nodded, the Colonel removed his hand from Ken's face, then showed him the note, making sure to put it in the beam of a streetlight. Ken's face grew pale. He nodded once, then looked up at the colonel and nodded again, firmly. He knew the codes. He rose quietly and went to wake the others.
Lloyd went into the bathroom and stood by the window, another feature he had insisted on, and glanced casually out the back as he used the toilet. (Same roll as above, no succeses, no botches rolled.) He saw no one, but it mattered little. He had to assume there were hostiles there as well. He flushed the toilet and stepped back into the main room.
The others were all awake and clustered around the patch of streetlight, reading. They all looked up as the Colonel entered the circle. "Ken, wake up," he said. He pantomimed yawning to the young Orphan, who took the hint and yawned audibly.
"Yeah? What?" he murmured sleepily. The deception was simple. Ken *was* sleepy. His head, however, was frighteningly clear, cobwebs banished by the rush of adrenaline pouring through his body.
"It's your watch. All clear." He motioned to the window.
"Yes, sir." He went over to the window. "Don't you think we're being a bit paranoid, Colonel?" he said as he walked over. "They couldn't have followed us."
Lloyd smiled grimly. It was a good ploy. His apprentice learned quickly. "We can't be too careful." He scratched quickly at the pad.
"I'm going to leave and try to draw some of their scouts after me. I should be able to loose them shortly. Go back to bed. Act as though nothing unusual has happened. If I'm right, you'll be visited by a clone of me fairly shortly. Play along. We need as much information as we can get from them. Mike, I'm trusting you to know when the time to strike is. Assume you are being watched, and assume you are being led into a trap. If I'm successful, and I believe the odds are good that I shall be, I will be watching you, and be able to act as backup. Keep your eyes open at all times. Mike, please destroy these notes without making any light. "
On a seperate piece. . .
"Ken, I'm giving Mike ops command for the next stage of the mission. His training with the Time sphere gives you the advantage you'll need. Follow his lead, but check his methods. We need information, not bodies and destruction.
I know you are afraid. Good. That's smart, under these conditions. Just don't let it rule you, Ken. You are alive. Focus on that. Use that as your guide to the Flow and the rest will fall into place. I have faith in you. Good luck."
He rose, handed the notes to their recipients. Mike read his, then looked up, a question in his eyes. Lloyd nodded, as if to say, "Yes, you are in charge." The Hollow grinned, then realized what that really meant. He became serious. Good. There was no time for frivolity.
The Colonel bent smoothly and retrieved his staff and gun. The staff he slung over his back, the gun was thrust into his belt. He went to the door. "I'm going to recon and get some supplies," he said to Ken. "Expect me in about a half hour. You're in charge."
Ken nodded. "Yes, sir."

1:10 AM

The night was still warm, and the smell of smog hung everywhere. Traffic was fairly light at the moment, with only the occasional car cruising past. Lloyd scanned the area quickly. The clone was gone, in hiding for the next gambit, no doubt. He deliberately caught no sight of the others, and moved purposefully down the ramp to the first floor. He reached the sidewalk and walked to the street. His senses blazed to full awareness, each sound, each smell telling the story of his surroundings. (Coincidental Correspondence 1 effect, attempting to spot pursuers. Difficulty 3, 3 successes rolled) The scuff of shoes on uneven terrain, the scent of cheap after-shave carried on an errant breeze. Heavy breathing and a light "thump" from above. Three hostiles, male, possibly heavily armed. Training adequate, but flawed. A pedestrian walked past him, earphones turned way up. Lloyd caressed his staff, twisting it slightly. Suddenly the earphones squealed and spoke. "Made him. Heading east. Units 1,3, and 4 in pursuit." (Coincidental Forces 2 effect to track their movements and isolate a radio, difficulty 5, three successes.) His ears told him the speaker was the one behind him with the leather shoes. The Sleeper smacked his Walkman, and music once again blared out.
The Colonel walked a block, then turned to circle the hotel. His pursuers stayed with him, but Leather Shoes was the closest. The others were temporarily out of earshot. Good. He turned again, nonchalantly, this time into a trash strewn alley. He pressed himself into the wall quickly, his staff swinging free in his left hand. There would only be one chance. Flowing his staff through a brief Kata, he arranged an atmospheric "hiccup" to squelch their radios for a moment. (Coincidental Forces 2 effect. Difficulty 6, two successes. These things do occur naturally. A close friend of mine once was the only link from a fire truck in LA to its base. He was in Fitzwilliam, New Hampshire at the time. I hope you accept the coincidence, but if you don't, I'll take the Paradox.) As his tail rounded the corner, Lloyd struck. As soon as the man turned, Lloyd had made his move, arm around the neck and with one quick twistBut, the Techo was quick as well and shifting his own weight, he pitched forward and Lloyd went flying. Lloyd tried to right himself, but the throw had made him too unbalanced. Now the initiative was with his quarry. Fortunately though, his bungled attempt at to break the tail's neck had at least stripped him of the Walkman. A gun appeared in the Tail's hand, but Lloyd, swatting out with his cane, sent it flying. The Techno retaliated by wrenching the cane loose.
"You're good," the Technocrat complemented him. "I rather regret this, whoever you are."
The two squared off for their fight.
The Colonel couldn't help asking, "Don't they tell you who your marks are?"
"Only if necessary," the tail replied, calmly, all too calmly. "Information should only be filtered down to a level where it is the most useful. Anything else is distracting excess."
"Sounds to me, agh!" The Colonel dodged the knife that had appeared in the Tail's hand and had lashed out unseen. Continuing while they squared off like two fighting cocks, "Sounds to me like an excuse for keeping you in the dark. My name is Lloyd, by the way."
"Why did you tell me that?"
"Just thought you ought to know who you're trying to kill. You got a name?"
There was a slight pause in the man's eyes. It was nothing really, but nothings could be an opening for an Akashic, trained to discern things as subtle as gaps in a breeze. The Colonel leapt forward. The tail smashed downward with the cane, but the Colonel took the blow in his arm and moved under it. Then the tail sliced upward with the other hand, but the colonel twisted and pinned this arm against the wall with his hip, so that it merely sliced his jacket sleeve. Using his body like a battering ram, the Colonel shoved the Tail back against the wall, knocking his wind out. Then, hearing the knife drop, the Colonel's bent down and suddenly the knife was in his own hand. His sensei had told him there was always time for pity. That was what Lloyd felt, as he watched the man's lifeblood spray out onto the alleyway. He had been so quick, he couldn't even remember slicing the man's throat. All he could think of at the moment was to wonder what the man's name was. Examining his abdomen, she saw that there was a shallow cut (1 hit, bruised). The fight was a short, strangely elegant affair, with the Colonel making short work of his adversary. Fortunately, the Tail, though naturally talented, hadn't been much at fighting.
Quickly shrugging into the dead man's outer clothes and concealing the body, he slipped the earpiece to the radio into his ear, and the wallet into his own pants. Lloyd emerged from the other end of the alley, mimicking the posture and movement of his erstwhile tail. (Dexterity+ Subterfuge, difficulty 7, one success.) "Report, unit one," the radio crackled. Lloyd waited a moment. "Unit one, report!"
"Unit one here. Stand by." (Manipulation + Subterfuge, difficulty 7, to mimic voice, two successes.) He paused another moment. "Damn. He made me! Heading North at sixty yards. Subject is running!" Lloyd began to pound up the road, deliberately suppressing his training. "Turning left! Alley next to sport card shop." He ran a bit further, to the alley in question. "Unit one to all units. . ." Lloyd panted. "Lost him."
There was a pause. "Unit three, confirmed. Contact lost."
"Unit four, confirmed."
"Units 1, 3 and 4, return to site, double time," the emotionless voice on the radio said. "Proceeding with next phase immediately."
"Confirmed. Return to site," came the voice of Unit 3.
"Confirmed, return to site." Lloyd replied.
"Confirmed, return to site."
Unit 1 turned, all senses alert for treachery, and headed back to the hotel.

Saturday, June 3rd, 1995 1:26 a.m.

Lloyd didn't run, but he walked nearly as fast. Only when a car sped by did he slow himself to a more natural gait. He thought about acting like a jogger, but he was neither dressed correctly nor in a neighborhood where such a thing would have appeared likely. A cab appeared, obviously scanning him. It was a slow night but it seemed so obvious, he felt with some surety that it had to be a trap. But then it was so sure, that he felt even the Technocracy would have not dared to offer it. Bucking probability wasn't their style.
"You need a ride?" the cabbie called out. "Cheap?"
Lloyd nodded and jumped into the open door. He ordered the cabbie around the block and then to the motel for an offer of twenty bucks, paid up front. Thinking with grim amusement, that into even the best laid plans of magi and Technos, some sleepers would come, he took advantage of the situation.
As he neared the motel, he noted that everything appeared quiet. Scanning about him, he noted that the surveillance teams hadn't been called off. He would have been surprised if they had. He wondered what the next phase in the Technocracy's plan was going to be. Probably liquidation, once they felt that maximum information gain for the situation had been achieved. They would need to relocate base camp. Right now, extraction of his team was the top priority.
Getting out of the cab, he walked slowly, he headed for the lobby. Inquiring about an empty room, he disguised himself well enough so that the manager didn't seem to recognize him, and after handing over the money, walked up the stairs and remained in view long enough for the surveillance teams to register him. Like any other sleeper, he simply opened the door to his room, by happenstance, alongside the one that Ken, Mike, Lily and Darrel occupied. He didn't even bother to try and peek or hear inside their room as he unlocked his own.
Inside the new room, he could hear the television turned on, somewhat loudly. That was good. Moving quickly, he dumped most of the rooms contents onto the bed and then, using Forces to heighten the effect, he lit the bed and everything on fire. Smoke detectors wired in series went off all over the motel while sprinkler systems engaged, drenching everything. However, nursing his fire, the Colonel felt that he had made quite a blaze and when he burst through his own door, he was rather proud of the effect that he achieved, a sleeper escaping doom, only to allow enormous rolls of smoke to broil out and cover the walkways of the motel. Of course, normal smoke would fail to obscure infrared, but the addition of a few synthetic ingredients created the implausible but possible occurrence that NATO forces duplicated in their new smokescreens, namely the blocking of both tracking and surveillance equipment - at least for the moment.
Lloyd didn't have to kick open the door. Mike and Darrel burst out followed by Ken and Lily. They had already secured base camp and taking a quick look inside, Lloyd saw that the clone was dead.
Running through the haze, sirens sounding in the distance, Lloyd led them all to the cab that he had told to wait for them. Leaving the motel, behind them they could hear heavy footfalls and the sounds of automatic gunfire. The colonel's ruse had only barely worked. Then there was an explosion and the night behind them was lit up as the fire took effect.
Lloyd looked at the Hollow Ones.
Lily shrugged off his accusatory gaze. "Gas pipes," she explained. "They must've ruptured and exploded in the fire."
"Not to mention the bomb in my truck," Darrel added.
"For the sake of your humanity and ascendance, I hope that there were no sleepers in those explosions," the Colonel commented as they all filed into the cab.
"But it's war," Lily protested. Darrel just looked guilty. "Wars always have collateral damage."
Lloyd winced. "Collateral Damage," he muttered. It figured those words would come back to haunt him. He remained quiet for the rest of the short ride until they struck out on foot for the new base camp.

Saturday, June 3 1995 11:52 am

Lloyd stood neck deep in the swimming pool of the small hotel, moving slowly through a kata. It had been a long morning. His tail's credit cards had rented hotel rooms all over the state before Lloyd had cut them and scattered them across two city blocks. If his pursuers bothered to check out all the leads, they would be at it for hours. Each room was within an hour of Santa Cruz, each had been rented after enough time had passed for them to arrive there. Each had been rented from a different pay phone. The phone calling card was the only one left untouched. That one had gone to a kid on the corner of some street. Mike claimed to have stolen it from some guy when he handed it to him. The boy would be safe enough. He knew nothing, a fact that was was painfully obvious to even the most casual observer.
The kata began to pick up speed, and the water around Lloyd began to roil lazily. The form made use of the currents in the water caused by his movements, allowed them to give him direction. The object was to encounter as little resistance as possible. It was Lloyd's favorite exercise, for it was beautiful both to watch and to move through. He turned, spun, flowed and kicked, arms moving to balance and counter the momentum of his kicking. The currents began to move faster, spurred on by his actions, and the form increased pace again to match it. The water surged around him now, but he passed through it effortlessly, using it to move his arms and legs.
Ken emerged from their room. "Sir?" he said as he neared the pool. "They're back from lunch."
Lloyd allowed the kata to end itself, a process that took a minute, then climbed out of the pool. "Thank you, Ken. I'll be in in a moment." He picked up a towel and quickly rubbed himself down as Ken went back inside. The young Orphan was handling things well, all things considered. His world had been in flux for two days now, a constant surge of motion, action and counteraction, but through it all, Ken had maintained a center. Lloyd was proud of his protege. He would be an excellent mage one day, regardless of his final decision. But enough of that. It was time.
Touseled and damp, Lloyd went into the room, picking up a newspaper on the way in. He opened it and scanned the page before him, assuming a grim expression. The others were plopped in front of the TV. "Turn that off," Lloyd snapped. "I need your attention for a few minutes." The TV went dead, and the others turned around. "Melissa and Antonio Banderas," Lloyd said, looking at the newspaper in front of him. "A couple in their late twenties, left their home and their children in the care of a babysitter for one night to have a romantic evening on the town. They died when the hotel they had rooms in exploded. Their bodies were crushed by the ceiling of the room as it collapsed." He looked up, saw the other's faces. Lily and Darrel looked at each other, aghast, while Mike, as usual looked rebellious. But under the look, there was concern. "That is what 'Collateral Damage' is, people. It has nothing to do with property. A hotel can be rebuilt. Streets can be repaired. Those children, however, have no parents now. Fix that."
"Jesus," Lily gasped. "Jesus, Mike, I killed someone!"
"So? They were in the wrong place, that's all." Mike tried hard to maintain his act. He was the tough guy, the pack leader of his crew.
"It doesn't wash," Lloyd said. "We were out. We had beaten the trap. There was no need to destroy the building. There was no need for those deaths."
"But. . ."
"Fuck the 'Buts,' Mike!" shouted Ken. "We were out!" Lily started to
cry quietly.
"Now you know what 'Collateral Damage' is." The Colonel spoke solemnly. "Now you understand what it means. It means you failed. It means that someone died for no good reason."
There was silence for several minutes. Lloyd sat down in the chair by the closed drapes, listening to the sound of Lily sobbing. "Melissa was a dark haired Hispanic woman, perhaps five feet seven. She had married her husband three years before, in a small private ceremony. . ."
Mike caught on almost at once. He was sharp, that one. "How do you know all this, man?"
"Because Melissa and Antonio weren't in the hotel last night. They were in Mexico six years ago." He turned away from the group. "You didn't kill them, Lily. I did."
The group stared at him. "It was roughly the same scenario, an extraction. My team and I wormed our way into a large hotel to get a VIP out of a nasty situation. We almost pulled it off, but someone triggered security and it turned into a meat grinder. I lost three of my squad to a firefight, but we finally pegged them down and made the back door. I decided to discourage pursuit, and the best tool I had for that was a hand grenade. I didn't see the gas tanks until after I lobbed it."
He paused, closed his eyes. "The fireball alone towered three stories above the hotel. The sound. . .imagine thunder as a firecracker, then make this sound thunder by comparison." He rose to his feet. "Fifteen people died in that explosion. Two of them were pursuers. The rest had nothing to do with us at all. Melissa and Antonio were the fourth and fifth names down on the casualty report. I used to carry their pictures in my wallet. Then I realized I didn't need to. I saw them at night. . .every night, for a while. They are part of a crowd. . ."
He shook his head. He was losing his center, drifting towards depression and self-directed rage. It was a distraction. It served no purpose. "Think about that when you decide to blow something up."
Silence reigned in the room for several minutes, and Lloyd breathed to the base of his spine, followed the air, felt it expand through his body, released it. It worked. His center returned, tenuous, fleeting, but there.
"Now, let's get down to some de-briefing," he said calmly. "I'll go first. I left the hotel and moved east down the street, drawing three of our observers after me. . ."

Saturday, June 3, 1995 12:56 pm

"Twenty four hours," Daniel murmured to himself for the hundredth time. "Assemble a dossier in twenty four hours. And where would you like Mount Everest, Mr Kyle?" He spoke softly, afraid he might be overheard by the bugs he knew were in the wall.
It hadn't seemed so difficult six hours ago, when Edmund Kyle, a large red headed man with a personable attitude and sharp, crystalline blue eyes, had called him into his office and handed him the file. "I have a job for you, Dan," he'd said. "I need your particular gifts."
"Yes, sir?" Daniel had asked eagerly. 'At last, an assignment!' he had thought. 'Now I can show this man what I can really do.'
Kyle had tossed a file on his desk. "I need you to collate this file. Right now it's a jumble of facts with no theme to bind it together. Find me the theme, son. You have twenty four hours. I want your report by then."
He picked up the file. "Lyle Henries" it said on a clean, white label. "I don't understand, sir."
"Read the file. You will." Kyle sat down, and it became clear after a
moment that Daniel was dismissed. He made his way back to his cubicle, through the maze of dividers and doorways, thumbing through the file. It seemed clear. Photo surveillance, legal documents, surveillance and mission reports. It wasn't even that large a file, perhaps thirty pages, tops. What could be so hard?
He stepped into his cubicle and drew it closed. It was pin neat, but when your work space is three steps across without counting the desk, it had to be kept neat. There were no pictures of family, no momentos from the outside world. Hammond and Bascomb Investigations didn't approve of decoration in the back rooms. Decoration was for the customers, to keep them at ease while they told their life stories. Decoration was for subconcious image impression and information extraction. It told the customers they were welcome, safe, comfortable. It made them trust the detectives they came to see, made them tell more than they really had to. More information could be extracted from idle talk than anyone might guess. It gave trends, data on neiborhoods and buildings. To the New World Order, information was power, and the more you controlled, the better off you were. Decoration was all part of the sham, and the sham stayed out front.
The back room was for the truth, the raw stuff of data. Here was where it was entered into the vast information network of the Technocracy and became free floating truths, simply waiting for the right question to bring them into focus. Are the teenagers of the area suddenly becoming more sexually active? Have they started using drugs and talking about their "conciousness" as though it were something that needed attaining as opposed to being a simple fact of existence? A Cultist of Extasy could be nearby. Does your neighbor's dog bark when a certain person takes his walk? Certain lycanthropes are known to disturb some animals.
It was here, in this sea of data, that Daniel did his best work. His studies began early, as the oldest son of an alcoholic. Daniel's mother had died giving birth to his second brother, a blow that his father never really recovered from. He was not an abusive man, just a lost one, wandering from job to job, bottle to bottle, trying to find the life his wife had taken from him by dying. Daniel was left with the job of raising his two brothers. That experience gave him a sense of what people were about, an ability to find the core of any dispute. Resolving it was another matter entirely, but he was good at that, too. He led by example, getting exemplary grades in school, which led to his scholarship to Brown University as a Criminal Justice major with a Psychology minor. Three years with the Police taught him that crime was a problem beyond the power of government to solve. It also taught him the ebb and flow of humanity, exposed him to a new world of motivation and causes. He blossomed and Awoke, attracting the attention of a prominent PI visiting from the west coast. That led him to the Agency, which led to the Technocracy.
Which led to boredom. For months now, he had been given minor tasks such as basic programming and data entry as his Magickal education progressed. It was stifling, totally unstimulating work. Now, at last, was a case he could get a grip on.
All he had to do now was get it to make sense.
Six hours had spread the file all over his desk. . .no, all over his workspace. Pictures littered the floor, cast about uselessly. Every single shot was blurry, as though the subject had moved at *just* the wrong time, or obscured by things around him. If the file had just contained the photo surveillance, the report would have read something like :
"Subject male between 25 and 60, between 150 and 220 pounds and indeterminate height. Hair dark. Due to inordinate environmental interference with surveillance, subject is probably a mage. Tradition Unknown."
As it stood, he didn't have much more than that. The legal documents were the deed to a house on the edge of town in the hills. It had been purchased almost two years ago by a foreign firm, Tiawanese, of all things, and leased to a Lyle Henries. The lease was up at the end of the year. Data on Mr. Henries was sketchy at best. He was a good student with no criminal record, no known credit cards, and no red flags on his credit rating. He was even a boring driver. No tickets, anywhere. No travel on any major, or even minor airline. Never rented cars. Never bought a new car. Never married. Employed in small, tedious jobs. Then recieved several paychecks from this Taiwanese firm, which promptly went out of business after buying the house.
It didn't wash. This past was too skeletal, lacked in too many minor details. It had to be an assumed identity. That much seemed clear. It was the written reports that got him confused, though. At a certain point, Mr. Henries had encountered a woman named Simone Kaufman, a Progenitor. There were several conversations between the two, each growing more serious, according to a temporal stress indication scan. Then, without warning, Simone had defected, and Mr. Henries was right in the middle of it. He had demonstrated a remarkable ability with hand to hand combat, fending off the extraction team single-handedly for several minutes. His moves were described by operatives at the scene as "graceful and strangely slow." It seemed Mr Henries was an Akashic Brother.
Then the house had blown up. The extraction team had been killed. When the mop-up team had arrived, Mr. Henries was gone, vanished with no trace. Where the hell had he gone? More impotantly, how had he gotten there? There was only one road to his house, and it had been covered. There had been no one on it during the critical time, and Henries' car was still at the house. The only answer was that he had gone overland, through at least three miles of scrub and hills in the summer heat. Efforts to find his trail were useless. Even the dogs lost it after a small stream a mile from the house.
His next known appearance was at Great America, where he slipped through a trap that should have caught him. HIT Mark V units had been scattered throught the crowd, and the security cameras had kept a close watch. The man saw the trap almost at once, firing on a decoy before contact had been established. It had been a good shot, too, considering the circumstances. But here was another discrepancy. An Akashic Brother with a gun? Most disdained the use of such weapons. The ones that didn't were rarely that good with them. This man had fired through a crowd to hit a moving target several yards away. He was at the very least well trained, possibly even a marksman. Another enigma.
Several hours later, after surveillance teams had located the quarry again and the Progenitors had provided the means to eliminate the rest of the team, he had slipped the trap again. More than that, he had used the trap aginst itself. It was brilliant. It was insane. The final result, one team member dead, in what appeared to be a common mugging, one hotel with a brand new, all natural air conditioning system disguised as a big bloody hole in the middle, and Mr. Henries and company vanished in the chaos. Three times. .three times he had escaped a trap that would have caught most people. It
was an impressive record.
Daniel took another sip of coffee from the mug standing on his desk. "All right, Mr. Henries," he murmured to himself. "Where would you have gone?"

Saturday, June 3rd 1:26 p.m.

"So, when the clone released the cyanide gas, you transformed it into steam?" the Colonel asked.
Ken nodded and added, "Sort of. But of course, it was still cyanide gas for him. We merely believed it to be steam so he did us the favor by killing himself and we were fine."
"But you learned nothing?" Lloyd couldn't hide his disappointment.
"I don't think he knew anything," Darrel said. "He was only a shell of a being."
"Now what?" Mike asked.
Lloyd settled into a comfortable position and began to chant mantras.
"We wait," Ken answered for him.
"I could've told you that," Lily chirped.
The Hollows looked around the room but the only thing the could see for entertainment was the television. But looking at the Colonel, none of them dared strike to up the courage to turn it on.

Saturday, June 3, 1995, 8:45 pm

"Subject demonstrates a high degree of strategic awareness and tactical thought. Evidence: Room selection at hotel. A high priority was placed on a commanding view of the area, which allowed him to spot surveillance. Evidence: Actions immediately following the spotting of surveillance. His team was alerted to the threat without us ever realizing it, until Post Temporal Infra Red Spectroscopy was used to determine his actions. He used the one method we could not track to warn his team, the written word. He then redirected our attention, weakened our available response, and extracted his team despite our best efforts.
Opinion: Elimination at that time was a mistake. Iteration X should not have been in command of that scenario. The group could have been tagged and trailed for weeks before surveillance was made if our methods had been used instead of theirs. I project we could have duped some of the other members of the team into being pawns for us, perhaps even steered Mr. Henries himself. Suggest a re-thinking of strategies.
Conclusion: Mr. Henries is an assumed name. The Tiawanese company that provided his house was all too obviously a front for someone, though who remains a mystery as of this report. It seems highly likely that Mr. Henries has a high degree of military training, as evidenced by his high levels of strategic and tactical thought and his skill with modern weaponry. It is highly likely that this training included Special Ops and Advanced Recon. It is highly likely that he attained a degree of Officer rank, as evidenced by his command over his team. It is highly likely that Mr. Henries is at least to some degree psychotic, as evidenced by his continued reliance on heavy ordinance or coincidental work that duplicates the function of heavy ordinance. . ."
Dan stopped recording for a moment and looked at the transcript that appeared on his computer terminal. Of all his conclusions, this was the one that stuck in his craw. The Akashics didn't take psychotics, and this man was almost certainly Akashic. It didn't match their profile at all. But that was what the evidence indicated. In two completely disparate events, there had been explosions. There were only three things each event had in common. Mr. Lyle Henries, Ken Dupree, and a high degree of pressure from Technocray forces. Explosions did not match the profile of Ken Dupree. Ergo, it was the mystery man.
"Reccomendation: Ease the pressure on this man. He has demonstrated a familiarity with high pressure assault situations and a high degree of competence in disarming them. It would also reduce the chances of further disasters emerging from his escape work. Low pressure surveillance tactics are indicated until we have a better grasp of this man's capabilities and tendencies. Then a plan can be constructed that would use these factors to our best advantage."
He paused a few minutes, re-reading the whole of the report. It was coherent, concise, and well supported. There was only one problem. It felt wrong. The facts were too sketchy.
"Personal note to Ed Kyle: Sir, I would like your permission to investigate this matter further. There is too much of a dichotomy in the available facts. More information is needed for a truly accurate report. Send." The computer obeyed the verbal instruction, and the report vanished into the information maze of the Technocracy.
Kyle's answer arrived minutes later, causing the computer to beep. "That's about what I thought you'd say," the e-mail note said. "Permission granted."

Sunday, June 4th, 1995 12:37 a.m.

"We won't fight for you, human," the woman staring at Lloyd across the table almost spat the words out at him.
Lloyd tried to ignore the smokey atmosphere as best as he could. He found himself wondering why the Glass Walker had even suggested the bar for a meeting place. Surely it stank of the Wyrm, as the werewolf would have called it.
"I don't want you to fight," Lloyd reassured her. "I merely want information. A sister in my order told me you could provide me with that." Lloyd had kept this contact to himself, hiding it from Hollows. He hadn't done so from a desire for secrecy but because he didn't want to get their hopes up. Though he had the number to contact the Walkers, he wasn't sure he had the means to enlist their aid. They could probably care less about the problems of a human mage. As far as they were concerned, he wasn't worth wiping their hairy butts with. There were even rumours that the Technos and Walkers were in cooperation.
"Certainly," the woman smiled. "Information is do-able. What do you offer to pay?"
"I have no money," Lloyd confessed, deciding to get it out into the open. This kind of subterfuge was not to his taste.
"Nothing?" the Walker asked, surprised that he would come to this meeting with empty pockets.
"Nothing that you would consider money," he replied. "However, I can offer you something."
"Such as," she smiled. Lloyd could almost read her mind. She thought they were at last coming to the meat of the matter.
"Friendship," he smiled back.
"Excuse me?" Her smile vanished.
"I'll owe you a favor," he said. "A favor of an Akashic is worthy of the information I ask. More than worthy. You would gain in the trade."
"That's a rather egocentric attitude, human." The werewolf looked around, scanning the bar as if already disinterested in him. Lloyd thought it would shock the bartender to the core to think that the two very ordinary people in the booth were a werewolf and a wizard, trying to strike a deal.
"Surely, there's some favor you Garou want that only a Mage can supply."
"There you go again," she shook her head, "thrusting your arrogance at me and assuming that you have something that we want."
"A woman's life is riding on this," Lloyd said, allowing his true feelings to show. Werewolves respected feelings.
"You mean a mage's life," the Walker corrected him.
"What if I said it was a garou, would that make a difference?" he asked.
She didn't answer him, but continued to scan the clientele at the bar. Yawning, she asked, "What was it you wanted anyway?"
"I need to find someone. She's in hiding and she can't reveal herself. If she does, she'll be killed."
"You keep saying that as if we should care," the Walker told him.
"I think you should. This is someone who matters. Certainly we all matter. That's what it's about, isn't it. Freedom? To live without fear? Certainly you werewolves can understand that?"
That got her attention. "Would you like to say the `W' word a little louder? I think that some of the folks here didn't get a chance to hear you the first time."
"What's her name?" the Walker continued, sounding as if she were bored to tears.
"Simone Kaufman," he said. "She used to be with the Technocracy."
"You mean, she's soon to be dead," she once again corrected him. "Look, if something comes up and it's not out of my way to call you, which I'm sure it will be, I'll remotely think about you if I find anything," she said dryly.
It wasn't much, but it was something.
"How will you know how to find me?" Lloyd asked.
She smiled at him like he was some sort of idiot child. "Human, you don't know what you're asking. Do you think you weren't made the moment you stepped onto our turf? The only way you walk here is at our sufferance. Step out of line and we'll put a leash on you."
"What do you mean?" he asked.
"No more stunts like the one you pulled at that motel. Just be thankful no garou were hurt there. You magi can kill yourselves all you want, but you don't make a mess in our backyard, do you understand?" Her words ended with a slight growl, and Lloyd saw a change in her eyes. They appeared more doglike - wolf like, full of raw animal anger.
"I'm sorry," he said. "Believe me."
She smiled. Like most garou, she was quick to anger, and just as quick to cool. She was like unbridled mercurial energy, furred Paradox that could strike anywhere.
"Do you have a name?" he asked.
"Not for you, I don't," she told him. "Are you sure you want to owe us a favor?"
"It's all I have."
"Well, I'll let our Dreamsayers know. It's up to them."
"Put in a good word for me," Lloyd smiled.
"You're a Mage," she quipped. "What good is there to say?" Getting up, she walked out of the bar. Appreciative eyes followed her movement. Lloyd started to cough. Even the air was hard to swallow.

Sunday, June 4, 1995 12:46 am

Lloyd rose and left the bar. As he passed the third stool from the door, he leaned over to whisper to the man there, "I'll be going to a fleabag near the Boardwalk in case you lose me."
"Oh, shit," the small man rumbled, almost too low to be heard. "I don't know what you're talking about," he said more audibly.
"Right." Lloyd strolled out the door, caught sight of the woman nearly half a block distant. He considered following her for a moment, but there was no point in antagonizing her. Instead, he walked past the bar window, pointedly not looking at the man in his stool. As he passed the corner of the bar, he ducked quickly around it, waiting for the inevitable pursuit. Long seconds passed.
"I changed my mind," a voice said behind him. I figgered I'd just meet you here." Lloyd whirled, his body assuming a defensive posture and his staff whirring into action almost before he was aware of the voice. "Sheesh . . .a little high strung there, buddy?" It was the little man from the barstool. He was dark of both hair and complexion, and his clothing was just short of total disrepair. "Relax. If I wanted ya dead I'd be chewing yer windpipe by now."
"You work with the nameless woman?" Lloyd guessed, relaxing into a graceful at ease.
"Nah. She don't like me too much. Says I stink, and keeps threatenin' ta bathe me ta death one a' dese days. I just follow her outta love." He grinned easily, showing a mouth full of gaps. "You gotta match?" Lloyd reached into his pocket, drew forth a spark of Fire attached to a piece of wood. The little man produced a cigar, and puffed on it contentedly as it lit. "Thanks."
"It's your funeral."
"Not today it ain't," he grinned back. "So why do you give two shits about this Kaufman dame?"
"Is that important?"
"It is ta me."
"Every person deserves freedom of choice, the right to seek their own path. Simone is being denied that right."
"And the fact that her body could stop a clock don't hurt none, does it?"
Lloyd's eyes narrowed. "Irrelevant."
"Yeah, right."
"It is. Her body means nothing to me. I would get more pleasure smoking that. . . .thing." He gestured at the cigar.
The little man stared at him carefully. "You know, I think I might believe you. But that don't answer my question."
"Why do you want to know?"
"'Cuz if I like yer answer, I might be able to help you, that's why."
Lloyd's eyebrows rose. "How?"
"I could push you in front of a truck and put you out of your misery, stupid," the little man snapped. "What do you think?"
Lloyd thought seriously for a moment. "She is a kindred spirit. I was trapped as she was once, forced into actions I objected to. I did things I would rather not think about. I would not see anyone else suffer that fate."
The little man stared at him. "So you were serious back there when you babbled about freedom of choice?"
"Yes."
"Weird. And here I thought you just wanted ta get laid. That I could understand."
"So you will not help me?"
"Who said that? Sure I'll help you. Forget her. She ain't worth the trouble."
"Then you know where she is?"
"No. What I know is more important than that. I know *what* she is."
"Enlighten me."
"You owe me?"
"Depends on what you have to tell me."
"Fair enough. How much you know about these Progy-nitters?"
"They are Technocrats dedicated to the study of Life, reponsible for many of the monsters the Technocracy uses to enforce the Pogrom."
"So what your sayin' is, you know jack."
Loyd was silent.
"'S what I thought. Listen up. Even the Technos don't agree with each other all the time. Different groups got different agendas, and sometimes even the groups divide up. The Progy-nitters are one of those groups. They got three different ideas on how things should be done. They call 'em Methodologies. I think I said that right. Sound good to you?"
"Yes."
"I don't know too much about the other two, but her group I'm real familiar with. They're called the Pharmecopiests. They work with drugs. All kinds of drugs, even the stuff you find in the drugstores. Aspirin was a big thing fer them." He looked up at Lloyd. "Her specialty was inventing designer drugs for the kiddies, new highs to distract them and lead 'em by the nose with. She was pretty good at it, too. The streets are littered with the shells of the kids her drugs done eaten up."
Lloyd was silent.
"You want to help her, buddy, that's your business. If *I* find her, I plan to rip her larynx out and make her look at it as she dies. Get me?"
"I get you."
"Super bitch there, the one that just left, she and her buddies don't know this. They ain't close enough t' the street. Neither are you. So, that worth a favor?"
"I owe you," Lloyd adknowledged.
"Fine. I gotta go. Be seein' ya."
"Wait. What's your name?"
"You can call me Bob." The little man faded into the night, his voice trailing over his shoulder. "I'll be in touch."
He was gone.

Sunday, June 4th, 1995 2:10 a.m.

"How'd it go?" Darrel asked him. Darrel was standing guard.
Lloyd paused, looking at Darrel. "How did what go, Darrel?" Lloyd's voice was passionless and calm, invoking images of a still pool of water.
"What ever you went to do?"
Lloyd pursed his lips and shook his head. "I don't know. Maybe nothing, maybe everything." The truth was, Lloyd didn't have a ready plan. It was a time for falling back, retreat, reassessment."
"Chief?" It was Mike. "We gonna go back to Santa Cruz?"
Lloyd looked over at the sleepy Hollow One, whose eyes cast their way over to Lloyd like a lost child, full of both questions and trust, but still needing an answer.
"Go to sleep, Mike," Lloyd told him. "We'll talk about it in the morning. You too, Darrel," Lloyd said, patting Darrel on the back. "You get some rest. I'll finish the watch."
"You sure?" Darrel asked him. Though he had been referring to the watch, the question actually caused Lloyd to think about something else.
"I'm sure," he lied, saying it with firm conviction. Though lying wasn't part of the Akashic way, Lloyd knew that as a commander, he had to keep up appearances before the troops. Morale was the most fragile of military attributes and Lloyd understood that he had to at least seem sure.
Darrel unrolled his sleeping bag and was soon fast asleep on the floor. Lloyd watched each of them as the slept. Each had their own style of sleeping and each seemed plagued by angels and devils of their own dreams. Lily and Mike clung together in one bed like two snoring Koalas, while Darrel shifted nervously, crying out and whimpering occasionally, even to the point of talking in his sleep. Ken was the quietest of them all, and though he moved a great deal, he made little in the way of sound.
Lloyd stilled his thoughts and though he didn't turn away from the world around him, part of him looked inward, searching for answers that weren't apparent, hoping to find for himself a promise that he had given the others - and Simone. And the name of the promise was Hope - but again, it's revelation eluded him.

Sunday, June 4th 3:30 a.m.

The thin sliver moon cast its weak beams onto the moot at Alum Rock Park. Bob looked down on the gathered assembly. It was mostly the usual Bone Gnawers and Glasswalkers crowd, with the occasional smattering of some other tribe - here and there a Silent Strider, a Black Fury, or a Fianna. A Strider had just come from the Sept of Three Waters, over on the ocean side of the Santa Cruz Mountains. And he had some pretty heavy things to say.
"Green Hills Sept is gone. Whatever remains of their packs are dead or have crawled as refugees into the surrounding septs. For generations, our people have weathered the storms of Wyrm and Weaver, but now, the hand of destruction has taken our kin, not from where we have expected it, but from those for whom our very struggles have given shelter and refuge. This betrayal is the return for the gift of peace our blood has brought!"
"Kill the magi! Kill the wyrmsons!" voices cried out. Bob counted over forty gathered garou. More would hear the words spoken as the voices of this moot echoed throughout the Bay Area, as they would by evening of the next day.
Salshanya, a tall lithe Black Fury from Oakland, jumped onto the large flat space at the top rock that served as a podium and focus for the angry crowd of werewolves.
"SISTERS! BROTHERS! HEAR ME!" Salshanya's thunderous voice broke through the turbulent chatter and focused every eye on her. Sniffing the wind, Bob could smell the anticipation of the gathered garou.
"A Fire has been kindled in the mountains!" Though her voice had dropped down to a mere roar, the crowd's attention did not waver. Rather, every ear strained all that harder to follow her words. Salshanya raised her well muscled arm, black sinews rippling as she turned to the southwest. "There!" she pointed, "There is the new power that comes - this time at our bidding!"
There was extreme excitement in the crowd. Howls and roars ripped into the night air, alarming sleeping birds, who fluttered away noisily.
"But this fire needs fuel," Salshanya said after a pause, letting the other garou's emotions rise up at her words. "The fuel it needs is - BLOOD! This time, let it be the blood of our enemies!"
At this, there came a roar of delight and approval. The crowd of werewolves surged forward, those in the front scratching deliriously at the base of the rock on which she stood upon.
Bob shook his head, unimpressed by the display. Changing back to glabro, his spirit linked clothes following suit, Bob lit up a cigar. He supposed the stench of it would have been bothersome to some; but he was far enough back that he didn't suppose anyone at the gathering would mind, or even notice.
Salshanya, having let the moot feel its fury, held her arms aloft, commanding silence.
"And there are some of those whose hands still reek with the blood of our noble Garou brothers and sisters from sea lands beyond the mountains." Salshanya pointed vaguely in the direction of Santa Cruz. "We have learned of their intrusion tonight and we have called this moot to gather the vengeance that will visit them before dawn."
"Hear the call of fire! Let us gather the blood of these self-naming magi together."
The garou hooped and howled to the night.
Salshanya again held up her arms. "The one we seek is called Colonel Lloyd Davies. He is a butcher from the Wyrm Wars. But tonight, we shall be the butchers, and he and those with him shall be the meat!"
Bob didn't even wait to listen to what else was being said. Someone had tipped Salshanya to the stranger, Davies', presence. And the blood of the garou was up, hearing about their brethren from over the hill. But Bob had plans of his own for the Akashic and he wanted him alive. Racing out of the park, Bob changed to hispo even as he jumped through a manhole into the sewers. He supposed that Salshanya probably knew where Davies could be found. Soon, Bob was racing through the bile, hoping to get word to the warriour mage before those at the moot found him.

Sunday, June 4th 11:47 a.m.

"All packed up," Darrel told Lloyd. Lloyd nodded and grabbed his own duffel bag. Just then, the phone rang. Everyone froze.
Lloyd glanced quickly at all of them. They, in turn, were watching him. Lloyd walked over to the phone and picked up the receiver.
"Hello Lloyd," Simone's voice greeted him from the other end. At least, he assumed it was Simone.
"Hello," he said woodenly.
"I need to see you," she told him.
Lloyd was nervous. Simone shouldn't be using the phone like this, not unless she had some way to masque her voice. The Techs could trace the call if they happened onto it.
"That was the plan," Lloyd dryly replied. "I thought you were going to wait?" He thought about pretending that it wasn't her, but if there were any Techs listening, they would undoubtedly have her voice print on file.
"I'm outside. Black B.M.W." The phone clicked. She'd hung up.
"It's a trap," Lloyd said, the calmness of his voice belying the seriousness of their situation. "They've found us."
"What do we do, Colonel?" Ken asked.
"We?" Lloyd shook his head. With hand signals, he motioned that he was going to go out front, to buy time for them to escape. He figured that he was the true target. The Technocracy wouldn't be interested in a bunch of Hollows and Orphans. Not enough at least, while he was kicking ass out in front of the Motel to draw all attention to himself. Lloyd hoped this assessment was true. Motioning up, he indicated to Ken that he, Darrel, Mike and Lily should crawl through the duct work and make their escape through some other, less watched, point in the building. Lloyd knew that the Hollows all knew a Rote, one that allowed them to shrink or contort. Lloyd didn't know which. What he did know was that they were like insidious rats, always sneaking about back in Santa Cruz. This time, that talent just might save their lives, damn whatever Paradox that might ensue.
Ken shook his head, but the look on Lloyd's face was very insistent. Ken hesitated a bit, then reluctantly waved good-bye. Lloyd nodded, knowing as he did, that this could be the last time Ken saw him. Death was always a possibility, and Lloyd surprised himself about how calmly he accepted it's potentially happening sometimes. Lloyd had no illusions about the situation. The Techs would be better prepared this time. What he hoped for was that he could buy time for Ken and the Hollows. Beyond that, he would have to accept his fate. But he wouldn't go out without a fight.
Placing his hand into his jacket, he thumbed the safety off of his service revolver, using the focus to concentrate his power. The black B.M.W. was parked on the street, just to the side of the motel parking lot. As he came out, it's lights flashed once. He didn't know if it was supposed to be a signal for himself or those waiting for him.
Throwing his heightened awareness all around him like a radar, Lloyd walked toward the B.M.W. No one appeared from shadow or rooftop to accost him. All was strangely quiet. Perhaps they intended to take him alive. Fat chance of that, Lloyd thought. As he approached the B.M.W., it's passenger door swung open. Lloyd didn't turn around to look about him. He sensed that there was no one else around, save a few sleepers driving by in their cars. The trap, if any, lay inside the car. What was the saying, - Come into my parlor?
What's the matter, dear Lloyd? Don't you trust me? The voice wasn't spoken but appeared inside his head.
Before he could respond, the door opened on the other side of the B.M.W. and Simone exited, smiling at him, the car between him and her.
"Hello darling, Lloyd. Nice to see you again, and this time in better circumstances."
Lloyd nodded. He thought the words. How did you know how to find us?
Come now, Lloyd. You're in our territory now. You didn't think your little game with the credit cards would put us off that long, did you? Consider the manpower resources we have here. This is, after all, one of our seats of power.
Lloyd didn't like the way she thought "Our." It was a terrible confirmation that he'd been duped.
What's the matter? Aren't you glad to see me again, Lloyd?
Lloyd scanned around him. Still, nothing. There was someone in the front of the car, chauffeur, but Lloyd couldn't make him out. Lloyd turned the better part of his attention toward Simone. There was something different about her. She didn't look like the clone he had killed earlier. She had a fresher, more vibrant look about her. And her eyes were almost fanatical. Lloyd wondered if this was who Simone really was. He hadn't time to see much of her at his house in Santa Cruz. The Techs had arrived almost on her tail, and that incarnation, clone, whatever, had been burned. Maybe, that had been intentional also.
You've changed, he thought.
Have I?
Yes. I'm not sure I like it.
Shall we get in the car. Let me take you to dinner. We can talk about it.
Wasn't I here to take YOU into asylum?
Somehow, I think you're too clever a man to believe that - now.
You're not Simone. You're another mindless clone.
I think you're too clever to believe that also. You know it's me, don't you.
It was true. Lloyd knew it was her, but it was like he had never known her. She seemed machine like, emotionless - a true Progenitor.
I won't go with you.
If you don't, I'll have your friends killed - immediately.
What if I kill you instead? Lloyd was actually preparing to do just that, though he continued with the charade of conversation to masque his intentions.
You can't. I am well protected. If you feel you need the proof, try, by all means; but I warn you, you could become - damaged - as a result.
Damage is something I'm prepared for.
There was a high pitched scream that came from somewhere, not too far away. Lloyd guessed that the source was from the back end of the motel. This was followed by more screaming, as if someone were in great pain.
That was one of your friends. Is that something you're prepared for also? If you cooperate, I'll see that the other three are spared by our people.
An expletive formed itself at the edge of Lloyd's lips, but he kept it inside. Control, Control, Control. (Willpower - 1 success) His pain and anger shut off and it was like he was outside himself, directing his own movements, passionless and cold. But his emotions couldn't be bottled up forever. They were there, inside him, his psyche holding them in like a cracked dam. Off in the distance, he could hear what sounded like gunfire. There was a burned taste to the air and a wave of Paradox energy washed over him. The Hollows were fighting for their lives.
"You'd kill them anyway," Lloyd said, this time preferring speech. Concentrating, he shut Simone out of his mind. But he could feel her there, pressing her thoughts at him, testing his defences. He was getting quite a headache.
"No, they are valueless to us. We don't care what happens to them."
"How can you guarantee their lives?" Lloyd asked desperately, hearing a sudden cessation to the gunfire.
Simone smiled. "You'll have to let me back into your mind."
"No."
"Then any guarantee I gave you," she told him, "would be meaningless."
As she was finishing saying this, Lloyd made his move. In fact she hadn't even finished speaking when the powerline above her suddenly snapped, gliding silently down to her and the B.M.W. The powerline showered sparks and electric fire danced around the glistening paint of the car. Whether by Magik or luck, Simone had jumped back just as the line hit the car. While the car and it's driver fried, Lloyd pumped off two shots, one hitting Simone in the head and the other in her stomach. The force of the bullets threw her down, but she seemed otherwise unhurt. It was something that Lloyd couldn't explain, but he wasn't sticking around for any in depth examinations either. Running, he scanned around him for Simone's backup. Nothing. It was too easy.
A wall of sparking electricity raced past Lloyd and terminated in Darrel's truck. The truck bucked and heaved as the massive currents danced through it's body and engine. The gas tank blew and the truck erupted into flame. Then the transformer on the power pole, way overloaded, blew in an impressive display of sparks.
Simone was standing where Lloyd had left her. The B.M.W. was smoking and it's tires appeared to have melted. Her thoughts slammed into him.
THAT WAS UNGENTLEMANLY OF YOU LLOYD
Lloyd tried to shut her out, but it was impossible. Her thoughts overwhelmed him.
Her mind collided with his. He felt like his head was imploding. For a while their consciences merged, they were like a single entity. Then, mercifully, just as another B.M.W. raced into view, Lloyd blacked out and his mind shut down altogether.

Sunday, June 4th 11:53 a.m.

The area was strangely quiet. As Darrel, Ken, Lily and Mike reformed, pushing their bones back into place after their contorted race through the ductwork, they found themselves on the roof of the motel. Ken raced over to see how the Colonel was faring on the other side, but Mike pulled him back.
"We're outta here!" he growled at Ken and not even waiting for an affirmation, Mike dragged Ken to the other side. Darrel had rigged a Spiderline to the roof. Even as Ken was clipped on, Lily had descended the line to the alleyway below and had anchored the line to a dumpster. Ken and the Hollows glided down the line to safety.
"My truck!" Darrel hissed.
"Fuck the truck!" Mike replied. "We head for home on foot. We can catch a bus in Los Gatos."
"The Colonel!" Ken protested. "You'd just leave him here?!"
Mike grabbed Ken by his jacket. "It's what the Colonel wanted! Don't make his sacrifice cheap! Be a man and live like he did!"
"You call running away, being like a man?" Ken said, pushing Mike away.
"Yea, I call it being a man, knowing when to cut and run. I ain't sayin we'll forget this. But we need to get home and get some help. Then we'll return and give these Technos some payback for the Colonel."
"He isn't dead yet!" Ken said. "Look, if you don't want to help me, fine. But I'm going back. You can cut out like chickenshits, if that's what you want."
Lily stepped in front of Ken. "Ken, I just want to ask you one thing. Honestly - tell me what the Colonel would have done in this situation. Let's say it's you on the other side of this building facing the Techs. What would he be doing now in your shoes?"
Ken clenched his fist. He didn't look any of them, but they could see his face turning red. After about ten seconds of silence, he nodded. "You can't expect me to be as strong as the Colonel," he said to Lily. "But I see what you're getting at." Turning to Darrel and Mike, he said, "Let's get out of here. But we'll be back."
Mike hit him softly on the chest. "Payback's gonna be bitchin," Mike told him. "You can count on it Kenny Man."
Darrel whipped his Spiderline off of the roof and the three Hollows and one Orphan warily made their way down the alleyway, away from the Motel.
A shot fired through a dirty window in a laundry room pegged Darrel right in the head. He would have been dead, but some protection spell triggered itself and the shot deflected itself into the alleyway. A ten centimeter hole appeared into the smoking asphalt. It was vulgar and Darrel was probably going to have to eat Paradox for lunch, but he was alive - at least for the moment. Lily wasn't so lucky.
"Lily!" Mike screamed.
A man dressed in something approximating police riot gear appeared in a doorway holding a rifle. He fired. What looked like white hot tracers impacted into Lily. It happened so suddenly that she was standing there for a microsecond, staring at the smoking holes in her body. Then she screamed and screamed as she started to glow, being eaten up from inside. Her body crumbled, corrupted into a smoking ruin of melted flesh and steaming blood.
"AGGHAHAA!!!" Something animal sounding issued from Mike's throat. He pumped his gun clean at the man who had killed Lily, but the figure had already darted back. Ken yanked Mike down to the ground and dragged him into some cover. Several other men had appeared and were firing at the Hollows, pinning them down behind a dumpster and some trash cans. Two cans had already melted to nothing and the dumpster looked like a piece of dirty swiss cheese.
"They're Supes!" Darrel said, crawling up to Ken and Mike. "Progenitor troopers - Superiors! They're bred to be the perfect soldier - faster, stronger, smarter!"
"Lily," Mike whimpered, tears flooding down his face. "They killed Lily!"
Knowing he couldn't say anything, Ken tried to think of a way out of their situation. Darrel fired back with his own piece, the pop of it's retort sounding insignificant against the sizzling explosions surrounding them. It was all happening so fast that Ken and Darrel didn't see what Mike was up to until it was too late. Ken noticed it first. Mike's hands were glowing red, but this time, the event was of Mike's creation.
"MIKE NO!" Ken yelled too late. Mike thrust his hands into the brick wall behind them. A glowing wave of red travelled from the point of Mike's hands and flowed like water over the walls, the alleyway, and to the buildings on the other side. Everywhere, brick, concrete, asphalt, gutters, all were glowing red hot from the strength of Mike's angry Magik. Ken and Darrel felt the wave of Paradox wash over them. From inside the buildings, they could hear the terrified screams of sleepers as anything combustible in the alley burst into flame.
Darrel and Ken jumped up from the painful heat underneath them. Squatting on their feet, they could hear and smell the burning soles of their shoes as they danced painfully from foot to foot.
Progenitor Supes continued to fire at them. They seemed unaffected by Mike's attempts to cook them out.
Ken looked around expecting a Paradox spirit any moment. At least, he figured, such an entity might take out some of the Techs along with them.
In frustration, having pumped most of his energy into his Stonefire rote, Mike plucked his hands free and gasped for breath. The superheated air burned their lungs. It was like being in an oven.
"No good," Darrel observed. "Supes are resistant to the effects of Magik."
Mike drew a long knife from his belt. "Resistant to Magik?!" he screamed at Darrel, "THEN EAT SOMETHING MUNDANE!!" Rushing forward like a Viking beserker, he caught one of the Supes just as he emerged to fire. Mike drove the knife all the way through the Supe, right through the body armour. Rather than falling, the Supe clubbed Mike's head, but the Hollow ignored the blow. Instead, using the strength of his rage, Mike lifted the knife and impaled Supe over his head and grabbing the Tech's rifle, pressed it's barrel to the Progenitor's head. Mike squeezed and the man's head exploded into bits of melting skull and liquefied brain.
Intense fire pinned Mike in the doorway but for the moment he was safe, using the dead Progenitor as a shield. As the walls and ground cooled, Ken tried to keep his feet moving, to keep them from getting stuck in the tar like melted asphalt. He commented to Darrel, "You know, they should have had us pegged by now. I don't think they're really trying!"
"What do you mean? What about the hit I took? What about Lily?!"
"Hey, we should ALL be dead by now!" Ken yelled back. At that point, the firing ceased, almost confirming Ken's suspicions. Mike jumped out and starting firing his plasma rifle at every imagined target. But, other than making more holes in the building around him, nothing happened. They were suddenly alone.
"Lily!" Mike wailed, dropping down to his knees beside the well cooked puddle of meat that had once been Lily. Ken and Darrel noted a few bones sticking out here and there, but otherwise nothing to show that the mess had once been an awakened Mage.
"Lily," Mike whimpered, holding his face to his hands, oblivious and uncaring that the Techs had mysteriously gone. However, Ken and the Hollows were not left long wondering why as several dark forms appeared in the alleyway, dropping from above and otherwise seeming to appear from nowhere. The furred monstrosities moved with mercurial quickness and Mike's rifle was snatched from his side before he even had a chance to react.
There were at least fourteen werewolves in the alleyway. The reason for the Technocracy's retreat had become apparent.
"Well, I never thought I'd be glad to see a furback!" Darrel said, shaking his head. Sirens sounded in the distance. Sleepers would soon be on the spot in droves.
A large black werewolf towered over Ken and Darrel, changing to a more humanoid form where the Magi thought they could just make out human features. Ken thought the werewolf might be a black woman when in human form, guessing from what he saw.
Salshanya barred her still impressive teeth. "Where's Davies!" she demanded. The tone of her voice sounded anything but friendly.
"He's on the other side of this building," Ken told her. "He's fighting the Techs."
Salshanya looked around at her own people to see if anyone could cooberate Ken's story.
"There's a burned out black sedan on the other side with a man's corpse inside. I don't know if it's Davies or not."
"Well, we don't have time for a search," Salshanya told them. "Humans will be here soon. We'll have to content ourselves with this meat instead!"
By meat, she obviously meant Ken and the Hollows. Ken started to protest, but a rough hemp rope was placed around his neck, choking his words. A garou balled it's fist and punched him in the gut, knocking his wind out even while another trussed him up like something captured from a pig hunt. The garou's attentions to the Hollows were even less kind.
"The Sun Child will be pleased with these offerings, nonetheless," Salshanya said. Even as quickly as they had come, the assembled garou disappeared, leaving only the insane battleground to greet the humans.

Sunday, June 4th 1:47 p.m.

"Hello Lloyd? Can you hear me?"
Lloyd's consciousness floated upwards through what felt like a river of hazy pain. Slowly, as the light of the room became apparent through his eyelids, Lloyd blinked several times, trying to adjust as his thoughts and consciousness resurfaced.
Two familiar faces where standing over him, framed by white light that made the definitions of their faces seem hazy on the edges. One was Bob, the mysterious man who had followed Lloyd outside of that bar on El Camino. The other woman was the nameless werewolf with whom he'd spoken in the bar, the one that Bob once referred to as Superbitch. She was in human form, as she'd been before, and she watched silently as Bob's gravelly voice urged Lloyd to leave the land of dreams.
"Looks like he's O.K." Bob said, puffing on a chewed up piece of what might once have been a cigar. "Cmon mage, say something to let us know you're alright," Bob urged him.
Lloyd's eyes focused on the woman werewolf. "What's your name?" he asked, his voice dry and husky.
The woman pursed her lips, but offered no answer to Lloyd's question. Rather she spoke to Bob. "Looks like he will be alright. Clean him up and bring him into the next room. Dataweaver wants to talk to him." She disappeared from Lloyd's vision. He heard the sounds of footsteps walking away. Only Bob was left, his face still hazy and framed in white light.
"Cmon, bucko. Let's get you cleaned up. The Glasswalkers want you to talk to one of their Dreamsayers. They are called, in our tongue, theurges. Cmon." As Bob lifted Lloyd up, Lloyd's heavy head fell back, sinking back into that well of pain that he'd emerged from.
"Aggh," he groaned softly.
"Here," Bob shoved something into Lloyd's mouth. "Chew this."
"Whath ith it?" Lloyd asked, having difficulty speaking past the bitter wad Bob had put into his mouth.
"It'll take the edge off of the pain. Boy, that Techno-witch did some number on your noggin."
Lloyd chewed on the plug. At first, even that effort hurt but as time passed, the mysterious fibrous drug started to numb Lloyd's head and he found that, freed from the pain, he could think clearer. Bob meanwhile, was dipping a rag into a clear cold pool of water, and using to wash Lloyd's face and hands. Looking around, Lloyd could see trees and bushes. There was even birdsong sounding somewhere. But when he looked up, great panes of glass, softening the sun high overhead, everywhere framed the sky. He was in a huge greenhouse of sorts.
"You should feel privileged," Bob told Lloyd. "Not many non-garou ever make it here. And those that do, well - nevermind."
There was a growling sound. Lloyd looked up. A huge red furred werewolf towered over him and Bob.
"What d'ya mean I can't come!" Bob protested. The red werewolf, flanked by another with grey and black fur, growled again, this time deeper. "Well fuck!" Bob said, "You'd think I was the prisoner here."
"Prisoner?" Lloyd asked. "What did that thing say?"
Bob just laid a sympathetic hand on Lloyd's shoulder. "Good luck, Colonel. Don't worry. You're a guest. Bad choice of words. Just watch what you say to the Theurge."
The two garou lifted Lloyd up by either arm. The red furred one growled back at Bob, it's animal mouth making unintelligible sounds.
"O.K. fine!" Bob said in a defensive tone. "If that's the way you feel about it, I'll just wait outside. Pardon me for trying to help!"
Lloyd was carried toward the far end of the greenhouse. It seemed a long way, but the giant strides of the werewolves took him there in no time. There, under the broad twisted limbs of an oak tree, a strange sort of werewolf waited for him. The wolf had silvery white fur, where it had fur, for part if it's body looked like it was made of glass, with glowing bits if circuitry winking on and off. Half of the creature's head, one whole shoulder and arm, and most of it's legs were artificial. Lloyd wasn't sure if was more machine or more werewolf. Two eyes, one a wolf's and one a blue glowing monstrosity fixed themselves upon Lloyd. The red furred garou transformed back into human form, it's clothes strangely reappearing in the transition. It was his red-haired liaison with the Glasswalkers. The other garou present remained in it's werewolf form. As the theurge spoke, it's words also in the animal language of the garou, the red haired werewolf woman translated for Lloyd, since he obviously couldn't speak their tongue.
"Greetings to you Mage Davies. Welcome to our bawn. I am called Dataweaver. Electra here, will translate for me since I find this form more comfortable than one that would allow me to speak to you directly. How are you feeling after your ordeal?"
"Fine, thank you. I feel much better. That drug that Bob gave me has helped take the edge off of my pain."
"Drug?" Dataweaver asked through the interpreter.
The dark garou growled something and Dataweaver nodded.
"If I may ask," Lloyd said, after the dark garou had spoken, "what happened? More importantly, what has happened to the people that were with me?"
There was more growling from the dark haired garou.
"Steelfang says that they were taken."
"By the Technocracy?" Lloyd asked, expecting a mere confirmation.
"No, by other garou." The answer came as a surprise.
"Then they are safe?" Lloyd was guessing that the garou had come to their aid after all.
"No, they are not," came Dataweaver's reply. "They are not in our possession, but have been taken by other septs. This is why we have brought you here, to discuss this matter with you."
"But," Lloyd was trying to make sense of the facts. "What happened to the woman who attacked me, the Technomancer who was called Simone Kaufmann?"
"She was killed. The one you know as Bob killed her. She had been weakened by her fight with you and she and the man she was with were killed. The other man had been killed by your - Magik?"
"Yes, that's what we call it," Lloyd replied.
"Anyway, you were taken from the Technocracy some few miles from where you were captured. Kinfolk have reported that your friends were captured by the Sept of Black Fires. They are a powerful sept from the East Bay Area, led by a Black Fury named Salshanya."
"This is very interesting," Lloyd commented. "But why would these werewolves be interested in my people?"
"They seek to aid our brethren in the sea lands by waging war on those of your kind. You magi have done great damage to our septs there."
"I assure you, Dataweaver, that this is not the doing of my Akashic Brotherhood."
"Nonetheless, to many of our people, magicians are all of the same make. They do not understand the differences that divide you. Only the ones called Dreamspeakers and sometimes those of the Verbenna offer any help to us. For the rest of you, you are seen to be as much an enemy to my people as is the Technocracy."
"But why help the Technocracy? Why go out of your way to attack my people when the Technocracy will do it for you?"
"Because a terrible hunger has been born in the mountains that separate the sea lands from us here. Salshanya has won the hearts of many in the Sept of the Silver Fury. Even members of the Sept of Three Waters now hear her call and flock to her war banner. Together, with the magicians you call Verbenna, she has summoned the Sun Child and it craves blood. The blood of magicians is said to be potent and very sweet to it's taste, but the Verbenna are loath to give it their own blood."
"Excuse me, but what is the Sun Child?" Lloyd asked, loosing himself in all of these new facts.
"The Sun Child was summoned only a few years ago, that time by Salshanya herself, in the hills of Oakland. However, she lost control of it and it wreaked great havoc there, burning the hills black as the name of her sept."
"The Oakland firestorms!" Lloyd said, realizing what Dataweaver was talking about. The Oakland firestorms had destroyed hundreds of homes and had killed many people; it was rumored many more than had been officially acknowledged.
"This time, Salshanya has enlisted the aid of your magician rivals. With them, she hopes to control the Sun Child and use it to scourge both Technocracy and your Traditions."
"What is the Sun Child?" Lloyd asked.
"It is a Wyrm allied spirit of great power. What you call - a Demon."
Lloyd's blood chilled at the werewolf sage's words.
"Why tell me all this? In fact, why help me at all?" Lloyd asked, suspicious of the werewolves' intent.
"Because Salshanya has become corrupted in her quest of destruction. She will destroy the very things she attempts to preserve by this course. And we cannot raise our hand to Salshanya without splitting the septs into civil war, both here and in the sea lands. Such actions would only play into the hands of the Technocracy. This event concerns you as much as it does us. Your hand and those of your kind are free to act. You must rally and put down this evil before it has had a chance to grow."
"Excuse me, but I am only one man. Why do you think that I will fight this demon for you? It seems that it is still your own fight."
"Do not forget your friends. Three of them were taken by Salshanya. She intends to sacrifice them to the Sun Child, using their blood to set it upon it's path of rampage."
"Three? What happened to the other one? Which three?"
"We do not know," Dataweaver said through Electra. "We only know that three were taken. One might have been killed in the fight with the Technocracy."
"Will you aid me then?"
"We cannot," Dataweaver told him. "Not only for the reasons I have told you, but because Salshanya has followers in our own sept. We believe that one of our people told her of your presence. And we believe that this same traitor has contacts in the Technocracy. We can do little for you without endangering you. Of all my people, I can only trust the two here you see with me, Steelfang and Electra. As I said, in this matter, we are a divided people."
Lloyd nodded. "Then I will return to Santa Cruz."
"There is one thing first," Electra said, speaking again for Dataweaver. "There is someone who wants to meet you. She contacted me to tell me of your danger, even before we heard from the one you call Bob. I think she might be of aid to you. She seems to have a connection with you. Because of the traitor, I have kept all word of her from my people, except for Electra and Steelfang here. Electra will take you to this woman."
"Thank you," Lloyd nodded. "Any help would be appreciated. Can you tell me anything about her?"
"I know little more than you," Dataweaver said, again through Electra's voice, "save that she cares about you. That much is very evident."
Lloyd nodded. The audience, interview, whatever it was, it was over. With a hood of dark gossamer placed over his head, Lloyd was led away from the bawn, and once more out into the stinging smog of San Jose.

Sunday, June 4 3:54 p.m.

The werewolf woman, now revealed as Electra, drove Lloyd down Saratoga Avenue in a Lexus. Lloyd didn't dwell on the irony of a werewolf driving such a car as his thoughts dwelt on what might be happening to his friends, who he had brought into this venture. Not a venture, he corrected himself. It was a trap. I led those kids into a trap and I was the biggest fool of all. Lloyd couldn't help but review the faces of the Hollows and Ken, one by one, wondering which of them had died back at the Motel. And what were the chances he could rescue the other three?
"Here we are," Electra said. She parked the car in front of an video rental outlet. "Dataweaver says that this is the place."
"I wonder who she is?" Lloyd said. "I can't say that I like any of this. If I wasn't so desperate, I'd just as soon forgo this meeting. I can't be enthusiastic about a supposed ally that just appears out of nowhere."
"Well, Dataweaver had a good feeling for her. And from what I can see, Mage, you're not in a position to be choosy. For my part, I wish you'd never come. I've never seen anyone who could stir up such a hornet's nest. When this is all over, if you're still alive, you must promise me to stay on your own side of the Hill."
"Believe me, I wish I never came also. Let's just get this over with, shall we?" Lloyd got out of the car, followed by Electra. The store was closed, it's shelves empty. Lloyd tried the door, expecting it to be locked, but it opened easily, as if he was expected.
Warily, he and Electra made their way down the dirty room, toward a door in the back. Lloyd hadn't made it half way when the door opened, and a familiar face greeted him.
"Hello Lloyd," the woman smiled at him.
Lloyd was breathless. It was Simone Kaufmann.
The gun was in his hand and cocked before anyone's heart even had a chance to beat. "Goodbye, Simone," Lloyd said.
"Lloyd, before you kill me, may I say something please?" Simone remained calm, but her eyes registered fear. With his peripherals, Lloyd saw that Electra was making no moves either way. She seemed curious, but unconcerned about this interchange.
"Say it," Lloyd told her.
"The woman who attacked you earlier, it was not me," Simone said.
"Don't give me that bullshit, Simone, it was you," Lloyd said, his voice giving no hint of the anger he felt. "I shared consciousness with her - you. I knew it was you. You betrayed me, and you caused the death of one, maybe all of my friends who came here to help you. So don't tell me it wasn't you."
"Excuse me for interrupting this friendly get together," Electra said, "But in all fairness, I should point out that we killed someone looking like her that was in the car with you."
"It was a clone. She'd probably gotten out earlier," Lloyd explained.
"No, you're right," Simone said. "It was me who attacked you, Lloyd. But not the me you see before you."
"Don't tell me you've had another change of heart," Lloyd growled. "The only thing I want to see is your dead body."
"Lloyd, if you kill me now, you'll be playing into the hands of the Technocracy. Don't you see? They knew that they had lost me. They didn't know where I was. They knew you could find me. And they decided to use you to act for them. They want you to kill me. And the way they got you to want to kill me was to hurt your friends. And I'm sorry for that."
"Bullshit," Lloyd said dryly.
"Lloyd, look at me. Look closely. Do you see any difference between me and the woman who attacked you?"
Lloyd squinted. The two women were identical. Simone was babbling, trying to stall for her life. There were probably more troopers enroute. Lloyd aimed his shot. Right between her eyes. - Her eyes! Simone's eyes were afraid, yes, but they were sad, more human, like he'd remembered from their encounters in the Umbra. The eyes he'd seen earlier were intense, energetic, fanatical.
Simone spoke to him. "I was once a very good Progenitor. I was dedicated and driven. I was loyal. I was the best!"
"They cloned an earlier version of you!" Lloyd said.
Simone nodded. "Yes. They had my gene sequence on file from many years ago. This time, instead of making an empty clone, they gave it my personality, my knowledge - but not me as I am now, but as I was - back then. That Simone would be furious to learn of MY defection and she would have used all means in her power to erase this stain on HER loyalty. She - I - was the best! No one was more loyal to the Technocracy as I was then."
Lloyd's hand wavered. He lowered the gun.
"I'm sorry, Simone."
She shook her head. "How could you have known? I'm so sorry. I sensed what was happening - through you. Then, when she - I - took over your mind, I sensed her as she sensed me. How she hated me. She'd taken a psionic drug in order to fight you and overpower you. She'd intended to rip your knowledge from you, against the wishes of her - my - superiors to just turn you against me. Lloyd," Simone started to cry, "she killed herself! The drug ate up her brain. She traded life for the power to bring revenge against me. Oh, how bitter it was then to feel someone who was you once, a younger hopeful you, hate yourself so much that she would kill herself to kill me - her, us, Oh I don't know!"
Lloyd took Simone in his arms, trying to comfort her.
"Simone, listen to me?" Lloyd gently urged her away from her growing hysterics. "Can they make another one? Another one of those younger versions of yourself?"
Simone nodded. "But, I never sequenced myself for the last several years. I don't know why. It was a gross violation of protocol, but I didn't want myself on file. Over time, I'd grown to distrust the path that I'd chosen, seen it for the terrible evil it was. My critical research, the reason that my order wants me destroyed so badly, that was all done years after the Simone you saw. And really, my breakthroughs were as much luck as intuition. I don't know, even if they created me again, that they could duplicate my work. I doubt it. And even so, it would take them years for a new Simone to reach the point I've reached now."
Lloyd smiled at her. "Well, I'm glad to have you back on our side. You don't know what it was like to see you that way. I hated your guts."
"I don't blame you," Simone said, offering Lloyd a weak smile.
"Lloyd!" Electra called out to him. "Visitor."
Lloyd and Simone turned. Bob had walked into the store. "Well, if that isn't enough to make you puke. What a dumb cluck you turned out to be, Davies. I swear, she tried to kill you before, and here you are swooning in her arms - never mind that your friends died because of her."
"Bob, it's not what you think."
"No buddy, it's not what YOU think. She's no different - despite all of that sob shit! She's the same bitch that's responsible for experiments on people that would make Mengele seem like an angel. Do YOU think someone can redeem themselves after actions like that? You are one fuckin fool! You make me sorry I went to the trouble of saving your ass. Now - step aside and let me do what needs to be done."
"You followed us!" Electra growled.
"Yes,.your glass assed highness - I did. Trouble with you Walkers is that you're so high and mighty, that you don't know what true street smarts're like. I don't know a Gnawer around that couldn't follow the trail YOU left!"
"Bob," Lloyd warned. "Back off!"
"You stay out of this!" Bob warned Electra. "This is between me and Techno-bitch there. Anyone else that's stupid enough to interfere," Bob said, glaring at Lloyd, "has what's coming to them." Even as they watched, Bob's clothing disappeared as he changed into Crinos, standing a full eight feet tall.
His claws distended as he came for Simone.

Sunday, June 4, 3:58 pm

Instantly, Lloyd was back in the pool, feeling the currents move around him, and allowing himself to move with them. Smoothly, he stepped between the Werewolf and Simone, his right arm coming across his body and catching Bob's wrist, pulling the massive creature slightly off balance. He drew from Bob's currents, allowing the energy to travel through his body as he pivoted lightly on his left foot, drawing Bob along with him. His left hand described a long arc, and as it moved it gathered speed. He clenched his fist, gathering the force of Bob's motion there, and as the furred head of the werewolf passed him, he gave it all back, striking him at the juncture between his neck and skull, and adding to his velocity. Bob struck the wall with stunning force, cracking the plaster. (Okay, this is a complicated one. I split my dice pool to gain two actions, the first being the Magickal effect that looked like a block. Since I was going to allow Bob to attack anyway, I didn't bother with initiative. I spent a Willpower point for an automatic success, and rolled one more, taking two possible damage successes from Bob (in a nicely coincidental way) and applying them to the second roll , a combination strike\throw. Adding the successes from the roll (two) to the inherent damage of the strike, (three) and adding two more for Bob's stolen damage allowed for seven dice. Here I got lucky. The resulting damage roll yielded 5 successes, two of which Bob soaked. (Thank the One he's a Ragabash! An Ahroun would have soaked the whole thing!) The impact with the wall yielded four more successes, two of which Bob soaked. Net result, Bob has taken 5 levels on non-aggravated damage. NOW I'm in trouble.)
Lloyd continued his motion until he was facing Bob again. "Get her out of here," he said to Electra.
"But..." Simone began.
"NOW!" Lloyd barked, using the command voice that had served him so well in the past. Bob was rising quickly, too quickly. Simone was hustled toward the door, and the werewolf moved again, leaping toward her. She slapped her belt, her hand twisting quickly. Bob had miscalculated, using too much of his prodigious strength to cover the distance. His leap was high, and this time he slammed into the wall above the door. (Life effect, she stimulated his leg muscles as he leaped. Bob soaked all the damage this time. He is down 1 Rage. ) He landed, catlike, with an amazing grace for something that
large.
The door closed. The huge beast flailed at it with his arms, delivering titanic blows to the wood, which would not yield. There was unlikely to be such a chance again, and the colonel took full advantage of it, whipping his right foot around and up. He caught Bob in the same place, the juncture of the skull and neck, a solid blow. It knocked the towering creature to its knees, where it sat for a moment, looking at Lloyd almost curiously. Then it collapsed, falling forward gracelessly. In a few moments he shrank into his human form, naked to the waist. (Straight kick, 4 successes for a total of 8 damage dice, five successes rolled. Bad soak roll. Bob took four. Bob is out, probably with a fractured vertebrae. Should only take him a minute or two to wake up.)
Quickly, Lloyd pushed the small man across the room, scanning the walls, ceiling and floor to insure there were no easily accessible escape route from where he left the still form. Then he took up a position by the door, drawing his gun.
Bob was awake in an astoundingly short time. Hardly three minutes passed before the little bum moaned and pushed himself up into a sitting position. Lloyd stood by the door, gun in his right hand, held sideways for cleaner cartridge ejection, leveled at Bob's head. Bob looked up at him and suddenly became very still.
"Silver?" he asked.
The Colonel met his gaze coldly. "Do you really need to know?" he replied evenly.
They stared at each other for a long moment, and Lloyd thought Bob would go for it, but all at once he relaxed. "Not really, no."
"Good." The gun dropped slowly, and Lloyd watched the little bum carefully to make sure there were no suprises coming.
"She can't be far away yet," was all Bob said, arranging himself a little more comfortably on the floor.
"Not very," Lloyd agreed.
"We can still do it. We can still kill her. Don't you see what she is? Don't you see what she's doing?"
"I'm alert to that possibility."
"BULLSHIT!!" the little man shrieked. "She's got you wrapped around her finger, pal. Look at you! Standing there like a pretty little boy-toy. Was the sex that good, Colonel? Was it worth killing for her? That's just what she wants! Don't you get it? She wants a toy soldier to play with, so she got you, and she got you by the balls!"
"Then why aren't you dead?" the Colonel asked simply. Bob paused, and Loyd pressed the point. "If I'm such a toy soldier, then why haven't I splattered your brains all over the wall?" He moved closer, gun raising again, until it was pressed into Bob's forehead. "I should. You are her enemy. You want to take her from me, you little shit! I should just do you right here and let the flies eat you eyes. It would be easy. Neat. No traces, no investigation. You would be an open file on some cop's desk for a few weeks. Your friends, assuming you have any, would never find me, and even if they did, why would you care? You'd be dead. Who would notice one less bum in the world, hmmm? So why haven't I done it?" Suddenly, he flicked on the safety and tossed the gun across the room.
"Because you are wrong," he whispered. He sat down, legs crossed, arms at rest.
Bob stared curiously. "I don't believe you."
"Don't. I don't want you to simply accept my word. I want you to think about it. I want you to reason it out. Why didn't I kill you? Why am I talking to you?"
"You're sentimental."
"Sentiment is for a dead enemy, or a friend. I don't know you, and I certainly won't call you friend. Nor are you dead. Try again."
"I don't know."
"I didn't kill you because you may be right. This may all be a trap, and if it is, I will need all the help I can get. I don't think it is. It doesn't hold together, unless you work for her."
"How DARE. . ." Bob began, then trailed off, thinking.
"Right. It doesn't make sense. That clone had me. . .had me dead to rights. If I'm such a trustworthy toy, why go after me? Even if I'm not, why try to kill me if my supposed "conversion" is going so well? To further swing me to my mistresses arms? That doesn't wash for two reasons. One, I had no way of knowing that wasn't the real Simone until it was too late.
Two, the safety valve, the circumstance that released me, was you." "Maybe they had a backup, a plan that they didn't use."
"Then why leave me with you? That wastes an opportunity to feed me false information, leaves me uncontrolled." He shook his head. "No. It doesn't wash. The only scenario that makes sense is that she is trying to leave the Technocracy, and they are trying to prevent it."
"That doesn't mean she's Miss Wonderful, either."
"Correct. It doesn't. The next scenario has her playing us off against the Technocracy while she plans some move of her own. In that case, I will need to stay close to her, to spot her play and counter it before it can reach fruition. I will need backup, someone to watch from a distance, someone who isn't close to her and can't easily be decieved."
"You mean me."
"I mean backup. I'm making no assumptions about you, yet. Another scenario considers the possibility that the Technocracy set this whole thing up to identify, classify, and target supernatural threats in the area. In that case, how are they tracking us? Not through Simone. Up until now, I haven't been in contact with Simone. Our communication has been prearranged and secure. Again, it doesn't wash."
"Extrapolate further, similar scenario with a minor twist. Simone's defection was valid, but the Technocracy is aware of it beforehand and uses it to their own ends. This one has a degree of merit. If they have been watching, we have revealed a great deal of information they previously did not have, including the identities of at least three of your people and a safehouse. Problem: Why haven't they moved on these threats? Possible explanation: they are, we don't know it yet. Alternate explanation: they do not feel the time is right. They feel there is more to be learned. Again, best possible counter involves having objective backup in the wings, watching
and waiting. This way, the strategy can be turned back on them, and we will identify, classify, and target several of their operatives"
"Jesus."
"Another scenario assumes that the premise we have been given is true. Simone is indeed defecting to the Traditions. The Technocracy is indeed trying to kill her. I am the only thing between them. In this case, the best counter is to marshal whatever assets I have at my command, accquire new ones if possible, and have backup at all times, watching and waiting. Again, this gives us the ability to identify, classify, and target the opposition."
"Another scenario"
"Enough! I get the idea!" Bob shook his head. "Jesus, you really have this thought out, don't you?"
Lloyd gazed calmly at him. "I am not a toy soldier." he said after a moment. "I am a warrior. I have dedicated my life to an ideal, risked everything I had, everything I am, time and time again for that ideal. Since that time, the Ideal has changed. My commitment has not. I do nothing," he paused for emphasis, "*nothing* without careful consideration of the alternatives and possibilities. This way, I can know my enemy, know myself, and use what I know to my best advantage. That is the Way. Never forget that." He sat back, his face calm and serene. "I've never been able to," he finished starkly.
Bob just stared at him, his eyes hooded. "You're a weird duck, buddy," he said at last. "Here I got you pegged for a second rate Kwi Chang Caine, and you turn out to be George S. Blood and Guts Patton."
"Don't underestimate Caine. He was a warrior, too. He just chose his
battles well."
Bob looked at him again.
"I wasn't a Mage *all* my life, Bob. I did watch the occasional TV show when I first joined the Army. In fact, it was Caine who first got me interested in the Way."
The little bum leaned back and began to laugh and laugh.

Sunday, June 4, 16:03:43.254

Daniel Hardigan leaned back in his chair staring at the report in his hand. *Those bastards,* he thought. *Those stupid, stupid bastards.* It was incredible. The Progenitors had made another attempt on the elusive Mr. Henries and crew, and again, the man had eluded capture. Net result, eight biological assets destroyed, one Awakened asset terminated, and the loss of a vehicle. It came to no surprise to Daniel that the car had exploded. Damage to target: 1 confirmed dead, no one captured, no known injuries.
The report was sketchy at best. Surviellance had been indirect to "avoid alerting the target." Daniel snorted. More likely to conceal something. He filed that away under "Questions I don't need answers to yet." The most important detail was how the man managed to escape this time. It was uncanny. From what could be gathered, a group of Garou had attacked just as the trap was closing. Daniel found it hard to accept the premise that this was coincidence. It didn't fit, cosidering the planning this man had done in the past. It now seemed likely that he had contacts and allies among the Werewolves of the region. Incredible.
He got up, grabbed his coat and shrugged into it. This report wasn't enough. It hardly gave him a framework, let alone a body of knowledge. He needed more data, and there was only one place to get it.

Sunday, June 4, 4:03 pm

Ken surged against his bonds for the one hundred seventeenth time, and for the one hundred seventeenth time, they refused to break. He relaxed utterly, the way the Colonel had taught him, allowing his body to recoup it's strength. The others were unconcious, and he was badly battered himself. It had been a rough trip through the woods, carried on huge, fur covered backs at a jarring pace, feeling the wind knocked out of him with nearly every stride, smelling the thick, musky scent of smoke and wolf fur, feeling the stickiness on his face and knowing it was someone else's blood. He wasn't surprised the others had passed out. That he hadn't as well. . .*that* surprised him.
Then there were these damned ropes. He had been working on them for what felt like hours, now, and they refused to break. He should have been able to snap them easily, or at least stretch them. He could feel the fibers in his mind, feel the texture, feel the spaces between them. They should have responded to his will, but they didn't. It was as though sometning else was there, some force that would not let the rope change, that held it tight to his wrists. He surged again, and again the ropes refused him.
One of the creatures, he couldn't bring himself to think of them as people, even though many were in human form, noticed his struggle and sauntered over. She was tall, with dark brown hair and green eyes, and under other circumstances, she might have been beautiful, but Ken could only see the feral grace she moved with, the fur and claws that hid beneath her skin.
"You might as well rest," she said. "The Mancatcher won't let go, no matter how hard you pull."
"Thanks for the advice," Ken mumbled. He was suddenly jerked to his feet by the shirtfront, his face pressed up against her nose. Her breath was strangely perfumed, he noticed.
"You might just want to be more polite, too," she growled in a deeper
voice.
Ken kept his voice steady and quiet. "I'm sorry," he said. "I thought 'thank you' was enough. I'll try to bow next time, but the rope makes it harARRGH!" He was slammed into the tree as he finished, and his already abused shoulders shrieked. Shit. He left one felt wrong, now. *Mind your manners, stupid! You need to be functional.*
A warm rainbow of agony spread along his left side. The shoulder was dislocated. There was nothing he could do about it. He couldn't even read a living pattern, let alone change it. It just moved too much. It wasn't a stable thing, with form and function clearly written in its nature. There were so many variables. The rope was a different story. He should have been able to part it within seconds. He shifted position slightly and bit back a scream as his shoulder protested. (For future reference, I picture Ken having Correspondence 2, Matter 3, and Mind 1, with an Arete of 3. If this agrees with your assesment of his capabilities, then please let me know. If not, we are at least sure of the three dots of Matter. Cyanide to steam is a three dot effect.)
A short man with a rolling, unnatural gait approached. He looked at Ken with obvious concern. "I saw what she did. Are you all right?"
"Just. . .unnhnnh. . . peachy, thanks."
"I can help you."
"Why would you do that?"
"There is no reason to torture you." He spoke fervently, but quietly, and Ken could hear the honesty in his voice. Still, it paid to be cautious.
"Why don't you tell them that?"
"Maybe you've noticed the large number of powerful women around the fire there?" He moved his head to indicate behind him.
Ken nodded.
"Around here I speak very, very quietly. This way I get to live longer." He knelt down beside Ken and gently probed his shoulder. Ken moaned. "She dislocated it," the dwarf said.
"I noticed," Ken grated out from between clenched teeth.
"Hold still. This is going to hurt." The dwarf suddenly raised his voice. "You don't listen well, do you?" he growled, striking Ken just below the shoulder. Ken shrieked as his shoulder slipped back into place. "Be polite!" the dwarf snapped. Ken just whimpered softly, but even as he did, the pain receded.
The green eyed woman sauntered over again. "Finally found something you can bully, did you Soft Touch?" she said with no small amount of disdain in her voice.
Soft Touch shied away from her, his eyes downcast. "He disrespected me," he said pathetically. "I only followed your example." Ken could feel the deadly reproach underlying that sentiment, but the tall woman missed it completely.
"Go bully some other insect, wretch. This one is mine."
"Yes, Samantha."
She cuffed the dwarf hard, moving with leonine speed. "What did you call me?"
"Sorry, Rends the Hearts of Men," the dwarf yelped as he scurried off. She watched him leave, then turned back to Ken.
"I earned my name," she said simply. "I'll earn it again, tonight." She turned and strutted away.
The thought was not reassuring.

Sunday, June 4, 1996, 18:10:47.673 pm

"I didn't ask you who the target was," Daniel said in a voice tight with controlled anger. "I asked you who authorized this action. Either you will answer the question, or we will both go see someone that will. Do I make myself clear?"
"Sir, you are very clear," the young Progenitor babbled. He was almost visibly shaking, his fear a palpable presence. Daniel's body language was arranged so that he radiated angry authority, and the Progenitor accepted it thoroughly. Daniel suspected he could have told the young man to stab his superior officer as a traitor and expected obedience. There was a great clacking of keys as the Progenitor called up the orders file. There was a slight delay as he corrected the occasional miskey. "The order is signed by Dr Hiram Terrance."
"And where might I find Dr. Terrance?"
"Sir, he's in his laboratory on the fifth floor."
"Thank you." Daniel turned and walked off. "Work on your typing," he tossed over his shoulder. "Your methods are inefficient."
"Sir, I will, sir." There was another great clacking of keys.
Once around the corner, Daniel rearranged his body language. He was no one worth noticing, a minor functionary that slips minds. Technically, he had just overstepped his authority. He was not authorized to see the orders file, merely the data files. However, ninety minutes of going through channels had gotten him precisely nowhere, and the data files were useless as a resource now. There were just too many holes in them. He needed more data, and this seemed to be the only way to get it.
The fifth floor of Danco Laboratories was a sterile, white area, with the scent of antiseptics overwhelming even the most subtle nuance of fragrance. It made hospitals smell homey by comparison. Ultraviolet lights used to keep the bacteria population down even further added a starkness to the colors. A security camera drew a bead on him as the doors opened, twin to the one that had no doubt watched him in the elevator. There was no need to flash his ID.
He had been watched since he entered the building. They knew exactly who he was.
A lab technician walked up to him. "May I help you?"
"I'm here to see Dr. Terrance."
"This way." The young woman walked down the hall. Daniel followed.
Dr. Hiram Terrance was a large, corpulent man, a neatly trimmed beard and moustache showing only enough grey to make him look distinguished. Hie sandy brown hair was greyed at the temples, and his brown eyes were almost completely hidden behind thick glasses.
"Mr. Hardigan," he boomed solemnly as they entered his office. He extended a thick hand, which Daniel shook. Firm handshake. The man was used to control. It showed throughout his body language. Daniel would have to use a different tactic if he was going to get anywhere with this man.
"I was under the impression that your Convention had dispensed with such. . . primitive aids," he said, gesturing at the glasses.
Terrance smiled. It was not the smile one would put on a human being. It did not warm his face at all. In fact, it did quite the opposite, removing several degrees of humanity from his bearing. It was a predator's smile. "Actually, they serve two functions. First, they lend me credibility. Hardly anyone believes you are a scientist unless you wear glasses, an impression we have yet to correct. Secondly, they conceal an unfortunateside effect of one of my experiments." He slid the glasses down over his nose, revealing eyes devoid of color.
"I see," Daniel said calmly. "Doctor Terrance, I was wondering if I might ask you a few questions."
"What about?"
"A woman. Her name is Simone Kaufman."

Monday June 5th, 1995 4:24 a.m.

"Lloyd? Are you alright?" Waking up, Simone rolled over and turned to look at him, framed in the window by the light coming through the open window. The light was from a street lamp outside and was a dirty yellow colour, reminding her of cigarette smoke. Thinking of cigarette's, she found herself wishing she had one.
Lloyd turned to look at her when she spoke. He walked away from the window and sat in a chair. There was nothing tense or worried in his look, so Simone decided that there wasn't anything wrong. Noting the distracted look on her face, Lloyd asked, "So what are you thinking?"
Simone smiled. She hardly looked like a top Progenitor researcher. "I was just thinking I wanted a cigarette, which is very ironic considering I helped enhance the addictive quality of cigarettes. While testing them, I'd fallen prey to them. I was just remembering that I'd intended to remove that flaw in my next clone incarnation. Of course," her eyes drifted down and the smile vanished, "there won't be another incarnation. This is the last. So strange."
"What is?"
"Being mortal. There was a time, you know, that I thought I'd live forever." She sighed. "I've given up so much."
Lloyd nodded, agreeing. "I hope in time, that you will have gained much more."
Simone nodded, not seeming convinced. "Well, I suppose that I'm to be allowed a little melancholy. I've lived so long that it's hard to accept a finality in myself just yet. Give me time."
This statement caused Lloyd to raise his eyebrow. "How long have you lived, Simone?"
That enigmatic smirk reappeared on her face. "I was born in 1798, in Strasbourg. You didn't know that, did you?" The answer was obvious, from the look on Lloyd's face. "All the things I've seen. Did you know that I saw Beethoven, as a little girl, conducting his Seventh Symphony?"
"Really?" Lloyd said. He couldn't imagine it, having lived so long. He'd heard that there were Akashic mystics who had lived centuries, but certainly it was a rare talent and, given his warriour path, one that he was unlikely to achieve.
"Don't be envious," Simone told him. "I wasn't very old, but I knew enough to realize that he was terrible. He couldn't hear, you know. No, his music is much better when conducted by others. I'll have to listen to some now. I haven't had time for music much in the last few decades. I've really grown to miss it."
Lloyd got up and walked back to the window, followed by Simone's distracted eyes.
"Are you thinking about Ken and the others?" she asked.
Not turning back, he nodded.
"I want to help," she told him.
He shook his head, still looking out the window at the traffic on Ocean Street. Santa Cruz looked positively dead on late workday nights. Only the occasional homeless person walked by, hopelessly looking in trash cans already plucked clean by others.
"You don't trust me, do you," she said.
"No." Lloyd's eyes followed the homeless man until he disappeared. He grabbed his jacket and put it on. "Stay here," he told her. "I'll move you when I come back. Simone, if I don't" He was going to say something but stopped himself. "Electra will take care of your needs until Bob and I get back."
Simone looked over at the huge sleeping "dog", curled up near the electric heater. She nodded and Lloyd walked out, not even looking back.

Monday June 5th, 1995 5:15 a.m.

Lloyd walked along the packed hard sand of the little beach. Behind him, the lighthouse, now a surfing museum, was silhouetted against the growing lightness of morning. The little beach on West Cliff, sandwiched between dark fingers of rock was surprisingly cold. Fog lay just off the coast, like a dark grey wall. With the fog moving off so early, it was going to be another hot day.
Lloyd checked to see if the rock had been moved. It had. He had a message.
Carefully checking to make sure he truly was alone, Lloyd walked up to the cliff and, not without effort, removed the rock, reaching inside for the small scrolled paper and then replacing the rock, only reversing it. It fit beautifully. No one would have thought there was anything there but a rock. Certainly, they would have to know something was there to take the effort of pulling the rock free.
The message was from Mitsu. He must have been travelling through Santa Cruz on his way back to Watsonville. Mitsutoki, true to his Akashic ways, was terse in his message. - "Chorus want meeting. Your call. Reverend Joy, Unity Temple. Monday, midnight."
Lloyd finished reading the note and dropped it into the surf behind him. It flamed and vanished before it hit the water, in true Mitsu style. This wasn't due, in this case to Magik, but rather the two types of phosphorus sandwiched inside the sheets of rice paper.
So, he thought, the Celestial Chorus had gotten word to the Akashics that they wanted a meeting. As one of the few Akashics in the area, his brethren had given Lloyd the choice of whether he wanted to meet or not. And of course, it couldn't have come at a worse time, with Ken and the others being held hostage.

Monday June 5th, 1995 6:00 a.m.

It was light by the time Lloyd hooked up back with Bob on the part of West Cliff that overlooked the wharf and Cowell Beach. Bob, true to his tribe, was gnawing on a bone of some sort. He was sniffing the sea disapprovingly.
"You decided what to do?" he asked Lloyd.
Lloyd turned to watch a group of seagulls fight for a scrap of garbage before answering.

Monday, June 5, 6:02 am

Lloyd breathed deeply of the salt air. "Yes, I have." He looked the little bum straight in the face. "I'm going to go get my people."
Bob stared at him for a moment, then reached into his coat and withdrew a flask. "You know, I think I just figured out why I like you so much." He took a long pull on the flask , offered it to Lloyd. There was a long moment where he thought the Colonel might accept it, but the man finally shook his head.
"Why is that?" Lloyd asked.
"Because you out of your fucking mind." He said it matter of factly, as though it were patently obvious to anyone. "You gonna do it alone?"
"Considering the amount of help the Glasswalkers have offered, it doesn't seem I have too much choice, does it?
"You mean they're gonna make you do their dirty work, and they aren't gonna help you at all?"
"No. They're going to help me. They may not realize it yet, but they will." He gazed out at the sea, watching the gulls soar out over the waves.
"How much do you know about this Caern place where my people are being held?"
"What do you want to know?"
"Everything."
"That might take me a while," the little man said cautiously.
"You have two hours." Lloyd moved back toward the hotel. "Bring it to the next location."
Bob took another pull off his flask. "Sure. No problem. And I'll just put the skyscraper in the back." He snorted. "Yep. He's nuts. Of course he's not the one who's talkin' to himself." The little man shimmered into his four legged form and took off down the beach, growling softly as he ran.

Monday, June 5, 07:15:34.25

Daniel dried his hair briskly as he stepped out of the shower. It had been a productive evening. Terrance had been very forthcoming, in his own way, certainly more then he meant to be. It had been a subtle process, working his way through the innate defense of the man's raw authority and strong self image, but it was a questioning technique he had found invaluable in the past. By asking innocous questions while subtly varying his inflections, and making correct assumptions about the next question to ask, he was able to draw quite a bit of information from the good doctor.
Simone Kaufmann was a prodigy. Born 1798 to a noted German Progenitor, she began her tutoring in her science at the age of 13, and was capable of advanced Procedures by the time she was 20. Her abilities were difficult to fathom from the discussion, but they were impressive. Her chosen field of study early in life led her to the art of Recombinant DNA, though she did have a few flirtations with drug interactions, and for a while tried to make cigarette smoking a hereditary trait. Her first love was still her "pets."
Terrance seemed to regard her as "highly efficient and dedicated." Daniel was able to read beneath the euphemism and hear the real meaning. . .ruthless and obsessive. His impressions of her were of a cold, remorseless woman, who, having seen the very stuff of life had grown cold to its possibilities.
There was no love, only the biological drive for sex. There was no passion, only the surging and ebbing of hormonal tides. There was no mystery, only questions.
He sensed, however, that that did not prevent her from learning the sexual arts and Procedures. Biological drives are powerful motivators to others. The fact that there is a certain - primal satisfaction that comes from indulging in them once in a while was an additional benefit. He imagined she was quite skilled.
Some time ago, something had changed. Information gleaned from routine surveillance led her superiors to believe something was amiss. Behavior patterns were changing, work habits becoming less efficient. Increased surveillance was warranted, and she went to 18W status, watched eighteen hours a day. Visits to her quarters by superiors and co-workers became more frequent and less predictable. Scenarios were set in motion by the Men in White, and reasonable excuses for such visits were manufactured sometimes days in advance.
No allegations were ever proven, but suspicions deepened. Her work habits returned to normal over time, but her behavior showed a definite trend of change. She began to show signs of lower levels of job satisfaction. It became all too possible that she was becoming ureliable. Again, scenarios were set in motion, and her name began to appear in connection with project she really had little to do with, though her work was extensive enough to allow some direct evidence to show. A paper here, a name dropped there. Word spread quickly among the street, along with a flood of powerful new designer drugs. Simone made the *good* stuff. She would have few friends on the street if she tried to defect, and some deadly enemies. Yes, it had been a very productive evening. It was all starting to come together now.

Monday, June 5, 11:18 am

"I thought I said two hours," Lloyd said calmly as Bob approached the fire escape.
"I thought you said everything," the little man shot back. "Quality takes time, General, sir."
"Colonel."
"Yeah, whatever. Ya wanna hear what I got, or would ya rather jabber on about military ettiquette?"
Lloyd smiled slightly. "What do you have?"
The little bum executed a crisp salute from a sloppy, but trained attention. Then he reached under his coat and scratched his armpit. "The place is a few miles outta town, in a notch in the hills."
"I need an exact location."
Bob tossed a packet of papers at him. "I circled it on the map. You can read maps, I assume?" Lloyd glanced at it. It was a survey map, highly accurate. A compass was folded in the center. "That location is accurate to within a half mile. I can't do any better than that. The Furies have been quiet about this place, and no one crosses the Furies too often and lives."
"And the demon?"
"Look for the big fire floating in mid air."
"Thank you," Lloyd answered dryly.
"Your welcome. I wasn't able to find out much about the Sun Child. It isn't a topic I'm really interested in. Why worry about the crawlies on the other side o' the Shadow when the crawlies in your shorts are so much more annoying?"
"I see."
"Thought you might. Dataweaver - the Glass Walker - he might know
more. That's his game."
The little bum reached into his coat for a notebook. "This is where I got some good stuff for ya. I found out quite a bit about security. " He started flipping pages.
"How?" Lloyd asked, beginning to be impressed.
He looked up at the mage. "I asked," he said slowly.
"Right. Carry on,"
"Right." He looked back at his notebook. "It's like you figured, the place is least defended during the day. There's maybe eight members of the sept that live on site. Not that that usually isn't enough, y'understand."
"Is Salshanya usually one of them?"
"Yep. She is. That isn't your biggest problem, though. The real problem will be the Guardian spirit. They aren't easy to sneak up on. They'll know you're coming, and probably from where."
"I'll need distractions."
"Count me out," Bob said at once. "I like you, Colonel, but not enough to get my throat torn out for you."
"I don't blame you," Lloyd replied easily. "It isn't your fight, Bob. I'll handle it."
"Thanks. I'll guard your tombstone, just in case."
"Anything else?"
Bob tore a sheet out of the notebook. "Names of three of the sept members you may meet there, and names and descriptions of two of the witches.
When possible, I tried to find out what I could about them, but time was short, and my pack's legs only run so fast."
"You have a pack?"
"Don't you?" Bob grinned quickly. "What's even funnier is, I'm Dad, at least for this week. Beat out Sammy in a scrounge. You shoulda seen her face"
"Thanks, Bob. This is more then I hoped for."
"I know." He turned and headed away, stopped, turned back. "Good luck, Colonel."
"Thank you," Lloyd said seriously. "I'll need it."

Monday June 5, 1996, 11:20 am

Electra padded barefoot across the floor of the new hotel. She seemed to disdain shoes completely. "Costs too much to replace them," was all she said when Simone asked. The Progenitor was sitting quietly in the chair, looking out the window over the city. It was the lull before the lunch rush, but there was still plenty of activity.
"Something's bothering you," Electra said bluntly.
"Is it that obvious?" Simone asked. "I was trying to hide it."
"I'm both woman and wolf. It makes for a pretty perceptive person."
"And why do you care? You don't know me at all."
"No, I don't, but I am putting my life on the line for you safety. I think I deserve to know what kind of person I'm risking myself for, don't you?"
Simone looked at her, surprised by the woman's straightforward answer.
"Yes," she she replied after a moment. "Yes, I suppose you do." She turned to face Electra, who settled onto the side of the bed and crossed her muscular legs. The Garou woman was wearing a simple dress, which seemed to stay with her when she changed, and somehow stayed clean. "I was remembering this morning," Simone began. "When Lloyd left, I asked him if he trusted me. He said no."
"Why should he?"
"That's what I've been thinking about. There isn't any good reason I can think of." She sighed. "That hurts me more than I thought it might."
Electra studied her closely as she spoke, watched her turn her face back to the window. "When did it change for you?" she asked.
"What do you mean?" Simone asked.
"You know exactly what I mean. When did you fall in love with him?"
Simone paused again. "Damn. You *are* perceptive aren't you?" Electra shrugged innocently. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you."
"Try me."
She smiled a strangely shy smile. "We went dancing."
"You're right. I don't belive it."
"It's true. Have you ever watched Lloyd move?" Electra nodded. "That's what first caught my eye," Simone continued. "He is so graceful, so controlled. I had read a report about him, and how it seemed likely he was a mage of some sort, and decided to seduce him. I have a knowledge of certain. . .techniques. . .you understand."
"Men are like floors," Electra smiled. "Lay 'em right once and you can walk on them for the rest of your life."
"Yes, exactly!" Simone laughed, and Electra laughed with her. "It was going exactly according to plan, too, until I asked him to dance. I'm an excellent dancer. It is a fine way to learn to control your muscles, to track metabolic changes, things of that nature. But for me, dancing was always an analytical thing. I would watch the other person and become his perfect dancing partner. It required concentration."
She drifted for a moment, her eyes far away. "It was the most incredible thing that ever happened to me," she said softly. "Lloyd doesn't dance waltzes, or sambas, or any other dance I know. There are no steps, no one particular pattern. He just moves with the music, and his body seems to become part of it. While I was dancing with him, I became a part of the music as well, and all of a sudden motion wasn't a thing to study any more. It was Art, pure and magnificent. In that one moment, I knew I could never look at life the same way again." She turned to Electra. "I'll never forget that night as long as I live." She turned away and continued. "I carried on with my plan, of course. I was a good little soldier at the time. I was also very good at my job. We went to bed together that night." She was silent for a moment. A tear leaked down the side of her face. "I lost myself to him in that bed. I felt it happen and there was nothing I could. . .or wanted. . .to do to stop it." She looked up. "This is all new to me, these feelings, these needs. It was always so matter of fact before. I never knew. . . God, is it always like this?"
"Only once. And only if you're lucky." Electra still studied Simone
carefully.
"And this morning I discovered that he doesn't trust me. He said it quite matter of factly, you know, in that short blunt efficiency of his. 'No.' Just like that. It hurts. It hurts a great deal." She looked at Electra again. "You probably don't believe me either," she said sardonically. "Why should you?"
"I believe you," Electra said simply.
Simone looked up, a ray of hope in her eyes. "Why?" she asked.
Electra reached for her left hand, which was across the back of the chair, and took it firmly. "Because I am both wolf. . .and woman," she said.

Monday June 5,1996 5:30 pm

The Colonel was ready. It had been a busy and difficult day of preparation, but at last he was ready. His mind was clear and focused, his body cleansed and purified by the two hours of rigorous Katas he had put it through. His Chi hummed within him, a ball of energy in his abdomen, and he could feel it flow through his body and into the world around him.
There had been a few tense moments over the course of the day. The discussion with Dataweaver had been - disturbing. "I need to get by the Guardian spirit of the Caern," he had said. "I can avoid living watchers, but spirits. . .those are beyond my power. Can you help me?"
The Werewolf had looked at him closely then, his eyes seemingly out of focus. "It will be difficult."
"Why?"
"I see many spirits near you. They are reluctant to leave your presence, and will more then likely alert the guardian of your coming. There is little I can do to prevent them, but what I can do I will."
"Where did they come from?"
"Perhaps that is a question you must ask yourself, Colonel. It is there that I think you will find the answers. I have none to give."
Dataweaver then went through a strange ritual, calling out names and brandishing various circuit boards and computer disks as he moved in a shuffling dance around the mage. Lloyd found it curiously comforting, as though a distraction had been removed. (Lloyd's Spirit Magnet flaw rearing it's ugly head here. Dataweaver has bound some friendly spirits to Lloyd, asking them to keep the others at bay. The friendlies will be driven off by midnight at the latest, by my estimation.)
The second tense moment had come during the final planning session. "I will need distractions," he had told the Glasswalkers. "Something else for them to investigate, to keep the size of their responding teams down. Two should do, coming in from different vectors."
"I'm going with you," Simone had stated.
"No. You aren't." Lloyd left no room for argument in his reply, but
Simone made some anyway.
"I will not be left out of this, Lloyd! This entire situation resulted because of me. I am responsible for your friends being captured, and I want to help. I am going with you!" Her eyes dared him to argue with her.
It was Electra who responded. "Simone, you can't go with him."
The Progenitor whirled on her. "And give me one good reason why not!"
"Because you will get him killed." Electra said it in a flat, no nonsense voice. "The Colonel has taken the warrior's mission upon himself. It is a mission he is trained for, and even so it extremely dangerous. You are a brilliant scientist, and I'm sure you are a powerful woman, but you are not a warrior. He would have to protect you, and where he is going, dividing his attention that way would be fatal."
Simone seemd to collapse in on herself "I thought you understood," she said quietly.
"I do understand. You will come with me."
"No," Lloyd said firmly.
"The decision isn't yours, Colonel," Electra said with equal firmness. "I was asked to protect this woman. I can't do that and provide your distraction at the same time unless she is with me." She looked him in the eyes and said, "The matter is closed. Move on."
Lloyd got the distinct impression that he had missed something, but moved on. It would have been a waste of time arguing with her, and in her own way, she was right. "Very well," he said. He turned to Dataweaver and Steelfang. "Do you each understand what I need?"
The wolf shook its mane quickly, and Dataweaver nodded. "We understand."
"Then we begin at seventeen thirty," the Colonel said, glancing at his watch. That had been just over an hour ago. The others had fanned out over the area, spacing themselves every two or three miles along the guarded perimeter, which Dataweaver had located for them. Lloyd had spent it meditating. He had slept only a little over the past two nights, and hoped to recoup his reserves, but the required peace never came. He was too connected to the upcoming action. It demanded his attention. It did help focus his thoughts, at least.
It was time. He deepened the shadows near him, gathered the sound of his passage into his feet for future reference and moved into the brush. He had a long run ahead of him. (I reduced the difficulty of his stealth roll by three. I gave him a Base difficulty of seven, and rolled Dex+Stealth+Arcane, for eight dice, counting the specialty "Deft" to reroll two tens for a total on nine successes. Lloyd is all but invisible to eyes and ears for the first twenty minutes, and his trail is all but unreadable.)
He expanded his mind outward as he ran, going beyond his physical senses to hear the minds around him. He was alone, with only scattered wildlife nearby. That would change soon enough. (No-mind effect, two successes.)
It was only minutes later when he heard the first howl. His team operated under orders of silence. He didn't need to know where they were. They were distractions, nothing more. Once pursued, they were to flee, leading the enemy after them if possible. He was the only one going all the way in.
He began probing out around himself regularly, listening for thoughts as he ran.(Two successes.) He was still alone. He kept running. (Only two successes on the stealth roll for the next twenty minutes.)
The wind began to pick up, and the terrain became rougher. Brambles began to reach out for him, catching in his fatigues, his shirt. His trail was becoming visible. Shifting his perceptions, he loooked at the shifting patterns of energy, attuning himself too certain parts of their flow. With a catlike leap, he rode an arc of gravity into the trees (Two successes, vulgar effect, 1 Paradox.), some fifteen feet above him. He flowed through the trees only slightly slower than the ground, adjusting his rhthyms to his mode of transport. (Dex+Do, difficulty 8, 4 successes to move through the trees. Stealth roll difficulty up to 9 for unfamiliar terrain, 1 success, but his trail stops suddenly on the ground.) He continued thus for almost a quarter mile before dropping effortlessly to the ground. He reached out around him again.
There. Almost thirty yards away, barely visible through the trees. It was a black wolf, almost pony sized, with massive shoulders and terrible teeth. He focused his concentration upon her. (1 success to read surface thoughts.) Her thoughts were strange.
*Where is he?* The thought was directed outwards, but Lloyd heard no response. Still, the figure turned toward him and began to run.
**It was night in the Black Forest. He crept through the underbrush, moving as quietly as he could, but his skills at silence were poor. His twelve year old body was not very coordinated. There were snaps of twigs all around him. The monsters were coming. He could feel them moving around. His heart began to race in his chest, and his blood began to sing. . .**
*NO, damnit!! Not now! I can't afford to lose it now!* He struggled to bring his fear under control, to find his center, but his concentration was shattered. (Throwback just kicked in. This situation is quite stressful, don't you agree? I'm raising all his difficulties by one for a few turns.) He moved to deeper cover, making sure he was upwind of the beast. He tried to deepen the shadows and gather his breathing into his chest, but the patterns evaded him. (0 successes on the rote, but no botch.) His movement disturbed the brush next to him, and the wolf turned. (Botched the Stealth roll. Bafflegab!!)
The wolf raised it's muzzle and howled. Desperately, Lloyd reached out and snatched the sound from the air. He heard it. She heard it. The wind drowned out the rest. (Spent 1 Willpower to bring my remaining pool to 6. Difficulty 5. Rolled 2 successes.) She shimmered into human shape, but tall, with a weightlifter's build. (Glabro.) She was blond and powerful, with a face hardened by more than the form she wore. "Don't move, buddy. It's over."
"I have no quarrel with you," Lloyd tried.
"Y'know, that's just too damned bad, 'cuz I got some MAJOR fuckin' problems with you. What the hell are you doing here?"
"I'll discuss that with Salshanya, and Salshanya alone," Lloyd said
evenly.
"You know," she said conversationally, ambling forward in a sensuous roll, "Your throat would taste real good with ketchup. Understand?"
The Colonel was unmoved. "Not if I rip your tongue out," he replied calmly. (No succeses on the Intimidation roll. This Throwback thing is killing me!)
She sneered. "Just try it." She began to swell into the huge wolfman shape Bob had assumed, only larger and deadlier.
"Salshanya wouldn't want you to do that. You couldn't feed me to the Sun Child that way." It was a risky gambit, but short of combat, it was the only one he had left.
The change stopped, and she looked him over carefully. "You're him,
aren't you?" she growled, changing slowly back. "You're Davies!"
Lloyd kept his face serene. He had been expecting that. Ken would have told them something about him, one way or the other. The boy was not a fool, and the Furies were apparently not known for their gentleness. "I am."
"You have big brass balls coming out here like this, Davies. I gotta give you credit for that. All right, come on, but don't step out of line. My pack is coming." She stepped back, just out of easy hand to hand range, but no farther. Hopefully, Lloyd would need no more than that. He composed himself. She was alone. She just didn't know it yet. There would only be one chance. He released the sound of his passage over the ground through his feet, sending it three yards to the right, and behind her. He guessed she was right handed, which would put her most deadly arm too far away to be useful. (Two successes. Lloyd has had time to compose himself, so I've rescinded the difficulty penalty.)
There was a sudden thrashing behind and to the left of the Fury, and she instinctively whirled to meet it. Lloyd leaped, not at her, but away from her. When she spun back to him, he was yards away. She charged, flashing into her mammoth combat form, but Lloyd was already in motion, riding another current of gravity upwards. (Another Paradox, for a total of two.) She tried to change direction, to swat him out of the air, but he was just out of her reach, and he reached the sheltering braches of the tree he was aiming for and settled lightly on its limb. He was now several yards behind her and six feet out of her reach. He moved quickly, flowing higher into the tree and leaping to the next one. (Two successes to move through the trees this time, against her 0.)
The Fury snarled her rage at being tricked and lunged into the tree after him, but her huge Crinos form was too large to manuver as easily as he could. He shifted trees again, and she dropped to the ground and shifted to her wolf form, the one he had first seen her in. He gathered the sound of his passage again, but instead of keeping it, he abruptly changed his course, sending the noise on ahead, along with a few flashes of color to simulate his own movement. (Spent a Willpower for this one, but I think I've earned one back for my Survivor nature. If you disagree, I will subtract it later. Three successes, enough to accomplish my basic goal, which is to distract her while I put distance between us.) She loped off after the sound, howling out her frustration. Lloyd kept moving. The deception wouldn't last long, and he had to be as far from her, and as upwind of her, as possible. He shifted direction again and brought himself to the ground. then wrapped the shadows around himself, gathered his sound again, and continued as swiftly as possible. (Two successes on the Magick roll, Five successes on the stealth roll.) He heard others coming. It saddened him how much of a thrill that idea gave him.
The next hour was a tense one, with Lloyd playing a lethal game of hide and seek with his pursuers. (Extended roll contest, his augmented stealth versus their tracking rolls. Rolled the effect two more times for two successes each time, made it to 25 successes about 9 successes before they did at base difficulty of eight +\ - variables. No botches for Lloyd, but difficulty penalties forced two on the enemy. The Guardian spirit, for reasons which will become clear, did not involve itself.) At last, Lloyd was at the center of the Sept. He saw the others, all but Lily. She was dead, then. He supressed the anger that thought brought him. There was no time for that now. He watched from concealment for a moment. There were five others in the immediate area. One he recognized as Salshanya from the description Bob had given him. Two others were the Verbena he had been told of. The other two were variables.
There was little time. The shadows had begun to lengthen, and the rest of the sept would begin to arrive soon. Ken was awake, but it seemed that Mike and Darrel were still unconcious. It was Darrel that Lloyd needed. Mike was skilled in Time and Matter, but Darrel was gifted powerfully in Correspondence and slightly skilled in Forces. If he could waken and free Darrel, they could make their escape, and the Garou would be helpless to prevent it. Making his way quietly through the brush, holding to the shadows and scattering his sound around him to appear as natural movement of brush in a breeze, (One success on the effect, four on the stealth roll,) No alarm sounded. He placed his hand on Darrel's shoulder, and sent a thought into his sleeping mind. It was a skill he had just mastered, one he was still cautious of using. (Two successes on the effect roll. This effect is coincidental beacuse Lloyd has grabbed Darrel's shoulder, making it seem he is shaking him awake. Simple thought projection is possible at Rank Two Mind in v.2) *Darrel,* he thought. *We Need You!*
The truck driver stirred, moaning softly. One of the others looked over. Lloyd pulled back, but not in time. "Salshanya! Intruder!" the woman yelled, pointin toward the tree the Colonel hid behind.
There were no more gambits, no more cards to play. He was on what Master Sun described as desperate ground. There was no longer any choice open to him. He stepped out from behind his concealment. "Is this the courage of the Black Furies I have heard so much of?" he said clearly and disdainfully. "They tie their enemies to make them easy kills? No wonder you win all your battles!" This was the one gambit he had hoped not to use, for it was the one he was least sure of. The Glasswalkers had given him the idea when they had told him about Salshanya and the Furies earlier. He reached out to her, to feel her reactions to his words and give him a clue as to how to proceed from here. (Two successes at read surface thoughts.)
Salshanya stiffened as though shot, her face suffusing with rage. "Who are you, man, to dare say such things to me?!"
There was only one way to proceed. Strike where she is vulnerable. Strike at her pride. "I am the man who has come to the very heart of your power, untouched by your Sept. I am Colonel Lloyd Davies, and I claim the right of challenge!"
"You have no rights here, Human!" the woman who had spotted him snapped. "Here you are prey, nothing more!" But Shalshanya didn't agree. There was a way.
He raised his voice to a shout. "I HAVE EARNED THE RIGHT!! You hold my pack - my friends, tied helpless before you. Is this honor? You deny them any escape, deny them even the possibility of fighting back. Is this courage? I am here to defend their honor - their very lives. You would deny me this?" He strode forward. "I am here, now, in front of you, despite your best efforts. My courage is not in question. Is yours?" He shouted again. "I WILL HAVE AN ANSWER!!"
Salshanya spoke. "I am not bound by your challenge. You have no rank among us. Your words are empty here." But they weren't. There was still a way.
"I did not challenge you," Lloyd snapped. "I challenged the Sept!" He turned to the group. "Is there no one who is woman enough to face me?"
A familiar voice sounded behind him. "I will face you! I'll kill you for that trick you pulled out there, you bastard!" It was the blond woman, the one Lloyd had eluded.
Gasps sounded behind him, and he felt Salshanya grow angrier. This only solidified his position. He had directly outfoxed one of them, and had done no harm to either her, or the forest in the process.
"The Mistress of the Challenge is not here!" Salshanya yelled out over the noise. We may not proceed until then." She walked toward Lloyd. "And by then," she said softly, "I will have found a way to make you pay for this - *man!*" She spat the last word at him as though it were a vile insult. In her mind, he saw that it was.

Monday, June 5, 1996, 8 pm sharp.

A fire burned in the center of the Bawn, as the women called it. The Colonel was stripped to his waist. A large brown haired woman, who would have been quite attractive but for the scar that ran across her left eye, stood in the center of a ring drawn in the dirt. Facing him, equally bare, was the woman who had accepted his challenge. Diana Moon Touched was her name. She was not going to be an easy fight. Her body was solidly muscled, and she moved with a predatory grace and trained lethality, even in this form. She paced like a tiger in a cage, moving across the other side of the circle and staring at him.
He was calm and serene. This was an atmosphere he was used to. His mind was settled, his spirit curiously at ease. He was ready.
The brown haired woman spoke. "The Challenge was made by Davies Brother to Shadow!" It was a name they had given him for getting so far into their territory. He wore it well. "It was accepted by Diana Moon Touched." She turned to Lloyd's adversary. "Choose the weapons."
"Claws and fangs!" Diana barked. The Sept, now crowded, whooped it's appreciation for the choice.
"Brother to Shadows, choose the terms."
"If I win, safe passage is required for all Mages in the bawn. Any mages who violate the territory of the Furies until sunset tomorrow must give up their lives willingly to the Sept. We are to remain unmolested otherwise until that time has passed. If I loose, I will surrender my life to the Sun Child." He looked at the Mistress of the Challenge. "Sufficient?" he asked.
"Sufficient," the woman replied. "Moon Touched, choose the victory."
"Until one of us can fight no longer."
"This Challenge is lawful and accepted. Let no one interfere until this battle has ended. Gaia will choose the victor." She stepped out of the circle, and Lloyd and Diana stepped in. Lloyd studied her carefully, watching her body move, listening to her mind work. He focused his attention on her, connected with her. He was attuned to her now. He could feel her muscles shift, hear her plan strategies. (Coincidental Mind\Life effect. Spent one Willpower, rolled two successes against a difficulty of 6. She is at +2 difficulty to hit or harm Lloyd, and he is at a -2 difficulty to hit or harm her. This will only work against her attacks that are not driven by Rage. Lloyd cannot react that fast. He is splitting his Dodge die pool of 6 dice to allow him to attack and dodge in the same turn.)
Diana quickly swelled to her mountainous form and leaped forward, claws extended. (Rake, three successes scored. I gave her ten dice.) Lloyd flowed aside, (three successes. No damage.) and struck her beneath the ribs. (Punch, one success, two damage. Five die soak absorbed all damage. First round over.) He spun to face her.
The two cicled each other for a moment, each watching the other carefully. Again, it was Diana who struck, this time moving with a blur of speed. Her first attack whipped past Lloyd's face, (No successes, no botch.), and his counterstrike (One success four damage. Diana soaked three. She is Bruised.) knocked her breath out of her. Her second attack flashed up, as she spun in mid lunge and raked across his body. The colonel flowed away again. (She got three net successes with her roll unmodified, Lloyd scored one success on his dodge with his roll unmodified. One level soaked. Lloyd is also Bruised, but Aggravated. She is down one rage. Round two over.)
This was taking too long. Lloyd did not have the advantage. The longer the fight went on, the worse off he was. It was time to end this. He allowed Diana to attack, but he tapped into her flow as she moved. (Same manuver he used on Bob, but he spent a Willpower this time. Two successes removed from her attack, which, modified, only scored two.) His right arm caught her wrist, and he spun around, drawing her after him. There was no dodge this time. He attacked her with all the power at his command. (SIX SUCCESSES!! Plus two from her attack for a total of eight, plus three for the punch equals 11 damage dice. Modified, there were seven successes. Diana soaked three. She is Mauled. Lloyd is still bruised.) But again, her arms flashed into motion. (She scores five damage success after hitting him convincingly. Lloyd soaks three He is Injured, aggravated.)
Both combatants looked at each other with renewed respect. Diana reeled slightly, trying to shake the ringing from her ears, and Lloyd was flowing with less grace as the bloody scratches across his abdomen impaired his movement. They moved suddenly, as one. Lloyd spun quickly, his left leg arcing around to connect with Diana's jaw as she drove her deadly talons toward his injured belly. (Lloyd scores three successes,for two damage rolled. She soaks. She rolls two successes aginst Lloyd's dodge of one success. Lloyd soaks.) Her counter attack threw his kick aside, and he barely twisted out of its way.
Suddenly, she became a true blur of motion, whirling too fast for Lloyd too see. (Four successes on the attack. Lloyd dodges, but just this once. Net of two successes hit. She scores three damage, one of which Lloyd cannot soak. He is Wounded, aggravated. His counterstrike hits against her dodge of six dice, but her injuries don't let her avoid the attack. Lloyd does two more damage. She fails the soak roll. She drops before the next attack goes off.) He barely spun aside, with only his link to her allowing him to avoid being gutted. Still, there weree more lines across his chest. he struck back, catching her in a nerve cluster under her arm. She twisted violently, but Lloyd's aim was true, and she fell, her ribs breaking under his hand. She did not rise.
Lloyd sank to his knees as the adrenaline left his body. His wounds hurt terribly, and his focus scattered like leaves in the wind.
"The Challenge is won. Brother to Shadows, you and your friends will be escorted to the borders of our lands and left there."
"Not enough," Lloyd gasped.
"We adhere to our bargain!" Salshanya barked.
"I said ALL mages." He gestured toward the two Verbena. "That includes them." He struggled to his feet. "Hold to your bargain."
"You fought for your Pack, and the bargain covers them alone," Salshanya bellowed. "There is no more bargain after that!"
The land spoke in a voice of undeniable authority. "HOLD TO YOUR BARGAIN!! " it bellowed. "I, GUARDIAN OF THIS PLACE, DEMAND IT! THERE WILL BE NO MAGES HERE THIS NIGHT, NO FIRES! THIS PLACE WILL BE PURE! I HAVE SPOKEN." The echoes faded slowly, but there was no argument. Lloyd had won, and in Salshanya's eyes, he could see her burning hatred.
(Turn addendum: One truly salient fact is missing from my turn. One of the spirits Dataweaver bound to Lloyd was to run ahead of him and speak to the Guardian, whom I shall let you name. His purpose was to convince the Guardian that Lloyd was an enemy of the Sun-Child. The Guardian can't like the idea of a Wyrm spirit being called in it's bawn, but up until now has been able to take no action, because the Sun Child is too strong for it to face directly, and Salshanya has bound the hearts of her people to the Demon, rather then the Guardian. Once convinced, it allowed Lloyd to pass unmolested and took his side in the judgement. That was the reason I told you would become obvious later. I had intended for Dataweaver to have time to explain that at the end of the turn, but I just forgot to in the last minutes. Besides, the present ending is just sooooo dramatic!)

{Hello Chris,

Your story was engaging and very balanced, taut and well contrived. I was especially impressed by how you managed to weave the story around your game results, which was very impressive in itself, even setting aside your good writing. You're spoiling me I think. I'd say about a third of the players write to your abilities, but none match the quantity and thereby the scope of plot and dramatic action in your stories.

In answer to your question about timing, as you can see, timestops don't always progress at such fast rates, but they can sometimes. Under this new system, they are player driven. The only thing I can suggest is that when presented with a timestop - either send in your turn as you have it, and then let me proceed, or take the timestop into account when writing and reset your story to correspond with the new timeframe, so that when you do send it in, your story will at least coincide roughly with when the chronicle is currently taking place. Depending on your own time constraints, you can adopt either of these suggestions, using whichever is appropriate given your schedule at the moment.

Now, some points about your story and the overall plot:
1. Simone's revelation about her and Lloyd's sexual encounter came as a bit of surprise. I don't object to it per se, and in fact had been considering one or both of the female N.P.C's present to become potential love interests - but I was expecting that to develop over time. The only thing about introducing it in this section is keeping consistent with the story as already revealed. Read the section below from the first bit of move I sent you for Lloyd.
{suspicions coloured his mental voice.
"She (Simone) observed me through the Umbra. She's attracted to the Akashic philosophy, and she thought I might be able to help her. So, now, after learning about each other, she came to me TODAY. Unfortunately, she had been suspected and she was tracked here."
"So they attacked you," Ken nodded looking around. "I still don't}
I highlighted the key word for you. In my first envisioning of Lloyd's relationship with Simone, it was their very attempt to rendezvous in physical person that brought the Tech. attack and what drove Simone into hiding. Their previous encounters were mental and spiritual, though that could have embodied a sensualness, if it was done, say, in the Umbra. You might want to clarify this point to make the story internaly consistent. Thus far, I don't see when they would have had time for such a coupling. Also, remember that Lloyd doesn't know Simone that well so I wouldn't mind seeing some revelation on Lloyd's part on what his motivations were to enter into such a liaison. Perhaps Simone is feeling something that Lloyd does not as yet reciprocate.

2. This last is more a fault with the long move section, especially given that there's input and work having been done for so many characters that have shaped Lloyd's world and helped make it more rigid in certain aspects. I think you should use the story as it has been given, but tailor it to reflect certain facts as I shall reveal below.
a) The Sun Child is being "housed" in a Verbena node, not in a werewolf cairn, despite whatever clues might have led Lloyd to believe such.
b) The Sun Child and it environs have been described in detail and therefore are not as open to change as other parts of this chronicle to the kind carresses of long moves such as yours. If at any point, Lloyd should enter the area, you should request a physical description from me to utilize in your story. There are also some very specific defenses around the node that help to shield the Sun Child. To reach the demon, Lloyd would have to find a way to breach these and their very nature will possibly come as a surprise.
c) Salshanya is not from the Santa Cruz mountains (the Sea Lands), but is from the East San Francisco Bay Area, specificaly the hills above Oakland, Berkeley and the Altamont area. As such, the strength tally of the warriours she brings with her has temporarily elevated the garou populations of those cairns near to the Verbena node. This is another factor of extreme danger to those venturing near to where the Sun Child is housed.
d) Use caution when utilizing the garou N.P.C's with Lloyd. I was very glad to see that you did not have Bob agree to fight other werewolves. This is exactly what Dataweaver seeks to avoid, the spilling of garou blood by garou, and thus the resultant internecine warfare and cycle of revenge killings. So, any garou helping Lloyd will have to walk a tightrope in whatever aid they can give and in some cases, cannot help. As I said, I was relieved and appreciated your sense of plot in adhering to the above. I just wanted to mention it anyway, to make sure that point was understood.
I think the proper reference for the story as you've given it is that Lloyd has come to rescue his friends, who are being housed in one of the garou cairns on the Summit, perhaps in the vicinity of Castle Rock State Park. The expulsion of the Verbena allies would not be a problem as the Guardian Spirit could justify their expulsion via the terms of Lloyd's oath. However, I think your understanding that the terms of Lloyd's oath does not prevent the Sun Child from doing whatever. However, he (Lloyd) might think that. The information I've revealed to you is not information that Lloyd knows, but is given you the player for your own understanding and to help prevent undoing your own work.
Good job! John K.}

( It was, alas, inevitable that certain details begin to slip throught the cracks. We have, after all, written almost 40 pages of text between us, and as much as I might like to, I can't re-read ALL of them before writing my turn. I have too many other responsibilities to take that much time, unfortunately. So I must grit my teeth and simply bear the inconsistencies.
There are explanations available to smooth some of them over, however, if you find them acceptable. The first and most obvious is that Lloyd lied about his relationship with Simone to preserve his command integrity. Let's be honest. Ken would, if at all possible, be even less enthusiastic then he has been so far if he suspected the Colonel's judgment was impaired by such crass stimuli as love\sex. I think Ken might just have refused to go along with the mission were that the case, and I suspect Lloyd would know that. Since it was Lloyd who was the source of the information, the explanation works.
The reason I wrote the scene in was to define, in my own mind, Simone's motivations. I needed to understand her character to continue writing her. "Interest in the Akashic philosophy," does not give her sufficient cause to change the course of her life in such a dramatic way. Either something internal changed, like a rivalry went a little too far, or her work led to some form of disaster that changed her point of view, or something external changed. . .Lloyd. You yourself provided the key in the last turn, when Electra said "It is obvious she cares for you very much." Why would she? Simple self preservation, or was it something deeper? I thought it over, and the explanation I sent you was the one that presented itself. The way I saw it, either you would veto the idea, or you would let it stand. (Besides, once it came to me, that scene HAUNTED me and would not let me go.) I was actually planning to reciprocate with Lloyd fairly soon, probably using Electra as a vehicle for that encounter as well.
As to the second point. . .drat. Here I was hoping I'd pulled of a coup, and it actually is a minor play in the Grand Scheme. Such is life. I have no argument to present. It was that very point I was concerned about when I wrote you about the Timestop issue. I felt somewhat pressured and continued beyond what I felt was safe territory. However, since the primary objective was completed, and Lloyd is still alive, I cannot complain very loudly. What I will do next time is only proceed until doubt besieges me, then turn things over to you.)

(What you do know about the Unity Temple is that a Christian church has occupied the sight since about 1860. The current building still retains the Church trappings of a cut in cross on the stone three story tower. About a fourth of the actual church grounds, not counting the dormitories, is given over to a small but colourful garden which occupies the corner of the lot closest to the intersection. The actual occupying church bills itself as an alternate religion and is said to incorporate philosophies and tenets of all major religions and philosophies - not only Christianity, Judaism and Islam, but Hinduism, Janism, Hinayana and Marayana Buddhism, Confucism, Animistic beliefs of Native Americans, Africa the Caribbean and Japan, as well as the tenets of the great Western philosophers.
Services are held daily and some worshippers seem to actually live on the site, in the dormitory and office building behind the actual temple. Acolytes wear robes varying from white to those made of elaborate Bali cloth. Incense continually burns while gongs sound and sonorous voices chant monotone yet captivating mantras. The priest in residence at Unity Temple, is Reverend Alana Joy)

Tuesday June 6th, 1995 12:03 a.m.

One by one, everyone was led into the room, whose borders were cramped by the large polished stone table that occupied its center. Thirteen chairs had been placed around the table, built of the same heavy red granite that the table itself was made of. The Reverend lifted her hands and the sounds of a series of chimes seemed to dance in the air, as if touched by wind. There was no wind however, only a still calm that serenely dulled the senses, beckoning those that sat at the table to gaze inward at the stone swirls. Blood red flowed over and through white of crystaline purity, touched here and there by bits of clear quartz.
Until they had finished assembling, the "guests" mostly occupied themselves by looking around the room, at the austere decorations, and at each other - mostly the latter. Ten men and women assembled in the room, not counting the Chorus acolytes who left as soon as their business was finished.
The room they were in was in the second story of the tower at Unity Temple. There was obviously a room above them as well, but few at the gathering could speculate what might be in such a room. Outside, traffic at the corner of Seabright and Broadway sped by, oblivious to the weight of discussion and power assembling in the quaint little building, once a modest stone church. Behind the small but colourful garden, the L-shaped building had given way to a series of chambers and halls, built of cool seamless stone, where burning incense and the new-age air of sonorous chanting and mantras crowded out thought until one felt the pull of joining in the chant, becoming one with everyone around them.
Since they were all expected, white robed acolytes led them as they arrived to the Tribunal Chamber, which by local reckoning in a history largely unknown, had gone unused for over a hundred years. Once seated, they were given clear water, served in simple wooden mugs, or hot green tea, as they preferred. For food, arriving magi were handed lacquered wooden bowls, whose dark brown lacquered interiors were filled with pieces of fresh baked flour tortillas.
"Now, following the custom of the last Tribunal held in this room, more than a century ago, we shall be seated in order. I ask you not to take umbrage at the course of this seating. We do not need any further arguments than shall be posed this night." The Reverend Alana Joy was a small, slender woman with electric blue eyes that seemed to pierce whoever she was looking at. Though she looked incredibly youthful, her snow white hair made her seem older but what her age could have actually been was anyone's guess.
"Dreamspeaker," the Reverend said, smiling and opening her hand toward the table, to indicate that someone should sit down.
The first to sit down at the Reverend's gesture was a young woman who had been ignoring all others, content instead to gaze into the tabletop. Her dress was made of what looked like a coarse cotton weave, cunningly dyed in enchanting patterns of black, brown and green that hugged her curvaceous figure. The woman's hair and skin were brown and her eyes, when they regarded them all, were a dusky green, large and softly stunning. The woman's race was indeterminate, and perhaps she was a melding of different peoples.
"I am Waahia," she told them. Waahia was a Speaker.
"Euthanatos," Reverend Joy whispered, the smile leaving her face.
A blond man dressed in a nondescript sport coat moved forward with cat-like ease and fluidity and sat down next to Waahia. His brown eyes squinted and regarded all of them as he looked around. He looked lean and dangerous, like a wild animal.
"Igor Stepanovich," was all he said. He looked cross for a moment as if, even in that brief statement, he had said more than he had intended.
"Cult of Ecstasy."
The next to sit down was a member of the Cult. He wore tan slacks and a blue Hawaiian patterned shirt, while thick gold chains lay draped around his neck. His arms were hairy, tanned and obviously muscular while his dark eyes seemed to be bright with mirth and cheerfulness. A mischievous grin spread across his face as he spoke, as if he were always tempting them all to leave the room and go outside to play.
"I am Montana Haul," he said, "And I am very pleased to meet you all."
"Verbena."
Two people, a man and woman emerged from the back of the room to sit down. Though they sat next to each other, the Verbs took pains to keep at least a chair's distance between themselves and the Cultist.
The woman was remarkably tall. She had a strong nose and deep blue eyes that seemed sleepy, like a deep pool of water. Her hair was wavy and fell naturally onto her shoulders and she offered them all a smile that seemed if nothing, very sad. Dressed in a simple dress and grey knit top, she sat down with effortless elegance.
"Bessie Moisha," she said.
The man was even taller, but slender with long fine blond hair. Though he wore a suit and tie, his arms when revealed as he took off his jacket were broadly muscular and covered with swirling blue tattoos. He stroked his long blond hair behind him, a grin on his face that could be read as either warm or an invitation to battle. Imposing in his height, he sat down next to Bessie, smirking at all of them."
"Gert Severin," he said.
"Order of Hermes."
"My name is Alexis Affery," the young man nodded as he sat down near but not next to the Verbena. The Herm was as tall as the Euthanatos but somewhat more slender, though elegantly dressed, in an expensive Italian suit. His short cut red hair seemed somewhat unkempt, surprising given his neat dress and a short growth of red whiskers adorned his face.
"Celestial Chorus," the Reverend said, sitting down herself, next to Alexis. "Then she said, "Akashic Brotherhood."
The man who sat down had a lean weather-beaten look about him. He had tanned, leathery skin, with long hair tied back in a pony tail and wore a beard, neat and trim. Once announced, the Brother quickly moved to sit and was busy regarding everyone before anyone even had a chance to notice him.
"Lloyd Davies," he told them.
"Sons of Ether."
The elderly man sitting down next to Lloyd was neatly, but casually dressed in jeans and a simple sports coat. Slender and wiry, he had light grey hair touched with white in places, which he kept short and neatly cut. The Son nodded and smiled to Lloyd and then to the others, and regarded them all with a piecing penetrating look.
"Jack Edar," he said.
"Virtual Adepts."
The young woman sitting down had long blond hair kept unadorned and simple and wore thick rimmed glasses. Her warm smile seemed if anything shy and as she sat, her hands played about on the table as if longing for something to touch. The Adept glanced about nervously and with her eyes locked to the table said, "Anne Evangelista."
"Well, I want to thank you all for coming, and I think we are ready to begin."
"Now quite," Montana, the Cultist, raised his hand. "May I point out that one Tradition seems to have been excluded.
Reverend Joy blinked. "Certainly you don't think I should have invited the Technocracy, do you?"
"That wasn't who I was speaking about," Montana said testily. "I was referring to the Hollow Ones."
Gert put his large hands onto the table and coughed to get everyone's attention. "Excuse me, but I must agree with the kind Reverend here. We cannot allow these vagabonds to be accorded the rights of a Tradition. They are simply an amalgamation of orphans, who seem to fight each other as much as they do any of us. They have no common thread or unifying factor other than that they are not part of our communities or of the Technocracy. And even if we were to acknowledge them, how could we ask them to choose a leader when they are just a mob?"
Anne Evangelista raised her hand. "Excuse me, but I have other things to get onto tonight and I know this isn't the main issue. But if you want my opinion"
"Not really," Gert cut her off.
Before anyone could say anything else, Reverend Joy was quick to comment. "Excuse me Gert, but I want everyone here tonight to have an equal share in speaking." Alana turned to Anne. "Please, continue."
"As I was saying," Anne glared at Gert. "we shouldn't exclude anyone. If a representative comes forward from the Hollows, then they should be allowed to sit."
"But no one has come forward," the Reverend said. "In fact, I had not thought to invite them."
Montana smiled and tapped his glass with his fingernail. "Excuse me, but I happen to know that a representative of a large group of Hollows is waiting outside. I know because I invited her."
"You did what?" the Reverend asked. "How!" She caught herself from saying something else. "You should have conferred with me first," the Reverend said.
"Why? Just because you're summing this Tribunal doesn't mean that yours is the deciding voice here, anymore than one of ours."
The Reverend paused, as if thinking.
"I agree with the good Reverend here," Gert reiterated. "I say, since she wasn't invited, let's keep her out. We should only start showing respect to this scum once they start acting like they deserve it."
"Perhaps we should put it to a vote," Waahia suggested.
"No chance," Montana thumped his fist on the table. Strangely, there was no vibration or sound. He paused, noting this, and then continued. "If you all don't allow the Hollows to sit in on this, then I walk and I am the elected representative of the Cult. I don't care how many Deadheads, Herms and Adepts you bring here, let's face it, the real strength on the coast belongs to the Chorus, Cult and Verbs. Without me, you have no real Tribunal. So, I say, let's let her in or I walk. So, you just all think about it and decide if you really want this Tribunal."
"Fine by me," Gert said aloud. "Go ahead and walk."
"You'd like that wouldn't you," the Reverend glared at the Verbena, her masque of cordiality slowly becoming undone. Across the table, the Chorus leader and Verbena glared at each other, as if daring each other to act.
"As far as I can see, there's no reason for this gathering," Gert growled. "And I veto any attempt to bring in the Hollows. The night's getting old and you've wasted our time enough, Joy. Why not admit it and let us all get out of here?"
"I have no objections to the seating of the Hollow," Waahia said in her soft lilting voice.
"Do any of the rest of you have objections?" Joy asked. No one said anything.
"But I do!" Gert said again, smiling as if triumphant. "I VETO this suggestion and if this council insists, then I declare this Tribunal null and void, according to the tenets of the last Tribunal held here."
Bessie, who had remained silent up until this point stood, "I am sorry, but as co-representative of the Verbena here, I must refute my brother, Gert. I do believe it is only fair that the Hollows be allowed to attend if they so wish to. So, with my vote cast against Gert's, the Verbena are deadlocked and have no vote to cast on this matter, nor can we veto your suggestion." She nodded to Montana, who surprised, nodded back. Montana exchanged a quick look with Gert, who shook his head.
Fuming, Gert folded his arms, not bothering to look at his fellow Verbena seated alongside. For her part, Bessie sat back, as if willing to become insignificant once more.
"Then, we will seat your Hollow," Reverend Joy told Montana.
Montana looked dumbstruck and then, he began to stutter, "Ahh, well, O.K. Great! Ah, she's outside, parked on a Harley."
"I think my Acolytes can recognize a Hollow," the Reverend said sarcastically. "Certainly we've had to teach them enough lessons of late."
The Reverend didn't get up but merely closed her eyes. Everyone waited for what seemed several minutes. Then, the door to the room opened and a leather-clad young woman entered, noisily chewing gum and snorting derisively as she paraded around the table, looking at the assembled magi.
"Why Bitchy thought you dumbfucks would be worth listnin too, I don't know."
"Sit down," the Reverend's calm voice suggested. The young woman stuck a pierced and studded tongue out at Joy, then inexplicably suddenly rushed to sit down. Her actions seemed to surprise herself and she looked around at the assembled Magi, shocked and seemingly a little scared.
"What's your name, Hollow One?" the Reverend asked.
"Helen. Helen Mariana. I'm ah, one of the "Black Arrows", she said.
"Who are the Black Arrows?" Anne Evangelista asked.
"There one of the pathetic gangs that the Hollows have formed," Gert snorted. "They give themselves butch names, as if they were important."
"We ARE important, you smug furback-FUCKER!" Helen said, rising and reaching for a knife at her belt. Anne pulled her back to her seat. Helen looked at Anne surprised, but her hand left her knife. Anne glanced at her arms. Needle tracks crisscrossed their way, following her veins, looking like a mockery of Gert's tattoos.
Once things had calmed down, Reverend Joy began again.
"Now that we are ALL assembled here," she said. "We come to the reason for our gathering. I shall begin by letting the Verbena tell their side of the story." The Reverend nodded to Gert, who arose and looked around at everyone.
"As you all know, for decades now we've lived here on the coast and in the mountains, sheltered from the Technocracy not so much by our own efforts, as by benefiting from the fight of the mountain werewolves to keep what they see as corruption at bay. This has been the way things have been for over a hundred years. But as you know, the earthquake back in 1989 destroyed a number of nodes. Certain of us," Gert said, glaring at Helen and Joy, "have taken it upon themselves to begin robbing werewolf nodes, raping them for their quintessence. Whatever their motivations in all this might be, the resultant effect has been to weaken the werewolves power. Now the werewolves have to watch their backs as well, not knowing if the attacks are going to come from us or from the Techs. The Techs have made inroads. Pentex has taken over the cement plant at Davenport. Fomori and mutated werewolves have been seen by the dump; vampires are more plentiful in town than they've ever been."
"We have a right to Tass!" Helen spat. "Since you've all seen so fit to deny us, we've taken our own! We have a right to survive! And we never attacked you!"
"Not directly, no." Gert admitted. "But you might as well have. Some of you know this already, but we Verbena have been hit hard. Tech troopers almost made it to the heart of our node two years ago and we only barely managed to beat them off and keep them from torching our sacred oak grove. Now that the werewolf power has been divided, the wolves are not able to watch the frontier like they once were. We've tried to help them but our power is nothing compared to the Technocracy. And certainly, fellow Tradition magi in Saratoga have not seen fit to help us," Gert said, accusing Jack Edar. Going on, "And I should tell you that this has infuriated the werewolves. They've lost face and faith in magi. They see you, not us, but ALL of you as being no better than the Techs and we were only barely able to keep them from declaring open war on all of you. Yes, Reverend Joy, you have the Verbena to thank for keeping the werewolves from torching this place and gutting every acolyte and convert you have. YOU!" Gert pointed at Helen, "have no idea what fury you've awakened."
"So, you admit it!" Helen pointed. "The furbags ARE out to kill us all. Then, you can all see that we were right to begin this war," she protested to the assembled group. "By hitting them now, we can prevent them from every being a threat to us. It was only a matter of time before they turned on us anyway."
"They didn't even know you existed until you started killing their people!" Gert screamed. "YOU FOOL! YOU BLIND PATHETIC FOOL! Don't you know what you've done? In the ashes of the war the werewolves would have launched upon you, only one victor would have emerged - the Technocracy! They would have won without even having had to fight us!"
"That is such pure Techno bullshit!" Helen screamed back. "You just don't want us to grow strong and become our own Tradition. We all know how rich Verbena nodes are, but do they share them? No! And then they scream at us for doing what we must to survive?! Give me a break. By the time the Techs get through those hills, they'll find we're more than a match for them - or any of you!" Helen warned. She looked at Reverend Joy. "We're not the same little kids you used to send your acolytes to pick on," she said venomously. "You all soon find that war has made us strong - very strong! And our plunder of tass is enough to scorch ANY of you off this planet if you even think of getting in our way." Helen looked at Gert and smirked. "That includes you, big boy, and you know its true, don't you?"
Gert nodded. "The Hollows destroyed the Green Hills Werewolf Sept. They raped beautiful self sustaining tass from Gaia's wound and have hoarded it somewhere. With Green Hills gone, the other werewolf groups are struggling to try and plug the gap, but for now, the way to Santa Cruz is wide open for the Techs. They could just march in."
"And they'll find us waiting," Helen promised. "We're not afraid of the Techs, you, the furbacks or anyone. You ignored us before. Now we have the POWER! to protect ourselves." Helen pounded the table and then looked at it much as Montana had done before, as if not trusting its surface.
Helen smiled, looking at all of them like a kid who had her comeuppance on her parents. "So, Magi, what do you say? We Hollows know how to die. You want us to show you the way?"
Now it was Gert's turn to smirk. "Oh, you'll get your chance, soon enough," he promised. "Together, my people and the werewolf tribes have banded together to try and bring the War to the heart of the Technocracy. We have now summoned and chained a power to our bidding that makes your sum of Tass seem like the nothing it truly is," Gert smiled at Helen. "We have brought the Sun Child to us."
"What is the Sun Child?" Anne asked.
"It's a demon," the Reverend explained. "The fools have brought a demon to the mountains, and they intend to launch it upon the Technocracy."
"The Sun Child!" Waahia gasped. "But, the Sun Child laid waste to Oakland just a few years ago! Hundreds were killed and the earth was burned black!"
"We didn't know how to control it then," Gert admitted. "We've learned much since then and we give it what it needs in order to control it."
"And what would that be?" Anne asked again.
Montana answered her. "The Verbena specialty - blood!"
"Blood!" Anne seemed surprised. "Whose blood?"
Gert grew silent.
"Whose blood?!" Anne demanded.
"Tell them," Reverend Joy said. "Go ahead and tell them, Gert."
"Whatever we have done," Gert said to them all, "We have done for the good of our people. We have been forced to this course," he said, again looking at Helen, "and now that we have arrived, we have no intention of turning back. We shall use the Sun Child to destroy our enemies - ALL of our enemies. And if a few sleepers must be sacrificed on the way, then so be it. Certainly their deaths are insignificant compared to all those who have died thus far."
"Insignificant?" Reverend Joy questioned. "Hardly to those sleepers who you culled for this barbarity. Or to their families. Don't you see how this evil has gripped you?" Joy asked. "You claim that the Sun Child shall rid you of all your enemies when what you don't realize is that this abomination is beyond your control. It is rather an enemy to all existence. It is a force of Paradox beyond reckoning, and you have brought it HERE!"
"We control it! You worry our fellows without reason!"
Joy pulled herself back, trying to focus and control herself. When she next spoke, her voice had resumed its calm and serene manner.
"It wants you to think you control it," she said. "My people have already witnessed two events that were undoubtedly perpetrated by your demon. It's testing the waters. While you think it's resting, awaiting your word, it's sneaking out to feed itself. It will rape a million souls and it will not be satisfied. You have brought us a greater evil than even the Technocracy. At least we have means to fight the Techs, but there can be no understanding of this thing. Even the spirits of the dead fly from this thing. Do you know something that they do not?"
"We will not change our course," Gert stubbornly maintained.
"Let us hope we can change that attitude," the Reverend said. "If not, then the purpose of this Tribunal is clear - to form an alliance for the purpose of defeating you and the Sun Child."
"As you always intended," Gert said, spitting out his accusation. "I don't know why you even invited us!"
"To give you a chance to change your minds," the Reverend said. "Though I don't think that is possible. You are too far gone in this madness - too far captured by this lust for power."
"Have you forgotten the werewolves?" Gert asked. "Do you think they will stand by and see you interfere with their plans once more? Don't forget that their shamans are the ones who have helped summon the Sun Child. You will initiate a terrible war if you all follow this course and you shall play into the hands of our enemy."
"There is only one enemy now that need concern us," the Reverend insisted. "And YOU brought it here."
There followed a great quiet as all digested the information brought forth. Finally, the Reverend turned to the others who had not spoken yet, asking them their opinions.
The thin bearded man sat back in his chair, carefully observing the discussion around him. As the tension mounted, he carefully and slightly pushed his chair back from the table. It was a quiet move, and those engaged in the shouting match seemed to pay no attention. When the furor died down, and attention diverted to the remaining four, it was Lloyd who broke the silence.
"Who are your enemies?" he said softly.
"What?" Gert asked, surprised by the sudden question.
"A man is defined by his enemies as much as by his friends or himself. You have stated that you intend to use the Sun Child against your enemies. I would know who they are. More importantly, I wish to know who they will become. Is Reverend Joy now an enemy because she does not agree with you? Will you now unleash the Sun Child upon her? We know where it starts. You have told us that. I would hear where it ends." He fell silent, carefully watching the table.
Gert drew back, assessing the question. "We summoned the Sun Child to fight the Techs. We never intended to unleash it on you."
Lloyd started to ask another question, but Gert held up his hand to show that he hadn't finished. "How many times I have asked why the Akashic warriours in Esalen have never roused themselves to help us. Yes, yes, I know, you say you walk the path of peace. But now I see you,. an Akashic and you come not with help but with only empty questions. THIS question of where to direct the Sun Child is not only ours. We have as yet tried to protect all of you from the fury of the werewolves in the past. Consider this, if you attack us, and thereby default, the great werewolf tribes, they will not hesitate to make use of the Sun Child. They have lost many to" he looked again at Helen and Joy, "predations by greedy magi seeking to bolster their own power at the expense of others. The werewolves do not shrink from battle, but I don't think they want to loose more of their people. I do not think that all of you are enough to defeat them. Already, their drums of war have been answered from septs all over the Bay Area."
Gert looked at his hands, his eyes absently wandering over the patterns of rock in the red granite that seemed to capture so many pairs of eyes.
"I would ask that all of you consider what I'm about to say. You distrust our ability to reign in this power, true? Well then, why not give us twenty-four hours to prove ourselves."
"Why twenty-four hours?" Anne asked. "What's going on?"
Gert smiled. "Why, nothing less than the opening moves of war. Even as we speak, the dog as been loosened. The Sun Child Walks."
Stunned silence greeted these words.
"Where?" Montana asked, his voice unsteady and quavering.
"Why, where do you think? It has gone walking over the Hill."
Waahia held up her hand. "But, regardless that Silicon Valley is the stronghold of the Technocracy, but still, more than a million sleepers, innocent lives, still reside there. Would you doom them as well?"
"This IS war," Gert reiterated.
Waahia sagged back in her chair. "I had come here with an open mind. Now I see that you have shut it for me."
Gert ignored her implied threat. "Other than for your vote, what does it matter what you say? The Speakers haven't roused themselves for over a hundred years and your weak numbers offer little sway to my mind. I would tell you this, Waahia, do not stand against us. In answer to this man's question," Gert pointed at Lloyd, "we do not declare YOU an enemy, but by foolishness, YOU may declare yourselves as such."
"The werewolves."
The comment, sounding like a passing thought spoken aloud, came from the old man. This in itself was surprising because it had seemed that the mage was far more interested in the uncannily silent tabletop than in the matter being discussed; he had spent most of the meeting running his hand over its surface and staring at it as if he were looking beyond its surface into its very core.
Perhaps he could. But now he was looking at the Verbena mage, his gaze light, his expression almost but not quite a smile, but his manner was very direct, meeting the gaze of the powerful bloodmage easily.
"What did you tell them?"
His tone is light, suggestive of an idle question...but not so idle so as to be dismissed without an answer.
"When you asked for their assistance in summoning this...creature," he amplified, helpfully.
Gert's eyes narrowed as he regarded the Etherson, as if trying to read something behind the question. "We simply reminded them that it was the garou themselves who first summoned the Sun Child back in Oakland. We proposed that this time, we could help them control it and this we've done."
During this exchange, Igor simply looked at the people assembled around the table. He mostly had a confused look on his face (which he was unsucessfully trying to hide) as if many topics in this discussion eluded him.
Alexis ran his hand through his unkempt hair and spoke at a lull in the conversation.
"So, unless I misunderstand, and you'll have to forgive me for I have had too little sleep, you have summoned this thing - let's not use the word demon, it's so predjudicial - called the Sun Child so that you can inflict it on the Technocracy.
"I think I can speak to this from my own Tradition's history. It always begins like this - you summon a power you know you can control, to do something good. But the road to hell is paved with good intentions, is it not? You may believe that you are the one controlling the Sun Child. But are you so sure?
"I am afraid that while I may not count you as an enemy now, the day will come soon when the power you have summoned will take you out of the sunlit realms and into the dark. And then I will be forced to count you as an enemy, much as it pains me to raise a hand against a brother mage."
Alexis almost sat down again, but then apparently remembered something else.
"As for the grievances of the werewolves against the Hollow Ones and such mages, I think that they are legitimate. I hope you," and he nods to Gert, "Will convey to them that if there is anything that I can do to make up for the sins of my bretheren, any help I can render, I will do so."
And Alexis sat down again.
Helen jumped up from her seat. "DAMN YOU!" she spat in the direction of Alexis, her spittle landing wet and glistening on the table before him. "You think you can JUDGE US?!! You who are so high and mighty! Well, listen here, Herm," the Hollow leaned on the table glaring at Alexis. "Anyone - ANYONE - who wants a piece of us can try and find us willing and waiting! Do you understand that? This is about war and existence, and we don't care what happens to any of you! We will survive!"
Lloyd turned to the others. "The problem goes deeper than that, and is of broader scope then any of us may realize." He turned back to the Verbena. "You have spoken of the Werewolves as though they were a united front. They are not. There are many who oppose your group, both quietly and otherwise. For now, they wait, hoping reason will win the day. Eventually they will be able to wait no longer. They will strike, or you will. It doesn't matter which. When that inevitable day comes, the Garou will go to war against themselves. Their attention will be divided, their focus scattered. You will be called upon to help your allies. Fail, and your alliance shatters into a thousand bloody pieces. Come to their aid, and you get dragged into their politics. Either way, your focus is lost, a situation that can only help our enemies.
"Further, this tribunal is hardly unified on this issue. We will take sides. It is happening already. Look around you! Reverend Joy and her Choirsters will almost certainly fight you. Others will follow. War will break out among the Traditions, and blood will spill. You, of all people, should understand what the spilling of blood does to human passions.
"The Technocracy will have to react. Or are you fool enough to think you can defeat them in a stroke? They will move with precision, coordination, and sound tactics into a field covered by warring factions too distracted by their own battles to fight the one that matters. Can the Marauders or the Nephandi be far behind?
"And in the center, the Sun-Child waits, feeding off the blood we spill."
His eyes locked on Gert. "I have seen war. I know it perhaps better than any person here. You say you control the Sun-Child. I say that point is irrelevant. You do not. . . .you *cannot*. . .control the events that must follow. The factors I have named are but a few that will surface."
His gaze shifted to Bessie. "Your cause is lost before it begins," he said solemnly. "Your tactics betray your objectives. There is only one path open to you." He spoke slowly and emphatically. "Change your course."
Gert shook his head, composed and resolute. "We will not. And any who oppose us will be destroyed. Despite all your rhetoric, you shall find that it simply comes down to this."
Reverend Joy spoke. "Your attitude, Gert, is hardly surprising. I had only allowed the barest bit of hope you could be persuaded otherwise. My true purpose in inviting you here was to show to the others how intractable you truly are."
Gert didn't reply but merely sneered at her.
She rose and all eyes turned to her.
"The outcome of this Tribunal shall be relayed to our Tradition chapters elsewhere. We urge you to contact your fellows abroad but we shall endeavor to do the same and word of this Tribunal shall soon be broadcast worldwide. Based on the outcome of our vote here tonight, we can bring pressure to bear on other Verbena chapters. All Verbena must be held accountable for your actions," she calmly stated to Gert. "If we cannot persuade you, then others of your Tradition will have to renounce you or they will suffer if they do not. Do not doubt it."
"You will not prevail. No matter what you decide otherwise, these minions will not plunge their Traditions into war," Gert told her.
"We shall see. I doubt that even other Verbena elsewhere will support you in this once the outcome of this Tribunal is made known," the Reverend replied. Turning to the others, she said, "As representatives of your Traditions, when we vote, each Tradition shall have one vote. The majority shall rule and if the motion carries, then the measure shall be supported by all the Traditions, on pain of being outcast and hunted."
"The motion being proposed is this - That the Verbena Stone Hollow Chantry will desist their alliance with the entity known as the Sun Child and that they will banish said entity back to the nether regions from which it came. That failing to do this, that the Stone Hollow Chantry will be declared as outcasts to be hunted and destroyed by all those who hold themselves to the Traditions. All Verbena chantries worldwide are called upon to renounce the Stone Hollow Chantry and aid in its destruction or face the same at the hands of all the Traditions. We shall vote in order of our seating. Does anyone have anything to say or add before the voting commences?"
Gert yawned as if the Reverend's words were of little interest to him. He hadn't even finished yawning as he spoke. "I wonder what the members of our little gathering would think if they knew, Reverend, that you were in contact with the Technocracy New World Order."
Waahia gasped. "Reverend Joy, is this true?"
The barest flicker of surprise registered across the Reverend's face, in the form of her eyes, which widened just slightly.
"Well, is it?" the Cultist, Montana, insisted.
Reverend Joy simply nodded. "Yes, it is my intention to warn the Technocracy. Why not? If anyone should expend their energies and resources fighting this abomination, why should it not be our enemies?"
"So, you would use us to gut the Technocracy anyway," Gert laughed. Turning to the others, he said, "You see how the Chorus acts? We've denied nothing, but here THEY are scheming behind all our backs. Don't think that they won't sell you out just as soon if it suits their purpose. As far as their concerned, Santa Cruz is theirs. Once we're gone, who will be next? The Euthanatos? The Hollows? The Adepts? We all know what happened to the Herms and Akashics a hundred years ago. The Chorus burned out their chantries and killed every one of them that they could lay their hands on."
"That was long ago," the Reverend calmly replied to the accusing stares that greeted her all around the table. "Situations and attitudes have changed much since then."
"She's lying," Gert sneered. "Once you vote her way, she'll be done with you. She doesn't need you, just your vote. After all, she's got the Technocracy as an ally now, don't you, Reverend? The way I see it, we're both dancing with devils. You know the caliber of loathsome treachery that embodies the Techs. Why not give our way at least a chance? You don't have to join us. Just agree not to fight us. Vote NO against this insane proposal and refuse to be Chorus puppets!"
The Adept Anne sighed. "Well!"
The Reverend didn't make any further reply, but simply waited for any last concerns or proposals to be put forward.
At this point, everyone present was surprised to see the red granite table glow, just slightly. The point of emanation originated from the Euthanatos, Igor, and spread with fingers of light barely perceptible within the stone, touching each of the magi present.
"Do not think that even subtle uses of Magick go unnoticed HERE," the Reverend calmly informed the Euthanatos.
The Russian turned toward the Reverend, with an impassible face. "I don't know anything about the topics discussed here. If I can't judge the ideals, I can at least sense the worth of the people supporting them." Those words were all the explanations he gave, before lapsing into complete silence again.
The elderly Son of Ether filled the silence. Addressing Gert once more, he said, "One more question. A small technical matter." His tone is matter of fact. "What preparations have you made with respect to Resheph?"
Gert turned his head, as if thinking. Finally, he replied, "Resheph? You speak in riddles Etherson. Is this a name or a term you use?"
However, Jack did not answer, merely watching the Verbena quietly. Unanswered, Gert shrugged and seem to forget the question entirely.
After a quiet lull, Reverend Joy addressed the Tribunal. "It seems we've all said what we're going to say. Now has come the time to vote. Please - place your hands upon the table, palms downward. Here is my proposal, - that we together form an alliance with the express purpose of defeating the Verbena. We shall inform our Traditions of this decision and all Verbena chantries that do not acknowledge the righteousness of this decision shall themselves come under pressure from our brothers and sisters. Consider this a dwell upon the answer, a yes or no."
One by one, all present placed their hands upon the table as directed. Interestingly, it was Besie and not Gert who voted for the Verbena. Gert kept his hands folded, scowling as he watched the Tribunal members. A sound of ringing invisible chimes sounded announcing what decision the Tribunal had come to.
The chimes sounded low with a mournful tone, meaning that the Tribunal had decided upon war.
"I want a polling!" Gert promptly demanded.
In the order of their seating, a coloured light emanated from the table, weaving either a thread of positive white light, that of disagreeing dark green or the neutral tone of purple. Those voting yes included the Dreamspeaker, Order of Hermes, Celestial Chorus, and Akashic Brotherhood. No votes were cast by, not surprisingly, the Verbena, but also the Cult of Ecstasy and the Virtual Adepts. For all their rhetoric, Helen, the representative from the Hollow Ones, who had been allowed to vote had abstained as had the Euthanatos and Son of Ether, both indicated by purple spots on the portion of table in front of them. War had been voted for by the slimmest of margins.
Gert glared at of all people, the Euthanatos. "You'll live to regret this," he spat, storming out of the room.
Besie lingered a moment. "Please, don't fight us. You'll only doom yourselves." Then she quickly left before anyone had a chance to reply.
The Reverend folded her hands. "I would have rather this had been a more unified decision, but accordingly, by the convention of the Tribunal of 1856, I declare that all members of the Traditions in this room, including in this instance, the ones who call themselves the Hollow Ones, shall be bound to take forceful action against the Verbena in order to halt this abomination. We, as instigators, will take the first action and we expect and require that any and all of you aid us in whatever request we make to prosecute this war. We must act quickly, lest the Verbena take the time to strike out at us. Gert has said that the Sun Child walks tonight. Hopefully, that shall not be true of tomorrow night as well. Unless anyone has anything to add, I declare this Tribunal adjourned."
Igor looked at the people still seated around the table.
"They will strike at me first, I presume. Gert was angry and feels betrayal from me. He tried to buy my vote with money and blackmailing, and as I reponded with honesty instead of fear or greed to this issue, it was sufficient to tip slightly the balance toward war. I was warned the Choristers," Igor gave a small nod to the Reverend. "would seek me out and destroy me unless I had the Verbenas' protection. I know nothing of you, you know nothing of me. I wish no harm to anyone and would like nothing better than to be as little involved in this as possible. Though my life is in jeopardy now from the little I understand of what happened tonite. I will help as best as I can if I am assured that the Choristers will leave me alone after this."
It seemed like talking too much was very unusual for him. He waited for any reply, hesitant and quite uneasy about this diplomatic exchange.
The Reverend returned to Igor a thin lipped smile. "Our Euthanatos brother here has nothing to fear from us. As long as the peculiar practices of his `Tradition' do not offend our sensibilities, then we shall not bring him or those of his way any harm - especially given his promise to aid us. And now, if you good people do not mind, I have much to do."
With that, the Reverend got up and left the table.

Tuesday June 6th, 1995 12:27 a.m.

"How did it go?" Simone asked, greeting Lloyd as he reentered the room.
Lloyd shook his head. "I find it hard to believe that I actually voted to go to war."
Simone let him be quiet for a moment. Then she said, "I want to help."
Lloyd just looked at her and nodded. "O.K. I think I'll need it."
He noticed she was smiling. "Did I say something to cheer you up?"
"Just that you needed me." She smiled at him and turned off the light.

Thursday June 8th, 1995 11:26 a.m.

Lloyd, along with Simone, Ken, Bob and Electra sat sipping various teas, water and beers at the Seabright Brewery, near the corner of Seabright and East Cliff. Ken was briefing the Colonel on what had transpired for the couple of days that the Colonel had kept Simone under wraps.
"From talking to Mike and Daryl, the Hollows figure that the Sun Child wiped out about every Son (of Ether) in Saratoga. It left their main chantry a burned out ash heap."
Bob swished some beer around his mouth but made no comment, instead trading glances with Electra. The Glasswalker had no qualms about speaking though.
"I can't believe that while you were all meeting, that the Verbena would just attack one of your order like that. Are they really that untrustworthy?"
Ken looked up at her and then at the Colonel. "Actually, I think the Verbena were as surprised as anyone. The Sun Child was told to go after the Techs. But being in Saratoga, the Ether chantry was kind of in the line of fire. They tried to defend themselves, and much good it did them."
"What about the Chorus attack on Tuesday night?" Lloyd asked.
Ken shook his head. "No good. They lost a lot of people in that one attack. They managed to pull a sneak on the werewolves, but only by sacrificing at least half a dozen of their people. And for all that, the rest of them got burned. Their souls are feeding that `thing' even as we speak. Reverend Joy's up healing at the Temple. Be a while before she tries something." Ken took a drink. "Mike's scared. A bunch of the Hollows are gearing themselves up for a try at the Verbs. He's going in with them. The Hollows figure that if they pull this one off, that the Traditions are going to have to respect them."
Lloyd glanced back as someone brushed his back. Judging by the clothing, he guessed the woman was a Dreamspeaker. They had been gathering in Santa Cruz for the past couple of days. Word was that they were getting ready for their own push. Lloyd couldn't help thinking about World War I, where lines of men were mowed down, in fruitless attacks on a fortified position.
"What do you think?" Bob finally spoke, directing his question to Lloyd.
"I was thinking, we need a tank."

Saturday, June 10, shortly after sunrise

The sun found Colonel Davies three miles from his camp, setting a grueling pace through the mountain wilderness. His staff swung easily, pushing aside the branches and puckerbrush that covered the untraveled terrain. He had wakened perhaps an hour before the sun and set out at once, disdaining breakfast. It was a luxury he could ill afford at the moment.
Time was not on his side.
As he walked, he reflected on the events of the past three days. The conversation with the others at the Seabright Brewery seemed so long ago, as though months had passed. He had been talking about their position when he suddenly rose to his feet. "I have to go," he said abruptly.
"What? the others asked.
"I have to go," he repeated, his voice almost wooden. "They are calling me and I have to go."
Simone stood. "Go where? Who is calling you?"
"The Brotherhood. I am being Summoned. I have to go."
"Colonel. we can't afford to lose you now. There's a war on!" Bob
snapped.
It was true, Lloyd realized. He was needed here, but that wasn't important. Nothing was important, not the war, not Simone, not Ken, not sleep, not food. There was only the Necessity of Going. "I have to go. I'm sorry, I have no choice. I'll be in touch."
"When?" Bob asked.
"I have to go." The Colonel had turned abruptly and left, striding down the street. He did not hail a cab. He had to go on foot. When Bob tried to follow him, Lloyd had backtracked and circled until the little bum finally lost his trail. He had to go alone.
The journey passed in a blur of Necessity, night blending seamlessly into day, until finally, even his great stamina taxed, Lloyd found himself in a corridor lined with wooden figures. His mind cleared, and in a rush he understood what had happened. "Damn them," he mumbled, his anger overcoming his controls. "DAMN THEM!!" He blurred into motion as the figures moved around him. This was a familiar exercise, a Kata the Brotherhood taught to all who left the Xiudaoyuan. It was the Path of Entry. The figures were designed to move in a certain way, and the Form allowed the Brother to slip through unharmed. No other person would be able to, theoretically. But within Lloyd, something had snapped. The Path burned within him, and he moved not to pass unscathed, but instead to break the gauntlet, whirling and striking, ducking and striking again in a blur of raging destruction. (Spirit Magnet got the best of him.) When he stopped, his body was battered by the blows he could not avoid, but the Path lay in ruins behind him. The final door stood before him. His anger faded, replaced by the sick feeling of failure that always accompanied such a loss of personal control. He sank to his knees, head bowed, and wept silently. His chest burned from the tearing motions he had inflicted upon his wounds, and blood seeped through to soak his shirt.
"Why do you weep, Wildcat?" It was the voice of his teacher, Xiang. It echoed in the space around him, eery in the now empty chamber. It had been too long since he had heard that voice, too long since the familiar name his Mentor had given him had graced his ears.
"I have failed, Master," Lloyd mumbled brokenly.
"In what way?"
"I have lost my center and wandered dark paths."
"Does weeping help you find your center?"
"No, Master. It does not."
"Then why do you weep, Wildcat?"
Lloyd inhaled sharply, deeply, filling himself with air, then let it out slowly, exhaling his rage, his pain, his fear. Again. . .again. . .again. ..the simplicity of breathing brought him back to himself, and he felt his center hum and flex within him. Calm now, he sat straighter, his shoulders squaring. He flowed to his feet, and the door opened before him.
"Welcome home, Wildcat," said Xiang, a well built Oriental in his mid-forties, his black hair straight and short. His face wore a hundred battles, and wore them well. They had not wounded him, but forged him. It was a state Lloyd hoped to achieve in time.
"Thank you, Master." Lloyd bowed to his Mentor, who returned it gracefully. "Why was I Summoned?" he asked.
"You do not know?"
"The war?"
"Your vote. It is questioned within the Brotherhood whether we were wise to send you to the conclave. You were Summoned to answer to the Brotherhood."
"Then let me answer to them now."
Xiang gaped at him. "But you are wounded, exhausted! Surely we can wait!"
"No, Master. Time is precious, and moments lost cannot be regained. I am ready now."
"Very well, Wildcat. Let us go." They proceeded through the door, past several chambers of the lesser Brothers set to guard the door. They passed into the large central Hall of the Xiudaoyuang. Five of the Brotherhood stood there, arrayed in ceremonial robes; orange silk, a scaled pattern, yellow silk and blue silk stood two to a side flanking a black robed, red sashed Venerable Master.
"It is as I said it would be Venerable One," Xiang intoned.
"He wishes to face us now?"
"I do," Lloyd spoke firmly.
"Your courage does you credit, Brother Davies," the elder said calmly.
"It is fear that drives me, Venerable Master, not courage. Events have unfolded that must be countered, and countered swiftly."
"Speak of this no more. We shall resolve it in the Record."
"As you say, Venerable Master."
"Let the Tribunal of the Record begin," the old man said, his head bowing. The others also bowed their heads, save for Lloyd, who closed his eyes, and Xiang, who kept watch.
What followed could not be called a discussion, or a Tribunal, by any of Lloyd's old definitions. There was no conversation, no argument. Instead, Lloyd's memories played out into the Akashic Record in a blur, images meshing and fluxing wildly. . .Ken meeting him at his home. . .Simone in the amusement park. . . Simone, nude and sensual beneath ebon sheets. . . the trap at the hotel. . .the clone of Lloyd. . .the Sun Child. . .the Werewolves. . .the trip through and battle at the Caern. . .the Conclave. ..Mike. . .Bob. . .Electra. . .Steelfang. . .Lily. . . blood, death painanguishanditwasallhappeningagain. . .It all poured out of him in a blurred flash, his knowledge, experience, fears, and dreams. He was before them, naked and exposed. . .but not unprotected. The others, they surrounded him, guarded his mind.
For a flash of a moment Lloyd knew peace like he had never felt before, a oneness with all things that surpassed his feeble understanding of the concept. He became WE, and WE knew what had happened, what must happen. War had started, and already damage beyond reckoning had been done. It was only a matter of time before the Verbena lost control of the Sun Child, or worse of themselves. Gert was obsessed, his mind consumed with revenge. His center was lost in the blaze of false power the Sun Child provided his ego. He was doomed. Unless action was taken soon, thousands were doomed. The ego\pattern Davies had acted according to it's nature. It could have voted no other way, given the information it had. There was no blame, no fault in judgment. WE would take action. WE had little choice. WE dissolved into us, into Lloyd and the others. Lloyd leaned heavily against Xiang, who moved in to support his battered form.
The Venerable One did not speak. There was no need. The echo of his presence still reverberated in Lloyd. He kneeled down next to the injured Colonel, slid back his shirt, and passed his hands over the wounds, tracing their outlines with the delicate tips of his fingers. They closed, healed, and Lloyd felt the last of his strength flow into them. The Tribunal nodded as one and left. (Vulgar effect, all damage healed. The Brotherhood recognizes Lloyd's importance in the coming battle as both a local mage, and a good tactician. I believe it justifies the healing.)
"How long?" Lloyd asked Xiang.
"An hour. You must stay here and eat, and then you must sleep."
"No. I. . ."
". . .Must eat and rest. You are exhausted, Wildcat. You cannot push yourself any harder and live. Heed me in this, as you did of old."
Lloyd considered his Master's words, felt the leaden weight of his limbs pull him to the ground. "I bow to your wisdom, Master," he said at last.
"And that in itself is wisdom, my son. Come."

That had been yesterday. When he had awakened, he was in the wooded hills surrounding the Xiudaoyuang, wrapped in simple traveling garb, his possesions piled nearby. He pushed himself, increasing his pace until he moved at nearly a run through the sun-dappled woods. His body adapted itself to the rhthym of the forest, and soon he was moving as lightly as a deer through the trees. He moved as silently as possible, keeping to the shadows just for practice. It was going to be a long run.

Saturday, June 10, 10:34:34.974

"Disaster. . . Disaster. . .Implement protocol M-17. All combat personnel report to Section 12 for immediate briefing and issue of armament. .
.Disaster. . .Disaster. . ."
The cold emotionless voice held no trace of fear as the walls collapsed around Daniel Hardigan. The rational, questioning part of his mind wondered idly why. The animal, survival oriented part had most of the resources under its control right now. Adrenaline pumped, breathing was shallow and ragged, heart rate neared overload. . .he hurtled through the corridors along his preset escape route. He did not qualify as "combat personnel." His procedures were more information oriented.
It had come from nowhere, a twisting ball of fire that lashed out with playful malevolence and clear intent. Three of Daniel's colleagues had burst into flame before his eyes. He forced the screams out of his thoughts as he wriggled through the final door to the tunnels. Hammond and Bascomb Investigations was gone, only twisted rubble and frightened personnel remaining.
"Holy Shit. What the hell was that?!" Molly Tyler, a young secretary Daniel had dated once or twice asked.
"You were pretty close with your first guess," Daniel muttered.
"What?" she said, obviously in shock.
"It was a little piece of Hell." And Daniel thought he had a pretty good idea who had set it loose. Was Henries really that crazy? *Jesus, there were over a hundred people in there, and twenty people with any Procedural knowledge at all,* he thought. *But then. . .he bombed that hotel, didn't he?* "Go home, Molly. I think it would be best if you were to rest now." He used his most convincing tones and sincere body language. "I'll take care of it with the boss. You just go home and unplug the phone for a while. All right?"
Her eyes, already unfocused, became nearly glazed. "Right," she said.
"Thanks. I'll just go home now." She wandered off in the general direction of the street, with Daniel watching carefully. Her presence would simply not be mentioned on today's roster. She would never be questioned, and soon enough her memories of the attack would fade. . .with assistance if need be.
Daniel turned back to the building. Henries. . .it had to have been Henries. He turned his back on Hammond and Bascomb Investigations and stalked to his apartment.
He had work to do.

Saturday, June 10, 1995 2:30 p.m.

The rock hummed beneath him, singing counterpoint to the air that swirled around him beneath the trees that whispered their secrets to the wind. He was One, at peace, gathering his energies for the next leg of his run. He had covered a great distance, almost twenty miles since morning, but at last he had found it necessary to stop. He ate sparingly of the supplies his brothers had provided for him; dried fruits, a hard bread, and pure spring water. Fed, he curled himself into the Lotus and sought to regain the peace he had felt in the Record. The memory still was strong, and it came to him almost at once. ((I would like to spend 2 of my 11 xp on another dot of
Meditation, for a total of 2 dots. I think Lloyd has earned the peace.)) He spent a timeless moment there, until it occured to him that he was not alone. He was not threatened, merely observed.
He opened his eyes and unfolded himself gracefully, stretching his legs out over his head to restore their limberness. The observer was behind him, perhaps fifteen feet distant. "Come closer if you wish, friend," Lloyd said calmly. "Let me see you."
"It was not my intent to disturb," came the polite reply, with a slight Australian accent. A slim dark skinned man dressed in colorful patterned poncho and blue jeans emerged from a thicket right where Lloyd had sensed him. He was tall, over six feet, but not so skinny as to look awkward. Rather, he was a lithe creature with a weathered face and dark hair speckled by age. A leather band crossed his chest, holding a worn drum to his back. A Dreamspeaker then.
"And you did not. Who are you?"
"A seeker. I have traveled strange roads to come here. And you?"
"To call me a seeker would be inaccurate," Lloyd replied. "I am a warrior, and I, too, have walked strange roads."
"Yes, I see them around you. Dark, tangled paths, filled with blood and anger, yet you have walked through them with your spirit whole. You are a worthy warrior, it seems."
"And you seem a worthy seeker. You see much."
"Sometimes more then I wish." He moved around to the front of the rock Lloyd sat upon and sat cross-legged on the ground. "Why have you come here?" he asked. "I see no battles in need of fighting in these woods."
"Not all battles are visible," Lloyd replied.
"Well do I know that. The most important battles are silent as well, as yours is."
"Agreed. But you are correct. This is not the battlefield I need to reach."
"Ah." The stranger nodded sagely. "Then you seek Santa Cruz?"
"I do. You as well?"
"I never seek battlefields. However, they do call to me, and when they call, I must answer."
Lloyd extended his hand. "I am Lloyd Davies, seeker."
The stranger took his hand. "I am Arthur Walkabout, and I am pleased to meet you. Are you in a hurry to reach Santa Cruz?"
"I am."
"As am I. I know a road that will take us there faster then yours, if you would trust me."
Lloyd felt no guile in Walkabout, no deceit. It simply was not in him. "I will trust you."
"Then come," he said. "It is this way." He rose to his feet and passed to Lloyd's left, back toward the thicket he emerged from. Lloyd followed. The woods became deeper, the sounds darker, more vibrant, and from the corner of his eyes, Lloyd saw shapes flicker between the trees.
"Stay close to me," Walkabout warned. "The road is safe, but the path diverges, and some of those roads are not safe."
"Right." Lloyd stayed within a few feet. They approached a stone portal, through which nothing could be seen. There was no door, no forest. ..nothing.
"Here," said Walkabout. "We must pass through here. Think of where you wish to be, Davies. Fix the image in your mind, and do not let go of it. When you emerge, I will not be with you. I have a different path to walk. But do not fear. Our roads are almost sure to cross again."
"You have saved me much time, Arthur. Thank you." Lloyd extended his hand again, and again, Walkabout took it.
"Perhaps I have saved you more than that. We shall see."
"What do you mean?"
"No time. The portal opens. Concentrate! Fix the image in your mind, and step forward."
Lloyd stepped forward, emerging in a cramped bathroom. Mildew creeped along the walls, and the dank scent clung to everywhere. Lloyd opened the door and stepped out into the warehouse he had imagined. It had been closed for years. Lloyd had considered opening a safehouse here, but had decided against it for strategic reasons. The approach was indefensible. There were too many angles of attack.
He sat down on a decaying stack of boxes for a moment. Ken. . .he needed to find Ken. That was where Simone should be, and Ken was not as likely to be under Magickal surviellance as she was. He pictured Ken in his mind, remembered his rhthyms, his patterns, his movements and style. He took his time, assembling the image carefully in his mind, then he rose and began to move, tracing the ethereal Pattern before him in great, sweeping gestures. The motions changed as Lloyd entered the Trance of Seeing. Ken was crouching. There was water nearby. . .salt water. . .he could smell the tang of the air near his apprentice. . .the Boardwalk. He was on the Boardwalk. Clever. On a weekday like this, the Boardwalk would be crowded. It would be difficult to spot anyone. Even Lloyd had only managed it because he knew Ken so well. Moving easily, Lloyd walked toward the Boardwalk. He only hoped it wasn't too late.

Saturday, June 10th, 1995 3:53 p.m.

Lloyd couldn't help shake the feeling that he was being watched. He'd never been to the Boardwalk before. The screams of the summer crowds around him brought to focus the sea of unawakened minds pressing around his avatar, seeking to draw it away into the numbing slumber of "reality." There was a maddening brilliance that played around him as burning sunlight sparkled off of plastic jewels set in the carousel, no less brilliant than true gems but cheap and tawdry when one gave all but the most casual of glances. Even the people seemed cheap, wearing too much makeup or not enough clothing, as if the plumpness of their exteriors could hide the emptiness within them. Plunging with screams of delight, riders on "the Big Dipper" vanished out of sight, their reborn screams rising once more heralding their reappearance on the wooden track. Heading towards the bumper cars and passing a mock pirate ship swaying violently back and forth like an enormous swing, Lloyd could smell air scented by pink cotton candy and salt water taffy while the bark of arcade attendants called to the foolish to trade money for a chance for a junk prize. Everywhere he turned, he sought for one awakened face amongst the crowd, but was only met with dull sunburnt stares. And yet, he couldn't help shake the feeling that he was being watched.
Fleeing from the garish lights, unwashed floor and electronic noises of the Casino arcade, Lloyd backtracked on the Beach Street side of the Boardwalk, following the train tracks where they cut through asphalt leading ultimately to the dark black railroad bridge that crossed the San Lorenzo River at its mouth. To his right, Lloyd saw the "Neptune's Kingdom" miniature golf course and decided to explore the large building. He walked quickly past the black and white pictures, showing the building's history as a salt water pool before it had been converted in the early fifties to another arcade building. Faces long dead stared back at his quick glance, frozen in the delight required of a proper photograph.
Ken was obviously not in the building, but Lloyd, seeing a small comic book store ducked into it to check it out just in case. What struck Lloyd first was that the room was larger than it should have been. This fact was cleverly disguised by the numerous weird angles and cleverly used design of the irregular room, but to an awakened mind, the use of magick was apparent.
"Is the owner in?" Lloyd inquired of the college kid behind the counter, an obvious sleeper. The young man straightened up, giving Lloyd the once over.
"No, he's taking the weekend off. You want to leave a message?"
Lloyd shook his head and walked out of "the Emerald City," pressing on in his search for Ken.
No sooner had he walked out of the shop than the entire thing exploded into flame behind him. Lloyd was knocked down by the force of the explosion. (-1 hit, Bruised) Touching the back of his head, he could feel how his hairs had been singed by the heat. Getting up, he ran back to help the college kid but saw that it was too late. The kid's burning corpse was draped over the counter, which along with all the paper fuel in the room, was creating billowing smoke which poured out into the main chamber and was soon filling it with a dark oily cloud. Screaming sleepers mowed him down, trying to flee outside and nearly crushed him. In fact, Lloyd was forced to respond with a little Mind and Correspondence magik to help deflect the crowd, convincing them of a better way to exit. Nearly alone in the building, Lloyd could hear fire engines already responding. Security guards called out to him to flee but were then cut off by a wall of black smoke that seemed to drape it's way over all exits, screening the room from outside. Lloyd looked around. He was not quite alone.
A man wearing a striped shirt, baggy pants and sneakers stood nearby at the entrance to the two story miniature golf course. In his hands, he held a small knife, hardly a threat to Lloyd who recognized the man for a mage from the sense of power about him. The man cut his arm, wiping the blood quickly on his hands, which he flicked in the direction of the burning comic book store. The room exploded, a fireball hurtling right at Lloyd. The first fireball had been a feint and Lloyd ducked and rolled only to land in the path of another flashpoint surge.

(I make the following assumptions about my opposition. He has demonstrated 3 dots of Forces and 2 dots of Prime, and by using blood as a focus has shown himself to be a Verbena. Therefore he must have some proficiency with the Life Sphere. I will grant him 3 dots to be safe. I have been observed for some time, or so I gather. I can reasonably assume that this surveillance was carried out by this man, and since I didn't spot him, am willing to give him the benefit of the doubt and give him two dots of Correspondence. This would make him roughly my equal, with a slight edge in raw power. I'll consider his Arete to be 4. I am also willing to assume that I am faster, with greater staying power, though he can heal at will and may be stronger. For the sake of argument, I am giving him a 7 Willpower. You'll see why in due time.)

Saturday, June 10, 1995 3:55 pm

Lloyd dropped. He did not dive, or throw himself at the ground. That would have taken too long. Rather, he collapsed backwards, limbo fashion, as though his skeleton had simply folded up on itself, allowing gravity to do the work. (Difficulty 7 Dodge, 4 successes.) The fireball passed harmlessly over him, exploding against the shell of the comic store. Then, heaving forward, he hurled himself into a standing position, then forward into a roll as another fireball screamed into the pavement where he had lain seconds before. (1 success.) Lloyd rolled clear. (Opponent rolled 2 success, soaked) Now, however, he had drawn his gun. The Desert Eagle roared, louder then usual as Lloyd bound the universal Flow into the path of the bullet. (1 success, Forces, Prime effect. This damage is Aggravated. 1 Paradox, Vulgar effect, for a total of 4 Paradox. Three successes on the To hit roll, for a total damage roll of 10 dice. 6 successes. Soak roll of 3 dice soaks 2. Opponent is -4, Wounded, Aggravated.) The enemy whirled and screamed as the bullet slammed into his shoulder. He turned and ran for cover, trying to make it into the golf course. The colonel fired again, this time without charging the bullet. (1 success, for 8 damage dice. 3 successes. 2 soaked. Opponent is Mauled.) It creased the enemy's thigh, leaving a red tracery of blood.
The Verbena disappeared into the minature golf course. Lloyd followed, moving like a great cat through the debris and smoke. His eyes scanned the ground, looking for traces of the Blood Mage. There! Spots of blood. Large ones. The Verbena was hurt badly, but Lloyd knew he couldn''t count on that being true for long. He kneeled quickly, wetting his fingers in the stain, following the fading pattern back to it's holder, flowing through that link, and filling the mind he found there with fear, raw and primal. (Two successes on a Correspondence\Life\Mind effect.) It was an easy task. The Verbena was already frightened, and badly. A frightened enemy was a careless enemy. He wouldn't stop to heal, wouldn't do anything but try to run to a place of safety. A place where help could be found. A place where others would be waiting.
Lloyd felt his confidence growing as he slipped through the crowds that had gathered, following the tenuous trail of fear his would be killer left in his wake. (I honestly believe that between this encounter and the one with the Werewolves, I have earned two Willpower back under my Survivor Nature. I am marking my sheet accordingly, leaving me down two, for a total of 6 remaining.) He moved at a distance, but stayed within sight at first, to add fuel to the Blood Mage's terror. Then he faded back, letting his quarry lead
him.
He had only gone a couple of blocks when he heard a gruff voice call him. "Colonel. Hey! Wait up!"
It was Bob. Lloyd slowed to let him catch up.
"How did you find me?" Lloyd asked when he had.
"Simple," the little man replied. "I've been following fire trucks for the past three days. Ken told me a few things about what you guys have been through. Big messes seem to follow you around. So, I figgered if I followed them around, I'd find you." He grinned wickedly. "Paid off, too. I spotted you coming out of the firetrap."
"Did you spot the other guy?"
"You mean the bleeder? Yeah, I saw him. He a bogey?"
"Of the most bogus kind. He was the one that started that mess. I was looking for Ken. I had him placed near the Boardwalk, where I met the flamethrower. As you can see, he came out the worse for it."
"You want him tailed?"
"Hell , yes," Lloyd asserted. He's about two blocks up, moving east.
He's scared out of his wits. I'm hoping he'll take us to some leads."
"How do you know that?"
Lloyd pointed at the ground, where the blood trail continued unabated.
"I blew a big hole in him. That's what scared him. Scared people tend to move in straight lines."
Bob just stared at him, unbelieving.
Lloyd sighed. "Trust me. Can you call in backup?"
"To kill a bunch of Mages? What are you, nuts?"
"Not kill them. They're useless to me dead. I want them watched, carefully and from a distance. I need to know where they're operating from. How many of them are there? You know the drill. Get me some intelligence on the enemy!"
Bob smiled. "That I can do," he said, then lifted his face and barked, three short yips and a drawn out almost howl. Barks answered from nearby.
"Leave it to me, Colonel. Ken's still on the boardwalk, layin' low. I told him I had you spotted before I left. That's why it took me so long to catch you. He'll take you to where you're holing up. I'll find you there later."
The little man shimmered into a mottled dog, aroung the size of a german shepard, and ran off. Lloyd quickly made his way back to the shattered remains of the comic store, skirting the outside of the crowd. It was imperative he rendezvous as quickly as possible. The Technocracy could not ignore this event. No doubt there were spotters all around even as he moved. He trusted his own abilities to avoid detection, but Ken was a different matter. He moved with determined grace, his eyes scanning the crowd. Ken was too bright to be in the thick of things. He watched the fringes instead. There! He saw the Orphan near a hot dog stand, watching the action. Lloyd moved toward him until Ken glanced his way. Lloyd quickly moved his hands through the next sign of the code, watching carefully as Ken gave the countersign. Then he gestured away from the fire, and began walking away as though he'd seen enough. Ken did the same, glancing over his shoulders now and again. The fringes of the crowd were starting to break up as people with business elsewhere began to drift away. Ken and Lloyd blended into that group and left the scene.

Saturday, June 10, 1995 16:10:35.6758

Again! Another explosion. . .more deaths. Damnit, what the hell was going on? Truthfully, Daniel Hardigan knew exactly what was going on. The undeclared war between the Traditions and the Technocracy had heated up, with the Technocracy taking the first blows. This time, however, the target had not been a Techocratic institution. Rather it was a small comic store on the boardwalk that had borne the brunt.
Daniel left his car nearby and approached on foot through the thickening crowd. His target was easy to see. The thick column of black smoke still rose from the twisted wreckage. Daniel moved around the edges of the crowd, watching the area for a sign of the perpatrators. He had been assigned this detail earlier in the week after the first attacks. His mission, spot, tail and report. Strictly speaking, it was a job better given to a Watcher, but Daniel was available, and the Watchers were overtaxed. Besides, questioning orders was not a good way to accelerate one's career advancement, especially at this stage of Daniel's career.
What truly puzzled him was the nature of this attack. This was not any sort of Technocrat installation, other then in the very peripheral sense that it forwarded the Ideal of the Technocracy through a fictional context. It certainly wasn't anything important, yet it was destroyed. Why? Through the crowd, he spotted the answer. Henries!
The man walked along the periphery of the crowd, scanning the edges, looking not the least bit psychotic. It was the first time Hardigan had seen him move. It was eerie, the grace he had. Every motion was a study in ergonomics and poetry combined. His every move was precise and controlled. Daniel knew Iteration X Time\Motion scientists that would give their eyeteeth and several cybernetic enhancements to find out how he could move like that. He was singed, but essentially unharmed. Apparently a little too close to his own explosion, Daniel surmised. He reached into his pocket for his .45, then remembered the number of bodies this man had piled around him against combat teams and heavy ordinance. Instead, he pulled out a smaller device, a pad with a screen above it. He held it low, out of sight, and aimed it at Henries. If he could just get a clear reading, just one, he would be able to give the pattern to Amalgam Prime at Hammond and Bascomb. Henries would then be ripe for the plucking. There would be nowhere he could hide.

Lloyd stopped. He was being watched. He could feel the eagerness aimed at him. It was nearby. . .and definitely hostile. He felt urgency at Ken. It was time to move. The Orphan began to move faster, glancing over his shoulder. The Colonel moved then, sliding into the deeper crowd, moving in time with it's rythyms to get through it faster then anyone else possibly could. He blended himself with the crowd, "fuzzing" himself into the Folds of Space. He followed the hostility with his eyes.
There! Tall and thin, nearly six feet of lanky neatness, conservatively dressed, long hair pulled back severely into a ponytail. He was looking down at something he held in his hand.
Technocrat! Lloyd watched him just long enough to memorize his features, then left the area, swiftly and silently.
Damn! He was gone! So close. . .Daniel had been so close. Pocketcing his device, the young Technocrat morosely turned back to the fire. There were notes to be taken, and reports to be filed.

Saturday, June 10, 1995, 7:30 PM

"Where the Hell have you been?" Ken demanded.
They were together in yet another fleabag motel, Ken, Simone and Electra. Lloyd had taken a roundabout route, following Ken from a distance to insure he wasn't being tailed. The Orphan was clean.
"I had to answer to the Brotherhood."
"And it couldn't wait? Jesus, Colonel, we've gotten pasted here! Have you seen the papers?"
Lloyd felt himself bristling, breathed deep and long to calm down.
"You act as though I had some choice in the matter, Ken," he said calmly.
"I did not. Belive me when I say it was not my idea to go into the woods for three days."
"Are you all right?" Simone asked.
"Well enough," Lloyd replied. "My encounter with the Blood Mage could have gone much worse."
"So what do we do now?" Electra asked.
"We wait."
"WHAT?!" all three of them chorused.
"At present, we are in the defensive role," Lloyd explained. "Even the other Traditions are flailing blindly, attacking wherever they see Verbena. This is useless in the long term. It only adds to the confusion. We need intelligencehard information about the enemy. Without that, we are also blind and useless. Bob is the best equipped and best positioned to get that information, so we wait for him. We move around, be hard to spot, and take as little action as possible to survive."
"A coward's actions," Electra snarled.
"A warrior's actions," Lloyd corrected. "When we strike, and I assure you, we will strike, we will not aim wildly and hope we hit something. We will hurt the enemy. If we get lucky on the intelligence gathering, we might even be able to end this war altogether. I think that possibility is worth waiting for, don't you?" He met the Werewolf's eye squarely. "Or we could rush out and get ourselves killed doing something stupid. Which sounds better to you?"

Friday, June 23rd, 1995 12:00 noon

The next several days passed with the crew moving from place to place, avoiding battles and helping fellow Tradition members whenever possible. Contact was reestablished with the Chorus, and Lloyd let them know what he had in mind. He and Bob traded shifts now and again, and even the Glasswalkers helped.
Now they were together in a slightly finer class of hotel, paid for by the Glass Walkers. The runty little Bone Gnawer sat in the center of the room, a notepad in front of him. Lloyd, Electra, Ken, and several other members of the Glasswalker sept clustered around him. The area was clean of surveillance. Both Lloyd and Bob had assured themselves of that.
"Okay," the little bum said. "This is what we found out"

Friday, June 23rd, 1995 12:02 p.m.

Before Bob could continue, there was a knock at the door.
Lloyd glanced at Ken, who went to the door while everyone else took up defensive positions.
"Hello, Ken."
Ken stepped back, allowing the man entry.
"Lloyd," Ken said, "This is Brother Louis, nominal leader of Unity Temple."
Lloyd nodded, surprised to see a Chorus member. Communication with the Chorus had been tenuous since they had been singled out among all the Traditions for early destruction. At last word, the Chorus was under siege, guarded by powerful rotes and the power of their node, one of the strongest known in Santa Cruz. "I was sorry to hear about the Reverend. You all have my sympathies."
Louis sighed. "Of course, but we shall continue."
(Perception = 0 successes.)
Lloyd continued. "Not to be rude, but do you mind my asking what you're doing here? It's a rather"
"Strange coincidence that I'd be here just as you're convening a strategy meeting? Yes, I agree. But, thank the One for the power of conicidence," Louis smiled.
Lloyd understood. While Louis seated himself, Lloyd nodded to Bob to continue.
"The local Glasswalkers are willing to help us only with information. They have a tribe - chantry sort of deal with the local magi who call themselves the Virtual Adepts. Their computer club up on the Hill (U.C.S.C.) is called the 'Data Facists.' But! There's another big bunch of werewolves who belong to a sept called Ancient Voices. Word has it that their big mama leader don't like the war and that she wants out in a big way. If she goes, she'll probably pull maybe a third of the garou with her. Now, if Ancient Voices not only leaves the werewolf-verbena alliance, but joins the rest of the traditions and comes in swinging against the Sun Child, then the local Glasswalkers will send in their ahroun, their warriours on our side. Otherwise, it's just money and a little bit of info. They're willing to ride the neutral tide until the end. According to them though, this chieftain - they call her Sarah Four-kills, will NOT fight her fellow garou."
Lloyd asked, "So you're saying the chances of this are?"
"Close to zilch," Bob nodded.
"Does somebody have any good news?" Lloyd asked the assembled group.
Ken raised his hand. He was going to say something, but then and turned to Brother Louis. Louis took the cue and turned to Lloyd.
"Brother Lloyd, it is our belief that YOU are best qualified to lead this struggle. Therefore, I declare you War Leader; assuming of course that you agree to accept."
Lloyd was about to point out that it was rather arrogant of the Chorus member to assume he had any authourity to appoint anyone; but he reconsidered.
"What's our current strength?" he asked.
Louis stroked the sandy stubble on his chin.
"We of the Celestial Chorus have seven members who are fit to fight, myself included. There was a time that we could have given you three times that number; but that time is past. And even now, all of our strength is being used to maintain the integrity of our temple."
Lloyd didn't say anything. He remained quiet, as if thinking.
"What of the other Traditions?"
Louis nodded to Ken, who continued.
"The Hollows got thumped. They burned a score of furbacks with their accumulated tass, but they just couldn't win and some well screened Verbena helped the furbacks to drive them back. Bitchy, the Hollow leader figures he can still swing maybe four total our way. The rest are dead or won't fight anymore."
"There's one Euth, who's running with the Hollows, and I didn't count him in on their number. And there's another Euth in town but he can't be found. The other Euths got kacked in some sort of squabble among themselves."
"Dreamspeakers have only three have agreed to fight on. They got hit pretty hard."
"The Cult isn't doing much. About five of them agreed to 'gig' with the Dreamspeakers for their push, but they were sizzled when the Verbena showed up instead of the Dreamspeakers for the meet up."
Louis raised his hand. "We have our suspicions about Montana, one of the leaders of the Cult of Ecstasy. You'll remember him from the Tribunal. So far, he's doing his best to keep his people neutral. We think he might be secretly in league with Gert."
Ken went on. "The Sons of Ether were practically wiped out in the first attack. We know there are two here in S.C. One is DEFINATELY on our side. He own's the comic store that got torched when you got ambushed. He says he wants revenge for his friends. The other, the guy who was at your meeting, he's keeping mum so I'd call him neutral."
"The Virtual Adepts, like Bob said, don't want any part of this war and are keeping to themselves. They'll defend themselves, but they won't attack."
"There's one Herme in town. They're not too big on this area since getting toasted by the Chorus way back when."
"And as for the Bros, that's your tradition."
Lloyd didn't tell them that nine Akashic warriours were in town, awaiting his orders. They had been specially chosen for this fight. Normally the Akashics were renowned for being the most peaceful tradition, but the Sun Child threatened the paths of Ascension; and that had been the call to rally Lloyd's brethren. However, Lloyd had no intention of revealing his "ace in the hole" until the time was right.
Lloyd looked at Bob. Everytime Ken had said the dreaded word, "furback," he'd chewed a bit too hard on his cigar. Now, he didn't have much of one left beyond a was of black tobacco leaves.
"Do you have anything to add?" he asked the Bone Gnawer, hoping to distract him from glaring at Ken.
"Naw, my contacts can't find out where the Sun Child is. I think only those mountain witches, and maybe some of the more important theurges, know exactly where the thing is. We have some possible guesses - but's that's all they are. And I don't think you can afford to be spreading yourselves too thin looking for it. And, you'd need an army to even get close enough."
"If only we knew where this demon is hiding," Lloyd said.
"I know someone who does." Louis' words, though stated softly, came with the force of blows. Every ear turned toward him.
"This person has been to the Verbena node. Not only that," he went on, "but this person has also seen the Sun Child first hand; in both its guises."
"What do mean, 'both its guises?'" Elektra asked, speaking up for the first time.
"I would rather discuss that privately with Brother Lloyd here," Louis said. "It is the reason I've faced so much to be with you all."
"Before you two disappear on us," Simone stated aloud, pausing as everyone's attention focused on her, "I want to point out that we do have an army - ready and able; an army that's more powerful, with more force than anything any of you've proposed."
This abrupt statement managed to capture everyone's attention. All eyes turned towards Simone.
Lloyd guessed at Simone's meaning, but decided to try and steer conversation away from the powder keg she was trying to ignite.
But Bob had another mind. "What army?" was all he asked.
"Why, the Technocracy, of course."

Lloyd Davies, Chapter 2

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