Chill: Two Bits

Back in Alaska! Also action! Back in Alasktion! Here's last time, though of course this is a new case.

It's been a couple of months since the events in Homer, and it's now late March in Seward. The powers that be in SAVE (since the Seward HQ is now hooked in to the larger organization) figured that since the road trip mission worked out, this HQ might wind up becoming the kind of hub for SAVE in the area. But that's a future discussion.

Tonight, Dr. Kirby Bellman has asked five envoys to meet up at the Crab Pot, but he's running a little late. The envoys - Arlo Miller, Amelia Rostov, Tuulugaak Hanta, Mercy Williams, and Khalil Barnes - are sitting around hoping this meeting isn't about what's on all their minds.

See, earlier in the week, a man named John Petty shot and killed his best friend, Houston Spears, and then shot the rest of Houston's family, and then was shot dead by the Seward police. Petty and Spears were both Army vets, both young - they enlisted right out of high school and did their four years - and both recently returned from Afghanistan. Tul wonders if Petty just snapped, and Barnes (whom you'll recall is retired JAG) says that of course it's possible, but it'd be weird for him to shoot his best friend and his whole family. If Petty and Spears had a problem they'd be more likely to just fight and then get drunk.

Bellman shows up, goes to the bar and orders something very strong, and then sits down. "Ever have a really shit day and then suddenly it gets worse?" he says. "I'm about to make your day worse, sorry."

He sends them a link to an Instagram story posted by a tourist in Seward. The story puts the photo of John Petty that the media has been using side-by-side with a photo she took of a man standing outside a strip mall in Seward. She says that this guy is Petty, and she took this photo at 1:40 PM on the 20th...which is a few minutes after the 911 call that got the cops to the Spears house. She rants a bit about government conspiracies and cover-ups, but Dr. Bellman has a different explanation ("always amazes me how competent people think the government is," mutters Khalil). 

Bellman freely admits this could be nothing, could be a coincidence, could be a lie from the poster, but y'know, worth a look. For his part, Arlo is actually somewhat...maybe not relieved, but heartened? by the idea that this was a creature of the Unknown rather than a man committing a quadruple murder out of nowhere. He also mentions the words "doppelganger," and Bellman nods; that had occurred to them, too. 

The envoys plan out their approach. Mercy knows some of the cops in the city (can't be an EMT and not get to know them), so she offers to take Khalil to meet them so maybe he can get involved. Amelia figures that tomorrow she'll go to visit John Petty's mother - Dr. Bellman had mentioned that she wasn't doing well and was having health problems before all this happened. Bellman also informs the envoys that John Petty is actually dead, and was killed by the cops; he saw the body when it came in. He also was the ER doc on duty when all this happened, and Houston Spears' mother, Bonnie, was actually alive when they brought her, but he couldn't save her.

Arlo and Tul decide to go over to the Spears house and poke around, and since it's nighttime and it's took late to be calling on Ms. Petty, Amelia tags along. The house is dark, police tape still up, but when does that stop SAVE envoys? Tul picks the lock on the front door and they slip inside.

Tul takes a moment and sense the Unknown, and feels something pushing him toward a door. He opens it and reveals stairs to a basement. The three envoys start heading down, but Amelia's cane misses a step and she goes crashing down to the bottom ("ow"). Tul helps her up and Arlo uses a quick use of Heal to fix her wrist up, and they start looking around.

The basement is finished - carpet, couch, TV, Playstation. But there's a big ol' bloodstained in the corner. Arlo checks the scene and figures that the blood spatter is indicative of a gunshot, probably from someone standing more or less at the bottom of the stairs. There are a couple of glasses on the coffee table; maybe Petty and Spears were down here when the shooting started. Arlo tries to sense the Unknown, too, does it maybe a bit too well...

He sees red smoke rising up from the bloodstain, and sees a humanoid, maybe masculine figure in the smoke. He hears it whispering to him, and can't exactly understand the words, but feels the weight of a pistol in his hand and feels a strong urge to shoot at the thing in the corner. He shakes it off and reports this to the others.

They head back upstairs and find more blood in the kitchen, and at the top of the stairs to the second floor. Arlo's reconstruction of the crime is that the shooter came up the basement stairs after shooting someone down there, shot someone in the kitchen, and then shot another person in the kitchen who then moved around and bled everywhere. And then finally he walked a few steps and fired up at someone coming down the stairs. 

The envoys head out, a little more certain of what happened but not why...and wondering what the thing in the smoke was.

Meanwhile, Mercy and Khalil head to the Seward PD. Mercy spots Darren, an officer she gossips with (he showed up once before, during the affair with Charlotte Deneer). Mercy asks what he knows about what happened with Petty, and introduces him to Khalil, and Darren offers to introduce Khalil to the detective in charge of the case. Said detective comes over to introduce himself - Lance Winslow. Mercy and Winslow have met (here), and while he seems generally suspicious and busy, he listens to Khalil. Khalil's knowledge of military law and the fact that the case is really already closed prompts Winslow to talk with him a little; he confirms that the gun was Petty's and he brought it with him. They don't have any real idea what set it off, and since the principals are dead it's going to be hard to know. He agrees to send Khalil some of the case information.

Everyone heads home. Khalil stays up and does a deep dive into Spears and Petty, learning that they were both born in Seward within a month of each other, went to the same schools, enlisted right out of high school, and were stationed in the same base (though Petty was boots on the ground, and Spears was communications and worked with computers). Mercy, likewise, focuses on the Insta post. Zooming in on the picture that purports to be Petty, she admits that it really does look like him. The conspiracy theorists in the comments have already latched on and have identified that he's standing outside Two Bits Barbershop ("that's where I get my haircut," says Khalil), but he's wearing a hat, which the internet takes as proof that he didn't get a haircut. 

(Mercy also notes that the comments bring up Corey West and Roger Brewster. Seward has a recent history of people just flipping out and killing people.)

The next morning, Khalil goes to Two Bits to get his haircut, and to check in on Monte Noble, the old fella who owns the place. He's thinking he'll see if there are security cameras there or in the area, but when he gets there, no one's in. This worries him - Monte doesn't open late. He waits around until Timmy, the other barber working there, opens up, and asks him about Monte. Timmy doesn't know, and in fact calls out to Monte. 

But then Monte walks in from the back door, and right away Khalil can see something's up. Monte is 72 years old, and he still looks it, but his posture is straighter, his eyes just a little clearer, his diction just a little too crisp. Khalil questions him ("you going to go out this summer and get some bass?") and "Monte" falls for it ("I certainly am"). Khalil calls him on it ("Monte is allergic to fish") and "Monte" shrugs and sits down. "It's so hard to keep track." 

Khalil quickly texts "GET HERE NOW 911" to the group chat, and "Monte" asks him for his phone. Khalil, feeling that this request is very reasonable, hands it over, and he looks at the screen, nods, and hands it back. Monte tries to get a little information about of him, and asks where he's from, and man(?) answers with a phrase in Arabic. Khalil understands a little, and recites it in his head while he waits. 

Arlo pulls up outside, and the man stands up. Khalil draws his pistol, and suddenly the room goes completely black. To Arlo, this just looks like the lights go out, and he opens the door into the blackness. Realizing that something is very wrong, he activates a Sphere of Protection and moves forward. Khalil heads for the back door and Arlo follows, trying to keep the Sphere up. The darkness goes away about the time they get to the door, and Tul and Mercy arrive (they were both at the gym). Tul grabs the wall and uses Schematic, getting a mental map of the whole building, as well as the sudden sensation of something watching him from above - something much more dangerous than anything he's yet seen.

Khalil carefully makes his way into the hallway, calling out for Timmy (based on the creature's comments, he figures Monte is probably dead). He sees Timmy staggering down the hall, and as he becomes visible Khalil realizes he's got a pair of scissors jammed into his throat. 

Khalil runs forward to help him, but Timmy grabs him by the throat and starts to squeeze. Tul, seeing this, rushes past Arlo and tackles him. The scissors fall out and Tul expects a jet of arterial spray, but gets barely a trickle. Timmy is already dead, but that's not stopping him from fighting back. Khalil kicks the scissors further down the hall. 

Arlo messages Amelia and Bellman, and Tul grabs a fire extinguisher off the wall and tries to hit Timmy with it...but misses. Timmy reaches up and punches Tul, knocking his head against the wall with a "you now have a concession" thump, and Mercy runs over and pins Timmy's arm. 

Khalil looks down the hall, and sees Monte coming toward them, holding the scissors. But Monte has a horrible wound across his throat - not a slash, more "ligature strangulation." The smell proceeds him and as he squeezes the scissors, Khalil can see fluid dripping. Monte slices down with the scissors, trying to stab Khalil, but he moves back and just gets a small cut. Arlo runs forward and knocks Monte over, and he tries to stab Mercy in the leg and gets a similarly shallow slice. Khalil leaps forward and smacks his head against the wall. There's a squish kind of sound, but Monte keeps coming.

At this moment, Amelia arrives in the hallway. She sees Mercy restraining one zombie and Khalil battling another, and, thinking quickly, draws a sigil on the wall. The hallway is warded, and both corpses become inert. Everyone sits and catches their breath...and a barista from the coffee shop next door comes into the hall. "What the fuck."

He retreats, and Amelia follows him to try and reassure him there's no danger (but the police are 100% on the way). Khalil moves quickly - he reminds everyone not to talk to the police and to ask for a lawyer, and then types the Arabic phrase into his phone. It comes back as: 

Now, we truly know that we cannot frustrate Allah on earth, nor can we escape from Him into heaven. - Suryah Al-Jinn.

Khalil quickly calls his brother, Hamza, an imam in Anchorage. "Hello?"

"Hey, it's Khalil."

"Yeah, I have caller ID. What's up?"

"I need help. Can you get down to Seward?"

"Sure. What's going on, 'lil?"

Khalil takes a deep breath. "I think there's a djinni, and I think it's killing people."

A pause. "I don't know what I thought you were going to say, but it wasn't that. I'm on my way."

Khalil hangs up, wipes down the scissors, and waits. And shortly thereafter, all five of them are arrested.

Chill: Under the Bleachers

Yesterday we wrapped up a case in Chill! Here's last time.

So, our heroes have a few hours before the basketball game at Fireweed Academy, where Tristan St. Cyr is convinced something awful is going to happen. They decide to check out the site where Donna Fitzroy crashed her car and died. 

They find the site easily enough, it's on a curve in a residential area. Apparently she spun out and hit a tree, but as they look at it, the envoys are confused. Kat Jameson tries to mentally recreate the accident and can't quite brain it - how fast was she going? What angle did she hit this tree? And more to the point, how was this accident fatal? Tuulugaak Hanta texts Dr. Bellman back in Seward and asks for more info, and he calls back a few moments later.

He tells them that, according to what he was able to find, Mrs. Fitzroy died from blunt force trauma to the head, apparently from her head whipping back and forth after hitting the tree. She wasn't wearing her seatbelt (weird) and the airbags didn't deploy (weirder), and either of those things probably would have saved her. Tul looks at the road and does a little mental math, and figures she had to be doing at least 40mph and accelerating for the accident to be as bad as it was, and that doesn't make any sense, either. 

Kayla Vanderhoven looks at what's in the area - mostly houses. She does a little digging into who lives in those houses, and comes up with a couple of very interesting results. First, Tanya Valmier, the teacher who died from an "accidental" gunshot, lived less than a quarter mile away. Second, and perhaps more significant, Tom Gregorov, brother of the late Baines Gregorov, the mechanic who was crushed by a car in his shop, lives very close by, as well.

The envoys decide to go and check on the Gregorovs. Tul sneaks up to the house and senses the Unknown, but doesn't feel anything. He gives an all-clear to the others, and Tristan knocks on the door. After a tense exchange with Mr. Gregorov, he opens the door and faces down Tristan (remember that this guy got two spam calls from "QCOMM" yesterday and now so goth kid is showing up at his door, it all seems very weird). But Tristan makes good use of the Telepathic Empathy discipline and manages to steer the conversation toward Baines and Samuel (Tom's son, Baines' nephew), and Tom even mentions that he's heard Sam talking to Baines in his room. Probably that's normal?

Tristan asks to speak with Samuel for a moment, and Tom lets him in. Sam is pretty taken with Tristan's pet raven (especially since it meows, sometimes), and Tristan uses his discipline on the kiddo as well. He feels that Sam feels tremendous guilt over the deaths of his teachers - like, not in a generalized way, he feels directly responsible. Tristan tries to sense the Unknown and just winds up with a headache for his trouble. Tom goes to get him an aspirin, and Tristan takes the opportunity to press Sam a little more.

Sam tells him that when he and his dad went to his uncle's shop, he found a little mechanical man that looked like Baines (he calls it "Robo-Baines"). He says that Robo-Baines talks to him, and that when he got in trouble with Mr. Torney for cussing out Nat Levin last week, he told Robo-Baines that he was mad at Mr. Torney and the next day he died! 

Tristan asks to see Robo-Baines, but Sam says he's not here, he hasn't seen him since yesterday. Last time he saw him, Robo-Baines' arm wasn't moving and he was dragging his leg, like he was hurt.

Sam's dad comes back with pills, and Tristan takes them and thanks them. He offers counseling via QCOMM and then excuses himself, and hooks up with the others. Now with a better understanding of what they're dealing with ("so it's like, a car golem?"), they start thinking of how to find it. Kat figures that, if it was injured, it probably hitched a ride with either Tom or Sam yesterday, and where did they end up?

Well, Sam ended up at school, where Nat, the kid he was mad at, was carried out in a stretcher. That seems like the best place to look. 

The envoys head to the school, and Tul makes contact with Miguel, his buddy who works there in athletics, and offers to help set up for the game. Miguel is happy to have the help, and when the envoys get there he gives them all jobs, which they mostly ignore. Kayla notes that the bleachers are motorized; hit a switch and they retract or expand. She watches the switch, while Tristan peers underneath. He doesn't see anything, but he hears a sound like a child wheezing. 

Tristan immediately heads underneath to help, and gets about to the middle of the bleachers when suddenly he can't move. Rather, he can, but he feels clumsy and unsure of himself, like he has to move everything deliberately. And then, of course, the bleachers start closing. But fortunately, the envoys figured this might happen. 

Tul uses Power Surge to short the bleachers, and Arlo Miller activates Sphere of Protection over where Tristan is, giving him time to get out (when the Sphere goes up, the weird clumsy-brain effect goes away, too). Now figuring that Robo-Baines is underneath the bleachers somewhere, the envoys flank the openings, looking for it, but then all of their phones die.

None of them really want to go into the dark to look for this thing, but fortunately they have another option. Kayla whips out her yoga mat and sits down to meditate, and Leaves her Body (Tristan stares with newfound respect and fascination). She walks through the bleachers and looks around, and finds the thing. It's just as Sam described, a little gnome-like creature made of lugnuts and car parts, but it's missing its left arm. 

It looks something like this

She draws back to kick it, using Astral Attack (what the heck, worth a shot), but misses and falls right through the wall into the snow. At this point, Tristan standing near her body, sees a little metal object scuttling out of the bleachers and heading right for her! 

Tristan tries to get in its way, but it's much too small and quick. It leaps up in the air and aims for Kayla's eyes, but Tristan yells "YALDY! GET THE SHINY!" and his raven snatches it out of midair and drops it in Tristan's hand. Tristan smashes it against the bleachers until it comes apart, and Kat, also standing near Kayla, hucks a basketball at it. The ball knocks it to pieces, and Tul goes under the bleachers from the other side and stomps the rest of the gnome into oblivion. Arlo raises a Sphere just to check, but the parts don't move. Kayla returns to her body and Tristan helps her up, and they both use Eyes of the Dead to see if they spot anything. All they see is a faint wisp of...something...dissipating as the gnome dies. 

At this point their phones turn back on, and they get a bunch of messages from Dr. Bellman (who's been trying to contact them to give them more info on Tanya Valmier, which of course they don't need now). The envoys hang around to watch the basketball game, and then head back to Seward, victorious.

Chill: A Week of Death

Here we are back in the wilds of Alaska. It's a few weeks after the conclusion of the last case, and three of the envoys on that case - Tulugaak Hanta, Kayla Vanderhoven, and Arlo Miller - are ready to be tapped for more investigation. Captain Barnes is still in physical therapy after getting shot in the damn hip, and Amelia Rostov has gone to a conference on the mainland in hopes of seeing the sun again. 

So when Dr. Kirby Bellman calls envoys together at the Seward TGI Fridays, he includes two new faces: Kat Jameson and Tristan St. Cyr. Kat is a home health aide, fitness/weightlifting enthusiast, and practitioner of Brazilian jiu-jitsu who happened to be working at Seward Rest Home when the fire started, and had the misfortune of seeing the living moss head. Her Drive is her belief that life is for the living. Tristan might not be Seward's only goth, but he's definitely the gothiest of them. He's a lifelong resident and has been studying the occult and paranormal phenomena online for years, and then found a few of the wayward SAVE papers that got lost from the community center. Recognizing them for what they were (more or less, the SAVE terminology wasn't necessarily familiar) he looked for and found their real owners, and SAVE has been interested in him ever since. His Drive is, obviously, to comprehend the Unknown.

On this particular Thursday (1/30/25), Dr. Bellman explains over cheese sticks that in the nearby city of Homer, AK (I mean, "nearby" is relative), an elementary school called Fireweed Academy has lost three teachers inside a week. None of the deaths look Unknown-related on the face of it, but this kind of string of "accidents" always has the potential to involve the Unknown. Dr. Bellman says this is the favorite kind of case, the kind that is probably nothing. 

He gives them what info he has: On Wednesday, 1/22/25, science teacher Dean Torney slipped and fell on a staircase inside the school and cracked his skull. No one witnessed the fall. That Saturday, English teacher Tanya Valmier was shot in the chest in her home, and Bellman says that he's learned that the death was initially ruled suicide but then changed to accidental, and he's not sure why. Finally, just this past Tuesday, math teacher Donna Fitzroy lost control of her car and hit a tree, and was killed instantly. He doesn't have a lot more information than that, and again, hopes that this is just a run of horribly bad luck in the community.

The envoys get their stuff together, and the next day they jump into Kat's 4x4 and Tristan's van and head to Homer. They roll into town about noon, check into a hotel (where they haggle over rooms a little, until they decide that Arlo and Tristan get to share a room because Arlo doesn't mind sharing a room with Ialdabaoth, Tristan's pet raven), and then start their investigation. They decide that Tul, Tristan, and Arlo will head to the school - Tul knows an assistant coach who works there and figures that's an in. Kat and Kayla go to find a coffee shop and listen for gossip, maybe do some internet sleuthing.

When they get there, there's an ambulance parked by the door. As they walk up, they see a couple of EMTs pushing a stretcher out. A boy of about 11 lies on it, looking pale; the envoys look as he goes by and see no obvious injury or wounds, but he's got an oxygen mask on and his breathing is labored - probably an asthma attack. A bearded man and a woman with a stethoscope watch from the door until the ambulance leaves, and then the man says "thanks, Mary" and both turn to go in.

Tul catches the man before he walks away and introduces himself, saying that he's here to talk to Miguel; the man (one Cal Darbonne, the principal) points him to the office to get a pass and says that Miguel's in the gym. Tristan starts a conversation with Cal and uses Telepathic Empathy to help guide it, and learns that Cal is overwhelmed - he's lost three good teachers in terrible accidents, he made the decision to keep school open but opinion from parents was about 50/50 and he's not at all sure he did the right thing. The boy that was taken away in the ambulance, though (Nat) is going to be OK, he just had an asthma attack, but the nurse was there quickly and got him breathing again. Cal doesn't know any connection between the teachers, other than they all worked here - they weren't the same age, they weren't really friends, they were at different points in their careers, they didn't teach the same grades or the same subjects. He feels that maybe the school is cursed somehow, but recognizes how silly that is. He's just under a lot of pressure, and is clearly grieving. He mentions that moving forward and finding some normalcy is maybe the best strategy - Donna Fitzroy even planned on having a test in her pre-algebra class on Monday.

Tul and Tristan get passes and head to the gym to find Miguel. Miguel is happy to see Tul, and talks with him about the situation, but doesn't know much more than Cal did - except he does mention that all of the stairwells have security cameras and the one that should have caught Dean Torney's death "wasn't working." 

Arlo steps out to have a smoke and then lingers in the vestibule. A security guard checks in on him and reminds him that there's no smoking on school grounds. Arlo chats with him, but he knows about what the other staff did - terrible accidents. The guard isn't sure if school should still be open, but they're going ahead - there's even a basketball game tomorrow night.

Meanwhile, Kayla and Kat find a place called Captain's Coffee Cafe and Bakerium not far from their hotel and decide to grab some coffee and pastry. Kat notes a bunch of people in scrubs, and then realizes that the Cafe shares a building with Hospice of Homer. The two of them sit and eavesdrop, and hear a couple of people talking about a mechanic. One recommends taking her car to "Gregor's Garage," as the guy who works there does good work and doesn't overcharge. The other tells her that the mechanic in question actually died recently - he was working under a car and the jack collapsed or something! Kayla does a little quick research and discovers that Baines Gregorov (42), the mechanic in question, died a couple of weeks ago (1/14/25), and was survived by his brother Tom (38), his sister-in-law Judy (36), and his nephew Samuel (11). They also note that the garage is right across the street, so after lunch they decide to go have a look.

Back at the school, Tristan and Tul chat with the secretary and ask about the video feed and whether it's working. She says it is, though it malfunctioned when Dean Torney died. Tristan, after using Telepathic Empathy again, notes that she really wants to talk about this to someone, so pushes a little, and she shows them the footage. The camera catches Mr. Torney going down the stairs, and then glitches - static, pixelations, and then the camera on the next landing catches him lying at the foot of the stairs, bleeding from the head. But apparently, just those two cameras glitched during those few seconds. 

Kayla and Kat go across the street and check the place. There's a sign in the door saying that they're closed indefinitely. They check around the back and find a door leading into the garage, and Kat expertly picks the lock. They enter the garage and look around - there's the scissor lift, there's smears of blood on the ground where Baines would have died - and then Kayla focuses and senses the Unknown.

Kayla experiences the Unknown as weird, otherworldly echoes, and they get louder as she gets closer to a drain in the floor. Kat checks it, and there's some smears of blood, but no detritus, which in a garage like this you'd expect. Did the police clean it out? 

They're pondering this when the light clicks on and a woman in her early twenties asks "who the hell are you?" Kat notes that she has a phone in her hand and "911" is already dialed, she just hasn't hit "send" yet. Kat and Kayla talk her down, falling back on the old "we're from QCOMM in Seward and we're here to help" cover story. The woman - Sheri - says that she worked her with Baines, and that his brother Tom is thinking about selling the place to a Take 5 or something; he doesn't want to run or own the business himself. That puts Sheri out of a job, though Kat points out that good mechanics don't hurt for work, at least. Sheri isn't able to tell them much; Baines was working late, the lift's hydraulics failed and a car crushed him. She found him in the morning. They do ask about the drain, and Sheri says that she cleans it every couple of months, as it gets clogged with lugnuts and other metal junk and oil, but she hasn't cleaned it since before Thanksgiving. 

Sheri gives them Tom Gregorov's card, and shoos them out. The envoys reconvene at the hotel and talk through everything they've learned. Tristan is very interested in the drain, and wonders where the blood is going. Maybe they could go into the sewers and look? ("Seriously?") They figure that Samuel Gregorov might be part of this - he attends Fireweed - but they aren't sure how.

The envoys plot out timeline, and look into who else has died in Homer over the past couple of weeks. Baines died on 1/14/25, and then nothing out of the ordinary for a week (there are deaths, of course, there's a hospice, after all), and then Dean Torney died 1/22/25, Tanya Valmier on 1/25, and Donna Fitzroy on 1/28. Nothing since...unless the asthma attack today is related? Tristan verifies that there's no history of this kind of thing happening in Homer, no "one every 23 years" kind of situation. This seems to have started with Baines Gregorov. 

They decide to sleep on it and then tomorrow check the pipes beneath the garage, the accident site where Donna Fitzroy died, and see if they can learn more about Tanya Valmier's death. 

They bed down, and Tristan dreams:

He's in a gym, clearly at a school. Where the bleachers should be is the remains of a scissor lift, a wrecked car, and smashed metal. He can see blood oozing out from under the wreckage, but it's oozing in the wrong direction, like something is sucking it in. Behind it all, he's aware of a loud, constant, ticking, like an alarm clock. It stops, and he realizes his heart has stopped as well.

Tristan wakes with a start, which has the effect of waking up Arlo, too. Tristan asks if he hears ticking (he does not), and then sods off for the shower. The envoys split up - Tristan, Tul, and Kat go to the garage to try and get into the sewers, while Arlo and Kayla decide to try and get hold of Tom Gregorov. 

Kayla calls Tom Gregorov and he immediately hangs up ("take me off your list"). Arlo calls back and manages to get him talking, explaining QCOMM. Tom doesn't need anything from them and isn't much interested in talking to him, but does let slip that Samuel was close to his Uncle Baines.

The others find a manhole near the garage, Kat pulls it up, and they descend. The find where the drain empties, and Tristan senses the Unknown, but doesn't get anything. If there's something supernatural, it hasn't fallen down into the sewers. Tul touches the wall and gets a mental map of the sewer system, so at least they don't get lost, but a bit of looking gets them nothing but a bad smell.

The envoys go back to the hotel and wash the stank off, while Arlo and Kayla grab some lunch for everyone. But then someone mentions the basketball game, and Tristan is horrified. They need to be at the game. And, based on the ticking, time might be a factor. 

But there's a few more hours, so they decide to check out the death sites of Donna Fitzroy and Tanya Valmier in the meanwhile. 

Chill: The One Thing You Can't Replace

Here we are back in Alaska! 

Recall that last time, the envoys had encountered the ghost of a World War One soldier named Benedict Martin, who had put a bullet in the hip of Khalil Barnes. With Barnes in the hospital overnight, the envoys decide to rest up and get back to the investigation in the morning.

And indeed, the following morning, Amelia Rostov and Kayla Vanderhoven hit the library and research who Benedict Martin might be. They wind up discovering that he was born in Seward in 1899, and died in 1968, long after the Great War. He married a woman named Judith Chauncey and they had four kids together. They wind with constructing a family tree for him:

This doesn't have birth/death dates, but the envoys did find them

They share this with the other envoys, and Tulugaak Hanta realizes that he knows Avery Martin. She was a year behind him at Seward High School, meaning she's a senior now. So how did the photo of Benedict and (presumably) Judith wind up in Alex McNulty's house? 

Arlo Miller picks up Khalil from the hospital, but shortly thereafter, the envoys all get alerts on their phones from Dr. Bellman. "Don't know if this is related to anything you're doing, but there's an active shooter situation at Seward High." The envoys all race over there, Amelia and Kayla arriving first. The situation doesn't look bad - no violence evident, the cops aren't getting ready to storm the place, and it looks to the envoys like things are winding down. Amelia talks to an EMT that she knows and learns that, to his knowledge, there was a shot fired but no one was actually hurt, people just saw a man walking around outside with a rifle. 

The other envoys arrive, and while they're waiting for the cops to empty out the school, Khalil and Kayla walk around the building a bit. Khalil glances around the side of the building and sees the weird, non-Euclidean, hallucinatory sightlines that he sees when the Unknown is about. They find footprints, resembling military boots but out of date, and the prints have blood and mud in them. There's no blood or mud in the area, though. Khalil takes some quick samples and he and Kayla watch as the prints fade away. Tulugaak touches the wall of the school and learns the locale of security cameras, and unfortunately none of them are pointing at that side of the building. But there's a classroom window looking right out there, and if Tulugaak's memory is right, it's Mrs. Mueller's senior English class.

When the school does get evacuated, Tulugaak spots Mrs. Mueller and goes to talk to her. He chats a moment, but she never saw the guy, just pulled her students away from the window when they did. Tulugaak spots Avery Martin and he and Khalil go to talk to her. 

Avery says that she saw a man with a big rifle walking around outside. She thinks he might have been wearing camos? But the weird thing is, he turned to the window and caught her eye, and she thinks he looked familiar. 

Khalil shows her the picture on his phone of the framed photo of Benedict and Judith and asks her if he looked anything like this, and Avery is flabbergasted, both because yeah, he did, but also because that photo disappeared from her house a couple of years ago! She'd had a party without her parents knowing and the next day, that picture was gone. She mentions that the same thing happened to one of her volleyball teammates, actually - she had a party and the next day an old photo was gone.

Khalil promises to get the photo back if he can, and the envoys regroup. They figure that they need to talk to Alex. It seems pretty clear that he stole at least a couple of these photos, but they don't know why. And even if he did, why is Benedict showing up now? That photo has been in Alex' house for a couple of years, after all. They have Tulugaak go and get Alex and bring him to a burger place for lunch, and stage a bit of an intervention.

The envoys explain that what shot Khalil yesterday was a ghost, and it was the ghost of a man in a photo that Alex took. Alex, after some prodding, admits that he was kind of fucked up in high school, and used to steal old photos from classmates at parties - they are, he says, something that you can't replace. The envoys note that everyone does stupid things in high school (Kayla relates her experiences with stealing cosmetics as a teen), but the Alex asks if this ghost killed his mom.

The envoys confirm that he did, but Khalil emphatically states that this is not Alex' fault. There's no possible way he could have known this would happen. Everyone decides to go back to Alex' house and check out the physical photo a bit more. 

They arrive at the McNulty house, and everyone goes inside. Amelia and Arlo stay downstairs, while other folks go up and check out the framed photo. Khalil pops it out of the frame and looks at the picture, and on the back, finds "B.M. + J.M. 1920" written in ink, but also a small, discolored rectangle, about the size of a little piece of Scotch tape. Something was affixed to this photo.

He looks around the room and finds a small lock of hair between floorboards. Khalil calls downstairs for folks to find some tape...and then feels a raindrop. Amelia notices fog rising up from the floor downstairs. Tulugaak heads out of the room into the hallway, and nearly runs straight into Benedict, who cracks him in the jaw with the butt of his rifle. He feels a tooth chip and pushes forward, attempting to tackle Benedict, and Khalil emerges from the photo room with his .45 drawn. He puts a bullet in the ghost, and Benedict falls to the floor, gasping, and melts away.

Meanwhile, Amelia attempts to get up the stairs quickly, but misses a step and tumbles back down. Kayla catches her to make sure she doesn't seriously hurt herself, and then creeps up the stairs, too, activating Eyes of the Dead to see if Benedict is still around. She doesn't see him, but he's melted away into a yellowish gas. Tulugaak, Kayla, and Khalil all cover their faces and head downstairs, where Amelia has already enacted a ward.

Alex is panicking a bit, looking through drawers for tape. The envoys figure they need to tape the hair back onto the photo, but they've left the photo upstairs. Hearing that they need to get it, Tulugaak runs back upstairs (and Kayla follows), and finds that the room with the photos is full of a thick fog. 

Kayla slips into the room and hunches down into the fog. She sees Benedict hunkered in the corner, peering over a nonexistent trench with his rifle. When Tulugaak enters the room, Benedict fires off a shot and hits Tul in the shoulder (Tul immediately gets a spike of adrenaline and doesn't feel a thing. Arlo comes up the stairs and into the room ("maybe next time you wait for me") and activates Sphere of Protection. The fog vanishes within the sphere and Tul grabs the photo. Benedict takes another shot, but it crackles harmlessly off the sphere. Arlo waves Kayla and Tul out of the room and they rush downstairs; Arlo follows slowly, maintaining the protection.

Downstairs, Amelia tapes the lock of hair back onto the photo and puts the photo back in the frame. Everything upstairs goes quiet, and the envoys slowly creep back up. 

They find Benedict in the photo room, his spectral form flickering between his Army uniform and the suit he was wearing in the photo. They enter the room carefully and engage him in conversation. Benedict is confused; he remembers being at war, but remembers coming back? Maybe? Khalil shows him the picture and reminds him that it was taken after the war, in 1920. He came back, he married Judith, he had four kids and multiple grandkids, and he didn't pass away until 1968. 

(Arlo draws a Line of Defense around him, just in case he panics.)

Benedict says that something still feels wrong, and the envoys tell him that they'll make sure the photo gets back to his family. Benedict, hearing that, slows down, and says that he's tired. Khalil tells him that he can rest now. "You did good, soldier." 

"I never really liked being a soldier," says Benedict. "But I did like being with Judith. You know. Being a husband." And he fades away.

Amelia takes Tul to the hospital so Dr. Bellman can work on his shoulder, while Khalil, Kayla, and Arlo go to the Martin household. They knock, and Avery answers. She's overjoyed to see the photo, and thanks the envoys - hopefully her parents just won't notice. She takes the photo, and the envoys regroup at the hospital.

"Well," says Dr. Bellman, "nice work. Hopefully that helps the ghost pass on, and doesn't just put him back to sleep." 

Amelia nods. "No way to know."

"Other than taking the hair out again, I guess." 

"Nope."
 

Chill: Old Photos

Yesterday we jumped back into the frigid wastelands of Seward, Alaska. Here's last time, but much has changed.

The envoys have been in touch with some folks in the greater SAVE organization, including Alison Ware and the staff of the Den, and have been folded into the larger organization, going from a lost cell to traditionalist. They've sent out an envoy to act as coordinator for the HQ, one Kirby Bellman, an ER doc originally from San Diego. 

In addition, several new envoys have joined up in the last few months:

• Capt. Khalil Barnes (USAF, Ret): Khalil was a JAG officer and legal investigator who, during the course of one investigation, uncovered something unspeakable. The eldritch truths he learned nearly drove him mad, and he retired and joined SAVE in order to make sense of the world.
• Arlo Miller: Arlo was a private security operative who protected mostly rich corporate types, and stopped a possessed stalker from killing one of his charges. He came up to Seward on rich guy's hunting trip and wound up staying with SAVE (and demonstrating an almost savant-like aptitude for the Protective Art). His Drive is to be the shield. 
• Kayla Vanderhoven: Kayla is a yoga instructor and self-taught astral projector who witnessed Mercy Williams get attacked by an incorporeal being while she was out-of-body. She seeks to better understand the universe. 
• Tulugaak Hanta: A Native kid and all-state track-and-fielder (100-meter dash) and recent high school grad, Tul also had the distinction of being struck by lightning and marked by some creature of the Unknown. His Drive is to find a larger family. 

On this particular Monday in December, snow blanketing the ground and more on the way, five envoys get a text message from Dr. Bellman. Amelia Rostov is working on signups for a Winter Pet Parade. Arlo is looking for work (bouncer, maybe?). Tul is out running, and Kayla is finishing up a yoga class. Khalil is at a doctor's appointment at Providence General, which is handy, as it turns out. 

The message tells them to meet him in the hospital cafeteria in an hour (he also mentions it's Salisbury steak day, but no one is much enthused by that prospect). When everyone gathers, Dr. Bellman tells them to maybe eat first, before he shows them what's up (whereupon Khalil decides to save his salad for later).

Dr. Bellman explains that a dead woman was brought in today, apparently killed by chemical poisoning. The police haven't determined whether it was accidental or deliberate, but that's less concerning than the effects of the poison. He shows them a picture (everyone but Khalil, who abstains - he's got kind of a weak stomach). The woman, Janice McNulty, is in her early 50s, but it's kind of hard to tell from the picture. Her eyes are swollen shut, her lips and throat and distended, and she's got awful, yellow blisters on her face and chest. Dr. Bellman gives them a little background: Janice was found dead in her home by her adult son, Alex. Alex had been away at school at the University of Washington, came home yesterday, and left the house last night at some point, but returned in the wee hours. He found her body when he came downstairs in the morning. 

The house has been cleared - no residual toxins. Bellman is still waiting on tissue sample tests and swabs for some more exotic toxins, but the obvious stuff has all tested negative. The body is downstairs and Dr. Bellman tells the envoys that he can get them in to see it, alone, for a few minutes. Amelia asks if this is an Unknown thing, and Bellman says he thinks so, but he wants some more eyes on it. 

The envoys head downstairs and Bellman gets whoever's in the morgue to take a walk. He lets them in and pulls the body out. Amelia senses the Unknown, and hears the ringing in her ears that indicates a supernatural presence, but it's residual - whatever killed the woman was indeed a creature of the Unknown. Khalil puts on a pair of gloves and pokes at the body a bit. Bellman informs them that Janice's throat closed, which is what killed her, but she has no history of allergies (or really any significant medical history at all). They determine that the toxin affect her trachea more than esophagus, so it was probably something she inhaled rather than something she ate. Her soft tissues are all swollen up, and that plus the weird coloration of the blisters make Khalil think of mustard gas.

Of course he's never seen mustard gas; it hasn't been used in a long time, but he's seen pictures. Kayla asks if it's possible for someone to make it, and Khalil says it is, but if someone mixed up a batch of mustard gas they'd probably have seen more cases of poisoning just from the off-gassing. Amelia can't think offhand of any significant WWI history around Seward, but that's definitely an area to look into.

The envoys split up - Amelia and Kayla hit the library, while Arlo, Khalil, and Tul head to the house to talk to Alex (and hopefully get to snoop around a bit). Bellman wishes them well, he's got clinic duty. 

The three envoys pull up at the house. It's a nice little split-level on the west end of town. They knock, and a young man (about 21) answers the door. He's clearly tired, but talks with them. Khalil gets them in the door (and assures him they're not cops), which seems to put him a little at east - he's dealt with enough cops today. He invites them in and takes them to the kitchen to sit down.

Conversation with Alex reveals that his relationship with his mother was, to the say the least, strained. He hadn't talked with her since the start of the semester, and when got home yesterday, he discovered that she was selling the house and had already packed up most of his stuff. He says they got into a fight and he stormed out around 8:30 and drove to a bar, and didn't come back until after 2AM. He went straight upstairs and didn't see her until the morning, when he came downstairs and found her dead in the kitchen.

Khalil also asks Alex about his studies; he's a history major. He's more interested in economic history than war, though, and he doesn't have any friends or professors with a special interest in World War I. Tul offers Alex a place to stay for a couple of days, to get him out of the house and away from this situation, and Khalil offers legal assistance with the probate and so forth. Alex agrees and goes up to pack a bag, and the envoys check the downstairs a bit. 

Tul touches a wall and uses Schematic, and learns that there are four rooms upstairs. Based on the layout, he's guessing master bedroom, Alex's bedroom, a bathroom, and then a small side room off Alex's room. He doesn't feel anything Unknown in the bones of the house, so whatever is going on here, it doesn't seem related to the place. 

The kitchen has clearly been cleaned recently; there's no real evidence of the death. No damage to the cabinetry and it doesn't look like Janice thrashed or flailed when she died - whatever did this, it was fast. The envoys also note that there are no pictures displayed and Khalil doesn't find any albums down here. Alex reappears with a bag and Khalil, but Alex says that his mom wasn't really sentimental like that. His dad left when he was about 8, his maternal grandparents are dead, and he's never met his paternal grandparents. Khalil asks if Janice was seeing anyone and he says he doesn't think so, but does note that she'd mentioned on Facebook that she'd been hearing weird noises in the house of late.

Tul rides with Alex to head to his mom's house, and Arlo follows. Khalil stays behind to look around, and of course heads upstairs. He finds that Janice's room is about half packed up, but Alex's room is entirely packed up. He also notes that the small room off Alex's room looks like an architectural mistake more than anything; slightly bigger than a walk-in closet, accessible by a panel on the wall that comes away.

In that room, Khalil finds a stack of boxes, and inside, a lot of antique photographs. They're of various people and families, and no one obviously resembles Alex or his mother. Khalil photographs all of them, and pops them from the frames and checks the back. Some of them are labeled, some aren't, but the handwriting doesn't match up. These photos look like they're all from different collections, even different families. Khalil sends all these photos to the group chat, and then heads to check out Janice's room.

When he steps out of Alex's room, though, fog rises up from the ground. It doesn't smell like sulfur, so no mustard gas, but that's still a little too weird for Khalil and he gets the hell out and texts the others.

Meanwhile, Amelia and Kayla do a little research. They learn that Seward doesn't have any particular history regarding the Great War. Sure, there were people from the area who enlisted, but no war heroes from the region, no memorials (and for what it's worth, Alaska wasn't a state at the time). When the info about Janice's Facebook comes through, Kayla has a look, and there are a couple of mentions of her hearing footsteps in the house at night (her friends recommend sage). The envoys wonder if this is what induced her to sell the place.

Tul, meanwhile, rides with Alex out to his mom's house, and realizes on the way that they went to the same high school - Tul was a freshman when Alex was a senior. They didn't run in the same circles, though. Tul was an athlete, and his recollection is that Alex ran with the party kids. When the photos start hitting the chat, Tul asks if his mom was interested in photograph (Alex says she was not) and then asks about the photos. Alex says they're just something he's interested in, and it's amazing what people sell at yard sales and whatnot.

They arrive at Tul's family home outside of town. His mom has something good on the stove, and is happy to put Alex up for a couple of days. About now, Khalil mentions the fog, so everyone reconvenes at the McNulty house. 

Khalil explains what he saw, and they decide to let Kayla go in first astrally. She unrolls her yoga mat, sits down and meditates, and walks out of her body and through the front door. She looks around the first floor and sees a layer of yellow goo in the kitchen - not present physically, but still present spiritually. 

She starts to head upstairs and sees fog spilling down. She hears someone calling "hello?" and then blowing a whistle. She calls out ("hello?") and a man's voice asks who she is. She tries to engage him in conversation (at one point, he asks if she's American, but generally he seems scared and confused), and then she hears a soft metallic ting and something bounces off the wall near her. 

Kayla sinks into the floor and away from the object, but it explodes. Shrapnel rips through her head and she panics, before she realizes that her head isn't physically present. She returns to her body and stands back up, now with a bad headache, and explains that he threw a grenade at her (Khalil: "I didn't hear-" Kayla: "A ghost grenade."). 

They consider what to do - there's talk of going in and having Amelia ward the room - but Khalil hears glass break. He glances up and sees a rifle barrel sticking out of a corner of an upstairs window. He grabs Amelia and Kayla ("GUN!") and pushes them behind the car for cover. Tul sprints to the front door, neatly getting under the line of fire, and Arlo reflexively raises a Sphere of Protection - just as the rifle fires.

CRACK. The shot bounces off the shield. Kayla and Amelia both run for the door, but Amelia stumbles (she's still recovering from a nasty werewolf bite). Khalil and Arlo exchange a look, and Khalil nods. Arlo drops the Sphere, runs out next to Amelia, and raises it again. Khalil yells at the gunman to stand down, trying to address him as a superior officer, but apparently he doesn't buy it.

CRACK. The shot goes through the top of the car and hits Khalil in the hip. Khalil yells at him again and ups the ante, trying his best to sound like a drill sergeant. The gunman retracts the rifle and asks where the squad is; Khalil says that he just put a round in a superior's hip, he's not entitled to ask any questions. He demands the gunman identify himself, and he does: "Private Benedict Martin." And then the rifle vanishes. 

Khalil collapses, Arlo calls EMS, and Kayla keeps pressure on the wound. The envoys check the house, but apart from the broken window, they don't find much. But when Kayla gets upstairs (Arlo goes in the ambulance with Khalil; Amelia texts Dr. Bellman to give him a heads up), she uses Eyes of the Dead, and sees ghostly spent cartridges and bootprints. 

Khalil and Arlo meet with Dr. Bellman. Bellman tells Khalil that, fortunately, the bullet didn't hit any major arteries and his hip isn't broken. No fragments or evidence of the bullet, though, which indicates that it probably vanished with the rest of the ghost. From the wound, it's a high-caliber rifle. Khalil's guess is an M1 carbine, the kind used by soldiers in WWI. 

The envoys need a bit of a breather. Khalil starts working on paperwork for Alex, helping out with the probate. The others prepare to spend tomorrow trying to figure out who Benedict Martin is, and why he's set up camp in the McNulty house. 

Chill: Another Bloodsoaked Conclusion

But, at least this time it wasn't (just) one character that got chewed up. Here's last time. 

Nicholas Failor is in the house in Council, AK, along with nine other people. They hunker down and wait for the others to arrive, but Nicholas does begin to wonder why he hasn't seen either of the two cops that had arrived in the helicopter...

Meanwhile, in a different copter, Amelia Rostov, Britt Lepus, and Mercy Williams are on the way! As Council comes into visibility, their pilot, Glen, radios ahead, but gets no response. Amelia asks him to circle the area once so they can get a lay of the land. They spot a body covered in a sheet next to the other helicopter, and what looks like a pair of legs sticking out at the back of the house. Preparing themselves for the worst, they have Glen land. 

Amelia tells Glen to let them off, and then head up and call for help - clearly there are people injured or worse. Glen tells her he'll probably have to get a little ways away before he can get through, but Amelia says they'll be all right. They disembark, and Nicholas opens the door and waves to them. 

The envoys enter the house and meet everyone (but mostly Lucas Mayer and his wife Eva). Nicholas fills them in on what's happened, and Britt relates the conversation she had with the strange woman on the radio. The envoys also mention the feet at the back of the house (though quietly, so as not to scare the civilians), and the four of them head back there to check it out.

They find what they excepted - a body. It's one of the cops, tucked between two big recycling bins. Mercy looks him over and determined that this throat has been crushed by manual strangulation. Someone throttled him from the front. Whoever did that must be extremely strong, especially to do it quickly enough that there was no noticeable scuffle. Also, the cop's gear - gun, handcuffs, taser, etc. - is all gone. Mercy glances up and sees the recycling bin is open a bit...being propped by a boot. She looks in, and finds the other cop. His gear is gone, too, and someone has bashed in the back of his head with a rock (which also falls out of the bin when they topple it). 

The envoys talk this through - this means that the mysterious "Bonnie" is armed (or, at least, is trying to remove guns from the envoys), and has no problem ambushing and killing people. They head back inside to reconnoiter, and then go look at the other body.

They pull the sheet off (and Amelia turns around, rather than look at the blood). The guy is shirtless, wearing blue jeans and boots. He's maybe in his late 40s, a bit of grey at the temple. He's pretty hairy, though not abnormally so. He's also been shot multiple times, mostly in the chest. The envoys briefly discuss shooting him in the head to make sure, but since the civilians are watching, they aren't sure how they could spin that. They don't see anything otherwise abnormal, though. Britt grabs the hatchet next to the body (the one he used to smash up the chopper), and the envoys check the interior of the chopper. They find a shotgun and some zip ties, and they tie the body to the landing rail of the helicopter, just in case.

They head back to the house, and the envoys go the kitchen to talk this through. They have several guns - Nicholas has his rifle, they found a police shotgun, and Amelia brought a handgun (which she's not terribly good with, but she does have it). They figure that Mayer and his cohorts might have a couple of rifles. They aren't sure, though, whether normal bullets will help, although they seemed to put the guy with the hatchet down (but is he a werewolf?). They don't know how many opponents there are, but they only know of two. And if silver is required to kill werewolves, they have precious little. Mercy brought a silver bracelet, and Britt has a silver jelly spoon. 

Nicholas points out that he could check tracks around the recycle bins and at least see how many people were there. They decide that Amelia will stay with the civvies (and ward the living room, just to see if any of them run out), while Britt and Mercy accompany Nicholas.  

Amelia meets the other folks here and tries to learn about them a little. Lucas is very much the patriarch or authority here. He's wealthy, and made his money in mining. Eva is his third wife (and about 30 years younger). Of the other folks, three of them are women of about Eva's age (Janna, Sonja, and Kaitlyn). The other men are friends or colleagues of Lucas, and all in their late 50s or 60s: Luther (former employee of Lucas; Amelia gets the feeling he's what's known as a "confirmed bachelor"), Danilo (also an employee, originally from Brazil), and Micah and his wife Esther (old friends of Lucas). She also wards the room, but no one reacts (other than to ask why she's putting chapstick on the walls). 

Nicholas, Britt, and Mercy go outside and check the area around the bins. Nicholas quite easily sorts out the tracks, and finds that one person - probably the woman that slugged him earlier, based on weight as guessed by depth of the prints - was the one that killed these guys. He tracks her to the south side of the house, where the cars are lined up, and notes that all of the cars' tires have been slashed. Mercy considers whether the rims would hold up, but they're too far from anywhere and the terrain isn't great. They're stuck until help gets back.

And how's that coming? Amelia borrows a sat phone from Lucas and calls Glen, and Glen gives them the bad news. There's some jurisdictional grousing going on about who's responsibility it really is to come out here, and they aren't listening to Glen about officers being down because they radioed back and got an all-clear. Amelia explains that one of the suspects has a police radio and both cops are actually dead, and if they call out and talk to a woman, it's not a cop. She also points out that there are rich people in trouble, and that usually greases the wheels. Glen promises to hurry things along as best he can, but it's going to be at least a few hours no matter what.

Nothing to do but wait. The sun begins to set. Music starts playing from one of the cars - CCR's "Bad Moon Rising" (Mercy: "First creature we've gone up against that brought its own soundtrack"). They turn off the car with the remote start, and Nicholas and Britt check upstairs (Eva mentions she has a spare set of keys up there). They find that the window is open and her suitcase has been tossed. Someone was in the house. 

Just then, a rock goes flying through the front window and shatters it. The people panic, but Amelia manage to keep them in the living room. A moment later, Amelia feels the little shiver that tells her the sun has set and the ward has fallen...and howls erupt at the front and back of the house.

Amelia and Mercy glance out the window and see an immense wolf sprinting for the front of the house. Amelia thinks quickly, and re-wards the room; the wolf aborts its leap. Mercy yells for the men to shoot the damn wolf, and they do, scoring a couple of hits! It stumbles, but doesn't die.

Meanwhile, Nicholas and Britt run downstairs. They hit the front hallway just as a splintering sound comes from the kitchen, and Nicholas goes to investigate, rifle raised. Britt ducks back into the living room to check on everyone, but then they hear a gunshot and screams.

Nicholas caught the wolf coming out of the kitchen with a shot to the shoulder, but it lurches forward, bites his leg, and drags him down the hall. Britt uses her Hidden Hand discipline and throws a pitcher from a side table at the wolf, but it just gives Britt a look that very clearly says: Wait your turn. The wolf pulls Nicholas into the kitchen, and, fighting the pain, draws the pistol Amelia gave him and empties the magazine into the wolf's face. 

The wolf drops him and backs up, pawing sparks out of its eyes. Amelia runs down the hall and into the kitchen, and smacks the wolf on the head with the top of her cane - the silver top of her cane. The wolf yelps in pain and backs off, heaving itself into a corner and collapsing, and Mercy and Amelia drag Nicholas back into the living room. 

Mercy uses Heal on Nicholas, probably saving his leg in the process. Amelia goes back into the kitchen to finish off the wolf, but one of the men yells that they've lost sight of the other wolf. Amelia barely has time to process this before that wolf comes flying through the kitchen window, biting her leg and pulling her to the floor. Between blood, pain, and terror, Amelia breaks, and starts screaming, barely aware of what's around her.

Mercy runs back down the hall with her shotgun and fires at the wolf, missing. It drops Amelia, however, and Mercy drags her back to safety. The envoys take a quick breather and Britt positions her phone with a video relay to Mercy's so they can watch the hall. They talk about taking a moment to rest - Nicholas is barely able to move, Amelia just keeps repeating "blood goes on the inside", but Mercy and Britt are unharmed, and they're afraid if they lose their advantage, they'll pay for it later.

Nicholas uses Clairvoyance to see where the wolves are. One is dragging the other by the scruff of the neck away from the house. He tells them where the wolves are, and they give Luther, Lucas, and Danilo rifles and head out. Mercy snaps a chair leg and affixes the bracelet to the top. Britt has the hatchet in one hand and the little spoon in the other. (No one thinks to pick up Amelia's cane, and Amelia is still incoherent.)

They head out of the house, full moonlight bathing everything in a blue-white glow. As they approach the helicopter (where, the notice, the body is no longer tied up), Mercy hears panting and turns just in time to see the wolf sprinting at them. It jumps up at her just as she brings her shotgun around, shooting it in the side, but it bites into her shoulder and she feels her collarbone snap. Adrenaline takes over and Mercy brains the wolf with the chair leg, calling on the Feat of Strength discipline as she does, and is rewarded with a little wisp of smoke as the silver burns it. The chair leg snaps, and the top (with the silver) drop somewhere into the grass.

Britt yells at the other guys to shoot the wolf, and they get close enough to do so. Three gunshots ring out, and the wolf snarls in pain...but Lucas falls. Luther and Danilo rush to his side, leaving Mercy and Britt to deal with the wolf. 

Mercy takes the broken chair leg and plunges the pointed end into the wolf's eye. It drops off her and starts pawing at the stick, trying to dislodge, but Britt seizes her opportunity and jams the spoon in its other eye. It stumbles around in blind fury, but Britt takes her hatchet and hammers the spoon home. The wolf collapses, and slowly melts back to human form - the man that was shot by the cops earlier. He rasps "Bógolarka," and dies. 

Nicholas, having heard the shots, comes to the door. He yells to Britt and she yells back, but both of them are having some pretty bad tinnitus right now (lots of gunshots in close proximity). Nicholas uses Clairvoyance again and finds the other wolf, limps out into the dark with his rifle, and shoots it. Britt wraps the silver bracelet around the blade of the hatchet, and finds the wolf in the tall grass. 

The wolf is still alive. Bleeding, panting, but alive. Britt raises the hatchet, and forces herself to strike, over and over, pounding the tiny bit of silver into the wolf's head. A moment later, she's covering in blood, shaking, but the wolf has changed into a woman. Her features are unrecognizable, her head split open, but horribly, she's still able to say something before expiring: "Белого Пути." And then she spits on the grass. 

The envoys pull themselves together (and Mercy uses Heal to mend her collarbone). They discover that Lucas is dead; errant rifle shot from Danilo. Moments later, they hear a helicopter incoming, and the police and medical help arrive.

This whole situation is what we call a "mess." There are five dead bodies just around this house, plus four more in the house by the water, plus two more stashed in a hollow a ways north (these last two turn out to be hikers, missing for more than a month). The police are completely baffled by who the two werewolves really are, but the fact that the woman had the cop's blood under her nails and both of them had human flesh in their stomachs makes it pretty clear that they aren't innocent bystanders. The corpses in the house were obviously killed by wolves and the witnesses all report wolves, but there are no wolf corpses. 

The envoys get taken away for medical treatment and tell the authorities as little as they possibly can. The cops are probably still sorting this out, but one thing is for certain: they're noticing the coincidence that there have been at least three incidents of weird, bloody murder and these same four people - Nicholas Failor, Amelia Rostov, Britt Lepus, and Mercy Williams - keep turning up.

Might be time for some new envoys in Seward, if there are other folks willing to stand up.

Chill: Bottle Episode (almost)

Yesterday we did some Chillin'. Here's last time (though of course that was the conclusion of the last case and this is the beginning of a new one).

It's August 17, 2024, and Nicholas Failor has been hired to fly a bunch of supplies from Seward to Nome, and then to Council, AK. Council isn't really a town, it's a fishing spot - there are some houses there that people use as summer homes or second houses, but no permanent residents. Based on the stuff he's hauling, Nicholas figures that the folks he's delivering to are wealthy - this is higher-end stuff. Looks like rich folks having a party.

And indeed, a woman in her 30s with dyed blonde hair meets him at the Council airstrip, and offers to pay him to help her load her car and then unload it at her house. She introduces herself as Eva Mayer, and they make chit-chat on the way back. When they arrive, Nicholas notes a few other houses in the area, including one near the water. Eva drives her big ol' SUV up to the back door of the house she's staying in (not the one near the water), and she and Nicholas unload the stuff. Nicholas meets one other woman - another blonde, clearly not an outdoorsy sort of person, named Kaitlyn (she has "trophy wife" written all over her). 

Nicholas gets everything unloaded and Eva drives him back to the airstrip. As they pass the house near the water, Nicholas feels the sensation of being slowly submerged in cold water - the Unknown. He tries to get a look at the house, but can't see anything and doesn't wish to arouse suspicion (or endanger Eva) by asking her to stop. She drops him at his plane, and Nicholas decides to investigate.

He unpacks his rifle, grabs some supplies, and hikes back. It's a good two hour walk, and it's late in the afternoon by the time he gets there. He doesn't see anything untoward as he approaches the house, but circles around back and sees that the back door has been smashed in. He considers using Postcognition, but he's never done it without another envoy watching his back and doesn't know if he'd notice anything coming. He decides to have a closer look first.

He pokes his head in the back door and sees an frankly disturbing amount of blood on the kitchen floor - looks like at least a person's worth, and some of it is still tacky. Before he goes further, he contacts the others.

Back in Seward, Amelia Rostov and Britt Lepus are doing inventory at QCOM. Mercy Williams is still at work. Nicholas contacts them on the sat phone and explains what he's found; Amelia tells him to call the police, but Nicholas is already looking around. He cuts some mylar from a tarp in his bag to make some booties so he can look around without getting blood on his boots, and takes a closer look.

It looks like something (or someone) was dragged out of the kitchen down the hall. Nicholas sees human footprints, barefoot, but also some prints that look canine. They're far too big to be dogs, but maybe wolf? Even then, they're on the larger side. They also seem...distended, somehow. He makes two distinct sets, and follows the track and drag marks into the living room. There, he finds another big splash of blood, and the drag marks continue up the stairs.

He follows them, carefully, and winds up in the master bedroom. At the foot of the bed is a pile of corpses. After overcoming his initial revulsion, Nicholas counts four bodies. One of them has been completely dismembered, but all of them have been hollowed out and are missing large chunks of flesh, as though they've been partially eaten.

Nicholas goes outside to call the state police, and sees a woman in a tank top hanging around, looking into the door. She waves to Nicholas and introduces herself as Bonnie, and asks what's going on. He tells her that this place is a crime scene, and she claims that she and her husband were hanging out with the guys in this cabin not long ago. Nicholas asks their names, and she seems a little flummoxed ("George, I think was the older guy?"). 

Nicholas is still shocked and tells the woman that he's going to call the police. He looks down at his phone, and notices her rushing him just in time. She tries to tackle him, and he moves back, trying to bring the butt of his rifle up, but she's fast, and socks him in the mouth. He doesn't feel anything break, but she's also very strong, much stronger than her frame makes her look. She pants slightly and grins at him; he raises the rifle defensively (he's too close to get a shot off), and she taps her forehead. "Go ahead. Right here."

Nicholas doesn't strike her, and she holds up his sat phone, waggles it tauntingly, and then yeets it into the river, and then runs around the house and across the street. Nicholas, fortunately, still has his short wave radio, and contacts Amelia again. By this time Mercy Williams is off work and has joined them. He explains the situation and Amelia tells him, again, call the police. They'll do whatever they can from Seward. Nicholas heads for Eva's house, and Amelia starts working on getting a lift out to Council - it's not accessible by road (certainly not from Seward, which is close to 600 miles away), but Amelia knows people. She can get a ride in a chopper.

While they're waiting, Amelia looks into the SAVE papers they have, looking for info about shapeshifters or lycanthropes, but the notes she finds keep referring her to something called "Lykos." Britt has a better idea - she gets Alison Ware on the phone. Alison tells her that basically if you've seen something in a movie or a book about werewolves, it's probably true, but you can't tell how any given werewolf works just by looking. Some are infective, though, and if one of them bites a person, you put two bullets in their head. Even if they're envoys. Especially if they're envoys. Alison also says that SAVE has a group of envoys that specializes in lycanthropes and she'll try and make contact and get back to Britt. ("This does seem like a Macnamara question.") 

Back in Council, Nicholas knocks on the door of Eva's house. An older man answers ("Yes?"), and Nicholas introduces himself. Eva calls him in, and Nicholas sees a room full of people - four men, five women. One of the men, a fellow in his sixties, introduces himself to Nicholas as Lucas Mayer, Eva's husband (Nicholas notes the 30-year difference between them but has no interest in judgment, especially not at the moment). He explains the situation and that everyone needs to stay put, and Lucas (to whom everyone else seems to defer) agrees. 

While they wait, Nicholas gets a quick lay of the land. The other three men - Danilo, Luther, and Micah - are all friends of and close to the same age as Lucas. One of the women, Esther, is Micah's wife, and is also in her 60s. The other women - Kaitlyn, Sonja, and Janna - are all in their 30s and have the same "rich LA housewife" vibe as Eva. Lucas also recalls that the men in the house by the water were a family - man, his brother, and his two adult sons. Their name was Stokes.

An hour or so later, a police helicopter lands. Nicholas prepares to go meet them, but then a man runs out towards it from another house. Two cops get out and the man excitedly talks with them, pointing to Nicholas (who is now on the porch of Eva's house). The cops draw their guns and approach him. Nicholas, no idiot, drops his rifle and holds up his wallet, and waits for them.

They check his ID, and one of them says "Nicholas Failor? You're Failor?" He says he is, and the cops turn back towards the copter. The man pulls himself into the cockpit, and then smashes everything with a hatchet. The cops run back towards him and he jumps out, raises the ax, yells "DIE PIGS" and charged them. 

Predictably, they shoot him multiple times. He collapses, dead, into the mud.

The cops go back to Nicholas and explain that the chopper is fucked, and the radio is destroyed. One of them borrows Nicholas' short wave and walks off to call in. The other starts asking questions and trying to get Nicholas' statement.

Meanwhile, the other envoys are on a helicopter. Britt gets on the radio and tries to contact Nicholas.

A woman answers. "Helloooo." 

"Um. Hi, I'm looking for Nick."

"Who's this?"

"Who's this?"

"Oh, I'm Bonnie," she says. "And who are you?"

"Britt." Britt pauses. "Can I talk to Nick?"

"I'm looking at him," says Bonnie. "But he can't talk right now. You want me to give him a message for you?"

"No," says Britt. "We're on our way."

"Oh, good. More the merrier." 

"You get around a lot, then?" asks Britt.

"Some," she says. "I'm from Hungary."

"You don't have much of an accent."

"Thanks! I'm pretty good at picking up the local accent." She says something in what Britt assumes to be Hungarian. "Anyway, gotta go. See you tonight."

"OK, bye, puppy."

"Bye, piggy." 

Chill: Mouthful o' Bugs

With that cheery image in mind, here's the conclusion of our current case.

Last time, Mercy Williams had just been rushed to the hospital following a strange, painful attack of some kind as she'd been tending to Jean Cameron's (self-inflicted) wounds. Jumping ahead to that evening, Jean has been stabilized and put up in psych ward. Mercy has likewise been treated, and they've run tests, and found exactly nothing out of the ordinary in her EEG. She's in a room for the night for observation, and the other three envoys join her to talk this through a bit (they're still waiting on a callback from Alison Ware, their new contact in SAVE).

Amelia Rostov goes upstairs to the psych ward and visits with Jean. They don't remember much - they were just cutting up a tray of fudge and then looking at the knife and suddenly cutting their wrists just made sense. Jean agonizes over explaining this to their wife; Amelia says of course she'll try and help if she can. She also listens for the Unknown (she experiences it as a ringing in her ears) and hears the faint ringing she's had before. This Unknown presence, whatever it is, has its hooks in both her and Jean, but it's not doing anything at present.

Amelia goes back to the room and reports to them on Jean's status (both mundane and supernatural). Amelia tries to text the group chat to check in with the others, but suddenly she doesn't have signal...no one does. Mercy watches the door to try and flag someone down, but no one walks past. Amelia tries to leave the room, but can't. When she steps close to the open door, she feels far away again. "Damn." 

Fortunately, they know how to get around this, at least momentarily. Amelia has Nicholas Failor stand near the doorway and uses Disrupt on him, allowing him to get through the door before the effect reasserts itself. The envoys in the room see Nicholas vanish (likewise, to Nicholas the room looks empty). He grabs a pad of paper from the nurse's station and write "I'm fine, what do you want me to do?" and slides it into the room.

Britt Lepus goes to pick it up, but the pad flies into the air and papers scatter everywhere. The envoys talk this through a little and figure that if Amelia wards the room, it might cancel the effect - she does, and it does. Nicholas comes back in, Amelia's text goes through, Dustin, Danika, and Rochelle all send variations on "wtf is going on with Jean".

The envoys put their heads together. They know that each of them seems to have a specific effect that follows them. For Amelia it's the barrier, for Britt it's objects flying around, Mercy gets physically attacked, and Nicholas seems to call extreme weather. Over in the other friend group, Dustin cause a woman to vomit bugs (rather, he didn't cause it, but it happened around him), Jean gets these self-destructive impulses, Rochelle sleepwalks, and Danika...we're not sure, maybe the dog attacking her? Whatever happened to her, it doesn't seem to be as dramatic. 

They chart out all the manifestations they've seen and try to find a pattern. It's not cyclical, the timing seems random. It's not when groups of them are together because it's happened when they're alone just as much as not. It's not just when they just the Art or sense the Unknown, though they do notice that with the meditation group, it seems to happen when they zone out or let their minds wander, which considering this started happening because of meditation and lucid dreaming makes sense. Maybe Danika is just more present in the moment, and that's why it hasn't hit her? But that still doesn't get them any closer to beating it.

They decide to get back to the community center and gather the others, and have every stay there tonight in a warded room (except Jean and Mercy, obviously). Mercy gets her hospital food ("yay"), Amelia buys burgers on the way, and when they get there, Dustin and Danika are waiting. Dustin says Rochelle is on the way.

Meanwhile, Mercy, with not much else to do, tries to do a little research into Stan Walton, the SAVE envoy who murdered Desiree Cummings while possessed and then turned up dead a few months later. Mercy discovers that his ex-wife, son, and brother all died between May and December of 2000, all in "accidents." 

At the community center, the others are about to go in, and then Britt feels something in her teeth...and then feels it move. She coughs up a mouthful of flies, but manages to keep herself from freaking out too badly. The envoys push everyone inside and Amelia wards the room. Dustin looks out the door and sees Rochelle pull up. "Yo, Rochelle! Come in! Wait, where you going?"

Dustin runs out after her, but slips on the gravel. Amelia tries to get to her, but she's not fast. Nicholas, however, is, and sprints across the parking lot, grabbing Rochelle just as she is about to step into the road. "Huh? What's happening?" 

"We need to get inside," says Nicholas. They start moving, and the wind starts to kick up. Debris flies around and smacks both him and Amelia, but doesn't do more than give them cuts or bruises. They all manage to get inside, into the ward, and calm down a bit.

They set the non-envoys up with a DVD and get on a video call with Mercy. She tells them what she's found, and they figure that if the entity possessing Stan is that aggressive, it should be possible to track it. Amelia points out that, according to Alison, SAVE was under attack in 2000, but that doesn't explain Stan's family. Mercy tries to track down similar patterns of death (clusters of accidents within a family or a group), but it's too broad to get very far tonight. She decides to get some sleep.

Britt's phone rings - Alison. She puts her on speaker, and Alison explains that she hasn't been able to find anything that specifically fits this creature's MO. It's not as simple as "oh it's a dream demon, you need to put robin feathers on it" (Britt: "Is...that a thing? Should we get some robin feathers?" Alison: "Never seen anything that reacts to those, but a lot of creatures of the Unknown do respond to shit that weirdly specific"). The thing she finds interesting, though, is the creature's apparent ability to use disciplines of the Evil Way through others. She likens it to having tied elastic around people and being able to twang the strands when it wants. 

Amelia asks if having everything sleep in a warded room would break that, and Alison says it might - if the creature can't find the people it's connected to, it might get lost. That's going to be difficult, though, because Mercy and Jean are in hospital. The envoys had been thinking that they were as safe as they could be, but if they could get in and ward their rooms...

At this point Mercy calls them and tells them that she had a dream. In the dream, she was in the community center, alone, when someone knocks on the door. She answers it, and there's a man standing there that she doesn't recognize, but who is smiling far too broadly. He says he's been looking forward to meeting her, and steps forward, at which point she wakes up, heart pounding. 

Alison hears this, and gets quiet. "I'll look into it," she says. "Let me get back to you. If you do see that kind of person, don't let them in."

Alison hangs up, and the envoys talk about the possibility of getting everyone under a ward. Getting Jean and Mercy out of the hospital at this time of night is unlikely, but getting a ward to them seems doable. 

They decide to try it. Amelia and Britt leave to head to the hospital; Nicholas stays behind with the other folks, both because they figure someone should and because they don't want a hurricane happening. They drive to the hospital and visit Mercy's room. Amelia wards the room, and then she and Britt head upstairs to psych ward. The find a machine that dispenses clean scrubs and Britt uses her Skeleton Key discipline to activate it. They walk up to the woman in the office and Britt uses the discipline again, and explains to her, using perfectly accurate medical technology, why she needs to get in. The woman lets them in, and Britt kind of blinks and asks Amelia what happened. "You were just a Viking," she says. "Yeah, weird," says Britt. "Kind of like being possessed, but in a good way!"

They find Jean's room and, through the window, see Jean start to thrash in his sleep. Britt quickly uses the discipline one more time, and Amelia goes in and wards the room. The thrashing stops, Jean flips their pillow to the cool side and goes back to sleep. 

Amelia and Britt head downstairs to Mercy's room and just crash out there. Everyone sleeps well (Amelia and Britt wake up a little stiff from sleeping in hospital chairs, but otherwise they're fine). Everyone (except Jean) gets together for brunch, and a few attempts to sense the Unknown confirm that, whatever it was, it's not in them anymore. 

Dustin leans over and asks Britt if there's an application or something for SAVE. Britt just says "you're hired!" Rochelle, however, basically tells them she's done with this nonsense; she is going to have to have a long, boring conversation with her mother as it is. Danika is unsure, but leans toward helping out. The weirdness isn't going to go away if she doesn't, after all, and now she knows about it.

The Seward HQ seems to be growing!  

Chill: Making Contact

Yesterday was Chill! I am very sleepy, which is nothing to do with Chill. Here's last time, on we go.

The envoys are in Nicholas Failor's car following their weird ordeal in the woods. Amelia Rostov is pretty wiped; she's not the most lithe person on the best of days and she had to really push herself to get out of the strange barrier zone that some Unknown being imposed. Mercy Williams is chilly and damp from the rain, but otherwise intact. Britt Lepus is mostly fine, as she spent most of this time in the trailer looking for (but not finding) Unknown influence on old SAVE papers.

The group talks a little about what happened and what the next steps might be. Digging up the area where the presumed SAVE envoy was buried might be a start, but they don't want to try and do that at night. They're all tired, but decide to check in with the four friends who are experiencing Unknown difficulties. Britt texts them, and Dustin and Danika reply. Jean and Rochelle don't, but they both have young children and might already be in for the night. They decide to do a drive-by, just to make sure no one's house is on fire or anything.

Rochelle lives nearby, so they check her place first. As they approach, they see a woman in a bathrobe walking along the street. They pull up and find that it's Rochelle, kind of stumbling along. Amelia gets out and gets in front of her, and touches her shoulder, using Disrupt. Rochelle starts, and then looks around, unaware of where she is. She says she must have been sleepwalking. Amelia walks her back home, and Rochelle's mother emerges from another room and speaks to her in Russian. Amelia asks what's being said, and Rochelle answers that her mother was reminding her that this has happened once before, but she didn't get out of her driveway. Rochelle goes to bed and Amelia wards the room.

Rochelle's mother notices this and then gets Amelia's attention before she leaves. "Ведъма?" she asks? Amelia's Russian isn't great, but she recognizes the word "witch." "Kind of?" she says. The older woman points to the bedroom then to the front door, and says "more." "She's done this more than once?"

Rochelle's mother holds up five fingers. "Five times?" Her mother nods, and then mimes typing at a computer, and then drops her head forward. "While she's working?" Another nod.

Amelia thanks her, and goes back to the car and reports all this to the envoys. They discuss why Rochelle didn't report this, but Amelia suspects she might not remember, or might be in denial a bit. In any event, with the ward Rochelle should be safe for tonight. They head to Jean's to check on them.

There's a light on at Jean's house, so Britt and Amelia go up and peek in. They see Jean's wife walking around the living room holding their son, but no sign of Jean. They decide to roll the dice and knock on the door; after all, she's up, hopefully she won't be mad (and hopefully Jean has told her at least something about what's been happening). 

She answers the door and is perhaps a little perplexed, but talks to them a bit. She tells them that Jean is asleep; their leg was hurting and they took a pill to help sleep. The envoys thank her and wish her luck with the little one (he's got an ear infection and is having trouble sleeping), and head out.

The envoys figure that they're best off sleeping in the same (warded) room, so they head back to Amelia's place. She wards the living room and they all bed down, and manage to get some sleep.

Next morning, Tuesday, July 9, the envoys wake up bright and early and rested. Britt texts the group for a check-in, and gets responses back from Jean and Rochelle (which makes sense, if Dustin and Danika were up later they might wake up later). They go and get some coffee and talk through their plan.

They decide not to immediately go into the woods to start digging up bones. Instead, they decide to do some research. They head to the trailer to go through papers and learn a little more about what's happening.

Amelia digs through the archives looking for names of former envoys in the area. She comes up with four: Desiree Cummings, Stan Walton, Dee Thorton, and Mimi Renault. They know who Mimi is and where she ended up. That might mean that Desiree was the woman murdered in the woods, and maybe Stan was the guy that did it (or, rather, whatever was possessing him). 

Mercy tries to get a sense of how long the HQ in Seward was active, but isn't able to come up with anything definitive. The last dates she sees are in 1998.  

Nicholas looks into learning the Art, and comes up with some stuff they already knew (the six schools), but also a little more consolidated info about how the Art is taught. Very generally, it involves focusing on the same feelings or instincts as sensing the Unknown, but then filtering those feelings through different areas of the body or mind. Want to learn Restorative Arts, you push those feelings through the body as a whole and the muscles, that kind of thing. Nicholas also sees some discussion of an upcoming "Symposium" in Seattle, and sees the name "David Robinson" mentioned as a speaker.

Britt takes the names that Amelia found and starts researching them. She learns that Stan Walton's body washed up on a beach a little ways south of Seward in late 2000. Desiree Cummings was reported missing in May 2000 (which lines up with her being the victim of the murder the kids witnessed). Dee Thorton died in a weird accident in Anchorage in 2000 - she fell down an elevator shaft. Apparently the door opened, she was talking on her phone and didn't notice that there was no elevator, she stepped in and fell to her death. There were witnesses and everything.

They do a bit more digging (and Mercy goes to work), and find that Desiree Cummings has a sister named Deanna who still lives in Seward. They decide to go see if she's feeling chatty. As they pull up, they see an older woman working in her garden. Amelia and Britt go to talk with her (Nicholas stays in the car). Amelia introduces herself as being from QCOM, and tells the woman (who is indeed Deanna Cummings) that she's working on a project to shine some light on missing and abused or harmed women from the area, and would she mind talking about her sister?

Deanna agrees and lets the two of them into her house (her ancient yellow lab, Callie, gives a perfunctory wuf and then goes the heck back to sleep). They all sit down and Deanna says that Desiree disappeared in May of 2000, but she'd been acting strange for a few years before that. Actually, Deanna thinks her sister joined a cult. She started hanging around with a group of people that took up a lot of her time, she wouldn't talk about what they did, and the only one Deanna ever met was a guy named "Stan." With something of a sinking feeling, Amelia confirms that the "Stan" in question was Stan Walton, and informs Deanna that Stan died a few months after Desiree disappeared. 

Deanna says that they held a service for Desiree a couple of years after she vanished (when she was declared legally dead), and Amelia asks if there was anyone at the funeral she didn't know. Deanna says that there were maybe five or six such people, but she doesn't know their names (obviously). Britt asks if there was a guestbook for the service, and Deanna goes upstairs to find it. She returns and points out a group of names that she believes were the people in question: David Robinson. Alison Ware. Mimi Renault. 

Britt and Amelia take some photos of the guestbook, thank Deanna for her time, and head back out to the trailer. The three of them start googlin'. "David Robinson" is a bust; it's far too common a name to get anywhere without more parameters. But as Nicholas searches for Alison Ware, he finds a personal web site that's password protected. "That seems kinda of SAVE-y," says Amelia. 

Nicholas obligingly types in "SAVEy" as a password. The page disappears and is replaced by a page saying "HOLD ON." And then a second later Nicholas' phone rings. 

"You've got ten seconds," says the voice on the other end. Nicholas, who isn't capable of saying anything quickly, takes a breath, but Britt grabs the phone and actually starts talking. Once it's clear that the envoys are indeed envoys, Alison is much more forthcoming. 

She was the office manager of the SAVE HQ in Detroit, she says, until that HQ was destroyed. She barely made it out alive, and she doesn't do field work anymore. She did, however, present at the Seattle Symposium in 1998; she's a master of the Kinetic School of the Art. David Robinson is a friend of hers ("he lives in New England somewhere, maybe Maine?"), and is a master of the Incorporeal Art. 

Alison gives them a crash course in SAVE history - started in the 1850s by some dudes in England, spread all over the world, had some ups and downs, one of the biggest downs was in 2000 when the Society was infiltrated and nearly destroyed. But then a Syrian woman named Hayat Nejem came along and taught SAVE how to survive and fight a bigger and badder enemy (she had been involved with the struggle against Al-Assad's regime), and SAVE shifted to its current model of mostly autonomous cells with some, but minimal, contact between them. She also mentions that some HQs still run on the old model of having lots of contact and organization, which is great, but the more you know, the more knows you. 

She tells them, too, that Anchorage used to have an HQ with maybe 20 people at its biggest (but to the envoys, that seems amazing; "we could have naps?!" says Britt). But Anchorage fell during the infiltration. She came out to Seward in 2002 for the service for Desiree Cummings ("she was a badass, really good at the Restorative stuff"), and worked briefly with David on trying to find out what happened, but there was so much else going on that they couldn't spare much time. She is not surprised to learn that Desiree was murdered, though is a little taken aback that it was Stan (or something wearing Stan) that did it. 

But on to the matter at hand: The envoys explain everything that's been happening, and Alison notes that the creature seems to be using them (and the four meditation friends, and Stef Copeland) to use powers through each of them. She tells them that creatures of the Unknown that show this kind of diversity of ability are generally pretty powerful and dangerous, but notes that it might be multiple creatures all summoned in the same act. The way to test that, she says, is see if powers are getting used simultaneously in different places (but does note that if something has its hooks into all of them, that might not matter - the Unknown is a bitch that way). 

Around this time, Nicholas' phone jumps out of his hand, spins around, and throws itself through the trailer window. Nicholas goes after it, and the wind immediately kicks up, blowing debris around and into him. He goes back into the trailer and Amelia wards it, and the wind immediately dies down.

Mercy, who'd been on speaker, calls back and confirms that everyone is all right, but then immediately gets an emergency call and has to hang up. Amelia goes to Alison's site and Alison calls her back (and actually gives her a number this time), and says that she'll do some digging on her end. 

Mercy heads out to her call, which turns out to be at a shop in a strip mall. It's called "Sweets of Seward"...that's Jean Cameron's store. A man is there waiting for them, and tells them that he went into the shop and saw someone lying on the floor bleeding. Mercy and her partner rush in and see that Jean is the one on the floor. Both of their wrists have been cut, the knife is lying on the floor nearby.

The two EMTs patch Jean up and get them onto a stretcher, but Mercy starts to feel a pain at the back of her neck, just like she did last night. The pain grows in intensity until her muscles start to spasm. She tries to fight it off with the Resilience discipline, and tells her partner that she thinks she's having some kind of neurological event, but then passes out. 

Britt texts the four friends and asks for a check-in, and everyone responds except Jean. Dustin says he's right near Jean's store, so goes to look in, but quickly discovers that there's no one there and a lot of blood on the floor. He talks to someone who says that one of the EMTs passed out and both the EMT and the person working at the store were taken to the hospital.

Hoping that Mercy is OK, the envoys ponder their next move...