Kasee: 3/9/97
Ok. Here goes. Grandfather comes in and looks at Wolfie and then I try to tell the story but Renee cuts me off and doesn't let me and tells a very boring version, typical of Renee, I tell much better stories, and he asks who we all are and he basically ignores me, the rude, wrinkled old werewolf (at least I assume he is a werewolf 'cause his aura looks kinda like Wolfie's but more dynamic) and we discover Nicole served someone called Grandmaw (though at the time we thought it was Grandma!) and she is a Berabi or somesuch (aren't they nomads in the Sahara?) and Renee admits Wolfie is her mate (talk about doggie style!) and he talks to Mary, and continues to ignore me, then finally asks what I can offer (I should think since I learned all this stuff myself and didn't need a teacher that would make me superior, but obviously other people don't see things the same way I do) and I tell him I offer all I have and all I can do, 'cause Wolfie saved my life before he even knew me so Granddad said the path was set and we would have to go to Grandmaw's place and Silver Tooth was going to come and teach us to fight which he did the next day for three days until the new moon when we were to leave and we got cool swords and daggers and Eric removed the door so Torres couldn't spy on us when Silver Tooth arrived and he broke the door which solved that problem (over his knee! Not a wolf to mess with) and I checked the mail that day (November 8) and I found 4 letters!! And I told Reuben and he said for me to keep them (I did find them afterall) and we would worry what to do later and the swords all have a glow to them, they are awake and have a spirit presence and Silver Tooth hands me the first training sword! He is so cool but he works our butts off but it paid off 'cause I learned how to use a sword and got to decapitate a monster! Friday night we summon Angela and give her the letters and she reads them and the quint goes away and she looks upset and confused and them temperature drops and Wolfie got her tea but when she touched it she vanished and we keep training and on the 10th in the evening we are done and wait for Granddad and we strap on swords and he arrives and says we will open the place (make it a cairn- don't you bury dead people in cairns?) and we summon Angela again and Granddad says the opening will remove her from here so she can be with her husband and he gives her two pennies for fare and then she dissolves and we realize she was a wraith and we get ready to leave I wear black jeans and a black tee shirt and a grey windbreaker tied to my waist and a pouch for my crystals and 6 king sized butterfingers (gotta have my butterfingers) and a big Swiss Army knife and a bottle of water and we prepare and he says I can't be in the circle because of my lineage and I'm rather miffed at that but Renee tells me I'd be better at sneaking up and killing creatures and she's probably right and then Granddad gives me a pouch full of mushrooms that Reuben says are Tass which is cool, magic mushrooms! (oh, wow, look at the paisley horses!) of course now I glow in the dark but oh well, I hide well and then he leaves and comes back with a white dove and tells Reuben to drum to keep spirits away and he kills the dove and steps sideways taking Reuben with him, then he returns and the circle joins hands and he chants and I draw my dagger and wait and long boring hours path with nothing but Granddad chanting until shortly after midnight we hear a window break in the kitchen and see three Jason rejects, one with a chainsaw and the other 2 with axes and I jump into the kitchen (not the brightest thing to do, I admit, but hey, we had these cool swords and we were supposed to defend the place) and I attack and hit one then he axes me but not too badly then the other starts up his chainsaw (eeeekkk!) so I back out of the kitchen and the guy with the axe follows me so I hide behind Daedalus who tries to shoot one but the bullet has no effect and then the chainsaw guy goes berserk and plows through the axe guy and charges Daedalus so I attack him and shatter his mask and cut his face and he falls but gets back up and his face is regrowing (hey! That's not fair!) and while this is happening an axe guy attacks and really hurts Eric and then (this is the cool part where Daedalus vanishes- though I imagine Daedalus would disagree- it's probably pretty hot where he is) flames start to crawl over Daedalus from his hands and then hands come up out of the floor and drag him through the floor and vanishes, with lots of screaming, and we are kinda briefly stunned and two of the guys head for the circle and Cab lunges across the room and attacks one and I attack the same one and decapitate it!! And Dog trips the other one and somehow Silver Tooth reaches over Renee and thrusts his sword into him and flings the thug across the room and he splatters on the wall and slides down and lands next to Eric and the chainsaw guy charges past Cab and I and I attack and have no effect and he attacks Granddad and then Cab decapitates him and showers everyone with blood and I go over to decapitate guy on the ground and I actually miss and Silver Tooth walks up behind me and breathes down my neck so I try again and slice open his neck and splatter myself with blood so I clean my sword off on him and then a guy appears and Silver Tooth just says, "Oh, it's you" and the guy says his name is Kevin Ravenswing (cool name) and he has a sparkly aura like a mage so he must be a good guy and Silver Tooth didn't kill him and then with my expanded awareness I notice the breeze is moving outside the room but not in the room and Eric advises us not to leave the room, he made a force bubble, and he can do some scary stuff (but I'm learning about forces- they're cool!) so I listen to his warning and time passes slowly...... and then dawn finally starts to approach and Granddad starts chanting faster and Silver Tooth says we really need to open this place and then Granddad says go find it and Silver Tooth runs off down the hall looking for something and comes out with Hairball and yells, "What is this?" "Um, Hairball. A cat." and then he crushes it and it turns to white goo and we see colors and Renee collapses and Kevin tries to take her place but he collapses too and then Eric somehow manages to complete the circle and then the nexxus crawler appears and Silver Tooth and I attack it and Mary chants "nepo" and then the crawler turns into a philodendron of all things (a rather LARGE one, too) then a small tornado forms next to it and the plant vanishes and the colors are still pulsing and the tornado engulfs Cab and Wolfie's body goes limp and then Cab is released and the tornado vanishes through the wall and Granddad says this is very odd and not right at all (of course it's not right! Hideous monsters should NOT turn into philodendrons, I don't care how good a mage you are!) and the paint on the walls is peeling and dust settles and the place looks very unlived in an Granddad and Silver Tooth vanish and Reuben and another Wolfie appears and we see his wolf body has a tendril wrapped around it and I expand my awareness and we are in the Chantry but it seems like no one's been here a long time and Renee fills in Kevin and Reuben says we are in the Dark Umbra but I thought Wolfie said not to go there 'cause it's a bad place and we rest and heal some people who got pretty chewed up and the magic mushrooms really help and Cab tells us some crazy story about her a her brother and their dad and one of them was Granddad and Mary's staff and they were in the grasslands and she got a poem and memorized it and wrote it down for us but it made no sense at the time and later I discover the Chantry seems to be the only thing that exists, nothing beyond it and no sideways from here, like there's a wall blocking it, but we seem to be safe the Chantry is empty so we sleep 'cause we've been up for far too long and after this we start out exploits into the Dark Umbra. But that's another sentence.
© 1998 by Julie Hough
Tom Brady<tabrady@mindspring.com>
Last modified: Thurs Jan 15 16:30:00 1998 by tabrady