Operation: Redemption

West Texas is an awful place.

Then again, I'm beginning to think that everything is terrible everywhere, what, with a horrible demon-cult conspiring to tear down the fabric of reality and all. I really hate west Texas. I have my reasons. Very, very good ones.

But I went anyway.

Part of it was morbid curiosity, part of it was the opportunity. It's not like I'm going to Costa Rica or Tokyo or any other of those hotbeds anytime soon. I can't afford the airfare, and from what I've heard, I sure as hell don't wanna go.

So I grab my gun and my camera, and head on out to this hotel out in the middle of nowhere. I wasn't the only one from the Cavalry there, thank god. In no particular order: myself, Jaques, Michelle, Apophis, Barrett, Dr. Jones, Cora, Mary the Ghost-Witch Lady, Mr. Scalpel, Dr. Watts, Dr. Watts' buddy whose name I forget, and, of course, Brayker. Ethan and some of the Lake Charles murderhobos were there too.

And then there was everybody else.

You know that scene in Star Wars, where they go into the space bar and see all the crazy-ass monsters hanging out? It was like that, only with less booze and shittier music. Note: somebody important work on this for the next big apocalyptic throwdown.

I'm not sure if some Thing was blurring the picture, or if I'm just a shitty photographer.

By my figure, I saw: Werewolves, Vampires, Frankensteins, Ghost-Zombies, Wizards, FBI Agents, Ninjas, Demons, Changelings, and some guy who looked like Darth Maul. (I'll stop making Star Wars references, I promise). There were probably even more Things running around that I missed due to the feeling of impending doom bearing down on me. Must have been at least a hundred “people” there, from all over the damn country.

The whole thing had been organized by one Mr. Warden (who, for the record, knew my name, which makes me wonder who's keeping dossiers on me)...and The Captain. Yeah, that one. I freaked out when I saw him roaming around, because who wouldn't? I guess he figured out that he fucked up the Quarantine when he broke it?

So this makeshift supernatural army assembled to make shit right, so the hordes of Abominations wouldn't come screaming out of the time-space-tear-thingies. I know there's a better term for it but I'm honestly afraid if I start researching the proper terminology my brain will explode.

It was a simple plan, as far as these things go. Mr. Warden would do his wizard shit to shift the entire hotel (and the poor bastards in it) into the Quarantine pocket dimension whatever. At that point, it was up to us to fan out and collect these crystal-whatsits that were part of a null zone generator so we could seal the tears and now I'm giving you the plot of a video game.

There was a time limit, of course. See, since things are all Groundhog Day inside a Quarantine, you have the advantage of knowing exactly when and where things are going to happen. Which meant we knew a slavering horde of abominations was coming for us a little after midnight. We could see everything going to shit outside- fires in the streets, abominations chasing down pedestrians; it's a glimpse of what's going to happen if we fuck up and lose this war.

This map was pretty much the extent of the planning we had. That's one map for a good hundred people. We had enough firepower to conquer a small eastern European country, but nobody thought to set up a powerpoint presentation. That's how organized the Accord is, people. We're doomed.

...which, of course, meant it took us like two goddamn hours to get parties organized and sent out. Seriously, it was fucking embarrassing. Everyone was wandering around either trying to figure out what the fuck was going on, or crowding around the Big Kids table and yelling for things to happen. Some dude named Dave from the Vault was nominally in charge,

You know how bad it was? I almost went tearing off with Ethan to start Doing Shit. I was instigating, even. Ethan, the paramilitary zombie ghost was impressed with me. Do you know how terrifying that is?

So after dithering around for entirely too long, the Munsters family reunion split into three groups to pursue three different targets:

Team A went downtown to go toe to toe with some giant abomination.

Team B went out to a suburb full of brainwashed people.

Team C went to a refinery crawling with flammable oil-monsters.

I went on Team B, along with about thirty other Accordists. We blundered around like so many drunken cats, splitting up into smaller sub-squads as we went. Apophis and Jacques managed to find the crystal gizmo, though, so good on them.

While our mission went smooth-ish, the others didn't. People died. Barret died. Mary died.

Kinda.

See, whenever one of ours got killed inside Redemption, they'd get spit right out of the same portal that Mr. Warden used to keep in contact with us from the real world. Don't ask me how this works because I'm not a fucking wizard. Magic is inexplicable bullshit like that. I think they're gonna keep Barret in a cell for a few weeks and poke him with sticks in case he mutates or something.

The three teams returned to the hotel with no time to spare- Cora pieced the pieces of the crystal together, which made a bunch of Things squirm and bitch (it was a null zone, maybe?) until she threw it into the portal.

Finally, we got a message back from Mr. Warden- there needed to be a sacrifice. See, there were seven Accordists in Redemption when it first got Quarantined, so there needed to be seven when we closed the tear. Seven people, doomed to fight and die, day after day, because that's how Quarantine works. There wasn't any shortage of volunteers.

Here's who stayed:

Daniel Kiev, from Boston.

He Who Takes All

Slide, from San Antonio

Nathaniel, from Redemption

Garn

Chance Master, from Lake Charles

Frankie Miles, from Lake Charles.

It's funny, as earlier that evening, I asked Frankie what kind of Thing he was. He told me he was a superhero.

I'm inclined to believe him.