A Grab Bag of Awful

It's weird, coming back to Houston.

I know everything is still the same as it was before (read: terrible), but it still takes some getting used to after the crazy ass bullshit that went down in Atlanta. I'm not entirely sure if 'normal' is the right word, but...I guess it's nice getting back to dealing with the monsters I know, as opposed to the monsters I don't.

So yeah. Saturday was kind of a grab bag of random shit. I guess that's a good thing, since Brayker wasn't able to make it, and since I was running late. Not only would I hate to be on deck when things really go to shit, but I'd also hate to be late for it. Then again, I pretty much hate this whole 'war for reality' thing in general, but hell, not like anyone else is gonna do it.

By the time I showed up, Ash and Penny and Ellie the Sharkgirl and the werewolves ran off to investigate some creepy ass haunted house that Lester the half-vampire Servant had sold to the CUT, or....something? I dunno. It turned out to be a trap, because of course it did. More on that later.

Meanwhile, Wayngro gave us a call. See, remember those labs we kind of burned down a few months ago? The ones that were researching Truthy artifacts and had monsters that bled BEES? Well, the owner of said labs kind of found us out. She's from Egypt (I think?) and has a burqua-ninja kind of style, with the face veil and everything. Oh, and goons. She's got goons.

And no RQ. So she's not a Believer or a Servant. Yet.

So Artemis, Luke the Hacker Demon, and myself roll up to Wayngro's tower to have a face to face (or, well, face to veil) meeting, which...didn't go well. She's somehow got an idea that we were behind burning down her science projects and broke some fancy shit...which, we did, but I thought we covered our tracks better than that.

She's got some idea of the Weird Shit out there, and she knows she's getting funding from the Church of Ultimate Truth, and...well, we tried to hint at why this was a Bad Thing- but before we could really get into threatening or bribing or properly negotiating, Ash texts me.

See, apparently everyone on Team Haunted House got trapped in the basement, which then started to fill with blood, and then everyone started hallucinating, because...trap. This kind of cut our little meet and greet a bit short. I don't think Miss Burqua Ninja was very happy with us jetting out. I tried to just bluff her, and make her think I was a harmless, clueless idiot. You wouldn't think this would be hard, but she was pretty much the only person I've met in two years who actually thinks I know what I'm doing. Shows what she knows, right?

But yeah. I dragged everyone out of the meeting, jumped in the car, and tore-ass up to the north side of town. Thankfully, by the time we got there, everything was wrapped up. Apparently everyone had stopped tripping balls, and they'd captured the Servant who was watching the house, at which Penny killed the bastard. So, y'know, good for the killing servants thing, but we didn't get the chance to interrogate him, first, so...yeah. None of our people died, at least, so there's something to be said for that. Ash was pretty horrifingly stabbed, but she said she was cool with it, because ghost zombie, I guess?

So yeah. Everyone packs up and heads back to the Citadel- but, of course, nothing's ever easy.

Apparently, one of those Purist Werewolves flagged down Jacques and Weylin, which only didn't go to shit because the Purist werewolf was a Believer...but not an Accordist. He warned them (and, by association, us) to stay the fuck away from him where he's hanging out in some dive-ass bar on the south side of town called the Living Inn or the Living End or...something. I forget the name, but if you're ever in some shithole bar on the south side that smells like wet dog, get the hell out of there.

And on top of that, here's where things get REALLY weird. See, on the drive up, Kendrick nearly ran over some guy with a dog. Like, the guy (and the dog) didn't notice him. At all. Which I'd just write off as just 'weird' until I nearly ran over the same fucking guy, with the same fucking dog, and he didn't notice me. He also gave me a real bitch of a headache, too, which...well, I've kind of learned to stop asking questions at this point.

Anyway, after I gave a brief lecture on why “I USE WIZARD VISION” shouldn't be the first answer to all your problems (Apophis says it raises the RQ, so fuck that shit), we do a little normal-mortal digging on Guy-With-A-Dog...and, uh, it's fishy, but we weren't able to really pin anything down on the guy. Yet. Maybe it's Truthy, maybe it's just general weirdness, I dunno.

But yeah. To recap, shit went down, and I (thankfully) missed a lot of it. I got the feeling that things are gonna get worse, but that's pretty much my default setting.

So, y'know, be careful, you terrifying monsters. If you get killed, I won't have anyone to hide behind.   

New Guy went down to Georgia (and thankfully there was no fiddling involved)

“You should get out of Houston,” Cora said.

“Come to Atlanta!” Cora said.

“It'll be a fun and fancy party!” Cora said.

I should've known better.

Against my better judgement (read: crippling paranoia), I listened to Cora, and I went to the fancy party in Atlanta. I just got back, and now I'm slowly working my way through a bottle of gas station whiskey because of what went down.

I bet you want details.

So, Cora, Brayker, and I all trucked out to Georgia for some big high-class schindig put on by the Samaritan Group. It was supposed to be an Accord social- a chance for people (to use the term loosely) from different cells to talk to each other and share notes and swap stories and all that good stuff. I actually ran into some folks I'd met before there- and I also got to put faces to a lot of names. I got to meet F13 (who doesn't look like a robot), Lilith (yes, THAT Lilith), Set (who you can tell he's ancient because he only buttons like two buttons to his shirt because they didn't invent shirts in ancient Egypt I guess), and Selma the Succubus (who looks exactly like what you're thinking. I know she's a demon and all, but still. Damn) and a bunch of other people. I even managed to piss off the Cell Leader of Cincinatti when I told him that I heard horrible time travel bullshit happens in his city, which he got a little pissy about, but then he didn't really help his case when he mentioned there was a giant cybernetic squid living at the bottom of a lake somewhere in town. So yeah. Don't go to Cincinnati.

And, because you can't get a bunch of vampires and werewolves and mummies and lord knows what else together without shit getting weird (well, weirder), no sooner had everyone gotten settled in and done their introductions, this super-old vampire dude with a skull-stick and a Mike Tyson face tattoo teleported in outta nowhere. Ancient Vampire Dude said he used to be a member of the High Council, but he left before they went big. So, yknow, a Fifth Beatle sort of thing, I guess?

The vampire wanted to recruit us to help him with some crazy-ass idea; he needed some magic doohickeys in order to perform a ritual that would summon the spirits (but not the ghosts, those are different?) of fallen Accordists in order to help us fight the Truth. Given how I've always been told the Truth eats your soul when you die...I was a little leery of the idea.

Somehow or another, people agree to this crazy-ass idea (partially because I think the sociopaths were getting bored and wanted to kill something), and split off into groups to go track the magic whatzits down. And somehow or another, I decided I wanted to see what the fuck was going on myself, so I fell in with one of the away teams. Lilith (yes, THAT Lilith) was leading this one, and I understood it was gonna be more of an investigative thing.

Once again, I was wrong.

So we truck down to some dank catacomb in the sub-sub-sub basement, and we wind up with two doors. One's got blood on it. The other one doesn't. All the magic-psychic-whatever people kept squinting at the damn doors, at which point I finally said, “Hey, why don't we go through the one that hasn't got blood on it?”

So they decide to go through the blood door.

And lo and behold, the blood door leads to a horrible torture dungeon where a giant hate face yelled lightning at us.

This is why you should listen to me.

There was a fight (and I contributed! I think. Hate face spirits aren't bulletproof, apparently), and we make it out of there relatively unscathed (or, uh, at least I did, and that's the important part). We finally made it back to the ballroom where all of this was going down- I think we were the last team back, because it took us longer because we weren't actually supposed to be a kill team, but I digress.

By the time we get back, Ancient Vampire Dude has got his crazy eyes on, and he started ranting about making history. Has this ever been a good thing? Ever?

And the gathered crowd still let him go through with his goddamn magic ritual. What the fuck? Did anyone at this point think it was a good idea? Anybody? Whatever.

Cora at least had the good sense to corral off a bunch of the less fighty people (so, y'know, me) in a side ballroom, so at least someone wouldn't get killed if Ancient Vampire Dude exploded everyone else.

The people in this picture all have common sense and healthy survival instincts. So if you ever meet them, LISTEN TO WHAT THEY HAVE TO SAY. Except for the dude in the top hat. He was weird and sparkly.

And indeed, lo and behold, shit got awful. I am Jack's complete lack of surprise.

Ancient Vampire Dude performs the ritual, and all of a sudden the whole top floor (with all of us in it) is teleported into the Dark Dimension- someone called it the Abyss, maybe? That's a thing? Anyway, Ancient Vampire Dude then yelled at everyone and scared the shit out of like half the people there and made them run away- but then the other half of the crowd who wasn't scared (including our very own Major Brayker, 'cause he's a badass) proceeded to kill the shit out of Ancient Vampire Dude until he melted into a pile of that Black Jello Metal that people have been finding. Someone opened up a portal back to the real world, thankfully, and we all went back to Atlanta without much fuss. 

And that was that.

Back in Houston now, and I'm rather glad for it. Because, horrible as it is, I...kind of like it here. I mean, at least here in Houston, I know who I'm dealing with, and what they can do, and people even sometimes listen to me when they feel like it. You're all still terrifying of course, but it's the terror you know, right? Meanwhile, in Atlanta, it was like 'oh hey here are more scary bullshit monsters that you've never seen before, have fun!'

I mean, seriously, you guys. If some weirdo showed up on our doorstep and started going on about his mad scientist plan, I bet we wouldn't put up with that shit. You're professionals, dammit. So, uh, keep up the good work, I guess.

See you Saturday.