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Post by Henley on Jan 4, 2022 23:04:00 GMT -8
"Let's trust the professional to sort out what's the best way to handle this, hey?"
It was a non-answer, but one he thought was fair given the circumstances. The fact was, Nate Henley wasn't a criminal mastermind. He never pretended to be. He was a bloody stock broker. That sort of nonsense was something that Victor could figure out, turning his veteran eye to whatever fucked-up carnage lay beyond the door. When the electronics were passed over, he told the group that he'd do the tracing with Tony's help for context. He led Tony out and headed back to the office, where the kid could take a shower, brush his teeth and get a bagel in him. With the kind of tech that Henley had at his fingertips, Fate's blessings and magical time compression for tasks, this wasn't going to take long.
Once back in his chair, he let Anthony get settled and began to work in mundane time, getting what information he could about the kid's friend circle before beginning to sing a slow, drowsy tune in low tones as he stared at the computer screen and worked the mouse.
Spring's blessings: one gift of sleep. When Tony was seated and comfortable, he let the magic fly. Good night, Anthony Cartwright; hello, tracking down the next kid before working on the day's stock picks. Once he knew who was up next, he'd pass that information along to Gavin for consideration before hitting the ticker.
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Post by Victor on Jan 5, 2022 4:18:06 GMT -8
Victor grimaced and shook his head as Anthony's voice floated out from the other room, fully intending only his fellow lost to bear witness to his answer. The kid didn't sound like he was taking any of this in stride, and Victor knew he couldn't say anything that wouldn't make the kid's day worse. Thankfully Henley seemed to have taken that particular responsibility, and Victor felt free to mentally cross the boy off of the list of things he needed to wipe down with a towel.
"Sounds like a plan to me! Give me a moment and I'll bag the stuff for you."
The chimera let the bag slip off of his shoulders. Even with gentle handling, the thing still made a racket as it settled on the ground. Victor opened up zippers and velcro, rummaging through his kit for all the PPE that he hadn't worn on his way in; a chemical mask, eye protection, rubber gloves, and a cowl all made their way onto his person. Throughout the process, he addressed Gavin
"You're right on the money about not peeking while I work, unless you want to be here for four hours rather than one. I certainly don't! Would appreciate it if you stayed on the other side of the door though- lookout is always nice to have... Here, I'll tell you what, I'll do documentation of everything, but you have to promise me that anyone who gets a copy knows how to keep documents from leaking, yeah? Then I'll bag the electronics. Won't mess with any of that stuff save for wiping the grime off of it. If y'all need it bricked and shredded after you're done looking through it, I know how to do that too. If you want biological samples I am also able to collect, but that promise of making sure nothing leaks goes triple for those.
As for the treatment of the cleanup, I'd personally be most comfortable with turning this suspicious death into a missing person's case. The name of the game here is to unsettle the masses without unsettling the authorities. Missing people are just common enough that anyone in a position to do anything about it will let the case go cold easy. Its also real easy to spread all kinds of wild stories about missing person's cases that the authorities would never pick up, but will still rattle the masses in the way that you need. I'm sure you've heard an urban legend or two 'bout what really happened to a Tom, Dick, or Harry that set off to work one day never to return... Sounds like something you can work with?"
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Post by Gavin Graves on Jan 5, 2022 10:51:30 GMT -8
Gavin had positioned himself between Anthony's movements and the possibility of the door to the room coming open to pass the technology, which it did. His frame had operated well to screen away further glimpses of the horror within. He dutifully passed the package to Henley and wished the pair off with good luck.
The Beast's instincts were confirmed that he wouldn't be able to get a direct look at things, which was its own very special kind of mixed blessing. "Yes, I promise. If I retype the notes in my own words and use a reference code to abstract the direct ties to this incident, oh and shred and burn the original notes and remaining notebook or pad or whatever, would that suffice for the physical notes to disconnect you from it? When you boil it down I'm mostly looking for event timing and phenomenological signifiers and results. One for knowing roughly how long he had been in his current state, which we could probably guess from the phone anyway, another to know whether or not and possibly how this relates to the curse. Are we talking spontaneous human combustion or did he do something to himself? Any signs of self harm?"
"As to the samples, I get the sensitivity here." Gavin really didn't want to be wandering around with human remains, he honestly didn't even know who he could take them to. The only lab he knew of was Callahan's. The other folks were Roger's, and he would most assuredly start prying sooner than Gavin might like. "Maybe we settle on you showing me the interesting bits at the end, I take a couple of pictures--or you do if you've got a polaroid--and then you finish up without me walking away with samples." It would probably be for the best. It was also an unconvincing attempt to rationalize away his own energy to follow up on every detail.
Persisting in the internal struggle, did he really have to run down every single scrap of evidence? He shouldn't need to know the chemistry or biology of how the cell barriers broke down and somehow catalyzed into a self-lighting 'Long Pig Luau' Yankee Candle.
The work at dismissing the urge only seemed to inflame it.
"Unless," his energy picking up again, "maybe you know who could run the samples with an eye toward the strange and discrete."
The Beast agreed with Victor's assessment, 'missing person' was a very nice blank canvas on which to paint. Only Gavin was not a painter of that kind. He would have to hope Henley would be able to manage that angle and keep it the right kind of spooky, and level of interesting to their target audience, but otherwise be dismissed by the broader masses. "We'll find a way for that to work."
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Post by Victor on Jan 6, 2022 4:35:24 GMT -8
Victor chuckled through his mask as Gavin hashed out a scheme to keep the notes safe
"Anything you feel you got to do to keep mundie hands out of it. That's all I care about. Should be mostly visual media- a picture is worth a thousand words after all, and I don't want to risk you missing out on some key detail just 'cause I didn't know what to look for."
Victor may have had some occult smarts of his own, but Gavin was the one who'd been spending time with the case. The chimera wasn't in the business of overestimating his own ability when murder was on the line, especially when the cautious approach was obvious and easy. The talk about the physical samples got a steady nod from the cleaner, right up until Gavin asked him the question he really should have seen coming.
"Mm. Tell you what. If I come out of that room with some vials with red in 'em, it's 'cause I have someone to give them to. Otherwise we're just going to have to rely on what my camera and observations can give you, and hope that's enough."
He pursed his lips, thinking, then nodded to himself.
"But! No more dilly dallying for me- I got a job to do. Let's see what we have got in here..."
With some effort he hoisted his bag back over his shoulder and turned to the door, opening it with little fanfare
"Oo-- This one's ripe!"
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Post by Krakenbox on Jan 8, 2022 19:44:41 GMT -8
Anthony clocked out without issue, sleeping normally on the office couch after the enchantment ran its course. His phone occasionally flickered to indicate an incoming message, where the name "Abigail Cartwright" briefly tugged Henley's attention as he put illicit programs to work—money and a hobby got the Ogre as far as he wanted, usually. It wasn't like the student's phone was a bank or a major company's mine of data.
'Janine dela Cruz' was passed along to Gavin. It looked like Dodson was going through a 'will they won't they' phase with her roommate and picked someone else, leading to a series of angry texts from her pissed off BFF about leading her on and using her for intimacy. Some high level college kid drama, as far as the Ogre was concerned, but Dodson had blocked her a month ago. Some of his buddies had bought into the curse after spooky rumours that a few people have gone missing, giving him advice like splitting his tooth and letting it go untreated.
Yikes.
Tony had been hit with the curse last minute as the guy was trying to squeeze days and then hours, with at least seven others in his ghost account getting the same message Cartwright had received. The notification that someone on campus had 'skipped town' and was totally dead connected to the chain game had fired off some last minute panic. Some images of a sheet over a crusted body in a trailer park were attached to his nosier and invested friend group. Henley determined Janine had twenty-four hours in her, unless she had cursed multiples too. It was a bit of a nightmare now that the Ogre was navigating it. Gavin would need to find a method to isolate the chain to the initial invitation, and not the consequential branches, or this was going to be untenable.
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Post by Krakenbox on Jan 8, 2022 20:17:49 GMT -8
Victor got a better look at the 'explosion', recognizing that it wasn't so much as something bursting as a high level of energy rupturing the body. They had been burned, with most of the damage coming from an impact point that had corroded the tissue. Victor didn't have the professional training to properly determine whether it was from the front or back (given that there was equal injury on both ends). The abdomen had split where the nexus of the energy had come from. There was no signs of a break-in, at least by conventional means...but he did note from the spatter that there was a site of blocked impact on one of the walls where he did not have to remove organic matter. He could tell the guy had fallen face-up.
One issue for police investigation, if it ever came to that, was that this student's bachelor pad was about to get super clean. Best practice would be to give evidence of leave, but he also wasn't exactly part of a vulnerable population where his parents would likely want answers. The Chimera would be the first to admit his jobs usually circled around dead sex workers, overdosed addicts, and criminal on criminal violence rather than middle class university students. Framing was another option, where one would accept a cleaner was called because of getting involved with a bad crowd.
Forensic-wise...? Stephen Callahan of Autumn Court was one of the few bonafide scientists Victor had heard of, or maybe the Sun Banisher Roger who did this for a living as a mundie investigator and a Freehold cleaner.
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Post by Henley on Jan 8, 2022 23:22:22 GMT -8
I'm going to make the video now while you do your part. We've got about twenty-four hours before the next one up the chain is in trouble, Gavin, and there are so many people involved in this. It's like a virus. We need to find a way to cut to the chase. Hopefully you have something brilliant up your sleeve, my man.
Anthony's quiet snoring drove Henley forward, stress and the sheer weight of responsibility driving the Ogre forward. He was a shit artist. That was the point. Someone shitty with a pen had to be able to do this. It was a matter of life and death, and as he glanced at the sleeping student and his mom calling him on the cell phone, he grit his teeth, produced a whiteboard and a pen, and got to work. The board would let him correct little mistakes and make it big enough for the camera, which he also ran on close-up after putting a black glove on his hand. Using the original draft as a guide, he went through step by step in the order Icarus had described. Super-quick work was compensated for in the video by using technology, moving through the drawing in a circle and using close-ups as required to get the details straight.
The next step was drafting the explanation, and this was where the stress was killing him as he poured Glamour into the work to get it done as quickly as it needed to be done. He couldn't find the words, had difficulty finding the explanations -- the script wasn't coming together! He grit his teeth and pulled at his hair before taking a short break. This was a hard explanation, and to do it with the detail he needed so that people really got benefit from the instruction was everything.
Scotch. Right to the fucking teeth. There was no time to fuck around. He had to try harder. A lot of lives were on the line. Putting his all into the second go, he managed to find the words, taking them around the sigil slowly and methodically. Finally, there was the matter of editing, taking the video and the audio and putting it all together. That was smooth; he had all the software in the world that he needed for something like this. Stock brokers made videos sometimes, too, as a means of advertising and reaching their clients with educational content. That was no problem. The advice and the ceremonial aspects were described and spliced in, and all was done.
For a normal person, it would have been twelve or more hours of work. For Nate Henley, it took about four as the Cobbler's Blessings did their part to speed up every piece of this that could be sped along. Exhausted and in dire need of a nap, the stock broker sagged in his chair as he stared at their final product.
A mouse click sent the file to Gavin for review.
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Post by Gavin Graves on Jan 9, 2022 15:46:32 GMT -8
While Gavin couldn't be present to watch the work that was happening in the other room, he was certainly getting an earful. The speed of the effort made for some unearthly tool and organic audio.
The musical horror made for a good background reminder of the pending consequences should they not be stopped. The Beast needed to adapt the ritual now. He was not going to be able to work the counter curse from the bottom of the chains up. What had already been done would still be quite useful, but it would not be enough. This version would have given everyone the best chance, he estimated. Having the added elements of the downstream links on side would improve the sympathetic links and make it easier to turn around for the people further up. Like many tributary rivers feeding into the one. Damming each in line would slow and lower the flow toward the river mouth making containment more possible. At this stage it was going to be necessary to take whole branches at once.
That was the thing with sympathetic connections though, in this case they are a chain. The curse flowed through the links from one to the next and did not necessarily spontaneously create a link directly to the Horror until the link above it was consumed. Somehow the magic was slipping around the links and allowing consumption to occur out of order. The Curse must be creating its own echo of sympathy running in parallel to the connections between the people.
Even a parallel echo of a connection would still have to follow the same chain though, wouldn't it? It would mean there would be an approach that could avoid the necessity of the link by link approach. Perhaps a few adjustments to the wording in the ritual and the procedure would allow for a more organic spread of the solution, no matter where it came into contact with a chain.
Wait a second, he thought. What if the sympathetic connection of the curse is the only one that really matters and not the one between the people? Would that mean that someone could effectively cut off a whole line of the curse at once?
He mapped out the patterns of his new experiment to make sure he wasn't just engaging in wishful thinking and then let it percolate while he poured over the work Henley had whipped up in such short order.
Oh to be so quick. He wondered a moment if two with such a Boon could work in the same space without interfering with each other. The teamwork that could be done would be astonishing. Corral them into a purpose built Hollow and smash a clock, you could probably get a fortnight's work out of them in a day.
Would this all work together when they found Janine?
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Post by Victor on Jan 9, 2022 20:11:29 GMT -8
As promised, Victor took copious photos of the carnage before starting the work of cleaning up the gore. His goal was to remove everything that wasn't supposed to be there (at least, in this form as a dead husk and crispy wall paint) while leaving everything that he could in the state that he found it. He didn't just want the corpse to not be here, he wanted anyone that walked into this room to think nothing of it and pass it by. Once the room was cleared, he turned his attention to to the cat, made sure that Anthony's weak stomach had left no trace of its own, and did a cursory cleanup of the place to ensure that the murder room didn't stick out as a uniquely bleached space.
"Right, and I think that's that!"
The cleaner flashed Gavin a grim grin, pulling the gloves off of his hands and the mask away from his face
"Got you the pictures, and I did get a sample. I'm going to ask Roger to see if he can do anything with that, if that's fine with you. He's one of the Sunbanishers. If he can't, I'll dispose of it safely, like the rest of it. Might be worth showing him the pictures too, if you think it'll help to squeeze more information out of this."
He shrugged, patting a compartment of the backpack where the samples supposedly were stashed.
"Aside that, the whole place is set up to look like he just got up and left. We should snatch his shoes and coat on the way out, maybe a backpack, to keep the narrative consistent. Maybe we can drop a shoe out in the dessert or something. As for the cat, it might be best to crack open a window to give a plausible reason for its escape, so that we don't have to leave it here- no reason to starve the poor thing if we don't absolutely have to. With no evidence to follow the case is likely to get cold, but I should probably see if I can reach out to... someone to ensure that the cops don't get any funny ideas about looking into this too long or too closely. Used to do that myself as a matter of course, but that was back when I had the good ID."
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Post by Krakenbox on Jan 12, 2022 18:57:27 GMT -8
The video file was ready to go, compiled as Victor moved through the task of sterilizing the house of evidence. Gavin's Fall insight crackled like leaves on the wind, locking onto Icarus' insistence on the blood bonding ritual involving the scrubbing of iron and swirling around the crucible.
Iron implants. Fairy rings—hand cuffs—
A ring exchange. Under the skin.
At least until the entity was dealt with, it was following The Rules, and making the beset mortal inhospitable to channel the magic through once they enacted penance for those they wronged. Asking the humans to chew ferros sulfate like candy would also work; Gavin wasn't a doctor and of average intelligence, but he had enough healthy paranoia and quick thinking to consider a basic problem. Avoiding toxicity with the penitents and would take a steep amount of medical knowledge and person-to-person prescription. It wouldn't fix the dream infection, but short of him being present to every bloody ritual to put a little glamour on the seal was impossible, so dousing oneself in a universal bane was what he had. Convincing humans to do this was going to be a challenge, but hopefully Henley's video and the inevitable bodies piling up would counteract as the positive alternative to simply cursing more people on your friend's list.
A sad, damp cat's yowl pulled the Autumn out of his mad sorcery as Victor chattered to him.
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Post by Gavin Graves on Jan 12, 2022 23:09:36 GMT -8
The ritual was always going to require more than one person in a given chain and the ritual to break the links effectively. What he needed to do was offer an alternative version of the ritual that could sever links without it requiring the full chain to be involved.
The core element of the ritual remained iron. It had to be iron. Complete engulfment in iron sulfate would do it, but that was a skin irritant the exposure of which couldn't last too long before medical attention would be required. Convincing a bunch of university students that bathing in moss killer would be a hard sell anyway. Moss also wasn't really a big problem in Nevada and its killer would be less common. It its other form, an elemental iron vitamin supplement, a quick check of the internet left the Beast reeling at the consequences of eating too much of it, so that was off the table--a dosage to weight variation could easily swing between helpful vitamin and lethal toxin causing organ failure. Each of those options would work because the iron would enter the body. He needed an option that would also enter the body, but somehow also be contained. Perhaps some kind of titanium plated iron core piercing?
No, that also wouldn't work he realized. It would be much safer from a skin reaction and toxic shock point of view, but it would ruin the occult effect. A complete separation from the metal necessarily would lead to a complete separation from its elemental effect. It had to be direct contact. It had to enter the body. It had to be an exchange between curser and one of the cursed within the same chain. It was the only way to break the sympathetic flow down the line. There was going to be a clock on this fix before the curse of the soul would become one of the body.
It would be a very simple addition to Henley's work, but one with pending medical consequences. Doable for the participants and uncomfortable and awkward enough to motivate them to eventually get help and hopefully buy enough time for the Freehold to take down the entity.
Henley gets a response text.
Just need to change out the powdered iron swirled on the hand in and around open wounds blood brothers thing for a more prominent exchange of iron ring piercings and tell everyone to get their damn tetanus shots.
I know it sounds simple and easy, but there is a high likelihood of skin reaction, infection, and then toxic shock with this metal. The ingested version is even more risky and dosage can't easily be adapted person to person.
The poetry of loops of iron temporarily severing the sympathetic links of a Faerie curse was delicious. Like fighting fire with fire to create a break wide enough the wildfire couldn't jump. It did however make him uneasy that he was connecting a true bane for the Lost as the solution to this problem, but what else was there to do?
"Thanks Victor. I'm a bit concerned though that if we bring in a Sunbanisher on this he'd make a connection to this problem and unnecessarily burn it all down to make sure it's sealed up. We're so close to a solution that gets far fewer people killed I can taste it. I'm also not sure that bit is completely necessary to even warrant the risk if the only option is Roger." He scooped up a few cat supplies and corralled the creature into its carrier. Henley wanted the cat for some reason and Victor already built the explanation as to why the cat wasn't going to be here into his plan. "If things go the wrong direction, sure, but we're doing alright so far."
Then he had a look at the images taken by Victor ...
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Post by Victor on Jan 13, 2022 19:53:34 GMT -8
Victor stiffened and his mouth skewed- protest wasn't the response he had been anticipating.
"Are you sure you don't want the police to be nudged? Prevention is the best cure, and I can't guarantee they won't stick their noses into this otherwise. Even with wiping all the evidence, a police investigation might still get in your way, especially if they lock onto that evolving electronic paper-trail you're following. Henley is making sure that the one's you've found so far aren't salvageable to be read by any hacker with a passcode, yeah?
As for the samples, the only other name I can pull out of my hat is Stephen Callahan. How do you feel about him?"
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Post by Henley on Jan 13, 2022 20:36:51 GMT -8
Okay. That's fine for the short term. Dermal implants it is. I'll get it edited. Something easy to install and easy to remove, common in the underworld. Do you or Victor have a line on someone who likes money and could do this for us discreetly? We can spread a number and some fake identity if they want through the student grapevine. Whatever works. If we have that, we can arrange the meet with the girl.
Fingers moved with incredible speed as Henley popped back into the editing software. Glancing over at Anthony, he sighed. This was going to suck for the kid.
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Post by Gavin Graves on Jan 13, 2022 20:57:30 GMT -8
"It's not that I don't want the cover. I'm just concerned that getting Roger prematurely involved might lead to everyone I'm trying to save ending up unnecessarily dead and the Good Cousin's plan doesn't get as maximally fucked. Would you manage that angle with Roger as well? Keeping him out of this until I decide my plan won't work or things get obviously out of hand, that is."
Gavin glanced back at the pictures and cycled through them a couple times. It was a puzzling mess of meat and bone that really didn't make much sense to him. It wasn't that he was unfamiliar with the messes humans made when they died. This was just not a version he had yet to encounter.
"I'm really not trying to manage your expertise at your work here. I don't think I know better. I just need to hear how what you're proposing won't destroy a lot of effort. I gave you the short version of what we're up to here, just let me know if you need more."
One image's angle stood out to him more than the others. It reminded him of a tree he once saw with the lines and eruptions and charring.
"Looks kind of like a lightning strike. Huh."
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Post by Victor on Jan 13, 2022 21:46:59 GMT -8
Victor searched the ground for answers, looking honestly uncomfortable for the first time since Gavin had met him. It was only a short silence, but it was heavy, and cut off with a frustrated growl.
"No. No, you're right. Like I said, I used to be able to do this all myself. Not used to this."
He snatched his bag by the straps a little too sharply, hoisting the thing up with a dreadful clamor
"We'll just have to be extra careful that there ain't nothing left behind for the cops to trace. Anything at all, and they could be signing death warrants just as well as Winter, albeit indirectly. I'll keep Roger out of this on my end, but I can't promise he and his friends won't see the flashing neon signs if any are left up. Burn evidence, sweep symptoms under the rug, and distract from everything too big to hide. In absence of rigging the game, the only winning move is to run under the radar."
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