All kinds of information flowing in today. Lady Abigail sends us a message indicating she has a couple requests for help. One from a Werewolf pack in Yellowstone who are being hunted by the pure. The other from the Prince of New York who feels he has traitors in his mist, this one is particularly interesting as not too long after we received the message I detected a hacking attempt into our network that I was able to track down to somewhere in New York. I was able to direct the hacking attempt into a honeypot so I could let it run free so I could figure out what it was trying to get. The hacker was trying to delete the information that our information spider had retrieved a few hours earlier. I fed it some bad data and reworked the detection algorithms to look for similar attempts and automatically send them into the honeypot and feed them bad data. One of the hits we got from the spider was tabloid reports of a small town in Spain where loved ones have come back from the dead. This seemed like a good hit so we charged up the Prius and prepared to portal it on over and investigate.
As soon as we entered Santa Cruz de la Sierra the stench of death was immediate, the resonance of the area was overwhelmingly bad. We started our investigation in the cemetery and sure enough there were several opened graves all though it appeared that the dead made their own way out. We made our way to the tavern where hopefully there were some people still awake. We got some strange stares as we walked in and found a table, this wasn't a very touristy town. I was able to tap into the universal consciousness and translate between the root concepts of English and Spanish so we could ask some questions. Ohm did his usual scan of the auras of the those in the room. Sitting at the bar was one woman who's aura wasn't looking right, she was dead. Other than looking a little pale, the woman looked like a living person, she was there having a conversation like everything was normal. Scanning her surface thoughts she seemed to have no idea she was dead, just going on like nothing ever happened. After some conversation and a little prying of the barkeep we finally found out that a few days ago the dead just started walking back into town and continuing on with their lives. The town folk just attributed it as some kind of miracle and chose to believe that nothing was wrong. We also found out that right around the time the dead started waking, strange noises were heard out of the church so thats where we headed.
Even without mage sight the church looked dark and quite foreboding. We walked right on in and kneeling before the altar was the town's padre. As he began to talk he just didn't sound quite right, the inflection in his voice seemed oddly familiar. An insane sounding chuckle escaped from his lips and we all immediately knew the padre was not himself, we all placed that inflection in his voice. We were staring at a body possessed by one of Donovan's 4, the werewolf formerly known as Stephen. There wasn't much time for catching up and the fight started quickly. Stephen was doing his moving in and out of twilight trick and we were having a hard time pinning him down. I took a moment to collect myself and stared into the future hoping to forsee where he would land next and I teleported Danno into position so he could try to grab onto Stephen. The move worked and things were starting to look up until Stephen let out this wave of energy encompassing us all. I was soon bleeding to death and ready to call a retreat and put our escape portal up then the strangest thing happened. I felt the familiar presence of a silver wolf and I felt a rush of warm energy and my wounds began to heal. The voice of the wolf telling me to get up and keep fighting. Reinvigorated I picked up Danno's walter pk which seemed to be able to hurt Stephen well, I summoned all the will and power I could muster to make my shot aim true. I was rewarded with a dead on shot and Stephen howling in pain. Things were looking better until Stephen unleashed some spikes in my general direction, the pain was too much and I lost consciousness. Again I felt a surge of warmth and opened my eyes. The group was looking quiet hurt but so was Stephen a few more hits and he decided to make a run for it. He was quite fast but I tempted fate and repeatedly teleported the group after him, each teleport raising the risk of the abyss fighting back, I infused each spell with as much mana as I could trying to mitigate the risk but I was soon drained. We finally managed to catch up with Stephen and strike the killing blow. Stephen had one more trick up his sleeve and unleashed a huge wave of dark energy as he fell. The shockwave was enough to knock Danno and Ohm out. If it wasn't for my guardian wolf I would have surely perished myself. As Stephen died a mote of black energy was released from his body and floated there. With the help of Red we were able to pick up the dead to the world Danno and make him touch the mote. The mote shot into him and Danno's wounds quickly healed and his eyes opened. Danno was now Death.
Danno used his new power to put the dead back into their graves and I grabbed the corpse of Stephen and we returned home bruised and tired but victorious.
Cygin
<-----AEMP----->
This first order of business was to find my wolf and thank her. She was lying in the farady cage looking quite tired. I gave her a big hug and a passionate kiss and thanked her for saving my ass, again. I informed her up what happened to Stephen and I brought his corpse back hoping we could at least give him a a proper burial. I felt such remorse and guilt over his death. I was responsible for this. I had let my pride control me. I knew how he felt about Kat and I knew why he couldn't do anything about his feelings, but yet I dumped a whole truck of salt in that wound and drove him to the edge. Drove him right into the arms of Donovan who used his pain and turned him into this monster. At least now his soul can rest but his death will always be a stain on my soul, a reminder of what happens when I let my pride drive me. I tell myself it won't happen again, that I have moved beyond such simple temptations, but can we really move beyond our vices?
Then as I lay there with Kat I feel more guilt. I know she did what she did of her own free will, but all the other times she saved me she always seemed to come out unharmed. This time she lays here drained of her essence and she did it all for me. Here she is in constant danger because of my actions, even halfway across the world I cause her pain. Even though it is only a small token of my affection I reach deep into the supernal and manage to convert my own mana into essence and recharge Kat a little. I am completely drained and my wounds are quite deep. I collapse on the bed and snuggle up next to Kat. It doesn't take long before exhaustion takes over, but somehow lying here next to Kat all the pain of the night seems to have gone away.
<----/AEMP----->