IA's newest predictive scheduling app is astonishingly good at predicting and managing your schedule. Supposedly the algorithm can read your e-mails, predict when meetings will be required, and pre-schedule those meetings. Maybe a little TOO good. Visit IA's HQ and see if this is science or something weirder at work.

Kilroy and Jabberwok were taking care of their own things, so there was agreement that T'ana and Anthem should accompany Tybalt to an underground fight club to watch him fight. Deep under a ramen place in Little Tokyo, stairs led down into a verge of Stygia, a sort of East Asian Valhalla. The opponent was living enough, a tough, tatted yakuza fighter. Tybalt hung in for a bit, but she clearly was a more experienced fighter than he was. T'ana patched Tybalt's wounds and then flirted her way into a date with the yakuza fighter.

Anthem got a message from Emil, moderator of the Assembly, asking them to come to the Observatory. There, the sentient AI asked them to follow up on a company that was developing 2B-Scheduled, a new app that apparently uses predictive AI to manage a user's calendar. Downloading and checking out the app made it clear that an expert was needed to assist. Anthem's mentor, Flow, arranged a meeting with a fixer named Anton in the Hollywood Forever.

It was at this point that the strangeness began. T'ana found herself a week in the future, in the middle of a date she had scheduled with the yakuza fighter. She would come to understand that she has slipped forward in time, but it wasn't immediately clear how it happened.

Anthem met with Anton and arranged for him to investigate the target company, in exchange for video footage of something impossible. Meanwhile, Tybalt paid a visit to his mother's grave and found that her ghost was lingering here. She encouraged him to reach out to his father, who she said needed Tybalt's help.

While Anton worked over the next few days, Anthem did some surveillance of the company's headquarters and T'ana researched time magic in the library.  Tybalt was shaken when he flashed forward in time to a volatile encounter with his father, who made it clear that he didn't want to see Tybalt again. It escalated and his father reached for something under the table just as Tybalt snapped back into the present timeline.

Anthem then had their turn in the temporal blender and found themselves sitting across from Dr. Reyes, the CEO of the company. She was explaining how she couldn't see how Kymani's celebrity endorsement or a musical marketing piece could really benefit her company. Kymani was explaining that their app wasn't sexy, and that they were reasonably sure that they could make even something as mundane as scheduling meetings sexy enough to get more users onboard. Tybalt and T'ana were there as well.  This wasn't a flash-forward.  This was the present. 

All of them remembered that their research uncovered that the head of the company was a member of the Seers and that the AI was somehow causing skips in the timelines of its users. The doctor sensed the use of their magical telepathy and things got tense as she demanded to know who they were. 

Anthem had the same question for her, peering into her deepest aspirations and obsessions, while feeling out what she was. The doctor was a master time mage in the service of the Horologian, the Exarch of the daily grind. She hoped to rise in rank within the Seers and for them to give her access to the deepest levels of the Seers collected data on everything and everyone.  All this to feed her obsession with freeing herself from a time loop she had been in since she was a child.

The cabal asserted that they might be able to help, in a less insidious way, if they understood what she was doing. A deal was struck. the doctor would show them her operation but she would not let them leave unless they committed to helping her. She showed them to the  machine that housed the AI. It was terrifying, somehow using the paradoxical qualities of the Abyss to drive the program. Reyes wasn't a Seer, she was a Celesti, a mage serving powers bent on the destruction of reality. Anthem covertly started recording the encounter, deciding that this qualified as Anton's payment of "something impossible".

The cabal was a bit overwhelmed by the implications of it all. She was too powerful for a head-on assault and they would not be able to warn the Assembly and Consilium about the danger. It dawned on T'ana that, if the machine needed raw possibility to function, maybe the Abyss wasn't the only source. A verge accessing the chaos of Arcadia might provide an alternative. T'ana's charm diffused the immediate danger and a tentative agreement was made to explore whether the Arboretum, with its access to the fae realm, could be a safer alternative. If we can turn this machine into something to serve humanity and steal a master of time magic from the Seers (or worse), it was a shot worth taking.

*************************************************************************

Some weeks later, the Cabal (minus Anthem, who has been called to the Obrimos equivalent of Jury Duty) set out to an arranged meeting with Wendell, the changeling guardian of the Arboretum. He says he is protecting the space for "important people" (the something-with-an-"L" Crown--but we don't know what that is, anyway). Kilroy is able to convince Wendell to let us bring Dr. Reyes there that evening. We do so, and he warns us "DO NOT STEP OFF THE PATH. DON'T GO INTO THE THORNS." And he makes us all swear on different things, including Reyes. She's terrified to make a capital P "Promise", as it may cause jealousy with the entity she serves. Wendell dons gloves and pulls out a set of iron keys, which he uses to unlock the gate. Here we go.

Jabberwock, who has been withdrawn and relatively quiet since returning from her absence (hair is dark green, tattoos are faded), perks up a bit being surrounded by the energy of Arcadia, and volunteers to solemnly lead the way. She navigates the hedges via intuition (mechanically that translates to a series of contested Occult + Resolve rolls). We find ourselves in the capital "T" capital "G" The Garden, which comprises all of the famous gardens of the world (Hanging Gardens, The Japanese Garden, the NOLA Botanical Garden, etc), and may very well be The Garden of Atlantis. 

As we go, the Cabal is being stalked/pursued by a being we only know as "The Weird". The navigation starts out fine, but the creature begins to close the gap, gaining significant ground when Maeve falters due to seeing something terrible off of the path (the jaws that bite, the claws that catch). The Cabal comes together to assist navigating--T'Ana and Jabberwock cast "Choose The Thread" together, and Kilroy and Tybalt cast (???? A space spell) which physically shortens the distance we need to travel. 

Then the fun stuff starts. Each of us is faced with the moment in our lives when we could have made a different choice; the moment that made us who we are. Everyone sees these scenes play out in front of us, trying to lure the person whose turn it is off of the path, and into a Bad Situation TM.

T'Ana is first, and she sees the moment when her brother is on the operating table, and T'Ana's paradox causes him to have brain cancer. She sees herself, as well as a grotesque version of her brother, who says that she can change it. Ultimately, she knows that it's better to have him alive and not remember her, than to have held on to him but ultimately cause his death. She resists, but is shaken.

Next up is Kilroy--we are at his family's beach house when he is in his mid-late teens (in his emo/MCR phase--terrible hair, among other delightful qualities). This is the moment when the rift between him and his family--most painfully his sister, now a medical intern--became a chasm. He is told he could do it differently; he could just apologize now. For the first time, the Cabal witnesses Kilroy momentarily falter. He volleys back that they could have also apologized, and that, even if he was wrong, they should have still loved him anyway. He also resists, curtly telling everyone they are never to speak of what they saw again. He's also shaken.

It is at this point that The Weird catches up to us, in the form of a nightmare version of T'Ana (mandibles under her surgical mask, blood everywhere, etc) wielding a scalpel. We start to fight it, but Kilroy ends up trapping it in a spacial prison, becoming injured in the process (T'Ana also takes lethal damage during this fight). 

At this point, the Cabal can see where they need to get Reyes, but there's stuff in the way, and more distance to cover. There are still more bad memories to explore.

Tybalt sees himself at his mother's funeral; the funeral he missed while he was in the hospital. His father, in agony, asks him "How could [he] not have been there?!" But Tybalt is able to resist by realizing that this flaw is true, and because it's true, it's beautiful. He's in the clear.

Then, it's Jabberwock's turn. The Cabal find themselves all to be eight years old, cowering under a bed with baby Maeve (the world is proportionately large), and we hear whispering and scary noises we don't understand. Baby Maeve turns to real Maeve and suggests that they could just go; they should leave their hiding place. Jabberwock is also able to resist, but comes out of the nightmare with tears streaming down her face. Reyes asks her, "that was you? I know you." Jabberwock doesn't reply.

We at last come to Dr. Reyes' memory--she sees a loop of a terrible lab accident on the news; one that killed the man she loved. Using his (Insightful?) condition, Kilroy is able to awkwardly comfort Reyes, saying that, while the Awakening was terrible (to which the other Cabal members offer their own confirmations--"It sucks", etc), they made us who we are; that some moments are immutable, and that we have to learn to accept them and move on. Reyes sobs into him, making Kilroy extremely uncomfortable. Tybalt offers the possibility that, eventually, he might be able to help her talk to her dead lover, in the hopes it might bring her closure. Reyes takes note . . . as does Jabberwock, who didn't know that Tybalt was capable of doing so. 

Suddenly, we find ourselves back at the entrance of the Arboretum. Wendell glibly asks, "Did you have a nice time?" We are released from our oaths. The Cabal plus Reyes heads out, except Maeve, who asks if she can stay there for a little while longer. We learn it worked--we successfully turned Dr. Reyes! Yay! 

Then, we need to decide what to do with her--do we take her to the Assembly, or to the Consilium? Surprisingly (to some), Kilroy suggests that we take her to the Assembly, since 1) Maeve led everybody through the hedges 2) the Assembly is less likely to be, erm, draconian in their interrogation methods, and we want to keep her as an ally. He also tells Maeve she did a good job--which everybody heard and is absolutely a thing that happened. He then texts Kingmaker, "I know something you don't know." Cheeky bastard.

We take Reyes to Griffith and present her to Emil, explaining who she is. Emil promptly alerts everyone in the Assembly, and then, a beat later, everyones' phones blow up with texts and calls. Everybody--Assembly, Consilium, and Seers alike--know what we have done. The Adamantine Arrow arrives almost immediately to take Reyes somewhere safe. On her way out the door, she puts her hand on Maeve's shoulder and says, "I have something you need to know." She is whisked away.

The session ends with Kilroy receiving a call from none other than Kingmaker. Kingmaker compliments Kilroy on our acquisition, and promises that he will be giving our Cabal "much more personal attention."

In downtime, T'Ana gets funding for her biotech company (sorry, I have forgotten the second action!). Kilroy first finds out from Vizzini that, to obtain a real Houdini artifact, he may need to find something of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's. His second action is spent calling his sister, and, in Kilroy fashion, asks her to go to dinner. Tybalt uses one action to train with Saito, and then, though it takes some stumbling through, successfully wingmans for T'Ana. He also goes to his father's house, where he begins to try to patch their relationship, and he, his dad, and his brother Keith watch a football game together. Jabberwock spends her first action going back to the Arboretum and asking Wendell if she can hang out/help out (mentor project). He says yes, but the first roll--trimming hedges--is a total whiff, and some bad spirit or creature or something starts to poke its way in. Whoops. Second action is spent resolving her Obsession (see the "Chatty Billboard" mystery for more).

For the immediate future, the Cabal resolves to try to make a pre-emptive strike against Kingmaker. We don't know much--just that he's an Obrimos Seer, the worst qualities of any Hollywood agent, he's in with the Yakuza, and he and Kilroy go way back as loathed enemies (who, let's be honest, are probably crazy about one another deep down). How we will approach this proactive move has yet to be decided.

A house in the Hollywood Hills is seemingly abandoned during the day, but at night is brightly lit up and alive with the sound of an epic party. The story is passed on by teenagers in the neighborhood, but no one ever seems to remember to call the police. Might be Awakened Magic at work. Check it out, team.

There's been an increase in disappearances on the Santa Monica Pier. Could just be organized crime or a serial killer, but SMPD isn't taking notice like they should. Either The Lie is covering it up or something powerful wants to keep it quiet. Find out if it's our kind of problem.

Periodically visible from The Arboretum.

A little piece of Victorian LA conservation.

Installed to protect the west coast from attack, this tunnel system runs under San Pedro's Friendship Bell.  What resides in the tunnels now is unknown.

A disparate collection of Burners, cryonicists, extropians, and life-extensionists. Interests peaked at the turn of the millennium before being overshadowed by dystopian cultural  memetics and internal ideological differences. Out of fashion but not forgotten.

This mystery really starts at the tail end of another, which had been Maeve’s raison d'etre since she was eight: Kill The Bound Thing. Before she’s able to do it, the Cabal finds out that—oop—The Bound Thing is actually The Holy Mother of Midnight. The Holy Mother of The Midnight, as the Cabal knows, and as Maeve knows intimately, is the Guardian of Runaway Children; she (or It) protects the wards of St. Anthony’s. Maeve lived at St. Anthony’s from the night her mother died to shortly after she Awakened and was sent to her mentor in Ojai.

Rather than visit the church/orphanage, the Cabal (minus Anthem, who was making funeral arrangements for his mother) decides to check out, via Postcognition, Maeve’s memory of the last time she saw THHTM—shortly after turning seventeen (with bad blue hair), she was about to be attacked by strangers; the Holy Mother—with wings like all of the LA graffiti wings, and strangely hard to perceive—tore them apart. Her intervention for Maeve was strange; THHM never really leaves St. Anthony’s.

Through a series of successful scrutinies, the Cabal (name and symbol TBD) reduces the Opacity of the mystery. Through their respective Mage Sights, they see little demons whispering around the Mother, chains that are being forged, and, somehow, a dreamlike city. They realize they aren’t going to be able to learn more until they go to The Astral Realm.

One by one, from safety of The Atlantean, the team enters their respective Oneiros (basically spelunking into each respective Mage’s souls.

Kilroy, as the one with the most experience in the Astral Realm (minus Anthem—missed you, bud!) goes first. He enters through a film strip of REPO MEN. His astral self is pretty similar to how he normally looks, but his clothes are a little "cooler" and his mohawk is taller. He’s with his family like it would have been when he was a teen, and they're waiting for the ferry to go to Catalina. His family bids him to come with them, but Kilroy finds a rowboat and starts rowing away from shore. He is then confronted by his Dichomon—an immaculate, suited, vanilla version of himself. His Dichomon grills him about what he’s rebelling against; what’s the point? Kilroy, in classic fashion, basically says “meh” and keeps rowing.

Ty is next, entering via SUNSET BOULEVARD. His astral self looks like a faceless doll; a mannequin. He is in front of two pathways, seeing his mom go down one, and his dad go down another. Ty finds himself in a fighting ring and KOs his opponent, waking up in his childhood home (AND FOR SOME REASON I DIDN’T WRITE DOWN WHAT HIS DICHOMON SAID—WAS IT ABOUT BEING ESTRANGED FROM HIS DAD?? SORRY!!).

Mina goes third, entering via RESIDENT EVIL. Surprising no one, her Astral Self is the anime version of her appearance; her cat ears are real (part of her body—not, like, a dead cat headband). Much to her chagrin, she’s also surrounded by a cloud of glitter and butterflies. She's back during her time in the Navy, where she was stationed in Korea . . . during Don't Ask, Don't Tell. Her Navy buddies are waiting for her in a car saying “Let’s gooooo”, and there’s a gay bar across the street, which is also (dream logic) in a forest. Mina heads inside and chats with her Dichomon, who accuses her of being so weird now because she had to hide who she really is for so long and is making up for lost time. Is she still hiding? Etc. Ultimately, Mina is able to confirm that she’s “happy now” and tells her Dichomon to STFU. 

Last is Maeve, who enters via PAN’S LABYRINTH. Maeve’s Astral Self is a foot and a half taller than her real self—NBA basketball player size, in a strange amalgam of warrior gear—plate armor, Braveheart war paint, an ancient-looking spear that (dream logic) somehow also is a long, druidic-looking shovel. Also, she has, much to her consternation, little girl high pigtails.

As one might imagine, she ends up outside her old apartment building where she lived with her mom in East LA. White Rabbit—the genderless, mysterious Guardian of the Veil Leon to her Mathilda—is standing outside. Maeve makes fun of their ears for being shorter from this tall vantage point, and they make them bigger; it's their little tête-à-tête they've always done. Abruptly, White Rabbit tells Maeve, “I have to go in now.” Reluctantly, Maeve follows inside, where she sees White Rabbit running up the stairs over and over again in a time loop. And, of course, her Dichomon is her eight-year-old self, crying at the bottom of the stairs. The Dichomon pokes at “how we're still so young and our enemies are so powerful and we are way out of our depth”. Maeve tries to console her Dichomon, picking her up in her arms and comforting her. There’s a choice to make—does Maeve go upstairs to finally see what's going on, maybe get some answers, or does she go out the back door into the sun (dream logic!). She decides that, even though what she wants more than anything is to understand what happened, she can't leave herself alone and unprotected. So she carries herself outside.

We have all made it out of Oneiros, into Temenos.

::SESSION BREAK::

The Cabal has reunited in Temenos, the Collective Unconscious. There are two ways they can travel through this layer--via a Guide, which can be v v sus, or via Association, where one kind of bounces from idea to idea. Because Maeve entered via a Guillermo Del Toro movie, the Association is HELLBOY, and the Cabal finds themselves in a Jack Kirby SUPERMAN comic book version of "The City", which is all cities. They're all illustrated in different styles--Maeve is like a Dave McKean character (AND I DIDN'T WRITE DOWN THE OTHER SPECIFIC ARTISTS SO PLEASE FEEL FREE TO ADD). The Cabal moves around via comic book panels.

They look for a newspaper and find a stand which has every paper--we take a copy of THE DAILY PLANET, which lets us go to the building. Getting a ride from a version of Space Cabbie, they get there and meet 1940s-style Jimmy Olsen (but is also every Jimmy Olsen)--who, unlike the other shades and figures in the city, is a Goetia and an actual being. Everyone has a ball doing mid-Atlantic until they don't anymore. He's kind of a dick, but Ty is able to massage his ego enough to take us to City Hall. 

The Cabal decides the best way to get to Astral Los Angeles (WHICH HAS A SPECIAL NAME??) is via the revolving doors (Jimmy Olsen is staying with us but now he's CW Olsen). The Cabal ends up first, by accident, in Every New York, and are swarmed by a jillion people a la Inceptiowhen the dreams detect intruders.

Maeve and Kilroy get stuck so she casts Red Light/Green Light, using it literally. They get away, but the experience makes everyone think of The Worst Place in Los Angeles . . .

They get spit out at Dream Hollywood and Highland, which smells of addiction. From there, they can see The Beacon.

They want to go see The Beacon up close, but, before they get there, Ty has business at Hollywood and Vine (investigating his Obsession, the Cri du Chat). Everyone is like UGGGGGH NO, but they go anyway because, you know, teamwork makes the dream work (har har).

The team ends up outside the idea of Capitol Records--we still don't know what Ty’s mystery is, but, while he's scoping it out, he sees a real ghost. Not the idea of one—an actual ghost. This is not normal, and it’s not right. Ty is like ??????

Her name is Soo Lin, who Ty ultimately learns came to LA to become an actress, worked as a sign spinner on Hollywood Blvd, and then literally just vanished off of the street. Soo Lin knows nothing about where she is, nor what happened to her.

For Some Reason They Don't Know Yet, she got yanked into the Astral Realm as a living person and literally just wasted away and died there, becoming anchored to Not Capitol Records.

(Meanwhile, none of the rest of the group can see or hear her, so Maeve and Mina are just eating Pink's Hot Dogs and complaining. Well, Maeve is complaining.)

There's nothing Ty can do for her right now, so we all decide to take the Street Trolley, which is a dead dream/idea, to The Beacon. The Beacon comprises the Inspiration and Hope which pull people to LA in the first place. It's Fate and Time and Focus and Dream and Drive; it looks like a lighthouse but without the house. Maeve ends up becoming Obsessed with it.

The Beacon, it turns out, is by City Hall and the guards/cops outside are (shocker of shockers), not helpful,  so Kilroy says fuck it opens up a portal to the top, getting the team up close and personal.

The others, conversely, focus on this empty space next to the Beacon which is just a Void. Through their Mage Sight and Other Stuff, they are able to see there are Iron Chains, The Angel of Death Crying, demons swarming—The Exarchs, or maybe the Seers in service of The Exarchs, have been here.

They also find out that the Void exists because something was there and was taken, and the Beacon is mourning. They decrease the Opacity of the mystery and learn/see that what is missing is The Guardian of The Beacon, who we see is not "A" lost angel, and not a Fallen Angel, but "The" Lost Angel--it's trying to fight off these demons and stuff and we see/learn it got pulled out into our world. The team understands that—ahhh!!!—it’s the Holy Mother of The Midnight.

With that, the Cabal feels they have been blocked from more knowledge; they gotta solve other linked mysteries first. Maeve realizes are two places in the Astral LA they might learn more—St. Anthonys, and her childhood home on The Night It Happened.

Very reluctantly, and absolutely sick about it, Maeve agrees to take the Cabal back into her Oneiros, which, as it is literally letting someone see into your soul, guarded, platemail-wearing Maeve is NOT psyched about. It’s very likely she wouldn’t have said yes, except she had just been staring into the embodiment of Hope and Inspiration, so—okay—fine, whatever.

She takes everyone back, they go inside, and they’re all their same size, but the apartment is enormous; they are seeing it from the perspective of a child.

They see White Rabbit bounding up the stairs over and over; they have a watch with hands which point to "Too" and "Late”. Always too late, over and over.

Maeve, emboldened by her friends, starts up the stairs, the rest of the Cabal behind her, giving her courage to continue.

As she gets to the landing they all find themselves in the closet—White Rabbit is there, face-to-face with the group, and they're like "Don't come out until I come for you.” That moment also starts looping.

Then, Maeve hears the voice of her mentor, Bernie--with whom she has been fighting, but is the closest thing she has to a parent (Gerry and White Rabbit being the other contenders). Bernie says "Fuck the watch. You know that Fate is what you make it”—Quoth the Cabal, “You’re a fucking wizard, Harry.” So Maeve snatches the watch and everything stops.

Finally, after all this time, she takes a deep breath and opens the door.

They walk into an image of a bunch of hooded Seers who are clearly in the middle of a ritualistic slaying. Studying the scene, it all snaps into place for Maeve.

The Mages suddenly find themselves in front of a cozy fireplace as children, while Bernie tells them a Bedtime Story, complete with “Once Upon a Time”. They learn that, over time, The Seers have worked to trap the Guardian; to do so requires a certain kind of vessel, and they've tried and tried but it hasn't worked.

That what they need is a ghost.

The Seers used Maeve's mom to possess and trap the Lost Angel via her ghost.

The Holy Mother of The Midnight is Maeve’s mother.

(During this story, Bernie mentions a Doctor and a Magician, and Kilroy’s eyes are basically popping out of his head.)

Nuked by this Truth Bomb, Maeve gets stuck in croaking “she's my mom,” "no, she's my mom,” “No! She is my mom!“ and breaks down, sobbing.

The Cabal finds themselves back in The Atlantean. Kilroy turns to Maeve, who is still crying—he teases “see, I told you guys someone was going to end up crying!“, which is the exact right thing to say; he gets a watery smile and a "fuck you”.

And then he says, seriously--

"That really sucks, and I'm sorry."

"But, on the flip side--"

"We get to do a Heist."

We are breaking into Houdini's vault.

::END OF MAIN STORY::

Downtime--

Ty—1. Finds Soo-Lin and is going to help her, but it goes wrong, so, even though he can assist her, Kingmaker is alerted to The Heist, so there will be competition. 2. Tries to talk to the Shades of exploited Hollywood folk (Garland, Monroe, etc), but that also goes awry and none of them will speak to him.

Mina—1. She ends up having to use all of her Resources to do a PR campaign to un-fuck the chicanery from the last downtime, where her lab was accused of animal testing 2. Finds something that has to do with werewolves?? (I MISSED THE EXACT DETAILS—SORRY)

Kilroy—1. Casts a spell on Kingmaker called "Memory Hole", which basically just trolls him so he doesn't know how to use a smartphone for a week and 2. Works on a "Heist Room" in the Hallow, which will end up giving us a bonus later. Cool.

Maeve—1. Tries to find IRL White Rabbit to try to get some more information about TF was happening that night, why were they there, why her mom, why was she taken to St. Anthony's, etc etc. Basically--what else do you know? And she tries to find them--because they usually don't want to be found (as a Guardian of the Veil thing)--through a Fate spell which basically points you to a general group of people, doing it in turn (I'm looking for Guardians, I'm looking for people of this height, etc etc) til she can triangulate where they are. It’s a Dramatic Failure. 

So Maeve is walking around trying to find them, and she is clocked by Friday, who breaks the news that White Rabbit has not come back from their last mission and is presumed dead. Maeve, having lost yet another parental figure, this time in such a way it very much might have been her fault, has a pang of agony show on her face for a second and then it's mask back up--"Add it to the tab, I guess." Friday tells her "Ask Kilroy if he's seen Him yet" to which Maeve says "I'm not your fucking messenger" and leaves, but does give the message to Kilroy. 2. As a result of action #1, she holes up in her apartment for a week with her cat, Cat, and just casts Postcognition over and over to watch the last time she saw The Holy Mother.

::END OF SESSION::

Everyone hears the cry at some point, though we pretend that we don’t. It’s a sound; more felt than heard. To acknowledge its existence is to succumb to its madness as it shreds your soul to ribbons.

There are no discernible words, but the message is clear: “Give up.”

The sound is predatory.

Tybalt heard it in the void beyond death and behind the “Veil of the Lie"--it nearly destroyed him.

Tybalt has heard it, faint but undeniable, on Hollywood Boulevard. The signal is strongest at the intersection of Hollywood and Vine.

Tybalt is determined to find out what is making this sound, and stopping it if he can.

The Masque was an underground punk club, back in the day. Recent reports claim that live music has been heard by club goers waiting to get into Bar Sinister, but authorities looking into it have found no change in the basement rooms. Tenants in the upstairs building also report never hearing anything out of the ordinary. Anthem went to visit the site and found it deserted, except for a figure of the Angel of Death. Later, Tybalt accompanied them to the site and discovered that there was a ghost door, presumably into the Twilight.  More research is needed.

Anthem set about researching possible keys for the ghost door. They tracked down and spoke to old punks who had been on the scene in the brief heyday of The Masque.  With a few leads, Anthem toted in some gear and jammed out a punk-inspired version of Don't Fear the Reaper. The door opened and the club laid beyond, the ghost of The Opening Night. A reminder that it is natural for all good things to come to an end. 

Of course, the conundrum now is that this means that humans don't have a monopoly on becoming ghosts. Apparently, goetia like The Opening Night can as well...

There is a billboard across the street from "Gerry's Garden" flower shop. Traditionally it's been innocuous--sometimes for a new movie, sometimes for STD prevention, sometimes for a dentist--but lately, it's been sending messages to Maeve in High Speech; messages only she can see. Who--or what--is behind these messages, good or bad, remains to be seen.

EDIT: Maeve now knows that the messages are being sent from a Dystopian Timeline, but when/where/by whom all remains unknown.

SECOND EDIT: Still licking her psychological wounds from the past few weeks (events during her absence from the first part of "Scheduling Conflicts", and then from the events at the Arboretum), Maeve throws herself back into this mystery. She cracks it, and a film reel starts playing in her head. She realizes that the entity responsible for the messages are none other than herself from another timeline. Dystopian Maeve has reached out to our Maeve, and perhaps many other Maeves, to impress upon her the fact that "it wasn't her fault", to "be nicer to herself", and walked her through the redeeming qualities of her cabal members and their relationships. "Do these things because", Dystopian Maeve says, "you never know when it will all go away."

A pop-up Halloween horror maze turned out to harbor an interesting yard sale find, a mana-infused Nintendo 64, the soul stone of a lost mage. And also, several off-program killer animatronics. The soul stone was secured and the anomaly dispelled.