Fault of Faith

Fault of Faith
Part of Search for the Sevenfold Staff
Date 2086-10-04 GM Breeze Location Salem, Masachuesetts Status Threat Level: Extreme
Factions Involved
ShadowHaven Wiccan Community Children of the Dragon Draco Foundation	Ares	Atlantean Foundation Runner Team	Aleph Society	The Forces Beyond
Exodus Alkali Brunhilde Huntress Iron Delphi	Chief Frederick Bollivar PIs Various Patrols	Brick Erudite Flash	Seer Friar Lia Correra The Bound Spirit of the Vessel	The Old King The Key Guardian Spirits Spirits of Man
Casualties and losses
Exodus had to burn edge to survive an ambush by a blood mage, Brunhilde and Huntress nearly fell to 2 others later on	Having been led away and distracted from any of the actual conflicts, Ares did not suffer casualties	None, having been misled and too trusting of Alkali's information despite earlier suspicions.	The Vessel was disrupted, and all three Blood Magic users were captured and sent to the Draco Foundation	The Old King was put to rest in his castle, and The Key's power was sapped when it was separated from the Head of the Sevenfold Staff

Summary

The 6th world is built on opportunistic vultures picking at the rotting carcasses of the less fortunate. When a moment of action, for whatever reason, shows weakness they swoop in and begin to tear and feast. An accidental discovery, a curio that slipped into a museum curator's possession by happenstance, lead to a deeply tragic and unintended accident. And the ripple of that accident, the midst of that tragedy and the mourning that should have gone by unimpeded so those affected could process such an unfortunate moment and move on, deal with the fallout on their own, only drew the vultures nearer and nearer.

Some picked at old scars.

Others took it as an excuse for tighter control, a tragedy turned into justification for their weighty intervention.

Others still simply had a vested interest in taking part of it for their own sakes, pragmatic to a fault.

And the worst of them all set that tragedy into motion, waiting eagerly for the chance to once more have what they craved for so, so long. The cost to others did not matter, could not matter, in the pursuit of that totality and wholeness.

There were so, so many reasons why the night of October the 9th should have led to the deaths of countless people, a city under siege, and a powerful artifact in the wrong hands as good people died for nothing.

All in all? it could have been far worse. Maybe there's still some hope for us after all.

Background

On September 30th, a strange artifact ended up in the hands of the curator of the Salem Historical Museum, who called upon a notable and well regarded member of the Wiccan community in Salem - one Yelena Monroe - to give some insights since something felt...wrong, about the thing. An orb, something that could fit in the palm of your hand, with ruins on one side of a blueish tint that seemed like an eye amidst a rather ancient cut of stone that still remained rather smooth. Unnatural didn't cover it. So, Yelena gathered her coterie and some aspiring pupils for the investigation, and the following day made for the commons with the artifact - The Key - contained just in case. But something went wrong. Something interfered. And one Jacob Howard found himself touching the Key, and for a brief moment all Hell broke loose. For what was only a few minutes, the area just north of the commons in the residential district was a total Hellscape. Jacob did not survive the accident. Yelena, shaken and heartbroken at seeing one of her pupils dead to the artifact, politely took her position as an acting figure at the museum so the curator did not have to be involved and had the artifact sealed away until they found a means of destroying it. A task she felt wholly unprepared for, muddled by self doubt and grief after how powerless she felt during the incident. And so, she set up the museum to delay any interrogations from outside forces and holed up, trying to force herself to act despite her weakness.

Unfortunately, that weakness did not go unnoticed.

Ares, being situated in Boston for the majority of the restoration, took notice of the strange blip of astral activity, and suspecting something unnatural and possibly useful could be hidden within the magical communities of Salem. Taking the odd aehteric readings and the death of a student of the Wiccans as a pretense, patrols of KE forces ramped up dramatically, and they began mobilizing. With heavy surveillance, heavy firepower, and incoming thaumaturgy assistance coming their way, they planned to take whatever the Wiccans may have had and use it for their own profit.

The Atlanteans, having divined the possibility of a piece of the Staff being found in Salem in due time, sent a small team of local, competent runners to begin investigations into the matter. And once there was a solid incident to back those divinations, they began ramping up their investigations into the Wiccans. Their job and plan was simple: learn what they can, and take the Staff Piece when the opportunity presented itself. They didn't really care about the significance: a 50k nuyen per head paycheck was well worth it.

Alexis Glimmerscale, and the rest of the Children of the Dragon, were quite obviously aware of the incident given their proximity and their influence in the area. With her position on the board of the Draco Foundation, Glimmerscale did her best to give the DF the confirmation of a potential staff piece in Salem, however with the increase in Ares activities and rumors of shady characters amok she decided her best move for the moment was to wait for them to send contacts to her and stay hidden. An important ally in the coming days.

Most dangerous of the outsiders to come into Salem, the divinations of the Aleph Society pointed towards a possible confluence of magical influence and aspected mana that would be...utterly enthralling. The cause of this had to fall under their possession, and they would spare no effort in doing so. Though they did not want to create a massive stir and ruin their public image, they had a team of incredibly powerful operatives whom they could rely upon to retrieve the artifact in question and wreak havoc on Salem, sparing no expense to see their plans come to fruition. the Seer and the Friar, two relatively stable, if cold and pragmatic mages were joined by a far more hot headed and uncontrollable mystic adept by the name of Lia Correra. Lia had quite the personal grudge against Salem as a whole; an accident many years ago lead to her requiring cyberware in order to survive, which unfortunately burned her out. The dismissiveness of the Wiccans whom used to nurture her and make her feel at home caused her to grow bitter, most of all against the woman who was rising through the ranks at the time alongside her. This woman, one Yelena Monroe, would finally pay. With the gift of Gaf, Lia wanted nothing more3 than to kill Yelena as brutally as possible and destroy the community she worked so hard to build, stalking the woman at times and trying to find an opportune moment to shove her axe into that redhead's trachea. Her unprofessional attitude and vendetta sometimes jeopardized the mission, but after retrieving a near dead body and using it as the base for a devastating massive Great Form Blood Spirit and establishing a relatively well defended base of operations in a motel they turned into a zombified murder fort, they were eager to put their slaughtering efforts to good use in taking control of whatever brought them here.

The Draco Foundation found themselves scrambling for time and needing to get a proper retrieval team asap to get the Head. And they called on a team they hoped would be up to the task.

The Meet

"Adowa "Moria" Webster" represented the Draco Foundation when the group was assembled in a Downtown office: Iron, Alkali, Delphi, Exodus, Huntress, and Brunhilde. A mix of social, physical, magical, and matrix prowess that they hoped would keep a diverse enough skill set that was still capable of handling the possibly dangerous threats that loomed in the shadows. The foundation gave the limited information they had and a case, along with the objective: secure the head of the staff while avoiding being waylaid by the third parties that were most definitely in the area after the noticeable moment over in the city of magic. The initial offer was 24 thousand nuyen, which Iron found offensively appalling to even suggest. Alkali managed to sneak in a number of additional gear rewards (Magical goods, Foci, Augmentations, and Vehicles/Drones) for the runners and a chance for additional pay in case the job proved more complex and dangerous than initially predicted, though Iron was still displeased. The Foundation had arranged for a base in Boston and transportation for the crew as well to make travel as seamless as possible, as well as getting vehicles needed over to the location to ensure smooth operations. Iron swore that he would not be risking his life for a paltry 24 thousand, but the foundation did not care at this point due to his unbearable behavior. Regardless the meeting was about over, so the runners went home and began working on the plan.

The Plan

The team planned to stay discretionary in their loadouts (sans Iron) so as to not draw attention in what seemed to be a tense situation, in so far as their own knowledge and intel of command led them to believe. Using what little they had, they drew up a simple plan

They needed to contact the Children of the Dragon, to find out more of the situation on the ground They needed to investigate the Wiccans, who likely new far more about the incident itself And following the divination given by Alkali over the threats of the run, he saw the visage of the runner team and the representation of the singular, devoted entity of Gaf's followers.

Once more information was gathered, they needed to handle the threats and find a means of locating the artifact they *thought* they were looking for, and then make a break for it.

Game Quotes

Amusing quote from game.