The players arrived at the funeral ceremony, being held in the middle of the grounds in broad daylight. Calvieri is there herself, and appears to be leading the service in prayer. Drake’s appears unhappy, because he’d been betting that she was a vampire. He quickly revises his opinion – she’s either White Court, or a Faerie.
At the conclusion of the ceremony, which doesn’t last terribly long, Ms. Calvieri comes over and introduces herself to Drake. She explains that it means a lot that River and he are already integrating into the Institute’s family. She’s going to the cemetery with the caskets, and they’re welcome to come along, but most people were going to be staying on campus. They nod graciously, and say they’ll stay.
Victoria grabs River and pulls her aside, asking when she’s going to come by campus for another party. River asks when the next one is – because the last one was TONS of fun. (Drake’s Player: Are we remembering the same party?) Victoria explains that there’s another party tonight, and that she should totally come for it.
Oh, and bring your cute friend too, she tells River, pointing at Eve.
The players got a kick out of that one. River’s player fistpumps. Eve calls Aya and gets permission to go to the party. They head home to get ready and stuff, because the party starts in the early evening.
In the mean time, back at the police station, Aya is running names furiously through the system. She finds out that Kryp, Julie, and Dimitri all go to Sunnydale South High School. There’s no mention of any Diane in that grade. Aya calls the school and finds out that Julie, Kryp, and Dimitri were all missing from class today. Christopher had graduated the year before. Again, Aya finds her suspicions rising, confirms that they’re all good friends, and proceeds to get addresses for all of them. She heads over to Kryp’s house, and finds out that he was feeling sick this morning, but has since started feeling better and went down to Christopher’s blacksmith job to help him out with some stuff.
Again, writes down the address, and goes there.
At the blacksmith, Christopher explains that Kryp has already gone. He was picking up a sword that he’d ordered a while ago. He made it as a side project. It was german style, would be functional if sharpened, but he didn’t sharpen it before handing it over. Claims to have no idea about anything else. Without anything to link him to the crime, Aya leaves. As she leaves, she receives a blinding vision.
Among a bunch of other images, she sees pictures of Aztec ruins and the Sunnydale museum. When she gets back to the station, she calls up the museum and asks about special exhibits – finding out that there was a special on Aztec Killing Rites just last week. Aya curses loudly. Wanting more information, and running dangerously low on actionable leads, she calls the owner of the store, trying to locate the group of five kids.
The shop owner doesn’t know anything about Diane, but the other four have been staples of the local occult scene for ages. They come in and buy herbs and other trendy faux-Wicca things. They shop at the local Hot Topic a lot, and spend a lot of time at a local coffee house. Aya gives the man the description of Diane, and he suddenly changes his tune. He says that she showed up in town around 6 months ago, and seemed knowledgeable of things of Power. May have spoken to the other four a few times, but he didn’t know where she was from.
Aya stops, the blood freezing in her veins. She literally just put two and two together. Warden Steven Marcos comes to town six months ago, with a daughter who has an interest in the occult. Another girl, with an interest in the occult and knowledge of things like the Accords and Guest/Host relations, shows up and starts chatting up the local occult circles. Then, a major-league artifact goes missing from the local magic shop. None of the kids have been seen since, except Christopher.
Likely magic-enabled teen with access to lots of power and the knowledge to use it, with goons.
Shit.
Aya gets ready to go and start hitting Christopher up much more aggressively for information when she gets a phone call from Eve at the party at the Calvieri institute. One word.
“Help.”
The line dies.
Aya turns the car. Magic powered teens later. Daughter in danger now.
(Next time on Seeking Shadows: What the hell happened at that party? What is Diane planning? Where is she planning it? How the hell are they going to stop it?)
Great post, seems like a fun Dresden Files campaign! If you have the time, I'd be curious for your opinion of the system and what kind of rolls the PCs were making (if any) through the story.
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