Case File 451: Monument, Colorado

[Serpens Walker]

I didn't see anywhere to document field actions in progress, so I'm gonna' dump it here.

This is Joe, checking in from Monument, Colorado. Checked out the old saloon, sure enough, there's a free roaming apparition. So far as I'm concerned, it's benign. If that was all there was to this story, I wouldn't bother with the checking in.

The trouble started when I walked in and the barman thought I was a customer. When I told him I was there to do paranormal investigations on his behalf, he didn't know what I was talking about.

"Sure there's the ghost, but we don't want to lose 'im! He gets the tourists in here!" Not quite the response I was expecting from a customer requesting an exorcism. Fair enough really, and hell, any schtick in a recession goes. Furthermore, like I said-seems benign to me. Between my sense for evil and what the kid behind the counter said, I have no reason to believe this is a serious situation that requires interdiction of any kind.

Further questioning was pointless-this guy works the day shift, the old barman works at night. I ordered a burger and decided to write this check in.

But now I'm out here, there's no trace of the fella' that called me out here, his phones been disconnected, I'm getting mailer daemon errors on the email approach, and I've got $600 in an account that I can't return because the account of the person who sent me out here no longer exists.

Ladies and gentlemen, this reeks of a setup. This is the 21st century, it's next to impossible to just disappear on demand. My first move is going to be looking for cult activity, followed with an interview with the barkeep tonight. More as things develop.

[Serpens Walker]

Checking in at... 9ish pm, The Old Iron Grille. Dinner tonight

Pros: No vampires. Yet. Starting to find evidence of things going on down in the mines.

Cons: Mineshafts. Reanimated cows are creepy as hell. Found chalk circle with blood and burnt candle, but got carried away with burying it and forgot to snap photo. STUPID! And the Sheriff...

So, after kicking around town a bit, I decided to slough off my responsibilities (such as they are) and go find something fun to do. I checked in with the town hall and asked about any old mines in the area, and sure enough, Monument is like most the rest of Colorado-there's old mines in the area.

Of course, I'm a weirdness magnet, and today was no exception. ...I swear, I must have Jynxed and Weird Wild Wasteland or something...

No sooner do I get off the car, I see some local police cruiser driving up and flashing his lights. Sheriff gets down off the car, I'm rolling my eyes, wondering what the hell I've done THIS time... pulls his gun and starts shooting! HE SHOT MY CAR! He could at least aim and hit ME for crying out loud, I'd get better!

Now... I don't kindly to being shot at see, so I did what most any man out in the mountains would do when confronted with a gunslinging loco gringo-we had ourselves a gun fight. It was short. He managed to fire off another double tap before I plugged him with a triple tap from my forty-five.

The officer was down, he wasn't moving. I walked over to examine the body. I... damn. All I can say for sure is that he was dead long before I put those rounds in him. Maggots were oozing from the the fresh holes in him. I've seen worse, but... ugh. Freakin' deadites.

And then there were cows! DEADITE COWS! ...who freakin' makes DEADITE COWS!? THEY GORED MY CAR!!! My insurance isn't going to want to hear this. Fortunately I have it all on camera thanks to that police cruiser.

I'm having to postpone my investigation. I radioed in the police station that the car was set to radio, but no one responded. We're filing that under the Category of Bad things.

Returned to town, had dinner. Going to head back out in a bit. Whoever these people are, they've made a serious mistake. You do not vandalize my car. I'd say there's a clan of Asian Triad vampires in New York who learned that lesson the hard way.

Except they're no longer with us.

[Serpens Walker]

Checkin: 9:40ish, Old Iron Grille, Monument

Y'know... there's something wrong in here. The ghost is sitting with me at my table, trying to tell me something, but I can't hear it. Which is weird because it's been steadily getting quieter as the night is wearing on in this joint.

They turned the music off a while ago, but I haven't seen a band setting up. Everyone's kinda' slow tonight. Sorta' swaying a little side to side. Eyes are kinda dull... brutal day at work for folks here?

...I'm having one of those feelings all the sudden like I should leave. In fact, I'm leaving. I'll check in again later.

[Serpens Walker]

Checkin, Midnight

Everyone's coming outside and walking into the street. Their eyes are glowing. They seem to be shuffling up the road to the old part of Monument that has all the abandoned mines.

I think I see... oh god, what is that... Some sort've parasite?

I'm about to do something reckless. I'll post again when I'm sure they've stopped looking for me... this will require more research, but anything that makes me think Dunwich Horror...

<attached to the post is a photo of a middle aged man, probably caucasian, although the green glow from his eyes and the tentacles danging out of his mouth are making it difficult to tell what race he actually is. As with any paranormal photo, the image is a bit blurred, and this particular photo is obviously taken with a cell phone camera, at night, with insufficient light>

[Tms3]

I see I am once again banished to the books I let you know what if any thing I find and how to deal with it. Though I think I have seen some accounts of something like that but not in over 100 years

[Hannah]

The poor cows.

Hannah

[Gotham Witch]

Sooo... still in tact, Joe?

[Serpens Walker]

Checkin... oh I don't even care what time it is.

Yes, I'm fine. The mine was going to collapse anyway, it was structurally unsound. It was abandoned for a reason. I'm not sure what the hell that was all about, but it was so not worth the $600. There were cultists, and squids, and tentacles...

Honestly, I'm still piecing together what just happened. The problem is... resolved? The local folks seem better anyways, and the supernatural fuzz around town is clearing, though... It's taking its time.

...Mel. Remember the last time I shot a cult leader to save you?

[Serpens Walker]

Alright, less fragged now. What a day...

SO! After I snapped that photo last night, this is what went down.

I had initially expected them to search for me for hours after doing such a blatant move to expose them (re: taking a flash photo), but to my surprise, they stopped looking for me within minutes and began lumbering around in the dark, all heading in the same direction. I decided to follow them, see what I could figure out.

They formed a long line of people with squidly bits hanging out of various places heading into the mines. Not the same mine I'd visited earlier that day, but another shaft within the general area. They weren't moving particularly fast, so I decided to take a chance and cut in line. They did react to my presence, but all they did was block my way out. If I hadn't been sold on the concept of supernatural abductions and possession before, I sure as hell was now. Worse yet, I could hear something squishy coming up from the depths.

Now, normally I ask questions. I try to talk to things, see what I can learn. When these creatures appeared... Y'know, the best way I could describe them is ascended cultists of an eldritch horror. They were wearing robes, were humanoid, but squidly and glowing. They locked their beady eyes with me and I heard the following.

"You will be implanted. All shall be made clear."

To which, I naturally responded, "Do I have a choice in this?"

They didn't tell me, but instead they reached out to grab me, so I'm thinking that was a 'no.' I slid back, popping a few shots with my gun, but the blessed bullets seemed to be having little effect. Fortunately I travel pretty heavily armed with concealed weapons, and drew my blade.

What can be said about the blade... it's a Kabar, probably from Vietnam or the Korean War, and someone enchanted it. I'm not sure what with, but I know that when holy rounds aren't working, this and my pipe are my go to weapons. Being squishy tentacle things, I figured the blade would be better here.

The left one simply came at me, tentacles out stretched, and I slashed away using circle parries. That got their attention. A shrill creature scream, and then they rushed me. The glint of my blade could be seen in the eerie green glow that bathed the cavern, and it flashed as it struck the squid things. I took no chances-I didn't want to end up like a Japanese School Girl in a hentai, so I focused almost exclusively on defense, keeping old enchanted steel between their sticky caresses and my body. It took a bit of doing-I'm not familiar with cephalopod physiology, and certainly not when it's attached to a supernatural monster, but like most things in life, you cut it enough, it'll die. I did my due diligence and severed what I figured were their heads from their bodies.

Now, this next part... I've heard stories. I've never seen anything like this until now, but if the rumors I've heard are true, I probably didn't do much more than piss it off and break its concentration... which fortunately, could be enough. The path into the mine lead down into a very large chamber with a pool of slime, and out in the middle of it was an eyeball propped up on tentacles that were growing out of the base of it. It saw me immediately, and I could feel it trying to get into my head while I ducked around the corner to come to grips with the fact that YES, I just saw an tentacle eyeball in a pool of slime. I calmed myself down a bit, but it took a little longer than I would've liked. When I turned the corner, it was RIGHT IN MY FACE.

...of course... see... I had one of my moments right there...

I'm well... clumsy. And while I tend not get scared easily, I do sorta' startle easily... And well, I was holding the knife, right? Before either of us could blink, I'd screamed, and reflexively pulled my hands up to cover my face... with a slithering eyeball not more than a foot away.

The blade slashed the thing all the way up the center line, making it scream horrible sounds IN MY HEAD, and spilling goo all over me. It almost immediately began to whither and fall away.

Now, remember how I said there was a steady glow in mineshaft? Well, after it quit screaming and started to dissolve, the glow went out for a few seconds... and then lit up brighter. Then the mineshaft started shaking. Time to go!

I ran back up the way I came, and all the townsfolk were milling about, wondering why they were in the mine. I decided to uncork a 40% bolt-it was faster than trading my knife for my gun and a helluva' lot more flashy. Seeing a blaze of blue lightning rip out from the recesses in the mine got the point across, and the people who were just standing around ran out.

I have no idea if everyone got out. I hope they did, and if that thing was some sort've eldritch horror trying to manifest, I hope that moment disrupted its concentration. At the very least, I doubt it can attempt to manifest in that mineshaft again-the whole thing collapsed.

Since I've got some enforced down time, I'm going to be checking myself out for signs of contamination, as well as the people in town if they'll let me. The good news is that while the presence was large, it wasn't very strong, so I don't think it was able to anchor itself here very well.

That's all I've got for now.

[Serpens Walker]

Case File 451 Wrap Up:

Having spent the past few days being questioned by the Police about why an officer unloaded his firearm into my vehicle went as expected, with the important consideration that his cruiser's recorder very clearly shows he got out and just opened fire. Although I'm pretty sure the officer was dead before I returned fire, the authorities in Colorado don't deal with situations like this very often, so I was expecting to have to deal with some litigation until they came in and told me I was free to go. Anyone here have something to do with that? I owe you a Coke and probably some fire support.

Moving on, I've been able to conclude that the only contamination of myself and my equipment is a couple of splatters of ectoplasm. The sense that anything was in town has completely fallen away, except for the ghost at the saloon.

Finally, and this is curious... the bank investigated the transaction from the account that vanished after crediting my account with $600. They turned up that the account was held be Harvey Prowler and Lauers Croven. Harvey and Lauers? I think I'm seeing HPLC, which indicates to me they knew exactly what was down there. ...seriously, HPLC? I feel like I'm being pranked by kids in Jr. High. >.>

I don't have enough in the way of leads to pursue anything at this time, so I'm calling this case closed, with an addendum to be on the look out for anything that seems related, particularly this "HPLC" business.

Also, we laid the Subaru to rest. The Spark served me well while she could, but the undead claimed another victim in their unholy war against those of us that stand with the light. Spark, I'll miss ya. Uprated parts are already on order for a Frontier. Trying to think of an appropriate name for the truck.

[Chalice]

This is the 21st century, it's next to impossible to just disappear on demand.

Actually, if you have the right connects, it's easier than you think.

[Rowan]

How big was the eye with the tentacles at the base? The tentacles in the mouth reminds me of a possible “Cthulhu” rendition I saw once—one of the memories I’d like to forget.