I know it's been quiet lately, at least here in my city. I've been busy with mundane investigations. There's been a couple drive-by shootings here, and the local gangs have started getting rowdy. Local LEO's have seen a push increase in the local narcotics traffic. It's only 10% more, but this city is one of the major pipelines. Runners and mules come up from the ports and across the border and take I-27, or 287 up into the city, then hit I-40, or route 66 which both take them east to west, and coast to coast, or nearly so.
The mundane stuff, while bad, is mostly normal. I guess.
I regret to inform the Lazlo Society that my team has lost a member, after a fashion. While I don't speak of the rest of my team often, usually only referring to Brandon, I do have a small team.
I guess it started with campers and hikers going missing in Palo Duro Canyon. It happens, often enough, but when local wild life service workers began finding bodies that seemed halfway eaten, and animal tracks it was clear that these weren't normal. Sure, there are coyotes out here that get livestock and small pets. The occasional mountain lion comes around too.
We suspected something different was going on, so we began to investigate. Contacting the local game warden and park rangers we went out to the camp sites and where the bodies were found. The tracks were old, degraded, but molds of the tracks were made. We were also given copies of photos taken of the tracks and bodies. The tracks, we agreed, were that of a mountain lion or puma, but they appeared to be much larger.
Our sensitives in the group relayed fear and pain of the victims, as well as glimpses of the attack. And came with it was a sense of cunning and intelligence, and evil. So... taken those things together, we surmised that we had a were-cougar on our hands. Simple matter to track it and bring it down.
In Palo Duro Canyon every year, all summer long, there is an outdoor play/musical performed in the local amphitheater called Texas. It's a great western story, and well done. Predators and animals will avoid large crowds. However, it's a gathering of a lot of food for supernatural predators.
We were tracking our were-cougar, but apparently we weren't the only ones. When we found the were-cougar, it was cornered by a couple of very serious looking Comanche tribesmen. They cornered it and impaled with a silver-tipped spear, but one that was enchanted. The killed the were-cougar.
All's well that ends well, right?
Not so much.
Apparently the were-cougar had a survivor or a mate or something. We didn't see that in our investigation. The next attack was close to River Road, but this time there was a survivor. It was a high-school art teacher. Very pretty lady by the name of Regina. She's... something of an eccentric, at least by her peers. Turns out, she's something of an occultist, but she doesn't work with anybody. As a result, she has a few things on hand, just in case. Regina keeps a revolver with silver bullets in it. She shot her attacker at least once that we know of. The cougar fled. It actually made it to the city, then managed to claw out the silver bullet, but the wound itself was slow to heal, as normal regeneration wasn't possible.
Alex, one of our two healers was in the city as she had the day off. Well, being near Amarillo Boulevard, we know she was driving and saw the guy. Of course, being a healer, she would be almost compelled to help someone who was hurt, and running around with a bullet wound in one of the ratty portions of town … well, you can imagine.
The first sign something was wrong was the mutilated body left at the corner of Filmore and Amarillo Boulevard. Most people around here get shot. This was different. It was gruesome. Gristly. There was a pile of strips of skin and flesh left next to the body, and it was mostly skinned. We were contacted of course because Alex was driving one of the company trucks at the time. She didn't have one of her own, so we were letting her use one, provided she took care of it.
We got a look at the street camera videos. She pulled over in the truck as the guy was moving down the sidewalk. Both of them went down behind the truck on the sidewalk. About thirty seconds to a minute later we saw a bloody hand with a dagger appear over the hood then plunge down sharply. Then, another thirty seconds or so later, she gets up, covered in blood, face twisted in a maniacal grin, apparently laughing hysterically. Running around the truck she gets in and peels out, fleeing the scene.
On the bright side: The were-cougars are dead.
On the not so bright side: It seems that Alex has gone insane and turned into a serial killer.
The last major case we reported on, the summoner? Yeah. He's dead. He was found dead in his office. He had a paperweight that was a replica of the daggers in Conan The Barbarian, the ones used by the cult of Thulsa Doom. He was found bound to his desk in a ritualistic manner and the dagger through his heart. His face was twisted in to a mask of laughter, apparently he had died laughing, but what was worse was the absolute terror and pain in the man's eyes.
One of our sensitives dared do an object read on the body. He wound up throwing up in a trash can for a minute, not because of the condition of the body, but later he relayed the terror and horror of the event. I think we have something much worse than before. Probably worse than the Shadowbeasts of several months ago.
We actually have retained Regina as a researcher for this case, just in case she turns into a were-cougar. Also, we can't really charge for rescue services, since she wasn't already a client, and we're sure that she probably couldn't afford it, and we arrived after the fact. So, we're having her help us as reparations, but even then, we're providing a commission too. We may hire her if this turns out well and she decides she wants to stay on.
She's being watched closely, but not in an unfriendly way.
At any rate... I wonder if anybody else here has dealt with similar? Any ideas? We're looking into past events to try to find a pattern, or a way to follow her. Does anyone here know of any psychic or magical healers that can work with highly disturbed mental illnesses?
We're really not sure -what- we're dealing with, but by the maniacal laughter and such, we're thinking either possession or insanity.
Bad News and New Case
Bad News and New Case
To see a world in a grain of sand,
to see eternity in an instant...
to see eternity in an instant...
