The session opens with Ariona Cassyon, Nikolai, Vitorrio Garibaldi, Bryce Murphy, Meechum, and Ian Thorpe, accompanied by Angelique du Coudray, Petrov Zarkovsky, Kimi Eagle Talon, and Hunter Savage. Kimi and Hunter are holding the coffin-type container housing the earthly remains of Cain.
After waiting around for a bit while the large public transit van is en route, the group climbs in. The four vampires pile into the back with Thorpe (inside of whom rides Garibaldi) and Meechum, and Ariona and Bryce ride in the front. Nikolai nervously says he’ll meet everyone there and disappears.
During the trip, Ariona and Thorpe are briefly overwhelmed by the evil emanations, retching up their dinners. Bryce is even more badly affected, becoming so ill he can hardly bear it. They all manage to pull themselves together enough to complete the trip, however; the vampires just appear amused.
They get to the forest, where Nikolai rejoins them, and begin the trek to Moss’. When they arrive at the door, DEE informs them that there is someone hidden nearby using illusion magic. Thorpe and Ariona both inform Moss of this through email, and delay opening the door to his sanctum. Moss replies that if the vampires can scare whomever it is off, they will be safe as soon as they get inside, for he can just move the location of his home.
DEE tracks the invisible creature, and sends a direct feed to all the vampires but Kimi (who lacks a neural jack), showing them where the creature is. They begin to approach, when the spike-haired pixie comes out and drops her illusion.
“I need to talk to William,” she says. “This can't happen.''" She claims that the Caretaker has stopped talking to them, and only talked to the party because He wants to use them. She also says that His will should not be allowed to happen, because He has abandoned them. Ariona sends a message to Moss, telling him what's happening, and he replies, "Underno circumstances’’ should you let Nyx in!” Then he remarks that he isn’t sure it’s going to be possible to stop her, though.
At this point, Thorpe decides for some reason to open the door. Unsurprisingly, Nyx bolts straight for it the second it’s open. Ariona, Meechum, Thorpe and Garibaldi all fail to stop her, physically or mystically, and she disappears inside the portal. Thorpe follows, causing the vampires to enter as well; and Meechum and Ariona somewhat reluctantly go inside as well.
“Sorry, but I have to go forward with this,” Moss says. Thorpe and the vampires set the coffin down in the middle of the room, and Ariona and Meechum watch from the sides.
Nyx looks unhappy but resigned, and replies, “Fine, but I’m staying here until it’s done.” Apparently, she is genuinely resigned to this.
The party then turns to the issue of how to get the container open. Thorpe suggests a welding torch, and Ariona mentions that there are some chemicals that might dissolve the alloy. It looks rather impervious.
“Well, let’s give the torch option a try,” says Moss, as he holds up his right arm. The arm slowly morphs into a welding torch, but before he fires it, he stops. “There’s some wards here that should probably be taken down first.” He then begins to dispel a bunch of protections on the container.
Five minutes later, Moss appears drawn and tired. “Perhaps now we can open it,” he pants, and his arms turns blue, then slowly resumes its normal color. Angelique instructs Kimi to tear the coffin open the rest of the way. She sprouts claws, and it is easily done. Inside, Cain is revealed to be an emaciated body, essentially only skin stretched taut along bones. ``Every’’ mortal, including Bryce and Nikolai outside, and with the sole exception of Ariona, appears affected by the terrible evil washing over them when the container is opened.
Moss cringes, but continues with his process. He removes a hand that is encased in rusty metal from his pocket, and uses a bit of destruction magic to remove the metal. He mutters that it’s a good thing they were doing this now, as the hand looked about ready to break out of its protection. He attaches it to the body, and flesh begins to spread up the arm, across the torso, and up and down his body until it reaches his head. The body issues an unnatural groan, and the vampires hiss, “MASTER. . . .”
. . . and promptly jump Moss. At this point, Nyx springs into action, jumping onto Cain’s body as all four vampires begin to strike at Moss. Kimi rakes him with her savage claws, causing him to bleed blue blood from his wounds. Moss deflects Angelique’s punches, but is burned badly by Hunter’s energy weapon. Petrov attempts to grapple, but Moss shoves him off without breaking a sweat.
Ariona attempts to shoot Kimi with her laser pistol, and fails. Moss melts into a puddle, and glides across the floor to form a pool underneath Cain’s erstwhile container. The ghost exits Thorpe’s body and runs towards Hunter’s back, punching him with a glowing knife-like first. The undead arches his back in pain, but does not fall.
The door slides open, and Nikolai is visible there. Meanwhile, Thorpe hits Hunter with a level-3 healing effect, greatly staggering him, and then hides behind Meechum. Meechum tries to attack Hunter with electricity, but misses.
The groan emanating from Cain grows in volume, and the corpse clumsily flails his arm and tears the lid of the container clear off; he completely ignores the pixie attached to his left bicep. The lid flies across the room, smacking into Hunter and knocking him to the floor. Petrov rather spectacularly writhes out of the way, but falls to the floor in the process. Cain then lunges towards Angelique, but she dodges with a terror-filled face.
DEE, flying as fast as it can towards Moss’ tree, informs Bryce of an unauthorized access to Hunter’s neural jack, and asks if he should attempt to close it. Bryce replies no, that’s him.
Nyx shouts, “NOW, Luna!” and the ground begins to rumble. There is a loud CRACK and the whole structure trembles as the ceiling tears open. Outside, Bryce and Nikolai see a lightning bolt strike Moss’s tree. They are both thrown backwards, and Bryce appears to be knocked unconscious by the blast.
Cain and the vampires all seem to start levitating against their will, with all save Hunter thrashing and writhing in the invisible grasp. Nyx continues to hang on for dear life.
Ariona tries to shoot Kimi again, and this time succeeds. Garibaldi sticks his hand into the puddle and attempts to heal Moss. DEE keeps blasting towards the tree, and Thorpe heals Kimi for massive damage. Meechum swings and misses, and the vampires begin to glow slightly with positive energy.
Nikolai heals himself and staggers towards Bryce’s prone body, reaching for his thermos as he goes.
Cain reaches for Angelique again, and this time she is unable to evade him. He grabs her, and opens his mouth. Instead of her neck, however, he reaches for her mouth, and she is turned into a swirling mass of dark energy and disappears inside of his maw.
Cain is then ``exploded’’ into the air, presumably by Luna, with Nyx still clinging to his arm. He shoots out the top of the tree, skyrocketing straight towards the top of the dome.
The vampires collapse, and appear stunned. The glow of positive energy fades from their bodies.
DEE observes Cain’s body combusting from the speed of his atmospheric ascent, and tells Ariona and Thorpe to ask Moss if there’s anything Moss would like done about Cain before he hits the top of the bubble, since DEE may actually be able to act upon him. Moss forms a mouth out of the blue puddle, and replies “Stop him! The ritual must be completed!”
DEE isn’t really sure how to stop him, but he tries a shot-in-the-dark attempt to teleport Nyx into his hold, for lack of a better idea. Instead, Nyx disappears . . . and does ``not’’ reappear in DEE. DEE begins algorithms to attempt to figure out where she went.
Inside, Thorpe and Ariona notice something appear in the casket where Cain’s body lately resided. Ariona peers over the side, and sees a statue of a pixie that looks suspiciously like Nyx. DEE’s only comment is, “Calculation was anomalous.”
Nikolai pours some OJ down Bryce’s throat, and he seems somewhat revived. Thorpe attempts to punch Kimi in the head, but even with his exo-skeleton-enhanced strength, he does not appear to even scratch her. Ariona then grabs her switchblade, flicks it out, and stabs Kimi in the throat. Thorpe is somewhat surprised to notice that for that moment, Ariona seems to register as mystic, and she somehow enhances her weapon to hurt Kimi significantly. Immediately thereafter, she stops looking like a mystic again.
At this point, Moss the puddle coughs out, “This place is no longer safe. We need to get out of here. I can take us to another place.”
Ariona asks, “What about Cain?”
Moss replies, “Cain is gone. We will have to follow him later.”
Ariona returns, “DEE is following Cain right now,” but Moss seems unconcerned by this. He casts some Wish-level magic to sweep up Meechum, Thorpe, Garibaldi, Bryce, Nikolai and Ariona and transport them . . . elsewhere.
Meanwhile, DEE sends its robot body in the shuttle to go pick up the Nyx statue, and the ship continues to follow the Cain-meteorite. It engages its tractor beam as Cain passes it, and is yanked along in his wake. As DEE realizes that they will shortly be hitting the dome, it blasts a small, neat hole in the dome and continues to be dragged along.
When connection is reestablished with the wireless linkups, DEE informs the party that he is now attached to Cain and flying through space. Ariona passes this knowledge on to Moss.
Meanwhile, Moss is disguising himself rather impressively. His features remold, and his body shape changes. He is now taller than average but hunched, with sandy blond hair. He seems to be dressed in rags, and looks like one of the rare homeless individuals that still exist.
Moss is quite upset; apparently the ritual required being begun while Cain was still waking up. Now that he is fully conscious, Moss can’t do what he was supposed to do.
DEE computes that Cain’s trajectory seems to be heading for Mars, the chances of which are of course astronomical. It estimates that Cain will impact Mars in somewhere between 10 and 14 days, and it does appear that the destination is intentional. DEE then releases the tractor beam, and informs the party of Cain’s ETA on Mars.
Moss intends to leave at this point, having transported them all to Lunar City, but he is talked into staying and hiding on DEE’s ship when it arrives. He’s chary of being away from mystic energy, but admits that the safety of being in space is tempting.
Moss is asked what would need to be done to enable him to cast the ritual at this point, and it basically boils down to Cain not being awake and aware. This occasions a massive session of research, as the party frantically searches for some way to hurt Cain, or ideally to actually incapacitate him long enough for Moss to do his thing. With the help of every single person there, DEE’s already not-insignificant skill at surfing the ‘net is boosted to a prodigious amount.
Finally, the research is complete. Ariona, Garibaldi, and Nikolai lend their knowledge of arcane lore, and Nikolai researches specifically artifact weapons of religious legend. There are many ``possibilities;’’ however, the best lead seems to be an ancient weapon that seems to have taken many forms throughout history. One legend involves an ancient blade which severed Cain’s hand. It has been known throughout the ages and different cultures as Excalibur, Mjollnir, and most notably Longinus’ Spear.
Further, these legends lead the party to discover that there are seven artifacts, seven items of legend that appear to take different forms as needed. Some of the most common names for these are: Longinus’ Spear (Excalibur, Mjollnir); Nebuchadnezzar’s Crown (the Crown of Swords); Babylon’s Horn (the Flute); Ambrosia (forbidden fruit, Snow White’s poison apple); Pandora’s Box (Ark of the Covenant, the Obelisk); the Shroud of Turin; and the Eye of Odin (Cain’s Hand, Medusa’s Head).
Who might know where these artifacts are now, particularly the Spear? Well, obviously, the Caretaker might, as might someone very ancient. Someone with extensive arcane knowledge, “perhaps someone with an ability to always know something, perhaps ending in Bullshit' and starting with Bardic’,” or someone with a great deal of knowledge of weapons or the undead might be useful. Someone who has incredibly powerful abilities of divination may also be able to help the party.
The session ends with the party in space on DEE, having researched the night away. The current day is now Friday, June 16th, 2299.