atolnon | [Awakening] Some Intro Fiction

I wrote some fiction to serve as an introduction to my one-or-two shot Mage game. I've been wanting to Storytell/DM for kind of a while now, and since Exalted is dragging a little bit, I decided to let us get our fix by running a game for between one and three people. It's a little long. Comments and suggestions welcome. Fiction below the cut.

happened on 11/17/98, which didn't correspond to any particular known data points on record. I attempted to check with

some awakened in the area to see if there were any historical events that they could point to in reference to the area,

but unsurprisingly, the area was mostly devoid. Records maintained in Chicago indicate that Mr. XXXXX (i) and Mr.

XXXXX abide in the city ^* which is a fairly lucky break, because it should prevent me from taking any more days off

work.

DuBois died in '00, of thyroid cancer, but Redmond opened the door to the three-room flat the two of them

had shared since the late 80's. I'm not sure if it's of any interest, but the old man seems fully in touch with his faculties,

compiling his notes from the early 60's and after. The whole flat was a mess of coffee-stained manuscripts indicating

he'd been working despite his retirement from field work. Kind of strange how we just let him fall out of the loop like

that. Can we check on him at the Chicago office? (1)^*

I transcribed the interview with Redmond on tape. (2)^*ⁱ There was a lot of interesting stuff on there, but I

compiled only what I thought was pertinent. The tape is included with this manuscript, though, so I'm sure you'll check

into this.

“....this was back in 1976, so the area was really more of a suburb then anything else at the time.

Did Lana ever take off? (more distant)(3)^*3 I rely on her more then I should these days. I can't cook

worth a damn. You know that, Ms. Kestral?”

(close to the recorder) “No, Mr. Richmond.”

(closer now, clatter of crockery) “You want a BLT? This bacon is real good. Crisp lettuce.”

“No thanks.”

“We drove up from Atlanta all the way to Chicago. DuBois, April, and myself,we thought we'd

stop in and see a friend of ours who'd settled in East St. Louis. That was Phillip Rogers Tchaikovsky,

who moved from the Ukraine in, uh... 1925, I think. Anyhow, he settled in Illinoistown around then, so

he missed the race riots by awhile, but you could still feel the aftershocks. Something like that doesn't

just dissapear, even if the government wishes it would.(1)¹ Anyway, Phillip settled down there, and sort

of helped out in the community for a while, but when he moved to a new apartment closer to where he

worked, he wrote me and told me he was havin' trouble with spooks and other sorts of problems. So we

was going up there to have a chat like we used to, but this was kind of a good excuse. ...

....in any case. The situation turned out to be much worse then we thought. We knocked on the

door, and certainly didn't get any response, so after a little while, we decided to just let ourselves in

with the spare key he had under the stoop. Wasn't nothing wrong with the place except that it felt

kinda cold for the season, and Dubois certainly knew better. Old Phillip wasn't pulling our legs; that

place was definitely a haint.”

“How common is that?”

“Well, not too terribly uncommon. You know, lots of places with history will be haints to

some degree or another, and that's to be expected. This place was real bad, though. (2)²

“Did you hear something?” - Me

“Yeah. Lana, that you?” (scrambling of the recorder) “I don't think that's anything. You see

if there was anyone outside doin' anything when you came in?”

“Like construction? Nothing.”

“It was darker then anything, in that basement and smelt more like someone pissed on a car

battery. (static) ...and there he was ****ngled on the floor. (static) ...smelt awful, as you can

imagine. (static, someone's whispering into the recorder?) ...I didn't remember seeing a sideroom, but

there it was. (sounds like the tape is rewinding or forwarding. I can't make out the voices int his)

shadows where there shouldn't of been. We never saw anything, but we went there with April. ...April,

you know, April...

there was kind of a whole where we thought there'd been a door, but it didn't lead nowhere.

You'd feel gravity sucking at your whole body, you stick your arm in that hole. (static, someone was

talking in this. I heard screaming. You can hear screaming, too.

“April was supposed to be outside. We didn't see her again.”

I'm honestly not sure what happened here. The text seems to indicate some

kind of real distress, mental or otherwise. The footnotes don't seem to indicate

any such thing. What's odd is that Kestrel was a competent Time mage, but

something was interfering with her capacity to verify her cassette records, which

were ostentatiously part of a ritual designed to allow for easy access to all

relevant information from this period.

This is the last incident of reporting from Kestrel I was able to locate

easily. Is she available for comment? I hope my added footnotes didn't detract

from the integrity of the piece. -Dusty

*i Determined to be Richmond and DuBois, and referred to such hereafter, with the aforementioned to demonstrate how they were initially referred to. - Dusty

*1 Richmond is dead. Died in his sleep in '04. The building is on record as being condemned since '02, and nobody ever did. I've sped along the process. It's rubble now.

*2 I don't have any fucking tape. ii

ii - This footnote is really atypical for Kestral. - Dusty

*3I had to insist on his help leaving. I think that she was as much on guard duty as she was hired to cook and clean. Lana was particularly fit, but other then that, really nondescript. Looking back on the scene, I'd say it was supernaturally so.

1He's referring to the fact that the US Government refused to release any information about the race riots in 1917 until 1986.

2I lost a large amount of audio on the tape, which doesn't make any sense at all. I can't even go back and recall it.

[Awakening] Some Intro Fiction

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