[Intermission]: Gathering shadows, part1

Springfield, industrial district

The sun was getting down, throwing long shadows on the industrial landscape. Whereas residential or commercial districts were full of people going home, shopping, or kids playing in the streets, this part of town was pretty dead at this hour. The afternoon shift was already gone, the night one already at work, only an odd delivery truck or lost driver could be seen in these streets.

For Seymour it was different: he was happy to walk his old beat. After 25 years of patrolling this district, between factories and warehouses, he knew every street, alley and corner. He had retired years ago, but when he was bored he liked to walk this familiar place, greeting the foremen and supervisors, getting a cup of coffee or a doughnut while chatting about the last game or what is happening in the world today. Today, it was too late for this. Usually he would be at home eating dinner with his wife, but since the **** of Selma he was barely eating.

Suddenly, in the alley between a warehouse and a slaughterhouse, Seymour noticed something strange. There was an odd noise, muted, distorted by some echo. It sounded like someone was crying, crying so much that they couldn't catch their breath correctly.

Years of training and honed instincts pulled him into the murky sidestreet; he couldn’t ignore whoever it was, especially when the sobbing sounded so familiar. The voice echoed through the alleyway, resounding off the close walls. Seymour looked for the source of the crying, noticing a smaller path off to the right along the back of the slaughterhouse. If he listened closely, it seemed the wailing came from that direction.

He followed into the darker shadows, hurried walking turning to a run as the noise got louder and louder. The weight of years seemed to fade from his tired old body as time rewound with the adrenaline rush of his mission. This was what he’d missed, what had been absent for so long from his life. Purpose. A plea for help to run towards.

At the next corner he came to a halt, faced with an open manhole cover. The auditory trail he’d followed came from within, now reduced to a much quieter sniffling and the occasional hiccup. Someone must have fallen in, though he couldn’t understand why the manhole had been opened. He walked to the side and looked down. It was too dark to see past the first few rungs of the rusted ladder, but the crying had stopped.

“H…hello?” the voice of a young girl, almost exactly like his neighbor’s daughter, came from the depths. “Is someone there? I’m stuck! I'm so cold!"

“It’s ok, I’m here to help. Everything’s going to be fine,” Seymour said gently and knelt by the side of the manhole. He wished he still had his police flashlight, but he’d had to return that with his badge and gun when he retired. It was too dark to make out any of the details within.

“Promise? It’s scary in here…I've been stuck here for a whole day. I'm hungry!”

Seymour leaned over the edge and smiled broadly for the girl to see, “I promise. Let me give you a hand. We'll get you something to eat and bring you back to your parents.” He reached over the edge. Suddenly, all he could see were two red glowing eyes, illuminating a row of sharp, white teeth. A hand grabbed his arm, nails digging into his flesh, and pulled him inside the hole. "Aaaaaaarrrrrrrggggg!!!"

A few seconds later a grey skinned, bloodstained arm reached for the cover and dragged it over the manhole as if the inch thick cast iron plate was made of cardboard.

"I'm so hungry...."

Secret dungeon: junkyard barrier rank 2

The tunnels of the mysterious concrete building were silent and lifeless. It would take a long time for the surrounding rats to decide to settle it again. Only one thing was disturbing the perfect order of this place. A silhouette, wearing a hooded robe made of stitched skin, was walking in it. It was leaving deep claw marks in the ground as well as a furrow where its thick tail was dragging in the putrid dirt covering the concrete floor. The walking staff it used was topped by a skull, one which could have been human but was strangely off enough to make one doubt its origin.

From place to place, the intruder stopped and knelt, touching the scorch marks left on the walls, ground or some bodies with a huge clawed paw. The shadows of the hood were concealing all but a short scaly snout of the individual. A long forked tongue slithered out at regular intervals, after which the creature changed direction, as if guided by something.

Its final stop was a very large, circular room at the center of the structure, where a the body of a very large rat was beginning to decay in the noxious environment.

Dipping the end of its staff in the blood of the monster, the hooded figure traced a circle on the ground, adding runes and glyphs around it. It began chanting in a language made mostly of hisses and clicks, before stopping to remove its hood.

The lizard man, a bit taller than mansized, was jet black with a pattern of bright red scales. It fell to his knees in front of circle and began to gag, taken by convulsions. It ended by him vomiting some igneous fluid into the circle.

The molten rock was burning the sludge, emitting an acrid smoke, but soon a pair of bright eyes appeared in it.

"She was here! She embraced the gift! The prophecy was true, and the bride lives. Hail Tarkos!" said the lizardman.

A deep chuckle was the only response he obtained, followed by a mad laugh. The eyes in the pool of fire disappeared, but the following second the creature's eyes began to burn in the same manner.

Shedding away the Elf skin robe, the laughing lizard, possessed by his god, paced around, feeling the magic traces left by the fight which had happened there in the afternoon.

"Perfect, yes... She'll do nicely! My perfect bride!" said the fire spirit just before his presence became too much for his host and the body turned to ashes on the spot.

Velvet Curtain night club, Chicago.

Four people wearing dark business suits were standing in front of a desk in the dimly lit but luxurious office. Behind the desk, a huge man wearing a similar suit was smoking a large cigar emitting some blue smoke. He was oddly proportioned, looking more like a small ogre than a big human.

"Sum o' ya wanna do sum explaining? Grego? Wanna tell me how you didn't catch some asshole who burglarized some clients? Steph? Wanna tell me how you ended with yer tits hanging out and the punk running away almost between your legs? Someone?" he growled.

Grego, a tall and muscular tanned enforcer with a buzz cut tried to explain. "Don Scalarfane! We don't know who this was! He left no magic trace, no DNA, no prints and no item to track him with. In and out, directly for the penthouse. Kicked their bodyguard, left the two cunts out cold, took some cash and jewelry before leaving. He had some shape-shifting or illusion charm, and I'm sure that he had his escape route planned out from the start. Probably used a feather fall charm or something. A real pro, he didn't even drop a body, but there are no witnesses with any intel on him."

"Not yer fault, hey? Isn't that a good excuse? Forget about it! Don Vanta has organized a friend pit fight for Thursday. She has bought a new owlbear; if you hold until the fourth round I won't kill you myself!" replied the ogre like Don Scalarfane. "Steph, when I send ya ta get someone's head I don't want you to give them head! We're a legitimate organization; this is not a whorehouse! Anything to say?"

"Don Scalarfane, please! This guy was prepared; we checked the cameras. He arrived wearing a gas mask, he had bombs filled with some sleeping gas, spells. The shit he threw at me ate my suit like wet cotton candy. He must have scoped the place out for weeks, getting the floor plans, passes, every exit listed. This was not a random hit. We found one of the cunts in the penthouse totally naked, no idea if he did something to her though. He even minuted the thing just right to jump on a train and escape the earthing rod," replied the woman, looking out of place here with her red pointy hair and glowing eyes. The busty woman was twitching constantly, as the borrowed vest that she was wearing was scratching her boobs, with them being too big for it.

"Yeah, I canna let it slip though. Donna Alba is throwing one of her little parties. Something intimate, no more than 3000 guests. I proposed your services, and you're booked for the next three weeks. And don't worry about the suit, you won't have need of it while the new one is being tailored!" he told her, laughing loudly. He then turned to the other two men in the room. "You two have one week to find who hit us and made us look like fools. If it is not done in time, you are on alligator duty in the sewers for the next ten years!"

The Don dismissed them and once alone filled a large glass with some liquor. A spilled drop began to eat the desk, leaving a dent in it. Don Scalarfane drank the glass bottoms up and pulled on his huge cigar.

"Damn, who is crazy enough to hit us in Chicago and get away with it!"