Episode 2 - Turning Mirrors into Windows

Mangas throws the remaining piece of tentacle away, with a look of disgust and contempt on his face.  "The day of the tentacle is over." he gets up, groaning under the pain that starts rushing over him, as the adrenaline fades. He kicks another piece of the monster with his foot  "Don't mess with children, you piece of filth."
Then he looks around to see where his friends and the children are.

After holding his shot, Matt had shot up and after the thing.

As he moved through the dark forest, following the noises, he had suddenly heard a growled, followed by the large splat.
Slowing down he readied his pistol.

Hearing Manga, he speaks up.
“You good Manga?”

Eshe! Where is she? He has to protect her! In a flash he sees a memory of Sophia impaling her and her dissolving into a flurry of leaves. Did that really happen? He forces himself to run back the path he came from. He sees Mat, hears him say something, but does not understand the words. He hobbles past the agent, almost pushing him aside. Eshe! The gods had trusted him with her life! "ESHE!" he sees her lying on the floor at the edge of the forest. Forgotten is his pain. With a few large steps he reaches the young woman and sees that she is alive. Sophia is next to her and without being able to help himself, he puts himself between the two. "Are you ok?"

Despite the water instantly easing her breathing, it takes a few beats for Eshe's muscles to respond to finally being fully oxygenated.  In the time that it takes her to get moving, Sophia is by her side.  A roar which Eshe finds both overwhelming and familiar rings through the air, giving both hunters pause. When no new threat emerges the two young women share a relieved smile.

Thelonius wrote:

"ESHE!"

Mangas is upon them before she can reply to his call, and he quickly fills most of her field of vision. Eshe hears Sophia sniff indignantly, but the divine agent remains silent (for the time being).

Eshe looks at Mangas solemnly, and pats his shoulder.
"There, there," she says, her tone soothing, but perhaps just a touch amused. "I'm fine." She explains to them both that Sophia only struck a manifestation of her patrons's will. Remains to be seen whether they decide that I owe them anything for this intervention. Eshe is careful to avoid invoking the idea of a debt aloud. The Tricksters were always more than happy to accept unsolicited offers of indebtedness, and she had learned that lesson both first and second hand.

"What about the 'fish'? You got it?" She shakes her head. "Of course you did, or you would still be fighting it. What happened?  Is Matty alright? Are you?"  Eshe goes to jump to her feet in order to look Mangas over, almost trips on a root, and with a sheepish, slightly pained grin to him, decides to take in what she can without moving too much.

Mangas, relieved to see Eshe up and about, looks down his own body. Blood is oozing out of various cuts on his legs and torso, his clothes wet with it. He lifts his throbbing hands and turns the palms up to look at them. The palms are two deep flesh wounds, blood pools up quickly in them and starts dripping to the floor. "I'm fine. The Draumavefari djúpanna is dead." He pronounces the word in a foreign, throaty intonation. "We were lucky it was a young one. But it will not weave any more dreams. Where are the children? They will wake up again. Where is Mat?"
Mangas' head starts spinning. As the adrenaline that kept him running leaves his body, the blood loss and exhaustion demand their toll. The large man sits down where he is standing and supports his head with his hands. Blood smears over his face and hair making it a grotesque mask.

Had Mangas said Drama Faerie? It was hard to make out. Either way, she finds that Mangas looks about as terrible as she feels. "I'm texting  Matt to see if we can regroup.  Then maybe you can tell us more about this... euh, creature."  The message to Matthew sent, Eshe contemplates their next steps: find the children, get patched up, leave before they had to answer too many questions.

The Hunters regroup, and then split off to search the woods for the children. It doesn't take too long for them to find the first one, a young girl, hiding in a thicket. It takes a bit of coaxing to get her to come out. When she does, she approaches Eshe, and whispers: "Something's wrong with my hands..." She shows the Chosen. Shining her light on them, Eshe sees that there are sharp, vicious-looking bony protrusions coming out of the top her fingers and hands.

The Hunters find Freddy next, huddled with one of the teenagers. He still has the mucus sack bulging from his throat. The unusually muscular teenager is trying to comfort him. Freddy looks especially small in the teen's arms.

Over the next hour, the Hunters manage to find all of the missing kids and teenagers. Though they all are free from the fish monster's influence, all of them have some sort of physical mutation. The most subtle is the teen's hypertrophic musculature. The most obvious include armored plates on one of the children, and tentacles instead of one of the teens' arms.

Mangas stays in the background during the search. Whenever he spots a child, he signals to the others to approach it, knowing he does not have the best first impression, especially at night, especially him covered in blood, especially after them having been disfigured by a monster. Unfortunately he has experience with situations including all of these factors.
Once all the children are gathered and they regroup, he starts explaining. "I have heard of these kinds of creatures, albeit it's the first time I faced a Draumavefari djúpanna. The fishermen in Northern Europe call them like this. It means something like Dream Weaver from the Depths. But I also heard the name Aboleth. They usually live deep in the ocean and can control other beings with their mind. We were lucky, this one was still young. " with a deeply sad expression he looks at the disfigured children that huddle frightened in the middle of the clearing, incredulously looking at their mutations. Some are weeping. "I don't know whether or how to reverse these horrible things the monster did. But I might know someone who does. We need to get the kids out of the woods, but maybe we should keep them away from the public for now."
He then moves away, pulls out his phone and clumsily types a number. After a few rings the line apparently connects. "Hi Daphne, I need your help..."
He hangs up, stares at the phone for a second, then dials again. Again a few rings and the line connects."It's Mangas, call me back."

Matt had watched as Manga rushed past him, and almost followed , but he needed to make sure.

Moving towards the now dead fish he had checked it over and made sure.

***

After regrouping and finding the kids, Matt had thought making a call, but as Mangas had someone he could call he would leave it to him.

Although the Custodes could take them in, and they would be well taken care of, there was a high chance they would lose their childhood to training…

Although he needed to contact his organization and the FBI, the child came first….

Eshe scoops up the little girl and smiles at her.
"I can see that, and I can tell that you are being very brave." As they approach the other kids, she takes in the scene. Eshe is tempted to try and cheer the children up by referencing any number of cartoon and comic book franchises, but holds off. It is a lot easier to get excited about having powers when their physical manifestations are retractable.

As Mangas steps away to make a call, Eshe addresses the group.
"Hi. My name is Eshe. We're here to help." She nods at the teens, entreating them with her eyes to continue to be supportive of the little ones. "We are going to do three things together, in order.. She counts off on her fingers, "First, is to get you all somewhere where you can warm up, and have a snack. Second is to get some experts to help us understand how your bodies were changed. Third is to call your parents and let them know that you are safe. My friend," she points to Mangas, ""is working on part two, so we better get started on part one. Is there a place around town where we could all stay together for a little bit? And do any of you have allergies, or medic alert bracelets," she again looks to the teens for support with the little ones.

Eshe is braced for if the kids ask why they cannot call their parents first. The answer is shitty, but she knows it will ring true for them: it would be a lot easier on their parents if it was possible to explain what happened to them and whether or not anything can be done about it.

Mangas returns back to the group, stowing away his phone. "I called someone, but it's late, she didn't pick up. I'm sure she will. Until then, nobody leaves, we need everybody together." His tone matches his uncompromising words, his dark aura only emphasising his unintentional "bad cop" appearance. "Do you kids want to come with me, or do you want to go with my friend?" Disappointment and a bit of surprise flash over his face, when all the kids immediately flock around his young friend. It's probably the age difference. he thinks and then turns to cleaning up the fight scene, in order for it to look like a fight with a local animal. This town is not ready for the truth yet...

Though shaky themselves, the teenagers get to work corralling the frightened children. One of them, a boy of about 15 dressed in jeans and a hoodie of some obscure band, approaches the Hunters. He's holding one of his arms out to his side, trying to keep it as far away from himself as possible. The Hunters can see the tip of a tentacle poking out from his sweater's sleeve where a hand should be.

"Look, uh, ma'am," he says to Eshe. "My friends and I can help with the kids, but we're going to need answers. Last I remember, I was heading to the pond, there were some kids there... then I woke up out here with... this..." he says tilting his head towards his tentacle without looking at it. He chuckles nervously. "It's taking all I got not to freak the fuck out and take an axe to it. What the hell happened to us?"

"You've been exposed to a toxin. My crew and I are working on a way to reverse the effects, but that's why we need you close. To monitor your development and to react fast when we have an opportunity."
Turning to the rest, he asks quietly, so the kids cannot overhear him, "Do you know whether there is anything we can do? Mat, do you have someone at the agency, that we can ask?
But first, Sophia, handle the kids and Mat, get the car and bring Eshe and me to the hospital. Work your Agency magic, I cannot handle interrogations... " He sits, exhausted from the short monologue and the pain.

The teenager frowns. His eyes moves as he parses out what Mangas said. After a few seconds he stomps back up to the group of hunters.

"A 'toxin' did this?" he says pulling his sleeve up to show his tentacle. "What the hell kind of tOxIn can do this, give some kid a shell, and another one some sort of weird chin-testies? There aren't no factories around here! Where did this tOxIn come from?" He crosses his arms. Well, arm and tentacle. "I go to school, I know when an adult says some bullshit so we'll sit down and shut up."

OOC:

Eshe looks the youth square in his eyes and nods. "Yes, we are trying to keep everyone sitting quietly, but we're not trying to bullshit you. It basically was a tOxIn, just not a mundane one." She takes a deep breath before continuing.

"When I say mundane, I don't mean small 'm' mundane as in boring. It's capital 'M' Mundane, like of this world. You were exposed to a... Dramafay... Her eyes flick over to Mangas, as if in hopes of that the sight of him might trigger an latent ability to correctly pronounce Draumavefari djúpanna.

"Actually, you know what, I won't even try to pronounce whatever nordic language its name is in. You were exposed to a Dreamweaver; a supernatural creature with all kinds of powers, including mind control and a kind of - for lack of a better term," she emphasizes the latter sheepishly, "toxin.  We are going to do everything that we can to help you, but you have to help us out here. K?"

The hunters see the wheels turning behind the teen's eyes as he processes Eshe's explanation. "Oh... um... ok." He looks at his tentacle and winces, before pulling his sleeve down to hide it.

"I'll, uh... talk to my friends. We'll help you get the kids somewhere safe. One of them suggested their school. It ain't far and they have a cafeteria. A familiar place could help settle them down, I think," he says uncertainly.

Eshe smiles at the teen and looks genuinely grateful, which she is. There are slight dark spots at the edge of her vision which with her focus on the young man before her, she is not yet aware of."The school is a good idea. On top of being familiar, it has already been searched. We can at least buy ourselves a few hours. After that," Eshe pauses, suddenly very aware of the encroaching darkness - was she going to faint? "After that we can keep working to help with… Oh, I think that I need to sit down for a minute." With her head resting heavily on her knees, Eshe continues. "So yeah, we keep figuring out the toxin, and then my friend and I'll go get patched up."
She isn’t sure how credible their bedraggled group looks, but cannot muster the energy to care.

Matt had been staring off into space, pondering over how to go about this when he snapped back.

"Ok. Get the kids somewhere safe and away from prying eyes. We don't want to cause more panic than is necessary. I will get in contact with our FBI friend and then the agency."

He looks over the teens and kids.

"Are all the missing kids accounted for...?"

He felt he knew the answer but hoped he was wrong...

****

While waiting for an answer to the question, he quickly texted a message to Agent Sorreyo.

"Special Investigator Matt here. Confirmed NON STANDARD. Spook taken down. Children currently safe but require NON STANDARD medical exam. Headcheck pending. Call me when available."

After sending the text he sends another one off to the agency.

"Threat designation: Aboleth. Target neutralized. Casualties: Children and teenagers inflicted with a variety of mutations. Need medical assessment and possible treatment ASAP. Local FBI Agent Sorreyo in charge of missing persons case contacted but has no previous experience with non standard cases”

The hunters do a quick headcount and see that all the missing kids are indeed present.

***

After a few moments, Matt's pager vibrates. "Disclosure NOT authorized. Cease all contact with local law enforcement immediately. Send coordinates for extraction of team and casualties, then engage blackout protocol on ALL electronics," the message says, the last part referring to the disposal of the team's communications devices.

The hunters, with the three teens' help, herd the four children to the school. It's a simple matter for them to get inside. The teens take the kids to the cafeteria to get them some snack, while the hunters head to the infirmary for some first aid.

OOC:

EXT. MIDDLEBURG COMMUNITY CHARTER SCHOOL - NIGHT

Two blacks vans and a short bus with tinted windows pull up outside the school. People dressed as EMTs exit the vans with gurneys. Three people exit the bus, a man and a woman dressed in simple, civilian clothing, and one woman dressed in a suit. The civilian-looking man stays outside and lights a cigarette, leaning casually against the bus. His eyes sweep the area, looking for potential threats. Silently, high above the parking lot, a drone circles.

The EMTs, the civilian-looking woman, and the woman in the suit enter the school.

INT. MIDDLEBURG COMMUNITY CHARTER SCHOOL - NIGHT

The besuited woman approaches Matthew. "9941? 8734," she says, all business. She looks around the cafeteria and shakes her head. "What a mess. Cleanup is going to require plenty of legwork." She turns to look at him. "I envy you. You get to skip it and put your legs up at a safehouse," she says. Matthew doesn't buy it. There's something in her tone that tells him the Custodes are displeased.

The EMTs make their way to Eshe and Mangas' side, loading them onto the gurneys and carrying them out to the black vans, whose insides are outfitted like ambulances. They struggle a bit with the large wearbear, the gurney's wheels squealing in protest, but manage to get him into the back.

The civilian woman approaches the kids with a wide smile that doesn't quite reach her eyes. Reassuringly, she tells them that she's here to take them to a special clinic where doctors will see to their ills. She coaxes them out the door and onto the bus. With one last look around, the civilian-looking man climbs aboard. The bus' door shuts with a hiss.

INT. MARYLAND SAFEHOUSE - DAY

The hunters spend the next few days recovering at a Custodes safehouse. Early on, Sophia tells them she needs to leave. There's a matter that requires her urgent attention and she cannot afford to wait until Eshe and Mangas have recovered.

Matthew gets a single report from the Custodes, a couple of days after arriving at the safehouse. "Mutations read as human DNA, native to the victim. They were shaped, not grafted. Solution remains elusive, will require more time."

The hunters learn from the news that Agent Sorreyo has arrested a suspect: Don Sheffield. Traces of blood from the missing children has been found in his truck. Strange, rambling online posts unearthed by the media, as well as his recorded presence at a few of the crime scenes solidified the suspicion. The FBI spokesperson says that they have not found any bodies other than the first one yet, but are confident that it's only a matter of time before their suspect cracks...

OOC:

Getting Mangas onto the gurney is an endeavour in itself, but given enough sedatives, the EMTs manage to strap him down. After the procedure, none of the EMTs allow the sedatives drop below a critical level.

Mangas remains heavily sedated until his most critical wounds have been attended to, but as soon as his sedation drops to the point that he is somewhat conscious, he leaves. He returns to the local safe house in hopes of finding the rest.

Eshe does not have the energy to interrogate the woman in the suit as to the fate of the children. In fact, as soon as the Custodes arrive, the last of the adrenaline leaves her body, and she allows herself to check out for a bit.  Matty'll take care of things, is her final, self-soothing thought before drifting off.

At the safehouse Eshe just about manages a tear tearless goodbye with Sophia. They may have started out as rivals of a sort, but had become fast friends in a field that did not readily allow for them. The news of Don's arrest is equally upsetting.

"I know that life isn't fair, but this really sucks! Even once the agency helps the kids and returns them to the town,  Don's never going to his life back."  

With no immediate recourse and a lot of very immediate frustration, Eshe trains as hard as her recovering body will allow.

Matthew hadn't said much since that night.

He knew the Custodes. He hoped they would help the kids but how much would be help and how much would be "weaponizing" was the big question.

And Don...As much as he was a nosey character, he didn't deserve this....

Saying goodbye to Sophie was a brief thing. That got easier the longer he was in the agency....this probably wasn't a good thing.

*****

"You are right...although he stuck his nose in things he didn't understand, he doesn't deserve this....I can try and reach out the agency, but I'm not exactly in their good books right now"