The Call of Madness pt 2

[chimera0010]

THE FIRST RIFTS

Jacob left the school, hopping on his motorcycle to go see hsi friend Neil at the Magic Shoppe. The place was not far from the school, it was mostly a gag shoppe with costumes, magic tricks for parties, and joke props. His friend Neil ran the store during after school hours and weekends for his folks. Jacob and Neil had a special connection. Both of them loved the occult and often visited the Curiosity store when they had some extra money to buy some weird antiques.

Jacob walks into the store. The place was general deserted due to the fact people where a bit skiddish about the word "magic". Neil was reading an old journal, trying to translate the old writing. It was an old cracked leather book, He was busy trying to translate the german note pages that laid between the much older pages that were written in Arabic. Neil was sort of an occult buff, even had a large assortment of Dungeons and Dragons products stacked in his room along with many things from Lord of the Rings.

Neil was kind of the school nerd. Always dressed clean, white shirts, slacks, suspenders, glasses, hair properly combed. He was the GO-TO guy for Jacob even when they where kids. He knew alot more than Jacob and with that new spell, Jacob was decidedly the brawns of this friendship. Neil was also very thin and weak, he spent more time in his books than in the gym, even managed to alter the school records to excuse himself from ever participating in P.E. to avoid the bullies in the locker room. Neil looks up and adjusts his glasses, "Woah! It seems that spell worked on ya bro!"

Jacob flexed a few times, still admiring his new body. "Yeah it did, a little too well, I started growing during class for some reason...." He showed his torn shirt and ripped holes in his pants. Neil looked them over, secretly admiring his handywork, he always had a thing for Jacob but would never admit it openly to his best friend. "So what happened Jacob?"

Jacob looked around to see if there was any customers, seeing all was clear he related everything. How he got horny, how he could feel the negative tension in the room, how he kept growing in the bathroom. Neil nodded and looked over the spell from the book he was translating. reading the lines several times and taps the page and grins. "Yep right here, the spell is a blood rite, drawing on negative energy to give your body strength and power. Lust also being a negative energy also activated it, and the envious looks from everyone was also a negative so you basically grew from the negative energy and your body simply reacted."

Jacob nods and takes it into consideration. He looks over the book that Neil was translating. To him alot of it was jibberish, though he was able to translate parts of the book Neil gave him which was mostly french and arabic. "Hey you missed the lecture today, some weirdo talked about this same stuff we have been researching." Neil did not look up, he did not seem too interested in a guest speaker who is not even known in the occult circles. Jacob looks back at the odd book. "I still got that odd lamp we baught at the shoppe, and some of those pages got translated...."
Neil looks up finally showing interest. "And?"

Jacob looks around and then looks back at Neil. "Well I read some of it last week, a few prohpecies here and there. It looked like I stumbled onto something big. I looked around town since the book did belong to one of our founding fathers, and seen the signs described in the book, often indicating a terrible omen of the coming of an ANCIENT ONE." Neil looked a little spell bound, apparently he read something similiar in his own book.
"Tonight, is a full moon, a blood red one. This is the final omen indicated by the book. Dude if this is true, and that negativity absorbing spell works, I am gonna be fricken huge, ripped, and a hero!"

Neil rubbed his nose at the idea and looked at the book he was reading. He flipped through some pages back to the beggining and cleared his throat. "Well after my failed attempt at boot camp, You know I tried to become a stage magician, which proved to be a successful venture, and then there is our longing for real magic. Well few months after i got my birthday party gig, this weird woman shows up. My God she was smoking hot, but the air around her was ice cold like she was the angel of death. She handed me a few papers from a book called "The Necronomicon". I was very intrigued and began to pour all my time into figuring out the txts."

He adjusts his glasses, "But the more I read, the less I wanted to know. It seems that This town is connected to alot of that mess. I seen many of the same prophecies and signs in my book as well. Tonight is the big night when all of this is supposed to go down. However I dont know which ancient one this town worships, no one knows." He stands up, and looks out the window at the blood red moon.

-------ELIZABETH THOMPSON--------
Elizabeth stood at the train station. She was dressed in a tan mini skirt with a white blouse and black shades. She was holding a letter left to her by her 16 year old sister Isabella. The writing was incoherent babbling, some wiriting about men in black cloaks following her all over town, hoof prints in the woods, an enourmous goat demon. The letter was partially stained with blood, and the ink smudges show she wrote it in a hurry as the end of the letter says she is leaving Alaric as quickly as possible before her dream visions come to pass.

She looks around the train station, the desk clerk claims he never seen any girls come this way in the past couple weeks. She did not trust him, however since Isabella was a bit unhinged from all this odd nonsence she thought it best to go downtown to check out the Bedlam Asylum. Bedlam was a copy of the same sanitorium from England. However on this night, the loons seem more riled up than usual. One thing she learned to avoid in that place thanks to some of the school gossip was Nurse Heather. She was a squat 40 year old nurse who was was mean and evil as the place was crazy. Many of the students who came here complaining about seeing shadow men and odd demons where subjected to her whims of torture.

Elizabeth sneaks into the doctor's office and finds a book of helpful notes gathered from inmate interviews. She finds a couple clues in the pages. Several of them speak of shadow people moving around the halls, seen out of the corner of the eye and vanish when you look right at them. The shadows forming shapes sometimes and becoming living monsters. Another clue shows many of the patients having prophetic dreams of a horrific demon coming to devour the world. The bottom notes on those dreams suggested the patients be moved to the coma ward under the administration of Nurse Heather.

Just as she sneaks out of the Asylum, she overhears the tv in the security guards office. The office was empty but the Tv was on. She closed the door quietly and ducked low, listening to what was going on in the Evening news.

HEADLINE: Goat-like Creature Spotted in the Woods!

Eye witness captures a weird goat like creature early this evening that walked on its hind legs and had the upper body of a human being!
In furthe reports, many police offers and eyewitnesses have witnessed strange happenings inside Independence Square with a monster siting moving from the square to the downtown streets.. More news later this evening!

　

-----------JACOB MATHIS-------
Jacob leaves the Magic Shoppe, and hops on his motorcycle. He can feel the darkness gathering in the air. One of his stops on his to do list was to check out a house in the Merchant District called "The Unnamable". This house was never named. Mostly due to the fact 7 families died in that house, each one from occult workings or from an insane family member. For Jacob it was a good place to go snooping for clues at to what kind of evil is plaging this town.

He parks his bike and walks up to the locked door. His clothes feeling a little tighter than normal as the dark energies fill his body. He grips the door knob....locked. He grips the door and rams it with his shoulder, forcing the door open. The house was dark, dusty, and abandoned. He found a couple clues lying about, mostly just old texts speaking of "the Black Mother" and ritual offerings every 50 years.

Before he could make it to the stairs leading to the bedrooms on the second floor he hears the ceiling creak. Sawdust falls as the beams start to give way. He pumps his thighs hard as he leaps out of the living room, rolls off the porch, and makes his way to the street. The living room is caved in. He huffs and puffs, feelings his clothes tighten again, a clear sign there is lots of dark energy. But as soon as his clothes almost begin to tear apart, his muscles shrink down some. What ever it was, it did not wanting him snooping in the town's murder house. He dusts himself off and turns on his bike. The radio kicks in, filling the soundwaves with another news report. He listens close, wondering what kind of hell is breaking loose in his town.

HEADLINE: Solar Eclipse!

A sudden Solar Eclipse has cast the skies into sudden darkness. Citizens are advised to stay indoors and do not look at the sky for any reason. Scientists cannot figure out why the Eclipse has happened when one is not even been schedualed for this month. Many citizens are claiming the end is near!
In further News, a strange woman is seen walking in Rviertown Streets from the graveyard, putting several police and citizens to sleep with a strange song.

--------NEIL McDagger---------
Neil leaves the Magic Shoppe and heads for the Silver Oak Lodge. It was supposedly a man's gathering place like the Free Masons or the Shriners. However Neil knew better. He found out the Lodge was a secret meeting place for black arts practioners. Goin in to the lobby he keeps his cool. He is quickly approached by Carl Sanford. He was a creepy old man and the chairman of the lodge. He puts an arm around Neil and smiles. "Care to join the order young man?"

Neil-"me?"

Carl-"yes, you, it was foretold you would come, the eager young magician. We have been waiting for you to gain the courage to enter our lodge and join us, the time is coming close for the gathering, and we always need new members to replace the old ones. The offer is simple, since its such a special night, we offer you this once in a lifetime membership for a low price of 30.00. Can you honestly beat that?"

Neil hesitates then whips out 30.00 from his wallet. Carl takes it and hands, Neil a membership card and an odd box. He explains membership at the lodge entitles him to all the lodge's secrets and use of their artifacts. However, since he is a member he cannot divulge any secrets to outsiders or bring guests with him. Before Neil could ask a question, Carl vanished like a true stage magician in a puff of smoke. Neil opens the box, finding the parts to assemble an Enchanted Sword. The blade was in two peices as was the handle and guard. The guard looked like a 6 armed God with snake tails for legs, a large penis, and goat horns sprouting from his head. The blade pecies had strange writing on them that he could not translate.

Just as he gets ready to leave, he sits and assembles the sword, listening to a sudden news bulliten on the radio. It seems something is going on besides the sudden eclipse that struck the town moments before, turning a normal 4pm in the afternoon into a midnight hour time of day.

HEADLINE:Witch Burning Anniversary!

Today marks the burning of a dangerous Witch almost 150 years ago. Agatha De La Morea was accused on the charges of necromancy, demonology, conjuration, and seduction through witchcraft. Though many eyewitnesses claimed she did these crimes, only evidence found was a spell book written in a strange language. On the day of her burning, she foretold the day when the Old Gods will return and claim the souls of the township in vengence.
In further news, a strange event is happening on the Unvisted Isle. As many know, the isle was an old spot for many occult sacrafices and was labled as a forbidden zone for any one to go near.
Some citizens have called in, saying a strange cloaked figure has been seen leaving the Isle and Heading to the Merchant District Streets.