Critiquing Evidence

Tuesday afternoon, July 15

Colleen Thomson was facing a bunch of charges levelled by STRIKE FORCE, so the party gathered in STRIKE FORCE HQ (in Philadelphia). With them was Lieutenant Prospero, Colleen, her lawyer Carole Christie, and Captain Lassard.

They had a questioning session, and went through Colleen's charges, one by one:

Infiltration of STRIKE FORCE

Back in 2009, the Gem of the Veil (allows the owner to identify veil-creatures and type) was much more costly than it is today. In 2011, Mage-Tech (a large magical R&D operation run by the Mages) had made a major techno-magical break-through in the production of these gems. Production no longer required the essence of a ghost, or the entrapment of a ghost, that was required formerly. This allowed the gems to be made far more cheaply and fast, and thus, today, they are more ubiquitous.

So, back in 2009, STRIKE FORCE had to rely on its members who had the Sixth Sense ability to vet new applicants to the organization; STRIKE FORCE, of course, did not want veil creatures in its ranks! Corporal Trent Howes was the recruitment officer on the day when Colleen joined, and a Corporal Filling was his magical vetter. It turned out that Filling was a lazy sod, and had neglected to vet Colleen at all. Trent wasn't very pedantic on the rules and he had ticked the "veil check" box on Colleen's application form. Thus she had entered the STRIKE FORCE mundane section as a veil creature, strictly against protocol.

"I wonder how many other veil creatures snuck into STRIKE FORCE then?" said Reggie.

"Only three," said Colleen smugly. "But I outed them."

Bewitching of a STRIKE FORCE Officer

In 2009, Colleen started her career as an Admin flunky in the STRIKE FORCE mundane section. She caught the eye of a Lieutenant Lassard, and he made her his PA. Due to Colleen's fae powers, and her fetish Dolly, she helped Lassard achieve a remarkable collection of successes, thus he rose through the STRIKE FORCE ranks, and was promoted to Captain. Then he was set in charge of STRIKE FORCE New York.

All this time, no-one knew Colleen was a fae. Throughout all this, Lassard and Colleen fell in love. So, in some ways, he was bewitched.

Siri was called in, and she conducted some tests on Lassard. She could find no traces of magical bewitchment.

"But that doesn't preclude true love," she smiled.

Lassard agreed to go with Jacob and Reggie to a neurologist. Lassard was in the early stages of dementia. They concluded that, without Colleen's help, he probably couldn't do his job.

Accessory to murder of Trent Howes.
Accessory to escape of Werewolf Reginald Maudling.

Back in 2012, werewolf Maudling was sentenced to be executed by firing squad, and was on Death Row (in New York) awaiting this. Lieutenant Lassard and Colleen went into his cell to question the werewolf on another matter and when they left, Colleen had closed his cage door. She had not been trained on the Oldershaw lock that held Maudling's cage closed, and so she didn't latch it correctly. Maudling escaped soon after, killed Trent Howes who was the guard, and got away.

There was an extensive enquiry after the fact, and its main conclusion was "Lack of Training", and piled no blame on Colleen at all. If anything, Howes was the assigned guard, so he ought to have activated the Oldershaw lock himself.

Suspecting the worst, the party sent the mugshot of Maudling to Juan, still embedded in the Morte Christe bikers, and sure enough, Maudling was there. He was using a different name: Wilfred Owens.

Accessory to assault of Cletis Crawdad, twice.

In 2013, Cletis Crawdad was one of a group that STRIKE FORCE was hunting for armed robbery. (Even though Crawdad was a human, his group was known to have veil creatures, hence STRIKE FORCE got involved.) Colleen, a non-combatant,  was left with the vehicles while the rest of the heavily-armed squad entered the building. Unknown to them, Crawdad had snuck around and got to the vehicles. He surprised Colleen, took her captive, and raped her. Eventually, the squad arrived back, dropped him and rescued Colleen. Tempers were high, and Crawdad was badly beaten up by them.

Two weeks later, Crawdad was being transported out, chained up, and Colleen beat him up again herself. Lassard helped.

Although these assaults were noted at the time, no-one worried that they had happened.

Cletis Crawdad was later taken to the Philadelphia Eastern State Penitentiary, under Warden Clam, where he "escaped" in 2014, and joined Morte Christe bikers q.v.

Grand theft of STRIKE FORCE property: Toyota Prius

The Toyota Prius in question was the very car that Colleen had driven down to Philadelphia yesterday. It was formerly Lassard's but he had gifted to Colleen.


After hearing all this, lawyer Carole was pretty sure she could get all the charges dropped. Prospero agreed, and he concluded that the only reason that this witch hunt had begun was that Major Ewing hated fae. With this in mind, Prospero planned to go over Ewing's head, to the STRIKE FORCE commander of the entire USA, Lieutenant-Colonel Spalling.

"We better check who Spalling hates," said Leon.

They had a look through STRIKE FORCE's records at Spalling's distinguished career . It was pretty obvious: the number of werewolves that had died in Spalling's missions out-numbered all the other veil creatures three to one.

It was also concluded that Colleen would no longer be able to be part of STRIKE FORCE, and without her, Lassard should really resign his commission. Especially considering his dementia.

"I'm getting too old for this, anyway," he quipped wryly.

Tuesday afternoon, later, July 15

With his wedding exactly two weeks away (on 29th), Sledge phoned his mum with a bunch of last-minute panics. But his mother and fiancee had everything in hand.

"But you will need to choose a best man, dear," said Mrs Hammer patiently. "And get a suit for him and yourself. Safiya has sent through the correct colour for your bow-tie and cummerbund."

Sledge looked at his phone forlornly: "Contacts deleted."

It always said that.

Sledge eyed Reginald.

"You're my best man, Corporal Gates," he ordered.

"It would be an honour, sah," snapped Reggie.

"Your first duty. Contact my wife-to-be, and get the colour of the bow-tie and the cummer thing."

Yes, sah."

Tuesday night, July 15

Safely ensconced in his five-dot safe-house, Reggie, Jacob, Sledge and Leon slept the sleep of Morpheus.

Back in the Elfrith Alley apartment, Mina arrived to be greeted by Ebony and Theo.

They were pondering over a letter sent to them by Ms Anderson, Oberon's PA:

Dear party,

How are you?
I am good too.

On June 15th you struck a deal with my Lord Oberon that you would
provide him a certain weekly payment as lease for your Elfrith Alley
apartment. A certain tasty payment that he would savour.

You are four weeks in arrears.

Please expedite this matter forthwith.

Kisses
Ms Anderson, for Oberon Sanchez

This payment was, of course, a "drink". The party had done this once, back when they first took up the Elfrith Alley lease (they found a volunteer who didn't mind losing some blood), but lately had been distracted by their missions, and had forgotten about it.

The apartment was still valuable to them, and Abu ought to make a break-through any day now - he was still coming daily to work on the hieroglyphics of the tomb down in the cellar.

There was nothing for it: Ebony headed off to vampire Oberon at his offices Khyber Pass Bar & Grill.

It seemed Oberon wanted lives, now, not just drinks, and Ebony was not sure that she should deliver lives to him. Plus she was worried about her soul [[ Morality stat ]] if she headed down this dark path.

"You can do something else for me," smiled Oberon. "I gave you those rings for a reason. Go seek out Defacto. Maybe I clear your debt then."

Tuesday midnight, July 15

Defacto's business card detailed his address, so Ebony headed there.

Sure enough, in the morgue under the University of Pennsylvania: Abramson Cancer Centre Hospital, she found him. Like Oberon, Defacto was surrounded by a group of women, and some other vampires.

 Defacto was amused to see her. He straight away had a job to test her and her party's skills:
There was a warehouse in Fishtown. On the corner of Webb St and East Albert St.

"Raze it to the ground," he said.