(I'm afraid this update will be brief and too the point as the long break, and a head full of cold leaves me a bit vague on the details of last session) I do recommend people glance over the last few updates before this to get them selves freshened up on the plot scenario.


[After beginning the Sultan engineering investigation under Markels direction the amalgam had recovered another strange artifact, had their minds "supposedly"!! wiped, lost the CEO of Sultan Engineering near a farmstead outside Moscow causing the company to pretty much dissolve and vanish, witness a raid on the museum by vampires and Zukov had been captured by what is likely one of the seven stars working with the vampire elder.]


Session 14

Agents Hurst, Krenyenko, and Oleg along with a couple of HitMarks raided the penthouse apartment of Konstantin Thon a Toreador Vampire and childe of the toreador elder Alexander Vedernikov who is holding agent Zukov hostage and demanding the magical artifact Urn/Jar from the Museum be handed over. The raid was highly successful and three hermetically sealed caskets were recovered, scans showed that they contained the bodies of three vampires.

Dr Volyova was strangely absent from recent events, although she had been seen spending a lot of time down in Yankovich's labs and the occasional view of her suggested she had put on some weight. The official line was that Dr Yankovich was conducting further assessment of her after the time travel incident and the following "mental attacks" suffered by the amalgam.

The interrogation of the captured vampires was conducted by Krenyenko and Oleg who kept the kindred sealed in their caskets in a sunlit room. The interrogation of the conscious and resisting Konstantine Thon revealed that Alexander had been making a deal with a group of strange mortals with great power, their representative calling himself the 4th Star was always masked and eerily silent in public. Alexander and this 6th star had made a deal: Alexander would recover a supernatural artifact from the museum and protect it from other parties and in return this 6th star had promised to give Alexander the upper hand over his rivals for power over the kindred in the city. The events of the previous few evenings however had changed things when the vampire had sent a team into get the item from the museum someone had already been there in the process of extracting it. The Vampire had slaughtered the thieves who were seemingly nothing more than mortal mercenaries. The item was brought to Alexander at the Bolshoi theater where he held court only to discover the artifact to be a fake. He did not have time to place blame when the man responsible burst in on the Elysium. From what Konstantin knows as he was no actually there himself this man fought the entire court killing several kindred and many ghouls but was finally brought down by the elder Alexander himself, who then realizing that whoever this man worked for must be in possession of the original Urn Artifact, took his prisoner to a secret haven located in an converted church in a small town called Vnucova 20 miles outside of Moscow. Konstantine also thinks that it is likely the 6th star is there with him.

The other two caskets are also investigated and contain the sleeping forms of Konstantin's coterie mates Sadina Ivonova and Karl Lavoski. The interrogation of the vampires abruptly ends when a toxic gas is released from one of the caskets. luckily no one was severely harmed.

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Meanwhile, Zucovs last memory was of smashing his own brains out against the metal bars of his cramped cage. Now he is running wildly through the souks of Damascus clutching a wooden box tightly to his chest. The streets are noise and crowded but he must keep running, they are getting closer. He dives down a side street still trying to reconcile what the hell is going on, only knowing that he must avoid capture at all costs. Turning a corner he stops dead in his tracks the way bared by a formation of soldiers leveling crossbows at him. The hard fast pounding of Zukovs heart slows as also the rest of the world slows around him. Pulling a disk like device from a belt pouch Zukov begins to spin it on the palm of his hand. It begins with a whirring noise that builds to a crescendo of raw energy violently leaping from the disk a striking everything and anyone nearby. Those touched by the raw primium energy explode as their avatars violently awaken. Chaos...!

People all around are vanishing, exploding, burning, freezing, melting and decomposing. Zukov moves calmly through the chaos a disappears down a side street. The dream fades and Zucov finds himself standing in an oddly empty space, lit by an unseen source think fog swirls around.

Out of the shadows walks a familiar face, Bogdan Knoss. This time he looks solid and less aged as he warmly greets Zukov. He explains that he has come to present the evidence he promised and in return requires Zukovs help to bring him safely into the Union. He also warns that what he is about to reveal if used wrongly would seriously harm the Unions position in Moscow and likely bring about the liquidation of the UMC as a front for the technocracy.

The two talk for sometime, firstly Bogdan explains that he is not just a random mage wanting to defect, he was once a member of the now long vanished craft masons and that he was part of the movement that was to eventually bring about the union, hence his wish renounce reality deviance and to become a technocrat rather than join with the traditions. He tells of how he was betrayed by fellow member of his own movement who revealed his sanctum to a cabal of tradition mages tasked with the hunting down of these radical daedaleans. This cabal was called the 7 stars.

The conversation then turned to more modern topics, the 7 stars where here in Moscow. Obviously not the same mages who hunted Bogdan but mages with the same purpose. Their agenda is to complete the destruction of Bogdan which their predecessors had failed to do and also to compromise the union in this part of the world corrupting it so that reality deviance can thrive. Bogdan thinks that the ruling council (Symposium) of technocrats responsible for the Unions presence in Moscow and the surrounding area have already been compromised although he is unsure as to who maybe under the seven stars influence.

The symposium is also aware of Bogdans existence and it has long been a topic of debate amongst the high level technocrats who know of him if what should be done about him. However up until recently with the discovery of the artifacts raising Bogdan from his slumber, it has all been hypothetical. Control has left the final decision of what is done about the Bogdan Knoss anomaly up to the symposium although they have recommended that they proceed with extreme caution. The symposium is now completly divided on the problem, Several members believe that the artifacts should be destroyed outright for being reality deviant, others believe that the artifacts should be collected and studied but not activated, the third group want to use the artifacts to bring Bogdan Knoss back as a weapon against the 7 stars and there is also a fourth group who are undecided or ambivalent to the artifacts and are playing the other off against each other to further their own agendas.

Zukovs then demands evidence for the corruption in the union, the scene changes and Zukov experiences several visions. The first shows agent Krenyenko sitting in a room talking too a group of tradition mages, one of which pronounces himself Krenyenkos mentor. The second scene is of Dr Yankovich and Dr Volyova discussing the clone replacement of agent Markel. The third vision is of agent Hurst meeting with Umbridge and an unknown woman discussing the subversion of the symposium. Zukov fades back into sleep.

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Agents Krenyenko, Hurst and Oleg meet briefly with Conrad and Umbridge who give the authorization to go after Zukov with what ever resources they need. After briefly visiting requisitions the depleted amalgam set off with several Hitmarks to Vnucova. The area seems quite as the helicopter lands but closer inspection shows several bodies littering the church grounds. The amalgam bursts into the church taking out the single living ghoul remaining inside. The church itself is a bloodbath intermixed with several piles of ash. The sleeping and bloodied form of Zukov is lying prone on the stone alter. The team wake zukov and after investigating the crypts find Mikheil unconscious in a cage below.