Keeper: Sean Nittner
Hunters: Eric Fattig, Karen Twelves, Adrienne Mueller
System: Monster of the Week
Supplement: Tome of Mysteries
Campaign Overview
Overview of the entire campaign here: Agents of Cisra
Adventure Log
Every two years, the various divisions and bureaus of the Department of the Interior meet for a major interdepartmental conference.
This year, thanks to Malik, it’s being held at the Salzwefel, a spacious, and by government conference standards, quite luxurious. It’s also got enough weird things that don’t add up to pique Malik’s interest, who is utterly triumphant about securing the location.
Seeing the location though, Stasia is reminded of a nightmare she’d had from the previous night, setting the party on edge.
The party arrives and are immediately struck by how swank it is. Bellhops quickly unload their baggage from the airport shuttle. The bottom floor of the hotel is full of high end shopping, which the team wanders through awe struck on the way to the hotel foyer. It’s full of sharply dressed government agents who have come for the conference.
The party—well versed in being where they’re not supposed to be and pretending to be who they’re not—notices that more than a few of the attendees seem anxious, as they’re trying a little too hard to blend in. She tries to eavesdrop, but it seems like they’ve got perfectly rationale reasons to be nervous: a big meeting, a difficult presentation, or the like.
Jessica heads down to mingle with some of her old agent buddies from before her time at CISRA at the hotel bar. Mordecai, recognizing that that’s not his scene, opts to go for a little walk outside, and Stasia tags along. At the front desk they offer to send someone along as a guide, and Mordecai gladly accepts. They send along Roger Sanchez, who Mordecai tries to befriend as they wander along the beach. Stasia breaks off and surveys the scene. She notices an almost uncanny synchronicity in the actions of the hotel workers at the beach. Using her powers, she tries to break the synchronicity between two bartenders. She succeeds, and the bartender loses her grip on her shaker, leading to a big mess. While she tries to clean it up with almost frantic urgency, Stasia “happens” to come across her employee keycard.
Mordecai wanders along the beach with Roger—never fully leaving the hotel grounds, which are expanisve—and gets to know him a little better. Between the hints he’s dropping and the background check that Malik runs, Mordecai realizes that he can’t break his contract with the hotel lest they call immigration on his parents, who have overstayed their visa. Mordecai texts Jessica who pulls some strings to get his parents visa extended, hopefully taking the pressure off Roger and earning his trust.
Jessica, meanwhile, is in full schmooze mode with her old friends. Helmut Salzwefel—the proprietory, whose image is everywhere—comes down with an attractive woman on his arm and starts schmoozing with the guests. Stasia recognizes the woman from her nightmarish vision as someone who is going to be stabbed. Helmut is clearly in his element as he starts working the crowd. Jessica recognizes this isn’t just idle mingling, he’s clearly working toward some larger goal. She stays in his orbit to try to get a read on what he’s after.
Stasia meanwhile, follows Helmut’s date. She’s cagey and shakes off Stasia’s attempts to gain her trust. Stasia’s cover story about trying to get away from a creeper does, however, get her the attention of security. She lets them know she’s fine, but does get a little information from the security person. The woman—Lydia— is actually married to Helmut, not just his date, and doesn’t have any actual responsibilities at the hotel.
Mordecai comes back to find a burly member of the hotel staff keeping a very close eye on him. Unaware that Stasia had used him as an excuse earlier, he sets up at the bar hoping to wait for this particularly dogged staff member to tire. It’s then that he notices he’s being watched not only by the staff, but by some of the supposed “guests”. They’re clearly subtly coordinating with each other to keep tabs on some of the other guests, Mordecai among them.
Stasia and Jessica return to the room to compare notes. Between the two of them there’s clearly more than a few things to be suspicious about. What is Helmut after? Who’s really in charge, Helmut or his wife?
The “guest” who had been keeping an eye on Mordecai comes over and introduces herself as Ilse Hershwor. She starts asking questions of Mordecai, who finds himself beginning to reveal more than he’d really intended. Unable to control his tongue, he forces himself to spill his drink on her to cause enough of a commotion to break away.
Stasia and Jessica do some digging and determine that the permits to secure such a remote, exclusive location for this hotel are legit, although there’s clear indications that many of the usual checks were hastily overridden by the head of Bureau of Land Management, who retired swiftly thereafter. They also realize that the conference being held at this location was no mere accident, nor the result of Malik’s intervention. Salzwefel engineered this conference at this location specifically.
Mordecai comes back and fills in the others on what he’s seen. He resolves to do some digging while the other two decide to infiltrate the fancy soirée for the heads of departments. They’re almost certain that something nefarious is going to go down there.
Jessica and Stasia dress up and head on in to the event. —Jessica in the best dress she’s got available, Stasia in a sharp suit. Director McCloud is all too happy to secure invitations for them, since she’s also concerned that something is amiss.
It’s a grand affair at the top of the hotel, with dancing and both Helmut and Lydia Salzwefel in attendence. Jessica tries to protect the director from being roped into a dance with Helmut, who is almost supernaturally compelled to accept, but only by jumping in to accept the dance on her behalf, placing herself squarely in the crosshairs of this manipulator.
Mordecai, with Malik’s help back in Washington, digs through the illicit arcane tomes that Mordecai definitely does not own, haha. He realizes that they’re in the grip not of an arcane person, but a living spell. The spells is aware and capable of influencing its “host”, but perhaps doesn’t have absolute control. He realizes that as long as the spell is known by someone, it can continue spreading…
Stasia is struck by a vision of one of the guests, a member of the DoI in mortal peril, and jinxes Helmut to make him spill a drink on himself, buying Jessica a chance to escape, and they rush off to rescue the DoI official
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