Adventures in Trinity - Volume 2
Volume 2 has the trio facing several ancient threats that emerge in the present day.
Heat Wave
A heat wave grasps Trinity City for several days before being broken by a sudden, massive thunderstorm. The next day Londyn learns from office gossip that there was a robbery the previous evening at a defense contractor and some security guards were killed by unknown means, with the bodies sent to Genesys for examination. Londyn tips off the others and Jen uses magic to sneak into the crime scene, where she does not learn much but is able to sneak away with a sample of some blood from the location that appears to have come from the thief and not any of the injured or murdered security guards. Back at the house, Jen performs a magic ritual on the blood and traces the source to a location downtown. Jen and Scott head there and find it is an office tower with a pub restaurant on the ground floor. When Scott goes into the pub he is called over by one of the patrons, a man named Garrett Sandstrüm who served during the One Week War and recognized Scott as a veteran of one of the Battle of New York like himself. The two chat for a bit, with Garrett explaining how he is an independent military contractor now and could see about getting Scott some work. Scott takes his leave, but Jen decides to stick with Garrett and follows him back to a fancy hotel. Londyn picks up the surveillance via hacked security cameras and tracks Garrett's earlier movements prior to Scott's encounter, spotting him emerging from a maintenance door into the lobby of the office building with the pub. Scott dons his costume and, with a little difficulty, is able to force open the maintenance door, only to find it just leads to a stairwell and parking garage.
With no leads the trio wait until morning, when Scott has another short meeting with Garrett. Afterwards Londyn keeps track of him as he returns to his hotel, only for his cell phone to fade from her senses. Jen and Scott investigate and find a secret door in the hotel basement leading to an elevator shaft leftover from the city's 19th Century coal mining days. Londyn joins them and they take the shaft down into old mining tunnels beneath the downtown core. They find some of Garrett's henchmen clearing out a small base of operations, complete with a black SUV. The trio attack, but a stun grenade triggers a seizure in Londyn, distracting Jen and Scott long enough for the henchmen to flee in the SUV. Jen magically heals Londyn and she is able to track the SUV's GPS to a location near the docks. As the trio reach the site a mysterious fog rolls in, obscuring everything from view. From an aerial drone view Londyn spots one clear area around a cargo truck and spots the SUVs there. Scott leaps into the area with Jen flying in behind. There they confront Sandstrüm, who is revealed to have weather control powers. Londyn joins the fight with her new tazer drone and the trio force Sandstorm to flee, leaving behind the prototype weapons he had stolen from the contractor. The trio call in CHIEF to deal with the cleanup and go get some ice cream.
Black and Red
Londyn attempts to track down where Sandstorm might have gone to, and the trail points to him having left the country. Scott is left at the house while Jen and Londyn are at work and school when he hears sirens and Stoptimus Crime raises an alarm. Scott heads to the site and finds the police investigating an armored car robbery, one where the armored car was thrown from the raised highway and ripped open. Scott dons his Adrenaline costume and takes advantage of his current popularity with the police and public and learns from the CSI and witnesses that the robbery was committed by King Coal, who fled on foot towards Mechanicsville. Scott is joined by Jen but they can find no trace of King Coal in the area. The trio turn their attention to the robbery itself, learning that King Coal had attacked by leaping from a van that pulled up alongside the armored car, knocking the armored car from the elevated highway to the ground below where he ripped open the doors and ran off with the money. This would have required knowing the timing and route of the armored car as well as extremely precise timing. With no indication of King Coal's accomplices from Four-Shadow being involved it makes a case for him having new allies. Tracking the van the King Coal used proves a dead end, but when examining the armored car's black box for signs of tampering Londyn finds evidence of anomalous behavior, like some external force had taken control of the vehicle.
When she looks for similar incidents Londyn finds rumors of strange happenings in the city's street racing scene. Scott checks with some of his street contacts and is told about an unusual winning streak by one racer, whose opponents have been reporting their cars behaving strangely during races. Londyn tracks the driver, Tommy Garcia, and Jen and Scott crash a party he is holding at his apartment. Garcia, aka Redline, flees and reveals his ability to control cars by sending several vehicles to try and run down the pair. Londyn tracks Redline's getaway vehicle and the trio pursue to an apparently abandoned building. Inside Scott and Jen are ambushed by King Coal, leading to a violent fight that threatens to demolish the building. The three finally take down Coal by soaking him with water while he is holding a metal beam and Londyn firing her drone Sparky's tazer at him, injuring him enough for Scott to knock him out. The unconscious King Coal turns back to a human form and the trio are able to search the building before the authorities arrive on the scene, revealing a hidden entrance leading to another abandoned coal mine tunnel under the building.
Trinity Underground
After two separate cases where the centuries-old abandoned coal mining tunnels scattered beneath Trinity City have been a factor, the trio try to learn more about them. At the same time, with the captured King Coal being revealed to be a Trinity City native, as are Redline and Sandstorm, the trio are also starting to wonder why so many people from the city have developed super powers compared to most other places especially considering that Trinity was not in the path of the Wave when it struck the Earth. Efforts by Londyn and Jen to research the tunnels online and at city libraries and archives turn up little, as they discover that the Welsh Mob apparently destroyed records of the old mine tunnels in the 1920s to cover their use of them for smuggling alcohol during Prohibition. Scott again turns to some of his contacts on the streets and winds up talking to several from the homeless community, who are aware of the tunnels. He learns that they mostly avoid the old mine tunnels except when in desperate need of shelter due to lingering toxic and flammable gas in some areas, along with rumors of disappearances and urban myths of monsters living in the deeper sections. Scott does learn of a way into the tunnels via a grate at a downtown subway station so he and Jen head in to take a look. Down one particularly deep shaft they hear a strange noise, so Jen drops them down, only to find themselves surrounded by pale figures with glowing eyes, all repeatedly mumbling a word that sounds like "SHUB". At the same time they realize that their smart phones are also playing the same word through their speakers in time with the pale figures. Jen can sense something magical is happening, and she watches in horror as Scott's phone suddenly starts trying to drain his soul. She desperately casts a teleportation spell to get them both out of there before it can finish whatever it is doing, returning them to the safety of the house.
At Genesys, unaware of what is happening to her friends below ground, Londyn is trying to research possible explanations for the rise of superhumans in Trinity. She is consulting with Dr. Wiseman when she is introduced to his new student intern Marcus Bowman, in reality Telemachus Blackthorne who has come for a surprise visit to see Londyn. When Jen calls to let her know what happened underground, Londyn breaks the news of Telemachus' presence. Reluctantly willing to accept his help, but not wanting Telemachus to know about the house, Jen has Londyn bring him to the Trinity College campus to meet. They theorize the thing they are dealing with may be a mystical entity, maybe even a powerful Elder God, that has taken up residence in the telecommunications infrastructure, a Shub-Internet. After giving Scott a day to recover, and for him to hit up a friend at the nearby Fort Gregg Army Base for some signal jamming gear, the trio and Telemachus prepare to head back down into the tunnels. Geared up, the four get back to the place in the tunnels where Jen and Scott had been attacked earlier. Despite being far underground, Londyn is surprisingly able to detect a signal of some kind, though something about it disturbs her and she fights off connecting to it. Soon the four start to spot movement, the zombie-like figures have returned, so Scott activates the signal jammer. This drives the zombies back, though it also effectively renders Londyn powerless. They head in the direction Londyn had detected the signal emanating from and are soon faced with more of the zombies. This time they also see that the tunnel floors are snaked through with bundles of cabling which writhe about as if alive. The cables have started attaching themselves to the backs of the necks of the zombies, negating the effect of the signal jammer. As Scott works to hold off the zombies, Jen and Telemachus combine their magic to generate an EMP (electromagnetic pulse) effect. This fries the cables and knocks out or drives away the zombies. They follow the now-dead cables and find them emanating from a mass of computer and telecommunications equipment all jumbled together with the cable bundles snaking off in all directions, and one prominent knot of cables reaching far up an old mine shaft. Scott climbs up the cable to find it is hooked into one of the main telecommunications hubs beneath downtown Trinity City. Scott severs the cables from the hub and drops them back down the shaft, then joins the others where, with their help, he jury rigs some thermite explosives and destroys the mass of electronics and cables.
Zombie Walk
Stoptimus Crime throws up alerts, indicating some of the Zero Zombies escaped from the tunnels and are loose in the city. They seem to be drawn to networks, many being sighted around Internet cafes and other areas with public WiFi. When Londyn does some research she learns that the authorities also found the bodies of many of the Zombies down in the tunnels, and realizes that they need an active network nearby to stay "alive". The police are covering up the large number of bodies they discovered and are using a municipal government warehouse as a temporary morgue. Scott goes out on foot to try and find more of the Zombies, while Londyn sends out some of her drones to do the same. Londyn's drones spot Telemachus, who also seems to be searching for Zombies, so she calls him and they decide to meet up at the ice cream bar where they had their "first date". When Scott learns this he goes along to chaperone, making no secret of his dislike for Telemachus. Despite Scott's presence, Londyn and Telemachus start discussing the recent events, particularly the apparent combination of magic and technology represented by the Shub-Internet entity and the Zero Zombies. The conversation starts to bore Scott, and once the topic moves to the creation of magically-animated robot armies he decides it's time to leave. Londyn and Telemachus stick around talking until closing time, when they part ways with a geeky, awkward hug.
History Lesson
Pokémon battle music rings out on everyone's phones, an alert from Stoptimus Crime triggered by reports of an unusual bank robbery. According to the reports the vault was melted into, and police responding to alarms have suffered burns while the bank guards were rendered unconscious. The only thing taken was a safety deposit box, which Londyn determines was registered to the Goodman Museum of Natural Sciences. She hacks into the Museum computers and learns that the box contained an item called The Stars of El-Akir, a medieval Middle Eastern necklace known for having jewels allegedly crafted from a "star that fell from heaven". Jen decides to take the direct route and, in costume as Hooded Sorceress, teleports directly into the Museum's offices where she finds a police investigator, Detective Ann Lewis, has also come. Londyn, has been observing via the Museum's security cameras and updates Scott, who fears Jen might be in trouble so starts making a scene in the Museum lobby to distract security. Similarly worried, Londyn hacks into the museum PA and calls Det. Lewis away. With the detective temporarily gone, Jen manages to get some more details of the theft from the Museum director before she teleports away. Jen is initially worried the stolen artifact might be magical, but her research turns up nothing. Londyn accesses the police reports to learn that high levels of radiation have been found at the bank, with the guards showing signs of radiation sickness and the security footage being corrupted. With radiation involved, Londyn decides to contact Dr. Wiseman at Genesys, who tells her that some federal agents had come in earlier and taken Marcus Bowman (aka Telemachus) away.
Checking footage at the Federal Building downtown, Londyn sees Telemachus being escorted into the building by agents, accompanied by an elderly man. Londyn texts Telemachus, who texts back saying he is with "oldmanyellsatcloud73", which Londyn recognizes as the online handle of someone she interacted with while researching Shub-Internet. Telemachus says the old man wants to meet and has extended an invitation for her to join him and Telemachus at a fancy restaurant. Londyn borrows a little black dress from Jen and Ubers over to the restaurant. At the restaurant she is introduced to the elderly man, Charles Cutler, who explains that he used to work for a covert government agency that dealt with paranormal phenomena and even after being forced into retirement he continued to try and keep track of reports on the Shub-Internet entity. He came to Trinity City after speaking with Londyn online and used his old government influence to get access to CHIEF's investigation. While meeting with CHIEF at the Genesys facilities he recognized Telemachus as a Blackthorne, having met a member of the family of dark magicians decades ago. He goes on to say that Telemachus is not in trouble, in fact Cutler says he is convincing CHIEF to let him come aboard to help them with magic investigations, and he plans to bring Telemachus with him as a consultant. Cutler then takes his leave of the two teenagers, telling them to enjoy the rest of the evening. Once Cutler is gone, Londyn and Telemachus have a good time, and as they say goodbye they admit they are dating now and part with an awkward teenage kiss. When Londyn gets back to the house she hits Jen with the double dose of bad news that (a) there are magical federal agents, and (b) Londyn and Telemachus are dating now.
That Old Black Magic
Genesys has been studying the Zero Zombies that have recently appeared in Trinity City, including one that CHIEF had caught and brought to the facility , and after getting a copy of an initial report Londyn suggests the trio go looking for some to study. They go out searching, with Jen using magical aura sight to look for any, eventually spotting one teenage boy. It occurs to Londyn that if the Zombies are attracted to computer networks, and her powers let her connect to computers, could she effectively summon them to her. Under Jen's guidance Londyn tries calling out, and it works a little too well as the Zero Zombie starts heading straight for Londyn. They get in the van and take off, the Zombie continuing to follow for several blocks before they get Londyn out of range and it stops. When Londyn is next speaking with new boyfriend Telemachus, who has had to go back to the Blackthorne Family residence before his absence was noted, she fills him in on the discovery and he suggests she try it on the Zombie held at Genesys. Londyn initially has trouble convincing Dr. Wiseman to let her observe his research on the captive Zombie, but new CHIEF consultant Charles Cutler intervenes and gets her in as an observer. Inside the secure building at Genesys the captive Zero Zombie is a teenage girl, who seems to react to Londyn's presence on the other side of the observation glass. Dr. Wiseman and the other scientists are fascinated by the change in behavior, not realizing it is Londyn who is causing it, though Cutler seems to take note. Londyn uses her networking power to reach out to the girl and at first gets nothing, but a she probes deeper the girl seems to become more aware, and starts pleading for help, saying she doesn't not know where she is. The scientists try to talk to her but she does not react to them. Londyn tries to probe deeper but suddenly a thrumming sound echoes in her mind that resolves to SHUB, followed simple by the word "MINE", causing her to immediately break the connection. When she does the girl reverts to her Zombie behavior. The scientists remain oblivious to Londyn's involvement, though Cutler notices how upset she seems and takes her out of the lab to a nearby office, then goes off to get her some water. Regaining her composure, Londyn notices that Cutler has left several paper files open on the desk and she can't help but sneak a peak. The files are a report on a team of CHIEF agents that went missing in the tunnels, five of whom remain missing but the body of a sixth was discovered earlier that very day. Of note to Londyn is the fact that the dead agent was stabbed to death, and the stab pattern bears a striking similarity to those on the body of the Black Adept. She takes quick snapshots of the files on her phone and sends them to Scott before getting back to her chair just as Cutler returns with a glass of water. Unsure if Cutler deliberately left the files open on his desk or not, Londyn keeps up the pretense, not entirely false, of being very upset by the events with the Zero Zombie so leaves work early to go home. Based on the photos of the files she took, Londyn is able to work with Jen to confirm the agent was killed in the same ritual manner as the Black Adept had been.
Dead Men's Tales
Londyn is using Stoptimus Crime to process old police and media reports to look for more cases of the ritual murder. Meanwhile Jen and Scott plan to head down into the old mine tunnels to where the murdered CHIEF agent's body was found. With the known ways into the tunnels now being watched by the authorities, Scott goes to some of his street contacts to find another way down. He is pointed to an abandoned building in Mechanicsville that used to be a meth lab. That night Scott and Jen head into the derelict building and down in the basement they find where a hole has been sledgehammered though a wall into one of the old mine tunnels. They sneak past some homeless people and into the tunnels, eventually reaching the area where the agent's body was found, and start exploring from there. They find an area where someone has dug through the mining tunnel wall into another set of tunnels, one that appear to be far older. They enter the older tunnel network, finding frequent branches that makes it difficult to navigate. A little divination magic directs the pair in one direction, and Scott spots something buried in the dirt of the tunnel, which turns out to be an old pocket knife. Heading further on Scott strips an old trap, sending a spiked log swinging towards him, though it is not enough to get through his super-tough resistance. Even further down the tunnel they eventually hit a dead end where a massive stone slab appears to have dropped into place at some point. Too large for even Scott to move with his strength, the slab cuts them off from the rest of the tunnel so the two decide to call it a night. The trio gets back together at the house, where Londyn reveals she has found reports of similar ritual murders spread out over the years, with no apparent connection between victims. She feels the reports probably go further back than what she can find on the Internet, so plans to hit the city's archives the next day.
Examining the pocket knife he found, Scott cleans it up enough to make out a set of initials carved into it: R.D.A.; could the knife have belonged to Richard Adair, the long-missing archaeologist whose research the Black Adept had been looking into? If that is the case, then the ancient tunnels they found could be connected to the Trinity Mounds located north of the city. Londyn tries to research the Mounds, but it turns out there is little proper scholarly work on it and she winds up getting drawn into "ancient aliens" conspiracy and other fringe theories. Having found nothing of use, Londyn switches focus to see if there are records of unusual activity around the Mounds that might provide clues. The next day Jen heads to the Trinity College Library and Londyn to the city archives while Scott plans for a return expedition down to the ancient tunnels. Jen does not find anything but Londyn is able to find records of more ritual murders, With Jen and Scott headed back down the tunnels, Londyn sends information about the ritual murders to Telemachus to see if he can find any mystic or occult significance. Back down the tunnels, Jen and Scott try a different direction this time, away from where the stone slab is blocking their way. As they explore they find another ancient trap, this time a sand pit that pulls Scott under until Jen is able to mystically free him. They continue on, noticing that they appear to be getting closer to the surface as tree roots start poking through the ceiling of the tunnel. Suddenly they are caught in a cave-in, burying them both. Scott, having shielded Jen with his body, uses his super strength to get the pair of them clear before their air runs out. By digging up out of the collapsed section Scott discovers they were under part of the forest in Mount Stanley National Park, near the border with the city. Scott carries Jen out until he reaches one of the outlying suburbs where Londyn hacks a self-driving car and sends it to their location which Scott uses to get them back to where they had left the van, which they then drive back to the house.
Solstice
Londyn wonders if she can modify her drones to help map the tunnels and starts working on plans while Jen takes up the research on the Mounds, turning up several reports of unsolved disappearances over the years. Equipped for mapping the tunnels the trio head down, Londyn coming along in order to control her drones. In the ancient tunnels it soon becomes apparent that someone else has been down here, and scouting ahead Londyn's drones make a macabre discovery. When they reach the stone slab there is a human arm sticking out from the middle, somehow embedded in the stone. Scott decides that if slab is too large to move he will just have to smash his way through and starts punching. It is slow going but he makes progress, knocking a path through the stone. Partway through he comes across another body completely embedded in the stone and uncovers enough to reveal it is one of the missing CHIEF agents. Finally he breaks through the other side and Jen and Londyn are able to follow. On the other side is the body of another CHIEF agent, but also discernible footprints in dirt and dust as the tunnel continues on. The tunnel leads to what looks to be an underground temple of some kind, a large domed room with a circular dais and raised pedestal in the center. A quick look indicates that until recently something had rested on the pedestal, but has been removed. In a side room there are another three bodies, all that appear to have been there for decades. Two of the bodies are men dressed in similar black coats and are carrying German Luger pistols, and there is no clear evidence of what killed them. The third body had clearly been shot in the chest, and Jen immediately recognizes him as Richard Adair. In a satchel next to Adair's body is a journal, which Jen takes. Seeking answers, Jen attempts to summon Adair's spirit to question it, but some kind of magical protection blocks her spell and causes feedback that nearly injures her. Finding nothing else the trio leave, wondering who had been down here just ahead of them. Needing more information, Londyn contacts Cutler, letting him know where the bodies of the CHIEF agents can be found and asking for any information on Richard Adair. Cutler agrees and meets with the Trinity, handing over SRO file which reveal that Nazi occultists led by a Thule Society occultist named Arsène Krueger, who is also known as Dr. Arsenic, had been following Adair in the 1930s. The SRO had contacted Adair and offered some protection, but in 1936 Adair and the Nazi agents all disappeared. To look for more answers Jen starts going through Adair's journal and learns that he was searching for a second artifact to match one he had brought back from South America. He had finally gained access to the tunnels that he hoped would get him to the Temple under the Mounds, but because the Nazis were after him he hid the other artifact in the Anthropology building at Trinity College so they couldn't get to it. When Telemachus texts Londyn with a warning that he has learned that the Cult of the Grey Man are active in Trinity City, the Trio realize that the Cult must be who had been in the Temple and recovered the artifact there and that they must also be looking for the one that Adair had hidden.
The three race to the Trinity College campus and at the Anthropology building they see the students and staff waiting outside, evacuated by reports of a gas leak. Londyn hangs back outside while Scott and Jen head into the building. Hacking the security system, Londyn reviews the security cameras in the building and sees a group of men heading for the basement where the archival storage is. As Jen and Scott head for the basement Londyn locates the Cultists' car in the parking lot, where she is surprised by the arrival of Telemachus who had rushed to Trinity when he learned that the Cult was making a move. In the basement Jen and Scott are confronted by a large, trenchcoated figure. It is the Nazi Dr. Arsenic, whose body had been recovered by the Cultists in the Temple and whose mind has been transferred into a super-strong Golem body. Scott engages Arsenic to let Jen look for the other Cultists. Once Londyn fills in Telemachus he rushes into the building, accompanied by Londyn's Sparky drone. Londyn guides Sparky to assist Scott while Telemachus races to join Jen. The two magicians encounter a magical force field, which prevents them from interfering as the Cultists unite the two artifacts and release the Grey Man from his other-dimensional prison. The Cultists have set up a magic circle to contain the Grey Man, but it does nothing as the being simply steps through. He attacks the Cultists and then flies straight up, demolishing the building as he goes causing it to collapse on everyone. Scott is buried but Jen and Telemachus have thrown up a force field to protect themselves. They start bickering but Londyn cuts in and convinces them of the need to cooperate, and working together Jen and Telemachus are able to teleport themselves and Scott to where Londyn is in the parking lot. The Grey Man is floating up in the sky above the ruined building getting his bearings when a police helicopter arrives on the scene. With a gesture the Grey Man fires an energy blast that knocks the helicopter from the sky, a crash averted only by an effort from Scott who manages to catch it. Despite every indication that he is not a match for the Grey Man, Scott opts to engage him as a distraction so others are not harmed, Jen tries to cast a healing spell to help Scott, but the spell fails and she temporarily loses her magic. Telemachus contacts Cutler to warn CHIEF what has happened, and Londyn reaches out the Genesys Technologies computer network, using it to link to the parent company Omni Industries where she starts interfering with the computers in an effort to get the attention of the owner, who is also the hero Omni-Man of the Protectors. With her magic gone, Jen concentrates on getting civilians out of the danger zone while Telemachus focuses mostly on protecting Londyn as Scott engages in a losing effort against the Grey Man, though at Londyn's assistance Telemachus does intervene in the fight at one point to protect Scott. Finally Londyn is able to get through to Omni-Man who dispatches the Protectors. Pulsar flies in and engages the Grey Man, leading to a pitched mid-air battle that moves away from Trinity City, while Greased Lightning arrives and evacuates the civilians from the area at superspeed. Once the authorities arrive and it is clear the immediate danger is over the group leave, with Londyn insisting that Telemachus be allowed to come back to the house with them.
Grey Night and the New Dawn
Londyn, feeling guilty over Jen and Scott's injuries from the battle of the Grey Man, attempts to make breakfast for everyone the next day with mixed results. The group review media coverage of the previous day's events to see if Londyn or Telemachus were spotted on the scene, but the focus of the reporting appears to be on the appearance of the Protectors and whether the Trinity of Heroes are now affiliated with the global hero team. There is nothing in the reports about Dr. Arsenic, who had been buried in the ruins of the Anthropology building when the Grey Man broke out. Londyn points out that she has the GPS data from the Cultists' car so she can track back to determine where their base of operations is. The location comes up as a house in the upscale Georgetown neighborhood on the west side of the Hope River so the team decides to go investigate, with Telemachus tagging along. As they approach the address there is the sound sirens and gunfire. Outside the house they can see Dr. Arsenic engaged in a fight with federal agents, likely from CHIEF, while Cultists inside the house are firing blasts of magical energy from the windows. Londyn sends out her drones while Scott goes to confront Arsenic. Jen heads out as well, her magic apparently recovered after whatever had happened the day before. Telemachus casts a spell to make himself invisible and starts to sneak towards the house. Scott and Arsenic exchange blows, including trying to hit each other with the agents' SUVs. When Londyn zaps him with Sparky's tazer she notices that the alchemical symbol on the Golem's forehead lights up, so Jen tries firing a magic bolt at it, but this has little effect. Seeing the Jen is a magician, the Cultists in the house target her and knock her out with a series of magic blasts of their own. Meanwhile, Telemachus has managed to sneak into the house and has discovered Arsenic's original body that the Cultists had recovered from the Temple under the Mounds. He is able to negate the magic that allows Arsenic to inhabit the Golem, trapping the Nazi occultist's spirit back in his magically preserved body. Outside the Golem drops to the ground, so the Cultists magically seal off the entrances to the house to stop the heroes or the CHIEF agents from getting in. Scott leaps up to the roof and starts forcing his way in from there, while from inside Telemachus teleports Sparky into the house and Londyn sends the drone after the Cultists. Sparky, Telemachus, and Scott are able to take down the remaining Cultists, releasing the magic seal and allowing the CHIEF agents to get inside. Telemachus teleports himself and Sparky, plus a handful of mystic tomes he has taken from the Cultists, back to the van. When Scott and a recovered Jen get back to the van they find Londyn and Telemachus making out in the back. The group heads back to the house and later that day Telemachus hears from Cutler, saying he has gotten CHIEF on board with a magic division so he will be able to bring Telemachus in if the teenager is interested. Seeing it as a chance to gain valuable knowledge, and a reason to stay in Trinity and near Londyn, Telemachus agrees. To help him out Londyn creates an electronic paper trail for Telemachus' Marcus Bowman alias, giving him a "secret identity" to use.
All A-Glow
With his Marcus Bowman identity established, Telemachus heads into work at Genesys with Londyn. There the see that Dr. Wiseman is busy analyzing information from the Grey Man incident to gather more data for his superhuman research. Londyn offers to help by setting up a search algorithm to collate data from the Internet, a cover story to explain the data she plans to provide based on the team's investigation. While they are ostensibly supposed to be working on the algorithm Londyn and Telemachus start making out, but being nerds they are also discussing the Grey Man situation and come up with the idea that the presence of a powerful being from the prehistoric era of the theoretical Primal Wave being trapped in Trinity City (or at least artifacts linked to him were) that might explain why so many people in or from the city are developing super powers from the more recent Wave despite it not hitting Trinity. Jen, meanwhile, has decided to start looking into the radioactive bank robbery from a few weeks earlier, since their initial investigation had gotten derailed by the Grey Man incident and the events leading up to it. She contacts Det. Ann Lewis at the Trinity City police, who Jen had met when the team first started looking at the robbery. After some exchange of information, Jen asks if the detective has looked for any other odd sources of radiation turning up. The detective does some checking and it seems that elevated levels of radiation have been detected around the western shore of Lake Kirby. Since it will take the detective time to arrange any kind of search, Jen heads there with Scott. She uses magic to part the waters of the lake and they find a submerged car with a body in it, and the body appears to have severe radiation burns. Jen notifies Det. Lewis, then lets Londyn known the name on the ID she and Scott found on the body. The victim was a man named Rhys Jenkins, and from what Londyn can find he owns several pawnshops in the city, is suspected by the police of being a fence, and that his electronic trail stops three days ago, giving a likely time of death. The trio investigate Jenkins' pawnshops, confirming that he hasn't been seen for a few days and also finding some small gold bars in one shop that read as mildly radioactive. They head for Jenkins' condo next, Londyn getting them past the building security. Inside Scott searches the place but does not find anything. Londyn hacks his laptop and finds his dark web files, including correspondence about the stolen Stars of El-Akir and suggestions of melting down the gold from the necklace. Londyn also senses the presence of a hidden safe in the room, and inside they find stacks of cash, some of which is radioactive, as well as passports, a gun and burner cell phones. They leave with what they have found and return to the house, but after an argument Londyn storms out and heads over to the apartment that Telemachus has moved into.
Left on their own, Jen and Scott decide they should go to the morgue where the authorities have Jenkins' body so Jen can try and magically interrogate it. They break into the morgue and try to sneak past the security, but are detected. They evade the security for a while, only to discover that Jenkins' body isn't even at the morgue, so they flee. Londyn and Telemachus, unaware of what the other two had done the previous night, discover that Jenkins' body is being held at Genesys due to it being radioactive. They also have his cell phone that recovered from the submerged car, and it is still functional enough for Londyn to pull some texts from it. She matches a partially recovered phone number to active cell phones around the city. At the house, Jen makes another attempt to summon Jenkins' spirit to question it, and she succeeds in drawing it to the house only for "Bruce" in the attic to absorb it. Londyn comes back to the house the next day and apologizes for storming out. She sees reports on Stoptimus Crime about the break in at the morgue, and similarly Telemachus is also investigating the break in with Cutler, and together they piece together that it was Scott and Jen. Londyn goes back to the phones she has been monitoring and identifies a suspect in the form of Paul Asherman, an executive at the Wolf Cove nuclear plant who is also on the board of the Museum of Natural History and would have had inside information on where the Stars of El-Akir were being held. The trio break into his condo, finding research notes about containing radiation that is linked to rare crystals like the gems in the Stars of El-Akir necklace, and a safe full of radioactive items. It is clear that Asherman is their radioactive thief and killer, so after preparing Jen and Scott wait at the condo to ambush him while Londyn waits nearby in the van. Asherman arrives and attacks Jen and Scott. The fight spills out into the street and Londyn calls CHIEF and also contacts Telemachus, who teleports to the location to make sure she is safe. Asherman's radiation blasts take down Jen, so Telemachus goes to check on her while Scott keeps on the radioactive man. CHIEF arrives on the scene and, warned by Twitch, uses knockout gas to take down Asherman. Scott is also knocked out, but Londyn and Telemachus are able to get him out of there before CHIEF move in and arrest Asherman.
Blood and Sand
Since being nearly buried alive in the ancient tunnels, Scott's PTSD nightmares have become more detailed and now include what he is worried might be suppressed memories from the Battle of New York during the One Week War, memories that hint at a deeper history between himself and Sandstorm. Scott calls in a favor from his contact at the Fort Gregg Army Base and gets some files on Sandstorm, who had been stationed there at one time. Jen catches Scott reading the files and he stumbles through an explanation of what he is trying to puzzle out. On the subject of dreams, Jen admits that maybe dream magic, called oneiromancy, might help so she drags Scott to the Trinity College Library to help her research the subject. At the Genesys Technologies compound Londyn finds Telemachus looking exhausted and on the verge of passing out. After Londyn presses for answers Telemachus admits he has been using some of the medical equipment at Genesys to drain a not insignificant amount of his own blood, explaining that he plans to ship the blood to the other side of the country in order to conceal his true location from the rest of his family should they use magic to track him. Though impressed by the ingenuity, Londyn still scolds Telemachus for how he went about it and takes him to the cafeteria to get some food in him before then hacking the Genesys systems to help with properly shipping the blood. The pair's conversation in the cafeteria reveals how secluded Telemachus' upbringing had been and just how ignorant he is about the "real world". This leads Londyn to decide to educate Telemachus, starting with exposing him to as wide a variety of street foods and junk foods as possible. Telemachus takes his lessons in how to be "normal" to heart and arranges for tickets to a Battle of the Bands event so that he and Londyn can go on a real date. Londyn goes to the house to get Jen's help picking an outfit for her date, and gives Jen a pep talk as Jen has been having doubts about her ability to use her magic. Once Londyn has left with Telemachus for their date, Jen and Scott set up for the dream magic ritual. As Londyn and Telemachus arrive at the concert venue they can see a thunderstorm is starting to move across the city and get inside before the rain hits. The evening promises an eclectic mix of local indie bands with names like Sodium Lampshade, Dayglo Assassins, Unforgettable Memes, 8-bit Wonders, and several more. At the house, the ritual begins with Scott taking shamanic drugs to induce dreams, specifically his PTSD nightmares. As Scott's nightmares begin, Jen magically links herself to his dreams, allowing her to observe. She is drawn to a nightmare New York City, where Scott and his squad are scrambling through the decimated streets. The sky turns a strange color and tentacled aliens descend on the squad, a different kind of Scourge than what Jen had seen pictures of before. Scott's squad is decimated, with only himself and one other soldier surviving, and the pair are running for their lives with the Scourge in pursuit. Outside of the dream. Jen realizes that the house is starting to shake, and suddenly Scott's sleeping form rises up, floating several feet off the floor, and an invisible force throws Jen across the room and into a wall.
Back at the concert venue the Battle of the Bands has been going on for a couple of hours when the storm causes a power outage, knocking out the lights. The crowd starts to get a little jittery as they are plunged into darkness, but it balloons into a panic when a lightning strike starts a fire on the roof. The crowd surges, but suddenly several balls of light appear floating in the air and start leading people towards the exits. Londyn and Telemachus try and find where the light is coming from and spot a hooded figure at the edge of the darkened stage, so they fight their way against the flow of the crowd to try and get down there. The pair get up on the stage and confront the hooded figure, who throws up their arms a flashes a stroboscopic light to distract Londyn and Telemachus. The strobe triggers an epileptic seizure in Londyn and she collapses. Telemachus catches her and lowers her down, then concentrates on casting healing magic. The hooded figure drops the effect, shocked at Londyn's collapse, and starts apologizing as Telemachus manages to focus his magic and stop the seizure. With Londyn recovered, she and Telemachus are able to see that the hooded figure is a young woman that they recognize as the lead singer from one of the bands, the Dayglo Assassins. Once they see that the building has been safely evacuated, all three sneak off to talk. At the house, the chaos continues as the mysterious force blows out an entire wall. Jen wonders if her spell has somehow triggered poltergeist activity in Scott or something, so she tries to use her magic to get through to him. Something about this attempt goes wrong, however, and suddenly Jen finds herself trapped in Scott's nightmare, where she finds herself bound in some strange material. Looking around she can see Scott and several other soldiers similarly bound, their surroundings looking like an alien lab of some kind. She tries to use a magic blast to free herself, but it does not appear to have an effect that she can see, though unknown to her at this point the blast fired off back in the real world and all she did was knock a large hole through another wall of the house. In the dream, Scott is also trying to free himself to no avail and remains entrenched in the nightmare, unaware it is just a dream. Then the alien lab shakes and there is an explosion, sunlight streaming in from a large hole near the ceiling. Through the hole several figures appear and Jen recognizes them as the Protectors, the first time the team came together when they helped drive the Scourge off the planet. As more explosions start going off the nightmare ends and Scott wakes up, as does Jen, and they survey all the damage around them with Scott oblivious to how it happened.
At Londyn and Telemachus' favorite ice cream shop the pair have a long talk with their new acquaintance, Eve, who tells them how she developed her light-based powers about six or seven months ago but has generally kept them secret, afraid of what might happen. Londyn says they will keep her secret, and she lets Eve know she can get in touch if she ever needs help. They part ways and Telemachus drives Londyn back to the house where they see the massive damage. Once it is clear that Jen and Scott, and her turtle Bernoulli, are all safe Londyn checks on her other stuff. The house is a mess now, not safe to live in until some repairs can be done, so they start salvaging their possessions, moving things into the detached garage. Jen and Telemachus go up to see if the damage has affected Bruce, the strange corner of the attic that no one is sure exactly what it is. They notice some changes and use their magic to try and contain Bruce, not realizing that it has instead fed on their magic. Everyone spends the night in the garage, and come morning they try and make sense of what happened. From Jan's description, plus earlier observations of Scott and his powers, the group come to the conclusion that Scott's abilities are not superhuman strength and resistance but are actually telekinesis, which he has been using unconsciously to augment his strength and to surround himself with a force field. He makes some haphazard attempts to move other objects, succeeding just enough to verify the theory but realizing it will take a lot of practice to learn how to use his powers fully. Scott also remembers more of the nightmare now, and wonders just what happened to him in that alien lab and if Sandstorm, who he recognized was also there, might know something. The group also wonders if they can ask the Protectors, but decide that they don't trust the heroes enough yet to ask. Jen and Scott opt to continue living out of the garage, at least for the time being, but Londyn takes Bernoulli and the rest of her salvaged possessions and decides to move in with Telemachus at his new apartment.
Hunting High and Low
Scott starts doing some basic repairs to the house, mostly just putting up plywood and tarpaulin to cover the large holes and blown out windows for now. Jen is focused on magical cleanup, since a lot of the components and reagents in the room she uses as her magic lab were disturbed or destroyed. Londyn arrives with coffee and starts checking on the wiring, deciding it is not safe and so turns off the electricity. This necessitates relocating Stoptimus Crime somewhere else, so Londyn decides to set it back up at her old apartment, which she had kept paying rent on despite having moved into the house. She also wonders if she can use the apartment as a safe space for people in need, like the super-powered singer Eve she and Telemachus had met the night before. While Scott makes runs to the home improvement store to get the stuff he needs to at least stabilize the house, Jen reluctantly goes off with Telemachus and Londyn to move some more stuff to safe locations. When she has a second along with her cousin, Jen makes him promise that he will kill her if she ever goes over to the dark side, as she cannot ask this of Scott and certainly not of Londyn. Back at the house, or rather the garage, the conversation turns towards Jen and Telemachus' family and how they will have to deal with them. Scott makes suggestions like sniper rifles and grenades, but Telemachus explains how while that might kill them, magical protections will result in some major fallout and backlash should the central family members be killed in so crude a manner. At the end of the day Londyn and Telemachus go back to his apartment, where she starts showing him a string of popular movies to continue his education in real life; and back at the garage Jen takes on the difficult task of trying to teach Scott how to focus his thoughts as a first step to him learning to control his telekinetic powers.
Unsupervised
Jen and Scott spend the evening training in the backyard, with Scott helping Jen improve her marksmanship and Jen helping Scott with his concentration. When they are finished they go back into the house and are halfway up the back stairs when they suddenly remember that the house does not have any back stairs. They look behind them only to see that the stairs lead back into utter darkness, a darkness that seems to be creeping upwards towards them. Looking ahead they see a single doorway at the top of the stairs, far higher up than should be possible for the height of the house. They run up to the door and reluctantly open it, revealing a wide open expanse of a dark cloud-filled sky lit periodically by flashes of purple-colored lightning. Leading away from the doorway is a twisting stairway made up of steps floating in the air that trails off into infinite, rising and falling, with the occasional square platform landing where other stairs branch away. Some the branches end in other doors, and there are also floating chunks of rock of some kind, some of which also have standing doorways erected upon them. Scott focuses his newfound telekinetic abilities and draws a small rock towards them, upon which is a tiny doorway just over a foot tall. Opening the doorway and looking through reveals a nighttime woodland, with mist covering the ground. Jen and Scott make their way further along the stairway until they spot something on a far off step. They head for it, discovering it is a human skeleton dressed in ancient, disintegrating robes. Written underneath the skeleton in long-dried blood are two phrases in Latin, which Jen translates as "Beware the Shamblers" and "Berasco hunts". Another chunk of rock floats near, with a door clearly marked EXIT on it, but crawling around the doorway is a shapeless, undulating black mass. Scott tries to telekinetically grapple the thing, but recoils when it feels in his mind like he is trying to grab, in his words, "cold snot". Jen shoots a magic blast at the thing and it cries out, and there are answering cries all around. A dull thud draws their attention down the stairway where another of these things has just landed and is starting to crawl towards them. They spot another rock with a doorway on it and Jen casts a spell that lets her fly over to it. Once she makes it Scott makes a jump to try and reach the rock and just misses, but is caught by Jen who helps him climb onto the rock. The door is made of iron and looks medieval, but with the creatures drawing nearer they open the door and leap through just as the creatures close in.
On the other side of the door they land in a swamp, and when they look back the doorway is nowhere to be seen. The night sky above them contains no familiar constellations, and there is a broken moon hanging among the stars. Jen tries to explain to Scott that where they just came from is called an Inbetween Place in magic parlance, and they are most likely in a different dimension and not on Earth. The conversation is interrupted by an attack from a three-headed lizard creature, but a few punches from Scott drives the thing away. They spend the rest of the night finding a way out of the swamp and by the time a large, white sun has risen they are in a wide field of tall grass. They walk a while through the grass until Scott notices that his clothes have small rips in them. He and Jen realize that the grass is actually razor sharp, and only Scott's force field and Jen's magical trenchcoat have been protecting them from a death by a thousand cuts. A ways in the distance Jen spots what looks like a clearing so they head for it, discovering that it is a wide dirt road that has been cut through the grasslands. The two follow the road out of the grasslands and into rocky desert terrain when they spot a dust cloud ahead, the result of a large group moving along the same road. With no real cover, Jen and Scott wait for the group, which turns out to be a small army of troglodyte like creatures. They are carrying disheveled-looking banners and armed mainly with swords and polearms. They surround the pair and a shamanic-looking one approaches them. Jen casts a spell to let her communicate with them, and the shaman reveals that he has senses her power and proclaims that the "power of Tulz-sha" runs in her blood, something that makes him believe that the two were sent to help the army. He tells how the army has recently been driven back by a She-Demon from the sky and her followers, who took control of his people's fortress. With no better options Scott and Jen stay with the army, provided with food and drink and a place to sleep as the creatures make camp for the night. The next day the army turns back towards the fortress they had been driven from and Scott and Jen go ahead of them. They see the battlefield around the fortress, and how trenches and other fortifications have been set up around the fortress as defenses, and that the field is dotted with blast craters.
Jen casts a spell to have a look inside the black tower and fortress and sees strange looking creatures and a female figure clad in black armor. Leaving the army behind them Jen and Scott start crossing the battlefield towards the fortress. They haven't gone far when a catapult behind the walls starts throwing explosive shells towards them. Scott evades and destroys a few shells, and when the defenders see the artillery is ineffective a loud horn sounds. With the sound a black dragon rises from behind the walls, with the black armored woman riding it. Scott leaps up and punches the dragon, and the rider swears at him. Jen tries a magic blast but it has little effect, so she tries to use magic to pull the rider off. Scott suddenly clicks that the rider is speaking modern English and manages to get Jen and the rider to stand down. Once the situation has calmed he and Jen talk to the rider, who introduces herself as Kelly Hemmings, a name the pair recognize. Kelly was the student who got pulled into the magically animated laundromat dryer during the trio's first adventure together. Kelly explains that she wound up here where the troglodytes from the army enslaved her. She wound up leading a revolt with the other slaves and drove off the troglodytes, she also befriended the dragon and one of the former slaves helped make her sword and armor. Scott and Jen are invited into the fortress where they meet the other ex-slaves, and Kelly and her dragon take off to drive away the troglodyte army again. Jen realizes that finding Kelly here means that she has a link to get them back to Earth, since she had studied the chaos magic that brought her here. Kelly asks to go back with Scott and Jen, even though she'll miss her dragon she'll still have the armor and sword to remember her time here. Jen sets up the ritual and casts a spell to transport the three back to Earth, where they explode out of the dryer in the Laund-O-Rama back in Trinity City.
Sidequest
While Scott and Jen had been gone, Londyn and Telemachus had spent the night watching movies and Londyn did not sense anything was off until morning when she realized she could not detect Scott or Jen's phones any-where in the city. She and Telemachus head for the house and immediately see that something is wrong. The house appears distorted, and Telemachus can detect a magical effect all throughout it. Telemachus loads up on magical gear and Londyn readies her drones, the pair of them using the garage as a staging area. When Londyn tries to send a drone into the house through the ceiling she is overcome with vertigo as the video feed goes topsy-turvy before she loses the feed completely. Once he makes sure Londyn is okay, Telemachus uses a variety of magic to examine the house. He is able to divine that Scott and Jen went into the house, but that they are no longer there. When he tries to divine more information from the house itself though, a magical force lashes out and sends Telemachus flying into the garage. Despite this, Telemachus has managed to learn something of what has happened, explaining it to Londyn as the house being completely taken over by Bruce, the strange phenomenon that used to be contained to a corner of the attic. Needing better gear, Londyn and Telemachus wait until nightfall and then sneak into Genesys Technologies and "borrow" high-tech sensors and other equipment. Back at the house they rig up another drone with the advanced sensors, linked by fiber-optic cable back to Londyn's computers, and send it around the house to get detailed scans. As it flies over the roof a black tentacle reaches out from the chimney and pulls the drone down. Telemachus has to cut the cable before the rest of the equipment got pulled in. They are about to try again when Londyn senses the sudden reappearance of Jen and Scott's cell phones and she and Telemachus race to find them.
A Crooked House
Londyn and Telemachus reach the Laund-O-Rama shortly after Scott, Jen and Kelly have reappeared. After a quick introduction of Kelly, Londyn demands to know what they did to the house. Telemachus tells them what he found out, that it looks like the dimensional rift in the attic, aka Bruce, has managed to expand to take over the entire house. They all return to the house, where the effect appears to be slowly expanding. The walls of the house appear to pulsing in a rhythm disturbingly like breathing and when a rock is thrown at the wall it causes a strange ripple effect, but the wall still feels solid to the touch. Jen wants to head back in, so they tie a rope line to her and she heads in the back door. Instead of the mysterious stairs that were there when she and Scott got trapped there is what looks like an endless hallway. Jen starts to head down the hall, but it starts to twist and bend and when she looks behind her the back door is getting further and further away. She tries to run back but the distortion of the hall disorients her. When the rope goes taut and starts to be pulled towards the house, they tie it to the van and use that to pull Jen free of the house. Once Jen is clear the group looks to the roof and sees black tentacles starting to emerge. Jen thinks it is the Shambler creatures she and Scott encountered in the Inbetween Space and knows they can't let those things get into this dimension. Scott leaps up to the roof to try and fight them while Londyn sends Sparky up and Kelly, still dressed in her armor, starts climbing up the wall of the house to join the fight. When Scott gets knocked down off the roof he tries to jump back up but only makes it partway, and at that point Kelly lets go and a pair of black dragon wings sprout from the armor and she grabs Scott and flies the two of them up to the roof. Scott had grabbed an axe and Kelly's sword seems particularly effective, so with Sparky's help them manage to hold off the tentacles for the moment. Back on the ground, Jen and Telemachus frantically ready a magic ritual. They don't have time to be precise so the plan is to try and purge all magic from the house, which they hope will close off Bruce and drive back whatever is trying to cross over. The battle on the roof starts to go badly, but Jen and Telemachus are finally ready and they tell everyone to get clear. The cousins perform the ritual and a blinding white light surrounds the whole house. There is an unearthly scream and the light explodes, shattering every remaining window in the house and blowing more holes in the roof and walls. When the dust settles however they can see that it worked, there is no trace of Bruce and the house appears normal again, though now in an even worse state of disrepair than before. Not only has the dimensional rift been purged, though, but so has the protection magic Jen had set up around the house that prevented anyone from noticing it. Everyone going by now can see the decrepit brownstone in all its glory. Jen is worried what this means, but Londyn cheerfully points out that since normal people can find the house now they can hire actual contractors to do the repairs. With the threat of the house finished the group turn their attention back to Kelly, who is now back on Earth after being missing for more than a year. Londyn says Kelly can stay at her old apartment while they figure out how to get her settled back in. Once Kelly is settled, Londyn and Telemachus head back to his place and Jen and Scott tidy up the garage and crash there again, deciding to figure out what to do about the house after they've had some sleep.