Week 1
Life can take some interesting twists when you least expect them. To say that I fell in with an odd crowd would be an understatement, though as I discovered, I was just as odd as they were. I suppose that my only regret is that I wasn't with them from the beginning, so even as I now attempt to set down our exploits I know very little of what happened before I arrived, but I will describe the goings on to the best of my abilities.
The first members of The Unseen Force came together before it had a name and through some unusual circumstances. Jalia was left to her studies while her parents traveled the world, so she had use of their car. Imagine, for a moment, her surprise when, as she drove home from class one day, her car spoke to her! Not just spoke, but informed her that it was low on oil. It was when she got out to check the oil levels that the real fun began. The poor girl, academic that she was, was attacked by a demon.
Luckily for her Mickey had prescient abilities and had had a vision of her being attacked and came to her rescue. Jalia's few combat-related skills were limited to throwing stuff and shooting things, so when faced with this demon she did the only thing she could think of; she took off one of her hubcaps and threw it at his head, unfortunately her aim was poor and she missed by a mile. Mickey tried to attack it as well, but didn't even manage to get near it.
When Fodder drove past she got it into her thick head to help. Even from the outset she didn't exactly distinguish herself as intelligent. When she saw the demon and Mickey and Jalia she decided that it was the demon that needed help! She squealed into a near-by parking space, retrieved a knife from her trunk, and started towards combatants, fully intending to assist the demon in its 'defense.'
Fortunately (or unfortunately as the case may be), Rose saw the battle going on and parked in a near-by parking garage. She dashed up the stairs to the uppermost level to try to get a better view of the goings-on. When she saw Fodder's less-than-auspicious approach to the combat she decided that her best course of action was to shoot first and ask questions later. She attempted to call down lightning to strike Fodder and stop her from killing the 'poor beast,' but she lost her concentration at the last second and the lightning veered away from Fodder and towards Mickey, who dodged it. Then it bent around him in what I am told was an impressive arc and struck Jalia, who slipped into the thrall of unconsciousness.
Rose chanted for a few seconds as a spider-shaped tattoo on her forearm began to glow; then climbed down the side of the parking garage quickly and easily, scurrying almost like a spider; and rushed to Jalia�s side. Under Mickey�s glowering gaze Rose concentrated while another of her numerous tattoos began to glow blue and Jalia was healed.
The four of them had barely caught their breaths and decided not to kill eachother when they were approached by an older man, whom I never met. He introduced himself as Carthis and convinced them to join him in his crusade against a dark force of evil. To help convince them of his sincerity, Carthis laid several gifts before them; Mickey he gifted with a diamond-topped staff, which later showed healing properties, and Rose received a mysterious crystal. He also handed each of them a communication unit (Comm) so that they could keep in touch with eachother and sent them on their way with a parting admonition: "Stay away from the Psi-Corps!"
Unsure of where to go or what they were meant to be doing they continued to walk in the same general direction Carthis had set them to and it wasn�t long before they came upon Selene, who was being chased by hell-hounds at the time. Rose tried to help her by casting a spell, but she misjudged the spacing and trapped Selene and the hell-hounds on one side of a giant wall of thorny brush with the rest of the group on the other.
Luckily, Selene was good at what she did and, with a giant leap, landed on top of an adjoining brick wall and made good her escape back to her somewhat ineffectual rescuers. Mickey offered to take her somewhere for a stiff drink, but she declined, unimpressed by his attempt at being suave.
Victoria and Mara were attracted to the location by the sounds of battle and arrived at about the same time from different directions, which was a good thing because it was about then that the hell-hounds burned their way through the thorn wall and renewed their attack on the gathered.
Some turned to run, others to fight, but all were suddenly distracted by the roar of an engine as the coolest, most high-tech car they�d ever seen drove up behind them and launched a huge missile offensive at the hell-hounds, managing to turn all but one of them into smoking, bloody craters. Victoria, attempting to help, leveled one of her guns at the last hell-hound and clipped its shoulder. Mara took advantage of its distraction to break its neck with a beautifully performed kick.
The car ground to a halt near them and the most attractive man any of them (or any of us who came after) had ever seen opened the door and stepped out. He had an almost divine beauty and most of the women found themselves admiring him openly, though Selene was hardest hit. I�m told she didn�t stop drooling for several days. He introduced himself as Genji, son of Carthis.
Once again, before any further discussion could occur, the group was rudely interrupted, this time by the wail of sirens. Many of them recognized these sirens as being those of the Psi-Corps' vehicles and they all ducked into a near-by bar for concealment. While they hid, Genji explained that the hell-hounds were small-change compared to the other enemies they would need to face. There was a growing problem in the Rosemont area with zombies, which seemed to be centered around the Rosemont Horizon, a well-known local theater/arena. After some discussion they all agreed that it needed to be dealt with and, after the Psi-Corps had vanished once again, headed in that direction.
As soon as they neared the Horizon it was clear that the 'zombie problem' wasn�t going to fix itself. Of the several zombies around them one charged. Victoria reacted quickly enough by leveling one of her guns and shooting it in the face. Unfortunately, this seemed to have little effect on it. Rose, thinking that perhaps her magic would be more useful than a physical assault, called down lightning upon it and was shocked to see that as the lightning struck the wound in its face healed. I fear that I should mention now that Rose never did seem to have much more luck than that with her lightning.
Jalia, in an attempt to help, pulled out her gun as well and fired at the zombie. She missed wildly and killed a civilian in a nearby apartment. Realizing what had happened, the whole group fled into the building, knowing that the cops would soon be arriving.
They found themselves facing a large gathering of zombies, but Genji had a short-term solution to that problem. He released a self-propelled, environment aware R/C car down the hallway. Amazingly enough, this distracted the zombies quite handily as they started chasing it instead.
As the group ventured into the building an aura of evil assaulted Mickey's senses. They made their way down the upper deck of seating and peered cautiously over the handrail. They were aghast to see the entire arena floor filled with zombies and blade-cats. Blade-cats stand about 6' tall and resemble wiry, bipedal, black cats with long blades where their hands should have been.
One of the blade-cats noticed the group and, with a flying leap, landed up on their balcony, scattering the group. Jalia bolted and it followed right on her tail. For a moment the rest of the group thought that they�d have a moment to relax and regroup before pursuing, but they were wrong. No more than a minute passed before the rest of the blade-cats and the zombies started pouring up the stairwells.
While they combated the zombie horde Jalia was still being chased down the hall by the blade-cat. She ducked through an open door, slamming and locking it behind her. She turned, thinking she had found a safe place to hide, and found herself face-to-face with a snarling zombie. It lunged forward to strike her and she did the only thing a rational human being would do: she ducked and put he hands up in self-defense. The minute the zombie touched her flesh it began to warp and change until it acquired the form of an 8'-tall, broad-shouldered mech, or robot. The odd-looking thing assayed her with child-like eyes and asked, "Creator, what is my name?"
Jalia was barely managing to stop herself from running in terror. She managed to stutter out a response she would probably regret for the rest of her life, "Uhh... I don't know... Z?"
Z nodded slightly, accepting the name with good grace, "Okay, Creator."
Jalia grimaced slightly, "Call me Jalia."
"No, you're the Creator."
At this point Jalia gave a small shrug, "Meh, let's go help the others," then she turned and unlocked the door. It swung open to reveal the adjoined hallway teeming with zombies. Z immediately dove into the fray and fought his way through to the others, killing an immeasurable number of zombies and one blade-cat as he went.
Jalia stumbled after Z in the wake of his carnage. Once they were reunited with the group, they made their way down into the bowels of the Horizon, occasionally dispatching a zombie along the way. It was during this descent into the depths of the Horizon that they discovered the dangerous affects of the zombies' bite. They saw a zombie bite what appeared to be an usher. He twisted and morphed, screaming in agony as his entire anatomy re-wrote itself until he too stood there as a zombie. They were forced to kill them both.
The lowest level was dark and dank. They hadn't traveled very far into it before they ran into the greatest surprise of all, Jalia's history professor. He stood near an idol which occasionally manifested a zombie. After a brief conversation no one fully remembers they beat a hasty retreat. The only detail they seem to manage to summon up from that conversation is that Mickey was originally approached by him to act as an artificer in the creation of the blade-cats, an offer which he refused.
Genji led the now very tired group back to his and Carthis' home, a mansion hidden and protected by Carthis' magic. I personally never saw the mansion, but I was told that it was huge and quite beautiful with a large dining room, easily large enough for the entire group to meet in, and several floors.
Carthis' last act of the day was to establish a training schedule and regimen for the group, making sure that each of them trained with each other one of them and that they all trained more than enough to guarantee continued progress in their special skills.
After this each person found their way to a room with their name on the door and promptly fell asleep. Over the next few days they all managed to retrieve their personal belongings and arrange their private rooms as they wished.