Episode 6
Encounter
The next day, Chet announced that he’d come up with an idea. Melba’s further research had discovered that Saigow, in the guise of a corporation called Tarbol Mining Industries, owned an iron ore mine in northern Minnesota. Chet thought that if the group went to the mine and did something to sabotage it, then took responsibility for it along with sending him clips from the video, it would be more than enough to convince him to clear the group’s names. Everyone agreed to the plan (though Marta had a few moral qualms at first) and began preparing. Arie decided to stay behind to keep an eye on things back home.
The night before the group was going to leave for the Tarbol mine, Marta had another dream. It began the same as the previous one, but this time she saw more. As the two large creatures fought, Marta turned to one side and saw that Darla was standing next to her, looking terrified. Then the fish-snake thing seemed to break away and, quicker than Marta’s eyes could follow it, moved to one side. The next thing she knew, it was right on top of Darla and had lifted her up into the air in a shower of blood. Marta screamed at the monster discarded Darla’s body and lunged for her…and then she woke up. This time, Marta chose not to tell anyone about what she’d dreamed, but she stayed awake for the rest of the night in terror, not sure what the dream might mean.
In the morning, the group set out and soon arrived at the Tarbol mine and began by taking the guided tour of the mine being offered and using it as an opportunity to check things out. They discovered that it had relatively light security but a few cameras which Chet and Saria offered to take out while. The rest of the group hatched a plan to use Will’s explosives to cave in the mining area after driving most of the heavy machinery into the open pit. They spent the rest of the day preparing and then went in under cover or night.
At first, everything went exactly as planned. Chet and Saria took care of the cameras while Melba took out the heavy equipment, Will placed and detonated the explosives, and Marta stood lookout. But while everyone else was doing their jobs, Marta noticed movement in the parking lot where they’d left their car (Arie’s Humm-Vee, which they’d borrowed for the night). She alerted the rest of the group, and after finishing their jobs everyone rushed down to find out what was going on.
In the parking lot, everyone saw three strange people standing near the Humm-Vee. One looked like a cross between a human and a lion, another looked like a humanoid bird, and the third was just a black, shadowy figure with a white cavern for eyes and a mouth. The lion-man, who appeared to be the leader, introduced himself as Talc and said he wanted to talk to Chet. Everyone else could only listen as they had an argument over things that had happened between them a long time ago. Apparently, Chet, Saria, Talc, and the others had all studied and grown up together at some sort of military compound (along with someone else named Cameron who Talc kept referring to). During that time, Chet and Talc had not gotten along. Now that Talc had found Chet, he wanted to end their dispute once and for all. Chet seemed reluctant to fight, but Talk wouldn’t back down and soon yet another battle had broken out.
During the course of the battle, some very strange things happened. When everyone turned on their second sight, they saw that Talc and Sarn (the bird) had green crystals like Chet’s, and that Blak (the shadowy figure) had a blue crystal like Saria’s. Blak called up a minor sandstorm that obscured the parking lot and hurt Melba somewhat. Sarn, threw a telescoping metal pole at Will that stabbed him through the shoulder. (Interestingly enough, Will hardly seemed to notice; he was mostly interested in how he could incorporate the pole into one of his gadgets.) Marta tried to break up the fight between Chet and Talc, but neither of them was listening to her so she just got in the Humm-Vee with the others. But the strangest thing by far was what Saria did. The hunters saw the crystal around her neck break apart as her hair blew back and her appearance (which was already freakishly beautiful) became so stunning as to be almost terrifying. She gestured with one hand and shot a bolt of energy which blew one of Sarn’s wings off. Then she nearly collapsed from exhaustion and stumbled to the Humm-Vee. After finally managing to pull Chet away from Sarn, the hunters drove off, got their stuff from the hotel they’d been staying at, and left town as soon as they could. On the way back to the Cities, Marta and Melba asked Chet and Saria what had happened, but they were reluctant to give details and they eventually decided not to pry.
Meanwhile, Arie was having problems of his own. He decided to take Darla on a quasi-date to Calhoun Square, but their evening was interrupted by the presence of strange men in black suits and dark sunglasses who began following them. Arie and Darla tried to retreat into an alleyway, but the men followed them. Things looked bad until, by sheer coincidence, an empty city bus crashed into the alley and exploded, providing a distraction. Then three young boys popped out of a dumpster in the alley and began shooting flaming, Impact-aided pebbles from their slingshots at the men in suits. Instead of running, however, Arie decided to fight. He took a weapon from one of the men who’d already been incapacitated by the bus crash (a submachine gun disguised as a briefcase, with very effective ammo) and started gunning them down, eventually killing all three. To thank the boys for their help, Arie took them back to his apartment and got them drunk, which was rather difficult for him to explain to Will when he returned later that night.