SESSION 8: THE THEFT
--------------------

We join part of our stalwart band of adventurers on the 30th of
January, 1925, at around 3pm. Elizabeth, Jim, and Katya all somehow
made it to Elizabeth's apartment; Adrian requested that he be left at
the library for a few days (those weird Brits...). Unfortunately, Jim
discovered when he went back to the University to teach that some
funding got cut, and he couldn't afford to pay for Jonathan after the
weekend. So he sent Jonathan off on one more yam-gathering
trip. Alistair was simply unavailable for comment, being busy with a
social life.

Once they met up at Elizabeth's apartment, Katya and Elizabeth
informed Jim that they had located Magonga's apartment building, that
there were perhaps 25-30 apartments in it, and that Elizabeth had
gotten scared and run away. Jim thought (and Katya agreed) that the
bowl should be stolen soon, before Magonga could discover that they
were after it. They convinced Elizabeth to help them retrieve it, and
Elizabeth told Margaret (her matronly housekeeper and companion) to
get a room at the 49th street hotel under the name 'Betsey
Johnson'. Elizabeth took the contents of the safe in her apartment
(all the handouts, notes, etc) to a bank and locked them in a
safe-deposit box, and kept the key with her.

Once again, they were appalled by the state of 129th street. (Katya
saw a child's bare footprints in the snow, and was outraged.) They
started at the top and worked their way down; they discovered that
most of the apartments were inhabited by non-cult members, though some
were inhabited by single men with machettes. Upon exiting a third
floor apartment, our heros heard a door slam, so they decided to check
out the second floor.

On the second floor, they found that two apartments are inhabited by
men, and found more machettes. They noticed that there wasn't any food
in those apartments; the apartments were not homes to the men who
lived there. As the first floor was all meat shop, the group decided
to move to plan B, and went up to the 3rd floor apartment where the
door slammed.

A middle aged black woman was eventually persuaded to let Katya and
Elizabeth inside, and they noticed something different about her
apartment immediately: it was decorated vividly, with crucifixes on
the wall. The woman had tried to make it a home. This made Katya and
Elizabeth like her, so they offered her $60 for information. The woman
eventually told them that Magonga lived *in* the meat store, and that
he and many of his friends go to Fat Isabel's for dinner every night
at around 8pm. She said that he worked in the North docks every day,
and that while he was at work, his cronies tended the meat
store. After thanking the woman for her information, Katya and
Elizabeth left her apartment (and being British, Elizabeth was
oblivious to the fact that the woman pick-pocketed another $40 from
her).

The group hashed out a plan: they would wait in the tenement across
the street in an unoccupied room until Magonga retrieved his cronies
for dinner; at that point they would wait a little while and then
enter the meat store, hopefully stealing the bowl.

Amazingly enough, around 7pm, they see Magonga. They notice that their
eyes are drawn to him; though upon serious inspection he looks
astoundingly average (if ugly), out of the corner of one's eye he
seems bigger, taller, and older. When they see him, he is talking to 2
or 3 people. By the time he makes it to the meat market, around 15
people total have come up to him, talked to him a bit, and leave (all
in the same direction). At around 8:15, they lock up the meat market
and Magonga leaves with some friends. Around 10 minutes after that, 6
more people leave the meat market.

After some time has passed, they went around to the back of the meat
market, and gained entry (thanks Katya!). The layout of the meat
market was thus: a long hallway, unlit, with two doors on the left,
and then the meat shop in the front. Katya, being much braver than
Elizabeth, snuck down the hall and looked around; the first door
opened into a small office with the other door to a meat locker. Katya
dragged Elizabeth into the meat locker with her, while Jim waited
outside in case there was trouble. Hidden at the back of the meat
locker, Katya and Elizabeth noticed a small door. It led to a small
hallway, with a ladder on either end; one going up, one going down.

This being Call of Cthulhu, and Katya being who she is, they decided
to go down first. Descending the ladder, they heard a slight buzzing
(like bees?), but smelled nothing. Katya made it down first, and in
the room they found a pile of about 1/2 dozen bodies. The buzzing was
files around them. Elizabeth (putting her medical school training to
good use, for once) noticed that the state of the eyes and skin
indicated the bodies had been dead for around 3 days, but that
curiously enough, the bodies hadn't swelled or started to smell
yet. In other parts of the room, they notice 6 by now very familiar
knives and masks, and then a pile of clothing (mens, womens,
childrens). They also see another door, and decided to open it.

In the next room, they say two tables, upon which sat alchemical
supplies, herbs, and the like, a large tiger skin, and a large blood
stain directly in front of an altar. On the altar sat a book, a mask
made out of mahogany (in a familiar shape), a scepter, a metal head
band, and (yay!) a small copper bowl.

Katya tries to take the copper bowl, and can't pick it up. She is
suprised by this, being a goddess in terms of strength. Elizabeth,
being a puny British bookworm, cannot offer enough assistance to budge
it. Katya takes the book (Africa's Darkest Sects, stamped with Harvard
Library's symbol), and the rest of the loot other than the bowl
(putting the headband on), and they try to go get Jim to help move the
bowl.

I say 'try', because when they turn around, they notice that the
corpses have animated themselves and are coming towards them. Katya
fires, and backs away. Elizabeth's screams draw Jim, and he eventually
joins the women in the under-chambers, firing at the corpses. Though
they are hitting the corpses at an amazing rate, one reaches
Elizabeth, and she gets incapacitated as it kisses her. She loses the
torch (so now the fight is in darkness), and promptly throws up. Katya
comes to Elizabeth's aid, and gets scratched in the process.

Eventually, Katya and Jim shoot the heads off all of the corpses, and
the torch gets lit. It is then when Elizabeth notices that based on
all of the blood, the corpses weren't dead after all, and freaks out.

After a little while, our group manages to get the bowl upstairs and
out of the shop.

While taking the back alleys to the car, the group notices a lone
shadowy figure tailing them. It is joined by another, and another, and
eventually becomes 5, tailing the group from all sides and
back. Miraculously, though, they do nothing, and the group makes it to
the car, and screeches off into the night.

They took shelter in an Inn far out of the city, and examined their
loot once safely barricaded inside their room:

- Africa's Darkest Sects
- African Devil Mask, made out of mahogany; it is strange in that
there is no depression into which the face could fit
- Burnished copper bowl. Despite being copper, it is etched with runes
and signs, VERY heavy, and unnaturally hard. Jim scraped it with a
knife, and it scratched the steel. He then proceeded to ruin one of
Elizabeth's diamonds.
- A wooden, carved scepter
- An etched headband of grey metal, which Katya said felt like a
protection of some kind, and so wore it

Jim recognizes the mask as being from the Congo, and I skimmed the
book for a little while. To make first watch go by quicker, Katya and
Elizabeth played strip poker, shocking Jim's sensitive soul.

The next morning, everyone drove back into the city. At around noon,
they went to Mama Mguana's place, and discovered it deserted. They
checked in with Margaret, who was fine. They checked in with Poole,
who was in bad enough shape that he would be in the hospital for a
while. They told him that they had found the bowl, but not his wife.

After all of that, they decided to check Elizabeth's apartment. It
looked fine, and as they left, a young girl handed Elizabeth an
envelope, saying that she had been told to give it to me. Katya cut
open the envelope, and discovered two things: a finger (Rachel's), and
a paper. The finger looked like it had taken 2 or 3 tries to cut off,
and the paper said that at Midnight tomorrow, near the duck pond in
Central Park, the group could exchange the bowl for Rachel.

And that's where we left it.

A bit of useful information:

Timeline: It is now around 2 pm on 1 February, 1925. Tomorrow night, 2
Feb, is the proposed exchange. The night after, 3 February, is Erica
Carlyle's charity ball.