A (post) Midnight Rendezvous in the Mist (August 28th, 1930)
The early hours of August 28th found the investigators—Professor Lilian Neill, Teddy Harris, Sophia Picado, and Peter Goodman—retreating from the blood-soaked soil of Hangman’s Hill. As they navigated the humid, mist-shrouded streets of Arkham, the weight of the night’s revelations pressed heavily upon them. Peter, who had held the vantage point in the graveyard, confirmed the grim details the others had only heard: the tragic suicide of the figure in Roderick Block’s body and the retrieval of the fallen Harry Higgins by the enigmatic Terrence Laslow and Jason Trent.
The group regrouped on the porch of Maria Gates’ boarding house, but their reprieve was short-lived. Out of the shadows stepped a man in a fedora, Wes “Smooth” O’Grady, an associate of the notorious O’Bannion mob. O’Grady had been tasked with watching over Higgins—his boss’s nephew—and demanded to know who had shot him.
Through a tense negotiation, the investigators convinced the mobster that the “Higgins” he sought was no longer human, but a vessel for something else entirely. Shaken by their candid accounts of “brain swapping” and alien influences, O’Grady departed, promising to keep the investigators under advisement while his own men tracked the fleeing agents.
Pandemonium on Campus
As the investigators turned back toward Miskatonic University, a dull, heavy explosion echoed from the direction of the campus. Arriving at the university gates, they found a scene of absolute pandemonium. The campus was gripped by a sudden, inexplicable riot: students were brawling in the streets, a man had climbed a tree to rain branches down on passers-by, and small fires were beginning to dot the landscape. Amidst this chaos, the group realised the Mi-Go agents were making their final move to erase all evidence of their presence.
The Horror in the Geology Lab
Determined to secure a vehicle and perhaps salvage what remained of the university’s research, the group infiltrated the Charles Tyner Science Annex. While Peter and Teddy moved toward the garage to prepare a truck, Lillian and Sophia entered the main building, only to hear the unmistakable screech of furniture and the high-pitched whine of a surgical saw emanating from the geology lab.
Inside, they witnessed a nightmare: Clarissa Thurber and Lewis Gibbons were in the about to initiate a gruesome procedure on Professor Learmonth, who lay prone on a science bench. Beside him sat a terrifying piece of alien technology—a foot-high metal cylinder with curious sockets designed to hold a human brain.
The confrontation turned lethal in an instant. As Sophia shouted for Clarissa to stop, Lewis Gibbons drew a concealed firearm and shot Sophia in the shoulder. The lab erupted into violence. Peter and Teddy burst through the doors just as Lillian attempted to return fire with the expedition’s shotgun. In a moment of sheer, frantic desperation, Teddy Harris charged Lewis Gibbons, ending the agent’s life with a brutal strike from a shovel. The strikes didn’t cease… Teddy’s mind had finally succumbed to the accumulated stresses of the last couple of weeks.
Revelations of the “Masters”
With Gibbons dead, the entity inhabiting Clarissa Thurber’s body surrendered. Identifying himself as “Wesley Smith,” a man whose brain had been trapped in a cylinder for fifty years, he confessed the full scope of the conspiracy. He explained that they were pawns of the “Masters” (the Mi-Go), tasked with destroying all evidence of the mineral Pasquallium and purging the Orne Library of any incriminating folklore or occult records.
Most chillingly, “Wesley” unmasked the identities of the other agents hiding among the faculty and students. He revealed that William Noakes, Harry Higgins, and Jason Trent were all compromised, and that the missing Daphne Devine had returned—not in her own form, but inhabiting the body of the head of the Anthropology department, Professor Roger Harold.
As the rioting continued outside, the “Wesley” entity utilised a strange, medical device that emitted a knitting gel to miraculously seal Sophia’s bullet wound. Though physically (mostly) mended, the investigators now stand in the wreckage with the evidence of Pasquallium saved. There looms the terrifying knowledge that the very administration of Miskatonic University may have been infiltrated at the highest level. What can they do next?
Until next time,
Owen