SPOILERS BELOW - SPOILERS BELOW
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Saturday, Sept. 24
The investigators make short work of digesting the contents of Harold Gray’s Little Red Book:
The contents are clear and easy to read, consisting of three sections with some useful hints or warnings and help with pronunciation.
1) A ritual for protection against domination of the mind - Detailed and relatively simple, with some tips on pronunciation. Accompanying is an illustration depicting the iron cage apparatus, found in the secret room. It requires also a ritual knife, and some of the blood of the “operator” the effect is claimed to extend to a ten foot radius and to last for “some hours”.
George Gray suggests that the ritual be done in the pre-dawn hours and contact with Drood be made only during daylight.
2) The Voorish Sign. A simple set of instructions for a set of thirteen hand gestures and an incantation to produce what appears to be a spell for rendering other spells more effective. It is stated that this ritual would improve the previous protective spell against mental domination by extending the effect for a full day and “enhance the potency”.
3) The Sigil - There is a spell for making one of the triskelion symbols “active”... It requires an incantation and a bit of blood.
With the Voorish sign and a careful study of the ritual for protection, the investigators are ready to go. Plans are made to cast the pair of spells early Sunday morning and to move on the old brick works by daylight.
Sunday, September 25
The spell casting seems to work and the “cage” becomes suffused with a shadowy sort of darkness which is mildly disturbing to look at…
The RCV support consists of Jessie Cook, Inspector Gregory, a new recruit from the shotgun squad named Tom Malloy, a detective the investigators do not know named Neil Corcoran and Joseph Linehan from the Department of Public Works. Shotguns are carried by just about everyone.
Lights, tools and dynamite are also carried.
Sarah makes a point of cautioning everyone to stay within the ten foot radius of the ritual cage device, which may be its limit of protection.
By daylight on Sunday the group approaches the brick works. They are attacked by Jake Luzinsky and another United Service operative and a gun battle ensues. A third attacker with a rifle opens fire from near the summit of the hill and Dr. Marsh is badly wounded. Joseph Linehan is killed… Dr. Marsh is carrying special ammunition for his shotgun and he brings down the rifleman with a slug.
After first dropping a stick of dynamite down the shaft the investigators make their way down the nearly thirty foot ladder – being careful to remain within the influence of the “cage”. Around this point Gregory nearly panics but is brought round by Sarah.
Drood is seen first as a black sihouette with redly glowing eyes and his hollow voice is heard as, from the far end of a twenty-five foot chamber, he invokes another of the, previously encountered “demons”.
Massed gunfire has an effect and the demon is vanquished. Drood escapes down a stairway while the investigators are briefly beset by hordes of rats.
As the investigators move down the steps there is a commotion as Drood is seen by Cook and the other RCV detective behind them. This causes the detective to panic and flee but no further harm is done.
At the bottom of the concrete stairs Dr. Marsh is in the lead when they emerge into a larger, roughly circular, chamber carved in the red rock – some sixty feet across. The doctor is nearly caught by the hypnotic effect of a corruscating light ball set in the wall just at the foot of the steps. He fires his shotgun into the ball and it shatters…
Drood confronts the investigator from roughly the center of the chamber immediately before a twenty-five foot triskelion which appears carved into the floor of the chamber. Drood is fully revealed as a tall humanoid form, much of his body glistening blackly but with pallid fleshy bits which seem to be in motion – flowing across his form. Dr. Marsh throws dynamite which lands just behind Drood. The explosion stops whatever spell Drood had been attempting and lands him more or less at the investigators feet.
Hector Gonzalez runs shrieking towards the investigators, being attacked by a horde of rats and he is shot down.
The dead or dying Drood, with bits of pale human flesh showing intermittently, is blasted in the head with a shotgun and black sludge flows out the neck-stump… The whole of the body seems to flow out, leaving nothing but a puddle of nastiness.
There’s a chair in the center of the large triskelion, dripping more black goo. The triskelion is elaborately worked with fine lines apparently engraved on most of its surface. It is damaged from the dynamite blast… Two apparent Gate circles are found on the walls of the chamber, one of them entirely intact. Not for long…
A shelf with papers and many small jars and bottles is found and looted. – Details of the material will be forthcoming… (I forget what I actually described and have lost track of the list… But I hope I will find it.)
The chamber is set with all the remaining dynamite and the investigators and RCV leave,. blowing the whole thing up behind them. The effect outside is underwhelming… A deep but muffled roar and a brief plume of dust shoots up from the shaft.
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