“Let’s go confront Victoria first.” John said after sharing his thoughts with the group. This day was really full of events. So far, he didn’t like a single one of them. It had a lot of time to turn for the better, it was barely 9 o’clock after all. If they went out now they would need maybe two hours to reach the cemetery, depending how well they caught the buses.

“Ja, that seems like the correct person to ask first.” Rave nodded. “Let’s not burst in and accuse Baldy of stuff just because he had a few bad days.” John shared the sentiment but he also had a more pragmatic thought.

If Travolta really set in motion this whole chain of events by taking something the Bloodfallen saw as theirs, how far would he go to protect it? Neither he nor Rave had a realistic chance to stop Travolta in his current state. Together they could maybe do something, but victory seemed like a very distant idea.

The Bloodfallen seemed to have an investment in them in one way or another. The attack made it difficult to ascertain how deep that investment went, but between the two choices it still felt like the safer bet.

“I will have to wait for you,” Jimmie said in an apologetic tone. “Can’t feel my legs.” John was about to start a series of ‘are you okay?’ questions when Jimmie raised his hands in a calming gesture. “Just some after effects. Should go away in the next few days.” Then, laughingly he added, “Not like I am of much help in a combat scenario anyway.”

He saw the three of them off with a wave. John and Rave waved back, Aclysia only confusedly mimicked the motion.

“Will he be calmer now?” Herman asked them outside. “It’s not easy to fix someone when they keep struggling, you know?” He scratched the back of his head awkwardly. “Only understanding Necron psychology could be harder.”

“Yeah, should be good,” John responded, while thinking, ‘Why are so many Abyssals Warhammer players?’

Herman went back in, leaving the trio to their plan. A few buses and stops later, they arrived at their target.

The cemetery of Springfield wasn’t big or small. Just a green space with trees and flowers, the gravestones of a few generations of people standing or lying around. Above it all hung the thick aura of solemn mourning and the knowledge that all things come to an end someday.

They walked around the thick iron fence that surrounded the graveyard until they arrived at the entrance. There was a small church and a parking lot, everything that would be expected. “If they put up a barrier, it would be here,” John looked at Rave, who nodded and Aclysia, who sent him her voiceless compliance, before raising his hand.

The slight breeze of reality ceased and they stood in a transformed graveyard. Transformed in the sense that the formerly empty green space was now patrolled by Soldier Golems. The contraptions looked in their direction, but continued on their patrols uninterrupted. Either the two of them had been made exempt from attack or defence was not these golems’ goal. In any case, their presence was telling.

“I wonder where that traitorous gal is,” Rave said and looked around.

“If I were a betting boy…” John pointed at the church. “…probably in the one building around.”

The church was quite beautiful for its size. Dark red bricks made up the bulk of the building’s walls, with a few light-grey cornerstones and facetted windows making up the rest. All of it was clean, but not too clean, giving it that air of a respectable institution.

John pushed open the thick oaken door. They opened with a light squeaking noise. A subtle entrance wouldn’t have worked anyway as Victoria was already pointing her sniper rifle at the door.

Okay, there was a rather explosive increase of Stats for her as well. Why? A question he would have to postpone. The person who was with Victoria attracted more attention. An attractive middle-aged man with long black hair, bound into a low ponytail, in an outfit that was the most casual version of a black military uniform John had ever seen. He raised his walking stick and softly pulled down Victoria’s gun.

He smiled warmly at the newcomers, then spoke in a deep and paternal voice. “We don’t want to scare our guests, Victoria. John and Jane, right? Ah, and that must be that lovely creation of yours, Aclysia if I’ve heard correctly. Please take a seat.” He gestured towards a couple of long benches that had been rearranged in a way to allow people to sit confronting each other.

Unsure what else to do, the trio sat down on one bench while Igor sat down on the opposing one. Victoria remained standing. “I was wondering if you would ever come.” The Bloodfallen Guild Master continued his warm speech, “Truly, I had been afraid that Travolta would have killed you to cover his tracks.”

John furrowed his eyebrows, “No. I don’t think you were afraid of that.” He said straight out doubting him, “But I am not here to throw accusations around. I have questions, Igor.” If he knew about Aclysia the middle-aged man knew about Observe as well. Indeed, the Guild Master only kept his warm smile.

“I guess so. Let’s hear them. Victoria and I shall provide the answers. An extension of good will. I’m not your enemy.”

“Who are you?”

“Igor, Guild Master of the Bloodfallen and the one who oversees the distribution of our elixir.”

“You mean the Blood of Thana.” The smile on the man’s face twitched but stayed for the most part. “Did that Observe ability of yours also tell you that?”

“Yes.”

“How peculiar. Never speak that name to anyone outside of this room.” Although his words were friendly the tone made it clear: this wasn’t a tip, it was a command. Igor clenched his walking stick and Victoria her gun. The topic of Thana, evidently, had to wait for now.

The way Rave stared with disgust at Victoria also was another reason to move on quickly. To calm at least one of the agitated parties down, he laid his hands on Rave’s. That was successful enough. His girlfriend didn’t jump up from the bench and start something stupid.

“What did Travolta steal and why did you attack us?” John asked the question they were really here for after turning his head back to Igor.

“Ah yes. The great mystery. Well, if you are aware of the existence of the Blood you must also be aware that he, me and Victoria all were injected with it – one way or another.”

John hadn’t known the last part, another jab at the usefulness of Observe. To be at the whims of what the supreme deity wanted to display was truly unreliable. John would need to keep future changes in mind and work out some kind of basic rules (If Gaia even abided by any).

“What do you know about us, the Bloodfallen, John Newman?” Igor asked into the silence.

“For certain? Not much. You hand out that ‘elixir’ of yours to people who follow you. It made Travolta a lot stronger, that much is clear, but apparently a lot of guilds that follow you also die off very quickly.” There was also a little tidbit about Victoria joining them because she hated communism but that he kept for himself for now.

Igor nodded with a deeply saddened expression, “Indeed and it seems that Collide will share the same fate unless we do something about it. Let me explain: We are not here to get back what was stolen but to protect you from Travolta’s future actions.”

Well, Victoria’s info page greatly disagreed with that. According to that, John could be executed on the spot. Nevertheless, he stayed quiet while Igor continued the explanation.

“As you said we hand out a limited amount of the elixir to each guild that decides to swear loyalty to us. Just enough for one person and only as much as they can handle. However, people often take a bit more from us in secrecy. How they acquire it is a tragedy yet to be fully understood but drinking more of the elixir than what we give people is dangerous.”

“In what way?”

“They start hearing HER voice.” Igor didn’t want to speak Thana’s name for whatever reason, like a preacher that dodges the blasphemous name of Satan. “And they start hearing HER pleas. She is a malicious entity, you must understand, and once people start hearing her they are lost. She promises power where there is only corruption and therefore we purge these guilds before her influence can spread.”

John boiled that down to: We kill people that drink the blood because they go crazy in some way and all of this only happens because we can’t find the guy who sells our secrets. That certainly explained Travolta’s paranoia the last couple of days but that also meant… “So, you are going to kill him?”

“Maybe.” Igor sighed the deepest of sighs, “See, your friend is a bit different. This time it seems that the refinement process of the blood was leaked.”

“He just makes more of it?”

“No, the elixir in his blood is reduced in potency by other means. If he can remove those it would have the same effect as drinking maybe three or four times what we gave him. Maybe it won’t cause any changes at all.” Igor shook his head. “Although I doubt it. He killed five of my people when we moved in to capture him. I am currently waiting for more forces to arrive to solve this without any further losses. On that note, Victoria here was only meant to distract you.”

“She shot us with a sniper rifle.” John pointed out.

“It was a tranquilizer bullet.” Victoria defended herself.

“In a sniper rifle?” he kept probing. “The bullet went clean through me.”

“The idea was to hit pinky here...”

 “PINKY?!” Rave was furious, never would John have thought that giving her a name would trigger such a reaction.

“…and then capture you with the help of the golems. I thought those golems would be more useful,” Victoria finished, uncaringly.

Rave was about to jump up when a walking stick was swiftly raised to her sternum. “Behave, young lady. I am not done with my story yet.” Igor said. Rave fell back the bit she had risen from her seat. “This is what it looks like: Travolta has become a threat. Unlike most of our other ‘rogue’ guilds you haven’t been tainted by the elixir overdose though, so I will give you a chance.” John didn’t like the sound of that. “You take out Travolta and the whole thing is forgotten. We will keep our support of Collide and we return to how things were.”

“You want us to kill him?” John asked, the suggestion alone was terrifying.

“You can try to save him.” Igor shrugged with a sorry smile, “But it will be in vain. Nobody who got that far into the overdose ever returned to normal. I will kill him without any remorse so this is the best opportunity you get.”

John looked at Rave. “What are your thoughts on this?”

“This is all cray-cray,” she said outright, “But Baldy deserves that we save him.”

John had no idea whether she ignored the whole subtext of them getting potentially ‘purged’ if they failed or if she hadn’t even heard it. “Right,” he agreed nonetheless. “We will take your offer. We will confront Travolta.” Whatever they did after that, they would decide at that time.

Igor clapped his hands together, “Marvellous, as a token of my good will, Victoria would you accompany them, please?”

The Sniper nodded. “Of course, Guild Master.”