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Description
Entry 41 - Echolot

It's been out of the frying pan and into the fire for us. My optimistic outlook on things has imploded, and that's how it went:
After a rest- and sleepless night, we met for breakfast as usual the next day. Without Andrew, who'd been sent on a mission by the Silverfang Eldest, that made only three of us: Me, Sam and Wild Claw. I declared the search for Shadow Voice the new top priority for our pack. We tried some things that we hadn't gotten to the former evening, but nothing yielded any results. Even the Uktena ritemaster admitted that he was running out of ideas. But I didn't care. Even if we had to search the entire Umbra! My final idea was getting some more information on Shadow Voice's first trip to Vulcan, but that never happened. Instead, the ritemaster found a sheet of paper in our alpha's tent, inscribed with a long and enigmatic text. Wild Claw recognized it as a prophecy from an oracle of the Black Furies from Greece. One of the kind that can only be understood when it's too late. Parts of it had already come true, but the rest didn't help us at all. But if I look at the bottom part of it... well, obviously there are very large, very wyrmish, very desperate things waiting for us. Next, we went to the Silverfang Eldest, who's been acting rather benevolently towards us after we'd repeatedly helped his daughter. But he too didn't know a thing about where our alpha might be. Instead, he had a little errand for us, which was to find a foreign and suspicious Garou sneaking around town. If an Elder asks you for something you don't just go „Well... you know... nah.", and so we set out.

On our way through the weaver-dominated, cobwebbed Penumbra, we talked to a raven spirit, who'd spotted a strange humanoid creature with patagia not far from our location. We looked around a bit. At one point I tried to sneak into the Green Cocktail's Umbra, that was sporting half a dozen toxic elementals again. And then that thing swooped from rooftop to rooftop right above us. When we followed it, all we saw was a closing door on one roof in the Tellurian. I said 'after him'. There was a little quarrel if that was the best thing to do. I gave in and sent only Claw after him and Sammy and me to intercept him from the other side, and then Sam and I got stuck in the Gauntlet. Two things I finally need to get a grip on. That stupid stepping sideways and the fact that there's no room for discussions in situations that need swift decisions. Normally I'm all for collaborative brainstorming, but not when every second counts! When we were finally on the other side, we saw Claw perched on top of a guy that looked like he'd just escaped from the South Seas. He only appeared to be a bit amused, but not as panicked as you'd expect from a normal human. And he smelled like wolf. And he produced a stream of lies while Sam kept throwing insults in Garou at him, until he finally answered to one of them and gave himself away. Since he mentioned Unicorn, Wild Claw could identify him as a Child of Gaia. The Silverfang named Falcon's Flight, whom we were supposed to contact, asked us to take him to the Glass Walkers' caern as quickly as possible, which we did. From then, it turned ugly.

We entered the caern to the sounds of Falcon's Flight chewing out Leads-the-Strong, the Shadow Lords' Eldest. At first, that was a pretty pleasant surprise. The latter had wanted 'our' Garou as his personal secret agent, but now he was to be assigned to a regular pack. They went through a list of the available packs. This one was unsuited, that one wouldn't want him, but there were always Owl's Saviors, the wastebin of the Garou Nation. Filled with icy rage I warmly welcomed the newbie into our pack. It's true, we could really use more wolves, and Falcon's Flight would be owing us one heck of a favor after this... Gaia, would I get my back on him. I wanted him to know that he'd just made an enemy. But all that hot air evaporated out of me hardly five minutes later, when the new guy, his pack bonds just freshly sealed, was introduced as Echolot, Galliard of the Shadow Lords. Echo and Leads-the-Strong exchanged a somewhat triumphant glance. The rest of us was mentally plummeting down the entire skyscraper and hit rock bottom. With a Shadow Lord in our middle it's over with the unconditional trust, the delicate dark secrets that nobody must know of, and above all, our search for Shadow Voice, which is connected with both. And no matter what Sam says, I fully blame myself for this. I haven't only let our alpha down but also allowed the pack to be split to its core. Echolot had had strict orders to keep his tribe a secret, and it was unavoidable that we found him. The whole thing was rigged. And even if Echolot had only innocently acted on orders, since as I said you don't just shoot down missions from Elders, Echo would answer every single question that Leads-the-Strong asked him, and whenever he did so. Maybe I can at least find out when. Crestfallen, Falcon's Flight wanted to slink away, but I went after him. Only now I couldn't even growl at him as I wanted to, since it was me personally who'd accepted the Shadow Lord into the pack. But instead, he could explain to me that the description of the strange, bat-like creature perfectly fit a Black Spiral Dancer. But without someone who could Sense Wyrm, he would be hard to find. So I quickly went over to our pleasantly down-to-earth Glass Walkers Eldest Monopoly and asked him for some equipment. I received a PKE-Meter. How awesome is that?

If our newbie is to be believed, he has no idea how rank and rivalry work. He came from Paris, where there is no functional Garou society because of the Weaver's strong influence that doesn't allow for caerns. I think that's odd – caerns exist in much worse urban nightmares, but whatever. He's also a little jack-of-all-trades, and he can operate modern technology. It doesn't paint a favorable picture of me that at first I felt threatened by that. Anyone of you seen Galaxy Quest? The whole thing where it's Sigourney Weaver's only job to repeat what the computer says? At first,she's upset about it, but then she happily embraces that task. Same thing with me. I'd almost forgotten that it _doesn't_ take special powers on my part to use Google. Hehe. Apart from lying to Garou, the task Echo had gotten from Leads-the-Strong was to investigate the increasing bane-infestation in the pub district. So far, everything hinted to a heavily infested redneck/neo-nazi pub named Celtic Circle. From there, they spread to other clubs, and at the same time it seemed that before long a wave of hate and intolerance rolled along. One cafe had even closed for good and was replaced by some sort of aryan restaurant. As I mentioned, our favorite drinking place, the Green Cocktail, was affected, too. And we Garou, as philanthropists and the least racist species in the whole wide world, decided to put an end to it. At first, we sent the health inspector after the Celtic Circle. A clever arrangement will have us noted before it happens, so that we'll get the chance to add to the filthiness of the place if it doesn't suffice. If that plan fails, we can still blow it all up.

Sam then disappeared in the direction of the Bone Gnawers caern to learn how he could dirty things up effectively, but I didn't quite catch that. Normally, we'd planned to clean up the Green Cocktail now. There's so much of these beginner's difficulties. I hate the thought to snap at my friends' heels all the time and keep them together, just as much as it's difficult to delegate without appearing too passive. My old pack worked just fine as a democracy, as long as it was clear who was in command in emergency situations. (Where this led us is an entirely different story. Hopefully I learned something since then!) Owl's saviors could work the same way, only that my wolf side feels threatened by Echolot's ambition. Of course, the boy wants to prove himself, but I have the feeling that I need to remain at the wheel. What kind of alpha do I want to be? I need to make up my mind about that. A cautious thought also tells me that I function much better from the second row. But something in me refuses decidedly to step down in favor of Andrew or Claw. Or in favor of _anyone_.

Speaking of lupine instincts of which I didn't know that I had them. In the Green Cocktail there were six toxic elementals hanging around. With Sam, our pack was four strong. And I was _looking forward_ to the battle. I was in Crinos faster than I even noticed, and cheered on by Wild Claw I was the first to throw myself into the fray. The first enemy was also killed by me. But the whole fight went a bit strange. Claw was constantly pumping fresh Rage into us all, and every time the banes struck, we were just short of going berserk. I got pretty scared of myself. At least part of me did, the part that was still traumatized by certain events in my past. The bigger part of myself however decided to stay in war form and solve the problem by killing the banes as quickly as possible. This could easily have ended in a catastrophe...! Instead, it only hit Sam, who frenzied, pounced on me before I could activate my Steel Fur, and at the end of the battle began to wolf down the oozing toxic stuff. Fortunately, he as a Bone Gnawer is immune to that. I was pretty mauled, the rest of the pack was fine. But the fight had been tough. And that even though we'd hardly been outnumbered. An unmistakable warning not to storm the Umbra of the Celtic Circle. Ah, and did I mention that we didn't have a healer in the pack anymore? By the way, Echo sports a pretty interesting fighting style, looks like break dance.

Wild Claw tried to organize a charity concert to support the Green Cocktail, which is a very cool idea. I hope it works! Echo, who plays several musical instruments, tried to latch on to that immediately, but he'll have to become a whole lot more gay, or the lesbian rockers won't let him. x)
The next surprise awaited us upon our return to the caern. With the Shadow Lord in the pack, a geas of Falcon forced us out of the Uktena-Silverfang caern. Shadow Voice will be delighted. But for the time being, Monopoly allowed us to move in with the Believers of Mammon, and we can also set up Owl's shrine here. So at least _one_ tribe didn't let us down. Huh, what kind of thankyou gesture is appropriate for an Elder? Guess buying him a pizza is out of question. x)
Since our departure for Vulcan I hadn't had any sleep, by the way, not counting occasional unconsciousness or lying awake in bed. That was almost 50 hours ago. And instead of sleeping, I'm sitting here and writing my blog. Ah well, enough for today.
So to sum it up: I'm at the verge of despair, our pack was infiltrated, and I have no idea how the situation can be salvaged. Seems all too fucking familiar.

Description
Entry 41 - Echolot

It's been out of the frying pan and into the fire for us. My optimistic outlook on things has imploded, and that's how it went:
After a rest- and sleepless night, we met for breakfast as usual the next day. Without Andrew, who'd been sent on a mission by the Silverfang Eldest, that made only three of us: Me, Sam and Wild Claw. I declared the search for Shadow Voice the new top priority for our pack. We tried some things that we hadn't gotten to the former evening, but nothing yielded any results. Even the Uktena ritemaster admitted that he was running out of ideas. But I didn't care. Even if we had to search the entire Umbra! My final idea was getting some more information on Shadow Voice's first trip to Vulcan, but that never happened. Instead, the ritemaster found a sheet of paper in our alpha's tent, inscribed with a long and enigmatic text. Wild Claw recognized it as a prophecy from an oracle of the Black Furies from Greece. One of the kind that can only be understood when it's too late. Parts of it had already come true, but the rest didn't help us at all. But if I look at the bottom part of it... well, obviously there are very large, very wyrmish, very desperate things waiting for us. Next, we went to the Silverfang Eldest, who's been acting rather benevolently towards us after we'd repeatedly helped his daughter. But he too didn't know a thing about where our alpha might be. Instead, he had a little errand for us, which was to find a foreign and suspicious Garou sneaking around town. If an Elder asks you for something you don't just go „Well... you know... nah.", and so we set out.

On our way through the weaver-dominated, cobwebbed Penumbra, we talked to a raven spirit, who'd spotted a strange humanoid creature with patagia not far from our location. We looked around a bit. At one point I tried to sneak into the Green Cocktail's Umbra, that was sporting half a dozen toxic elementals again. And then that thing swooped from rooftop to rooftop right above us. When we followed it, all we saw was a closing door on one roof in the Tellurian. I said 'after him'. There was a little quarrel if that was the best thing to do. I gave in and sent only Claw after him and Sammy and me to intercept him from the other side, and then Sam and I got stuck in the Gauntlet. Two things I finally need to get a grip on. That stupid stepping sideways and the fact that there's no room for discussions in situations that need swift decisions. Normally I'm all for collaborative brainstorming, but not when every second counts! When we were finally on the other side, we saw Claw perched on top of a guy that looked like he'd just escaped from the South Seas. He only appeared to be a bit amused, but not as panicked as you'd expect from a normal human. And he smelled like wolf. And he produced a stream of lies while Sam kept throwing insults in Garou at him, until he finally answered to one of them and gave himself away. Since he mentioned Unicorn, Wild Claw could identify him as a Child of Gaia. The Silverfang named Falcon's Flight, whom we were supposed to contact, asked us to take him to the Glass Walkers' caern as quickly as possible, which we did. From then, it turned ugly.

We entered the caern to the sounds of Falcon's Flight chewing out Leads-the-Strong, the Shadow Lords' Eldest. At first, that was a pretty pleasant surprise. The latter had wanted 'our' Garou as his personal secret agent, but now he was to be assigned to a regular pack. They went through a list of the available packs. This one was unsuited, that one wouldn't want him, but there were always Owl's Saviors, the wastebin of the Garou Nation. Filled with icy rage I warmly welcomed the newbie into our pack. It's true, we could really use more wolves, and Falcon's Flight would be owing us one heck of a favor after this... Gaia, would I get my back on him. I wanted him to know that he'd just made an enemy. But all that hot air evaporated out of me hardly five minutes later, when the new guy, his pack bonds just freshly sealed, was introduced as Echolot, Galliard of the Shadow Lords. Echo and Leads-the-Strong exchanged a somewhat triumphant glance. The rest of us was mentally plummeting down the entire skyscraper and hit rock bottom. With a Shadow Lord in our middle it's over with the unconditional trust, the delicate dark secrets that nobody must know of, and above all, our search for Shadow Voice, which is connected with both. And no matter what Sam says, I fully blame myself for this. I haven't only let our alpha down but also allowed the pack to be split to its core. Echolot had had strict orders to keep his tribe a secret, and it was unavoidable that we found him. The whole thing was rigged. And even if Echolot had only innocently acted on orders, since as I said you don't just shoot down missions from Elders, Echo would answer every single question that Leads-the-Strong asked him, and whenever he did so. Maybe I can at least find out when. Crestfallen, Falcon's Flight wanted to slink away, but I went after him. Only now I couldn't even growl at him as I wanted to, since it was me personally who'd accepted the Shadow Lord into the pack. But instead, he could explain to me that the description of the strange, bat-like creature perfectly fit a Black Spiral Dancer. But without someone who could Sense Wyrm, he would be hard to find. So I quickly went over to our pleasantly down-to-earth Glass Walkers Eldest Monopoly and asked him for some equipment. I received a PKE-Meter. How awesome is that?

If our newbie is to be believed, he has no idea how rank and rivalry work. He came from Paris, where there is no functional Garou society because of the Weaver's strong influence that doesn't allow for caerns. I think that's odd – caerns exist in much worse urban nightmares, but whatever. He's also a little jack-of-all-trades, and he can operate modern technology. It doesn't paint a favorable picture of me that at first I felt threatened by that. Anyone of you seen Galaxy Quest? The whole thing where it's Sigourney Weaver's only job to repeat what the computer says? At first,she's upset about it, but then she happily embraces that task. Same thing with me. I'd almost forgotten that it _doesn't_ take special powers on my part to use Google. Hehe. Apart from lying to Garou, the task Echo had gotten from Leads-the-Strong was to investigate the increasing bane-infestation in the pub district. So far, everything hinted to a heavily infested redneck/neo-nazi pub named Celtic Circle. From there, they spread to other clubs, and at the same time it seemed that before long a wave of hate and intolerance rolled along. One cafe had even closed for good and was replaced by some sort of aryan restaurant. As I mentioned, our favorite drinking place, the Green Cocktail, was affected, too. And we Garou, as philanthropists and the least racist species in the whole wide world, decided to put an end to it. At first, we sent the health inspector after the Celtic Circle. A clever arrangement will have us noted before it happens, so that we'll get the chance to add to the filthiness of the place if it doesn't suffice. If that plan fails, we can still blow it all up.

Sam then disappeared in the direction of the Bone Gnawers caern to learn how he could dirty things up effectively, but I didn't quite catch that. Normally, we'd planned to clean up the Green Cocktail now. There's so much of these beginner's difficulties. I hate the thought to snap at my friends' heels all the time and keep them together, just as much as it's difficult to delegate without appearing too passive. My old pack worked just fine as a democracy, as long as it was clear who was in command in emergency situations. (Where this led us is an entirely different story. Hopefully I learned something since then!) Owl's saviors could work the same way, only that my wolf side feels threatened by Echolot's ambition. Of course, the boy wants to prove himself, but I have the feeling that I need to remain at the wheel. What kind of alpha do I want to be? I need to make up my mind about that. A cautious thought also tells me that I function much better from the second row. But something in me refuses decidedly to step down in favor of Andrew or Claw. Or in favor of _anyone_.

Speaking of lupine instincts of which I didn't know that I had them. In the Green Cocktail there were six toxic elementals hanging around. With Sam, our pack was four strong. And I was _looking forward_ to the battle. I was in Crinos faster than I even noticed, and cheered on by Wild Claw I was the first to throw myself into the fray. The first enemy was also killed by me. But the whole fight went a bit strange. Claw was constantly pumping fresh Rage into us all, and every time the banes struck, we were just short of going berserk. I got pretty scared of myself. At least part of me did, the part that was still traumatized by certain events in my past. The bigger part of myself however decided to stay in war form and solve the problem by killing the banes as quickly as possible. This could easily have ended in a catastrophe...! Instead, it only hit Sam, who frenzied, pounced on me before I could activate my Steel Fur, and at the end of the battle began to wolf down the oozing toxic stuff. Fortunately, he as a Bone Gnawer is immune to that. I was pretty mauled, the rest of the pack was fine. But the fight had been tough. And that even though we'd hardly been outnumbered. An unmistakable warning not to storm the Umbra of the Celtic Circle. Ah, and did I mention that we didn't have a healer in the pack anymore? By the way, Echo sports a pretty interesting fighting style, looks like break dance.

Wild Claw tried to organize a charity concert to support the Green Cocktail, which is a very cool idea. I hope it works! Echo, who plays several musical instruments, tried to latch on to that immediately, but he'll have to become a whole lot more gay, or the lesbian rockers won't let him. x)
The next surprise awaited us upon our return to the caern. With the Shadow Lord in the pack, a geas of Falcon forced us out of the Uktena-Silverfang caern. Shadow Voice will be delighted. But for the time being, Monopoly allowed us to move in with the Believers of Mammon, and we can also set up Owl's shrine here. So at least _one_ tribe didn't let us down. Huh, what kind of thankyou gesture is appropriate for an Elder? Guess buying him a pizza is out of question. x)
Since our departure for Vulcan I hadn't had any sleep, by the way, not counting occasional unconsciousness or lying awake in bed. That was almost 50 hours ago. And instead of sleeping, I'm sitting here and writing my blog. Ah well, enough for today.
So to sum it up: I'm at the verge of despair, our pack was infiltrated, and I have no idea how the situation can be salvaged. Seems all too fucking familiar.