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Traveling as a vampire is something I'm still getting used to. I wish it were the only thing I were getting used to. I miss food. It appears I can drink, although the effects aren't the same and I've had a few adverse reactions. The strange new hunger seems to react to it.
Still, at least the people who arranged this travel seem to know what they're doing. There's no jitters or disorganisation going on, everyone seems to be treating this as routine, almost like another boring Friday night job to be done before going home to their lives. It's comforting to know that I won't be alone in this strange town — although I've never met my companions face to face before, we've talked and found we share some common values. I'm still not entirely sure why I'm here; the rules of the vampire world are still mysterious to me, although I've been given a primer on the basic dos and do nots. Priority one, then, is the same as it was in my past life — there's written rules and unwritten rules, and the second set are the ones you really need to pay attention to. I thought I knew the unwritten rules in my past life, but then if that were really true I wouldn't be here, would I?
The men who rouse us provide us with food, and I am immediately suspicious. In the time I've had so far I've found it most comforting to sate my hunger with blood from blood banks and other storage facilities; I can almost convince myself I'm just doing another job, providing people with what they want. As long as I forget that the people are me and what I want is blood. Rex clocks before I do — this is not normal bagged blood. The men who provide it are tight lipped about its source, waving it away with a vague explanation of scientists and clever ideas. Always be wary of men bearing gifts, especially when you don't know where the gift came from.
We're driven into the city by a rather garrulous man — he's putting real effort into playing the part of the knowledgeable, affable host, and yet I can tell he's clearly been briefed on what to tell us and what not to tell us. Before I was told I was coming here, I knew nothing about the city, although I try my best not to let that show. It's somewhat unnerving having this man supposedly at our beck and call, as I know all too well that those who are purportedly subservient to someone often end up being the ones really calling the shots. He shows us to our accommodation, provided by a benefactor, and then drops us in the city with directions to a nearby pub. This seems to be a theme of this city — business, both legitimate and otherwise, is conducted in pubs.
At the pub, we meet a man who once again seems to be playing a role. He's playing the part of genial barman, and playing it rather well. We're still finding our feet here, and none of us wants to be the one to blurt out the real question of what exactly it is we're doing here. I decide to probe with a topic that's familiar to me, and mention that we passed a football stadium on the way in and I come up with a cover for being here — that I travel the world watching football. He suggests, in a roundabout way, that we might like to check out the match that's happening this evening, while simultaneously managing to hint that it's not the football we should be watching. As he does this, a colleague of his provides us with a map of the city — professionally published — with some handmade additions. He tells us not to feed in these areas, pointing at the handmade additions. These people clearly have some sway in the city, and yet they're being very careful to tell us just enough and no more. I approve, although I don't like being left in the dark. I prefer to be the one leaving others in the dark.
As we're leaving, Magda appears to have a sudden turn. She starts shouting about The Prince. This is concerning to me; I know enough of the rules to know that maintaining The Masquerade is sacrosanct to our new kin, and I'm not sure shouting about having met someone so high ranking in a public place is entirely smart. It's not helped by all the cats that appear, as if out of nowhere, and start to swarm her. Magda has strange ways, although we've developed a superficial kinship over the past months, and this is clearly not a random occurrence. She's so taken by one of the cats, that she names Prince, that we have no choice but to take it with us. She doesn't explain further why she felt to name the cat Prince and I'm left confused as to whether the barman was The Prince, or if she thinks this cat is the Prince. Regardless, it appears our party has grown from three to four, even if one of the party members is not blessed with the gift of speech or at least not inclined to speak to us. We explain away Magda's sudden fit of the vapours to anyone who might've been watching by blaming the drink, but I'm not sure it's entirely successful.
As we get to the stadium, we notice a pub that appears to be somewhat attached to it. My plan was to get into the match the normal way; I learned long ago that if you look confident and assured of what you're doing, it's often the best camouflage you can ask for. Magda has other ideas, and strolls into the pub with her new best friend. One of the bar staff is immediately taken with the new arrival, which means at least the cat has had some use to us. I'm content with the idea that this cat will be joining us for the evening but I'm privately wondering how long Rex and I should indulge this. The cat appears to be our ticket into a special area of the pub — they have a deal with the football stadium and their outdoor area has a view onto the pitch. I'm pretty keen on this, as I would actually like to watch some football, but I also want eyes in the stadium; we can't see everything from here and I'd hate to report back empty handed.
Rex and I agree that Rex will go into the stadium proper while I stay in the VIP area of the pub. Magda, meanwhile, is at least providing us with some excellent cover by taking up the staff's attention with the cat. The cat appears to be becoming an erstwhile instagram star. Privately I hope the bar doesn't get that much attention from the posts of the cat; a clever person might wonder how this cat got here and trace our steps back, but that's a future problem and right now it has at least provided us with a plausible reason to be here taking up the attention of the staff.
A lot of people around me appear to be discussing a local library, which I think is an odd topic to be discussing at a football game. It turns out this is a 24 hour library with rather elaborate security measures for protecting a bunch of books; it's immediately clear that this library is not what it seems. I'm also picking up an undercurrent of antagonism about "immigrants" — this is nothing new in the European world and yet I can't help but feel the people are talking about a very specific type of immigrant, the type that tends to come out at night. Eventually I piece together that the library is planning to expand its services starting the following night, providing social services as well as learning, and that this has caused enough consternation amongst the locals that they're planning to protest.
As is the way in these matters, nothing is written down about the protest, or at least nothing I've seen so far; the protest is spread by that oldest of methods, word of mouth. Keeping 40% of my attention on the game, because I don't want to blow my cover, I manage to track back the messages going back and forth to a man who appears to the casual observer to be every bit the avid football fan, and yet like me is keeping his eyes on two things at once. Hopefully I'll get a chance to let Rex know about him — I don't know if he's spotted him, although Rex appears to have a keen eye for investigation. Luckily Rex rejoins us for half time, and I'm able to hint to him that this man is worth keeping an eye on.
As the game enters the closing stages, Magda and I notice a couple in the corner of the VIP area. I'd noticed them earlier but privately dismissed them; they gave every impression of being a stereotypical young couple, a vapid social media influencer with a bemuscled and bemused partner in tow who's privately wondering if the sex is really worth spending every night out watching his partner pout into her phone. I chastise myself for dismissing them so readily; as I've already said, camouflage in plain sight is often the best way, and I should've paid them more attention.
She subtly manages to contrive an opportunity to interact with Magda, making it look like a natural chat in a pub, and yet it's clear she knows what we are. I'm concerned about this; if we've somehow managed to break The Masquerade on our first night here that doesn't bode well for our chances of achieving anything worthwhile, but I get the sense that this is not a break but rather an introduction, albeit a strange one.
Meanwhile, I'm still trying to maintain my cover by actually watching some of the football — it hardly compares to the delights of watching my beloved River Plate, and this quaint little stadium is nothing compared to El Monumental, my very own theater of dreams, but I'm careful to keep these thoughts to myself. Suddenly, one of the Cork players takes a wicked curling shot that appears to defy physics and nestle itself into the corner. I've seen a lot of football in my time and I've never seen a football move like that, not even the much maligned 2010 world cup ball that seemed to have a mind of its own. Something supernatural caused that ball to move, and this took no small amount of effort. It seems like a lot of work to manipulate a football game.
With the game over and the unnerving woman seemingly re-absorbed into her boyfriend, my companions suggest that we should scout out this library. I'm not sure this is an entirely wise idea; we've clearly already made some ripples in the local area and I don't want to make many more. However, we'll have to scout it out eventually, so why not now, before it's an even bigger focus?
We head over and are immediately clocked by a security guard, who seems to recognise that we're "immigrants". I'm getting a sense that this word has two meanings in this city, although I'm not sure which meaning he's using here. We're immediately invited into the library. I am even less comfortable about the idea of actually going into the library, but I see no easy and graceful way to back out. Our faces are becoming known by more people than I'm used to. Rex's investigative nature has taken over, however, and I respect his skills enough to let him take the lead.
We enter the library and engage one of the members of staff in idle chit chat, when Magda picks up on a comment that I'd missed — perhaps a subtlety of English that evaded me, as I must admit I still find the language confusing on occasion. Magda takes offense at the comment, and the atmosphere shifts. The female librarian immediately apologises, but the damage is done and I know we'll gain no more useful information here — at least, no more information useful to our benefactors. The librarian explains that the library has been set up to help people like us, by which she means immigrants although again I'm not sure which meaning she's getting at. She's frustrated about the amount of opposition to a simple library. If I were in a more cynical mood I might point out to her that altruism is often a shield for the most nefarious of schemes, but I don't want to antagonise her further; I'm still not sure if her comment was a mistake or her mask slipping.
Another librarian, having perhaps sensed the atmosphere, joins us, suggests we stay for a cup of coffee and attempts to repeat the same explanations, but in my mind the damage is done. They're clearly on guard and alert for verbal traps.
At this point I think the time is right to check in with the man who set us to our task in the first place; I'm still finding my feet here and beginning to feel a bit overwhelmed, we've clearly been dropped into a situation that's on the edge of erupting and quite frankly I could do with a bit of guidance. I don't like to admit when I need it but I know when I'm in dangerous depths and this definitely qualifies.
We head back to the bar that started the evening off, but Gerry, the man who appeared to be calling the shots, is nowhere to be seen. We ask about, but no one seems to admit to knowing him. We're waved over by a woman in the corner who gives the immediate impression of being a barroom lush and gossip; mindful of my earlier mistake with the social media girl, I make a conscious effort not to take her at face value. I keep my cards close to my chest and engage in some superficial chat, and eventually she suggests that we might check out another bar which just happens to be close to our accommodations. I'm still getting used to the timezones my new existence necessitates — my brain is telling me it's late and I should be sleeping but my body knows this is the only useful time for it, so we head off to another bar. At least I could give someone a whistlestop tour of the pubs of the south side of Cork if I had to.
As we enter the pub, we immediately spot the man who was passing messages back and forth at the football game. This unsettles me; while I'm pretty sure he didn't clock us, others may have, and I'm becoming more and more concerned about ripples all the time. I have some skill in piecing together seemingly unrelated incidents and witnessings, and one thing I learned long ago is never to think you're the only person who has your skills. It only takes one connection to start a chain.
With that said, I know that to immediately turn tail and flee would raise more alarm bells than once again acting like I belong and I know what I want, and I take up a seat at the bar next to the man. He's got a group of hangers on with him, but he doesn't appear particularly concerned to hear what they have to say — it's impossible to say if this is through tiredness or because he knows they don't have anything worthwhile to tell him right now. One of them tries to engage me in idle chat, but I quickly discern that this man is an irrelevance in this situation and ignore him, attempting to get the attention of the barman who's making an artform out of ignoring us while not appearing to. My actions with the irrelevance have impressed the message man, who starts to discuss the match with me. This means he clocked me at the match, which is not news I wanted to hear, as he definitely qualifies as the sort of person who would have the same skills I do, or perhaps even a man of Rex's investigative nature.
I give the man the backstory I'd concocted — I'm "independently wealthy" (not true, but I can make it appear so for conversational purposes, and our benefactors have given us enough in the way of resources that I can at least do a convincing impression, for the immediate future at least) and enjoy travelling the world for football. Like all the best lies, it has just enough of the truth in it to be plausible, and I do miss watching football on a regular basis. The man perks up at the news that I'm not here to be a drain on the state, and I get the impression again that this is an old discussion being had, yet somehow it's recently taken on a more urgent tone.
As is inevitable when discussing football in this part of the world, Diego's infamous Hand of God is mentioned. I know what these men want to hear, and I'm happy to provide it, since it happens to be my thoughts on the matter. Peter Shilton should be ashamed that he got out jumped by a five foot five man, hand or no hand, and Diego was a genius. This goes down beautifully and I'm clearly flavour of the minute with the men around me.
All of a sudden the conversation starts to shift towards the planned protest at the library. I was content to keep the conversation superficial, but with the conversation heading in this direction I'm compelled to gather as much information as I can. The man rants for a bit about the protest; I was under the impression that he was a prime mover in making it happen, but that doesn't appear to be the case, or if it is he's doing a credible job of making it seem like he's not. He talks to me of tensions between the north and south side of Cork and I get the sense this is an old wound that's recently been reopened, apparently at the behest of some big—short Northsider. Again, there are clearly two worlds being discussed here, but I don't see a way to find out which is the more important without giving away which one I'm part of.
I make the right noises, and having gathered some useful information for myself the man appears to have taken somewhat of a shine to me. He asks me if I'm really just here for the football — a reasonable question, the League of Ireland not having the greatest standing internationally. I tell him that I might be around for a while, but I'm settled and housed for at least the short term. The man appears to have made up his mind about something and offers to take my number, saying he might have some work for us. It's at this point that I realise I don't actually know the number of the phone I've been given, but I manage to get around this by asking for his number. I send him a text, with a fake name attached; that could cause problems down the line if we're associated with this man for a longer period of time but right now it seems a sensible precaution to take.
As we return to our accommodation I realise we probably should have at least stopped in hours ago, just to get a feel for the place, because my mind is awash with new people and new situations. As we enter, we notice an electronic device on the door, but we're unable to work out a purpose for it. All we know is it's probably not something we want on the door, and it gets removed. If questioned we can always claim ignorance.
We sit and discuss the evening's events, but all we really come to in conclusion is that we've been dropped into a situation at once much larger and much more volatile than we were expecting. As I said earlier I understand why we're being kept in the dark; in this world we're nothing but neophytes, potentially even deniable assets, especially given that we've been provided with more knowledge than would usually be expected of vampires of our relative youth. We are not what we appear to be, but then neither is the situation in this city, and I'm concerned that we've been noticed by more elements than I'm comfortable with.
Priority one, for me, is the same as it ever was; step out of the darkness, metaphorically, and find out what's really going on. Hopefully I can find some way to turn the situation to my advantage, and if not I can at least maneuver myself to the winning side. Although I'm mindful of my benefactors and the challenge they've set before me, they are, so far as I know, 11,000 km away from me, and I'm here. A new city, a new market to uncover, and new alliegances to be formed — it's almost like old times.
If only I could eat a burger.
Read about Session 1 from the GM's perspective.
Link to Second session of the campaign.
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