The Awakening - Part 4

Begins Tuesday, June 7, 1921. Reverend William Grainger arrived at an asylum to visit Teddy Lockhart, the historian and adventurer who had been presumed dead after the catastrophic collapse of the Langham Hotel. To Grainger's astonishment, Teddy was alive, though in a deeply disturbed state. The asylum staff had called upon Grainger after Teddy mentioned his name repeatedly during his delirious episodes. When Grainger sat beside his old friend, Teddy recognized him immediately, crying out "William!" before launching into fragmented warnings about visions, gates that needed closing, and wounds that were bleeding. He rambled urgently about needing to "close it where it opened," his words tumbling over each other in desperate confusion. Grainger explained to the asylum staff that Teddy had traveled with him to Peru earlier in the year and had been caught in the hotel collapse, providing the sister's contact details for notification. Before leaving, Grainger sent a cryptic telegram to John Anderton: "Suspect I have found Teddy alive, but in a state of shock. Will take you to see them tomorrow, 1 p.m. See you 9 a.m tomorrow." That night, Grainger's sleep was plagued by a vivid nightmare. He dreamed of the ancient jar stored in a bank vault, watching helplessly as it cracked open and leaked thick black fluid that dissolved the bank's walls and drowned the staff. In the dream, the only safe ground was St Albans Museum, which glowed with a protective, warded light. When morning came, all members of the party woke feeling exhausted and magically drained, having lost six magic points below their normal levels. Morning of Wednesday, June 8, 1921. John received another telegram, this one from Vernon Nowell at St Albans Museum, relaying urgent information from the German academic Brandt. Brandt claimed to have discovered a warning glyph in the sketches Grainger had provided, suggesting the jar leaked psychic radiation that attracted dangerous interlopers. The glyph indicated the jar needed to be kept in a lead-lined or magnetically sealed environment, equipment that only the museum possessed. As the party gathered to discuss these revelations and prepare to meet Fire Chief Freeland at the collapsed hotel, the sky suddenly darkened without warning. Within minutes, a torrential rainstorm erupted with frequent lightning strikes that appeared distinctly wrong—rather than normal bolts, they looked like cracks spreading across a glass mirror, as if reality itself was fracturing. The storm passed as quickly as it had arrived, leaving the morning eerily normal again and the party questioning whether they were still in their own world. They proceeded to the Langham Hotel, where Fire Chief Freeland awaited them with troubling news: many attendees of the exhibition event remained completely unaccounted for, and remarkably, no bodies had been recovered from the terrace level where the event had taken place. Upon entering the hotel lobby, those sensitive to such things felt a strange, humming energy permeating the building, making them supernaturally aware of something unnatural lingering in the structure. The lobby had been stripped of all portable items, with hydraulic jacks and screw props supporting the dangerously unstable ceiling. As they moved through the restaurant area, Reverend Grainger and John Anderton noticed a brief blue light emanating from the kitchen, though it vanished before they could investigate properly. The Fire Chief led them upstairs, where the damage became increasingly severe, with large sections of the upper floors completely open to the sky and debris scattered everywhere. When they reached the fourth floor, Alfie made a remarkable observation with his keen eye for patterns. The outline of the missing material resembled the bottom of an enormous bowl, as if something had scooped out a massive sphere from the center of the building. The Fire Chief pointed out the strangest aspect of the damage: various materials including copper, stonework, wood, and metal had been fused together at peculiar angles, yet there were no burn marks anywhere. This suggested the destruction hadn't been caused by fire or a conventional explosion. Reverend Grainger and John noticed a shimmering heat haze hovering in the air where the center of the "wound" would be, though the Fire Chief couldn't see it himself. Despite warnings about the danger, Alfie sneaked away and climbed through the debris to investigate the upper level more closely. What he discovered there would haunt him: beneath fallen rubble, he uncovered what appeared to be a stone carving, but as he cleared more debris, he realized with horror that it was the actual bellboy he had met on the night of the collapse. The young man had been completely petrified into stone, frozen in a pose of absolute terror with his hands raised and a look of horror etched permanently on his face. The sight cost Alfie some of his sanity, and he scrambled back down, lying to the others that there had been nothing to see. The Fire Chief theorized that the damage suggested an implosion rather than an explosion, with material pulled into a central point creating an eighty-foot diameter sphere of missing matter. As the party prepared to leave the hotel, they were approached by two well-dressed individuals: Ross Albright and Beth Chilton, lawyers from the firm of Birch and Chase. They were searching for their missing colleagues Wayne Devers, Jim Pooler, and Edith Lusk, who had attended the hotel event and never returned. The conversation grew tense as the party remained evasive, with John directing them to speak with Carl Sherwin, the solicitor who had organised the event. Reverend Grainger, however, revealed a chilling truth: Wayne Devers was the person who had transformed into the monstrous creature that tore Teddy Lockhart apart during the hotel collapse. During the exchange, Grainger noticed that Beth Chilton seemed to be using some form of psychology or perhaps even magic to read him. The lawyers proposed a meeting at the Ritz the following morning at eleven o'clock to exchange information more formally, and Alfie managed to follow them to their car and note its registration. The party split up to pursue different objectives. John Anderton returned home to arrange the construction of a specialised container for the jar—a double lead-lined box with structural material sandwiched between layers of lead and a proper seal, designed to contain the jar's psychic radiation. Meanwhile, Reverend Grainger and Everett Reed learned that Teddy had been relocated to a more secure facility in Epsom, Surrey, for his own safety. During the journey there, they conspired about how to convince John of the jar's danger and potentially retrieve it from his vault, convinced that sealing it properly was of paramount importance. At the Epsom asylum, Grainger and Everett found Teddy sitting in a chair, engaged in repetitive stimming behaviors. When he saw the Reverend, he became agitated, crying out "William!" repeatedly and speaking urgently about "the wound" that was "still bleeding" and "in the room." He insisted they must "close it where it opened" and "seal it," confirming that the jar was what needed to be closed. Most importantly, Teddy revealed that the "bowl" was the "cap" needed to seal the jar and close the wound. He mentioned that "they" were coming but couldn't identify who, before lapsing back into a catatonic state. Grainger attempted to comfort his friend, assuring him they would use the bowl to seal the jar and promising to visit again soon. Meanwhile, Alfie conducted reconnaissance at Montague House, where a future event was planned. He attempted to gather information about servant uniforms by approaching the back entrance, but was confronted by a stern cook who dismissed him with a rolling pin when he inquired about work. Undeterred, Alfie waited outside and engaged some younger servant boys in conversation as they arrived with baskets of vegetables. From them, he learned that servants at Montague House didn't wear specific uniforms but rather typical black servant attire that could be purchased from shops. Armed with this information and the urgent warnings from Teddy about the need to seal the jar using the bowl as a cap, the party prepared for their next moves, knowing that time was running out and that something dangerous was coming through the wound that remained open in reality itself.