Justin and Tony were up already when Karen crept out of her room, and they seemed none too happy about the lack of coffee. But she never drinks straight coffee herself, and this was the first time she'd ever had overnight guests who did (or overnight guests at all!), and she really hadn't had much time to do any shopping. If she had felt better, she might have felt bad about the situation. But given last night's sleep, or rather, lack thereof, she was feeling less than hospitable. She sat and listened as the guys debated the merits of recent tv show episodes, and tossed testosterone-tipped barbs at one another, and wondered if she didn't really look as bad as she felt--or if she always looked so bad and that's why no one seemed to have noticed. The weather didn't even hold out much hope of a brighter day--cold and rainy, with a high of only 45.

Other team members were greeting their mornings with just about as much enthusiasm. Kat was still at work, having had only the barest minimum of sleep since Thursday night. Jenkins, the former 'head guy', had disappeared, along with all the personal stuff from his office; and the #2 man from DC was now warming Jenkins' chair. And keeping the entire office almost literally hopping. There had been an enormous stack of messages on Kat's desk when she got in Friday morning, job requests that seemed to have no rhyme or reason to them, and they were no April Fool's joke. Her friend in the next cube, Brendan, had a similar stack, and no one knew what the point was. In fact, everyone seemed afraid to even look at anyone else, such was the atmosphere of uncertainty and doubt that filled the office. Their instructions were to complete one assignment, fill out the usual paperwork, and personally run it upstairs. All the usual runners were busy passing out water and highly-caffinated drinks, and, at mealtimes, were delivering food to peoples' desks. During one run upstairs, Kat happened to pass Jared coming out of the head office with a stack of files. He greeted her, but with the same cold efficiency which everyone else seemed to be using today. Everyone was getting to curl up on cots in the breakroom for occasional 'power naps', but nobody got more than a couple hours of sleep at any one time. Finally, about 10am on Saturday morning, the work orders stopped coming in. Shortly thereafter, Kat received an email: "Thank you for all your hard work. See you Monday morning." She spent a little time on a new project she was promoting, and as she left, she noted that Jared's car was still in its space. She headed home, and as she listened to the few messages on her machine, the phone rang. It was Harvey inviting her to join the rest of the team for the day's research. Grrr...just what she needed. She agreed to meet them at about noon at the Detroit Public Library, under the condition that they bring much coffee and a half dozen warm Krispy Kreme donuts for her alone. At urging from the kitten, Kat fed it and scooped its litterbox (making a quick note to herself to get one of those automatic scooping boxes.) She set up Jared's favorite meal in the crockpot, left a glass, the decanter of brandy and a candle near it with a "gooshie" note, and showered. As she went to pick up her laptop bag, the kitten crawled in and made itself comfy. Kat asked it if it had decided on a name yet, and its mewed response sounded uncannily like a "No." Kat agreed it could come along if it understood that there was to be no messing with any of the stuff in the bag, and that it couldn't complain if it found the trip boring. With that, the two hit the road.

Meanwhile, Harvey cautiously informed Katy that their trip to Greenfield Village would have to wait. His showed her the riding helmet he'd bought, and promised that a matching outfit was stashed at the Village with her name on it; it would just be a bit longer before she could retrieve it. In return, he had a 'job' for her. A convention of television syndicators was going on, and he needed to be at a meeting to promote a new project. So he needed Katy to look at some new shows targetted at her demographic--12 to 34 yos. Katy reminded him that she wouldn't be in that demographic until May 13th, but seemed intrigued. It was up to her to pick out the 3 shows that his production company would pick up the options on. She quickly went to the bedroom to change, and eventually came out dressed like a miniature CJ. Considering that the previous night's blow-up occurred because, when the two girls went to the beauty salon, their 'design' requests got switched, with Katy getting CJ's short 'do and CJ getting Katy's color job, the little business suit looked appropriate. While Katy changed, Harvey let CJ know that she would be carrying part of the meeting with the advertisers. He knew that she wanted more responsibility, and he wanted to give her her chance. They went down to the convention floor and dropped Katy, carrying an official company portfolio, off at her assignment; then Harvey and CJ went on to their meeting. After a rousing hype for his new project, Harvey turned the floor over to a slightly stunned CJ (Harvey didn't tell her just how much of the meeting would be hers, the bastard); and as she graciously took the floor, Harvey slipped out. On his way out of the building, he peeked in on Katy, who had already been through two utterly hideous scripts and had not hesitated to let the young man in charge know just what she thought of them. He was actually quite impressed by her abilities, and asked Harvey's permission to have her read some other scripts in return for covering her lunch. Harvey agreed, with one more stipulation--he had to get at least one workable script out of Katy's efforts, whether it meant snagging one from a different demographic and modifying it--or even locking a writer in a room to write something adequate before 3pm! With that, Harvey was on his way out the door, and calling first Kat (again, just the answering machine) then Karen to find out what was going on.

As Justin, Tony and Karen finished their turns in the shower, and discussed their plans for the morning, Harvey called. Karen told him to meet them in back of her place, and gave him directions--which included a stop at a nearby coffeeshop for lattes and donuts (so the guys would stop their whining.) When Harvey pulled up, the gangbangers' appeared, as if their radar had guided them to his car. They excitedly handed him a CD, and he assured them he would turn it over to his producer friends as soon as he got back to LA. They gave him a cell number and started to head off when Karen stopped them. She figured it might be helpful to have their names, too--Sketch was the mouthpiece, with tall, skinny Jigger as his right-hand man; Bobby was the big mean-looking one, and the others were Tone, Buzzcut, Jazz, and Stoner. They looked to be about 15-17 years old, a motly-looking group ranging from fully African-American to fully Hispanic with several in-between. As soon as they were off, Harvey called to see if Kat was available to join the group, and found her grumpier than usual but up for the gathering, as long as she was provided with hot coffee and a half dozen warm Krispie Kremes. She would meet the others around noon at the Library.

With that, Harvey took off in the direction of the UPS office to which Tony had sent himself a package. Not everything he wanted to bring with him would fit in his luggage. And some wouldn't even have been allowed into the airport, the other three suspected! Their suspicions certainly weren't allayed when Tony pulled out binoculars and requested that Harvey park across the street while the group finished their coffee. Harvey, poking fun at Tony's paranoia, refused and pulled up directly in front of the building--but he did offer Tony use of any of the costumes in the trunk, if he thought a disguise was necessary. Tony, trying to cover his discomfort, slipped on his shades, got out of the car, straightened his jacket, turned up the collar and headed into the office. All his 'cloak and dagger' attitude was completely missed by the woman working the counter, who merely asked to see his ID before handing over the box. When he came out, he asked Harvey to pop the trunk, and he ripped the shipping info off the box as he placed it in the trunk. Closing it, he got back in the car and asked to swing by the 'Batcave' to drop a few things off there. Harvey pulled the car around back, and Tony took his box in. Right away he noticed that there was some stuff there that hadn't been when the three had left the night before. There were some folded TV trays against a wall, a sofa, and a couple arm chairs. All of it had seen better days, but looked clean and comfortable enough in spite of the wear. After setting a bag of tools on a makeshift toolbench--an old door laid across a couple of sawhorses, Tony stashed another bag under a chair and headed back out. He'd only been inside about 15 minutes, so the group had enough time to meet Kat at noon.

As Harvey parked his car in front of the library, they spotted Kat's SUV already parked. After Harvey took a call from CJ, who told him the advertisers were impressed and wanted to take her to lunch, the five met inside the front doors and took places around one of the large tables. As they discussed the past couple of days and started throwing out ideas for the day's work, Tony eyeballed some of the young women also using the library. When his gaze settled on one pretty young thing, he pointed her out to Justin, who, appalled, said "She's under age and she's my cousin, you freak!" To which Tony replied, "Will you introduce me?" Some might think that Tony was yanking Justin's chain, but Karen's not so sure. Justin did allow that the girl's mother probably had not seen her leave in that particular outfit, and laid five dollars that he could get the librarian to 'shush' them within 30 seconds of going over there. Karen took the bet, and Justin made his way over, as the girl, sitting close to a friend (also pretty 'hot' in Tony's estimation) giggled over something they held between them. Justin didn't elicit the expected response. His cousin looked him over and told him she didn't believe it was any of his business. Her friend gave him the once over and declared him pretty cute, which was met with "Not when you know him." Justin tried a little while longer, getting nowhere, when Harvey came over holding out a cell phone, and told Justin he'd better take the call. Justin attempted to make the girl think it was her mother, but the ruse failed. Then Kat decided to stir things up a bit. She went over and asked to see what the girls were giggling over, snatching the book out of their hands. It was an old, oft-handled copy of "The Joy of Sex." She snickered, and told them the Kama Sutra had better pictures. Justin pointed out to his cousin his own initials scratched onto the back page before getting up to leave. As he did, on one side of the room he noticed Karen making a show of picking up the fiver while his cousin began to tease him about his hot new girlfriend, meaning Kat. Justin protested that she wasn't there with him like that, knowing that by 6pm the whole family would think he was inches from marriage. And Karen, for some strange reason, felt uncomfortable about Kat, Harvey and Justin's cousin teasing him about it.

While Kat was away from the table, Karen noticed a kitten crawl gently onto her lap. She told it that it ought to keep quiet since it probably wasn't supposed to be in the library, and it purred softly as Karen petted it and puzzled over why the thought of Justin and Kat being an item bothered her so much. She knew that Kat had a boyfriend. And she knew that Justin was only being nice to her because he felt obliged to; so whether or not he had a girlfriend, which he probably did, was none of Karen's business anyway. But she'd never had a guy pay her any attention at all before, and it was kind of nice even if he did it because he had to, and Justin was a really nice guy, too. Shit.

As the group began to reassemble at the table, and the kitten made its way back to Kat's lap, Karen started to notice that the crucifix was again warm against her skin, and she began to feel the press of the Unknown around her. It was as if all her nerves had been stripped raw, and she felt every Unknown emanation that had ever been in or around the library. She sat there absentmindedly rubbing the crucifix when Justin asked her what was wrong and Kat asked if she realized that she was glowing. Harvey had thought the glow just a trick of what little light was coming in the window behind Karen. But Justin noticed it too. Karen said that the crucifix was warm again--which startled Justin, since she hadn't mentioned it before--like it had been the night before when she tried to contact Jane. Karen got up and moved around the room, but felt certain that whatever it was she was feeling was centered on her, not just on the space where she sat or the room in general. Tony, who hadn't noticed that anything was going on at all, got up to do some research on property around where Jane had been appearing, and Justin joined him. Kat and Harvey did a little research of their own on the library's public computers--Harvey checking out what he could find out about Tony on the web, and Kat zeroing in on Aiden, particularly things that Harvey couldn't find just by googling his name. Tony managed to find a two-line notice about a colored girl named Jane Howard dying in a traffic accident in July, 1936, which said that police were looking for relatives. With the last name, Justin found her mother's name, Melissa, listed in the death notices from the heat wave. It seemed Jane's mother had died less than a week before Jane. Tony also found references that indicated that there might be old folks that knew the two still living in the neighborhood. Harvey found all the usual info about Tony: military service, old work records, college attendance and degrees, even his Master's thesis on chemical explosives. About Aiden, he found confirmation of what Aiden had told him the night before. Kat, however, found that his military records had been sealed, that he had been discharged on a Section 8, and that to get access to his paper records she must contact Lieutenant General Kevin C. Kiley, M.D., U.S. Army Surgeon General; Commander, U.S. Army Medical Command!

While all this was going on, Karen sat at the table, trying to figure out what she was feeling. Not just the stuff about Justin. And not just that she sensed the Unknown. But that the Unknown seemed to be putting some pressure on her. It wasn't obviously good or evil, just powerfully THERE. And that was beginning to scare her. What if Fr. Andrew was right, and the Unknown was trying to use her as a bridge into this world? She couldn't stop it alone. But that was the other thing she felt just then--terribly alone. She hadn't felt that alone since she'd been in the 'hospital'. Maybe, she thought to herself, you never really notice how alone you are until there are other people around to make you notice it. But nobody was around right then to notice the tear roll down Karen's cheek.

As Karen filled in Aiden and Harvey, Harvey seemed distracted, as if he were worried about the future state of his credit rating (since CJ and Katy took his credit card on their way out the door!) Then Harvey got a call and, from the sound of a female voice barely contained, it seemed that either CJ or Katy was at the end of her rope. Harvey excused himself and high-tailed it out of the building.

He'd no sooner left than the remaining team members (Karen, Justin and Aiden) heard a knock at the front door. They looked at one another, surprised, and Justin began to draw his gun. Karen asked Aiden, "Were we expecting anyone else?" Aiden scanned through the recent messages on his cell and realized that it might be our newest team member at the door--Tony Leonetti. Sure enough, when Karen opened the door, Tony stood outside with his bags in hand. After introductions all around, Aiden gave Tony "The Speech", briefly explained what had been going on in the last couple days, and described the different types of Zombie for Tony. The group also realized, from Tony's description of this poor guy who'd been brow-beaten by "his wife and daughter" on the plane, that Tony had sort of met Harvey. They'd ended up on the same connecting flight into Metro! Tony and Justin discussed options for acquiring one or more guns and possibly a car for Tony to use when he's in town. This led to the guys trading their 'military experience stats', and a little chest-thumping by Tony. When the testosterone fumes had thinned, Aiden realized how tired he was--he'd been up since 5am, and it was now about 9:30pm--and headed out for home. When Karen realized that Tony hadn't made any sort of hotel arrangements, she offered him space on her floor. But when Justin made a comment about heading to his own home, and Karen got the impression that Tony was expecting more than just a sleeping bag and couch pillow, she nervously asked if Justin wasn't going to be staying at her place too. (Though she'd only known Justin for a few days, she somehow trusted him implicitly. Tony she wasn't so sure about....) So Justin grabbed a couple of the cots from upstairs, to throw in his truck, rather than spend another night on the floor.

Tony hadn't had anything to eat since leaving Arkansas, so Karen and Justin took him down the street to the nearest National Coney Island, to satisfy his cravings for coney dogs and Vernors. As they sat and chatted, they happened to overhear the conversation of two cops a couple booths away. It seemed that a "Satanic cult" had moved into the area between Cass and the warehouse district. No one had caught them in the act yet, but the remains of their 'rituals'--blood and puddles of wax on the floor and dead animals like chickens, cats and dogs--had been found in a number of buildings in the area. One thought that there might be a Task Force assigned to deal with the problem. The other figured that "The Administration" would chalk the whole thing up to Santeria practitioners, and, to avoid any hint of religious persecution, sweep it under the proverbial rug. Both decided that they'd end up wasting time doing a canvass of the neighborhood when they ought to be out catching drug dealers. Their conversation then moved into a discussion of the pros and cons of the recent gentrification of their neighborhood--just a couple beat cops grousing. As Justin waved over the waitress and had her take the cops a couple pieces of pie, on him, Karen noticed, beyond the reflection of her own face in the window, Jane standing on the street, slowly bouncing her ball, with tears in her eyes and a look of betrayal and despair on her face.

Asking Justin to move, Karen slid out of the booth; but by the time she got to the door, Jane was gone. As the three settled their bills, Tony chatted with the cops, telling them he had an interest in old buildings and wondering if they knew if anyone who might know the history of some of the buildings in this neighborhood might still be around. They suggested that he check out the Detroit Historical Society, or come back during the day when the old folks of the neighborhood would be out and about. Karen stood impatiently by the door, and at her insistence the three started a slow walk back up the street, with Karen trying to silently persuade Jane to come and talk to her, while the guys talked cars. By now, Karen had noticed that the crucifix that Fr. Andrew had given her felt warm against her skin, but said nothing. Probably just her imagination. When she got the impression that Jane was pouting and had no intention of showing up just then, they returned to Justin's car and headed over to Karen's condo.

In the morning, Karen woke up feeling oddly unrested. Though she didn't have any bad dreams, it felt like she had spent the entire night fighting against having them. And the crucifix was now HOT on her skin. By the time she finished showering, the crucifix had cooled off, but Karen felt no better about it.

After pacing around her condo for what seemed like hours, Karen saw Justin's truck pull in. As she waited at the door, hand on the knob, she didn't realize that he'd narrowly missed stepping on a small blue rubber ball that appeared just below his foot. As he picked up the ball, which was remarkably similar to the one he'd watched Karen drop into her pack, and finished the climb, he (and Karen) heard the giggle of a child, and he noticed that the air at the landing was colder than it ought to be--much colder, since he could see his breath. As he raised his hand to knock, Karen opened the door just wide enough to allow Justin through, and she grabbed his sleeve and yanked him in, practically slamming the door behind him. As they stood just inside the door, Justin asked if Karen knew how cold it was in the hall and Karen told him that it had been that way when Fr. Andrew had come, too. She explained that it was probably Jane, and that she'd encountered 'cold spots' associated with ghosts before but never that extreme a difference. Then Justin handed her the ball, saying that he'd found it on the stair (not his exact words, which were more along the lines of 'I could've broke my neck if I'd stepped on this damned thing') and wondered if it had fallen from her pack on her way in earlier. "Not exactly," she responded, and told him how she found that it had disappeared from her pack, leaving a dusty ectoplasmic residue, when she went to show it to Fr. Andrew. She opened the door a crack, set the ball on the floor, and nudged it out the door. As she shut the door, she heard the ball bounce....slowly...down..thestairs.

Karen thanked Justin for coming all the way down there in the middle of the night and showed him around the condo, including the spare room that he would be using, and asked if he was hungry because she was going to make something for herself. He said that what he really needed was a shower, so she got him towels, and as he showered she pulled french bread pizzas from the freezer and got them baking. By the time Justin had finished, the pizzas were hot and, with Justin's request for an alcoholic beverage, a bottle of red wine was opened. They sat and ate and chatted, and Karen finally asked Justin how he'd come to be involved with SAVE. They moved to the comfy chairs, and Karen curled up in one opposite Justin as he told her his story. As he finished, Karen, full from the food and finally relaxed from the wine, and feeling much safer now that Justin was there, slipped into a deep sleep. When she didn't stir when he touched her arm, Justin carried her to her bed, checked that her alarm was on since she'd mentioned having to teach in the morning, and went off to the spare bedroom.

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP. The alarm went off at 8am, as scheduled, and, with bright sunshine streaming through the curtains, Karen almost felt like the past couple days had been a dream. She hadn't had the chance to get such solid sleep since this whole thing started--and it seemed like a week instead of the 2 days it had been since she first got the message to meet at the burned out building. She tiptoed out of her room to see if Justin was up, and suddenly realized that she didn't remember going to bed! She checked the living room and kitchen, and then went and listened at Justin's door. When she couldn't hear any sound at all, she slowly turned the knob and peeked around the edge of the door...to see Justin reaching out for his gun. He stopped his hand as he realized it was just Karen, and sleepily asked what time it was. Karen told him, and asked if he'd taken her to bed; when he said "Yes", she quietly thanked him. (At least he's a gentleman, she thought to herself. She knew there were some guys who might've taken her lack of consciousness as an invitation.) She told Justin that she'd be taking a shower and needed to be at class by 10am, then asked if he wanted something to eat before she had to leave. She explained that she usually walked the 8 blocks to class, and could pick something up on the way, like usual, if he didn't want anything. He countered with an offer to drive her to class and suggested they stop someplace to eat along the way. With that, they both got themselves ready for their day. Before leaving, Karen rummaged through a desk drawer and pulled out a key, and handed it to Justin. When he asked what it was, she told him "A key to my place--so you can come and go." She explained that she really hadn't thought to ask Fr. Andrew how long she'd need 'babysitting', but would be calling him this morning to find out; in the meantime, she didn't think it was fair to make Justin wait on her coming and going, since it was so nice of him to look out for her. Justin, in turn, offered her his key to his house, along with the address and directions...'in case [she] might need to get to somewhere safe from bad guys or a crazed ex-boyfriend'. When she tried to object that she didn't have an ex-boyfriend, crazed or otherwise, and that she'd still have to run back here first to get her jeep, Justin told her 'you never know' and to forget the jeep--"Take a cab!"

With that, they left the house and headed to breakfast. As they ate, Karen sketched out her schedule for Justin--a history class from 10 to 11:30am, an archaeology class from 1 to 2:30pm and another from 3 to 4pm, then she'd be done for the day. Justin said he was going to do some research on Jane and her mom at the public library, and suggested he pick Karen up for lunch at 11:30. Then he dropped her off on campus for her first class. Since she had a moment before needing to be inside, she rang Fr. Andrew's number, to ask how long Justin would be staying with her. After an odd clicking sound, a young male voice answered the phone. Karen asked for Fr. Andrew, and the voice asked who she was. After she gave her name, the voice told her that he was Fr. Andrew's "pinch hitter"--Aiden Carter. He said he was at work and might not be able to answer her question right away, and Karen said it was a simple one--how long is Justin stuck babysitting her? Aiden confirmed that Karen was the one with the 'ghost problem', and said 'until the problem was solved--maybe a couple weeks'. He suggested that the team meet with him at 7pm at the safe house on Cass, and then he went back to his work and Karen went off to hers.

At lunch, Karen told Justin about Aiden, and Justin let Karen know that he hadn't really gotten anywhere on his research yet. He also asked if she would want to join him in volunteering that evening at the soup kitchen his uncle runs--to ask around about possible disappearances and anyone new showing up--and she agreed. He dropped her off at a different building this time, where her office and her next classes were, and headed back to the library. In the short time left before her next class, Karen went down the block to the Bio. Sciences complex to find out if anyone who worked with the lab animals had heard of a recent shortage or disappearance of lab animals. They said they hadn't, but that Karen might want to check with Animal Control because there was a rumor that small animals--chickens, cats and dogs--were turning up dead and exsanguinated. She thanked them and headed off to class.

In the meantime, Kat was overwhelmed with work, and put a greeting on her voicemail to the effect that 'I can't take your call now, or maybe not even tomorrow, but I'll get back to you when I can...if I can....' When Justin tried to call her, he just left a message; and when she later called him back, she sounded very stressed and said she'd get back with us when she got caught up--but that might be a while. Harvey got back to LA to find that his daughter's nanny was stricken with a bout of salmonella; so when he headed back to Detroit, it was with Katy (his 11 y.o. daughter) and CJ (his personal assistant) in tow. Their plane landed at Metro about 5:30pm, and as soon as Harvey checked his phone he found a text message from Aiden to meet on Cass at 7pm. As the three of them ate dinner, Harvey started trying to persuade CJ to tend to Katy for the evening, making lame (to CJ anyway) excuses about an important meeting and how doing this for him would be a win-win situation. CJ didn't really see it that way, but agreed in return for the promise of running the next big meeting with investors. She also would make no promises regarding the condition that Katy returned in. (Not even that she'd be in one piece!) Katy, who didn't think she needed a nanny at all, agreed to the deal if Harvey would spend the next day with her--and he promised a trip to Greenfield Village on Saturday. As Harvey headed off to Cass, CJ and Katy headed off to the MGM Grand to get rooms and a night on the town.

Justin picked up Karen around 4:30/5pm, just as his phone rang and displayed a text message from Aiden about the meeting at 7. Karen didn't bother telling Justin about the child-like giggling she'd heard periodically throughout her day--no point in freaking him out. Over dinner, Justin gave her a quick rundown of what he'd been able to find out--he'd searched newspaper records from 1930-36, and found that a killer heatwave in July of '36 had killed hundreds in Detroit and thousands across the country. He was able to track down lists of the dead, but without knowing Jane's last name all he was able to do was eliminate the male names and any females who had enough of a notice to include race--which weren't many, since not many people had the money to run a full death notice. After dinner, on the way over to the Bat Cave, Karen got a call from Harvey. He was back in town and had gotten a TM about the meeting, and wondered what it was about. When Karen realized that Harvey hadn't met Fr. Andrew, much less Aiden, and had missed all that had happened over the last 36 hours, she told him she'd explain at the meeting. When Justin reminded her about "Pimp Daddy", she called Harvey back and said that he should park behind the bldg. and use the back door. He said he had a different car, fancier than last time, so Karen suggested that he park near a club instead, but still use the back door. Justin and Karen agreed that since they no longer had time to work the soup kitchen tonight, they'd do that Saturday.

As Justin pulled into the parking ramp near the Bat Cave, he spotted "Pimp Daddy" and his crew--and they spotted Justin, and gave him a little wave as they ambled toward the safe house. Justin switched coats, so he could carry the shotgun, and suggested Karen put her gun in a spot more accessible than her pack. She moved it to her jacket pocket, then, at Justin's insistance, tucked it into her jeans at the small of her back.

The two watched as a glossy, smoke-windowed Town Car rolled past and into a club parking lot. "Pimp Daddy" noticed too, and he and his crew moved toward it. Justin walked purposefully toward the cluster, with Karen slightly behind, as Harvey got out of the car and was surrounded by the gangstas. They offered to "protect" the car "for a small consideration" since "a guy's gotta eat." Harvey countered with an offer to buy them all dinner when he was done with his meeting. Well, they were thinking of a slightly "greener" reward. Then Harvey, in a moment of utter brilliance, asked if they could rap. They did a short rap for him, and he offered that, if they made a one cut demo disk and got it to him, he'd take it to some people he knows in LA and try to get them a contract. Amazingly, or maybe not so, they moved away, talking excitedly among themselves about the new bling they'd buy when they became rap stars

Justin and Karen, stunned by this turn of events, asked Harvey what he'd done, and he explained. They all went together to the back door of the Bat Cave, and found a pickup with the vanity plate "MEDIC" parked in back and the back door slightly ajar. Justin heard the clinking of bottles from inside and slowly slid the door open, one finger along the side of the shotgun's trigger. Inside was a young guy dressed in worn jeans, a 'scrub' top and Tigers jacket, putting bottles into the 'fridge. On the counter near him was a Tigers cap. It was Aiden. Karen introduced herself, and Aiden introduced himself to Justin and Harvey. He referred to Fr. Andrew as "Drew", as he told the group that Drew had been recalled to Rome because "the big guy' was going fast. Aiden is a paramedic, and while he isn't as experienced as Fr. Andrew, he's all that's available right now. He gave us a little of his background: half way through med. school when his twin sister was killed in the Trade Center; dropped out to join up with the armed forces, since he couldn't just sit around doing nothing; sent to Afghanistan as a medic; encountered werewolves there, killing one when he shoved a silver candlestick through it, and saving his best buddy's life by healing his torn-open throat after praying fervently that God not let his buddy die. He was discharged with Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome, recruited by SAVE, and is taking a few classes at Wayne while working, in order to get himself ready to go back into med. school. If he decides that's what he should do....

After Justin commented that 'more stuff from the movies (referring to the silver candlestick thing) was actually true' and Karen mentioned that she'd had no idea that making promises and feeding a ghost might be bad things, Aiden realized that Fr. Andrew had never given us "THE SPEECH", and seemed pretty pissed about it. He explained that SAVE in Michigan amounted to only about 50 people in the Lower Peninsula, and 2 in the UP. There might be only about 3000-4000 envoys in the whole world! SAVE is primarily a conduit for information, a network to spread hard-won experience to all those who have to deal directly with the Unknown. There are only a few rules envoys must follow, and failure to follow them will result in dismissal. The average lifespan of someone dismissed from SAVE is 18 months--once you're consciously aware of the Unknown, they're aware of you; and while SAVE might not offer much more protection than the safety that comes in numbers, without that a former envoy has no protection at all. Then, pulling out a small card, Aiden reads us the rules:

1)Keep all info about SAVE secret at any cost, even death. If an envoy is captured or arrested, SAVE will NOT publicly acknowledge him, though they will do what they can behind the scenes to protect him.

2)Envoys will be held to the highest ethical principles, and must respect the customs and lifestyles of the people and cultures they encounter.

3)Any information an envoy gets MUST be noted and distributed throughout SAVE channels ASAP.

4) Envoys may be the guardians of the world, but none outside SAVE will ever know what they do. Don't expect much return on your investment.

Those are the rules. Aiden promised that he would hang out with us when he can and help when he can, but with only 3 years experience under his belt that may not always be enough. Then Karen began to fill in Harvey and Aiden on the events since Harvey dropped the team at the Bat Cave early Thursday morning....

Justin hadn't seen much on the roof, so Karen went up to give it a quick look. In the meantime, Kat pulled out her laptop and began to look for aerial photos of the building and area. Justin and Karen started studying the debris on the roof and noticed that it appeared to have been deliberately swept out of the center of the roof, though not as cleanly as to indicate use of a broom.

Just as Justin and Karen were about to give up, Kat asked if they could see the design that the most recent photo showed. "Uh, what design?" was their only response. Justin and Karen proceeded to look carefully for what Kat described, and managed to find it--a case of not seeing the forest for the trees. The design looked like it had been painted with a mop and poster paint, large enough to cover the roof. Justin and Karen proceeded to map and photograph the details, including reference points on the drawings and Karen in the photos as a scale reference; and they took a sample of the "paint" for later analysis.

As they finished their work, Kat pointed out the gathering clouds--a storm was coming. Justin and Karen climbed down, as Kat packed up the laptop, and as the team turned to go to the truck, the skies opened up with a torrential downpour. They heard the sound of shuffling coming from inside the warehouse and saw that the rain was washing away the 'circle' scribed around the building, and hurried toward the truck. As they got in, they noticed the warehouse door opening slowly. As soon as they were out of the rain, they directed their flashlights toward the door.

Just then, lightning struck the ground about 15 feet from the truck and they were all blinded and deafened for what seemed minutes, though it was only about 30 seconds. When they recovered enough to act, Justin positioned the truck to direct its headlights at the door. But there was no sign of anyone there, and no sight of anyone... or anything... moving away from the now wide-open doorway. As the team continued to scan the area for movement, lightning struck again -- at the same distance, but on the opposite side of the truck. They were being warned, and decided to heed the warning, driving quickly away.

The team headed for a coffeehouse to dry off, warm up, and compare notes. Kat did a little more research, and found that the design--which Karen identified as a Voudon veve, or ritual symbol--had not been on the roof in the satellite photo taken the week before, though the rain/snow mix on the 19th could have washed any previous evidence of it away. At that, Justin's phone rang. It was Jerry. He'd been leaving messages for Justin all afternoon--there had been 4 appointments for the day and the customers were getting antsy for their work to be finished. Since Justin had work to do and Kat had a date with Jared, Karen offered to contact Fr. Andrew and report what they'd found. Kat headed home, and Justin offered to drop Karen at her apartment.

As Justin drove down the rain-slicked streets, he saw a child's ball bounce into the street and caught a glimpse of a small black girl running into the street after it. He slammed on the brakes, fishtailing the truck, threw it into park and flew out the door. Karen hadn't seen what happened, but when she calmed Justin down enough for coherent speech, he described the child and pointed out the blue ball near the front tire. Karen picked up the ball and said "Welcome to my world."

She explained to Justin that the girl was Jane, the ghost she'd met at the diner earlier in the day. Karen is sure that this was Jane's way of reminding her of her promise. She briefly laid out the story for Justin--how she'd seen ghosts all her life, had been approached by Jane while waiting at the diner, and had promised the child (because that's how she thought of Jane--not as a potentially dangerous part of the Unknown) to help find her Mama. Justin offered his help, and, still shaken, turned the truck toward Karen's place.

Once home, Karen called Fr. Andrew. He offered to come by to hear the team's report, and a little while later Karen heard his footsteps in the hall, just as an email delivered a copy of the aerial photo that Kat had by now cleaned up to make as distinct as possible, as well as the photos that Justin had taken.

While tea steeped, Karen began her report, showing Fr. Andrew the photos and sketches, and describing what the team had found. She presented the sample of the 'paint', and he sniffed and tasted it and said it was blood mixed with flour.

Fr. Andrew went quickly to a website where he found a veve similar to the one on the warehouse roof, and explained that it was the symbol of Dambala, but slightly different than the one in his reference. He explained about the differences between Voudon -- the religion -- and Voodoo -- the 'American movie' version, and said that some people (pointing to his indalo pin) believe that Voodoo is an Unknown perversion of Voudon.

Karen continued her report over tea and the cookies that Fr. Andrew brought, describing how the storm blew in as the team packed up, and how the lightning struck to either side of the truck, forcing them to leave. Fr. Andrew told her that he believed that whomever was behind the zombies in that warehouse (he called it a bokor) was obviously fairly powerful, perhaps more than an inexperienced team could handle. He was going to look into getting us help, or finding someone else to pick up at this point.

(In confidence, he also added that the health of the Holy Father was not good, and that he might have little warning before being called to Rome. But he said that he would try to arrange for a back-up contact to take over for him, should he be called away before the matter was dealt with.)

In the meantime, he said, the team should stay away from the warehouse, but continue doing research: painting the veve on the roof would have required a great deal of blood--we needed to find out where that came from. Look for reports of animal disappearances, large quantities of blood stolen from a slaughterhouse, and missing people--particularly the homeless. We should also look for people new to the area, someone who seemed the sort to attempt this sort of thing.

When Karen had described everything else, she made a passing comment about Justin's first encounter with Jane. At that, Fr. Andrew leaned forward and asked for details of how she met Jane. As she described promising to help find Jane's Mama, he asked "You didn't feed her, did you?"

When Karen said that she had offered Jane a spoonful of chili, he became alarmed. He explained that ghosts can become dangerous when promises made to them aren't kept, and that a ghost's 'timeline' for expecting fulfillment of the promise might be very different from a living person's. He added that feeding a ghost creates a connection, a bridge, between the person and the ghost which could lead the ghost to the person.

He asked permission to bless Karen, which she gave, and when he had blessed her, he also marked all the windows and door of the apartment using the same prayer--one which, though she was raised Catholic, Karen didn't recognize.

When he finished, he offered her the cross that hung around his own neck, and blessed her with a more common blessing. When he did this, a trick of the light made it seem almost like there had been a slight glow around his hands, and the blessing left Karen with the warm fuzzy feeling that one gets when blessed by a trusted cleric. Karen helped Fr. Andrew with his coat, and he left her with the warning that she might want to be alone as little as possible until he had time to deal with Jane. Somehow, the hallway seemed colder than when she'd gotten home.

When Fr. Andrew had gone, Karen called Kat and Justin, and told them all that Fr. Andrew had said. When she told them about Fr. Andrew's warning about Jane and not being alone, Justin offered to come over immediately--and Karen accepted. She began peering out the windows, watching for Justin's truck. She'd never encountered a malevolent ghost before, and was more shaken up by what Fr. Andrew said than she would admit to anyone. She just hoped Justin would get there soon....