Episode 2 -  Gator Baitin'

Tuesday, June 3rd


While the majority of the group had been out Ghoul hunting, Danny Chow decided to do a little investigating of his own.  He decided to check out the local Ninjitsu school since the group had just had a run-in with a squad of ninja assassins with heavy magical back-up.  He wanted to see if there was any possible connection.  So, that evening he headed down town to the Vibora Bay Bujinkin-Do Ninjitsu Dojo.  He arrives just before the evening class is about to start and meets "Sensei John" Wellman.  John seems a nice enough guy, though slightly flaky.  As Danny observes the class, he notices that John is deliberately down-playing his own skill.  He doesn't exactly teach anything wrong so much as his teaching seems deliberately inefficient.  Similarly, when demoing techniques and lightly sparring with students, he subtly but deliberately leaves openings and makes small mistakes.  Some are obvious and meant for students to exploit however others are subtle enough that Danny's convinced they're more for his benefit than the students.  Near the end of class, several students are paired off to spar, including two of the most senior students, Susan and Steve).  During the match, it's obvious Steve has a significant reach and strength advantage (being nearly 6 1/2 feet to Susan's 5 1/2) as well as appearing more graceful and experienced.  However, Danny also notices that Steve is overconfident and that causes him to leave an opening that Susan is able to exploit and with the match by breaking Steve's nose.  After the class, Danny talks some more with John and directly asks him why he is hiding his true skills.  John is taken off guard and Danny senses a brief "chi spike" before John recovers and basically dodges the question.  Danny requests a friendly sparring match but is turned down.  As Danny leaves, he notices Steve throwing several dirty looks Susan's way in the parking lot.

Also, while everyone else was busy with Ghouls, Mike Silva felt he needed to keep a close eye on the Orphanage.  He took Tinker with him and got a few funny looks because most folks haven't seen a cat in a "trench coat" before, much less in the Florida June weather.  Nothing much happens until around midnight when Tinker spots someone sneaking into the orphanage.  Mike shadows him in and follows him through the halls for a while before realizing that it's Tom the Janitor.  When Mike confronts him, he finds out that Tom has taken it upon himself to perform middle-of-the-night patrols of the orphanage.  He hopes to be able to spot "Mary" in time to call upon Mike before she can take away any children.  He begs Mike not to tell anyone because if he's caught sneaking around the orphanage at night, after his shift is over, he'll probably get fired.

Friday, June 6th

Shortly after arriving at work, Julian gets a call about a gator attack near one of the camp grounds.  He's one of the first on scene and takes a look around the sight. The wife is in a state of shock but manages to inform the park rangers that her husband had gotten up about dawn to make them breakfast. Then she heard him screaming. When she looked out of the tent, she saw her husband being drug into the water by an alligator. There's definitely gator tracks, blood and other signs of a struggle.  While looking around, Julian is certain that he's overlooking something but he's not quite sure what.

Julian calls Mike since Mike works at the zoo and may know some stuff about alligators. Mike consults with a coworker, Alice Lima (the zoo's resident herpetologist). She and Mike head out to the site to lend their expert opinions. Both agree that the size of the alligator tracks indicate that it's at least 40, maybe 50 feet long. Much larger than common (Florida alligators typically getting no larger than 15'). Also, it venturing 20 feet on shore to snag prey, much less human prey, is highly unusual. Mike gets a vaguely queezy feeling about the animal's tracks.

Concerned about Mike's “bad feeling”, Julian decides to start the phone chain to the rest of the group. As the group starts contacting one another, other experts start arriving: trackers and alligator wranglers. Sonja arrives just as the rangers and company are getting ready to start sweeping the swamp to try to find the monster alligator. The wife has been taken to a local hospital to be treated for shock and then questioned further after she calms down some.

The rangers, wranglers and trackers all spread out to hunt for the gator. Every now and then, Mike's queezy and uneasy feeling comes back. He figures he's crossing spots where the alligator has been. However, he's not having much luck finding its tracks. Around lunch time everyone stops for a break.

Lunch time is about when Kayla arrives. Figuring Kayla's the sneaky one, Sonja suggests that she should go in a take a closer look at the tracks. As soon as Kayla reaches the tracks, she collapses. Sonja rushes over to drag her back outside the cordoned off area. A Deputy Park Ranger who had been left to keep an eye on the scene spots them. Sonja tells him that Kayla had a seizure of some kind. He rushes back to his truck to get his first aid kit and to call the EMTs. However, Kayla comes to shortly and the pair manage to convince the Deputy Ranger that she's going to be okay.

While Kayla was out, she had a vision of a small hill in the swamp with a rickety old shack on it near a fairly wide stream at twilight. She also had the sensation of extreme pain. She calls Julian's cell phone to tell him about her vision. Just as she describes the shack and it's location, Mike gets his feet tangled up in some underwater roots and falls over, knocking the cell phone out of Julian's hands. Mike goes under, but comes up sputtering and covered in mud. Julian & Mike's cell phones are both ruined.

Around mid afternoon, the last two members of the group (Danny and Zeke) arrive at the camp sight. At about the same time, Julian, Mike and Alice manage to find the shack that Kayla had described. There's no sign of the alligator and Mike does not get the uneasy feeling he'd been getting most of the day. Julian checks out the shack and finds a small bolt-hole underneath it. There's a hand full of shacks like this around the swamp dating back to the days of prohibition. They were drop points for whiskey runners. Most were converted over for hunting camps and then, when San Sebastian Swamp was turned into a Wildlife Preserve, they become commonly used by researchers, bird watchers and wildlife photographers. The shack does show signs of recent use and Julian finds a small amount of silvery-gray powder down in the bolt hole. He takes a sample and puts it in a baggy for later analysis.

Using Alice's cell phone, the group makes plans to meet up at the shack. Unfortunately, the only two people with any familiarity with the swamp or tracking skills are already at the shack. The other four, are instructed to drive around to Seminole Hills (a Vibora Bay suburb on the side of the swamp opposite the city but closer to the shack) and make their way in from there. Several trips to the local Wal Mart later, the group is finally outfitted with a map of the swamp, compass, GPS unit and hip waders for all. Having been given a brief run-down of how to use the map, compass and GPS unit from the kindly middle-aged sales clerk Zeke and company make their way into the swamp with a great lack of confidence.

When the group finally arrives at the shack, they concoct a story about having to “lead these lost tourists back out of the swamp” in order to get Alice away from the scene. The also ask her about getting enough tranquilizers to stop a fifty foot alligator. She grabs a cab back to the zoo to get a tranq gun with an elephant sized dose.  The group makes their way back to the shack about 45 minutes or so before sundown. Zeke attempts to cast a spell of protection for the group but the back-lash of a botched ritual leaves him in brief but intense pain and feeling magically drained.

Shortly before sunset, Julian spots ripples in the water coming down stream. They warn the others and soon the alligator comes up onto the island's bank. It has a corpse in its mouth that matches the general description of the man who was attacked that morning. Kayla and Mike charge in to attack while everyone else decides to employ the safety of distance and shoot it from out of chomping range. Mike is grabbed and drug underwater, which is unfortunate as his attacks seemed to be having the greatest effect. Zeke is frustrated by his weakened magic and the alligator proves to be remarkably resilient, resisting arrows, swords and bullets with equal efficacy. Mike manages to briefly escape once when the alligator is detracted while trying to tail-swipe Kayla but is quickly grabbed again.

Eventually the group manage to subdue the beast, leaving them wondering what to do with an unconscious, heavily injured 50-foot long alligator. Now that the combat is over and he has time to think, Mike gets a vaguely familiar feeling about the infernal sensation he can feel coming off the alligator. In fact, it feels similar to the half-oni they'd fought nearly a week ago. When he mentions this, it occurs to Julian that the campground where the attack occurred was only a couple miles from where he'd dumped the half-oni's dead body.  The group decides to call in to the ranger station to let them know that they've found and subdued the alligator and need assistance securing it. A group of wranglers is sent down. Zeke, Danny, Kayla and Sonja attempt to follow their trail back out of the swamp, in the dark. Fortunately, they don't get too lost before making their way out.

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