It was still hard to use the wings, but Sal was slowly getting the hang of flying with the cape he'd been given. The coat grew ridges and expanded with the strips of leather weaving together into bat-like wings capable of lifting him off the ground. It would take a bit of training to get good at though.

Michael made sure the battery was out of the phone on his way back in case they were trying to trace him through the phone back to the meet up. He looked at everyone after he conveyed what had gone down. “Well, what are your thoughts?”

Noah tilted his head side to side, "Of all of us you are the most experienced with hunters. It is to my limited understanding that they take every advantage they can. They don't fight monsters or beings able to rewrite reality without taking every tiny ounce of information and put it to good use."

"They also have a synth tech in there, so we will need to recalibrate all the slates. "

After Noah said his piece, Mistral spoke, "Pardonne-moi, but I may have missed the striking of an agreement.  We have provided intelligence to these hunters, but what have we received in return?  I did not hear a promise to leave our allies alone to pursue cultistes démoniaques."  Mistral reclined easily upon a bench, looking as if she'd been there all along despite nobody having noticed her arrival.

After that discussion Mistral reported, "There is another matter of an unexpected discovery made during my search.  I have sighted Nefertiti, in worrying company.  She was accompanied by a large man whom I have descried before carrying la Croix Affreuse, a cursed cross of murdered synthetics belonging to an Earthbound démon.  He appeared at that time to be in service to that selfsame démon.  The loups-garous you encountered previously--"  She glanced to Michael, "--served as security for what seemed to be an audience with an unknown greater entity.  I was unable to pinpoint the location due to extraordinary measures of sympathetic obfuscation.  It was a feat to have witnessed this at all."

Mistral crossed her legs and added, "I am concerned, whether she is aware of the nature of these associates or no."
This message was last edited by the player at 00:43, Tue 23 Nov 2021.

Sal looked at Point Break and seethed. "If she aids those murderers, she must be stopped. If she even looks funny at Point Break, or Grey, all bets are off. I'd fight Talion himself to protect them."

Noah frowned a bit as he sat next to Mistral. Even he with Omni sight couldn't see Mistral if she did not want to be seen. "Grey is a precious lil bean. She sent a ping last night but I couldn't narrow it down, so I know she is ok. When she sends another I'll be able to zero down a fair bit more."

He got quiet to listen to what Mistral had to say. "I pay to every higher power out there that she hasn't gone to the dark side."

"Do you know where she is at? If we can get a trace on her we will know where about to strike once we fully recover."

Sal says, "If not, we can check with Milo. Last I saw her, she was on her way back to his place. She may still return there."

Mistral shook her head, "I deduced the location to be a dockside warehouse from environmental cues, but have been unable as of yet to attain its emplacement spécifique.  Extraordinary obfuscations are at play."  From the tone of her voice, it was evident that Mistral was quite vexed by this failure of mystical detection.

Sal was upset by the report, and Mistral looked to him and cautioned, "Take care in casting judgement too quickly, mon ami, for we haven't yet seen the full picture.  Our meeting with the hunters would be viewed with suspicion by many of our allies absent of context, or even with it.  This scene had the look of the prelude to a first introduction, the purpose of which is unknown to us."  She added, "Les loups-garous were not best pleased to see her, for what it is worth.  Also, her wounds appeared to be entirely healed.  Her new sire provides, it would seem."
This message was last edited by the player at 01:22, Tue 23 Nov 2021.

Michael shrugged at Mistral’s inquiry. “They will never admit to working with anyone that isn’t completely human. The most we can do is feed them information and see if they bite. They won’t allow such evil to exist for too long when they know where to look. The fact that they let us leave without a threat or fight shows they at least see us as a lesser evil and of possible use to them. It may work to lead some evil to their doorstep if they don’t start acting.”

Noah looked at the building so the hunter he was absolutely sure that was watching them would think Noah was looking at them. That was his head cannon anyway. "As long as they back off and start fighting the bad guys we won't have to step up to the plate any more than we have already. Though I must confess I do want to know if they have any plans to route the Synths."

"I know Neko5000 was a highest bidder kinda programmer, Hempknight also. But it's hard to tell who got them jamming code. It's not something script kiddies can pull off."

He sighed, "Sal, is there any way we can get in contact with Nef. caretaker? I can't call her directly as that won't go well... at all." He was out of his element dealing with people.

To Michael's statement about the hunters focusing on "greater evils" Sal mused, "A battle to be fought in the future, I'm sure. Well, if we can get all our enemies to kindly take turns, it would make things easier..."

In response to Noah, Sal said, "I can call Milo. As far as I know, Nefertiti doesn't have a phone of her own."

 When Sal dialed the number, it rang 4 times and then the call button was pressed. However, no one spoke on the other end. The silence coming over the phone was unnerving.

Noah flipped out a disk and started sorting quickly through a number of programs. ((20:16, Today: Noah rolled 2 successes using 9d10 with the World of Darkness nWoD system with a target of 8, rerolling 10s with rolls of 5,8,5,9,2,4,5,7,6.  Back hack the line.)) He was pushing a ping signal to the three closest towers. If he could get their location and distance to the phone he could pinpoint it.

There was also recording for background noise.

Noah made a "keep them on the line" gesture.

Sal said,"Hello? Milo? Must be getting a poor signal. You in a tunnel? Hello...,"

Mistral answered evenly, "These hunters will not have infinite resources, so let us hope they overextend themselves."  She glanced to Fate and then added, "With information on emplacements particuliers where the Mysterium feels excess pressure, it might be arranged for that pressure to be relieved.  Unplanned vacations for hunters on duty to the Mongolian steppe, or the mountains of Greenland, perhaps.  Solutions non violentes."

Sal put in a call to Nefertiti's sire, but it seemed that he was to be foiled by some tedious vampiric intrigue.  Mistral sighed and withdrew a band of strange fabric to wrap about her eyes like a blindfold, then cast her senses afar.

 The silence hang in the air for a few moments and then the cell hung up abruptly without anyone saying another word.

 Noah's attempt to back hack the line was going smoothly until the call was abruptly cut off.

Mistral sat up straight, going from casual to attentive in the space of moments.  Appearing to be observing something despite her blindfold, she reported, “Milo had good reason to miss your call, for he is en difficulté.  I suspect it was a hunter who answered.”  Mistral continued to observe, head turning slightly as if searching, then she added, “Twelve hunters, heavily armed and closing.  He is wounded and has perhaps five minutes until they have him… as matters stand.”

Mistral stated with cold confidence, “It is within my power to bring this situation to une résolution décisive.  The only questions that remain are the method and the message to send by it.  Sal, avez-vous secure confinements for multiple prisoners, should we require them?”

Michael held up a hand and smiled. “Why not get two birds with one stone? Teleport them to the warehouse on the docks we informed the other Hunters of. We need them to deal with that issue and save Milo. It won’t be hard to figure out it was us who did it, but it’s better than holding them hostage.”

Sal held back his anger at his friend being targeted-- again-- and suggested a course of action unlikely to end in bloodshed (or at least, postpone it,) "I'd prefer sending them, sans clothing, ID or other possessions to the changing rooms of that lovely Parisian boutique we took Lola to, but Michael's plan is good, too, if bloodier."

Mistral considered Michael's suggestion, then tsked toward Sal, "I would not taint that lovely boutique with such as these.  You may greet Milo in votre foyer in approximately one minute, Sal."  With that, the blindfolded archmage set to work.  She performed a series of intricate gesticulations that were difficult to follow with the eye, while muttering incantations in a cryptic tongue never meant for mortal ears.

Elsewhere, the squad of hunters pursuing Milo were rapidly diminished as small groups quietly vanished, spirited away upon a supernal breeze.  Four found themselves stranded and separated in the trackless wastes of the southern Mongolian Gobi desert, while four more were marooned in an arid scrubland on the Patagonian steppe in Argentina.  Three more found themselves on an endless sheet of cracked ice near the western coast of Greenland.  The squad leader found themselves submerged and crushed in frigid seawater, too deep to even see the light of the sun far, far above.

Back at Sal's estate just under a minute later, Milo staggered into the foyer in a swirl of supernal mist, looking rather worse for wear.  His coat was gone and his shirt was torn and riddled with gunshot holes, trousers wet and stained with filth.  Mistral observed the ensuing meeting, but let Sal handle it and take credit for the rescue.  She waited quietly for a couple of minutes, then retrieved a pen and a small pad of paper from a tiny portal and wrote a quick note, which she folded in half.  Mistral waited a little longer, then carefully deposited the note into another tiny portal.

In the hunter's safehouse visited previously in the day, there came a sudden and rather inexplicable disturbance.  The waterlogged and half-frozen corpse of a hunter squad leader and a dozen gallons of icy seawater collapsed wetly onto a sofa in the safehouse's central living space.  Folded neatly upon a table near this grisly tableau was a brief note, written in a neat cursive handwriting that read simply, "Voscal.  You were warned."

Mistral allowed herself an enigmatic smile and reported to her cabal-mates, "This matter is resolved, and a message has been sent."
This message was last edited by the player at 21:48, Fri 03 Dec 2021.

Michael arched an eyebrow at the enigmatic response from Mistral. “What sort of people or creatures did they encounter at the dock? I’m curious since I doubt whoever was there would take kindly to a dozen Hunters showing up on their doorstep.”

"While it was a clever suggestion, it was an impractical one under the circumstances.  Instead, I've removed Milo's pursuers from play for the forseeable future.  Some may find their way back to civilization, if they are resourceful."

Noah nodded and made a few gestures to reach out and attempt to establish a mental connection with Milo. If his attackers had just been poofed it may be likely that he would want to know. But given what Milo was he wasn't exactly sure if he could punch through and make the connection.

Michael sighed and put his chin in his hand. “It would appear that our meeting at Haven was for nothing then. They will be actively trying to hunt us now above all other threats. We are now enemy number one. They will now develop anti-teleportation precautions to combat you. They have already prepared for Noah. Now they will prepare for you.”

 Milo appeared suddenly within the massive French Pyramid and paused, looking briefly like a hunted animal as he took stock of his surroundings. To his credit, it took him only a minute or so to get his bearings and regain his calm demeanor.

 Of course, that did little to dampen the smell on his pants or make him look any less like the victim of a drive-by. "It seems I owe you a debt of gratitude."