Nairobi, Kenya, Africa:

00:13 PM:

A hush falls on the scene of butchery. A brief pause as another wave of fanatical cultists prepares to throw themselves into a maelstrom of high caliber lead projectiles. The quiet is punctuated by the clinking and clattering of guns being reloaded and Wesley Fock lighting another Lucky Strike.

One Hunting Horror is dead, another fled and a huge pile of bodies lies before us. Cultists are still pouring up the mountain, a tide of blind fanaticism and insanity. Irma figures that the Hunting Horrors are the servants of The Bloody Tongue AKA Nyarlathotep. The thin and ropey body of a Horror is gradually melting and disintegrating, back to whence it came.

More Horrors attack! Two of the fiends attack from the entrance to the cavern. Simon fires and damages one. Fester shoots AND HITS! (02!) Miraculously he does a huge amount of damage to the otherwise impossible to hit target. Wesley and Gupta both unleash volleys, Irma fires too and one of them (the smaller of the two) drops. The remaining one, whips in its tail and grabs Wesley! It pulls him forward! Donelly fires his BAR! No damage! Wilbur fires again and does more damage! The Horror has Wesley immobile in its coiled grasp, and it begins to raise him towards it revealing a hideous grimace of deadly razor sharp teeth. Just before it can bite the scientist’s face off, Gupta throws the Powder of Ibn Ghazi into the face of the monstrosity and it dissolves and melts hideously!!! It’s putrefied head drips foul reeking ichor onto the enormous pile of corpses, its tail releasing Fock into the carnage. He half crawls, half swims out of the mixture of body parts, entrails and blood back to the thin line of investigators.

Wes: “I need a Lucky Strike,” is all he can mutter.

We are busy reloading and listening. Is there anything else coming? There is a sound of something getting closer. Something in pain. A hurricane force wind blasts into the cavern entrance! The bodies are whipped into the air, swirled out over the precipice, Wesley, Gupta, Irma, Donelly, Fester and Trixie are all knocked to their feet! There is a flash of lightning and suddenly

THE BLOODY TONGUE MATERIALIZES IN THE CHAMBER!!!!

Irma is luckily unable to comprehend what he is seeing. Unfortunately Gupta does…He sees the true form of Kali! The others are able to get to their feet. The Bloody Tongue gazes at us and its ultimate malign intelligence is able to anticipate our moves! It destroys Simon’s (Gupta’s) lightning gun and tries to grab Wesley, who sidesteps it and dodges!!! Trixie fires her lightning gun and hits it! DOING SEVERE DAMAGE!

Meanwhile, Gupta insanely believes he can banish the Bloody Tongue/Kali by casting the ritual of cleansing and BITING INTO A HUMAN HEART!

Simon tries to shoot it and does some damage. Irma throws a magic knife at it and also does some damage! It is being whittled down, but is it a case of too little, too late? Fester shoots:

AND THE BLOODY TONGUE COLLAPSES TO THE GROUND!!!

Trixie fires her lightning gun at it and does a huge amount of damage! Wilbur fires a volley with his BAR, Wesley fires the lightning gun and Trixie too! Chaos in the room! Lightning and gunfire! Cultist bodies fly everywhere! The body of the Bloody Tongue dissolves into small wriggling tentacles and then dissipates leaving a stinking pool of gunk. It is the same thing as with the Bloated Woman. We are shell-shocked and stunned. The mountain is shaking. Gupta snaps out of his madness and we begin to flee the cavern out on to the mountainside – the whole place is collapsing! The staircase created by Nyarlathotep begins to collapse. All of the cultists that are on it are now falling into the abyss! Something that shouldn’t be there is disappearing!!!

The journey down is going to be difficult. Any remaining cultists are in disarray; some throw themselves to their deaths or fall anyway. Others make a pitiful attack and are easily gunned down. We have caused a star to supernova – the ultimate form of destructive power! But this was different. The scale of horror is inconceivable. A catastrophe beyond the bounds of reason!

We have no rope and must attempt to scale the side of the mountain. This is going to be difficult. Trixie has the idea of salvaging the chains from the cages in the cavern to aid our descent. There are cultists still fleeing the cavern. Some continue to flee, others try and fight. A short fire fight ensues and they are quickly gunned down. Some stragglers decide against a quick death and flee back in to the heart of the mountain.

Irma climbs across the ridge with the chains to support it for the others. Wilbur slips but manages to hang on to the chain. The rest of us make it across effortlessly except for Joe who almost slips, hanging onto his BAR by the strap. Once down, we hear the ominous baying and howling of hyenas and jackals is they greedily anticipate the feast that now awaits them… There were thousands of people here. And many of them are now dead. This is like the apocalypse. Almost surreal.

Wilbur suddenly falls silent and refuses to move. The temporary relief granted him by Bundari has expired and his mind is gone. Snapped like twig beneath the iron-shod shoes of insanity.

We set out across the plains. In the darkness, the eyes of jackals can be seen as they rend the flesh of the dead and the dying. We find our guides at their hiding place.

Sam: “Bundari can give him relief for one hour or so. He has seen things he should not have seen. The mind is gone.”
Wesley: “Can you teach us how to do this enchantment?”

Bundari: “You must follow the path. It would take time and if you have the power you may be able to learn this earth magic.”

Our trek back to the vehicles is littered with bodies and damage. We are in shock, carry injuries, are covered in blood and filth. Wind and rain. It has been 24 hours by the time we get back to the vehicles. They are all in one piece.

Gupta reflects: “Kali. I saw Kali. Nyarlathotep has 999 masks. And Kali is one of them. But this was for me. This demon has a form for every culture and ideology. Whatever your nightmare is. He will be there. But he can be stopped in the short term. But all of his aspects can never be entirely destroyed. For it is a cosmic being.”

Bundari: “Those who have the strength of will should be taught the eye of light and darkness. Including the people who were rescued from the mountain.”

We have to go back to the mountain to cast the eye of light and darkness. There are bodies but even still the traces of the catastrophe are beginning to vanish. At the peak of the mountain there is nothing. Inside there are still some charred and blackened bodies. The pits are full of driver ants, rats and snakes. They were used for a gruesome purpose. It stinks.

The destruction was probably caused by the altar as it exploded releasing all its power. The body of M’weru must have been disintegrated.

It is a full moon. And it is time to perform the ritual. Trixie begins. Uncle Fester will provide the blood of innocence. The intensity of the chant costs us power. Wesley is drained, Gupta too, all of us!

Bundari: “It is not enough!”

Fester suddenly grabs Bundari’s hand. His eyes are burning with a strange fire. The ritual is completed. Suddenly Fester collapses. Wesley rushes to him but his pulse is gone.

Bundari: “He gave his soul to protect the world. He died a hero’s death.”

With the exception of Wilbur Fester, we have survived. But as is the way of all things, there was a price to pay, and we paid it in full. With interest.

We need four days to get back to Nairobi. It is now June 24, 1925. What do we now want to do? We have effectively ruined the plans of the cult. Do we go to Egypt to tidy up the last threads?

Of course we do.

Mombasa, Kenya, Africa:

10:10 AM:

On June 26 we reach Mombasa. “The Dark Mistress” is still there.