Life is just ironic as hell. Last evening I was terrorizing two states and kidnapping a twelve year old, today I am going to swoop down upon a competing chancel with the power of Justice and right a wrong done to the boss, all in the name of the law. I sort of get an insight into how my brother the police chief must feel. Taking bribes in the morning but catching a shooter by afternoon. Weird.

My trip to Boise turned out pretty good. Jason was an easy snatch job and I spent a little additional time ransacking his computers and his mother's laptop. The kid was pretty easy to handle, especially taped up in the back of the UPS truck. We got to talking about his particular activities and I learned enough to know I want the kid to take me off his "suck" list and do work for me.

The problem with just turning him over to Jurai is I will lose out on all his potential. I'm selfish that way. If he starts doing his thing for the Commora, illegally transferring funds between various organizations that "suck" as he puts it, I lose out on that warm and fuzzy feeling I have come to enjoy. He has to be working for me! Yet, a deal is a deal (most of the time) and I need to turn him over to fulfill the letter if not the intent of the arrangement. So here is what I decided. I would "hire" Jason to infiltrate the Commora for me and go ahead and suborn the jobs they want him to do. Blame the overkill on copycat hackers.

The main thing is to make him willing to work for me. Happy employees are loyal employees so I took him to my place, gave him a suitable cover story and plied him with booze and a hooker. I now own him. He is mine. His crimes will be mine. And the Commora is paid off.

I took him to Jurai this morning and made an additional offer....the kid's gear in return for a future Commora favor. Jurai is thinking about it (no doubt hoping to locate the stuff on his own). Next stop was to go see Justice.

Alejandro was sucking up to him on the roof of the courthouse when I got there. Justice and I started to converse in the mother tongue and I outlined my findings that Arnaud is likely involved. Justice agreed that there was enough evidence to proceed with an investigation of Arnaud's chancel. First he wanted to finish observing the ritual war and then he wanted to see the Excrucian to hear it from his own lips. Fine. As we were discussing things, a non-legal "move" took place on the ritual battlefield and a building blew up. Fortunately I was right there in front of Justice, so I have an alibi. Still, now I have new crimes in the chancel to investigate and a "warrant" to crash Arnaud's pleasure palace. A life as Crime is never dull.

Burn baby burn!

I decided at the last minute to torch a second whorehouse I knew since the first was so much fun. Got lots of good polaroids of prominent citizens jumping out windows in their skivvies too.

I dumped Eve's body in the second one to minimize the likelihood of interference.

Lust has a soft spot for minors as it turns out. We came across a sweet young thing, maybe twelve years old [prostitution, shoplifting, pickpocketing]. Lust took her underwing and bid me adieu. Just as well, I got things to do, people to see and felonies to foster. Guess Lust needs to do something for her chancel, so I headed off to Noctis to report to The Man.

Dade is getting pretty weird these days. Some of the streets are choked with the mechanoid invaders facing off with The Man's gargoyles and occasionally fighting it out. Like a chess game on acid. I am told I am not supposed to interfere, so I guess I need to pay back Jurai for the scoop on the bribe.

Guilt contacted me about his preferred payment. Seems there is a snitch being held under some kind of witness protection program in Boise. Jurai's boys can't find him and they want him real bad. Looks like I get to head to potatoville and roust up the snitch. Time is supposedly of the essence, so I am gonna need faster transport.

I took the Salt Lake City exit from Noctis and dumped the buick. Jumbo is pretty much parted out, so I dumped the last nasty bits in the river and paid a visit to a Porsche dealer for a fresh set of wheels. I flashed a bit of my counterfeit cash, finagled a "test drive" with the saleman [fraud, narcotics distribution, tax evasion, vandalism] and took off for Boise. He quickly realized I was not a paying customer, so I pulled my .44 and dumped him off on the highway.

When it comes to a getaway car, Porsches rock. Accept no substitute. It did not take long for the cops to start chasing me. I exchanged a little gunfire with a couple to keep their interest and played chicken with folks in the oncoming lanes. Made the trip go much faster. Nothing like listening to Blue Oyster Cult's Career of Evil on the radio doing 140mph up the wrong side of the road and popping off a few rounds out the window to keep a guy awake.

Just this side of Idaho I found a good spot to ditch the porsche and get a new one. A cute little blond gal was stopped in her SUV, so I pulled out the .44 again and told her to scoot over. She was completely terrified of me and gave me no trouble at all. I crossed the state line and started trying to get her to relax a bit. Found out her name was Tandy and she was as squeaky clean as anyone I ever saw. Made me wanna slap her around a bit, but I decided she needed a little crime to liven up her existence.

Took a while, but after changing my appearance in front of her, putting on the "aura" and such, I soon had her convinced I was the Archangel Michael from scripture. I said I was here to give her a chance at redemption for taking a bite out of an unpaid for slim jim when she was six. I kinda felt like I was butting in on guilt's schtick a bit, but she soon fell into a religious frenzy.

We pulled into Boise and I stopped at the first junior high school I could find. I told Tandy that in order to be saved, she had to take a gift to the Lord's prophet. He was inside the second classroom to the left and his name was Michael. Of course, doing a holy thing requires ultimate purity, so she had to disrobe completely to perform the task. I gave her the gold colored cigarette case I had lifted from Jumbo's grave (now packed with low grade grunt weed) and sent her off to the classroom after she stripped down. Damned nice body too. Lust woulda been happy.

Now that I was free to get to work, I cased the whole damned town divining for crimes. I selected fraud and electronic theft and eventually found where Jason Dupree had ben buying computer gear using stolen funds. A little more tracking led me right back to the school where I had dumped off Tandy. The little shit was an eigth grader. Apparently he had cracked a couple Comorra servers and pissed some folks off. I guess they wanna recruit him or whack him. Matters not to me.

I followed him home and decided to approach him as a UPS deliveryman. I found a van, carjacked it after knocking out the driver and swapping clothes and drove back to Jason's house for a "special delivery".. I hope the little bastard doesn't put up too much of a fight. I wanna know more about what he found out.

Been cruisin' through Georgia in a stolen Buick with a twisted white girl (Lust) and an exhumed stiff in the trunk and back seat when she says "We have to stop in this next town for a bit. I have something I have to do". It's cool. I owe her for helping me stash the Excrucian weapons last night. We dug up the fresh grave of some fat slob who died in the storm a while back, put the weapons in the coffin and reburied them all slick like. Of course that left Jumbo to deal with, so I cut him into manageable pieces and loaded the Buick. He ain't stinking too bad yet, but it's hot today and the AC is not workin' too good.

Turns out Lust wants to grab herself a new anchor, some preacher guy holding a revival in Podunk Georgia. I dunno if she had a fling with him or what, but it should present the opportunity to advance my estate a bit while I wait.

We stopped, she slipped into the back of the revival and did her thing. I figured she would be busy a while, so I figured I would get rid of the hunk of Jumbo that was in the back seat. I swiped a carving knife that was laid out for the picnic and proceeded to carve a few Jumbo-steaks for the BBQ. That got rid of the pesky hunk, and getting the fine folks to commit a bit of cannibalism was just a bonus in my book.

When I was done, I swapped clothes and introduced myself to the organizer as a guest speaker, the Reverend Jessie Washington from Stillwater OK. A little charm and I was soon preachin' from the pulpit. Now normally you might think I would be up there urging the congregation on to sleep with each other's wives, steal from their neighbors and whatnot. I figured they were going to do that anyway, so I would rather egg them on to support all sorts of draconian laws to stop the sinning hereabouts. It is my firm belief that the more laws there are, the riper the ground for Crime to take root. I layed it on thick and they just lapped it up. When I was done, I finished the sermon with a "now eat hearty y'all! Barbecue is out back!" and slipped away to await Lust.

She showed up pretty quick and soon I was getting contacted by the Chancel. Seems the details were now known about the bribe being offered to Desecration and I was keen on boosting the credit. Lust was game, so I let her drive us back to Florida. It seems our own great ancestor Eve (from the Bible of course) had been dug up and was going to be planted with incriminating evidence at a whore house fire. She was to be buried as a Jane Doe prostitute as an act of desecration.

I figured out what locals were going to be in on the deal and with the help of lust managed to suborn the deal. Now we have Eve in the back of the truck with a shitload of accellerant and a whorehouse just up the road. If I can just take credit for this whole deal, I will have stolen the bribe, offered it on behalf of my boss-man Cathetel and generally advanced the cause of Crime. How can I complain? Arson, theft, murder, falsifying official documents, bribery, conspiracy, crossing state lines in the commision of a felony, counterfeiting, plus the prior graverobbing, cannibalism, and speeding all made me feel like I was accomplishing something.

I'll let you know how all this turns out. I'm getting a major chubby just thinking about it (Lust might have something to do with that too).

Fungus and I were standing around the shipwreck wondering what to do about it when we heard Punishment clambering around and calling down to us about a survivor. I figured I was bound to get wet, so I stripped down nekkid and was about to start climbing up when Punishment lowered down a young white boy from the window. The kid was busted up a bit with what looked like a gimp leg and maybe some busted ribs. He seemed a bit too pretty and I noticed Punishment was licking her lips a bit. I was hoping for a little statutory rape there on her part, but I had to settle for impersonating a doctor and indecent exposure on the beach on my part.

The kid was armed with what seemed to be an illegal Excrucian weapon, though I had a hard time wrapping my mind around it. The best I could do was concentrate on swiping the sheath and belt it was held in and strap it on. I cheered up and fashioned a splint for his leg. Too bad about his ribs.

He was definitely an Excrucian and the whole illegal immigration/weapon aspect made me feel like he might be worth cultivating as an intelligence source on what the Excrucians were up to. Guilt showed up after a while to help keep an eye on the perp, so I assisted Punishment in further exploring the wreck. While Punishment poked around below looking for more survivors (presumably to punish), I , um, gathered evidence in what looked like the Captain's quarters. Being a little unfamiliar with Excrucian artifacts, I felt it wise to just grab everything that was not nailed down. I had to cut up the upholstery of the Buick to make a bag to hold it all, but the take included some strange navigation instruments and the log book.

Punishment re-emerged from the lower section, gave me a dirty look and made sure I brought out all I had found. In the meantime, Fungus was zoning out and had gotten some strange visions of what looked like a deal gone bad. A contract seemed to be involved, so I suggested we check the log book.

Bingo. It held a naughty contract to trade favors for outlawed Excrucian weapons. I checked out the paperwork and delved into the various crimes involved. Treason certainly. More interestingly was conspiracy and forgery. The non Excrucian Fungus saw in her/his/it's vision was impersonating Cathetel and forged his symbol on the contract. After the deal went down, the ship began hauling it's cargo towards our chancel and just plain blew up.

I really wish I could sense my estate directly off these characters. They seem like my kinda folks. Anyway, Punishment decided to report directly to Cathetel while Guilt and I were to haul off the kid to a holding cell for interrogation. We dumped him into the trunk and sped off to the pokey.

When we got there, the night clerk [bigamy, illegal gambling, possession of narcotics] let us in and we dumped the punk into the drunk tank. Guilt and I figured it wasn't secure enough, so she made some changes to hold him better while I watched and learned. We decided he needed softening up a bit before we started with the questioning, so I had the local radio talk show piped in nice and loud. I was a little worried it might be too much and he would off himself (Lord knows I started feeling like punching out myself after listening to 20 minutes of that crap. Guilt knows her stuff). The Excrucian seemed to take it in stride. I began to wonder what a good dose of street acid might do to his system, but the nearest dealer was eight blocks away and busy stealing hubcaps. I didn't want to disturb him on a whim.

Next stop was city hall to meet with Punishment and Cathetel. I delayed just long enough to disable the catalytic converter of the buick, then went careening around town knocking down neighborhood watch signs. It's a lot faster sometimes to just drive on the sidewalks than sit in traffic when you are in a hurry. We made it to city hall in good time. Lots of gargoyles were gathering in the square and looked like they were getting ready for some action. Looked pretty serious.

Guilt and I went inside and got the lowdown. Some fella from the Comorra was there and introduced himself. He let us know that a gift was gonna be presented to our arbitrator (Desecration) from an opposing chancel as a favor to us. This fella just reeked of my estate without actually doing so, if you know what I mean. I thought about offering him a spot on my staff, but decided to wait and see what else he could offer. I think I may have to work out an arrangement with him soon. I would love to steal the gift he mentioned and present it on our behalf. Gonna have to think on that a bit.

Shortly afterwards, Punishment showed up and gave us the skinny. We were supposed to find the cache of weapons and get it under control. No problem, I have experience at that sort of thing. Just about then Fungus got word that one of our enemies was kinda invading the beach in some sort of ritual fight, kinda like one of the old rumbles we used to have when I was a kid. Punishment flew off and Guilt and I swiped another police cruiser to haul ass down to the beach.

I sensed illegal radio transmissions from the beach, so I called up the radio station and had them tune their transmitter to that frequency. By the time we got there, some weird assed mechanoid things were milling around and heading for the lighthouse. Punishment was already there. Guess where the illegal weapons were. Shit, one of them was seen and the rat off to accuse Cathetel as soon as possible. I decided to get down there as fast as possible and do a miracle of Crime to spirit the stash of weapons the hell out of town. Damn I hate getting fingered for shit I didn't do (yet).

I, Little Doc Devereux have finally found fulfillment. Not that I was not happy before, but now I have a purpose beyond the simple pleasures I was able to afford myself as mayor of Dade Florida. The power I feel within me is intoxicating, almost too much so for a proper description.

A week or so ago I was a very worried man. I had begun noticing that I was being stalked, or at least surveilled. I thought perhaps the DA was after me again after a recent fiasco with one of my drug shipments. A scary looking white bitch kept showing up to my public appearances and I would see her from time to time out of the corner of my eye. It got to the point where I was forced to send a couple of my employees, Mooky and Choda to pay her a visit and discourage her.

Mooky and Choda disappeared, only to show up a few days later dead as hell. I was contemplating this turn of events and berating my brother when I had a vistor show up at the office. Another scary looking dude. I ushered him into my office and listened to what he had to say. His initial words to me made me think I had a psycho on my hands and I covertly pocketed my .38 in case I needed to defend myself. But then I began to listen to him and something in his eyes was extremely convincing.

I still can't explain what moved me. He offered me a ridiculous prize in return for killing my secretary right there and then. But somehow, I just knew he was telling the truth. Some self preservation instinct kicked in and instead of just knifing her with my letter opener as he requested, I ushered her into the toilet and found myself drowning her in the bowl after a brief struggle. The bitch was blackmailing me anyway so I was not overly concerned for her welfare. When I finished, panic set in. I was toast if this guy was wired or a nutcase.

He just smiled and plunged a strange glowing ball of light into my chest.

When I woke up I understood so much. Everything I had been led to believe was bullshit. I was part of a power now, hell I WAS the power now. This cat, calls himself Cathetel, is basically my boss. I have a job to do, fostering and looking after one particular aspect of reality. In my case crime. Make that Crime with a capital C. Something I have always understood implicitely anyway.

By concentrating, I can sense crime around me and by extension the criminals performing the crime. What fun! As I left the office, I could look around and see the true person bebeath the veneer of law abiding citizens. The janitor Benny [shoplifting, robbery, tax evasion] for example. Or my brother the police chief [theft, murder, extortion, possession of narcotics with intent to distribute]. I could sense nothing from Cathetel himself. He directed me to seek out a few "anchors" to help stabilize my power. Outside the world was getting very weird as our new chancel was beginning to form. I thought I would start with my brother.

He was in a panic, trying to get the force into some order to put down the rioting that was starting due to the change. I calmed him down a bit and then tricked him into drinking a bit of my blood. He soon saw the light. Next up was my cousin the newspaper man [plagiarism, grand theft auto, tax evasion]. He was very excited and confused, but not really unhappy about the whole thing as far as I could tell. Thirdly I paid a visit to my sister [prostitution, theft, drug dealing] and got her on board. Lastly I visited my premiere money launderer, my uncle the Archbishop [fraud, tax evasion, DUI hit and run]. It really turned his world upside down after I got him into the "family".

I was soon summoned to the chancel for my first duties. I quickly hijacked a car, made a quick robbery of a liquor store and hauled ass to the beach area. Slamming on my brakes, I spun the car right into the handicapped spot I was aiming for and emerged to greet the other nobles. Shit. The psychotic looking whitey was one of them (Punishment) along with a really ugly looking glob of fungus (Fungus) and some old white bitch with a face like a prune (Guilt). Putting on my best face I came up and introduced myself.

I could not sense anything from them, but felt assured that Fungus was violating a number of health ordnances simply by existing and Guilt looked like she had a shady past. The real criminal was whoever sold Punishment her personality. She got robbed big time. Anyway, a strange boat had beached itself a short distance down the beach and we were supposed to investigate. Punishment decided she was too good for our company and flew like a goddamned balloon out to the ship. I felt better about that cause I doubt she had a pilots' licence and it looked like she was carrying a concealed weapon or two without a permit.

A trespassing beach comber [theft, fraud, assault, child abuse, drug dealing, arson] had been there first and hailed Fungus, Guilt and I on over to check out what he had stolen. Looked like a bunch of fancy wood to me, maybe worth something to an antique dealer. It had some funky writing on it that I was told was Excrucian. The bad guys. I considered what to do next, but we let the beachcomber go especially since I could tell he was gonna tie one on and beat the old lady a bit when he got home. Guess I am gonna have to get my feet wet.