1. Act I: Some things start, other things end.
2. Act II: Who’s in, who’s out.
3. Act III: Contracted Meetings
4. Act IV: The client is always right.

Act I: Some things start, other things end.

After getting established as an employee at Wolfram & Hart, Lindy found herself being trusted with more and more important work. Being progressively moved from back rooms doing paperwork and legal filings, to being involved with meetings and being at times in front of smaller clients and higher level legal staff.

For example, Lindy was asked to attend a series of meetings between a pregnant woman and her husband being divorced. Rani and Samir Saujani. The pregnant wife was being represented by Wolfram & Hart. It appeared the marriage had broken down due to infidelity, and negotiations had been struggling with the settlement of the divorce. Lindy was asked to try and sense the motives and priorities of the opposing legal counsel and of the husband. she sensed:

• He was heartbroken, but angry.
• He was willing to give her their house and most anything, so long as he got to move on and start afresh.
• The one thing really important to him was his restored vintage Triumph motorbike.
• They had established long ago that they would not be able to have children due to incompatibility between humans and her type of demon.

Over a period of meetings it became clear that she had been selected as the mother of the next generation of her tribe, which was paying for W&H to represent her. As the negotiations proceeded and even concluded Lindy learned:

• Rani had been impregnated by the tribal Storyteller, the Warlord, and their Lawchief.
• She was due to lay many eggs quite soon.
• W&H seemed quite committed to their association with the tribe.
• In the settlement Samir lost his bike, but was allowed to keep a small investment apartment they had owned in London.

Lindy was told she had done well and her efficacy and talent had been noted.

Act II: Who’s in, who’s out.

A while later, Lindy was invited by one of the junior partners, Elias, who has some sort of induction or HR role to attend an evening event. Apparently a selection of junior staff of various sorts were invited, It seemed like this was the sort of thing that happened from time to time. And formal wear was required.

The group met in Trafalgar square, near the lions and tried to avoid the occasional spattering of rain from the darkened skies. Some of the attendees Lindy knew enough to have a rough idea what section they worked in or which partner they worked for. Some she knew by name.

Elias greeted everyone kindly and lead everyone down to Charing Cross station. From there he lead the group down the side of the platform into the darkness of the tunnel. There they met a mustard coloured, demon with a bony ridge extending over the top of his head, dressed in a suit. He checked some papers Elias held and then ushered the group into a gated side tunnel.

The tunnel lead to stairs heading down, another tunnel and eventually out onto the platform of what appeared to be an abandoned tube station. There a wide ranging group of formally dressed people, many of them clearly demons or at least not quite human had assembled. A red hued demon who looked a little like a skinned human tended bar in one corner.

Eventually a bell rang and the assembled people headed into another tunnel and down further stairs. around a turn and through a solid industrial door the group entered a square room with a railing cage built over its centre where it opened onto a lower floor.

Across the far side of the room a spindly limbed, robed creature in a high backed leather chair wore a thick aged copper mask, greening where it had not been freshly polished. Wisps of some sort of gas seeped from behind the mask. A well, if provocatively, dressed girl sat on his knee and frankly seemed a little out of it. The group spread themselves around the perimeter of the room, looking down into the area below. Generally none went too close to the creature in the chair, except Elias who seemed more or less comfortable with it/him.

An announcement is made and it becomes clear the area below is an arena of sorts. An extremely tall muscular man with long dark hair of some sort of asian extraction. Prodded into the arena behind him was a pair of hunched, slimy, wide mouthed demons. They bared their teeth and began to fight. Eventually the tall man killed one of the demons and severely injured the other. He left the arena, accompanied by the mustard demon from upstairs, and the remaining demon dragged the body of its compatriate out. The crowd cheered.

Another of the slimy, crouched demons entered. A little smaller than the others, and dropped two knives. The spindly demon gave a nod and the red demon from the bar upstairs opened a gate in the superstructure above the arena and Elias grabbed an intern called Zane and threw him through the gate into the arena below. “You’re fired”, he yelled to Zane, now below. And then muttered “He was terrible. Really.”

The demon quickly tore apart Zane, despite him grabbing for the knife and trying to defend himself. Again, a door below opened and the demon dragged Zane’s body out licking up excess blood with it’s long toingue as it went. The crowd cheered even louder. A couple of the W&H employees looked concerned but not unenthused.

Then a disheveled homeless looking man was pushed into the arena followed by a limping dwarfish figure. The small figure raised his right hand and the cluster of tentacles that served as his left hand in the intricate ritual of a spell of some sort. The homeless man shuddered and screamed, turning to gurgles as his body grew and transformed as if a demon within him was trying to force it’s way out through his skin. The newly formed abomination strode around the arena bellowing angrily. The dwarf simply left.

A small, slight, striking girl with long blonde hair dirty with lack of care was seemingly pushed into the arena and was immediately attacked by the new demon form now prowling it. With surprising strength and dexterity she fought it for some time, taking some terrible hits she kept fighting. Eventually she smashed the demons skull against the wall as a demon somewhere yelled. The reddish, skinless demon whispered to the masked thing on the throne. It nodded. He then announced that the evening needed to be cut short, apologised and asked the crowd to leave. The girl below looked around confused. Two men stepped from the crowd, adopted their vamp faces and leapt through the gate into the arena as the crowd was shepherded out.

Back in Trafalgar Square above, Elias apologised for the truncated night but hoped everyone had an interesting night otherwise, and arranged taxis to get everyone home.

Act III: Contracted Meetings

The next day at work Lindy was summoned to meet with a partner she knew by reputation but had not met. Denise Montgomery was her name, but quietly when she was certainly out of earshot she was often referred to as General Monty.

Lindy was asked if she would be kind enough to run an errand that night, others being unavailable for a variety of reasons, and this being an opportunity for Lindy to prove herself capable of going to the next level at W&H. A car and driver would be provided. General Monty would provide guidance as needed via phone.

That night Lindy met the driver in the W&H vehicle pool, and they headed out of town in a limousine. Lindy found an envelope with 2 contracts and two envelopes of money in the car. Checking the contracts Lindy identified that they were for agent services and were partly in demonic or arcane languages she could not read.

They eventually arrived at some sort of country estate based on the fences and layout. In the dark Lindy was able to see that there were a few other, largely dark, vehicles parked nearby and a lake. After a few minutes there was a brief knock on the window. Lowering the window Lindy saw a man in tactical gear who handed her a small video camera.

A few minutes later another knock and Lindy again rolled down the window to see two [presumed] demons standing by the car. A very large, bulky one with features like a shark, including the rows of sharp teeth. And a smaller figure, green with black mottling and with spines. The smaller one said, “We need to sign some contracts and collect something.”

Lindy let them into the back seat and handed them the contracts and the money, of which the larger amount went to the shark-demon. They signed in blood and the smaller demon (Bert) took the video camera. They then got out of the car and went off toward the lake where Lindy lost sight of them.

Then, waiting.

The phone rings and Lindy answered. General Monty said “There has been a change of plan, you will be taken to a new location. I will fax through a new contract.” Then the driver got a call.

Lindy was able to make out the soldier figure from earlier moving past the car with several others. As the car pulled away Lindy was able to hear gunfire and some quieted yelps. Seemed a lot like Bert and the shark demon.

The limousine drove out of the estate and around through some forest, ending up parking in the outskirts of a nearby town. The fax machine in the limousine sprang to life and a new contract arrived. Then, more waiting.

Eventually there was another knock on a window, this one left a smear of blood. An older man in a three piece suit stood outside the window tucking something slithery into the pocket of his jacket and wiping the blood off his hands. He politely asked for the contract, quickly read it, signed it and handed it back with a smile. Then he walked off into the night.

General Monty called again and thanked Lindy for her efforts. She was done for the night.

Lindy wound the window back up and they drove back to London.

Act IV: The client is always right.

Monday morning Lindy discovered she had a new, better desk and her security clearance seemed to have changed.

General Monty called Lindy to her office. She said Lindy had done well and had shown she could be trusted with some more sensitive work assignments. Of  course she would be expected to keep up the high quality of her work thus far.

As it happened Wolfram & Hart had acquired a new client over the weekend that was very interested in the item that had been sold at the auction Lindy had attended on Friday night. And was very eager to recover it. As such, he was very interested in two girls that had been at the auction. As Lindy had been very nearby where this item last was and had been to the auction she would be dispatched to attempt to find these girls so they could be handed over to the client.

The General didn’t seem at all concerned with actually retrieving the item. Lindy was given a car and sent back to Milford (turns out, that was the town where she had briefly been) to find two girls. That was all the client seemed to know about them.

Arriving back in Milford Lindy headed to roughly where she had been and soon spotted a Pub that might be a decent place to start. When she walked in she saw two girls asking the bartender some questions and then heading upstairs. Wondering if they might be the ones, she followed stealthily and listened outside the door they went into.

Lindy heard them talking with a third party and only moments later they opened the door and pulled her into the room. The third person they had been talking to was a large, reddish, hooved, horned demon. Eventually, tentative introductions were made and Lindy met Adora, Jane and Nydilidien.

Lindy explained she had been sent to find them as an assignment for work and told them who she worked for. Although they seemed to know the name Wolfram and Hart only the large demon recoiled at the mention. They started to discuss why this was and what they had to do with an auction or any such thing when General Monty rang to check up on progress.

Lindy reported she thought she had found the girls. Monty said that was excellent work and would send a tactical team right away to take them in, and asked where they were. Lindy lied and said they were at the library. Then had to tell Jane and Adora that there might be a problem and some people were coming to get them. This news was not happily received.

Eventually they agreed that Lindy should meet the team at the library and that they should all leave town together. So, they did. Then they remembered the part about Lindy meeting the team at the library and turned back. Jane agreed to damage Lindy so it would appear she had been overpowered.

They got back to the library and dropped Lindy off there. Soon the tactical team arrived and Lindy told them the two girls had beaten her and fled. The team checked her over for serious injuries then headed off to try and find their quarry in case they were still nearby.