Session 15 Report: Sleeping Selu

General Summary

NRPD HQ

The SIDE officers regroup the next day to find a stack of paperwork and documents waiting for them. Among the documents were:

• Search warrants for:
  • The Nest
  • Selu Vilute's apartment - Apartment 6B, 43 St. Vincent st, Northwall Apartments
  • the RUGL dormitories
• The chemical analysis report from the farm marshland and "zombie" bodies
• Sketch artist renditions of the students who were at the Nest who seemed to be trying to stop the strange mind control

Officers Brand, Shoke, and Karl immediately got to work trying to parse through the incredibly dense chemical analysis from Professor Lolin Arnini. After a couple hours of splitting up the many pages and comparing notes, they finally felt they understood what the professor had found. The analysis primarily used a technique called "Magical Spectroscopy", a measurement involving something about using lights and crystals to breakdown details of magical matter, to measure three particular substances the professor found out of the ordinary on the corpses and marsh material.

1. Surface tissue sample: Long report of specific percentile quantities of various bacteria and some kind of curse-like matter (Matter A) affecting rot and plant-matter growth.
   • Marsh life in contact with the curse matter seemed to grow, multiply, and mutate more readily. Almost as if it would decay then rebirth from the decayed matter in contact with the curse material. Effect diminished over time and disappeared entirely after about 24 hours.
2. Internal tissue sample: Similar report from the surface tissue sample, but with fewer marsh bacteria.
   • Three of the corpses had a different curse-like matter (Matter B) within their heads
   • Exception: 1595640-B contained no "Matter B" but did contain "Somnol", a sleeping poison in parts of the throat and stomach, also known by the street name "Sleeping Beauty".
3. Post script: A note at the end of the analysis states that it's difficult at this stage of "post-life" to determine the original specific spells used or the difference between curses and generally more dangerous magics (both register as forms of the purple magical wavelength, ie. dangerous and/or of sinister intent)

Discussing these results a bit further, the group speculated Matter A may be causing people to go crazy while Matter B might causing them to re-animate.

RUGL

Meanwhile, officers Gyrm and Dray planned to head to RUGL to debrief with Carol and Professor Mallo one last time after Carol had some time to rest. Keeping her promise to Carol that she would try not to "look like a cop" when meeting her at RUGL dorm room, Dray donned her civilian clothes and Gyrm changed into the dress outfit he picked up from The Boar's Bowtie. Once everyone together in Professor Mallo's office, they ran through the same timeline and questions from the evening before. Carol didn't seem fully recovered necessarily from the ordeal, but her mind seemed a lot clearer and without any evident gaps. In the end she couldn't think of any more details than they'd already uncovered, so the officers asked Carol and the professor to let them know if they remembered anything else then took their leave.

Northwall Apartments

The team regrouped briefly before heading over to Northwall Apartments to check out Selu's apartment. They searched around for some time; Dray checking several known "secret spots" in the apartment, having grown up in Northwall Apartments and knowing that most of the apartments were built in the same layout with the same nooks, crannies, and questionable-quality materials. The apartment was pretty basic, few decorations and a little personalization but over all relatively bland. They noted some work outfits and regular clothing in the closet, as well as a couple dresses laid out on the bed. In addition, the team acquired the following to take back to the office for further investigation:

• A journal in a side table drawer by the bed.
  • After a very cursory flip through the pages, note that the last page mentions she went out to Kintower Park for the new year celebration and that she "may or may not see him there", dated shortly before her reported disappearance.
• Sleeping pills from a cabinet in the bathroom, to look into whether they contained or are used in the production of Somnol.
• A cup from the bathroom, a toothbrush, and a hair brush for analysis, in case any substances were detected in hair or left-behind residues.
• Lifted fingerprint dustings to compare with the bodies at the anatomy lab.

From what they could tell after their investigation, the apartment had not been touched in a long time, likely since Selu's disappearance around 6 months ago. This became the most apparent when Shoke attempted to check out some bread that had been left out on the table and threw up a little in his mouth due to its advanced state of mold as he drew closer.   Following the apartment search, the team interviewed some of the neighboring apartments (apartments 6A-E), asking:

• how well they knew her
• when they last saw her
• if they'd ever seen her bring anyone home or with any friends
• whether they recognized any of the individuals in the sketches of individuals from The Nest
• whether they knew if she'd ever gone to The Nest

Only three people were around, but all gave generally the same answers: that no one knew her or who she hung out with that well, she didn't socialize much with her co-residents. Sensing they'd likely get the same answers if they kept asking around, the SIDE officers decided to next head to her previous employer, O'Farley's in Newtowne.

O'Farley's in Newtowne

They arrived at O'Farley's around mid-afternoon, just before the lunch rush. Once there, the team sought out the manager at the pub, a squat human man who introduced himself as Brum O'Farley. He remembered Selu and called out how she'd always been early to work and never missed a day, so when she didn't show up in the new year he immediately felt something was off, hence the early missing person report. Outside of writing her checks though, he didn't interact with her too much so pointed the officers to talk with his other waitstaff that may have chatter with her more.   First, the group flagged over a young human woman named Devin. Unfortunately, it seemed that she'd only started a few months ago so had never met Selu when she worked there. She did however note that the other member of the current waitstaff may have known her, a red tiefling woman named Jazlin who had been working there for a few years. The team went on to speak with Jazlin who did in fact have a bit more information. She didn't hang out with Selu outside of work, but they often had shifts together and she'd noticed Selu sometimes being chatted up by one customer in particular, someone who had come in relatively regularly when she was on evening shifts. She tried to search in the back room for a tab log to see if she could find his name but had no luck, the records had probably been cleared after the new year and she hadn't seen him around since at least then. Jazlin described the individual as an average height human man, well-trimmed dark hair and no facial hair. The SIDE officers asked if she'd be willing to provide the details to their sketch artist so they had a better visual to ask around, and she agreed. When asked about other regulars, she pointed out an half-orc man sitting in one of the booths reading a book and drinking a coffee. He introduced himself as Gregory and explained he was a regular but only around lunch time so hadn't really been around to see Selu and the individual in question. He had seen Selu before but never interacted with her for longer than some standard niceties and taking his order. He worked over at Bent Corners, a bookstore nearby, so often came here on his lunch break.

Character(s) interacted with

• Carol Tin: Student at RUGL, reported her friend and roommate Carli Padfoot missing.
• Myri Mallo: Professor of Enchantment at RUGL
• Brum O'Farley: Owner and manager of the O'Farley's pubs
• Devin: Waitstaff at O'Farley's, Newtowne location
• Jazlin: Waitstaff at O'Farley's, Newtowne location
• Gregory: Staff at Bent Corners, a bookstore in Newtowne