Thomas, once he recovers from the Moot, lets the pack know that he is going to be going to the Flux Realm to try and regenerate his arm, and while it is a personal thing, they are welcome to come along. John and Melissa agree, but its well into April before they manage to get away. (John and Thomas only)
Thomas goes and visits with other Silent Striders beforehand, wandering overseas ("Look, a postcard from Greece??") and then in the outback somewhere. He returns a couple of days after the April Moot and the three Garou head out into the Umbra.
When they return, Thomas has a new arm, and they bring Mathias with them ("he followed us home, can we keep him?"). Thomas has also somehow discovered how to grow wings which looks suspiciously like those sported by his tattoo. (Thomas only)
John spends a week or so after the Moot mourning Peter before getting his life together. He takes to spending a lot of time in the Umbra and at Scars Atoned and Rippling Waters. John tries to encourage the others to do more packoriented stuff outside of school hours, but people are busy getting on with projects that have been put on hold. He goes and learns a bit about jewelery from the CAE to pay back the metal spirit that taught him Steel Fur and for the next few weeks everyone got some quite nice metal jewelery for presents.
After being asked to deal with Marnie at the March Moot, John took the unexpected step of sleeping with her, much to the bemusement of Melissa ("Stupid mental link. Guys are weird."). It turns out that she was stalking him to learn magic, and John carefully teaches her some basic theory, as well as continuing the relationship. (John only)
Brett is spending a lot of time with the Children of Gaia at Reconciliation as well as with Malajimbarra at Grinding Stone. Brett and Malajimbarra spend some time investigating the Bane Lock and the Silent Stone. A sense of the wyrmbeast is built up from the Bane Lock, but it is an impression, not an idea of its nature. The closest thing that either of them can put into words is "destruction". (Brett only)
Darren: One morning, not long after the attack on the hive, Darren asks to see the pack. He arrives at the caern with a small pack already strapped to his back, containing the few meagre belongings he brought with him. "Your hunt in no longer my hunt. My purpose here is complete. I have gained both strength and wisdom from my time with you but my path leads in other directions. If you have need of me in the future I will come if possible." Darren is summoned back to his home Silver Fang protectorate where rumours have begun about a possible Dancer presence.
Chasing-the-Night is recognised as rank 3 the Moot after the attack, and his challenge is set as writing an epic account of the events. He becomes just that little bit obsessed by it, turning it into a many-part song and questioning other Garou about their parts in it. He is recognised at the April moot as formally having accomplished the challenge even though it is not perfect yet (according to Kimu).
Chasing-the-Night makes some enquiries abut the various native Australian tribal associations and starts to make contact with them, feeling that his Ainu heritage gives him an insight into the history of the Aboriginal people. The Sept supports him in this as they really have not had the time or people to try and make these sorts of connections, but it all comes crashing to a halt when representatives from Reconciliation turn up and ask him to politely butt out and not interfere with the progress they have been making. (Chasing-the-Night only)
Melissa came away from the attack on the Hive with a sense of revenge accomplished. After the February Moot, she moved in with Thomas to give her somewhere to stay. In between helping out at Sleeping Lore, she takes to spending a chunk of time at Hidden Green, learning more about Glasswalker stuff. Melissa grows to be good friends with with Ben Phillips, who also finished school last year.
At some point she turns up with short, green hair, claiming it was a disguise (given she is supposed to be dead). Since then it changes colour about once every 3 weeks. The rest of her time is spent going with Thomas to the Flux Realm and avoiding the university.
Dominique continues to get pregnanter, as is fairly normal. She spends her time at Rippling Waters learning more about Theurge things and watching Patricia. She spends some of her time learning about the fae, and trying to convince people who know about the faerie to act as her midwife, Just In Case.
Mathias
returns to the Sept with Thomas, John and Melissa. They can only
say that he met them in the Flux realm, much to their surprise. Mathias
is physically worn out and spends a large amount of time sleeping for
the first week or so after he returns.
Mathias seems considerably changed after his experiences in Erebus, and
takes a new name:
(Mathias only)
After Peter's burial, a statue appears over his grave in the Umbra. It depicts Peter in Crinos form rising out of the body of a Black Spiral Dancer.
The destruction of the Dancer hive is marred only by the continuing Full Moon killings. Investigations are still proving fruitless, but its generally held that it must be one of the escaped Dancers. The only other oddness resulting from the battle is the fact that the collar used to trap Peter disappeared - Hidden Green and Sleeping Lore both assumed the other had it until someone went looking for it.
The attack on the Hive served to not only release a lot of the pent up frustration in the Sept, but it has also improved relations between some of the packs and also between Sleeping Lore and Hidden Green. With the destruction of the Black Spiral Dancer's hive the Garou around Melbourne decided to take an organised and pro-active stance at monitoring and controlling Wyrm influence. This involves more spirit monitoring of areas not directly connected to the Caern, and greater interest in human institutions. The sept has agreed to spend more resources directly monitoring and investigating industry, as well as aiding the sept of Hidden Green in monitoring the media and the finance sector.
However this is impacting on the resources available to Sept members, and on the amount of time the Garou need to spend doing maintenance on such monitoring. Nearly everyone is kept busy, and people are asked to minimise costs. One of the easiest way for this to happen is for people to share housing, and so living alone is now a bit frowned upon unless supported by individual funds.
Originally The Scryers were working with The Alternative, but they drifted back to their old interests after the change in leadership. The Daughters of Mnemosyne are most likely to be sent to handle any cross-Sept issues.
Revenge seems to have at least partially snapped Christine out of her funk. However, there are still some lingering effects. She has built a personal shrine in the Umbra to fallen packmates with personal items from Marion and Georgina. Its a tiny bit spooky. There has also been a few altercations between Christine and Keziah and/or Jacynta with the younger packmates claiming that she is being overprotective.
Carmel is pregnant again with her third child. The rest of the Get of Pennington buy her a television. Kirsty is unusually stable during the interlude, and is working more closely with her pack again. However, she does have a new obsession: the S11 protests, planned for the World Economic Forum later in the year.
A few weeks after the February Moot, Marnie is spotted creeping around the cemetary, spying on people. The Sept unanimously makes it John's problem.
The Umbral Glade prospers and expands under the attention of the kids in the Realm and the Garou in the Umbra. A couple of other Garou turn up wanting to examine the Glade child and how it has managed to distribute itself across a garden. The kids settle in to their new life fairly well.
Ian is recognised as Rank 3.
Dominique continues to watch Patricia for signs of weirdness. There is nothing overt - she goes to school, gets on with the other students, generally seems normal - but there is the occasional glint in her eye that says otherwise.
Rippling Waters has handed the responsibility for the cave at Hopping Mouse Hill to the closest Fianna sept, The Sept of Blood's Unspoken Voice.
Sandra Norton is recognised as Rank 3
The Sept is stable and works together well. Jolenta Petersen challenged Jane Redfeather for the position of Master of the Challenge but lost, but neither Garou seem to bear any enemity for each other after the attempt.
The rivalry between Ion Apostolova and Irena Sliviak has been settled for the time being. Felix sided with Ion, claiming that monitoring criminal groups was part of Ion's sept role, whereas it was distracting Irena from her pack duties. Despite what everyone imagined would happen, Irena did not challenge Ion for the role of Master of the Challenge. She did however, sucessfully challenge Tony Cho Mi for leadership of The Alternative.
The new agreement with the sept of Sleeping Lore to curtail Wyrm influence in Melbourne has freed up more of the sept's resources, making them better able to deal with problems that arise.
Adam Shergol, Yvonne Proven, Ben Phillips, Claude Foucault and Tanya Muller are all recognised as Rank 2. George Selwyn leaves for Sydney, leaving Christopher Rourke as the only remaining member of Conviction Made Flesh. He is still recovering from wounds gained at the Hive battle.
Not much out of the ordinary happens here over the Autumn. There is a generalised reduction in the amount of wyrm that the Sept deals finds locally, so it is felt that perhaps the Dancers were causing more general trouble that was previously believed. They compensate by spreading out further to cleanse of the Wyrm, and start taking a serious look at Geelong and the Bellarine pensinsula, which had been previously a no-mans-land to the Garou. They find much there to be cleansed.
Eric Koehler is recognised as Rank 2.
The Sept remains an isle of calm, although there are signs that some of the Sept may be taking a greater active political interest in not only the human arena, but also amongst the Garou.
Isis Healing-Hand is recognised as Rank 3.
The Children of Gaia finally nominate a replacement Arm of the Goddess to replace Cernonous. Diem, a homid Child of Gaia ragabash from Cambodia becomes Inanna's partner on the council. Rumour has it that he has not yet shown any particular preference for the various factions on the council.
There are rumours that Fingal Flashing-Claws is occasionally quite ill, prompting some to believe that he will soon be too sick to continue as the Righ of Australia. As a result there has been an increased jockeying for status amongst the Fianna.
Mother Pasta retires from the Jindabyne Council after a sudden illness. She is replaced by a lupus Ahroun Bonegnawer called Scratches-at-Fleas. Scratches is challenged by Mamu within a month of being on the Council, but through the medium of a baseball bat, he manages to win the challenge. He brings a new outlook to the Council, but perhaps not one that sits well with all the Council representatives.
Constable Carmichael turns up dead, beaten to a pulp and smothered. Investigations prove fruitless, and his death is attributed to being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Investigations eventually begin into the disappearance of Detective Patrick Faithful. It is suggested that he was killed or otherwise incapacitated during the Millenium Fever outbreak on New Years Eve.
Gabrielle Thomas is still writing for The Age.
Bartholomew Wise-in-the-Ways-of-the-Wyrm spent some time examining the fae cave and Hopping Mouse Hill before returning to his home in the Blue Mountains. He reported back that while there were similarities, there is still insufficient information to say much conclusively about the spirits that rested there or the Garou who made them.
