Started out in the office, about to continue interrogating K'shrik. At some point there started to be a swirling mist in the corner, and something came out of it; greenish, about large dog sized, with teeth and claws and a malformed head (all teeth, nothing else). It jumped K'shrik/Tom and mauled him, then jumped on Fox . Jonathan sliced it a few times with his sword, and it retreated;lothers came in to help, failed to hit it with stunners and tanglers as it retreated back to the corner. It vanished back into the mist, seeming to receede into the distance in a way that shouldn't have been possible given the walls... Research turned up references to something in fiction by Lovecraft that fits the description; it's something that will attack time-travellers, which I guess means K'shrik in this case. We'll have to be awfully cautious about doing this in the future... While we were recovering from that incident, an elf walked in, claiming to be a prospective client. After asking a number of questions of Peter , he pulled out a gun (gauss needler) and shot Peter twice. He then proceeded down the hallway toward the basement. Koda went invisible and snuck up on him, and attempted to shoot him with electrolaser. She missed, and got blown away by gauss needler on full auto (16 shots per second is lethal to unarmored target). He proceeded down the stairs, and Fox screwed with his head, causing him to drop his gun. I ran out with a drone to take it, but he recovered and overpowered the drone. When he was in the hallway in the basement, he stopped to gun down the drone; I told Dargo to shoot him while he was distracted. Long gunfight ensued, due to both of them having effective armor. Eventually Dargo pulled back and switched to heavier gun, which got through. The elf pulled out a grenade and tossed it; Jonathan smacked it back into the hallway where it detonated, injuring Dargo, the elf, and Fox, who was trying to sneak up behind the elf, none of them badly. Dargo fell back into the room after taking a full-auto blast of apex rounds to the face, and the elf followed. Jonathan chopped off his gun hand, and Melody and Fox tangled him to the wall. He send a message "For faerie, queen, and country", and shortly thereafter blew up. Docwagon was called to haul off Dargo, Peter, and Koda. Forensics and investigation revealed it was probably a remote-detonated pound or so of military grade explosives, and it did a fair amount of damage to the walls. The elf was a member of the elite guard of Tir Tangire (the elven nation in what used to be Oregon and surrounding areas). We called the embassy. They hung up, and shortly thereafter called back on a more secure line and said they'd send somebody. The ambassador showed up; someone who was identically dressed to the attacker came in and did forensics, while the ambassador took Tom (K'shrik vanished after the mauling), Melody, and Kiana for a ride in his limo. They teleported to Oregon to get some info on lost swords, though they did not seem to get the info they were looking for. The ambassador discussed prophecy that involved people dreaming of past ages, and seemed somewhat annoyed that we apparently were fulfilling the prophecy, though he indicated that it would be a bad thing to actually tell us about it. The ambassador made an offer: we give them the sword, they give us protection, put us on retainer, and train us. Them giving us their propaganda on the situation, and quite possibly sending us on special missions for them seemed to be a not-quit-in-writing part of the deal. Tom, Melody and Kiana were returned to the office, and the ambassador and investigator departed, promising to call back three days after the party reassembles (originally it was 'in three days', which we suggested he amend, given that Koda might not be concious anytime soon). He left us with a number to call if we need protection before then, to summon an unsubtle strike force, and he is arranging to pay for medical care for Tom, Melody, and Kiana. We discussed his offer, and worked on a plan for defense. We now have a standing order that everyone be wearing heavy armor and be armed while in the office, Tom has set up traps around the building, and we'd like people to stay at the office. Peter is concious and will be out of the hospital soon; Koda and Dargo are stable but bad, so it might be a while. Top of the agenda for next time is to discuss the offer; consensus of those who were there seemed to be that we can't protect the sword, and while we don't trust the ambassador and he clearly doesn't like us much, we're unlikely to get a better offer. Also, had he really wanted to just backstab us he could have, given that he had three of the five concious people in his limo with a heavily armed thrudd 'investigating' our office, so I suspect he'll more-or-less uphold his end of the deal. But, this really is a personal decision for everyone, so we do need to discuss further... Kudos to Dargo for well fulfilling his job as bulletproof stopper of badguys in the firefight; to Jonathan for his wacky sword tricks that drove off the dog-thing and finished the fight with the elf; to Fox and Koda for heroically sneaking up behind someone who was obviously really dangerous. Things to work on: we need more distributed tactical clue in the party. Timelag makes it hard to manage a battle from my end. The most obvious thing that went wrong was Koda attacking alone; had she just kept sneaking along until the attacker was in the basement, then when he spun around to shoot her, Dargo could have nailed him from behind, or she'd have gotten a perfect shot while Fox was mind-controlling him into not being able to dodge or shoot back. In general, when ambushing someone, wait for a good shot rather than taking the first one; we will often have the mages working on things (Fox doing mind tricks; Melody attempted to do TK tricks; Koda sneaking into position, etc). Admittedly, she had a great shot, and flubbed only due to horrible luck and sleep-deprivation. But bad luck happens, and being in a position to have others cover when the inevitable slip-up occurrs is a good thing. We need to be more combat-ready; having the sword has gotten us in over our heads. Everyone needs to wear at least light armor most of the time, and heavy stuff when possible. Everyone needs to be armed with a couple weapons (a lot of stuff are immune to stunners or tanglers or electrolasers or light slugthrowers, but few things will be immune to all). Carry your medkits. _Never_ leave your radio behind, or turn it off -- you _always_ want to be able to call for help. I'll set up a sleep-teach program or two for people who want to practice their combat skills. We need to work on having more pshrinks, and better ones; a lot of people got really disturbed by impossible monsters, impossible teleports, seeing Koda splattered on the floor, and general violence. All of you should be talking to me and/or Kiana regularly from now on, and Tom has agreed to learn some psychology as well. Don't allow yourself to go over the edge... Don't even allow yourself to get close to it... Also, people should be prepared to move if necessary. the company's HQ is not a fortress, though it comes a hell of a lot closer than most office buildings. At some point we may need to (hopefully temporarily) abandon ship; if there's anything you can't leave behind if we do have to go, bring it to the office instead of having it at your home; homes are horribly insecure... If any mages can set up wards, now would be a great time... Let me know if there's anything you will need.