Qui Sont-ils?

* While in our church HQ, William does a walk around to make sure there are no signs of a Grim.
* We take furniture and other accessories and arrange them in a fashion so we have a place to gather evidence and discuss things.
* There is no crawl space big enough to hide a body. 
* As they do this, Cyrus starts acting oddly. 
** Like he’s swatting a fly, he sits in the pews with his head in his hands, he looks tired, and spent.
** Signe notes this and asks if he’s alright
*** He states it’s ‘very loud’ on the church grounds with spirits 
*** Signe is dubious at first at this explanation but lets it go.
* Martha grabs a broom to clean the offensive dust and cobwebs, Wila helps with straightening things.
* The investigators discuss their next move:
** Alec wants to go to the library to check a backlog of newspapers to get a better handle on the murder victims
** Signe is concerned about the story for our involvement in the investigation
*** Martha suggests she could be a nun.
*** Everyone trusts a nun, she just needs a habit.
** Signe suggests keeping it as simple and as close to the truth as possible:
*** We are private investigators hired by a concerned citizen close to a murder victim.
** We also want to try and locate the chapter house for the Men of Letters
** William wants to talk to the coroner. Signe will go with him. 
** Martha and Alec will go to the library, then the nunnery
** Cyrus and Wila will go to the cemetery and then the apothecary
* William and Signe make their way to the morgue. 
** There are slabs and ice boxes on the wall
** In the middle is a hunched over person, in the middle of an autopsy
** Signe gets their attention by knocking loudly on a metal table
*** We meet Dr. Amelie Fonteneau
* William makes introductions and makes their case to see the victim’s bodies.
** Dr. Fonteneau is a bit standoffish at first but quickly warms to us when William explains he’s also a doctor with experience in autopsies, general medicine, as well as a combat medic.
* The body she’s currently working on is the latest victim, Thomas LeFit. William is excited to take a look. 
** A large part of his jugular has been ripped out violently
** A part of their rib cage has been destroyed, damage to their left lung and diaphragm
** The heart is missing!!
*** Someone reached in and pulled it out!
** Sixth corpse of this kind (including LeFit)
** The throat attack tracks for the animal attack, but the heart removal does not. 
*** This detail has not been made public
** Rings and glasses worn, paunchier, more sedentary lifestyle, calloused feet. 
* Dr. Fonteneau shows us another body of a woman, Beatrice Dupont
** Right shoulder, by her clavicle, as a carved wound in a C-like shape
** Stab wound in center mass, done with a double-edged blade.
** Grime under her fingernails, dirt particles of someone who tills the ground, bruised knees, calloused hands. 
** Ms. Dupont is the fifth victim of this kind. 
* Fonteneau will not let Signe go through Mr. LeFit’s belongings.
* Williams displays some agitation with the evidence of the animal attack that Signe notes (it’s not the first time).
* While this is happening, Cyrus and Wila make their way to the Cemetery #1. 
** He asks how Wila is handling things
*** She admits she’s doing better than she thought, given what she was taught of the outside world while being raised in a cult. 
** He’s not reassuring in telling her the world is a strange place, but reminds her she has a support system with us to help her.
* Wila wants to know what Cyrus is hoping to find at the cemetery.
** He wants to get a feel for the kind of symbols people are using for protection
*** Is it a general fear? Or are there specific symbols being used that point toward witchcraft or werewolves. 
* They arrive at Cemetery #1
** They find the symbols referenced by Madame Beaudreaux.
** They are carved into the stone on the gates at the cemetery entrance
*** He can’t seem to find any others, and he’s disappointed.
** He sees an approaches two men, one young (Gabe), one older who look like gravediggers
*** He asks the two men if they knew any of the victims of the recent attacks
*** The men lead them to a mound-like cairn where the unclaimed bodies are buried. It is only marked by a date of death.
*** They don’t know anything about the symbols
* On their way out, Cyrus whispers to Wila that we may be coming back later for other conversations.
* Alec and Martha arrive at the library.
* Martha is nervous about agreeing to come on the mission to the library, so she agrees to look for symbols.
* Alec asks where they’re going to acquire a nun habit, and Martha advises them that it just so happens to be laundry day at the abbey, so maybe she can borrow one from a clothes line.
** The damage to her soul will be zero, as she will return it. 
** It’s for the greater good, and no nun will have to go naked.
* The library is massive, and Alec is in “heaven”
** They locate back issues of the Crescent Observer
*** There are several recent articles with very click-baity headlines
** Alec tries to parse through fact and sensationalism 
*** There’s a LOT of bullshit 
** The reporter names:
*** Jean-Paul Fontaine: they seem the most factual, seems he knows more than he’s writing, he implies the police are withholding victims identity. 
*** Remy Dubois: Factual & heavily sensationalized.
*** Lucas Grant: most frequent, written half the articles, mostly bullshit, equivalent to an editorial. Very sensationalized.
* Martha looks for books on symbology, asking the librarian for help.
** Her automatic writing skill kicks in, and she starts drawing seven different symbols.
** She doesn’t recognize these symbols but in a book called, “Alchemical Table of Symbols” though she can’t read the words.
* Meanwhile, Alec is searching through the stacks.
** They are familiar with the methods the Men of Letters used to hide information in plain sight. 
** In a row of books, they notice one of the shelves is thicker than the others. 
*** They press on the shelf and it drops down, revealing a handwritten note, a record
**** It details an artifact called ‘L’armes de Lune’ 
**** The record is adamant the existence of this artifact is real and that it has influence over shape changers
**** Its last known location is the New Orlean bayous, lost after a devastating hurricane.
**** The name translates to ‘Tears of The Moon’.
**** There is also a rough drawing of the area with criss-crossing lines over it. 
** As Alec focuses on these pages, we see T.W. Arche carved into the wood of the shelf. 
* Unbeknownst to Alec, a pair of eyes observes them from the other side of the shelves, and as Martha approaches, the person disappears into the stacks.