How They Did It

*cracks knuckles*



The library upstairs appears to have been untouched by whatever it was that Marla and Jackson were up to--there is no trace of Qlippothic energy in the attic, and the books don't appear to be out of place or "harmed" in any way.



In the master suite downstairs, Marla has a closet full of clothing, a password-protected laptop, and a desk full of papers. Most of the papers are yellowing photocopies of articles that appear to be research for whatever novel she had been working on months ago, and then there is a yellow legal pad with two columns and a list of names. It appears to be a list of the Magi who were active in Chicago in June of 2009, and the list is Spheres in which they are proficient and Spheres in which they would like to gain proficiency. Ashley, Gregor and Wharil are not among those listed, but Dylan Willis and Henri Bean are. At the bottom there is a list of addresses and phone numbers attached to some of the names.



Underneath the yellow legal pad, there are pieces of paper with drawings that hum with Qlippothic energy. One of those pieces of paper looks like a map of the city, with certain locations dotted with a dark rust-colored substance.



There are two bedside tables flanking the queen-sized bed where Marla and Jackson slept. One of the tables is completely empty save for a few sticks of incense and an incense holder; the other table has a (tell yourself it's) leather-bound book that appears to be a diary. It is maybe one-third filled with increasingly frenetic handwriting. If you sit and read it too long, you'll start to get a headache, but within the pages you'll find information on an attack in Grant Park that killed a woman named C.A. and injured C.W. and A.M.--there was a "Chris White" and an "Alice MacIntyre" in the list of Chicago Awakened in her desk--that apparently went according to plan; there is information on a package that was to be picked up in Grant Park by A.M. and D.W. (the package was never recovered, and A.M. and D.W. were to be dealt with later); there is information on a walking dead outbreak in the South Side, with some lamentation that D.W. did not fall during the assault; there is a sparse account of an attack that took place in the North Side between herself, J., D.W. and a number of Hunters. Every single day since June 30, 2009 has an entry, save for a span of days between November 2nd and November 4th. November 5th's entry reads simply: "We've finally broken him."



Where the headache comes in is when the entries begin to turn into rambling run-on accounts of Qlippothic rituals that she and J. were involved in. The entries get longer and longer, describing more and more rituals, until they finally stop on January 8th. The last entry is a rambling explanation of how with their combined powers and "the Marauder providing distraction" they'll be able to lure the rest of the Awakened populace into Falling.