The group rents two fan boats. Adam, Didier and Hazel go into the swamp with the special box, while Ray and Alastair wait at the edge of the swamp as backup (although if the other three were really in trouble, there was no way Ray and Alastair could reach them in time). The two boats maintained radio contact and had GPS systems and plotted their progress on twin maps.
At one point, tentacles grabbed the boat with Adam, Didier, and Hazel in it, but Hazel was able to touch the box to the tentacles and they froze up and they were able to proceed. When they reached a line of trees they figured they had reached the site of the old plantation house they were looking for, and would have to proceed on foot. Adam stayed with the boat, since he had a full leg cast on. Didier and Hazel proceeded onto the land. A nasty big evil slimy thing attacked them. Hazel jammed the box into its mouth as it moved to eat her, with the result that the monster disintegrated and Hazel was left covered in nasty, vomit-like goo.
They hurried along a path and came to a small, crude wooden structure nailed between three trees. They could hear rustling in the vegetation behind them. It occured to us later that this may have been the fort that Timothy, Alan, and Karen had had in the swamp when they were kids. There was a crude wooden floor, but no sign of a green stain that might indicate the source of the evil. Didier pried up a board and found the old foundations of Irving Helzer's house beneath. Through the hole he could see a plastic bag. As he reached in, something grabbed his arm and tried to yank him down into the hole. As he struggled, Hazel managed to get the box in and touch it to the tentacle, but it had no effect! Didier managed to pull free and the two of them heard a gurgling, laughing sound behind them. They looked up, and saw a rotted corpse hovering above the ground, supported by tentacles. It had an evil green glow at its center, and was laughing at them.
Meanwhile, Ray had gotten a panicked call from Clarice Ekloff saying "They've taken Samuel!!" Ray passed this info along to Adam, still waiting in the boat by the trees and unaware of what was happening with Didier and Hazel, and Ray and Alastair took off for the Ekloff house.
When they got there, behind the house they found Mrs. Ekloff lying on the ground, covered in slime, sobbing incoherently and indicating they'd gone toward the swamp. Ray and Alastair took off in pursuit. When they caught sight of what had Samuel, Ray went ballistic and started madly hacking at the nearest of the slimy swamp creatures. A second one went after Alastair while three others were trying to make off with Samuel and smother him.
It dawned on Hazel that this dead thing before her, with the evil green glow, must be the "green stain" the priest had written of, the source of the evil. In a practiced judo move, she leaped in the air and thrust the box at its chest. What was left of the cadaver's rib cage crumbled, and Hazel and the rotting matter fell to the ground in a heap. A shudder, like the shock wave emitted through the water from the cursed golden medallion in "Pirates of the Caribbean," went out from the spot through the swamp. In the boat, Adam noticed the water level drop significantly.
Struggling with the swamp creatures over Samuel's limp body, Ray and Alastair found the creatures suddenly disintegrate into nothing more than goo and rotting plant matter. Samuel was not breathing, but Ray was able to resusitate him.
Alastair radioed Adam and let him know what had happened, by which time Didier and Hazel had informed Adam of what had happened and were returning to the boat. Didier had found, in the plastic bag in the hole, a briefcase, which he would eventually have a chance to look at. They hurried out of the swamp to join Ray and Alastair at the Ekloff house.
Ray and Alastair attended to Mrs. Ekloff, who was in shock but not terribly hurt, and Samuel, who was not speaking. When the other three arrived, they all left to take Mrs. Ekloff and Samuel to the hospital. As they were getting the two to a car, however, the car belonging to Father Cartier pulled up in a hurry. He jumped out and said that the FBI was looking for us and he had to talk to us. We passed Mrs. Ekloff and Samuel into his care, told him to get them to the hospital and that we'd contact him, and took off.
We drove for about four hours, stopped at a truck stop somewhere with showers, and drove another two hours. Adam then called Father Cartier from a pay phone and arranged to meet him in Arcum in a few hours. The priest said that the FBI was looking for him, too, and that he would be getting out of town. Adam pressed him to get Mrs. Ekloff and Samuel out of town too, that they were in danger. We got to Arcum and Alastair, now the only one in the group NOT wanted by the FBI, got us two rooms in a cheap hotel.
Didier found that the briefcase contained a business card from a "Tommy Zane" in Savannah, and the final entry from Timothy Ekloff's diary, in which he described this conspiracy he had discovered, and mentioned something about Tibet.
In the morning, Ray, Adam, and Hazel met Father Cartier (now in civilian clothes) at a cafe on Main Street while Didier and Alastair had breakfast nearby (the idea being that if it was an FBI trap, we didn't want everybody going to the meet). Cartier said one FBI agent, a Mitchell Davis, had been asking around Bowersville for us and Timothy Ekloff, and that recently more agents had shown up, and he said they had been watching him, too. He asked if there was anything he could do to help.
We adjourned to discuss the matter, finally deciding to let him come with us at least as far as Savannah. Adam had contacted Roland and briefed him on the situation (emphasis on _brief_), and Roland said we could meet soon, as they had operations in Atlanta and Savannah, did we have a preference? Adam said Savannah. We did not tell Roland very much over the phone, just indicated that we had some fairly urgent information and that our aliases had been compromised.
The end of the session finds us in Savannah, with Father Cartier. The plan next is to try to track down this Tommy Zane and see if he can contact Timothy, possibly using the priest as a "good character reference." Then we're also going to meet with Roland.
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