Things exist in this word beyond mundane cognizance. Ancient Magics work behind the scenes and creatures of the night stalk the unwary. Unseen worlds exist alongside this one, permeating every facet of reality and making some question their own ability to know - truly know - fact from fiction. Amid the deluge of false sightings and hoaxes are always a few gems of truth; the familiar legends and fairy tales are never entirely accurate, yet are closer to reality than most are comfortable admitting.
Some things - some threats - don't exist in songs and stories. No heroes of old have discovered ways to deal with them; no libraries of occult knowledge are dedicated to them. One of these threats has taken root here, in Sacramento.
Off the Western bank of the Sacramento River, near the skeletal twists and twines of new construction and burgeoning industry, amid scattered suburbs and small businesses sits a lonely little dive called Dave's. A brick front wall, neon sign and an American flag face the street. It's never very busy, even during happy hour, save for a few regulars. Every night except Sunday - because Dave doesn't do Sundays - workers from a local textile factory make up the majority of the bar's patronage. The factory, not more than a block up the road, has no signs or company logo. It looks like it may be under new construction - or was never really finished - with scaffolding still erected in seemingly random places. At nearly nine stories tall, with it's smoke stacks churning grey smoke into the air and an odd chute running from the top level to a hub across the street, it cuts an intimidating profile even from a distance. A sleeping dragon.
Business is slow tonight. Dave, a man in his forties with a bit of a paunch and a salt and pepper crew-cut, grabs a glass stein and pours a Bud Light. He's got a steady hand; he's been doing this for twenty years. He's owned it ever since his brief stint with the Marines. Lost the fitness vibe but kept the haircut. That's what he tells people, anyway. He sets the beer in front of a stocky, surly looking man at the bar. He wearing grey coveralls like the only other two patrons at the bar tonight. Another man with a smoker's cough and a bad hunch plays a game of darts while a third man - wiry, bookish type with glasses - sits at one of the bar's three booths drinking tap water and looking over paperwork.
Draft this Post
Failure!
