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Fire trucks and police arrive at the scene of the explosion that destroyed Jalen and
Lauren's apartment building, with Lauren inside. Rescue workers are shocked to discover that Lauren
has miraculously survived. Among the police at the scene is Frank Brigham, Patrick's former partner.
Meanwhile, Patrick and Dana have gone to the Oracle's to retrieve the Book of Zar-n'Atoth. The Book
appears to be reacting to the Oracle in the same way as it did to Gordon, though Patrick and Dana
have no way of knowing it is actually reacting to Lorne, who is in his usual hiding spot in the back
room. The Book settles down once they leave the building, which is when Patrick receives a call from
Frank telling him what has happened to Lauren.
At the hospital Frank briefs Patrick on what the police know, namely that the
building appears to have been destroyed by a bomb. Lauren is in emergency surgery so Patrick and Dana
go to Jalen's room in the hospital while Ethan watches over Lauren. While the others are going over
what happened, Jalen spots a breaking news report on the TV. The report is about a major fire, still
blazing, that started at Planet-X Comics, which Jalen remembers is where Dave the Comic Book Demon
(and demonic scholar) lives. While Patrick heads over to check out the fire, Dana heads to her
apartment building, suddenly worried about Gordon amidst the rise in attacks against demons. At
Gordon's apartment, the Book of Zar-n'Atoth starts reacting to Gordon again, complete with the
whispers that apparently only Gordon can hear. This time Gordon writes down the words, or as close
as he can guess them, phonetically and Dana takes them to the library to try and decipher what the
Book is saying.
Back at the hospital, Jalen leaves his room to go check in with Ethan. Lauren is in
critical condition, but the doctors seem to have stabilized her. From what Ethan has overheard, it seems
likely that Lauren was able to use her telekinesis to at least partially shield herself from the
explosion, since all evidence indicates she was at ground zero when the bomb exploded. When Lauren
is moved to intensive care, Ethan uses his medical knowledge to bluff his way in to watch over her
and Jalen returns to his room.
At Planet-X Comics, Patrick "borrows" some gear from one of the fire trucks on the
scene and makes his way into the still-burning store. Inside he finds the body of the guy worked
the cash during Patrick's earlier visit. Though the body has been burned, there is enough left for
Patrick to realize he was already dead before the fire started, apparently stabbed in the chest.
Making his way to the relatively undamaged (so far) basement, Patrick sees that Dave's living area
has been trashed. In a closet he discovers that a hole has been smashed in through a wall from a
connecting sub-basement. Just as he goes through, the fire finally makes its way down, cutting off
Patrick's escape. Luckily, or more likely deliberately, there is a sewer access from the sub-basement that allows Patrick to reach the street level a few blocks away.
At the UCLA library, Dana manages to do a partial translation of the words Gordon
wrote down. They are in an old demon dialect and appear to echo the wording of the Third Prophecy of
the Devourer. She and Patrick meet up with Jalen at the hospital to discuss their next move. Patrick
is tempted to stage an attack on Kronos Industries and sets about finding a chemistry lab on the UCLA
campus where he can make some explosives. Dana, meanwhile, heads back to her apartment to get
materials to do a locator ritual in the hopes of finding the "sacred ground" where the summoning of
the Devourer needs to take place.
As she approaches her building, Dana sees a police cruiser outside with its lights
flashing. Fearing the worst she heads up to Gordon's apartment, where her fears are confirmed.
According to the police on the scene, all of Gordon's roommates have been brutally murdered and
there is no sign of Gordon. She calls Patrick to inform him, and while they are speaking Patrick
receives another call on his call waiting. Switching calls, Patrick hears a panicked plea for help
from the Oracle that is quickly cut off. He rendezvous with Dana and they head to the Oracle's
building across town.
Skilled but insanely fast driving by Patrick gets the two through LA's notorious
freeway traffic to the Oracle's in record time. En route Dana comes to the shocking realization
that she and the others may not be the Five spoken of in the Third Prophecy, but that the Five may
actually be demons. The two burst into the apartment to see one of Maalik's patchwork demons
strangling the Oracle. Blindsiding the creature, Patrick stabs it through the chest and Dana buries
an axe in its head, killing the creature. The Oracle recovers quickly and tells Patrick and Dana the
truth, that he never had the seer powers, that the real power was Lorne and he admits that Lorne is
a demon. This confirms Dana's fear that the Five are demons, and that Kronos now has the Warrior
(Gordon), the Scholar (Dave), and the Seer (Lorne). Patrick notes that Dr. Maalik and Cerne may be
the other two demons needed, since Leland Richter is not the kind of person to let the fact that
these two work for him stop him from sacrificing them for his own purposes.
Desperate to find out where the summoning will
be held, Dana and the Oracle start to cobble together an augury. Most of the Oracle's occult gear
was trashed in the attack, so they improvise with a Scrabble game and a little of Patrick's blood
(because of his connection to the Powers That Be). The divination comes up with the letters P, N,
Y, R, E, I, O, and H. The word they come up with is Hyperion, which Dana first thinks refers to the
mythical Titan Hyperion, son of the Greek god Chronos, until Patrick points out it is also the name
of an old hotel here in Los Angeles. With that the Oracle points out the the Hyperion hotel was the
site of a battle between the previous champion and an army of demons, just the kind of
"sacrifice" of demons that would sanctify the site to the Devourer. Dana and Patrick
immediately head to the hospital to get Ethan and Jalen.
At the hospital, alarms begin to sound in intensive care as Lauren's vital signs
drop suddenly. Ethan watches as the ER doctors rush to try and revive her when something suddenly
gets his attention... To Be Continued.
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