Fixing Rovena's Bee Part 1

Tuesday, June 9th 2015 - Shenzhen, China

Gathering of friends

Shenzhen is a sprawling, fast growing city located just north of Hong Kong. In the last few years it has become one of China’s major industrial centers and is known for electronics, software, and finance. The climate is subtropical so the weather will be warm and humid in early June.

The party will be met at Shenzhen International Airport (Map https://goo.gl/maps/ubFBZ) and ushered past customs and immigration by officers of the People’s Armed Police to where cars will be waiting to take them to the facility. Those arriving by Agartha portal will be met by drivers who will take them through the city’s heavy traffic.

The facility isn’t exactly “hidden” so much as deserted. It’s located in an industrial zone in quite close to the airport. The area is currently abandoned and slated for redevelopment but nothing has happened yet as plans seemed to be mired in the Chinese bureaucracy. The building is one of row of drab, concrete boxes and seems to have been a factory of some sort. Most of it is one large room lit by a few windows high up on the wall and flickering fluorescent lights that hang down from the ceiling.

The room that Emily has selected is a former storage room off to one side of the main factory floor. It is windowless, has a heavy steel door and concrete walls, floor, and ceiling. By the time everyone else arrives, Emily will have already finished the first layer of wards and set out water, Gatorade, and iced tea for everyone as well as some small fans to try and move the warm, heavy air.

Emily greets everyone as they arrive and offers them cold drinks while they wait for the others to show. She’s wearing her usual warm weather attire of a loose tee-shirt and baggy cotton pants and no visible weapons. Her fingers are stained with the colored chalk she’s been using to scrawl the lines of runes and Chinese characters on the walls that form the first layer of wards.

Rovena arrives with two bags, one being her typical emergency bag and it is stored away. The other has holds hospital clothing and other personal items she might need in here. She places it next to what will be ‘her’’ bed.

The German is dressed for business but will change later on for sure. She is still wearing her engagement ring but no other jewelry or makeup.

Rovena greets Emily and gives her a short hug but then lets her take care of the wards. Then she waits for everyone else to arrive.

When Dui arrives she is carrying her pistols and a blood focus but no other weapons, which is generally unheard off ..even for her. She is wearing, red and white tartan skirt and a white camisole along with her typical boots but never before seen white. Overall this she wears a long leather white coat.

Dui arrives with two satchels over her shoulders. One satchel is filled with plastic bags filled leaves each individually marked and simple explanations are written on each bag. SO others may use at others discretion during the rituals.

Lastly in the satchel is a medium sized incense infuser for burning leaves mainly for safety reasons.

The Second satchel contains a two mason jars of “Pure Enriched Anima” Dui has extracted and distilled from the portal bees in Agartha. She has a gift with the honey bees they never sting her. Also Five white candles infused with enriched anima. The golden substance forming the “Tong Ren” gua. A harmonizing Gua of the I-Ching meaning “Seeking Harmony” from the end to end. Of course Dui will have on her person at all times Hematite. Also She would include in her pack Acupuncture needles and epinephrine injection.

Dui lays all these Items out on the tables in the main room and makes herself available to any that ask her what they do and are for.

Rovena smiles at Dui when she arrives and greets her with a hug as well. She seems even less talkative than usual.

Dui Returns her hug with a warm smile and a sympathetic look of concern. She doesn’t linger in the hug making an excuse about the heat and humidity. When Rovena takes her leave Dui makes her way over to Emily’s cold drinks. She takes one and immediately places on her forehead to cool her self down then chugs back the bottled water. Dui waves to Emily who she doesn’t quite know

Kyle arrives via Agartha portal, and into one of the cars over to the facility. He didn’t bring anything with him, and he’s wearing one of his open collared suits, his typical uniform when he’s not in uniform. When he arrives at the facility, he looks everything over with a intense gaze but he’s projecting a fairly calm, relaxed demeanor.

When he’s done looking around, he winks at Rovena and offers Dui and Emily faint smiles of greeting, along with anyone else. He’ll find a spot against the wall out of the way to let the others set up their preparations or what have you and patiently wait until he’s needed.

Like the other Kyle got his greeting hug, even the wall was not a place to hide from her since she is as useless as he is at the moment, while the medial and magical skilled set their things up.

He returned her hug, and then took off his suit jacket, rolling up his shirt sleeves since it was pretty warm in the facility. And then he’s back to waiting, calmly, patiently, just another walk in the park. Hopefully.

Dui makes her way over to Kyle “Hey boss.”

Jessica, when she arrives into Shenzen, doesn’t bother with anything so pedestrian as a security gate or a meeting party. The Lear jet lands without any bother, and the black car meets her on the tarmac before whisking her into the city.

Arriving into the factory complex, she flicks a wrist at the driver to stay where he is and makes her way into the building on foot. High heels click on the hard floor as she slips into the store room. The slender young woman is dressed mostly in black, what looks like a razor-sharp business suit under a well-cut dark trench coat. The image is completed with dark glasses and a small clutch bag. Scanning the room she catches Emily’s eye first and quietly makes her way over to the magus.

“Hey. So. You know the plan?”

“Only the broad outlines. I’m mostly security and facilities. And backup anima battery.”

A bit further back in the complex Rovena is standing with Sophie, handing her back the engagement ring to take care of it while the procedure happens. Metal and medical scanners are not good friends. But she demands that however this ends that Sophie puts it back on her finger.

Sophie slips it on her own finger with her engagement ring. She tells Rovena “okay” though the emotions of something possibly going badly may show through. She tries to remain strong and holds Rovena’s hands in her own, her eyes not leaving the German’s for several minutes.

Rovena holds her very long and tell her how much she loves her and that Sophie is the best reason of all to make it through this.

Hearing this brings tears to Sophie’s eyes. She nods several times before whispering “you better make it though this,” her tone betrays the strength she tries to show. “I love you, Rovena. You’re my life!”

“And you are mine. I love you, my Sophie. So very much. I’m happy to have you on my side.” Rovena kisses away the tears of her fiance but is crying herself. She gives her another squeeze. “I won’t promise to come back when I don’t know I will, but I really, really want to.”

Sophie knows the woman is right and nods her acknowledgment. “I know, my Rovena,” she softly says. Sophie reaches for Rovena’s have and brings it to her lips. “Mine,” she states in a bit of a firmer tone.

“Yours.” Rovena whispers and brings the hand with the mokumegane ring to her lips and places a kiss on it. She looks into her fiance’s eyes. “My Sophie. Forever.”

“Yours! Forever!” She says with her eyes unwavering from Rovena’s own steel blue.

Rovena nods and passionately kisses the redhead. When the kiss breaks she takes a deep breath. “I love you, my Sophie.” Then she nods more firmly. “Time to get this done.”

Sophie returns the passionate kiss. When Rovena indicates she’s ready to head in, Sophie watches her go through the door and just stares at the closed off entrance for several minutes before she makes her way to join the medical staff. She plays with the rings upon her hands, twirling them in place, as her mind goes over a thousand different things.

When Eboni arrives, she’ll simply wander over. There is no grand introduction on her part. She’s simply there. Perhaps she used some spell to manifest, or teleport, to the airport. She’s wearing a yellow tee with a pyramid upon it, the eye of Horus centered in its stone.

Tight jeans and knee-high boots round out the ensemble. Fairly simple and ordinary, save for the buckskin backpack over one shoulder. It rests just beneath her thick, black mane of hair, and the numerous rings, bangles and otherwise about her wrists and fingers are an eclectic assortment, per usual.

She’d wander over to Rovena and Sophie, and offer a smile towards the others gathered.

“Hello everyone.”

“Hello Eboni.” Rovena gives her a smile and a hug, then waits for the others to arrive.

Arianwen arrived late and with the local heat combined with her rushing, her embarrassment and the hefty amount of baggage she was lugging into the site she was red faced and overheated. Dumping one rucksack down heavily then a second one far more gently, the blonde was also dragging a heavy wheeled suitcase and a large and long canvas bag.

Divested of her burdens she eagerly accepted a cold drink from Emily, holding it against her cheeks and forehead before actually drinking any of it. “Hey, sorry I’m late. Time it seems has been against me this week.” She takes a deep and calming breath then makes and accepts introduction, quick catch up comments and then as soon as the drink has been gulped down she sets to work on preparing her dreambridge paraphernalia.

The rolling case contained what looked like four stacks of circuitry and sockets plus eight small cameras of two different designs, the canvas bag held wiring and wireless electrodes, the carefully placed rucksack a simple circlet imprinted with circuitry and sensors and finally a sealed metal box that Arianen checked over thoroughly before setting to one side.

Though she was regretting it, Arianwen at least tooked the part of a technician or scientist in her short white lab coat though the black blouse and slacks could perhaps have been something cooler.

She withdrew a small box from one of the lab coat’s pockets and placed it on the earnest available flat surface then popped the lid open. From within she drew a long, flat metal probed and without much pause, slid it down into the edge of her right eye. A little pushing, some wiggling and the probe easily popped the techsmith’s right eye out of it’s socket. She carefully wiped the medical prosthetic clean and put it into one side of the box then withdrew from the other side her augmetic replacement. It popped into place with a mted click.

Arianwen blinked rapidly and the iris of the eye began to glow a steady pale blue. Tapping on her phone she linked the engineering module of her eye to the saved schematic of the dreambridge equipment and with the design floating within her vision in her augmetic eye’s display, she began to put all the pieces together.

Vanessa arrives toting several suitcases in a few trips with Drizzle’s aid, along with a long intricately-carved walking stick. The suitcases seem to have medical monitoring equipment, which she carefully unpacks and begins setting up. In addition, she begins taking out a number of other items from her backpack – a bottle of rum, some incense, a carved flask and wooden bowl, a pipe and tobacco, and what appears to be a rattle made from a hollow gourd which she treats with great reverence.

The Plan

When everyone has gathered and the equipment is prepared Rovena motions to gather them together. She is not wearing the engagement ring anymore and the only fabric on her body is a white hospital gown. Even the the raven hair is braided. The German forces a smile to her face and takes a deep breath.

“Thank you for coming to help me everyone. I’ll quickly go over the plan, so everyone is clear about what we are going to do. But first, I want to introduce you all to each other, make sure you know who is on your side.”

She nods to the shy, ebony skinned woman. “This is Vanessa. She will make sure I and everyone else survive this. She is part of our medical team on Prometheus and really knows her job. And bees.” Rovena won’t say it to not make it worse for Vanessa but her expressions and voice make clear that she sees Vanessa as the person in charge of the medical team. In response, Vanessa lowers her strange all-onyx eyes, a bit awkward at the attention directed her way.

“Everyone here knows Kyle, so I don’t have to introduce him, but know, despite all what you might have heard in rumors, I still fully trust him and we are still friends.” She gives him faint smile, then her eyes go to Jessica.

“Jessica, Ms. Vanderbilt. My closest friend.” She swallows a bit. “And when it comes to making hard calls, her decisions are final. You may not like it but she knows how I want things handled.” Rovena gives her a small pat on the back.

Moving on to Sophie, she gives the redhead a soft kiss. “This is my fiance, meet Sophie.” For a moment the smile actually reaches her eyes before she moves on.

“Here we have Emily, who provided us with the location and who is quite a potent bloodmage.” She points to Arianwen. “Also from CACHE we have Arianwen.”

The German’s steel blue eyes move on to Julia. “This is Julia, and she will keep you all physically secure. I hope we won’t need her but better safe than sorry.”

She steps over to the small Egyptian and brushes through her hair. “This is Eboni, one of the most powerful witches I know.”

Last in her circle is Dui. “And here is Dui.” She does not really know how to describe her in a short ways, so she just leaves it like that.

“You all are here because you are my friends. I’m grateful to have you.”

Then she nods. “Alright, here is the plan. I will be put to sleep and Arianwen will link my dreams to Jessica’s and Kyle’s mind, so that they can join me there. Once the connection is stable, Eboni will supercharge my body with Anima to reanimate my bee. Vanessa will keep an close eye on my Anima-body and my vitals. Once the bee is back alive, Dui will take over and stabilize my Anima levels back to healthy and feed the bee as long as it needs to.”

Rovena sighs and looks at their faces. “Sounds easy, right? It is not. During past Anima exposures some hidden memories got free and reliving them I cast a lot elemental spells. That is what Emily is here for. Her wards hopefully will keep you all safe. There were Spells on me, locking the memories. One was broken but the others are still intact and more sophisticated. We don’t know what the side effects will be when the bee breaks them.”

The German grows pale and shivers a little. “In case the bee gets reanimated but I need to be terminated, Kyle has everything needed for that. It will be Jessica’s call if that has to happen. And I don’t want anyone to doubt her in that case.”

Dui looks about to the the others offering eye contact to each and smiles widely and with an assured voice, not jokingly but in confidence “Easier things are done by the Saints every day, right every one?”

Jessica’s expression remains glacially cold and remote, her eyes unreadable. She doesn’t say anything, other then to set her bag down and remove what looks like a small, dark, compact handgun from it. The device flickers with a pale energy and any trained eye would easily spot that the gun was fused into one solid block of metal - the receiver and slide and barrel all one. It doesn’t even appear to have ammunition.

Rovena eyes the gun with mixed feelings. A bit of fear but also a lot curious interest. She would have to ask Jessica about it once this all is over. The German tries to give Dui a smile at her words but it does not really work.

Dui looks at the cold and steely eyed Jessica and smiles warmly completely undeterred in her optimism.

“It should be easy enough, I suppose. I mean, we’ve specialists for every task.” She offers a shrug of her small shoulders. “As long as everyone does their part, and pulls their weight.” She seems serene, lacking her usual mischievous glint of her eyes. The buckskin bag swings about and dangles freely at her side as she looks to the others.

Emily’s expression gradually fades into a blandly pleasant and somewhat distant as she listens to the introductions, nodding at each new arrival.

Arianwen remains as poker faced as she can over the grim words and possibility of how badly the procedure could end. It wasn’t terribly effective as she began to worry at her bottom lip, teeth tugging at her lip ring. She busies her mind with other things, her mouth moving of its own accord. “I’ve got four dreambridge rigs set up ready. Wasn’t sure if we’d need the extra one but couldn’t hurt to have the option of adding someone else to the dreamscape if things don’t go entirely well.”