| From: | Mach mach@****.caltech.edu |
|---|---|
| Subject: | Madame Noir |
| Date: | Thu, 13 Jul 2000 22:52:56 -0700 (PDT) |
>>>>>[+++++begin video: noir.info.vid
The 2-D image resolves, looking from over and above Michael's shoulder,
slightly obscurred by a couple of unruly hairs, as though from an
earing's-eye-view. He is walking into a darkened shop with
African-motif fetishes adorning one wall and tools of the voudoun trade
on another. Campy Calypso music plays in the background. Looking
around the shop, he spies a few meta-human shoppers and a young clerk of
African decent examining or proffering fetishes, talismans, and potions
of dubious content. He also notices the reversed sign painted on the
shop window announcing that this is "Madame Noir's." Michael, on the
other hand, doesn't seem to be finding what he was looking for. A few
of the customers begin to give him and his female companion odd looks,
probably in no small ammount due to their brilliant red hair and
Northern European features. Finally, he heads for a doorway shrouded by
thick velvet, with a sign announcing "Employees Only!" above it.
Knocking politely on the door frame, he says, "Excuse me, Madame Noir?"
and is nearly bowled over for his trouble by a rotund little woman
dressed head to toe in various black materials, pushing out from behind
the curtain.
"Employees Only! Keep yourself out, boy! There be things back there
that'll frighten you to your bones." Her thick Haitian accent is
quite intelligible, despite the patois. She attempts to shoo him away
with dismissive handwaving. "You want something? It be on the
shelves. Not back there." She notices the girl with him and adds
conspiratorially, "If you be looking for something to spice things up
between you and your ladyfriend, it be over there." She points to a
rack of vials of liquids and spices.
"Uhmmm. Actually I was looking for Madame Noir. Tas told me I should
talk to her."
"Tas!" The woman's white eyes flare against her ebony skin. "Why you
not say so to begin? Come! You find Madame Noir, we talk," She
directs them through the curtain. On the other side are more fetishes,
in various states of construction or storage. "How is the old
enchantress doing these days, anyway?" she asks in a voice that is now
less Port-au-Prince and more Harlem.
"Madame Noir?" Michael is perplexed.
"Call me Sophie," the woman replies, "Wouldn't nearly get so much
business if this place was called Sophie Jackson's, but I prefer friends
use my real name."
"Mambo Sophie," he begins.
"Just Sophie, alright?"
"Okay...Sophie. Tas is doing well." He bobs his head nodding. "Some
guy has her working on a focus that is giving her fits. Based on basic
ThASEM principles, but she's a bit old-school for that, so I've been
giving her a hand with the design."
"ThASEM?"
"You know.... Thaumaturgical Amplification by the Stimulated Emission
of Manna? Tuned resonator?"
"You're making my head hurt boy. And you haven't even introduced
yourself or your friend yet."
"Oh...sorry, I'm..."
"Wait.... So, I'm no mind reader, but I can add it up: 'flaming' red
hair, hexagram earing, precocious as all get-out. You must be Michael.
Tas introduced us shortly after you started hanging out at her shop, but
that was a long time ago. My how you've grown! Let me take a look at
you."
The woman's eyes look up and down his body, but loose their focus on the
second pass. "You've gotten strong, boy."
"Thanks."
She looks at his companion, and takes a step back, crossing herself as
if using it as a ward against something dangerous. "What are you doing
bringing a spirit in here?! I thought she was your girlfriend."
The girl looks very nervous. "Actually," the girl begins to say, but
Michael intercedes.
"It's okay Sera," he says reassuringly. Turning back to the
talismonger, his expression turns stern. "Sophie. This is Seraphina.
If she goes, I go. She isn't just some spirit."
"Mere de Dieux.... Tas wasn't kidding me about you."
"Probably not. But I don't care. Are you going to help me or not? All
I need is some information. Tas said if I ever had any questions about
voudoun, I should come see you."
"I owe Tas. Can't say as I'm too comfortable with her around, though,"
she says glancing at Michael's ally. "But I'll help you. So, what kind
of information are you looking for?"
"I've been asked to research an old relic of some sort. I think it may
be enchanted. And from what I could tell, being as non-intrusive as
possible, it has something to do with voudoun. Not, as they say, my
area of expertise. You have a telcom?"
"Yeah. Upstairs. Follow me." She waddles from the workroom, to the
back and hoists herself upstairs to the second floor, with Seraphina and
Michael following. In a small living room with an adjoining kitchen, a
telcom is showing a trid talk-show playing with the sound off.
Michael picks up a remote keyboard propped up against a comfortable
looking recliner and steps over to the telcom to load a diskette. With
a few clicks, the near-brawling guests of the show are replaced by what
appears to be a jade sculpture of a lower jaw floading in the trid
screen's viewing area.
"So, my 'client' got this thing, and wanted my help figuring out what it
'is.' From mundane channels, all I learned was that they're called
'Branstone's Teeth' and were discovered by the Canadian explorer Richard
Branstone in 1879. Uh...he's Canadian, er not that that matters. Where
he found the teeth is a bit of a mystery, since they just turned up in
his collection. He did travel a lot in the Caribbean, though. Still,
not exactly a place big on jade. On top of that, like I said, reading
this thing makes me think it has something to do with voudoun...it...
smells like voudoun anyway, if you know what I mean."
"I can tell a shaman's work from a mage's, with 'the Sight,' if that's
what you're talking about, yes."
"Well, I've seen a little bit of everything by now, and we used to have
this guy in our group that practiced an interesting flavor of something
like voudoun, and this is more like that."
She nods.
"So, I was saying, about this jaw, it's weird. It looks like a jade
sculpture, and it seems to be made of jade alright, but whoever sculpted
it was a master."
"How so?"
"Well, normally a sculpture is some idealized form. But this jaw, it
has pits and flaws, and the teeth are crooked and worn, and all that.
One tooth even has part of it made of a different kind of jade. It's
like the artist had a real skull laying there and was copying it in
every detail. Or else..."
"Or else?"
"Well, you know. Someone _turned_ a jawbone into jade."
"That would be a trick. Hmmm. Jade you say?" she asks knowingly.
"Yeah. So that isn't the weirdest part. There seems to be some sort of
enchantment on it, that I can't quite tell what it is. Maybe some sort
of anchored spell or bound spirit. It's like it isn't all there, and so
I'll either get nothing, get something scrambled and piecemeal, or else
I might disrupt the enchantment, so I'll never figure out what it is."
"This 'client,' do they have more than a jaw, or is that it?"
"She says that she thinks it is part of a whole skull and that she's
going to be getting the rest of the skull soon."
"Hmmm. So it may really be _the_ skull."
"What skull? Tell me anything you know."
"Well, as my momma used to say to me, 'That's bad juju, girl.' I'll tell
you, but I'm going to say first, you should tell that client of yours
'bye' and get the hell out of there. I don't like the sound of this one
bit."
"Is it bad? What is it?"
"If _it_ is what I think it is, _it_ may just be the 'Red Lady's
Skull.'"
"The Red Lady's Skull. But it's green?"
"No, child. The skull of the Red Lady. That's who she was."
"Oh...right."
"Story goes, she was powerful with the spirits and she would let the Loa
ride her like no one else. And when she died, her bones turned into
jewels. Her skull held some serious mojo for whoever had it."
"Wow...."
"They say she was one of the 'ocean people,' from, where was it...that
big island off the coast of Africa?"
"Madagascar?"
"Yes. Momma said the skull disappeared ages ago, but I thought it was
her way of covering the fact that the whole thing was just a legend."
"So were dragons and unicorns."
"Too true child, and that's what scares me. Leave it alone and walk
away."
"Don't worry. I'll be careful. Besides, it's probably nothing, just
soaked up some mana from being too close to a funky hot spot and it
isn't this Red Lady's skull anyway."
"Still...."
"I know. Grief...Tas already worries about me more than my mom."
"That's 'cause your momma doesn't know what you like playing with."
"Listen, I don't need you worrying too. Like you said, I'm strong. I'm
also pretty bright, so don't worry about me. If you want to help,
maybe you could take a look at this thing too, and let me know what
you think."
"Not on your life. Or mine. I don't think this old woman could tell
you any more than she has already, or what you'd be able to find out on
your own."
"Oh. Well then. Thanks for the info."
"Be careful," Madame Noir pleads, looking like she really means it.
"I will. Come on, Sera, we should go." Michael turns and threads his
way back down and out of the store.
+++++end include
Guess I'm better at BSing other people than I am BSing myself. If the
jaw is radiating, what the hell is going to happen when we put it with
the rest of the Skull? Now, I'm officially scared. Should I
bring the others in on this? I'm gonna feel stupid if it turns
out to be nothing (not to mention poorer, after they all take
their cuts).]<<<<<
-- Michael <21:35:12/07-13-61 PDT>
Personal System
*****Private: Bob Laconi
>>>>>[This is all the research I've been able to gather on the skull so
far. It isn't much. The teeth at least, have some written history that
I could dig up, but you probably have much, if not all of that already.
+++++include: Branstones.teeth.file
Unfortunately, if you read my notes, you'll see why I find some of the
story rather dubious. A bit lot of dead and/or fuzzy ends.
As I told you earlier, I still think it is related to voudoun, but
unfortunately, theirs is an oral tradition. Too bad they didn't keep
notes like us in the Kabbalah, or the Wuxen. There's a _chance_ this
thing is what is refered to as, "The Red Lady's Skull" if my sources are
to be believed. Very little literature about that legend exists.
+++++include: Red.lady.file
The oral histories of the artifact got scattered and altered through the
ages, but it appears to trace back to Madagascar. Very interesting
place. The inhabitants are/were a mix of Indo-Polynesian and Bantu
peoples, so their mystical tradition has some interesting flavors to it.
The colonial french slave trading in the area didn't help matters much,
blowing the indigenous peoples to the four winds, but a great deal of
them ended up in the Americas, especially the Caribbean. Which could
explain how Branstone ended up with the jaw.
+++++include: Madagascar.file
Some of the antropological studies I threw in are worth reading in and
of themselves, but you probably can't spare the time. Summing it up:
we've got a few leads, most rather shaky. Where exactly the skull came
from is unknown. Who knows? It may not even fit the jaw you have.
And maybe neither of these are from the artifact that I got information
on. Unfortnately, we probably won't know anything concrete until after
a thorough ritual analysis.]<<<<<
-- Michael <22:38:56/07-13-61 PDT>
