Werewolf Weaver Wonders
On the Edge
No city is friendly to the shapeshifting folk. But some have learned to adapt. Some have found hope, and others strive to protect their chosen people from the city’s depredations. They are Bone Gnawers, Glass Walkers, Ratkin, and the hengeyokai immigrants. There may be individual lycanthropes at large in the city, but none have the organization to fall back on like these four mighty groups. Like their rural brethren, these shapeshifters lean towards more spiritual affairs than physical.
Rules
Both Garou Septs obey the Litany as appropriately as they feel necessary. Of course, the Veil is paramount among most other laws. The Ratkin of the Black Blood Warren obey their own Wyld-inspired Litany, too, since their interests are turned inwards and more spiritual than some colonies. And the hengeyokai obey all the Mandates of the Emerald Mother to a tee.
Sept of Silicon Streets
At Sunbrite Technologys, Incorporated, innovative and entrepreneurial Glass Walkers seek to harness the power of the Weaver spawned so recently, even frivolously, that Grandmother Spider doesn’t seem to have much control over it all. Here is a forefront of the entire Glass Walker Tribe’s purpose, and they lead the fight to justify the Tribe’s adaptable but decried beliefs and lifestyles. Though the caern is in Silicon Valley, which lies south of San Francisco (and is actually closer to San Jose, a more populous city than San Francisco), the Glass Walkers’ influence and resources are largely in the City by the Bay (notably a number of business offices in the affluent Financial District).
Location
Just north of the town of Palo Alto in Silicon Valley lies an unusually shaped office building. Designed as a solar-powered sphere, the structure houses some of the brightest minds of Silicon Valley today. Computers whirr and great minds plan new and improved kinds of software programs and even the media for modern computer technology. The next “chip” may very well derive from this building, known as Sunbrite Technologies, Inc. The Sept Leader, CEO Roderick Harrington, is also the builder and designer of this caern, raised back in the 1970s.
Bawn
The outer grounds of Sunbrite involves little more than a green lawn with colorful gardens and sculpted hedges marking the boundaries, circulating out in a diametrical manner. Parking lots and pathways all gravitate to one of two places: the law-required emergency exit (which is well-secured) and the glass-paned front doors, which are barred to outsiders. No one enters Sunbrite but employees, which are all Kinfolk and the Glass Walkers themselves.
Caern
While a number of offices and high tech computer labs surround the outer rim of this half globe-shaped building, the center of the building also houses the center of the caern. Here the solar panels irradiate a large and almost vacant chamber (save on moots) with light. But what humanity doesn’t realize is that they are not solar panels, but Glass Walker-designed lunar panels. They capture the weaker light of the moon, store it and amplify it, and radiate this chamber at all times with Luna’s glory. Simply basking in this room can restore Gnosis. Beneath the floor of this central chamber are where the mechanics and electronics that make this place possible whir and calculate and are otherwise operated. The Pathstone is likewise kept under here. Naturally, Cockroach patronizes this Level 2 Caern of Innovation.
Tribal Structure
Only Glass Walkers may join this Sept.
Guardians
A pair of spirits known as Guardians of the Gate man the doors of the building. The small Sept has only one Guardian/Warder, but his unusual skills with electronics make him more than adequate.
Sept of the Golden Way
The Bone Gnawers of San Francisco are more attached to the human population – especially its burgeoning homeless one – than other Septs. Some associate this behavior with the ‘Hood Camp in the Tribe, but said Camp only has a few members in this Sept. Instead, it’s just a sense of community that the small caern they command exudes. But the sentiments were there first. The Bone Gnawers would not have found their caern if they didn’t have some compassion for their human neighbors to start with.
Location
The Golden Gate Park, found in the northwestern quadrant of San Francisco, has been claimed by the Bone Gnawers. There is no treaty, but an understanding with local Gangrel vampires, over the use of the park. The line is drawn at feeding off the homeless folk who camp out at this park, and many bloody fights have started between werewolf and vampire over this problem. Luckily, the Bone Gnawers have been tentative friendships with certain faeries that flock to the park’s bright points, like the Japanese Tea Garden.
Bawn
Over two miles long across extends the Golden Gate Park, from the Panhandle to the Pacific. There aren’t enough Bone Gnawers and allies to patrol it all constantly, but they keep their ear to the ground and hear about problems within a half-day’s time. Most of the Sept’s members blend in among the homeless and ragtag tramps that camp out around the park, which contains green hills, a number of small ponds and lakes, and groves of spruce and cedar.
Caern
The caern was raised during the 1880s, founded on the traditionally made Conservatory of Flowers, one of the only wood and glass-paned conservatories left in the world. Some say its building was a favor from the Glass Walker, though the magic of its raising was entirely in the hands of the Gnawers. In this building, which is repeatedly closed to the public due to danger natural hazards can inflict on the glass dome, the Gnawers can meditate among flora with beauty and serenity beyond compare. Its fragility contrasts with the ferocity by which the Gnawers defend it. The room in which the heart of the caern dwells is always closed off to humans. Here some of the most fragile flowers reside, at least that is what the public is told. In truth, the petals of these flowers carry the magic of Gaia even here in the heart of the city. This Level 2 Caern of Visions is occupied by City Mother as Totem.
Other Landmarks
The Pathstone is hidden behind the waterfall on Strawberry Hill, an island in the middle of Stow Lake. A Glass Walker disillusioned with her Tribe’s electronic fixation took up the reins of the Academy of Sciences. Though none of the Sept’s dead perished from AIDS, they are buried beneath the AIDS Memorial Grove, as are Kinfolk (some of whom did die from AIDS).
Tribal Structure
Bone Gnawers dominate the Sept’s affairs. A Glass Walker and Silent Strider or two member the Sept, as do a few other Tribes.
Guardians
The Garou appoint Guardians themselves as the only real defense besides influence over human affairs to keep trespassers away from where they shouldn’t be. Because so many humans traffic through the park all the time, the Sept simply lives alongside them as peacefully as possible. Kinfolk help keep things ruly and secret.
Warren of Black Blood
East of San Francisco proper is where the local Ratkin have set up their home. Unlike other Ratkin of the region, these fellows have uncovered a treasure trove of forbidden secrets on their own back porch. They have turned their gnawing teeth, snuffling noses, and digging paws to the ground, digging up all the dirt they can, and redirecting the evil they find back at their enemies with frenzied passion.
Location
The small city of Richmond is on the East Bay, not in San Francisco proper. Of course, the Ratkin have tunneled their way through all of the Bay Area, including the city proper. The only sewers and maintenance shafts they do not travel anymore are those under Chinatown, after striking an accord with the Beast-Court’s Nezumi. Richmond is an economically depressed town, an industrial center in its last throes. Only the chemical and oil refineries thrive still, and the Ratkin suspect (or flat-out know) that these places are human pawn-run sites of Wyrm corruption.
Nest
While many warrens make the heart of their Nests underground, the Black Blood Colony took over an entire city block of “projects” apartment complexes and abandoned warehouses. The walls…hell, everywhere…is overrun by their rodent Kinfolk. The human Kin who occupy these homes, too, are a grim lot. They’ve refused to throw in their lots with some of the human gangs roaming the area, and consequently are under constant siege from police and rival gangs all the time. The Rat Queen claimed one entire warehouse to herself, and here the scrawling on the wall and littered furnishings form her royal chambers. Her own deceit keeps Thunder as patron (unsurprisingly), though to each their own. (OOC: This Warren is considered a *** Colony.)
Tribal Structure
The Rat Race are all that one is likely to find membering the Warren of Black Blood, so named for the corrupt spiritual energies found thriving under Richmond…and filtering into the rest of the city. A few Ronin visit the Colony when their ships arrive at dock, but sometimes their visits are unwanted or unannounced, and they find themselves repelled viciously.
Guardians
Thousands of rats and dozens of armed Kinfolk provide the primary buffer between this Warren’s interests away from immediate physical threats. Stormcrows provide intel on possible dangers and intruders on either side of the Gauntlet. The Rat Queen, a Shadow Seer, surrounds herself with mighty Generals who know how to wage brutal guerilla warfare in defense of their holdings.
The Beast-Court of the Gate of Thunder
In Chinatown, the shen long past immigrated alongside their human counterparts. Some came with humans that were related to them: that was the case with the hengeyokai. At first, there was just a trickle of hengeyokai, only enough to form a single Sentai. Later more came, and soon formed one of the most powerful Beast-Courts outside of the Middle Kingdom: the Gate of Thunder. Zhong Lung and Makara, Nezumi and Tengu, Kitsune, Garou of even many stripes, even Khan, Nagah, and Same-Bito member this court now. Once they were focused on the protection of their immigrant Kinfolk against the depradations of abusive Westerners and Western supernaturals. Now the court expands its interests, becoming a path by which hengeyokai back home may benefit. Resources, mundane and magical, are funneled back to Beast-Courts in the Orient.
Location
Chinatown, San Francisco, is where all the local shen carved out their homes and dragon nests, if they were so lucky. The hengeyokai were so fortunate, claiming the Chinatown Preservation Exhibit as the seat of their power. Here the first hengeyokai awakened a small dragon nest (caern), hidden among the flora and fauna in that exotic menagerie.
Bawn
Essentially a zoo, the Chinatown Preservation Exhibit was erected in 1982 under the guidance and money of Far Eastern financiers (notably certain Hakken and Boli Zouiszhe). This exhibit is only 25,000 square feet, but transports visitors (who are limited and must pay entrance fares) into a hotter, exotic, jungle-like climate.
Dragon Nest
The dragon nest is found on the south end of the exhibit, blocked off from human trespass or even view. The reptile exhibit includes a small stream and many rocks, which they may clamber behind to avoid nosy humans. Behind the rocks is a wider-than-expected glen of soft moss and grass surrounded by a ring of carefully arranged stones exposed to the foggy air of the city. Each stone has a warding glyph of magical power upon it and seems to hum and thrum with charged-up power. Here the hengeyokai may meditate upon the essence of their dragon nest and its guardian, Wen Chung, a god of thunder and lightning. This place is a Level 1 Caern of Will.
Other Landmarks
The Pathstone is buried also in the middle of the caern center, bridging the way back to the Middle Kingdom. The Graves of Hallowed Heroes are buried in unmarked greenery sealed off from human eyes and venture. Though the Beast-Court was founded in Chinatown, the Hakken and Boli Zouiszhe both promote financial success for the court and their brethren. They have branched out their interests into Japantown, an affluent district for Japanese-Americans way across town, as well as the so-called New Chinatown, where numerous commercial avenues have opened for Asian-American immigrants.
Tribal Structure
Some of the most prominent members are Kitsune (werefoxes) and Garou, namely Hakken (Shadow Lords) and Boli Zouiszhe (Glass Walkers). Other Tribes, such as Dadi Ertong (Children of Gaia) and Xing Kanmengou (Stargazers), abound. There are also Tengu (Corax), Nezumi (Ratkin), Khan and Bagheera, Makara and Zhong Lung, and even Nagah (Vritra, of course) and Same-Bito (Rokea). The last berth in the San Francisco Bay, and do not have to stray far or long inland for Courtly Assemblies (moots).
Guardians
Beside the exotic array of hengeyokai set as Guardians of the dragon nest, the Gate of Thunder also employs a Tiger-spirit and Wingless Dragon-spirit, both of which dwell in the caern area and patrol the realm of interlopers quite effectively.
Special Events
Special events are annual (or more frequent) holidays or special ritual days that the main group or groups observe as a whole community. Attendance and participation is often expected of all members, and sometimes required.
Give a Home
For humans, Christmas is a time of giving. For many Bone Gnawers, it is a time of receiving, from the soup kitchen if from nowhere else. But the Sept of the Golden Way is particularly sensitive to the plight of the homeless, which are tragically common in the Bay City. On December 25th, the Sept presents a new boarding house for local homeless. Sometimes that house is built over the course of weeks, sometimes it seems to appear overnight (Reshape Object for the win!). The event is not the only time of year that the Gnawers aid the homeless get homes, but because it’s Christmas, it’s an especially celebratory occasion. And it’s good PR. Glass Walker allies help with that, as well as with zoning permits and fees.
Current Wars Reenactment Week
The Glass Walkers of the Sept of Silicon Streets hold a special event of their own. The Current Wars were an industrial, innovative, political, and even downright physical clash between the human inventors of modern electricity, especially Tesla (AC) and Edison (DC). For the fun of it, and to attract exotic Electricity-spirits, Glass Walkers put on a city-wide reenactment of the Current Wars from January 24th to the 31st, complete with Tesla coils. It’s all fun and games, but like any reenactment, it tries to stay true to history, so Tesla (AC) ultimately wins.
Take All Your Shit Day
The Ratkin of the Warren of Black Blood have declared December 26th (the day after Christmas) as Take All Your Shit Day, where the wererats steal as much stuff as possible from whomever they please, including little kids and all their newest plastic Avalon crap.
Delights of the Far East
The “Delights of the Far East” is not so much an event as it is a campaign. The event it mirrors is Chinese New Year (which takes place over two weeks, starting on the new moon that falls in January or February), when the greatest advertising and marketing drive takes place, but the campaign carries on all year. Started in 2008 by enterprising immigrant shen of San Francisco’s traditional Chinatown district, the “Delights” effort hooks Americans by appealing to their ethnocentric expectations, and then bombards the tourists with cultural honesty. Nothing is watered down, not even the spicy food. Every country and culture of East Asia is represented, especially China, Japan, Korea, Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia, the Philipines, and India, and many more. Representation has been effected through a general clean-up of Chinatown’s appearance, modernizing some of the more rundown sections, as well as a clamping down of tong and other rougher elements of organized crime. (It’s still there, just more urbane now.) Advanced tourism hubs play up East Asia’s burgeoning technology revolution with even more talented tour guides. The purpose, of course, is to broaden acceptance of genuine East Asian immigrants and culture in America. For the hengeyokai of the Beast-Court of the Gate of Thunder, this helps spread tolerance for their Kinfolk in and beyond Chinatown while improving overall prosperity to their “home away from home”, which now is simply home.
“To know the truth and seize the power, you have to dig deeper.”
-- Elsa Nimm, “Shadow-of-the-Storm”, Queen of the Warren of Black Blood
