Okay, so where do we start from?

I take it the guy at your Legion's office read you the riot act about the DM and told you to watch out for guys with dark circles under the eyes and to go see the guys with the iron lanterns when that little voice in your head starts getting really nasty, right?

Okay, good, at least you got off on the right foot. Met some gal last week who hadn't been more than five minutes in the morgue and two in the Reach before some asshole put her corpus on guard duty. Mother of two bastards and an "accident" with the father, his girlfriend, three bags of coke and a sawed-off shotgun and she's out looking for
trouble before she's even in the ground. Yeah, well, that's the Grim Legion for you. I guess you got lucky... sort of.

Ah, okay. Dumb thing to say, mea culpa. Another drink?

Well, let's see. I guess I oughta give you the quick and dirty. This big thing that we're standing on, here in the Tempest... that storm outside... this is a Tempest Fortress. You'll hear a lot of old-timers talk about Islands and Shores? This ain't one of them. This here's a man-made wonder of stuck-together memories of buildings and things that went down like a Clark County ranch gal in tourist season. The Shadowlands of Las Vegas are just full of old buildings and parts of old buildings that no one knows just what to do with yet. A lot of the older stuff got moved out here to keep the Necropolis Port happy.

Yeah, that big oval thing in the center of the place that leads from here right into the Shadowlands. That's the Port. Without it you'd have to go find a Nihil somewhere to get here, or pay a Harbinger to fly you on up, either that or learn how to grow wings and do it yourself. Security's pretty tight on both ends but hey... you know how that goes.

You do? Ah... thought there was that something in your eyes. Good, we're on the level. That means we can talk...

Anyway, this Tempest Fortress is affectionately known as "Luck's Reach." It's also known as "Lucky 7" and "Fort Baker" and a whole lot of other names besides, but if you want to stay in the good graces of the people who run it you'd better call it by its rightful name around them. It's some crazy copyright thing, you know?

Right. Okay, this bar is the real Fort Baker. There's a great story about that but I'll get to it later. You need to make a deal or score some good Juice, you come here to do it. On a good night all the major players from all camps walk in or out at some point, and wouldn't you know they leave all their crap at the door? Well, a hierarch's still a
hierarch and a renegade's still a renegade, and this is Hierarchy territory, but this is sort of... ah...

You've seen "Casablanca," right? Okay, good. This is Bogie's bar, here, and Prefect Louis can go ring-a-ding-ding a Barghest sideways. No trouble, no arguments, no fighting and you leave your stripes outside for the night unless you want to be someone's ashtray in the morning.

Yeah, it does sound a little koo-koo, considering where we are and what's all around us. But then it's like flies and honey. If you look right across the street you'll see a very large detachment of Legionnaires...?

Uh-huh. You got that right. Smart people don't come in through the front door, and I got it on good authority that most of the major players don't.

Me? Ah, I'm harmless. I just float in and out like a cloud of cigar smoke and no one bothers old Ratzy. Suits me fine.

Okay, now, this place is just lousy with byways. Out front... back, whatever... you got your piers. There's a huge ocean byway out there? That's the River of Death. You hop on that it goes all the way back to Stygia and all points beyond. Lot of traffic. There's ships out there that were made to go through the Tempest itself, too, and they'll dock out front.

Now, in the back, we got two land-based byways. One of them is a railroad that connects with a lot of the Necropoli in North America, and the other's an old stagecoach trail that does the same. Not many people use the stagecoach trail as much nowadays, but they got this special service where this coach'll fly you down the path so damn fast you'd think you arrived before you left. If you got the money they'll get you where you're going as long as the byway hooks up with it. Otherwise you got to take a ship and that's just your bad luck.

Now, the Port comes out on top of the Mirage hotel, like you saw. If they put it down on the ground they'd have to dodge the Quick all day, and if they put it on the ground outside of town... well... wouldn't be too convenient. It's a tough call but that's death, eh?

Anyway, you need to do any official business, Luck's Reach is the place to go. All the Legions' got their main offices here, the armories and storehouses are all up here, and anyone you might need to talk to shows up at Fort Baker at least once a week to do some business... most of 'em, anyway. Some got the sense to stay underground. The
Legionnaires might not be able to come in swinging their swords but they can always wait for you to come out.

See the charm? Yeah... here, down the hatch.

Now, you got anything to do in the Shadowlands, it's the same deal. The Legions all have offices down there, too, and due to space constraints up here the majority of Enlisted folks, like yourself, have to make do with what's down there for Slumbering and what not. You can also do some more kinds of deals down there... I suppose you could say... but I'm sure you don't want to think about stuff like that, do you?

Heh! I thought so. Here's to your Mama. Now, speaking of which, the big DM is in full effect the whole time you're down there, so watch your trail and watch your tail. If you want to get some Juice, the casinos are just full of people who feel very, very strongly about a lot of things, and I'm sure anyone with any imagination and a smell for the stuff
can go have themselves a nice buffet any time they like. The city's going 24 hours, seven days a week, after all.

One more word of warning. Your legion mouthpiece probably told you to watch out for people with dark circles under their eyes. It's worse than that - the city's just surrounded by 'em. The deserts are just full of 'em, and not always the ones who can pass for normal folks like us, either, so you keep your ass in town unless you're in a big
group. You see any suspicious types or anyone who looks like a refugee from a horror movie, call in the guard. If it's a false alarm there's no harm done, right?

Well, okay, maybe the guy that got called on it won't be so happy. But hey! He gets a free session with a Pardoner out of the deal. Can't be that bad, eh?

No... never had it happen to me. Can you tell?