Hello Grandmother,

I lead a strange life. Most people would consider any of the events in my life completely insane. But even I can’t quantify what’s happened to me the last ten days.

I’m back among friends, which is someplace I wasn’t sure I was ever going to be again. All I can say is I’m glad to be able to talk to you again. I can’t wait to tell you the story of where I’ve been, though with the condition that I’m in, I’m going to save it for tomorrow. But suffice it to say, I wasn’t in Japan.

-1159

World-

I don’t know how 1159 did it- writing every day. My fists are sore and my head is ringing, and all I want to do is go to sleep. But I’ll give everybody an update, cause I’m proud of today’s… activities.

Based on the information I beat out of the vamp parasite cowboy Pistol yesterday, I tracked a warehouse where 1159 may have been kept. The Eye warned me to wait til after the holidays, in case I ran afoul of any robot shenanigans, but I don’t usually listen to good advice, and I wasn’t about to start then. Turns out the facility was a robot shipping depot, ferrying parts and programs into and out of Japan (which apparently violates some kind of Ministry bylaws, but I’ll let the Eye clarify that at a later date, my heads pounding too hard to get the details straight). It makes sense too, because 1159’s trail has gone completely cold. Which means he very well may have been packaged and delivered across the pacific.

Anyways, I butted heads with beings made of metal until it became clear that nothing there was going to help in my search one way or another. They didn’t seem to know anything, and their records weren’t reveling about their deliveries.  Also- robots aren’t nearly as fun to punch as vampires, I can tell you. But now I have to figure out how we’re gonna find 1159 if he’s got his ass packed up and shipped to the robot-happy land of Japan.  Which I’m glad to let Eye do while I pick shards of steel out of my paws.

-Marksman

World-

I like to think of myself as a hero. Protector and all that. So I don’t like to glorify violence. But man, beatin’ up vampires is fun. A slimy cowboy vamp calls himself Pistol happened to cross my path while I was hunting down 1159’s trail. Seems he knew a few things about where 1159 might be. Or at least, we assumed he might.

Trapping a vampire isn’t easy. They’re tough buggers, and a lot of them have special powers. Even when they don’t, you still have to come up with some form of chains or a cell. If you’re lucky, they’re Christian vamps who can be held down by anything blessed by a priest. But mostly you’re going to need high powered UV lights and a decent lighting rig. Once I had Pistol pinned down, it wasn’t difficult to get him to talk. Vampires aren’t loyal, and they aren’t used to someone having power over them. What I learned is that there are some fishy dealing going on with the Ministries’ reality program, something I’m gonna have fun looking into tomorrow. But what I really learned was something I already knew- It’s a hell of a lot of fun to beat a monster to a pulp.

-Marksman

World-

I understand magic. It’s mostly someone breaking the rules to screw you over. That’s what I do when I use my mark. I understand machines. They do what you tell them. What I don’t understand is thinking machines. Something man-made with a mind of its own. It defies how the universe is supposed to work.

The Eye understands these things. She’s got more brains in her pinky than I’m ever gonna have. She’s the network’s specialist in robot strategy. I don’t think I can even fathom it. If she says that we need to watch out for a robot strike, then we’d better listen. Me, I don’t mind spending the holidays taking some R&R, let the robots kill the vampires for us. Course this doesn’t mean I’m gonna stop hunting for 1159. Just do it more cautious like.

-Marksman

Day 132

Um, hey out there. This is the Eye. I’m guessing you don’t know me, and I’d like to keep it that way. The Marksman asked me to give you a report on the information that I’m getting. I don’t quite know who I’m writing this to, but I guess this would be useful to people who believed any of this was true. So if you’re not part of the network, but are hiding in a basement in fear of what’s out there, this is for you.

The Infiltration has been continuing its strikes against the Seven Deadly Ministries. And it’s starting to finally reveal the immediate aim. There are three cities that the Infiltration is supposed to come from. Perdition, the California suburb; Duat, the Massachusetts hamlet, and Valhalla a small town in Montana. Only it turns out Valhalla isn’t a small town anymore. Instead, it’s been turned into a prison. One for robots that rebelled against the vampire regime in a war that took place around 2000. First goal of the Infiltration is to liberate the city from vampire control. And they’re using terrorism to do it.

Robots often will use a specific type of battery to power-up when they don’t expect to have a chance of recharging for a while. And that battery is becoming scarce around the Wyoming/Montana area. Studying the longevity of the energy source, it’s likely that an attempt is going to be made against Valhalla in the next week. I can’t narrow down the exact location of the city, but I can say, if you can get out of the state for the holidays, please try. And if you see a large group of strangers come through your town, just keep hidden in the basement until the new year.

World-

I’ve killed a lot of vampires in my time. More than a couple. When I first started down that path, it was pretty easy. They attack, you stake, you move on. That was back in the early days after the vampire revolution, where most of the vamps hadn’t quite adjusted to the new status quo. They were still used to being creatures of the night, not business people in charge of secret underground organizations.

So why do I bring this up? Because I’m starting to get worried. I’ve started to have a glimmer of hope that I’m going to find 1159 alive, and that seems less likely with every day. Because these new vampires, the ones in charge today, they don’t mess around. They are dangerous blood suckers. They aren’t going to fall for a quick trap, and they aren’t going to attack unless you take something they need. Which means striking at them isn’t easy. And if they get a hold of 1159, he’s not going to last long.

-Marksman

World-

I’m not a very open person. But since I promised to keep this going, it occurs to me that I’d be a good idea to tell the world about the kind of man I am, the kind of man they’ve forgot.

I bear a mark. I’m not the first. I won’t be the last. It’s a mark that makes me more than man. I sometimes wonder if that mark is the reason I was spared when all the other heroes disappeared from our world. I was not the only one with superior strength, or superior senses. But I am the only one that bears the mark. And there will always be a Marksman.

Before me, the Marksmen were hidden, living in the shadows like the vampires and machines that haunt your world today. I was the first to work alongside the heroes of the world. Did I curse them to their doom? Of course not, what the hell kind of thinking is that. I was willing to put aside the secrecy of the past. Maybe that scared the Illuminati into giving more control to vampires than the super-humans though. So I guess I can’t escape the regret that drives me to kill the blood suckers that exiled my friends. 1159 was better about talking about his feelings than I am. I don’t know what it all means. All I know is that I’m not ever gonna rest until all of the parasites that manipulate this planet are back in the ground where they belong.

-Marksman

World-

I don’t think I’m that smart. I got a mark on me, lets me know I’m special, lets me do things others can’t, but it don’t make me smarter than anyone else. That’s why I have a network, a group of allies in the fight on evil that can figure out things that require two brain cells rubbing together. I got people of exceptional talent that for some reason are stupid enough to help me fight the forces of darkness that are very likely going to kill them. It’s from these folks that I’ve got a piece of information that’s made things a bit simpler for me in what I gotta do.

1159’s not gone yet, at least as far as they can tell. Traces of his existence keep popping up, so they haven’t quite removed him from reality. Hell, his blogs still here; though people still remember my old friends as fictional characters, so that might not mean a whole lot. But the docs who know tell me that they didn’t use their big zappy thing to get rid of him. Doesn’t mean they didn’t kill him, but at least they didn’t obliterate his memory. Which means that there’s still a trail I can follow, still a path that will lead me wherever it is he went. Just gotta hope he’s not at the bottom of the ocean.

- Marksman

World-

I used to help people. Not by fighting monsters in dark places, but in broad daylight. Back in the day that was acceptable. Course I was never your bright and shiny hero. I’m the Marksman after all. I shot the bad guys that deserved it. I never thought that much about religion or the hows and whys of the world. Bad does bad, I show up and put’em down. At least until bad finally won the whole thing. How does the world get that pear-shaped? This world had heroes. Men and women of forthright valor and all that. Now it’s just a place where people do stuff. I can’t even see sometimes what I keep fighting for. Would a world ruled by humans going nowhere any better than one where they die slowly from a suck on the neck?

All I know now is that my job consists of little more than hunting shadows. I’m chasing the tail of a man who may no longer exist. I’m hunting the clues to find some great big mystery that would probably mean a whole hill to a guy like 1159. But to me, I can’t seem to care about any of it. What does it matter what muck they’re hiding in their dark nether regions? Til we get our heroes back, it’s all just a big mess no matter who’s in charge. Til we can go back to really helping people move forward, the bad guys will always win.

-Marksman

World-

I hate vampires. I really do. They suck the life out of you and then act indignant when you get mad about it. God damn Damned. I know 1159 worried a lot about robots and progress, but the machines are really going to have to show me something to prove they are scarier than the monsters that run our world already. The world is scary enough as it is. Possessed dead people control whether or not we exist in reality. I’ll get scared of robots when they can do something worse than kill me.

I’ve been following the trail 1159 left. I don’t think he was following what he thought he was following. Whatever device they use to erase people, it wasn’t the last place he went to look. Means I have to figure out what was really there. Guess that means I gotta go kill more vampires. Ah, shucks, and I was gonna go do laundry today.

-Marksman