Vapula is very, very angry.

It's mostly with himself, but he's ready to share some of it with his peers (and, of course, his own subordinates). It would seem that someone has stolen a march upon him. Someone has come up with a scheme that practically screams "VAPULA MADE ME!" to a wincing world, and now someone is sitting back and letting the Prince of Technology take the flack for the side effects. Now, Vapula is used to getting heat for idiotic stunts, but he usually at least gets to actually do them first. It isn't a pleasant experience. The worst bit was the idea was so obvious in retrospect. The Prince of Technology doesn't work too much with ethereals (they can't even be stapled together properly), but that's no excuse. Vapula is supposed to be helping the War effort, after all.

Now, everyone who is anyone knows that not all the ethereal pantheons have completely broken with Heaven. Of the few 'neutrals', the Native American tribal spirits are both one of the hardest, and one of the easiest to attack: hard because Jordi himself keeps an eye on them, easy because he's got no backup. The trick is to distract him long enough to get a few good hits in, and what better way than to plant a mole?

Sensitive readers may now wince in advance, given the date that this was written.

Anyway, apparently somebody managed to grab a perfectly innocent ethereal ancestral spirit who managed to eke out a living from the American holiday of Groundhog Day. One would think that this isn't too noteworthy, except that the same somebody apparently also borrowed Yaotl (a fairly fractious and definitely nasty minor Aztec god) from Beleth's stable without asking her first.

Still doesn't sound too interesting? Well, whomever it was that did this somehow managed to fuse the poor unfortunates together, slapped on a Force or twelve, and set the bugger loose. Apparently, normally the spirit's personality is dominant: however, at (apparently) random intervals Yaotl takes control. He's not enjoying the experience, by the way. It's making him tense.

And we all know what Aztec deities do to relax, don't we?

Heaven found out about this little problem after the split personality ran seriously amok through the ethereal plane and (wouldn't you know it?) headed for earth. Jordi is so infuriated that he's ready to spit teeth (preferably, someone else's): those Archangels that could care less about some scruffy ethereals being flayed (i.e., most of them) are wincing at the idea of a fluffy, cuddly little mammal with a taste for wearing human skin. Some angels are about to get new marching orders pronto: no, separating the two ethereals isn't necessary, or even desired. Just kill them both and let God sort them out, presuming that He even cares.

Hell has pretty much the same mission, oddly enough. Beleth wants Yaotl back (he's on contract), but everyone else just wants to shut this little monstrosity down before it makes the morning paper (and not the tabloids either, this time) with its shenanigans. If Hell has learned anything in twenty millennia, it's that "Mass numbers of ritualistic, serial murders by unknown assailants" equals "higher gate at the church of your choice". Vapula especially wants this one taken down, albeit alive: he figures that he'll be able to analyze the critter and figure out just who upstaged him. He'll be more than happy to give anybody (anybody) who looks like they can do the job the necessary tools - and what he doesn't hand out, his sidekick Sparky will. It took Vapula's keeper half a day to get out of the knot that a very irate Nybbas tied him into during the initial 'misunderstanding' about who caused this mess. Sparky, in fact, is almost as angry as Vapula … and he knows where all the really Make Things Go Boom devices are.

Meanwhile, down on earth, the critter is kind of confused. It doesn't remember that it's sharing a body with a socially challenged maltheist, so it doesn't know why all of his compatriots ran away so quickly. Obviously, it needs to get back to its roots: luckily, one of the biggest 'rituals' is going to take place tomorrow. Embracing the spirit of Groundhog Day (pardon the pun) should clear its head. Yaotl has no problem with this plan, albeit for slightly different reasons (well, drastically different reasons). Should be one heck of a ceremony. PCs on either side would be well advised to ignore the politics this one time and just concentrate on seeing how much woodchuck they can chuck… sorry, wrong cliché.

And, off to one side, a figure takes careful notes. Really, doing this was much easier than he thought - and even more useful. Vapula has been embarrassed, there's a bunch of angels and demons whose ability to transcend ideology has been revealed and duly noted (in triplicate), and every important entity involved is most assuredly more annoyed and less effective.

All part of the Game.