Strange Times: The Pendant

This was the second "Strange Times" story from Strange Worlds. It was improvised on March 9th, 2013.

Episode Summary

With his partner Detective Morgan McNulty on suspension, Nate Jester pursues his own story as he tries to convince his editor to let him investigate rumors of a mystical piece of jewelry. His sources have led him to Stephenson, who now works for reclusive billionaire and occult collector Benjamin Davis (who has apparently acquired both Van Der Pferffer’s manservant and his collection). His editor begrudgingly allows him to chase the story, ignoring the reports of a zombie attack at a local cafe.

Davis agrees to meet with Jester upon hearing of his bright blue eyes, explaining that blue eyes are a sign of someone who sees things more clearly. Confused by his youth, Jester asks to speak with Davis’ father. Davis reveals that his “father” is a ruse, an identity he hides behind. Realizing Jester isn’t there for just a puff piece on his collection, Davis tells him to ask his questions. Jester asks him about the rumored zombie attack, and Davis replies he was aware of the attack because of the Globe of the Amazons, an orb that detects and reveals incidents of necromancy. Jester attempts to take pictures, but Davis tells him that magic often doesn’t show up on film. Despite the rumors he’s heard, Jester is incredulous at the word “magic,” believing there must be some rational explanation. He demands to see the pendant, but Davis warns him that once he has seen it, he’ll be cursed evermore with seeing magic, demons, spirits, the dead, the living, and the in between. Jester declares that he’s seen plenty of horror in the Great War and the streets of the city, but nothing to convince him of the existence of the supernatural. Davis reveals that he was once a blue eyed boy like Jester until he looked into the pendant and the knowledge turned his blue eyes hazel. He tells Jester that he buried the pendant in the graveyard at 26th and 8th with the only man to complete the Amazon Tomb trick. He then sends Jester away.

Jester finds his grave digger friend Leonard at the graveyard and questions him about the zombies. A golden light shines from one patch of earth. Jester gets Leonard to help him dig it up. They find a triangular coffin, inscribed with a feather snake speared through by a lightning bolt under a cloud over a river with two crocodiles biting each other. Jester thinks he recognizes it, but soon realizes he was mistaken. Jester and Leonard pry the coffin open, the golden light suddenly suffusing them both. The pendant levitates and spins before Jester’s eyes, turning them hazel, before appearing to explode and vanish.

With no pendant or proof of his experience beyond his eye color change, Jester is forced to drop the story and acquiesce to his editor’s demands. Having survived his first brush with magic, he’s somewhat relieved to just cover the birth of a new elephant at the zoo.