The story up till now.

Leo Rhodes, Ethan Woodward, and Kyle McMurdoch arrived for work one rainy autumn morning as new recruits for the Laketown Paranormal Scientific Investigation Agency. Rhodes, a gruff, white haired, former FBI agent, had been shunted into the Paranormal field against his will. Ethan Woodward, a skinny, shady looking man, was an ex- private investigator with a checkered past. Kyle McMurdoch's background was unclear, but was puportedly an expert in ancient languages and had previously conducted some esoteric archaeological research. The department was unable to substantiate these claims at the time of his employment, but they were desperate for staff, so they hired him anyway.

For their first assignment they were sent by their boss, Stan Galloway, to Edgeways prison to assist FBI special agent Frank Dinostino. Shortly after their arrival they found Dinostino's dead body. Warned by the ramblings of an old black prisoner, McMurdoch attempted to find the prison records about an past inmate, Lenny Hobbs. McMurdoch was confronted by the prison guards, who, possessed of some unknown power, attacked with inhuman ferocity. The heroes were overcome and were marched by the guards to the prison governors office. The governer was clearly out of his mind and railed about Lenny Hobbs, and how his evil spirit had possesed the prisoners and guards. The heroes were placed in the hole, a pitch dark cell in the basement.

Will, an old black prisoner, told them about a tunnel that had been scooped out by other prisoners over the preceding decades. They managed to escape through this, but having only a spoon to scoop out the remaining tunnel. The heroes escaped the prison by shooting several of the possessed guards and crashing out the gate in their car.

Their next assignment was to investigate a sighting of mystery vessel made by some residents of Roan Island, a small island with a lighthouse in the lake. After interviewing the lighthousekeeper, some hippies, and a friendly fisheries research officer, they decided to camp out for the night and see if they could catch sight of the mystery vessel. Their stakeout was unsuccessful and they returned to HQ the next morning empty handed.

They next visited Bill Holly. He asked them to investigate the disppearance of Lucy Staines, who was kidnapped while he was walking her home from the Nightshade club. They first interviewed her father, who seemed a troubled man. Woodward remembered having performed a backstreet plastic surgery job on him to disguise his features, some years back. Leo Rhodes threatened him, but he still seemed to be withholding information.

In McArnie's Lakeside Tavern that night, Leo Rhodes bumped into received a handwritten note addressed to himself and "Doug" from Sebastian Singer, and old school chum, who was now a geologist. The mysterious handwritten note described a strange incident in the desert involving a meteorite. Singer claimed that his life was in danger, and proposed to meet Rhodes at Laketown Central Station the next night.

The heroes arrived on the platform at the arranged time, and when the crowd emerged from the train, Singer appeared. At that point, another man stepped forward and claiming he was an National Security Agent, drew a handgun and attempted to arrest Singer for terrorist activity. Singer bolted for a departing train, and in the heat of the moment, Leo Rhodes shot the agent dead. Woodward managed to jump on the back of the departing train, but could not find Singer on it, and lost him when Singer jumped off when the train slowed and ran off into the dark countryside. McMurdoch's attempt to catch up with the train in his beat up jalopy failed.

Leo Rhodes was grilled by the local police department and several NSA agents. 2nd degree murder charges were dropped.

Further investigation from University sources, the heroes managed to find the dig site that Singer was last posted. They found evidence of vehicles, and a large burnt crater. McMurdoch took a rock sample and is still awaiting analysis results.

The light house keeped Carl Wasser had the next evening seen again the mysterious, unlit boat out on the water beyond Roan island, perhaps in the sweep of his the lighthouse beam, and he called Rhodes on his mobile. He called the boys and got hold of McMurdoch, but was unable to contact Woodward.

Rhodes and McMurdoch met at the marina opposite McArnie's took and the FBI launch Inspiratia out to the western headland of the island where Wasser thought he had seen the vessel. Rhodes and McMurdoch guided the vessel bravely into the unknown at full speed, and,making no precautions for the fact that what they were looking for was unlit, they slammed into an unseen object. Steel screamed and crunched, and the heroes were knocked to their feet. Their FBI launch, the Inspiratia, began to take on water.

They heard voices from the other vessel. Water was shin deep when Rhodes decided that the cause was lost, and he inflated the life raft and abandoned ship.

At this point the launch was listing dangerously, but McMurdoch scrambled to retrieve some scuba gear, grappling hooks, and a harpoon gun. The launch capsized, and McMurdoch collected his haul and escaped going under by a deft leap from the swinging deck into the life raft.

The heroes heard the men from the mystery vessel calling to them in the darkness. McMurdoch announced that they were federal agents. The men fire with a rifle and harpoon gun.

Rhodes, cool headed, dived out of the life raft and into the water, avoiding the light and into the black lake water. McMurdoch took a hit from the rifle. McMurdoch skewered one of their assailants with a harpoon gun.

The enemy vessel swung around and piloted a course to run down the small life raft. As it approached, the other man aimed the rifle and wounded McMurdoch in the arm. McMurdoch leaped just in the nick of time and the life raft was crushed under the bow of the 40-foot steel-hulled vessel.

Rhodes was already swimming for shore, safely concealed in the darkness of the lake. McMurdoch ducked underneath the water to avoid the sweeping flashlight beams. Finally they both made it to shore.

Pondering their predicament, they decided to hike up to the top of the bluff to the lighthouse keeper's cottage and ask for assistance. Carl Wasser greeted them with concern, tended to their wounds, and helped them avoid suffering hypothermia. The night was deep outside, and the winter air cold, but Wasser started a fire, brewed some tea, and offered to help them apprehend the men on the vessel, who had shot McMurdoch and were clearly were up to no good. Wasser shared a pipe of tobacco with McMurdoch, grabbed his shotgun, and headed down to the jetty.

He lead the men down the tricky cliffside path in the dark. Rhodes and McMurdoch accompanied Wasser to his runabout. Wasser guided the craft cautiously into the lake, across the water, searching for the mystery vessel with his flashlight. His keen and cautious eyes spotted it some way off. He cut the engine, lowered the lights, and paddled the rest of the way. As the heroes approached, it became clear that the vessel was unmanned.

There were some cables visible that were attached to a winch system that disappeared under the water. Rhodes leaped on board and grabbed the ignition keys. Then, suspicious that the missing sailors were scuba diving somewhere in the depths beneath the vessel, Rhodes kept guard on the deck.

Sure enough, within minutes, a frogman clambered up the side of the boat. Without ceremony, in true Rhodes style, he shot the man square in the chest. The frogman fell back into the water, and thrashed for a short time. There was a green button on the winch system, and McMurdoch, his finger itching, was unable to resist the temptation and pressed it.

The winch engine started and the cables began to wind through their pulleys, and judging by the tautness of the cables, lifting something from the depths of the lake. Wasser paddled out and retrieved the frogman's corpse from the water and dragged it on to the runabout.

Suddenly out of the darkness a flashlight beam swept over the craft several times. It settled on Rhodes, and then went out. A second later, a harpoon slammed into Rhodes, not piercing him but catching him on the side, and knocking him to the floor. He lay on the deck, wounded severely, bleeding heavily, and unconscious.
Finally, the cables wound up to completion, revealed their cargo, and the winch motor stopped. In the dim light hung a strange, spherical object, about two metres in diameter, covered in mud and waterweed and cascades of hissing water, rocking gently from the winch cables. Meanwhile, the other diver was still out there...

A few minutes later a chopper arrived and hovered over the boat. Black kevlar helmeted men abseiled down. The was a standoff, with McMurdoch and the unconscious Rhodes taking cover in the pilot's cabin. The the men attached ropes to the sphere, and returned to the chopper, and the chopper carried the sphere away into the distance. The heroes returned to shore, confused and wounded.

Bill Holly was convinced that there was gang involvement in the kidnapping of Lucy Staines, and he suggested that the heroes do some undercover work to find out more. The heroes met with Holly's snitch, Donny Ramone. Ramone reluctantly said that he could arrange an introduction with Andreas Sanchez, one of Elden Garcia's underlings, but they needed a convincing cover. The heroes devised the "Cleaning Crew" cover story. Ramone arranged the meeting.

The heroes met with Andreas Sanchez, and the fiery hothead, Julio Sonosa in the Nightshade club, deep in the heart of the Withers. Sonosa was enraged by McMurdoch's insolent arrogance, but Woodward managed to save the day with a slick, cold performance as a body disposal expert. They made a deal, Sanchez took them on, and they played some cards in the back room with some other gangsters.

Their first job was to accompany Boots Malone to a site where a body cleanup was required. The heroes pulled up in their cleanup van packed with bleach and mops to a large house on the outskirts of town. Entering the dimly lit house, they were almost shot by a dying gangster. They found other bodies in the house, carried out the cleanup operation with aplomb, and Woodward effectively dealt with a dangerously persistant enemy phone caller.

It was around this time that the heroes, during another job with Boots Malone, discovered the young girl, Lucy Staines, in an underground complex. Using a combination of daring and guile, they rescued the girl from the complex. Boots Malone, tried to stop them, after a searing car chase, and a shoot out, Malone took a fatal bullet from Woodward.

Some time went by before McMurdoch picked up a voice message from a nervous sounding Donny Ramone who wanted to meet with them at Snigglers bar. The heroes showed up at the bar at noon, and strode in the front door. Ramone was not there, and the place was deserted. Just as they began to suspect a trap, Julio Sonosa stepped out from behind a door, flanked by henchmen wielding machine pistols. A furious Sonosa accused the heroes of the murder of Boots Malone. McMurdoch displayed his usual reckless bravado, and swaggered up to Sonosa, asking for a light. Sonosa, wound up to breaking point, repeatedly bitch slapped the Beedie out of McMurdoch's mouth, McMurdoch picking it up off the floor each time. Woodward threats fell on deaf ears when he alluded to the affair that Sonosa was having with Sanchez's wife, gained via FBI wire taps. Finally, McMurdoch, by some miracle of persuasion, managed to convince Sonosa that it was a member of the mutant rat community that had carried out the assasination. However, it seems that Sonosa has taken Woodward's accusation to heart, and has him as a marked man. The heroes strode out of Sniggler's, and headed to McArnie's Lakeside Tavern for a much needed ale.