Smokefall Ridge has seen somewhat of a resurgence now that The Dread has been purged from the land. The characters have made New Friends, and the town has prospered in the weeks since the last ruckus. It seems that the town will survive (for now), but there is a new issue at hand. How will Smokefall Ridge survive the transition into a new century?
Jan. 03
From the Journal of Josephine Maxwell
December 18th, 1875
Felecia the Indian Princess is still in town. She has a boyfriend now, his name is Thomas. They are working on the language barrier. She says it's starting to get serious.
Jan. 10, 5:33pm
December 18th, 1875
This evening in Smokefall, a shot rang out from the Yellow Rose. I threw on my coat and took my camera equipment out to investigate. The sheriff and several of the deputies had begun to gather in the saloon.
Sarah and her bartender John had a man sat down in the middle of the parlor and a man's body lay on the floor not far away. The man who shot him said that he caught the dead man cheating. He said that he confronted the dead man, who went for his weapon and he shot to defend himself.
John said he heard no arguments, but heard a shot. There were extra cards on the table. Mel, from across the room, was sure that he saw the dead man go for his gun.
The sheriff asked the man to leave town. The man gave the sheriff ten dollars for the dead man's funeral.
December 19th, 1875
I received a letter with just three letters on it, saying FNM as the return addressee. The text said, "Don't leave yet, a Nexus is near."
Juan says that he saw his goats running in circles. I went to go take a picture of the ring they left in the dirt.
December 20th, 1875
We all gathered at the Yellow Rose as normal. A man from town, Mr. Hofsteader, comes in and says that he's had something bad happen on his land. He too us out to his farm to see a cow that was cut cleanly in half, head to haunch. There was no blood around, like the cow had somehow been drained.
8:52pm
A man named Mr. Blöch, who was portly looking, came into town. He said that he was in town and his company was considering surveying for mineral. He asked the mayor to let he and his group survey the lands surrounding Smokefall while the town accommodates them. His group, Gladstone Energy, is from Baltimore and Chicago. We took information for the next day's paper to announce that Gladstone Energy Co. would be in Smokefall to take surveys.
Jan. 17, 5:28pm
December 22nd, 1875
Jakey Wales met up with the doc and let him know that weird things have been happening around him. They came to get me and tell me that Jakey thought that the eagle spirit had been affecting things in his house.
Jakey Wales decided to cut himself and the spirit made the blood spell out the word "Tohtra-Ohta".
The preacher came to tell me that there was a family on the outside of town that has a daughter that is six years of age. The girl, whose name is Alice, started acting in a strange manner and collecting increasingly macabre things like bullets and fresh rabbit's feet.
The family had brought the girl into town to meet with the preacher and the doctor. The Doc got a really bad feeling from the girl.
After this, there is a somewhat varied account of an attempted exorcism on the young girl, but the preacher declared it was not proper and unnecessary. The family went home to Primrose.