Tim is off with his family for Father's Day, so of the usual group only Bruce (Cyrus) and Nick (Vincent) are present. Doug also shows up, playing a new character. Chris is running, as usual.
Doug's character is Pallis Toter, a Ventrue from Miami. Pallis is rife with unusual abilities, including an ability to remain free of Blood Bonds, and has spent his unlife in the background of Kindred society, acting as a kingmaker.
Pallis introduces himself to the Prince, who contacts Cyrus and Vincent to show the newcomer around the city. The three of them get into Vincent's car (a big Town Car) and head to the Riverwalk to introduce Pallis to the area.
Having done a pathetic job of introducing Pallis to the city, the characters elect to take a look at the Hotel Lee, near where Vincent's mentor was attacked by a gang of gun-toting chimpanzees. The hotel is a three-story stone eyesore beloved by the Historical Society but hated by everyone else. The place is surrounded by chainlink fences with appropriately threatening warning signs.
Vincent's mentor was actually attacked on the second floor of a disused grocery store across the street. Cyrus and Pallis scale the side of the building using the fire escape, while Vincent refuses to follow the same route for fear that he will get his suit dirty (Pallis, wearing a similarly-expensive suit, boasts that he can afford a new one).
The interior of the building is filthy. One second-floor room has been equipped with a sunshade and obviously was recently the site of a gunfight (spent brass on floor, bullet holes in walls). The window of this room looks over towards the hotel, where some lights are visible on the second floor.
The characters spend some time searching the hotel. Vincent locates a room that appears to have been extensively used by junkies, then finds a path through it to another room dotted with chimpanzee droppings and a small shrine to Adolf Hitler. Vincent and Cyrus start to investigate the room, then hear gunfire from outside, where Pallis is attacked by a gorilla in a WWII German helmet carrying an automatic weapon. Cyrus swiftly drops the gorilla with a single shot from his automatic, then gets blown up by a potato-masher grenade.
After the grenade, the hallway fills with angry chimpanzees who storm towards the characters. Cyrus attempts to hold them off, but gets cut down by one of the chimpanzees. Vincent and Pallis, neither of them combatants, turn to one of the windows behind them and clear it out for a quick escape. Once they finish, Vincent fires upon the chimps while Pallis retrieves Cyrus' barely mobile carcass. The situation becomes rather worse when one chimpanzee attempts to throw another grenade, then bobbles it into the doorway when Vincent shoots it. The explosion drives Cyrus over the edge and into frenzy. Everyone else heads out the window while Cyrus rips into a dead chimpanzee.
After some moments, Cyrus recognizes that there are no more moving chimpanzees, and heads out the window after them. Everyone runs for Vincent's car. Pallis and Vincent get in and frantically order Vincent's driver to "DRIVE!" As the car pulls away, Cyrus lands on the trunk and tries to tear his way into the car. Vincent and Pallis release a desperate torrent of gunfire into Cyrus' body, pushing him to incapacitated and forcing him to release his hold.
Cyrus spends some time raging around in the alleyway, then hunts down an unfortunate homeless person and drinks down his blood. He regains seven points of blood, and replaces his shredded clothing with what he takes from his victim.
While Cyrus is recuperating in the alleyway, he encounters Screaming Joe, who informs him that he was quite disturbed by all the noise, and wants Cyrus to never go to this part of town again. He backs up his request with Dominate, which Cyrus resists through expenditure of dramatic quantities of Willpower (3 points). After this encounter, Cyrus runs away to call his cohorts.
Cyrus sneaks up to the grocery store as carefully as possible. Along the way, he sees one cop putting two bums into the back of a patrol car and another one (some distance away) taking a statement from a tourist couple.
Meanwhile, Vincent checks with his friends in the police department to make sure that his car's license number has not gone across their desks. They tell him that it hasn't. Feeling reassured, he and Pallis take Pallis' rented Crown Victoria to pick up Cyrus.
After everyone is reunited, Cyrus sneaks back into the grocery store and attempts to retrieve his gun. Halfway in, he hears voices discussing what had happened in the building and comparing it the the "spectrometer" readings. He concludes that the local Malkavians are investigating, and beats a hasty retreat.
Cyrus returns to the rest of the group, and attempts to get them to go and talk to the Malkavians. Extensive discussion follows, after which Vincent agrees.
Vincent and Pallis park in front of the grocery store and walk inside making no effort to be stealthy. Meanwhile, Cyrus hides in the trunk of the car. They are greeted with a scene of extreme strangeness:
Vincent asks the Malkavians about what happened. Remo responds by noting that his "ghost touch" tells him that Vincent and Pallis were in the building earlier, and that the Professor's spectrometer agrees. He then starts to breathe heavily, explaining that he must breathe properly to be able to detect lies.
Vincent explains that there have been some previous incidents of chimpanzee violence, and that he had heard of a similar incident here. Remo initially suggests that the "Simian Gang" could be responsible, but Frank Committee briefly drops out of his gorilla persona to indicate that he thinks Remo is nuts.
Vincent and Pallis spend a fair amount of time talking to Professor Brain about a number of subjects, most of them having nothing to do with Nazi chimpanzees. In the process, they manage to pull an ear tag (for Pharmaco Research) off one of the chimpanzees and retrieve Cyrus' gun.
The group is about to leave, when a very large Frank Comanetti, apparently wearing a gorilla suit, leaps onto the hood of the car. Pallis pulls the car around very rapidly, causing Frank to roll off the car. After he hits the sidewalk, he stands up, dusts himself off, and walks away. The characters drive off.
A small amount of research indicates that Pharmaco is located in Austin. The evening following the events at the disused grocery, the group drives up to Austin to investigate. Prior to their departure, Vincent creates a few bogus badges intended primarily to confuse contract security.
The Pharmaco building is located about a quarter mile from Loop 360. It is a glass-and-steel structure about five stories high. Vincent Dominates the guard into giving the characters a tour of the building. Unfortunately, he doesn't have keys to most of the interesting areas (the laboratories holding the apes and the drugs). The characters wait outside the drug storage area until someone walks in. They follow immediately afterward and Vincent dominates him.
The man is a scientist, and after Vincent completely overwhelms his mind he describes what the drugs all do. Some of them are for controlling the apes, but about twenty are painkillers (three of which are used on chimpanzees). Through the scientist, Vincent learns that the chimpanzee Cyrus shot in the grocery was originally used in experiments for five years, then sold to Petco Animal Supply in San Antonio. However, the scientist comments that the animal should have been destroyed. The scientist's supervisor, Don Edwards, was the one who okayed the transaction. Ten similar monkeys (five showing particularly violent behaviors as a side effect of the drug tests) have been sold to Petco Animal Supply, including one addicted to cigarettes. All these transactions were okayed by Don Evans. The characters make sure that they have a home phone number and address for Mr. Evans before they leave (2210 Quiet Wood Dr.).
After the characters obtain the information they want, Vincent alters the scientist's and guard's memories of the evening.
The characters break into Don Evans' house. Vincent interrogates him with Dominate, and learns that he was selling the chimps to Petco because he needed the bonus money. His contact at Petco was Bruce Turner, who convinced him to sell them even though the chimps were violent and potentially dangerous. The first six were sold in a group, while the next four were sold over a period of time.
Don does not have the contact information for Petco at home, so Vincent Dominates him to remember nothing unusual about the evening and to bring the information home with him the next evening. The characters all spend the day in his attic.
When Don returns home, he gives the characters the information they asked for. Vincent and Cyrus both take a point of blood from him to render him drowsy, and Vincent Dominates him to ensure that he will remember nothing of the characters' visit. Afterwards the characters return to San Antonio.
The characters have returned to San Antonio, and each gain five experience points. Cyrus spends a total of 12 experience to gain Protean 3 and to replace the point of Conscience he lost after killing a wino in frenzy.