The characters enter the Leminkainen system and decide to start by asking the local Eskatonics about Annunaki artifact sites on the planet. They land in Hakkonen and begin seeking out the best-known Eskatonic around. After a short time they hear that there is an Eskatonic named "Stinky" who lives just outside of town, but they are warned not to call him "Stinky" but to call him "Bu'qaz" instead.
They make their way to the abode in question, and find a large house, almost a noble's manor. However, the terrain surrounding the house was full of animal feces and the like, and they carefully proceed up the walkway. They are greeted at the door by Stinky, I mean, "Bu'qaz," and are ushered inside.
He tells them that Myra Decados has been captured by Natasha Decados, and that Natasha is using something to make dopplegangers out of Myra. At some point during their conversation, a new Myra is "spawned" somewhere. He also tells them that a great war is coming, and they will have to eventually descend into a sort of hell and prove their worth by escaping. The characters continue to ask about the artifact but he continues to evade them, giving other useful information in its place, such as the fact that the "dead thing" which is following them grows stronger each time they "kill" it, and that it is on its way here now. Finally, he hints at something dark growing within the Church.
After the unsuccessful Q & A session, they leave the house and see the very "dead thing" the Eskatonic was speaking of, coming straight at them. They make a break for the ship and liftoff safely.
They take up orbit around Leminkainen to begin scanning and mapping. Because of the Jyhad's advanced sensor arrays, it only takes a couple of weeks to get a good map and some good ideas as to where the piece of the artifact they're looking for might be. Pitt continues going through a character transformation here - torn between being a constant lackey for the evil whims of his Decados overlords or becoming something higher, and perhaps, nobler. Leminkainen provides House Hawkwood with precious Pygmallium mines, which make a tempting target for the Decados agent. While the Jyhad is scanning the planet, Pitt is dropped-off to train the northern savages, descendants of the Vuldrok, how to fight the Hawkwoods. He hopes to use them as a raiding party or at least as a distraction so that he can disrupt the Pygmallium mining operations.
Marduk eventually discovers what appears to be 3 Ur ruins sites on the planet, one in the north, one around the Pygmallium mines, and one deep in the southern jungles, all approximately evenly-spaced from each other. He investigates the one near the Pygmallium mines himself, leaving Kantarra to pilot the ship. Kantarra drops him off in the mountains near the ruins site, but he finds little except scorched earth, as if from an orbital bombardment. After a short analysis of dirt and rock samples, he determines that it was done recently, and is promptly picked-up by Kantarra.
Before going to the next set of ruins in the south, they pick-up Pitt and head south, landing about a mile from the ruins. On the way there Pitt discovers a secret underground facility, apparently unguarded, which has Vuldrok gear and clothing. They steal a lot of Vuldrok furs and equipment and move on, discounting it as yet another conspiracy they'd rather not be involved in.
The site proves to be a dead-end when all they find is a stone obelisk sticking-up out of the dirt. The oblelisk resembles some odd geometric prism-shape about a meter and a half in height, with Ur runes carved upon it. They examine the obelisk for a time and then decide to move on. At that point the sky grows dark and they hear the sound of thunder, as if lightning had struck nearby. Out of the jungle comes a large black....thing. It is humanoid in shape but it stands about 4 meters tall, has jet-black skin covered in glistening slime, and is covered with horns and claws. Sister Kantarra pulls her standard maneuver of unloading the clip while the others run for the ship - as usual, her bullets seem to have little effect against it. They reach the ship safely and take-off, heading for the northernmost set of ruins.
The group reaches the ruins and find that the Imperial Eye has already beaten them there. Two agents are scouring the area, obviously looking for the same things they are. The Agents are about to question Marduk when the sky grows dark and they hear the thunder again. The black horrid-form thing appears again and Marduk decides that he's had enough and they're going to make their stand here. A very short fight ensues, with the two Agents being gruesomely killed by the "horrid thing" as we started calling it, and Marduk engaging it in melee with his 4 Vorox swords. It parries one of his swords, shattering it as if it were mere glass. Marduk decides that perhaps this wasn't the best of ideas and hurries back to the ship, barely escaping its grimy claws.
They leave the atmosphere of Leminkainen to orbit a while and pick loot off of the dead Imperial Eye agents. One of them has a map detailing the three locations of the artifacts, though there seems to be a fourth location at sea which Marduk wasn't able to find. They also find the name of a contact who apparently was to provide them with a boat to get to the ruins. However, before they are able to head down to check upon the site, they get an interesting radio transmission.
The ships is a destroyer identifying itself as the Golden Cloud - an al-Malik vessel. Apparently someone on board wants to meet in person with the crew of the Jyhad. The characters are skeptical at first, but eventually their curiosity gets the best of them, and they set-up a meeting area on a small island. They land the ship and wait while a shuttle from the Golden Cloud is dispatched. The shuttle lands and out step two al-Malik nobles. One is older and looks much wealthier than the other, who is dressed in Charioteer livery. The older one is Duke Oman al-Malik, a man of great importance in House al-Malik. He tells them that he knows about how they caused the destruction of the destroyer Alejandro's Fist and how they are responsible for razing several labs. Apparently all of the property destroyed thusfar belonged to Duke Rakim al-Malik, who is the enemy of Duke Oman. Rakim has declared a vendetta against them and has hired an Eskatonic Seer to tell him where they are so that he may send his forces to harass and hopefully kill them. Oman is happy to see them causing Rakim so much grief, and offers to provide them with money if they agree to continue doing so. Marduk and Pitt decide to accept the offer of 40,000 Imperial Firebirds to do the job. In addition, a bonus will be delivered if they are to kill Rakim or his pregnant wife (yeah, I know, it's pretty sick). In addition, he sends along Shamis al-Malik, Charioteer and son of none other than Hakim al-Malik, head of house al-Malik! Shamis is to be their liason to Oman, as well as a sort of insurance that they don't go blowing-up the wrong person's stuff. Shamis is also an old friend of Marduk - he was one of the few people who treated Marduk kindly.
Duke Oman gives them a chest full of money and bids them farewell. They take off once again and land outside a small fishing village where they can easily access the boat which the Imperial Eye agents were going to use to get to the ruins. The four of them board the boat and after a half-hour drive, see a lone structure in the sea ahead. They come upon what resembles an 8m x 8m cement square embedded in a tiny island, barely large enough to hold the square. The square sits about half a meter off the sandy island and is blank except for a small square in the center. After fooling with the stone for a while, one of them finally presses down on the square, which causes it to levitate up. They eventually figure out that the more pressure they apply to the stone, the higher it lifts, up to a limit of about 6 meters. Peering into the hole made by the missing square they see only blackness. They drop into the cylindrical room, leaving Kantarra above to keep watch. On the walls is the same strange Ur glyphs which they have found at many other ruin-sites, but on the walls are four stone faces - their faces. In the center of the room is a strange impression, as if something fits in the room. They eventually decide that the obelisk they saw at the second site resembles the depression, so they make a plan to recover the obelisk and try placing it in the depression.
They return to the obelisk and uproot it after a short struggle, after which, they return to their boat and begin driving back to the island. However, once they reach the island, they find the "door" closed, which they distinctly remember leaving open. Drawing weapons, they hear a voice inside their heads which whispers "no, it is not yours, you must leave." They open the "door," throw a fusion torch down, and see some squid-like creatures, roughly two of them (hey, you try counting a whole bunch of tentacles and stuff all writhing around!). Deciding this could be an obstruction, Marduk designs a concussion-grenade-like device from Pitt's stunner, which they throw into the hole and close-up. After hearing a resounding *thud* they open it back up and find that they are still moving around, and so they resort to plan B. Marduk gives Shamis his Eruptor Auto-Blaster Pistol and he and Kantarra drop down to do battle with the beasts. Shamis pops a single shot off and almost roasts one entirely, while Marduk and Kantarra deal with them up close and personal. After Shamis' amazing one-shot, Marduk pulls a Kantarra impersonation and looks up, saying "that thing has a single-shot setting?!?!" Before the fight is over, however, one of them manages to get some sort of slime on Marduk's studded leather armor, causing him to discard it. If you're keeping track, it's like the 2nd suit of studded leather he's gone through now - just a running joke of mine :) - though nothing bad really happened to his armor, he decided it's better to be safe than sorry and just got rid of it.
After the fight they lower the obelisk into the proper slot, where it fits perfectly, creating a holographic image of the a system with a moon of one of the planets circled. Shamis knows it to be this system, though he doesn't tell them this until later. The others assume it's the same system, but don't necessarily know that the moon which is designated is Baltos, one of Leminkainen's moons (could be one of the other planet's moons).
Marduk gets this wild idea to stab that evil horror-demon-thing with the obelisk, so they take it with them back to the ship. They travel back to the northernmost set of ruins where they wait around until the thing shows up again (it broke one of his swords - he's pissed). This time, however, Marduk rams the obelisk into the midsection of the creature, screaming and yelling at it all the way. After a short death-scene, the thing dies, leaving a humanoid-shaped pile of ash, with a human body at the center of it. They catch the scent of car exhaust in the air, and Marduk is convinced that a vehicle of some sort was nearby, but a short search of the surrounding area reveals nothing. A search of the nearby Ur ruins also reveals nothing, so they decide that what they are looking for is on a moon somewhere, (at this point Shamis slips and mentions that it's Baltos they're looking for).
They make for Baltos, the watery moon of Leminkainen, and a short scan reveals the artifact piece they are looking for is indeed here. Shamis manages to land the ship so that it will float, they don scuba gear, and head out for some diving. They find that what they are looking for is somewhere in an underwater maze, so they make preparations (using the whole string technique) and diving in shifts. Eventually they retrieve the artifact and return to the ship just in time to see a squid-like ship launch some sort of pod or probe into the atmosphere of Baltos...