The scene upon a 1pm meeting of the New York City planning commission. Several members of the commission were meeting with the members of New York Power & Light, who had a revolutionary plan to drastically reduce the cost of New York City's power.

While nobody was opposed to the cost of reducing electricity, the Geothermal Mining product involved digging a series of wells deep enough to create heat vents up from the earth's crust -- a tremendously expensive proposition, but once in place, the self-generating heat would be virtually maintenance free.

The necessary placement of the vents had been charted by NYP&L, and they had a number of key sites throughout the city which were to be key routing and control stations. These three sites were already owned by NYP&L, but they needed the city to buy into the plan and give them the right of eminent domain in order to take the land from its current owners. While NYP&L had managed to steer clear of any major city landmarks and/or critical buildings, a number of the city's historical society, as well as a few others, were greatly opposed to the demolition of a number of the city's few remaining colonial houses. Other buildings -- an office building in Manhattan, a multi-million dollar estate in Queens, etc. were also under protest. Why these spots? Why couldn't they build down the street and take out the abandoned building?

According to NYP&L, those were the necessary hotspots -- digging even so much as a few feet away would cause an incredible cost increase, and doing this in more than one or two places would increase the cost beyond the point where NYP&L could handle. Effectively, they were going to be taking it in the shorts with this place for the next dozen years or so. After that, however, not only would New Yorkers save hundreds of dollars a year, NYP&L would make a fortune as well.

The Planning Commission, who had been instructed by those on high to make a decision, came to the typically bureaucratic decision that they didn't have enough information. They tabled the issue and told NYP&L to come back to the meeting next week better prepared, with answers to a number of key questions that the commission demanded before OK'ing the project.

Enough confidence was expressed in the project that NYP&L elected to go ahead and begin construction on the project, on three primary sites that they owned the land for. These sites were destined to be the nerve centers for the entire Geothermal Project. Demolition began later that afternoon.

That, however, was Monday. This was Saturday. Multiple Kindred were alarmed by the sudden action without *someone* at least knowing what was going on. Prince Veronique had been scheduled to hold court at some point during the night at a suburban haven in Queens.

About a dozen Kindred arrived, including a pair of Lasombra who were alarmed at an attack (by a wrecking ball, of all things) upon their fully occupied corporate headquarters. Elder Angelique Montgomery was missing and presumed trapped under the rubble. The Lasombra were obviously here to try to figure out what the hell was going on.

Other Kindred began to show up, followed by Grendel, the Anarch leader, who had some beef with the Prince, and Scarlette, an ally of his. Others, Elijah Hightower of Ventrue, Monroe of the Tremere, Gepetto of Malkavian, and Armitage of Toreador. The Lasombra, Marius and Lasette, were disturbed, more so than most.

Veronique had not arrived by 8:45, and a number of other Kindred suggested sending out a search party. So, naturally, they sent out a ghoul in a limosine.

At 9:15, the darkness fell. Every vampire in the room felt a tremendous surge of power and quiet, and those with Auspex got the sudden feeling that all of the air was sucked out of the room, leaving the entire city with a negative pressure of some sort. The power went out and stayed out -- battery operated devices would not work either. The scientist amongst the Kindred said it resembled an Electromagnetic Pulse. The Archon Armitage said she had seen this before -- in the Sabbat siege of Buffalo.

A Nosferatu representative, Masters, arrived and demanded to know what the hell was going on. Another Kindred, Austin Dodge of Clan Ventrue, arrived with the alarming news that Wilhelm Gearhart, elder of Clan Ventrue, had also been buried alive in the rubble. It wasn't until the ghoul returned (on a bicycle, no less) with news that Veronique was buried as well that everything sunk in.

Tremere elder John Diamond arrived with news. John Diamond never interacts with other Kindred -- he was very involved in his own thing, and only very rarely would he come out and only to suit his own purposes. Apparently, Diamond was very aware that the Sabbat were very, very close and very strong. He was willing to help the rest of the Kindred, but only because it served his purpose, whatever that might be.

Gepetto was also concerned -- the blood bond he had long felt with his sire was flickering. Gepetto's sire was the legendary Benedict and one of the Camarilla's most powerful forces in New York. Losing Benedict would be losing one of the strongest defenses against the Sabbat.

Searching around Benedict's haunts, the assembled Kindred discovered a partially buried body of a Kindred, a young member of a Sabbat assault team that had been Earth-Melded. He had been part of a strike team destined to hit a variety of five targets, and there were about five Kindred on his hit list that he recognized from the assembled group.

The targets were the more prominent Kindred, those amongst the group that might lead a resistance. Those that might have been able to create an organized defense, even without the presence of electricity or telecommunications.

Diamond, Armitage and Marius were able to discern that the Blackout was caused by a powerful Lasombra ritual -- seven seventh generation Lasombra created a circle of utter darkness, which they used to create an EMP pulse over New York City. With the EMP, there could be no communication with the outside world -- no help could be gotten from Archons, Justicars or Princes outside the city. The very purpose of the ritual was to eliminate the very possibility of timely Camarilla reinforcements. Ending the ritual would, quite simply, allow others to come and come quickly, before the sun set the next evening.

The Nosferatu Masters had an artifact, a relic which he had come to the Prince to assess. A blue pearl had some mystical properties, which he felt Veronique might be able to tell what the hell was going on. John Diamond had been able to pick up on its presence immediately, and at this point, took it forcibly from the Nosferatu.

This was a powerful magical focus, and with a little bit of blood from the Lasombra, and a little bit of additional Auspex provided by Armitage, he was able to turn the ritual back upon itself and create a power surge powerful enough to destroy one Lasombra where she sat. Thus ended the ritual, and the leaders of the siege scattered quickly. The few packs that were left were mopped up easily.

NYP&L went through a major undertaking, and the majority of the executives were fired, and a couple of them were charged with graft, for there was no way that the Geothermal Mining project was profitable or even likely to work.

Prince Veronique dug herself out of the rubble the next night, and the Lasombra were able to extricate their elder, Angelique Montgomery, about a week later. Although a number of the younger Kindred lost their unlives in the siege, mostly due to direct conflict with Sabbat attacks, the only major confirmed loss was Wilhelm Gearhart, who was buried underneath his mansion in Queens.

Malkavian elder Benedict, who has not yet been seen to this day, has not been seen since the day it happened either. While his own followers seem less concerned about his fate, a variety of elders are still fearful of what happened to him. Because whatever happened to Benedict, it could certainly happen to them.

Since that day, there has been no repeat attempt at a Sabbat siege in New York City, but there is a huge concern that the Sabbat want to reclaim what was once theirs. New York, arguably being the most important city in the world, was a key piece of their empire, and without the Big Apple, the rest of the empire is slowly but surely crumbling.

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