It was hard to decide if this was an artifact or a new, fledgling cabal.
History of the Apiary
Homeless wanderer of Los Angeles, California, Huggy Bear, AKA Chuck, has a weird thing for bees. No one knows how or why, but he established contact with the queen of a huge hive once and decided bees were better than humans and asked if he could join. The queen told him he could if he built them a good enough house.
He set about doing so and has amassed a sizeable collection of shopping carts, milk cartons and wax paper beverage containers. He’s built these into a shack of sorts where now lives…., along with about 7,500 cousins and his consort, The Hive Queen.
The Apiary’s Specifications
The Apiary stands about eight feet tall and is normally 10 feet wide. It keeps getting longer, as Huggy Bear finds new construction material and his bees reproduce. He has four acolytes. Peter Simpson, Renaldo, Quick Fix and a little girl name Rosa Maria, who’s face is about to go on milk cartons all over the LA Area.
Besides from the five human inhabitants, the house holds a horde of larger than normal honey bees and, her eminence, The Hive Queen. Its walls are about nine inches thick and are riddles with bee construction and honeycombs. There will generally be between 50-500 bees randomly flying within 25 feet of the hive.
The hive has a door at either end. One door is a set of three wooden planks stolen from a lumber yard and tied together with binding cords from a bundle of stolen newspapers. The dwellers open the door by lifting it and sliding it to the side. It’s not too heavy, and most typical humans can manage the task in about 1 round.
The other door is a metal panel door salvaged from a junk yard. This rusty, bent metal door makes an annoying noise whenever moved, and will stir up 1-100 sleeping bees who will buzz around angrily for 1-3 rounds.
The interior of the hive consists of a newspaper strewn floor with five sets of sleeping rags for the humans. There is a giant stack of rotting candy, sugar and assorted pastry in the middle of the shack. This stack provides the main source of food for the hive and is constantly being replenished by the human inhabitants.
At any given time, two of the humans will be present, asleep in the hive. A third will be wandering around the hive site, pulling security with an old .38 revolver stolen from a passed out hooker a few months back. The other two humans will be out gathering sweet things for The Hive Queen.
The Apiary’s cast of characters includes the following human inhabitants.
Chuck, “Huggy Bear” Pallance. Caucasian Male, Age 49. Occupation: Bee keeper.
Home LA, CA. Chuck is the head human at the hive and is the original architect of the structure. He and the other humans are all humans with a rare allergy to the sting of a specific species of bee. It makes them susceptible to commands from The Hive Queen. He was stung two years ago and has done the hive thing ever since.
Pete Simpson. Caucasian Male, Age 33. Occupation: Ne’er-do-well. Home: The Hive.
Simpson recently crashed back out of society after a particularly bad bought of drinking and pills. He’s working for The Hive Queen and is becoming Pallance’s main acolyte. Unbeknownst to Pallance, The Hive Queen is planning on setting up another branch of the hive, using Pete Simpson as the human care-taker.
Renaldo. African-American Male. Age 23. Occupation: Street Person. Home LA, Ca.
Renaldo has been down and out since getting expelled from his tenth school 7 years ago. He is violent, addicted to heroin, and likely to snap easily if provoked. He got hungry one day and tried to rob the hive. That’s how he got stung and was sucked in.
Quick-Fix. African-American Male. Age 28. Occupation: Street Person. Home LA, CA. Quick-Fix used to sell, now he uses and can’t get rid of the monkey. He crashed-out, wound up homeless and got stung helping Renaldo attempt to boost junk food out of the hive.
Rosa Maria. Hispanic Female. Age 9. Occupation: Cute little missing girl. Home LA, CA. Rosa Maria De Leon was out playing hop scotch on the street when she got stung by a bee flown far a field. She staggered into camp and has joined the hive. Her parents had sufficient means to raise a considerable hue and cry. If the authorities find the hive, the scene could become pyrotechnic.
About 7,500 voracious bees. These bees are primarily either feeding eggs in the hive walls or eating off the junk food pile in the center of the hive. These bees will naturally mount a fanatic defense of the hive. Any person stung by these large bees takes 1-3 points of damage from venom. With each sting, they have a 1% chance of becoming a hive zombie and working for The Hive Queen.
The Hive Queen. This highly intelligent sentient bee lives for three years and then passes on her genes via royal jelly to the next hive queen. Her mission, quite simply, is to build as large and successful hive of bees as possible. She will protect the hive at all costs and will use zombied humans to guard the hive and bring in high sugar junk food.
The Buzz
Possible scenarios.
1) The search for Rosa Maria – Rosa Maria’s family hires some PI’s to find their lost daughter. The find the hive. It’s a sting job.
2) A Night At The Hollywood Bowl – Some occult pranksters put a magical scent in the air which causes a swarm of bees from the hive to descend in the middle of a rock concert at The Hollywood Bowl and cause utter mayhem.
3) Meet The New Neighbor – Pete Simpson moves into an apartment nearby. And look, he brought some pets. A new hive queen and about 300 angry winged soldiers.
4) World War III at The Chocolate Factory – A large candy factory has a new problem with security. Pete Simpson has found the place and has told the entire swarm where to go pig out.