By Anders Sandberg (nv91-asa@nada.kth.se)
"Little Nasties" are minor beings which tend to be attracted by the activities of mages, usually harmless and merely annoying. The near umbra of a mage's home can be a very strange place...
Some mages wage a virtual war against unwanted presences, building wards and performing exorcisms. Others accept them, and claim they belong to a home just like rats belong in a house (It is worth mentioning that cats often seems to be able to perceive the beings and hunt them). Anyway, they are very hard to keep away for long.
The Eaters of Dust
These Entropy-minions are quite common, they feed on quintessence from the scraps left by mankind. The usually manifest as dust in the corners, stains or sticky patches and feed on cookie crumbs, spilled liquids, dirt or lost objects as they vanish into the Shadowlands. They are both ubiquitous and harmless; they appear in large numbers in places where people forget and spill things, like bars, untidy rooms or in gutters. They are naturally attracted to Entropy mages.
Huulh
This is a somewhat more powerful relative to the Eaters of Dust, a spirit attracted by sex. Huulh is invisible in the material world, but in the Umbra it manifests as a ball (around 30 centimetres in diameter) of sexual organs, dribbling fluids and quivering slightly. It seems to feed on the emotions of stale sex, hovering around prostitutes or neurotics and subtly encouraging them to get involved in more sex. It is actually repulsed by true passion, and prefers to keep its distance from many Cultist Mages.
Abyss Hunters
The Hunters are a mixed groups of minions who only exist for the hunt. They are able to hunt down their quarry across space and time, finding even the most clever hiding places. Usually a pack of Hunters are summoned by a mage or another spirit and given the task to find someone; the hunt itself and its dangers is their payment.
Hunters can look like just about anything, but physically they usually manifest as hound-like shadows, suggestions of faces in the wallpaper or woodgrain, the sound of heavy steps closing in or a distant howl. They can hunt just about anywhere; in the physical world, in the Umbra, in the Shadowlands, and pursue their victim relentlessly, feeding on its paranoia and growing fear (quite often the victim is given glimpses or hints that he is hunted long before the Hunters arrive). Finally they appear, surround the victim and wait for their master to arrive.
Lurkers
Lurkers are quite discreet beings, who quietly hide in shadows, behind furniture and in inaccessible places. They are usually only felt as a presence watching people in the room. While many mages are a bit paranoid about having spirits spy on them (not to mention how much cats likes to hunt the lurkers), they are usually harmless and merely curious. Sometimes they appear just before something important is going to happen, watch it and then vanish again.
The Watchers
The Watchers are an enigmatic group of beings, apparently unable to cross the Gauntlet by themselves. They see and hear just about anything; they constantly keep track of what happens in the world using Correspondence and Spirit, quietly watching what the humans are doing. According to some theories they are an older race than mankind, they were created before the physical world and are unable to enter it of their own power. Instead they silently watch over it, hoping/fearing to somehow find a way in. Both the Ahl-I-Batin and Order of Hermes agree that this would be a bad thing, although they are unsure of exactly why. Many mages communicate with the Watchers, hoping to gain valuable information from the elder beings. A few conservatives frown on this practice, warning that such an exchange could be harmful for both parts.
"Don't Think About It, Because It Will Get Worse"
This is one of the most bizarre entities from the High Umbra, apparently recently unleashed into the Near Umbra. It personifies the concept of something you should not think about, but of course are unable to avoid ("Don't think about a white elephant!"). When people fail to avoid thinking of something it gets stronger, and gradually take on the form of whatever one shouldn't think about. When it manifests, its shape is undefined until it is formed by the fears of someone present (everybody in the vicinity intuitively realises its true nature and the danger). One could guess that the Imp of the Perverse would be very fond of this being, who could serve as a Mind-Paradox spirit.
Emotrophic Growths
These are among the lowest minions, hardly more than umbral plants, feeding on emotions (a wraith would say Pathos), using their energy to grow and reproduce. They look differently depending on the type of emotions they feed on (and the paradigm of the viewing mage, of course); growths around a building filled with rational thoughts become clear and crystalline, while an old and homely flat might contain baroque polyps reminiscent of brown corals.
Emotrophic Reefs and Psychic Vampires
While the Growths are harmless and merely annoying, sometimes they can infect a very weak-willed human under severe emotional stress. The growths absorb every scrap of emotion and memory from his mind, and he becomes little more than their symbiote, a psychic vampire. The vampire begins to absorb emotions and energy from others, bringing them back to the growths which feed on them. In time the growths develop into a complex reef of mixed mentality, while the vampire grows more and more hungry for true emotions. It is not uncommon for the vampire to be completely unaware of that anything is wrong, they just feel empty and strangely detached from everything while their homes get more and more filled with mementoes, unsorted garbage and things they don't need.