Beginning?

An office is supposed to be a symbol of authority, and a place where you can expect people to listen to what you have to say, especially when it's large and carefully appointed to give the impression of tasteful, restrained and overwhelming wealth and power. Leo Tarea was too arrogant and thick-headed to realize he should be impressed and perhaps a bit intimidated by my office; I'd have to get my decorator to come up with something a bit more obvious. Nevertheless, I made valiant efforts to get my point across with all sorts of messy, gratuitous violence. "Leo, this is the third time that you've changed the specs this month, and I'm sorry, I won't allow it." "You are being unreasonable, I simply can't do without the new modifications" Leo Tarea had a habit of falling into some sort of European accent when vexed, something faint enough to be unidentifiable, but strong enough to speak of old world breeding and a habit of bossing people around. Probably French. "You'll have to. My employees are working overtime already, and I've turned down two other fairly sizable contracts that I would have taken if it wasn’t for this. I've been accommodating, but there really is no further I'm willing to go for you. the project continues as it stands or we drop it." "No, this is unacceptable. You will make these modifications. I will have them. If it is an issue of money-" "It's not an issue of money, you idiot. Look around you, I've got things hanging on the walls that I could auction for more than your net worth. It's an issue of a reasonable contract, or even the facsimile of one." as I was speaking, I made up my mind once and for all that I was finished doing business with mister Tarea "In fact, our current contract is unreasonable, and I'm dropping the project." "You can't! I need this done, at least as the project stands now." he was starting to get nervous, apparently he'd never taken the threat of a total drop seriously "we can leave it as it stands, it was very, very rude of me to come here today, I'm so very-" "No. Our business is concluded, I'm very sorry. If you like, we'll arrange everything we've worked on so far to be shipped to any firm you care to name. My secretary will show you out." I opened a folder on my desk and started doodling on a piece of paper. Leo was too full of bullshit to leave reasonably, so I didn't bother trying to start any real work. I drew a flower. Sure enough, I could hear him start towards the door with small, shuffling steps. About halfway across the room, he hesitated, started again, then stopped. I could almost picture his face, working halfway between rage and fear as he readied himself to do something remarkably stupid. It was a few seconds later that I heard the click of a gun being readied, and I was a little disappointed. Leo always seemed smarter than that. I looked directly at him and couldn't help but smile. His face was sweaty and red, and his eyes bulged with something that resembled incredulity, as though he couldn't much believe what was happening. My secretary was already behind him, but I waved her back to her desk. it had been a long time since I had had an opportunity to handle a problem on my own. It had been a longer time since something as simple as a gun had scared me. I stretched out to the magical defenses in the room, and my consciousness extended into it. For all intents and purposes, my office was now a part of me. I saw in three dimensional, three hundred and sixty degree (for those curious, yes, it is fairly disconcerting to see yourself with what your brain interprets as your own eye). I felt with the air, as though my nerve endings extended right out of my body, into the room. I could feel Leo Tarea like a fly on my skin, every drop of sweat on him, and the beating of his heart. I raised a hand and snapped it into a fist. Every muscle in Leo's body contracted violently and at once, causing more than a few ripped tendons, broken bones, internal bleeds, and general trauma. The immediate threat thus neutralized, I set about dismantling any desire for retribution that might be formulating behind his eyes. "Leo, you should have brought something bigger than a gun." I let his muscles relaxed, but kept him upright, and kept him conscious. "Allow me to make a few things clear. You don't get to jerk me around, you don't get to demand that I do things. I'm rich enough that I never have to take a contract I don't want to. Hell, all of my employees are rich enough for that. My name is on more patents, magical and technological, than you could count. I have the best and worst reputation in this city. And, this is the most important bit, I've earned it all. Every. Single. Bit." I punctuated my words by lifting him higher every time, until he was lying flat on his back on my ceiling. "So pay attention. When you decide to point a weapon at me, you had better make fucking sure you kill me. Next time, I won't be so nice, and you'll see why everyone smarter than you knows better than to screw with my business." I flung him neatly out of the door, his already broken body crumpling on the impact. He couldn't move, but his eyes streamed with tears and were alive with fear. Leo wouldn't be forgettig his lesson. I sent an email to my secretary, asking her to clean him up, give him a healing charm, and send him on his way. the next day, I planned on sending him a very nice apology and all of his work. Business was business, and it was the only professional thing to be done. I didn't like being violent like that. There were professionals for that sort of thing; hell, I was related to some of the best of them. I stood and looked out of my window. a row of comfortable looking, pale buildings stood in neat rows. Lush green grass and well cared for trees and flowers kept the place from looking too cold and unfriendly. People in suits walked about, I guessed it was about lunch time. My empire, I suppose. I'd built a kingdom out of a business. I like to think that I did it well. Our legal team was a defense mechanism, not a profit seeking missile. Every product the company put forth was really a marvel of scientific and magic development. I tried to keep things fair with my workers, and so far it seemed I had succeeded. But then someone like Leo would show up and remind me of the other side of the coin, the Darwinian school of business, when you needed to slap someone down to protect your own interests. I didn't avoid it, if it came up, but I never enjoyed it. "You're doing it again." came a voice from behind me. I turned around to face the newcomer. "Doing what?" It was Eddie McEllroy, called Tight Eddie because he had a talent for tying up up loose ends. "Being philosophical, thinking too much." Eddie was a friend and at one time a bitter rival. Now, he was a technogamist and worked for the City. "I am not, I know better than to think about what I do. Full speed ahead and damn the torpedoes." "You always think too much after you put the hurt on someone." "Perhaps. Anything I can help you with?" "Pour me a drink for starters." I poured one for each of us, from my private stock. Good scotch in a crystal bottle that aged it at twenty times the normal pace, and when it had reached its peak preserved it indefinitely. One of my more practical innovations. Eddie took a grateful sip as I sat down "You always have the nicest things. Anyway, I'm here about your run in with Mister Leo Tarea." "He pointed a gun at me, I was defending myself." "I know. One of our precogs saw it all happen days ago, but he's not going to mention the gun in his charges, so I had to get your statement." "He's filed charges already?" "No, but he will in the future, after a day or two of licking his many wounds." "I told my secretary to heal him up." "Oh his body's fine, but Leo's not really bright enough to see when he's outclassed, and he's going to try for a bit of legal retribution." "Will it work?" "I don't know, nothing's set in stone as far as the future's concerned." I scowled. I really hated dealing with the future. "So why'd you show up?" "You make people in the city very nervous, so they like to keep tabs on you. You even make some of the things that aren't people very nervous, which makes my people nervous, which makes everyone more nervous about you." "You do that on purpose." "Of course I do." "So it's just the zookeepers wanting to make sure I'm in my cage?" "More like the little fish wanting to keep track of the sharks." For most of its history, the City had been ruled by beings and gods and anything with a lot of power, and those without it- mostly, but not exclusively, humans- tried to keep their heads down and avoid them one and all. Then a few decades ago, someone had realized there were a hell of a lot more little people than anything else, and there was a war. Eventually, the little people managed to land on top of it, and had formed the City Government. It was a strict democracy, enforced by totalitarian force. Every decision was by plebiscite, and everyone from the major powers to your quintessential every man got one vote. Eddie was part of the enforcing arm of the city. they weren't quite a police force, because law and order and justice were never their thing. they kept the status quo, however, and did a damn fine job of it. "Tell the little fish I have no plans of smiting anyone tonight." "Oh our revered lords and ladies are watching as we speak, at least those whom it concerns." He tapped his eye, which made a dull clinking sound. Eddie was a technogamist as well as secret police. His goal in life was to marry himself as closely to technology as possible. His connection to the internet, spy sattelites, every network there ever was and a few he made up especially for the job made him invaluable to the City, and a minor power in his own right. I waved politely, then stuck my tongue out at them when Eddie wasn't looking. We talked for a bit, and then Eddie got called away to deal with a necromancer trying to ressurect a museum full of dinosaurs. I felt better after he left, in fact I was happy and thought I deserved a treat. It wasn't that long of a walk from my office building to the river front, if you were judging by the number of steps you took, but in all the ways that mattered, it was a different world. My place was one of cold hearted business, grabbing ahold of the building blocks of reality and wresting control of them. The river front, though, was dangerous. Rich and powerful men and women and families and things that weren't as human as they'd like to pretend, every nightmare the city, the gods and monsters, lived on the river. But if you wanted good food, or music, or any semblance of fine culture, it lived on the the river too. So I walked, with the intention of buying myself a steak at one of the smaller cafes and watching the fireworks to celebrate. The main street was a carnival, as always. People in masked costumes, in lurid fashions, in three piece suits, in their bare skin twirled and bobbed together to a thousand different beats, lights flashed through the air and seemed to dance on their own. The party never stopped. The crowd spilled in and out of buildings down the street, and even the most dignified shops and boutiques sometimes fell victim to the endless party. If you followed the the flow of the party to its source, you'd come to a pier, and docked at the pier would be one ship, the Indulgence. Rumor had it that the captain was Dionysus himself, attended by his orgiastic guards, the merry bastard god of wine. I'd gotten lost in that party once, when I thought I needed it, and I'd only emerged months later when a good friend had come and brought me out under pain of death. I turned my back on the spectacle, walking away from the Siren's song of the Indulgence, to the more dignified end of the street. It wasn't any less dangerous here, but at least they'd smile politely to your face while they slipped a knife in your belly. My destination was a place called Dragoon's. It was as nondescript as you could ask, and one of the City's better kept secrets. You'd have an easier time sneaking out of Hell than sneaking into Dragoon's unwelcome, it brought whole new meaning to the word exclusive. Luckily the owner was a friend. I walked to the door and entered as though I owned the place. The regulars ignored me, and the rest sneered down their noses. They didn't dare do anything else, perhaps afraid that the chef would chop them up and serve them as the next special if I was sufficiently annoyed. They shouldn't have worried; I had nastier things planned if they messed with me. "Charlie-boy!" a voice called out from back "take your usual place, I'll be with you in a second." It was Patrick Gentle, the Gentleman. He always knew when I arrived, and kept me segregated from his other patrons. I wasn't bothered by it, last time I'd been left to my own devices here I had a slight disagreement with another diner, and blown a hole in the wall. And the other diner. My usual place was on the roof, overlooking the river. I had a bird's eye view of the garden dining area and whatever entertainment Pat had hired for the night. Tonight was particularly pleasant, since it was pixie mating season, their lights flitted about Pat's meticulously maintained garden, glowing softly in every color you could imagine. He'd also managed to get a really killer guitarist, one that I recognized. It was a demon that had made a deal with a famous blues musician, granting the man eternal life in exchange for his soul. As any musician could tell you, you need soul to play the blues, and now the demon was absolutely flush with it. The immortal man had gotten a job as a janitor. I sat at the table and let the evening roll over me, enjoying myself. As I reposed, Pat came climbing up the wrought iron stairs. He was dressed in a light gray suit, exactly the same color as the smooth stone of the walls, accented with green that exactly matched the predominant hue of the garden and the vines climbing the walls. He looked like an extension of his establishment. Cool and understated, dignified to the point of aloofness. He sat down opposite me and handed me a glass of red wine, keeping one for himself. Wordlessly we clinked our glasses together, and i sipped. The wine was strong and deep, the exact right blend of fruity and spicy to ward off the chill of a summer's night. "You've been in a fight, Charlie." he smiled at me wryly, trying to disapprove and not being able to pull it off "No I have not, my friend." I sipped again at my wine, reveling in it for a quiet moment "I've been in an ass kicking, and believe it or not, on the right side of it for once." I told my story, such as it was, thanking Pat for helping me set up my office defenses. "Worked alright then? 'm glad, I can't afford a lawsuit right now." we both laughed, partly because Pat could afford to buy most small countries, and partly because lawyers in the City were driven out on general principle. "What're you eating tonight, Charlie-boy?" I scowled at the nickname. "I'm about one 'Charlie-boy' from carving and serving your wrinkled ass, old man." "I called you that since you were n'more than a mistake your parents made in the back seat of a convertible." My father had worked in the same field as Pat Gentle; they were professional duelists, gladiator spellists, who fought and killed for money and entertainment. Pat had been the champion of some old royal family in an international dueling tournament, and my dad the City's. They'd fought each other to a three day long stalemate, and the contest had been declared one of the few draws in the history of the sport. When my dad died, Pat had moved to the City, under the pretense of retirement, but I think it was because he felt guilty, and decided to look after me. "I'll have a steak, throw some vegetables on the side so I can at least pretend to give a damn." "You're going to die young eating that much red meat." "It's good for my health, I promise you. When I'm happy I tend to piss off fewer people, so I'm not in quite so much danger of someone killing me." "Whatever you say, what would I know about it? I'm only a chef." "You are not even a chef right now, seeing as I have no food that you have prepared." He stood, feigning offense "A pox on your house Harris." I waved him off and turned back to the river, not letting him see me smile. Across the river were the Wastes. Looking at them too long left a sour taste in anyone's mouth, and to me they were a vista of shame and loss. Twenty years ago, my dad had fought his last battle there. Not for fame or money, but because there was a dangerous man doing mad things out there. A man no one had heard of trying to summon the nameless queen of the fae, called Mab because we had to call her something. My dad killed him before she could break into our reality, sending her back. But the energies released wiped out what had once been a vibrant part of the city, and one hundred thousand people died. Including my dad. So I'd changed my name and tried to grow to something apart from him. I didn't even touch the money he left me, and since mom was dead too it just sat there. And the Wastes had been born. The place was so radioactive that it was illegal to come back from it. "How do you want it?" I turned, grateful for the break in my reverie. "Medium rare please." "Please now? My my, something on your mind?" "Just gimme my damn steak" He put a bowl of roasted vegetables in front of me, dropped a pat of butter into them and a squeeze of lemon juice. then came a plate with a raw slab of meat on it. The show was about to begin. Pat whistled harshly, a discordant note that was entirely abhuman. something flapped down on to roost lightly his shoulder. A pygmy dragon, a fraction of a size of even the smallest true dragons, but still immensely powerful, still dangerous. Pat whistled again and the dragon crawl-slither-fell down his arm, steam issuing from its tiny nostrils. it reached the table and started darting about my steak, sinuously twisting and making low, flying passes, all the while breathing opalescent fire, cooking it to perfection. After maybe thirty seconds of this Pat recalled it, and pushed the plate towards me. Everything was delicious, but brooding and my history had made it impossible for me to enjoy. Everything was sour and ashy in my mind, the taste of a dead City and dead men. I sat and had more of Pat's wine, and we talked. I asked about his business and we speculated about mine and as the night deepened I began to put things behind me. By the time I had helped Pat lock up for the night, the other patrons having left hours ago, I was happy again, floating on wine and good company. I walked along the street, keeping my back to the lights of the Indulgence. And I was almost killed by a dying god. If I had been elsewhere, I would have had more warning, but here on the Riverside the screams of ecstasy melded into screams of terror all too easily. As it was, I only knew something was wrong when I was knocked off my feet, buffeted by the wind of something huge and fast, falling to the Earth. The street shook as a great golden something, magnesium bright and thrumming with power, carved a large crater from it. I was the closest, and through the dust and debris I ran forward to see what had happened. It's human nature I suppose. I wish to this day that I hadn't. In the crater was something that looked like a man. He was bare chested and wore leather pants of some kind, and a huge belt with a silver buckle that looked like a manhole cover. He was about two and half times my height, and three times my width. His arms looked like they could break through the world, through space and time itself. His face was beautiful, but in a feral, cold way, framed by deep golden hair. It was Thor, son of Odin, lord of the northern thunder. Thor was one of the old gods, an old power. There were rumors that he and his hammer had stood against arcangels and demon lords during one of the last great wars. Supposedly, he was proud and vain, but an honorable soul. He wouldn't die easy. His chest was rent open... and worse. It looked like something was growing on him, in him. He breathed and it seemed to grow a bit more in that instant. It seemed fungal, a horrible infestation in his beautiful form. Something about it was terribly, horribly wrong. Thor looked up at me and I almost swooned. The fungus was behind his eyes as well, spreading filaments and taking hold. But what scared me was the fear I saw there. Something had scared Thor. The implications of that were reality shaking. As I watched, he howled once, and died. The golden glow faded from around his body, and the fungus grew around him more quickly than I imagined possible. It was black green and as it consumed the body of a god I knew that it wanted more, that as it finished with him it would spread and grow. I thought of trying something magical against it, but without knowing what it was and after watching it kill a god... I was afraid. I shouldn't have worried- about the fungus at least. Something else fell from the sky. It struck the ground next to Thor and I worried that I would have to see another fundamental part of the world move on. But it was a man in black, and he was walking tall towards the fallen warrior. He touched the fungus and it flowed up his arm, under his large coat. Turning to face the greatest part of the gawkers, he spoke. "My name is Morgan." Morgan's voice was pleasant, calm and soft, like listening to a young preacher. His face was tanned and shaved clean, and his eyes a forgettable brown. The only thing noticeable about him at all was the power that radiated out of him, and the fact that he stood on a dead god "I killed Thor, and in ten days I'm going to kill an angel. Ten days after that, I'm going to kill any that don't yet follow me. Your old gods-" he kicked Thor in the ribs "-are obsolete. Your new god won't stop me. I am the Lord of this world." He said it all so simply, but not blandly, like someone faking boredom and effete competence, but with a preacher's enthusiasm, anxious not to make us believe in him, but to tell us what he knew to be true. He caught my eye before he was gone, but I was hardly unique in that. He surveyed the crowd like a performer, nodding and not quite smiling. Morgan, even standing near the corpse of a god, was terribly enigmatic. I found myself wanting to follow him, even if I knew it'd lead me to hell. He left without saying anything else, sublimating into nothingness like smoke. I made my way to my own house, and as i walked I couldn't help but the think the shadows looked a touch deeper, the people a bit more nervous. Morgan seemed to have pulled some of the vitality out of the air by is very existence. My house was a modest thing from the outside, just another in a row of very fine but uninspired homes. Open the door and walk in, and it's a different story. Like so many things, it's larger on the inside than on the out (I'd learned the trick from a doctor who wouldn't give me his name. Eccentric man.) and I think it's pretty nice. Large windows opened onto a a stunning view, but I had no time for that tonight. I went to bed, hoping I might wake up from this nightmare. I woke up to my cell phone buzzing noisily in my pocket. I hadn't even changed out of my day clothes before falling asleep. the phone said it was three in the morning, and phone calls at three in the morning are never, ever good. "Charlie?" "Eddie? What the hell are you doing calling me at three in the morning?" "Yeah, it's me. We need you, here, now, if not much much sooner." "Who is we? How did you get my number? Where is here?" "I have all the numbers, its my job. And here is City hall." "Who needs me there so urgently?" "Everyone, Charlie. I have more calls to make." And he hung up. I went to City hall, and I was glad I did. When Eddie said everyone, he meant every-fucking-one. The good and the bad and unnatural all coming together. I had a bad feeling about it all. Some seriously major powers- things even I would think twice before annoying- were rubbing elbows with their most hated and equally powerful enemies. Imagine sitting in the middle of two armies that are just itching to start shooting at each other, and you'll get what it felt like. I took a seat in the back, and as the room filled up my sense of dread kept rising. There was only one thing this could b about; Morgan and Thor. And his next threat. The flood of people slowed to a trickle, and someone stood up to begin the meeting. I'd been to a few of these meetings before, when things were going wrong, but there'd never been this many people in the hall. the walls kept expanding outward to accomadate more bodies, although the ceiling was holding steady a comfortable distance above the head of a giant. someone finally stood and started speaking; I recognized him, it was the security chief, Eddie's immediate and only superior. "You all know why you're here, so sit down and quiet." his words were brusque, but calculatedly so, if I had to guess. He was trying to give the impression of a chain of command. I couldn't blame him. If he didnt act like he was in charge, any number of others would have been happy to fill the role. As it was, there was enough of an air of authority about him that the crowd did as he said. "I apologize for asking you here so late, but it couldn't really be helped. We've just finished gathering everything we know about the crime that took place earlier, and thought we should let everyone know what we could." he pulled out a sheaf of paper and started flipping through it. "the suspect has identified himself only as Morgan, and we were unable to turn up any other names or aliases. He appeared today as young man, caucasian, brown hair and eyes, six two, and approximately one hundred and eighty pounds. I wouldn't count on him looking like that next time though. At about three o clock PM the suspect assaulted Thor, deity second class, in his home. At approximately 9 o clock PM the suspect killed Thor, by means unknown." he went on to repeat, word for word, what Morgan had said to the crowd. Being that I was there, I took the opportunity to get a closer look at my fellow meeting goers. About ninety-nine percent of the interests in the City were represented in some form or other, with only the really obscure or dangerous left out, like the Pestilent or Bloodied William and his cult. Suspiciously absent were angels. Usually they made it their business to show up, whether they were wanted or not. But there were none here, from either heaven or hell, and I could only imagine they were busy dealing with the threat on their own terms. Which was vexing in itself, because since time immemorial they had favored very final and all encompassing and messy solutions to their problems. Think of names like Sodom and Jericho. Someone was yelling, so I turned my attention back to the meeting. "- all you know? There's no way in hell. What aren't you telling us?" It was a short, broad man wearing some sort of animal skin over his shoulders. "We've told you everything. We're printing fliers as we speak with all of it, and after this meeting I'll personally submit to any assurances you need. But really, we need to think about what we need to do right now." Someone else stood up, a ghost dressed in a uniform reminiscent of the civil war. "What could possibly kill Thor, he was supposed to be immortal." "All we know that it was a chest wound, coupled with some sort of growth that killed his cells as soon as his godhood regenerated them." A man in a white lab coat "Are we sure that the growth didn't kill Thor, and Morgan was just there to take credit?" "It responded to him, it went away when he wanted it to. Actually, 'growth' was a misnomer, we think it was a magical construct Morgan conjured. We have no reason to believe that Morgan wasn't solely and wholly responsible for the murder." Questions were coming faster now, people shouting all over the place "What about the other gods, his brothers and father?" "Odin and his sons are actively seeking Morgan, and coordinating with us. We deigned it unsafe to invite them to this council, however." That made sense. when Odin was angry, drawing even the minutest part of his attention could result in violent death. "Why look for him? I know where Morgan is." The crowd, as angry and scared as they were, fell silent. The voice was soft and light and high, like flute. It was also deadly in a primal way. The speaker was the Child, a young boy born into a satanic cult, destined to be a sacrifice to summon something from hell, something he wouldn't even name. Instead, he had taken the power of the ritual for himself, and used his inestimable power to kill his parents, and every one of their cohorts, and a few people that happened to be around. He was scary, even by the standards of the people in the room, a child infused with the power of hell. After recovering from this, the chief spoke again. "Why haven't you mentioned this before?" "No one has asked before. Before today, morgan was nothing." "How did you come to know about it?" "Morgan is known in the lower dungeons in hell. We hear rumors, we see further there." "Dammit, you should have spoken up. What else do you know?" "Nothing much, he is inscrutable. We know where to find him, and we know that it is impossible to See him, in either the future or past. It's why your precogs told you nothing." "Will you show us the way?" "When ever you like." At this voices resumed their shouting, demanding that the whole group go now, right now. others called for wait, and planning. And I distinctly heard an intelligent few say that they should stay behind while everyone else assaulted Morgan. The Security Chief tried to restore order, but the council had dissolved into a mob. The Child walked calmly at their front, and those who weren't screaming for blood and mayhem were sidling away, getting safe. I decided to see what the crowd would do. The Child led them out of the doors onto a street that didn't always exist, through a door that didn't open, and along a canyon left by a dragon's tail. we were well and far outside the city, but we'd only walked a mile or two. That's what's so unsettling about reality bending powers like the Child. We finally came to an empty field and the child stopped, turned and waited for the slower members of the mob to catch up. Then he spoke in his terrible, innocent voice. "It's here, but you can't see it right now." there were some quite pointed grumbles at this. I and the few others that were along more to observe than to break things got decidedly nervous. A mob thwarted of its prize was one of the most terrifying forces in the world. "Now, don't get antsy, I'll show you." he turned, and moved his hands along directions that i couldn't comprehend, in motions that couldn't fi in our geometry. Someone sidled up next to me and whispered "What's he doing?" it was a young lady, and she sounded faintly nauseous. "It's hard to explain. In fact, it's impossoble to explain or understand while your mind exists in three dimensions. But think about a sheet of paper. It's got length, width, and depth. Imagine looking directly at its side. Very little depth, and a lot of length. Well, you can sort of decrease the length by increasing the depth. think about if you folded it a whole lot. Except the length isn't gone, it's just moved. That's what Morgan did, I think. He moved the length, width and depth of his place into another dimension." "And he... it... is undoing it?" "Looks like it." "I didn't know the Child was so... strong, I suppose." "He shouldn't be. If Morgan was strong enough to kill Thor, he should be out of the even Child's league." This was a disturbing thought in and of itself. As scary as Morgan was, the Child was truly demented. "He is." another man said. He looked like some sort of zombie, but I'm not prejudiced. "I can see past what he's doing. He's opening up Morgan's defenses from before when they were there. He's manipulating the past to leave himself a back door." "I hate time travel." "Everything does tend to get a bit wibbly-wobbly." The Child had stopped, and stepped back. Where before there had been an empty field, now- or then, or whenever the hell it was- was given over to a quite lovely reproduction of a medevial castle. The walls were of steel-gray stone, straight and even, and there were plenty of windows. It looked quite pleasant, actually, and I began to make plans for a summer house in a similar design. The Child turned to us. "This is Morgan's home. Do what you think you need to do." But no one moved, and he sighed "You can approach without fear. His eye sees all things, but in some places his eye sees less well." Someone- I don't think anyone could say who- took the first tentative step. Then someone took another, and then there was no more hesitiation, the crowd rushed forward like a tide, a force of nature that wouldn't be turned aside, delayed, deterred or distracted. they moved as one, and more than a few of the weakest were trampled cruelly under foot and hoof and claw. The Child watched from a distance, like the rest of us that didn't want to get involved. Thus began the first battle in Morgan's War. The quickest ones there were the ones with some animal in them, the werewolves and shape shifters and things that were less well-defined. They reached the walls and leapt onto them. from the stones grew what looked like cruel spikes, and as the beast-men came down, they were impaled. The rain of blood didn't stop the riot, it seemed to spur hem on, if anything. A man the size of a small office building, eye level with the top of the tower, was holding a naval rail gun to his massive chest. It went off, trailing fire in the night behind it, blindingly bright against the velvet black sky, and impacted harmlessly on the walls. A small oriental man with a white beard and wearing a gem-lined crown called down hail and rain, collected it in his arms and sent it in a vicious torrent at one of the windows. It froze on contact and kept freezing, the flood turning into a solid, glassy column, freezing the mage's torso all the way through. The lizard men turned their fierce claws to the earth, digging at the base of the fortress. Morgan had clearly thought of that, because as soon as they were too deeply entrenched to hop out, they broke through to molten rock, and I could hear the hiss-pop of their flesh cooking even over their screams. A dozen cyborgs from a possible future rose into the sky, and launched pure antimatter bombs, the last weapon man kind would ever develop before annhilating ourselves. Morgan's castle caught them, stretching like putty around them, pulling them into itself. Then it launched all of the energy back at the cyborgs blasting them away on a molecular level. Good bad and ugly, hey all tried to fight. With rockets and guns and sorceries and things better left unsaid. Swords and lances crashed into the wall along side steel-hard talons, and even the Poet Incarnate was there, trying to wound with his terribly beautiful verse. I looked around and thought that aside from myself, the Child, and one or two others, there was hardly anyone here I would consider a major player, a power or domination. "He's toying with them" I murmured, only half out loud. The onlookers had gathered together, herd instinct I suppose, and now they looked around at me. Slightly uncomfortable, I expanded on the though that had come to me so suddenly "Well, he killed Thor, and even his damned castle is more powerful than all of them put together." It was true. Every strike against the walls resulted in nothing, or in a fatal counterblow. "if he's so powerful, then why go to all that trouble?" The crowd seemed to agree, but someone to my left laughed out loud "Morgan doesn't have time for games, he's a serious man." I looked over at the non descript man, he seemed utterly unconcerned with the death and mayhem flying all about his head. "What's going on then?" "Well it's late. The only reason we're not all very messily dead is that Morgan is asleep." The mob was starting to get organized now, although it was probably too late for that. A woman in a long flowing dress, holding some sort of ugly, futuristic mechanical thing and a man that slipped in and out of existence seemed to be leading them, giving orders. But with so many dead, their strategy was pretty much "Hit it with everything we've got all at once and pray." the final assault began, a blitz of fire, lightning, steel wood and pure energy, from all sides, throwing every thing that ever hurt or killed into one blow. I shivered. All that force, all that power, it could bring the world down, it could blacken the sun and move the oceans. It could shake the floors of heaven and the roofs of hell. and after the smoke cleared, and the fires died away and the lights faded, Morgans tower still stood. The attackers were understandably dumbfounded. It didn't seem like there could be anything else and they were turning back, to follow the Child's way back home, when the world shook. A door opened on the blank stone, forcing itself outward. No one doubted who was coming, and they scrambled, breaking into a stampede-retreat. Morgan walked out onto the field, smiling a bit sadly, and lifted his hand. Everyone who had lifted a hand against Morgans home stopped; just stopped, exactly as they were. "Come back here, stand in front of me." They all did, they walked sedately back to him, not hurrying, but not shying away either. there was no one who looked like he wanted to escape. Even the ring leaders, the lady in white (who I now recognized as the queen of some Earth in a parallel world, come to ours by arcane means; she'd been a minor celebrity for a while) and the man who wasn't quite there came forward. "You did well to find me, I'm impressed. Still, it was foolish to think you could fight me, foolish to think anything other than to come and worship me. foolish to come and fight. I've no use for fools." He began to walk among them, smiling and touching them. When he touched them, they crumpled and died, instantly. those around the dead made no move, or any sign that they had noticed. they werent in a trance, as far as I could tell. It was more like they were enamored with him, held by his presence. He killed the giant and it fell on a dozen of his companions, and no one moved. He walked calmly, and even though there were dozens of them, it seemed to take no time at all. At last, he came to the Child. "You brought them here." "Yes I did." "Why?" "To kill you, if they could. your name is known in hell." "Hell is of no consequence to me." the Child looked at him steadily, and then he knelt before Morgan. Morgan laid a hand on top of the Child's head. "Suffer the little children to come to me. You will be a welcomed lieutenant." he turned to us onlookers "go, and tell what you've seen here tonight. I'll be moving my castle, but you won't need to worry about finding it." We turned and ran, all the way back as though he were right behind us. We weren't a group, weren't ocused on anything but getting far far away from Morgan. I got back to my house as the sun was coming up, tired and frightened. The thing about terror is that it's exhausting, though. No matter how bad things are, you simply can't go on being heart in your throat terrified all the time. Eventually it fades into a low, bowel gripping dread. Eddie was in my living room, apparently waiting for me. "You look like hell." "Hell's got no part in this. I don't think Heaven does either, come to think of it." "So... what do you know?" "The City folks need a full account already, do they?" "You never know." So I sat down and told him everything that happened, because we'd need to know everything about Morgan to be able to put him down. And I told him everything I felt, because Eddie was a friend. "And that's it?" "That's it? That's not enough? The man is a monster. And not the sort of monsters we normally get around here, he's like... he's like a tumor. He's implacable and unswayable and deadly and there's literally nothing we can do." He looked at me for a long moment. "I'm supposed to take you to see the Chief, and other places, I suppose. But we'll have a drink first, I think." He opened my cabinets familiarly, and pawed through them, bringing up my best whiskey. Dark, amber liquid that rose in perfect waves when he moved. He got two glasses and sat by me, pouring a very genorous measure for each of us. Something wasn't right; Eddie was never this quiet, and never this serious. "One for God" he drank the glass down. I smiled, it was an old toast we made up back when we were far too young to drink. One for God, one for the Devil, and one so they'd leave us the fuck alone. Back then we had the whole world figured out. "One for the Devil" I drank, and the whiskey warmed me all the way through. He refilled our glasses and we both lifted them, ready to drink at the same time "And one... for Morgan." we drank, and I looked steadily at him. He wouldn't meet my eye. "So... it's like that." "Yeah... look Charlie, things change. You can't... look, do you honestly have a reason for being set against Morgan?" "Yeah, I do a bit." "What's that? You weren't a personal friend to Thor, and I know you've never given a damn about angels, or the City, for all that. So what, you just don't approve?" "No, it's not that. Everyone deserves to go to hell in their own way." "Then why?" I sipped on another glass of whiskey, trying to hold my thoughts together well enough to explain. I'm not sure why I bothered, except that it gave me something to do. I felt like a block of ice had grown in my gut, sliding along my warm innards and dragging me down. "Because... no one gets to use power like that, to say that 'you have to do what I tell you because if you don't I'll kill you' ... that's just not the way we work here." He looked at me sadly "That's always how it works Charlie. But i won't try to convince you." he finished his glass and stood, and i saw that his eyes were cold. He wasn't my friend any more "a little advice: if you're going to fight Morgan, you better make damned sure he never sees you. He's already going to know how you feel" he tapped his eye "but if you don't call attention to yourself, it could be a long time before he finds you... but make no mistake, he will find you." He left then, his last words to me, his oldest friend, a cold threat. I slept again then, wanting to be away from a world I didn't understand anymore. I would fight Morgan, and probably die doing so, because I had believed what I told Eddie. Besides, maybe I could make it sort of a family tradition, to die in unwinnable battle. Like father, like son. I woke up, dressed in my best suit, and went to see the Chief. it was important that they know what Eddie was now, because he was probably cued in to all their systems still. I explained as best i could, what Eddie had done, and what had happened the night before. He shook his head when it was over "Losing Eddie is bad. There's no way to get him out of our systems. Looks like communication and surveillance are going to be magic-only for a while" I shook my head "No good, Morgan also has the Child on his side." The Chief looked taken aback, as did his aides, which was quite impressive considering one was a statue."Could it be the other way around, that Morgan is working for the Child?" "No" i said, thinking glumly that I had just been ushered into Eddie's job, probably on an unpaid basis "Morgan outclasses the Child, and everybody and everything else you can think of. Morgan is a new thing all together." He scowled "We're going to need your help Mister Harris. We're going to need all the help we can get." I nodded "good. now, first things first, we need communication and we need eyes on Morgan." "But he could be anywhere. More importantly, he can be anywhen." "He can be, but he's not. Apparently, he's moved his headquarters into the Wastes." "How do you know that?" "We can see his castle, a bit. We're using small and indirect ways to look on him now, nothing that can be of much value, but better than nil. Come on." he lead me down a hallway into an ad hoc command center, full of justling, frightened people. "We're mobilizing as quickly as we can. There aren't many contingencies for a situation like this, but we're not totally lost either. We always had a plan for what to do if a major power went rogue." he looked at me sideways "To be honest, a lot of people were betting it'd be you." I had to smile. I didn't like being told what to do, and had told the City government to fuck itself on more than one occasion, but I didn't think I'd ever declare myself against them. "So anyway, we're using kind of a mash-up of various strategies, but they all come down to the same thing. Figure out what he wants, try to reason with him, and then bing in every source of power we can find to kill him when negotiations break down." "You're so sure they will?" "They always do." I couldn't argue with that. "Our precogs haven't been able to get a fix on Morgan. Sometimes things come through, but we think he selects what those thing are, because it's always him gloating victoriously." "And it's definitely not because he wins in every possible future?" He ignored me. We came to a room filled with tables and chairs, obviously set up for convenience rather than comfort. At the front of the rom was what could only be described as a fucking big television. If it had been laid on the floor I could have sprawled over it like a bed, and still had room for a nightstand and pillow fort. At first I thought it was displaying a still image, but it was just a stone gray sky and the gently bobbing waters of the river, and the Wastes. It should have been a serene, if rather bleak view, but all I could feel was the rising fog of war, pressures building during this brief lull that would burst and spill over. It felt like waiting for the doctor to come back with your test results and tell you the bad news. It felt like falling from a huge height, the almost interminable time between the beginning and the violent, sudden end. In the corner of the screen, I saw Morgan's castle again. It wasn't hidden, but whatever was looking out towards him was at a very bad angle,and the stone towers and walls blended almost perfectly with the the cloudy sky. "Where is this being shot from?" "Dragoon's. Patrick Gentle volunteered it, since no one will eat there with Morgan so close. But our team couldn't stay in the place long enough to position it; frankly, they just threw it in there and ran. We couldn't figure out why, but from what you've told me I'd hazard a guess that it's the Child's doing." "Seems about right. Morgan's powerful, but I doubt he'll ever have the Child's mind for sheer gleeful spite." "He's a creepy bastard for sure." I turned, and Patrick Gentle walked into the room. "Hello again. I've heard you've been making new friends, Charlie." "You got that right, I'm moving up in the world." he shook his head "I didn't think you'd ever leave your place, even for Morgan." "No way to stay there, it's like living in a nightmare." he wasn't exaggerating. Not much scared the Gentleman, and if he was this openly shaken, it must have been worse than I thought "It makes a lot more sense if it was the Child, from what I've seen... it feels like all the shadows have eyes, and teeth." The Chief looked at me "So now Morgan has two lieutenants, Eddie and the Child, that we know of. Honestly, I don't see why he'd need more than them. If it came down to it, could you go toe-to-toe with them?" I thought about it "I'd have no trouble taking Eddie, if it came to that. He's smarter than me, and has more resources, but not much real power. I could take him. the Child... probably. He's scary, and demented, but I give myself good odds walking away from a fight." I had to sigh "but if they're back by Morgan, they could probably tapdance on my skull." "We're hoping to take them out first, and quietly. It's good to know that you could provide the muscle." "It doesn't matter." Patrick interjected "He could handle a hundred of the Child, but it won't mean he can go against Morgan. You need a plan to put Morgan down." "We know that. Right now we're looking to mitigate the damage that could be done in the immediate future, and we've got people- and other, really distressing things- working on how to handle Morgan." "Then what am I here for?" "First, meet with the team that's working on getting our eyes and ears back up. They can handle the heavy lifting, but you knew the our rogue technogamist better than anyone else. Get him out. Then come find me." he grinned tightly "We're going to talk to the angels." It didn't take long to offer my advice to the task force appointed with getting Eddie out of the communication systems, but I took my time, trying to savor wht could be my last moments in this or ny other life. Angels are projections of God's will into our world. Forget all the harps and white robes and eagle wing stuff. The truer stories of angels are the ones in which they wield inestimable power, like the killing of the first-born sons of Egypt, like the Flood. First Morgan, now Angels... I wasn't used to feeling this overwhelmed all of the time. It's humbling to realize that even if you're the biggest ant in the anthill, there's always a kid with a sneaker able to fuck you up. The chief and I drove out of the city. His car was from a possible future, and had an excellent sound system and fully stocked bar. I sipped on an ice water. If I were going to speak to Angels, then I wanted a clear head. "Shouldn't we have brought along a priest or something?" "I thought about it, but... say we bring a catholic priest, only it turns out the Catholics have been wrong this whole time? No, we're on tricky theological grounds as it is." "Still, i wouldn't mind going in with a bit more... holiness on our side." "Well I'm sorry we don't have the holy fucking grail on demand for such occasions." "Please refrain from using the phrase 'holy fucking grail' before this is over." He winced and glanced upwards, as though expecting the holy hand grenade of antioch to dent the roof of his car "you may have a point." We went miles from the city, the road looping along grassy hills, climbing into the mountains. There was a Church up here, among the stony cliffs and hard frost, called Saint Michael of Heaven. It's attended by a lone priest who holds mass four times a day, whether there is anyone there or not. And if you ask him what denomination his church is, he'll just smile and say "Yes, quite right." Most times, St. Michael's is just a church, you go there, and pray, and you leave. Some people make a sort of pilgrimage to it, but most leave it alone. However, there are those that go to St. Michael's and call to Heaven, and recieve replies. It's the only place in the world where the eye and ear of heaven are always open. As such, it's one of the scariest places in the world. Only a fool or a liar wants to get Heaven's attention. And we were about to go knocking on their door. We pulled up and got out, and I couldn't help but notice the Chief running his fingers along the form of his gun in his jacket. I'd heard he was in the habit of polishing his gun with desecrated holy water, made impure by the blood of a murdered priest. You had to be a hard man to run security in the City. I wish I had brought a weapon. Not that it'd do me any good, but it would have made me feel a bit safer. I'm crap with most weapons, but due to some unfortunate situations, I've learned how to handle a revolver with some skill, and how to kill a goblin with a watermelon. We walked into the church, and I was struck by the simplicity. I'd never come to St. Michael's of Heaven before, I'd never had a need. But the people that had been here, and especially those who knew of its true nature, spoke of it in awed and hushed voices, their eyes fever bright and passionate. They say that if the world ended, if the old monsters wiped out the stars and the stones, and all that was left was fire and dark shadows, St Michael's would still stand and look out over it all. But today, it was a small building with rough wood floors, dim lighting and a good view. I didn't feel overwhelmed, I didn't feel anything at all really. I turned to the Chief "Is this it?" "Just wait, and don't forget the legends about this place. for once, myth is more reliable than your instincts." It was a few minutes until the priest came out. He was a short man who looked vaguely mediterannean, or middle eastern, or something not quite either. He smiled and spoke softly "Welcome to Saint Michael of Heaven. Can I assume you're not interested celebrating the mass?" "I'm not Catholic." "No more am I, but it is such a beautiful prayer, and a wonderful way to concentrate the mind." "We didn't come to pray, father. We came to talk to heaven." He laughed "what ever gave you the idea the two were different?" But he led us back to a small garden behind the church that smelled of lavendar and geranium. I liked this garden, it was almost feral. Weeds and flowers grew together, and it seemed the only gardening the priest did was to make sure it all got watered and stayed off the stone paths. In the center of the garden, where four paths met was a circle of the same cobbled bricks. Inlaid inches deep in the circle was a silver pentacle, softly brilliant in the daylight. pentacles were marks of summoning. I mean, there are other uses, but ... well, if you have a swastika on your wall, no one's going to buy that you're a sanskrit mystic. everyone knows what its really for. "We're not the first to want to." "I should warn you that no one has ever succeeded in what you're doing, and that the young woman who came closest is still not the same. She glimpsed what was never meant to be seen at all." "We don't have a choice." "I know. Go about what you need to do, if you make it, we can talk afterwards." he walked back into the house. The Chief spoke for the first time since we came here "That sounded distressingly pessimistic." "Shut up." "Right." We set to work. I drew water from a well into a wooden bucket, and after a moment's consideration, I took a drink myself. Sweet, cold and clear, water from the deepest well in creation. I tried not to think that as last meals go, it was better than others. I poured water into the grooves of the pentacle, filling them up entirely while the Chief picked flowers, carefully only selecting perfect examples off their plants. he laid them in complex patterns, murmuring spells of protection and ancient rites. When it was done, he asked me to wait and went back to his car and returned with a book. I was expecting a Bible, but he was holding a copy of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn "What are you doing with that?" "Do you speak Enochian?" "Do I speak what?" "Enochian, the language that God and Satan made together, so that they could speak to their angels, angels could speak to men, and men could speak back." "No, I don't." "then the angel needs a way to communicate with us that won't blast the soul from your body. Just watch." We were ready, and the entacle and the warding characters written with flowers, and I sat back "It seems like there should be more." "Summoning an angel isn't complicated, but that doesn't mean its easy." he looked at me "Now its down to you. Charge the pentacle with enough power to break through and get the attention of Azareal." "We're calling a specific angel? by name?" "Azareal has always been the angel with most ties to Earth. It stands to reason that he's the easiest one to attract." he paused and looked at me steadily "He's the angel of death." I stared at him blankly, unable to believe he'd brought me here to summon death itself from the White Palaces. "Just do it." I swear, nobody else has days like this. I did, pushing as much pure energy as I could into the water. The water sparkled silver, briefly, and then froze solid. I had just enough time to draw in breath before unspeakable power filled the garden. It was like being blinded with a light you couldn't see, like suffocating in a gale of wind. I didn't feel any goodness or holiness radiate from it, just sheer, undeniable power. "What is your name?" asked the Chief. his eyes were closed and he lay facedown on the ground; he wouldn't look at it if he could help it. Which meant is up to me to read the angel's response. The book in the middle of the pentacle disintegrated, and only individual letters were left. I used all of my power to shield myself, my mind and heart, and walked closer, until my nose was at the edge of the binding. It was like standing next to a nuclear bomb, and hearing an onimous ticking that might only be your imagination. The letters swirled on the air AZAREAL "Are you the angel of death" I DO AS COMMANDED "Have you been known to humans as the angel of death" YES "Do you know of Morgan" YES "Will Heaven help us in our fight against Morgan?" NO "Why? Why not?" OUR WAYS ARE NOT YOUR WAYS. OUR JUSTICE IS NOT YOUR JUSTICE. I finally spoke, outraged at this abandonment "That's just so fucking typical. Heaven is a lot like Morgan, you know? Justice on your terms, peace on your terms, and we'll like it?" YOU WILL NOT SPEAK TO AN ANGEL OF YOUR LORD SO "Morgan is a threat to you as well, he said he'd kill an angel." WE ARE UNCONCERNED I thought about it "No, you're not." WE WILL NOT BE CONTRADICTED I continued on "The way i see it, you don't need to be here at all" I smiled a little bit "you want to find out more about Morgan as well. We could fight together." MORGAN IS OF NO CONCERN "It could be you, you know." i spoke softly "Morgan could be coming for you, Azarael." THE LORD'S WILL WILL BE DONE "Go, go now." it did, the power in front of me suddnely vanishing. I turned back the chief, who was bleeding from the eyes and ears. "Well that was useless." "You shouldn't have been able to look directly at it. You should be dead or blind." "You always say the sweetest things." "I'm serious. You looked into the eyes of god through only the thinnest lens." "I didn't know you were such a poet." The priest was waiting for us inside, and even though the Chief was still looking at me with something that bordered on fear, we sat down with him at a card table, on hard folding chairs. "That was an exceptionally short visit." "It turns out angels aren't much help. we did learn a few things though." "Do tell." I eyed him "you seem very uninterested in the man who claims he'll kill the servants of your boss." He laughed at me "If morgan could bring down heaven, I would kiss his feet and kneel before him." his voice was suddenly bitter, not the calm and soothing priest, now he was a man, one with hatred raging behind his eyes like lightning in a bottle. He was not what he seemed to be. I decided to let it go for now. "Heaven won't, or can't help. i'd bet my life that they're as terrified of morgan as we are." he nodded. i noticed the chief had gone to lie down on one of the pews. he still wasn't feeling the best. "is there anything more that you could tell us? anything at all?" He nodded "Nothing concrete, only myth and legend and rumor. Some of it quite appalling, really." "Tell me." "Very well. you see, morgan isn't the first to set himself against heaven. A thousand years ago, someone else did. It's a long story, would you like a cup of coffee?" I shook my head. "All right. the story begins with a name you think you know, but don't." he looked me in the eye and held my gaze with his "Merlin." I shuddered. Merlin was te greatest power of this, or any age. His name could move mountains, and his every thought and move was legend personified. Best known for building up the realm of Camelot, but he was so much more. Older than the stars, more powerful than time itself. "I see you grasp the meaning. After the fall of Camelot,something happened, and even i don't know what. But Heaen and Hell were prepared to go to war over it, the kind that hasn't been seen since Lucifer's fall. It would have burned the Earth to a cinder. But Merlin stopped it." I realy hadn't been prepared for that "He stopped it? what does that even mean, how does one man stop Heaven and Hell?" "He called to them. The Creator and the Adversary. And they came. The Merlin... he told them that if Heaven and Hell went to war on Earth, they would be at war with Earth. And with him. And then they stopped, the War never happened." "Was Merlin really powerful enough to stand up to god? and to lucifer?" "He did it, so yes. And they didn't go easily. After he dismissed them, they sent angels after him. Merlin slapped them down and ripped their wings off. an army of the light and the dark, and Merlin repelled it alone." "What does this have to do with Morgan?" "I think Morgan wants to do the same thing. He wants the power to stand agaisnt heaven and hell, and i think he has it." "How does this help us?" He sighed "I don't really know. all that I can say is that once again, there is a power like the Merlin loose in the world, and we can't even pray about it." "Is there anyone else who would no more than you?" "About heaven and hell? No one. But about the merlin... you could try sinister crowley." I winced. sinister crowler was the son of the legendary, aleister crowley, who called himself the most evil man in the world. He'd named his son sinister, and hoped it would make him want to follow in his father's footsteps. but sinister crowley was as rebellious as the man who sired him, and spent his life doing good things, in an exceptionally appalling manner. He killed his father in the pursuit of goodness, and then walked the world round, dispensing his own brand of justice with passion and sharp objects. he was powerful and immortal, because he made a bargain with something even he couldn't name. "Why him?" "Because he has knowledge of all the evil in the world, so he can go about killing it, i suppose. it was part of his bargain. " "Well, I know my next stop then." i stood. the priest did as well, and stretched out a hand to shake mine, but i just looked at him. "What's your name?" He smiled, an it wasn't his polite one. This one was like a hole in a mask, letting something deeper and older bleed through. "My name is Cain, and I was doomed by heaven to wander the Earth." I left in a hurry, leaving him there. Old Testament shit scares me. I picked up the chief, and we walked back to the car as I filled him in. "So today you've looked into the face of god, talked with a biblical myth, and have been tasked with uncovering the secrets of the most legendary man in the world?" "Sounds bout right" "and its only tuesday." "Yesterday I was worried about a bad contract" i mused "and today I'm just hoping the sky doesnt open up and kill us." "Where to now?" "I need someone who knows where Sinister Crowley is." "Why? Because no one else you bothered today managed to kill you?" "He knows things." "Well good luck. you can drop me off at the nearest anywhere, and I'll give word to your next of kin." "You're coming too." "Like hell I am! I'm full of soft squishy bits that I just know Crowley would love to feed to me, slowly." "You're being dramamtic. Besides, you'll be with me, and he'll be too busy smiting me to bother with you." "Oh, that makes me feel all sorts of better. Why do I lead a life full of obscenely powerful people that ll want to kill each other?" "Who would know where he is?" He gave in; people always do "We know where his home is. Unless he's out doing terrible good deeds, he'll be there." "Good, how soon can we get there?" "We're already there. This car is a lot faster when it wants to be." I blinked stupidly. there'd been no acceleration, no noticeable change in pace. but I stepped out, and we were somewhere very very different. It was dirty and everything was a shade of brown or gray. I got the distinct impression of severe poverty. "He lives here?" "This is the worst slum in the world. The people here are the only ones desperate enough to have him." We walked into a building that looked like it had been bombed out with prejudice. No windows, and not even any graffiti. just blank concrete, poured from a mold as cheaply as possible. One door, an aluminum thing that looked like a good can opener would get you past it. But then, I don't think sinister crowley worried about thieves. Thieves worried about him, and rightly so. the Chief balked at the door, and would simply not touch it, no matter how i cajoled, threatened, or wheedled. In the end, I ended up knocking on it, and tried not to imagine that crowley was just on the other side, waiting. After a moment, the door opened. Crowley was very, very pale, tall and thin. his face was pleasant enough, if you didn't look him in the eye. god help you if you did; they were black and deep, like tar pits your soul could get pulled into. They were the bottomless holes in the earth and the spaces between stars. He was terribly dignified, and utterly humorless. He had forsworn kindness and mercy and laughter and light, all to ensure that someone punished the guilty. I nodded gravely "Sinister Crowley. You know who I am." He nodded back "Yes, i know you. I know why you're here. I have the answers you seek, but you won't like them. Come in. We have to talk." The Chief sulked behind me, and muttered something about walking into a lion's den. Sinister Crowley led us into a room as stark and spartan as he was. A bed, a table and two chairs. He sat at one, I took the other and the Chief flopped onto Crowley's bed, loudly complaining about having to come along when he was patently not needed. We tuned him out. I knew full well that Sinister Crowley and Charles Harris in the same room would give most people nightmares for weeks. He spoke first "You should know, you're on my list." "You have a list?" "Not a literal one. But I've been tasked with finding and punishing the evil of this world, and you qualify." "But not right now."mi "No, not now. I have more pressing concerns, and I'm just a person after all. I can't travel through time, and no, before you ask I can't take on Morgan." "He's evil, you're supposed to have power over all evil." "He hasn't done anything really evil yet. No one he killed could rightly be termed an innocent. He will, probably, commit great atrocities. But he hasn't, and so I have no power over him." It was a long shot, I knew, but I was still disappointed. Sinister Crowley was above Heaven and Hell, and lived in the true world of Good and Evil. He was the wrath of righteousness on Earth, a surgeon's scalpel, and the last defense of the truly desperate. "What about Merlin, what can you tell me?" He smiled, and it was more like a wound than an expression, a deep cut with a reaper's scythe. "Can I assume that you've talked with a man named Cain?" I nodded "Marked by God himself, one of the only men I can't touch directly." "I thought you didn't answer to Heaven?" He shrugged "I'm more than a man, and less than a god. I don't really know the rules, I just know that I've killed saints and monsters in my time, but Cain is one of the ones that are Off Limits." "Who did you make a deal with?" it was one of the great mysteries of the world. "Who isn't really the term... and the answer would only upset you." "That's always the way. Back to the task at hand then, what about Merlin?" "There's only one reason Cain would send you to me. Come on, we're leaving." "What, why?" "Well I imagine that you've had quite enough talking for the day, so we're going to kill a very bad man, and then we're going to meet the only being to thwart the Merlin." "Do you know how sick I am of people saying impressive things?" He stopped and turned to me, and his gaze was more intense than I thought I could bear for long. "Understand this Charlie; you think you've talked with beings of power so far, but you're going to have to talk with the real powers, the things underpinning reality. If you're serious about stopping Morgan, then you need to prepare yourself for that." I nodded at him seriously, and we walked on. We were about halfway down the block before the Chief caught up and glared at me. Sinister Crowley led us deeper into the slum, the worst parts of the world. There were seedier bars and deeper dives, places where you could get anything that was bad for you, if you were willing to pay the price. When we came to the our destination, I almost didn't want to look. The place had a sort of sleazy fame, The Rabbit Hole, the place for every drug and damnation you could imagine. Sex and chemicals and other things. Autoerotic hypnosis. Hallucinogenic possession. Every stain that you could put on your soul was available for sale or rent. Just walking in the door made my lips and nose and fingers numb, and I'm pretty sure I developed six or seven addictions, for things I couldn't even identify. Everyone knew we weren't supposed to be there. At first I couldn't help but think that if Crowley wanted to kill a very bad man, he could lash out in any direction at all. But then as I looked, I began to realize that most of these people were broken and sad, as lonely and desperate as they came. If they were vicious, they were vicious for a reason, because their backs were to a cliff and they had nowhere to go but all the way down. We went down steps, through lounges scattered with cushions and low couches. The air was impossible to see through, almost a tangible fluid, something that must be pushed aside, but people still seemed to know where Sinister Crowley went. Eventually, we made our way into a basement, no more stairs to take or doors to go through. Here, things that weren't and never could be people did things so distressing that they hurt my eyes to see them. The Chief spoke up "I've heard things about you, Charlie. Is this what it's like on the Indulgence?" I shook my head "The Indulgence is about joy. It may be about sex and drugs too, but first and foremost it's about the joy of pure sensation. Do you see any joy here?" I didn't need an answer, and he didn't bother with one. If there was joy here, it was a dark and stunted thing and someone probably snorted it as soon as it showed its head. Crowley seemed to find who he was looking for, because he moved with a new purpose, like a shark that scented blood on the water. He finally stopped in front of a tall man with a broad face, and black hair slicked back over his head. He was dressed in a navy pinstripe suit, and looked incredibly stylish, suave in the old style, like Al Capone. He held a fedora in one hand, the same color as his suit, and in the other a surprisingly tame looking martini. He caught me looking at it and winked at me "Not what it looks like, friend. This is a particularly nasty blend of Angel's tears and Demon's blood." I was about to reply when Crowley spoke up "Don't encourage the incarnated psychopath. This is Mack the Knife, Charlie, sung into reality from the old song. The perfect murderer, the living god of the blade." Mack smiled and nodded "Got it in one. And I know your name too. Sinister Crowley, the avenger. Like someone from a funnybook, 'cept without the pajamas." "Charlie, this man's killed four hundred and twelve men, one hundred and eighty three women, seventy one children, and a variety of other, less easily defined things." "Your numbers are off, pal. I'm well into four digits." he smiled; he might have been the first man to smile at Sinister Crowley "I'm murder personified, you gonna come at me, you better come hard." There was no more need to talk Mack drew a wicked switchblade knife and fell on Crowley like tide upon the cliffs. Crowley had drawn his knife too, and I swear he smiled again. The god of murder and the wrath of justice met, slicing, stabbing elbows and hands flying almost faster than the eye could see. One thrust, the other dodged. One slashed and the other parried. It looked like a dance, and neither of them made a sound. Crowley's back was to me, but Mack's face was in ecstasy, the joy of his entire purpose. That's why he came to the Rabbit Hole, I think. He was addicted to murder, to blades clashing and the spill of blood. And since he couldn't indulge it as often as he needed to, he came here for ever increasing highs, a poor replacement. Eventually Mack over extended, as murderers always do, and Crowley caught him by his elbow, and overbalanced him. As Mack fell, Crowley slipped his knife through the suit, and pushed against the fall. Mack's side split open, and he didn't bleed. Because, after all, he wasn't alive. He was simply an idea, the incarnation of gleeful, perfect murder. The god of the knife, and he died like a murderer should. Crowley looked back at me, and held up his knife "I always use this knife. Its a symbol, as much as I am. Don't forget it Tommy." it was a reminder that he wouldn't be any less implacable in his pursuit of me than of Mack. We walked out of the Hole, leaving Mack's body for the management to deal with. I turned to our erstwhile guide. "Not that it wasn't fun, but our errand really is pressing. You said something about a being that defied the Merlin?" "We had to do that because now someone owes me- and by extension you- a favor. Do you know about the Blue Light Man?" I nodded "The premier summoner in America, the best person to call when you need something that doesn't need you." "That's the one." "We could have just paid him." "You don't have enough money to convince him to do what we're going to ask of him." I turned to the Chief "We're about to do horribly upsetting things in distressing ways with abominable people in places I don't even want to think about. Shouldn't you be getting home?" "Yes, I'm sure I'm urgently needed to do things that aren't be with you." I smiled. "Then drop us off at the Blue Light Man's house, and you can go off and cry a bit." "Thank you. I haven't needed to get black-out drunk this badly since I was eleven." "I don't even want to know." We walked back to his car, and he dropped us off, before taking off as fast as he could, and probably just a little bit faster. Sinister Crowley walked to the door of a house that looked like any other, except that brilliant blue light spilled from the windows, from the cracks under doors, and even glowing through some particularly thin spots in the walls. He went right up to the door and opened them without knocking. An old man sitting amongst the blue light, his white beard neatly clipped, and his old face drawn tight in sadness. Crowley nodded at him, and handed him Mack's fedora. I hadn't noticed him take it. The Blue Light man smiled grimly and accepted it. "Thank you." he finally looked at me, and although meeting his eye wasn't as bad as meeting Crowley's, it was disturbing nonetheless. His gaze made me feel unreal, as though he had seen so very many significant things, other worlds and strangeness, that the sum of my existence was nothing to him, a passing breeze. "You are Thomas Harris, mercenary and rogue power." Sinister Crowley hissed into my ear "He's using your true name to validate your presence and identity. The Blue Light Man can do things with true names that are supposed to be impossible, he works his own special sort of magic with them." It made sense. To summon something, you need three main ingredients: a binding, a significance, and a marker. When the Chief and I summoned an angel, the place was the significance, the name of Azareal was the marker, and the silver trap was the binding. After you have the three key pieces, you just shoot the damned thing full of power and will, and hope for the best. If the Blue Light Man could really twist the power of an entity's true name, there was almost no limit to what he could do to them. A true name was tied into the every atom, every nuance of a being. "Do you know Morgan's true name?" The Blue Light Man paused "It is difficult to say." "What? Do you know his true name?" "Yes I do. But so does he, and he has worked his own magic on it. As soon as he revealed himself, I did what I could, but Morgan has removed his true name from his being." "That's not possible though! He exists, he has a true name." "It's been done before. Morgan has separated himself entirely from identification, from reaction, on a metaphysical level. He has divorced his entire being from the context of reality, and lives outside of existence. I couldn't tell you how, and even if I could begin to guess at the mechanics of it, you'd need four philosophy degrees to understand it. Suffice to say, his true name is useless." "It's been done before?" "By beings of great power that wanted to deny their enemies an obvious weapon. The King in Yellow, the Puck, and the Voidwyrms have no true name. Neither does Morgan now." I thought for a moment, and then asked a question I hoped would validate a theory of mine "What about the Merlin?" The Blue Light Man smiled "The Merlin has- had- a true name. But he changed his, and made it into a weapon against his enemies." "He did what?" "When you speak a true name, you invoke the deepest magic of the universe. It's axiomatic, neither time nor space will distance you from that power. Merlin changed his name into an Enochian spell of undoing. If any being, up to God and down to Lucifer, spoke the true name of Merlin, they would axiomatically undo themselves. It is suicide to invoke the Merlin's name, literally." "Could Morgan do it?" "If anyone alive- or otherwise able- at the moment could do it, I'd say yes, it will be Morgan. He has... power."

Newness

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10 Things

My ten principles? Interesting question, let me see ....

1. A thousand idiots are smarter than a lone genius
2. Happiness is internal, not external
3. Getting better is the only way to not be bored
4. Morals and logical efficiency should go hand in hand
5. Don't do complex math late at night
6. the best solution is always simple
7. Open doors for anyone older than you, and any lady
8. You learn best by starting from the basics
9. There is ALWAYS someone smarter and
10. Never pass up the opportunity to talk to a pretty girl, and always ask her to dance

The Leaves Is a-Changing

Perhaps Water for Wine needs a more Fall-appropriate theme?

Fuuuuuuuuuuuuu...

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