Blizz

SPIRITUM

---

Something stirred in Morden when he saw the Vangar ship crash. Something that allowed him to tolerate Silje clambering onto him like a horse. What lay before them was allegedly a civilian airliner piloted by Vangar. Morden absorbed the mist to keep pace with the truck on the off-road path, with Silje stuck on top of him. He just barely moved faster than it, able to move just ahead until they were all at the scene. It was a barren, dedicated crater of dust and rock with nothing to offer for anyone but the occasional vulture. If anything, the downed airship did it a favor. From the smoke and twisted wreckage, Morden could see thin trails of mist fuming out. To him, the astral mist was a red energy that diffused into the atmosphere like oxygen, waiting to be breathed in. The tractor of the ship had been compromised.

The mist is leaking from the reactor. That is what you are noticing, Gerard, he warned, silently. Mind your magic use, all of you.

As Gerard managed to deduce, the Vangar Honorguard lie dead as well. What kind of civilian airliner held troops like that?

Diplomatic? No, Vangar does not negotiate. I do not like this, I’m going on ahead. If anyone is alive, they won’t be able to kill me. Morden dropped Silje off of his shoulders and breathed in more mist, for good measure. His skin began to crackle with red energy, his limbs thickened as his muscles grew denser. He felt power surge through him, and now he was confident enough to enter a fight.

The rush never got old.

Everyone, stay together. There is no telling what could be attracted by the etherium.

With that, Morden turned and stormed off into No Man’s Land.

A trail of iron and steal surrounded him, burning bodies and withered flesh filled the air, but Morden blitzed past everything. His steps were light, without proper Vanguard plate armor, and all the destruction could not phase him. Morden stopped to survey the bodies along the massive scar cut into the land. By all accounts, this landing was relatively soft, it wouldn’t be impossible for a decent amount of them to survive. Most of the ship itself seemed to have torn away in massive chunks, leaving behind pile upon pile of scrap like a trail of breadcrumbs.

There was definitely no saving the vessel, that became apparent as Morden neared the remaining half of the ship. The stern seemed to have been lost in the initial explosion, but what could possibly do that much damage to a ship out here? While in flight?

Barghest, I am at the center of the crash. No survivors yet, and most of the vessel is missing from the destruction. The path is safe, you are clear to-

CLANG!

A huge metal hunk of something fell out of a large pile of wreckage. Stepping forward, Morden saw what looked like the beaten and battered remains of some strange bipedal robot. A large, hulking 8 foot tall machine forged of some sort of dark blue metal alloy he'd never seen before, its head set deep between its shoulders and layers of heavy armor, and a cannon the size of a 40mm grenade launcher attached to its arm. Was it one of the Vangar's new toys? They loved their powered armor- but this machine had sustained large amounts of damage. Across its torso were impact marks, scorches and dents from bullets, blades and spells scoring or ricocheting across its armor. Its left arm was missing and in its place was a tangle of wires and cords in patterns that didn't match typical Vangar synthetic muscle and stuck between its shoulder plates was what looked like the blade of a Vangar power-lance.

Contact! ENGAGING!

He didn’t give the thing time to use that weapon before charging it. Morden dropped low and sprung up to give it a quick haymaker straight to its center mass.

Morden was rewarded for his troubles with a stinging jolt of pain up his hand and wrist, and a dent in the armor. The robot didn’t even react. The fact that it could survive that meant this wasn’t ordinary material.

Vangar never sent machines into battle. Robots were their logistics workhorses, not their soldiers. AI wasn’t sophisticated enough for Vangar’s standards, it was simply not fit for the battlefield, and they shipped them with weapons onto a “civilian” airliner…

It had to be dead, given the damage. But the fact that it was here at all was a grave omen.

Barghest- We have a problem. It’s a dead robot. Not power armor, not an armored foot soldier, a robot. This isn’t a civilian airliner, this robot in front of me is eight feel tall, and armed with a cannon. Vangar doesn’t use machines to fight wars…

This did not bode well. How many of these things were still functioning?

…I barely damaged it. There could be more of these still in working order. Holding this position for now.

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

Stormy’s updated spells

_{Abstraction
^{▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔}}
"NOT. ONE. STEP. FURTHER!!!"

TYPE ⫻ Adept

ABSTRACTION ⫻ Yellow Lux. Stormy's channeler is an old wristwatch.

ABSTRACTION DESCRIPTION ⫻ Stormy's magic focuses on a variety of defenses for every occasion. He is a magic tank who turns the area into a hazard for enemies, and a sanctuary for his friends.

Defender’s Armory ⫻ Stormy has created a collection of shield spells that protect people from various sources of danger. Each spell produces a physical object, which is specialized for a different approach to combat.

Guardian Barrier ⫻ Stormy can create lightweight, circular shields of magic energy that block incoming assaults. These shields can take a decent amount of damage before breaking, including everything from bullets or a sudden sledgehammer, to certain forms of Lux. These shields are designed to be produced multiple times over in quick succession at the cost of individual toughness, making them good for spreading out cover over a wider area. Stormy can also use these shields like a projectile, throwing them at a target for a quick, ranged gut punch.

Stoic Shell ⫻ Stormy produces a heavy tower shield that reflects some magic like a mirror. Rather than simply block the spells, the Stoic Shell can potentially hit someone with their own attacks when applicable. If Stormy manages to aim properly, he can use this to make attacking him or anyone next to him more trouble than it’s worth. The Stoic Shell can be placed on the ground, to act as cover from ranged magic, but will disappear when Stormy moves more than 10 feet away.

Iron Fortress ⫻ Using all of his concentration, Stormy can surround himself in an immensely durable dome of magic energy. Anyone trying to get past it is stuck; No one goes in and no one goes out. The Iron Fortress is drastically stronger than the Guardian Barriers, trading mobility and nullification for enough toughness to brush off a runaway train. Trying to break through it to hurt anyone benefiting from the protection is like trying to break through a brick wall with a plastic spoon. You're just wasting your time, and should just find a way to bait him out somehow.

Abjuration Arts ⫻ The Abjuration Arts are a set of spells that provide a protective effect to Stormy, or anyone that agrees to receive one. These spells keep an individual safe from a specific form of harm that may not necessarily be blocked by a physical barrier, by affecting a radius around the target.

Phantombane ⫻ Stormy projects a magic aura that repels Apparitions. Like iron to a fairy, or sunlight to a vampire, the affected entities grow sick and frail around the aura, feeling worse until they get the hell away. Whoever has a Phantombane aura is completely defended from any influence of an Apparition, even if they are somehow under its influence. This can temporarily block off the Adjoined from the Apparitions that they've bonded to, without causing any harm to the Adjoined or the bond itself.

Phantombane is identified by trails of green smoke rolling off of the target.

Consecration ⫻ The exact opposite of Phantombane. Stormy projects an aura that repels Abberations. What type of Aberration they are is irrelevant, as the spell does not discriminate. When exposed to the magic, Aberrant targets will feel a burning sensation of pain and weakness overtake them as their connection to magic and the Paranormal diminishes. Adepts and Apparitions adjoined to the affected targets will feel absolutely nothing, and may not even realize the spell is active. Stormy's favorite way to execute this spell is to punch something with it.

Consecration is identified by a consistent green glow emitting from the target.

Dragonhide ⫻ Dragonhide provides enhanced physical durability, allowing someone to shrug off shots from a handgun, or a knife to the stomach. A punch to the face would barely be felt at all. When applied to objects, Dragonhide makes them incredibly sturdy, allowing someone to smash through something with a piece of cardboard as if it were a sledgehammer.

Dragonhide is identified by a glowing scale-like pattern spreading across the surface of a target.

Witchveil ⫻ Witchveil supercharges the target’s Emotional Field to grant them extra resistance to Abstractions. Incoming magic has a harder time getting through the Emotional Field, and this can act as a substitute for people who do not have one, such as Blinds and One-Eye-Opens. In the case of someone who does have their own Emotional Field, they will experience a backlash effect once this wears off, where they are more vulnerable to magic than normally. Blinds, One-Eye-Opens and similar entities will not experience this once Witchveil wears off.

Witchveil is identified by a green, crackling energy that forks outwards like lightning.

Plagueward ⫻ The Plagueward aura was originally a running joke among Stormy’s friends back in the old days. But as a Yellow Adept, it made perfect sense. It is magic protection for the totally innocent sexy times that totally never happen, which applies to everyone inside the radius. It can be applied to objects, but this mainly just disinfects the surface.

Plagueward is identified by waves of green energy gently rolling across someone’s skin.

LIMITS ⫻ All of Stormy’s magic operates with low range, and demands some level of attention. Phantombane and Consecration have a maximum range of 20 feet, and all of the Abjuration Arts last for exactly 15 minutes. Granting an aura to an entity with an Emotional Field requires their consent. Even if the entity doesn’t not truly know what he is about to do, Stormy still requires them to invite him into their Emotional Field. Abjuration Art auras cannot be canceled early. An active aura can be renewed with physical contact, but it must run its course if Stormy wants to apply a different aura to himself or someone else.

This can lock Stormy out of half of his spells entirely if he miscalculates a fight. Each aura is visually distinct, meaning someone can study his magic and identify each one to plan accordingly.

While the Abjuration Arts are passive when used, Defender’s Arsenal spells are active. They have “weight” to them, and each one is a burden on Stormy’s magic. This is directly related to the amount of a damage a specific smell can withstand before breaking. More shields means more weight, more weight limits how much he can cast magic. The Stoic Shell, for example, is enough of a strain that Stormy can only make one copy of it at a time. This also applies to the Iron Fortress, which completely overtakes all other shield spells, snuffing them out to make room. Guardian Barriers are the “lightest” shield, which makes them easy to cast in large quantities.

WEAKNESSES ⫻ (DO NOT FILL THIS OUT, I WILL PROVIDE IT FOR YOU)

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

Interactions: Oh, you know.

Cracker Barrel

---

Perhaps Sloane was just a bit more hammered than she appeared. Once they teleported, she started mouthing off in Jack's direction about how he had been gone forever. Jack was, admittedly, caught off guard by that. A drunk person's words were a sober person's thoughts. Sloane held it against him for retreating into the Void and never leaving so much as a voicemail, didn't she? Of course she did, the entire coven had the right to do so.

"I got around just fine without you."

It didn't show, thanks to the shadows concealing Jack's face, but that comment didn't sit well with him. This whole time, she could've said something. She could've pulled him aside and asked, "why didn't you come back?" or, "What was so important that you never returned?" But it took four strong drinks for her to even imply she took offense to it. Jack would've admitted to the fact that he should've come home sooner. He would've taken the blame, she didn't have to hold onto it like that. Sloane didn't have to wait until now to throw it in his face.

"You go after Sloane, I'll catch up, I need to make sure she doesn't lose everything after offending the man who practically runs the city.”

Who?

"Who...?" Jack didn't recognize that man. Why would he? He didn't seem like anything special.

"I'll be back," he said, concealing his discomfort at Sloane's jab as Anya walked off.

Jack stepped into an alleyway, and teleported up to the rooftops, following Sloane in secret until she came to a stop. She was easy to spot, in that bright red trench coat of hers. Meanwhile, no one would be able to catch a glimpse of the ominous shade flickering in and out of the background as he kept up with her. Tonight was meant to be fun, and Sloane wasn't having any. Did he really get under her skin that much? Was coming back a mistake? Had she been waiting for an excuse to tell Jack that he should go back to the Void? Jack trailed Sloane long enough that, hopefully she managed to cool down at least enough to be interacted with.

And then he stepped out into the open, pulling his hood off to reveal his face again. Not a trace of emotion was on it. Sloane, what is it that troubles you tonight? It isn't Drake, or me, is it?"

Interactions: A Gaggle of Dipshits, and his Friends

Isle of Cracks

---

"Then don't."

Well, there it was. They didn't care enough to commit. There was no conviction, no determination in what Meifeng was trying to pitch. The moment she met resistance, she bent. Stormy felt that he was being clinically objective in his dissecting of her excuses. And by all accounts, he felt Meifeng was genuinely sorry about the incident. But she wasn't sorry enough to dwell on it, and he couldn't expect her to. As one of her companions explained, Director Alcott simply didn't have the time to care, so it was up to the PRA to decide if keeping good relations with the paranormal scene was worth their time. Stormy wasn't sympathetic to her response, but he saw the point in it. And he saw the point in what Bianca provided. It was hard to be mad at Bianca in particular, she was a survivor of the old days, and blood like that ran deeper than most were willing to accept. If he were there, when the attack happened, Stormy would've gone to a maximum security paranormal holding facility for the bloodbath that he'd leave behind. Or, at the very least, for trying. He understood that protective streak, it was what made him who he was.

He saw the look Lila gave him. Stormy accepted that. He'd accept every hateful, bitter word from every last member of the coven for this. Someone had to at least try and make peace before things escalated into a cycle of revenge. Even if things would only be made worse in time by Stormy's actions, he could say that he handled things with dignity, that he tried to do the best he could; An error of compassion beat an error of malice. Stormy reached into his jacket and pulled his wallet out...

“A Moscow mule.”

“Make that two Moscow mules,”

"Make it three, and bottled water if you have it."

Stormy sat two $100 bills down on their table, in the center to pay for the drinks.

"Actions speak louder than words, that's true." he acknowledged. "So let me be a man of my word." Being a senior-level college professor, Stormy had plenty of cash to spare when he was in the mood.

"I'm not going to patronize anybody here by implying that we are destined to be able to make amends properly. But I want to, at the very least, try to make that a possible future. We're dying, you know this already. And the truth is we've got nothing to show for the investigations we've conducted," to say nothing of the fact that their investigating amounted to a disaster thus far. "Bianca is in danger, no less than any of us. We both want to protect our people, Meifeng. That means protecting the ones we care about from Father Wolf. If there is a chance that mine will live one more day by speaking like this, then I'll it my responsibility, and mine alone, so no one else has to sit through this. "

They could share information, and use apply it together to take the bastard down wherever he might be. Survival brought everyone together as kids, it could bring them together now, even if they were bound to divide again afterwards. "And if anyone holds it against me, just know that I'll respect that," he said, looking to his fellow covenmates. He knew Lila was the most pissed, and Stormy wanted to acknowledge her feelings, since they were unquestionably justified.

"But for now, drink to your hearts content, everyone. I meant what I said, it's on me tonight."

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

Here’s the updated version of Jack’s stuff, and the undisclosed reason he can navigate the Void so safely.

Jack’s Updated Spellbook

_{Abstraction
^{▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔}}
"Do not fear the darkness. Fear what lurks inside it."

TYPE ⫻ Adept

ABSTRACTION ⫻ Red-Purple Lux. Jack's channeler is a curious book.

ABSTRACTION DESCRIPTION ⫻ Jack blurs the lines between red and purple Lux into a form unique to him, allowing him to weave supernatural darkness into a variety of spells that allow him to manipulate his surroundings, protect people, and trespass into the Void. Jack is always lurking around every corner, in every shadow, only to be vanish like a ghost in the night.

Voidwalk ⫻ The spell that Jack considers his greatest work. As a kid, Jack developed a way to open up a doorway directly into the Void, and back into Shimmer. Doing this displaces him chronologically, meaning he could spend what feels like a day on the other side, but actually return several days later. The exact details of how he achieved this are a mystery. To open a portal, Jack requires several minutes to focus in a dimly lit area. During this time, he uses his shadowy red Lux to pull away at the "net" between worlds. The portal can only stay open for a few seconds at a time, after which the proverbial net will snap back like a rubber band. This spell is based on the concept of the Gloomy Step, and as a result of this, he can pick and choose certain regions of the Void to enter. One such region is a place he calls the Shadowzone, an area that is relatively untouched by the horrors of the Void, where Jack lives during his extended trips. If Jack does not actively decide where he wants to go in the Void, then his portal will place him somewhere at random.

Blackout Shift ⫻ A new spell that Jack has been inspired to create, thanks to a certain Blue-Orange Adept's magic. Jack marks a specific object with his magic, and can instantaneously teleport that object into his hands from anywhere in the All-Verse. The object must be inanimate, and must be something that a person can reasonably hold with one or two hands. Shadow marks may also be used to set up two-way transportation of objects, and marks can be used to indefinitely move the objects they are attached to. Jack can have up to four active marks at a time, and creating a fifth one destroys the oldest existing mark.

Umbramancy ⫻ The oldest form of Jack's Abstraction is the ability to transform otherwise normal darkness into something tangible through red Lux, within roughly 100 feet. He can pull a shadow off the wall, and shape it into strictly solid objects, use it to blind others or play tricks on someone. This expression of his Lux partly explains the amount of layers he tends to wear, as the shadows under his clothes make for a quick and dirty source of power. Jack can also create darkness, dimming down a normally well-lit room to the point that it becomes difficult to see. The light that would be rendered nonexistent by this magic does not go away permanently, Jack doesn't destroy light sources. Rather, he simply replaces it with magical darkness, meaning lights will return to normal when he wants them to, almost like something out of a horror movie. When Jack makes something solid out of shadows, it has about as much durability as hardwood. You could swing a hammer at them and you might not punch a hole through them but a gun would shoot right through.

Jack has a few specific Umbramancy tricks, to round out the broad nature of the spell.

Shroud ⫻ Jack throws a small orb of darkness that clings to the first person it hits, enveloping them in black smoke. This acts as a form of sensory deprivation, blinding the target and cutting them off from the sounds of the outside world. All they can hear is the sound of something grinding and churning against their ears, and all they can see is pitch black. This doesn't restrict movements, and lasts for only a few seconds in bright light. The Shroud lasts notably longer in dark places, but can be physically ripped away by someone under its effect, by tearing it off in chunks.

Reaper's Blade ⫻ One of the spells Jack regularly used to fight back against the Stygian Snake and its army. It is a scythe made of solidified shadows, sharp enough to cut through concrete and capable of doing significant damage to some apparitions, if they are vulnerable to Adept magic. The scythe is functionally weightless, and Jack can control the use of it with telekinetic precision when in a close range fight. This was the spell that branded him the resident edgelord of the coven.

Grasp of Nothing ⫻ Jack turns the shadows around him into a mass of arms that attack from every angle, clawing and scratching at whatever they can to wear targets down. When possible, these arms will try to lock someone down, but the spell gets weaker as the distance between the target and Jack grows.

Night Terror ⫻ Jack surrounds himself in a veil of shadows, letting him blend in with the darkness almost like a chameleon. In the right conditions, someone who managed to spot Jack would simply see a black, smoky silhouette of a person. This serves as both a method of concealment, and as a way to scare the living shit out of someone. Night Terror is not armor, and doesn’t provide any physical protection. But since it’s an Umbramancy technique, Jack can telekinetically make himself faster in the darkness.

In bright light, the Night Terror spell is effectively useless. Its main appeal is for situations that require stealth and evasion, and neither of those things come into play when Jack is out in the open.

Gloomy Step ⫻ If Jack can find a particularly dark area, he can walk into it to vanish on a whim, and appear at an exit point of his choosing. He has to picture this place in his mind, meaning he needs to have been there before, or have a picture of it that he can commit to memory. This means that Jack can suddenly appear on the other side of St. Portwell, but he can’t appear in Dollhouse’s basement. The only factor that Jack has to really consider with Gloomy Step is the light. He just be in a dark area to teleport, and it doesn’t stop him from teleporting to a bright area, but doing so would be a one-way trip.

Shadow Hand ⫻ Less a spell, and more a permanent replacement for the arm he lost during the battle with the Stygian Snake. Jack's left arm is made of magic darkness, and feels like solid rock when touched. He could use it to punch through windows and not feel a thing, crush tin cans with it, and carry things that would be too awkward to lift for others. The advantages stop there, since having a fake hand isn't the same as being supernaturally strong. It also makes blending in slightly challenging, since people tend to notice when your hand is solid black. The Blind, however, perceive his arm as flesh and blood at a glance. A closer inspection would reveal that the hand appears fake, as if made of plastic, implying strange at hand. (Get it?)

LIMITS ⫻ Jack's Abstraction comes with the territory of staying concealed and staying mobile. Intense light effectively starves him of his ability to use most of his magic. Put him on a beach at midday and the best he can do is start looking for shade. In worse cases, the poor bastard can't even open a water bottle, having lost a hand to the sun.

WEAKNESSES ⫻ The Void is easily the most dangerous element that is known, home to unimaginable horrors and God-like Eldritch abominations. Opening a door there can end badly if he uses it willy-nilly, and something can come through - or quickly kill him if they will it. Umbramancy is countered by light-based magic or magic that generates light, which means Photomancy hard-counters his Umbramancy, and the constructs are far easier to destroy with magic. The Gloomy Step does not indicate what is on the other side and can leave him in a sticky situation if he does it willy-nilly. Light-based magic can, again, render him unable to teleport altogether, if he's being exposed to it.

Also, people will make fun of him for how edgy he is.

THE BLACK STAR

^{_______________________________________________}

Hider

"Reality calcified, time and space crystalized. Entropy made manifest. Don't lose it out there." .................................................................................

. . When Jack Hawthorne first entered the Void, he was vulnerable to its influence like anyone else. The horrors of unreality fascinated him, but a fascination didn’t stop his mind from fraying at the seams. He was lucky to have only caught a glimpse of them, but Jack knew deep down that he would not be satisfied without deeper answers for long. He drifted through the Void’s shallows, learning what he could before he could no longer safely study anything new. It frustrated him, not being able to venture further. So he returned to Shimmer, and sought answers back in familiar territory. Scouring through books, secluded libraries and the paranormal scenes of the country, Jack’s pursuit eventually led him to the doorstep of a man who called himself Mortimer Zapata. In exchange for a written copy of all the knowledge Jack had acquired in his life, as well as Jack’s discretion, Mortimer worked his magic to create a special object to accommodate Jack’s incursions into the Void.

The Black Star is a non-Abstraction granting artifact created by Orange Lux. It is a small amulet made of polished black jade, rose gold, and African blackwood. Whoever wears it is rendered entirely immune to the harmful effects of the Void, allowing the mind to heal the worst of its damage. The Black Star’s protection even diminishes the effects of what Jack calls “Void Exposure,” or the mental erosion caused by the denizens of the Void. The artifact wards them off, acting as a deterrent so long as the user does not actively aggress or agitate the horrors. Anyone can benefit from the Black Star regardless of their Abstraction, but the artifact requires a brief period to “calibrate” itself to the unique emotional field of every person that wears it for the first time. This means that a person can wear the Black Star and still be ruined by exposure to the Void if they are not aware of its nuances.

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

Interactions: Oh, you know.

Cracker Barrel

---

While Sloane and Anya had somehow managed to inhale four drinks individually, as if they were Drake and Sully, Jack had only gotten halfway through a single drink. As someone who frequently teleported, he tried not to get too drunk- Don’t drink and drive, don’t drink and teleport. Jack listened intently as Sloane explained that she almost ran into Drake, and how she didn’t understand why things were allowed to be so shitty without intervention. Truly, Drake hadn’t changed, and he was always an ass.

Though, perhaps there was a world in which the same old Drake from years past was not a bad thing. It certainly wasn’t the one where his wife was dead, however.

”Nothing is permanent, my drunken friend,” he said, cryptically, before Sloane stood up deciding not to think about a damn thing other than their own amusement for the night. Jack grinned behind the veil of his magic and cheap costume.

”Yes, of course. Let’s go.”

They teleported out, and Jack was conveniently the only one that didn’t feel heavily nauseous upon arrival. When they walked out into the open, a small part of him died. Sully, Drake, Vashti and Emily fucking Reed were dancing in a conga line. The Greek gods of yesteryear were making merry with a dinosaur and some redheaded person.

Jack was speechless. And not in a good way. It was so foolish, and it was just like Drake and Sully to act like total dumbasses. But… That was not the same man that he saw at Dairy Queen a week ago. Not the man who almost cut Jack’s head off when he reappeared in Shimmer.

He hadn’t changed in any way at all, had he? Not for better, not for worse.

The only reason he didn’t stop and lament about the future of the coven for the second time in his life was because Anya had gotten his attention.

”Yes, of course. Both of you, close your eyes. It will help with the jump.” He waited a second for them to do as instructed, and whisked them away again.

Once they were near Sloane’s stall, Jack let them both go about their business. ”Here we are. I suggest waiting before asking for another teleport, unless you want to experience tomorrow’s hangover tonight,” He said, right before falling silent… Something told him he’d need to talk some sense into Drake personally.

Avengers Academy: Junior Year 💥

Leah Jordan

---

Location: Hedge Maze > AA
Gear: A bloodstained dress and a sword
Skills:
Oh god oh fuck

---

---

She was mad. Leah had attacked and killed the creature that could have swallowed her girlfriend whole, and Sabine was mad. It was obvious, right? Leah wasn’t crazy for assuming based on the icy attitude she suddenly had after being so pissed at Nimue, was she? She wasn’t overreacting and making a mountain out of a molehill by filling in blanks that weren’t even there, right? Leah said absolutely nothing when Sabine walked off, and she couldn’t. There was this knot forming in her chest, a small note of dread that was only getting worse the longer Leah just stood around, doing nothing. She was such a god damn fool, a fucking moron! Of COURSE Sabine would’ve manipulated his memories to calm him down! She was in his HANDS! There was no possible reality in which Leah could’ve POSSIBLY killed him quicker than she could calm him down!

Did she have trust issues? Did she not trust Sabine to use just powers properly? No, of course she did. She saw dad beating she shit out of Leah once- But that was by accident- No, shut the fuck up and CALM THE FUCK DOWN!

Leah needed to move, or she’d be here all night.

April needed someone right now. She was crying, and Leah was still here moping over a dead dog. Leah was an absolute fucking joke of a girlfriend, screaming loud enough to shake the heavens when April was scared and vulnerable, and not stopping to think about the cost of vengeance. And now, she was just sulking.

Hee grip around the sword tensed up, threatening to shatter the hilt, before she took in a deep breath. She doesn’t hate you. She doesn’t. She doesn’t. She’s not mad, she’s just stressed out and doesn’t want to think about it anymore than you do. It’s going to be fine.

She could tell herself that all night, and maybe she could fool herself into thinking it might work if she tried hard enough.

Leah finally managed to turn her gaze away from the corpse and walk out of the doors. Tonight was a disaster, and it would’ve been so much easier on everyone if she had just listened to her own pitiful paranoia, and stayed in fucking bed. Leah could’ve saved everyone the trouble of embarrassing April, killing an innocent creature and now having to face all of her little fuckups if she didn’t have the hubris to think she could enjoy one night without a care; Why did she deserve to associate with people in a party? The one time she tried, she made everything so much worse.

The hallways were quiet, everyone was either dancing or in their dorms right now. Leah walked past hers, and stopped when she saw that there was a switchblade stuck in the door. A folded up postcard was nailed to the door by it. Leah stared at it for second, wondering why someone didn’t just tape it or something.

She learned her new sword against the wall and unstuck the postcard, letting the knife clutter to the floor. She opened it, and her blood ran cold. It said it was from Oslo, Norway. And there was nothing on the inside by two simple words.

Mayra Pavon

There were only two people alive in the universe who knew that name. Sabine was one of them, and Leah tried to kill the other one. The world around her fell away, like old quarters down a well, and there was only black around the edges of her vision.

Leah was a grain of sand in a desert. A drop of water in an ocean. She was incomprehensible small, unfit to stand against the weight of the world.

He found her. She was running out of time.

---

The low drone of the fluorescent lights held her attention long enough that she didn’t notice the needle, until after it had left her skin. She didn’t know what it was that he had put in it, but she didn’t feel like asking.

Mayra didn’t feel like eating, either. But she was hungry.

”Your wrist will heal in four days,” he told her, in a tone that she had long since come to understand as disappointment. ”And your training will continue in two.” Imperator fixed a look at her, which she didn’t see, because her eyes were cast down to the floor.

Then there was a pause.

”Look at me, Mayra.”

Her eyes snapped up to meet his, a pair of blood red orbs. Redder than all the blood she lost today.

”You had better start impressing me, before I break you down every day. Your mutant powers can rip a volcano from the earth, and today, you could barely push a cinder block. That is miserable. No daughter of mine is going to have such a sad excuse for control over her powers.”

She couldn’t look away, or he’d snap her legs again. Or maybe he’d put another hairline fracture in her skull. He could’ve done a thousand things to her before she could blink, sometimes… And he could tell she was shaking.

It only made him scowl.

”I…” She tried to say something, but quickly felt her voice die in her throat. The lab became dead silent. The lights weren’t loud enough.

”Speak up, girl.”

She couldn’t. He’d kill her if Mayra talked back to him. She looked away.

”Say it,” he demanded.

He hated repeating himself.

She could feel herself choking.

Imperator’s grip on her arm tightened. The fact that it didn’t hurt told her that she was in danger.

Silence. Suffocating silence.

”NOW!!!”

He screamed, and Mayra flinched as if he had punched her again. Her eyes screwed shut and did not open. She was going to die, she just knew it.

It was stupid to try and speak, but it would’ve been stupider not to listen to him.

”It’s too hard- I can’t- I-I can’t do it. I’m tired, it’s too much. It’s too hard to move anything else…”

She was worthless. Dead weight. A waste of resources. Imperator glared through her, Mayra could just feel how much he hated looking after a hopeless brat like her.

”If you’re too weak train, then you’re too weak to eat my food. Fix the rest of your injuries, and don’t take too long. You have work to do.”

He didn’t give her the chance to argue, not that she would have. He stood up, and walked out of the doors to the lab. The elevator whirred into silence as he went back up to the surface.

Mayra doubled over on the bed and finally broke down into tears. She sobbed, and trembled like a dying animal.

If he had seen her cry like this, he would’ve shot her between the eyes. So she didn’t allow herself to shed too many tears.

---

The door to the dorm opened slowly, and Leah stepped into the room to the sight of her “friends,” by someone’s definition, consoling April. Leah looked tired, dejected and lost. She held her sword and the veritable death knell with her birth name in one hand.

She didn’t have the right to be here.

”…I’m sorry,” she said, weakly, to April and Sabine.

The least she could do was pretend she deserved their love.

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

Interactions: A Gaggle of Dipshits, and his Friends

Isle of Cracks

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”I apologize. I hope that from here on, the Coven and PRA can have a positive relationship."

I’ve seen conservative politicians lie better than that, Liao, he thought to himself. He was willing to believe that there existed such a reality in which Meifeng genuinely felt bad about what she did. But he was not born yesterday, and Lila, being the only one really staring Stormy down intensely right now, would be able to see the subtle expression of… Unamusement on his face that no one else could. It was easy for him to keep things from strangers, but his friends were always very good at reading him like a kindergarten-level book.

And he knew better than to believe that the PRA wanted a positive relationship with them. Police officers didn’t give a rat’s ass about having a positive relationship with the communities they regulated, prison guards couldn’t give a shit maintaining a positive relationship with inmates. It wasn’t in their job description to play nice with people, especially not when there wasn’t anyone around to hold them accountable. That was why Stormy decided to extend an olive branch to these people. Not to befriend them, but to know his enemy.

His drink came by, a dark and stormy. The man who ordered it did so as a joke, hoping someone would pick up on just how absolutely masterful his sense of humor was. He took a contemplative sip of it and measured his words carefully, and professionally.

”It is not my place to decide whether you should be forgiven. And I have no right to take you up on your offer. But, I’m glad you mention it… I was not present when you overstepped,” he explained factually, without any audible judgment. ”But my understanding of your command structure is that you have a superior you answer to. Director Alcott, I believe their name is? Do they allow you the freedom to maintain a positive relationship with us? With Greenwood? 8th Street?” It was taking a monumental effort to be calm right now. When he first heard about the raid, Stormy was tempted to hop into his car and hunt them all down for sport, like something out of a movie. But there were more important things to worry about at the time.

Similarly, there were things more important in the present moment than being outwardly hostile. Lila and Lynn were absolutely right. He could play nice with them, but under no circumstances was he going to be friendly with them.

”You were angry, because Kali Mahendra was killed. We were angry because he was killed. Now, my friends can tell you that I be irrational myself,” Stormy damn near tore Britney’s head clean off when he first saw her during the reunion... And when he learned about what she did a decade ago. ”But… Was there not a better way to prove we were innocent? You are a government agency, you likely knew exactly where we were at the time of his death, every last one of us. And more importantly, you had to have known that we were all returning here for a reason, including Kali; An agent who our leader contacted.”

He said all this as if he were presenting evidence in a court room. Not an accusation in sight, just cold, clinical observation. ”Would agent Mahendra not have reported that information to you? It stands to reason that, because you have- had two of our former members working under you, your department would have known about our reunion long before we arrived.”

There is something that goes unsaid, there: You have no excuse.

”So, I’m sure you can understand why your apology isn’t easy to believe.”

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

Inferno - STRIKE THE MATCH! - Concluded

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Jack Hawthorne

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Location | The Sanctum Sanctorum
Skills | Extra-Planar Navigation, Magic Expertise, Basic Spellcraft, Soul Staff, Mutant Circuit
Spells |
Outfit

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It went so, so wrong.

To Jack’s credit, the portals absolutely started draining the infernal energy into the Everdark. But the problem with being magically connected to an entire plane of reality was that the energy of that realty flowed through him. Every facet of Jack’s self started withering, his bones felt weaker and his teeth loosened from his jaw. Time slipped away faster and faster. Moreover, he felt himself dying. His vision was fading to black just before he saw Ananym in the blaze of the pentagram. Needling him, taunting his blunder. Jack wasn’t surprised by this outcome, after all, anything was possible through magic.

The Everdark would be fine, he felt sure of that. It was all but boundless as the known universe. By the time that energy spread, it would be absorbed by something. And by the time something absorbed it, another one of the land’s monstrous denizens would simply adhere to the food chain, and the corruption would dwindle into nothing.

Would this world be fine? Was this the last story he would ever witness? In all of Jack’s years, he learned time and time again that nothing could last forever. Everything came and went, but evils rose and fell in the same way. If he slipped into the endless sleep of death now, Jack would become a fleeting memory. Reza wasn’t around to remember him, neither were Stephen and Ororo. He would not be remembered, even if the other seven companions on this journey somehow managed to stop Witchfire.

And yet, Jack felt that he was okay with that.

The impact he had on countless places would live on. Someone would one day stumble upon the things he left behind, and make something of themselves. He was one drop in a cosmic ocean, but part of it no less. And for him, that was enough…

Until Max saved his ass.

He felt Max’s magic overlapping with his own, mixing like blood in clear water. It spread, until the blood had no beginning, and the water had no end. They were no longer Jack and Max, but one individual. It was… Strange. And Jack- What part of them was Jack, had to think. They were one now, and their magic was equally unified.

”You damned fool,” he said to himself. ”Now we’ll both die from this.”

"I can't die yet, got a husband and kid waiting for me back home. But what we can do is give it our all and take this thing down."

He thought to themselves… Magic was a method of infinite possibilities. What separated a good wizard from the best was how they applied the possibilities, how they turned the circumstances against them into a favorable outcome.

So how did they turn this into an advantage?

For a moment, Jack was silent. Perhaps Max knew every thought in his mind now, how he desperately wanted to do the right thing. A plan slowly formed in his mind.

”I’ve got it… We’ll use your magic to teleport the power source away to safety, one by one. And we’ll use mine to substitute a source in, until it is safe to collapse the pentagram in on itself,” he explained. ”I will use Everdark energy in place of it, and I will cut it off once everyone is at a safe distance. The pentagram should, in theory, have no more fuel at that point.”

"The force binding them was too strong for me earlier to teleport them off...but perhaps united we actually stand a chance. Especially if we're swapping one source for another...Fine. It's the best lead we have, worst case we fail and approach from another angle we haven't thought of yet."

”Or the Veil suffers for nothing. The risk is that we do more damage than we can fix with our divided power.”

It scared him, to not be able to stop the incursion permanently.

”But we’ve run through most of our options. So, if you’re ready…”

"As ready as I can be I suppose."

They reached for the energy of Jack’s home, and split open fonts of darkness to replace the babies. Like fuming black holes, the energy leaked into the open air of Earth and dissipated into harmless nothingness in equal measure. The energy sources spilled out dark energy in total equilibrium. In the same motion, they asserted their will over reality itself, and three of them were sent off into who-knows-where.

”It is working, slowly but steadi-“

The energy of the pentagram cascaded at one corner, immediately mutating one of them. A pang of stress filled Jack. ”No- Damn you, Witchfire,” he hissed. ”…Three out of five, Max. Progress, at last. All we have to do is continue, and hope for the best. And… Make a note to see if we can undo the mutation that just occurred once we have a chance.”

It was working, even if the results were unexpected.

Max helped guide his magic as the pair moved as one. Each infant appearing in the only location he knew to send them, the main floor of the Sanctum Sanctorum. A place both wizards were well acquainted with. He'd initially thought to send them to Xaviers, but there was no guarantee these babes were mutants or orphans, so it was best to keep them close. "There's nothing wrong with having a mutation Jack, though I suppose we could attempt to reverse the mutate if it is possible at all."

”This is not quite the same mutation that my old friends from Charles Xavier’s mansion are familiar with. We are responsible for that, it is the least we can do. Though, if we cannot, then we will decide what to do afterwards.”

They had a solution now, and everything seemed so much easier when the way ahead was clear.