[Story] Chronicles of Jakob Pettersohn (01/Jun/08 - Final chapter)

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

more conversation can be supplied, if you want to chat about it, but this probably isn't the place :-)

If you want to discuss it in depth, email is fine.

Not especially :-) It was more a "well, here's a few thoughts, and if you want to chase them up, perhaps see if something percolates and generates a more interesting story, whilst papering over the possible hole" sort of thing.

If you do, pm me, it'll email me, and I'll email you back. (I get ~80 or so spams a day, and rising fast, so I'm kinda paranoid about putting my email address out there on websites. :-/ )

[Tapewolf]

Chapter 9

At first I feared that the shock of Azrael's discovery, which he had pinned so much hope on, would plunge him into a chronic depression.  Indeed, he was rather sullen for rest of the day, although by morning he had begun to take an interest in things again.

Wilson had no real plans of his own, other than to travel around the country, and we tentatively revealed to him that we were searching for a very specific monument.  It turned out that he believed in some rather peculiar magical phenomena, such as the ability of pyramids to sharpen razorblades so he fairly quickly deduced that we were searching for a rock with special mystical vibrations.  A rather shrewd guess, all told.

With this in mind, he was happy to help us in our quest and proved a most valuable ally.  Stopping at the nearby city of Salisbury, Azrael and I played tourist for a bit, exploring a magnificent church known as Salisbury Cathedral.  I was astonished to learn that the priests worshipped the same god as the congregation where I grew up, although they did not call themselves 'The Church of Christ the Human' for fairly obvious reasons.

I also managed to purchase a UHER 4000 magnetic recorder and some tapes for it, two of which had pre-recorded material on them, the rest of which were empty.  Foolishly I left it in the van while purchasing some more food.  By the time I returned, Azrael had removed the the back cover and was spinning the large central flywheel with his finger.  He would probably have had the entire machine in pieces if I had not rescued it from his clutches.

After some further study at the local library, Azrael and I had produced another shortlist of monuments which could possibly be dimensional gates.  With Wilson's aid, we drove around the country checking them out.
We did actually find one, which caused Azrael to become excited, but it was pretty far gone and a number of stones had been removed.  We made a note of it, intending to return if we had no further success.  With some work, we might be able to reactivate it, although since some of the missing stones had apparently been broken up and used for houses or walls, it was only a slightly better proposition than summoning a Warp-Aci.

Our journeying was interrupted late one evening in August when a news broadcast came through on Wilson's radio which caused him a great deal of concern.  Apparently a nuclear submarine named HMS Resolution was going to be docking at a port in a place known as Barrow.  Since it was still fairly new there were some teething troubles and the machine was going to undergo a minor overhaul in the shipyard where it was assembled over the course of about three years, to the consternation of many.

On hearing this, Wilson became frantic and decided that we had to go there immediately to protest against it.  I was not sure why at the time, but I cautioned Azrael to be quiet.  Since it was fairly late, Wilson was already a little drowsy so we pulled up by a stream somewhere in the north of a place called Wales and camped for the night.

While Wilson slept, I probed his mind and reported what I could see to Page.  I made sure that he was asleep while we spoke - it would prevent him from hearing us, and it also allowed me to go a lot further into his sleeping mind than would have been possible with him awake.

"It seems that the humans have harnessed a great source of power," I said.  "If I didn't know better I'd say it was magic.  Apparently there are certain kinds of rock, which, when purified, release energy.  If you bring several pieces of the rock together it will generate an enormous amount of energy.
But this energy is poisonous and destroys life.  The residue will remain dangerous for thousands and thousands of years.  People are concerned about this since it will generate a lot of waste which they don't know what to do with, and also because if there is an accident, the poison could be spread over a large area."

"That doesn't sound too bad," said Azrael.  "All they need to do is get a dragon to look after this waste..  Oh.  No dragons."

"There's more," I said.  "They have also discovered that if you bring the pieces of rock together in the right way it will cause an explosion large enough to vapourise an entire city and turn an area the size of Zinvth and Armansta combined into a poisonous wasteland.  Wilson has seen some film of the results.  It's very, very bad stuff."

Azrael was silent for a few moments.  "And this 'submarine' thing has something to do with this energy source?"

"Yes.  They call it 'nuclear energy' or 'atomic power'.  The poison is called 'radiation' and appears to be an uncontrolled emission of dangerous energy.  You know, it's starting to come back to me now.  I read a few things about this in the encyclopedia, but it didn't make sense at the time.

"Anyway.  The HMS Resolution is a warship in the rough shape of a whale which is completely enclosed and able to sail beneath the water, where it can go undetected.
This particular machine does two things which upset Wilson and his friends. Firstly, it uses a nuclear power source to drive all its systems, and secondly, it is armed with atomic weapons, the ones which can vapourise cities."

"But why?"  Azrael was aghast. "What are they fighting against that would need that much death?  Demons?  'cubi?  Dragons?  A Fae gone rogue?"

"No, just other humans.  They call them the Russians, and they call themselves the 'Free West'.  Both sides have these terrible weapons and each side is afraid that the other will use them first.  The populace has either gone into a state of quiet resignation of their impending doom, or has determined to enjoy life while they can.  I think you can tell which group Wilson falls into.

"There's one other thing," I continued. "These Russians have apparently infiltrated the Free West with spies who disguise themselves as Free Westians but may suddenly cause chaos or something when they receive the appropriate  signal from their controllers.
It seems we were lucky with the gold.. the Free Westians are on the lookout for unusual behaviour and may have reported us as suspected agents of the Russia.  I didn't see anything in anyones' mind at the time, but we could easily have got into real trouble."

"These humans are bat-shit crazy." said Azrael.  "Um, anyway.  So where is this Barrow place?"

"Somewhere north of here, I think.  We'll have to ask Wilson when he wakes."

* * *

We were somewhere around Barrow on the edge of the coastline when the drugs began to take hold.  The van careened off the road with enough force to take it over the concrete barrier, smashing the suspension and into the sea leaving a trail of Volkswagen-branded parts in its wake.  The only thing I remember after that was waking up in a prison cell with Azrael and Wilson, but as I listened with my mind, I could hear the thoughts of the chief policemen in the room above.

He was composing the charge sheet in his head.  They were going to bust us for possession of the illegal drugs in Wilson's stash, probably with intent to sell, as said stash was quite considerable.  They hadn't worked out where I had managed to get all the gold from, or why I had an opened pack of rawhide dog-chews in my backpack, but he was assuming it was in some way drug-related.  One of the chews had been sent off for analysis.

They had also taken my UHER, the portable record player and our notes on the stone circles, which the chief was convinced was where we were meeting to sell our ill-gotten wares.  Fortunately they had not taken Azrael's charm, or all kinds of savage hell would have broken loose when he reverted to feline form.  Nonetheless, he looked very pale.

"What's the matter?" I asked.

"You remember that conversation we had last night?  About the submarine?" he replied.

"Ye-ee-ss.." I said slowly, although I knew what was coming.

"I recorded it," he said.

I was silent for a few moments, as all our plans of quietly exiting from this world suddenly vanished in a puff of Mary.  "Well, then," I concluded, "We shall have to leave.  We simply cannot allow them to play that back."

Wilson looked extremely alarmed.  "Are you dudes.."

"..Spies?" I said.  "No.  But I'm not sure you'd believe me if I told you the truth anyway.  Certainly I don't know what they'd make of it, but I don't intend to find out.  It's so far outside their experience that they'd probably assume we were spies anyway."

"What are you going to do, then?"  said Azrael.  "Warp-Aci?"

"No!" I replied.  "I told you, they take days to summon and anyway, seeing that would make the contents of the tape seem like a cub's bed-time story by comparison."  Wilson's eyes bulged, but I ignored him.

"We're in trouble.  Whatever we do will leave some evidence, but perhaps I can minimise it."  I moved towards the cell door.

As a cub, Izak and I had been quite proficient with magic, far more so than a regular Being, and this might have tipped us off that we were 'cubi and not simply a hybrid of wolf and phoenix as we had first assumed.  Among the spells which I had in my admittedly small repertoire were a few which could be used to levitate rocks and move other small objects.

I pressed my hand against the lock, which glowed faintly and the bolt slowly began to withdraw.  A little while later it became stuck.  My hand glowed brightly and the bolt suddenly shot back with a most unpleasant sound as the metal within the lock sheared.  "Oops," I said.  Wilson said nothing, but his face had turned the same colour as Page's fur.

"Wait here," I said and crept out.  Unfortunately I didn't have the ability to make myself invisible at the time, but I was able to use my 'cubi shapeshifting powers to blend myself in with the wall.  This helped as long as I moved slowly.

Suddenly one of the policemen saw me.  Then his eyes took on a glazed look and he slumped to the ground.  I propped him in a chair and crept upstairs, hunting for the police chief's mind.  Several more policemen saw me and they too fell - in a world devoid of mindreaders, they had not evolved any kind of mental shielding.

I would have done the same thing to the police chief, but unfortunately I needed to know where our possessions were.  So I knocked, entered and said "Excuse me, sir, can I have my tape recorder back, please?"

"You!" he exclaimed, and pressed a button sounding an alarm.  "How did you get out of your cell?"

"Magic," I replied.  "Now please, give back my recorder."

In my mind I felt another policeman about to enter the room.  All the police chief heard was a muted thump as he fell to the ground as well.

"All your staff are unconscious now, so you're on your own," I said, starting to lose patience.  "Now give me the recorder.. I don't want to have to hurt you."

"No," he replied and drew out a small black object with a protrusion from his belt.  Very quickly he pointed it at me and with a loud retort there was a sudden, intense pain in my arm.
I screamed, not a human scream, but a feral one, a howl of primal rage and pain.  My tentacles sliced through the metal of the weapon, removing the tips of his fingers.  Reverting from the shock of the pain, he saw me in my true form, managing to utter the words "..what are you..?" before he too crumpled and fell.

Sadly for him it was not a clean, precise edit like the others.  A wounded 'cubi does not usually do a good job.  We later found that it took him a month to awake from the coma.

Shutting off the alarm, I found some bandages and wrapped them around my arm.  Unfortunately Wilson entered the room at that moment and promptly became the second human to see me in my true form before I was able to shapeshift back.  I ate his terror which helped to speed up the healing process considerably and also left him relatively placid.

We searched the police station and found the tapes, the recorder and various other things including the stolen library books which we had actually come for.  Unfortunately there was too much for us to carry without the van, so we had to leave most of Wilson's stash.  Realising that, he had immediately gone for the marijuana again although to his credit, it made his nerves a lot steadier.
Taking the pieces of the chief's weapon, I put them and the remains of my gold into a briefcase, having tipped the prior contents onto the floor.  At that point we were able to leave the station.

No explanation was ever offered for our mysterious arrest and breakout.  Since we were high at the time they never got our names and with no witnesses who could remember the event at all, the incident was explained away as the result of some weird drug in Wilson's stash and quietly forgotten.

As we crossed the street, I suddenly realised that I no longer had the charm which Fa'lina had given me to return to SAIA.

"What..?" screamed Azrael, "you mean you could have taken us back to the Academy all this time?!?"

"My Gods, Page!" I exploded, "Don't you think I already tried that?  It's dead as stone!  But assuming we get back to Furrae, I would very much like to keep all my options open!"

The fumes from Wilson's Mary gradually began to calm our tattered nerves, and we trudged back towards the small town of Ulveston, where the van had been wrecked during Wilson's ill-advised experiment to see whether acid would improve his driving skills.  The last time I had removed my shirt had been in that van, so the necklace had to be inside it.

"Hey, Cross, man, can I ask.. like, what are you?"
These were the first coherent words which Wilson had uttered since our escape from the cell, when his already strange life had suddenly been turned inside-out.

"Okay, Wilson," I started, "I feel guilty that we've dragged you into this mess, so I guess you deserve the truth.  This is going to be quite a head-trip, I'm afraid.  Are you up to it?"  He nodded.

Taking a deep breath, I began.  "Myself and Page - or Azrael as he prefers to be called - are magical creatures from another dimension.  I have the ability to change form and read minds."  I ignored the bit about being able to steal and eat people's souls as he clearly wasn't ready for that.

"We come from a society which is rather backwards compared to yours, and so we travelled here to learn of your technology in the hopes that it could improve our own world.  Unfortunately we became trapped, and since that morning in Clacton we have been examining various ancient monuments in the hopes that we can find an abandoned but working transdimensional gate and reactivate it."

He nodded again.  "So what are the people like back on your world?"

"Well, unlike yours there are many different types of us.  You only seem to have humans as the sole intelligent race - for us, there are no humans and we are different kinds of animal.  You saw that I am a winged wolf.  Page here is a snow leopard.  His race can't shapeshift, so he relies on a magical charm to conceal himself.  If we find a secluded spot, he can probably show you if you like."

Wilson shook his head vigorously.

"I understand," I said.  "You know, I didn't know I was a shapeshifter at first.  It came as quite a shock, especially when I discovered that I would live to be maybe three thousand years old..."

"How old are you now?" he asked.

"Around 410," I said.  "You tend to lose track after the first hundred years... you start thinking in decades instead."

The police had had some difficulty removing the van, so it was still more-or-less where we had left it, but they had taken up where the sea couldn't reach it.  Sending the police men left to guard it to sleep, we entered the van and I quickly found my precious necklace, along with a few other oddments which I was reluctant to leave.

As we left the van, Page - having acute vision - caught sight of something on a nearby hill.  He sniffed twice, and began to get quite excited, just as he had at stonehenge and when we found the defunct gate in Monmouth.

"It's a gate!" he cried.  "I tell you it's a gate.  I can feel its energy.  Wilson, do you know what that hill is?"

"I dunno, man," Wilson replied.  "It's a common.. I went there last year after the protest when the Resolution was launched.  You know... there is a stone circle up there.  Called the Druid's Temple, I think.  Someone did feel some good vibes when we were up there before, man.  I thought they just had some good grass, though."

* * *

Strangely, as we approached the circle, Page became less tense and more businesslike.  He was utterly convinced of the gate, and I was dreading what he might do if it proved to be another failure.   Nervously I took one of the dog chews and munched at it as he set to work.

"The circle has been damaged," he said, "but I think I can compensate for it." so saying, he searched for a particular piece of rock, eventually taking one from a dry stone wall and placing it upon the ground in the centre of the circle.

"I must warn you, this is going to be a little different to the gates we've used before," he added and as his hands glowed, the rock began to rotate slowly , and then gained speed.  As it rose into the air, the ground in the circle began to glow faintly and then became brighter and brighter until finally the Gate was there in all its glory, blue as the morning sky.

"Well," he said to a stunned-looking Wilson, "I guess this is goodbye.  We're extremely grateful for everything you have done, both to help us find out way back and to help us understand your world's culture."
Azrael gave him the briefcase full of of gold as a parting gift and we shook hands, but there was a funny light in his eyes.  The Mary made it a little hard to read his mind so I couldn't see why at the time.

Page and I held hands and jumped into the Gate.  The transition was a little unfortunate since our gate was horizontal and the receiving gate was vertical, so we landed on our asses.. all three of us.

"Oh dear," I said, looking at Wilson.
"You can say that again," said Azrael, but he was looking at the three weasel guards pointing their halberds at us.

[Hilary]

Hahaha... I love Wilson. (For some reason, I keep thinking about that volleyball in Castaway...)

"Um, anyway.  So where is this Barrow place?"

"Somewhere north of here, I think.  We'll have to ask Wilson when he wakes."

Couldn't Jakob just find out by poking around in Wilson's head like he did for the submarine?

[Gabi]

Interesting developments. In spite of all the Mary.

[Hilary]

Interesting developments. In spite of all the Mary.

Or, very possibly, because of.

[Tapewolf]

Hahaha... I love Wilson. (For some reason, I keep thinking about that volleyball in Castaway...)

"Um, anyway.  So where is this Barrow place?"

"Somewhere north of here, I think.  We'll have to ask Wilson when he wakes."

Couldn't Jakob just find out by poking around in Wilson's head like he did for the submarine?

I'm assuming that he's not so good at reading geographic data from people's minds.  Note that he did get the rough direction.

Interesting developments. In spite of all the Mary.

Or, very possibly, because of.

Last night (apart from the first 2k, this was written last night in an enormous chunk) I came perilously close to having all three of them on pot as they left the police station.  But so far I have maintained Jakob's stance on mind-altering chemicals (he doesn't take them intentionally) and I intend to keep it that way.

Originally Wilson was going to play back the recording of the submarine conversation, but I just couldn't resist adapting the opening line from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, which of course meant that it was going to end up badly.  Originally they were going to go to Barrow, protest and stop off at Ulveston on the way back, but I think this was more interesting and it had the side-effect of trapping them in the right location by destroying the van.
Breaking out of prison was a theme I'd been toying with, although the original idea for that one was that they were accused of being communist spies since they didn't fit in properly.
When I lived in Swindon there were a couple in our street who my father was convinced were sleeper agents.  He is rather left-wing himself though and merely eyed them with curiosity.  He once told me he was tempted to ask them what they were going to do now after the USSR collapsed in the early 90s.

**EDIT**
Incidentally, this is NOT the part where Jakob develops his horror of guns.  That comes later.

**EDIT EDIT**
I've made a few wording changes to the scene where they're in the holding cell.  I think the new description is funnier, but I might change it back.

[Gareeku]

Hehe, i really like that line from Fear and Loathing, nice touch. Makes me wanna watch the movie again. >.>

A very good read so far, JP, though I didn't realise that cubi could travel through dimensions to ours.

[Tapewolf]

Hehe, i really like that line from Fear and Loathing, nice touch. Makes me wanna watch the movie again. >.>

The book is better, although the film is one of the best book adaptations I've ever seen.  The acid trip from a few chapters back also owes a lot to it although it was also based on a few other sources as well.

A very good read so far, JP, though I didn't realise that cubi could travel through dimensions to ours.

Furrae has dimensional gates, as seen in strip #59.  If humans can use them to enter Furrae, it stands to reason that Furrae can use them to enter Earth, but for plot convenience and DMFA continuity reasons it's a rare skill (or most people are happy to stay in their own dimension). 

Azrael/Page has discovered how to create dimensional gates on demand (see Ch4).  Ultimately Jakob will learn how to do this himself without any instrumentation but it does cost him a lot of energy.  This is where all his Earth-based equipment comes from, by the way.

However, it's worth bearing in mind that Warp-Aci can also cross the dimensional barrier (that's what summoning them does).

[Gareeku]

Very good points, JP, though surely furrae would have the type of recording equipment Jakob likes to collect and use? Sure some aspects of Furraen () culture may seem medieval-like, but if you take in account of cars (pretty modern-looking ones too, like the "Pinto" mentioned in one of the strips where a dragon has just sat on a car. However, cars may be much rarer than they are on Earth)  and (presumably) colour T.V then I don't see why Jakob wouldn't be able to obtain the recording equipment. Of course, the equipment may not have even been invented in Furrae, so that would kinda crush my arguement. 

[Tapewolf]

Very good points, JP, though surely furrae would have the type of recording equipment Jakob likes to collect and use?

Indeed, but Jakob is doing this 500 years before the comic began - the rise of Being technology on Furrae is quite a recent thing which the Creature Council is struggling to understand.

The way I've been handling it, Jakob is buying the original equipment from Earth, but having the consumables (tape, film, spare parts) made on Furrae.  The technology that Jakob and Azrael have stolen is eventually replicated on Furrae, probably through subtle influencing on his part, but I'm leaving that bit ambiguous to avoid conflict with the strip.

Some things which Azrael originally developed, like patches, have been lost and rediscovered since (although Jyrras' patches are more stable than the entirely magical ones which Azrael has invented).

[Gareeku]

Again, good point. It just came to my attention earlier just after i'd re-read through the FC rp, which takes place around the same time as the beginning of the comic, where Jakob is in the human world browsing for equipment.

[Tapewolf]

Again, good point. It just came to my attention earlier just after i'd re-read through the FC rp, which takes place around the same time as the beginning of the comic, where Jakob is in the human world browsing for equipment.

Yes.  I chose 1992 for that because I have a 1992 price list from Turnkey.  As I say, Jakob has about 500 years more experience by that point - not least because he spends around 300 years studying magic, brooding and empire-building after Page, um, leaves.

Note that the dimensional portals which they're using allow you to specify the destination time, which is why he's visiting 1992 and not 2470, but although it's possible, Jakob isn't happy with going back in time except for when he's absolutely sure that he isn't going to cause some kind of paradox.

**EDIT**
I've finally managed to find my photograph of the stone circle.  It's bigger than I remembered:

[Tapewolf]

I've got a buffer of nearly four chapters now, so I'm posting this now.  I think I'll do the next one on Halloween 

Chapter 10

Azrael, Wilson and myself slowly picked ourselves up as the three weasel guards watched us nervously.  I could see in their minds that they were startled by our human appearances.  "The charm," I said to Azrael, reverting back to human form myself.  Azrael followed suit, but the guards did not lower their weapons.

"At ease, men," Page said, but to no avail.  "I order you to lower your weapons!" he said.  Finally, one of them stepped forward.  He was the captain of the palace guards, who I had appointed myself not five years ago.

"I was ordered to arrest you for treason, sir." he said.

"Treason?!?" shouted Azrael, "I am your lawful ruler!  What is the meaning of this outrage?" as he spoke, my wing-tentacles rose, the heads growling at the captain in a threatening manner.

"You are no longer our Lord," he said, swallowing.  "Our just and true ruler is Lady Siad, who came to power after you fled this world, leaving us without guidance."

"How long have we been gone?" I asked him, but he looked away and didn't reply.
"Three days," I said, reading the weasel's mind.  "She didn't wait long, did she?  Now tell me, captain, what happened to those whom we left in charge during our absence?"

He didn't reply, but became even more nervous.  "Dead," I replied for him, in a tone of disgust.  "Captain, I see in your mind that you were against this coup and only acted under your oath as a castle guard.  This oath was made to me.  If I were to release you from this oath, would you join us against the usurper?"

He shook his head, and I could see that he was beside himself with fear.  I couldn't really blame him - if we returned to power, he was sure he would face death for his part in the treason.. but if his new mistress found out about the offer I had made, he wouldn't even get a trial.  He was caught between a rock and a hard place, as the saying goes.

"Very well," I said.  "Take us to your Lady, and know that should we return to power, I shall take your misgivings about the coup into consideration."

"Thankyou Mi'Lord," he said uncomfortably, and lead us into the main chamber, where a brunette lapine figure was seated upon Page's ceremonial throne.  With a sudden shock, I recognised her - she was the same hare succubus that had tried to steal Chelsea's soul all those years ago.

"You were a fool to have spared me, Jakob," she said.  "I shall not give you the same mercy now."

"Is there some grievance between you?" said Azrael.

"Silence, Page!" she replied.  "You too were a fool to have come back through the Gate, breaking the exile which I had given to you.  You need never have known of the loss of your kingdom if you had only stayed where I had put you.

"As for Jakob.. Hah!  I was there when his clan drove mine from our city.  Our leader was nearly killed in the struggle.  Only she and a handful of others survived that night.  We swore there and then that we would never rest until his clan has been made extinct by our hand!"

"If you say so," I said.  "My family is an offshoot of our clan and I have no knowledge of their deeds, evil or otherwise.  Heck, my father didn't even know what they were called until he went to SAIA."

"Then you shall die unknowing," she replied and moved towards me.

"Couldn't we settle this like 'cubi?"  I asked.  "How about a nice game of Dreamwar?"  She didn't grace that suggestion with a reply.

I really wasn't sure what to do.  I had never physically fought another 'cubi before.. it was something that Fa'Lina's Academy tried hard to prevent, given that it was established to help preserve our race.

I tightened my mental shield and focused upon her, but she had done the same.  It would take just one slip from either of us and it would all be over.

Azrael lunged at her, his claws extended and his skin hardened and sharpened.  I had never seen him angry enough to do that before, but I kept my cool - otherwise he might have done the succubus' work for her.  She was less fortunate, but she pushed him aside quickly and closed the gap in her mind before I had a chance to exploit it.

Page was not so easily rebuffed though and redoubled his efforts.  The guards were not able to defend their Lady as the pair of them were entangled.  I joined the fray as well and between us we soon had a chunk of the hare's ear.  She yelled at her guards to aid her, but I knew she didn't want Page dead yet.  More likely she intended to steal his soul if she could, since it would greatly increase her power, as would mine - but absorbing the both of us at once might be too much for her to handle and was potentially fatal.

Between the two of us we managed to pin the succubus to the ground.  My tentacles closed around her neck - just one quick movement and she would be very dead.  The problem, ethical complications aside, was her guards who stood behind us, halberds at the ready.  All in all, it was a stalemate.

Suddenly the captain broke the silence.  "Let her speak," he said.  I didn't have much choice so reluctantly I unwound my tentacles from her throat.

"About time," she said.  "Now perform your duty and execute the traitor."

The weasel paused, his mind impossible to fathom.  His eyes kept glancing from the succubus to Azrael, and then to me.

"I said execute the traitor!" she commanded, furious at his hesitation.  "Do it at once, or you shall die too!"

"Yes, Mi'lady," he said, raising the halberd.  I closed my eyes.  A moment later there was a sickening sound, followed by retching from Wilson who was hiding in the corner.
A few moments later I opened them, and promptly saw the succubus.  I closed them again very quickly after that but could not stop myself from following Wilson's example.

"Remove her," said Azrael in an unsteady voice and clapped his hand on my shoulder.  "Come on, my friend.." he said.  "Let's get you and Wilson cleaned up."

* * *

Despite the appalling start, Azrael's plan for a new Furrae free of prejudice and hatred worked out reasonably well.  We set up a number of movements which spread far beyond Ha'Khun, and although their message rarely gained traction in the mainstream, the truths behind it were sufficiently self-evident for it to have survived even until today, nearly five hundred years later.

Wilson acted as our spiritual adviser until he reached the end of a full life.  I have often wondered what happened to his soul, whether dying in the wrong dimension caused him any administrative problems when he went upstairs.

Azrael and I had many happy years running the city together, inventing new things and engaging on yet more expeditions to the human realm.  We did eventually enrol as students at Essex University, with Azrael studying electronics and mechanical engineering as my own degree.

One of the more remarkable things we did in later years involved a financial scam which Azrael had devised.

When we had built the first machine that allowed us to leave Furrae, our method of financing had been rather crude.  We had initially used gold or diamonds, but these caused too many questions, since we had no address in that dimension, and that made getting credit or a bank account rather awkward.

Eventually Azrael had hit on a beautiful scam during an era when banks were offering credit cards like sweeties with only minimal checking.  I thought it was immoral myself, but finally agreed after Az convinced me that it was the credit card companies' own fault for not instituting proper identity checks and they only had their own greed to blame.
This was typical of Azrael - it was his idea of a good practical joke.  I think that Wilson would have approved as well, as it was just the sort of low-level subversion which he thrived upon.

Using the proceeds of some gold to set up an initial account, we bought a flat, which we did via an agency so no-one ever saw us.  Not that it would have mattered, since I could change my appearance at will anyway.
Then we took out a series of lineage ads in various newspapers, offering some kind of service to help people find work abroad - "Just send in your CV and references!"

Using this information, which was sent to a P.O. box address and then redirected to the flat, we were able to take out scores of credit cards from nearly every bank in other people's names, which were then sent to the flat.
We used each card to make a single, huge withdrawal from the bank's cash machines and then discarded it.  It took them several months to realise what was going on, and by the time the police entered the flat, they found it empty as we had long since fled.  Empty, that is, except for the floor which was covered in thousands upon thousands of unopened credit cards, far more than Azrael and I could ever have used.

That wouldn't work now of course, since this incident prompted the credit card companies to actually start cross-checking the identity of their customers, but for the pair of us it had been a windfall.  The money we had withdrawn had all been put into completely separate savings and current accounts, which I still use today for my occasional shopping trips into the human realm.

* * *

All told, we ran the city together for almost a hundred years until disaster finally struck, a disaster that would plunge me into the depths of insanity for the next three centuries.

[Hilary]

And the foreshadowing roundhouse kicks us in the stomach.

Favorite part:

Wilson acted as our spiritual adviser until he reached the end of a full life.  I have often wondered what happened to his soul, whether dying in the wrong dimension caused him any administrative problems when he went upstairs.

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

Indeed. I liked that line :-)

[Gabi]

And so did I.

[Tapewolf]

Step after step we try controlling our fate
But when we finally start living it's become too late
--Dream Theater

Chapter 11 - (Warning.. violence)

The worst day of my life was a beautiful one.  Perhaps it was to compensate in some small way for what was to come, or perhaps it was to provide a pleasant set for those who were about to leave the stage.  Or perhaps it was all just blind coincidence.

I sat in the sun by Wilson's grave, a small open area in the centre of the palace.  Beneath the shade of the marijuana crop which we had planted in his memory, I sat reading a treatise on the problems of recording television signals from an electrical engineering journal I had bought on Earth.
There were a pile of other magazines, including one titled 'The Dr. Atomic Pipe and Dope Book' which Wilson had left to Azrael.

Absorbed in this study I was suddenly distracted by a scream from inside the palace.  Rushing inside, I was wholly unprepared for the sight which met me.  One of the palace guards, a polecat, lay dead with a crossbow bolt protruding from his chest.  Three weasel demons stood over him, one was preparing to reload and the other two were covering me.

"I don't want to kill you," said their leader, "but I will if I have to.  If you stay calm and do what we say, I'm quite happy to allow you to go into exile once we have taken control."

I almost laughed, but it caught in my throat when my eyes glanced back to the polecat they had murdered, a promising young guardsman.  For a moment I thought I saw a dim figure standing over his corpse out the corner of my eye, but when I turned to look it was gone.

"We should kill the incubus," said one.  "It will prove to Page that we mean business."
"Who is the leader?" barked the weasel, subduing his minion.  "The guard will prove that adequately.  We'll give them a chance to cooperate first, and then kill him if Page refuses to abdicate."

Suddenly, Page opened the door behind them.  This startled them and before anyone knew what had happened, the leader had fired.  In under a second, Azrael's face went from his usual carefree expression to surprise and then finally to disbelief as the bolt struck his chest.
Forgetting the danger, I rushed to where he fell and cradled his head gently.  He looked up at me in surprise, and said "See you later.".

* * *

I am a wolf, a predator.  Millions of years of evolution have fine-tuned my senses and hunting instincts.  Only comparatively recently has it become necessary to hide these urges so that we can partake in society with what would once have been prey races, but they aren't gone.   They're still in there, deep down, below the surface.  One crossbow bolt through the heart of my closest friend and they all came flooding back.

Pain and terror aren't my primary emotions, but I learned to make use of them anyhow - it was a compulsory module at the Succubus and Incubus Academy.  At the start of the course, my Professor, Destania, remarked that emotions were like any other kind of food.  "You can harvest them like fruit," she said, "gathering what you come across by passive absorption.  But that isn't the aim of my class.  I am here to teach you to hunt red meat, to actively look for a victim and to squeeze every last drop of pain and fear from them before they die.  That is what we will be studying in this module."

There are things which they teach you at SAIA, horrible things.  Ways to maximise the terror of your prey as you tear them apart.  Amongst these are a number of strategies to alter your appearance, to make yourself seem more threatening and terrible and I knew these off by heart.
I had found them most useful to prevent confrontations by scaring away my foes, although this wasn't the reason we had been taught them.  But the professor would certainly have approved of what I was about to do now.

* * *

My pelt turned a shade or two darker.  I grew two feet taller and my eyes burned red as a feral snarl tore from my throat.  I was utterly beyond reason, and if there was ever any doubt at all of my demon heritage, there could be none now.  The lead demon had already loosed his bolt, and he wasn't going to get a chance to reload - not now or ever again.
With eyes like slits, my wing-tentacles emerged at a shocking speed, slicing the strings of all three crossbows, breaking the leader's leg and finally dragging him back towards me as the others looked on in horror.

"No," he whispered as I brought him to face me, my eyes boring into his as the wing tentacles lacerated his chest.  Tentacles can do many things, you know.  They can be sharpened to points, or flattened into knives.
A favoured technique for disposing of adventurers is to simply curl your tentacles around the neck and lop the head off in a single motion, the way a child might do to a dandelion.  Or you could simply extrude the tentacles to a point, instantly impaling your victim through the heart.  I might have done that, given him a quick, clean death - had his victim been anyone other than my dearest friend and mentor.

When his spine broke I dropped the demon's lifeless, wide-eyed corpse with a peal of insane laughter and a feral grin of exultation on my face.

For some reason the two surviving weasels had actually stayed to watch as I slowly filleted their late comrade.  When I turned my attention back to them, wild-eyed, wired on an overdose of pain and coat gloss-red with the blood of my victim, they suddenly realised that this course of action was ever-so-slightly threatening to their own survival.

I pursued them, howling like my feral brothers on the open plains, but demons have the ability to vanish into the shadows and I lost them.  That didn't matter.  They were going to die anyway, and they knew it.
Whether it took three hours or three centuries, they were already dead.  Johan Cross would see to that.

* * *

Great, said Page, with his head in his hands*.  Look what you've done!  I'm dead and you've turned the ruler of my city into a psychopath.  You realise that he won't rest until the others are dead too?

I'm sorry.. said the weasel, unable to take his eyes off the staring, mutilated body on the floor.  I'm so, so, sorry..

You're lucky he wasn't thinking clearly.  He could quite easily have destroyed your soul.  We can only pray he doesn't think of that when he manages to catch your companions.

Can we go now? asked the polecat.  His corpse is making me feel ill.

* * *

A month after Page's death, I was back in SAIA again.  Not to teach, as Fa'lina had hoped, but to learn things which I had not felt the need to study before.

I could sense that Fa'lina had misgivings about my return, but I did not know to what extent.  I'm sure she noticed that my attitude was different - darker and more furtive than I was in happier times - the slightly wild look in my eyes, and the fact that I never smiled.  I had kept my mind shielded for the whole of the interview and I never knew if it was that which made her suspicious, or if she had, by some deep magic unknown to me, silently broken through it and read from my mind the true reason why I had decided to return.

Either way, she allowed me to re-enrol and I immediately began to study hard, concentrating almost entirely on the theory and practical study of life sciences and metabiology.  I don't think anyone noticed that I was focusing obsessively on Angel metabiology in particular, or if they did whether they realised why.

One night I entered the library with a fellow student, in hopes of recovering an extremely arcane and forbidden text which dealt with the summoning of creatures from the realm beyond.  I told him that it was to help with our coursework, but really I was hoping that the secrets it contained would be the key to raising Azrael from the dead.

This was made more complicated by the fact that a number of Beings had somehow infiltrated the Academy and had engaged in a fight with the Librarian, foolishly summoning dire monsters in order to defend themselves and hampering our plan.

At length I managed to take a copy of the relevant parts of the tome, and set to work.  The first stage was to cleanse my mind, which I did by embarking on the age-old ritual of sleep.  This was not something I had needed to do for many many decades, but it was sometimes useful for problem solving and meditation.

I lay there, my mind concentrating on nothing but the black void, the null dreamspace which had come to replace the once-vivid dreams of my youth.  Suddenly, I saw Azrael.

"Jakob," he said, "I know what you are seeking to do, but I beg of you not to proceed with it."

"But it will work!" I insisted.  "All I need to do is amass sufficient energy, and I can bring you back!"

"Indeed.  But have you stopped to work out how much energy you'll need to create a living body from scratch?  Or from the decaying bones which you laid to rest?  There's only one way you'll be able to do that, and that is by devouring the souls of dozens of other people.  Maybe hundreds."

I looked at him, blinking back tears.  "Is there no other way?"

"None.  And if that is the alternative, I would rather stay dead.
That is all I can say to you right now, Jakob, but take heart.  I shall be watching over you.  After all, what are Angels for?" he grinned, and faded away from my dreams.
When he was gone, I awoke with my eyes still damp.  Suddenly I sat up, clenching my fist around the bedclothes.
I had wavered from my original plan to try and make things right again, but this was now denied me.  If I could not have Azrael back, I would put all my energies into vengeance.  Those demons would wish they had never been born.

* * *

When I returned from SAIA, I found the palace brought back many painful memories.  So I left it and the day-to-day running of the city to the mayor whom I had appointed to act in our absence, and moved the seat of governance to a new building in the mountains overlooking the city. 

At its foundation was the generating station from the hydroelectric dam further up which powered Ha'Khun, but by the time my modifications had finished it was more like a fortress.  The throne room was mostly kept dark and was lit from behind so that no-one could see me mourn.  I kept it that way long after my grief had run its course, but by then it had taken far more sinister connotations.

I sat morosely upon upon this throne, listening to the reports my advisers brought for me.   

"Well, Mi'lord, I fear there is still no news of the assassins, although we believe they may have fled to Macura Province."

"I see," I sighed.  "And has there been any word from our ambassador there?"

"None as yet, Mi'lord."

"Very well.  And what of our internal affairs?"

"The only real problem of note seems to be the problem of crime.   There have been at least four slayings this week owing to the continuing gang war between Zarista Clan and the Fat Sun Brotherhood."

"Who is winning?" I asked, perking up for a moment.

"Zarista Clan, but by a small margin.  Left unchecked this problem will continue to grow, I fear.  Do you wish me to step up the raids, Mi'lord?"

"No.." I said, rubbing my muzzle.  "No.  I think I shall deal with this personally."

"What do you propose to do, your excellency?" he asked.

I smiled for the first time since Page had died, although it wasn't a very pretty smile.  Soon it would become infamous.  "I'm going to reason with them."




*I didn't hear this exchange at the time of course, but in later years, to try and learn more of these demon assassins, I wove a spell that allowed me to look back into the time of Azrael's death.  This came as something of a surprise.

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

Hmm. He's going to be very reasonable, I feel.

Not.

[Drake Manaweilder]

they suddenly realised that this course of action was ever-so-slightly threatening to their own survival.

favorite line so far.

[Tapewolf]

I think my absolute favourite bit of this one is the line where the weasel is staring at his own body, although the "I am a wolf" bit also ranks quite highly.
I have actually read the Pipe and Dope Book - I still don't know why my father has it for all that he's not exactly pro-drugs.  The bit about the library is a reference to Gabriel's Abel's Friend strip.

It was kind of hard to write this one.  Like Jakob himself, Azrael was originally created for a specific purpose and was never really supposed to take on such a life of his own.

[Hilary]

This is probably my favorite chapter so far-- I absolutely love the part where they're all standing around looking at their own bodies.

[Tapewolf]

This is probably my favorite chapter so far-- I absolutely love the part where they're all standing around looking at their own bodies.

Thanks.  An interesting thing about the more recent chapters is that I've written the core first and added the top afterwards.  In that one for instance, there was originally just going to be Page and the weasel.  The polecat was actually a late addition since I didn't know how I was going to link to the death scene up until the day before (Page was going to say his line).

The other change was that I finally figured out how to link that conversation into it.  I was actually prepared to break the first-person narrative just to keep it in.  I should have the next chapter up in a few hours too.  More violence, I'm afraid.

[Tapewolf]

Tortured insanity, a smothering Hell
Try to escape but to no avail

Innocent victims of merciless crimes
Fall prey to some madman's impulsive designs
--Dream Theater

Chapter 12 - warning.. more horrible violence

My meeting with the bosses of Zarista Clan was short and to the point.  Dressed in a trenchcoat I introduced myself as Johan Cross and stated my desire to aid them against the Fat Sun Brotherhood in exchange for a controlling stake in their organisation.

Two of these bosses objected violently... if they had simply said 'no', or even been a bit less skilled in combat, they would probably have lived.  Although it greatly pained me to have to do what I did, it was them or me and it certainly helped make the survivors more pliant.

Becoming a crimelord was the most fun I'd had since Page had died, and I soon found it was just the thing to distract me from the pain of his loss.  I was not yet ready to reveal my true identity, although I had let slip that I was a corrupt 'cubi official in high favour with the Palace and chuckled silently to myself as I helped the Clan to break my own laws.

The Clan had not had a 'cubi in charge before, although one of the bosses was a demon, and my powers helped greatly.  Disguised as a random citizen or hidden entirely I was able to eavesdrop and mind-read the members of the Fat Sun Brotherhood to learn their plans and weaknesses.
By this means I was able to isolate key members of the Brotherhood and trap them so that the Clan could remove them, and within a month the Brotherhood had surrendered - the operation entirely bloodless save for a few accidents and diehards who would not come quietly.
Now there was one organisation that controlled all crime throughout the entire city.. and I controlled it.

I had been tempted to wind up the Clan once their rivals had been absorbed into it or otherwise neutralised, but I saw now that it would simply have split into factions again and returned to its violent ways once more.
So I remained in charge of it, gently focusing it upon economic goals such as smuggling and the sale of contrabands, some of which I had outlawed myself to keep them occupied.

Gradually over the decades the underworld became my pawns.. hidden tools of government which everyone knew of yet remained unspoken.  It doubled as the basis of my intelligence network and as a means to round up the political enemies of Johan Cross.
Few dared to openly speak against me, and my shameful descent into tyranny was well underway.

* * *

And so it happened that in the hundredth year since Page's death, I sat as usual, brooding upon my dark throne, disguised as a grey fox.  My advisers arrived, bringing reports of the economy.  My rule, strict though it was, had greatly increased the standard of living among the citizens of Ha'khun.
Alas, my agents had reported no further sightings of the demon pair responsible for Page's assassination, but I could wait.  If nothing else, I knew how to wait.

Suddenly I felt something.  I dismissed my advisers, requesting them to return in two hours, and turned to look at the right-hand door.  Suddenly a young weasel burst through, brandishing a large sword.  I had expected something like that, since I had felt strange emotions from an unfamiliar mind approaching.  He had done a fine job of entering the castle by stealth but now the moment had come to reveal himself.

"Lord Cross, your evil reign must end!" he cried, and threw a dagger at me.  I caught it with one of my tentacles, slicing the blade in two.  Meanwhile, the guards had wrestled him to the ground and two of them held him down.  A third, a lynx, raised his halberd to deliver a blow that would sever the unfortunate weasel's neck, his victim bracing himself for the end of his life.

"STOP!" I yelled.  "Did I order you to kill him?  No, I did not!  Sergeant!  Place your halberd on the ground.  I shall deal with you later."

Nervously, the lynx placed his weapon on the floor at my feet.  No sooner had he done so than his eyes rolled up into his head and he crumpled to the ground.  "Place him in the corner," I directed, and then turned my attention to the two guards, a wildcat and a fox who were still holding the weasel to the ground.

"Bring him before me," I said.  "I shall hear his grievances."

The weasel was shaking with fear, but despite his youth he maintained a proudly defiant expression on his face as he looked up at me.  By careful arrangement of the lights controlled by a panel on my throne, only my face was dimly lit... the rest of my body a mere shadow.

"Who sent you?" I asked him.

"I shall not tell you," he said.  "but know that your days are numbered.  When the others hear of my death they shall send another.. and another!  Even if only one of us succeeds where I have failed it will be a price worth dying for, to put a knife through your black heart and save the realm from your evil ways.. the secret executions.. all the souls you have devoured!"

"What the hell are you talking about?" I asked, in a faintly amused tone.

"We know the truth!  We know that you murdered Lord Page to take his place, and since then the streets have been filled with terror.."

The words died on his lips as my eyes burned with rage.  "Hear me, weasel," I snarled, and he took a step backwards.  "You can never understand what Azrael meant to me.  His death, and my failure to prevent it was the worst day in all six hundred years I have lived.  In accusing me you insult his memory and his choice of successor.  Yet I am not surprised since his true murderer was a weasel, like you!"

The would-be assassin blinked, unsure of himself, but recovered quickly.

"Be that as it may, since you claimed the throne, the streets have been filled with terror!  Whole families have disappeared, never to be seen again!"

"Malcontents," I said.  "Their presence was a destabilising factor.  I cannot allow the minorities who oppose my rule to threaten the safety and prosperity of the majority."

"You had them all beheaded.. or shot!  Men, women and children!" he screeched.

I smiled my trademark cynical smile, the hooded eyes.. amusement and deadly menace in equal proportion.  "Executions are messy and inefficient," I said.  "It's so much easier and just as effective if the population thinks that my opponents and their families have died by my hand."

"Hah!" he shrieked, and I could feel that although he was trying to muster a defiant laugh, he was close to tears.  "Outspoken critics of your rule have been murdered!  I hid and watched as my own father was dragged into a dark alleyway and shot by your guards as he pleaded for my life!
"And now I have come to slay you and avenge my father... but I failed and I shall gladly pay the price.  Kill me now, so that we can again be together!"

I leaned towards him, my twisted smile evaporating as I digested his words.
"What did you just say..?"

Among the many implements of torture and death which I had devised during my madness was a semiautomatic pistol.  I had taken the principle from one of our encyclopedias.
Although none of my books had shown a diagram of the mechanism, within ten years' time I had designed my own, taking clues from the shattered and rusting remains of the weapon the police chief had shot me with on Earth in 1968.  I field-tested it on a feral deer, which my palace chef later roasted.  Satisfied that it would serve, I built many more for my guards to use in defence of the realm.

As it turned out this proved a most popular measure.  Firearms suddenly found their way into plays and novels.  Young men of military age - far more than we could handle - were vying to join my elite marksmen.  But although I had carefully screened them where I could, the risk of a marksman going rogue with their gun was a possibility I had long feared, and now it seemed that it had finally come to pass.

I looked down at the weasel, who stood there defiantly with his arms folded, waiting for me to condemn him.

"Young man," I said, "tell me about the guard who murdered your father."

As he spoke, I reached into his mind.  The guard who had made the kill was a feline, the product of generations of interbreeding between different kinds of cat until his exact species was indistinct.  But I saw him in the weasel's mind.

"I am sorry," I said, "this should never have happened."  The young would-be assassin simply blinked.  He had been expecting a death sentence, not sympathy.

"I shall find the one who did this and avenge your father myself.. rest assured of that.  But now I must decide your fate.
It goes without saying that you will never see Ha'Khun again - it better suits my policy of social order through fear if my opponents are believed to be dead, and what you have learned tonight would jeopardise that if it was repeated.
The consequences of that would be horrific, so you too must be disappeared - into exile."

I was smiling my cynical smile again as the weasel stared at me in disbelief.  "Yes, exile.  There is a large island where you will meet most of the victims of my evil reign.  As I cub I was taught to believe that life is sacred, although I don't suppose for a moment that you'll believe me until you are safely there.  Just be thankful that Johan Cross can be merciful.  A lesser ruler would have your head on a pole outside the castle by now."

The lynx guard in the corner had woken up and was nervously watching as I passed judgement on the weasel who had sought to kill me.  I beckoned him towards me.

"Sergeant Ashley, I acknowledge that you sought to protect my life, but I am rather disappointed that you intended to behead my attacker when he posed no further threat.  Pray do not do that again.
I shall let you off  this time with a cut in this month's pay.  But I warn you - if you do that again I shall not be anywhere near as forgiving.

"Now.  This young weasel is to be exiled.  Take him to the Gate, and do not forget to send his sword through first.  He's going to need it.  Now I must go - I have other business to attend to."

"Yes Milord," he said gratefully and led the weasel away.

* * *

In a dark alleyway, just as the weasel lad had described, I sat waiting, a shield of partial invisibility rendering me almost undetectable against the dim light.  From this vantage point I saw four men.

Three of them were my guards, all feline - one of Page's traditions.  Once I had been granted a share in the running of the city I had opened the post up to other species, but there was still a majority of cats in the service.

These guards were a bobcat, a puma and a feline of indistinct species, almost certainly the one who had committed the crimes.  The other two dragged the struggling, pleading figure of a canine and pinned him to a wall as the cat stood before him.

The husky whimpered, staring down the barrel of the semiautomatic gun.  "Please.." he said, one final time.  A second later his body crumpled to the ground, his life spilt onto the wall behind him leaving a grim red stain.

Cursing myself for being too late to save him, I closed my eyes in silent prayer and just for a moment I could see the husky again, crouching to examine his own murdered corpse with a look of horror and bewilderment.  When I opened my eyes again, he was gone.

"I must say, I am very, very disappointed.." I began in a chilly, almost bored tone, making myself visible again as I did so.  The three guardsmen turned to see me perched on a low wall in the alleyway, sitting there cross-legged in red fox form, with my backwings and headwings visible.

The gun might have worked, but I had already hardened my skin as a precaution in case they tried anything foolish.  Anyway, it was too late now since the cat holding the gun was rooted to the spot - partly out of fear, and partly because I had already invaded his mind and was preventing him from leaving.

"I might have asked you why you killed him," I continued, climbing down from the wall and staring the cat in the face, "..but I already know.  I know all your murders.  You can have no secrets from me."
I sighed.  "I can see that I shall have to show you why what you have done is wrong."

Somehow his weapon was in my hand, a trick I had learned that was very useful for intimidating people.  He stood there breathing heavily as I slowly levelled the gun right between his eyes, in exactly the way he had done to the unfortunate canid.
The hammer clicked upon an empty chamber, and I took the gun away again.  The feline was trembling violently.

"Do you understand now?" I asked him.  He nodded with relief.
"Good," I said, and with one swift motion put a bullet beneath his chin.
Now there were two red stains on the wall.

"There will be no more killings without my express consent," I said coldly, my eyes boring into the puma's.  "Do I make myself clear?"  The surviving pair nodded vigorously.

"Good.  Remember, I can kill more than just your body."  This threat needed no amplification.. the 'cubi ability to eat the souls of their victims was legendary.

"Now remove this mess, and ensure that the husky is given a decent funeral.  And if any more of you get the urge to murder my citizens for kicks, bear in mind that I shall always be watching.  Do not ever forget that."

I gestured at the corpse of the feline guard, and the others turned involuntarily to glance at it.  By the time they turned back, I had vanished.

Life is sacred, but sometimes desecration can become necessary.  They never saw the tears in my eyes at what I had done.

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

Nice chapter title. :-)


.. and it's a nice twist at the end, there...

[GabrielsThoughts]

nice

[Tapewolf]

nice

'Nice' wasn't exactly the word which sprang to mind while writing that one, I must confess.

Hopefully the next one should be up fairly soon.

[Tapewolf]

And here we go.  See also this song from my album 'Songs for the Wild-At-Heart'.

Chapter 13

It was evening.  I stood upon the balcony of my fortress gazing out across the city, when I heard the sound of sword upon halberd far below.  I turned sharply, to ask one my guards to go down below and investigate, but before I could do so one of my scouts, a ferret, burst into the room, panting.

"Intruder, Mi'lord..." he wheezed.  "At gates...  Trying to break in through front gate..."

"Know you his name?" I asked.

"Bull... says he is Ulric the Strong..." replied the scout, slowly getting his breath back.

Ulric was an adventurer I had heard many rumours of.  A 25-year old bull, he had made his name as something of a demon hunter.
Arrogant and vain, Ulric was nonetheless regarded in many circles as a true hero's hero - one who had saved a number of villages and inspired many others to follow his lead.
He was also directly responsible for an equal number of disasters and had narrowly escaped being hanged on more than one occasion for the murder of those who had been foolish enough to say so within his earshot.
In short, he was one of the few bounty hunters to have a price on his own head.

"Hmm," I mused, and smiled my wicked smile.  "Switch to code 'gazelle' - Inform my captain of this at once."
The ferret sped off, shouting the word over and over, as loud as he could.

For my tactics I used different species as codenames.  It helped attach a visual cue to the code making it easier to remember - so long as I chose different enough species to avoid confusion.

'Gazelle' meant that we would seal off the corridors and my guards would fall back, guiding the intruder to the throne room where I and my henchmen could safely dispose of them.  Simply shooting him was an option of course, but I much preferred to give my enemies a chance to surrender first so I had devised a series of strategies to defend the fortress while still retaining this option.  'Gazelle' was one of these - a standard exercise I performed at least once a year to keep my guards upon their toes.
Likely some of my guards would think this was an exercise too, since the exact date of the drills was known only to me.  Otherwise there was the possibility of an intruder coinciding their attack with our exercises if they were commonly known.  But tonight was no drill.

Since the throne room had been breached by the stealth approach of a young weasel a year or so past, I had also begun to make more use of electric eyes and other such sensors.
All the corridors surrounding key areas such as my throne room and other important parts of the complex could now only be entered by those who carried inductive pass-keys - anyone else would trigger the alarms.
Like the exercises, I would test them at irregular intervals, leaving my own pass-key behind, sometimes even hiring a thief to try and break into the fortress.

Touching a wall of my throne room, I opened a secret door and entered a small chamber down a flight of steps.  On one wall there was a map of the fortress.  As I stared at it, a light near the entrance came on, followed instantly by the ringing of an alarm bell.

So far, so good I thought.  As they came on one by one, I monitored the intruder's progress as he made his halting, confused way from room to room.  Apparently he had become lost trying to accomplish the exceedingly simple task of making his way to the throne room, made even simpler by the fact that most of the ancillary corridors had been blocked off by portcullises as per my order.

Either that or he's trying to loot the place, I pondered.  But even that dimwit can't be stupid enough to try plundering a castle before taking care of the owner first.  Or maybe he is just raiding the place and not after me.  If so, codeword 'Gazelle' was the wrong strategy.

As if on cue, the bull began to trace a more normal path towards my throne room.  I stood there, focusing on the final three lights, waiting for them to illuminate as he approached the entrance.

Suddenly there was a crash.  I turned around, stunned and ran up the steps back into the throne room.  The crumpled figure of an armoured lynx was spreadeagled by the door of my throne room and the bull had positioned himself just outside the door, blocking my exit.

The lynx was Captain Ashley, lying in a pool of his own blood, victim of a savage thrust to the waist by Ulric's powerful arms.  It had gone right through the chainmail joint.  Pushing aside for now the fact that he had caught me unawares, I raced over to where my stricken captain lay.

"I'm sorry, Mi'Lord," the lynx gasped as I knelt down beside him, cradling his head in my hands.  Memories of a similar moment with Page came flooding back to me, but I pushed them aside.
Touching his waist my hands glowed for a moment and the bleeding stopped, as did his breathing.

The spell wouldn't last long but it would keep him in a suspended state until I was able to heal him properly or until I joined him in death, whichever it was to be.

I turned back to the intruder, my eyes burning with hatred.  "You may well have killed the captain of my guards," I said.  "for that you will suffer."  The warrior's mind shield was tight and I was unable to find much purchase on his thoughts.

Together we did a dance around the room, him with his sword and me with my tentacles.  "Ready the battering ram," I said to my men, parrying and thrusting at my foe.  He concealed his puzzlement at this illogical request - which was of course a code, like 'Gazelle'.

"You know, I was always taught to believe that life is sacred," I said, "but in your case I'd be happy to make a small exception.  Unless of course we can come to some kind of gentleman's agreement."
He laughed and threw a dagger at me.  I caught it in mid-air and threw it back.  Demon reflexes are very handy to have.

"What foolishness," said the bull.  "there is a bounty on your life that would make me a king!" so saying, he leapt forward with a sudden thrust.

"As you know I am an incubus," I said.  His sword made it through to my chest, but I had hardened my skin and it glanced off.
"As such, your chances of surviving this fight are as close to zero as makes no difference.  If you throw down your sword and swear never to return, I shall forget all this bounty-hunter shit and allow you to go free.  If my captain lives I may only take your weapon and not your clothes too."

I was leading the dance now, and we were approaching a particular spot of the room which I had in mind.

"Do not plead with me, demon.  I shall never spare your cowardly life," he replied, dodging a blow from my knife-sharp tentacles.  "It is not simply the money, it is a question of honour.  You are a demon and your death will be welcomed by all.  Why should I back out of such a glorious challenge?"

"Now wait a minute," I said, parrying his attack again, "Demons and other Creatures make nearly half the population of this city.  Everyone is welcome here so long as they live peacefully.  I don't expect they will welcome my death, especially not if I was replaced by some racist bonehead like you who'd kill them as soon as look at them."

"Then after I have brought your head to my patron, I shall return to purge this city of its foul denizens.  Songs shall be sung of my achievements!  My name shall live on in legend forever!"

"Indeed it shall," I said and at that moment the trapdoor opened beneath him.
It was only about a foot deep, but its main purpose was to make him lose his footing.  There were other, deeper trapdoors for other purposes too.

The shock took him off-guard and I broke clean through his shielding.  A sudden memory of Page lying in state filled my mind, his face serene and peaceful, surrounded by flowers.  Suddenly his face changed into Ashley's.
"NO!" I shouted, and in a burst of rage I focused my hatred on the erstwhile hero's mind.  His body quivered, slumping limply to the ground and his eyes took on that singular, horrible expression that only comes when the soul has been eaten or cast out of a living body.

"And now there's one less hero," I said, as he became the fifth person to die by my hand.

I shunted the dead bull's soul into a specially-prepared jewel on a chain around my neck.  Taking a small portion of its energy, I cancelled the spell keeping Ashley in suspension and channelled the newly-stolen power into his dying body.  The bleeding stopped again but this time he was still breathing, although raggedly.

My chief healer arrived as if on cue, and a few minutes later my captain was lying peacefully on the floor almost exactly like my vision, but with one crucial difference.

"He should live, Mi'lord.", the healer announced, as we prepared to move him to the infirmary.

"Good.  Unless there are more pressing needs, I request that you stay with him," I said.  "If his condition worsens, inform me at once.  Otherwise I shall visit him in the morning."

* * *

That night I visited my laboratory, where ancient tomes of magic and dark, forbidden lore sat alongside hand-written copies of the electronics texts which we had borrowed from Earth.
I had managed to improve on the design of our home-built electron valves, bringing them closer in line with the ones that I had imported from Earth.  I should soon be able to repair the G-36 on my desk - one of the last magnetic recorders to rely entirely on valve circuitry.  Once again, I felt a pang of loss for Azrael.. he had had a natural gift for the mathematics underlying these circuits, whereas I had found it much harder work.

But tonight I was not interested in electronics.  I consulted some of the more esoteric works which I had learned of from the library at SAIA.  Tracking down another copy had been difficult, but it was worthwhile.
In accordance with the instructions I took an empty bottle, charmed it in the same manner as the soul-trapping jewel and built a heavy lead pendulum which I suspended from a wire thread.  Stopping the bottle so that the pendulum was inside it, I transferred the captured soul from the jewel into the bottle.

"Can you hear me?" I asked it, and the wire vibrated faintly in reply, a strange whispering voice made still more hollow as it resonated within the bottle.

Let me go, it said.  Return my sword to me, demon!  I shall kill you when I find you!

"Your body is dead," I told it.  "You're just a soul in a beer bottle now."

The wire made an eerie screaming sound.   "QUIET!" I snapped at it and the screaming ceased.
"You were right though," I pointed out, "your name shall live on in legend, but not in quite the way you had intended.  Your name shall henceforth be a reminder of the price to be paid by those seeking to thwart Johan Cross."

As I spoke I began drafting a letter in my head to the officials of Zinvth, to claim the prodigious bounty on Ulric's head for a murder he had committed during a banquet in his honour.  If I could magically preserve the corpse, I could probably claim the other bounties too.

Whistling a song by 'Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs' about a big bad wolf pretending to be a sheep, I rifled through the bull's personal effects.  Amongst these was a large hemp sack, filled with loot from the lower floors of my castle.  There, fallen to the bottom of the sack, was a pass-key which Ulric had taken because it looked shiny.

Roaring with laughter, I left the laboratory and headed towards the infirmary.

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

Sam the Sam and the Pharoes?

Is that correct?

[Tapewolf]

Sam the Sam and the Pharoes?
Is that correct?

No.  It needed a bit more H.  Fixed now.

[Hilary]

Hehe-- this chapter was made twice as fun with the parallell of "One Less Hero." I put it on my ipod a while ago, and I couldn't help imagining Jakob singing the line at Ulric instead of saying it normally.

Another great chapter... I'm really enjoying this story.