Red Twilight: Long Distence Runners

Chapter 2

Into the Darkness

(Watcher Archive note by "Watcher" A. L. Gallard, segment taken from "Hunter S." Richard Blake's journal 0, recorder 09-10-01)

His name is Criss. Most people seem to think we're twins; I'm OK with that. The truth is, however, he is ten months older and I'm two inches taller. But we are brothers. Criss is lean and straight as in an arrow; I tend to be as impartial as a polar bear. What a pair we make! Criss is always sharp as a whip. I'm more blunt than a spoon.

As far as I'm concerned, he and I are just a pair of average twenty-year-old jack offs. I guess I've always been a tad strange. When I was a child, I thought I could see things that were invisible, light, mostly circles, floating over and through people. I was told I was crazy. My brother, Criss, knew I was telling the truth; he reinforced and told me to practice with my gift and see what else I could do. Before long I could move objects around, only pushing them at first, then levitating them and dragging them into myself. There were only small things back then, nothing the size of a human. Today I can lift and throw a beer keg in whatever direction I like.

Our parents are from Ireland. We moved to the United States when we were still really little. Hidden in our father's collection of first print books was a book labeled only with the letter "W"; it was leather bound with a steel clasp on it. Hidden within the pages was the key to my powers. It is called psionisism. It manifests in many ways—most commonly telepathy (I don't have this one), the ability to see into another's mind and on one level or another converse and manipulate it. Next is called clairvoyance; one or more of your senses are enhanced to superhuman levels. Maybe you can see though others' eyes or feel the world around you in a way that is more than just empathetic. (I can see emotions, that is what the globes of light I saw as a kid were.) Psi-co-partition: you, or at the very least your conciseness can move though space or time without the need to cover both simultaneously (teleportation and astral projection fall under this category); psi-co-metabolics, the ability to breathe under water, heals instantaneously, massacred as in animal, weird shit. Telekinetic (this would be what my ability to move objects was categorized as) can f.u.c.k with the rules of reality, to some extent speed up/slow down time, light shit on fire. I wish I could do that. Apparently this is like any skill—use it or lose it.

The book suggests one in fifty children are born with one or more of these talents, and as they grow up, they forget how to use them.

That is not important really in the long run. Let me get back to the point. Criss and I are living together again, just me, him, and his lovely fiancée. Her name is Pink; she is an Arenuse (don't know what that is, don't threat. I just figured it out for myself. She has red skin and a tail if you look at her in the dark, like that of a cartoon demon you would see on the billboard for a nightclub. Cast her in full daylight on the other hand and she looks like a teenage girl. She is just one of a thousand life forms otherwise referred to as extraplanners.)

We live off reputation. Floating from town to town, we are "monster hunters," not like the ones you see on TV running around with cameras and EMF readers. We're not interested in ghost stores and the like, local roomers. We are looking for real monsters, giant dogs escaped from hell, bats from the abyss that sum up how wound up in New York humans are being used like martinets by jellyfish from the f.u.c.k.i.n.g moon. And let me tell you, we find them, kill them, and then just before we claim the glory so, the damn shadow cult cleans up our mess and makes us all look like nut balls.

Every day just before sunrise, my brother would rouse me from my slumber and slap a book in my hand and take me out to train. "Richard, you are a psion. You're faster and stronger than I can ever hope to be. Now take up your sword and fight!" Ya, Blake is my name by the way, Richard Blake.

We meet swords just as we do every day; Pink heads out to get us breakfast. The match goes as it seems to every time Criss plays with me, for a time letting us draw at 2-2 for a time. Then he starts to get tired, and it's time for him to take command. (Criss loves sword play. After one of our jobs, rather than take the cash we were offered he talks us into taking this antique glaidus.) We end our match for the day at 12-4, his favor.

August 20 was when it all started to change. At 4:00 a.m., I'm kicked awake, but not by Criss, but by an old man with a cane made of glass; he has a skunk-striped beard and a limp so bad he nearly drags one leg behind him. He has a deep husky smoker's voice and dresses in a green velvet sport coat.

When I had fallen asleep, Pink was in the middle of the bed, I was behind her, and Criss in front of her so . . . you can imagine the fright I felt when this old, gray face was suddenly against my nose. "Put some paints on you bum," he commands. I fall out of bed and on to the floor with a great thump. I soon would find this is just the first of many such encounters.

Criss and Pink are in the main room of the hotel. Criss is somehow showered and shaved already. Pink is in a night gown. I find my pants and my tan overcoat, but there seems to be no shirt in sight. The old man is called Dove; he has the same tattoo on his hand as is engraved in my brother's book. I can feel he saw that to. "So you think you're monster hunters? If so, I have a job for you." We all nod in damn near union. "Good! There is a demon running around town. He calls himself Cravixs. Find him and find out if he is afraid of anything. You don't have to engage him yourself. Do this and you can name your price." Pink speaks up, "One million dollars." "Done!" Dove proclaims.

"Cash," Pink requests.

"In advance," Criss adds.

"No," Dove replies.

"Then cut us a check, and if it's any good we'll take your job," Pink plays with the old man.

"Do the job, and if you're any good, I'll cut you a check," Dove announces.

Sounds fair to me, I thought.

(Note by L. Gallard "Watcher SS": Joseph Dove had been trailing the movement of a unregistered plane shifter at the time he first encountered the Blake family; their interaction at that time was unwarranted. The action was forgiven by the council due to the exceptional skills brought forth by "Hunter S." R. Blake in spite of the plane shifter's escape. It is also my feeling (even if not acknowledged by my superiors) that the recovery of John T. Hacker's journal was a contributing factor in this lenience.)

This job like most others begins with a trip to the library. The demon in question is seemingly very elusive; the text on hand gives no clues as to where to start our search, nor did it help to unravel its history. It turns out Pink had more to say than properly noted. Upon returning to the hotel, she takes her true form for us and begins to weave a tale.

"My home realm is called Aether. There are many Arenuse that worship Cravixs. They call him the 'Keeper.' He is the great mist that divides Aether from 'Earth Prime' and 'Red Twilight,' your realm. My sisters claim he is a 'changeling,' a man that can mimic any other man perfectly. He can be man or beast. He can sleep for a thousand years. He has the strength of a hundred or more lives, and he can summon 'Mana' the life stream to his aid."

I know what a changeling is. That means a lot all ready, but God, I don't believe it. He is only a man. OK, he might be ten thousand years old and he might be able to command animals the same way I can read auras, but that is nothing more than a barroom illusion in the end, nothing some cold steel can't deal with. I've never been a god-fearing man after all.

Frankly, I find it hard to comprehend. Pink has just handed me the key to the perfect truth, a key to unlocking some of the greatest mysteries of all time and I'm too stupid to understand it. If never again I breathe a breath of truth, let this be known. Heaven IS hell IS earth; the only difference is where are you standing. It's in the songs we sing, the poetry we read, and in the words we speak. Think about it; it will all come to light soon.

"How do we find it?" Criss asks at the end of the tale.

"It will find us."

The next day is a strange day. Things just don't feel right. I sleep with Pink again; this time Pink sleeps facing me. I don't wake up till half past ten; Criss doesn't wake me. In fact, I don't know if Criss even sleeps. When I get out of the bath, Criss is sitting up in the living room staring into a mirror on the other side of the room. Pink waves one hand in front of him; he fails to react. She tells me, "He has been sitting there for most of the night, I think."

I snap my fingers a few times. "Criss? Criss!" He refuses to move. I ask one more time, this time a bit harder and with the back of my hand. Criss falls out of his seat and looks normal.

"What's up?" Criss asks.

"You first," I insist.

"Have you ever sat and stared into a mirror?"

"Yes."

"Does the reflection always follow you?"

"Far as I can tell." It seems clear to me that he can see something that I cannot. That's when the phone starts to ring, a strange ancient ring like that of a rotary phone; in today's world that is almost an alien sound. We all turn to the telephone; it's old and made of wood with a bronze reserve. Funny, I don't remember having even seen a phone yesterday. I nod my head at Pink; Pink looks at Criss. Criss waves me on; I pick up.

"Hello?" Wind howls so loudly on the other end that it echoes in the hotel. Metallic grinding fills the air; glass all around us creaks and cracks; I drop the phone and start to spin about searching for an explanation for the phenomenon. I'm not alone in my quest.

A whisper drools through the phone sharply, all other sounds deaden. "You're looking for the Cravixs. You can find what you are looking for at 1515 Dolphin on the seventh floor. Go there if you dare." Silences comes next; strangely I'm not relieved.

"Did everyone catch that?" It's not really a question; I know everyone did. But in the off-chance I have lost my mind, I ask.

There's no hesitation, no discussion; Criss goes for the phone book and looks up the address. It's real, a hotel; we're on the road in no time. Criss grabs his sword and asks me if I want mine; I laugh. A decade in the field of monster hunting and I haven't seen the monster yet that was more afraid of a blade than my "Jessie James" revolver.

We make our way to the location described, there forth to be known as mistake number one if I do say so myself; the hotel is a upper class kind of place—glass doors, all hard wood construction on the first floor. There are six uniformed crew members waiting to check us in. Turning left from the entry way, there is a bar and grill; maybe we'll grab a bit after this snoop job is over. Pink checks the directory, Criss the elevator; both come to the same conclusion that the hotel is only six floors.

I go to see the young lady at check-in.

"Checking in?"

"Yep."

"How many?"

"Myself, the young lady, and my brother."

"Our two bedroom suites run for three hundred a night."

"Ouch, how much for one bed?"

"One seventy-five. Did you have a room in mind?"

"Anything on seven."

Her voice seems to change slightly. "OK, great!" She chuckles a manly chuckle through her teeth and hands me a key. "First night's on me, love." The tone is low and devilish like a dozen people talking at once.

"I beg your pardon?"

She turns her head and coughs into one shoulder to clear her throat. "Elevator is on your right, just around the corner." There is clearly something sinister here; if only I had seen it.

I clap twice and point at the elevators; Criss and Pink fall in behind me. "Richard, there is no seventh floor," Criss points out.

"I know. Let's see if the hotel agrees." The elevator moves painfully slow. It seems caged in, a whiplash from the eighteen hundreds; there is a fan ten feet long about eighty feet overhead and dark light pours in through the ventilation.

Semi-tangible shadows seem to surround us. From every which way, things move without being seen. Pink shifts into her demoness form, red skin tail and all. She yelps as if to suggest that something tried grabbing her from behind. So begins a nightmare that I had hope to never live through, but yet I can see now it will never end.

The doors open; it is clear that we are no longer in the hotel. Everything is wrong; the world is dilapidated. The walls are flesh toned; the ground is made out of rusted metal grating. There is no more light falling from above; now the only light comes from a fire burning a mile beneath our feet. Where doors might have otherwise been, there is nothing more than flesh stretched across the openings, some still containing features of the animal that it must have once been.

Criss pulls his sword out and gently pushes Pink in between us; I draw my iron. It feels as if we are being led; slowly we march into the center of the complex. Slowly, we move away from the safety of the light; some doors open in front of us, others are closed. Below we can see the first flickers of life—Thallads' gray-skinned faceless humanoids, no eyes, no nose, just a mouth; some look male, others female, but it feels like a mockery, a wax body with no face. They move in inhuman ways, walking backward, on all fours sometimes, crawling along walls or swinging from the roof. Almost none of them seem to feel the need to cover themselves; they would be beautiful if I didn't think them so horrid.

Chain gates rise in our wake, cutting off some hallways; it is clear that they want us to see something. We are led to what must have been the common areas of the hotel. There in the wide open space of this rusting world stands an effigy made of some form of crystal; humanoid in nature, it stands in a dominating posture, one arm back, the other forward. The back arm clinches a scythe with a chain wrapped around its torso; in the other, it holds a globe and is reaching for the sky. The being is robed; its hair blows across its face, hiding all but its eyes. Faces can be seen in its clothing; human shapes crawl up its body. It feels both elegant and evil.

"What the hell do you think this is?" I find myself asking no one.

Criss throws out his thoughts first, "It is what we came here for."

Then Pink says, "He is Adam Crow, the Avatar to Cravixs. When the lord moves from world to world, he inhabits a mortal form, throughout the course of history as you understand it, that has been his vanguard."

"This hunk of rock is a god?" I find myself spouting out.

"It's an effigy, a piece of art made to look like a man or god," Criss throws across as if I didn't know.

"Do you know what the most painful thing a biological life form can be subjected to?" An unknown voice comes from behind. "Being alone, and that is revealed only by the heartache of being forgotten." The voice comes from a shrouded entity that looks mysteriously like death himself—black hair, white skin, and glowing purple eyes set deep into its skull. Black light spill from its body, sinking into the heart of this world. The dim fairy lights grow only dimmer as they are choked out by this devil . . .

Gradually the light comes back as a gray-white fog pours upon like a hunger mist freezing the environment before us. Our eyes turn to the sky only to see the world seemingly enveloped by an astronomically huge beast, completely inhuman; it is a purple pink mass of slime with a void as its heart; these vortices are never-ending. It has teeth lining its spiraling core pointing into the great nothingness. It breathes an icy breath that coats the world in a thin layer of ice. I lack the power to describe the truly overpowering presence that is this thing; the only word to comes to mind at this time is whether it is divine.

It feels as if my feet are frozen to the ground; I stare in mortal awe. My soul drinks deeply of the sensation that was never meant for it. Frozen earth begins breaking apart; the splintered pieces are dragged into the air and into the black hole of a beast orbiting around us. Pink is the first one of us to regain her senses. She grabs Criss with one hand, me with the other, and shouts, "Come on, come on! Let's go!"

We run; I'm the fastest, quickly taking point, leading the way back along the trail we have previously traveled. Things don't go as well as expected; the tower starts to shake to pieces. The land is dying; a hole opens in the ground beneath my feet. I make it over the hole without a thought. Pink jumps over and I catch her; Criss goes for it. He falls short; I go to grab him. I'm too slow. Criss vanishes. He yells up to us, "Just run!"

Pink is devastated by what she assumes to be our friend and brother's horrid demise; I feel the same way. Pink nearly collapses in tears; I grab her, nearly dragging her along as we sprint through the nightmare hotel.

The Thallads stop hiding and come out to confront us; maybe they think this was our doing. I can't say for sure; I don't stop to ask either. The first gray-skinned monster to step in our path is confronted by the blunt of my psionic force, a blast of raw energy that nearly shreds the monster to pieces upon hitting the metallic floor. The next is a horde that gets shattered like bowling pins. By the time they gain their bearings, we're long gone.

We go round the corner, down the hall, and back to where we started—the elevators. What made me think this was a good idea is beyond me at this point. The door slides open and I step in, the chamber jars, nearly taking us both off our feet. Pink goes to step in behind me; something grabs her from behind, throws her off into the mist. I go to chase after her; I'm cut off.

The biggest Thallad I've seen yet blocks the way; seven feet tall, a diamond-shaped head with a hinge-like jaw, and dressed only in a cloth around its waist, it is armed with a claymore.

I don't have the time or energy to summon anther psychic attack so quickly; I raise my Jessie James and start shooting. The doors slam on me; I hit nothing. The claymore smashes through the door. I hold against the wall to get away; the elevator starts to plummet. I can hear the monster overhead. He lands atop the elevator. I aim and take a potshot; it stabs down at me in return. I duck; we dance around the room that way. I shoot; he stabs till at last the ceiling can't take it, and the monster falls through the floor. We both stand stunned, staring each other down (its eyes look to be in its mouth); he swings his sword. I swing my arm out and hit him with a psychic blast; his sword flies off course and into the wall. He growls at me; I stick my gun in his mouth and blast a hole through him. The elevator screams to a halt. I feel strangely satisfied.

As the doors slowly creak open, I can hear the sound of music being played on a gramophone. I feel a sensation of renewal; I find myself dreaming of the doors swinging open and I'm back in the hotel. Everyone is safe, or better I'm safe in bed; we haven't even left yet.

I'm not that lucky; the doors open to a walkway four feet wide with a twenty-foot tall fan blocking me off from the exit. I'm still in THIS hell, and just now it seems I'm noticing that I'm here alone. I put my back to the wall and walk slowly. Carefully I listen for voices, footsteps anything that might give me some clue where I'm going. I feel my foot hit something heavy. I look down; it's Criss' sword. I can't decide if I'm relieved to know he made it this far or devastated by the idea that if I have his blade he doesn't. He wouldn't have dropped it, that's for damn sure.

I don't know how long I stumbled around in the darkness, likely only a minute or two, but as far as I know it could have been three days. There are no landmarks. I keep moving in a straight line, but time and time again, I keep finding myself standing in front of the elevators. That damn music is playing on a loop. I find myself singing along, "All I have to do is dream, and I know you will be there. In my dreams . . ."

The fans stop, and I find I can slide beneath them. I find my way past the steel doors. I walk into another world; shards of broken glass sixty feet tall by ten feet wide surround me. I weave my way through knee-deep powered glasslike sawdust; my nose is assaulted by a scent I can't quite place. It's a bit like "titami tea" (a industrial comical bamboo is soaked in to be petrified for building purposes). I can now see what Criss was saying about mirrors; these ones don't seem to be mirroring me so much as shadowing me.

Finally, I see blue skies again, but they are alien. There are too many stars. The nebulas are too close, the colors too bright. Everything in sight is made of crystal, but looks broken or half complete.

A voice with an echoing whisper speaks to me, "Welcome, worthy friend, to Tamriel." Glowing purple eyes shimmer at me across the mystical terrain. A black flowing cloak, a mass of bird feathers blow around the newly formed man that now stands before me; he feels like an angel of despair. It finally hits me that I have seen this thing before; the effigy, the white-skinned phantom—he has been like a specter just out of the corner of my eye from the moment we met the estranged Mr. Dove. He must be the monster Pink called Cravixs "or what's left of it at least." He spins around as if to admire the broken realm.

(I should like to make note that I say "he" more so out of habit than to suggest that this monster has an easily defined gender. Though its voice is a hard baritone, its smooth skin, long silky hair, and sharp eyes are very feminine. It would be more fair to say it is as.e.x.u.a.l, but to say her or him every time I refer to him would be unfair.)

"Who are you?" I square myself off with the demon.

He tucks his hands in his pockets and flaps his cloak up and down like a set of wings. "The most obvious of questions, but least relevant. How can one truthfully yet fully reply to such inquiry? 'Fear and harken onto me for I am the Lord' comes to mind. 'I are thee how is called I am' or 'we are the Alpha and Omega.' I am to dawn as is dusk. We who rules the midnight air: I the destroyer."

"You are God?"

"I am what you would call a god, yes."

I hate everything about the guy; I raise my iron and take a shot. I can take this guy out. No problem, one shot. 'That's that' is what I think. The devil slaps my bullet out of the air like a bug, and suddenly I find a rusty chain linking my c.h.e.s.t to his hand. The thing called Cravixs tugs his hand forward and I fall at him. I don't give up; I clench my fist and take my brother's sword in both hands with hopes of knocking the f.u.c.ker's head clean off. He grabs my wrist and forces it down. He stares into me; his eyes are narrow with hatred and l.u.s.t. He pulls his hair away from his face, then wipes the sweat from my brow. I can taste his breath; it's hideous. His skin is so cold it burns; his lips touch mine and I am paralyzed. In the moments that follow, I experience what must be the limit of mortal suffering.

One of his legs wraps around mine, and he lays me down; his lies on top of me. I barely notice. The anguish of my body is nothing compared to what I see within him. He is the void; I fall into his eyes, and past them is a vortex of cycling souls reaching for me, screaming, trying to pull me in, trying to pull themselves out. For them it is too late; they are a part of the nothingness, and in a moment I will be to. I can feel it almost immediately; they take away my dreams, then my memories. They eat me from the inside, working their way out. I turn what is left of my strength inward. Foolishly I think, I, the mighty psychic, Richard Blake, can stand agents the void.

My feeble efforts are not only meaningless but flat out laughable; he tears apart my defenses like a hand grenade tears a part rice pudding. It seems needless to say I am crushed beneath Cravixs' cosmic strength. I remember hearing him say or maybe think a word "Ju-on?" I can't remember anything that happens thereafter. Time passes; for all I know, he takes my v.i.r.g.i.n.i.t.y.

I awake hours, maybe days later. I'm beaten to a dry but bloody mess; my clothing is torn to barely adequate. My mouth is filled with sand (a feeling I find I'm somehow getting used to). I search myself for what is worth for any physical evidence of my most recent memories. The only thing I find is that I have a death grip on Criss's sword. That's proof enough for me that what I thought I saw I did see.

I'm standing on a dirt road; there is nothing in sight but miles of corn. I start walking, and it's not long before I'm approached by a black 1980s' style Jaguar. The rear window rolls down; the windows are tinted to hide whoever is inside. An English woman's voice comes from the back asking me, "Are you Christopher Blake?"

"No," I respond, and start to try to relate what has just transpired, but I am interrupted by a silver and blue gun peeking out the window. I hear the bang and I see the flash, but I don't feel the impact, not at first. I reach down and feel my c.h.e.s.t. I pull out a dart; it has a syringe attached to it and three needles. Next I feel rage; I can hear my heart beat loud as thunder. My vision blurs; I raise my gun and cry a primal roar. This time I don't see the flash, only feel the darts hitting me, a dozen of them. My heart slows to a stop.

That was three weeks ago . . .

(Watcher archive note by "Watcher A." L. Gallard—for the sake of accuracy Richard Blake was shot six times with an injector gun filled with a neurotoxin called INT-23. Typically a single dose would render one immobilized and disable their ability to formulate memory for several days. According to (Hunter U. H.) Wright Von Richton, she fired one shot. He (Blake) appeared resistant so she fired five more times. He awoke only several minutes later and became hysterical, so she shot him again, this time with a sedative called CON-5 at which time he lost consciousness.

As a rule of thumb, stories of the nature that I have just shared find their way into a special section of the archive known as the "unknowns" stories that contain material we simply cannot verify the authenticity of. As I was sorting this material, I was approached by my intern, a young Fay named Amarant Springfield, who pointed out that there are now three stories throughout the archive speaking of a glowing-eyed monster like the one Blake describes, one by the son of the perverse Von Richton, Joseph, the other by the reputable Joe Dove, currently the second highest rated Watcher. I have taken the liberty to add these sections for quick references in the future.)

* * *

(Section by "Watcher C" Joseph Von Richton's journal 4: January 27, 1947/

January 28, 1947)

In the past years, in the days before the watchers, I recall my father spinning tales about "the timeless ones' living gods," "immortals." He would sometimes say "Ju-on," silent wars, thirteen angels, and thirteen sister demons. No matter the story, there are always links; the living gods are forever young. They have the power to bind the world, and they always carry swords. He would tell that he once saw two Ju-on's fight and he saw what happens when a god dies.

So if a god can die, then that's not a very good god, is it? I think that the swords are the key; the blades have the power. So if I had one, I would be a god and I would have the power to do as I please. Be that as it may, my true concern is the protection of my own kind. It looks as if man is small and weak. I will take the Ju-on's sword, and with it, man will become strong again.

Poland is where I execute my plan. There is a Ju-on there, one we have followed for years. I have read the "Watchers diary." I know everything, I know where he lives, and I know where he works. "Maxwell Foust" is the name he is going by today, an American spy posing as a German secret service agent.

I sneak into his office under cover of night and hide on the rafters of the ceiling till he goes to sleep. I do as any good Watcher does; I record what he sees and what he does. He looks very strange for a German, doesn't even look right for an American. His hair is long and dark; he keeps his hair tied up with a red ribbon. His skin is almost bronze in color with a hint of red; his eyes glow a metallic yellow. I watch as he removes his army uniform, he wears a necklace with three rings on it. One looks primeval made out of hand-cut stone, possibly jade; the second is ancient, skillfully carved out of white silver with wing-like shapes on it, and the last is modern and of simple gold with writing on the inner ring. I can't read it; I'm too far away, and even if I were to get a better look, the language may be one I can't read. He has a scar on his arm, like a brand; it is an early Christian symbol maybe—a cross with a handle could also be from the Cleopatra dynasty—the Isis seal 'the Ankh'. He is built like a dancer, slim and toned.

He engages in a complicated prayer as he removes the blade from his hip. It looks like an oriental sword. He wraps it in a black velvet blanket, folding the cloth around the blade, kneeling before it, slowly turning the blade after every fold. It sounds to me as if he is whispering something in Mongolian and clapping his hands every several steps. The process of tying the blade in cloth takes nearly half an hour before he finally wraps a tassel around the reverently tied sword and sets it against the wall alongside the bed.

(Note from Archives: This section has been abridged due to a conflict during translation. The full version is still available on request from the archive center, Wales, England. For more information, speak to a Rank S Watcher.)

I arrive at the trolley station at dawn just as planned. From here, I will take a train to the next county and a dirigible back to England, flawless as always. The finest art that the "Holy Order of the von Richton Society" has to offer is to make one's self invisible in broad daylight, and I am a master at age fourteen. I can stand next to anyone and look like I belong. A handy trick, I might say.

Early in the morning I was an urchin; after breakfast I became the son of a duke. Yes, everything is perfect, and now it is time for me to look at my prize. I start to pull back the delicate black cloth as I am seated on the train and we are safely coasting down the tracks . . .

(Note from the archive: the following conversations were recorded in French. They have been translated for use in your region, see the office for more information.)

"That I do not think belongs to you," a voice speaks to me in a light tenor tone.

Impossible, no one could have followed me. No one saw me board the train, I think, but nonetheless I raise my head only to see Maxwell Foust back in his SS uniform sitting in the chair alongside me. The door didn't open. I heard no noise at all; he is just there, flashing gold eyes and all.

I leap to my feet, shouting words I will not repeat. There is only one way out. Foust leans in to grab at me, I fall backward out the window and skillfully climb onto the roof. I should make a note that running along the roof of a boxcar is neither fun nor easy as the romance writers of this decade would make it seem. I make my way toward the engineer's car only to find Foust waiting for me; as soon as I leap to the next car I freeze and reverse my advances. "Come on, kid, give me my sword, and this will all be over."

Running against the train seems less difficult. Swiftly I dash down one car after another, leaping and rolling with the utmost of ease. Foust cackles at me as I run; the bastard thinks this is funny. We approach a large bridge. I leap down to a guest car and shove my way to baggage and the caboose. I swing open the last door; I see that we seem to over a river. Foust is no more than a dozen steps behind. "No place to go, kid. What are you going to do now?"

I look at Foust, then at the blade at my side, finally down into the river two hundred feet below. "Can you swim?" I hold out the blade, threatening to throw it. Foust looks concerned and holds his hands up In objection.

"I can!" I shout, taking one last step off the side of the train, plummeting into the waters below.

(Watcher Archive note by "Watcher A" L. Gallard: the following sections describe Joseph's week lost in the wilderness (section has been omitted, available at the online archive if needed for review ). His next encounter with the unknown continues in the evening of 2-6-1947.)

Strange things have been happening to me since my little swim down river. I have fallen ill with a strong sniffle, my skin feels cold, and I can't sleep. But physical pain aside, my real worry is in that I don't know which city I'm in. I can't spot any other Watchers and I'm surrounded by members of the German Socialist movement.

I break into a museum with a plan to holed up for the night. I have no money left and no friends to turn to. All that is insignificant because I still have the sword; once I learn to use it, I can fix everything.

I'm beginning to feel strange yet; I can hear voices whispering to me. I look around and see nothing; shadows move around the museum, following me, sometimes even tipping over displays as I swear they reach out to touch me. I now it is all in my imagination. It's my fever, nothing more; once I reach England everything will be fine.

Nearing midnight, I find a place to lie down; it's beneath a sculpture of a plane and between two pieces of modern art. It looks safe. My eyes barely close before I hear a voice call my name loudly. "Foust, he found me here? The river must have carried me a hundred miles, how is he here?

"von Richton, I know you're here. Come out and hand over the sword. You lose."

I stand; there is no place to go. He's right, but that doesn't mean I have to like it. I unwrap the sword and grab the handle. The walls are crawling; I can hear a dozen voices whispering inhuman chatter. My fever is getting deathly. It feels like the ground is shaking, or it might be me.

Foust stands in the darkened doorway before me. "You can't be here," I mutter.

"You're still on the train."

"Hand me the sword, kid." Foust walks slowly, watching my hands nervously.

"This is it, the key to your power. With it, I can be you."

"It doesn't work that way."

"Teach me."

"If you don't drop the sword in five seconds, you're going to lose something you're going to miss." He seems not to be looking at me anymore but instead passes me to something on or in the walls.

Can he see my hallucinations? I start to draw the blade out. "Don't do it. You'll call all of hell down on you."

"Prove it."

"I won't say it again!"

He looks angry. I step forward in rage; my hand squeezes the handle. A crossbow slides down Foust's sleeve and snaps open. I barely see the medieval weapon before he has taken aim. He fires two darts, almost simultaneously it would seem. One hits my right leg just above my knee; the other shoots clean through my wrist as I raise the blade.

The magic katana slips from my fingertips as I fall on my face. The weapon flies away from me in slow motion. The blade splits into two and folds in on itself in a scissor-like fashion, then snaps back into place. Had my hand still been on the handle, the vice would most likely have taken my whole arm off. Foust dashes forward taking his sword out of the air as he rushes past. I roll onto my side and grip my injuries.

The flashing white blade back in its rightful owner's grip seems to push the darkness away. A spotlight shines down on the swordsmen. The darkness takes shape. A personification of fear and anger, the shadows grow faces, then hands, becoming a living swarm before me. The spirits grow and lash out at Foust. Foust does not quiver in the face of evil; he instead relishes in the glory of combat. It seems clear that Foust needs not a blade to fight as his hands seem to cut down the evils fine without it. Courageously, he dances almost teasingly into the fray of the ineffectual demons. The way he mopves, the way he fights I can only attribute to some form of omnipresence as he seems to not see so much as feel the world around him.

I can hear Foust in my mind; he speaks as clearly as if we were face-to-face. "What are you really after, kid?"

"The darkness."

"Is that so? Then why do you need A sword?"

"The ancient ones were right. The darkness is alive."

"Leave the darkness to me. I want to know what you want."

"I don't want to be afraid of the dark. I want to fight it. I want to be what you are."

"I am Sal-la-day-namO. I am an Avatar, chosen to stand forever against the evils that plague this world. You can't be what I am. But if you want to fight alongside me . . ."

* * *

(The remainder of this doc.u.ment was destroyed in a fire in 1962 as well as many other chronicles left by the Watchers. No one can tell me what Foust said to Joseph, nor can Joseph himself, as it appears that he died in 1958. He was married to an Asian woman named Aska. His last name was not recorded. He had a daughter named Wright. Wright was granted her place as the speaker of the council in 1970 where she still sits today. It would seem too that she is the youngest speaker in the council's history.

This last section was taken from diary No. 46 of Joe Dove (Watcher S): 08-28-2001.)

After you have been in the field for a year or two, you start to just know when someone has something to say. So you do what anyone would do: follow them, to hear what they have to say. I'm on the streets of New York; it's three in the morning and its cold as hell. I spot my prey—a middle-aged man with dark hair and dressed in black. He has the look of a man with something on his mind. The streets are crowded as always, and I like it. The streets of "the Big Apple" make for a good place to tail someone without being seen.

As I walk behind my mark, I feel as if I know this guy, someone I tracked once before. He steps into a rickety-looking building with a demolition tag on it. He goes to slam the door; I slide one foot in to hold it. The dark man swerves between some drifters clogging the condemned building's halls. Then he walks up the steps; I keep my distance. He gets ahead of me for a time, but I catch up with enough time to see his coattails slip into a room with an emergency generator set outside of it. It must be the only room with lights. I stand against the door and pull my notebook out of my pocket. The first words I hear are "Mr. Dove, would you please come in?"

The whole scenario sounds like an early 1960s' bomb shelter; it seems like a good idea till you come to notice that you're really sitting in a hole in the ground with your head between your legs. I walk through the door; things start to look clear. I know who I've been following. I've been following him for years; it's damn near my life's work.

It's the demon called Crow; it's an empty room aside from a table and two chairs. You would think he was expecting me. I accept. "It's been a long time, Mr. Dove."

"I don't seem to recall having ever met you face-to-face."

"You? No. The men you represent on the other hand I know very well. Every decade or two, we have a heart to heart like this."

"How charming!" I make no attempt to hide my love of sarcasm.

"I don't mean that literally. Of course, it would be a waste of both of our times if I were to rip your heart from your c.h.e.s.t right now."

"That's reassuring."

"I trust you know who I am."

"Adam Crow, Vampire, Warlock, and demonic prince. Am I close?"

"Sometimes I am also called Filius-Mammon, king of Tamriel. One of three

at least."

"How lucky for them!"

"Can the jokes, old man, before you become a late-night snack."

"Look who's calling who old. Well, it looks to me that you planned for me to be here, so what are you looking for?"

"I want you to place your holiest of holy book on the table before you and do what you Watchers do."

"And for a second there I thought you wanted me to suck you off." I place down my diary as asked.

"I'm going to speak and you are going to write. Or is that too hard for you?"

"Maybe I should call for backup. Do you mind waiting for about half an hour," Crow growls, making an unearthly sound, and throws me into the chair before me.

"Should I take that as a yes?"

"Now start writing." Crow takes a seat in the opposite chair. His head dr.a.p.es back, and his long dark hair falls away from his face. "Would you believe me if I told you only a handful of centuries ago this world was an united being? All races, humans and animals alike, spoke a singular tongue?"

"Is that a rhetorical question?" I know it is but I ask anyway.

"Mr. Dove?"

"Yes."

"Be quiet."

"Do you want me to record that as well?" I'm already writing.

"Mr. Dove, we are not friends. In fact I deeply hate everything you stand for, and after this speech I was going to tell you how I laid a hex on you and that your son is going to murder you."

"I don't have any kids."

"Ah . . . how silly of me. I didn't realize you're a seventy-year-old v.i.r.g.i.n that has never even touched himself."

"Do you know what narcissism is?"

"What you're full of."

"A witty demon! We are going to get along great."

"What did I do to deserve this?" Crow rubs his eyes momentarily. I don't waste an instant; forty years ago, I swore to do everything in my power to rid the world of monsters like Crow. Now I have a chance to assassinate the king himself. I'm going to take it. I twist the handle of my cane and withdraw my Iai-do blade without a word or a sound. My blade strikes home, digging deep into Crow's c.h.e.s.t and into the seat beneath him. Crow's eyes roll downward. "That was uncalled for. Do you mind if I continue now or shall we proceed with this foolishness? You see, Mr. Dove, many hunters mistake me for a night stalker. That simply is not the case. Mr. Dove, I am God. Your pitiful assault is nothing if not meaningless." The humor melts from my face as I slowly sit back down.

Crow slowly slides the blade out of his body and takes a moment to admire the art of the oriental edge. "This is a finely crafted blade. Whereabouts did you happen to come across it?" Crow asks as he courteously hands the blade back to me.

"A friend."

"Anyone I might know?"

"Who knows? The world's not that big after all." It's strange, or maybe not so strange, that Crow doesn't seem to bleed. He doesn't even seem to care that I attacked him. I tap my pen on the table. "Please go on."

Crow places his feet on the table as he rests back in his chair "Mr. Dove, this world is not your world. It is in fact my world. You had stolen it from me several thousand years ago. I lived on this world and you worshipped me as well as my two brothers and my sister. We were your beloved. But one day someone became greedy and asked, 'Why must my life be one of bowing and groveling?' Naturally the faithless would be 'Willed' out of reality. But somehow this one gained power, enough so that he had ability to harm the immortal overseers. You found weapons that could cut our flesh, armor that could deflect out magic. You even had stolen a fraction of the power of creation. Not enough so to really do anything but enough that one day you might. That on top of the fire and fertility you already had pillaged from us made you a worthy enemy."

I feel the need to cut in, "You're immortal. How can we have harmed you?"

"Move world to world for a time and you'll find that you become susceptible to some of their rules."

"Traveling makes you weaker?"

"I'm not at liberty to discuss that at this time."

"I'm deeply sorry."

"The point is, you have something that belongs to me, and I plan to take it back. I'm not unsportsmanlike. I understand you are somewhat attached to this world, and I will give you the opportunity to keep it. The world as you know it is coming to an end. Trees will walk, animals will talk, and humanity will take its rightful places back as messengers to the ancient gods. The transformation will begin with the burning of a mighty church, then four-fifths of all men will die. Beasts will override your cites, rivers will run black like oil, and the oceans will swell. Yea, they that love me will be spared my wraith. On the last day of the purging, the sun will set and shall not rise again till man and monster sleep together in acceptance of the coming of the Lord."

"And when will this last day be? How long will the transmutation take?"

"Nine years."

"Nine! Why not ten? Some astronomical event occurring that we should be aware of? Some aligning of planets?"

"No, I simply think nine sounds right."

"I think you're full of shit. I don't think you have the power to do everything."

"No?"

"And even if you could, someone would stop you."

"Like who?"

"Sal-la-day-namO."

Crow finds his feet and leans forward; he manifests a bottle of wine and two goblets made of gold with gemstones. He pours into the glasses and passes one to me as he thinks about the statement made. "Sal-la-day-namO, my younger brother. It's true he might still have the power to stop me, if he were still a god, or reobtained his divinity. Good luck with that though. No one has heard from Sal-la-day-namO in over fifty years, I would wager."

Uncharacteristically, Crow sighs after taking a drink. "I think it is truly sad what became of him (Sal-la-day-namO). I love retribution as much as anyone, but justice should be fast and passionate I feel, not what Laus-deu-O subscribed. This is not the first world Laus-deu-O created, and humans were not its first inhabitants. The Greeks were more or less right. There were many gods at one point. We have been somewhat wasting away with the passage of millennia. We have a set of conducts we follow. Amongst them is a law stating that once a race is strong enough to survive without our direct interventions, we let them grow on their own till they can pass over into our reality. Sal-la-day-namO could not comply. He loved one of you, mortals I mean, more than our elder brother. So he was condemned to live on this rock, stripped of everything but his timelessness till the end of history."

Crow sits in deep thought. What can he be thinking about? Is it anything I could even comprehended?

"I'm sorry, Mr. Dove, but I grow weary. I wish to retire for the evening. Can I call you back to finish this another time?"

Gods get tired? "Yeah, no problem. You have my number." Hastily I collect my notebook and cane. As I walk out of the door, I hear Crow speak one more time.

"Joe, my brother traded his soul for ten years of p.l.e.a.s.u.r.e. Did he get a good deal?"

Standing in the doorway, I recall my own tortured past. "I've known people to settle for less. Whether or not that's a good deal, I'm in no position to make wagers."

* * *

Tail crawls out of bed at the crack of noon; Blake is her new roommate. He is asleep in the folding chair alongside the bed still fully dressed. Von Richton has provided them with new accommodations, far superior to the icebox she lived in last month, but not as nice as the room at Claw Co. Tower. Tail gets up on all fours and looks around the room, trying to find her jeans, T-shirt, and laptop. "Hmm . . . two days of frozen pizza and it looks like a college dorm room, not bad." Tail picks up her shirt and finds it half covered in tomato paste. "How did that happen?"

Tail exhales sharply, taking her soiled clothing to the bathroom to soak in the sink. She spends some time combing her hair, brushing down her fur and straightening her whiskers. She wags her cl.u.s.ter of tails and laughs at herself in the mirror and at the irony of her being the s.e.xy fox she is.

The first week in a new apartment is never easy and seldom as comfortable as one would imagine, or hope. Knowing that there are cameras hidden throughout the walls would make most uneasy as well but that you become callus too. And if you like walking around in your u.n.d.e.r.w.e.a.r, sooner or later you'll start doing it regardless of who might be watching.

Tail steps into the relatively compact den; it is still filled with boxes of amenities donated by the Watchers to make this a more livable space, seeing that Blake has nothing and everything she has is . . . being withheld. Tail sets up her computer and turns on the media player, tuning into some punk rock; she finds the willpower to start sorting the boxes. "Clothes?" She opens the first box. "Women's jeans, size zero and below? Well . . . if the eating fad ever passes I might need this, or if my b.u.t.t falls off." She throws the box off to one side.

"Novelty shirts! This is relevant to my interest." Tail starts looking through another box. "Fear Factory" Zero Signal, "Nobuo and the Black Mages 'Sky's Above,' Prince and the Batman 'Party Man,' Rise Against 'Like in Angel,' Metalica 'Blackened,' and finally, Michal Jackson 'Smooth Criminal.'" Tail dances in place, amused by the selection.

Next box in line is filled with cups, plates and canned goods. Tail takes a coffee cup, fills it with raw coffee beans, and starts drinking. Much cleaning leads next to a need for lunch. Tail dances into the kitchen and searches about. "Flour shells, don't see hamburger. Lucky Charms, no milk. Baking soda, I can't eat that. Hotdogs and instant noodles?" Tail turns on the stovetop, boils the noodles, and starts cutting up hot dogs, all along dancing to her music, h.i.p.s shaking, tails wagging, head bobbing.

Blake stumbles out of the bedroom and stands in the hallway, admiring Tail's energetic dance. "What's cookin', Doc?" Blake calls over.

"Ancient Chinese magic, Roman Hot dog," Tail jokes. "Hey, Blake, do you ever think about marriage?"

"I don't think we have that type of relationship."

"I don't mean us. I mean marriage in general. Why do we still have it? It's a completely arcane ritual that totally has its roots in paganism. It defies the natural order of the s.e.x.u.a.l animal and is a tool of slavery even in the modern world. There's nothing romantic about it. Romantic love never existed between the betrothed anyway even in the romantic Victorian ages. It's, love I mean, between the fruitful a.d.u.l.terous. Then to even more so complicate this dark age stigma, it weaseled its way out of the church and into mainstream politics, so now we have government practically paying people to f.u.c.k and calling it a public good. As if we couldn't do it without monetary compensation. That's gotta be criminal. Taxing people for being single? . . . Could I petition to have marriage delegalized and legalize hemp in its place?"

"Tail, it's early and I'm still feeling the whiplash off that drug from last, day, week, night, month? I'm not ready for advanced stuff," Blake mumbles.

Tail spoons up the soup and leads Blake to the modest table in the room. "Well, what do you say we start small? Really, this is the first time we have been together and one of us hasn't been incarcerated or incapacitated. Word on the beat is you have some badass magic at your disposal."

Blake shakes his head as he begins eating the meal placed before him. "Magic, it's not my thing. The only magic I can do is make light dance. I can't even do that for more than a second or two before I become too tired to sustain it. I'm a Psion. I do tricks of the mind. I can see through other people's minds, and I can levitate stuff."

"Stuff?"

"Small things mostly. Sometimes I can do something big when I'm scared."

"Like me?"

"Not you. You're too big. I've never moved a human." Blake veers off topic. "What about you? I heard you toasted a guy the other day."

"It's called pyromancy. I can create fire. But . . ."

"But what?"

"Well, it is based almost solely on my emotional state. I can't conjure at all when I'm sad. It's exhausting when I'm happy, and I do it by accident sometimes when I'm angry . . . or in heat."

"Well, I can see that being a problem."

"It's OK. I have violent menstruations."

"How would that help?"

A third voice comes into the room, interrupting the conversation with a thick British tone. "Ms. Vixon?"

"Jesus Christ!" (Tail pronounces Jesus as Ha'-Zeus.) Tail falls out of her chair; Blake leaps to his feet as the haunting and awesome presence of Wright Von Richton appears in the room.

Von Richton is the overseer of the Watchers; she dresses in sanguine red sportscast with matching slacks. Her vest is buttoned up around her neck, leaving only the collar of her tie visible. Her tie is clasped with a ring embroidered with an early Christian symbol; her left hand is tucked into her pants' pocket, her right clenches tightly a cane made of a crystal ore featuring the same symbol as her tie. Her skin looks almost pink due to the reflection cast by her thick bronze glasses; her eyes are invisible there through.

"Morning, Boss. What's new?" Blake asks in an almost joking fashion.

"America is under siege by religious extremists hailing from Egypt, Pakistan, and Israel." Von Richton tries to pass the news off completely nonchalant as she then fades seamlessly into her next point of discussion. Blake sits stunned, trying to deduce whether or not that was all a joke or if his host is heartless enough that the threat of war is meaningless to her.

"I have good news for you. Now make yourself decent if you don't mind. You too, Mr. Blake," Von Richton commands. Tail and Blake fail to hesitate as the powerful British woman follows them back to their bedroom. "Ms. Tail Vixon, you claimed to be born in New York City. You told me you had a mother that is human, and she cared for you. You're sad that you did not know the name of you biological father and that your mother would never tell it to you. Not even your birth certificate, which strangely you have, contends that information. After investigating these claims I have concluded . . . you are correct on all accounts." Von Richton turns her back on them as she removes her glasses to clean them.

"The records we have unearthed suggest you were born in Claw Co. Tower. Your mother is recently deceased, and you are in fact 100 percent human, based on the loose definition of human some of our councilors seem to be using." As Von Richton speaks, Tail throws on a green T-shirt that has two interlocking Fs on it, a rainbow belt with blue jeans, and a Hawaiian yellow and red over it, with a pair of skating shoes that are checkered.

Richard Blake dons an almost D.i.c.k Trace look with a tan overcoat, black tank top, and blue jeans with work boots.

"That being what it is, Ms. Vixon, it turns out you are entitled to certain privileges, amongst them being I will not be hanging you anytime soon and I cannot legally hold you here in the 'grotto' any longer. That also entails you are now subject to rules that I failed to press upon you earlier."

Tail whispers to Blake, "Why do I get the feeling I'm going to like being a monster even less than I liked being an alien?"

"Unfortunately, Ms. Vixon, it turns out you have siblings that you failed to tell me about, and they like you are under investigation. Yet, one or more of them may not be as human as you are."

"I have siblings?" Tail inquires.

"According to the information I was delivered, you have a brother and two

sisters."

"No one told me that."

Von Richton walks back into the living room, turning her attention now on Blake. "As for you, congratulations! You are now officially a member of the Von Richton Monster Hunters Organization. You survived initiations."

"I thought I was to become a Watcher?"

"Very astute, circa 1970 you would have been, but status quo seventy-one. There was a great conflict of interest in and amongst our holy orders. There the Watchers were broken into factions hints why we call ourselves the Von Richtons. Here under my offices there are two factions. First, the Order of the Watchers, as led up by L. Gillard and Joseph Dove, and then there are the Order of the Hunters vanguarded by myself. You will still receive your Watcher diary, handbook, and manual, but in addition to the responsibilities of a Watcher, you will be given special sanctions to carry out, not so indifferent from the one you just disembarked from." "What do you mean conflict of interest?" Blake asks.

"I typically don't like disclosing archived information like this, but I envision you and I being close in the future so . . . after the fire at the central office, my predecessor suspected arson and mobilized the Watcher. At the time, that was all we were called—Watcher, and set out on a campaign to find the lair of the monsters responsible for decimating a thousand years of studies. They found a door, one that led them away from earth and into the lower realms. There was endless debate as to what was there, and so thereafter each head Watcher took a section of the remaining body of the organization and began to study this thing independently . . ." she trails off.

"What did they discover?" Tail leans in.

"The world you would call hell." Von Richton seats herself in one of the armchairs in the living room. She crosses her hands over her mouth, hiding her face almost wholly; she leans slightly forward. "Mr. Blake, I do believe that Mr. Dove is waiting for you in the study of the mansion. I would like to speak with Ms. Vixon a little longer."

Blake nods; Tail looks over at Blake, shaking her head in protest. "Don't leave me alone with this gargoyle."

Blake steps out of the room after tucking his sword down the back of his coat and his gun into his t.h.i.g.h strap.

It's not more than a moment after Blake leaves that the door slams open and half a dozen men in suits rush into the room, grabbing Tail and throwing her to the ground. "What the f.u.c.k is this shit!" They pin Tail's arms and legs and start pulling at her clothing. "Ha, watch it. That doesn't come off. You? Do I know you? Do that again and I think you're buying me dinner and a show." Tail wrestling with the guards protests. Von Richton smirks devilishly. "This is less than civil."

"I thought I told you once already. Freaks don't have rights."

"I thought you just told me I'm human."

"That doesn't make you any less a monster."

"Are you getting off on this?"

"In a matter of fact, I am."

As she is stripped, one of Tail's hand burst into flames and then the other. Slowly the flames creep up her arms, and her eyes flicker with fire. Tail is a wild mage; her "talent" as it is called is pyromancy. When hurt or afraid, Mana flows into her, invoking the element of fire; fire is rage, and fire is anger. It feeds, it burns, and it consumes. Only a truly gifted pyromancer can avoid the flames, taking tribute from even its conjurer. Tail is not that powerful yet; if the flames are allowed to burn, they will consume everything around her. Then when there is nothing left to feast upon, it will devour her in retribution for its service.

"Ms. Vixon, if you set yet another of my men ablaze, I will see to it that you lose that which identifies you as a woman." Tail claws and she kicks, but she stokes her own rage till a messenger ends up coming to her aid.

"Madam von Richton!" It is a boy likely close to Tail's age. Von Richton holds up her hand in protest, and everyone seems to freeze in place. Von Richton crosses her hands back over her face and turns her eyes to the young man. Tail stripped down to the bone looks around puzzled at the reaction to the simple hand gesture.

"Soldier, what is your name?" she asks briefly.

"Victor Lee Valentine," the young man responds.

"You are a member of Cerberus's team, are you not?"

"I am."

"Cerberus represents the face of Watcher law. You are the team responsible for recovering rouge agents. I do believe."

"Yes." He seems puzzled by the statement. Von Richton knows well who Victor is and knows well what Cerberus is.

"Then try to look the part. Straighten your caller, tie your shoes, and make sure your belt is secure before addressing me!" the overlord of the Von Richtons demands.

"Yes, madam." Swiftly Victor adjusts his clothing.

"Now speak your mind."

"Ms. Von Richton, messengers from the Jesuit have been IDed. They seem to be moving this way . . ."

"How many?"

"Two—Paladin Mace Hammer and Father Abel Nightingale."

"Damn . . ." Von Richton looks strangely upset. "Well, Ms. Vixon, it looks like we will need a rain check on your abject humiliation." Von Richton tucks her cane under her arm and swiftly makes her way out; her guards fall in behind.

Tail pants for a moment, calming herself, then walks over to her cup of coffee. She grounds and eats another spoonful. "If you're r.a.p.ed by a gangster on your way home from the mall you call the police, who do you call if the police join in when they arrive?"

* * *

Blake makes his way out of the underground of the facility and back into the mansion that Is the upper floors. The estate is monstrous in size and has a 1700s' gothic appeal. Much of it looks like it was taken from a church and had the house built around it—stone and hard wood inner walls, braziers hanging from the walls, and stained glass covering most the windows.

The main room of the castle seems to be the entryway; this room is three stories tall with two stairwells that wrap around each other. One leads to the second floor, the other to the third. They start from the same place but split at the thirteenth step becoming individual halfway to the second floor. There are gargoyles and suits of armor lining the stairs. In the gap near the divide, there is a twenty-five foot tall broke of a goddess bridging the distance between the second and third floors.

There are seven balconies like opera booths looking down at the doorways, and a red carpet leads around the room. Fine art fills the ground level in a haunting way. It's not fine art by the traditional methods wherein you might find lovely young women and lords on horseback, but instead a much darker version there of death, a torment well lit in vibrant colors to c.a.r.e.s.s the eye round the room.

A plump old man awaits Blake on the second floor; slowly he hops down the steps one hand outstretched in greeting. Blake's eyes are drawn to the brand burned on his right hand. Blake nearly recoils in shock as his mind is finally clear: the old man's hand, Criss's book, Blake's tattoo, they're all the same—the letter "W" with three rings enshrining it. Blake can't help but refer to the brand even before greeting his host. "Your hand?"

"Yes, sir, I'm property of the Von Richton's as well."

"Would that make you a . . . ?"

"Abet? No, I'm one hundred percent human and I have the scars to prove it."

"What does that word mean?"

"'Abet',—is a man that possesses cretin traits that are uncommon of their brethren, like an Asian that's seven feet tall or an African that can throw a knife three hundred yards and peg in ace or anyone that can read minds . . ." "That's not how it works . . .

"I know. You told me already." Dove holds out a book. "Do you know what this is?"

Blake's eyes lower to the leather-bound book in Dove's hand. "That is my brother's book, the one about Psionicist."

"No," Dove cuts him off. "This one is your book."

Blake takes the book and looks at the first pages. "There is writing in here. It's my penmanship."

"Yep, you gave it to me almost ten days ago. Now I'm giving it back to you. Welcome to the Watchers."

Blake shakes his head. "Since I met you I have been shot, nearly stabbed, poisoned, and turned into someone's bitch in a state penitentiary. What if I don't want to be a Watcher?"

Joe walks over to the double door at the front of the room. "I bet I know you better than you know yourself. Here is the door. I can tell you if you walk out right now no one will follow you and you will never see me again. But in spite of that, I bet you won't do a damn thing. Do you know why? It's because you want to know what you will see tomorrow if you stay. Am I right? Are you leaving?" Dove knows well Blake won't leave. And he doesn't. "That book, get used to it. We expect to see no less than seventy pages turned in at the end of each week. Fail to deliver and you don't get paid," Joe yells back as he disappears from sight.

"Do we have uniforms!?"

"Do we look like the MIB!" Somehow Joe's voice is distant as if his yelling from another wing of the estate.

Dove slaps Blake on the arm, ensuring him they will speak again soon, as he waddles away. Blake opens his book and starts looking around, almost instinctively cataloguing the paintings and the rest of what he sees before him.

There's a pounding on the front door; as Blake opens his notebook, the door flies open . . .

* * *

Joe makes his way out, and I feel it may be best for me to familiarize myself with what would soon become an extension of my arm. I start by walking around the stairwell, searching for paintings hidden around them. It looks to me as if there are twenty-five photographs, fifteen of which are black and white; one is yellowed by the acid in the paper and failure to protect it from sunlight and oxygen. I find the photos hold very little interest for me.

Behind the goddess statue, I find a slight incline in the floor that leads down six steps to a door that looks boarded shut; I would wager that at one time this might have been the elevator that led into the Grotto. It seems like someone has tried to masquerade this as a shrine of sorts by placing a painting in front of the boarded-up door. It is an interesting painting at least.

The painting is seven feet wide by nine feet tall; in the foreground, mostly shadowed, out there are six men. The one that is clearest is a man with a sharp Don Keota-like beard with a curly Q; he has warts and his face looks dry and chapped. His clothing is earth-toned and he is armed with a torch; he has a musket slung across his back maybe a conquistador judging by the jowls he wares. The meat of the painting looks to be two young women dressed in vibrant cloaks, one blue, the other green. One girl has red hair; the other is blonde, and they are both tied to long wooden stakes tipped away from each other, creating a V shape within the painting. Flames kiss at their heels. The background is a cloudy sky blackened by the smoking stakes, but still an eerie orange glows looms overhead.

My trance of study is interrupted by a pounding behind me; it is clear someone wants in. I hide under the steps and watch. I get the feeling that what is to come is going to be infinitely more fun than what I was previously doing—pounding, pounding some more, tapping on the steps. Two titans approach.

The front door smashes open and a pair of men storm in. The one in the lead is a hairy man with red hair and a flat top; his skin is worn and redden. A tan burn covers his face; he is dressed in a gray pair of slacks and a matching shirt. His partner is a middle-aged man with bifocals; his skin is pale and he has salt and pepper hair. He has heavy garbs and hides himself well.

From down the steps, the mighty Von Richton descends dressed in her blood-red suit. She stops partway down the steps and squares herself for battle as it would.

The man in the lead with red hair points at Von Richton inquisitively. "Wright Von Richton!" he shouts. "You are a disgrace to His Holiness!"

Von Richton tucks one hand in her pocket, facing down at him. "This is not Italy. His Holiness has no power here!"

"You insult us with your zeal!"

"Strangely, Paladin Hammer, I do not care! Your very presence on my property is an offence to our statues as in agnostic people!"

The one called Hammer sets foot on the stairs and threatens to make his way into arm's reach in the heat of the debate.

"Know your place, Paladin! Take another step and this is an act of war!"

"His Holiness will not stand for your insults. You were appointed guardian of this province and you have failed! The growth of demon activity here is self-evident thereof! We, the Brothers of Jesuit, will see to it you are punished for your treachery! Our Lord . . ."

Von Richton stands bleeding, moving closer. "What will your impotent God do? Your God has failed to deliver you from evil a dozen times already. Your prayers are quaint but utterly meaningless. Your worship is misplaced. The world will not be spared the never-ending darkness by any unseen father figure! Nothing but sweet hot blood spilled upon cold earth can hope to fulfill your miserable hallucinations of peace. I am the sword and the shield that will deliver you from the grip of sorrow. Only I can materialize your dreams, and I will cast away despair and I will do it if I have to send us all to hell first!"

"Blasphemer! You will see what the anger of the divine means when His Holiness arrives!"

"Let him come! Send me your lords and your kings, your sisters and your brothers, your bishops and your fouls, sinners, and saints. Let them all come and be enveloped by my rage! You can have your war, and when it ends I alone will rise as a goddess from the ashes of dissilience you shall leave behind. Your lord will grovel in disarray at the power I shall unveil." A shadow slips smoothly along the ceiling as Von Richton monologues. I know who it is. It's Von Richton's pet monster; his name is England.

Hammer is completely unaware as impending doom crawls toward him, slithering along like a serpent bathed in black and brown. The other Jesuit seems no more alert, as he is doing now what I was doing half an hour ago, looking over the bleak galleries.

Hammer moves in so close to Von Richton that from where I'm sitting it looks as if they could be kissing. "We the Brothers of Jesuit demand—"

Von Richton doesn't let him finish. "You demand nothing," she speaks in a whisper. "You and your zealots bore me." She elapses as the shadow of the demon England is cast over the Paladin. "Kill him." This time she speaks to her pet, not Hammer.

England is a man of monumental size; six foot nine easily, he has horns that look like a crown hooked around his head, skin that looks like tree bark, and a grin so sinister it could stop a clock. England chuckles to himself as he moves one hand up and his fingers shift into an evil rake. With one swipe of his claws, he can shred the priest apart, and that is what he plans to do.

Somehow I failed to note the second priest move. It just seems that I blink and the gray-haired man is standing between Hammer and England. I crawl along the ground in search of a better vantage as I have lost sight of both Von Richton and Hammer. I can't imagine it took me more than a few seconds to move to a paralleled corner of the room, but things seem to have escalated severely.

Hammer is lying on his back at the second floor divide, skittering backward away from Von Richton, who now is brandishing a Estoc (a French sword crafted for armor-piercing thrusting attacks).

The second priest is engaged in battle with England; he seems to have mimicked England's attack in that one of his hands has turned into a silver talon. They are locked in a power struggle; it looks as if at any moment one may throw the other to the ground and execute a killing blow. I could help; I should help, but I feel inclined to sit and write instead.

Von Richton holds her blade firm to Hammer's neck. "Move and you die," she whispers to him. "Brother Nightingale!" she addresses the other priest. "Look carefully at your opponent. He is a Baatezu from the realm called Phlegethos. He is thought to be the most beautiful and powerful of creatures in his land. You being a Valhallan from Sojouri likely have adequate power to defeat this one, but how many more?" She gives him a moment to think before speaking again, "You Valhallans are hardly wise or elegant, but you are inspired fighters and you tend to know your art well. Consider this, England is my banneret. What would that imply about the rest of my operation?" (A banneret is a sixteenth-century flag bearer sent onto battlefields before wars to mark the approach of the rival forces known. Understandably, the banneret is killed after delivering their message.)

Nightingale takes the bait. He drops his guard and England disengages as well. Von Richton smirks, holding back a laugh. "I've decided to let you live assuming you leave without another word. Tell your Holiness I can see his hands are as dirty as mine and that it is in his best interest when it come to us to leave the past buried. When one submits something to the ground, it is often for a reason."

Von Richton throws her sword into the ground. England kneels at her side, and the two priests swiftly make their leave. "I'm sorry you had to see that, Mr. Blake. What transpired here was not meant for your ears, and it would be best if you simply discarded your feelings at this time. They will do you no good."

How can she have known? She can't possibly have seen me. I tuck my book into my coat and slyly slip away, or so I think.