Resurrection of the Cabal - Prologue
Prologue One
The Past
The world spun around the young man, moonlight and forest trees blurring together as he frantically, frenetically searched for some kind of purchase while his entire existence began to blur together. Things were moving far too fast for him to feel sick – if he was weak enough for his stomach to twist at this point, then almost certainly he would be torn to pieces by the very forces spinning his world on its axis, reduced to a quivering, puling child...or worse.
He fell to his knees, gripping his head and doing everything he could to shrink away to nothing. No sound escaped his lips, but a thin line of saliva did as his face and body seized and twitched without restriction. Anyone observing this young man in the moonlit clearing might think that he was simply kneeling on the ground, unknowing of the infinite pain and torment that was roiling within his soul at that moment.
Eventually, the twitching subsided and the silent sobs were halted. After kneeling in silence for another minute, the young man stood. From that point on, he – they – would never kneel again. The young man was no longer alone in the clearing. In fact, it could be very easily stated that the young man was no longer a part of the world as we know it. In his place, in his body, instead stood the vessel that held the captured and combined essences of one million demons, a horde of unimaginable proportions and strength.
Unimaginable evil.
The body of the young man looked around. Desecrated bodies, both French and English, lay on all sides. The English, he realized objectively, were once his kinsmen, his family, and their loss was the catalyst for his creation. He supposed he would never really understand what grief did to people, but such was life and death.
The French, though...he had killed them. Their blood was wet on the grass, the trees, and his clothes. Seconds before he had fallen to his knees, he had unleashed such power on them that they never even stood a chance. Skin and bone unknit before his eyes; muscles and blood vessels burst under his attention; eyes and tongues exploded, bodies twitching and falling in a beautiful, macabre, thrilling dance for the boy.
They had brought this on themselves. The young man had only wanted to help, to mend and cure, as was his calling. He had studied for many long years – almost a dozen, even – in order to learn the ways of the white. The man's magic was only for healing, for mending and the promise of tomorrow. He had taken this French prisoner after English forces had wounded him, swearing to heal him and present him to the English for questioning. He had vital information, after all. But the French officer was shrewd, and managed to trick the young man into believing his injuries were worse than they actually were. The young Englishman had tried to cure him, to make him comfortable and well, and this French pig had responded by taking the healer's family captive and escaping.
The young man pursued, of course, but he could not stop the Frenchman from rendezvousing with his party and making good his escape. Before he left, however, he decided to kill the healer's family, leaving their bodies torn and bloody from the medical tools the Frenchman had stolen and used to keep them hostage. Seeing the tools meant for healing and goodness used to such ends, after years of being indoctrinated with the idea that they could only do good, the young man felt something within him...snap, if you will.
Here he stood, a minute later. He had remembered everything he had ever been warned away from about magic – especially that of trading one's soul for power amongst demons. Mind ravaged by grief and confusion, he had opened his soul to all of the demons in the Unreal, calling to them with the most succulent sorrow. None could resist his call, and soon his body become an unholy conglomeration of evil...and power.
He was a new being now. A new, powerful...no, an unstoppable being, with a new agenda and a new way to run things. He would still bring about tomorrow for all, but this time it would be his tomorrow, and not theirs, on the horizon.
Another glance was thrown around the clearing, this one bearing not confusion and fear, but disgust. It was time he left the past behind and made his way to his future, his destiny, with his own power behind him. He supposed he would need a name of some kind, something that the fearful would whisper in the dead of night, and that the forces he bent to his call would worship. He thought upon all of his eldritch, arcane, and eclectic knowledge, and it was with a grim smile that he decided.
Turning on his heel and striding out of the clearing, Legion disappeared into the inky blackness of the autumn night.
---------------
Seven Years Later...
A man strode alone up the path. He was in the middle of a deep forest in northern Britain, a place of untamed wilds and powerful energies. It was chilly; he would be able to see his breath, if there were any light to see by.
The moon was covered by thick, dark clouds, but even so there would have been some light to penetrate these trees. No, what covered this area in darkness was something far more powerful and sinister: it was magic, and not a friendly kind at that. If he listened carefully, the man could hear the sound of thousands of souls, screaming in eternal torment, just beyond the roiling miasma. His lip curled. It was nothing he wasn't used to, but he wasn't particularly fond of the discordant sound. Something his life in Italy had bred in him, probably.
Though the darkness obscured everything from sight, the man was taking no precautions. His finger toyed idly with the amulet around his neck, an original creation of his that used his magic to bend the light around him and render him perfectly invisible. He called it the Chameleonic, and with it he would only be detectable to other mages. Mages that he hoped to meet tonight.
He felt a presence and looked up. Though there had been no sign of it moments before (of course), there now stood a decrepit shack in front of him, small and leaning slightly to one side. It was all the mage could do to keep from scoffing; surely he hadn't been summoned to this piece of filth in the middle of dark nowhere? Did they even know who he was? Perhaps it was best if he introduced himself, and made it clear that he didn't like to be bothered.
Stealing silently to the door, he pushed it lightly. It glided open silently and he stepped over the threshold, holding his breath. He let it out again in a soft sigh, however, when he realized that he was standing in the foyer of a huge hall, a brilliantly lit mansion of marble and dark wood. He looked over his shoulder; still the darkness and the forest. He knew that if he went outside and looked, it would still be the same shack. Some powerful magicks were at work here, and he aimed to find out what they were doing.
“Ahh, it seems you made it,” came what could be called a voice. The man whirled to find himself facing a table, at which was seated six or seven people, genders and faces obscured by thick black cloaks. The one at the head was looking directly at him when it spoke, though his Chameleonic should have been working perfectly. Judging by the surprised motions and sounds of the others at the table, it had been – which meant that the one at the head must be very powerful indeed.
Unlocking the spell, the man stepped forward. The light-bending effect unraveled around him, making him appear before the eyes of those seated at the table. One hand was on his hip in an impudent fashion, his eyebrow quirked along with his lip as he surveyed those around him. None of this was making any sense to him. This place and this situation reeked of amateurs, and yet this mage at the table had seen through his masterpiece with no problems, and this mansion was truly a magnificent use of space-bending magic. So what was going on?
“You must have many questions,” the one at the head of the table said. This time, when he spoke, the previously invisible man listened harder to pick out what was wrong with that voice, and caught it. When the one at the head of the table spoke, it sounded like a hundred voices, speaking and hissing in perfect unison and inflection, the only difference being a slight overlay in sound and volume. The confusion grew in the man as he nodded. “You are Arturo Trapani, yes?”
“That's right,” the man said, straightening up. “He who drops fireballs on people, blah blah blah. Now tell me, why have I been summoned here?”
The figure at the head of the table stood. “Your impudence shall be forgiven, as you are in an unknown situation and will react as you wish. Our name is Legion.” Throwing back his hood, Legion revealed a face that was perfectly unrememberable, and would, with no doubt, slip from Arturo's mind seconds after the young mage looked away. That is, if Arturo had the ability to look away. For him, Legion had defined powerful, defined evil and driven and singular and legendary – things that Arturo the Hellfire had striven to be his entire life. The Scourge of France, the original Army of One, in the same room as the now-humbled mage.
Dropping to one knee, Arturo was unable to keep his voice from wavering as he said, “Your presence honors me, Master Legion. I...I am sorry for my behavior.” If there was one thing he knew about Legion, it was that Legion was merciless and had slain men of Arturo's caliber without so much as a twitch or a provocation. Though Legion had said he was forgiven, Arturo knew that his ice was very thin now, if not completely broken. Still...he had been summoned here, so perhaps he was necessary for one of Legion's machinations. The silence that stretched on was almost unbearable.
“Thank you,” Legion said eventually, “but please sit down. For now, we await the others.” Arturo almost leaped to do so, though Legion used no compulsion to force him. The Hellfire glanced back over his shoulder; he could no longer make out anything beyond the threshold of the shack's door, as though a black sheet had been hung across it. He took a deep breath and almost shuddered with pleasure as he realized that it was simply a wall of impenetrable malevolence. One thing was clear: they were no longer in Britain.
“One more thing,” Legion said suddenly, causing Arturo and more than one of the other mages at the table to start. “If you would, take a robe and hood from the box and put them on.” Arturo obeyed, and was soon seated at the table with the others as a faceless member of the group.
Over the next few hours, they were joined by more and more mages. Arturo was initially surprised when some of the mages emerged from deeper inside the mansion, each looking as confused as he must have, but after a few had come that way, it was revealed that they had entered through buildings and doors as nondescript as the one the Hellfire had entered through. Each was introduced and told to take a robe and sit. The box never seemed to run empty, and there was always an open seat at the table, until there were over a hundred mages seated together at Legion's table.
When they had all been seated and it appeared that no more were coming, Legion stood and cleared his throat. Attention turned to him instantly as he rose up to the height of the table and floated over it. He appeared to be walking as he spoke, though his feet never actually touched the polished wood.
“Brothers and sisters,” he began, regarding those gathered with a gaze that would pierce steel, “I have gathered you all together today because I am not the only one that has been faced with the difficulties that wait for us. Surely you have all taken note of the increase in the movements of the Hunters that curse our people. More and more warlocks like yourselves are slain each week, and with each raid the forces of the Warlock Hunters grow as they push their campaign from village to village. Soon, Warlocks of all skill levels will be outmatched by the sheer numbers of the Hunters.
“I propose a path that will bring us far above them,” Legion continued, twirling on his heel when he reached the center of the table. With a flourish, he presented to them an amulet that appeared from nowhere. It was burnished gold, with a lining of silver and a cobalt stone set in the center. It shone with an eerie light to those that were gifted with the Third Eye, an ability that allowed them to see the magical currents of the world around them. “This is the Amulet of the Cabal. With it, I may communicate freely with anyone else that is wearing one of the same. With a simple push, I may alert all of those wearing one of any danger that has befallen me, and with a small portion of their energy, those wearing an amulet may move to my location and provide assistance to me in my danger.”
He stopped pacing and looked down at the mage in front of him: Arturo, as it happened, who swallowed softly when Legion looked him in the eyes. “Each of you will be given an amulet to wear. Together, we shall be organized into the Warlock's Protective Cabal. As we are, it is impossible for us to stand against the forces of the Hunters for long. We will be erased from the history books, our art and our knowledge cast as sin and devilry to the future. I will not allow our craft to be thrown aside as such!” A roar of agreement came from the mages at the table as they pounded their fists on the wood top, or stamped their feet.
“Together, we will move in safety,” Legion continued, riding the wave of enthusiasm. “Together, we will stand against the forces of the Warlock Hunters! And together, we will make a brighter future, full of magic and enlightenment, and we will never have to fear for our lives again!”
Arturo smiled to himself as Legion's voices were lost in the crashing blast of sound that erupted around the table. It seemed that everyone agreed that Legion's idea was a good one. Maybe it was just his own sinister bent, but Arturo felt as though Legion had another motivation for creating this Cabal – one that might line up with the Hellfire's own ideas.
At the very least, this should be an interesting undertaking. Arturo accepted the first Amulet of the Cabal with a bowed head, and from that moment on, his fate was linked to that of everyone else that wore the same piece of jewelry around their neck.
Two years passed...
The Warlock's Protective Cabal had been a massively successful undertaking: the deaths caused by the Warlock Hunters had been brought almost down to zero; emboldened mages had begun and continued advanced research in magic that had been impossible while fearing for their lives; members had continued to pour in, bringing the total count into the thousands as mages from across the world were invited to join the fold.
Legion and his appointed council of lieutenants met every month to discuss and further the plans of the Cabal. As Arturo had imagined, Legion's goal was to advance their magic as far as possible, and use it to take control of the world in order to make it a place more accepting of magic – indeed, to make magic commonplace. In addition to their meetings, the general Cabal could be called to meet at any time, and it was at one such meeting that Legion's plan was revealed.
“Good evening, everyone,” Legion greeted, standing on the table as hundreds of cloaked figures gave him their undivided attention. He had been the leader since the Cabal's inception. He was the most famous, easily the wisest and the most powerful, and most importantly, The Cabal had been his idea. He continued, “It has come to my attention that we’ve angered some people with our mass-killings. Now, the purpose of the cabal is to ensure each of us is safe. We have a problem.”
Everyone was silent as he paused. Hundreds of Warlocks hung onto every word he said.
“We cannot make an untraceable teleport. It just doesn’t work. And while black magic is undeniably strong… after all, why else would we pursue it? But it has its weaknesses. It can’t do everything. And if they should ever take advantage of this effectively, we will be, pardon my phrasing, knee-deep in our own shit and blood. In addition to that, they may have found a number of magical weapons, including the Oathkeeper and the Divine Punisher. To this end, I’ve been researching a spell of remarkable usefulness, though I haven’t tested it yet for reasons that will become clear.
“It will require that every person here have progeny. I am aware that many of you detest the idea of children. It is, forgive my terminology, a necessary evil.” The Warlocks laughed. “I am also aware that a number of you cannot have children. If that is the case, I am sorry, but that makes this spell useless to you. It requires successors to your bloodline.
“You see, this spell will allow you to fling your soul forward in time to a descendant, and lie dormant within them until the time is right. I suggest something in the order of five to eight hundred years.”
A murmur passed through the crowd.
“In that much time,” Legion continued, “Our enemies will have forgotten us. Not all of us will make it. Some of us will have our bloodlines exterminated, others may be taken by surprise and killed before we can launch our soul. Some of us will probably carry the spell out with minor, but fatal, errors. But some of us will live on. After all, that’s what we’re all about. Continuing to live.”
He jumped down from the table and shuffled towards the door. He turned before he reached the exit.
“We won’t have contact with each other for most of ourselves’ new lives. It will be difficult to gather again. But we will. Anyway! Using the amulets, I will provide instructions on the procedure of the spell for each mage to prepare on his or her own. We will discuss the results at the next meeting, if no one has anything add. No? Then I wish you all luck.”
Turning on his heel, Legion disappeared through the door's dark portal.
Despite the Cabal's advanced planning and ability, they were caught off-guard by a massive blitzkrieg from the Warlock Hunters. Aided by their legendary weaponry and magic of their own, the Hunters mercilessly slew hundreds upon hundreds of Warlocks around the world, destroying them before they could call for help or move to help the others of their order.
The number of Warlocks that managed to perform Legion's spell was never revealed. The Hunters would have been unaware of the event if one of them had not stumbled upon a Warlock's journal and removed the spells designed to destroy it before it could be permanently erased. Realizing that their work was not done, the Warlock Hunters passed their weapons and abilities on to their own descendants. Some of them threw the calling off as a fool's errand; others decided to continue training and preparing for the eventual return of their ancient enemies.
It is now the year 2012. Legion has awakened in his descendant's body and promptly devours his soul. Sacrificing his host's wife and children in order to gain contact with the demons he originally made the pact with, Legion has become aware of each Awakening as it happens. However, due to advancements in their magic, the Warlock Hunters are also alerted to the unique magical activity that the Awakenings provide.
It's unclear whose life is more confusing: the soul of the Warlock that has awakened to the future, or the body of their progeny, who has one day rolled out of bed to find themselves talking to a voice in their mind that has granted them otherworldly powers. Either way, the race to find them has begun, and the struggle between the Cabal and the Hunters continues after centuries of uneasy silence.
---------------
Enter: Paul McCulloch. At the time that the story begins and his Warlock soul awakens, he is 23 years old. Paul occupies his time working at one of the largest shooting ranges in the world. He has an extensive background with guns and bullets, such that one might be tempted to brand him a “gun nut” or something similar. Really, he just loves being outside and shooting guns – both aspects that his job provides him.
Happily married, Paul works the long days at the firing range and spends the evenings at home with his wife Melissa when she gets home from the office. The young man is friendly, undoubtedly so; in fact, if one were to ask him, he would say that he almost feels obliged to befriend the friendless, having been friendless before himself. He is both blessed and cursed with an almost naïve belief in the goodness of those he meets, though he doesn't show it much outwardly. In fact, Paul's outward expression of feeling doesn't change that much at all: he seems to be in a perpetual state of somewhat good humor, at peace with life in general.
Paul stands over six feet tall, his hair cropped so close to his head that telling its color is a fool's errand. His blue eyes, shining with intelligence and observation, view the world from behind a pair of rimless glasses designed to correct his mild vision problems. His typical attire consists of T-shirts and shorts, which is not to say that he doesn't own anything else, but that he prefers only those.
Almost all of the matters of interest in Paul's life occurred in middle or high school: he fell in with the wrong crowd, and found himself in situations that he would rather not be in. Due to a series of bad decisions in his adolescence, Paul's acquaintances were all rather bad types, and it wasn't long before Paul found himself fighting for non-existent drugs and fending off opposing gang members at every other turn. The only time Paul was ever seriously hurt, though, was in an incident that didn't even involve a rival gang, but a deranged hobo with a knife.
Eventually, though, Paul's conscience took over and he made his escape from the vicious cycle. He moved to Mesa and has lived a happy life there for a few years, meeting and marrying his wife and finding a solid job. It was at this solid job of his that Paul had his first encounter with the Warlock Soul of one Robert McCullough. When a foolish patron of the shooting range mistakenly spun around (gun in hand) and began waving it around, it was the soul of Robert McCullough that gave Paul the heads-up he needed to turn around and take the gun away before anyone was hurt.
It was only afterward that Paul realized that he had known about the gun even though his back had been turned. He was also vaguely aware that he had heard some kind of voice, or a thought, in the back of his mind just before he was suddenly cognizant of the knowledge in his head regarding the incident. Something was not right there, and the largely introspective Paul decided to take the time to escape and sit down to have a little brainstorm.
Only a little prompting later, Paul was largely startled when Robert's soul was fully awakened in his mind. When he rolled out of bed that morning, life had been as it always had before; suddenly, though, he was sharing his mind with one that was virtually a stranger, despite his claims of being an ancestor. It was only after several hours of denial and confusion that Paul was able to come to grips with the fact that Robert was very conscious, and very much inside of his head. It was hours after that that Paul was able to stomach the idea that Robert was his ancestor, and his presence was the result of a powerful spell arranged by demons. What other way could this possibly have happened, after all?
Eventually, Paul allowed Robert to tell him about himself, and the Cabal, and what had happened so many years ago. Robert proved to be a calm, patient man – probably a necessity, because it took Paul a long time to calm down himself. Robert viewed the world that he lived in with a sort of disconnected detachment, viewing almost everything objectively. His patience and calm lent him an air of being standoffish, but he came across to Paul as a nice guy.
Robert was a Scottish man that grew up on a small farm, where his life was mostly uneventful. It was this boring life that lent Robert his incredible patience, and this patience that in turn lent him the ability to be a powerful mage. He explained to Paul that he utilized the magicks of Elementalism and Shadow, two disciplines with multiple applications, ones that allowed him to bend the four elements and the darkness of the world to his bidding. He told Paul all the myriad ways that his powers could be bound to objects, or to keywords, in order to set up effective traps and powerful enchantments for future use. He told Paul about how he joined Legion's Cabal: that a friend had seen some talent in the young McCullough, had trained him secretly for several months before presenting him to the Cabal scouts. Amazingly, they saw the same latent ability and took Robert as one of their own.
When Paul took all of this in, he was far more than speechless. Despite this, though, he knew that something needed to be done: he was being called, and he had no choice but to listen. Robert and Paul agreed almost right away that they were not cut out to be a part of the Cabal any longer, especially not the one that was going to take over the modern world. Still, they needed to do something, and sticking around there wasn't going to do any good. Robert also informed Paul that Legion was aware of their Awakening. Melissa would be in danger.
Given such conditions, Paul decided that it would be best to leave Melissa in the dark. Calling it a vacation, he left for Las Vegas, hoping that an answer would come to him. And an answer did come indeed.
On his first night there, he awoke quite suddenly. Taking in a deep breath, Paul became aware that something was wrong. It was a little too cold, a little too dark, a little too...silent. The sounds of Vegas and the smells of the hotel were muted, almost as though something was keeping them out of this room. Paul couldn't see in the darkness, but he could smell something that tickled his throat a bit, like...rotting flesh.
Shooting up, Paul looked around wildly, but there was nothing new in the room. Nothing new except for the small envelope sitting on the foot of his bed, the front clearly marked Legion. Paul swallowed slowly, suddenly very uncomfortable.
[That's what I was feeling!] Robert broke in. [This is Legion's influence. Get used to that feeling, because whenever it's there, it means Legion, or something he's affected, is near us.] His voice, or rather, the idea of his voice transmitted directly to Paul's mind, was slightly tremulous.
"So do we open it?" Paul asked out loud, still unused to speaking in his mind.
[If we do, there's always danger. There is danger any time you interact with Legion,] Robert pointed out. [The problems being, you and Melissa can't make a living particularly well while on the run; it's pretty much impossible to run from him in the long run; and, if he succeeds and we're on his side you've betrayed everyone and everything you knew and loved, but if he succeeds and we're against him we and everything we knew and loved will be summarily executed...]
"So what if we fight him?" Paul inquired, rubbing one eye absently.
[We'd be hopeless alone. He can use every discipline of black magic and is not only the best thaumaturge I've ever seen, he's among the best evokers, too.]
"Wow." Paul's eloquence left him as he felt Robert's admiration for Legion and knew he wasn't exaggerating.
[Exactly.]
Paul stared at the letter for a little while longer. Something, perhaps a compulsion placed on the letter by Legion, made him want to open it. It made him need to open it.
So Paul did. He opened it.
Nothing happened. Inside the envelope was a small slip of paper, which Paul extracted and read.
Los Angeles. I'll know when you arrive. The time for a new age of humanity has come, an age in which we, those who use magic, will be gods among men.
That was what the note read. A single plane ticket drifted slowly to the ground, heavy with Paul's destiny.
---------------
Enter: Siber Terrian, a pasty little nerd of a man, unsurprisingly single, currently enrolled as a college student pursuing a biochemistry major. The youngest of the major players at only age 21, Siber is also the least experienced of the newly awakened mages in terms of physical combat: with only basic martial training at his disposal, his greatest weapon is not his body, but his mind.
Logical and pragmatic to the point of coldness, Siber is Darwinistic in that he believes in the survival of the fittest. When he forms a friendship, he does not do so as some would; instead of a surface friendship, he gives his friends his quiet support. In all things, Siber maintains a flair for the theatrical, a certain dramatic spark, while at the same time being both reflective and introspective. The boy has a good understanding of how his mind works, and how he can best use its resources to his own ends.
The young Mr. Terrian has a great interest in intelligent debate, spiritual exploration, and the sciences of man. This fascination of his stems from his intense dislike of overly emotional or irrational people, which in turn stemmed from his early childhood, where he observed the actions and mistakes of his brother and sister. It is from this that Siber draws his theatrical interest: the theater only requires the use of false, ever-changing emotion. It was his fascination with the theater, in fact, that led to him shedding his old name of Karl Andrew Terrian and adopting a more fantastic one.
Despite all of this, or perhaps because of it, young Siber is neither corrupt nor righteous. He is, instead, right at the line separating the two, an unbiased and realistic individual. His lack of corruption is contrasted with that of his ancestor: a mage by the name of Keldan Tomera.
Keldan, unlike his descendant, is quite malicious. A social spider, Keldan does not respond to mots slights through his own direct action, instead preferring to pluck the strings that make up the societal webs until things dance the way he wants them to. Though courteous and generous on the outside, he hides a very deep anger within, and sometimes wreaking mayhem on a person's reputation was just not enough for Keldan. In such situations, causing a person severe mental agony is the preferred method of revenge – sometimes Keldan releases his victims with no permanent damage, and other times leaves them as a blubbering mess for the rest of their mortal lives.
Growing up poor, Keldan rapidly grew tired of his life and tried to escape it by striking out, young hero-style, at age ten. Within six months he was back home, but he never forgot his attempt; seven years later, after studying the arts of politics and government, he tried again, this time killing his now-overbearing and violent parents as well as his siblings before leaving. From then on, his skill in manipulating other people gave him all the support he needed to start his life anew. It was this revival of his that led him to discover dark magic, and the influence it could have in accomplishing his ends in life. After some study, Keldan became a somewhat skillful Demoniac as well as a Shadow mage, his preferred style being that of thaumaturgy, like Robert McCullough.
His induction into the Cabal was grand and he rapidly ascended the ranks, but it wasn't long after he joined that the Warlock Hunters wiped them out, and Keldan “died” at age 27. His soul was flung into the future by Legion's spell, and he awoke one day within the body of Siber. He remained silent, dormant even, observing everything through the eyes of his progeny. It was on the day that Siber was approached by Legion, as a matter of fact, that Keldan made himself known.
Siber Roelan Terrian awoke early in the morning to an unnatural chill and a distinct smell of putrid, rotting flesh. He looked down the bed to see that a dead body was placing a letter at the foot of his bed.
"Holy shit!" he exclaimed when it registered. He had already scrambled back to the wall. The body was gone moments later; it walked out of the door and apparently just...disappeared. Siber slowly allowed himself forward again and gingerly picked up and opened the letter. The envelope, which wa simply marked with the name of Legion, gave him a terrible feeling of unease.
Los Angeles. I'll know when you arrive. The time for a new age of humanity has come, an age in which we, those who use magic, will be gods among men.
A small piece of paper fluttered out of the envelope as Siber finished reading. It was a plane ticket, he realized when he picked it up. Holding the ticket in one hand, and the letter and envelope in the other, Siber suddenly realized...he had no idea what was going on. Maybe he was dreaming. No, the surprise he had felt when seeing the body had been more than real. He needed to relax.
Standing in his dark dorm room, Siber made his way to the bathroom, where he turned on some cold water and splashed it on his face. He set the small stack of papers to one side and reached for a towel. When he finished drying his face, however, he was shocked to see another man standing behind him, dressed positively archaically and eyeing the envelope with interest.
[Looks like Legion's back.]
Siber's heart jumped as he spun around, but there was no one there. When he looked in the mirror again, he could vaguely see the man still, but it was much harder than the first glimpse he had had. “What...who are you?” Siber asked cautiously, watching as the man switched from looking at the envelope to looking into his eyes.
[My name is Keldan Tomera. Your name is Siber Terrian. And you, young Terrian, are my descendant. You're wondering about the contents of the letter: Legion; magic; me, surely. The long and short of it is that I'm your ancestor, I came from the farthest pits of Hell to be a part of you, and you're a mage now. Not too complicated, I'm sure.]
Siber's head was spinning. He must be dreaming, right? But no, that was a sad and pathetic attempt at distraction. The young man knew what he had to do, as objective as he was. He went back to his bed and sat down, looking around – no sign of the man.
[I'm still here. Part of you, remember?]
Siber nodded. “I suppose you have a lot to tell me, then. Let's get started.”
---------------
Enter: Joe Simpson. A seasoned special forces agent, Simpson makes his living by risking his life more times weekly than most people do in their entire lives. Trained to deploy behind enemy lines in a radar-stealthed jet and drop in to gather information, protect an objective, or take out a target, it could well be said that even before his Awakening as a mage, Simpson was a very dangerous man. All of the stereotypical images of a super-spy apply to the squad that he belongs to: advanced weapons training, spanning from wooden poles to the most advanced aerial gunships; unarmed combat in a multitude of styles; diplomacy, leadership, problem-solving and memory – the works. These men and women are expected to be the best, and rarely did they fail to deliver.
High standards are and have always been a typical measure of life for Joe, though. From a young age, his parents prompted him to be the best that he could be, and the young Joe made sure to make his parents proud. In fact, it was this same drive that prompted him to join the armed forces after his father, who served in the Air Force, fell ill and died. Swearing to protect his mother and make his father proud, Joe took on the mantle and joined the military, where his high scores in both mental and physical tests caused him to be placed on a special watch list and eventually drafted into the special forces program.
The oldest of the Awakened thus far, Simpson had been serving for about ten years when he first made contact with his ancestor, a man by the name of Roland Dark. A quiet, reserved man, Roland is one that thinks before acting, without fail. Always older than his years and sometimes overly cautious, he has been a tempering force for the sometimes-brash Simpson. Their first conversation occurred at 30,000 feet, when Roland suddenly opened his eyes to find a sight that he had never thought possible: there he was, soaring above the ground, approaching Mach One and feeling the exhilarating freedom of the open air. The empty landscape around them filled both Roland and Joe with a sense of ease, beauty, and appreciation, and Roland's first words since the Dark Ages were poetic and full of wonder towards the beauty around them.
Fearing technical difficulties, Joe attempted to figure out who had somehow gotten into his radio channel. Of course, no one at the operations base could figure out what Joe was talking about, and his test flight was luckily canceled, Joe being put on a temporary wait list pending psychological analysis. To deepen his plight, he was unable to perceive Roland in his mind, unlike the rest of the Awakened; the unfortunate result of an error in the original spell. It was a collection of such errors that prevented the vast majority of the Cabal from awakening in the modern age, and the fact that Roland performed such an error and still Awakened is nothing short of a miracle of statistics.
Because Joe was unable to summon an image of Roland to his mind, however, he only had the voice of his ancestor to relate to him his story, and nothing to lend this story any credibility. Joe feared it was all a specter of his mind, that the stress of his career had finally gotten the better of him. [Please trust me,] Roland had pleaded – but Joe was stubborn. In fact, he did not believe the story to be anything but until the day that Roland finally decided to cease trying to get through to his descendant and resigned himself to silence. It appeared that there would be no getting through to Joe, and that they would live out their joint life apart from each other. As the first night fell and Joe was settling in to bed, however, he found himself filled with a strange sense of unease that Roland recognized quite well. Even before the special forces agent could draw his gun and turn, Roland was aware that they were in the room with a messenger of Legion.
Reflexes were what they were, though, and Simpson gunned the zombie down quite efficiently – or so he thought. It rose again, and Joe put it down again, more than surprised by what he deemed to have been impossible. Deciding to break his own decision, Roland quietly told Joe to check the letter that was in the zombie's hand. Heart pounding and mind whirling, Joe decided to oblige Roland instead of trying to fight him. Opening the letter gingerly, Joe found a plane ticket and a bill that simply read:
Los Angeles. I'll know when you arrive. The time for a new age of humanity has come, an age in which we, those who use magic, will be gods among men.
With that, Joe had no choice but to accept that the events going on around him were real, and that Roland was not lying to him. In an attempt to calm his progeny, Roland related to him his life tale in brief: how he had come from a well-to-do family of much privilege, and how his magical education had started soon after his academic education – as well as the fact that Roland was not his given name. Driven by absent but demanding parents, Roland pushed himself as hard as he could to be good enough for them, to no end. It was impossible to please his parents or even his teachers, who looked down on him for his struggles.
It was on the day of his final magical exam that Roland's life took a turn. Gathered in the presence of his teachers and his parents, Roland began to bend the elements and demonstrate his mastery of them. His overwhelming need to impress was too much for him, however, and he continually stumbled. The teachers continued to scorn him and his parents would have nothing to do with him as he struggled more and more to show them his worth. Confusion and anger got the better of the young mage, and in a bloody flash of power he eradicated his teachers and half of his family's home, including his parents. Mind torn by the impact of what he had done, the confused young man fled into the wilderness, where he cast off his old life and took the name of Roland.
From then on, he traveled the land as a healer, a mender of body and spirit, to atone for his crimes. Unlike the other two, Roland was an Evoker, one who adapted and flowed with the magical energy instead of trying to set its course in advance. When he was invited by another mage to join the Cabal, he had some misgivings: though the Cabal stated that its purpose was to protect the mages, Roland also knew that it was led by a positively evil mage, and the majority of those in the Cabal were of the same type. Still, pressure from the Hunters was mounting, even for a healer, and Roland eventually joined, taking the surname Dark as a half-hearted attempt to fit in. A year later, he “died” and threw his soul forward, hoping for a better life when he awoke.
At the end of Roland's tale, Joe realized that there was more to the world than what he had seen. Ticket and letter in hand, he made the decision to find Legion and discover what the real situation was, just like Siber and Paul. So they set forth, the three newly Awakened mages, each boarding a plane and making their way to Los Angeles to find their destiny.
The Past
The world spun around the young man, moonlight and forest trees blurring together as he frantically, frenetically searched for some kind of purchase while his entire existence began to blur together. Things were moving far too fast for him to feel sick – if he was weak enough for his stomach to twist at this point, then almost certainly he would be torn to pieces by the very forces spinning his world on its axis, reduced to a quivering, puling child...or worse.
He fell to his knees, gripping his head and doing everything he could to shrink away to nothing. No sound escaped his lips, but a thin line of saliva did as his face and body seized and twitched without restriction. Anyone observing this young man in the moonlit clearing might think that he was simply kneeling on the ground, unknowing of the infinite pain and torment that was roiling within his soul at that moment.
Eventually, the twitching subsided and the silent sobs were halted. After kneeling in silence for another minute, the young man stood. From that point on, he – they – would never kneel again. The young man was no longer alone in the clearing. In fact, it could be very easily stated that the young man was no longer a part of the world as we know it. In his place, in his body, instead stood the vessel that held the captured and combined essences of one million demons, a horde of unimaginable proportions and strength.
Unimaginable evil.
The body of the young man looked around. Desecrated bodies, both French and English, lay on all sides. The English, he realized objectively, were once his kinsmen, his family, and their loss was the catalyst for his creation. He supposed he would never really understand what grief did to people, but such was life and death.
The French, though...he had killed them. Their blood was wet on the grass, the trees, and his clothes. Seconds before he had fallen to his knees, he had unleashed such power on them that they never even stood a chance. Skin and bone unknit before his eyes; muscles and blood vessels burst under his attention; eyes and tongues exploded, bodies twitching and falling in a beautiful, macabre, thrilling dance for the boy.
They had brought this on themselves. The young man had only wanted to help, to mend and cure, as was his calling. He had studied for many long years – almost a dozen, even – in order to learn the ways of the white. The man's magic was only for healing, for mending and the promise of tomorrow. He had taken this French prisoner after English forces had wounded him, swearing to heal him and present him to the English for questioning. He had vital information, after all. But the French officer was shrewd, and managed to trick the young man into believing his injuries were worse than they actually were. The young Englishman had tried to cure him, to make him comfortable and well, and this French pig had responded by taking the healer's family captive and escaping.
The young man pursued, of course, but he could not stop the Frenchman from rendezvousing with his party and making good his escape. Before he left, however, he decided to kill the healer's family, leaving their bodies torn and bloody from the medical tools the Frenchman had stolen and used to keep them hostage. Seeing the tools meant for healing and goodness used to such ends, after years of being indoctrinated with the idea that they could only do good, the young man felt something within him...snap, if you will.
Here he stood, a minute later. He had remembered everything he had ever been warned away from about magic – especially that of trading one's soul for power amongst demons. Mind ravaged by grief and confusion, he had opened his soul to all of the demons in the Unreal, calling to them with the most succulent sorrow. None could resist his call, and soon his body become an unholy conglomeration of evil...and power.
He was a new being now. A new, powerful...no, an unstoppable being, with a new agenda and a new way to run things. He would still bring about tomorrow for all, but this time it would be his tomorrow, and not theirs, on the horizon.
Another glance was thrown around the clearing, this one bearing not confusion and fear, but disgust. It was time he left the past behind and made his way to his future, his destiny, with his own power behind him. He supposed he would need a name of some kind, something that the fearful would whisper in the dead of night, and that the forces he bent to his call would worship. He thought upon all of his eldritch, arcane, and eclectic knowledge, and it was with a grim smile that he decided.
Turning on his heel and striding out of the clearing, Legion disappeared into the inky blackness of the autumn night.
---------------
Seven Years Later...
A man strode alone up the path. He was in the middle of a deep forest in northern Britain, a place of untamed wilds and powerful energies. It was chilly; he would be able to see his breath, if there were any light to see by.
The moon was covered by thick, dark clouds, but even so there would have been some light to penetrate these trees. No, what covered this area in darkness was something far more powerful and sinister: it was magic, and not a friendly kind at that. If he listened carefully, the man could hear the sound of thousands of souls, screaming in eternal torment, just beyond the roiling miasma. His lip curled. It was nothing he wasn't used to, but he wasn't particularly fond of the discordant sound. Something his life in Italy had bred in him, probably.
Though the darkness obscured everything from sight, the man was taking no precautions. His finger toyed idly with the amulet around his neck, an original creation of his that used his magic to bend the light around him and render him perfectly invisible. He called it the Chameleonic, and with it he would only be detectable to other mages. Mages that he hoped to meet tonight.
He felt a presence and looked up. Though there had been no sign of it moments before (of course), there now stood a decrepit shack in front of him, small and leaning slightly to one side. It was all the mage could do to keep from scoffing; surely he hadn't been summoned to this piece of filth in the middle of dark nowhere? Did they even know who he was? Perhaps it was best if he introduced himself, and made it clear that he didn't like to be bothered.
Stealing silently to the door, he pushed it lightly. It glided open silently and he stepped over the threshold, holding his breath. He let it out again in a soft sigh, however, when he realized that he was standing in the foyer of a huge hall, a brilliantly lit mansion of marble and dark wood. He looked over his shoulder; still the darkness and the forest. He knew that if he went outside and looked, it would still be the same shack. Some powerful magicks were at work here, and he aimed to find out what they were doing.
“Ahh, it seems you made it,” came what could be called a voice. The man whirled to find himself facing a table, at which was seated six or seven people, genders and faces obscured by thick black cloaks. The one at the head was looking directly at him when it spoke, though his Chameleonic should have been working perfectly. Judging by the surprised motions and sounds of the others at the table, it had been – which meant that the one at the head must be very powerful indeed.
Unlocking the spell, the man stepped forward. The light-bending effect unraveled around him, making him appear before the eyes of those seated at the table. One hand was on his hip in an impudent fashion, his eyebrow quirked along with his lip as he surveyed those around him. None of this was making any sense to him. This place and this situation reeked of amateurs, and yet this mage at the table had seen through his masterpiece with no problems, and this mansion was truly a magnificent use of space-bending magic. So what was going on?
“You must have many questions,” the one at the head of the table said. This time, when he spoke, the previously invisible man listened harder to pick out what was wrong with that voice, and caught it. When the one at the head of the table spoke, it sounded like a hundred voices, speaking and hissing in perfect unison and inflection, the only difference being a slight overlay in sound and volume. The confusion grew in the man as he nodded. “You are Arturo Trapani, yes?”
“That's right,” the man said, straightening up. “He who drops fireballs on people, blah blah blah. Now tell me, why have I been summoned here?”
The figure at the head of the table stood. “Your impudence shall be forgiven, as you are in an unknown situation and will react as you wish. Our name is Legion.” Throwing back his hood, Legion revealed a face that was perfectly unrememberable, and would, with no doubt, slip from Arturo's mind seconds after the young mage looked away. That is, if Arturo had the ability to look away. For him, Legion had defined powerful, defined evil and driven and singular and legendary – things that Arturo the Hellfire had striven to be his entire life. The Scourge of France, the original Army of One, in the same room as the now-humbled mage.
Dropping to one knee, Arturo was unable to keep his voice from wavering as he said, “Your presence honors me, Master Legion. I...I am sorry for my behavior.” If there was one thing he knew about Legion, it was that Legion was merciless and had slain men of Arturo's caliber without so much as a twitch or a provocation. Though Legion had said he was forgiven, Arturo knew that his ice was very thin now, if not completely broken. Still...he had been summoned here, so perhaps he was necessary for one of Legion's machinations. The silence that stretched on was almost unbearable.
“Thank you,” Legion said eventually, “but please sit down. For now, we await the others.” Arturo almost leaped to do so, though Legion used no compulsion to force him. The Hellfire glanced back over his shoulder; he could no longer make out anything beyond the threshold of the shack's door, as though a black sheet had been hung across it. He took a deep breath and almost shuddered with pleasure as he realized that it was simply a wall of impenetrable malevolence. One thing was clear: they were no longer in Britain.
“One more thing,” Legion said suddenly, causing Arturo and more than one of the other mages at the table to start. “If you would, take a robe and hood from the box and put them on.” Arturo obeyed, and was soon seated at the table with the others as a faceless member of the group.
Over the next few hours, they were joined by more and more mages. Arturo was initially surprised when some of the mages emerged from deeper inside the mansion, each looking as confused as he must have, but after a few had come that way, it was revealed that they had entered through buildings and doors as nondescript as the one the Hellfire had entered through. Each was introduced and told to take a robe and sit. The box never seemed to run empty, and there was always an open seat at the table, until there were over a hundred mages seated together at Legion's table.
When they had all been seated and it appeared that no more were coming, Legion stood and cleared his throat. Attention turned to him instantly as he rose up to the height of the table and floated over it. He appeared to be walking as he spoke, though his feet never actually touched the polished wood.
“Brothers and sisters,” he began, regarding those gathered with a gaze that would pierce steel, “I have gathered you all together today because I am not the only one that has been faced with the difficulties that wait for us. Surely you have all taken note of the increase in the movements of the Hunters that curse our people. More and more warlocks like yourselves are slain each week, and with each raid the forces of the Warlock Hunters grow as they push their campaign from village to village. Soon, Warlocks of all skill levels will be outmatched by the sheer numbers of the Hunters.
“I propose a path that will bring us far above them,” Legion continued, twirling on his heel when he reached the center of the table. With a flourish, he presented to them an amulet that appeared from nowhere. It was burnished gold, with a lining of silver and a cobalt stone set in the center. It shone with an eerie light to those that were gifted with the Third Eye, an ability that allowed them to see the magical currents of the world around them. “This is the Amulet of the Cabal. With it, I may communicate freely with anyone else that is wearing one of the same. With a simple push, I may alert all of those wearing one of any danger that has befallen me, and with a small portion of their energy, those wearing an amulet may move to my location and provide assistance to me in my danger.”
He stopped pacing and looked down at the mage in front of him: Arturo, as it happened, who swallowed softly when Legion looked him in the eyes. “Each of you will be given an amulet to wear. Together, we shall be organized into the Warlock's Protective Cabal. As we are, it is impossible for us to stand against the forces of the Hunters for long. We will be erased from the history books, our art and our knowledge cast as sin and devilry to the future. I will not allow our craft to be thrown aside as such!” A roar of agreement came from the mages at the table as they pounded their fists on the wood top, or stamped their feet.
“Together, we will move in safety,” Legion continued, riding the wave of enthusiasm. “Together, we will stand against the forces of the Warlock Hunters! And together, we will make a brighter future, full of magic and enlightenment, and we will never have to fear for our lives again!”
Arturo smiled to himself as Legion's voices were lost in the crashing blast of sound that erupted around the table. It seemed that everyone agreed that Legion's idea was a good one. Maybe it was just his own sinister bent, but Arturo felt as though Legion had another motivation for creating this Cabal – one that might line up with the Hellfire's own ideas.
At the very least, this should be an interesting undertaking. Arturo accepted the first Amulet of the Cabal with a bowed head, and from that moment on, his fate was linked to that of everyone else that wore the same piece of jewelry around their neck.
Two years passed...
The Warlock's Protective Cabal had been a massively successful undertaking: the deaths caused by the Warlock Hunters had been brought almost down to zero; emboldened mages had begun and continued advanced research in magic that had been impossible while fearing for their lives; members had continued to pour in, bringing the total count into the thousands as mages from across the world were invited to join the fold.
Legion and his appointed council of lieutenants met every month to discuss and further the plans of the Cabal. As Arturo had imagined, Legion's goal was to advance their magic as far as possible, and use it to take control of the world in order to make it a place more accepting of magic – indeed, to make magic commonplace. In addition to their meetings, the general Cabal could be called to meet at any time, and it was at one such meeting that Legion's plan was revealed.
“Good evening, everyone,” Legion greeted, standing on the table as hundreds of cloaked figures gave him their undivided attention. He had been the leader since the Cabal's inception. He was the most famous, easily the wisest and the most powerful, and most importantly, The Cabal had been his idea. He continued, “It has come to my attention that we’ve angered some people with our mass-killings. Now, the purpose of the cabal is to ensure each of us is safe. We have a problem.”
Everyone was silent as he paused. Hundreds of Warlocks hung onto every word he said.
“We cannot make an untraceable teleport. It just doesn’t work. And while black magic is undeniably strong… after all, why else would we pursue it? But it has its weaknesses. It can’t do everything. And if they should ever take advantage of this effectively, we will be, pardon my phrasing, knee-deep in our own shit and blood. In addition to that, they may have found a number of magical weapons, including the Oathkeeper and the Divine Punisher. To this end, I’ve been researching a spell of remarkable usefulness, though I haven’t tested it yet for reasons that will become clear.
“It will require that every person here have progeny. I am aware that many of you detest the idea of children. It is, forgive my terminology, a necessary evil.” The Warlocks laughed. “I am also aware that a number of you cannot have children. If that is the case, I am sorry, but that makes this spell useless to you. It requires successors to your bloodline.
“You see, this spell will allow you to fling your soul forward in time to a descendant, and lie dormant within them until the time is right. I suggest something in the order of five to eight hundred years.”
A murmur passed through the crowd.
“In that much time,” Legion continued, “Our enemies will have forgotten us. Not all of us will make it. Some of us will have our bloodlines exterminated, others may be taken by surprise and killed before we can launch our soul. Some of us will probably carry the spell out with minor, but fatal, errors. But some of us will live on. After all, that’s what we’re all about. Continuing to live.”
He jumped down from the table and shuffled towards the door. He turned before he reached the exit.
“We won’t have contact with each other for most of ourselves’ new lives. It will be difficult to gather again. But we will. Anyway! Using the amulets, I will provide instructions on the procedure of the spell for each mage to prepare on his or her own. We will discuss the results at the next meeting, if no one has anything add. No? Then I wish you all luck.”
Turning on his heel, Legion disappeared through the door's dark portal.
Despite the Cabal's advanced planning and ability, they were caught off-guard by a massive blitzkrieg from the Warlock Hunters. Aided by their legendary weaponry and magic of their own, the Hunters mercilessly slew hundreds upon hundreds of Warlocks around the world, destroying them before they could call for help or move to help the others of their order.
The number of Warlocks that managed to perform Legion's spell was never revealed. The Hunters would have been unaware of the event if one of them had not stumbled upon a Warlock's journal and removed the spells designed to destroy it before it could be permanently erased. Realizing that their work was not done, the Warlock Hunters passed their weapons and abilities on to their own descendants. Some of them threw the calling off as a fool's errand; others decided to continue training and preparing for the eventual return of their ancient enemies.
It is now the year 2012. Legion has awakened in his descendant's body and promptly devours his soul. Sacrificing his host's wife and children in order to gain contact with the demons he originally made the pact with, Legion has become aware of each Awakening as it happens. However, due to advancements in their magic, the Warlock Hunters are also alerted to the unique magical activity that the Awakenings provide.
It's unclear whose life is more confusing: the soul of the Warlock that has awakened to the future, or the body of their progeny, who has one day rolled out of bed to find themselves talking to a voice in their mind that has granted them otherworldly powers. Either way, the race to find them has begun, and the struggle between the Cabal and the Hunters continues after centuries of uneasy silence.
---------------
Enter: Paul McCulloch. At the time that the story begins and his Warlock soul awakens, he is 23 years old. Paul occupies his time working at one of the largest shooting ranges in the world. He has an extensive background with guns and bullets, such that one might be tempted to brand him a “gun nut” or something similar. Really, he just loves being outside and shooting guns – both aspects that his job provides him.
Happily married, Paul works the long days at the firing range and spends the evenings at home with his wife Melissa when she gets home from the office. The young man is friendly, undoubtedly so; in fact, if one were to ask him, he would say that he almost feels obliged to befriend the friendless, having been friendless before himself. He is both blessed and cursed with an almost naïve belief in the goodness of those he meets, though he doesn't show it much outwardly. In fact, Paul's outward expression of feeling doesn't change that much at all: he seems to be in a perpetual state of somewhat good humor, at peace with life in general.
Paul stands over six feet tall, his hair cropped so close to his head that telling its color is a fool's errand. His blue eyes, shining with intelligence and observation, view the world from behind a pair of rimless glasses designed to correct his mild vision problems. His typical attire consists of T-shirts and shorts, which is not to say that he doesn't own anything else, but that he prefers only those.
Almost all of the matters of interest in Paul's life occurred in middle or high school: he fell in with the wrong crowd, and found himself in situations that he would rather not be in. Due to a series of bad decisions in his adolescence, Paul's acquaintances were all rather bad types, and it wasn't long before Paul found himself fighting for non-existent drugs and fending off opposing gang members at every other turn. The only time Paul was ever seriously hurt, though, was in an incident that didn't even involve a rival gang, but a deranged hobo with a knife.
Eventually, though, Paul's conscience took over and he made his escape from the vicious cycle. He moved to Mesa and has lived a happy life there for a few years, meeting and marrying his wife and finding a solid job. It was at this solid job of his that Paul had his first encounter with the Warlock Soul of one Robert McCullough. When a foolish patron of the shooting range mistakenly spun around (gun in hand) and began waving it around, it was the soul of Robert McCullough that gave Paul the heads-up he needed to turn around and take the gun away before anyone was hurt.
It was only afterward that Paul realized that he had known about the gun even though his back had been turned. He was also vaguely aware that he had heard some kind of voice, or a thought, in the back of his mind just before he was suddenly cognizant of the knowledge in his head regarding the incident. Something was not right there, and the largely introspective Paul decided to take the time to escape and sit down to have a little brainstorm.
Only a little prompting later, Paul was largely startled when Robert's soul was fully awakened in his mind. When he rolled out of bed that morning, life had been as it always had before; suddenly, though, he was sharing his mind with one that was virtually a stranger, despite his claims of being an ancestor. It was only after several hours of denial and confusion that Paul was able to come to grips with the fact that Robert was very conscious, and very much inside of his head. It was hours after that that Paul was able to stomach the idea that Robert was his ancestor, and his presence was the result of a powerful spell arranged by demons. What other way could this possibly have happened, after all?
Eventually, Paul allowed Robert to tell him about himself, and the Cabal, and what had happened so many years ago. Robert proved to be a calm, patient man – probably a necessity, because it took Paul a long time to calm down himself. Robert viewed the world that he lived in with a sort of disconnected detachment, viewing almost everything objectively. His patience and calm lent him an air of being standoffish, but he came across to Paul as a nice guy.
Robert was a Scottish man that grew up on a small farm, where his life was mostly uneventful. It was this boring life that lent Robert his incredible patience, and this patience that in turn lent him the ability to be a powerful mage. He explained to Paul that he utilized the magicks of Elementalism and Shadow, two disciplines with multiple applications, ones that allowed him to bend the four elements and the darkness of the world to his bidding. He told Paul all the myriad ways that his powers could be bound to objects, or to keywords, in order to set up effective traps and powerful enchantments for future use. He told Paul about how he joined Legion's Cabal: that a friend had seen some talent in the young McCullough, had trained him secretly for several months before presenting him to the Cabal scouts. Amazingly, they saw the same latent ability and took Robert as one of their own.
When Paul took all of this in, he was far more than speechless. Despite this, though, he knew that something needed to be done: he was being called, and he had no choice but to listen. Robert and Paul agreed almost right away that they were not cut out to be a part of the Cabal any longer, especially not the one that was going to take over the modern world. Still, they needed to do something, and sticking around there wasn't going to do any good. Robert also informed Paul that Legion was aware of their Awakening. Melissa would be in danger.
Given such conditions, Paul decided that it would be best to leave Melissa in the dark. Calling it a vacation, he left for Las Vegas, hoping that an answer would come to him. And an answer did come indeed.
On his first night there, he awoke quite suddenly. Taking in a deep breath, Paul became aware that something was wrong. It was a little too cold, a little too dark, a little too...silent. The sounds of Vegas and the smells of the hotel were muted, almost as though something was keeping them out of this room. Paul couldn't see in the darkness, but he could smell something that tickled his throat a bit, like...rotting flesh.
Shooting up, Paul looked around wildly, but there was nothing new in the room. Nothing new except for the small envelope sitting on the foot of his bed, the front clearly marked Legion. Paul swallowed slowly, suddenly very uncomfortable.
[That's what I was feeling!] Robert broke in. [This is Legion's influence. Get used to that feeling, because whenever it's there, it means Legion, or something he's affected, is near us.] His voice, or rather, the idea of his voice transmitted directly to Paul's mind, was slightly tremulous.
"So do we open it?" Paul asked out loud, still unused to speaking in his mind.
[If we do, there's always danger. There is danger any time you interact with Legion,] Robert pointed out. [The problems being, you and Melissa can't make a living particularly well while on the run; it's pretty much impossible to run from him in the long run; and, if he succeeds and we're on his side you've betrayed everyone and everything you knew and loved, but if he succeeds and we're against him we and everything we knew and loved will be summarily executed...]
"So what if we fight him?" Paul inquired, rubbing one eye absently.
[We'd be hopeless alone. He can use every discipline of black magic and is not only the best thaumaturge I've ever seen, he's among the best evokers, too.]
"Wow." Paul's eloquence left him as he felt Robert's admiration for Legion and knew he wasn't exaggerating.
[Exactly.]
Paul stared at the letter for a little while longer. Something, perhaps a compulsion placed on the letter by Legion, made him want to open it. It made him need to open it.
So Paul did. He opened it.
Nothing happened. Inside the envelope was a small slip of paper, which Paul extracted and read.
Los Angeles. I'll know when you arrive. The time for a new age of humanity has come, an age in which we, those who use magic, will be gods among men.
That was what the note read. A single plane ticket drifted slowly to the ground, heavy with Paul's destiny.
---------------
Enter: Siber Terrian, a pasty little nerd of a man, unsurprisingly single, currently enrolled as a college student pursuing a biochemistry major. The youngest of the major players at only age 21, Siber is also the least experienced of the newly awakened mages in terms of physical combat: with only basic martial training at his disposal, his greatest weapon is not his body, but his mind.
Logical and pragmatic to the point of coldness, Siber is Darwinistic in that he believes in the survival of the fittest. When he forms a friendship, he does not do so as some would; instead of a surface friendship, he gives his friends his quiet support. In all things, Siber maintains a flair for the theatrical, a certain dramatic spark, while at the same time being both reflective and introspective. The boy has a good understanding of how his mind works, and how he can best use its resources to his own ends.
The young Mr. Terrian has a great interest in intelligent debate, spiritual exploration, and the sciences of man. This fascination of his stems from his intense dislike of overly emotional or irrational people, which in turn stemmed from his early childhood, where he observed the actions and mistakes of his brother and sister. It is from this that Siber draws his theatrical interest: the theater only requires the use of false, ever-changing emotion. It was his fascination with the theater, in fact, that led to him shedding his old name of Karl Andrew Terrian and adopting a more fantastic one.
Despite all of this, or perhaps because of it, young Siber is neither corrupt nor righteous. He is, instead, right at the line separating the two, an unbiased and realistic individual. His lack of corruption is contrasted with that of his ancestor: a mage by the name of Keldan Tomera.
Keldan, unlike his descendant, is quite malicious. A social spider, Keldan does not respond to mots slights through his own direct action, instead preferring to pluck the strings that make up the societal webs until things dance the way he wants them to. Though courteous and generous on the outside, he hides a very deep anger within, and sometimes wreaking mayhem on a person's reputation was just not enough for Keldan. In such situations, causing a person severe mental agony is the preferred method of revenge – sometimes Keldan releases his victims with no permanent damage, and other times leaves them as a blubbering mess for the rest of their mortal lives.
Growing up poor, Keldan rapidly grew tired of his life and tried to escape it by striking out, young hero-style, at age ten. Within six months he was back home, but he never forgot his attempt; seven years later, after studying the arts of politics and government, he tried again, this time killing his now-overbearing and violent parents as well as his siblings before leaving. From then on, his skill in manipulating other people gave him all the support he needed to start his life anew. It was this revival of his that led him to discover dark magic, and the influence it could have in accomplishing his ends in life. After some study, Keldan became a somewhat skillful Demoniac as well as a Shadow mage, his preferred style being that of thaumaturgy, like Robert McCullough.
His induction into the Cabal was grand and he rapidly ascended the ranks, but it wasn't long after he joined that the Warlock Hunters wiped them out, and Keldan “died” at age 27. His soul was flung into the future by Legion's spell, and he awoke one day within the body of Siber. He remained silent, dormant even, observing everything through the eyes of his progeny. It was on the day that Siber was approached by Legion, as a matter of fact, that Keldan made himself known.
Siber Roelan Terrian awoke early in the morning to an unnatural chill and a distinct smell of putrid, rotting flesh. He looked down the bed to see that a dead body was placing a letter at the foot of his bed.
"Holy shit!" he exclaimed when it registered. He had already scrambled back to the wall. The body was gone moments later; it walked out of the door and apparently just...disappeared. Siber slowly allowed himself forward again and gingerly picked up and opened the letter. The envelope, which wa simply marked with the name of Legion, gave him a terrible feeling of unease.
Los Angeles. I'll know when you arrive. The time for a new age of humanity has come, an age in which we, those who use magic, will be gods among men.
A small piece of paper fluttered out of the envelope as Siber finished reading. It was a plane ticket, he realized when he picked it up. Holding the ticket in one hand, and the letter and envelope in the other, Siber suddenly realized...he had no idea what was going on. Maybe he was dreaming. No, the surprise he had felt when seeing the body had been more than real. He needed to relax.
Standing in his dark dorm room, Siber made his way to the bathroom, where he turned on some cold water and splashed it on his face. He set the small stack of papers to one side and reached for a towel. When he finished drying his face, however, he was shocked to see another man standing behind him, dressed positively archaically and eyeing the envelope with interest.
[Looks like Legion's back.]
Siber's heart jumped as he spun around, but there was no one there. When he looked in the mirror again, he could vaguely see the man still, but it was much harder than the first glimpse he had had. “What...who are you?” Siber asked cautiously, watching as the man switched from looking at the envelope to looking into his eyes.
[My name is Keldan Tomera. Your name is Siber Terrian. And you, young Terrian, are my descendant. You're wondering about the contents of the letter: Legion; magic; me, surely. The long and short of it is that I'm your ancestor, I came from the farthest pits of Hell to be a part of you, and you're a mage now. Not too complicated, I'm sure.]
Siber's head was spinning. He must be dreaming, right? But no, that was a sad and pathetic attempt at distraction. The young man knew what he had to do, as objective as he was. He went back to his bed and sat down, looking around – no sign of the man.
[I'm still here. Part of you, remember?]
Siber nodded. “I suppose you have a lot to tell me, then. Let's get started.”
---------------
Enter: Joe Simpson. A seasoned special forces agent, Simpson makes his living by risking his life more times weekly than most people do in their entire lives. Trained to deploy behind enemy lines in a radar-stealthed jet and drop in to gather information, protect an objective, or take out a target, it could well be said that even before his Awakening as a mage, Simpson was a very dangerous man. All of the stereotypical images of a super-spy apply to the squad that he belongs to: advanced weapons training, spanning from wooden poles to the most advanced aerial gunships; unarmed combat in a multitude of styles; diplomacy, leadership, problem-solving and memory – the works. These men and women are expected to be the best, and rarely did they fail to deliver.
High standards are and have always been a typical measure of life for Joe, though. From a young age, his parents prompted him to be the best that he could be, and the young Joe made sure to make his parents proud. In fact, it was this same drive that prompted him to join the armed forces after his father, who served in the Air Force, fell ill and died. Swearing to protect his mother and make his father proud, Joe took on the mantle and joined the military, where his high scores in both mental and physical tests caused him to be placed on a special watch list and eventually drafted into the special forces program.
The oldest of the Awakened thus far, Simpson had been serving for about ten years when he first made contact with his ancestor, a man by the name of Roland Dark. A quiet, reserved man, Roland is one that thinks before acting, without fail. Always older than his years and sometimes overly cautious, he has been a tempering force for the sometimes-brash Simpson. Their first conversation occurred at 30,000 feet, when Roland suddenly opened his eyes to find a sight that he had never thought possible: there he was, soaring above the ground, approaching Mach One and feeling the exhilarating freedom of the open air. The empty landscape around them filled both Roland and Joe with a sense of ease, beauty, and appreciation, and Roland's first words since the Dark Ages were poetic and full of wonder towards the beauty around them.
Fearing technical difficulties, Joe attempted to figure out who had somehow gotten into his radio channel. Of course, no one at the operations base could figure out what Joe was talking about, and his test flight was luckily canceled, Joe being put on a temporary wait list pending psychological analysis. To deepen his plight, he was unable to perceive Roland in his mind, unlike the rest of the Awakened; the unfortunate result of an error in the original spell. It was a collection of such errors that prevented the vast majority of the Cabal from awakening in the modern age, and the fact that Roland performed such an error and still Awakened is nothing short of a miracle of statistics.
Because Joe was unable to summon an image of Roland to his mind, however, he only had the voice of his ancestor to relate to him his story, and nothing to lend this story any credibility. Joe feared it was all a specter of his mind, that the stress of his career had finally gotten the better of him. [Please trust me,] Roland had pleaded – but Joe was stubborn. In fact, he did not believe the story to be anything but until the day that Roland finally decided to cease trying to get through to his descendant and resigned himself to silence. It appeared that there would be no getting through to Joe, and that they would live out their joint life apart from each other. As the first night fell and Joe was settling in to bed, however, he found himself filled with a strange sense of unease that Roland recognized quite well. Even before the special forces agent could draw his gun and turn, Roland was aware that they were in the room with a messenger of Legion.
Reflexes were what they were, though, and Simpson gunned the zombie down quite efficiently – or so he thought. It rose again, and Joe put it down again, more than surprised by what he deemed to have been impossible. Deciding to break his own decision, Roland quietly told Joe to check the letter that was in the zombie's hand. Heart pounding and mind whirling, Joe decided to oblige Roland instead of trying to fight him. Opening the letter gingerly, Joe found a plane ticket and a bill that simply read:
Los Angeles. I'll know when you arrive. The time for a new age of humanity has come, an age in which we, those who use magic, will be gods among men.
With that, Joe had no choice but to accept that the events going on around him were real, and that Roland was not lying to him. In an attempt to calm his progeny, Roland related to him his life tale in brief: how he had come from a well-to-do family of much privilege, and how his magical education had started soon after his academic education – as well as the fact that Roland was not his given name. Driven by absent but demanding parents, Roland pushed himself as hard as he could to be good enough for them, to no end. It was impossible to please his parents or even his teachers, who looked down on him for his struggles.
It was on the day of his final magical exam that Roland's life took a turn. Gathered in the presence of his teachers and his parents, Roland began to bend the elements and demonstrate his mastery of them. His overwhelming need to impress was too much for him, however, and he continually stumbled. The teachers continued to scorn him and his parents would have nothing to do with him as he struggled more and more to show them his worth. Confusion and anger got the better of the young mage, and in a bloody flash of power he eradicated his teachers and half of his family's home, including his parents. Mind torn by the impact of what he had done, the confused young man fled into the wilderness, where he cast off his old life and took the name of Roland.
From then on, he traveled the land as a healer, a mender of body and spirit, to atone for his crimes. Unlike the other two, Roland was an Evoker, one who adapted and flowed with the magical energy instead of trying to set its course in advance. When he was invited by another mage to join the Cabal, he had some misgivings: though the Cabal stated that its purpose was to protect the mages, Roland also knew that it was led by a positively evil mage, and the majority of those in the Cabal were of the same type. Still, pressure from the Hunters was mounting, even for a healer, and Roland eventually joined, taking the surname Dark as a half-hearted attempt to fit in. A year later, he “died” and threw his soul forward, hoping for a better life when he awoke.
At the end of Roland's tale, Joe realized that there was more to the world than what he had seen. Ticket and letter in hand, he made the decision to find Legion and discover what the real situation was, just like Siber and Paul. So they set forth, the three newly Awakened mages, each boarding a plane and making their way to Los Angeles to find their destiny.
posted by Jokerman.EXE at 3/24/2011 09:31:00 PM
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