Chapter VI - Asunder

[IamLEAM1983]

Lucian's reply was less verbal - even if telepathic - and came in the forth of a shared sense of agreement. Tom, Marius and Aislinn would briefly sense images form in the backs of their respective minds: Lucian's tactics and concerns made as tangible as their own thoughts. He did envision the front lines populated with dozens of quantum twins, but therein came a risk. Small divergences, over time, could lead to wide shifts in agreement. Some of the myriad warlocks and vampires would soon disregard the urgency of the matter and eventually try and seek personal glory or survivability. The Vlastos they knew had reasons to be committed to their cause in the immediate and the Tom they knew was still steadfast enough to hold on - but what if the enemy offered them more? How patient would all of the involved Aislinns remain? Tom had never doubted of Aislinn's dedication towards her own family, their shared causes and Hope's protection, but what if one of the other Aislinns had suffered enough to doubt? Rothchild did intend to pull from minute divergences in their lives' course so as to avoid the emergence of distinct alternate selves, but not everyone reacts to hardship and loss in predictable ways.

In return, they'd sense Tom reply with a simple mental image: his own right hand, tossing a pair of red dice onto a Craps table, the gesture captured in slow motion. It was a gamble they'd have to take. If any one of their other selves developed unfortunate ideas, they'd simply have to contend with it.

Thankfully, holding a discourse with images and fully-formed concepts flashing by was faster than the exchange of mere words. Only a heartbeat had passed, which left the Goat none the wiser.

"I'd like to introduce you to Azazel," casually replied Pride's figurehead. "I've heard tell of you investigating his associated legends, so I'm almost certain you know who he is and what he represents."

Lucian being a sensitive soul, his large eyes immediately began to gleam with pity and empathy. He'd always used his innate kindness as both a tool and a shield and for centuries on end, being kind had never steered him wrong. Ignoring the Goat, he tried to coax Azazel into locking eyes with him.

"I am Lucian," he said, raising his voice only so much as to be easily heard by the seemingly distracted caprine demon. "How are you today, Azazel?"

The armor-clad goat bristled and looked away, tension coiling in his limbs and his teeth clenching over sobs. "D-Don't speak to me," he quietly replied. "You're being kind... and I always hurt the kind ones, in the end."

Lucian angled his head to the side, tsking the way he would have if one of his grandkids had said something stupidly self-deprecating in front of him. "I'm sure you don't mean that, my lad," he replied. "I'm sure that when you're left alone, you happen to be quite gentle with your own things."

Hesitating, glancing off to the side to check for the Goat's response, Azazel laid the case down as carefully as he could. "I-I have nothing," he replied. "I was never allowed to-"

He couldn't finish, as the Goat's hand slowly closed on his shoulder. "Did I say you could put the case down, wretch?
- N-No, but-"

Looking back to his enemies, the Goat sighed. "I would've hoped to defer this to the battlefield. Thanks to you, mister Rothchild, I find myself forced to provide you with a demonstration."

Pride's leader said nothing, and merely glanced back down at Azazel, the two of them locking eyes together. Something that remained unsaid passed between the both of them. The result in Azazel was rising tremors in his features, a few tears escaping him, and his begrudgingly bending down to pick the case back up. His eyes flashed to Tom and his friends, a supplicant's desperation filling them. Tom wasn't aware of it, but his staff softly creaked in response to his grip growing tighter.

"What did you do?" he asked, steel in his voice.

The demon shrugged. "Nothing much; I simply gave to the Scapegoat what Humanity has been passing on to it for generations. The coming pain and suffering of both our forces, the fruitless struggle of those already doomed to time measured in the billions of years, the incipient failure of our own reality in safeguarding its existence in the face of greater foes than I... An ocean of despair in the instant - a drop of water for those who would remake this world of yours to be as just, perfect and whole as it deserves. More importantly, I framed this as being his fault."

He glanced at the remains of the park. "Whose fault is this, anyway, hm? Is it any singular footman of mine's, or maybe Sophia's, with her extreme measures of protection? I'm sure you think this is all mine to bear, but I haven't personally pillaged your world. I merely claimed a high seat and gave wide-sweeping orders. If anyone chose to destroy or pillage as they claimed your world for my glory, this is entirely their cross to bear. This obviously gives enough leeway for certain noteworthy events to happen."

The Goat glanced off at the negative space that surrounded the visible trio. "I can't see or hear you, mister Vlastos, but I know enough to assume you wouldn't have passed this opportunity to drive new stakes in the ground, set up new foundations. I've seen the ship reports and odds are you're very close by... Of course, I could also be speaking to the four winds, in which case foolishness is also something that can be deflected - also something for the Scapegoat to bear."

Egging him on, Tom clicked his tongue. "Nobody else is here. I'm guessing all this irresponsibly-channelled Hellfire finally got to you. I'd refer you to a local shrink, but intel says you allowed his pocket demon to swallow up his soul.
- How endearing," replied the Goat, his tone glacial. "What matters is that even your opposing us strengthens Azazel's growing rage. You're rather commendable in your efforts to keep him level-headed, but the simple fact is that we can't have that."

Nothing tangible happened, but Tom's ears perked nonetheless. It took a few seconds, but he soon felt something snake past them; more of an unspoken feeling than a summons or command; more an urge than a siren's call - and it tickled even his alert practitioner's synapses, searching for the wick of some mental explosive he'd almost always denied himself access to.

Aislinn, Lucian and Marius would feel it just as well: the alien desire to hate, to cast all of their misfortune on Azazel's misshapen shoulders, as bile that would rise up in their throat, all but demanding that this rationally unaffiliated individual were made irrationally responsible for everything, from Marius' failures to the doomed chapters of Dalarath's rebel uprising to Aislinn's recent life in all its twisting turns and meanders...

Why, something had driven Tom to claim Quint's body and to set their resistance in motion, right? What had stood at the helm, in those now-distant days? Was the Goat the source of it all, or wasn't it simply simpler and convenient to lump all of the world's evils and failures in one sum and lob it at a single target?

They'd all feel it, somewhere within, from the frontline negotiators to Ciaran and Sophia, Arthur and Alana, Dickens and Claudia - the need to blame someone, beyond all reasonable doubt. Someone conveniently punchable who couldn't fight back, something frail and easily detestable, something that wouldn't offend them with further preening or posturing, someone whose passivity would reassure them as to their righteousness...

The catch was, of course, that people of sound mind didn't lob their woes at easy targets while in times of crisis. If emotion could be parsed and selectively pushed aside, the requested answers became clear as day. Azazel wasn't much more than the living embodiment of mob mentality as a concept, the proof that Reason was most definitely a higher brain function.

* * *

It took some effort, but the glass panel Matriel stood in front of soon felt as though the Throne's voice were coming out of some sort of high-powered subwoofer, with visible eddies of force traversing its membrane - perhaps just short of forcing cracks to appear. After some patience, however, a spiderweb pattern did form. A few seconds more, and the fault lines cut across a few of the wards' directing lines, causing the entire arcane assembly to fail. The pane finally shattered with a sound that wasn't quite that of breaking glass; it felt more like a human scream modulated at the same pitch as breaking glass. Zeke had cowered as far away as he'd been able to within the confines of his cell, with hands on his ears just in case. Matriel's efforts still left them ringing, which caused a slight delay in his realizing the Thone's efforts had paid off. When he did, however, his doddering steps forward were complemented with outstretched hands.

"Take me to him," he said, his voice frail but now filled with excitement and hope. 

In the meantime, the Hog had begun to stir, first turning back onto its read and then raising its head towards them. Its almost-sapient features now affected annoyance, a burp-like roar leaving him as he slowly scrambled to his feet. Seeing this, and realizing Ezemial would be better served with a lower point of entry. Archie deployed his cane's rifle components and began shooting at the being's elephantine feet. His first few shots blew out a few candy-floss-colored toenails and exposed glistening blobs of the being's dark, chocolate-like inner flesh - and more importantly caused its balance to fail. Having been careful, the android spy effectively forced it to fall back onto its rump, where it gritted its teeth and attempted to assess its wounds - but not before raising its head in a more modulated and deliberate call that left little to the imagination.

Ezemial's jailer had just called for reinforcements.

Still, Archie wasn't too concerned with this, in the immediate. Instead, he refocused his sights near the creature's navel and worked in order to make Matriel's own efforts a little easier. If things worked out alright, the Throne wouldn't have to remain exposed in mid-air for too long and would only need to turn the tiny, grapefruit-sized indent in the Hog's flesh into something more suitable for serving as the receiving cavity for a Damned soul of Zeke's size.

"Would you please scout ahead for us, darling?" he then asked of Crystal. "If this place's denizens are any indication, they won't think to effectively surround us - and Beelzebub strikes me as the type who would want to personally chew out his detractors. Literally, in this case. We should see him coming."

* * *

Spotting Meris' construct and realizing Herbert's wings weren't able to latch onto a stable current, Three gritted his teeth and forced himself to briefly haul the attorney in closer.

"STAY HERE!" he screamed. "I'M DROPPING HERBERT; YOU'LL HAVE TO COMPENSATE FOR THE WIND FORCE!"

He then looked down at the demon. "MERIS'LL CATCH YOU! I CAN'T HOLD YOU LIKE THIS FOREVER!"

Herbert didn't verbally respond, something like a wordless cry of indignation and frustration leaving him. Three hardened his features despite the buffeting winds. "USE THAT!" he screamed, referring to the attorney's anger. "STAY FOCUSED ON THE BARRIER! IT'S NOT YOUR FAULT IF SOME OF THEM USE THIS AT THEIR ADVANTAGE, BUT YOU CAN STOP THAT ON YOUR OWN TERMS!"

Flapping tie and ruined dress shirt notwithstanding, Herbert was able to recompose his features and to reply with a nod. "MAKE IT BACK TO EARTH, DRAKE - THE LADIES AND I ARE GOING TO SEE WHAT WE CAN MAKE OF THIS!"

Three raised his eyes and took in the intersecting Infernal plain he was dangling over, a wide-expanse of sand-blasted dunes with only a strangely-networked keep visible only a few short klicks East. It looked small, and he could see convoys of incoming prisoners marching towards it, even as a detachment of Knights stepped out of its portcullis. Having seen this, he used his own inherited telepathic abilities to home in on Aspasia.

"I count one full unit walking out of some kind of outpost, three Ks East! Head Northeast, and keep to cover behind the dunes! You'll only have the advantage if you come at them from the rear! Herbert's going to show you through the keep! I'll head back out and make sure Bucky and Volker are okay!"

Wormsworth might've briefly looked surprised, but he quickly rolled his eyes, adding his own voice to the telepathic conversation.

"My, but don't we lead charmed lives, eh? Go on and play hero, Aidan - and don't worry about the barrier, I'm already proud enough of all of us for surviving this!"

He then kicked himself out of Aidan's grasp and partially managed to use his wings to angle himself in the general direction of the Archmage's ghostly mitt.

* * *

Gabriel nodded in the affirmative. "That would be his final trump card. We simply need to hold the line long enough for everything to fall into place - and we can only hope that the Creator and the Architect have both done enough to assist us.
- Why don't you just ship me out to the front lines, then?" asked Lucifer. "I could still help!
- I don't know what your Eldritch payload is, Lucifer," noted Gabriel, "but if you're the key to preserving Creation in some capacity, you're safer with a smaller group. Pride's going to want to crush Sophia, Doherty's stepping out of a time paradox with renewed potency strikes them as a minor win for us. Besides, they'll need you to trap Moloch in the past."

Lucifer blinked. "The spy's Moloch?! What if he just coasts back to the present the old-fashioned way?!
- Then it'll be up to you to ensure that doesn't happen without a serious cost," noted Gabriel.

Amazo seemed to share Gabriel's consideration. "Moloch wasn't a figurehead in your own timeline's original nineteen-fifties, but he made it in mine and a few others. He usually presents as an anthro bull of some lineage, dressed to the nines. He's a non-vampiric practitioner of blood magic, an old Babylonian angelic transplant that went the same way as the Goat."

He sighed. "Moloch isn't Belial, but he also isn't the Goat, either. He looks vain, but it's mostly because he knows mortal goons respond well to a boss that looks like he has his stuff together. Officially, he's a business rival of mine, as much of a Las Vegas standard as I used to be. Officiously, he has no problems ignoring his own heritage if it means he gets to derive power out of mortal criminal spheres; he just slaps a slightly cult-like structure on it, like he never really stops showboating with assistants."

That left Lucifer to grunt. "My Moloch got his wings torn off while Falling and got stuck halfway down. He died a nobody, stripped clean of everything he'd built back in Mesopotamia. The only thing that's left of him is some vague Pop Culture significance, but no working ritual.
- Well, that's about to change, if we're pulling Doherty back into the present," noted Amazo. "Even if Moloch stays in the late fifties, he'll catch up with us on the long run."

Glancing about, Gabriel shrugged lightly. "If Moloch survives all this without dipping back down to Hell and experiences the incursions on his own from some other corner of the globe, he'll have reasons enough to leave us be for now. It'll give us time to get acquainted with the new timeline that's forming in our wake."

He then looked back towards City Hall. "First things first, though. Raguel, Nami - take to the skies and keep our friends occupied. We'll get into position, suppress their fire and then neutralize them."

* * *

Pericles and Cyrus agreed, and shook the pair's hands one last time. "The other Revenants like myself or the Einherjaren of Scandinavia are already in position," noted the Greek statesman. You'll see Fae portals open above Hope within the hour."

Satisfied, Melmoth turned back to Enlil. "So do we just portal out, or...?
- If Abdiel knows of a safe space, this could be viable. All that matters is that you're both given time enough to prepare, if need be."

No sooner had he spoken that a brief klaxon sounded, followed by a warning that was announced in German, English, French and a few other languages.

"Attention: a substantial attack is reported to have crippled Magnus Tower, one of the Eastern seaboard's main staging grounds. No information regarding casualties is as of yet available."

A few voices rose in clamor, but we all quickly silenced by Cordatus and Amaterasu. Everyone's ingress into Hope needed to be properly staged, they explained. Panicking, at this stage, would do no good. If anything, the proceedings could now be accelerated.

"We'll have a marching order set before the hour ends," reassured Enlil.

[TennyoCeres84]

Once the Goat had confirmed the diseased Goat's identity, Aislinn ignored the pitiful figure for the time being and listened to the Pride demon prattle on with a slightly bored gaze. "Yeah, I don't know what history book you've been reading, but leaders and their subordinates usually all get the blame for when things go to shit. It's same for American politics or any other culture that's had their share of despots, tyrants, or otherwise crappy politicians," she noted.

Speaking to the Scapegoat and interacting with him appeared to only irritate the situation. No matter how sympathy-inducing he was, they needed to avoid riling him. The young warlock along the image of herself tapping her brain with an otherwise calm and neutral expression. A quick flash of a red circle and diagonal line and violent imagery laid over a projected Azazel followed after that. They had to remain calm, reasonable, and nonviolent to prevent placing blame on the Scapegoat and a bloodbath from occurring.

Upon sensing the exuded alien feeling of hatred, Ciaran withdrew away from the windows and erected a force field around the perimeter of the Tree, to keep anybody from coming in or leaving without his consent. He knew he was putting himself at risk in case anybody would fall prey to the visceral emotion, but it was better than leaving himself, Sophia, Arthur, Alana, Dickens, and Claudia to add to the tension.

***

Matriel took Zeke's hands and gently scooped him up, flying out of the prison with ease.

He initially swooped away from the prison to see the different angles Holden was shooting at. Trying to deliver the frail demon toward the toes and leg would have likely wasted vital time, but his brows rose in gratitude once the aristocrat struck the jailer's abdomen.

He soared toward the vulnerable area and tore the grapefruit-sized hole with an improvised ice blade from his arm. He slashed a small human-sized tear from the initial wound and positioned Ezemial inside it. "Move quickly and bon appetit," he said to the rescued demon before flying off.

Crystal shifted to her wolf form and nodded, slipping off to investigate for incoming threats.

***

Herbert wouldn't have to wait long to be rescued from the fierce winds, as the large, mitt-like construct caught him up and secured him behind the "fingers".

Meris grabbed onto him and steadied him once he would be inside. WIth the high winds muffled some, the Fauness was able to talk to both of them in a normal tone, "We need to head Northwest and use the dunes as cover. Drake saw a fortress with guards leaving it 3 Ks East, and we'll need to head in from the rear to surprise them."

"On it," replied the Heiress. She took a quick peek to get her bearings and then directed their impromptu transportation toward the Northwest in the seemingly endless desert.

***

Nami sighed with some annoyance at yet another complication besides meeting up with Wallace and Nybbas, but she knew what was at stake. She extended her wings and flew into the sky. "Off we go!" she exclaimed to Raguel.

***

The klaxon alarm caused the Throne to bristle concernedly, and she shook her head to calm herself.

She looked over at Melmoth and asked him, "What do you need to prepare? It seems a bit silly to have a pep talk at this point, but I supposed we should prepare somehow once we receive the marching order."

[Karl the Mad]

Hatred and rage were familiar emotions for Marius. He felt them, like old friends who thought they could sneak up and prank him; what was unusual this time, though, was the sensation of having it be forcibly directed at someone in particular. He shook his head; he had no quarrel with this Azazel person, and he knew perfectly well who was truly at fault. He saved his resentment for Pride, and ignored the Scapegoat altogether; he couldn't summon the sort of empathy and kindness the others could at the drop of a hat, but he could give him the next best thing, in his estimation: Indifference.

In the next second, however, he caught sight of something through the rift that demanded his attention instead. A couple of somethings, in fact! He muttered the same trick and called the air for a spyglass to get a better view, and sure enough, there was Aidan, Meris, Aspasia and someone he didn't recognize off the bat, falling through the air after a red flash of some kind. He could see, but he couldn't hear them; subtle as he could be, he didn't dare risk using the Black Speech more than he already had, considering present company.

He conveyed what he saw to the others through their telepathic link, sending the image of the four others appearing in the skies over the prison outpost and falling towards it. Can we help, or should we stay here? he asked, even though he'd been thinking about going through there himself anyway, earlier.

[IamLEAM1983]

Tom kept his eyes squarely set on the Goat, even if his mind constructed a nonverbal and somatic reply cut from the same cloth as Aislinn's. They'd see themselves somehow deferring the two armies' last palaver before open hostilities began and walking off for a few paces - before being cut down by a descending hail of Brimstone steel soldered to cruel hilts. They obviously couldn't stop now, but Lucian had still offered them an element of compromise...

Another milisecond of shared thoughts was sent, Lucian's plan resulting in the expected myriad of identical selves - with one of each of them using the resulting scrap to slip out of the battlefield, to come to their friends' aid. If that was to work, however, words had to give way to action.

The Goat, in the meantime, was amused by Aislinn's retort. "Ah, yes - I always forget how those in the front-row seats miss the plebe's unfortunate reactions. You might blame me, many others may join you, but who would Crystal Lowell blame for her weeks of isolation? Who would Albert Dickens blame once your defenses falter? Would he blame me, I wonder, or the first of my Knights to bellow their hatred in his hideous, pasty visage?"

He smirked. "You would be surprised, dear girl. The Scapegoat takes all, and we all are someone else's scapegoat. History sanitizes the wretchedness of your humanity - with the last two of your Presidents being forced to fight Middle-Eastern proxy battles that began decades ago over barrels of crude. Greed and desperate need dressed in the linens of righteousness and Justice, paraded over two generations of soldiers... Ask Aidan Drake who the ghosts of Najeeban blame, Aislinn McConmara. They know too little to cast their eyes to the first ones who saw the barren wastes of Pakistan and Afghanistan as a shield placed to protect the dying husk of Communist Russia from the blind hate of someone else who also deserves blame..."

The warthog rolled his eyes. "Blame is endemic, so's hatred. Live through enough bodies and facile contempt loses its lustre. Any other platitudes you'd care to dole out, before we rejoin our ranks? I cast blame on you, Goat, spurn and shun you - and I don't need to pin that like a gaudy badge on some poor kid's chest. I don't need more hatred, either - I've got millennia of the stuff bottled up."

The Chief Inspector chuckled darkly. "Good. You'll need it."

He turned his eyes to Azazel. "Wretch - the case. Open it."

Begrudgingly, the Scapegoat did as he was told, shivering and sniffling the whole way, teeth clenching over pain and rage. Inside waited three cruel-looking necklaces of a sort, neither quite a gorget or a collar, but festooned with red Brimstone plates and black spikes, oozing the very stuff of what had once been Valefor's province - Wrath made manifest. The three collars shivered in their padded slits, jangling and clicking as though they were fastened on the necks of rabid dogs barely being kept in check.

"The more you'll project your anger onto me, the more these beauties will seek you out. If they find you across the battlefield, and if their clasps close around your necks, Valefor's unrequited desire for vengeance will claim you. If they don't latch onto you, they'll surely choose those here who cower behind walls but still have much to extol."

The Goat gave Azazel another glance, the poor thing quietly wailed under its breath, and more waves of irrational resentment pushed past them, again reaching Sophia's abode, teasing those whose resolve had already been tested.

"How focused are you truly, I wonder?" then asked the Goat. "Can you best us while being divorced from your emotions? None of you here are Karthians, none of you here have ever truly acted without impetus or passion - not even the one who would rather I act as though I couldn't sense him. Therein lies the dilemma, as I haven't met a single mortal in all of my years, much less a single vampire or immortal, without heartstrings."

Tom glanced at Lucian, the Void Weaver subtly nodding back. Marius would then sense some strangely alien form of the Black Speech caress his mind, not out of some desire to assault him, but carried like an urgent missive - laden with Rothchild's own clarity. He didn't have the Gentlemen's resources but still had spent centuries distilling the Black Speech to the closest form he could reach of the idiom's formerly reality-sustaining properties. Words of quiet force and conviction seeped into the Alexandrian's mind, painting the portrait of a broken dialect, a shattered tongue - something he'd spent lifetimes wielding in its jagged form only to now be presented with a semantic relic - like a fragment of Etruscan or Minoan pottery recovered with its glaze intact, the prototypical forms of Herakles or Perseus gazing back at living eyes after centuries spent lying under loose soil. 

A tiny, glistening thing of intellectual beauty. A minuscule fleck of truth miraculously plucked out of occult History's dung heap. The plate it had once been, the amphora or clay tablet - that was gone. Its promise, however, still remained.

For all his years, Vlastos would need a second to process it, and a good bit of gumption for it to not be too obvious for their foe: the old Void Weaver root for Peace - inner peace, especially, expressed as the Mind briefly learning to wrest itself into a place of absolute and nurturing stillness. Zen packaged in a single word of power designed for now-dead minds who would've once been able to maintain that sense of balance for entire lifetimes. The Squids had lost that gift eons ago, and Marius had only been given a single piece out of a larger mantra, the rest waiting behind millions of dollars of further philological research, lifetimes of further toil.

A few minutes of pure focus, doled out to Aislinn and Tom, as well. They had one shot - the Peace-Word wouldn't affect their minds in the same way again if they tried using it again, later. They were not of the Architect, and even Lucian was naught but a pale shadow of what had once been. They'd have to hang onto Peace like a talisman and wait until the right moment to use it.

In Sophia's apartment, however, no candlewick had just been lit - and hatred festered. Albert watched Ciaran deploy his shield with growing uncertainty, even as his dead guts cried out for Azazel's life-drink. If only someone could kill that thing, he caught himself thinking, then it would all be over. His already-fragile mind fought for whatever scraps of rationality they could hang onto, insisting that this made no sense. In the meantime, Claudia had chosen to channel that imposed resentment for as close to good as she could manage, returning to whatever notes and books she'd been able to salvage from Arthur's victims, before being forced to hole herself in here with the others. It wasn't much, but being aware of Azazel's effects was a start. 

The dryad's Wi-Fi had conked out ages ago, but parsing her phone's grimoire app allowed her to put a name on this deleterious effect, as well as cast a tentative web of clues that all left her puzzled.

Keeping herself centered with a breath, she sent her fellow siege victims an interrogative glance, not being sure as to whom happened to still be lucid enough to help her think things through. She would've hoped for Ciaran's assistance, but the Dryad's last line of defense had busied itself already. Thinking her best bet was with Sophia, she bit her lower lip and hoped that her dying smartphone would last long enough for Sophia to at least assess her haphazard findings.

"I'm not sure," she said, her tone understandably nervous, "but I think I found some kind of counter-ritual. Maybe I'm too riled up to think straight, but I can't figure out why Paracelsus says iron beats out enmity. Do you think it's a reference to the Bane, or...?"

* * *

Zeke practically hadn't heard Matriel, his eyes locking on the glistening, pudding-like consistency of the Hell-Hog's flesh like a junkie's would have on a proffered and prepared needle. In retreating, the Throne wouldn't get to hear much, but the diminished Fiend quickly wormed his way into the being's flesh - something which elicited an immediate response from the failed jailer. More loud, warbling cries followed, with the being clumsily attempting to slap and tear at its own belly in some vain effort to rid itself of the parasite that now slowly worked through it. From annoyance, these calls turned to increasingly desperate tones as its hands padded and tore at its own flesh increasingly higher.

For a few agonizing seconds, Crystal wouldn't see much. The living mounds of the other Hell-Hogs stirred and shifted, adding their own cries to the now-distressed jailer's, but that seemed to be the extent of their contribution. Then, just as she'd decide to change her vantage point, she'd catch side of a dark cloud on the horizon - and perceive a growing buzzing noise in the air.

Flies - billions of them, gathered in a tight cloud about the size of one of Hope's smaller neighbourhoods, flowing and undulating like cicadas over bodies of water, the almost blob-like mass they formed in the air slowly creeping towards them - even as some sort of form or definition was beginning to emerge in its core. There was one gigantic fly in the swarm, about as large as the Hell-Hogs, with four of its front legs terminating in human hands that were outstretched. Its compound eyes were set in a similar manner to the Hogs', with a tightly-furrowed brow suggesting intense focus. It was otherwise morphologically similar to a Terrestrial fly, except for how its bulging abdomen here looked less like the typical insect's feature and more like a distended stomach.

Erin wasn't a werewolf, but she'd heard that buzzing many times before. "Beelzebub is coming," she said, her tone clipped as she adjusted her grip on her sword. "Let's hope Lyman's hungry, the Lord of the Flies is as hard to corner for gunmen  as he is for sword-wielders..."

Nergal's response was swift, his wings coming back into view as he surprisingly pulled out not a gun, but a ruggedized military laptop, from one of its steely folds.

"We can still slow him down with fire," he said. "White phosphorus should do the trick."

This apparently alarmed Archie. "White phosp- What are we, bloody barbarians?!
- Beelzebub is only second to Leviathan," replied Nergal. "His hunger is all-consuming, his mind wholly devoted to sating his desires. One of them likely involved seeing Ezemial suffer. We've irked him enough to warrant a personal visit - he won't offer us an easy way out. Not unless we strike first.
- I'm starting to understand why the Mesopotamians stopped worshipping you, Galbraith!" pointedly noted the android, who kept his rifle trained on Crystal to better assess her condition.

* * *

While they remained hidden, the dunes' shifting crests allowed them to sneak in occasional peeks at the various processions that approached the keep. Most consisted of the familiar sights of the enclave's undesirables being led off for "re-education", but two of them caught Herbert's attention as they neared the keep. After a few seconds spent observing them with his eyes narrowed to slits, he soon gripped Meris' shoulder. 

"Stop," he quietly seethed. "Stop this thing now! Look at this file - I recognize one of these prisoners!"

He pointed at the distant figures, one of them looking as distinct as Wormsworth once had, as far as demons were concerned. It wasn't every day you found a Fiend of Pride in manacles with a three-piece suit and a kilt, of all things... He looked to be of similar stock to Herbert, even if he sported a vaguely dragon-worthy snout in a more rounded form as well as pince-nez glasses that someone had carelessly stomped on, the tartan fabric being pushed against his thighs by the howling winds and occasionally revealing a bit of side-rump. The pattern wouldn't be familiar to Meris - even the MacDonalds hadn't used that much red and orange tweed. It felt as though the demon had more or less co-opted the concept of Scottish kilts for its own sartorial satisfaction, designing its own pseudo-clan weave for good measure. One of the accompanying Knights carried a badly-crooked nine-iron, almost as if someone had tried to defend themselves with it only to have it snatched away.

"That's Cacus," observed Herbert, "my old boss! He was sympathetic to the Black Goat; why is he being led off with other prisoners?"

 Since the incursions had begun and some demons had started to join the resistance's ranks, the sight of Damned pushing or otherwise abusing other Damned on the Pit's side of the local rifts had become rather common. Usually, however, the runts were those who were being pushed around, and rarely did the victims look like they had enough power to so much as have a Name, much less a constructed identity. Yet, here was what was probably a low-rang dignitary in Pride's halls, held by his spaded tail and given the occasional harsh yank whenever he failed to keep pace. For reasons they couldn't ascertain for the moment, Cacus didn't seem able to simply fly off and away. His wings remained folded, their gestures sluggish - as though something were weighing them down. Distance would swallow the former cabinet chairman's heated response, but he still seemed to speak with a kind of indistinct Western European accent; like a Scots brogue filed down to something that was neither British, nor American, but still germane to both dialects.

* * *

The angel followed as he'd indicated he would, holding above the sunwell that broke the municipal building's first-floor ceiling. He waited until Henry's reformed demons and Gabriel's angels fell into position, only then giving Nami a nod in assent.

Things unfolded rather quickly. Raguel's wings manifested physically for a moment, then turning slightly hazy as they changed shape and turned into three additional arms on each side of the angel. Some arms wielded guns, while others stuck to what looked like the more practical cousin to most Classical painters' idea of angelic spears. He did his best to rain fury down on those demons left holding a few more innocents hostage, in the assurance that Nami would add her own brand of sensory torture. 

Seconds later, Gabriel's men and the reformed demons stepped forward, weapons at the ready. Nami was in an especially favorable position, in that she'd be well-suited to test just how dazed or otherwise paralyzed the remaining Pitspawn were. Whatever happened, this wasn't much more than a formality. City Hall belonged to the resistance, now - a fact that equally relieved and worried Allocer.

Watching the proceedings from the squad car, Allocer sucked in a nervous breath. "I wish I could smile, like some of Gabriel's men. I just know the Goat's going to find some way to punish me - some way to pin the blame for further tragedies on me."

Lucifer tsked and crossed his arms against his chest. "Fuck him; this is our win. Nothing's gonna change that."

* * *

The Broker settled with taking a deep drag of his stogie, his eyes looking harder than usual. "You burn 'em, I smoke 'em. It's that easy, hon. The only issue we gotta face is the Goat's actual power: he's kept it in wraps for long enough that there's no local assessment for him, back in Hope. You're probably fine, you're a Throne; and I'm guessing our close collaboration sorta covers me - but the footmen and the ground commanders don't know how strong he is. He's done a lot during his time with Holden Hall; but he's free, now. That flesh he's riding is a hundred percent his, and he won't mind destroying it if it means he'll come close to destroying us."

He sniffed. "We'll have to think for the little guys, cover the front-liners carrying mundane weaponry, somehow."

[TennyoCeres84]

Aislinn chose not to respond out loud to the Goat, knowing it would simply act as kindling to a fire. She focused on the slip of a talisman Lucian had shared from Marius to them. It felt oddly soothing, like a cool cloth against the back of the neck previously burned by the blazing sun. She allowed herself to bask in it as she held onto it dearly for the time being.

Inside the apartment, Ciaran had managed to distance himself somewhat with his focus on his erected barrier, allowing the hatred be placed on the back burner. He could overhear what Claudia was asking, but he felt that he was better off keeping everyone inside.

Sophia was doing her best to push away the awful sensation coursing through her. Unfortunately, this bottling of emotion manifested as her features starting to appear feral. Her green pupils had turned to slits against her even greener irises. Red, thorny vines slithered and undulated around her as though searching for the culprit. They didn't leave the perimeter of the apartment, but her attention was caught by Claudia's question.

She hurried over and leaned over to look at the little screen and the information it offered. "That's possibly a connection, given the enmity the original Fae held for the dragons and their usage of iron against them. Let me see, though...." she mumbled.

***

"Slowing them down is the best we can do," Matriel answered as he landed beside them, glancing back to the Hell hog that Zeke was currently in middle of eating. "It'll be fitting if Ezemial can counter Beelzebub if he can take over the creature's facilities," he observed.

Not wanting to be caught up in the coming swarm of demonic flies, Crystal no longer needed keep to her vantage point and hurried back to where the others were. She panted from rushing back and shifting forms. "Well, if we're going to delay that swarm, we best get to it!"

The Throne glanced over at Nergal and his laptop. "Do you think a storm would slow them or does that just seem like something else for Beelzebub to desire?" he asked.

***

Stopping the ephemeral mitt's movements, Meris eyed where Herbert gestured to and squinted her eyes to see the former colleague and anybody else who might unexpectedly be there.

Also studying the line of prisoners and their sluggish movements, Aspasia grunted thoughtfully. "It's possible he's not in line with the Goat's efforts enough to his liege's liking. Though, it could also be that the Goat could be using prisoners as disposable for other, unknown means," she mused.

"The only way to know for sure is to get closer," the Archmage responded, getting the creation back into progressing while using the dunes as cover.

***

Nami partially followed Raguel's example and shifted her wings to resemble a couple additional arms to hold the guns she had gotten from the Pandemonium armory. She fired them down at the demons who still held mortals hostage, the released ammo packing a double whammy of both remorse and pain. Unlike some of Gabriel's officers, she didn't bear a smile, knowing how serious things were still likely to get.

***

"I can extend a shield over them, much as I did in Israel over ourselves and the Court members," Abdiel suggested with a sigh. "It'll be more of an effort than that, of course, but it's what I can do. It's all too easy for the Goat to act the way he does because he thinks he's in the right. Somebody will have to act as a polarizing force to burst that power bubble he's been fostering for so long."

[Karl the Mad]

Marius was confused, and he didn't like being confused. Who the hell was this Azazel person and why was everyone walking on eggshells around him? Some kind of berserker or some damn thing? He didn't look like much of a threat, but then again nor did Marius, with his aged profile and withered body. Every fiber of him ached for combat, to lash out, to sink his fangs into the nearest enemy throat and feed in a way he hadn't in decades: completely, excessively, draining them of every last drop of blood and life and leaving their desiccated corpse behind for the next bloodbag.

In the next moment he realized that was the Goat's influence, and shook himself, trying to get a handle on his emotions. Was this the wrong field of battle for one such as him, to fall so easily for the enemy's parlor tricks? The others had their plans, what did he have?

Then the peace-word was cast, and he froze up, watching the effects of using the Black Speech in a way he'd never thought of. To stabilize someone, as opposed to knocking them off guard. He could just see how it was done, too, and resolved to study it for himself once the fighting was over and he had his time and resources back. For now, though, he stood fast and waited for the signal to attack.

[IamLEAM1983]

"But neither the Fae or the dragons had to contend with demons," objected Claudia, "unless that part's also something the old geezers conveniently forgot or don't like to talk about..."

She scrolled down, forcing herself to read as fast as she could, hoping beyond hope that her phone's blinking Battery symbol meant she still had a minute or two.

"Summon iron and steel one's mind," she muttered. "How do you summon iron, or any metal? Do you need a magnetic superhuman to be around, or...?"

Dickens peeled his eyes away from the scene on the front lawn. "Most of us secular types have only just learned that the elements have Celestial representatives, miss Tomlin. Maybe he's referring to Zadkiel or Hesediel."

Claudia tsked. "No, they're one and the same, it's just the same way Matriel's carried a bunch of names across History; Kaito Urakawa's just the latest-"

In speaking, she felt something dawn on her. "It's Hesediel," she said, her voice nary but a whisper. "He can channel steel, counteract Earth, Wind, Water and Fire's own passions. Nothing made out of metal is ever dangerous on its own, even the most dangerous gun needs a human element to remove the safety and pull the trigger..."

Dickens nodded. "He's immune, Claudia. He'll never play into Azazel's feedback loop.
- Then how do we summon him? I can't just chuck a few carpenter's nails in a bowl and pray for a sec, can't I?"

Grimley's old snake oil salesman smiled. "Say what you want about us Freaks; we pay attention. None of us can wield magic, but Horatio always made it a point to keep us abreast of the fundaments. Hesediel is the Builder and the Scaffold, if you go back to Astronomia Novem. He works with the other Thrones to turn inert minerals into organic compounds; neither Abdiel or Matriel would've been able to assemble the first DNA strands in the primordial oceans' cellular beings without his minerals. What's the simplest tool you can think of?"

She licked her lips nervously and glanced back at Sophia. "I don't know, er... It's just that thinking is getting to be so hard under Azazel's influence!
- A carpenter's hammer," supplied the vampire. "A regular old hammer."

Out by the front lines, Lucian had narrowed his features. "I believe we've settled this, gentlemen. It seems clear to me that one amongst us is not willing to transact in good faith."

The Goat merely chuckled at that observation. "At the very least, you'll find it hard to fault me for having failed to uphold your martial traditions."

He nodded one last time. "We'll see you on the battlefield."

Lucian waited for the others to turn back, and then headed for the front line comprised of the stationed angels and the Legion of the Burning Suns. He waited for the group to settle down, gathering his focus as he did so, and offered one last nod to Tom.

The Warlock nodded. "Do it," he said.

A word Marius wouldn't recognize flowed out of the patrician Void Weaver's mouth, tentacles flowing with visible power - and he'd soon feel himself exploding, all the while somehow remaining whole, alive and tangible. There wasn't pain in that sensation, but rather the sudden, brief and overwhelming awareness of every single small fork in the road he'd come across in as small a time period as the last few days. Rothchild was only pulling on their group's last few days of existence to avoid creating starkly divergent alternates, and even then - the uniqueness of Tom, Aislinn, Marius and Lucian became as many pluralities - until some wave of gentle mental force carefully snipped all connections between the dozens of individual new bodies and minds that had sprung up and left each instance free, but completely aware of their current situation.

From the enemy's point of view, the sparse front line had suddenly thickened in an instant - a forest's worth of Warlocks' staves standing up, a small legion of deceptively strong older men hiding nearly-identical millennia in experience. The differences were so small as to seem almost absurd, almost a slap in the face of the usually grandiose ideas that involved alternate selves or timeline divergences. Here was a Marius Vlastos identical to him in every way, except for how he'd taken to wearing a mustache. Here was another one with longer hair, or one with slightly different sartorial tastes - this and more, repeated dozens of times. Dozens of Aislinns that had led a life identical to the prime one's in every way, except for tiny shifts in the last few hours' lot of choices both conscious and otherwise.

The first Tom sighed and glanced at one of his clones. "I'm starting to feel better about this, Me.
- Me too," replied the other warthog, followed by a soft cascade of Tom's own chuckles, coming out of a handful of different throats.

Prime Tom steadied his breath. "Let's start with the first salvo, hm?"

The forest of staves shifted slightly to the back, they all lowered their heads and gathered their willpower...

Came two words, spoken out of dozens of copies of the same throat.

"Take them."

Above the front line, a long, glowing orange gash formed in the already-lurid sky, and out of it came all of the Warlocks' commanded imps, multiples of the already-sizable retinue of small, winged and wily creatures Tom kept at his beck and call, a leftover from Thomas Quint's first forays into Infernalism. What was a small mob's worth of small simian and winged demons turned into a swarm thick enough to intermittently blot out the sky, and that cruelly descended upon the enemy. Individually, most of Tom's imps would've been harmless - he'd even shown one or two to Aislinn in the past. Tamed by someone who meant well and who could still channel their natural cruelty constructively, these little things could almost have passed as pets.

They didn't, now. Winged piranhas with prehensile hands and feet tore through the Goat's front lines, finding either the open and soft flesh of Pride's Eldritch creditors or the gaps in the armored hide of the Pride Knights. Clumps of the little beings used their combined wingspan and torque to lift Knights out of their ranks and toss them below, cackling the whole way. Eventually, however, Paimon's former brethren figured out how to repel the swarm with their expelled plumes of Hellfire, which ended Magnus' opening salvo. The end-result was an effective one despite this, with several ranks in the front guard having been disbanded and recalled - and the front being wide open.

The Warlocks brought their staves forward like jousting lances, domes of force forming at the varying tips of the shaped dead branches.

"CHARGE!" called out one of the Rothchilds, as everyone threw themselves forward.

***

"If you think it'll help," replied Nergal. "There's a reason why we haven't seen that many scions of Gluttony back on Earth, Pride knows that the more debased in their number can't be controlled in any satisfactory manner. I won't feel bad for laying waste to Beelzebub's fiefdom, considering." He kept his eyes on the laptop. "There - drones deployed. I can rain fire down on them at the push of a button. White phosphorus burns chemically, your water won't interfere with its effects."

Archie, in the meantime, kept close to Crystal but glanced at Nergal's device. "We stand in the Pit; will your devices interfere with the Sammaelites' efforts on the surface?
- No. The Pit and Pandemonium are both conjoined and seperate, in a way I would assume only Thrones and Void Weavers could consciously grasp. One day, I intend to blanket the Pit in orbital platforms, to forcefully keep them in check."

Holden's gaze hardened. "Does Gabriel know you intend to use authoritarian politics in the same manner our current abusers are?
- You've seen the Pit now, Lord Holden," replied the weaponsmith, "you know as well as I do that it won't respond to diplomatic outreach. Only us outliers have any hope of integrating Earth's diplomatic circle."

Archie looked displeased, but a glance towards Crystal made it clear he thought Walpurgis' patron demon was touching on an unfortunate truth. As for Belial, he'd simply leaned against the front fender of his Humvee and had observed the proceedings, arms crossed in front of him.

"You an outlier too?" asked Bob of Belial, while keeping a hand near his gun and his eyes on the horizon.

The Smith pursed his lips together. "I'm someone who realizes certain desires are best left unexpressed or reduced to more productive energies - and that others are unavoidable parts of the human condition. Nergal obviously hopes for safety, but my track record leaves me to suggest that coercion won't offer desirable results on the long term." He observed as the beast now began clutching at its throat, its warbles now having a desperate tone and the moving lump that slithered around its neck progressing with almost inhuman speeds.

"I kept my workers primed for Earth's wider cultural basin knowing this could happen. They'll fit in with you because I allowed them to - and that's something you can't accomplish with weapons platforms.
- Says Pride's main armorer," added the Sammaelite.

Belial smirked at that. "Nergal would prefer the term warlord. I do, too. If I control the weapons, I control the ebb and flow of conflict. For all I've done to arm the Knights, I didn't supply Pride with a trump card they'd desperately need.
- Which is?"

Belial paused as the Hell Hog now padded at the back of its skull, screamed one last time with its eyes wide, facets glimmering in red out of sheer panic - only for its hands and arms to flop down as, seemingly, its skull was ruptured and its brain, compromised. Its eyelids were now drooping, eyes twitching.

"The means to outclass basic ingenuity - or what some might call cruelty."

The creature's eyes fully closed and slowly reopened. Discordant sounds escaped its throat, until the possessing spirit realized the Hog's clay-like physique made it possible for him to reconfigure its throat and vocal tract. Zeke glanced down at his new hands as if doing so would help him refocus his vocal control. Eventually, a thoughtful grunt tuned in the same registry as the voice of the lawyer he'd possessed was heard. In the back, a deafening roar rose in the air, produced by a horde of buzzing flies that all carried their master's growing anger.

"KILL THEM, JAILER!" said the flies. "DESTROY THEM ALL!" In return, Lyman looked over his new, massive shoulder, shaped the Hog's features into a moue of contempt and shrugged. "I'll get right on that," he said, taking a few lumbering steps towards the group.

Seeing his shadow stretch over their group, Nergal appeared slightly concerned. "This isn't what we agreed on, Ezemial!" he soon shouted, perhaps expecting a fist to come down or one of the Hog's pudgy hands to try and grasp Matriel by the waistline.

None of that happened.

Instead, Zeke sat down heavily, adding a few ground-shaking tremors to the din, and leaned forwards slightly, resting his hands on his knees."I doubt anyone's extended a formal welcome to Hell to you, Deputy Chief Lowell," he said, looking at Crystal. "For what it's worth, I apologize for proverbially breaking the last seal. You'll tell me the Goat's treacherous nature should've been obvious to me, and I'll simply have to agree. I'd let my cravings dictate my actions, when I'd in fact placed myself in a position where indulgence should've been a useful affectation."

In the back, Beelzebub's horde wordlessly screamed in sheer rage, while Lyman's mass effectively served as a lean-to that protected the group from the insects. Noting this, Archie looked up while keeping a hand on his gibus' brim. "Don't these things inconvenience you, at least?!"

In response, Zeke raised his head and opened his mouth, something in the gesture evoking both indolence and decadence. A large chunk of the swarm flew in, perhaps seeking to heckle the obstacle into leaving, but he instead closed his maw on them and began to absent-mindedly chew. "No," he finally said, after swallowing. "If I were you, I'd open another portal close by and let Matriel and I deal with Beelzebub. We'll cover your retreat and then catch up."

That said, he looked back to the Throne. "Flood the plains behind Beelzebub; he'll have no other choice than to confront me. I'll treat him to a king's spread, believe me.
- What could you do?!" asked Archie, to which the Hog shrugged. "I can swat the Fly, which hasn't happened often, and I can poison him - make him taste what he doesn't want to taste. My own regrets, for one, and my new hopes."

* * *

They quickly reached a point where any further movements using Meris' construct would have been seen. Hopping off of it, Herbert quickly realized they were almost within line of sight of one of the frontline portals, their side allowing them to see the distant forms of Aislinn, Tom, Lucian and the Goat's retinue. Noting this, he couldn't keep a vaguely syrupy and perhaps evil smirk off his face. 

"I think we have a few opportunities we could capitalize on, ladies," he noted. "Meris, if you could put together a bit of a Veil over us, it might behoove us to look suitably demonic in the immediate. I suggest we keep to stealth, but not looking like ourselves should give us an advantage whilst inside the keep."

He then glanced down at himself, realizing he perhaps didn't need an Archmage's help for Veils whilst in his native land. His form blurred, and he soon reappeared as a burlier and armor-clad version of himself. Judging by how ostentatious his armor looked, his Ego hadn't been too banged up or had sufficiently recovered - and Aidan's efforts with the tower's frontline forces would be a bit easier.

Wormsworth glanced back at Aspasia. "Knowing in who's turf we are, I suggest we gain entry by giving Pride exactly what it would want, in the current circumstances - the head of Meris of the Orcades. If I rattle off enough titles to go with a false Name, it should give us enough leeway to tour the facility and negotiate the release of a few prisoners."

He then sighed, almost wistfully. "As for the others - institutional sabotage does have its merits."

* * *

As predicted, the remaining possessed being suppressed allow Heaven's forces and its allies to march inside. Soon enough, the remainder of the resistance within fell and Gabriel gave Nami and Raguel a thumbs-up through the skylight. Coasting back down, Raguel landed in front of the three other men the Nephilim had journeyed with.

"Alright, fellas - you're free to go," he said, then lightly stopping Allocer with a hand on his forearm. "You do know what's coming, right?" he asked.

Allocer shifted a few gun straps around and sighed, nodding. "Prosecution, imprisonment. If Heaven has any say in it, I'll be consigned to a local artifact and left to rot in a museum or Francis' own vault. If the United States of America manage to reform into something close to their former self, I can expect a trial and a few mortal lifetimes of imprisonment in Chimera Row, in accordance with the US chapter of the Vienna Council. One is theoretically infinite, the other will ruin me but leave me with a sliver of a chance at adapting."

He sighed. "Either way, I'll never work to represent others again. I've lost that right."

Raguel pursed his lips together. "Nah, man - all this here? This here's your second chance. Caliban Smith lied, cheated and stole stuff when he first came to Earth, before '75. He did all to hide and survive. Everything he did afterwards paid for his sins a thousandfold. You fucked up when you first settled here, that much is true, but now you've got the chance to prove that hypothetical jury that Knight Commander Allocer can still be trusted, when he says he wants to make amends."

Raguel shifted his clasp to a light fist bump on Allocer's forearm. "Go kick Moloch's ass. Pull Doherty out of the Eisenhower years, he's probably half-crazy with all the social conservatism. Plus, the We're-Not-Leaving-Heaven camp is going bonkers with how God and the Architect are messing with Spacetime; it's making Angel Time way harder to keep track of than usual."

* * *

"If Lucifer's back and Doherty's actually saved," noted Melmoth, "you'll have your polarizing force. For the mortals and for us halfway-decent Fiends."

[TennyoCeres84]

"I have a hammer in the drawer by the kitchen sink," Sophia noted before hurrying to retrieve it. She brought the tool in a large bowl that was likely used to make salads.

The tree spirit looked to Claudia. "We have what we need. I will help you call Hesediel," she said.

"Hesediel, Builder and Scaffold, we call you here to steel our tempers and to calm our minds. Aid us in our plight!"

Outside, the collection of Aislinns divided their offensive in the charge. Aislinn Prime sent the subtle image of a knife cutting through the foes, followed by burning them. About half of them used their telekinetic abilities to cut and slice through the Pride Knights still loyal to the Goat. The second group blasted the demons with blessed Hellfire, send an immense torrent of flame toward them.


***

Matriel nodded to the looming Hellhog and looked back to the group. "I suggest you open that portal sooner rather than later because this area will be inundated by flash flooding. The terrain will become treacherous for you,"he explained, setting his eyes on the horizon.

Pregnant, gray clouds started to rapidly cluster together against the crimson sky, rumbling thunder accompanying them and shaking the ground. The precipitation began as a brief drizzle before shifting to an all-out downpour, drops pounding into the dusty surface like nails. Dangerous lightning lit up the darkened sky, turning an angry purple highlighted by electric white scars.

Crystal looked back at Nergal and Belial and exclaimed, "You heard them! We need to get out of here ASAP!"

**"

Meris smirked with amusement. "This wouldn't be the first time I have had to take my death, but I would say that my skills are better to make things more realistic without the use of a veil," she commented.

The Archmage raised her hand and focused on the space above it. After a few minutes, a humanoid skull started to form. The details were quite precise, even down to the small curved and sharp teeth that befit a selkie. Muscle and fat quickly layered over it, followed by pale skin and black hair. Blue and purple bruises, along with a gash and cuts, had been added to the visage. The double's expression was slack. The neck had been duplicated, the stump ending in a gory mess. To add a layer of cruelty, the throat appeared to have been sawed through to make the Archmage's so called death be excruciating.

The fauness winced. "If you didn't want to be an arcane professor in the future, I think you could find a job in special effects for movies."

The roane scoffed and then focused creating veils for herself and Aspasia. She made the Chimera's armor more ostentatious, not as much as Herbert's, though. Her amber eyes turned to a glowing red, and her hair became stringy and brittle, as though she had over straightened it in a fit of vanity.

Meris's veil made her seem old and withered, yet she retained great strength. She made fangs extend past her lips. A pair of small horns protruded from her forehead, and her eyes were a lurid orange. Her hair hung in tangled mats. She now wore grandiose armor similar to Aspasia's, making it seem like they were guards for Herbert.

"I think we're ready," she said.

***

Nami smiled hopefully and reassuringly rested a hand on his shoulder. "Raguel's right. Keep doing what you've been doing and others will take notice of your efforts. You don't know what the future will hold, but I think you'll eventually find yourself a position that's fulfilling to yourself and beneficial to others."

She then chuckled. "Besides, I plan on vouching for you if any of those blissbrains start squawking over your past. They don't know everything, certainly because they never leave the nest. Their tunnel vision's so bad that they didn't realize people can turn things around or overcome their expectations. I know they probably expected me to be a monster, but I'm proving them wrong right now. You can do the same."

***

Abdiel frowned thoughtfully. "That's true. We'll just have to see what hand we're dealt."

She eyed the Broker with interest. "This is just my opinion, but I'm not sure if the word Fiend really applies to you anymore. Or any of the humane demons, really. You, the Court, the Sammaelites, and anybody else who rebelled. You're free to identify as you wish, but it seems like you need a different term to describe who you are. It's obviously not the time to delve deeply into the matter, but I believe it is worth considering later on…"

[Karl the Mad]

In the seconds before they were multiplied, Marius reasserted himself on the visual spectrum again, coming into plain view of everyone. As much fun as it might be to have a bunch of him appear from nowhere, there was just something more dramatic about his appearance ahead of Lucien's plan going into motion. From one, many, after all.

If they wouldn't fear one of him, let them fear a few dozen!

The world splintered and reformed, and he found himself at the center of a crowd of himself. He glanced around, nodding in approval at some of the choices his alternates displayed. A few of them had facial hair, very nice; some wore older suits, or tuxedos, some nine or ten of him had Southern white man's outfits on. And they seemed seconds away from demanding a mint julep of the nearest minion!

Those would be the direct strikers, he decided; let that shiny white cloth stand out like it should. The others would alternate between finishing blows, illusions, and generally making life hard for the enemy. Agreement surged through the crowd of Mariuses, and when Lucien sounded the charge they were ready.

Dozens of Aislinns, Mariuses and Toms became hundreds as illusory selves manifested, with the false Toms summoning more false imps to add more confusion. Scores of sharp-dressed old men zapped ahead, tearing through the enemy relentlessly, crippling each before him with one or two blows and leaving the injured to be finished off by the next Marius. Others targeted the enemy spell-casters for swift disablement, some even ripped the enemies' weapons from their hands and tore through the lines with them, displaying a rusty but functional knowledge of ancient Egyptian combat techniques.

The alpha Marius was among that number, and he thrilled to have a sword in hand after so long. Lucien's peace word was still in effect, and it was a bit strange to feel disconnected from the fury of battle, but he knew it was for the best, to avoid those collars.

[IamLEAM1983]

Throughout the push, the numerous alternates and doubles would find themselves assisted by Lucian's own proxy selves, as reality was bent and reshaped across a few thousand small individual occurrences. Stepping stones were created, ramps were fashioned, or already-powerful thrusts would find themselves guided by unseen rails of assisting external momentum, gravity shifting in a myriad of small pockets that allowed for more thrust to be applied, or for greater conductivity to be ensured. Floating isles of clumped-together stones and earth formed above the main battlegrounds, a few of the Squids taking on specific Knights one-on-one.

Still, one fact would soon dawn on the resisting front line members: Azazel and the Goat were nowhere to be seen. Centennial Park was largely flat and there weren't that many places nearby that would have afforded their enemy a commanding view of the battlefield. It stood to reason that the Goat had retreated to the Pit in the immediate, and intended to wait for his opponents to exhaust themselves.

Tom did the best he could in the circumstances, his selves landing the most vicious strikes and curses he could manage, excoriating the enemy and openly reveling in their downfall. The negative energies he stirred were then re-purposed into quickening charms he directed towards both himself and Aislinn, so as to repel exhaustion as much as possible. If anything, however, he'd eventually realize he owned his continued ability to push on to Otto Geier's distant drum calls and chants. The bat-faced Warlock and his assistants sang and called for ritual cruelty to be visited upon the Pitspawn, their primal beat like a giant heart waiting atop Magnus Tower. He knew he could keep going in the immediate, being a possessing spirit controlling a maintained body - but what of Aislinn? Archmage or no, she'd eventually get tired. Eventually, her body would reject his calls for more endorphins, more dopamine and more undeserved doses of serotonin. Even Marius would eventually have to resort to biting his opponents for sustenance, and the warthog didn't want to imagine what Pride's undistilled essence would do to someone like him, in as precarious a state of recovery as he happened to be.

Still, the heavens eventually pushed things in their favor. What had begun as a largely-ignored rumbling in the sky and the flashing of a few lightning bolts in-between two distant cloud layers turned into white arcs unnaturally questing for the ground, the delayed shockwave and thunderclap casting the Goat's rear guard into disarray.

For a few moments, the allies would feel as though their victory was at hand. Then, out of the corners of their eyes, they'd all spot more portals opening, now effectively cutting them off from the Tree - using their own advance against them.

"No!" screamed Tom. "We need to shore up the rear - we're going to lose Sophia!"

The angels and allied demons didn't need to be told twice, and threw themselves at the forming portals, with several of them threading between them to try and make a stand as close to Sophia's front door as possible. Some of the Lucians pooled their power to sink a circular band of land around the Tree by several miles, effectively creating a kind of narrow moat, but Pride's conscripted thralls thought nothing of tossing themselves into the artificial void, the Goat having the advantage of his infinite troops to slowly and inexorably plug this created gap. In a few moments, they'd be able to cross over to Sophia over the dead bodies of their fallen comrades. More lightning bolts quested for the ring, eventually igniting it in a stinking pyre of burning Infernal flesh, cutting the invaders off for a while longer.

"Hesediel," breathed a soot-covered and exhausted Celestial footman, stopping to adjust his grip on his own sword. "Hesediel has been summoned!"

In the first few ranks of the reformed front guard, the angels expected blazing wings to descend from above, hands clutched on the side of a meteorite of pure iron, or maybe the Iron Throne's myriad eyes spearing their opponents from the folds of almost impossibly thick wings. Instead, the requested help came from the rear - and effectively knocked on Sophia's rear door. Opting to be useful, Arthur opted to answer it, only to be met by the unusual sight of an armor-clad Void Weaver.

William Cuthbert wasn't wearing his usual suit, and instead wore a black turtleneck obviously designed as a top layer for a series of Kevlar and ceramic inserts. A modern skull cap that had been shaped to his unusual cranium's dimensions rested atop his head, and a sleek cape clasp secured some sort of hybrid between a cape and a sleeveless tunic that had been shucked on top, in the Order of Saint George's red-on-white tones. His modern claymore waited at his waist, with a leg-mounted rifle holster waiting on the opposite side.

"You're not Hesediel," observed Arthur. "What is this; the big guy can't make it in time to save our behinds?!
- Ye of little faith, mister Holden," quietly groused the Squid. "Hesediel called me to stand by your side; it doesn't suggest he won't make an appearance.
- We only just summoned him, how can you have had enough time to get moving?"

Cuthbert marched across the apartment, briefly nodding to Sophia, before opening the front door. "I was summoned here days ago, mister Holden. I'd been assisting resisting ciphers of the IRS and Homeland Security in Washington, helping them gather proof against their corrupted superiors and protecting the investigators in their travels. I was beginning my evening prayers, last Thursday, when I felt the call. Hesediel needs me to be here, now."

The thespian couldn't repress a scoff. "Well, glory hallelujah."

Cuthbert either didn't catch the attempt at sarcasm, or chose not to dignify it as such. "Indeed," was his flat response, before his faith flared like a beacon in the crowd. He stepped out on the front yard, claymore drawn.

"Beauséant!" he called, using an old Templar battle cry. "Rally, my lords!"

The angels responded with wordless shouts or modern ooh-rahs, closing around the Void Weaver like a detachment of soldiers protecting their commander. As if this had been rehearsed, Cuthbert immediately led his group in lock-step, shouting a prayer that was echoed by each angel.

"Thou, O Lord, art just and powerful
O, defend our cause against the face of the enemy.
O God, thou art a strong tower of defence to all who fly unto thee; 
O save us from the violence of the enemy.
O Lord of hosts, fight for us; that we may glorify thee!"

The angels repeated each verse, further amplifying the Squid's mantle of faith and forcing the advancing hordes to delay their attack. By the end of the fourth cycle, Cuthbert's group had raised its weapons and now bellowed or snarled the prayer's words with every ounce of martial conviction they had, ending it on a wordless cry of challenge. They beat against the enemy with enough force and regularity to evoke a wave made out of wings, light and glinting steel, Cuthbert's weapon flashing as it sliced through air, tendon and sinew, tentacles flaring out of wild and righteous anger. For every strike he landed, he alternated between bellowing "Deo gratias!" or "Laus tibe Christi!" - his conviction so strong that even side-glances at the enemy caused a few of them to flinch or otherwise falter. The Goat's Order-provided allies had planned for the tower's Void Weaver contingent, but William was a loose rock stuck between the cogs of their otherwise well-oiled machine - one of the only few renegade Weavers who hadn't abandoned the others for the sake of furthering the study of their lost legacy.

His calling, as the others knew, had been different - and the enemy seemed to have trouble accounting for it. How long this would last, however, was anyone's guess.

* * *

"Align your portal with the highways along Walpurgis' periphery," suggested Belial, "it'll allow us to drive through safely.
- This would put us in range of Walpurgis' own front lines," noted Nergal, "President Jones' attack strategy took long enough to formulate, we can't risk disrupting it!
- Ask Crystal," replied the porcine demon, "but some disruptions are actually worthwhile. All that water would be a terrible thing to waste, especially if it could help the Einherjaren and the Valkyries repel the invaders and close the local portals. The sooner Walpurgis has some breathing room, the sooner we can assist Hope."

Ereshkigal pursed her lips together. "You're suggesting we don't so much open a portal as we do a large-scale gate.
- Lyman's going to need some help getting through, won't he?" noted the Smith, hooking a thumb at the shifting form of the Hell-Hog, who now ponderously turned to face both Matriel's eventual tsunami and the onslaught of insects. Noting this, Erin's tight lips turned into a slight grimace. "That's going to take a lot of juice, but it's a fair point."

Lyman's low-pitched and slightly echoing voice rang out, as he glanced behind himself. "If you're looking for power, you're in the right place, Mrs. Galbraith. As soon as Beelzebub makes contact, I'll have plenty to share.
- How do we do that?!" she called, raising her voice. Lyman smirked, as if amused by the fact she found it necessary to shout at him.

"What do you want, right now?" he asked. "What is your deepest desire?
- I'd like for us to get out of here in one piece, thank you!" she shouted back.

"So do I," breezily replied the Hog. "Gluttony itself is throwing all it has at me, unaware that I've been feeding on it. All my power, Ereshkigal, is yours."

Erin looked a bit puzzled, but Beelzebub's descending form - and the screeches that followed it, were obvious enough: a scion of Gluttony was sharing its power - something which was anathema to the Order of the Fly's founding father.

"SPINELESS SIMP!" screamed the bloated fly in the myriad voices of its horde. "WRATH'S SHE-WOLF HASN'T EARNED YOUR MANTLE!
- Then throw more sky raisins at me," casually retorted the pink behemoth, "I'll just keep swallowing them."

What followed might've been comical if the group hadn't been about to be swarmed by the Pit's most craven mass of gaping maws, but Lyman's massive left hand reached back and blindly flicked its index and thumb at Nergal's van, as if the vehicle had been a pawn in a game of tiddlywinks, and repeated the process with Belial's Hummer. Both vehicles coasted backwards at a pace that could be matched with a bit of an energetic jog, and that would hopefully allow the group to quickly reach the two vehicles' top speeds, once they'd have gotten in.

A clearer non-verbal invitation to get going couldn't possibly have been formulated.

* * *

Smirking at Meris' prop work, Herbert carefully climbed past the ridge, grunting slightly as he did. "The zealous cretins are going to love you for this," he noted, then leading the trio towards the rear of one of the marching colonnades. The trick was to quickly blend in and then act like they'd always been part of the procession - something which amused the lawyer quite a bit. He'd never had an excuse to don armor or a cape and to affect his Vice's love for military struts, and stamping the plane's bare stones with exxagerated steps worthy of the Galactic Empire was a hoot, as far as he was concerned. It also served as a decent crutch for his Ego, seeing as even Meris and Aspasia might feel tempted to thrust out their upper torsos and square their shoulders. It was obvious that as far as this particular detachment was concerned, the invasion was a done deal.

A few seconds in, they'd notice a few of their newfound colleagues casting envious glances at Meris' grisly offering from the corner of their eyes. Herbert, in the meantime, paraded towards the closest front guard with his chin held high, even their size difference being unable to dispel the impression that the false Knight was successfully looking down on someone who was two heads taller than him.

"Marquis Gusion," he said, "Primarch of Vainglory, favored orator of the Order of the Fly, accompanied by the commanding Knights Gressil and Morguse. I've come to deliver an omen of our victory."

The Knight glanced at the two female demons and took note of the trophy-carrying one. "A selkie's head. Our runts killed dozens along their American Eastern coast. How is this one worthy of note?"

Herbert didn't have to pretend particularly hard to act as though the question vexed him. His dainty pout transitioned into an equally delicate snarl of sublime contempt. "Take a step closer, Sir Knight. Feel this head's mantle of power, such as it remains. I might refrain my ladies-in-waiting from tearing your impertinent head off of your shoulders."

One glance at Aspasia's affected form seemed to dissuade the Knight. "The head of Meris of the Orcades came to us at great cost," said Herbert, intentionally raising his voice for others to hear. "An honorable man might have called her a worthy opponent; I call her a former thorn in our side. Thirty ground squads for a single woman - all of them lost. All but my guard and I."

By now, he'd managed to pique the collumn's interest to freeze it in its tracks, which made the other Pitspawn behind them grumble in rising irritation. One of the interested parties snorted. "You threw meat at your quarry and closed the distance when she became exhausted. How is this worthy of consideration?"

Herbert slowly walked towards the heckler, hand on his illusory sword's pommel. "Morguse swallowed the Archmage's soul," he said, his voice kept soft and dulcet, his affected relish and malevolence enough to make the smaller Knight nervously swallow. "Her power is hers, now."

Glancing back as though this were somehow routine, he sent Meris a bored glance.

"Morguse - do with him as you see fit. The next one who interrupts us won't live long enough to suffer."

The first Knight caught the hint and stood at attention. "Your orders, sir?
- I want this outpost placed in full review - the Goat expects much of front-line detention centers such as this one. We'll each require new slaves, as well. Open your pens and send your wretches to the bailey in single-file.
- Milord, we've received no instructions concerning prisoner release-"

Herbert intentionally made his Ego flare visibly, channelling some of it into his own throat, as well. His voice dopplered slightly in response, going down by almost two full pitches. "Question me again, Sir Knight, and Gressil shall skin and tan your hide for boots. If I see it fitting to transfer prisoners elsewhere and through whatever path of my choosing, then I shall not be questioned."

The Knight nodded nervously. "Anything else, my liege?"

Sensing an opportunity, Herbert glanced at the hazy silhouette of the main barracks for Pride's forces - and what he knew to be Riona's prison.

"Have the bànfaith transferred here; use the Goat's own seals. He'll want to use her to demoralize the enemy."

The Knight nodded. "I've been asked to ask for prisoner release forms, in the advent of the Asset's relocation."

Herbert nodded as if this had been an entirely reasonable request, but he'd just seeded a decent reponse that would work in the absence of said forms...

He glanced back at Aspasia. "It seems I was questioned again, Gressil; wouldn't you say?"

Wormsworth started past the guard as though the keep were his. "Kill him, Gressil," he said, keeping his tone as casual as possible.

* * *

Allocer's smile didn't look too convinced. "Thanks," he nonetheless said. "That's... very kind of you to say."

Sighing out of mild exasperation, Lucifer turned back towards Magnus' car. "Welp," he said, "the Silver Age won't come to us on its own, we should-"

He didn't have time to finish.

God's last alteration of Spacetime had involved the weakened Amazo fading out of existence before being replaced by his own, currently-empowered variant. This time, it felt as though the Creator had turned both dials at once, as all of them remained physical even as City Hall and the surrounding streets and angelic forces stretched and trailed out like a frozen screenshot manipulated with a datamoshing effect. The physical world's audio canopy didn't usually skip and fade - and yet here, it did. Premature summertime weather gave way to what looked like a late afternoon in June 1959, the streets reasserting themselves as they'd been at that time, and in the vicinity of what had once been Hope's fully-functional Wells-Fargo bank outlet. They were decades before Marius Vlastos would purchase it to further his ambitions - and apparently?

Apparently, they were right outside of a bank that was being robbed. Having barely taken in their surroundings' dated references, Lucifer nearly jumped out of his skin - as did the surrounding bystanders - as the bank's ceiling was outwardly forced open with a loud groan of tortured steel. Large farings and solder points loudly snapped as one of the three vintage, and now seemingly brand-new vaults was lifted through the hole using a tremendous application of arcane force. The front doors flew open and out came a smattering of human and anthro goons carrying old flour bags likely filled with their ill-gotten gains.

"We ain't got time to showboat, boss," screamed one of the men, "we barely lost Hammerhead! Mister X has our scent for sure!"

Out walked a tuxedo-wearing anthro bull in his late fifties, his massive and chest-heavy frame looking poorly suited for the almost prancing steps he took as he stepped out. He wore a domino mask, and some degree of latent power suggested he was using some sort of vocal obfuscation cantrip, his unnaturally low voice having a kind of game-show-host-worthy lilt.

"Thank you, thank you, kind citizens! I apologize for leaving you on such an abrupt note, but the little blue men are as persistent as ever, and my bills don't pay themselves! I hope you've enjoyed the show, and you can look forward to catching more of myself, Mister Moloch, during your next Brinks delivery!"

Perhaps catching Nami off-guard, a sudden plume of smoke and a pop of air both erupted behind her - and an elongated and almost caprine tail playfully encircled one of her ankles. A man of short stature and perhaps vaguely familiar features was reclining behind her, floating a foot or two off the ground and clad in an extravagant late eighteen-hundreds' double-breasted three-piece. She'd certainly recognize him, although it looked like Nybbas had lost at least a hundred and fifty pounds, gained a Mephistopheles-worthy goatee and maybe picked up a few more useful tricks than his function as Meris' protocol officer would've required.

"Well, I'll be," he said, floating a bit like the Cheshire Cat as he spun around and floated on his chest, grinning as he did, "a few days on your count, I'd wager, and sixty years on ours! Can I assume we're still screwed in your present?
- Things are as dire as you left them, I believe," replied Haraldson.

Nybbas clicked his tongue and widened his eyes. "Mags, old bean; you wouldn't be a Draugr if you weren't such a downer, eh?" he said, adding a chuckle. He spun around Nami, added a useless zero-G flip and then landed on his feet with an almost reluctant moue. "Well, if you lot made it here by the Pair's good graces, then it means Hammerhead's vintage days are done. Time to go home."

Mister X, as Nybbas had likely crowned himself, sighed wistfully. "I'm going to miss the fifties, I tell ya: all that moral hypocrisy, the bell skirts and the constant outpour of cigarettes and pipes... All the bored housewives, too," he said, adding in a lecherous leer.

* * *

Melmoth eyed Pericles, smirked, and shrugged. "I'm a demon, love," he replied, "plain and simple. One of them old-fashioned Spirits of Knowledge, even if I'd wager you'd be the first to tell me I've got a lot left to learn. There's nothing wrong with the old Greek roots and there never was. We'll just have to reclaim it from the assholes that stole it from us."