Ghosts of the Past

Completed one-shot storylines are archived here after their completion.
User avatar
IamLEAM1983
Site Admin
 

Posts: 3707
Joined: Tue Jan 08, 2013 4:54 am
Location: Quebec, Canada

Ghosts of the Past

Post by IamLEAM1983 »

September 28, 2026

Silas had never been one to consider himself a wizard, despite his obvious abilities. Ask Aspasia and you would've heard about a displaced man of the range, someone who had an uncanny knack for making the most out of unenviable situations. He'd picked up the skills, had discovered his own leanings, had charted rune and ward systems and found out how to equally heal and harm others – all on his own. A big trunk had been stowed away in their shared residence, containing old personal effects from his living days, as well as his long, long years of self-discovery. All of it had been committed to paper, in a display of thoroughness even most classically trained practitioners tended to neglect. Robertson had left nothing to chance. He'd studied the ins and outs of being a lich, of being suddenly entrusted with immense reserves of power and of managing to wrangle them – to use them responsibly. He'd isolated himself for a few hours each day, ensuring that nobody would suffer from the fallout of his first blundering attempts or his later experiments. If Meris or Merlin or anyone else were to find these papers without being properly told of his story, they couldn't have been faulted for thinking that Silas Robertson had always been some sort of via-focusing horse-wrangler and coach guard.

They also couldn't have known how much everything else had followed along with his decaying – and later disappearing – flesh. Learning how to work with the World's Breath required reading. It required research, and the Missouri native had only ever learned to read out of his mother's Bible. He'd started out with an antiquated and limited lexicon, only for magic and time to expand his horizons. Now, Silas skirted the fields of research that bordered on classical quantum physics, dipping a toe in the sort of books that archmages considered as primers to exceedingly complex notions: complex alchemy, spacetime manipulation, permanent Veils or the secrets needed to confer deathlessness to fellow mortals... Compared to Meris, Silas was still only just a student.

Compared to Zebediah Buck, he might as well have been Paracelsus or Cornelius Agrippa. It didn't change the fact that he didn't exactly feel like an ideal teacher.

The cold had started to inch out of the sea and had managed to spread along the now frozen grass behind the Buck mansion. Like all liches, he and Zeb didn't seem inconvenienced by it, even if Silas did welcome the presence of his old suede duster.

“Alright, Buck. What you want to do is melt the frost off the grass – not burn the grass. What you need is a fire spell, but you need to shelve those notions I showed you about making fireballs. They're too much for us right now. Focus on your basic fireball spell. Bring your mnemonic pattern up to bear – but only focus on heat as a notion.”

Skilled practitioners didn't need a tactile connection to the flow of via, and neither did they need stereotypical chants or calls. Silas always thought of his old campfires by cold and dark Texas or Louisiana nights. If he wanted to cast a fireball, he only had to remember gingerly reaching into the low flames to pick out a piece of meat before it charred. If he only needed heat, he recalled the penetrating sensation of the campfire's warmth. Blazing buildings reminded him of the destructive nature of fire, and he turned to their thought if he needed to harm someone. For now, however, he thought of the stove he and Aspasia had, back home, and of the tea she sometimes set to steep on a gently heating element.

Zebediah, however, was nowhere near being able to focus on something so familiar. He'd shucked his slippers off and had buried his phalanges and metatarsuses in the cold soil with a slight moue of disgust.

Coach's result was as stable as could be expected. The air shimmered in front of his outstretched right hand, a slowly expanding lance of heated air creeping over the grass. If you listened intently, you could hear the frost layers crackle, the blades of grass gently snapping as their prison of ice was opened. A sparrow jumped from a nearby tree and passed through the shimmering pale of air with no apparent effect. The heat was enough to melt that fine layer of ice but only registered as warmth to anything else that passed through it.

Eye sockets narrowed in a picture of intense concentration, Buck brought all of his timidly recovered willpower, his months of slowly and patiently climbing the hill of his self-esteem. He reached inward and outward, coaxing himself to work past his reflex of denying via an easy access to his provided vessel, his continued certitude that he'd find a way to bungle something this simple, that he was doomed to be a lich who couldn't even wield the energies that had brought him forth...

Looking at him, you'd have sworn the local eccentric undead had some serious clout. His dressing gown billowed away as power surged into him like an unseen and otherwise unfelt gust of wind, the outline of his wispy crown of hair shimmering in the receding daylight. He had the kind of posture you'd have associated to modern-day Gandalfs – and Coach knew it didn't bode well. He tried to raise his voice in objection, but knew better than to disturb someone who was still on the level of power-focusing schoolyard rhymes:

“Solar forces, hear my plea,
Make your light shine forth through me!
Winter's fires, come to me,
Make this frost cease to be!”


Tension rose in the air, the dandy's eyelights shimmering for a moment -

Sparks crackled in front of Zeb's hand, the air's humidity being superheated to the point of a faint wail of escaping steam rising, and a single flame lashed forth, recoiling into nothingness as soon as it had appeared, only leaving behind a limp-sounding fwoosh.

However, that wasn't what Silas was afraid of. Zeb had leeched too much energy and had never really learned to control his intake of via. Cracks of blue light began to spread along the dandy's skull, but he hadn't yet realized what was happening. Dejection lined his cheekbones, and he seemed about to land some sort of whinging and self-deprecating comment, but Silas didn't let him. A hard shove sent him on all fours, the excess potential surging down through his arms and legs, safely grounded in the earth.

Silas had tried discipline in the past few weeks, but it hadn't worked out too well. Empathy seemed to be the best course of action. Sighing, Robertson let his spurs clink as he left the porch to help his murderer-turned-pupil to his feet.

“What was your focus, Zeb?
- I – I thought about the fireplace in the living room, but she just – popped forth – and I couldn't stop it. I just felt I had to-”

Silas pursed his ghostly lips. “Zeb, you're only just starting out. Drawing on something as powerful as your wife's memory isn't advisable, in this case. You aren't going to save Evvie with fireballs and heat lances, my friend – and you aren't ready to take a dive in the Shadowlands. That place, in the mental state you're in? Not worth it.”

Buck protested. “But I've been doing good for myself for the past year! I've stopped drinking, I'm focused on my work with Shield, I've never been so happy, on average, in the past hundred years!
- Yeah, but she's not letting you go, is she? She's all you ever think about – when little Nicky doesn't take some space.”

Zeb felt a core of indignation slip into his initial dejection. “What would you rather I do, then?! Set aside my wife and child when they've motivated everything I've done even long before I became this pathetic sack of bones?!”

Another pair of shoes produced delicate footsteps as they stepped on the porch. Russian cigarettes wafted in the air for a moment, followed by the sound of a teaspoon clinking in a cup. A slightly indulgent slurp was heard, which made the dressing gown-wearing lich look over his shoulder. Tom Magnus hadn't changed much, proving that financial independence didn't change one's life significantly. With a Renton loft and a cash deposit for his club's early architectural submissions, he only seemed a little more free to work on a freelance basis.

“Obviously,” he said, “Evangeline and Nicholas aren't bringing you much comfort. Foci need to be comfortable, to reflect your power as being something you're comfortable wielding. If family matters that much, I'd focus on your brother and his great-granddaughter.
- Eliphas?” the lich replied incredulously, “I thought my disdain for my brother's ambitions was obvious! He's free to gallivant around town intimidating low-tier Commission goons and parading our dwindling checkbook around for the local store owners to gawp at, and people act as though this were somehow worthy of praise! The Werewolf Financier of the East Coast, Forbes called him! In the meantime, I'm here trying to transcend my nature as a worthless arcane fuse, and there's pools going on around town on the odds of me losing it again!”

“It's Halloween season,” supplied Coach with a sigh, “of course there's going to be insensitive tavern betting rounds about Evangeline taking you for a ride! It's the same reason why Archibald and the kids are out trying to corral the Kilkennys; someone always tries to burst Old Jack's gourd!”

At that thought, Zeb's plaintive dispositions seemed to lessen. He instead became contemplative for an instant. At least someone had it harder than he did...

* * *

Pumpkins only came in plastic this early in the season, but Old Hope's produce market was an exception to the rule. Thanks to Jack Greene's nature, pumpkin pies or gourd-based meals and treats came early to the coastal parts of the city. Greene thought it too early to decorate his stall in the usual oranges and blacks, seeing as only kids tended to really get jazzed up this early in the season.

Well. Kids, Arthur Holden's Freaks – and the Kilkenny boys. Oh, and the local Fox and MSNBC broadcast stations, too. Especially on the weekends.

In any case, he wasn't exactly willing to barter with anyone just yet – not with a trio of prematurely soused Elves doing their usual number on his best pieces of the season... All he could do for now was cower behind his stand, clutching his cell phone and hoping he'd actually brought his shotgun along. Cowardice wasn't making him stay low, so much as the desire to keep his current head in one piece.

“Get outta here, you pathetic excuses for Tir Na Nog folk; you're scaring the normals!” was all he could add, frustration taking the place you'd normally have associated to fear in his voice. “You're all lucky I didn't bring my shotgun, or else it'd be rock salt for the three of you!”

Unfortunately, Elves didn't have much in common with Tolkien's regal beings. A few managed to pack some restraint and snobbery, but these were usually of German descent. American Svartalves tended to look like African Americans with deep-seated Teutonic ancestry, packing an attitude that was too restrained and self-serious to fit with the usual Tyler Perry demographics. The Scottish ones tended to be tempered down by their own tendency towards grumpiness – but the Irish?

Tir Na Nog was one of the most distinct locales in Faerie, the Summer Isles providing for so much of these pint-sized creatures' needs that hardships had never entered their culture. The Irish Elves were lifelong party-goers and generally carefree creatures that only matured under the most grievous of circumstances. It took trans-planar repercussions of the Potato Famine for a few generations of Irish Elves to have some vague sense of personal responsibilities, something that interbreeding with the Svartalves occasionally solidified into a racially alien but socially responsible mindset. Feargus O'Sullivan was one such example, with family across all three racial subsets. The end result was a humanoid figure that was about one head shorter than a Ken doll, and that was still able to command precincts of mixed human and anthro officers with aplomb.

Jacob, Harry and Reese Kilkenny were in their three hundreds on average, but you'd be hard-pressed to believe any of that time had meant anything. Jacob was built like an ox despite his small size and still dressed like and acted like a classic Irish hooligan – flat cap and suspenders included. Harry was half a head shorter than his brother, but had somehow taken ahold of the eighties' Punk aesthetic. To Jacob's classic late-1800s-thug fashion sense, he opposed the leathers and bold colors of someone for whom the Sex Pistols and Sid Vicious had never fallen out of style. Reese, on the other hand, looked like a modern-day Oxford sycophant, polos and tweed jackets and popped collars included. Three thematic variations on the idea of the Moron, various precursors of the idea of the Douchebag. Reese carried the most obvious academic credit, and it only served to make him the leader of the trio.

Perched on the edge of the stall, his tiny fists on his hips, Reese looked down on Jack's round and orange head with a smirk.

“Come on, Greene! It's not like we're asking for much, isn't it? We'd like to buy those gourds of yours!” he said, a chuckle on his lips. “Failing that, though, we're just gonna take what we're owed on our own, and leave. Why isn't that reasonable?
- You failed Economics on Daddy's money, Reese!” spat back the dryad. “You spent three years sleeping with doxies and boozing it up on the oldest campus in Great Britain, so you tell me!”

Reese laughed. “Economics have nothing to do with this, you overgrown turnip – you know what we do on Samhain.”

The cap on Jack's head rattled with barely-contained anger. “Sham payphone Wiccans have more credibility than you, you numbskull!
- How else will my brothers get any practice for the big day?”

Archie's gloved hand slipped around Reese's midsection at this precise moment, grasping him the way King Kong had Faye Wray.

Really, Rhys, I'd have expected you to have understood the value of pumpkins as delicacies, by now. A proud Celt such as yourself wouldn't squander Nature's gifts, after all...”

The younger Kilkenny yelped. “Ack – Come on, Holden! It's not like it matters to Greene, his head'll just grow back!
- I could survive my armature being crushed, dear boy, and you certainly won't see me slipping in the city's junkyards to sample their hydraulic presses...”

Reese squirmed. “Boys-!”

Archie was typically used to feeling the person who managed to lock him into a throw. He was used to martial arts as displayed by people of similar heights and proportions – and had never gotten used to the idea that Jacob could grab hold of a sock's fold and pull the rest of him to the ground... This is exactly what happened, instinct forcing him to let go of Reese so he'd be able to receive himself on the ground with both hands. His chin slamming against the asphalt enough to make his porcelain teeth wiggle, he groaned as Harry kicked his top hat off.

“Gentlemen, if you please...?”

Three had spent a few weeks getting used to the Hall's newly acquired Space Compression suits – or as Preston and Travis referred to them, the Not-Antman suits. He'd spent the last few minutes standing only a few inches tall and had been secreted away in one of Archie's frock coat pockets. Climbing out with the fabric providing no easy handholds proved to be no easy task. Knowing he could close the gap between himself and Jacob fairly quickly thanks to the suit, he tried for a controlled leap. Archie's back briefly looked like a distant shore, the Clank's usually fluid gestures looking slow and sluggish to him, now that he saw the world from an Elf's perspective.

“Jenkins-” he yelled, “take care of Harry! Neasa, you're on Reese!”

The older soldier had ended up in the opposite frock coat pocket, while the superpowered selkie had been hidden away in the Clank's little fob watch pocket. Three could only hope she'd had been able to use her strength to avoid ending crushed between the ground and the Clank's proportionately larger and – for now, at least – heavier mass.
User avatar
TennyoCeres84
Site Admin
 

Posts: 2929
Joined: Tue Jan 08, 2013 4:59 am

Re: Ghosts of the Past

Post by TennyoCeres84 »

The selkie had prevented herself from being injured by curling into a ball, protecting her head and insides. Having heard the call, Neasa pushed with her feet against the round pane of glass on the fob of the pocketwatch. It clicked open and allowed her to slip out. The depth of Archie's waistcoat pocket was easy enough to escape. The automaton would feel her push his torso up and back down as she wriggled out. It obviously wouldn't have left an imprint on his body, but she hurried in the direction Reese Kilkenny would have landed.

Elf of not, she had seen enough of his type at Hope University that she knew what he was like. All money, immaturity, and no sense of morality to boot. Neasa was now about the size of a doll, wearing the same space compression suit as Drake and Jenkins.

While she wasn't fond of her other side, the leopard selkie fierceness inherited from her ancestor Uthar, she had come to accept it as a useful strength. Reese would not have seen a dark-haired, Elf-sized selkie coming his way. Going for a stealthy approach, she also jumped a measured distance to catch up with the preppy little snot. By the time she would land, she would come within striking distance of Reese's head and deal a blow that felt like a sledgehammer.
User avatar
Karl the Mad
 

Posts: 1260
Joined: Wed Jan 16, 2013 4:27 am
Location: Oregon

Re: Ghosts of the Past

Post by Karl the Mad »

"Oh sure, gimme Tommy Throwback," Charles muttered, clambering out of his assigned pocket with the help of a mental boost. He still had his powers while miniaturized, which was cool, although being a fiftieth of one's usual size did take a fair deal getting used to.

But! Charles Jenkins III was nothing if not adaptable!

Applying telekinesis again, he launched through the air in a split second, choosing a simple bull rush over anything more complex. "Hipster!" he yelled as he collided with Harry, using his fists to pummel the punk even before the momentum of his wild charge had given out.
User avatar
IamLEAM1983
Site Admin
 

Posts: 3707
Joined: Tue Jan 08, 2013 4:54 am
Location: Quebec, Canada

Re: Ghosts of the Past

Post by IamLEAM1983 »

Unfortunately for Neasa, enhanced blows were part and parcel of many an Elf's growing pains. Made and born superhuman and raised in a community of pint-sized superhumans, most of them could take a punch of the roane's magnitude with the sort of aplomb you'd have expected of a more classical supervillain. Reese took the punch, bone against bone resulting in the sort of cracking sound you'd have assumed to mean either one of them would've fractured something - but it wasn't the case. Aislinn's sister had found her physical match; and she'd feel its full measure as the youngest of the Kilkennys simply laughed and went for a bull rush, tackling her off of what felt like a solid two stories high. The truth was that she'd only reached the ground from the height of Jack's stall - only four or five inches high, at most - but with her current size, the ground slammed into her for her to quite possibly be very thankful for her abilities. She'd end up with bruises where others would've received broken ribs for their trouble.

"See, that's what I like about you super-cops," said Reese in-between pants, as he rolled off of her, "you know when to actually back up your words!"

Harry, in the meantime, rolled in the direction Charles' punch had indicated, his initial yelp gaining a bit of a defiant edge. He skidded to his feet and spun around in the same gesture, giving the older soldier a shit-eating grin. "Says the guy who wasn't even a sperm in his wee daddy's ballsack by the time I gave Thatcher's boys the run-around! Betcha I can loosen that fake jaw of yours real good, mate!'"

Jacob obviously wasn't feeling more agreeable, intercepting Drake on his way down and carrying the received momentum into an enhanced lunge that sent Aidan skidding along the ground, wincing all the while. "Big shot," he sneered, "tryin'a mess with our customs!"

Three tasted blood inside his suit's helmet, but not enough to be worried. The impact had probably caused him to bite his cheek. He'd rinse and spit the worst of it off as soon as these clowns were in irons - which in their case, wasn't entirely a euphemism. The zip-ties they all carried contained tiny iron tines designed to chafe against the skin at the first signs of resistance. A taste of the Bane was likely to put the Elves in a more receptive mood...

"You're destroying goods that are for sale, you jackass," he spat back, standing up with a wince. "You're disturbing the peace and frightening the market's customers away! We have the right to take you in!
- Wouldn't be the first Samhain the coppers gave us the sirens, soldier boy!"

In defiance, Jacob shot out like a bullet not towards Three - but back towards the stall. His tiny - if enhanced - fist (and entire body) slamming into a plump zucchini Jack had set up on display on a decorative and miniaturized bale of hay. Drake followed along with a frustrated grunt, still rather uneased by how weightless he felt. The compression suits meant they all temporarily packed super strength along the lines of Neasa's; only laid out on the scale of their now relatively tiny fists. It was a hard thing to wrap your head around. Pushing off the ground felt too easy, almost as if someone had played havoc with the planet's gravity.

None of this allowed Aidan to do much of anything for the zucchini, however. He could only follow behind Jacob, narrowly missing Jack's side as they shot past the stall. Jacob received himself on a low wrought-iron fence, stopping his forward motion and flipping himself onto his feet like an Olympic gymnast. Three could only wince and blindly attempt to do the same. Five or six muscles screamed in displeasure at his attempt, but he did manage to keep enough momentum to end up flip-kicking Jacob to the ground.

"Fuck me, being an Elf is tough!" Aidan commented, briefly forgetting their official duties.
User avatar
Karl the Mad
 

Posts: 1260
Joined: Wed Jan 16, 2013 4:27 am
Location: Oregon

Re: Ghosts of the Past

Post by Karl the Mad »

"Yer ain't th' first what's tried, boyo!" Charles yelled back, wishing they had a parkour enthusiast on their team, or a former exosuit wearer; either one of which would be more able to adapt to this mini-me crap and the acrobatics that had to go with it. They still couldn't convince the Jameson woman to sign on, after all, or she'd probably be here, dancing around and showing off and lecturing them all on how awesome she was.

Well, that or she'd get her ass kicked like the rest of them!

Using his mental abilities again, Jenkins wrapped Harry's neck and throat in invisible steel bands and yanked him around wholesale, slamming him into the ground for good measure. "Now surrender, boyo, or else..." he warned, a manic tinge edging into the last couple words.
User avatar
TennyoCeres84
Site Admin
 

Posts: 2929
Joined: Tue Jan 08, 2013 4:59 am

Re: Ghosts of the Past

Post by TennyoCeres84 »

"More like them being every Irish stereotype in a three-for-one bundle!" Neasa responded to Three's comment. "These aren't traditions; it's harassment!" she spat, feeling her vision start to see red. With a snarl, her foot kicked Reese in the stomach, but it would also send him flying toward some rocks underneath a random tree.

While Jack would have remained behind his stall, he would see his female counterpart ambling down the sidewalk. Sophia was almost in the middle of Reese's trajectory, which she quickly dodged by leaning back to avoid being hit. Given that this was a time when her power was generally weaker, she still looked stately albeit slightly tired. Recognizing the scene for what it was, she frowned sharply and said to him, "Business as usual, hm?"

***

A light scoff came up behind the two liches and the Infernalist. "It'd be nice to just be able to sit around a warm bonfire and play divination games," Meris chuckled. "So much for simple pasttimes."
User avatar
IamLEAM1983
Site Admin
 

Posts: 3707
Joined: Tue Jan 08, 2013 4:54 am
Location: Quebec, Canada

Re: Ghosts of the Past

Post by IamLEAM1983 »

Doing his best to shake the trauma off, Jack tried for a sarcastic approach as Sophia stepped forward. "Oh, you know how it goes," he said, unable to stop wincing as the three shrunken superheroes worked their trade, "never a dull moment!"

In the meantime, Three was in no posture for banter. Harry obviously hadn't expected telekinetics, but Three had a sense of what could happen. "Go easy on the stuff, Jenkins - we need to bring a perp back, not a vegetable or a Squid convert-!"

He couldn't finish, Jacob pushing him off of the fence and onto the grass on the other side. As he hit the ground again, Drake had to admit that the Black Speech had its uses... Where Charles was skilled at delivering intense blasts, Aidan felt his vision blur and spots creep in as somewhere in the back of his mind, the Words for muscular atrophy came forth - seemingly whispered by that damnable voice, the Doctor X he'd given up on chasing. Following his current policy, Drake had no frustration to expend and instead embraced the verbal tools as they came forth. The sooner he and Charles were free, the sooner they'd be able to assist Neasa, if need be.

Pulling Jacob's round and meaty face closer, he whispered words that spoke of tightening limbs and stiffening tendons - Old Age creeping in, death slipping in-between each sinew on a microscopic level. He'd never been able to manage raw levels of output, but tweaking something of an unconscious - or subconscious - nature was the most he could hope for. In response, the blows that rained on him stopped as Jacob's eyes widened, looking at one of his meaty hands in horror as the fingers curled in despite his best efforts to control them. His knees buckled and his thighs and calves suddenly feeling weak, he barely managed to roll off of the younger soldier. Grunting in exasperation, Aidan followed along and used his new advantage to tie up the eldest of the Kilkennys.

It must've been odd for Sophia to see friends looking so, well, diminutive... Drake tried for a strained "Hey, Soph!" as he wrestled Jacob on his rump.

"Agh! Just - Ah, feck me!" spat the burly Elf, the Celtic brogue slipping back in under duress. "Didja really hafta stick the Bane on me, boyo? I'll be havin' nightmares fer weeks, now!"

Three gave his bald head a hard slap. "Greene might press charges. He never does, but you never know. The day he does, Jake, Winters' gang is actually going to cheer you off. Not because they'll think you gave the cops a good run - because it'll be the end of one fucking source of humiliation!"

Still, a few moments earlier and during the more dire moments of Aidan's gardenside brawl, Reese wasn't doing much better. He'd recovered from his impact with the rocks - big stones if you'd been human-sized, really - but now gave Neasa the sort of looks brazen fighters who hadn't realized how stunned they were did. One or two more hits, and he'd be done with. "What if harassment is a tradition, then?" he opposed. "You giants and your laws, an honest Elf can't do anything without someone saying you're due for a stint in the pokey!"

Annoyed with the whole thing, Aidan chose to cut in. "Hey, United Colors of Assholes, your bruiser brother's just said uncle! The sooner you let us take you in, the sooner you'll get to run away from Little Kerry's incensed mothers!"

Knowing how virtuous Elf mothers tended to be, it could very well be that a lecture from one of them would be worse a punishment than spending a few hours in an adapted cell...

In the rear, the most humiliated of all the team members finished putting some order into his cervical cogs and pinwheels, both brushing himself off and gingerly checking his teeth for any unfortunately deceased troops...  Finding one, Archie pulled out the fake molar with a faint look of dejection and bent down to retrieve his gibus.

"Hello, er, Sophia," he called, almost as if he were embarrassed to be found in this state. "Such a lovely day, isn't it? Crisp autumn air, fresh produce, regional nincompoops in need of a sound thrashing - in which I failed to be of honest use, eh heh..."

* * *

"I'm not sure I'd try the Shadowlands at this time of year, honestly," noted Coach. "Well, not this year, at least. Something's off. Nothing's happened yet, but you can feel it, if you start peeling a few layers..."

Zeb looked justifiably clueless, while Tom could only shrug. "I'd have given it a look-see, but I'm a bit reluctant about going on a planar jaunt with this body laying around... I worked hard enough to earn first bids on it, the last thing I want is Belial sneaking in from behind me."
User avatar
TennyoCeres84
Site Admin
 

Posts: 2929
Joined: Tue Jan 08, 2013 4:59 am

Re: Ghosts of the Past

Post by TennyoCeres84 »

Letting Reese see her roll her eyes and groan in exasperation and disgust, Neasa quickly bounced across the distance that separated her from her target. "Oh, shut up! You're not an honest Elf; all you are is an immature jackass! I've seen what an Elf with a sensible mind can do; you're not like that at all!" She delivered a one-two punch to his face and picked him up, hurling him in direction of Jacob.

Sophia offered Jack, Three, and Archibald a faint, sympathetic smile before approaching each of the Elves. If she couldn't control the vegetation in the vicinity, she could still control the living vine hair on her head. She promptly used a few of the lengthened vines to each give them a sound, hard pop on the rear end. "These antics of yours aren't traditions! All you're doing is making the rest of the local Elf and Irish communities look bad!" she spat, giving them a collective stern glare that would have equaled any Little Kerry Elf mother.

"You want to talk about preserving traditions? How about hospitality?" she harshly scolded them, her eyes green slits. "This food you've damaged could feed families or be made into a hearty meal for Samhain! You spit on his hard work and hassle him like a bunch of thugs, ingrates!"

She paused for a moment. "On a further note, Jack and I are protected by the Vienna Accords just like Elves are, which the Countess, Queen Titania, and many others worked diligently on to see that it was passed. Don't be disrespectful toward that! He has the right to carry out his business without harassment."

"Most of all, remember this: the worse you treat any dryad or naiad, the less protection you have against Mab, Morgana, or the forces that lie beyond Faerie." she finished, thinking of Circe.

***

Meris nodded in agreement. "Without the proper warding spells, any of us would be vulnerable. The Shadowlands are more active than usual, to be sure. Caution must be advised," she answered.
User avatar
IamLEAM1983
Site Admin
 

Posts: 3707
Joined: Tue Jan 08, 2013 4:54 am
Location: Quebec, Canada

Re: Ghosts of the Past

Post by IamLEAM1983 »

Thanks to Neasa, Reese joined Neasa in general harmlessness, leaving only Harry and Jenkins. Thankfully, the soldier could rest easy in the knowledge that his teammates would assist him if need be. Three took care of Reese, all the while giving the punk a look.

"Look, everyone in Little Kerry wants to celebrate Samhain - we get that. You're proud Celts, the reaping season is important to you and to Neo-Pagans countrywide, and I can sort of understand why you think taking seeds from a ripe dryad would be part of some sort of ritual!
- Why'd you stop us, then?
- Because it still qualifies as assault, if it doesn't exactly equate to murder, and because assaulting Jack is useless. You want his seeds to be sown? Ask him to take them out on his own. We can do it respectfully - surgically, through the cap on top of his head. We could ask Lady Eirean to plant some of his seeds in community gardens around the city, so everyone gets to benefit from Jack's harvest.
- But where's the fun in that?!"

Three sighed. "If I said breaking into your house and beating you senseless is fun, would you agree with me?
- No, but-"

Harry Kilkenny hadn't given the issue much thought, as could be expected. They'd never benefited from one of the oft-described Little Kerry families, being three brothers who had more or less raised themselves between Dublin and Hope. With no adult Elves to weigh in on the importance of personal responsibilities and parents that had been taken by the Potato Famine, they'd grown up as eternal teenagers, never developing much foresight.

Three gave a meaningful look to Jenkins, suggesting that now might be the time to cuff a more receptive Punk Rocker Elf. Judging by the little man's face, thinking past the contradiction between his denied pleasure and the moral implications he was now being presented with took all of his meagre brain cells.

* * *

"What's causing this, then?" asled Zebediah.

Tom could only shrug. "Evangeline's yearly slow climb towards occasionally effective malevolence, or maybe last year's demonic visitors are to blame - myself notwithstanding. Or maybe this year's Samhain just happens to coincide with a solid eruption of additional via - who can say, honestly? Magic has its own quasi-physics to consider, with several things not necessarily being related to events or individuals."

He gave a pout. "Unless something more... dire happens, I'd consider this an arcane cousin to the storm clouds that are going to freshen up the air, between now and November."
User avatar
TennyoCeres84
Site Admin
 

Posts: 2929
Joined: Tue Jan 08, 2013 4:59 am

Re: Ghosts of the Past

Post by TennyoCeres84 »

Knowing her berating of them had likely gone in one ear and out the other, Sophia moved aside and let the young vigilantes do their jobs. Neasa crossed her arms and waited to see what the punk Elf would do. Hopefully, that tiny brain of his would see reason...

***

Meris conceded to this idea with a nod of her head. "Perhaps it's all of those variables, but I do have a hypothesis on Evangeline. Samoset's curse can't explain everything that's haunted your family, Zebediah. Are you willing to hear what I have to say?" she asked.
Locked