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Flight (Mythklok, Chapter 73)
Title: Flight (Mythklok, Chapter 73)
Author: tikistitch
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Some origin stories. Yes, stories. :D
Warnings: I start off with a funny “not clear who it is” POV. It gets explained, but if that's not gonna do ya, go look at the comms, I'm sure there's some nice pr0n. :D
Notes: Notes after the jump.
Mythklok started existence as a Metalocalypse AU. Now, your guess is as good as mine.
First off, many grateful thanks to Z and Tam for their ideas about Toki's story. I really couldn't have written this sequence without them. Even though Mythklok was nominally supposed to be a Metalocalypse AU, I've spent a lot of time (70 chapters more or less) vaguely waving my hands in the direction of the band and their individual stories. I figured everyone (including me) ams be disappoint somehow with anything I could come up with. But, life is disappointment. :D
Last time: Nathan and Toki won big on America's Next Fashion Victim, Skwisgaar got a new guitar, and we learned that angels like Hell Fries.
Many years ago....
Wings.
Beating the night air.
The thin air seems even more meager up here, at this elevation. This is a meager land.
It's cold. It's dark. Only at night. Only in the dark. Don't want them to see. Never let them catch the abomination.
What they'd do.
What's already been done.
The outcropping. Purchase.
The wings wrapped round now. Shivering. But not from the cold. Half naked, but not cold.
An affront to the lord god himself.
Then why does this feel so damned good?
“Dood! You shouldn't smoke so much!”
Charles pulled his overcoat tighter against the chill wind and stared at Pickles through the soft grey cloud of smoke. “You are telling me not to smoke?” he asked. Like everyone, Charles had heard tales of rampant use of psychopharmaceuticals in the old Snakes and Barrels. Judging from Pickles' current behavior, those tales had been pale, pathetic shadows of the truth.
Pickles grinned. For someone who by all rights ought to be a jaded burnout, Pickles had the world's most infectious grin. “Yoo shud try somethin' more nacheral, dood! Wud change yer outlook!”
Charles flicked the cigarette, spreading ashes into the ice cold Norwegian lake the ancient wooden ferry was now lumbering through. “What's not natural about fucking tobacco?”
“Smoksing ams stunts your growth,” chuckled Skwisgaar. He had his back against the railing, and was huddling around his guitar, seemingly to protect it from the spray.
“I asked for one of you – one of you! - to come along with me today,” Charles grumbled, testy at the poor arithmetic skills of death metal musicians.
“Ja, I ams here for transglating,” agreed Skwisgaar.
“An' I'm here in case we gahta get him drunk again!” Pickles laughed. “Prahbably won't doo it on one beer,” he added.
Charles ignored the jape and turned around to face the slowly oncoming dock. They would probably be lucky if this old hulk of a ferry didn't fall apart and sink to the bottom before it reached shore, drowning them all in the freezing lake. From what he had learned, there weren't any roads out to this godforsaken place. If you wanted to take a car, you waited for winter, and risked driving across the “ice road” - really, the frozen river. That's what he would have preferred: wait for January, and then take a nice heated limo, maybe with a little bottle of brandy and a stash of fragrant cigars in the compartment.
“We t'inks hims ams like you, Charles,” said Skwisgaar quietly.
Charles snapped out of his reverie and looked at Skwisgaar, and then at Pickles. “Like me how?”
“Ain't eggzactly human,” said Pickles, gazing out into the lake.
Charles was quiet for a moment. He had revealed his True Form to Pickles soon after they officially met, mostly as a desperate gambit to catch the musician's interest. They had not mentioned it since. Anyway, wings weren't the piece of his anatomy that seemed to fascinate Pickles most.
And Charles had admitted to Skwisgaar, when the musician questioned him directly, that he wasn't entirely human, but hadn't clarified any further. He had often wondered if they two of them thought anything further, or even remembered. They weren't stupid men, but they were narcissistic to an absurd degree – really, about as much as anybody in show business. Thinking much about other people, even the one in charge of their careers, didn't suit them.
“You think he's right for the band?” Charles asked at last.
Pickles and Skwisgaar exchanged a glance. “Ja,” nodded Skwisgaar.
“Magnus wuzn't raight. Yoo knoo dat,” Pickles told him.
Charles flicked his cigarette butt into the lake and nodded.
“Yoo shud try some o' my stuff, dood,” said Pickles, holding up a baggie. “Mebbe it'll put yoo in a better mood!”
“You want me in a better mood, don't fire a fucking guitarist in the middle of a fucking tour,” groused Charles. “You know, Skwisgaar, it isn't as if there's some kinda groupie shortage!”
Skwisgaar looked Charles up and down. “You coulds have outvoted us,” he said simply.
“Whaddya mean?”
“Yeh, dood, go hire da guy back,” said Pickles.
“I couldn't do that,” Charles snapped.
“You coulds. If you ams wanted to,” smiled Skwisgaar.
“You gaht us t' sign our lives away wit' all yer contracts an shit. Get sum paperwerk an figger it out.”
Charles blinked. It had been a test. And he had passed. Or failed? Or something. He stood, his coat wrapped tightly around his thin frame, wishing for another cigarette, but wanting to conserve his one pack of Marlboros against the unknown expanse of the day.
“OK,” he said.
“So, you ams works for us? Da guardians angskels, or whatevers?” asked Skwisgaar.
Charles nodded. These guys talked to each other, evidently. Well, why not?
“Dis is da guy we want,” said Pickles.
“I'll get it done, then,” said Charles, having really no idea if this were even possible. And he stared out, watching the dock – as broken down, in appearance, as the pathetic ferry – approaching.
In a secret underground lair....
“Explain to me how the flip you lost again. SPEAK!”
Kenley looked around, seeming a bit bemused. She wondered where they had the hidden cameras.
“Uh. The other guys won?” she snapped. She was expecting “Beat” Beretta to pop out of somewhere any minute for the America's Next Fashion Victim reunion show. That's what this was, right?
“Gabriel, where the flip is my Red Bull?” She asked the nervous man at her side. He signaled, and several people rushed off.
That was sorta cool, Kenley thought, getting an actual presidential candidate in on the gag. “Look,” she said, “my look was definitely best, because that foreign guy was a dip, but they brought on some shill judge. They cheated.”
“That slimy little earth god?” She shrieked, tearing open her Red Bull.
“Well, he's very persuasive,” explained Gabriel. “To women. And, ah, men.”
“And why didn't the normal guy give me my Red Bull?” She demanded, gesturing at a cowering Cherub.
“There have been, uh,” said Gabriel. He hesitated before the word, “defections.” Two pieces of bad news at once. He stole a glance over at Uriah, in his usual place, grinning. “There have been illnesses. Yes. A very bad, er, case of laryngitis is going around, and we don't wanna get My Lady sick!”
It worked. She turned her attentions to Kenley. “America's Next Fashion Victim is the greatest show that television has ever known!”
“Oh? I actually sorta like Corazon de Azul?” Kenley admitted. This would make her look humble when they broadcast the show, she thought.
“You like WHAT?” She thundered.
“I know it's foreign, but did you see it when they had that cute singing doctor?”
She rose. She pointed. “You have failed me for the last time, Kenley!” she barked.
Uriah was already standing by Her side, grinning a grin at Kenley.
“Where's 'Beat' and Pippi anyway?” asked Kenley as She swept out of the room, Gabriel three paces behind her.
“How did those flipping guys win my show. Gabriel! Have them killed.”
“Er, what?” asked Gabriel, to the sound of a muffled scream and then a thud from the throne room.
“Have. Them. Killed.”
“Do you think that is, er, a wise move at this point? It seems a little....”
“Gabriel. Was there something not clear about my mother-flipping instructions?”
Uriah had appeared, grinning, not speaking. He didn't need to speak.
“No, Lady,” said Gabriel
She took a large gulp of Red Bull and stormed off, Uriah at her side.
Gabriel stood in thought. Vahlalla. Mordhaus. Even the Imperial City – they were all heavily fortified. He could send assassins, but they would be shot down on site, and the Lady was pretty clear she wanted results this time.
It would have to be somewhere between.
He signaled to a Cherub. “Send for my archers,” Gabriel told him.
Many years ago....
The town wasn't in the middle of nowhere.
It was nowhere.
“No there there.” Had that been Gertrude Stein's snark? One of Raziel's nutty buddies. Batty as a fruitcake, that one.
“Whats?” asked Skwisgaar. After a cold walk from the dock, the three of them were standing in the middle of “downtown.”
“I said, how can this fucking place be abandoned if nobody ever fucking lived here?” huffed Charles. He glanced around. The place looked like it was listed in the dictionary, under “grim.” No matter how small, though, a town always needed a bar and a post office. He nodded towards the appropriate looking building, and they entered.
It was nice to get out of the chill wind. The place looked a lot less bleak from the inside, and it appeared as if the entire male population of the town was crowded around. The men looked up, briefly, at the strangers, and then went right back to what they were doing, their curiosity apparently exhausted.
“Skwisgaar? Bartender,” said Charles. The guitarist looked a little dubious, but pushed up to the bar where he hailed the bartender, and, to Charles' annoyance, ordered beers. Oh, well, so much for a quick fact finding mission. He sighed and lit a cigarette. “You gonna ask him about your guy?” he asked when the pints arrived.
“You sure you nots asks him?”
“Two problems: I never met this guy, and my Norsk fucking sucks.”
Skwisgaar, seemingly reluctant for some reason, chatted with the bartender, who cast a suspicious eye on Charles as he spoke.
“What?” asked Charles.
“Hims ams say, no smoksing!” chuckled Skwisgaar.
“What?” gawped Charles. “This is a bar.” He eyed his freshly lit Marlboro with much woe, and then regretfully stabbed it out. “OK. Fine. Great. Now does he know anything about your mystery guitarist?”
There was another rapid exchange.
“Did he say, reverend?” asked Charles, whose comprehension was a bit better than his grammar. “Is your guy a priest of something?”
“His dads,” explained Skwisgaar.
“Oh, dat makes sense,” muttered Pickles. “Skeery dood.”
The bartender, who Charles had taken for taciturn, suddenly rattled off more.
“Dey ams not likes him much,” Skwisgaar translated. “Ams tries to get dis place shut down. Ams real strict guy.”
“So, where can we find Mr. Personality? And hopefully, his kid?”
“Dey lives outta town. Ams a few miles.”
“Oh. Great. Perfect,” grumbled Charles. “Just what I want, a stroll out in the fresh air.” He looked around darkly. “I don't suppose these guys gotta limo service?” he grumbled, taking a big gulp of beer.
The present day....
Angels, Ganesh had decided, were vexing creatures.
Ganesh liked sleeping with men. Not specifically the sex part – though that was delightful. But rather the lovely bit afterwards when you dozed, all entangled in another body. It was in fact one of the many ways he had grown disappointed by human men, not that they didn't have their virtues. Unless you had thought to get them very, very drunk beforehand, they usually objected to sleeping entwined by any more than one and exactly one pair of arms.
This was probably the reason that, when Ganesh began to sleep with Sariel, he probably went just a little bit overboard, most thoroughly entangling the angel in a surfeit of limbs before contentedly drifting off to sleep. He could hardly be chided, angels being such enticing creatures, however, he soon learned that Sariel himself, far from treasuring the ravishing feeling of flesh on flesh, instead only barely tolerated the whole business, given that he was quite literally often unable to escape the enmeshment.
Ganesh regretfully decided, as he was now fated to spend an eternity with his dear angel, that perhaps he oughtn't spend it causing overmuch irritation, and so one night, after bedtime activities were concluded to the satisfaction of all parties, he gave his angel a single kiss and then, without a word, rolled over and left him to his personal space.
He awoke the next morning with the unmistakeable impression that he he either caught a chest cold, or was perhaps in throes of a cardiac event. These fears were allied, however, as soon as he opened his eyes and found the reason for the pressure on his chest was its current occupation by none other than Sariel, who had evidently climbed atop him some time during the night, and was now quite contentedly asleep there, his mouth trailing a strand of saliva onto Ganesh's chest, and sawing angelic wood in a rather ridiculously loud manner.
Ganesh chalked it up to Sariel having had a rather odd dream. As Sariel was wont to do. But then when the same thing happened the next night, and then next, and the next, Ganesh realized he was probably fated to spend eternity in the very close company of angelic snores and saliva.
“It's not as if it's the worst problem ever,” said Lady Raziel, to whom he had just related his tale. Winter was fast approaching in Valhalla, a circumstance Lady Raziel met in her characteristic manner, bedecked in a bikini and stretched out on a beach chair, a tiki drink and some space heaters at her side. Ganesh, who had decided there were worse ways to spend the day than working on his already perfect tan, was similarly attired in fashionable beach wear, on is own comfortable wooden chaise lounge.
“Well, it's not,” admitted Ganesh, taking a small sip of a splendid rum drink – splendid as he had been the one to mix it. “It's just counterintuitive, for one. As you know, your kinsman is not one who favors much bodily contact, unless it is of the X-rated variety.”
“Sariel ain't a hugger.”
“And, well, there is this odd sense of entitlement, as if he owns that expanse of real estate.”
“He does!”
“What the fuck are you guys up to?”
The last comment was from Sariel himself, who was much more seasonably dressed in an overcoat and scarf.
“Hey, wanna go to the library? We could steal pencils,” suggested Raziel.
Sariel grinned despite himself. “Seriously....”
“Final plans for the Naming,” said Raziel.
“You look like you're drinking and bullshitting,” said Sariel, helping himself to Ganesh's drink. “Hey, this is pretty good!”
“That too! We're multitasking!” she grinned. “Want me to grab you a chair?”
“That's OK,” said Sariel, who had already slipped on top of Ganesh, his head on the god's chest.
“Hey! I shall have a Sariel-shaped hole in my perfect tan!” wailed Ganesh.
“What does he say to that?” asked Raziel.
Ganesh sighed. “Already asleep!” he told her.
Raziel frowned. She sat up in her chair and leaned towards Ganesh, tipping back her sunglasses. She appeared to be listening. Then she started laughing and laid back. “Yeah, you're right. And having a great X-rated dream to boot!”
Ganesh may have blushed, but it was difficult to tell, what with his almost perfect tan.
Many years ago....
Charles stopped. He turned around, and, seeing his traveling companions were now some distance back on the path, lit up a cigarette.
The bartender had been correct: the Rev. Wartooth's farm was far out of town. And straight up a mountain. Though it was an annoyance to Charles, between the already high altitude and the elevation gain, his companions both looked on the verge of either throwing up or collapsing, or perhaps both.
“You ams stops for da SMOKES BREAKS?” Skwisgaar gasped when at last he was within shouting distance. Not that he had enough breath left to shout.
“Well, bastards wouldn't let me smoke in the damn bar,” Charles grumbled.
“I don' unnerstand,” said Pickles, when he finally approached. “Yoo ain't even dressed fer a hike!” he concluded, pointing a sweating finger at Charles' dress shoes, now probably ruined with the mud.
“You guys could go back,” Charles allowed.
“Naw, I t'ink we shud be dere,” Pickles puffed, lowering himself onto a rock.
“I ams not knows if we ams makes it backs alone,” worried Skwisgaar, looking down the mountain. It was true – the trail, such as it was, was badly marked. He turned and gazed up the mountain. “Dat place up dere! It ams looks occuspied!”
“How the fuck can you tell that?” asked Charles, squinting under his hand in the direction Skwisgaar was pointing.
“Sometimes, I ams tells dese t'ings,” Skwisgaar shrugged.
Charles scowled over his cigarette. “You guys want me to go up and check?”
“Naw, we'll go wit' yoo,” Pickles puffed. “Jest give us a minnit.” Both the boys definitely seemed uneasy about being left alone. Charles couldn't exactly say he blamed them. He wasn't one to believe in woo-woo stuff like signs and portents, but this just plain seemed like a bad place. He almost longed to go back to that shithole of a town.
The present day....
“Well, this is a pretty sight!” said Wotan, grinning broadly and folding his arms.
“I am pinned beneath a sleeping angel!” wailed Ganesh.
“Wake him up. I have news,” said Wotan.
“Dutch apple!” shouted Raziel.
“What? Huh?” said Charles.
“What kind of news?” asked Ganesh.
“She's on the move.”
“What, now?” said Ganesh.
“Who's she,” muttered Charles.
“My mom,” grumbled Raziel.
“Why the fuck would She do anything now? Before the Naming? That's utterly stupid.”
“That's my mom,” said Raziel.
“Seems like the Fashion Victim thing did ruffle some feathers,” grinned Wotan.
Charles was rubbing the sleep from his eyes. “All the defectors have said the same thing. Then it was worth all the bullshit? I'm not sure Nathan is over it.”
“Toki saide he had a great time,” Raziel said. “Pippi told him they might ask him to the All Stars!”
“But not Nathan?”
“I think he punched one too many people for that.”
“Well, I've warned him.” But Charles smiled nonetheless.
“She has supposedly ordered some kind of retribution,” said Wotan.
“What? Here?” asked Charles. “We'll fucking obliterate Her. Besides,” he yawned, scratching his head, “I don't have any word of troop movements.”
“No,” said Wotan, “I don't expect a full scale attack at this point. She is waiting until we are more vulnerable for that.”
“Uncle,” said Ganesh, “What specifically are we to expect?”
“The unexpected!” said Wotan.
“Like that?” asked Raziel.
They looked up to the strangest flying being ever beheld. It looked like a drunken gooney bird. White wings stretched out over a thick, ungainly body. It was obviously struggling to maintain altitude.
“That's your Dick Knubbler, isn't it?” asked Wotan.
“He's trying to carry William!” said Raziel.
“Why the fuck didn't they take William's car?” asked Charles, who was already up and throwing off his overcoat.
And then there was a small ruffling of the feathers, a splash of white and red mixed.
The ungainly bird stopped struggling and started to dive.
“That was an arrow!” shouted Raziel.
Many years ago....
“Why wud people farm on a feckin' CLIFF!” huffed Pickles.
Charles shrugged. “Why do people live in this piece of shit place anyway.” They had approached the front of the small hut. “You want me to talk to 'em?”
“Yoo don' eggzactly seem like our best ambassador,” grumbled Pickles.
“Dere he ams!” said Skwisgaar, pointing to the tall figure who had appeared on the porch.
“You wanna ask him where to find the Reverend Wartooth?” asked Charles.
“No, dood,” said Pickles. “Dat's him. Dat's da dad!”
Charles looked over to Skwisgaar, who nodded. He took another good look at the black-clad ghoul standing on the porch. “Whoa. OK. Here we go.”
Head held high, he marched up to the porch. “Am I speaking to Rev. Wartooth?” he asked.
The man grunted.
“I have some business with your son,” stated Charles, as Skwisgaar translated.
“He ams says, no on talks to da son,” Skwisgaar told him.
“How about you bring him out, and we decide that?” asked Charles, forcing a smile.
“Hims says, how about you gets lost?”
Charles crossed his arms, smiling and glaring at the same time. “Not without talking to your son,” he stated, gesturing for Skwisgaar to translate.
“He ams says we needs to leaves.”
“Far!”
Charles felt Pickles tugging on his sleeve when a slim boy with long brown hair appeared on the porch.
Rev. Wartooth barked something at the boy. “He ams telling him go back inside,” Skwisgaar whispered. But from the boy's wide-eyed stare, it was fairly clear he had recognized Pickles and Skwisgaar, and no force on earth was going to push him back.
Rev. Wartooth raised a hand, and the boy cringed.
“HEY,” barked Charles. He was no longer smiling, and now both Wartooth men were staring at him. “I just want a calm discussion. Skwisgaar!” Skwisgaar translated. “My boys heard your boy playing guitar the other night.” Rev. Wartooth glowered as Skwisgaar translated. “We like his sound. We'd like to hear more.”
The Reverend was now glaring at the boy. “Guitar ain't da lord's instruments, or somet'ing like dat,” said Skwisgaar, who sounded a little confused.
Charles gestured around the farm. “Rev Wartooth, with all respect, maybe you think this land could stand with some improvements. We could help.”
“He ams says he don't want your money.”
“But maybe the boy wants my money?”
“Hims say no.”
Charles looked between Rev. Wartoothe and the boy. “Skwisgaar, ask the kid if he's over 21.”
Still unspeaking, the boy nodded frantically.
“Well, I guess that makes it his decision, doesn't it?” Charles asked Rev. Wartooth. The boy's eyes darted between his father and Charles. For the first time, a spark of light shown in them.
Rev. Wartooth spoke to the boy again.
“He tells him to go back inside....”
“Yeah, I heard,” said Charles. He turned to the boy. “What's your name?”
The boy paused. A heartbreakingly beautiful smile broke out. “I ams Toki,” he said very quietly, in halting English.
“You like playing guitar, Toki?”
“Oh, ja,” he said, before Skwisgaar had finished translating. “I ams learned da Englishes from da Dethklok songs!”
“Really? You can understand what Nathan is saying?” laughed Charles. Toki nodded, all earnestness. He glanced at his father, and then hopped off the porch, coming closer to Charles.
Rev. Wartooth followed, looming behind like a tall shadow.
“I was telling your dad, these guys liked your guitar playing. A lot.”
Toki didn't answer, but looked like he might faint. Charles wondered how the hell he sneaked a Dethklok CD past the old man.
“What would you think.... About coming away with us? Maybe just for a while.”
Toki gasped, but then his father was in Charles' face. “You needs to leave,” Skwisgaar translated.
Charles smiled up at the taller man. Then he made an elaborate show of pulling out his Marlboros, extracting a smoke, and lighting up.
Rev. Wartooth was looming over Charles, barking at him in Norwegian.
“No smoksing here,” Skwisgaar translated nervously.
Charles' expression darkened. He leaned in, especially so the smoke would puff into Rev. Wartooth's face. “Føkk deg.”
The reverend raised a hand.
There was a cry, and the reverend was on his back, one arm raised, this time not to strike, but to protect himself. A flurry. “Være borte djevelen!” pleaded the reverend.
And then it was gone.
The reverend bolted inside the house, slamming the door behind him, as if the very devil were chasing him.
“Hollee feck,” said Pickles with a low whistle. He looked at Charles.
“Huh. I think this is my department,” said Charles. “You guys stay here.”
“What if dat guys comes outs again?” asked Skwisgaar.
“I dunno. Hit him with the Gibson or something.”
“WHATS?” asked Skwisgaar.
“Aw, it'll be fine. I bet it wouldn't even bow the neck,” said Charles, walking off.
Valhalla, the present day....
The sky was dotted with the attackers: Powers, the class of warrior angels. They sported magnificent gold and green wings. Some were armed with bows and magicked arrows which caught flame in flight. Ahead of them – too far ahead of them – were a flock with flaming swords.
Sariel and Raziel were True Formed, swords in hand.
“You take the left flank,” Wotan told Ganesh. “You two, try to target the ones closest to Dick and William!” There were nods.
Charles took off and immediately batted away an arrow with his sword. Flying and trying to sword fight? This sucked.
There was a cry in the distance. He looked off to where the arrow had been loosed. Some bows had just burst into flames, burning angelic hands. He glanced back to the ground. Ganesh, all concentration, was holding out several hands. And then more cries: Wotan's spear, Gugnir, had hit home, improbably knocking back a column of archers like so many dominoes.
It's up to us now, he thought, nervously eyeing the desperately fleeing Dick Knubbler, who was in his winged Samael form. Samael was definitely bleeding from a wing, though improbably seemed to be holding his glide now. But the green and gold swordsmen were within a blade's distance now.
Raziel has already sailed past Knubbler and Murderface and was striking out with her sword like a whirling dervish, green and gold and red now flashing. Charles considered helping Dick, but decided to slice up a few swordsmen first. He hovered, silver wings at full extent, and being careful to steer clear of Raziel, traced an index finger across the sky. There were surprised cries and a spatter of crimson as his slicing power crippled three of the Powers. Then he gripped his sword two-handed to finish them off one by one.
“Watch out!” He whirled in the air. These guys moved fast, not like the lumbering Seraphim. One had gotten behind him. He got he sword up, but the guy was already ready to strike.
And then the Power screamed as his wings burst into flame. He plunged to earth.
“Whoa,” said Raziel. “Ganesh has gotten really good with that.”
“Can you handle the rest? I might give Dick a hand. William isn't exactly a lightweight.”
“Yeah, go ahead,” said Raziel, gripping her sword and grinning.
There was a very soft twang. The last volley of a Power, before he was impaled on Wotan's spear.
Only one arrow.
But it only took one.
It sliced silently through the air, shot true, into Dick Knubbler's side, knocking the breath out of him.
Knocking him out of True Form.
“SHIT” screamed Charles as he flew, too fast, but too late, towards the plummeting figures.
Too fast, end over end.
And then, something. Billowing out. Like a large, dark parachute.
Wings.
Not an angel: that was readily apparent. Dark, black, leathery. It was even more ungainly than Dick trying to carry Murderface.
It wasn't the most graceful landing, with a thud and a tangle of insanely huge bat wings. It was more of a controlled fall.
“I'm too fucking FAT to do thisch any more!” wailed William Murderface's voice, as the figure flopped onto his ass. A pair of dark, leathery wings fumpfed out beside him. And he was dark now, black faced and yellowy-eyed, as black as the god, Surtr. Dark, like something that had just crawled out of the earth, and not plunged from the sky.
Ganesh was there, gently supporting Dick Knubbler's head while he laid out the wounded producer on the ground.
“How isch he?” the Murderface thing asked Ganesh.
“He is still unconscious, and I would like to get him inside,” said Ganesh, still looking at Dick Knubbler. “But,” he told Murderface, “I believe he will recover. You have definitely saved his life.”
Murderface's blush seemed to spread all the way to his black wingtips.
“Unless I miss my guess,” said Wotan softly, “you are a Draugar, aren't you William?”
“A demon?” asked Charles, who, with Raziel, had just landed nearby.
Wotan nodded.
“And, you guys can't fuck with your body weight, like angels do, can you?” asked Charles.
“No,” huffed Murderface. “Can't do fancshy schit like you guysch.” The eyes blinked, two disks of amber set in the dark, dark face.
“I've never been able to do fancy shit,” Charles laughed. He and Wotan extended hands, and got Murderface, somewhat shakily, to his feet. “Personally, I think I mid-air rescue is pretty fucking fancy.”
Murderface looked back and rattled his magnificent leathery wings, seeming satisfied that they were sound.
Ganesh had scooped Dick Knubbler into his arms. “Would you like to come along, William?”
Murderface nodded, but then signaled to wait. He appeared to concentrate very hard, and then suddenly the wings were gone, the face was fleshy, and he was William Murderface again. And the he followed Ganesh inside.
“A Draugar! I'll be a monkey's uncle!” said Wotan.
“And angel and a demon! THAT'S SO CUTE!” squealed Raziel, who had just landed, blood-stained sword in hand.
Charles just shook his head.
“Did you know?” asked Wotan.
“No. I mean, I suspected. All these years, and I've never seen him True Formed before. Well, not clearly at least. What the hell is a Draugar, anyway?”
“They live in gravesites. Used to be common up in these parts, but not so much in the modern world.”
“So, what the fuck....”
“I think this tale might require a whiskey. Or two,” said Wotan.
Many years ago....
Charles found Toki huddled in back of a broken down outbuilding that looked like a barn.
“That's called a True Form, in case you were wondering,” Charles told him, offering him a cigarette.
Toki waved off the cigarette. He huddled more deeply into his soft, brown-feathered wings.
“My dads. Him ams scared of me. Because I ams da DEMON.”
“Uh, no, actually. You're not a demon,” said Charles, sitting down on a bench and wrapping his coat tightly around him.
“How you ams knows dis?”
“Well, for one, those aren't demon wings.”
“No?” Toki stared at Charles, and then partly extended one of his wings and looked at it. “But dey ams dark!”
“Yes, they can be dark. Demon wings don't have feathers. They're more like bat wings.”
“How you ams knows dis?” asked Toki darkly, now huddling back into the wings. “You ams da demon?”
“Well, some would think that. But no, no I am not a demon,” said Charles.
“You knows da demons?”
“Well, yeah.” This seemed to scare Toki, but Charles pressed on. “I've been around a long time, and I've seen a lot of things.”
Toki looked dubious, but seemed a bit calmer. Curiosity had gotten the better of him. “If I am not da demons, den what am I?”
“Well, to be honest, I'm not really sure. I'm not even sure you should exist. I know this is a personal question, but your mom and dad – mor and far – are they really your parents?”
“Of course dey ams my parents! Dey ams watches over me! Dey keeps me from da devils!”
OK, don't go there, thought Charles. “OK. All right. Do you know how to go back? I mean, to how you were?”
Toki huddled. “You can hits me,” he whispered.
“I don't think we'll do that, OK?” Charles frowned, trying to puzzle out what the fuck he actually did to get back to Court Form. Injury would do it, but no. Not today. “I'm sure something like cold water would work. But how about this? How about you relax?”
“Relaxes?”
Charles wished he had brought along Skwisgaar after all. “Uh. Think of something happy?” Toki blinked, but looked curious. “OK. Close your eyes. Imagine you're playing Skwisgaar's guitar.” I hope to fuck this will work, he thought.
Toki already had a dreamy look in his eye. Charles tried not to smile as he mimed an air guitar.
And then he was just Toki, sitting there, half naked and shivering.
Charles stood up, trying desperately not to look as reluctant as he felt. He took off his overcoat, and handed it to Toki.
To his instant regret, Toki seized the garment, pulling it round himself. Charles pulled his thin suit jacket tighter and sat back down, wishing for all the world he could bring his own wings out at this instance. I really will do anything for Dethklok, he thought with a sigh. As Toki donned the coat, he noted the scars running up and down the boy's back. How often does this guy get upset and True Form, he wondered. And what the hell would they do about it on a fucking tour?
One thing at a time.
“We have a problem,” Charles told him. “And I think you can help us.”
The blue eyes: so bright and trusting. “I ams helps you?” He leaned forward. “Wit da guitars?”
“We need a guitarist. Now, you would have to think about it! Carefully. I don't think you've ever been far from this place before, have you? So, you would need to leave this place, and your Mor and Far....”
“Whens we leaving?”
The present day....
“William, I am sorry to pry, but I didn't know of any Draugar in the New World. I find it amazing!”
Murderface sat looking into his whiskey. He appeared a bit more relaxed, especially after Ganesh, who was off attending to Dick Knubbler, had repeatedly assured him that the producer would wake up presently.
“I'm from middle Europe. Originally,” Murderface explained to Wotan. “Living in scholdier'sch barrowsch, guarding their treasuresch, that kinda thing. I can't exchplain. I guessch I schorta got bored. Anyway, the lascht schentury, there wasch talk of the New World, lotsch of brave warriors fallen. Scho, I hopped on a boat.”
“Over water! For months! That's extraordinary!” said Wotan, sitting back and puffing a cigar.
Raziel, perched on the arm of her husband's overstuffed chair, said, “Lemme guess: the American Civil War?”
“The Schivil War!” grinned Murderface, looking genuinely happy for the first time that day. He actually got a dreamy expression. “And I had the greatescht graveschite.”
“OK, but William, how the hell did you end up with Stella and Thunderbolt?” asked Charles.
Murderface looked dark again. “Condominiumsch! For a schentury, I watched over my scholdier'sch schite with honor! And then they paved it over! In a weekend! The whole fucking thing!”
“Aye. That's the modern world for ye,” sighed Wotan.
“But,” Charles persisted, “William, you are hundreds of years old....”
“I'm not really William Murderfasche,” he admitted. “Asch you've probably guessched.” He drained the whiskey glass and set it down.
“Dead?” said Wotan.
Murderface nodded. “Schee, I was pissched off! And tired of being chasched away. And I wasch just schort of hiding out in a tree schtump, near a field, and here were thesche picnickers. And thisch crying baby. And sche lay him down to schleep, and, well....”
“Crib death?” guessed Raziel.
Murderface nodded. “I hadda think fascht. But I figured, Mom'sch not gonna be happy. What would it hurt, if I schtepped in, had a little rescht for a few decadesch? Let schome asschholesch feed me oatmeal and schit?”
“But they figured it out? Somehow?” Charles asked.
Murderface may have looked vaguely guilty. “He did,” he mused. “To thisch day, I don't know how. I mean, he didn't guessch who I wasch, he wasch juscht a schtupid colonial, but he knew I waschn't hisch. I think it drove him crazschy. Not that it was a long drive.” He scowled.
“William?” Murderface jerked to the sound of Ganesh's voice.
“Someone was asking for you,” grinned Ganesh. “He claims you now owe him two!”
“He owesch me one!” shouted Murderface, who began to run but then skidded to a halt. “Uh, it's OK if I schee him?”
Ganesh waved a couple of arms. “Go right ahead.”
Murderface scampered out of the room. Charles shook his head. He hadn't really been aware until that day that William Murderface was capable of a scamper.
“Ganesh,” asked Charles. “Remember what you told me, about my boys? About Nathan?”
Ganesh looked thoughtful. He sat down on the couch next to Charles, kicking off his shoes, curling into the lotus position. “That Nathan is some kind of … focus?”
“This can't leave this room!” Charles warned everyone. “I told you, Murderface, all the years I've known him, that's the first I've seen his True Form. Years! And there's another thing.” He held onto the rim of his whiskey glass and twisted it, as if he were trying to screw it into the coffee table. “Toki.”
“What about Toki?” asked Raziel.
“You're around him a lot, Raziel. Have you ever seen anything that would make you suspect … that's not his only Form?”
Raziel appeared truly surprised. “No. I mean, he's obviously magical somehow. But, no.”
“When he first joined the band, when we first found him.... He True Formed.”
“WHAT?” said Raziel.
“And you're not surprised,” Charles told Ganesh.
Ganesh frowned. “You angels – you have a different magic than ours. It's....” He rippled some fingers. “It is difficult to explain. It is in a different spectrum.”
“He's like me and Raziel?” Charles asked. Ganesh looked around. “Ganesh, this is fucking important, or I wouldn't be asking you. She's trying to kill us. I know you don't wanna talk about what you see....”
“He is not like you and Raziel,” said Ganesh. “He is not as bloody powerful for one thing. And, I don't sense any earth god magic.”
“Power,” said Charles. “More or less than a Cherub?”
Ganesh pushed his hair out of his eyes. It fell back. “More.”
“Damn,” said Charles. “Blows that theory.”
“What theory was that?” asked Wotan.
“We know you can't have ones like me or Seraphim trying to mate with humans – you get monsters. But I've been wondering lately.... There's actually not a few of the lower orders around.”
“Ah! Some interbreeding!” said Wotan
“But Toki's more powerful than a lower order....”
“You don't breed horses, do you?” laughed Wotan.
“Uh, what the hell does that have to do with this?”
“You don't always want a thoroughbred! You know my Sleipnir! You know he is part horse, and part god!”
“Yes,” said Ganesh. “My brother ended up with very little power. But Skwisgaar....” He trailed off.
“As much as me?” asked Wotan.
“Maybe more. Yes,” breathed Ganesh.
“Whoa,” said Charles.
“This is strictly between us four,” Ganesh urged. “Your four boys, I am astounded at the power. They are obviously, not completely human....”
“I've never heard before of a Draugar who could take a three month sea voyage!” said Wotan. “That is extraordinary!”
“And that's back to what you told me Ganesh,” said Charles. “When we met Toki, I got the impression he had no control over True Forming. He got pissed off at his dad, in front of us, and went winged!”
“He literally got wingy?” laughed Raziel.
“Yeah!”
“Perhaps it was due to being removed from the company of his parents,” said Ganesh. “But go on....”
“Look, Ganesh, you unhook extra arms to open a jar of peanut butter.”
“Well,” smiled Ganesh, “not that I eat peanut butter....”
“No, but I mean, you go back and forth to your godly Form. But the boys....”
“Oh!” said Ganesh. “They don't bother? Or, you are saying that they can't, somehow?”
“You think Nathan sucks out all their power?” asked Raziel. “Cool!”
“More or less,” said Charles, although he had to admit, it sounded sort of stupid when Raziel said it.
“So he's like Rogue!”
“Well, not completely like Rogue. Uh. He just borrows it. I think.”
“Who is this Rogue person?” Wotan asked Raziel.
“Uh, she's a comic book character,” Charles told him.
“She's got a really cool white streak in her hair!” said Raziel. “Hey, I should do that!”
“It would only come out when you True Form,” Charles reminded her.
“Well, yeah. But, maybe Nathan should do it!”
“Yeah, I'll tell him you said that,” Charles laughed.
“He works by literally taking power away from the other four?” asked Ganesh. “That makes sense.”
“How so?”
“The magic. It is normally human magic around him, but it can be all kinds: human, earth god, angelic … demon. And, some with which I am not familiar.”
“Wait. There's more?” asked Charles.
“Miscellaneous magic!” said Raziel.
Wotan roared with laughter, and waved the whiskey decanter at Charles. “I think you need a refill my friend!” he said.
Charles sighed, rubbed his forehead, and held out his glass.
Many years ago....
All of Toki's worldly possessions, as it turned out, fit in a rather small, well-worn rucksack, which was now sitting at his feet on the deck of the run-down ferry.
He was leaning on the rail, chatting intensely about something with Pickles.
Charles pulled his overcoat tightly around him against the chill wind. He had been very grateful to find out that one of Toki's few possessions was in fact his very own overcoat. He felt in the pocket for his pack of smokes. Yes, one left.
“You should ams not smokes so much,” Skwisgaar chided before he'd even gotten the damned thing lit. It was surprising: Charles had expected Toki and Skwisgaar, with their shared background and language, to bond, but the two had spent a considerable chunk of the walk back quibbling about something, and now the young guitarist seemed to have taken a shine to the incredibly worldly Pickles.
“I'll quit tomorrow,” Charles told Skwisgaar. He waved the cigarette at Pickles and Toki. “What are those two going on about?”
“I ams not know. Pickle ams tooks up da gee-tar and left home when he was a kid. Maybe dey talk about dat?”
“Oh. Yeah.” Charles luxuriated in the feeling of warm smoke filling his lungs. “So, that's your guy?”
“Him ams your guy too now.” Skwisgaar looked up momentarily from plucking strings.
“That's true I guess.”
Skwisgaar went back to his guitar. Curious, Charles wandered over to where Pickles and Toki were conferring.
Pickles looked up. “Charles, who's da hottest comic chick?” he asked.
“Uh.”
“I say it's gahtta be da Catwoman, but Toki likes Power Gurl.”
“She ams hots!” Toki attested.
Charles looked between two anxious sets of eyes. “Rogue,” he decided.
“Oh, yeah, she ams hots!”
“Wut?” said Pickles. “Nawt her!”
“Why not?” asked Charles.
“Yoo can't touch her!” protested Pickles. “Cuz, she'll suck yoo dry.”
“Well, that's why,” said Charles, leaning his arms on the rusting railing. “You can't touch her. There's that air of mystery,” he said, wagging his cigarette.
“Yoo want wut yoo can't have?”
“Maybe.”
“Dat's weird, dood.”
They stood together in silence for a moment, watching the sun set across the dark Scandanavian winter sky.
Author: tikistitch
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Some origin stories. Yes, stories. :D
Warnings: I start off with a funny “not clear who it is” POV. It gets explained, but if that's not gonna do ya, go look at the comms, I'm sure there's some nice pr0n. :D
Notes: Notes after the jump.
Mythklok started existence as a Metalocalypse AU. Now, your guess is as good as mine.
First off, many grateful thanks to Z and Tam for their ideas about Toki's story. I really couldn't have written this sequence without them. Even though Mythklok was nominally supposed to be a Metalocalypse AU, I've spent a lot of time (70 chapters more or less) vaguely waving my hands in the direction of the band and their individual stories. I figured everyone (including me) ams be disappoint somehow with anything I could come up with. But, life is disappointment. :D
Last time: Nathan and Toki won big on America's Next Fashion Victim, Skwisgaar got a new guitar, and we learned that angels like Hell Fries.
Many years ago....
Wings.
Beating the night air.
The thin air seems even more meager up here, at this elevation. This is a meager land.
It's cold. It's dark. Only at night. Only in the dark. Don't want them to see. Never let them catch the abomination.
What they'd do.
What's already been done.
The outcropping. Purchase.
The wings wrapped round now. Shivering. But not from the cold. Half naked, but not cold.
An affront to the lord god himself.
Then why does this feel so damned good?
“Dood! You shouldn't smoke so much!”
Charles pulled his overcoat tighter against the chill wind and stared at Pickles through the soft grey cloud of smoke. “You are telling me not to smoke?” he asked. Like everyone, Charles had heard tales of rampant use of psychopharmaceuticals in the old Snakes and Barrels. Judging from Pickles' current behavior, those tales had been pale, pathetic shadows of the truth.
Pickles grinned. For someone who by all rights ought to be a jaded burnout, Pickles had the world's most infectious grin. “Yoo shud try somethin' more nacheral, dood! Wud change yer outlook!”
Charles flicked the cigarette, spreading ashes into the ice cold Norwegian lake the ancient wooden ferry was now lumbering through. “What's not natural about fucking tobacco?”
“Smoksing ams stunts your growth,” chuckled Skwisgaar. He had his back against the railing, and was huddling around his guitar, seemingly to protect it from the spray.
“I asked for one of you – one of you! - to come along with me today,” Charles grumbled, testy at the poor arithmetic skills of death metal musicians.
“Ja, I ams here for transglating,” agreed Skwisgaar.
“An' I'm here in case we gahta get him drunk again!” Pickles laughed. “Prahbably won't doo it on one beer,” he added.
Charles ignored the jape and turned around to face the slowly oncoming dock. They would probably be lucky if this old hulk of a ferry didn't fall apart and sink to the bottom before it reached shore, drowning them all in the freezing lake. From what he had learned, there weren't any roads out to this godforsaken place. If you wanted to take a car, you waited for winter, and risked driving across the “ice road” - really, the frozen river. That's what he would have preferred: wait for January, and then take a nice heated limo, maybe with a little bottle of brandy and a stash of fragrant cigars in the compartment.
“We t'inks hims ams like you, Charles,” said Skwisgaar quietly.
Charles snapped out of his reverie and looked at Skwisgaar, and then at Pickles. “Like me how?”
“Ain't eggzactly human,” said Pickles, gazing out into the lake.
Charles was quiet for a moment. He had revealed his True Form to Pickles soon after they officially met, mostly as a desperate gambit to catch the musician's interest. They had not mentioned it since. Anyway, wings weren't the piece of his anatomy that seemed to fascinate Pickles most.
And Charles had admitted to Skwisgaar, when the musician questioned him directly, that he wasn't entirely human, but hadn't clarified any further. He had often wondered if they two of them thought anything further, or even remembered. They weren't stupid men, but they were narcissistic to an absurd degree – really, about as much as anybody in show business. Thinking much about other people, even the one in charge of their careers, didn't suit them.
“You think he's right for the band?” Charles asked at last.
Pickles and Skwisgaar exchanged a glance. “Ja,” nodded Skwisgaar.
“Magnus wuzn't raight. Yoo knoo dat,” Pickles told him.
Charles flicked his cigarette butt into the lake and nodded.
“Yoo shud try some o' my stuff, dood,” said Pickles, holding up a baggie. “Mebbe it'll put yoo in a better mood!”
“You want me in a better mood, don't fire a fucking guitarist in the middle of a fucking tour,” groused Charles. “You know, Skwisgaar, it isn't as if there's some kinda groupie shortage!”
Skwisgaar looked Charles up and down. “You coulds have outvoted us,” he said simply.
“Whaddya mean?”
“Yeh, dood, go hire da guy back,” said Pickles.
“I couldn't do that,” Charles snapped.
“You coulds. If you ams wanted to,” smiled Skwisgaar.
“You gaht us t' sign our lives away wit' all yer contracts an shit. Get sum paperwerk an figger it out.”
Charles blinked. It had been a test. And he had passed. Or failed? Or something. He stood, his coat wrapped tightly around his thin frame, wishing for another cigarette, but wanting to conserve his one pack of Marlboros against the unknown expanse of the day.
“OK,” he said.
“So, you ams works for us? Da guardians angskels, or whatevers?” asked Skwisgaar.
Charles nodded. These guys talked to each other, evidently. Well, why not?
“Dis is da guy we want,” said Pickles.
“I'll get it done, then,” said Charles, having really no idea if this were even possible. And he stared out, watching the dock – as broken down, in appearance, as the pathetic ferry – approaching.
In a secret underground lair....
“Explain to me how the flip you lost again. SPEAK!”
Kenley looked around, seeming a bit bemused. She wondered where they had the hidden cameras.
“Uh. The other guys won?” she snapped. She was expecting “Beat” Beretta to pop out of somewhere any minute for the America's Next Fashion Victim reunion show. That's what this was, right?
“Gabriel, where the flip is my Red Bull?” She asked the nervous man at her side. He signaled, and several people rushed off.
That was sorta cool, Kenley thought, getting an actual presidential candidate in on the gag. “Look,” she said, “my look was definitely best, because that foreign guy was a dip, but they brought on some shill judge. They cheated.”
“That slimy little earth god?” She shrieked, tearing open her Red Bull.
“Well, he's very persuasive,” explained Gabriel. “To women. And, ah, men.”
“And why didn't the normal guy give me my Red Bull?” She demanded, gesturing at a cowering Cherub.
“There have been, uh,” said Gabriel. He hesitated before the word, “defections.” Two pieces of bad news at once. He stole a glance over at Uriah, in his usual place, grinning. “There have been illnesses. Yes. A very bad, er, case of laryngitis is going around, and we don't wanna get My Lady sick!”
It worked. She turned her attentions to Kenley. “America's Next Fashion Victim is the greatest show that television has ever known!”
“Oh? I actually sorta like Corazon de Azul?” Kenley admitted. This would make her look humble when they broadcast the show, she thought.
“You like WHAT?” She thundered.
“I know it's foreign, but did you see it when they had that cute singing doctor?”
She rose. She pointed. “You have failed me for the last time, Kenley!” she barked.
Uriah was already standing by Her side, grinning a grin at Kenley.
“Where's 'Beat' and Pippi anyway?” asked Kenley as She swept out of the room, Gabriel three paces behind her.
“How did those flipping guys win my show. Gabriel! Have them killed.”
“Er, what?” asked Gabriel, to the sound of a muffled scream and then a thud from the throne room.
“Have. Them. Killed.”
“Do you think that is, er, a wise move at this point? It seems a little....”
“Gabriel. Was there something not clear about my mother-flipping instructions?”
Uriah had appeared, grinning, not speaking. He didn't need to speak.
“No, Lady,” said Gabriel
She took a large gulp of Red Bull and stormed off, Uriah at her side.
Gabriel stood in thought. Vahlalla. Mordhaus. Even the Imperial City – they were all heavily fortified. He could send assassins, but they would be shot down on site, and the Lady was pretty clear she wanted results this time.
It would have to be somewhere between.
He signaled to a Cherub. “Send for my archers,” Gabriel told him.
Many years ago....
The town wasn't in the middle of nowhere.
It was nowhere.
“No there there.” Had that been Gertrude Stein's snark? One of Raziel's nutty buddies. Batty as a fruitcake, that one.
“Whats?” asked Skwisgaar. After a cold walk from the dock, the three of them were standing in the middle of “downtown.”
“I said, how can this fucking place be abandoned if nobody ever fucking lived here?” huffed Charles. He glanced around. The place looked like it was listed in the dictionary, under “grim.” No matter how small, though, a town always needed a bar and a post office. He nodded towards the appropriate looking building, and they entered.
It was nice to get out of the chill wind. The place looked a lot less bleak from the inside, and it appeared as if the entire male population of the town was crowded around. The men looked up, briefly, at the strangers, and then went right back to what they were doing, their curiosity apparently exhausted.
“Skwisgaar? Bartender,” said Charles. The guitarist looked a little dubious, but pushed up to the bar where he hailed the bartender, and, to Charles' annoyance, ordered beers. Oh, well, so much for a quick fact finding mission. He sighed and lit a cigarette. “You gonna ask him about your guy?” he asked when the pints arrived.
“You sure you nots asks him?”
“Two problems: I never met this guy, and my Norsk fucking sucks.”
Skwisgaar, seemingly reluctant for some reason, chatted with the bartender, who cast a suspicious eye on Charles as he spoke.
“What?” asked Charles.
“Hims ams say, no smoksing!” chuckled Skwisgaar.
“What?” gawped Charles. “This is a bar.” He eyed his freshly lit Marlboro with much woe, and then regretfully stabbed it out. “OK. Fine. Great. Now does he know anything about your mystery guitarist?”
There was another rapid exchange.
“Did he say, reverend?” asked Charles, whose comprehension was a bit better than his grammar. “Is your guy a priest of something?”
“His dads,” explained Skwisgaar.
“Oh, dat makes sense,” muttered Pickles. “Skeery dood.”
The bartender, who Charles had taken for taciturn, suddenly rattled off more.
“Dey ams not likes him much,” Skwisgaar translated. “Ams tries to get dis place shut down. Ams real strict guy.”
“So, where can we find Mr. Personality? And hopefully, his kid?”
“Dey lives outta town. Ams a few miles.”
“Oh. Great. Perfect,” grumbled Charles. “Just what I want, a stroll out in the fresh air.” He looked around darkly. “I don't suppose these guys gotta limo service?” he grumbled, taking a big gulp of beer.
The present day....
Angels, Ganesh had decided, were vexing creatures.
Ganesh liked sleeping with men. Not specifically the sex part – though that was delightful. But rather the lovely bit afterwards when you dozed, all entangled in another body. It was in fact one of the many ways he had grown disappointed by human men, not that they didn't have their virtues. Unless you had thought to get them very, very drunk beforehand, they usually objected to sleeping entwined by any more than one and exactly one pair of arms.
This was probably the reason that, when Ganesh began to sleep with Sariel, he probably went just a little bit overboard, most thoroughly entangling the angel in a surfeit of limbs before contentedly drifting off to sleep. He could hardly be chided, angels being such enticing creatures, however, he soon learned that Sariel himself, far from treasuring the ravishing feeling of flesh on flesh, instead only barely tolerated the whole business, given that he was quite literally often unable to escape the enmeshment.
Ganesh regretfully decided, as he was now fated to spend an eternity with his dear angel, that perhaps he oughtn't spend it causing overmuch irritation, and so one night, after bedtime activities were concluded to the satisfaction of all parties, he gave his angel a single kiss and then, without a word, rolled over and left him to his personal space.
He awoke the next morning with the unmistakeable impression that he he either caught a chest cold, or was perhaps in throes of a cardiac event. These fears were allied, however, as soon as he opened his eyes and found the reason for the pressure on his chest was its current occupation by none other than Sariel, who had evidently climbed atop him some time during the night, and was now quite contentedly asleep there, his mouth trailing a strand of saliva onto Ganesh's chest, and sawing angelic wood in a rather ridiculously loud manner.
Ganesh chalked it up to Sariel having had a rather odd dream. As Sariel was wont to do. But then when the same thing happened the next night, and then next, and the next, Ganesh realized he was probably fated to spend eternity in the very close company of angelic snores and saliva.
“It's not as if it's the worst problem ever,” said Lady Raziel, to whom he had just related his tale. Winter was fast approaching in Valhalla, a circumstance Lady Raziel met in her characteristic manner, bedecked in a bikini and stretched out on a beach chair, a tiki drink and some space heaters at her side. Ganesh, who had decided there were worse ways to spend the day than working on his already perfect tan, was similarly attired in fashionable beach wear, on is own comfortable wooden chaise lounge.
“Well, it's not,” admitted Ganesh, taking a small sip of a splendid rum drink – splendid as he had been the one to mix it. “It's just counterintuitive, for one. As you know, your kinsman is not one who favors much bodily contact, unless it is of the X-rated variety.”
“Sariel ain't a hugger.”
“And, well, there is this odd sense of entitlement, as if he owns that expanse of real estate.”
“He does!”
“What the fuck are you guys up to?”
The last comment was from Sariel himself, who was much more seasonably dressed in an overcoat and scarf.
“Hey, wanna go to the library? We could steal pencils,” suggested Raziel.
Sariel grinned despite himself. “Seriously....”
“Final plans for the Naming,” said Raziel.
“You look like you're drinking and bullshitting,” said Sariel, helping himself to Ganesh's drink. “Hey, this is pretty good!”
“That too! We're multitasking!” she grinned. “Want me to grab you a chair?”
“That's OK,” said Sariel, who had already slipped on top of Ganesh, his head on the god's chest.
“Hey! I shall have a Sariel-shaped hole in my perfect tan!” wailed Ganesh.
“What does he say to that?” asked Raziel.
Ganesh sighed. “Already asleep!” he told her.
Raziel frowned. She sat up in her chair and leaned towards Ganesh, tipping back her sunglasses. She appeared to be listening. Then she started laughing and laid back. “Yeah, you're right. And having a great X-rated dream to boot!”
Ganesh may have blushed, but it was difficult to tell, what with his almost perfect tan.
Many years ago....
Charles stopped. He turned around, and, seeing his traveling companions were now some distance back on the path, lit up a cigarette.
The bartender had been correct: the Rev. Wartooth's farm was far out of town. And straight up a mountain. Though it was an annoyance to Charles, between the already high altitude and the elevation gain, his companions both looked on the verge of either throwing up or collapsing, or perhaps both.
“You ams stops for da SMOKES BREAKS?” Skwisgaar gasped when at last he was within shouting distance. Not that he had enough breath left to shout.
“Well, bastards wouldn't let me smoke in the damn bar,” Charles grumbled.
“I don' unnerstand,” said Pickles, when he finally approached. “Yoo ain't even dressed fer a hike!” he concluded, pointing a sweating finger at Charles' dress shoes, now probably ruined with the mud.
“You guys could go back,” Charles allowed.
“Naw, I t'ink we shud be dere,” Pickles puffed, lowering himself onto a rock.
“I ams not knows if we ams makes it backs alone,” worried Skwisgaar, looking down the mountain. It was true – the trail, such as it was, was badly marked. He turned and gazed up the mountain. “Dat place up dere! It ams looks occuspied!”
“How the fuck can you tell that?” asked Charles, squinting under his hand in the direction Skwisgaar was pointing.
“Sometimes, I ams tells dese t'ings,” Skwisgaar shrugged.
Charles scowled over his cigarette. “You guys want me to go up and check?”
“Naw, we'll go wit' yoo,” Pickles puffed. “Jest give us a minnit.” Both the boys definitely seemed uneasy about being left alone. Charles couldn't exactly say he blamed them. He wasn't one to believe in woo-woo stuff like signs and portents, but this just plain seemed like a bad place. He almost longed to go back to that shithole of a town.
The present day....
“Well, this is a pretty sight!” said Wotan, grinning broadly and folding his arms.
“I am pinned beneath a sleeping angel!” wailed Ganesh.
“Wake him up. I have news,” said Wotan.
“Dutch apple!” shouted Raziel.
“What? Huh?” said Charles.
“What kind of news?” asked Ganesh.
“She's on the move.”
“What, now?” said Ganesh.
“Who's she,” muttered Charles.
“My mom,” grumbled Raziel.
“Why the fuck would She do anything now? Before the Naming? That's utterly stupid.”
“That's my mom,” said Raziel.
“Seems like the Fashion Victim thing did ruffle some feathers,” grinned Wotan.
Charles was rubbing the sleep from his eyes. “All the defectors have said the same thing. Then it was worth all the bullshit? I'm not sure Nathan is over it.”
“Toki saide he had a great time,” Raziel said. “Pippi told him they might ask him to the All Stars!”
“But not Nathan?”
“I think he punched one too many people for that.”
“Well, I've warned him.” But Charles smiled nonetheless.
“She has supposedly ordered some kind of retribution,” said Wotan.
“What? Here?” asked Charles. “We'll fucking obliterate Her. Besides,” he yawned, scratching his head, “I don't have any word of troop movements.”
“No,” said Wotan, “I don't expect a full scale attack at this point. She is waiting until we are more vulnerable for that.”
“Uncle,” said Ganesh, “What specifically are we to expect?”
“The unexpected!” said Wotan.
“Like that?” asked Raziel.
They looked up to the strangest flying being ever beheld. It looked like a drunken gooney bird. White wings stretched out over a thick, ungainly body. It was obviously struggling to maintain altitude.
“That's your Dick Knubbler, isn't it?” asked Wotan.
“He's trying to carry William!” said Raziel.
“Why the fuck didn't they take William's car?” asked Charles, who was already up and throwing off his overcoat.
And then there was a small ruffling of the feathers, a splash of white and red mixed.
The ungainly bird stopped struggling and started to dive.
“That was an arrow!” shouted Raziel.
Many years ago....
“Why wud people farm on a feckin' CLIFF!” huffed Pickles.
Charles shrugged. “Why do people live in this piece of shit place anyway.” They had approached the front of the small hut. “You want me to talk to 'em?”
“Yoo don' eggzactly seem like our best ambassador,” grumbled Pickles.
“Dere he ams!” said Skwisgaar, pointing to the tall figure who had appeared on the porch.
“You wanna ask him where to find the Reverend Wartooth?” asked Charles.
“No, dood,” said Pickles. “Dat's him. Dat's da dad!”
Charles looked over to Skwisgaar, who nodded. He took another good look at the black-clad ghoul standing on the porch. “Whoa. OK. Here we go.”
Head held high, he marched up to the porch. “Am I speaking to Rev. Wartooth?” he asked.
The man grunted.
“I have some business with your son,” stated Charles, as Skwisgaar translated.
“He ams says, no on talks to da son,” Skwisgaar told him.
“How about you bring him out, and we decide that?” asked Charles, forcing a smile.
“Hims says, how about you gets lost?”
Charles crossed his arms, smiling and glaring at the same time. “Not without talking to your son,” he stated, gesturing for Skwisgaar to translate.
“He ams says we needs to leaves.”
“Far!”
Charles felt Pickles tugging on his sleeve when a slim boy with long brown hair appeared on the porch.
Rev. Wartooth barked something at the boy. “He ams telling him go back inside,” Skwisgaar whispered. But from the boy's wide-eyed stare, it was fairly clear he had recognized Pickles and Skwisgaar, and no force on earth was going to push him back.
Rev. Wartooth raised a hand, and the boy cringed.
“HEY,” barked Charles. He was no longer smiling, and now both Wartooth men were staring at him. “I just want a calm discussion. Skwisgaar!” Skwisgaar translated. “My boys heard your boy playing guitar the other night.” Rev. Wartooth glowered as Skwisgaar translated. “We like his sound. We'd like to hear more.”
The Reverend was now glaring at the boy. “Guitar ain't da lord's instruments, or somet'ing like dat,” said Skwisgaar, who sounded a little confused.
Charles gestured around the farm. “Rev Wartooth, with all respect, maybe you think this land could stand with some improvements. We could help.”
“He ams says he don't want your money.”
“But maybe the boy wants my money?”
“Hims say no.”
Charles looked between Rev. Wartoothe and the boy. “Skwisgaar, ask the kid if he's over 21.”
Still unspeaking, the boy nodded frantically.
“Well, I guess that makes it his decision, doesn't it?” Charles asked Rev. Wartooth. The boy's eyes darted between his father and Charles. For the first time, a spark of light shown in them.
Rev. Wartooth spoke to the boy again.
“He tells him to go back inside....”
“Yeah, I heard,” said Charles. He turned to the boy. “What's your name?”
The boy paused. A heartbreakingly beautiful smile broke out. “I ams Toki,” he said very quietly, in halting English.
“You like playing guitar, Toki?”
“Oh, ja,” he said, before Skwisgaar had finished translating. “I ams learned da Englishes from da Dethklok songs!”
“Really? You can understand what Nathan is saying?” laughed Charles. Toki nodded, all earnestness. He glanced at his father, and then hopped off the porch, coming closer to Charles.
Rev. Wartooth followed, looming behind like a tall shadow.
“I was telling your dad, these guys liked your guitar playing. A lot.”
Toki didn't answer, but looked like he might faint. Charles wondered how the hell he sneaked a Dethklok CD past the old man.
“What would you think.... About coming away with us? Maybe just for a while.”
Toki gasped, but then his father was in Charles' face. “You needs to leave,” Skwisgaar translated.
Charles smiled up at the taller man. Then he made an elaborate show of pulling out his Marlboros, extracting a smoke, and lighting up.
Rev. Wartooth was looming over Charles, barking at him in Norwegian.
“No smoksing here,” Skwisgaar translated nervously.
Charles' expression darkened. He leaned in, especially so the smoke would puff into Rev. Wartooth's face. “Føkk deg.”
The reverend raised a hand.
There was a cry, and the reverend was on his back, one arm raised, this time not to strike, but to protect himself. A flurry. “Være borte djevelen!” pleaded the reverend.
And then it was gone.
The reverend bolted inside the house, slamming the door behind him, as if the very devil were chasing him.
“Hollee feck,” said Pickles with a low whistle. He looked at Charles.
“Huh. I think this is my department,” said Charles. “You guys stay here.”
“What if dat guys comes outs again?” asked Skwisgaar.
“I dunno. Hit him with the Gibson or something.”
“WHATS?” asked Skwisgaar.
“Aw, it'll be fine. I bet it wouldn't even bow the neck,” said Charles, walking off.
Valhalla, the present day....
The sky was dotted with the attackers: Powers, the class of warrior angels. They sported magnificent gold and green wings. Some were armed with bows and magicked arrows which caught flame in flight. Ahead of them – too far ahead of them – were a flock with flaming swords.
Sariel and Raziel were True Formed, swords in hand.
“You take the left flank,” Wotan told Ganesh. “You two, try to target the ones closest to Dick and William!” There were nods.
Charles took off and immediately batted away an arrow with his sword. Flying and trying to sword fight? This sucked.
There was a cry in the distance. He looked off to where the arrow had been loosed. Some bows had just burst into flames, burning angelic hands. He glanced back to the ground. Ganesh, all concentration, was holding out several hands. And then more cries: Wotan's spear, Gugnir, had hit home, improbably knocking back a column of archers like so many dominoes.
It's up to us now, he thought, nervously eyeing the desperately fleeing Dick Knubbler, who was in his winged Samael form. Samael was definitely bleeding from a wing, though improbably seemed to be holding his glide now. But the green and gold swordsmen were within a blade's distance now.
Raziel has already sailed past Knubbler and Murderface and was striking out with her sword like a whirling dervish, green and gold and red now flashing. Charles considered helping Dick, but decided to slice up a few swordsmen first. He hovered, silver wings at full extent, and being careful to steer clear of Raziel, traced an index finger across the sky. There were surprised cries and a spatter of crimson as his slicing power crippled three of the Powers. Then he gripped his sword two-handed to finish them off one by one.
“Watch out!” He whirled in the air. These guys moved fast, not like the lumbering Seraphim. One had gotten behind him. He got he sword up, but the guy was already ready to strike.
And then the Power screamed as his wings burst into flame. He plunged to earth.
“Whoa,” said Raziel. “Ganesh has gotten really good with that.”
“Can you handle the rest? I might give Dick a hand. William isn't exactly a lightweight.”
“Yeah, go ahead,” said Raziel, gripping her sword and grinning.
There was a very soft twang. The last volley of a Power, before he was impaled on Wotan's spear.
Only one arrow.
But it only took one.
It sliced silently through the air, shot true, into Dick Knubbler's side, knocking the breath out of him.
Knocking him out of True Form.
“SHIT” screamed Charles as he flew, too fast, but too late, towards the plummeting figures.
Too fast, end over end.
And then, something. Billowing out. Like a large, dark parachute.
Wings.
Not an angel: that was readily apparent. Dark, black, leathery. It was even more ungainly than Dick trying to carry Murderface.
It wasn't the most graceful landing, with a thud and a tangle of insanely huge bat wings. It was more of a controlled fall.
“I'm too fucking FAT to do thisch any more!” wailed William Murderface's voice, as the figure flopped onto his ass. A pair of dark, leathery wings fumpfed out beside him. And he was dark now, black faced and yellowy-eyed, as black as the god, Surtr. Dark, like something that had just crawled out of the earth, and not plunged from the sky.
Ganesh was there, gently supporting Dick Knubbler's head while he laid out the wounded producer on the ground.
“How isch he?” the Murderface thing asked Ganesh.
“He is still unconscious, and I would like to get him inside,” said Ganesh, still looking at Dick Knubbler. “But,” he told Murderface, “I believe he will recover. You have definitely saved his life.”
Murderface's blush seemed to spread all the way to his black wingtips.
“Unless I miss my guess,” said Wotan softly, “you are a Draugar, aren't you William?”
“A demon?” asked Charles, who, with Raziel, had just landed nearby.
Wotan nodded.
“And, you guys can't fuck with your body weight, like angels do, can you?” asked Charles.
“No,” huffed Murderface. “Can't do fancshy schit like you guysch.” The eyes blinked, two disks of amber set in the dark, dark face.
“I've never been able to do fancy shit,” Charles laughed. He and Wotan extended hands, and got Murderface, somewhat shakily, to his feet. “Personally, I think I mid-air rescue is pretty fucking fancy.”
Murderface looked back and rattled his magnificent leathery wings, seeming satisfied that they were sound.
Ganesh had scooped Dick Knubbler into his arms. “Would you like to come along, William?”
Murderface nodded, but then signaled to wait. He appeared to concentrate very hard, and then suddenly the wings were gone, the face was fleshy, and he was William Murderface again. And the he followed Ganesh inside.
“A Draugar! I'll be a monkey's uncle!” said Wotan.
“And angel and a demon! THAT'S SO CUTE!” squealed Raziel, who had just landed, blood-stained sword in hand.
Charles just shook his head.
“Did you know?” asked Wotan.
“No. I mean, I suspected. All these years, and I've never seen him True Formed before. Well, not clearly at least. What the hell is a Draugar, anyway?”
“They live in gravesites. Used to be common up in these parts, but not so much in the modern world.”
“So, what the fuck....”
“I think this tale might require a whiskey. Or two,” said Wotan.
Many years ago....
Charles found Toki huddled in back of a broken down outbuilding that looked like a barn.
“That's called a True Form, in case you were wondering,” Charles told him, offering him a cigarette.
Toki waved off the cigarette. He huddled more deeply into his soft, brown-feathered wings.
“My dads. Him ams scared of me. Because I ams da DEMON.”
“Uh, no, actually. You're not a demon,” said Charles, sitting down on a bench and wrapping his coat tightly around him.
“How you ams knows dis?”
“Well, for one, those aren't demon wings.”
“No?” Toki stared at Charles, and then partly extended one of his wings and looked at it. “But dey ams dark!”
“Yes, they can be dark. Demon wings don't have feathers. They're more like bat wings.”
“How you ams knows dis?” asked Toki darkly, now huddling back into the wings. “You ams da demon?”
“Well, some would think that. But no, no I am not a demon,” said Charles.
“You knows da demons?”
“Well, yeah.” This seemed to scare Toki, but Charles pressed on. “I've been around a long time, and I've seen a lot of things.”
Toki looked dubious, but seemed a bit calmer. Curiosity had gotten the better of him. “If I am not da demons, den what am I?”
“Well, to be honest, I'm not really sure. I'm not even sure you should exist. I know this is a personal question, but your mom and dad – mor and far – are they really your parents?”
“Of course dey ams my parents! Dey ams watches over me! Dey keeps me from da devils!”
OK, don't go there, thought Charles. “OK. All right. Do you know how to go back? I mean, to how you were?”
Toki huddled. “You can hits me,” he whispered.
“I don't think we'll do that, OK?” Charles frowned, trying to puzzle out what the fuck he actually did to get back to Court Form. Injury would do it, but no. Not today. “I'm sure something like cold water would work. But how about this? How about you relax?”
“Relaxes?”
Charles wished he had brought along Skwisgaar after all. “Uh. Think of something happy?” Toki blinked, but looked curious. “OK. Close your eyes. Imagine you're playing Skwisgaar's guitar.” I hope to fuck this will work, he thought.
Toki already had a dreamy look in his eye. Charles tried not to smile as he mimed an air guitar.
And then he was just Toki, sitting there, half naked and shivering.
Charles stood up, trying desperately not to look as reluctant as he felt. He took off his overcoat, and handed it to Toki.
To his instant regret, Toki seized the garment, pulling it round himself. Charles pulled his thin suit jacket tighter and sat back down, wishing for all the world he could bring his own wings out at this instance. I really will do anything for Dethklok, he thought with a sigh. As Toki donned the coat, he noted the scars running up and down the boy's back. How often does this guy get upset and True Form, he wondered. And what the hell would they do about it on a fucking tour?
One thing at a time.
“We have a problem,” Charles told him. “And I think you can help us.”
The blue eyes: so bright and trusting. “I ams helps you?” He leaned forward. “Wit da guitars?”
“We need a guitarist. Now, you would have to think about it! Carefully. I don't think you've ever been far from this place before, have you? So, you would need to leave this place, and your Mor and Far....”
“Whens we leaving?”
The present day....
“William, I am sorry to pry, but I didn't know of any Draugar in the New World. I find it amazing!”
Murderface sat looking into his whiskey. He appeared a bit more relaxed, especially after Ganesh, who was off attending to Dick Knubbler, had repeatedly assured him that the producer would wake up presently.
“I'm from middle Europe. Originally,” Murderface explained to Wotan. “Living in scholdier'sch barrowsch, guarding their treasuresch, that kinda thing. I can't exchplain. I guessch I schorta got bored. Anyway, the lascht schentury, there wasch talk of the New World, lotsch of brave warriors fallen. Scho, I hopped on a boat.”
“Over water! For months! That's extraordinary!” said Wotan, sitting back and puffing a cigar.
Raziel, perched on the arm of her husband's overstuffed chair, said, “Lemme guess: the American Civil War?”
“The Schivil War!” grinned Murderface, looking genuinely happy for the first time that day. He actually got a dreamy expression. “And I had the greatescht graveschite.”
“OK, but William, how the hell did you end up with Stella and Thunderbolt?” asked Charles.
Murderface looked dark again. “Condominiumsch! For a schentury, I watched over my scholdier'sch schite with honor! And then they paved it over! In a weekend! The whole fucking thing!”
“Aye. That's the modern world for ye,” sighed Wotan.
“But,” Charles persisted, “William, you are hundreds of years old....”
“I'm not really William Murderfasche,” he admitted. “Asch you've probably guessched.” He drained the whiskey glass and set it down.
“Dead?” said Wotan.
Murderface nodded. “Schee, I was pissched off! And tired of being chasched away. And I wasch just schort of hiding out in a tree schtump, near a field, and here were thesche picnickers. And thisch crying baby. And sche lay him down to schleep, and, well....”
“Crib death?” guessed Raziel.
Murderface nodded. “I hadda think fascht. But I figured, Mom'sch not gonna be happy. What would it hurt, if I schtepped in, had a little rescht for a few decadesch? Let schome asschholesch feed me oatmeal and schit?”
“But they figured it out? Somehow?” Charles asked.
Murderface may have looked vaguely guilty. “He did,” he mused. “To thisch day, I don't know how. I mean, he didn't guessch who I wasch, he wasch juscht a schtupid colonial, but he knew I waschn't hisch. I think it drove him crazschy. Not that it was a long drive.” He scowled.
“William?” Murderface jerked to the sound of Ganesh's voice.
“Someone was asking for you,” grinned Ganesh. “He claims you now owe him two!”
“He owesch me one!” shouted Murderface, who began to run but then skidded to a halt. “Uh, it's OK if I schee him?”
Ganesh waved a couple of arms. “Go right ahead.”
Murderface scampered out of the room. Charles shook his head. He hadn't really been aware until that day that William Murderface was capable of a scamper.
“Ganesh,” asked Charles. “Remember what you told me, about my boys? About Nathan?”
Ganesh looked thoughtful. He sat down on the couch next to Charles, kicking off his shoes, curling into the lotus position. “That Nathan is some kind of … focus?”
“This can't leave this room!” Charles warned everyone. “I told you, Murderface, all the years I've known him, that's the first I've seen his True Form. Years! And there's another thing.” He held onto the rim of his whiskey glass and twisted it, as if he were trying to screw it into the coffee table. “Toki.”
“What about Toki?” asked Raziel.
“You're around him a lot, Raziel. Have you ever seen anything that would make you suspect … that's not his only Form?”
Raziel appeared truly surprised. “No. I mean, he's obviously magical somehow. But, no.”
“When he first joined the band, when we first found him.... He True Formed.”
“WHAT?” said Raziel.
“And you're not surprised,” Charles told Ganesh.
Ganesh frowned. “You angels – you have a different magic than ours. It's....” He rippled some fingers. “It is difficult to explain. It is in a different spectrum.”
“He's like me and Raziel?” Charles asked. Ganesh looked around. “Ganesh, this is fucking important, or I wouldn't be asking you. She's trying to kill us. I know you don't wanna talk about what you see....”
“He is not like you and Raziel,” said Ganesh. “He is not as bloody powerful for one thing. And, I don't sense any earth god magic.”
“Power,” said Charles. “More or less than a Cherub?”
Ganesh pushed his hair out of his eyes. It fell back. “More.”
“Damn,” said Charles. “Blows that theory.”
“What theory was that?” asked Wotan.
“We know you can't have ones like me or Seraphim trying to mate with humans – you get monsters. But I've been wondering lately.... There's actually not a few of the lower orders around.”
“Ah! Some interbreeding!” said Wotan
“But Toki's more powerful than a lower order....”
“You don't breed horses, do you?” laughed Wotan.
“Uh, what the hell does that have to do with this?”
“You don't always want a thoroughbred! You know my Sleipnir! You know he is part horse, and part god!”
“Yes,” said Ganesh. “My brother ended up with very little power. But Skwisgaar....” He trailed off.
“As much as me?” asked Wotan.
“Maybe more. Yes,” breathed Ganesh.
“Whoa,” said Charles.
“This is strictly between us four,” Ganesh urged. “Your four boys, I am astounded at the power. They are obviously, not completely human....”
“I've never heard before of a Draugar who could take a three month sea voyage!” said Wotan. “That is extraordinary!”
“And that's back to what you told me Ganesh,” said Charles. “When we met Toki, I got the impression he had no control over True Forming. He got pissed off at his dad, in front of us, and went winged!”
“He literally got wingy?” laughed Raziel.
“Yeah!”
“Perhaps it was due to being removed from the company of his parents,” said Ganesh. “But go on....”
“Look, Ganesh, you unhook extra arms to open a jar of peanut butter.”
“Well,” smiled Ganesh, “not that I eat peanut butter....”
“No, but I mean, you go back and forth to your godly Form. But the boys....”
“Oh!” said Ganesh. “They don't bother? Or, you are saying that they can't, somehow?”
“You think Nathan sucks out all their power?” asked Raziel. “Cool!”
“More or less,” said Charles, although he had to admit, it sounded sort of stupid when Raziel said it.
“So he's like Rogue!”
“Well, not completely like Rogue. Uh. He just borrows it. I think.”
“Who is this Rogue person?” Wotan asked Raziel.
“Uh, she's a comic book character,” Charles told him.
“She's got a really cool white streak in her hair!” said Raziel. “Hey, I should do that!”
“It would only come out when you True Form,” Charles reminded her.
“Well, yeah. But, maybe Nathan should do it!”
“Yeah, I'll tell him you said that,” Charles laughed.
“He works by literally taking power away from the other four?” asked Ganesh. “That makes sense.”
“How so?”
“The magic. It is normally human magic around him, but it can be all kinds: human, earth god, angelic … demon. And, some with which I am not familiar.”
“Wait. There's more?” asked Charles.
“Miscellaneous magic!” said Raziel.
Wotan roared with laughter, and waved the whiskey decanter at Charles. “I think you need a refill my friend!” he said.
Charles sighed, rubbed his forehead, and held out his glass.
Many years ago....
All of Toki's worldly possessions, as it turned out, fit in a rather small, well-worn rucksack, which was now sitting at his feet on the deck of the run-down ferry.
He was leaning on the rail, chatting intensely about something with Pickles.
Charles pulled his overcoat tightly around him against the chill wind. He had been very grateful to find out that one of Toki's few possessions was in fact his very own overcoat. He felt in the pocket for his pack of smokes. Yes, one left.
“You should ams not smokes so much,” Skwisgaar chided before he'd even gotten the damned thing lit. It was surprising: Charles had expected Toki and Skwisgaar, with their shared background and language, to bond, but the two had spent a considerable chunk of the walk back quibbling about something, and now the young guitarist seemed to have taken a shine to the incredibly worldly Pickles.
“I'll quit tomorrow,” Charles told Skwisgaar. He waved the cigarette at Pickles and Toki. “What are those two going on about?”
“I ams not know. Pickle ams tooks up da gee-tar and left home when he was a kid. Maybe dey talk about dat?”
“Oh. Yeah.” Charles luxuriated in the feeling of warm smoke filling his lungs. “So, that's your guy?”
“Him ams your guy too now.” Skwisgaar looked up momentarily from plucking strings.
“That's true I guess.”
Skwisgaar went back to his guitar. Curious, Charles wandered over to where Pickles and Toki were conferring.
Pickles looked up. “Charles, who's da hottest comic chick?” he asked.
“Uh.”
“I say it's gahtta be da Catwoman, but Toki likes Power Gurl.”
“She ams hots!” Toki attested.
Charles looked between two anxious sets of eyes. “Rogue,” he decided.
“Oh, yeah, she ams hots!”
“Wut?” said Pickles. “Nawt her!”
“Why not?” asked Charles.
“Yoo can't touch her!” protested Pickles. “Cuz, she'll suck yoo dry.”
“Well, that's why,” said Charles, leaning his arms on the rusting railing. “You can't touch her. There's that air of mystery,” he said, wagging his cigarette.
“Yoo want wut yoo can't have?”
“Maybe.”
“Dat's weird, dood.”
They stood together in silence for a moment, watching the sun set across the dark Scandanavian winter sky.