Fallen · Tower · Los · Angeles

From the Journal of Missus Miller, Free Council  Emissary of the Path of Moros

Monday, February 28, 2005

My sleep is black and blank.  Is this what it’s like for the resting dead? 

That thought reminds me that I’m still alive.  That wakes me.   

I roll over and open my eyes.  I’m not in my own room.  I’m somewhere else.  Dirty clothes and sneakers litter the floor.  An Abbey Road poster hangs on the wall.  I’m at Austin’s.  That’s right.  I came here last night.

Locke is dead.   Nicodemus was murdered.  It hits me again, the enormity of it.  Nicodemus lured to the Magic Castle and killed.  Locke fought to protect Reinata from the vampire, only to die.  It’s already too much.  I shake and pinch my eyes shut.  Locke loved me.  Ian cannot rest and now his ghost is missing.  Cassandra floating down from the dark.  Howls and blood.  Gunfire.  Arctos’ body wrapped in a shower curtain.  Josiah in a car with his throat slit.  Wally’s body dead and bound on the floor of the closet.

The raw pain is too much.  I can’t catch my breath.  I dry heave and shudder and the tears come out of me.  It’s too much.  It’s too much.  It’s too much.

 

Around noon I go into the living room where Austin is playing video games.  I’ve pulled myself together.  I’ve showered.  I’m putting one foot in front of the other.  I have things to do.  I have to call Vigiles and find out what’s going on.  I have to think and I have to be ready for Valentine.  I have so much to do.

“Hey,” Austin says, looking up at me.  He’s bare foot in sweat pants and a tank top. 

“Thanks for letting me stay here,” I reply.

He pauses his game.

“Are you okay?” he asks.

“I’m better.”

“I think we should talk.”  He moves over, making room for me on the couch.

“Why don’t we go get brunch?” I suggest.

“We can eat here.  I’ve got frozen waffles and a couple eggs.”

“No, I should take you out.”

“Look,” he says, catching my eyes with his, “I know how this goes.  If we go out then you shut down and we don’t talk about anything that matters.  Because that’s what girls like you do when you’re in public.”

“Girls like me?” I know it’s a mistake, but I can’t avoid the bait.

“Girls who are strong, who don’t cry in public.”

“Of course I’m not going to cry in public.  I’m not that much of a mess.”

“Jaya the way you fell apart when you got her last night, well, no offense, but you are that much of a mess.”

I sit down beside him.

“Jaya, what happened?”

“Look, a couple friends of mine died and it really shook me up.”

“So tell me about it.”

I pause, then realize I’m biting my lip.  I want to tell him the truth, but I can’t.

“Look I know why you’re here.  You, like most women I know, are like an onion.  You’ve got layers and layers and if you ever want to get to the heart of something all that stuff has got to get peeled away.  And women like me because I’m not like that.  What you see is what you get.”

“It sounds like I’m not the first girl you’ve found crying on your doorstep.”

“Nope.  I’m a bartender, remember.  I am the default shoulder to cry on/rebound guy.  And I don’t mind because I get a lot of crazy, need-to-feel-alive, something-to-prove sex out of it.”

I frown at him.  He smiles.

“Hey, you’re a friend so I’m here for you no strings attached.  Nothing happened last night.  But I’m just saying, that’s normally how it goes.  It’s gone that way with us in the past.”

I can’t deny that.

“So tell me what happened,” he persists. 

I remember how sick with tears I was last night, how when I tried to speak, I just vomited outside his door and then I couldn’t talk because of how hard I was crying.  I have to find the road between the truth and avoidance.  I have to let him in to some of it.

“Do you remember a while back, when I told you that Ian died?”

“Yeah.”

That’s when I came here needing to feel alive.  After all the insanity with the Cult of Mali and those mutilated children and seeing zombies and werewolves and awakening as a mage, I came to Austin.  I needed something normal to hold onto, I needed something simple and comforting.  I only told Austin about Ian and Wally, that they were both dead.  And things kind of went their own way from there.

“Well, a lot of things changed for me then.  Not just with losing Ian, but the way I saw the world changed.”  I pause.  How do I say this?  “Do you remember why I first quit the P.I. business?”

“Yeah, you didn’t like guns.”  It’s a little touching that he remembers.  It means that he was paying attention even back then, when he was with Maggie. 

“Right.  Well, there’s something I didn’t tell you about what happened to Ian and Wally.  They were both murdered.  By the same man.  This cultist who called himself Brother Malachi.

“Ian had been missing a couple weeks already and I didn’t know what to do.  Then Wally called me up.  He asked me to help him on a case and I said I would if he would help me find Ian.  He agreed.  I went to his office and started reading up on the case.  It was a nasty one.  There were all these kids who had gone missing.  Most of them were runaways who had ended up here in L.A. and then they disappeared.  The kids who the police had found were dead.  It was pretty grisly.  Pairs of children were turning up with their insides torn out, like some sort of ritual sacrifice.”

Austin nods.  He’s a little pale.  He’s handsome and a charmer.  I know he’s heard it all before but he’s never heard a story like this.

“Pretty soon it became clear that something had happened to Wally.  He wasn’t answering my calls or coming back to his office.  I met these two guys, one of whom was a cop, and they helped me on the case.  We figured out that this guy, Brother Malachi, was somehow involved.  He had set up a cult here in L.A. that preyed on young people and kids.  Eventually we tracked him down.  We took down his top guys but he got away.”

I feel no pride in this.  It was a triumph tainted with so much loss.  It stripped me of so many illusions, of my sense of safety.

“What I found out as we were sorting through the aftermath is that this guy, Brother Malachi, had been keeping tabs on me.  This started before Wally called me in.  He was the one who kidnapped Ian and eventually killed him.  He had all this information about my family tree, tracking back hundreds of years.  Wally had found out some of this and I think that’s why he got as involved in the case as he did.  Because this psychofuck had some sort of plan that involved me.  And before I was able to stop him, Malachi killed Ian and then he killed Wally.”

I reach into my courier bag and pull out my .357 Magnum.  I set it on the coffee table.  Austin’s eyes widen. 

“I’ve carried this with me ever since.  Everywhere I go.  And I’m damned good with it.”  I look at my gun.  “I used to be afraid of these things because they can kill people.  But now it’s just an everyday thing to me. 

“You know that Wally left me the agency.  Oh, his partner, this guy named Greg, he had been working for Brother Malachi it turned out and he tried to kill me.  My friend, the cop, killed Greg in defense.  So, when Wally’s will was read, the agency was all mine.  I thought about just closing the business down, but after what I’d been through, after seeing just how dark the world can be, and knowing that this Malachi shitbag was still out there, I wanted to make a difference.  I wanted to protect people.  I wanted to shine some light into the darkness and drive it off.  So I asked Guzman and Jim, the two guys who had helped me on the case, if they wanted to be my partners in the agency and they agreed.

“Business was thin for a little while there, but we found our niche.  Unfortunately, our niche turned out to be the really fucked up stuff.  Creepy old books getting stolen by biker gangs, teenagers playing at magic and murdering their friends, grave robbers.  The LAPD even started hiring us to solve some of the freakier cases they came across.  And time and again we came across the name Brother Malachi.  There was this one case where these two cheerleaders had gone missing in one of those little towns in the mountains.  We found the cabin where they were being held and it turned out that the guy behind it all was a protégée of Malachi.  I killed that guy.  I shot him in the head as he was trying to kill one of my friends.”

I stare down at my gun.  For all my magic, I have no power to match it.  Without my gun I would be powerful, but I would not be lethal. 

“So, along the way I’ve made a lot of friends.  There’s this old guy who owns a bookstore who has helped me out a few times.  And there’s this other guy, Locke, who has worked with us as sort of an occult consultant.  And there’s this whole network of psychics and mediums I’ve met.  They’re not all my friends, but they were generally good people, working in their own way to make the world better.  But Locke, and the bookseller, they were my friends.”

I take a deep breath.

“A couple days ago Locke sent me a text message that read HELP.  I went over to his place and found him nailed to his living room wall.  Literally nailed, with these big spikes though his hands and feet, the sort they used for railroad tracks.  There was a note from Malachi.  Pay backs a bitch, it said.  Locke was still alive and we got him down okay.  But the next day I found the bookseller dead.  Then I found out that a couple of the psychics I knew had been murdered in their home.  I drove by my house and there was someone waiting for me outside.  It was Malachi again, with some psychofuck delusional plan and a grudge against me.

“We realized that Malachi must have an inside man, someone who helped him lure these psychics to their deaths, and I had a hunch who it might be.  When we confronted that guy, he got away and then blew up his own house to cover his trail.  Luckily, we escaped with some clues.  Then a gang of thugs showed up to try to get back what we’d taken.  While my partners and I were busy defending our safe house, one of the thugs broke into the back and killed Locke who was defending my partner’s sister.”

I have to stop here.  Who knew that I had any more tears in me?  But this is more controlled.  Just a few tears and a lump in my throat.  Austin waits for me to go on.

“Then last night we found Malachi.  And I shot him dead.  After all the things he’s done, all the people he’s lied to and manipulated and killed, I stopped him.  With this gun.  I killed him.”

I haven’t been looking at Austin, not for a while at least.  But I turn and look him in the eyes now.

“He took Ian from me and Wally and Nicodemus and Locke.  He’s the one who pulled me into this world of cultists and murders and little kids getting torn up by people who think it’ll give them power.  He’s the reason I quit my job at the library.  He’s the reason I’ve been carrying this gun all this time.

“Now that he’s gone… it doesn’t put anything back the way it was.  All I’ve got now is more people to mourn, more problems to face, and more things to try to set right.  And honestly, Austin, I don’t know if I can face it anymore.  I don’t know if I can face any of it.”

Austin leans back into the couch and looks at me for a long minute.

“Fuck.”  He shakes his head.  “Okay, we can go out for brunch.”

I laugh.  It’s a little hollow.  He must think I’m lying or I’m out of my mind.  But once we’re out on the sidewalk, he takes my hand and talks as we’re walking.

“When Sylvia died, that was weird shit.  Did you guys look into that?”

“Yeah.  And we made sure those people won’t hurt anyone else again.”

He nods. 

“So, Jaya, if you’ve got these two partners and these new friends, why did you come to me?”

“Because you’re not a part of it all.  Everyone in my life these days is part of this world of dark things and secrets.  And last night I just needed to connect with something normal and sane.”

He laughs.

“Straight forward, yes, but normal and sane are not the words most girls use to describe me.”

“Well, now you understand that I have a slightly twisted point of reference.”

We walk for a little while.

 “Are we going to do that thing we did last time?”

“You mean hanging out for a while when I’m sad and cry-y and then I drop off the face of the map?”

“Actually I was thinking about that having sex thing we had going on for a while last year.”

“Probably not.” 

“Well I had to ask.”

I stop and turn to him.

“I wish I could just get my old life back.  I wish I could forget the last year and go back to how simple things used to be.”

“You can’t forget, but does that really mean you can’t walk away from it?”

 “Not right now.  I’m in too deep.  There are too many things left half done.”

            “Well, I hate to be the one to tell you this, but sometimes the deep stuff only gets deeper and the only way out is to turn around and go out the way you came.”

By now we’re walking up the driveway to Hugo’s.  I nod and once we’re seated I change the subject.  I ask him about work and he tells me about a celebrity party he worked and how he ended up going home with some actress I’ve never heard of and then the whole time she wanted him to call her some other actress’ name, some old actress from back in the 40s.  I listen, but in the back of my head I keep thinking about how I got here, the path I took, and if it is possible for me to follow that path back out the way I came.

Saturday, February 26, sometime around 8PM
(last night of the Full Moon)
As the group gathers and begins to decipher the disc containing the ritual to reincarnate Mali, the group plans their next move.
Using their laptop computers, the group engages in indepth research on the Librum Necrenegrum, looking for any clues to either stopping the ritual (if it has not started) or destroying the Acamoth demon Mali (if the ritual has succeeded).

After spending nearly 2 hours perusing the disc, Ms. Miller uncovers a strange passage, "she can be destroyed if an athame fashioned of purest coral, sanctified by the blood of an innocent, is plunged into her breast."

Later, around midnight, they all gather around the Toll House Cookie shop at Hollywood & Highland. Lake parks the Dolphin in a parking lot behind the El Capitan Theatre, Eleni, the Alpha of the Three Sisters, agrees to stay in the RV in case anyone needs her ritual healing abilities. Ms. Miller meets with Vigiles, (who is invisible) near the front of the Gap clothing store. He tells her that the Illuminated Pentad made their sanctum atop Hollywood First National Bank Tower, right across the street. A few minutes later, (with Vigiles now visible), they look for an entrance into the abandoned bank tower. They find it through the alley behind the building, Jim using one of his werewolf gifts to warp and twist the metal of the glass door apart (after scrutinizing it for magical or other security protections).  They enter the ground floor to find it completely dark. A hallway connecting to the front lobby separates into 4 old elevators, each bearing a human figure emblazoned with an Atlantean symbol. Vigiles and Ms. Miller recognize them, two are female bearing the symbols of the Path of Obrimos, one is male bearing the skull coin and crown of the Moros and the last is a male with the book and antlers of the Thyrsus.

Once they figure how to open the elevator door open, the see a row of unnumbered bottons (12 of them). They also notice a card swipe next to it. John uses the black plastic card which activates the elevator car. They all rise to the 13th floor. As the doors open they are greeted by a large octagonal room with marble tiled floors and walls. The ceiling has an octagonal opening which opens into a balcony and above that a high copula dome. Windows filter some of the lights from the streets outside, but on the whole the large room is cold and dark. They begin to disperse, John and Lake staying close to the elevator entrance, Guzman and Jim taking point, shifting into urshul and dalu respectively. Reinata, Lilah and Erasmus flank the group in case of attack. The mages of the group then begin to use their various mage sights to scrutinize the apparently empty room.
As the group scans the darkenss they begin to see and hear gibbering animals in the balcony above. Then suddenly two dark shapes land atop Reinata and Lake; rabid babboons who's minds have been warped by Malachi.

As the melee ensues with the rabid babboons, Guzman and a few others see a white robed figure begin to float from the dome of the copula, slowly levitating. Sensing danger, Guzman leaps using one of his spirit gifts; jumping more than 18 feet into the air to claw and bite the figure. His bite hits the floating figure's leg, tearing it off in a fountain of arterial blood, driving him into death-rage. He lands, his 800lb bulk breaking the stone and marble tiles as he lands in his gauru war form, his torso and muzzle covered in blood. He howls in bloodlust.

Lake, using forces magics, makes the candles in the chandelier burn brighter to reveal that the floating body was Cassandra, mage of the Adamantine Arrow and a Sentinel of the consilium.

A second later the body drops. In silent spasms Cassandra dies... 

More baboons attack, jumping from above, seemingly under the control of someone...

Then another shape is seen above, on the balcony appears Thanatos, holding a pair of lead forceps, his face impassive and devoid of emotion.  Guzman, in his rage leaps, crashing through the stone railing and attacking Thanatos.

Then Reinata, shifting into urshul form leaps to attack her comrades. Lake detects a strong mental influence on her and traces it to the back of the room, near the wall opposite. He also mentally alerts Jim that the illusionist may be hiding and tells him where to find him.

Back on the balcony, Thanatos uses powerful death magics to weaken Guzman, who's strenght is sapped to that of a weak child. Nevertheless, he tries to grapple the necromancer in his death rage. Below, Vigiles runs to the edge of the balcony, using life magic to shift into the form of a large black panther, leaping up and landing near the battling pair.  John, also using life magic, controls one of the rampaging baboon to attack Thanatos. Together with Guzman, Vigiles in his panther form take down Thanatos just as he is about to use death to shift into Twilight to escape. Even while he is weakened by the necromancer's spell, Guzman continues to try to grapple Thanatos. Vigiles claws at the mage and together with Guzman take him down, however, at this point Guzman shifts his rage to the Thyrsus mage who must now try to defend himself while at the same time trying to keep Guzman from killing Thanatos.

Below, Erasmus and Jim, along with Lilah and Ms. Miller begin to look for the form of Malachi. Jim finds him first and in seconds the cult leader reveals himself to everyone. Jim shifts into gauru form, attacking the illusionist with all his fury as Ms. Miller aims and shoots her .357 Magnum. Erasmus, shifting to gauru, also joins the fray.  However, just as Jim is about to attack the magus, he assaults his mind, siphoning away all his willpower and reducing him to a whimpering and crying victim.

On the balcony above Guzman has managed to reign in his beserker rage, shifting to hishu. Vigiles, after dispatching the last remaining baboon, also re-assumes his human form begins to bind and gag the necromancer. Lake and John continue to use their magics to counterspell those of Malachi and Thanatos...

Pumping rounds from her heavy revolver, Ms. Miller suddenly drops her firearm as Malachi invades her mind with visions of horror, forcing her to scream, running away towards the only visible elevator. However, Erasmus, not to be deterred, begins attacking Malachi. Malachi screams triumph, calling in Latin to his demon mistress as he uses his mana to heal his pattern, healing some of the bullet wounds and injuries from the werewolves.

At this point, Reinata turns to attack Lilah, having shifted into her urshul form and as Lilah shifts into her gauru form to attack the illusioinst. However, having taken over Reinata's mind, Malachi uses her to divert Lilah's gauru fury away from him. Sensing imminent triumph, Malachi continues his mental assults on Jim and Ms. Miller, as he is also controlling Reinata. But just as he tries to invade the mind of Erasmus with visions of terror from his mistresses realm, John counterspells the effects allowing the enraged Erasmus to tear Malachi apart, disembowelling him with fangs and claws.  This releases Ms. Miller and Jim, who now turn to attack the fallen magus. However, sensing defeat and crying to Mali, Malachi forces a suicidal thought into Reinata's mind. As the illusionist begins his final death-throes, Lake senses that Reinata's mind is clouded as she leaps above him, falling into the open elevator shaft, plunging to her apparent death. Ms. Miller, using the darkness she'd summoned previously, uses it to slow Reinata's urshul wolf form as she plunges 12 floors to the elevator now on the ground floor. They hear a pained wolf howl as Reinata hits the floor, almost at death's door.

A few seconds later, as they are able to return the elevator to the 13th floor, John uses his life magics to stabilize Reinata, whos body is broken and twisted from the fall. Guzman and Erasmus begin to remove the eyes from all their kills, even Cassandra, as mandated by their Ravens totem. They search and scour the abandoned sanctum, finding various objects of value but otherwise finding no further presence from Malachi or his cult. Vigiles decides to take Thanatos to stand trial before the consilium, admonishing the remaining mages that he may need to call on them for testimony, including the werewolves. As the scene closes; however, a dark gleam clouds Reinata's eyes, turning them completely black then back to normal...

Finis (for now)

 

Saturday, February the 26, Sometime around 3AM,
(4th Day of the Full Moon)
The group gathers after Jim blows up Thanatos' home (Jim had staying behind to do the deed then leaves to head to Griffith Park).
As the others leave a group of ghostly shades attack the vehicles, using their powers (numina) to blow out the tires of Guzman's Black Escalade. As they weave down Mulholland Canyon they come to a stop to prevent veering off the winding roads.

John, using his shamanic spirit magic, anoints Erasmus' bowie knife, as they exit their vehicles, they notice that the ghostly shades have now vanished into the darkness. Guzman decides to leave his vehicle behind (and have it towed later). He, along with Erasmus, Lilah and Reinata shapeshift to urhan wolf form and agree to meet the others later in the day after they get some much needed sleep...

Despite being exhausted, Ms. Miller, along with the gypsy Lake Charles and John Smith the shaman all head downtown to No. 515 Bradbury, Nicodemus' antique book shop. When they arrive Miller uses her Grim Sight, but does not see any shades as she noticed the day before. They agree it may be safe to go up to his office to investigate the message sent to them by Linus, Nicodemus' peregrine falcon familiar. They enter the historic building and go up to the office. As Ms. Miller attempts to pick the lock open she is blown back by a powerful electrical blast coming from a mystic sigil on the door (which they did not see and only appeared when the warding spell was triggered). Her thoughts racing, Miller decides to trace the three Atlantean runes that were written on the small piece of paper that Linus had delivered. But before she does that, John suggests that he should speak to the spirit of the door to see if there are any other mystic safeguards they should know of. Awakening the spirit, John translates that "only those who trace the keys upon my face may enter." Using some chalk, she traces the three runes on the surface of the door and they hear audibly as the door's lock opens. They enter. Rows upon rows of bookshelves line the walls almost 12 feet. An antique iron railing circles the bookshelves about midway with a sliding step ladder that can be moved along the wall on casters. 

They investigate what appears to Nicodemus' sanctum, only to discover the small peregrine falcon, Linus, perched near the window in the office. John and Lake communicate with Linus, who tells them that he was to return after delivering his message to Jaya. He also tells them that he senses that his master is no longer alive in the fallen world. They decide to spend the night and peruse some of the texts in the library. Jaya uses one in particular to use Fate magic to clue her as to then next step.

That evening, they all gather, the GPA's, the mages and their allies, at the ranch house in Silver Lake. Using Mage Sight, John ascertains that the plastic card is ensorcelled as is the watch. Also, Miller, using her PI investigative skills deciphers the coded missive and discovers that it uses the Masonic cipher to spell out Malachi’s true name.  Using her computer hacking skills, Reinata decodes the stolen CDROM disc, which is a complete English translation of the Librum Necrenegrum and highlights a particular ritual to “bring Mali, the Thousand-fold Emanation” to the fallen world of man. This ancient ritual also asks for the souls of 3 awakened magi.  As they are strategizing their plan they see a thick mist coming in from the roadway beyond, 5 silhouettes appear in the darkened mist. Guzman and Miller recognize the vampire pack that they had fought a month before. The fray is entered by all and they emerge victorious; however, one of the vampires slays Locke after mortally wounding and severing his leg.  

"And he caused his children to pass through the fire in the valley of the son of Hinnom: also he observed times, and used enchantments, and used witchcraft, and dealt with a familiar spirit, and with wizards: he wrought much evil in the sight of the LORD, to provoke him to anger."

-2 Chronicles 33:6


Self proclaimed leader of the Children of Mali, the Brother Malachi is an enigmatic figure. Few know of his whereabouts and fewer know his real name or identity. He goes by many names, Nix, Illusionist and the Puritan. A charismatic, terrifying, powerful and Banisher magus, he seems to commands the powers of Mind, illusion and to control wild animals (a pet baboon and a snake). Rumored to have given himself over to the Abyss. He has promised his followers that death is an illusion. Has been on the FBI's most wanted list, but he and his cult continue to elude the authorities and local police in many states.

Some of his followers have been driven insane by their apocalyptic leader. They drink blood, carve sigils on their bodies, perform masochistic rites and other sexual debauchery. The cult mostly recruits impresionable young runaways, criminals and delinquents--all totally devoted to their master, body and soul.