Everything has been said before Nothing left to say anymore When it's all the same you can ask for it by name Babble babble, bitch bitch, rebel rebel, party party Sex sex sex and don't forget the violence Blah blah blah, got your lovey dovey sad and lonely Stick your stupid slogan in, everybody sing along Are you motherfuckers ready for the new shit? Stand up and admit tomorrow's never coming This is the new shit, stand up and admit Do we need it? NO. Do we want it? YEAH This is the new shit Stand up and admit Babble babble, bitch bitch, rebel rebel, party party Sex sex sex and don't forget the violence Blah blah blah, got your lovey dovey sad and lonely Stick your stupid slogan in, everybody sing along Everything has been said before Nothing left to say anymore When it's all the same you can ask for it by name Are you motherfuckers ready for the new shit? Stand up and admit tomorrow's never coming This is the new shit, stand up and admit Do we need it? NO. Do we want it? YEAH This is the new shit Stand up and admit Now it's you know who I got the you know what I'll stick it you know where You know why, you don't care Babble babble, bitch bitch, rebel rebel, party party Sex sex sex and don't forget the violence Blah blah blah, got your lovey dovey sad and lonely Stick your stupid slogan in, everybody sing along Are you motherfuckers ready for the new shit? Stand up and admit tomorrow's never coming This is the new shit, stand up and admit Do we need it? NO. Do we want it? YEAH This is the new shit Stand up and admit Let us We're entertaining you
Having paid the minimum price at the port in Asphodel, Non-Lux finds himself floating in a river. He makes his way to the shore and into the city in search of the mortal who is soon to Become, hoping that he can find her and educate her. He has only the name, Gene Simmons. He finds a phone booth and looks her up, calling the homes with the last name Simmons. He eventually finds one where a Gene lives, but she is currently at school. He manages to figure out which school, and sets off for it.
Gene is having a bad day. Or at least, a strange one. All day, she has walked about, and she has known exactly what everyone is feeling, even to the point of feeling it herself. This level of empathy is utterly alien to her, and it is unnerving. She manages to get through the theatrical performance for the senior citizens, all the while simply relishing the thought of going home and sleeping until the day was over. The play, at least, is enjoyable, featuring an opening in which she sings solo. When the day ends, she gets into her father�s limo and he reminds her that she will perform again tonight, at a gathering of all of his politician friends. She sighs and prays for at least a few hours rest.
Anachrion, wings folded about his shoulders under his clothing, steps into Earth, immediately disliking it for it�s feeling of mere imitation of the reality that is Kashmir. Nonetheless, he has a job to do. That job is to find the one named Yessenia and watch her and protect her and study her and find out why a Created, one of the most powerful beings in existence, has aligned against her. The May Queen�s truth fills him and he senses where she is. He makes his way to an apartment building and sits in the coffee shop across the street. He watches, he waits. Finally, night falls.
Yessenia emerges from her building, ready to hunt and kill. She hops on her motorcycle and rides. Anachrion steals a run-down truck and follows her in it. They drive, and drive, leaving town, into the surrounding forest. They drive for well over two hours into the forest until Yessenia hears commotion at the campsite ahead, and hides her bike in the woods. Anachrion also stops and proceeds after her on foot. When she makes her way into the woods, sneaking near the campsite, she sees what she didn�t expect.
There are at least one hundred of them. Great big burly bikers. A plethora of Harley Davidsons are parked nearby. The bikers, mostly male, are partying, drinking, fighting, raucous and disorderly. Yessenia is confused. She knows that she was certainly not sent to kill a biker. It makes sense, though, when she sees in the mass a man looking very out of place. He has pale skin, long dark hair, and is wearing a cloak. She can tell already, he is a Forsaken. He is her target. She reasons that he is among these bikers because he has convinced them to give up their lives for him. She will have to kill a great deal of them before getting to him. She takes out her poisons, the powders she carries, and disguises herself as a female biker. She then heads into the group.
Anachrion watches as she makes her way amongst them. Stopping at a table long enough to say merely a few words as she gracefully slides about, dropping the powder into their drinks. He watches while she slips the poison into everything she can. One man grabs her by the ass and wants to take her to his tent. She poisons him quickly and he drops. Anachrion, though, realizes that a man has noticed her. He is moving to stop her. Anachrion quickly makes his way into the group and knocks out the would-be attacker.
Yessenia doesn�t stop, but continues with a merciless efficiency, poisoning drink after drink, flirting as she does so. Finally, when suspicion is growing, and another man attempts to seduce her, she follows him to his tent. Anachrion notices two more armed men moving for her, and he manages to subdue them both. Yessenia, once alone with the biker, quickly dispatches him. She looks out of the tent to realize that more than half of the bikers are dead or dropping dead, but her target, the Forsaken named Glass, is nowhere to be seen.
She rushes out and hears bikers discussing that Glass has gone down to the river. She rushes into the woods and to the sound of water. She looks and sees, standing knee deep in water, Glass, holding a SilverWing, and looking very confused and frustrated. She aims her automatic pistol, but can only let off a few panicked shots as he whips into motion and flies past her up the hill, back to the campsite. She pursues, and by now Anachrion has decided to head back for the woods closer to the road, to hide. Glass, though, doesn�t see simply a man leaving, he sees a Blessed, and looses from his hands two Abyss Silver daggers which dig into Anachrion�s wings. Pain flames through them and the Blessed wails. Yessenia uses her shadow power to get close to Glass, but not close enough to stop him before he leaps atop a Harley and drives off onto the road. She gets onto another and chases him.
Anachrion knows he has no time to waste, and with all his nerve, rips the blades out of his wings and throws them down. He then rushes to take a motorcycle and give chase. By now, Yessenia is far ahead of him, and Glass far ahead of her. Yessenia, though, pulls up a shadow and drives through it, emerging from another very close to Glass. As they speed down the road, their swords clash. Glass is wounded, and the air is alive with the scent of Forsaken blood. Finally, though, Glass slices apart Yessenia�s front tire and she flies to a graceful landing on the ground. She sees that soon ahead, the road bends into a wide U-turn. She means to head Glass off and rushes into the woods. Anachrion continues his pursuit of Glass.
Glass realizes he is being followed, and as the road straightens out, he takes his hands off of the bars and stands up on the seat, now driving telekinetically. He pivots to face Anachrion even as the vehicle continues straight on, and fires with twin Abyss weapons. Anachrion�s Blessed senses come alive and he sees before him hundreds of rips and fractures in reality littering the air. He deftly drives his motorcycle amidst them, but loses ground, and by the time Glass is done firing, he has nearly lost his target.
Yessenia, though, using her shadowplay again, is ahead of him, emerging from the forest and making her way into a cemetery, directly in Glass�s path. As he comes, she unloads her pistol at him and destroys his motorcycle, but he flies at her and cuts her down with his sword before charging straight into a crypt. Anachrion arrives and drives straight for the slamming door of the crypt. He tears the door open and enters to find� nothing. An empty crypt. Glass is gone.
Non-Lux has learned patience. He was patient enough to merely follow the limo that Gene entered. He is patient enough to wait outside her house while she sleeps and eventually dresses before emerging with her father to go to the performance. He is patient enough to follow again to the hall. Gene enters and mingles with the people who will speak to her as her father leaves to speak with politicians and veritable aristocrats. She sighs, the show will begin soon.
Yessenia and Anachrion, having thoroughly established that Glass is gone, finally speak. They speak of who they are and what they are doing and why he was following her. She is less than convinced that he is here to help. The stolen phone rings again and she has a strange idea to attach to it the tracer she carries in her bag of tricks. She does so and answers. Her employer speaks to her and seems surprised that she is alive. He eventually tells her flat out that she was sent to Glass to be killed, and that he will not pay her. He promptly hangs up following this. Yessenia boils with rage and is reminded of the bomb she has. She looks at the address, and heads back for town. She leaves Anachrion behind, but he follows her still. Finally, he stops her and tells her why he is truly following her. She has a Created against her, and she needs all the help she can get. She agrees to have him with her, and they head for town.
Non-Lux finds the large banquet hall that Gene and her father entered. There is a doorman taking invitations. He makes his way to a nearby parking lot where a man is exiting his car. He knocks the man out and takes his invitation. He also assumes his form and attire, then makes for the building. He makes it past the first doorman simply by presenting his invitation. The man takes it and sends him in. However, when he reaches the second doorman, the man is taking names. Non-Lux, unable to read, couldn�t take the name from the invitation, and hits a snag. He tells the man that his name is Robert Crow, and of course, he is told that he is not on the list.
Gene walks about, still some time before the performance. Everyone is giving off emotion and thought that she can�t help but take in, and it is all strange to her. Suddenly, there is something altogether different. She looks to the door and sees the source of it, a man having trouble entering. She knows not why, but she goes to Non-Lux and the doorman, and convinces the doorman to let Non-Lux into the hall.
Gene and Non-Lux talk at length, the Forsaken carefully wording things to not frighten Gene too badly. He tries to explain to her that she is going to change, that something is happening to her. She believes him as he uses his powers on her. She cannot deny that something strange is happening. She runs out of time to discuss it though, as her friend rushes to her and drags her off as the show is about to begin. Gene quickly dresses in costume and puts on makeup. Non-Lux simply waits, deciding to see her sing.
Yessenia and Anachrion arrive at her apartment, and she fetches the bomb. Immediately they make for the building. They find it and Anachrion decides to wait halfway down the block while Yessenia goes to take revenge.
Gene stands behind the curtain, sensing the crowd on the other side of it. Finally, the curtain is pulled open. Looking out at them, she begins to sing. She sings, and it is beautiful as her voice echoes in the hall. Yessenia is sneaking into the alleys, finding her way to the corner of the building. Gene sings, dancing about gracefully, the crowd transfixed with her. Yessenia is setting the bomb. Gene continues to sing and dance, flowing around with an almost superhuman grace, the watchers stunned by it. Yessenia finishes setting the bomb, and runs. Gene suddenly hears behind her� something happens.
The explosion tears through the building, everything behind Gene immediately aflame, a great wave of force rolling through the great hall, throwing everything about, including Non-Lux, who is blasted clear out of the building onto the street. Gene, though, is not moved by it. She dances forward, off of the stage, still singing, flying amidst the fires even as they scorch her. She dances amongst the flying bodies, crying out with beautiful tones, the flames consuming her flesh, everything painful and brilliant, until finally, a great chunk of debris strikes her and knocks her out.
As he sees the building leveled, Anachrion swoops down from the rooftop to meet Yessenia. Non-Lux gets up on the street. Sirens are coming and he cannot distinguish Gene from any other body. However, all three Endowed suddenly realize each others� presence, and they come together. As ambulances arrive at the building and begin sifting through wreckage for survivors, the Endowed meet.
Non-Lux speaks with Anachrion and Yessenia, discussing what to do. At first, Anachrion and Yessenia wish to simply flee, until they hear that there is a Blessed about to become nearby. Anachrion wishes to find her and make her True. Yessenia wishes to keep her free. Regardless, they decide to go and save her from the hospital together. They follow the ambulances on their motorcycles.
When Gene returns to awareness, she is in a swoon. She lies on a stretcher speeding down a hospital hall. She can see the ceiling tiles flying by, and her entire body is pain. She stops in an emergency room and the doctors get to work on her, injecting her with drugs, rushing to treat her injuries. Her head is swimming, but despite the lack of concrete sensation, she can feel everything. She can feel the doctor�s voices. She can feel the water dripping in the sink. She can feel all the pain and sickness from every single patient in the hospital.
Suddenly, a calm comes over her. She understands everything. The pain subsides, at least enough. She sits up, and the doctors jerk back in shock. She can move. She can do anything and everything. The doctors seem to enter a kind of trance, and as she stands and begins to walk, they follow. They follow as she moves into the halls, leaving bloody footprints as she is naked, bald, her entire body scorched. As she passes them, doors open and patients come out, equally entranced, following her. All she knows is that this is right. She wants them with her. She wants more.
As Yessenia, Anachrion, and Non-Lux enter the emergency area, they see Gene walking down the hallway, over two dozen patients and doctors following her, many bleeding, some burned, but all entranced. They decide to follow as well, knowing what is coming. They join the procession.
Gene can only continue to walk, and everywhere she walks, she gains more followers. Patients emerge from their rooms, some dragging medical equipment with them that is still attached, one holding a bedrail to which he is handcuffed. Crippled people crawl on their bellies after her. Some come dripping blood, some come walking on broken legs, but they all come. Even the morgue doors open and men and women horribly broken and disfigured come and follow. Finally, they reach the main lobby, and Gene stops and turns to look over the hundreds of people gathered before her.
She wants to speak, but finds no words, and so, she sings. She sings, and a great white light shines from her, enveloping everyone. She dances among them, touching them, making each and every one of them whole. Finally, a great eruption rattles the place, and Yessenia, Anachrion, and Non-Lux find all their wounds healed, their bodies returned to perfection. And as the light subsides, and all the mortals collapse, healed, Gene merely stands and utters one word, �Soliloqui�, before collapsing to the ground.
Solliloqui is the first to awake, a rush of sensation blasting her eyes and ears. If this wasn�t enough to throw her into panic, a look at her new tail, ears, claws, and fur are. It takes her some time to become accustomed to her new senses, and by the time she is able to sit calmly, the rest of the Endowed are awake. They explain to her what has happened, that her father is dead. Oddly enough, this doesn�t seem upsetting to her. She loved him, and feels that she should be upset, but is not. She has little time to think about it, however, before the Endowed begin telling her about what is to happen next.
She struggles to make sense of all the information thrown at her, along with Anachrion�s somewhat biased interpretation of reality. She listens as they describe Kashmir and reality to her, the two realms, the gods, and precisely what came before her and what she is now. Everything she hears at once surprises her and seems very familiar. She can�t entirely make sense of it, but she has a distinct understanding that they are telling her the truth. Anachrion�s wings and her own feline appearance are also good evidence. Other sensations have been growing over her as well. She feels a strange curiosity about anything and everything. And there is an odd desire for home. She tells the rest of the group this, and they decide that they could take her to her house for a short while. They set out in their stolen vehicles.
Moving on the streets, Soliloqui�s curiosity is amplified until she can�t control herself. She listens closely and can hear anything she wishes as if she were right next to it. The bum in the alley seems particularly interesting, and she opens the car door and rushes off. The rest of the Endowed chase after her and find her in the alley kneeling over the hobo. She is touching his face, seeming to examine the dried blood on it. Before she or anyone else realizes what she is doing, she smashes her own face into the wall, and blood gushes down it. Within moments, she focuses on it, and her wound closes. They are beginning to attract attention from pedestrians.
Anachrion begins to suggest that they leave, but Soliloqui is already rushing off, wildly curious about what is behind the metal door she has found. She finds it locked and, in a fury, her strength seeming to double, fueled by passion, she throws it open and rushes into a dark parking garage. The darkness vanishes as she lifts up a finger flickering Holy Light. The others follow her, Yessenia and Non-Lux insisting that they get her out of here. A group of curious whites have followed them into the alley and come to them, suggesting they leave before the police are called. Soliloqui merely goes to the man and tells them that nothing here is wrong, and he leaves.
The group of Endowed manage to get back to their vehicles. Soliloqui seems very tired, her curiosity somewhat receding, though she still has a strong desire for home, asking to be taken to her house. Yessenia, Anachrion, and Non-Lux point out the danger in this, however, and decide it would be best simply to return to Kashmir. They agree and make for the river. Once there, Anachrion, being the only one skilled with such things, is sent to open a Gateway to Kashmir. He steps out into the water and begins the art. However, he is unsuccessful. He tries again and again, but it is as if there is a wall between Earth and Kashmir that was never there before, and he can�t break it. Finally he goes to the others and tells them this.
The group only begins to consider what to do before they hear a voice greeting them. Approaching them is a short black man with dreadlocks. He introduces himself as H.C. They learn that this man is a Blessed from Asphodel who has only been on Earth for a few days, and as of the night before, has had the same difficulties as they in returning home. His efforts since then, and their failure, dash hopes that they might have better luck on a different river. They wonder at what to do. Soliloqui is still requesting to be taken home, and with no other place to go, they decide to take her. They take H.C. as well, having a common goal of returning home.
They reach the Simmons estate quickly, and decide that their entry should be as quiet and stealthy as possible. Yessenia ferries Non Lux and Anachrion through a shadow, and H.C. vaults over the wall with Soliloqui in tow. He explains that his legs are both cybernetic, from Dystopia, and good for jumping. The group makes their way to the mansion and sneaks inside, tip-toing to Soliloqui�s room.
Once there, the troupe takes a moment to relax. Soliloqui wanders around her room, looking at things that belonged to her in her last life. Yessenia and Anachrion discuss the problem at hand and wonder at how they might find their way back to Kashmir. They come up with very little. H.C. and Non-Lux decide to go in search of something to eat. The pair sneak down into the main floor of the house and wander about, talking lightly. H.C. seems to rue that his woman will be rather irked at his tardiness. He delights, however, in managing to find the bar and takes for himself a bottle of liquor. Through a less-than-ingenious series of follies and distractions, the pair manage to get the staff out of the kitchen, and take for themselves a good bit of food.
Hearing the commotion downstairs, and knowing the staff will be suspicious, Yessenia, Anachrion, and Soliloqui decide it would be best to steal a steal a new vehicle and vacate. They make their way downstairs and find H.C. and Non-Lux. They make for the garage and have an encounter with a few bumbling servants, only one of whom ends up dead, and head out. Disappointingly, it seems that the family didn�t keep this particular vehicle gassed up very well. Before long, they stop to refuel.
Most of them remain in the car, save for Non-Lux, who does the fueling, and H.C., who goes to steal some food and drinks. The place seems strangely quiet and calm, like the eye of a storm. Non-Lux finishes fueling and turns to see H.C. emerging from the gas station, carrying his spoils. Suddenly, though, the black man freezes with a look of shock and terror on his face. The place is instantly silent, and within a moment, it looks as if an invisible meteor strikes the world precisely upon the gas station. The Endowed are unharmed, though the building, the car, the people around them, are obliterated. Fire blasts up and outward and those things which were not incinerated fly in chunks of debris and shrapnel on a wave of force. Things, however, begin to slow in movement until they freeze altogether in a silent picture of destruction. The Endowed sit dumfounded until one of them looks straight up and sees that the clouds have formed into a face that seems to be trying to force its way downward, and failing, and screaming out in rage. Then, everything begins to reverse, drawing back to the way it was before, until they are all sitting in their car and the gas station is standing and no one is dead and nothing at all has happened.
�� WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?!� is the general sentiment. The Endowed speed off and scurry into Yessenia�s apartment to try to figure out what just happened. They find that this is another question without an answer. They already have one and it is frustrating enough. They turn their attention back to it. While trying to think of different ways to return to Kashmir, H.C. eventually recalls something. He tells them of a sort of club, one exclusively for Endowed and those chosen to be brought there by Endowed, a club called Hernando�s Hideaway. This club, he says, exists in the Vortex itself, not in Earth, Kashmir, or any other subverse. As such, it seems plausible that the club would be a breach in whatever wall separated Earth and Kashmir.
The only problem is that they have no idea where to find an entrance to the club, and H.C. is of no help there. The group thinks on it for a while, and finally, Anachrion and Yessenia have the answer. They recall what happened the night before, with Glass. Glass had been standing on the river, looking frustrated and confused, and then they had chased him to where he had vanished in a mausoleum. Wasting no time now, they rush out and to the car. It is a long drive and it will be night before they reach the place. As they go, H.C. reviews what he knows to be the password for entry. One is to knock on the door three times and declare that he was sent by Joe. No one knows who Joe is, but that is nevertheless the password.
The troupe reaches the mausoleum and finds that the door is already open. They enter and close it behind them. It is very dark inside, and they use holy light to see by. It is strange, that there are still shadows in the room, behind pillars, despite that holy light usually leaves no shadows. Those who are not inspecting those shadows, however, find a door, or rather the image of a door, not a real one, carved into the floor in the center of the room, with a circle around it. Non-Lux gathers the rest of them within the circle, and decides to give it a try.
He knocks three times, and declares that he was sent by Joe. Suddenly, there is the sound like a hundred fingers snapping at once. From behind each pillar, from the shadows, step figures wearing black cloaks and masks. These figures, beginning to sing in a low chorus regarding the place the Endowed wish to enter, inch closer and closer to the group, and begin to dance in an odd ritualistic fashion. As they continue, some of them move to the walls, drawing strange symbols on them, and they move to the door, swishing their cloaks over it and it begins to look less and less real and more and more like a carving. Others slip amongst the Endowed in the circle, swishing their cloaks over the door carved in the floor until it begins to look more and more real. Finally, finished, they join once again in a circle around the Endowed, and recede back into the shadows, finishing their song, vanishing into darkness, and leaving the Endowed with the door.
The obvious realization strikes them immediately that, if there were any question about it, they are not underground., as even the antechamber they find themselves in is far too large and expansive to fit under the cemetery. The ceiling soars over a huge room with an almost indescribable d�cor. Neon lights sweep over gothic sculptures. The architecture is incredible and, in some circumstances, impossible by physical law. The people are equally bizarre, both in attire and in appearance. Many are doing strange divine tricks for their friends. Some are dancing on the dance floor on the left side of the room, others lingering at the massive bar on the right, but most are sitting at the tables spread throughout the center of the room from the foot of a great staircase leading up to the second level.
As the group stands gawking, they are approached by a group of obvious guards dressed in what could only be described as casual armor. The guards are surprisingly friendly and helpful. The group asks if they could speak to Hernando, but the guard in charge tells them that they would have to speak to Uncle Max. He invites them to have a drink while he finds Max.
The group fans into the crowd. Anachrion and Yessenia and H.C. go to the bar, though H.C. disappears quickly afterward as the bartender approaches them. The bartender, a big bear of a man with extremely rosy complexion, explains to them the mechanics of the place, that it is within the vortex itself, that Hernando controls all comings and goings. Anachrion and Yessenia drink, and as they do, Yessenia feels a strange sense that something is coming�
Non-Lux and Soliloqui wander through the crowd. She watches the people growing more and more shocked by the sheer alien quality to it all. Something catches her eye as familiar, though, and she approaches it. However, the closer she gets, she realizes that the people at the table she is walking for are hideous beasts of men, scales, horns, claws, fangs. The familiar part, she realizes, are the robes of catholic priests that they wear. Curious, she inquires about them. They tell her they come from a place called Dragontown, a place where cannibalism is rampant, and power is believed to come from eating the flesh of the powerful. Endowed are of course a rare commodity. This group traveled to Earth after hearing a rumor that there are humans on Earth who eat the flesh of Endowed on a regular basis, but unfortunately, it turned out to be bread and wine.
Before long, the guards find them and tell them that Max will see them now. H.C. rejoins them and they are led up the large stairwell to a large platform with a balcony overlooking the first floor. Max is there, a massively overweight fellow with great pudgy cheeks and a bald head. With a pleasant, kindly sort of low bellow he greets them. They tell him that they wish to see Hernando, and he thinks for a long moment, then finally tells them to follow him.
Max leads them down one of two hallways. It darkens until finally it dead ends at a strange circular piece of dark glass in the wall. Max kindly instructs them to turn away, and the next thing they know, a bright light has flashed and they are in a new hallway. Max leads them a bit of a distance through a great hall of strange paintings, but becomes distracted and beings observing the art. Finally, they approach him and remind him that that are looking for Hernando. Introductions are done again, and finally he begins to lead them once more.
Max leads the group through several rooms. He leads them through a living Escher Print. He leads them into the mouth and digestive tract of a huge beast. He leads them through great outdoor areas and through chambers of every conceivable architectural style and d�cor. Between each one, they find a dead-end hallway and Max has the group turn before doing something to transport them. And in almost every room, Max will stop, seeming to forget what he is doing, until Soliloqui reminds him, again and again and again, that they are looking for his nephew, Hernando.
As the group is moving through a network of dark hallways, taking various turns along the way, Yessenia�s sense of apprehension returns. It stops her dead in her tracks, and now, there is something else. Overcoming her fear, she senses a desire to go down a certain hall, though Max tells them that it is not the way to Hernando. She considers what she is doing, but as the pull gets stronger, reason drops away until she doesn�t at all care for finding Hernando, but merely finding whatever is drawing her. She begins to leave them, and they try to stop her. When it becomes apparent that she will not listen, Anachrion decides to go with her. She wishes to go alone, but Anachrion is feeling the May Queen�s guidance once again, and he will not leave her. Finally, Anachrion and Yessenia go their own path, and Max leads the rest of them.
Finally, Non-Lux, Soliloqui, and H.C. are following Max down a wide hall ornamented with vases and painted in bright colors. At the end of the hall are stairs leading to a platform and double doors. When they arrive there, Max tells them to wait as he opens the doors and heads inside. Everything in the room that Max walks into is clearly audible as they listen to someone, hopefully Hernando, asking Max why he is here. Max tells him that he has brought visitors, and Hernando reminds him that his repeated instructions were that no one be allowed to see him tonight. Max tells him that he forgot and Hernando becomes angry. As Max seems to hang his head in shame, Hernando tells him not to feel bad, that it was a simple mistake. He inquires about the visitors, and when Max tells him about them, Hernando says that they may be shown in.
The room, as the enter, is a spacious office with a large oak desk. The walls opposite the doors are nothing but glass, overlooking an endless and cloudless blue sky. As Max walks away, the only other person here is Hernando, a lanky man in a flashy suit with wide eyes and long dark hair. He looks upon them with a strange sort of relief, saying that they aren�t the ones he was worried about.
When introductions are done the group is very straightforward and asks if Hernando will place them in Kashmir. Hernando says that before he would do such a thing he would have to know about them and why they came here. They talk of what has happened, and Hernando muses that they don�t seem to have done anything important enough for this whole business to be about them. They ask what he means, and he says, of course, the wall that the Two have placed between Earth and Kashmir.
They inquire and it turns out that such a thing has happened in rare instances in the past. They begin to wonder at what could be so important to keep from traveling through, they discuss what happened at the gas station. That it seemed that an invisible meteor struck, and it appeared in the sky as a screaming face, but everything drew back and there was no effect. It seems likely that this was the one trying to pass through, the one stopped by the barrier.
In the network of hallways, Yessenia walks forward, Anachrion close behind, but she is ignoring him. All she can think of is her destination, which she eventually realizes is just beyond the door before her. She can hear talking through the door. Without pause, she pushes it open and goes inside. They are hardly noticed in the room. The room is a strange dark den, complete with a fire pit. All around is bizarre art and instruments of torture. It becomes quickly evident that in this room there are those who command and those who serve, and the servants seem anything but pleased about the situation as they are shoved, struck, and tormented.
Anachrion makes their presence known as Yessenia walks through the room, watching everything. He begins to preach to the group, who at first ignore him, but soon become very irritated. As Yessenia observes the crowd, rage flames inside her at seeing the injustice. She realizes that her Zondervan is in her hand. In her mind, she sees only two choices. She can either do nothing, or she can kill. Kill them all. Her mind is made up as simultaneously, a glass is thrown to shatter into Anachrion�s face, and a man strikes a woman crawling on the floor.
Yessenia lets her bullet fly. It is effortless and perfect and her target�s head explodes from his shoulders. Anachrion, drawing his Vorpal blade, jumps into combat. The place is instantly in an uproar, but Yessenia doesn�t pause for a moment. She is committed now, she continues the killing. Again and again, each shot perfect and lethal. Shots fly back at her, and she dodges without even considering it. Some power is filling her now, she cannot be stopped.
Anachrion struggles with a small crowd, being battered and burned by a fire poker. She cuts them down as they batter him. Yessenia�s head is swimming with pain overcome by purpose. It seems that with every shot she delivers, the pain redoubles, and she can only control it by committing to her goal further, calling on her Passion to complete it. Every shot is fatal, none can touch her. Finally, with no others left, she turns to the crowd around Anachrion. She fires, blowing off heads, almost collapsing with pain, expending all the energy within her to keep going. When those surrounding Anachrion are gone, she cannot think, she aims her weapon for him. But before she can bring herself to fire, the pain overcomes her and she falls.
She falls, but even before she hits the ground, the pain has begun to subside. Replacing it is a numb emptiness as her vision fills with white. She knows what has happened. Coma White.
Back in the office, Hernando advises them to go back to Earth to wait until this is all over. He tells them that he won�t risk the wrath of the Two for putting them through. They think to ask about Glass and he tells them that sadly, he let a number of Endowed through before he realized what was happening. He advises them to leave his club as quickly as possible, that it is not safe. They realize, then, that if they were able to figure out that Hernando�s Hideaway could be a way through the barrier, than whatever was trying to get through would probably realize this as well.
Having sent Max away, Hernando decides that he personally will take them back to the main hall. He walks them out of his office, down the hall, and goes through the same procedure at various dead ends that Max had gone through. They realize that they are being led on quite a different path, but have no reason not to trust Hernando.
Only the slaves are left in the den, and Anachrion frees them, sends them away. He goes to Yessenia and picks her up, helping her walk as they leave the room. She feels a vague desire to vomit. Anachrion helps her as they stagger through the network of dark halls, losing their orientation very quickly. They attempt to remember where Max led them before. Anachrion, using his fantastic senses, finds the scent of Max and manages to follow the trail back to the dead end that they came from. There, for the first time, they can get a good look at just what is at these dead ends.
The wall they find is no different from the others, save for what is imbedded in it, which is a circle of dark glass roughly a foot and a half in diameter. They examine it for some time, but can think of nothing. They try the obvious solutions, saying Open Sesame and such like, but it is fruitless. Yessenia, having rarely felt so tired and helpless, grows sick of the situation very quickly. Eventually, though, they do get a reaction from the glass. As they hold their hands up before it, there is a brief flash of light and a clicking sound, and nothing else. They find that each time that put their hand up as they did, there is the same result, and they continue doing so a great deal, producing fast paced clicks and flashes, but no other result. As they begin to give up, Yessenia senses something again, something coming, and almost here.
Hernando finally leads Non-Lux, Soliloqui, and H.C. into the main hall, and he is leading them down the main staircase, explaining that he will send them back to Earth, when he suddenly stops in his tracks, and tells them that it is too late.
The entryway double doors promptly blow off of their hinges, and through the smoke and fire walks a great hulk of a man wearing a gray overcoat with wild black hair that matches his eyes. In each of his arms are huge weapons. Non-Lux, and any other Asphodei realize that these are things not meant as weapons, but rather as demolition gear, and it typically takes two men to operate one such machine. The man strides in and is quickly approached by a barricade of guards in their casual armor. They open fire with their weapons, but the man doesn�t seem to notice, simply lifting his own weapons and opening fire with both, calming blasting down two guards at a time, explosions engulfing their bodies until they have all been mowed down, and the man continues in.
Max thinks to approach the man but he quickly takes an explosive in the gut. There is the distinct smell of frying fat as he spins off in a heap of dead weight on the dance floor. The Endowed scramble in an effort to find their friends as the man opens fire into the crowd, at first seemingly at random locations until it becomes clear that he is firing on anyone taking up a weapon. A group of Forsaken gang up and rush him, but from the man�s body spring out dozens of smaller creatures with blades on their arms, swarming into the crowd to subdue them.
Yessenia and Anachrion spring to their feet as they realize something is coming from down the hall. As they stand and wait, she wishes she had her divine power. She aims her Zondervan and readies herself, and sure enough, the little beasts come in a horde, and they fight.
Hernando, H.C., Non-Lux, and Soliloqui rush for the bar to take cover as the rosy bartender lifts up a shotgun and begins blasting the small creatures out of their path. They leap over the bar just as explosives come in and begin shattering untold fortunes of liquor bottles. Hernando tells them that they won�t be safe here, and need to flee. The bartender offers to cover them, and Hernando leads them out onto the floor. The attacker is dispatching the Forsaken who attacked him as the creatures seem to be herding everyone from the club into the center of this room.
Yessenia and Anachrion fight bravely and fiercely, but in the end, sheer numbers overtake them, and they are brought back, they find themselves literally dragged into the main hall.
Hernando leads H.C., Non-Lux, and Soliloqui bashing their way through the creatures into the hallways. They run and duck and avoid the creatures as long as they can, but in the end, they are cornered. Hernando tells them that he will try to help them if they can escape, that they should find him at the Golden Fingerbowl. After this he promptly disappears and the Endowed are taken, dragged into the main room with everyone else. With the attacker and the creatures. The fighting has stopped, and all of the Endowed are gathered in the middle of the hall. The man walks amongst them, his weapons smoking.
He makes no action now, but to introduce himself as Omega. And he then prompts the question of where to find Hernando.
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