|
     |
Utopia must come to an end.
All good days reach their denouement, whether in a blazing sunset streaked upon the sky or a quiet, slow march to a misty end marked by none. In a cathedral several hundred miles away, thousands gather row on row to pay their final respects to the scion of a bloodline wreathed in mystery and drama. The glamour wore off with three blasts to the skull to prove not even John Fitzgerald Kennedy is immune to nameless malice. His internment under piles of crumbled earth puts to rest the summer kingdom, watched by countless eyes from around the world and beyond.
Yet some men say in many parts of America that JFK is not dead, but had by the unseen will of gods or mutants or the Secret Service vanished into another place; and those men say he shall come again at an hour of need.
Bells set to toll in ten minutes, ready to strike noon on a heavy, balmy day about nine degrees warmer than average. Good weather for a jacket but neither scarf or mittens. Grey clouds roll through overhead, a cottony ceiling for a pressure cooker engulfing the city. Whispers about riots and fires carry on the air, not reaching far along a paved path meandering through Central Park. It cuts in from the east and spills towards one of the many reflection pools, this one owned more by the mallards than anything else.
Here a young woman in a coat the shade of a proper shiraz peers into the water, staring down at her own likeness painted there against the stirring weeds and stirring brown muck. "I cannot detect anything that speaks to a disturbance. Neither from him or something sooner," she murmurs. "It feels disquieted about here. Waiting."
*
"My sentiments exactly," replies the man quietly standing beside her. His reflection, in hues of muted black, silver, and crimson brighter than arterial blood, breaks away in a riffle caused by a passing gust of wind. "It's too still." He looks up and around them, hands still buried deeply within the pockets of his coat. The frown darkens his steel-blue eyes that remain untouched, currently, by the traces of summoned Mystic Arts.
At his neck, the scarf tightens slightly, like a snake sensing approaching footsteps, and the Sorcerer Supreme looks around again. The uncertain thrums of reality hum distantly to him, as sure as the rumbling of cars along the avenues, and he sighs sharply. "This has the distinct feeling of an ambush and I don't like it." Thanks, Mister Doctor Obvious, even nature seems to agree with you. The mallard ducks, three in total, all dressed in dull winter's plumage, seem to want to hide amidst the skeletal reeds on the far side of the pond. Even their quacks are muted, as if waiting with bated breath.
*
Skali
*
Namor strode up casually, seeming vaguely piqued about something. His black hair was mussed slightly, his clothing torn with some indication he might have been recently bleeding. "What the fuck are you people doing here?" he wondered absently.
*
Skali wasn't sleeping. She was pacing. She was growling. She was shifting, riding the edge between wolf and woman as her sense burned and her occasionally apparent tail pinned between her legs. The apartment did not lend itself well to such nervous attentions, crowded by the beast manifest in human form, and thus she eventually abandoned it to twist along the currents of air. Rising, rising, wind roaring in her ears even as all she could hear was the snapping of her bones, the stretching of sinew, the blood pounding through her veins in nigh suffocation of breath.
Four paws collided with the earth in the wake of Namor's stride, something akin to a wolf but only in approximation prowling after his footsteps as the tipped ears twitched and the muzzle dropped to snuff at barren earth. No announcements were made to the other occupants of the park as she trailed some unseen thing across the verdant expanse of lawn. The silence was deafening. The wolf stilled, tail lashing in a feline fashion as it huffed out something in a language nobody present could speak.
Skali agreed. Something wicked this way comes.
*
"No," Strange's companion murmurs, possibly in agreement. Wanda's fingers are buried in her pockets to stay warm, and possibly shape out the beginnings of a shield. "I do not like being unaware." Flat skies outline the young woman and the statuesque gentleman beside her, barely a ripple blown across the shallow water. Destruction unleashed by the spawn erupting from the Hellmouth remains visible where plant life is absent, the ashen soil turned over in scars that likely remain until the depths of next spring. Broken pavement mars the lines of the lovely natural space, a bench removed but its rusted feet and bolts remain as maroon stains.
She averts her gaze from her own perturbed likeness, instead registering Strange's response with a somewhat veiled look. Sunglasses upon her nose blunt some of the force of her iridescent gaze, the ruby filaments of a nebulae patterning her pupils. Unlike the good Doctor, she is drenched in the Sight, open to the traces of the supernatural and mystical imprinted upon the world. That gives her an advantage to the battered man headed towards her, obviously in signs of a scuffle, and further followed by an overly large wolf. His question almost warrants a peal of a laugh or a chuckle, but meets with absolutely bored silence. Those darkened lenses cover what could be a scrutinizing glare.
"Language," she states in a blunt, matter-of-fact tone.
Another soft chime in the distance speaks to a call to school, if not prayer, the system calling the students out of their class and out to the cafeteria. Her back stiffens slightly at the knell that tolls, the crack of bones behind the merry electronic clapper. Even the traffic, rarely heard this deeply in, falls away until it might be obvious to anyone at its absence. Flags are not in evidence; not even the habitual seagulls fly around and squawk their cries of misery.
*
The arrival of the blunt man, with his damaged clothing yet untouched skin, makes Strange turn in place. He doesn't offer any other moves or replies, especially not in the face of the sudden arrival of a large wolf — WHOA. That is…not natural.
"No kidding," he murmurs to the woman dressed in scarlet leather even as he blinks on the Sight. Her aura roils to him, clearly concerned at the proceedings in lieu of the unsteadiness of general reality around them. His irises glow a bit, that odd frosted-violet color, as they take in the sight of the wolf and then he squints for a moment, brows knitting.
"Hold on…" His voice is low and lightly amused, likely only audible to Wanda beside him — actually, the wolf can likely hear him too. "I know that signature. You're of the Prince's ilk." Which Prince? Loki? Hrimhari? The Sorcerer knows which and gives the wolf a slight smirk. "Didn't think I'd see you again so soon. But let me guess: you've all felt it." The last statement loud enough to be heard by all.
Then comes the abrupt silencing of the world around then. With the instinct driven into him by Fate and fight, the Sorcerer aligns himself towards the odd sound and then squints. "That. Right there."
*
Namor looked to Skali, he said something low and unintelligible. Then he lifted up from the ground and shot off into the sky, disappearing rapidly from view.
*
Skali seems unconcerned with who recognizes her, or what they think of her being, the musculature underneath thick coat rippling as she comes to a pause at the hip of the exiled Prince. A head containing slavering jaws presses into his hand in a show of companionable trust, a pair bonding thrumming with colors and stilled images that marked these two allies for the moment. A low growl rumbles in her deep-keeled chest in answer to the recognition, a simple nod of assent to confirm Strange's proclamation.
As the man claimed the sky, massive paws single-tracked to one of the many nodes of death still ingrained in the soil without further ceremony. Talons dug into thick clay, and Skali began to dig out the screaming echoing in her ears, the persistent buzz of something none of them could name that defied a silence of nation in morning. Her focus was tireless, the efforts dredging out earth that could hold no roots, poison incarnate in soil.
*
"A death of a leader. A sense of mixed with a sense of ill will. A park that is more than a park." An old man wearing robes and a pointed hat, with a long white beard and hair, a sword hanging from his belt, and a staff in his hand, walks slowly toward the large wolf, the witch, and the Sorcerer Supreme. There's a brief glance to the departing man before he brings his attention back to the others.
"Greetings, Great Wolfish One. I am honoured to meet one of your people." He bows to Skali. His senses having allowed him to perceive that there is more to Skali than meets the eye.
"Ms. Maximoff. Mister Doctor Strange." He nods to each of them in turn. "I trust we've all been brought here by the same thing, yes? Whatever it may be?"
*
Beyond even the reach of canid hearing, the tide turns. Ripples of a low murmur build and then fade, drawn back to their source and rushing out again a few seconds later. Sonic troughs grow louder in time, revealing themselves first to Skali as soft chanting set against a low percussion beat of hands upon a taut skin. These are more pulsations of a primal nature than the crack of a bumstick or the fast-paced rumble of African drumming.
Then the voices emerge in their distant, vaporous chanting, speaking a language forgotten largely in its emerald cradle as much as the verdant colonies to the far west over the endless sea. Their haunting lamentation comes to the skirling of pipes and strings that only percolate outwards from a particular direction painted under their feet, proverbially. Mystically inclined individuals can feel the groundswell of power coming up to the surface, pushed away from its usual deep quiescence to a current that might well flood through them.
Nothing emerges yet to see, but the voices go rank on rank in the mourning, lifted in high, feminine harmonies that call out for an answer.
*
Announced by names and title, such a pairing they make. Namor fading off into the sky with all the subtlety of a bag of hammers warrants arched eyebrows, no more. Fading back into the more reserved spectrum of behaviour prohibits Wanda from breaking into a smile or questioning the wolf. The former Sorcerer Supreme is another matter altogether. Her eyes narrow behind the sunglasses, for even on a cloudy November day, he blazes hotter than a lighthouse offshore and requires minute adjustments to avoid being starkly blinded in turn. Her pupils shrink, but not the incandescent garnet film saturating them, and she steps in ever closer to Strange. Call it a byproduct of politeness to open up another limb in their present triangle.
"Good day, Mister Merlin. Have you not called us?" It could well be likely his idea of a fun time or time for a portentous announcement, like his discovery of his missing slipper.
A sadness tarnishes the air alongside the cool singing of lamentations that bewail the dead, and she possesses that ephemeral urge to find her harp. "Is such digging necessary?" The ground suffers under blunt lupine claws, disturbed further, and the bite to her lip does not suggest a happy smile taking form there.
*
The movement to his side is mirrored, practitioners drawn to one another as surely as polarities and gravity draws order in the cosmos. His reaction stems from a base need to protect, even as Strange acknowledges it isn't currently necessary, not with the presence of Mystic Arts along with deep-running primal powerhouse of the large wolf, now digging at the soil.
Skali is privy to a confused glance by the Sorcerer, who doesn't feel the need to ask for a cessation in the matter. He had a dog growing up, a working cattle dog, and there are memories connected to revelations from childhood.
"Merlin," he greets the staff-bearing Wizard distractedly. Craning his neck to look at the disturbed pile of soil growing around the wolf's tough-clawed feet, he thins his lips before glancing back at the old magician. "I think she might have found it," and he gestures towards the great wolf with a scarred hand. The crimson scarf at his neck shifts once more, seeming to predict its master's next unspoken command.
The air fairly vibrates around them with the breath before the plunge, the moment before the reveal, and that chorus is reeeeeeeally beginning to grate on him.
*
With muzzle encrusted by dirt, the black creature turns massive head towards the newest entry into this play. Unceremoniously, she sneezes, and returns to her work, the hollow now deep enough to swallow up her shoulders as the haunches bulged with the effort to support her weight; an entirety of being cast into the effort of moving mountains. Sod and something blacker now, grime thick in the space between her pads, as if the nearby pond was seeping into her efforts if only the filth was black instead of copper-stained. There was a smell of rot in the air, a sickly sweet gut-punch of carrion in the hot sun. Skali disappeared into the hole she made save for a tail which curled and unfurled like banner over her rigid back. Hackles lit down the spine and the silence was broken by slaver-thickened snarl as her teeth closed and she began to drag loose the prey hunted in a whirling of dead peat and dust
*
There's a slight twitch of Merlin's nose, his head tilting at the chanting. The thrumming. He thuds the butt of his staff against the ground, a few sparks flying. He blinks when Wanda asks him the question, his head returning to a normal position. "Hmm? Oh. Right. Yes. Or no, rather. 'Twasn't I. Although I did just recently find a bunch of socks that had mysteriously disappeared of my…" He wiggles his toes and looks down. "My feet." He finishes the thought after a few second pause. "Apple seeds and Arthur's creeds! My socks have disappeared again! Perhaps they'll be in the pile I found earlier." He furrows his brow.
Shaking his head, he turns back to the Wolf Person and their digging. When Skali looks at him and sneezes, he nods at her with a solemn look upon his face. "Ah, yes. My apologies, Great Wolfish One. It was rather quite rude of me to interrupt your work, wasn't it? Please forgive me." He then becomes quiet, watching to see what has been found.
*
The melodious requiem continues to play 'round them, the very songs of the rank and file following the direction of the leyline. Without the Sight, merely the sounds through the growing grey slant of light accompanying an autumn day follow through. For the eldritch, a procession emerges out of the dismal surroundings, flickering shapes that resolve more complete for some than others. There, a maiden in long robes; here, a knight with helm drawn low over a three-piece suit. Features made amorphous and indistinct prevent immediate recognition, but they universally resonate a grief as old as time and universal to mankind. No consideration for the living, their pace carries them onwards towards the trees as the whole of the area around them hushes, and everything upon that surfaced leyline answers to the tyranny of quiescent reflection. Even the huddled ducks dare make no noise, and the water in the pond has none to spare. What gnawed horrible bone of a demon's buried meal — some sorry victim without name — makes no noise in slavering jaws, even if cracked to the rotted marrow.
*
Heads bowed, hands clasped, they walk as the women voice their haunting lamentation in the Angels' tongue, one tendered in Latin only to the very end.
"And dreaming through the twilight
That doth not rise nor set,
Hap'ly I may remember,
And hap'ly may forget."
*
Resonant chanting spills over them all and, if nothing else, drowns out the ease of a conversation. Wanda knows the touch of something odd when she sees it, and her hands slip back into the confines of her coat pockets rather than trace anything unusual or flip off a spirit that passes alarmingly close to her. They hardly care for her presence, echoing their doomtide in a language dead before she was born, though one achingly familiar in places.
Still, even for a mystic, she might appear alarmingly comfortable being surrounded by the invisible and the leylines at the surface. It might well be a show, this lack of unease, but possibly not.
TBD…