//------------------------------// // Blut und Eisen // Story: Pandemic: Stirrings in the World of Human Magi // by Corascal //------------------------------// 5 Days After the Counterspell “Why do we hate ponies so much?” Hubbard Geissen mused from his seat upon the abandoned orphanage entrance steps. His fellow skinhead, whose name was Ottokar Koetz, raised an eyebrow as he finished taking another drag of his cigarette, before blowing out smoke into the cloudy night air with a single puff. “What the f*** are you smoking? ‘Cause it sure ain’t tobacco.” “Marijuana, but that was hours ago,” Hubbard replied. “But I mean, just think about it. Why do we hate ponies? What makes them so different that we hate them so much?” “Because they are not human,” Ottokar inhaled again. “But the Jews and the niggers aren’t either,” Hubbard replied. “And they at least have all of the same parts as we do.” “Human beings don’t invade other people’s homelands and steal their money, women, homes and lives,” Ottokar crushed the cigarette under his shoe. “The niggers breed like rabbits and push our race to extinction, the Jews steal our money, enslave us to their companies, and then feed us pretty lies to keep us deluded. We hate ponies because they do all of these things, and then they go another step further by stealing our human forms and mind-controlling the victims. We hate them because they pose the greatest threat the Aryan race has ever faced.” “Wow, that’s deep,” Hubbard looked up at him in awe. “I thought it was because we were trying to resist the cuteness overload that was threatening our collective manhood by committing violent actions upon them in order to convince ourselves that we were all big, strong men and not girly faggots.” Ottokar looked at him in disbelief. “Are you sure you haven’t smoked in the last few hours? And that it was weed, and not meth?” Hubbard looked offended. “Hey, I may not know the difference between a Turk and a Jap, but I know the difference between weed and meth. I’m not that stupid.” Ottokar smirked. “Have you really already forgotten the Brandenburg Incident?” Hubbard paled. “How do you know?” Ottokar broke out a smile worthy of the Cheshire Cat. “Oh, I-” For a brief moment, a lavender glow surrounded both their heads. Hubbard briefly wondered if the drugs had really gone to his head, while Ottokar was about to panic. “Oh SH-” *crack* *crack* Their heads violently twisted backwards, and they were unable to think anymore. Their bodies fell limp, but the glows remained, as their bodies descended quietly to the ground so as to reduce noise. Another glow of the same shade could be found across the street, but only from behind a slightly open door, where a grey-eyed blond amazon stood, with the glow wrapped around her first two right-hand fingers. Once she saw that no disturbance had been made, she cut off the magic and brought the hand next to her enchanted emerald earring, snapping her fingers twice. After a few seconds of silence, she heard four sets of double snaps. After concealing her figure in an invisibility cloak, she then opened the door, rushing across the street in a blur as her magic strengthened her muscles and pushed the air around her to increase her speed. Within a moment, she was on the steps in front of the doors to the prison-like orphanage. a female voice whispered in her ear. The woman grunted as she opened the door and walked inside. “I hate dealing with rats. There’s no dignity in the work.” Hearing footsteps coming from the next floor up beyond the stairs in a nearby hallway, Teresa Gottschalk removed her cloak, revealing a slender and flexible suit of darkly silver armor. She then connected her magic to the cloak, and it hardened and folded itself into a large, round buckler shield, just as she unsheathed a four-foot hand-and-a-half sword with her other hand. Then as the armor about her collar shifted to cover her head - only her long hair allowed to spill out from it - and a transparent plate in front allowing her to see as well with it off, the image of a modern knight in shining armor was complete. Not long after, Teresa came into the hallway, coming towards the stairs, she heard the three men she’d been alerted of reach the top and begin descending when they spotted her. Shocked at the sight, and with the adrenaline of seeing one of their friends dead by unknown means, they immediately yelled and began firing their Carbine and Kalashnikovs at her. Teresa merely sighed as the bullets bounced and ricocheted off her armor like pebbles. She knew that the armor was overkill for dealing with a few Third Reich-admiring amateurs armed with outdated submachine guns, but she had been hoping to receive a more novel reaction to her appearance than what she was receiving. Disappointed, she simply put out a magical burst of speed and bashed all three men into the concrete wall with her shield. When their bodies settled on the ground, the crushed bodies gave no indication of life, and she descended the stairs, sheathing her sword. “Looks like we couldn’t break in quietly,” she heard a male voice nearby as she reached the bottom. Looking over, she saw a tall and broad brown-headed man in a billowing, shimmering cloak, with a handsomely rugged face set with blue eyes and an easy smile. Coming behind him was a short-haired blond woman with grey eyes wearing a magical exoskeleton that made her taller and broader than she was. “These three were closer to your position when they came towards me, Chlodwig,” Teresa addressed the man. “The fact that I had to make noise to kill them lies partially on your head. And again, please, save your illusions for the enemy’s face, not yours.” Chlodwig shrugged. “Whatever you say, my lady.” “Are their weapons at least still intact?” asked the woman, as she came to the stairs, walking toward the bodies. Teresa nodded. “Yes, Viveka. You are free to use them however you like.” “Thank you,” Viveka replied, as she took each of their guns and ammo and attached them to the back of her exoskeleton. “Milady,” came a soft voice from behind. Teresa saw a redheaded older woman with green eyes dressed in loose, dark purple robes. “I have found the entrance to the underground laboratory. Zelig will have it open by the time the rest of us arrive.” “Very good, Gaelle,” Teresa placed a hand on her shoulder as she walked past. “We’re all wasting time. Let’s go and get our bastard.” All three magi responded at once. “Yes, milady.” “Roger.” “Will do.” The four of them, with Gaelle providing directions, soon went down to the basement, where they found a gangly man with grey hair, orange eyes and a navy-blue ensemble from his coat’s collar to his boots. He was bent over a bed-sized square panel covered in intricate designs that alternated between glowing golden and dark blue, the latter being the same color as the aura that emanated from the man’s hands, as they weaved through the air above it, drawing mystical symbols and magical equations as quick as he could. By the time they were beside him, the panel glowed completely dark blue and sank into the floor in segments to become a steep staircase. “Follow me people,” Teresa walked down, each of the four magi behind her. The steps extended far down into blackness, in much the same way as the entrance to the hidden fortress of a magi family’s would. With only green lights on the sides to guide them, Teresa and her aides trod forward, each of them ready for any traps they may find. Teresa also saw, as she moved on, that the lights were simple glow-in-the-dark fixtures, some of them already growing dim or even winked out. They were not the crystal lights used by magi families that could glow for decades on end without recharging, and even longer before needing replacement. Finally, after some two minutes of a nerve-wracking descent down the stairs, they reached a steel door at the bottom. Upon reaching it, Teresa turned to Zelig and motioned toward the door. After extending his magic to the metal portal, he nodded his head. Nodding back, Teresa grasped the wheel in the center of the door and pulled it open. Stepping into the black room inside, each of the five magi activated light spells, brightening the room in shades of lavender, navy blue, forest green, orange, and electric yellow. They found themselves in in front of three concrete tunnels branching off in different directions. Two tunnels turned sharp corners out of sight, while the last one ended with a massive doorway big enough to comfortably allow two trucks in side by side. “Gaelle,” Teresa whispered. “Take a sounding.” Gaelle nodded and bent down to put her ear to the ground, closing her eyes to focus. Concentrating magic in her ear, she then engulfed her hand in a forest green aura and slapped it on the ground, dispersing it around her. After a few seconds, she released the magic, opened her eyes and stood up. “There are rooms beyond the corners of the two opposite tunnels, but I cannot tell how big they are, or whether there is anything inside. But judging from how the tunnels both wrap around the room in front of us, I imagine it must be some sort of hub for everything going on down here.” “And now it’s where we will confront the Nazi-fraternizing Outlier,” Teresa stated. “It’s all too obvious he is waiting for us. Can you tell me anything more?” “Sorry, milady,” Gaelle said, her face downcast. “I would be able to tell you more, but whoever built this place has probably taken into account indirect magical detection spells like my soundings, so I can’t tell you more.” Teresa simply sighed, then turned to face all of her allies. “The situation we’re all facing is far from ideal. We don’t know our adversary’s numbers, specialties, special surprises, or even his general purposes and goals. But this doesn’t change the fact that he must be neutralized. I pray that God have mercy upon their souls, for we shall give them none. Am I clear?” All four of the magi before her uttered not one word, but all showed their determination in their firm but relaxed postures, hard-set faces, and readied magic emanating from their arms, legs and, in Chlodwig’s case, his eyes. It was exactly the sort of sight Teresa loved to see in her comrades before battle. She smiled like a reaper before the harvest. “Very good.” She turned back to the door. “Now then, Für die Ehre Gottes!”** “Für die Ehre Gottes!” her brothers- and sisters-in-arms cried. At that moment, the door began shrieking its metal cries as it slid up to open the way for Teresa and her aides. They immediately began striding forward, soon passing beneath the door and into the wide space beyond it. The room was lit by a vast web of glowing silver crystal conduits that crawled over the floor, walls and ceiling of the expanse, as well as the two rows of pillars that held it up. The walls to both sides of them had two lines of doors, one on top, the other on the bottom, with a larger door set in the center of each wall. Catwalks spanned across the upper parts of the expanse, connecting the pillars with one another and with the second level of doors. The only other feature of the place was a massive black banner showing a golden sigil of a stylized crown inset with the symbol of the All-Seeing Eye, surrounded by a ring of three keys. Three figures were standing in the center of the room. The right and left figures wore gender-concealing grey hooded robes, with featureless masks on their faces, the left one wore a gold mask, the right a silver. In the center was a rotund man in a billowing laboratory white coat over a black suit and gray pants, with his arms crossed behind his back. His bald head had a puffy face with a scraggly salt and pepper beard growing from his double chin, and a pair of muddy brown eyes behind wire-rimmed round glasses. Teresa growled as she laid eyes on the man. “Why am I not surprised to find you here, Traitor?” The man smiled. “Because you are a very difficult woman to surprise, Fräulein Gottschalk. And please, my name is Ritter Hirsch, not Traitor, or Fat-man, or Stupid, Idiot, Motherf***er or every other colorful name you’ve bestowed upon me over all these years.” “I already grow weary of this banter,” Teresa stated. I have but one question before I split you from head to groin.” She pointed her sword at the banner. “Whose sigil is that?” “You like it?” Ritter beamed. “It is the flag of the organization I joined when I left your family’s service so long ago. We care little for the Family Affairs, and we have but one goal: to break the Three Locks and unlock humanity’s full magical potential. Once humanity has magic, we will then help them to grow in their newfound talents, and guide humanity to its ultimate golden age! For this reason, our esteemed order is named The Culmination, and we invite all the magi of the world to join us!” Teresa was unimpressed, and drew her sword. “You are truly a fool if you think that some Outlier organization can accomplish it any better than the Families can.” Ritter smiled dangerously. “And I think you’re blind to the truth of your situation.” He then pulled out his left hand and snapped his fingers. At that moment, the two large doors on the walls began to groan as they split open. Immediately, strange animal noises began to emanate from beyond them, from roars and screeches to scratching and buzzing. “Of course he has chimeras,” Teresa muttered The first chimera to fly out from the left door – literally – had massive eagle-like wings and an avian torso and talons, while it had a bear’s head, and a long, snapping snake for a tail. The flyer from the opposite door looked like little more than a man-sized dragonfly with an extra pair of wings and a nasty stinger on the tip of its tail. The next ones out were far simpler, with one being a bear-sized wolf with spines in its fur, and the other was a lion with bone plates covering its body. The last two that followed, however, were what finally made Teresa and her followers gasp in horror. The left creature had cheetah-like front legs and a mouth full of razor-sharp teeth, the other had a turtle-like shell and a horn sprouting from its forehead, and both had very equine-like bodies and legs. These two chimeras had been made from ponies – transformed humans. And from the animal looks in their eyes, the people that had once inhabited the bodies were long gone. Teresa had had enough. She activated both of her sword’s enchantments, and soon the air in the room became electrified and arcs of electricity began sparking to life all along the blade. She swung her sword high, and the energy about it began to writhe about it like sharp ribbons in a strong breeze. A shield sprang up around Ritter. “KILL THEM ALL!” And she swung the sword forward and in an instant a bolt of lightning crossed the gap and struck the shield with a thunderous *BOOM*. In that instant, the four magi accompanying her sprang into action, with Gaelle and Zelig attacking the chimeras on the left while Chlodwig and Viveka taking the right. For the first few moments, the magi had the advantage. The chimeras, for all of their magical origins and control by handler magi, were still animals, and a lightning strike so close by panicked them, causing them to run and fly back to their enclosures, only to find they had been closed. The moment the bolt was sent, Teresa shot forward in a burst of magic-enhanced speed, closing almost a quarter of the distance in a few moments. Ritter’s shield had somehow held against Teresa’s lightning strike, but she was confident she could still break it. But Ritter’s two companions were also speeding right toward her, their robes flapping like flags, as they closed the gap between them and her very quickly. Teresa then activated her sword’s first enchantment, wrapping it in a blanket of whirling wind and swinging it down like a hammer to launch it forward in a powerful gust. The two assailants coming at her immediately stopped and planted their feet in the ground, breaking up concrete as they swiftly stopped themselves, but the brief wind was strong enough that it tore off their robes. Teresa instantly saw the very female figures that the robes had hidden, and also some details that truly surprised her. The woman on the left had ridiculously long, sharp claws growing from her fingers, and spikes on her arms and legs. The woman on the right had transformed parts of all four of her limbs – and parts of her torso it seemed – into a nightmarish amalgamation of various minerals and metals with a mixture of flesh. And both of their heads looked very akin to those of the ponies. -- To Teresa’s left, Zelig and Gaelle engaged their three chimeras. After the lightning strike, Ritter reasserted control over the chimeras, and directed them to attack the nearest enemy magi. Zelig held back from engaging the chimeras at close range, using the distance to take his time drawing a pair of magic circles in the air. Gaelle ran straight up to the chimeras, using her magic to rip pieces of the crystal conduit right out of the ground and reshape them into a vicious barbed spear. The massive wolf was first to reach Gaelle, leaping forward with claws out and jaws wide open to rip her to pieces. She easily saw it coming and leaped aside, slashing her spear across its foreleg as it sped past. But as her attention was focused on the wolf, she missed the pony chimera that slammed into her torso, tackling her and locking its jaws onto her torso, the blow knocking her spear out of her hands. For the woman who had been an enthusiastic horse-rider in her youth, the nightmarish sight was almost enough to help the blazing pain to push her over the edge into unconsciousness. The bear-headed and snake-tailed eagle flew past both the wolf and Gaelle to attack Zelig, who just finished his first rune began to begin firing a continuous barrage of knife-like icicles at the flying creature, forcing it to pass by him and circle around. Zelig continued to follow the bird with his ice, but unlike Gaelle, he noticed the other chimera coming at him – the massive wolf which had decided to ignore Gaelle and attack him. He finished his other magic circle with his remaining hand and a stream of fire poured out onto the beast, setting it ablaze as it stumbled back in panic and pain, the flames dooming it to a slow and painful death. -- On the opposite side of the room, Viveka and Chlodwig battled their trio of artificial monsters. Chlodwig charged in front, using his illusions to make himself appear three times larger and start swiping at the chimeras. The creatures were briefly fooled by the trick, as each of them backed away from the man’s swings. This left them wide open for Viveka’s attack, as she telekinetically pulled out five guns she had looted from the Neo-Nazis to fire a swarm of bullets upon the creatures. The armored lion and the turtle-pony curled up and absorbed the blows, but the mutant dragonfly was torn to pieces in the gunfire. The turtle-pony, being made from a unicorn, instinctually charged magic in its horn, firing at Viveka. Chlodwig, having seen the initial buildup, dispersed his illusion and leaped in front of his partner, hastily raising an energy shield to protect them. The shield was only half-formed when the beam struck, easily breaking through and blasting Chlodwig into Viveka, shorting out her magical grip on the firearms and stopping her shooting. -- While Teresa was shocked that her two opponents appeared to be partially-transformed victims of ETS, she didn’t allow herself to dwell on it, considering the two of them instantly leaped forward as one to murder her. Teresa decided to stand her ground, holding her shield forward, and activating her sword’s second enchantment, and soon the sword grew red-hot like a poker in a fireplace. The right one reached her first, lashing out with a leaping kick aimed at her head. Teresa slashed at the limb and struck metal, knocking the leg aside. The blow spun the attacker’s body, who used the momentum to swing her other leg at Teresa’s chest, which she blocked with her shield. The other attacker struck at that moment, thrusting her hand out and striking Teresa’s armor underneath her shield arm. The strike failed to scratch the armor, but the brute strength behind it knocked Teresa back a pace and ruined her follow-up sword strike at the right-hand attacker’s body, who sprang off of her shield and narrowly avoided the swing. The two attackers leaped back as Teresa carried her swing at the left-hand attacker and brought the shield to try to slam it into the other. As Teresa looked for an instant on how to attack the pair of fighters, she suddenly felt something slam into her back and knock her forward. Unable to stop herself from falling forward, she tucked herself and rolled forward, her hot blade sparking against the floor as she simultaneously spun herself around to face where the attack had come from. She was once again surprised, not because it was Ritter Hirsch from whom the attack had come from, but because of the wand wrapped in a golden aura held in his outstretched hand. In the brief time she saw it, her mind racing at a million miles an hour as a battle-hardened mind does in a life-or-death struggle, she noticed more specifically the spirals around the piece from handle to tip, and instantly deduced its material: unicorn horn. -- Gaelle’s mind worked sluggishly against the pain to keep herself awake, even as she tried to dislodge the jaws of the Pony from Hell. She tried to get her hands on it and to kick her feet to knock it off, but the creature was very good at using it hooves to keep her pinned. She tried to use telekinesis to choke it to death, but anti-telekinetic enchantments embedded in the creature’s body kept her from getting a magical grip on it. It was while she using her magic that her pain-addled brain remembered that she still had a spear. Looking to her side and finding it, she grasped it in her magic and shot it straight through the demon pony. Its jaws remained tight on her body in its death, but its limbs ceased to hold hers down, and she was finally able to wrench its jaws off of her. With that done, she telekinetically forced the blood in her body to stop leaving it. Looking over at Zelig, she saw the older battle magi bringing both his ice and his fire to bear on the flying chimera, which was finally brought down when Zelig’s fire clipped the snake head and the beast’s panicked reaction brought it into the path of the ice that speared through its heart. With the monsters dealt with, Zelig turned to Gaelle, and without any warning, thrust an icicle in her mouth pressed his fire rune to her wound. Gaelle reflected on how much she wanted to kill him the first time he had done this to her. -- The armored lion was quick to notice when the guns stopped shooting, and was even quicker to react, charging forward to ravage the two magi that had dared attack it. With Chlodwig temporarily out of commission, Viveka rolled him off of herself and cast her magic on the ruby set into the chest-piece of her exoskeleton. The contraption instantly unlatched itself from Viveka and unfolded itself to stand on four spiderlike legs and four arms, with two arms serving as little more than needle-like swords and the other two picking up a pair of rifles. The lion was unintimidated and attacked the golem, which leaped atop the animal and rode it like a bucking bronco for several seconds while it stabbed and shot at its joints and head. Then the lion tried to roll over to crush the machine, but it revealed its unarmored belly, which the golem took advantage of to thrust its blades into and fill it with bullets. The lion died quickly. While her golem fought the lion, Viveka got into the strangest shootout in her life, as she used a Soviet AK-47 and an American carbine in battle against a turtle-shell-wearing unicorn pony blasting magical energy from its horn. She kept running about trying to get a good angle to shoot the chimera pony at while the animal tried to both shoot her and ensure that it didn’t get shot anywhere but on its shell. Then, suddenly, Viveka stopped firing, simply dropping her guns. The chimera seemed confused at the sudden change in behavior, but then decided to just shoot her and charged another blast. Then it felt a tap on its shell. The creature turned in a panic to see who was attacking it. Then Chlodwig, whose illusions had allowed himself to remain undetected while it was distracted by Viveka, put a bullet through its head, killing it. He gave Viveka a thumbs-up, and she returned it. -- Ritter Hirsch fired another beam of magic at Teresa. Although it was far more magic than she had ever seen him put out before, she was more than ready for it, and blocked the blast with her shield. There was a not inconsiderable amount of power behind the blast, but personal experience informed Teresa that she had been hit much worse before. Then, once the blast ended, she saw that the two assistants to Hirsch were charging forward again, the left one had covered herself in an orange aura and was changing her spikes to plate-like armor, while the other one had wrapped its arms in a teal aura and were adding long, sharp metal spikes above its wrists. Teresa turned off her heat enchantment on her sword, and switched to her air enchantment and swung her sword about, wrapping yet another windstorm around her blade. The two fighters switched themselves from right to left and from left to right, spaced themselves apart and came at Teresa from opposite sides. But as they closed in, Teresa activated the heat enchantment, and slammed her sword against her shield, sending a shockwave of electricity around her that struck both of her opponents, and knocked them both down. The fully organic fighter was left unconscious and twitching from the electricity, but the metallic one was clearly not moving in spite of it, and Teresa suspected that she was dead. “DAMN YOU!” Another burst of magical energy struck Teresa’s hastily raised shield, almost knocking her over. “DAMN YOU! DAMN YOU! DAMN YOU DAMN YOU!” For every time Ritter Hirsch repeated the words, he fired another blast of magic at Teresa from the unicorn horn wand. But each blast was weaker than the last, and Teresa easily regained her footing. Looking to her left and right, she saw that each of her aides had finished their battles, with Gaelle easily being the worst off with Zelig having seared a gaping wound closed. “DAMN YOU ALL TO HELL!” He fired yet another burst, but this time Teresa dodged it, slinging her sword to shoot an arc of lightning that struck the wand, obliterating both it and charring most of the arm that held it. “AAAAAAAGGGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!!” Ritter clutched at his arm as he cried out in pain, falling to his knees and then the floor. Teresa strode forward with all the regality and furor of a Teutonic goddess of old, with lightning and wind swirling about her spotless magical armor and sword and her hair spread out by the unleashed forces of nature to reveal their full radiance. Soon, she stood above the cowering magi, and looked down upon him in judgment and contempt. He looked up at her with tears in his eyes as he continued to whimper. “P-p-please, Your Grace. H-have m-m-mercy on me.” She sneered at him. “Never.” Then she smacked him in the face her shield. He fell to the ground, unconscious. Teresa sighed, as she directed her magic to remove her helmet, which then folded itself into her suit. She turned to her allies. “Are you all well?” Gaelle grunted as leaned against Zelig. “I will live, but I would respectfully request for time to recuperate, milady.” Chlodwig simply shrugged, the dispelling of his illusion magic revealing a scruffy-haired dwarf. “Had a moment where I wasn’t sure of myself, but that was the worst of it.” Viveka’s golem latched itself back onto her. “No injuries or major lasting damage to Herman.” Zelig simply grunted. Teresa smiled at them. “Very well done, all of you. Our mission is complete. But it is very clear there is much work to be done.” She turned and strode over toward the massive black and gold banner. “Not only do we have to do the usual duties of cleaning up our mess to hide it from the normal authorities, taking control of the magi’s workshop, research and ley lines as well as interrogate him for any other secrets he has, we also need to investigate this, Culmination.” She stopped as she looked at the flag in disgust. “This organization has already begun experimenting with pony magic, and this research has already produced results. What we have faced here are likely just the earliest prototypes of this work, and they likely have far more competent and dangerous magi than this Traitor working for them.” She swiped her sword at the banner and the lightning it slung set it ablaze. “This organization aims to be the next Illuminati, if not surpass them outright, and we must assume they have the resources to fulfill this ambition.” She turned back to her comrades with all the theatricality due the Head of a Core Family, just as the flames reached the sigil. “When I meet at the Decimum Concilium Magia in two days, I will share everything we learn with the other Families.” The bulk of the banner tore from its top and fell to the floor behind Teresa in a smoldering heap. “As of now, we are war with The Culmination, and we will not be finished until they are annihilated.”