Author notes: World-building is for me an important phase when planning a crossover. You find yourself wondering about things like: "okay, I have this organization from universe A. What changes should I do to canon so that they fit seamlessly? Should I tweak their origin story, maybe expand on the areas never covered in canon? What do they know and how did they interact in the past with the factions of the universe B?" In other words, this is all about making them a fitting part of the merged universe, one that feels like it had always been there.
Another point is that I chose to interpret something about a certain Norse god in a certain way. This is my take on it for this story, not a truth.
Thanks to Azmarie, Computerfreak CK, Mr Aakmr, Mr Pumblechook, f321, mycroft 216, nadirjohn and unknown1124 for marking this story as a favorite as well as to all the people who spent time reviewing it.
Rickmer: you will see some replies to your interrogations in your chapter. The problems you pointed are definitely something I will address
Chargone: I think this chapter will answer your question
- Rosenberg House, Wednesday 2 November 2011, 06:30 -
Willow woke up and looked at the small shape cuddled against her. She was really cute like this, asleep, her face free of that sadness that had wracked her the night before.
Skuld… my little sister. I remember so fondly our fights for the remote, my plans to get Keiichi and Belldandy finally act as lovers conflicting with your own to keep things 'non-perverted' between them and so many other things. It doesn't matter that those are not really my memories or yours. You're my sister.
She got up delicately, taking great care not to wake her up. She took her laptop and went down to the living room. She first sent an email to the high school secretary to explain that she had to skip today due to a family emergency.
"Let's see my inbox… reply from Mo… Mrs. Summers, easier to think of her like that for now. Belldandy's address… Living with Loki… if Frigga's here, she's gonna have a heart attack."
Willow remembered some of Urd's adventures with her half-brother Thor and their friend Loki. She went along rather well with the latter. Loki was a half-demon like her so they understood each other. Then Mr. Perfect came into play and things went down.
Balder… how much Urd hated him… self-righteous jerk who thought any trace of 'uncleanness' should be removed from Asgard, half-bloods like me removed from any access to Yggdrasil or goddess license if not cast out… If Loki hadn't… Urd's patience for her little brother was wearing thin. She more reacted to how Loki used Hoder and disregarded the demon that died at the same time because of the doublet system than to the act itself…
After Balder's death, the Allfather had not been the same, losing himself in his work and too often forgetting to be just 'Daddy' to the Norns and their siblings.
"…Morning," said Skuld as she reached the living room.
"Good morning, Skuld… or do you prefer if I call you Alice?"
"No… easier to just be Skuld for now, Urd," said the girl, shaking her head. "Easier to forget…"
"You don't have… family left? I mean: human relatives?"
"My grandfather in Oregon but… what will he say if I do that? He already thinks that computers are Satan's work."
She reached behind her back and pulled a tube-covered sphere the size of a tennis ball. Willow took it delicately as the child started to shake and laid it on the table. She hugged the girl that became her little sister as she cried.
"I… know," said the girl, trying to dry her tears, "my parents, my human parents, they would want me to be happy to be alive but…"
"It's all right to be sad, little sister. Just remember that I am there for you and Belldandy will too."
"If she's here… why didn't the water…"
"Dunno. I like to think that you like me more. Or maybe it was just because I was in my bath at that moment."
"Maybe… you're using Linux?" she asked while looking at Willow's laptop.
"It's a custom, I constructed it from selected spare parts and I use a tweaked Linux system for it," replied the teenager, recognizing Skuld's will to change the subject. "Before I became Urd, I was already a lot into computers."
"Hmm… should have something in here," said the child as her hand retrieved a palm-sized cube from the non-space behind her back.
Willow recognized the thing. It was the Asgardian equivalent of a flash drive, this one tweaked to also accept USB cables.
"Your infamous Skuld OS?"
"Eh! It works perfectly well. It's not my fault Keiichi's computer is too backwards to handle…"
"Even a teraflop computer would be hard-pressed to manage your OS… We'll see what we can do with the spare parts I still have but later. We have a lot of things to do today."
"We're seeing Belldandy?" she asked, a smile fighting to appear on her lips.
"Yes we do. We also have to try to retrieve your things from the motel. Also, there is one thing. You will see demons in town… I mean our demons, probably Mara and Hild."
The kid paled at that.
"You'll have to remember that they're… just like us, humans that got changed. We have a truce and we're all working to get rid of monsters like the one you napalmed."
"But…" she started, obviously thinking hard and fast. "Okay, I'll make an effort."
"Good. Now come help me make us some breakfast."
- 1630 Revello Drive, Wednesday 2 November 2011, 06:50 -
Dawn was looking at her reflection in the bathroom's mirror. Her fingers followed the curve of her horns, searching for irregularities. She frowned a little and took a file. With a few precise strikes, she removed the offending bump while making sure not to damage the pattern of her horn's ridges in that area.
"Perfect," she said with a smile as she took a pose in front of the mirror.
Her clothes were still aiming for that 'gothic lolita' feeling she had been cultivating for a year. Since Halloween, there was just less black and more dark red. She knew that Pam Akumachi, 'the other girl in her head', would have dressed differently but this was something of her old self she had decided to keep.
She giggled at her reflection, wondering what some of her friends from Los Angeles would think. Sure, she had made some new ones since she came to live in Sunnydale last summer, friendships that were now seriously strengthened by the fact Kit and Amanda were also Raim and Vine, Pam Akumachi's best friends. Still, she missed the old gang of the literary club in her former school. She was still chatting with them online but it wasn't the same.
And now I have to mind what I tell them…
Her old friends had been the ones to induce her into the whole Goth movement after they had spent some hours discussing their mutual dislike of the Twilight Saga and pointed thoroughly why it wasn't Gothic. She even had a t-shirt stating that 'Real vampires don't sparkle' somewhere but she hadn't worn it for a good while. Not since the parent-teacher night as a matter of fact, not since she had understood that the people that attacked Sunnydale High that night had not been 'a gang on PCP' but real vampires. Since that moment, she had understood what was eating her sister, what she was fighting night after night.
But now, everything is different… I am a creature of the night now. It has been a hell of a start for my freshman year in high school… pun intended.
Horns, pointed ears, scarlet eyes burning with unholy fire and canines that were cute little fangs, all surrounded by a perfect alabaster skin and dark red hair that somehow reminded her of the Balrog's flames. This was the face the mirror was sending her back. She tried to look for either her old human self or Pam Akumachi's cheerful face but the first was already dimming in her memory, washed away by the hellfire flowing through her veins. As for the second…
"Mom… do you think I am… eviler than Pam?"
Dawn turned her head to look at her mother. The teen demoness had felt her energy approaching rather than heard her coming. Again, she tried to remember the image of Joyce Summers and pit it against the one of the platinum blonde, tan-skinned woman leaning on the bathroom door's frame. She tried to tell herself that her Mom would never dress so provocatively, that she would have bothered with wearing a shirt and a bra under the jacket of her power suit. But the memory of the human Joyce Summers was dimming too, replaced by the new reality they had both eagerly accepted.
"I don't know much about Pam as I only have the few memories of Hild when she met her during Halloween night. She seemed to be a sweet girl wanting for people to be friends."
"Isn't that… naïve?"
"It is," said Joyce with a sad smile, "particularly for a Shedu. But, being a Shedu myself, I also respect her immensely. She didn't care about fitting in. She held to the values she had chosen for herself despite what other thought. Finally, she came on top and changed the rules."
"And… if she had been wrong? What if what she built… hadn't worked?"
"Then others with different ideas would have risen and replaced her. You are my daughter and are thus entitled to some privileges but neither Buffy, Urd nor you will inherit my throne simply because of this. If you are interested in following in my steps, you will have to conquer it and then prove every day that you are worthy of it."
"But… I mean Hild surely did but you…"
"Elections are… facultative for us. One cannot take Satan's throne without the people's agreement but seizing it by force, guile or simply by… being the first on it is fully acceptable. If the people don't rebel… well we tend to consider they are agreeing. I took command during Halloween and most Shedim probably decided to play safe, thinking 'she has Hild's memories and powers: she should be fit for now'. The thing is that every day is cementing my position a little more and I already have all my… potential rivals under watch. Of course, they know it and they know that I will crush them if they try anything. So they are bidding their time, waiting for me to make a misstep."
Dawn looked back in the mirror, at their joined reflection as her Mom was now standing behind her, hands on her shoulders. There was a hardness in her mother's face. From what she remembered, it had sometimes been here, particularly during the divorce, but never with such intensity. Dawn knew that her 'new and improved' Mom could do terrible things without the slightest remorse.
And that I will soon be able to… Mom will make sure of it and it will be because she loves us and wants us to be able to protect ourselves…
- 1603 Revello Drive, Wednesday 2 November 2011, CHECK 07:30 -
A pity I don't have more… I know: this afternoon after class, Kit will certainly be up for it.
For the first morning since the start of school year, she didn't have to take the bus. She had simply exited the house, spread her wings and taken flight.
"I'm flying in the sky, just flying in the sky. What a glorious feelin' I'm happy again…" she sung with a grin, skewing just a little Gene Kelly's words.
It was truly glorious to her, to glide freely, moving faster than the cars in the streets. She felt the wind on the skin membranes of her wings though these didn't really flap. While her wingspan was honorable, it was nowhere near enough to allow her to fly in a 'natural' way given her mass and muscle power. The trick, one she remembered from the lessons Raim and Vine – Kit and Amanda's devil alter egos – had given to Pam, was that devil wings had more to do with sci-fi concepts like gravity redirection than with the ones of birds.
"… and I'm ready for love!"
She started her descent on the high school while, at her side, her familiar rolled his eyes.
"Mistress…"
"Yes, Zu?"
"You will really try to… woo her?"
"Of course!" said Dawn, not able to fully prevent the blush rising on her cheeks. "I mean… it's Linfa!"
She landed near the entrance, remembering what their homeroom teacher had told them the day before. While there was still a lot of work to do, they had already done some amendments to the school rules to take into account the student's 'improved mobility'. In practice, it meant no flying or teleporting on school grounds, except for emergencies or during some special courses like PE.
"And you are Pam?" asked the lion-headed eagle.
Dawn stopped, lowering her head as she felt doubt in her heart.
"I won't know if it works until I try, Zu."
"I see you made your mind up… I'll spend the day resting in your pendant if you don't mind. I don't want to risk seeing that crazy girl."
The familiar dematerialized and Dawn entered the building, heading for her locker. She wondered if Zu had meant Linfa but then remembered there might also be another possibility. In Pam's world, a devil girl called Camio had been completely smitten with him.
A thought for later. Now, the objective is Linfa.
From what she had uncovered the day before, she was a freshman in Sunnydale High like her and her human name was Liberty Kendall. Her human self was a problem because of their respective big sisters. Buffy and Harmony Kendall could not stand each other and from the information Dawn had gathered Halloween had potentially made things worse. Not only had Harmony merged with Lind, a Valkyrie that seemed just as amenable as General Patton but their parents were even worse. If Susanoo's intel was correct, Linfa's mom was none other than the commander of the Valkyrie Corps: Mikael. She would probably have something to say about their little angel hanging out with Satan's daughter.
Though… remember what Susanoo told me about her Dad. Gabriel is the Allfather's Jim Phelps and has a very pragmatic view on things.
- Joyce's office, Wednesday 2 November 2011, 08:27 -
Joyce raised her eyes from the report she was reading and looked at the woman sitting in front of her. The human that person had been was unfamiliar to her, some biology postdoc at the UC Sunnydale from what she had been told. However, she was very familiar with another side of that woman, the one that went with the demon marks adorning her guest's face.
"So, we have a problem," said Satan.
"It depends of how you look at it," replied the guest while scratching the animal sitting next to her chair behind the ears.
Joyce had to admit that for the part of her that was Hild, the animal in question was normal, a common household pet… in Niflheim.
"What's her name?" she asked with a smile.
"Belle, after the one in the novel. I just couldn't resist."
Joyce looked in the animal's eyes. All three pairs of them, each placed on a different head, or even four if you counted the ones on the viper head at the end of the animal's tail. Belle had otherwise retained most of her traits as a Great Pyrenees and actually managed to look cute.
Or maybe my new and improved brain has skewed my sense of aesthetics…
She saw the Cerberus cower before her gaze. Joyce got her eyes back on report. She knew that the animal had enough magical senses to feel her power and was just acknowledging her dominance over her. It was better to ignore the 'dog' before the canine did something embarrassing. She turned the pages, reaching something that looked vaguely like a weather pressure map of Sunnydale and frowned.
"Bifrons… these are all measures taken while you were looking for the vampire nests?"
"Yes. As the local breed has a different signature than the one we had in the other universe, it was easier to use a general scanning spell and filter afterwards."
Joyce didn't even need to read the conclusions. Thanks to Hild, she knew immediately what the measures meant. She typed a few commands on her Nidhogg terminal and looked at another graph.
"We have underestimated the corrupting effect of the Hellmouth. We are immune to it but the local fauna and flora are not so lucky... I want you to coordinate with Malphas and Vapula on this and refine Nidhogg's radiation filters. I also want sensors posted outside of the city's barrier."
"The barrier will prevent radiations from leaking outside but…"
"But preventing things such as a mutated seed from being blown away is another matter," she concluded.
"As well as animals who will have the desire to wander. To give you a simple example, a filly born this morning in a farm belonging to a god family has wings and a blue coat… from what I was told, the family's kids named the future mare Rainbow Dash," added Bifrons with a bemused smile.
Joyce sighed as she leaned back in her chair. Pegasi were not just winged horses. They were creatures of elemental air and needed to roam freely in the sky to flourish.
"Which means the Celestial Tear the Elohim opened has a similar effect… who is in charge of that dossier on their side?"
"I don't think they have a task force yet… you know how bureaucratic they can be. Raphael contacted me directly and I suppose he will be put in charge once things have gone through 'the proper channels'," replied Bifrons, making air quotes while saying the end of her sentence.
Satan nodded. Hell functioned more or less like a corporation with Satan as CEO. It was often ruthless and had little patience for slackers. The quick efficiency was however countered by a difficulty to keep plans with no short-term results going on. At the other end of the spectrum, Heaven was pretty much as Ancient China had envisioned it: a bureaucracy with a plethora of ministries that often fell victim to their own inertia.
Joyce had another look at the woman petting her three-headed dog. From what she remembered, Bifrons was one Hild's trusted people, maybe even one of the few she could call a friend. Initially a patron of necromancers, she had diversified her activities during the Renaissance and ended being the muse for all the wannabes Frankenstein, Moreau et al.
But I also remember other things… I remember her fondness for chocolate and some practical jokes that made Hild laugh a lot… like that day where she replaced all the bodies in a med school's morgue with zombies programmed to dance on the music of Thriller.
She had a small smile as she remembered the incident. Athena's face had probably been one of the funniest things, particularly with Bifrons sending paramedics straight to the goddess with a false report regarding a stuck-up lady about to have a stroke.
Note to self: if I un-cat Ethan Rayne… presenting them might either be a match made… in hell or the source of many headaches to come.
"You know," said Bifrons. "This contamination will solve one of our big problems. The kids will want familiars."
Joyce frowned. While Hild never had one, many Shedim liked to have a familiar. There was however a slight problem with that. Modern familiars were advanced golems, spiritual creatures that latched on their master's soul and created a symbiotic link with them, normally deriving its personality from its host's soul. The Elohim used a similar technology to create their guardian angels.
But there is an older way: contracting an independent magical creature. This is the way Dawn – or rather Pam – used to bind Zu.
This was another reminder that there were currently two cultures of Shedim living side by side and that the same went for the Elohim. It wasn't too alien as the Devils and Angels of Pam Akumachi's world were quite similar to what Hild and Odin's people had been in the past.
"The Elohim won't like it. Abandoning contracted familiars was one of the concessions we did when signing Ophir's Treaty. It will also be years before we can put together the facilities to create artificial familiar eggs, and so are they with guardian angels."
"Except the old treaties don't really apply to us as we are not the ones that lived in the other worlds… even if we tend to forget it."
"True… something else to renegotiate. Last point: do you have any data on human corruption?"
"Not for the Hellmouth but by comparison to some of 'my' old research, it will be slower. Sentient souls just don't resonate the same."
There was a discrete knock on the office's door and Joyce made a distracted hand wave, toward it, sending just enough magic to open it while she perused once again the data assembled by Bifrons. Just as expected, she felt the sweet scent of coffee but then realized the aura of the person bringing it was not the one of her secretary.
"Any reason you are playing butler, Belial?" she asked as the demon prince poured cups.
"You know that I am always eager to please ladies, sister dear."
Sister… the word rolled in her mind, reminding her of the new family links Halloween had spun. Her own with Willow because they were Hild and Urd, one between Willow and the girl that became Skuld and probably many others in town.
Like the fact Hild has a little brother called Belial… though, what are a few centuries of difference when one counts her age in millions of years?
Yet, there was something else. She knew Belial intimately, biblically even. Had they not been so busy lately, she would probably have closed the door and told him not to please but to pleasure her and Bifrons.
"But I know that smile, Belial… to quote my daughter: what's the what?"
"You are right, we have a problem, one that will require our attention today but for which it is better not to rush blindly. A human escaped the conversion during Halloween night."
St. Michael Church, Sunnydale, Wednesday 2 November 2011, 8:40 -
Milos Zeman was praying, kneeling before the altar of his church. He knew he had sinned many times and that he was probably not worthy of wearing the habit of a catholic priest. Too often he had watched what happened in Sunnydale without acting while he could have tried to fight and maybe gain some measure of redemption through martyrdom.
But there were orders…
Once again, he wondered if his superiors in Rome were really accomplishing God's will, if they had not become too jaded to the people's suffering in their fight against the forces of darkness. But with Halloween, something changed. He got up and went to the entrance of the church, looking at the street.
It was a nice, sunny day in Sunnydale and the town looked very much like the quiet Californian city it was supposed to be to the ignorant one. Even to him, it seemed that the usual aura of malevolence that permeated the place had disappeared, which had make him wonder, at first, if the Hellmouth had not gone fully dormant. Then, he had started to notice things.
On the opposite side of the street, a young couple was doing a promenade with their baby in a stroller. He knew them well. He had baptized their child a few weeks ago. They waved to him and he waved back, forcing himself to act normally, as if he did not see the red marks on their faces, their horns and tails and did not feel the demonic power rolling out of them.
He took a step down the church's front stairs, feeling the spell descend on him, masking all the blue and red marks on the townspeople's faces, the horns and the tails. It was like in that old science fiction movie where the hero received sunglasses that allowed him to see past the illusion spun by the alien. He couldn't be sure as only the wards of his church protected him from the glamour but he was more and more certain that the whole town was affected… possessed.
He took the newspaper left by some delivery boy earlier and went back inside the church. Like the people's appearance, the newspaper was bewitched and would have looked nothing out of the ordinary… except inside of this church. The editorialist had signed a commentary on 'proper spellcasting classes' that would be introduced the following week and enjoined parents to teach their children to use their magic responsibly. He had signed it with the name Baalberith. Another article was an interview of Allan Finch, the Deputy Mayor, who reminded people to be wary of outsiders, both demons and mortals. His picture showed him as a blonde man with long hair… and a halo.
"They have to be a… new kind of demon… maybe… the Grigori angels of the book of Enoch?"
- On the other side of the street, at the same time -
Spike lighted himself a cigarette and smiled. What he was doing was quite simple. He was leaning against a car's hood and feeling the sun on his face. A sun that wasn't reducing him to a pile of ashes.
"I haven't seen you smile like this for a long while, Loki," said a voice near him.
He turned his head, thinking that one of Loki's oldest friends had kept his sense of humor by choosing someone looking a little like Christopher Walken. Despite everything, they had stayed such, as this man had been the only one to understand that Balder needed to be dealt with. While he had no proof, he was also almost certain that this man had been behind the unexplainable security failure that allowed Sygin to give the finger to the Valkyrie Corps and escape Heaven.
"A part of me hadn't seen the sun for a very long time, Gabriel."
"So have I heard… I suppose Drusilla is adapting well?"
The former vampire had a smile as he thought of his former sire, now his companion.
"Belldandy is the best thing that ever happened to her, Gabe. She's… it's like Bell allowed her to be as she should have been, if Angelus had not twisted her."
"Angelus… you know he is in the hospital?"
"How do you know?"
"He 'inherited' Valefor."
Spike scowled. Loki considered Valefor like an insufferable poseur even if he recognized the talent of the Thief Master.
"Bloody charming… that bloke never understood the best trick is the one where the victim doesn't realize she's been tricked… You're seeing the Old Man later today?"
"Yes, if only to tell him how the problem in that church has been handled. A message to pass?"
"Tell him I will treat his little girl right and make her an honest woman as soon as possible."
"I don't know if he will be pleased or horrified but I will tell him that. About that church…"
"I am handling that personally, Gabriel," said a voice behind them while its owner materialized in a torch of dark flames.
The archangel could not prevent a little shudder as her aura washed over him.
"You know I could go there and do it all Annunciation-style," replied Gabriel.
"But you know why it wouldn't work," said Joyce, her now usual bemused smile on her lips. "Wait for me here, boys."
They both watched her as she started to walk across the street, her high heels clacking on the asphalt.
"You know," said Gabriel, taking the smoke Spike handed him, "intellectually, I know that she's just like me, a human changed only two days ago. Yet…"
Spike snickered.
"Listen, mate. When she was a 'mere human', she chased me with a fire axe. Actually… I think she will be even scarier than Hild."
Gabriel took a second to think about it. It was true that Joyce Summers was different from Hild in many ways and he could now see some subtle differences. Hild would have made some snarky comment about how she was doing the gods a favor. When Joyce had said 'Wait for me here, boys', it had rather felt like 'Stay safe, Mom is taking care of everything'.
And here it goes, thought the archangel as he saw her knock at the church's door, which immediately made the gargoyles start to wail.
St. Michael Church, Sunnydale, at the same time -
Milos Zeman raised his head as he heard the gargoyles wail, their cries soon ending in a gargle as the church's door opened. He felt the wards tearing away like if they were tissue papers, shattering against the dark red light haloing the silhouette in the entrance. He had a look at the statues, shaking as he saw them cry tears of blood.
"Forgive me father, for I have sinned…," said the person in the entrance, the sound of her heels resonating as she progressed in the central alley.
He knew who had this voice. He had observed her many times because of who she was: Joyce Summers, the Slayer's mother and a good woman. But now… he turned to face her.
"You are the last human in Sunnydale, you know," she said. "The wards of this church were well designed, with their own cloaking field to prevent the demons from noticing them…"
He looked at her, seeing the changes in her, the arrogant stride, platinum blonde hair, burgundy eyes and dusky skin. Yet, despite the flaunted flesh, she did not look like some harlot. Her inhuman perfection rather made people want to worship her and the very ground she walked upon.
Ô toi, le plus savant et le plus beau des anges, Dieu trahi par le sort et privé de louanges*…he thought as Baudelaire's verses assaulted his mind.
"Indeed," replied Joyce, a smirk on her lips. "Though… let's not reopen the dispute on the gender of angels."
He raised his cross in front of him, knowing that his soul was bare before her, before Satan.
"I… I already reported to Rome."
"I know. That's how we were reminded about the loose end you represent. As you certainly noticed, we had a lot to do these last days…"
"This is not some remote place you can isolate from the world…"
"Very true… Arranging everything so that regular people like delivery men did not notice anything has been… a rush. Anyway… things are now under control. Can you look at the obituaries page?"
He turned the newspaper's pages. The obituaries were empty, only announcing some services for deaths that happened before Halloween. A day without any death was completely unheard of for this town.
"You…"
"Please, do you really think I would bother with lying to you? I can crush your will with a thought."
"It might be a game for you…"
"Hmm… yes it could be and She knows that I will have earned some fun next weekend but… I will only spend what I can spare of my Sunday on the beach with my three daughters… and have dinner with my ex-husband. But to get back to the point that made me visit you, I am here to tell you we consider you to be the Apostolic Nuncio for our fair city."
"You… you want to establish diplomatic relations with the Holy See?" he asked with disbelieving eyes.
"We do. I have no sympathy for the demon lords you are familiar with and I think this world could do without their menace. For this, we need allies and I have it on good authority that the Catholic Church still has soldiers around the world."
Milos felt his head spin. The Devil herself was offering an alliance against the demons. That… wasn't so unbelievable. All people knowing about the real demons also knew that they often warred among themselves.
But if we help this one gain ascendancy on the others…
"I… I will contact them but… what of the humans of this town?"
"What happened here was not decided by me… but by someone higher. I am who you believe I am, mostly, but I am also still Joyce and the same goes for all people in town. Go meet your parishioners, discuss with them and see for yourself if they have been damned or just changed. Do not be bothered too much by the empty seats in yesterday's service. You see, they don't need to believe in Her existence anymore… they know."
He looked at her, being remembered that, if the tradition was true, those eyes had seen the Lord's face.
"I grant you the gift to see beyond the veil we spun. I'll also have my ex-husband send someone to repair those wards…"
- Across the street, at the same time -
Gabriel sighed as he looked at the church. The gargoyles looked like if they had choked in their own blood. He took out his phone and sent a message to Allan Finch, asking him to send a team to repair the wards and purify things. He saw her walk out of the building and sing a cleansing spell. Good, things would be easier for them and they would make sure to include some bypasses in the new wards to prevent such issues in the future.
He knew why she had succeeded when his own chances would have been very small. The priest knew that something is wrong in that town. When facing Satan, he had good reasons to be wary but… she was just another demon and he could actually believe her to be somewhat honest. An attempt by him, going all messenger angel on him, would have been almost certainly considered a deception.
"I asked the Mayor's Office to send a repair team for his wards," he said as she neared them.
"Thank you, Gabriel," replied Joyce. "How is Heaven's Intelligence Service doing?"
"Still busy putting it back together but that's Athena's job. In the meantime… well I'm one of the few that know how to play fast and loose on our side."
"All right. Loki will be your contact on our end while Belial sets up our own services back together."
"Odin will probably try to convince you to create common institutions, maybe put back together the ones we had in Atlantis…"
Joyce shook her head.
"We don't have the two centuries it took to build it the first time. Maybe later but for now, our duality is actually a strength, as each side will be able to do things the other can't. For now… we're like Sparta and Athens during the Persian Wars: we have external threats to deal with in priority. We'll find solutions to our internal problems later."
"Understood," said both Spike and Gabriel.
"With that boys, I still have a lot to do. See you later!"
She waved them goodbye, smiling cheerfully as she dissolved into dark flames.
- Sunnydale, Wednesday 2 November 2011, 9:17 -
Drusilla answered the door and was greeted by a preteen girl who rushed to hug her while another, older girl waved her hello from behind. Of course, she recognized them. They were her sisters after all.
"Oh my… please do come in," said the former vampire.
"Nice place you have here, sister," said Willow.
"Thank you, but you know it was just one of those abandoned warehouses a few days ago… and I still need some genuine art to fill in some spaces. Please have a seat. I will make some tea."
Skuld reluctantly let her other big sister go to sit on the couch, next to Willow.
"The… other you is British, Belldandy?" asked Willow who was wondering about Drusilla's accent.
"Yes, though I traveled a lot since then… it's probably better to put things out in the open directly. I was a vampire before Halloween."
"But…" started Skuld, "how? I… your aura is Belldandy's?"
"I think I can guess," said Willow. "Skuld, you remember what happened when Hild replaced Belldandy's angel with that demonic familiar?"
"Yes, it was changed into… something else, not quite an angel but… Got it, the nasty vampire could not resist my beloved sister's power."
Drusilla stifled a giggle. It was so good to see them both.
"That's true," said the middle Norn, "Belldandy restored my soul, a little like what happened to Angel."
"You know him?"
"He sired the vampire me, long before his soul was forced back on him. He and my Spike are doing something on Hild's request."
"Spike being Loki?" asked Willow.
"Yes… It's not easy for the part of me that is Belldandy but I am less innocent than she is, Urd. I understand Loki's reasons even if I would have preferred for him to find another way to deal with Balder."
"I know this happened before I was born," said Skuld, "but… I remember Thor saying bad things about him, though never in Mom's hearing range."
"Contrarily to what we would like to believe, Skuld," said Drusilla, "we gods are not necessarily good. To speak frankly, your big brother was a jerk, the kind who thought that certain people were worth less than others just because of their ancestry or looks."
"Yeah," said Willow, "people like me."
"I'm not sure I understand," said Skuld, "but I remember one of our neighbors in San Francisco, I mean in my human life. He didn't like black people and once I saw him dressed in a white robe…"
"Hem," said Willow, scratching the back of her head, "yes, Balder was like that. Skuld, if Loki hadn't killed him, Urd would probably have done something and…"
"I know, you don't do subtle," said Skuld, taking a sip of tea.
"Anyway, we are going to have to learn to live together, both gods and demons," said Drusilla.
- Abbazia di San Liberatore a Maiella, Abruzzo (Italy), Thursday 3 November 2011, 18:34 (GMT+1) -
"Your Eminency… do you think that the Watchers already realized?" asked a man in black monastic robes to his superior.
The cardinal James Carmody, head of the secret order of the Knights of Saint Jude, was busy helping his people going through numerous occult books. Earlier in the day, two emails sent by their agent in Sunnydale had revealed a major power shift in town.
"It all depends if their man was possessed at the same time as the others… given that the Slayer's mother is concerned, it is possible that nothing was reported to them."
"Your Eminency, I think I have it," said a nun wearing a strange symbol on her white habit.
"Hmm… let me see this, Sister Lori…"
The cardinal put on cotton gloves and unrolled the old papyrus, reading quickly a text written in Greek.
"This is part of the Alexandria collection?" he asked.
"Yes," replied the nun. "The original is attributed to Manetho and probably in the Watchers' library now."
"Hmm… Caesar certainly wasn't an easy man but having his soldiers bringing back the content of the library to Rome secretly is just another proof of his genius. Yes… it's here: 'and I, Manetho, did under his orders research among the archives in sacred script of the Double House of Life of the Great Temple of Heliopolis to assemble the prophecies done by the Heretic King that were hidden when his city was destroyed…"
He switched to a lower part of the text.
"... and Akhenaten said that on the day of… Brother Luca, can you match that date with the Gregorian calendar, please?" asked the cardinal as the monk near him took down some notes with his style on his computer tablet, injecting the data in a software designed by another member of the order.
"This corresponds to the 31st of October 2011 your Eminency."
"Thank you brother…. During this night of transition, the gods will emerge once again from the Noun, led by Amun-Re, creator of the staff of life, and his beloved Astarte, so beautiful as she rises in the morning sky. Sublime is their power as they stand on Atum's Wound to accomplish Aten's will… Atum's Wound, where did we see that?"
"Here, in Paatenemehb's texts," said Sister Lori. "We think it's an Egyptian expression for a hellgate."
"Thank you… They will make the new Heliopolis their earthly capitol, allowing all men and women who dared to stand on Atum's Wound to be reborn and elevated as their new courts. Then the vision becomes unclear as they battle against Apophis and the Shining Ones… and that's all."
"Your Eminency… I thought the gods of mythology were either the Powers or the demons playing with humans…"
"This is different. According to the records coming from the Shadow Men, the demons known as the Old Ones 'lost their purchase on this reality' or, in other words, God decided to make place for Man, letting the angels known as the Powers in charge of… lower management."
"So this could be the Lord's will?"
"Luca… how many demon-related catastrophes did our order prevent in the last decade?"
"Too many," replied Sister Lori.
"Indeed. Even if the Watchers are fond to have the Slayer believe she's alone, the world has always been too vast for that. Us, the Watchers, the Yukikaze ninja clan, the Soldats and some other factions and independent demon hunters… most of us with only very limited support from the Powers while the other side has structures like Wolfram and Hart. I can suppose that He realized how bad it was down here. But that's only a theory… So we dispatch a team to Sunnydale and try to learn more."
* This a quote from Charles Baudelaire's famous poem 'Les Litanies de Satan'. It translates roughly as "O you wisest and fairest of angels, god betrayed by fate and deprived of praise"