Interlude: Fixations

fix·a·tion (fĭk-sā′shən)

n.

1. The act or process of fixing.

2. An obsessive preoccupation.

3. Psychology A strong attachment to a person or thing, especially such an attachment formed in childhood or infancy and manifested in immature or neurotic behavior that persists throughout life.

XxXxX

One of the perks of being a Lord of Chaos is longevity. You've been around since long before anyone else can remember. It sometimes feels like it's been longer than you can remember too, but it's not. That's another perk of your power: memory. For all that others call you a Witch Boy, you know your immaturity is only by choice. You have experienced more than any mortal worms ever will. You can remember everything, though more often than not you choose not to. The longer you think back, the more apparent it is that history repeats itself, and patterns are just so… orderly.

That's why, when you think of the beginning, you usually think of Teekle.

Magic, even Chaos Magic, has rules, though you prefer not to think of them that way. Rituals confer the power needed for big magic. Runes grant control. Anchors are required for permanency.

The first two of these are plebian enough magicks that even mortals may use them, if they become powerful enough. It is the last of these that separates true mages – Lords of magic – from the average sorcerer. Only a being of your level of power could have such a pull on the universe as to need such a thing.

There are two main categories of anchors. Inanimate anchors tie you to your chosen plane of existence when you impart your magic and will into an object from that plane. Their strength is based not just on the power of your magic, but also the strength of your desire to remain in your current plane of existence. They're harder to protect and maintain, and they limit your mobility through different dimensions in a plane of existence, but they usually don't require much of a commitment, and you can make as many of them as in your lifetime as you want. Such were your anchors for a long, long, time.

Animate anchors – familiars – are far more powerful, granting true permanency and thus the ability to move freely between dimensions in a plane. They require you to sacrifice an irreplaceable piece of your magical core, though, so if you are separated from your familiar, not only do you permanently lose a piece of your power, you can also never anchor yourself to another. Unless you find powerful motivation to compensate for your new – relative – weakness, even inanimate anchors will not hold you outside of your own plane for long. You will be forced back to your original plane of existence, and be powerless to leave again.

For a long time, you cared little for the idea of a familiar. What good is permanency– what with its stability and thus implicit order – when one has access to vast reserves of the more useful power and control? Especially when you will suffer the eternal boredom of being stuck in the Chaotic Plane should something ever go wrong.

So went your thinking for… oh, call it eons. Longer than anyone else can imagine, at any rate. You survived, creating temporary, inanimate anchors based on your desire for a little fun, and losing nothing when they lost their potency and you were forced to move on. You might have gone at that way forever had Fate not intervened.

Over the millennia, you learn that aimless freedom is so… boring, even for Chaos Incarnate. Fate's arrival in the mortal plane, and his subsequent tendency to oppose your work gave your life a bit of direction: the opposite of Fate's.

Nabu, being Orderly, decided not to leave your eternal struggle to the getting sent back to the Plane of Order. He created a permanent anchor in the mortal plane. The Helmet of Fate.

It was quite an ingenious piece of magic, really, not that you'll ever admit it. Still, you understand his thinking. Chaos is inherently unpredictable, therefore Fate had to be ready to oppose you anywhere. A regular, inanimate anchor is too limiting for that. Similarly,Nabu is too cautious to risk being sent back to the Plane of Order permanently, so a familiar is out of the question.

Instead, he sacrificed his own autonomy, placing his power in the hands of a willing mortal host. By implanting his consciousness into the helmet, then splitting it across every dimension in the mortal plane, Fate gained the flexibility of a living anchor without a risk to his power.

Of course, you can't let that go unchallenged. If Fate is going to stake his claim on the mortal plane, then obviously you need to stay here to stir up trouble for him.

You won't do it the same way as him, though. This is partly because you never want to do anything in the same way as a Lord of Order, but mostly just because you think being stuck in a helmet would be so boring. That's why you decided to take the risk of creating a familiar. In fact, you convince yourself it's not even much of a risk. You're a Lord of Chaos. Who could possibly overpower you to threaten your anchor?

So you pull apart your soul, and infuse a piece of it with the Mortal Plane. This creates Teekle.

Having a familiar changes everything. You are more powerful, for one. You can move anywhere in the plane, without skipping back through the Chaotic Plane, for another. More than that, though, is that you have to actually interact with someone else after spending eons alone.

Suddenly, you have someone to look out for, and someone to look out for you. Reflecting your chaotic nature, she often disagrees with you, though she never truly never opposes you. She mrowls that you're immature and unthinking and you call her Stupid Cat in return. You both know the other means it endearingly. Teekle becomes more than just the other piece of your magic. Teekle is your companion… your friend.

On a whim one day, some millennia after you made the Mortal Plane your home, you push a meteor into a collision course with a nearby planet. It doesn't destroy as much as you hope, nor even incite the level of fear and infighting that you would expect from the primitive beings that live there. Instead, one of the idiot mortals decides to go and sleep under it. For some reason, though, you stay to see what the radiation of the star-rock will do to it.

In the morn, you find the mortal faster, stronger, and smarter than any of its brethren. The adaptation astonishes you; you've seen no other mortal race with the ability to change so widely from the average. You realize that these particularmortals might be more fun than any of the others you've encountered. You decide to spare a couple thousand years, and see how this plays out. So begins your habitation on the seemingly unremarkable Earth.

As the population of the so-called humans grows, you lose track of your creation, the first metahuman. It's no matter, though. There is plenty of chaos, and struggle, and fun to be had. Occasionally, more meta-humans develop, some of who even try to challenge you. More frequently, the mortals develop new ways to destroy each other, with little prodding from you. Fate often shows up to heckle you, but it's no matter to retreat from that dimension, and play in another for a while.

One day, your metahuman – Vandal Savage – finds you. He says he has a plan, and he wants you to join him. Normally, you're not one for plans, but he offers you the chance to cause so much chaos… you can't resist. You decide it might be fun to be part of a team for a little while too; Savage has the connections to find Fate, a feat you can't accomplish on your own. Chaos' talent for detection has, unfortunately, always been weaker than the orderly Fate's. So you become a part of the Light, and likewise, an opponent of the League and their little Kiddies.

The first time you fight them, they're annoying. As if putting up with Kent's stubbornnessisn't bad enough, you have to deal with these… these… kids defeating you. Well, technically, Fate does, but they made it possible. Especially the stupid, non-believing Speed-Brat who had to go and put the helmet on! In the end, you don't get the helmet, you don't get Fate's secrets, and you're forced to retreat by a group of mortal children. The whole affair puts the League's kiddies on your map – especially the Speed-Brat.

The second time is a little better. Oh, they still technically defeat you, sure, but the Light got what it wanted, and you got to cause two worlds worth of chaos in one night! Hearing that the little Baby-Mage cried over her father was a nice bonus, even if it means Nabu got a permanent host. You don't forget which of your real foes escaped that night unpunished, though. The girl may have put on Fate's Helmet and restored the worlds, but the Speed-Brat was also instrumental in stealing the gem and disrupting the ritual.

The third time is downright fun. When the kiddies disable your Puppet-Leaguers, they're really doing you a service. The League is so boring when they're under control, and using them to fight the kiddies is the most fun you've had in a while. Even when you lose, it works out for you; the Light will have to enact plan B, and plan B is so deliciously messy. Oh, sure, you'd still like to take them out, but your allies are right; you probably would kill everyone on the Watchtower. Since you are not, in fact, the Witch Boy you act like, you are able to see the long-term benefits of allowing them to live instead. Never let is be said that you would sacrifice a lot of Chaos in the long run for a little bit now.

You face them – and their growing club of little friends – four more times after that. They're mostly inconsequential struggles. You lose some, but mostly gain at least partial victories. During one of your scuffles, you even get to kill the little Water-Girl, and learn how to make the kiddies really suffer. Of course, you would have tried harder to get the Speed-Brat, too, if you had known what was going to happen during your next skirmish.

You don't even mean to fight them, the last time. You were only trying to provoke Fate; how were you supposed to know the kiddies would be so up in arms because you took the Baby-Mage? You expected Fate to come running to save his host's little girl. You didn't expect the kiddies to come for you first. And with such determination! You'd find it amusing if they weren't ruining your beautifully laid plans. Honestly, they're acting as if you have a history of killing them off or something- oh yeah. That's probably why. Teekle rolls her eyes at you, and mrowls a reminder that she did warn you.

No matter.

This time, you're not working for the Light, so there's only the tertiary objective of 'don't kill them yet' holding you back from going all out. You think it will be an easy enough matter to disable them, and reset your trap for Fate.

This is, in fact, intended to be a trap, not just another skirmish. Fate's interference is growing tiresome, and if his allies prove to be successful over your own… well, the League might be enough to finally tip the scale in Nabu's favor. That's not something you dare risk, so you're willing to resort to extreme measures.

There are very few ways to permanently harm or banish Lords of Chaos and Order, and all of them rely on the oldest and strongest of rituals. Even then, you are only an even match for Fate in the archaic ways. It would take a little something extra to give you the upper hand…

That's why you chose this specific site. To those without magic, it probably looks like almost any other moor in Scotland. Indeed, the moor itself is unremarkable. It's placement, though… The moor sits in the shadow of an ancient castle. A very specific, very much remarkable castle. Ruins are all that remain of it now, but you remember it as it once was; a thriving center of knowledge. Specifically, it was the center of mortal learning in regards to the magickarts.

It so amused you, to watch those mortals scurry around, tinkering with magic as if their puny minds might one day be capable of understanding it. While a few of them may have had the talent, the majority would end up wasting their lives in fruitless pursuit of unattainable abilities. Such impotence in the face of a few colleagues' success easily brewed jealousy and hate. Why, you barely had to do anything at all to provoke that war.

The non-gifted overwhelmed the real mages despite their magic, and ensured they were slaughtered. The magic from their blood still stains this place, and will provide you with the powered needed to take you foe down, once and for all.

That's why it's so inconvenient when the kiddies show up first. There are too many ways they could mess this up for you. They could defile the runes you laid to exorcise Fate from the Helmet; his anchor to this world. They could drain you of too much power before Fate arrives, or delay you too long passed the time limit of your ritual. They might prevent Fate from coming at all, if he believes they will save the Baby-Mage for him.

They could target your Teekle, and permanently cripple your power.

"We figured out your weakness, Klarion!" In the midst of your battle, the Speed-Brat whooshes up to you. You claw at the boy as he ducks in past your shields, and manage to catch his goggles in your burning hand. He dodges further injury, though, and continues passed you and back out of the range of your attacks. You realize that he scooped up your Teekle on the way.

You're not concerned, at first; your magic will protect her form any attack the kiddies might conceive of. After a moment, though, you notice the inhibiter collar the Brat must have clicked on you as he passed by. In the same instant, he skids to a stop, tossing your Teekle on to the runes you set up to trap Fate. "Fate said there's not point in trying to hold you. That doesn't mean we can't at least get rid of you. How long do you think you can stay here without your familiar anchoring you?"

"No, no, no, no, no!" You screech as you watch your very own ritual strip your magic from Teekle's portion of your soul. Before your eyes, she withers away to dust. Your own hands becomes translucent. There's no time to grieve, though; the kiddies aren't as dumb as you like, and press the advantage. Your semi-tangibility allows you to slip from the collar, but doesn't mean you're impervious from harm. There's no way for you to dodge all the attacks; an arrow, water, a boomerang, two super-enhanced punches, and a telekinetically thrown boulder all converge on your location. You pull all the magic you can back from your surroundings, and retreat.

You don't know where you are when you fall out of your portal on the other side. It's definitely still the Mortal Plane, though, so they must not have hit you. Still, this could be any of the almost infinite Earths in the multiverse. Without an anchor, you may never find your way back to the dimension you have called "home" these past few years.

With Teekle gone – Gone! – you need to make a new anchor quickly or be pulled back to the Chaotic Plane. Luckily, you're still holding the lens from the Speed-Brat's ruined goggles. It's not the sturdiest of materials for this sort of work, but you're confident your magic can make up for that; vengeance is a powerful force for Chaos. Your need to remain is more than strong enough to compensate for your now reduced state. It won't give you the freedom that having Teekle as an anchor did, but it will allow you to accomplish your goals before you're exiled back to the Chaotic Plane.

Besides, it just seems… fitting, somehow, that he should give you this. He took away what was yours, after all. It's only fair that he give you something in return. The fact that he's giving you a chance at his own demise is just your luck.

Teekle. My poor, Stupid Cat.

The Speed-Brat won't have any idea what's about to hit him. Fate himself has never cost you so much as this, this… Boy, and thus has never seen your true wrath. You willmake him pay. Dearly. With everything you have.

It's not long after you re-establish your tangency that you see him again. It's not your Speed-Brat; the boy is definitely smaller than the cretin that took away your Teekle. Still, it's quite satisfying when you run him down with an ephemeral tiger and claw him to shreds. In your rage, you kill him too quickly. His pain doesn't last long enough. So, you decide to test your new anchor's limits and try dimension crossing again. You find the your magic holds, but you can't go far. It's enough. You find new versions of the Speed-Brats on every world, and every time you move on, the multiverse is short one more Wally West.

In each dimension, you kill him a little differently. It's fun, coming up with new ways to kill him, to hurt his friends, to thwart those who stand in your way. It becomes a new game for you, and you decide to challenge yourself to cause as much chaos as you can in the process. Such petty vengeance is enough to keep you content, but it does little for the ache in your soul every time you turn to call for your Stupid Cat. You wish more than anything for a chance to take down your Speed-Brat. You will make him pay for taking away your power, your Teekle. Your friend.

It's lucky you're close enough to "home" to feel it when Savage finally, finally releases the magic you left him. The teleportation spell calls to you like a beacon, so although you can only move slowly through the multiverse with your current anchor, you can at least stop dallying and head straight back. You will have your revenge – it's so close now you can taste it.

Except then it isn't.

Apparently the little Speed-Brat is already dead; he got caught up saving the world in the wake of the Reach's little hissy fit. The new Speed-Brat is just some Time-Baby that won't even recognize you. When you hear the news, you throw a little hissy fit of your own. Savage tries to soothe you and Luthor tries to distract you with plans for the Apokalyptan invasion. Luthor's a smooth operator, and if you were actually the immature brat you act like, his diversion might have worked.

You like Apokolypse. For all that Darkseid claims to rule with an iron fist, the being's cruelty instead inspires more anarchy than lawfulness in even its "obedient" citizens. You also like the idea of this invasion; it would likely wipe out the Justice League once and for all, and most likely destroy any order left on the planet. Under any other circumstances, you might be giddy with excitement.

Unfortunately, you can't truly delight in the impending chaos. For perhaps the first time in your existence, something is more important to you than disorder.

Kid Flash – Wally West, Al Ghul tells you, when he recovers from his time in the Lazarus Pit – has wronged you. You can't make him pay personally, but there is something you can do to those he cares for. The multiverse doesn't need any Wally Wests. You've so enjoyed watching him die, again and again and again. If you can't have him, you'll have the rest.

Newly directionless, you give yourself more time to kill each one and get even more creative. You possess more powerful villains. You manipulate the Speed-Brat's friends. You set up unbeatable odds and watch as your foe falls again and again. Sometimes, you're able to set up whole conspiracies, and leave knowing the League will tear itself (or the government, or the world, it doesn't matter) apart in your wake. Other times, you savor the Speed-Brat's despair before you kill him and make only his life spin out of control. It goes quite well for a while.

One day, though, you do a double-take. There are definitely two Archer-Babies fighting you. By the end of the battle, there're two of all the little kiddies, except, of course, for the Speed-Brat. There's none of him.

Ten people despair, and it's not very long at all before the blame game starts; one set of kiddies turns on the other, and the latter is forced to make a hasty retreat.

As Water-Boy carries the Archer-Baby away – the poor thing is broken physically and emotionally – he murmurs, "Artemis, it was not him. He was not ours. This is not your fault any more than the North Pole was. We will save him next time."

You nearly cry out with glee and give away your position. These aren't some cloned kiddies or even random kiddies from another dimension. These are his kiddies – your kiddies. And they intend to try to stop you again! Oh, how wonderful. You'll get to see them fail again and again! It's going to hurt them so much.

Of course, this only makes it all the more important that they don't know it's you. They've learned your tricks, and might be able to actually resist you if they knew. You'll have to be more discrete, attack the Speed-Brat even less directly. That's fine, though. You have an eternity to ensure the Speed-Brat is wiped from existence. There's no harm in slowing down a little just to savor their despair.

And so life continues. You do your best – which, by all accounts is very good – to be unpredictable. You never kill the Speed-Brat the same way twice. You delay the League and the kiddies in different ways. Sometimes you draw out their pain. Often, you draw out his.

It's during one of the latter that this all comes to head.

You hate to tip your hand too soon, so you tend to avoid the Watchtower – and Fate – unless it's absolutely necessary. You magically "watch" their teleportation beams instead. Finally, one of the ones you check is the Speed-Brat. How cute, you think, and how perfect.

He's been sent down to search for the Legion of Doom's headquarters. It's easy enough for you to nudge this Luthor's mind however you want. You don't know what drove him crazy, but his mind is so perfectly disorganized... well, it would just be criminal not to take advantage of it. So Luthor sends his goons out, and the Speed-Brat is captured.

You have time, so your treat yourself; they don't kill him right away. You make Luthor think that he has a plan, and that they need information from the Speed-Brat. You let his underlings get creative.

The Speed-Brat sure knows how to scream, you'll give him that.

Eventually, the Archer-Baby-In-Disguise comes to rescue him. You're about to allow it – her pain is especially gratifying to you, and there's no need to rush this execution – when he recognizes her as her. That's unusual enough, but then she accepts him as him and you almost can't breathe.

It can't be.

It's him.

He's here.

You might… this could be… if this is him….

The Archer-Baby confirms it, and the closest thing to joy you've ever felt floods through your veins.

That's when you sound the alarm. You can't let this golden opportunity get away. And if the other kiddies come to find their missing comrade? You'll end them all. Your vengeance will finally be complete.

Unfortunately, your minions are far less competent than your former partners; the two escape. You decide against following them immediately. There's no reason to waste your one chance to end the Speed-Brat. If you're going to do this, it's going to be big. Your thoughts suddenly recall your work with Professor Ivo, as well as his all the trouble his little machines caused the League. Your smile curls upward to an inhuman degree as a plan forms in your mind. You are going to have so much fun with this.

Unfortunately sending hundreds of androids to dozens of places and coordinating them across the world and shutting down League transportation is a drain on the weakened state of your magic (how you curse the Speed-Brat for that!). By the time the rest of the kiddies show up there's little more you can do to take them on. Not with Fate's magic augmenting the teleportation gear in their hands. It would be too easy for them to retreat now… and take the Speed Brat with them. If they're smart – and they might be – you'd never find them. Or at least, you'd never be able to keep up with them. No. It's better to regroup, separate their forces, and then attack again when they're not expecting it.

You think the third time will again be the charm. Why the very mortal League thinks it's a good idea to base their HQ in a very vulnerable satellite in the very deadly vacuum of space, you have no idea. It's probably your best shot, though, once you learn Fate's away. A little possession to send away the big guys, a little flame to take out their critical systems… It's easy. You're more than capable of taking them down, if they would just stop fighting back.

Then! Oh, and then! The Speed-Brat has to go and fix the reactor and give everyone a chance to escape. He even has the gall to leave before you find him. What a hero, you think spitefully. Luckily, you find him again quickly. And he's with his little Archer-Baby too! They were dumb enough to use the League's teleportation tech instead of Fate's. Well, they'll pay for that.

"There's no escape now!" you want to shout, but hold it in. You don't need to monologue. You don't want him to understand why he's going to die. The fear and despair in his eyes is enough for you as you close in….

And then he's gone.

You scream in rage as you feel the flare of Fate's magic, and he slips through your grasp once again. For several moments, the world burns red.

When you're aware of yourself again, you find out he left you a little gift. They didn't escape. He did. The Archer-Baby is unconscious at your feet. One more, final, plan, begins to form in your mind. He'll come for her. They all will. And that's how he'll make them all pay. He surrounds the girl in a bubble of his magic, content that she won't be able to escape on her own. Your prisoner means that, for once, the Speed-Brat is going to come to you. You hold all the cards this time. You get to choose the location and method of the Speed-Brat's final demise. You know just where you want him to find you.

This ends now.