Blood, Bullets, Blades and Brothers
Downtown Little Rock, December 30th, in the lower levels of a Catholic Church, where many alterations have been made. The custom of the clergy, the significant financial donations, and predatory scare tactics have long kept mortals from these lower reaches, in traditions begun beneath the Cardinal Tiernan Callaghan. Here the Lancea Sanctum gathers to discuss, to worship, and to enjoy a sense of community with fellow predators.
This night, Sister Rebecca has asked to take confession with Mother Superior Callaghan, so they have secluded themselves in silent in the booths set aside for such, with the ominous Paladin Vrai guarding them. Beneath that hallowed location, in the true heart of the faith's worship, the Sanctuary plays host to Archbishop Cassius Callaghan, Bishop Wyatt Riley, and Brother Puck who stands behind Cassius, acting as a de facto Paladin. Brother Gabriel Priest fulfills his duties about the city, hunting for the Prince.
The discussions are simple and succinct. The Archbishop and the Bishop converse on the celebrations that come to the faith, the Quadrigesima and the Feast of Longinus. They discuss the Strix and the Texan front. They talk of the Carthian body politic, and the circumstances arrayed for and against the faith. But most often, both predators light up when discussing tactics, and they focus on those details specifically. Together they sit in the chairs behind the altar, facing empty pews.
In the midst of such conversation, Sister Angelique Dragosani slides passed the door and comes inside the Sanctuary which remains open to all predators, her goal to achieve a nightly meditation of purpose, and to have her nightly prayers. Upon seeing her fellow faithful she moves instinctively to join the community of which she has become a part.
As they note her presence, the conversation turns to local threats.
"Your Grace," says the child-like predator dressed in Blue Byzantine robes, adorned simply with a Lancea Sanctum stole made of black silk, and embroidered with a red Spear of Longinus at both ends and in its middle. He addresses the Bishop next to him. "Its a shame that such violent threats are required to gather so many of the faithful in one place."
Bishop Riley, nods as he speaks. "I agree but it is something that has to be done for the greater good of all. Also if I fail in this Killeen will be in very trusted hands with Bishop Dominic and Paladin Valentine. They will still fall under your guidance."
"Good evening, your Excellency. Your Grace...if i may ask....what is going on?" The lovely lady interjects.
Archbishop Callaghan turns a pair of green eyes and his sad smile to Angelique.
"Have you not heard, Sister Angelique, of the threat posed by Caleb Barrow?"
Her lips purse in a look of concern, her brow furrows. "Vaguely."
"Caleb Barrow is a warrior-hunter of the Circle of the Crone, who also holds affiliations with the Carthian movement." Cassius sighs in frustration. "A couple of weeks ago, he broke into a meeting I was having with a few of our locals and threatened Brother Vrai with retribution, promising a 3 for 1 death rate should a battle come to fruition between the Acolytes and the Faithful."
He turns to look thoughtfully at Riley, "I know your zealotry to be true. Do not fall, and we shall have no need to consider who answers to whom. And know that should any of us fall, our faith cannot and will not falter as long as a single Kindred remains to hold it."
"First of all, this Borrow is rude and deserves to be brought to judgment before Him." Angelique appears to build a head of steam, even as a slight smile grows on Riley's face. The visiting Bishop nods at her words. "Second of all It is my duty to protect."
Puck stands behind the Archbishop, quiet, and watchful. Brother Puck is taller than Cassius, which isn't hard, and dressed in functional military fatigues. His long hair is braided and swept back, the blond rope hanging behind him. He watches the interchange and measures Cassius as much as Angelique.
"Duty is not absolute, Sister Dragosani." Cassius answers her. "Having duty and the honor to carry it out does not guarantee success. We must always plan for both our potential victory, and the possibility of failure. You have fervor, Sister Angelique. But protection is harder than destruction. Vastly more difficult. You have fervor, Sister Angelique. But protection is harder than destruction. Vastly more difficult."
Puck flinches, as Bishop Riley smiles. Cassius seems not to notice either.
"I know, but as I am learning my duties and my Path. I know what has happened in the past with your...family."
Now it is the Archbishop's turn to flinch, as she continues.
"I do not wish that to happen to anyone else i know. I will do all in my power to protect those around me until I am accepted by a charge."
Cassius becomes possessed by a vacant look.
"All the training in the world matters not. Sometimes, it is merely God's will. Until our time, we can only do what we feel is best."
Riley's smile fades to nearly nothing, as he nods in accordance with the words. Puck adjusts the strap of his gun holster, and checks his blade. His nervousness does not show easily. The young predator before the anointed presses on, fervor and passion fueling her words.
"I am doing my best to become what God wishes me to be!"
"I know," her Archbishop replies, "And in that, I am proud of you."
"I also have not traveled since you have talked to me last," she challenges.
"Its best to learn from the examples of others and spread this example to all," Bishop Riley intercedes. The rising passions of so many predators easily put each of them on edge. Like a the tactician he is, Riley moves to intercept possible explosions of emotion.
The Bishop and Archbishop exchange glances, and the feverish pitch disappears from Cassius's voice.
"I have noticed, Angelique. All is well. Bishop Riley, I agree. I think that perhaps..."
A faint sound, unidentifiable, echoes down the stairwell. Cassius turns his head to hear it better. Bishop Riley focuses on the door to the Sanctuary, while Puck begins to draw pistol with practiced smoothness.
"Perhaps what, your Excellency?" asks the beautiful girl monster, but now even her ears are catching it, and closer to the door than the others she turns, her hands staying behind her, and her passion giving rise to the beginnings of battle lust.
The sound grows and Cassius begins to stand, as the doors that keep this chamber sealed from the world of mortals are forced open by what looks like a rallying horde. Puck clears his gun, and Cassius reaches for a curved Japanese blade kept near at hand. Angelique's fingers grow fluidly into razor sharp edges, the birthright of her blood, and a growl echoes from her throat. Bishop Riley is as stoic as Cassius, drawing a long western style broad blade and an antique revolver.
The people that flood through the door, are not quite people at all. They have hands and feet, arms and legs, bodies...but their mouths seem to have been moved and cloned a hundred fold. On their faces they have no mouths. But on their hands and near their necks there rest scores of misshapen and tiny orifices, which chew at the air and grind and grind and grind.
"Faithful!" cries the Archbishop, "to arms!"
Wyatt Riley dashes from his seat with sword in hand charging the crowd. His blade is already moving, the heavy metal edges parrying the most likely angles of assault, as he searches for an opening with which to kill. His gun, an extension of his will, raises in his other hand like a cobra, ready to spit leaden venom into the face of those who would violate a Sanctuary of the Lancea Sanctum.
Angelique began the utterance of a prayer for strength. Being so close to the front, and also moving forward, the horde crashed against her first, and her claws reached out to snuff the life from unwashed heathen monstronsities, meeting evil with violence.
Callaghan rushed forward, down the steps using their height for momentum. The katana he carries arcs fully and catches the candle light in its speed, looking for all the world like a streak of fire, before it buries in, peirces through, and passes beyond the first of his victims. His speed carries him past Angelique and into the throngs of invaders.
Puck also moves, though not directly to them, circling around the mass of conflict knotting up just past the doorway, and firing rapidly into the crowd. The hindmost invaders begin to fall to his well placed shots, a hand cannon booming in the nearly sound proof sanctuary.As the back numbers of the enemy fall to bullets, they begin to impede one another. New invaders, and God knows how many there are, must now climb over the rapidly mounting bodies of their allies. This gives the front line time to meet the Archbishop, Bishop, and Sister Angelique in close and point blank combat.
"I shall," Cassius speaks, swinging the blade in a crossing arc, slicing off neatly the head of a beast-man, "take the left flank."
Wyatt caught an invaders slashing claw on the crossguard of his larger blade, and with a quick motion, rolled the blade to an en guarde position, breaking fingers, and exposing a hand-mouth. As the thing gnashed and wailed, stretching and flexing to devour his face, the ghoulish thing came into line with the mouthless face of its owner.He lifted his revolver, taking a split second to aim and get the angle just right, before its barrel roared, and hot lead burned and broke through the foul mouth, the hand's flesh, the bones and the air between it and the things face, finally destroying the beasts brain and taking its life.
"I'll take the middle route," spoke the Bishop, calm and collected, save for his eyes where the battle lust was beginning to brim to the forefront.
"That leaves me with right," said the brutal lady, wading through the onslaught and slashing the enemy. "God be with us!"
Cassius dances in a masterpiece of rhythm and skill, but as he begins to shout strategic orders to coordinate the faithful, the sound of his voice is swallowed. The battle prayer that Angelique recites disappears, though her mouth still moves. Within five feet of the enemy, sound shatters, consumed by the insane, silent rambling of the monstrous throng.
The enemy seems heedless of their losses. Their sick milky eyes don't seem to acknowledge what they see or their surroundings at all, merely looking pained and filled with suffering. But their shark toothed hand mouths reach graspingly for their Kindred enemies.
While Cassius stands confused, and Puck maneuvers to best catch the enemy in useful fire, Angelique continues to pray, ignorning the silence. She catches a claw in the nose of one of the mouthless men, and tears it free with brute strength, dragging most of a face with her freed hand. Her lips switch from English to Japanese, but the sound refuse to come, regardless of the tongue its beckoned in.
Bishop Riley feels the hesitance of their advance, and sees the cohesion failing. With a wild moment of abandon, he hurls himself even further into the enemies' ranks, blasting with his hand cannon, eerily quieted but no less bright. Flash after flash, meets the oncoming wretches. As they close, through sheer numbers, his blade begins to carve and slice at limbs, disabling and dismembering.
The enemy falls. One monstrous invader slashes out hard with a clawed hand, and a sickening vibration races up Riley's sword, as the mouth literally chews on the metal. For now the fold of the blade holds up. In response, Riley's gun blazes a trench through the creatures face. A new one quickly takes the dying and warped mortal's place.
Two of the beasts move in on Sister Angelique, and they try to attack her together. Both of them though, blinded by madness, rush her low, and she leaps, clawing their throats, and rolling in the air to land behind them.
Wyatt Riley, battle maddened, appears to be laughing with fangs extended as he keeps attacking, despite the advance against him. More and more, the brutes hit home with their biting glances. Vitae trickles in slight rivulets from the wounds, and as he spins to fire, or to cut, he paints spirals on the ground.
Cassius seems disturbed most by the silence, and rolls his blade about him in a wall of metal, defensively. He draws a second shorter blade from his back, this one without the circular guard, from its hiding place amidst the cowl of his hair, and a lock of that hair falls to the ground cut by a parrying blow.
The Carnage ensues. The faithful gain ground, at little cost to themselves. Puck has expended all the rounds in his pistol and instead of reloading, simply moves forward, drawing a curved blade of his own, heavier and larger than his Archbishop's, and crashes into the far left flank with Cassius.
Yet, the bodies of the crippled horde are still being pressed by more and more of them from the other side, the entryway jammed by their numbers. From above them, starkly audible through the silence unnaturally created, the struggling Kindred hear ringing metal in the loftier sections of the Cathedral. Powerful blows, likely caused by Vrai, are joined by a screaming Valkyrie battle cry as Sister Rebecca joins the battle in her own violent conflict.
In the Sanctuary, the furthest from the gathered faithful begin to turn on their dead brethren and devour them with hand mouths. Pressing flesh of the fallen to their necks, they knit their own wounds, and seem to glow with a sickly green light. Suddenly, sound returns to the chamber, the unholy spell broken by this new priority, this unearthly hunger. They begin to press themselves, these enemy survivors, closely together. They murder the space between themselves and push to the faithful.
Freed from silence, Angelique again begs for sharpness from the almighty, "Lord make us a weapon for you. Help us to defeat our enemy."
Bishop Riley, lost in the lust of battle, screams as he runs another beast through, "I will guide your personally to hell if I have to!"
Cassius also prays, a measured rhythm, the sound passing between the hissing of his dancing blades, "Hallowed in faith and hallowed in blood..."
Riley's zealotry costs him a moment, as his blade is caught in the belly of an attacker, the torn cloth reveals a distended and bloated middle, adorned with a functioning mouth.Its tongue is wrapped about his blade, keeping it tightly to the beast, and though it dies slowly, three others fasten to Riley's arm, and tear into it, sawing it off with their innumerable misplaced jaws. The arc of vitae fountains about the melee.
Now, the enemy seems to have gotten wise as well as fanatical. They crash to the middle and begin to focus on Riley, and his wounds bleed rivers to the floor. He parries a few of the overbearing monsters with his gun, shooting at limbs, into faces and flesh, but they crush him, crashing into him over and over again.
Angelique and Puck begin to wade through the violence, paddling through the carnage with blades and hands and claws to get to Riley, the first to fall from sight. Cassius screams in near mindless rage and begins to climb the monster in front of him, skipping across the bodies of his enemies to get to Riley's defense, but he slips on the uneven torsos and slides into the mass, fighting as a blur to get free.
Riley screams in pain and anger, the sound like a demonic clarion call from the pits of hell. Many of beast-throng press their backs to Angelique. They make themselves vulnerable and seem uncaring. Something, wrong, is happening in the throng of flesh.
"Return to hell!" she cries slashing hard at the soft parts exposed to her. Many of them fall to her ferocious assault, but this seems only to aid in their defense of their foremost, who have the advantage over the fallen Bishop. The bodies she creates slicken the floor, and her feet have difficulty finding purchase.
Riley falls to one knee still fighting, but he is fastened to by so many. They cling to him like insects, chewing at his lone remaining wrist, and drinking the kindred vitae that comes forth. His world turns into a crushing wall of bodies, each covered in mouths. The numbers of the horde have thinned, but it does not seem to be quickly enough.
"There are but 15!" the Archbishop cries out, still stifled by the crowd about him. His passage is not clear, though he takes but a few wounds. "Look to Riley. Look to the Bishop!"
"Damn you, monsters!" Angelique kills and rends. "Enjoy my claws as they end you!"
Callaghan's face becomes a wall of panic as he slices and pushes through. All his grace abandoned in desperation. "We shall not lose him! Puck, Angelique, to Riley."
Riley himself disappears beneath the waves and no longer do they recede. His image is lost in the sea of violence. The tide steadies as it wavers, and the only thing to break their devouring pattern is Riley's broadsword thrust up as Excalibur from the lake.
Even as that familiar blade, bloodied, shoots like a spire through the skull of one of the enemy, a horrendous tearing echoes through the chamber. In sudden response, the mass of enemies turn their attentions to their flanks, where Puck, Angelique, and Cassius are grating at their numbers like sand blasting stone.
Angelique keeps going,screaming in anger. Cassius screams at the sound, and full blown red eyed frenzy takes him. His sword is dropped and he begins to tear at eyes, and throats, rending as he moves towards where Riley made his stand. Puck moves to get in between Angelique and Cassius, fending off blows aimed at them. Several blows that would have slashed Angelique's neck are met with skillful parries before powerful ripostes send the offender to hell. Puck is efficient, and nearly composed, though his anger is beginning to chafe at his mask.
The faithful are nearly consumed by frenzy, with only Puck retaining his sense of self. The carnage is over in seconds. The enemy is broken, and shattered, some being drained by Cassius in his vengeful frenzy.
For a few seconds after the hard edge of violence is assuaged, Puck is torn in how best to act. It grows apparent that neither Cassius nor Angelique will turn on one another, and with a parting look at Riley's remains he moves to the door to keep cover their, in case of a renewed press of the cultists comes.
Angelique regains herself before Cassius, and rushes to Riley, her hands hovering over his headless body, a skull and head torn from one of his enemies still clutched in his lifeless hand. His skin has begun to blacken, as final death overcomes his corpse, and the surface of his body has begun to fall away as ash.
Her voice begins as a low whisper, but escalates to a scream, "No. No. No! NO!"
As she gives in to impulse and touches him, her own soft motion sets off the chain reaction upsetting the uneasy equilibrium in the corpse. It falls away as powdered gray and black ash, becoming mud near the neck, as his remains mix with his spilled vitae. His head is nowhere to be seen, likely devoured by the cultists in their own frenzy.
His clothing remains, and a piece of paper sticks errantly from his coat pocket. Shock washing over her face, she moves to take the paper from his pocket, blood tears springing to her eyes.
Cassius regains himself also in tears, blood spattered over his face, and a drained corpse dropped at his feet. He looks about, seeming to recover himself but slowly.
Puck takes stock of the door, his back to the wall, and his face only slightly exposed as he inspects the staircase. He calls out in Gaelic, waiting for echoed responses. Code words are bandied back and forth.
Angelique pulls the paper free from the coat, and unfolds it, seeing a lazy handwriting, arching over the page.
Callaghan moves to reclaim the sword he lost in frenzy, and moves also, with reverence to the sword that Bishop Riley had left behind.
The grating sound of the blades across stone echoes as she hoarsely begins to read. Bishop Riley's last message to the Damned rebounds from the walls.
"Any day, anyone of us can fall. Our Faith gives us strength, will unify us, and keep us strong. If one falls, learn from them, teach their lessons. Stay strong and never fail even if it will mean your end, because if you die on your feet for what you will hold sacred you truly never fail."
"Archbishop Callaghan, you are brother to me. Be that leader that others strive to serve."
"Bishop Dominic, be the bishop you where meant to be."
"Dragosani, serve and protect and never stumble."
"Citizen Princes September and December Carnivale, remember that there is no merit without effort. Lead your cities the way you always have."
"Paladin Akira Valentine, you have been the closest thing to a friend as one could ever ask for. Keep strong and serve Bishop Dominic as you have served me."
"Sum Sanctus and Strength threw Merit."
"Bishop Wyatt Riley"
Cassius bows his head, his gore spattered hair dripping on the stones. "We have failed a brother, O Lord, one who came to us in our our of need. We will not forget his sacrifice, O Lord, and pray that when the time comes, each of us are prepared to make that same stand in faith and service. Amen. Sum Sanctus!"
From his position against the wall, looking out the door, Puck makes the mark of the Spear of Longinus, and kisses his hand, saying quietly, "Sum Sanctus." After a brief space of time, he says, "All clear, Excellency."
Angelique, her voice wavering, intones, "Sum Sanctus." She clutched the letter to herself, her body shaking.
Rebecca's voice is heard saying, "All clear." Brother Vrai's voice elsewhere in the house cries, "All clear." Bishop Callaghan's voice cries out in desperation, "Cassius! Cassius! Who has fallen!" her connection bearing the truth of despair to her heart if not the details.
The shaking Sister Angelique continues, desperation and loss in her voice, "....I know i wasn't asked.....but this night has lost a great predator. Bishop Riley has fallen, he went down fighting."
Cassius moves to the door, speaking quietly to Puck, whispering requests for aid, to go and see to Katherine, to see to the others. Puck nods at his words and passes out the door, hesitating to look with concern to Angelique. He sees Cassius moving towards her and quickly glides to his duty.
Cassius quickly returns to attend Angelique's words, "That he did."
Dragosani closes her eyes, unable to speak more, trying to keep from just losing it completely.
The Archbishop puts a hand on her shoulder and squeezes lightly. "The letter, Angelique. I would make a copy of it. Those named in it must be told. For him."
"I'll do it, your Excellency," her fist grips the letter brutally, grasping it like she grasps at honor.
"May I copy it please? For the Archives. For remembrance. For his honor?"
Angelique nods,losing it then, handing it to him, her hands falling into Riley's ashes.
The Archbishop takes the letter and prays for strength.
This night, Sister Rebecca has asked to take confession with Mother Superior Callaghan, so they have secluded themselves in silent in the booths set aside for such, with the ominous Paladin Vrai guarding them. Beneath that hallowed location, in the true heart of the faith's worship, the Sanctuary plays host to Archbishop Cassius Callaghan, Bishop Wyatt Riley, and Brother Puck who stands behind Cassius, acting as a de facto Paladin. Brother Gabriel Priest fulfills his duties about the city, hunting for the Prince.
The discussions are simple and succinct. The Archbishop and the Bishop converse on the celebrations that come to the faith, the Quadrigesima and the Feast of Longinus. They discuss the Strix and the Texan front. They talk of the Carthian body politic, and the circumstances arrayed for and against the faith. But most often, both predators light up when discussing tactics, and they focus on those details specifically. Together they sit in the chairs behind the altar, facing empty pews.
In the midst of such conversation, Sister Angelique Dragosani slides passed the door and comes inside the Sanctuary which remains open to all predators, her goal to achieve a nightly meditation of purpose, and to have her nightly prayers. Upon seeing her fellow faithful she moves instinctively to join the community of which she has become a part.
As they note her presence, the conversation turns to local threats.
"Your Grace," says the child-like predator dressed in Blue Byzantine robes, adorned simply with a Lancea Sanctum stole made of black silk, and embroidered with a red Spear of Longinus at both ends and in its middle. He addresses the Bishop next to him. "Its a shame that such violent threats are required to gather so many of the faithful in one place."
Bishop Riley, nods as he speaks. "I agree but it is something that has to be done for the greater good of all. Also if I fail in this Killeen will be in very trusted hands with Bishop Dominic and Paladin Valentine. They will still fall under your guidance."
"Good evening, your Excellency. Your Grace...if i may ask....what is going on?" The lovely lady interjects.
Archbishop Callaghan turns a pair of green eyes and his sad smile to Angelique.
"Have you not heard, Sister Angelique, of the threat posed by Caleb Barrow?"
Her lips purse in a look of concern, her brow furrows. "Vaguely."
"Caleb Barrow is a warrior-hunter of the Circle of the Crone, who also holds affiliations with the Carthian movement." Cassius sighs in frustration. "A couple of weeks ago, he broke into a meeting I was having with a few of our locals and threatened Brother Vrai with retribution, promising a 3 for 1 death rate should a battle come to fruition between the Acolytes and the Faithful."
He turns to look thoughtfully at Riley, "I know your zealotry to be true. Do not fall, and we shall have no need to consider who answers to whom. And know that should any of us fall, our faith cannot and will not falter as long as a single Kindred remains to hold it."
"First of all, this Borrow is rude and deserves to be brought to judgment before Him." Angelique appears to build a head of steam, even as a slight smile grows on Riley's face. The visiting Bishop nods at her words. "Second of all It is my duty to protect."
Puck stands behind the Archbishop, quiet, and watchful. Brother Puck is taller than Cassius, which isn't hard, and dressed in functional military fatigues. His long hair is braided and swept back, the blond rope hanging behind him. He watches the interchange and measures Cassius as much as Angelique.
"Duty is not absolute, Sister Dragosani." Cassius answers her. "Having duty and the honor to carry it out does not guarantee success. We must always plan for both our potential victory, and the possibility of failure. You have fervor, Sister Angelique. But protection is harder than destruction. Vastly more difficult. You have fervor, Sister Angelique. But protection is harder than destruction. Vastly more difficult."
Puck flinches, as Bishop Riley smiles. Cassius seems not to notice either.
"I know, but as I am learning my duties and my Path. I know what has happened in the past with your...family."
Now it is the Archbishop's turn to flinch, as she continues.
"I do not wish that to happen to anyone else i know. I will do all in my power to protect those around me until I am accepted by a charge."
Cassius becomes possessed by a vacant look.
"All the training in the world matters not. Sometimes, it is merely God's will. Until our time, we can only do what we feel is best."
Riley's smile fades to nearly nothing, as he nods in accordance with the words. Puck adjusts the strap of his gun holster, and checks his blade. His nervousness does not show easily. The young predator before the anointed presses on, fervor and passion fueling her words.
"I am doing my best to become what God wishes me to be!"
"I know," her Archbishop replies, "And in that, I am proud of you."
"I also have not traveled since you have talked to me last," she challenges.
"Its best to learn from the examples of others and spread this example to all," Bishop Riley intercedes. The rising passions of so many predators easily put each of them on edge. Like a the tactician he is, Riley moves to intercept possible explosions of emotion.
The Bishop and Archbishop exchange glances, and the feverish pitch disappears from Cassius's voice.
"I have noticed, Angelique. All is well. Bishop Riley, I agree. I think that perhaps..."
A faint sound, unidentifiable, echoes down the stairwell. Cassius turns his head to hear it better. Bishop Riley focuses on the door to the Sanctuary, while Puck begins to draw pistol with practiced smoothness.
"Perhaps what, your Excellency?" asks the beautiful girl monster, but now even her ears are catching it, and closer to the door than the others she turns, her hands staying behind her, and her passion giving rise to the beginnings of battle lust.
The sound grows and Cassius begins to stand, as the doors that keep this chamber sealed from the world of mortals are forced open by what looks like a rallying horde. Puck clears his gun, and Cassius reaches for a curved Japanese blade kept near at hand. Angelique's fingers grow fluidly into razor sharp edges, the birthright of her blood, and a growl echoes from her throat. Bishop Riley is as stoic as Cassius, drawing a long western style broad blade and an antique revolver.
The people that flood through the door, are not quite people at all. They have hands and feet, arms and legs, bodies...but their mouths seem to have been moved and cloned a hundred fold. On their faces they have no mouths. But on their hands and near their necks there rest scores of misshapen and tiny orifices, which chew at the air and grind and grind and grind.
"Faithful!" cries the Archbishop, "to arms!"
Wyatt Riley dashes from his seat with sword in hand charging the crowd. His blade is already moving, the heavy metal edges parrying the most likely angles of assault, as he searches for an opening with which to kill. His gun, an extension of his will, raises in his other hand like a cobra, ready to spit leaden venom into the face of those who would violate a Sanctuary of the Lancea Sanctum.
Angelique began the utterance of a prayer for strength. Being so close to the front, and also moving forward, the horde crashed against her first, and her claws reached out to snuff the life from unwashed heathen monstronsities, meeting evil with violence.
Callaghan rushed forward, down the steps using their height for momentum. The katana he carries arcs fully and catches the candle light in its speed, looking for all the world like a streak of fire, before it buries in, peirces through, and passes beyond the first of his victims. His speed carries him past Angelique and into the throngs of invaders.
Puck also moves, though not directly to them, circling around the mass of conflict knotting up just past the doorway, and firing rapidly into the crowd. The hindmost invaders begin to fall to his well placed shots, a hand cannon booming in the nearly sound proof sanctuary.As the back numbers of the enemy fall to bullets, they begin to impede one another. New invaders, and God knows how many there are, must now climb over the rapidly mounting bodies of their allies. This gives the front line time to meet the Archbishop, Bishop, and Sister Angelique in close and point blank combat.
"I shall," Cassius speaks, swinging the blade in a crossing arc, slicing off neatly the head of a beast-man, "take the left flank."
Wyatt caught an invaders slashing claw on the crossguard of his larger blade, and with a quick motion, rolled the blade to an en guarde position, breaking fingers, and exposing a hand-mouth. As the thing gnashed and wailed, stretching and flexing to devour his face, the ghoulish thing came into line with the mouthless face of its owner.He lifted his revolver, taking a split second to aim and get the angle just right, before its barrel roared, and hot lead burned and broke through the foul mouth, the hand's flesh, the bones and the air between it and the things face, finally destroying the beasts brain and taking its life.
"I'll take the middle route," spoke the Bishop, calm and collected, save for his eyes where the battle lust was beginning to brim to the forefront.
"That leaves me with right," said the brutal lady, wading through the onslaught and slashing the enemy. "God be with us!"
Cassius dances in a masterpiece of rhythm and skill, but as he begins to shout strategic orders to coordinate the faithful, the sound of his voice is swallowed. The battle prayer that Angelique recites disappears, though her mouth still moves. Within five feet of the enemy, sound shatters, consumed by the insane, silent rambling of the monstrous throng.
The enemy seems heedless of their losses. Their sick milky eyes don't seem to acknowledge what they see or their surroundings at all, merely looking pained and filled with suffering. But their shark toothed hand mouths reach graspingly for their Kindred enemies.
While Cassius stands confused, and Puck maneuvers to best catch the enemy in useful fire, Angelique continues to pray, ignorning the silence. She catches a claw in the nose of one of the mouthless men, and tears it free with brute strength, dragging most of a face with her freed hand. Her lips switch from English to Japanese, but the sound refuse to come, regardless of the tongue its beckoned in.
Bishop Riley feels the hesitance of their advance, and sees the cohesion failing. With a wild moment of abandon, he hurls himself even further into the enemies' ranks, blasting with his hand cannon, eerily quieted but no less bright. Flash after flash, meets the oncoming wretches. As they close, through sheer numbers, his blade begins to carve and slice at limbs, disabling and dismembering.
The enemy falls. One monstrous invader slashes out hard with a clawed hand, and a sickening vibration races up Riley's sword, as the mouth literally chews on the metal. For now the fold of the blade holds up. In response, Riley's gun blazes a trench through the creatures face. A new one quickly takes the dying and warped mortal's place.
Two of the beasts move in on Sister Angelique, and they try to attack her together. Both of them though, blinded by madness, rush her low, and she leaps, clawing their throats, and rolling in the air to land behind them.
Wyatt Riley, battle maddened, appears to be laughing with fangs extended as he keeps attacking, despite the advance against him. More and more, the brutes hit home with their biting glances. Vitae trickles in slight rivulets from the wounds, and as he spins to fire, or to cut, he paints spirals on the ground.
Cassius seems disturbed most by the silence, and rolls his blade about him in a wall of metal, defensively. He draws a second shorter blade from his back, this one without the circular guard, from its hiding place amidst the cowl of his hair, and a lock of that hair falls to the ground cut by a parrying blow.
The Carnage ensues. The faithful gain ground, at little cost to themselves. Puck has expended all the rounds in his pistol and instead of reloading, simply moves forward, drawing a curved blade of his own, heavier and larger than his Archbishop's, and crashes into the far left flank with Cassius.
Yet, the bodies of the crippled horde are still being pressed by more and more of them from the other side, the entryway jammed by their numbers. From above them, starkly audible through the silence unnaturally created, the struggling Kindred hear ringing metal in the loftier sections of the Cathedral. Powerful blows, likely caused by Vrai, are joined by a screaming Valkyrie battle cry as Sister Rebecca joins the battle in her own violent conflict.
In the Sanctuary, the furthest from the gathered faithful begin to turn on their dead brethren and devour them with hand mouths. Pressing flesh of the fallen to their necks, they knit their own wounds, and seem to glow with a sickly green light. Suddenly, sound returns to the chamber, the unholy spell broken by this new priority, this unearthly hunger. They begin to press themselves, these enemy survivors, closely together. They murder the space between themselves and push to the faithful.
Freed from silence, Angelique again begs for sharpness from the almighty, "Lord make us a weapon for you. Help us to defeat our enemy."
Bishop Riley, lost in the lust of battle, screams as he runs another beast through, "I will guide your personally to hell if I have to!"
Cassius also prays, a measured rhythm, the sound passing between the hissing of his dancing blades, "Hallowed in faith and hallowed in blood..."
Riley's zealotry costs him a moment, as his blade is caught in the belly of an attacker, the torn cloth reveals a distended and bloated middle, adorned with a functioning mouth.Its tongue is wrapped about his blade, keeping it tightly to the beast, and though it dies slowly, three others fasten to Riley's arm, and tear into it, sawing it off with their innumerable misplaced jaws. The arc of vitae fountains about the melee.
Now, the enemy seems to have gotten wise as well as fanatical. They crash to the middle and begin to focus on Riley, and his wounds bleed rivers to the floor. He parries a few of the overbearing monsters with his gun, shooting at limbs, into faces and flesh, but they crush him, crashing into him over and over again.
Angelique and Puck begin to wade through the violence, paddling through the carnage with blades and hands and claws to get to Riley, the first to fall from sight. Cassius screams in near mindless rage and begins to climb the monster in front of him, skipping across the bodies of his enemies to get to Riley's defense, but he slips on the uneven torsos and slides into the mass, fighting as a blur to get free.
Riley screams in pain and anger, the sound like a demonic clarion call from the pits of hell. Many of beast-throng press their backs to Angelique. They make themselves vulnerable and seem uncaring. Something, wrong, is happening in the throng of flesh.
"Return to hell!" she cries slashing hard at the soft parts exposed to her. Many of them fall to her ferocious assault, but this seems only to aid in their defense of their foremost, who have the advantage over the fallen Bishop. The bodies she creates slicken the floor, and her feet have difficulty finding purchase.
Riley falls to one knee still fighting, but he is fastened to by so many. They cling to him like insects, chewing at his lone remaining wrist, and drinking the kindred vitae that comes forth. His world turns into a crushing wall of bodies, each covered in mouths. The numbers of the horde have thinned, but it does not seem to be quickly enough.
"There are but 15!" the Archbishop cries out, still stifled by the crowd about him. His passage is not clear, though he takes but a few wounds. "Look to Riley. Look to the Bishop!"
"Damn you, monsters!" Angelique kills and rends. "Enjoy my claws as they end you!"
Callaghan's face becomes a wall of panic as he slices and pushes through. All his grace abandoned in desperation. "We shall not lose him! Puck, Angelique, to Riley."
Riley himself disappears beneath the waves and no longer do they recede. His image is lost in the sea of violence. The tide steadies as it wavers, and the only thing to break their devouring pattern is Riley's broadsword thrust up as Excalibur from the lake.
Even as that familiar blade, bloodied, shoots like a spire through the skull of one of the enemy, a horrendous tearing echoes through the chamber. In sudden response, the mass of enemies turn their attentions to their flanks, where Puck, Angelique, and Cassius are grating at their numbers like sand blasting stone.
Angelique keeps going,screaming in anger. Cassius screams at the sound, and full blown red eyed frenzy takes him. His sword is dropped and he begins to tear at eyes, and throats, rending as he moves towards where Riley made his stand. Puck moves to get in between Angelique and Cassius, fending off blows aimed at them. Several blows that would have slashed Angelique's neck are met with skillful parries before powerful ripostes send the offender to hell. Puck is efficient, and nearly composed, though his anger is beginning to chafe at his mask.
The faithful are nearly consumed by frenzy, with only Puck retaining his sense of self. The carnage is over in seconds. The enemy is broken, and shattered, some being drained by Cassius in his vengeful frenzy.
For a few seconds after the hard edge of violence is assuaged, Puck is torn in how best to act. It grows apparent that neither Cassius nor Angelique will turn on one another, and with a parting look at Riley's remains he moves to the door to keep cover their, in case of a renewed press of the cultists comes.
Angelique regains herself before Cassius, and rushes to Riley, her hands hovering over his headless body, a skull and head torn from one of his enemies still clutched in his lifeless hand. His skin has begun to blacken, as final death overcomes his corpse, and the surface of his body has begun to fall away as ash.
Her voice begins as a low whisper, but escalates to a scream, "No. No. No! NO!"
As she gives in to impulse and touches him, her own soft motion sets off the chain reaction upsetting the uneasy equilibrium in the corpse. It falls away as powdered gray and black ash, becoming mud near the neck, as his remains mix with his spilled vitae. His head is nowhere to be seen, likely devoured by the cultists in their own frenzy.
His clothing remains, and a piece of paper sticks errantly from his coat pocket. Shock washing over her face, she moves to take the paper from his pocket, blood tears springing to her eyes.
Cassius regains himself also in tears, blood spattered over his face, and a drained corpse dropped at his feet. He looks about, seeming to recover himself but slowly.
Puck takes stock of the door, his back to the wall, and his face only slightly exposed as he inspects the staircase. He calls out in Gaelic, waiting for echoed responses. Code words are bandied back and forth.
Angelique pulls the paper free from the coat, and unfolds it, seeing a lazy handwriting, arching over the page.
Callaghan moves to reclaim the sword he lost in frenzy, and moves also, with reverence to the sword that Bishop Riley had left behind.
The grating sound of the blades across stone echoes as she hoarsely begins to read. Bishop Riley's last message to the Damned rebounds from the walls.
"Any day, anyone of us can fall. Our Faith gives us strength, will unify us, and keep us strong. If one falls, learn from them, teach their lessons. Stay strong and never fail even if it will mean your end, because if you die on your feet for what you will hold sacred you truly never fail."
"Archbishop Callaghan, you are brother to me. Be that leader that others strive to serve."
"Bishop Dominic, be the bishop you where meant to be."
"Dragosani, serve and protect and never stumble."
"Citizen Princes September and December Carnivale, remember that there is no merit without effort. Lead your cities the way you always have."
"Paladin Akira Valentine, you have been the closest thing to a friend as one could ever ask for. Keep strong and serve Bishop Dominic as you have served me."
"Sum Sanctus and Strength threw Merit."
"Bishop Wyatt Riley"
Cassius bows his head, his gore spattered hair dripping on the stones. "We have failed a brother, O Lord, one who came to us in our our of need. We will not forget his sacrifice, O Lord, and pray that when the time comes, each of us are prepared to make that same stand in faith and service. Amen. Sum Sanctus!"
From his position against the wall, looking out the door, Puck makes the mark of the Spear of Longinus, and kisses his hand, saying quietly, "Sum Sanctus." After a brief space of time, he says, "All clear, Excellency."
Angelique, her voice wavering, intones, "Sum Sanctus." She clutched the letter to herself, her body shaking.
Rebecca's voice is heard saying, "All clear." Brother Vrai's voice elsewhere in the house cries, "All clear." Bishop Callaghan's voice cries out in desperation, "Cassius! Cassius! Who has fallen!" her connection bearing the truth of despair to her heart if not the details.
The shaking Sister Angelique continues, desperation and loss in her voice, "....I know i wasn't asked.....but this night has lost a great predator. Bishop Riley has fallen, he went down fighting."
Cassius moves to the door, speaking quietly to Puck, whispering requests for aid, to go and see to Katherine, to see to the others. Puck nods at his words and passes out the door, hesitating to look with concern to Angelique. He sees Cassius moving towards her and quickly glides to his duty.
Cassius quickly returns to attend Angelique's words, "That he did."
Dragosani closes her eyes, unable to speak more, trying to keep from just losing it completely.
The Archbishop puts a hand on her shoulder and squeezes lightly. "The letter, Angelique. I would make a copy of it. Those named in it must be told. For him."
"I'll do it, your Excellency," her fist grips the letter brutally, grasping it like she grasps at honor.
"May I copy it please? For the Archives. For remembrance. For his honor?"
Angelique nods,losing it then, handing it to him, her hands falling into Riley's ashes.
The Archbishop takes the letter and prays for strength.