After the Vigil

Kord here. This is just going to be a brief run-down, just because- well- O'Zalia already said most of what I was going to say. He kept it concise and he kept it brief. I'm just going to write down what I think, since, well, Isaac can read my mind anyways, there's no point keeping it from anyone, either. All I'm going to say is, I understand why Isaac wouldn't like the idea of the Backer and him being one and the same, and I'm not even going to write it down further. This case is already treading on bloody eggshells, and I honestly don't want to get into a spat with him. I'm not stupid, between the two of us, he's the far superior and I don't want to piss him off and end up working this case alone.

In the end, all we got was more incentive. I don't know who the Backer actually is, but if he's not what he sounds like then we have a nice third party representative here now, too. Let's see- Daemons, stalkers who really shouldn't quit their day job, and the Backer. If the stalkers aren't associated with the Backer himself, which would make sense, or, by some twist of logic, Alagarus itself. I highly doubt the latter for obvious reasons.

But again. More incentive. Not enough knowledge. We still have a name and a general idea of its M.O. and we know it transforms and uses claws. That's a lot more than we started off with, yes, but there are still too many loose ends. I might be a goddamn idiot in comparison to O'Zalia but dammit I know better than to walk in guns blazing now. It took me about a year of Servant and Demi-God hunting, but I learned my lesson.

We're locking the money in the motel room safe- with the exception of just enough to pay for another week extension and some food- but right now we have nothing to do but talk and figure out where Alagarus might be or how he could be drawn out.

I'm getting tired of just hiding out, and old me would have just thrown a party with nobody but competent fighters involved, but let's get real here. Most of O'Zalia's teammates are out doing whatever. His friend Daniel and his friends are doing things. Most major players are out and otherwise indisposed so that's not a viable plan and to top it off that's a very risky plan with too high a possibility for casualties. That's a post-escape Kord plan. Not good.

Now let's just get this clear. I am an idiot. But I'm a self-aware idiot. Distinction.

Screw it, I'm gonna go find a coffee shop. I'm just gonna go ask if Isaac wants anything and then I'm gonna head out. Hopefully neither of us get followed by those people. Though, I mean honestly the best way of following us would be to track us by our blog... shit, that actually may be a problem.

Candlelight Vigil

Kord and I attended the vigil, as planned. There were a lot of people there. Friends and family of the deceased, as well as people like us, who were completely unrelated, but chose to pay their respects anyway. It went on for a while, giving me plenty of time to think about this Daemon Lord. He was obviously powerful, but that didn't make our struggle hopeless. I've tangled with powerful beings before. This was just a new one that I don't understand yet. But I'm a quick learner. And all I could think about while staring at the pictures of the murder individuals was that I HAD to stop this one.

I began tapping into the thoughts of everyone there, just to see if there were any clues in their thoughts. I found nothing, but I kept scanning, until I came across something odd.

Hear something? Kord thought, noticing my unease.

It's not what I hear, I though back. It's what I don't hear.

There was a man outside of the crowd, dressed in a dark longcoat. He was too far away to make out is features, but he was in range of my telepathy. Despite this, I couldn't read his thoughts. His mind was blocked off to me.

That guy, I thought, gesturing to him. Follow him.

Kord and I began tailing the stranger, who led us away from the vigil and into town, eventually turning down a dark alleyway. And the closer we got to him, the more I could feel his poer. And he had a lot of it. Whoever this guy was, he was strong. As we came to the opening, the man spoke up.

“You know,” he said, his voice seeming to come from all directions at once. “Having such a violent Daemon running around the streets? Really bad for business.”

He turned to face us, but remained concealed mostly in shadow. At this distance, I could make out that his coat was a dark violet, rather than black, like I had initially assumed.

“Who are you?” I asked.

“Just a man with a common enemy,” he said.

“You have beef with the Daemon too?” Kord asked.

“Oh, do I,” the man said.

“Are you connected to any of the victims?” I asked him.

“Not this batch, no,” he said.

“This batch!?” Kord exclaimed. “Are you saying there's more!?”

“Amaryllis,” the man said. “You heard of them?”

“Yes,” I said. “A recent company devoted to the research and development of prosthetic limbs.”

“Just last night they were celebrating the anniversary of their second year in business,” the man said. “When they received an unwanted guest.”

“Alagarus,” I said.

“That's right,”
the man said.

“And what's your affiliation with the company?” I asked.

The man chuckled

“I own it,” he said simply.

“I see,” I said. “So you're the Backer.”

“Correct,” the man confirmed. “Now, on to business. You are both after Alagarus, and I would like to see him destroyed. So I came to make an offer.”

“Of what?” I asked.

The man conjured a briefcase out of seemingly no where and tossed it to me.

“Just a token,” he said. “Don't be humble, just take it.”

I caught the briefcase before it could hit me, and examined it.

“What's it for?” I asked.

“Whatever you want,” the Backer said, fading away. “As long as Alagarus is sent back to Hell where his kind belong, I don't give a damn!”

And then he was gone.

“The Backer, huh?” Kord asked. “So he, like, backs people?”

“Pretty much,” I said. “He funds various people as part of some grand scheme he's planning.”

“And he's backing us?” Kord asked.

I opened up the briefcase and was met with the sent of freshly printed cash.

“Looks like it,” I said.

Kord looked over my shoulder at the shitload of money inside the briefcase and whistled.

“Is this all stolen?” he asked.

“From various banks, yes,” I said.,

“Is it safe to spend?”

“You're talking to an evil mastermind,” I said. “In my hands, anything is safe to use.”

We started heading back. We were about  halfway to my bike when Kord spoke up in my head.
So, are we just gonna ignore the giant elephant sitting in the middle of the room? He asked.
I plan to, I responded.
That guy sounded just like-, He said.
"Shut up," I told him. "It's not him."
"How do you know?" Kord asked.
"Because I've been around him enough," I said. "Aside from a trace amount that all runners gain from Fear exposure, he has no Eldritch energy in his body. Not as much as the Backer has."
"So how do you explain it, then?" he asked.
"A coincidence or a trick," I said. "Daniel had the same thought when he heard the Backer's voice."
"And what if that's not the case?" Kord asked. "What if they are the same person, somehow?"
"This conversation is over," I said, and continued walking.

Alagarus (And Also My Rant On Daemons)

For your information, Isaac, the reason I don't happen to use my Choir powers to listen in on other people is because I happen to believe in common courtesy and dignity and dammit I can get enough information reading your blog posts that it doesn't matter how I get the information and--

You were otherwise disposed?

I was listening for the people who were tailing us, thank you very much, my ears were otherwise pointed. But so. Daemon Lords. Fun-ness. I could tell it was a Daemon from the get-go, just by the symbols it was splattering around in blood reds and bile greens and eye jelly purples like an extradimensional Bob Ross or somet-

okay I threw up. Hard. I almost forgot how disgusting and bloody the killing was, but good old sarcastic fucking me had to go and be sassy and remind myself of the massacre like that.

So. Alagarus. Daemon Lord of Celebration. Now, I don't know much about the Daemon Lords. I know there's ten of them. I know one's name is Azail and he enables people. And there are nine more where he came from. They come from and are some of the natives a Fear-less domain that had some old name once upon a time but now is known as Bloody Hell, because, once again, the red haired dick decided to redecorate the place.

You know, if you call The Biker a dick one too many times and he begins to take notice and we end up with two adversaries instead of one, I'm going to blame you.

And the problem with dealing with two adversaries being...?

Nothing, really. Aside from the fact that we already have to prevent a series of perverse massacres by a creature that has a skewed idea of "fun".

Isaac, how do you even do the finger thing with your thoughts?

You mean... finger quotes?

Yes. That. The finger thing.

...O'Zalia stopped responding to me. I believe my replies are starting to give him conniptions.

But essentially, this one takes fun to a whole new level. We don't know exactly what it does, or what powers it holds other than ripping people apart and being good at visceral arts and crafts-

I threw up again. What I was trying to say was, we still don't know its full power scope. We know it represents something. We know that the Daemon Lords represent things that it incites in people, and it can use it on people to a limited extent- or, at least that's what I've heard, anyways. I dunno, my facts may be skewed. But if I see people with wide Joker grins and skin balloons and bloody orgies in the street, then I will assume that our unfriendly neighborhood hellspawn would be involved. However, the ultimate point is that Daemons are supposed to be in Bloody Hell. That's where Daemons are supposed to be, and for some reason right now they're not cool with their Domain anymore. So they're beginning to move in. I know of at least two Daemon Lords who've entered this world, and there are another eight that are probably out there somewhere, instead of sticking around in their home domain, because that would be too easy, and no, the Illusionist Club can't just have a nice relaxing day off, now, can we?

What- Illusio- what are-... you really do give me conniptions. 

Aww, gee. Love you too. But the point is, we've found something much more pressing than Fears or Demi-Gods or Half-Fears or Emissaries or whatever other entities are just lounging around on earth right now. Because Daemons have no chill. They have no chill and they're killing people by the dozens. They're killing children. They're treating humanity with such disdain and disregard that they're thinking they can go around squashing us flat as much as they please and not care about the repercussions of their actions. They don't have the sophistication of Fears. They don't have the motivations of Demi-Gods. They don't have the destructive artistry of any other being in existence. They're just semi-powerful beings with the mentality of toddlers. And we're toys to them, toys that they can break. Fears at least have some level of coherence to them, some level of subtlety to their work, but Daemons just break and break and incite war and incite negative toxic human behaviors in people and then break and slaughter and break again because goddammit they haven't broken enough. They can flaunt all the power and all the memetic effects and incite as many negative emotions as they damn well please, but in the end compared to anything else even remotely on or above their level they are nothing, and they're just throwing a last-ditch hissy fit to prove it.

Well, I don't know if this is a good time for a Toy Story reference, but someone's gotta be the snake in their boot. Likely many someones will have to do it. And if we can take care of this Revelry Daemon, then we're one step closer to wiping out this immediate problem. And then we'll move on to bigger and better things. Like...

uhm...

shit. Forget about it.

It doesn't matter about what happens when this is all settled and done. We'll cross that road when we come to it. By that time we'll probably have met more things that want to kill us, uncovered another plot, met another of Isaac's likely numerous crazy relatives.

Not funny.

All right, all right. But right now, human beings, somewhere, anywhere across this world, are going to try to throw parties. Try to indulge in a little enjoyment to break the monotony of their lives, trying to take time to socialize or engage in some kind of activity or sit in the corner of a loud rave hall with a solo cup in one hand and a phone in the other. And this piece of shit is waiting somewhere, in the dark, with nothing but contempt for human life and his own twisted ideal of what we think "fun" may be. And anyone can die. We need to stop this thing now, while it has only one massacre that we know about. We may have been too late to stop it the first time, but we're not going to let it happen a second.

Revelry

“Yeah, I've heard of it,” David told me from the other end. “Must have been awful to see it up close.”
“Understatement,” I told him. “I don't suppose you know much about Deamons, do you?”
“Afraid not,” he replied.
“What about the Vision?” I asked. “Or that ghostly Grandpa of yours?”
“Haven't heard from either of them in a while,” David replied. “But if I can get in touch with Marshall any time soon, I'll send him your way.”
“Appreciated,” I told him.
“If I hear about any more murder parties, I'll let you know,” he said.
“Thanks,” I replied.
“If they're close enough, I'll check them out myself,” he said.
“You don't need to,” I told him.
“I will anyway,” he said.
I didn't respond to that. I'd rather him not subject himself to those sights, but it was his choice.
“Uh, as one ex-Proxy to another,” David began, “If you ever need to take a couple days of to relax, my door's-”
“I appreciate the offer,” I interrupted. “But the way things are looking, it may be a while before I can actually consider vacation days.”
“All right,” he said. “I'll let you know if I find anything.”
“Thanks,” I said.
My next call was to Estren.
“Hey,” I said.
“The Daemon Lord, right?” HELLFIRE asked. “That's why you're calling?”
For the record, Estren is possessed by a Dying Man shard named HELLFIRE. They have a mutualistic thing going on. I can tell which one of them is speaking due to some subtle changes in inflection and attitude when HELLFIRE takes over.
“Yeah,” I said. “How'd you now?”
“HELLFIRE thinks you're predictable,” Estren said, taking over for a couple seconds.
“Well, he is!” HELLFIRE retorted.
“Plus, we found you guys' blog,” Estren said. “We knew you'd call.”
I felt slightly offended that they would call me predictable, but I ignored it.
“So you think you can help me out?” I asked.
“You see, Estren,” HELLFIRE asked. “It told you that he wouldn't give us the satifaction of getting mad at us for calling him predictable.”
“Thus proving how predictable he is,” Estren agreed.
“Fuck both of you,” I said.
“Watch your mouth,” HELLFIRE said.
“So, HELLFIRE,” I said. “What exactly do you know about the Daemons?”
“Some stuff, but not everything,” HELLFIRE said. “For instance, I can't tell you which Daemon it is, but I can tell you that you're royally screwed if you meet him face to face.”
“That's very comforting,” I said.
“A sarcastic reply,” HELLFIRE said. “Like I said. Predictable.”
“Whatever,” I said.
“Knew you'd say that,” HELLFIRE said. “Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some Proxy's to deal with.”
“What are you gonna do to them?” I asked.
“Impale them,” He said. “Maybe disembowel a few. Behead some of them. Then set them on fire. And if I have the time I might piss on their ashes.”
“Okay, but remember not to swear!” I said. “Because swearing is bad!”
“Go to hell, O'Zalia,” HELLFIRE said, hanging up.
I called up Andrew next.
“Hello, Isaac,” he said, sounding disinterested and somewhat detached from the world.
“Hey, Andrew,” I said.
“Don't call me that,” he said. “What do you want.”
“Any information you might have on the birthday party gone wrong that's all over the news and whatever Daemon caused it,” I said.
“I'm afraid I can't help you,” he said. “I know nothing, the Convocation doesn't want any involvement in it, and I have my own assignment to deal with before I can look in on it myself. Not that I'd want to.”
“I miss the old you,” I sadi. “The old you wouldn't have stood for that kind of insane, unprovoked murder.”
He stayed silent for a couple of second.
“That man died with Malkator,” he said.
Then he hung up.
Next, I called Daniel.
“Sup,” he said.
“Hey, Daniel,” I said. “Shot in the dark, but do you know anything about Daemons?”
“Not a lot,” he said. “I think you'd have better luck with Tony. Want me to put him on?”
“Yes, please,” I said.
There was muffled talking on the other end before Daniel handed the phone to Tony.
“You need to know about Daemons, right?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “One was involved in a grisly murder recently.”
“Tell me what you can about it,” Tony said.
I heard papers shuffling as he opened a book. Tony Helioson recently came to own a large book on demonology. I knew he'd be my best bet. I described the scene and the creature I saw in that man's memory as best as I could. I also told him about the symbols on the wall, and texted him some pictures that Kord took of them. Tony considered the information for a while before giving me his input.
“Alagarus,” he said. “One of the ten Daemon Lords.”
“Shit,” I said. “I was hoping it wasn't a Lord.”
“His title amongst the Lords is the Reveler,” Tony said. “He enjoys celebrations. Especially violent ones. If they're not violent enough, he changes that.”
“Sounds about right,” I said.
“Those are definitely his symbols,” Tony said. “And the party seems like his style.”
“Any advice you can give me on him?” I asked. “Like, weaknesses, or anything?”
“Sorry,” Tony said. “I can look into it a bit more, but I don't think I'll find any in this book. And I'd suggest you avoid throwing any big shebangs, unless you want him showing up uninvited.”
“What about Damien?” I asked. “You think he'd know how to kill a Daemon?”
“I wouldn't rule it out, but I wouldn't count on it either,” he said. “This is the Biker we're talking about. Aside from a common enemy, he has no reason to work together with any of us, and that's nowhere near enough for him.”
“You're right,” I said. “But still, I need whatever information I can get.”
“Good luck,” Tony said.
“Thanks,” I replied. “You too.”
“So, we have an idea who our man is now?” Kord, who probably wasn't eavesdropping on every word spoken, asked.

All Dressed Up and No Place to Go

Police initially arrived to the scene well before O'Zalia even showed up- however, due to the visceral nature of the crime scene, they more or less had it partitioned off and set up coverings so that no weather could disrupt the crime scene. We had no business there, but we did see a number of police cars heading towards the scene. O'Zalia still had blood from close contact with the barely-living victim of the Daemon's twisted party games on his hand, and concealed it with his illusion powers until the police cars passed by, but after they passed O'Zalia spent the next block and a half looking at his bloodstained hand, taking no other notice but to conceal it from any outsiders. I think what he saw was getting to him. I definitely know it was getting to me as well. It was, after all, a children's birthday party. However, at the time I was past nausea and revulsion and into the phase where I was itching to tear the responsible party apart.

The news of the grotesque massacre stretched at least halfway across the state, if not state- and nation-wide at this point, and so on top of the four or five shadowy figures that we only barely eluded, a plethora of news vans, political talking heads, agency bureaucrats, and I'd be willing to bet a handful of Fear-connected individuals like O'Zalia and yours truly, though we haven't seen any just yet. And of course they would appear. This was a particularly vicious crime. Only roughly one tenth of the backyard wasn't covered in someone's body parts or fluids, and the way in which they died and then their body parts used to add "decorations"... those who didn't know about Fears and Daemons would be morbidly repulsed and wondering what could have caused such a thing, and those who did know about Fears and Daemons would already have at least an inkling.

I ended up having to lead O'Zalia back to the motel I've been staying at for the past couple days. Well, I say leading him to it, but it's quite clear that he took the effort of reading my mind to get the location, because he was already going off in the right direction before I had time to get my bearings.

Well, the location was actually simple to get if you had even tried to keep points of reference and landmarks in mind.

That's what O'Zalia said, transcribed in nice, italicized letters for you, the reading audience.

It better not be an audience that you've attracted with this blog, Romeni.

Hey. Nobody calls me by the name. In any case- hang on, I just have to send out a nice good old fashioned STATIC SCREECH aaand I think O'Zalia's gotten the message- we haven't seen hide nor hair of the spies since reaching the motel, but O'Zalia remembered exactly where we lost them and where they were likely to lie in wait. O'Zalia sent up another illusion, one that changed our outward appearances and added a handful of nonexistent unrecognizable faces, blending us into the crowd. Between this, the concealment of the blood-stained hand, and his original illusions to ward off the unknown pursuers, O'Zalia was becoming particularly strained. In fact, he was becoming so strained that that static screech I sent out not even thirty seconds ago actually seemed to really affect him. Actually hang on I need to check this out.

Okay so apparently either I've gotten really good at my abilities or O'Zalia is really worn down from all the illusions but apparently I gave him a headache. Not a blistering or splitting one, but a relentless percussive throb. This is a bit of a shock, because in all the days I've known him back when we were hunting his freaky power vampire cousin and her cronies, O'Zalia never was incapacitated by a headache. In fact, I think I never saw him get a headache at all. He said something about the psychological imbalance that the nature of the massacre caused him combined with persistent use of his ability, so I'm going to take his word for it. But still.

Please don't tell them about the headache.

Don't worry, I'm not.

You liar.

Okay, Isaac's laying on the death glare now. I'm still not removing it though.

Essentially, what we have now are basic details. We know that the culprit is a Daemon. We know that the Daemon likes parties, celebrations, revelry, just a little too much. We know that this Daemon absolutely can and will hurt a child, and that this Daemon doesn't have enough vitamin fist-in-the-face in his diet. Other than that, we don't really have a veritable compendium on Daemon information. Daemon's are originated from Bloody Hell, and, up until the previously-mentioned asshat known as the Bloody Biker took over, Daemons were their own thing, completely separate from Fears, Demi-Gods, and any other unnatural creature out there. As such, we knew they existed, but we didn't ever really take the time to learn about them, because they were always just there, in Bloody Hell, literally attacking no one. Now the game has changed and we have only a meager amount of information on the group entirely, let alone any particular Daemon in general.

We're dealing with something that, even if it's not beyond our pay grade, is at least outside of our usual repertoire of huntable things. We're dealing with something that can assume a human form and then tear things apart in a body so disgusting and nightmarish that it would make the Fears blush. And we don't know the first thing about it. We don't know its powers, we don't know what its strengths are, what its weaknesses are, what it does other than massacre people on a whim. We don't even know its name. We're running in blind trying to fight something that we never usually fight, and that's bad. So, for the moment, we're going to try to seek out information. Isaac said that he has a number of contacts that he can get in touch with, so long as he's given enough time to recuperate. I suggested that I could get in touch with one of the people from the Archive who actually care to speak to me from time to time, although I admitted it was a risky gamble. Isaac wasn't completely opposed to the option, but he was opposed enough to tell me to save it as a last resort. Apparently he believes that one of his contacts has the information we need. But for now, he needs rest, and I'll be honest I do, too. It's been a long couple of days, and I've had very little sleep due to the events that went down.

So, basically, to-do list is as follows:

1.) Let Isaac recuperate from the last day or so. Same goes for me, I'm beat.

2.) Scrounge up any information on this Daemon that we can find, and, additionally, try to find out more about these sneaky little spies that think they can emulate my mental barrier to any degree of success.

3.) See if anybody else is willing to join in on the Daemon-hunting goodness.

4.) Find this Daemon and get some justice for the dozens that it massacred.

Aren't you forgetting something, Kord?

O'Zalia is standing right behind me right now, with something in his hand. He's motioning for me to take it and he's getting really annoyed that I'm turned away from the laptop right now and still typing and not even taking his okay okay fine sheesh I'm taking it now

oh.

Oh.

This is a flyer for a candlelight vigil for the deceased and the family and friends that outlived them. I see. It's set for a week from now.  So... do you want to pay your respects, Isaac?

Yes.

All right. A week from now.

One Sick Party

I reached the town Kord's been hiding out in and parked my motorcycle. I picked up my glave and started walking. As I did, I reached my mind out to keep track of any onlookers that might see me. It was early morning at the time, so not many people were out and about. The ones that were were pretty easy to fool. Just had to tweak their perception a bit and they didn't even notice the giant polearm I was packing. I then started listening for Kord.
He's gotten good at hiding his thoughts. His nature as a Grayskin allows him to create some mental background noise that makes it difficult to pick out his real thoughts. Difficult, but not impossible.
This time, he wanted to be found. So I was able to locate him pretty easily. I began walking toward him. He was in an alleyway, waiting for me.
“Your hair's getting longer,” He said, as I came into view.
“And yours is getting grayer,” I replied. “So where's this party?”
“I'll show you,” he replied.
We started walking, catching up on a few things as we did. It was a few minutes in that he said to me, in a low voice, “You've noticed them, right?”
His voice had an odd sound to it. He must have been using the Choir's power to limit his voices range, so that no one else would hear.
“Yes, I have,” I said. “They're doing a decent job staying hidden.”
Amongst the people I was tapped into to maintain  my glave's concealment, there were a few interesting ones. Their thoughts were full of things like “Better get milk” or “That's a neat looking rock” and all kinds of other miscellaneous thoughts which I normally wouldn't pay much attention to. But there were deeper thought beneath them. All those meaningless thoughts running through their heads were just to cover up what they were really thinking. I pushed my way into Kord's mind to tell him as much.
Are they hostile? He thought.
Looks like they're just spying for now, I thought back at him. But their intentions could change at any moment.
Can you throw them off? He thought.
At this next turn, I replied.
I dropped my illusion on everyone nearby so I could focus entirely on the spies. It meant that a few people would be able to see my weapon, but I had to risk it. I needed to focus for this. I concentrated on those few people, 4 in total, who were spying on us. As Kord and I came to the next corner and made a right turn, I altered their perception so that it looked like we were turning left. We continued another couple blocks in one way, while the illusions of us went the other. Then I had illusion-me open an illusionary portal, which both of the illusions stepped through.
Did it work? Kord thought.
I listened in on the true thoughts of the spies, who were now convinced that we had entered the Path Of Black Leaves.
They bought it, I thought. They think they've lost us.
I dropped my illusion entirely, giving my mind a rest. I continued listening in on the surrounding thoughts, in case there were more of them, or in case one of the earlier ones caught on to my trick.
They were using my thought hiding trick, Kord thought. But on a lesser scale.
They don't have the Choir backing them up, I thought. So they're not quite as good at it.
They must have some idea of how your powers work if they were clever enough to do that, Kord thought. Who do you think they work for?
I couldn't tell, I thought. They had those thoughts hidden pretty well, and I wasn't focused enough to go digging through.
We'd better keep a lookout for more of them, Kord thought. I nodded.
“We're here,” he said out loud.
We entered the place he had brought me to. I immediately gagged and covered my mouth and nose with my hand. The bodies had had some time to start stinking, and the sights weren't any more pleasant.
“I know,” Kord said. “Awful, right?”
“Oh yeah,” I said, pulling myself together.
“So I'll admit this is beyond what a Fear would do, but what makes you think daemons?”
“Mostly that,” he said, pointing to a far wall. I approached it, and found myself face to face with several symbols and words written in blood. They were in a language I didn't understand, but I spotted the words “Daemon”, “Death”  and “Blood” mixed in with them.
“And that,” Kord said, motioning to a crumpled piece of paper next to a ypung girls severed hand.
I picked it up and uncrumpled it. It was a torn page from a book. There word blood stains covering a lot of the words, but what I could make out told me enough. It was from a text on demonology.
“I know it doesn't confirm Daemon's for sure,” Kord said. “But with the Biker out there, bringing Hell to Earth, it's the biggest possibility I can think of right now. And the writing on the wall looks like pretty good evidence.”
“Yeah,” I said. “But there's one last thing I need to check.”
I approached the mutilated remains of a man. He was horribly maimed and beyond recognition.
“There something special about this one?” Kord asked me.
“You could say that,” I said. “Something horribly special.”
“What?” he asked.
“He's still alive,” I said.
“Are you serious?” Kord asked, sounding appalled.
“Barely,” I confirmed. “His body's on the verge of shutting down, but his brin is still kicking out signals. If I try to, I think I can get a look at his memories.”
“You sure you wanna see them?” Kord asked.
“Absolutely not,” I replied. “But it'll give me an idea of what we're dealing with here.”
Taking a deep breathe, I entered the man's mind, digging deep into his memories. I found what I was looking for, and immediately wished I hadn't. What I saw was at first a simple gathering. But then a man showed up. He seemed normal at first, conversing with the others and joining in the festivities. But then he attacked. Things turned almost to quickly for me to comprehend. The man changed. I'm sure I could find the words to describe it if I tried, but I don't think I want to. I severed the metal connection before the memory got too violent and I collapsed against the wall.
“The hell did you see?” Kord asked.
“You're right,” I told him. “That thing... I can't think of anything else it could possibly be. All this-”
I swept my arm across the room in a wide arc, gesturing to the entire gruesome picture.
“-was definitely done by a Daemon,” I finished.
“Shit,” Kord said. “So what are we gonna do?”
“Regroup with the others,” I said. “Make some calls. Think of a plan.”
“Okay,” Kord said, helping me to my feet. “What about this guy?”
I turned to the man. He was dying. And in pain. And if that weren't enough, he was reliving that entire experience that I didn't even had the stomach to view in its entirety. I couldn't leave him there like that. So I did the most merciful thing I could think of. I re-established the mental link, entering his mind once again. And I shut everything down.
“Let's go,” I said. “We've done all we can do here.”

Bringing the Band Back Together

I'm sitting here now, watching the words be transferred, transformed from unimportant, solitary electrical signals in my brain to electronically printed text on this blog for one reason. I'm setting up this blog for one reason. I'm coming back out of hiding for one reason and one reason only.

My name is Kane Romeni. For those of you who know my name, congratulations, you read any paper in and around central Texas or, you poor, poor bastards, were affiliated with the people involved with or were somewhere around the area where I had my first supernatural freakout moment. They called me a terrorist and a murderer and they locked me away in a cell for a few years before me and another supernaturally empowered shit-stain (whom I later had the unique and singular pleasure of bursting his head apart at about 30 paces without any kind of weapon other than my own gifts- he deserved it, though, just trust me on that) and later was foiled in my attempts to get some petty vengeance on what, now that I've matured a little, realize was merely action taken by foolish people who were too scared and unbelieving to understand anything other than the fact that I was (and, I won't lie, I certainly was) a danger. But, hardened criminal blah blah blah later, here I am.

For those of you who aren't on a full name basis of me, you may know me as Kord. This was the name I gave myself on my first blog (which I now despise for its brevity, choppiness, lack of perspective and context, etc...), Deadly Chords. Just... read at your own risk. I'm greatly considering just rewriting the whole thing now that I've gotten a new angle on life.

Now if you don't know me on a full name basis or as Kord, don't know or haven't read my first blog, and don't know what the following words (Fear, Demigod, Daemon, Domain, Archive, Fury) have in common, then get out. Now.

No. Seriously. Leave. It's best you don't read any further.

...I'm waiting. Seriously... go.

...Okay if you've scrolled down this far either you are aware of what it's about and you're reading to get some insight on things going on, or there's no dissuading you, in which case, it's your funeral, you poor, poor, unfortunate bastards.

So, to bring some insight to certain newcomers who just won't understand that they're messing with powers that could literally give them fates that make death look like a cakewalk, (seriously, last chance) I guess I'll have to explain myself. [enters overly dramatic voice] In the beginning, there were... creatures... beings of unknown origin- mostly- and unknown motivation- again, mostly- things that enraptured and seemed to invoke certain forms of our greatest primal instincts and fears, and so they were aptly named such... Fears. How many are there? [end dramatic voice- I really can't do this shit] I dunno, I did some research, there's an undisclosed number that are alive and kicking, and an even larger number if you count the dead ones whose phantasms still echo to this day.

Alongside Fears are other beings from other realms- some hail from their own individual abodes, little circles of Hell that we unfortunately enlightened like to call Domains, and some hail from... other places. Some just walk right here, on good ole Earth. And, luckily, it mostly doesn't completely suck for most people. Generally Fears are very peculiar about this stuff. And, of course, there are Demi-Gods. Demi-Gods... there's a difficult way to put them. I'm friends with a number of Demi-Gods, as have I killed a number of Demi-Gods in my time. I'm a sort of quasi-Demi-God, having been granted a level of longevity and ability with a Fear- The Choir (put into layman's terms, if you ever wondered if reality is only an illusion and you, or you were afraid that what you said isn't what the other person's hearing, or even if someone's perception on what blue looks like is different than yours, that's what the little bugger inside of me likes to invoke, if it likes anything)- going around inside my veins. It's sentient, and it speaks to me, and it gives me abilities to manipulate aural and- when it goes full commando- visual stimuli. The Choir for some reason likes me and doesn't just erode me away with its fungal form.

But then there started coming a new batch of things, Daemons. See, kiddies, once upon a time, there was a Demi-God, actually really, really close to being on Fear levels of nightmarish, named The Bloody Biker. Put simply, a pretty overpowered cockbite with a bad attitude and his own little domain. This domain was called Bloody Hell- or at least it was when he controlled it. See, alongside the normal Fear and servants ish that happens in most domains, that one has its own little hierarchy in itself. Daemons. Scary, scary daemons.

And that's what I'm hunting now.

See, I've been off hunting things. I used to run with a group of... well, I guess they were colleagues but we were together for a while, and I honestly considered them, well, better friends than the people I met back in the joint, that's for sure. But Isaac O'Zalia, another Demi-God of sorts with a lot of mind-y mind powers of mind-ness, and his friends left after dealing with his own cousin's fanatical brigade of Fear-worshiping asshats, and I was left to my own devices. 

What happened since then? I started hunting. See, it started with these servants of one Demi-God, some guy channeling a Dead Fear named The Tale Weaver? He apparently is a lazy bum who doesn't complete his grand schemes, but does enough damage that he's earned a place on my shit-list. I've dealt with a grand total of three of his Servants, and then other Demi-Gods and other creatures just start coming at you. Either they heard about the Nolla Row incident, or they were just getting antsy after I slaughtered a total of three of those little word jumbles of Weaver's, and they tried to take me down. Close encounters, all of them, but I've gotten a lot better at what I do, and they all ended up begging for their lives. I granted it to two of them, but a little piece of my own little piece of the Choir is in them, so every time they get out of line- heh heh heh- ohh, David Lynch would shake my hand from the stuff that I make them experience- but that's besides the point.

See, Demi-Gods are fine. Especially the rogue ones. Servants are all good, but The Archive and I have an uneasy truce so I don't go after them and they don't help me do shit. Even Fears in a localized manner (fellow Grayskins like yours truly, Nests of The Convocation, and Drones of The Intrusion) are... survivable... okay there are people who can put down Fears like it's no big deal but I'm not one of them. But Daemons... are another matter entirely. They represent things, too. I don't know how many groups of "unnatural entities representing things" actually exist, but Daemons are one of them. But they usually stay in Bloody Hell. Only a couple managed to worm their way out... or so I thought.

Then I saw a bloodbath. It was... once... a children's birthday party. I only heard word of it because of police band radio that I may or may not have been jacking into at the time. The police were traumatized by it, and so were the witnesses, the onlookers. Everyone who saw even a momentary glimpse of it were sent into some level of panic attack or shock and... I'll be honest, I still don't want to think about what it was. It was... it was something that even a Fear wouldn't think of. It was a party of flesh and viscera. Peoples' jaws were distended unnaturally out of their mouth, their lips morphed into twisted fleshless smiles. Some people had party horns made of their own respiratory organs. To say nothing of the cake... the presents... the everything else... I can only name a few things before throwing up from the memory of it. I don't want to fight it alone. I... I just can't. Nothing's hit me like this before. Even Fears have a limit, or they restrain themselves most of the time, but this... this was unhindered. This was unrestrained. This was... this was like some pseudo-Fear butchery. It seems to focus on humor, reveling, and enjoyment- in the most twisted, perverse way possible. I don't know what it does or why it does or how it made the... the party (never going to a birthday party again)... the way it was... but I'm afraid of it. I truly am. And I have the power to warp perceptions of reality, if used correctly I can be an adequate fucking tank, but this thing...

That's why I called this blog up. That's why I made this post and god-fucking dammit O'Zalia I already attached your account to this shit please help me I don't know what to do anymore, this is beyond anything that we've done before and I need help I really don't know what to do and I can't cope.

Right now the voices in my head that I like to call My Little Buddies are telling me to not sound so pathetic. So... yeah. O'Zalia, you're reading this and, excusing the... above... we need you. This is beyond my pay grade, I'm still barely on Class S Demigod level (uhm, there is no actual class ranking of Demigods, I'm just being a snide little bastard), I'm not on Representational Entity level. At least not alone. So... if you are reading this (and you are)... just... please... I don't know what to do other than... bringing the band back together again.