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Post by Crow on Oct 6, 2007 23:51:27 GMT -5
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Post by Crow on Oct 6, 2007 23:53:22 GMT -5
Faust
A Never-Ending Page, Part One:
Cold Reflections
Written By: Masoud "Crow" House
Cover by: JVM
Edited by: Mark Bowers
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Post by Crow on Oct 7, 2007 0:00:49 GMT -5
♠F♠ “You are incorrigible, insufferable, and corrupt, Mr. Fust! It takes the greatest patience to be around you for even two minutes!” Product of my birthright, he thought. When you have no soul, everyone hates you. “How can you expect to make any kind of business if you’re rude to your paying clients?” He straightened himself in his chair and pushed his sinking shades back up the bridge of his nose. “First of all, Ms. Dover, my name is Faust. Think ‘oust’, but with an F.” It was a hot, humid day inside his graying, crimson townhouse, where he ran his mage-for-hire business. Outside, on the streets of New York City, it was windy and chilly, but bearable. But for some reason, inside of his run-down, shabby building, it was the equivalent of the African plains. Even better, he had to listen to this argumentative divorceé who expected him to waste his time on a useless case. “Ms. Dover, let me get this straight. You want me, Faust,” he said, pointing to himself, “to get rid of your ten year old son’s imaginary friend, Spot, who you believe is making your dishes change colors, your detergent appear in places you don’t remember putting them, and your parrot shout profanities?” Ms. Dover’s mouth frowned impatiently. Her make-up was caking together because of the heat and her occasional itching. She was an older woman, and an odd one at that. She had on a big bonnet that screamed to be showed off at Easter. She wore jeans a little too tight for her size and wore a bright lime green blouse. She had at least seven different necklaces around her neck; three of which Faust recognized as deities in different religions. Worst, she seemed to be very short tempered and very fussy, complaining on everything from the shabbiness of his townhouse to the arrangement of post-its on his desk. It had taken him twelve minutes just to figure out what the problem was. Finally, she said that her house was being ‘terrorized’ by her son’s imaginary friend. “It doesn’t get much simpler than that, Mr. Fust. Should I spell it backwards?” He stared at her blankly. He tried to see if he could fake a smile, but no, he couldn’t. “Did you think about getting your son some help?” Ms. Dover’s eyes burned with anger. He knew that wouldn’t work. “There is nothing wrong with my son!” Faust sighed, his expression blank. Sweat ran down his back under his black shirt, and the loud ticks of his clock echoed in his ears. He had to remember to buy a digital. “Ms. Dover, what do you want me to do? I can’t spend my following weeks chasing after an imaginary dog named Spot!” Ms. Dover’s heavy cheeks heaved as she began to speak with a mixture of annoyance and need. She was tired, he could tell. She must have tried this elsewhere and met with the same results. “Look Mr. Fu-Faust... I am paying you handsomely for this. I need you because no one else will take this job and the problem is escalating. It might sound crazy, but for all you know it could be a poltergeist or something. And I don’t want my little boy being like that ‘Exorcist’ girl. Just please,” she said, her eyes betraying her desperation, “please, just check it out.” He sighed, but before he could speak she began to write out a check. And all those zeros he was seeing were nice encouragement. A cold chill came through the room. Faust would have welcomed it, had the windows been open, or if there was a hole in the wall. That, he could accept. But this chill came from nowhere, and ran down his spine as if trying to reach his soul. That is, if he had one. Suddenly all was quiet. He looked up at Ms. Dover, whose eyes had faded and whose body had stiffened. Something was wrong. He removed his shades, revealing misty indigo eyes. A strange aura encompassed Ms. Dover’s frame like a mist. It wasn’t hers though, but more like someone else’s aura shadowing hers. She was being possessed. “Deadman?” |
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Post by Crow on Oct 7, 2007 0:05:36 GMT -5
Ms. Dover grinned ear-to-ear, shifting in her seat and moving with the fluid, liquid grace of a ghost acrobat. “Faust, Faust, Faust. Call me Boston, whydoncha?”
Deadman was an acrobat in one of the top circuses in the world. That is, until he was killed during one of his killer Deadman stunts. From what Faust heard, he was made into an agent of a female deity named Rama Kushna who sent him around to do good deeds. Something like that.
Faust leaned back and crossed his arms. “Deadman, don’t you see I’m in a little business here? Unless you want to add a few more zeros to that check, I’m going to need you to leave.”
Ms. Dover made an appalled face. “I can’t check up on an old pal? And call me Boston, I insist.”
Faust’s eyes narrowed. “What are you doing here, Deadman?”
“Fine, fine.” Suddenly Ms. Dover’s body leaned in real close on the table, her face now serious and stiff. “I’m here because someone, I don’t know who, sent me to warn you. Hell, forced me to, through some kind of old, powerful magic. There are forces gathering to destroy you, Faust, because you seem to pose an obstacle between them and something they covet so much. Something they’ve been killing to get for these last few years.”
Faust’s eyes widened, slightly. “What? What the hell could they want that I’m in the way of?”
“A book.”
“A book? A book? I can give these ‘forces’ my library card if they want a book. What book is it?”
Deadman remained silent. Faust stood up, slamming his hands on the table. Not in anger, he didn’t have emotions. But he couldn’t think of any reason why he posed a threat to ‘forces’. “What the hell am I supposed to do?” he said frustrated.
Ms. Dover looked at Faust, her eyes struck by surprise. “Well Mr. Faust, if you find this job that difficult I might as well find someone of higher caliber!”
Faust shook his head, his hands on his waist looking to the floor, searching for answers. “Not you, Ms. Dover. I’m a bit confused on the details. I uh…take my job very serious.” He looked up, glancing right into her eyes from behind his shades, his voice even and blunt. “I’m going to have to ask you to leave. Let’s rearrange a meeting. Maybe for another week.”
Ms. Dover looked surprised. “Is it that serious?”
“Very. So much that I need you to leave now, so I can study. Now.” Ms. Dover, looking half appalled and half worried, began to quickly snatch up her purse as Faust shuffled her towards the door.
“Will you call me if you figure anything out? I don’t have the number to your, uh… business…Underground you call it?”
“Actually I’m changing the name. I just don’t know what to, yet. But I will definitely get back to you. In fact, I will get back to you as soon as humanly possible. So please, go home, and don’t worry about a thing. Good night, ciao, adios, au revoir, bye.” He slammed the door.
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Post by Crow on Oct 7, 2007 0:08:15 GMT -5
The room began to tremble with a terrible chill, not like Deadman’s, but one that froze and left terror in its wake. The air shook with heat as the smell of ashes and snow drifted in. The lights flickered, and the shadows vibrated with a tingling spark of fear.
The floor burned in two places; smoke rose from two forming circles, which slowly began to widen and rise from the floor. A mist that smelled of sulfur started to spread into the room, and the burning circles on the floor began to turn dark and empty, as if something was opening a door from the other side. Damn, Faust thought. I need to get some supplies.
He ran to the bathroom, leaping over the burning spheres rising from his floor and feeling a scorching sensation in his wake. He ran into the bathroom and shut the door. There were two mirrors, one mirror on his medicine cabinet and another on the wall opposite. A mirror could be a window to the soul, some said, but he didn’t know if that would work for him... His reflection was cold, emotionless, and somehow lacking substance, a substance most reflections had. He opened the cabinet, grabbing random different items he might be able to use.
A sizzling sound came from his living room. Whatever was out there was ready to get him. But he was damned if he wouldn’t get them first.
Something began to drip. A line of something warm ran down his arm. He looked down to his arm and saw a fresh cut, spelling out some kind of message to him. Confused, and feeling the pain, he gritted his teeth as he saw the message slowly reveal itself. “L-O-O-K B-E-H-I-N-D Y—“
Suddenly he looked behind himself, but no one was there. He looked around, but saw no one in the bathroom with him. His chest began to hurt as his shirt began to slice open and read a message. “R-E-F-L-E-C-T-I—“
He looked into the mirror to see a pale, cold feminine face with long, black stringy hair grinning deviously at him, behind his reflection. She had a curved dagger in her hand, carving in a new letter where she had left off. He tried to move, turning around to fight, but when he turned, all he saw was his own image staring at him in the other mirror, with his silent assassin still behind him. Her dagger bit in to make a point, drawing blood from his back.
“Who are you? What do you want with me?”
“I am the Mistress of the Mirror, and I’ve been sent to kill you.”
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Post by Crow on Oct 7, 2007 0:17:35 GMT -5
In one swift movement he crashed his fists into each mirror, blood running over his knuckles as each mirror became shards, falling down to the floor. A mist began to creep up from the mirror pieces, and he could see the Mistress’s eyes all around his feet.
Suddenly the wall burst out. A flame burned through with a cold draft following. As the dust settled, Faust could see two hooded figures. As they walked, their footsteps burned and then froze. Their movement was rigid yet precise. They were puppet-soldiers of the Brotherhood of the Cold Flame. Faust had never gone toe-to-toe with their cult, but he had run into a few stories.
“There’s no point in fighting back Faust. Submit and I’ll let you be my love slave in the grandest of mirrors!” Faust looked over the puppets to see the Mistress rising from a mirror in the living room. There were two mirrors in the living room; both were gifts from other mages. Now they were a burden: he’d have to keep an eye on both with her around.
“Oh the mirrors I'd put you in! You could live in a nice large La Parra!” she said excitedly. “Or a polished chrome Bollard!”
The fists of the puppets began to tremble and burn, black smoke encompassing their hands and rising only up the length of their arms. They lunged at Faust, and he rolled away. Where they had hit his wall now was only a charred hole. He had an idea. Magic required some kind of payment, so to speak, when using certain spells. So maybe he could use the puppets to help him out.
He continued to roll and dodge the puppets, their strikes quick and burning through the air like a soldering iron being swung around by a madman. Coming close to the mirror the Mistress was rising from, he feigned movement to attract the attention of the soldiers.
“You come to me willingly Faust? I knew my cold touch was what you wanted.”
Faust grimaced and dodged just as a Brotherhood puppet punched at him, burning hands holding the mirror and melting it slowly, the Mistress only half way through. Faust incanted a quick spell, throwing the dust of Salamander bones in front of him, and using the puppet’s fire and his magic to bind the Mistress to the mirror astrally and physically. She was trapped half-in, half-out. Next he had to tap the Mistress, his exclusive magical power. Spirit tapping was a double-edge sword. Being that he had no soul, he could steal fragments of others for a time; to not only drain them but also their abilities. The only price: it left a burning, spiritual glyph, or tattoo, on his back that grew according to how much he took. And it hurt. Like hell.
Pressing his hand against the Mistress’s forehead, a violet energy ran through him that matched his shifting eyes. The Mistress gasped, terror in her eyes, as a piece of her soul was stolen. As she fainted, his back began to burn just a little, and his eyes shifted colors again to match the Mistress’s cold yellow stare.
The other puppet lunged at him again, and he found himself dodging and rolling in a more liquid state, his mind as lucid and deep as a mirror. As the puppet began to creep up on him, he faded away into the other, good mirror.
Confused, the soldier looked around, finding no Faust. In the mirror Faust came into view, waving at the soldier. The soldier turned, looking for Faust behind him, but saw no one but his fellow puppet struggling at the mirror beside the Mistress of the Mirror. The soldier peered into the mirror again, creeping closer.
Steam began to rise off of the soldier; first on an arm, then on the other. Then the steam began to rise from all around its body, and it began to quiver. It looked into the mirror to see Faust carving it up with a mirror shard. Slice, slice, slice, slice, slice, slice, SLICE!
The puppet’s body shook hard, jerking around, as steam built up around it like a kettle ready to blow. Faust, in the mirror, finally stuck the shard in its heart, and it blew up on the spot in a ball of flames, with ashes raining on the floor.
Returning from the mirror into the regular plane, his now messy living room, Faust walked over to the Mistress and the puppet, sticking his mirror shard in the thing’s chest. It shook and quaked, and finally blew up in a burning ball of smoke. All that was left was the Mistress.
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Post by Crow on Oct 7, 2007 0:20:05 GMT -5
He stuck his hand in, pushing her further into the mirror until she was wholly inside, but this time he sealed it so she was trapped. Had he never tapped her he wouldn’t have known how to do that. The wonders of having no soul.
“Why the hell are you trying to kill me? I haven’t tangled with the Brotherhood before.”
The Mistress trembled in fear. “It’s not only the Brotherhood of the Cold Flame. The Cult of the Blood Red Moon is also on your tail, and more are to join.”
Faust grimaced. “Why?”
The Mistress shook her head, holding her arms to herself. “I don’t know. They told us they wanted you… and to kill you. We didn’t ask why. Well, I didn’t ask why. I doubt the puppets think enough to ask anything. But I wouldn’t want to kill you—you’re too handsome…”
Faust, he thought. They were probably after the right name, but not the right person. “You guys were probably after my dear ol’ dad, not me. Check the yellow pages next time.”
The Mistress shook her head. “That’s not possible.”
Faust, turned, eyes narrowed. “Why not?”
The Mistress seemed like she had let slip something not meant to be said. She shook her head and trembled nervously inside the mirror.
“Why. Not.” Faust demanded.
“B-because it was your f-father…Felix Faust…who arranged the hit.”
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Post by Crow on Oct 7, 2007 0:20:46 GMT -5
TO BE CONTINUED
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Post by mockingbird on Jul 29, 2011 12:14:57 GMT -5
To let us know what you think of this issue, please visit the letters page here!
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