Prologue: Hunters Stance

Max, Maggie, Angst and I stood outside the cemetery. I didn't know where it was, some hick town in some backwater county, but to me all cemeteries looked the same. It didn't matter if we arrived in the dawn or the middle of the afternoon, for some reason it always transformed into a dark night.
 
Maggie had said something about the demonic manifestations and the aspect of negative energy which caused the unnatural phenomenon. I had been through this several times before but each time it gave me the creeps.
 
Now here I am staking out another demon. A demon that is terrifying a small town.
 
Max's long coat flutters open with the wind. A cigarette is in his mouth as he glances down at his watch. 1:11 pm.
 
"All set?" he asks.

> Debashis in Plureality 5

bright. sunny day. puffy clouds. warm wispy breeze.
grainy filmy image.


commotion. just over there. pan out. turn to the commotion. focus in, too far in, blurry and focus out. see more clearly. 


he’s being pulled. three others. are pulling him.
words and shouts, nothing really intelligible.
Chaos. Loud. Emergency. Urgent. Disorder. 


imperative to Intervene. but no manuals. no rules. no protocol.
just observe? 


he’s not resisting the others. can’t.


Heart.Beats.Faster. 


he is losing strength. dragged to the street.
they are intervening. violently. they are intervening.
he’s weak. grainy scene. sunny sky in sepia tones? moving toward black and white and grey. 


they’re pounding on him. on his chest. some kind of system re-boot?????? 


getting darker and scene fading. they’re still pounding on him. no energy left. his eyes are trying to stay open and he stares at everything and anything. scene keeps fading. they’re still shouting and yelling. scene fades and pans out. 


no-manuals-no-rules-no-protocol 


can only observe. can’t intervene. 


fade to white. heart beats loud.

Black Magick

It was a little past three in the morning; Max was wide awake. He lay in bed with Mags snuggled against him and stared through the french doors at the silhouetted cityscape, his mind throwing images like a turning slot wheel machine. Max eased out of bed, pulled on his jeans, and quietly stepped outside into the morning air. 

He stood on the balcony overlooking the city below, absently surveying the landscape like a deposed king. The images continued to dance in his mind, and he couldn't make any sense of them. There was no discernible pattern.

"Are you okay?"

"No," he honestly answered. He turned to face Mags, who was leaning up against the door. "I really could use a coffee though."

Mags flowed over and embraced him. She gave him a kiss and then said, "Sounds like a plan to me."

The Thought That Counts

Moving right along at a rapid pace, the group didn't pause for a second. There was no time to lose, as the saying goes. For if they faltered for just a moment, the hordes of flesh-eating alien cyborgnetic-organisms would slightly gain the advantage.

Frank dropped back from his pace with Max and joined in with Angst who was with Tatter, Suki and Aqua. They were keeping each others' pace.

"I don't know if this is the proper time or place for this," Frank said as he reached inside his jacket. "I just wanted to give you something, and I don't know if we are going to get out of this one alive. So I have to do this now."

He handed Angst a small parcel adding, "Merry Christmas."