Incubus/Succubus vs. The Avenger/Zach van Owen

The atom-in-ouroboros glowed bright, lit up crimson against the gloom, pulsing like a heartbeat. As it faded, the scene opened into an interrogation room. Mark Carlton and James Bates sat cuffed to chairs, arms held tight behind their backs. The walls were spattered with blood, some of it faded to a dark brown, left there as a tribute to the fallen and a warning to those yet to come.

Carlton wore a mask of the Avenger, Bates, that of Zach Van Owen. The fabric was thick, choking, every breath a struggle that left one unsatisfied and light headed. Incubus stepped forward and slapped Carlton across the face, the sound ricocheting off the walls like a gunshot.

"Just as every cop is a criminal," sang Incubus. "And all the sinners saints!" He span on the spot, suddenly animated, before catching Bates with a backhanded slap that had the captive man whimpering in pain. Succubus laughed and grabbed him, her arms around his waist, and dipped him as in a ballroom. She pulled him upright and scooped him into the air, kissing him deeply, before spinning him round. Incubus extended a boot and nailed both Carlton and Bates with vicious kicks to the head as the turned him through the air, finally bringing him gracefully back to terra firma.

"Never trust a hero," said Succubus. "Heroes always let you down. Heroes will make you believe lies, give you something to lose, a faith to be shattered. Heroes will make you believe their shit doesn't stink, then drown you in the septic tank without a second thought. Heroes will fail you.

"Trust your enemies. Those who despise you will show their true face soon enough. No hero has that courage."

Incubus withdrew a taser, twirling it on his finger with exaggerated swagger, like a refugee from a 1950s Western. "Two men, one from the village that always lies, one from the village that always tells the truth. What do you ask?

"'What is the way to your village?' Either way, the answer is the same, the land of truth - so the popular wisdom would have it. Yet the deeper question remains - which village is your destination? The painful truth - or the beautiful lie?

"You cannot know the answer until you know the question. You cannot know the question until you know yourself. Will you dare to see the truth? Or will you turn back to the lie?"

Incubus spat at Mark Carlton and grabbed him by the back of the head, bringing him crashing face first into the desk. Succubus vaulted onto the table, flipping over the two captives, landing behind them. She grabbed James Bates and yanked his head back, staring into his eyes upside down, her expression manic, bubbling over.

"Tell me, my Vigilante, my dear, sweet Vigilante - who is really the fugitive? Who hunts the hunter, who stalks the stalker? At what point will you cease your pathetic skulking in the shadows and come out into the light?"

She shoved him aside with contempt, sending him toppling to the ground, his chair tumbling alongside him. Bates's skull collided with the floor with a dull thud, the banker weeping in pain and despair.

"For God's sake!" yelled Carlton beneath his mask. "What the hell do you people want!?"

"This," hissed Succubus. "This is what we want. Pain has no goal. Pain is our goal."

Incubus stared at the two captives, his mind swelling, vision drifting in and out of focus. In his minds eye, Carlton and Bates disappeared, replaced with the Avenger and Zach Van Owen.

The vigilante and the hero, the would-be saviours. In his mind, Incubus saw them, heard them, felt them. Was them. The heroes. The Moralists. Those who would give all for others, those who fancied themselves righteous.

Incubus gazed upon them and felt nothing but contempt. He lunged at Mark Carlton and knocked him to the ground, seeing in him nothing but the Avenger, the weak, inept shadow of what was once human.

Suddenly, an alert sounded, cutting into the festivities. Carton and Bates lay prone, exhausted and spent.

"Incubus. Succubus. If you possibly have a moment," came the voice of Raziel, dripping with sarcasm. "You are summoned."



The Manor. The place in Southern England where it all began. They were just teenagers then, scarcely more than children. Full of piss and vinegar, they were anarchists, happy to go out and fight the good fight. Fuck the state, fuck the cops, and fuck any authoritarian who stands in our way.

Then one day they heard about the Institute. They - Tamsin and Josh - had been living at the Academy, the sanctuary for rebels and outcasts up in Yorkshire. Together, they and the other residents had come down to the Manor, to protest against the actions of the Spirit Science Research Institute - an organisation that, to hear the Academy folks tell it, was the Third Reich, the OTO and the CIA rolled into one.

So they had gone to the protest. The moment they arrived, security were on them. The crowd had scattered, Elijah, Omega and the rest running for cover. Tamsin and Josh had carried on, proud and insolent youths, refusing to back down until they were tackled to the ground.

The looks in their eyes. Sixteen and seventeen years old. The fear, confusion, defiance.

The scene froze, Josh laying face down in the mud, arms cuffed painfully behind his back, the knee of a security guard buried in the small of his back. Nearby, two more security held back Tamsin, her mouth frozen wide open in an expression of pure horror.

To one side, ignored by all those involved, stood Incubus and Raziel. Raziel knelt, gazing into the eyes of Josh as he lay motionless on the ground, frozen in time.

"You really used to dress like this?" Raziel asked with a smirk, gesturing at the prone Josh's goth pants, weighed down with multiple heavy chains, his feet clad in thick black boots covered in band names drawn in tippex.

"It was the 2000s," responded Incubus with a shrug. He glanced down at Josh. The feeling was strange, like a personal Uncanny Valley. Logically, he knew this was him. He remembered this time, this place, this incident - the smell of fumes from the abattoir down the road, carried on the summer breeze; the feel of the soil under his body, his face ground painfully into the dirt.

Yet he remembered it in the way one might remember a particularly vivid film or play. Seeing it here, however real, however true, was like visiting a museum, like one of those vapid Second World War tours he was forced to endure as a child. Another place, another time, of no more personal relevance than the pyramids.

But still….

Raziel glanced at Incubus. "You okay?"

Incubus nodded, as if trying to dislodge the thought. "What is this? Where are we?"

"England," said Raziel. "You can tell by the rain."

Incubus rolled his eyes. "You know what I mean?"

"We are inside your timeline," answered Raziel. "Everything you do, everything you think, the course of your life - these things leave a trail through space and time, like a cockroach crawling through sand. You never think about these things, of course, any more than you think about the fact you are hurtling through space at thousands of miles an hour.

"Think about it like this. We exist in 4d space - three physical dimensions, plus time. You have no control over your motion in the fourth dimension - you cannot move backwards, nor speed your movement forwards. You experience time in a forward direction, at a rate of one second per second.

"But you do have control over your position in the other three dimensions. You can go from York to Rome to Tokyo if you so choose. All of those places exist simultaneously, and while you have to be in one physical position you can move from one to the other at will.

"The same is true of time. For me, all of time exists simultaneously, and I can choose when and where to exist. When possessing a physical body they remain in their time stream, experiencing time at a rate of one second per second in a forwards direction. When in the spirit realm I can move from ancient Egypt to the heat death of the universe in the same manner as, say, going from York to Tokyo.

"Which is to say: there is effort involved. It's not as simple as closing your eyes and waking up in another time, same as one cannot simply wish one's self to another place. It requires energy. Especially if I choose to bring along a tourist."

Incubus nodded, looking around, taking in his surroundings. "So….this isn't just a projection or a dream? This is real?"

"As real as you are," answered Raziel.

Incubus shrugged. "Why did you bring me here?"

"I wanted to see where it all began. For you, that is. And for her," Raziel added, glancing over at Tamsin. "The birth of Incubus and Succubus. Tell me….what happened next?"

"You can see my past. You already know."

"I can see. But I want you to tell me."

Incubus nodded. "Tamsin and Josh were taken by security, dragged into the Manor, questioned. Institute security took them into a room, showed them photos, people from the Academy. The Apostate and the Whore - the ones they called Elijah and Omega. And others - the Skeltons, Lady Tomlinson, the Brigantia. Demanded to know everything."

The scene around them faded from view, retreating into darkness, the eyes of Tamsin and Josh the last thing to vanish into the gloom. Slowly, the world around them began to fill with colour. They were in a cell, deep underground, lit only with a single fluorescent light tube. A table sat in the centre of the room; Tamsin and Josh sat beside it, their arms cuffed behind them. Their young faces were covered with cuts and abrasions, eyes bloodshot. Tamsin leaned her head to one side, resting it on Incubus' shoulder.

Suddenly, Tamsin screamed as a baton came crashing down on her back, sending her crashing headfirst into the table. A gash opened above her eyebrow, sending blood spraying across the cell. Standing above them was an agent of the Institute, poised, ready to strike again if needed. Josh made to stand but was shoved back down, his eyes wide, yelling in protest.

The scene froze. Raziel glanced at Incubus. He stood impassive, expression unreadable, as he watched his younger self - the boy he once was - in his panic. On the wall, a series of photos formed a Rogue's Gallery, enemies of the Institute past and present. Some had lines struck through them, others were defaced with occult sigils of one sort or another, acts of malevolent magick designed to lay the Institute's enemies low.

Pride of place on the wall was a portrait of a man in his early 40s. He wore a simple tweed business suit, clean shaven, a pair of thin-rimmed glasses perched on his nose. His eyes were pale, watery, his expression one of thin-lipped formality. Beside him was another portrait showing Clyde Pierre, the Founder of the Spirit Science Research Institute.

"Tell me about him," said Raziel, gesturing at the first portrait.

For the first time, Incubus' expression turned to anger. "The Usurper, the Imposter. He called himself Benson. When the Founder supposedly died in 1998, he took over. By the time we were taken - the time you see here - his authority was well entrenched. Benson ruled the Institute for damn near two decades, until those loyal to the Moonchild forced him out. The Institute fell into civil war. A war in which we were victorious."

Raziel glanced at Incubus with curiosity. A note of pride had entered his voice, pride mixed with venom. "We?"


Incubus nodded. "Even under Benson's rule, there were those who opposed his leadership, those who remained loyal to the Moonchild - the Amoral Messiah, born in Pierreia, destined to free the members of the Institute and lead them into battle against not only the Usurper but the whole world. Word spread within the Institute's detention facilities, loyalists infiltrated every level of Benson's entourage. When the time was right, we rose up. He was deposed as leader of the Institute. The prisoners were freed, the Prophetess - Cassandra - was restored to her place as the consort of the Moonchild.

"First we took the Institute, then we took Pierreia. Next we take the world, one step at a time. The dominos are already beginning to fall."

Raziel looked from Josh to Incubus and back again. For the first time, Raziel noticed the scars on Incubus' body, lacerations to his arms, fingers that bent at just the wrong angle. Looking at Josh, Raziel saw a child. Looking at Incubus, they saw a warrior. A soldier forged in Amorality.

The world around them faded from view once more, replaced by a succession of scenes, each one utterly real, each one frozen in time. Tamsin and Josh, locked in separate cells, just close enough to hear one another's screams in the night, just too far apart to talk, to give comfort. Josh connected to a set of electrodes, camera focused in on his face as it contorted in agony, Tamsin forced to operate it under threats to her family. Tamsin opening up a sealed box, wrapped in gaudy paper and ribbons, a glimmer of hope crossing her face; only to hurl it to one side, horrified, a glimpse of blood and fur just visible inside, a collar and nametag toppling out.

Here, the two of them were forced to drink kykeon, heads yanked back, the psychedelic elixir poured down their throats, giving them a glimpse of blessed relief. Incubus watched as Tamsin and Josh lived through ego death and resurrection time and again, dead to self, dead to the world. Now, they were clad in the plain white uniforms of the Penitents, made to assist in the interrogation of others, bringing along instruments of torment both physical and mental.

Finally, the ceremony at the House of the Will, the Institute's headquarters in Los Angeles. The pair, now in their twenties, stood side by side in front of a waiting audience, a metal container between them filled with fire. They silently disrobed, removed the garments of the Penitent, and cast them into the flames. The fabric caught fire instantly and flames shot out of the container. Inside, the embers of old photographs and childhood toys glowed brightly, plumes of smoke twirling into the air.

Two Penitents walked onto the stage, presenting the pair with a pair of robes, grey, embroidered with sigils and symbols, profane names and diabolical spirits invoked with every stitch. The Penitents clad the duo in their robes. Henry Benson entered the scene, a golden dagger in hand, and took their hands in his. He slowly, deliberately cut into their palms, blood swelling up, the pair not flinching for a moment. They extended their hands over the fire and let the blood drip down, steaming, the heat making the cuts sting all the more.

"Tamsin and Josh are dead." Incubus was enraptured, his eyes fixed on the scene unfolding before him. Everything froze, the smoke, the flames, the calm, considered malevolence in the eyes of Henry Benson, the determination on the face of the pair.

"And Incubus and Succubus were born," responded Raziel. "You remember this day, don't you?"

Incubus nodded. "The day he died. The day I was born."

"Do you ever think about him? About Josh, the one who died so Incubus could -"

"Do you ever think about Emily?" Incubus' voice had a certain edge to it.

Raziel snorted. "Of course not. For me, her body is merely a temporary vessel; I think no more of her than you would think of a rental car. Once my business here is done, she will return. The same cannot be said of the person you once were - of the part of you that died so that Incubus could be born."

"That part is dead. There is only Incubus."

Raziel nodded. "We must go. The Prophetess needs us."

"Understood." Incubus closed his eyes. Raziel raised their fingertips, about to touch him on the temples. Before making contact, Raziel paused.

"I have seen something. Let me show you. A spoiler of sorts."

The scene around them shifted one last time. They were in an arena. The lights were bright, the crowd filled to capacity, signs held high, cheering their heroes and booing the villains. In the ring, Succubus and Avenger went head to head, trading blows, ducking and dodging. At the top of the entrance ramp, Incubus and Zach Van Owen went head to head.

Incubus watched himself batter Zach in the skull, once, twice, three times, before Zach sent him staggering back with a boot to the stomach. Before Zach could capitalise, Incubus charged forward and leapt at him, crashing into him with his full body weight. The two men collided and went tumbling off the edge of the stage, crashing down painfully to the concrete below.

Raziel and Incubus watched as the scene froze, the two figures suspended in mid air, hung halfway between heaven and earth. The expressions of the audience were filled with a sort of horrified bloodlust, terrified of the outcome yet too fascinated to look away.

Incubus turned to Raziel in curiosity. "This - this is my future?"

Raziel shrugged. "It can be, if you want it to. Depends on the path you choose to take." Raziel laughed. "Crawl, my little cockroach. Crawl through the sands of time. There's some dung at the end of the journey, trust me on that at least."

Raziel placed their fingertips on Incubus' temples. The two of them closed their eyes. Incubus felt a sudden rush of blood to the head, a flood of nausea, a pounding tension headache just behind the eyes. He felt a wetness on his upper lip and touched his hand to his nose, feeling the trickle of blood.

Incubus opened his eyes. He was in the library in the Palace of Amorality, the seat of power of the nation of Pierreia. He was seated in an enormous armchair, cushions of finest silk, the arms topped with the skulls of extinct animals. Raziel sat opposite him, a small table between them, a tablet recording the whole process. Raziel passed him a handkerchief and Incubus wiped his nose, the cloth coming away stained a bright red.

Incubus blinked, the hazy world around him slowly coming into clear view. Raziel's expression was curious, concerned. "How are you feeling?"

Incubus took a moment, breathed slowly, deliberately, letting himself get back to his body. He nodded. "Fine." Incubus paused. "You know, from anyone else, that question might be mistaken for compassion."

"Call it professional interest. You intrigue me. Can't be very intriguing if you're a corpse - well, depending on the corpse at least, and the person. My old friend Agrippa of Nettesheim once -"

"Quite." Incubus rubbed his temples. The headache still felt like a red hot knife embedded in his skull. "You said the Prophetess needed us? Where is she?"

"I may have jumped ahead a little in our story," said Raziel. "She will be with us in five, four, three, t-"

The door to the library crashed open. Cassandra stood in the doorway. Her expression, her body language, everything about her conveyed a sense of utter fury.

"Incubus. Raziel. Come with me," she snarled. "We have a problem."

"Attention, Patriots! This is Zeboim!"

The voice echoed, reverberating off the walls, the windows beginning to shake. The Museum stood tall, reaching into the heavens, its front lined with stained glass windows. Once these windows had been home to images from the history of this land - then known as Zeboim, renamed Pierreia in 2018 following the seizure of power by the Spirit Science Research Institute.

Now they were a mockery. Some showed scenes from the seizure of power itself, the day the former leadership of Zeboim had been forced to step down, the tiny nation powerless against the forces of the Institute. Others showed the Institute reigning supreme, the victorious serpent coiled around the land it now called home. Still others were blasphemous retellings of the world's mythologies, Lenin and Washington smeared with faeces, Churchill sodomised, the kings and queens of the world humiliated and made humble. The windows were bordered with strings of occult symbols, interspersed with profanity, cursing all authority but that of the Institute.

Standing outside the Museum's enormous oak doors stood a group of a dozen men, clad in military camoflague, boots and balaclavas, armed with batons and stun guns. Behind them, they had unfurled an enormous banner reading "ZEBOIM AWAKE", fringed with green vines made colourful with flowers of white, blue and green, the national colours.

In the streets beyond, passersby went about their business, heads bowed, rushing to get away, not daring even to pause lest they be taken as sympathisers. One woman in her seventies tripped and fell, her head colliding painfully with the pavement. The rest simply walked on.

One man held a megaphone, another standing beside him, holding it steady.

"My Patriots, my people! Listen!

"For too long we have allowed ourselves to be ruled by the impure, the foreign, the corrupt - those tainted by the world outside our borders, those who know nothing of our people, our customs, our history.

"For years - centuries - generations, we, the people of Zeboim, have forged our own path, autonomous and alone, a haven away from the affairs of nations, from the wars and crusades and plagues of the world.

"Yet now our homeland has been placed under the rule of the serpent, under the reign of despots and busybodies! Our years of splendid isolation have been brought to a crashing end at the hands of this foreign menace, aided and abetted by traitors amongst our own ranks! What was once a land of freedom and tranquility isolated from the outside world has been dragged into this war - a war not of our making, but for which we have paid a cost in blood!

"On the one hand, the so-called Spirit Science Research Institute, lovers of the serpent, worshippers of devastation and destruction. And on the other hand, their enemies, the brigades of would-be heroes and martyrs who have flocked into our once proud nation, bringing their war to our lands, dragging along pestilence, idolatry and sin in their wake.

"We stand here today, the Patriots of Zeboim, to say one word: ENOUGH!

"To the lovers of the Serpent and to their opposite number, to the Institute and to those who call themselves the Children, to those within our own ranks who look to these twin foreign menaces as a source of salvation: This is a declaration of war.

"One day, our lands shall again be free - free from the poison injected from without and the cowardice eating us away from within! Free from the banner of the Serpent, and of the interlopers who stand against it! Free to pursue our own destiny, free to live untroubled by the concerns of the outside world, uncontaminated by its concerns and affairs.

"One day, Zeboim shall rise! And on that day, may the world quake in terror!"

The men erupted into a roar of approval, stamping their feet, smacking their batons against the walls and pillars of the Museum. A few passersby dared to catch a fleeting glance up at them as they went on their way, shuffling ever faster, eyes ever alert from the motion of a security camera or a Guardsman hidden down an alley.

Suddenly, there was a burst of engines as a single vehicle came screeching into view, speeding down the Grand Parade and coming to a halt just outside the Museum. A Penitent sat at its wheel, their hands clasped firmly to the wheel, eyes locked straight ahead. The vehicle had barely come to a halt when the doors opened and Cassandra, Incubus, Succubus and Raziel came rushing out, Cassandra carrying a megaphone.

"Right," said Cassandra. "We give them one chance to give themselves up. They refuse, we go in. We have Guardsman units located around the building, waiting for our sign."

They nodded. Cassandra turned to face the Museum, raising the megaphone to speak.

"Attention, so-called Patriots! This is Pierreia!

"Your protests have fallen on deaf ears, your acts of defiance futile, failed before they began. Those who would stand against the flow of history are like one who would hold back the tide or slap a tornado. Your efforts are meaningless; you have already lost. Submit now, or the blood of your children will be on your hands."

"Go to hell!" yelled the man who had been speaking. The others around him started to tense up, hands at the ready to grab batons and stun guns, smoke grenades at the ready.

Cassandra glanced at Raziel. "The speaker. Who is he?"

Raziel shrugged. "I need to touch him, or something he has touched. Then I will be able to give you everything down to his dental records. Until then I wouldn't know him from Adam. Fucking imbecile."

"Well obviously. The whole lot of them are -" began Succubus.

"Not him," interrupted Raziel. "Adam. What kind of idiot gives up paradise for a fruit salad offered by some mad rib-woman and her scaly mate? I tried to explain everything to them afterwards but some people just won't listen."

Succubus rolled her eyes. Cassandra raised the megaphone once more. "This is your final opportunity to spare those you love. Will you -"

Before Cassandra could finish, there was a series of small explosions, and a string of projectiles came firing out from the windows of the Museum. Gas canisters streamed towards them, six in total, landing just in front of their vehicle. Each canister was strapped with a whistle that screamed at ear-shattering pitch, tearing the sky apart as they came rushing to their destination.

Cassandra, Incubus and Succubus darted back into the vehicle just as the gas began to fly. A series of small, compact gas masks dropped from the roof and they put them on, breathing heavily. Outside there was a series of thuds as the canisters continued to come. Raziel stood alone, arms raised in two middle-finger salutes towards the Patriots, their body almost obscured by the gas.

Cassandra withdrew a tablet from her pocket and tapped in frantically, bringing up multiple video feeds connecting to the Guardsmen.

"TAKE THEM OUT!" Cassandra screamed, still coughing from the gas. "TAKE THESE MOTHERFUCKERS OUT OR I WILL WEAR YOUR LUNGS AS A TIARA!"

There was a moment's silence, the gathered Patriots at the Museum celebrating their brief victory, beating out a drumbeat with their batons against the walls. Every so often a slogan would go up - "FREEDOM FOR ZEBOIM!" "DEATH TO THE SERPENT!" - first by one, echoed by the rest.

Abruptly, the cheers turned to a roar of defiance as the Guardsmen arrived, storming the Museum from all directions. Two Guardsmen rushed towards the vehicle wearing gas masks, carrying what looked like oversized, militarised leaf blowers. The gas dissipated rapidly, revealing a scene of unfolding chaos.

At the outside of the Museum, the twelve masked men were fighting against the Guardsmen, doing their best to stand their ground even as the numbers of Guardsmen swelled, each Patriot scarcely visible behind a maelstrom of boots and fists. Above, more Patriots stood at the windows of the Museum, hurling down projectiles on the crowd below, rocks, small explosives, stun grenades and smoke bombs.

Suddenly, there was an explosion as one of the Guardsmen's vehicles burst into flames, a flurry of small incendiary grenades fired in its direction from the Museum. The air filled with the stench of burning rubber, the skeleton of the vehicle standing out stark against the flames, the air thick with plumes of black, choking smoke.

Cassandra glanced at the others. Raziel nodded before they, Incubus and Succubus strode forward, making their way through the chaos, flames and bloodshed springing up on either side. Incubus had his ruby-tipped cane at the ready, Succubus wearing her spiked gloves, the two of them dispatching of Patriots and onlookers with a casual ultraviolence. One woman did her best to get out of Succubus' way, dodging this way and that, scarcely able to see through the smoke that stung the eyes and burned the lungs. Succubus grabbed her roughly by the throat with one hand and struck her with the back of the other, the spikes gouging painfully into the woman's flesh, before shoving her to the ground, rubbing dirt into the open wounds.

They reached the entrance to the Museum, the Patriots almost all detained, laid prone on the ground. The Guardsmen had ripped off the men's masks, revealing faces filled with terror and defiance alike. The "ZEBOIM AWAKE" banner had been torn to pieces, with one Guardsman squatting over it, defecating over the word Zeboim, wiping himself on the mask of one of the prone Patriots.

Raziel glanced around the fallen bodies then turned their attention to Incubus and Succubus. "He must be inside," said Raziel, shaking their head.

The trio entered the Museum, making their way through its corridors. Somehow, even now, even here, the place felt peaceful, like a shrine or chapel on a busy city centre street. Where the sound of the chaos did come through it was as an unwelcome intruder, forcing its presence into this hallowed space.

They made their way upstairs, moving rapidly, taking no time to take in the scenes around them. Raziel went first, their eyes closed, moving based on instinct and spirit sense. They turned first one way, then another, passing artefacts going back centuries - relics of Gnostic and Templar, Cathar and Cagot, lost relics of a hundred faiths long thought to have vanished from the pages of history.

They passed down one last corridor and turned left into a stately room. The walls were painted with ornate designs in gold, roses and tulips, woodrose and morning glory, decorative vines studded with diamonds weaving their way around the walls. A single man stood in the centre of the room, a syringe in his hand, eyes wide, defiant, unafraid.

"You're too late! You and your fucking Institute! One day the Patriots will take back what's ours - and if not, we'll burn this land to the fucking ground! Now we have everything we need!"

The man glanced to one side, to a bookcase set against the wall. Incubus and Succubus ran towards it, throwing it to the ground to reveal a hidden door behind. The two of them disappeared through it, a narrow, spiral staircase leading down to the bowels of the building. Raziel crossed the room with inhuman speed, grasping the man by the wrist, holding him steady, the syringe ready to strike.

Raziel closed their eyes, probing the man's mind, searching through thoughts, memories, emotions. Suddenly, Raziel stepped backwards, eyes wide, expression incredulous. Raziel stared at the man, mouth agape.

"Is it real?" asked Raziel.

The man nodded in glee, suddenly animated. He raised the syringe high into the air, bringing it plunging down on his own neck with a defiant jab. He slumped to the floor, his legs beginning to kick out, body convulsing.

With his last moments, the man threw his head back and laughed, an echoing, joyous laugh. His eyes locked with those of Raziel.

"You lose, motherfucker!"

Then nothing.