Velvet Shadows
The Never Ending Quest - Episode 12922
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Hearing a tiny, barely perceptible noise, Edgar turned just in time to
briefly see an odd shadow flit across a pew and behind a column. He shook
his head as a throbbing echoed in his skull, and shifted his weight into a
defensive position. "You might as well come out. I know you're there, and I know you can't do a damned thing to me in a church." A young, attractive dark-haired woman stepped out from behind the column, dressed in a modern casual style with a tank top and jeans. She started walking towards Edgar. "Clever boy, and learning fast. A good sign." Edgar frowned. "Look, this chit chat is cute and all, but what do you want?" "Such determination...there's a lot of him in you." "More than I'd like, but go on." "You know, I envy your mother. Chamuel and I were close, but the circumstances of the War never let us share the sacraments that produced you." "I didn't think that sort of thing was allowed with your kind" "That," the woman said, "is highly subjective, considering everything else." "If you're going to try to kill me as soon as I leave holy ground, don't even try. It's not that easy." "Ah, but Edgar, I'm one of the few people who doesn't want to kill you, as the Nephilim and my kind go hand in hand." "Then you're..." "Grigori. Yes." The Grigori. The Watchers. The Teachers. The one choir that has never participated in the Wars of Heaven, and one of a small number of neutral parties in the present War. In the first days, they were teachers of mankind, revealing the secrets of fire, civilization, and magic to the first people. Think of them as sort of a Judeo-Christian Prometheus. Like Prometheus, they got burned. They loved humanity more than anything, and they were the ones who produced the first Nephilim. Thus, as a punishment, they were sentenced by God to become the Watchers, as in "Look but don't touch". Considering how much they cherished the humans, I'm not sure I could deal with that if I were one. If what I've learned is true, though, they might well be the closest of the Angels to God himself. You see, the war I've gotten dragged into, the war my father and his kind started, is pretty messy, and everyone in it's got an opinion. On one side, there's the Ishim, the choir led by Gabriel. Messengers. Harbingers. Nasty blokes, because the message isn't always pretty. In their heyday, they were, literally, the voice of God. Nowadays, though, it seems God is silent, and idle hands are the devil's work. Gabriel himself killed another archangel, Rafael, who he claimed was about to Fall. I don't think the angels know what Falling is, anymore. The Ishim have one choir allied with them, the Erelim, though I don't know much about them yet. The other side's not much better, though, and that's the side my father used to fight for. The Elohim, under the archangel Michael, whose main stake in this war seems to be getting righteously peeved about the fact that Rafael died. They're God's warriors, so I get the feeling that they're always righteously peeved about something. They're allied with the Serafim, who I've talked about, and the Ofanim, the "wheels". The Ofanim are keepers of secrets. If there's something to know, chances are they've got it tucked away somewhere. That leaves two choirs of angels who don't want any part of it, besides the Grigori. Frankly, I can't blame them. These are the Kerubim and the Malakim. The Kerubim are some of the nicest folk I've ever met. They're almost halfway sane, and they've hidden me from other angels occasionally. See, the Kerubim admit they don't know God's will, and they see the war as sort of an insult to God. The Malakim, though... They scare me more than the ones who want to kill me. They're really creepy blighters. Once they stood for the Dawn, back when Rafael led them. The thing is, an Archangel forms the core of a choir's essence, so when one's killed, they take it hard. Oddly enough, though, they don't want to kill the Ishim. Near as I can tell, they've gone completely crackers. They don't even register that Rafael's dead, but they're definitely disturbed. I met one, once, and it's not an experience I care to repeat... "All I'm asking of you, Edgar, is to remember me to him. Tell him Sariel still thinks of him fondly..."
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The Traveler
9/15/2000 9:40:48 AM
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