The Assassin
Jul. 23rd, 2017 11:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
madimpossibledreamerAlso, Angel, sorry about what happened in Shadowed Suspicion. For the record, Anya, I also don't dislike your character; I just have the feeling that the whole Tony Stark thing wouldn't intersect well with your character. (It brings out the worst in you I think.)
~Dreamer~
Main Points:
Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Marvel Crossover AU (Self-Made Hero: The Infinity Mirror)
Summary: Giles finds the fourth of his recruits.
Word Count: 2204
Rating: Gen
January 1943
Many mages before this point had mistaken the actions of the line of Aurelius as those of good.
It’s a club. Those who fit in not only get to live, but get to dance and celebrate their supremacy. For now.
Other vampires called them derogatory names—Fangless, Slayer’s bitches or bastards, traitors, human sympathizers.
White skin turned even paler by the lack of sunlight makes one as a god among these people. It’s easy enough to lure in fresh prey, if that’s what you’re going for.
They made the same mistakes that these Nazis had.
Angelus sips at his beer, carefully disguising his disgust. It doesn’t have the same taste as fresh blood, but he has to fit in if he wants to be able to track his mark.
That being neutral didn’t mean that you’d chosen a side.
Movement. Just the lieutenant he was looking for. Dressed, of course, in army finery taken from a recent kill.
That a difference in goals did not, in the end, mean a difference in ideology.
The Master had recently broken with the Order. With the Nazis and their magicians and the other arcane resources at his disposal due to his new alliance, it had been impossible to track the traitor down, before now.
The mages and the Council attempted communication but were rebuffed; the other vampires attacked and tried to kill them when they could.
Fortunately, Angelus was the Order’s greatest Assassin, patient until the moment called for swift, unhesitating ferocity. A lesser vampire would have seen this lieutenant and immediately gone for the kill, but that was not the goal.
But still, it was pure, noble.
Sending pointless messages made no difference. You had to wait and cut off the head of the wolf in its lair, then display the head for all to see. Action, that’s what mattered.
It was a code to live by—the others were the dogs, acting on pure instinct, not intelligence, lower even than the humans from which they drank.
He paused to admire a propaganda-inspired painting, and, with a thought, faded from sight. Easy enough for any follower of Aurelius.
If given a second life, surely they should still have something to live for.
On padded feet he follows as the fake lieutenant leaves, several of Hitler’s ‘perfect race’ human females hanging off each arm. He watches from the shadows, motionless, as Colin falls on them and feeds on them. Angelus feels a touch of compassion as the women scream, but only a touch. After all, they brought this on themselves by the company they keep.
Why play at being serial killers when you could have real power?
He follows, silent, unnoticed, as the vampire heads to the base of operations. To the Master, the entire point of the whole jaunt.
Why indiscriminately slaughter the sheep when you need a herd not just for the next few days but for the next few centuries?
The Master will not be an easy target, which is why Angelus was chosen. The Master rose far in the ranks, but he’s hardly the only one who had reached power in the Order, and his changed priorities had made him weak.
They should allow the humans to continue to evolve, to thrive, for it is with their success that vampires also rise.
He does not even slaughter the door-guards. It will be easy enough to sneak past them, once the circumstances call for it. He merely follows, a silent shadow, as they enter the stronghold and head to the Master’s throne-room.
They should feed on other vampires who have strayed off the path and demons, for there and not in humans does true power lie.
Colin kneels, but the Master turns to where Angelus stands, a smile playing on his lips. “Angelus. Darla misses you, you know, as do I.”
Colin stares around in confusion.
They should prevent the end of the world, for that ends them as well.
“Master, who are you talking to?” Colin asks, confused, and in response the Master reaches out with one bony hand and crushes that neck in one smooth motion. Failure is met with death. A short-sighted yet utterly characteristic decision.
They should study magic from all sources, evaluating potential, as even human mages have a thing or two to teach those wise enough to listen.
The twice-dead can learn nothing from their mistakes. It is the wise who can admit their mistakes and thus learn from them, become stronger. But then, the Master had stepped off the path of wisdom, though he had grown strong sucking the lifesblood of wisdom offered by the Order of Aurelius.
Angelus allows a twisted smile to reach his lips. “The both of you betrayed the Order. Did you think that you could escape retribution for your treachery?”
When they have ascended high enough in the hierarchy, they are to have their souls restored and choose a new name.
“Come. Join me. I would weep over your ashes, and with the blessing of the Old Ones, I will triumph, in the end. The Order of Aurelius seeks power, yet when it is in their grasp they would turn away like sheep.” The Master lets some of his magical charisma drip over the words like honey.
Angelus feels the power gathering in the room, like seductive lightning down his spine. He doesn’t answer directly, merely beginning the chant.
They are true vampires, then. They walk two worlds, the world of the dead and the world of the living.
The Master whirls away from the throne. As expected when the light bursts into the room bathing every nook and cranny with the awe-inspiring glow of the sun, the Master is not even a little singed. He stole the Gem of Amara, making the move more dangerous for Angelus than for the Master, but he lives on danger, thrives on it.
They can accomplish more than either the dead or the living separately.
Another whispered spell and the two trusty Blades of Shadow and Silence appear in his grasp. He whirls to parry an attack as the two phase into this realm. This earns a grin with bared teeth. Why the Master would hide down here when he could step into the light is a question Angelus cannot answer, for he cannot comprehend the thoughts that had led to this foolish path.
But the honor must be earned. The initiate must prove that they have the wisdom to use such power in ways befitting a member of the Order of Aurelius.
It is anything but easy for Angelus to maintain the spell to stay hidden—from the light, at the very least. It is mere matter of willpower, of convincing the light that he is not in its path, that stays between him and a future as a pile of ash.
The Order is neutral in all things, no matter what the idiots outside the path would have anyone think.
Fortunately, it is not merely his own willpower that keeps it active. It is his power that does so, but it is being maintained by a dozen acolytes in one of the castles. His success is their glory.
Simple injustices are, for the large part, not the purview of the Order.
The Master has slowed down slightly. It’s hard for him to keep up with the fury of blows as Angelus keeps him occupied and waits to spot an opening.
The death of a single human means little in the grand scheme of things, unless they be, say, the Archduke of Austria, or a Slayer.
The Master’s followers, by now, have noticed the commotion and attempt to run to the Master’s side. They burn, and the air fills with the ash of their deaths.
It is when others attempt to destroy the world that the Order gets involved, since they live in the same one as humans.
The problem is that the Master has a new strength. It’s not enough to easily overpower, but it is wearing down Angelus’s stamina. It’s probably due to the power of the Old Ones, but they would have the world burn. The Master has truly turned his back on everything he had been taught, the ungrateful swine.
Maintain the world. Keep the flock sated, happy, flourishing. Seek power. Preserve the balance.
He manages a hit, and the flesh bubbles like he’s used acid. He allows the battle-lust to grow, the grin to widen. So his instincts had been correct, then. The fact that the blades had been blessed presents more of a problem to the Master than to Angelus, since he’s left the Path of the Order.
Never forget yourself. Never forget the Order. Never forget the Path pure.
Angelus makes a strategic decision, impaling himself on the sword the Master uses, and pulling himself forward until their faces are nearly nose to nose. The pain is secondary, temporary, to his true goal.
Forget the tenets, forget the Path, and you betray the Order of Aurelius. You forsake wisdom.
He can see as the Master’s eyes widen in alarm. He thought he’d had an idea of Angelus’s powers, but he’d never been on a Hunt. Angelus had chosen the path of the Assassin because it was there he was truly tested, truly pushed to his limits. And that is the point of the Order of Aurelius.
You forsake your second life. It matters not how far you run.
A little pain is nothing. A little sacrifice is nothing. There, there lies power, if only one has the guts to reach out and take it.
It matters not how many you kill.
The Master tries a chant to block the acolyte’s channeling. It’s a matter of whether he can kill the Vampire before the chant finishes. Ordinarily it would be impossible, but he feels the boost that the Old Ones have given to the spell, a twisted touch that corrupts and bleeds.
It matters not how you squirm.
It takes great effort, but he’s accomplished nothing without, and inch by agonizing inch the sword lifts toward the Master’s throat.
The Assassins of the Order will find you.
There’s a scream Angelus recognizes. It’s Darla, burning up in the spell. He feels a pang, but in the end, it rewards her betrayal with exactly what she deserves. The Master falters. She’d always been a favorite.
Your second death will find you.
Angelus brings up Shadow another four inches in one motion and slices through the Master’s neck in one smooth motion. His hand trembles only a little from the pain of the sword in his chest and earlier wounds.
This is the Order of Aurelius.
The body doesn’t disintegrate. The hand cruelly twists the sword inside him, but with Silence flickering dangerously in the other hand, he pulls it up and hacks through bone and sinew. The detached hand falls, and he falls with it.
He picks up the hand as the dust falls around him and takes the ring off the hand, which crumbles in his fingers. He then places it on his own hand for the time being. The Master is dead. Any of his minions who remain will be dispatched by lesser Assassins. He will have to have his wounds treated by the Healers, but he is still alive and his enemy is not. This is a good day.
Present Day
It is a second treachery that shakes the Order. Spike, following the whims of his beloved Drusilla, is hunting down the Elders one by one, and he’s brought an army. As the Elder Assassin and a Vampire with a connection to Spike, Angel is one of the first on the list.
His friends and fellow Assassins die around him.
He feels the portal before he sees it, sees what spills out. It’s tension on the air, a crackle in time. Then the air breaks, and there they are—a Chaos Mage more powerful than any human mage he’s ever met hidden behind layers and layers of deception, a second mage, red-headed, with a different brand of magic and no hidden subtlety and a magical artifact in the form of a cape, a werewolf whose brand of lycanthropy seems more mundane than magical and blends an odd mix of calm certainty and self-loathing, and a man encased in an iron shell whose spells run on computer code. They take to his side like comrades, silently joining the fray with few words, even magical, exchanged. It’s as if they know how to work together and yet have barely done so.
“Would you like power?” the leader asks, the Mage with the benediction of Chaos. “Would you like to save the world?”
Magic comes at a price, but he can see this man speaks the truth, and their goals and those of the Order of Aurelius largely align. He will decline to participate when their goals are more petty, but he’s learned to be more flexible, to see the Buddhist truth of it all, for one life can save the world. It requires more knowledge to see such things.
“I’m insulted you even have to ask,” he says with a smile, and then they are gone.
