01-19-2015, 12:26 AM
The Regus’ gaze swept across the assembled throng of the Atharim. Expectant eyes looked back up at him. In some, he saw mere curiosity. In others he saw excitement. And in others, faces that he memorized, fear.
He never considered himself a public speaker. His life up to now had been too solitary, too used to speaking to individuals or small groups. The Regus of the Atharim, of the Vatican Historical Society, was not a public position. Yet for what he would forge the Atharim into, they would adopt his vision as their own. He would make them believe by speaking truth from his heart. They had spent thousands of years hunting the easy prey, creatures whose evil was visible for all to see. They had grown accustomed to the ease of this hunt because the TRUE DANGER was eradicated millennia ago. They had lost their edge. Their understanding of the terrible suffering and wars between man and gods forgotten. He had not forgotten. It was the mandate of the Regus to constantly sharpen the Atharim so that they were always ready to carve evil from the world no matter its form. That work began anew today.
“My sons and daughters. Look around you. The might of the Athari are here today. Atharim. ‘Remnant.’ Do you remember that you ARE but a remnant? A remnant of a devotion that saved the world from annihilation?” He paused long enough to study which faces among the crowd nodded and which spines stiffened. “Do you even remember what it means to be Atharim? You should. For some, the rites were recent undertakings. For others, they exist in distant memory. But you should remember as clearly as I recall mine.” He lifted his left arm, and although he did not bare the skin beneath his sleeve, the symbol that united them should pierce every mind in the room.
”To be Atharim is to keep the world safe. We keep the darkness at bay because we are the only light in a world dying in darkness. His voice dropped, disappointed. ” And you don’t even see it.” As intended, the room was silent. “I am going to remind you why we fight. Why we die. Why we sacrifice. Why we are eager to be the hand that offers light to an ungrateful world. Long ago, WE were slaves. Mankind was enslaved. WE groaned under the lash of the immortal gods. WE suffered at their capricious whims. Men and women and children died at a thought. Cities were razed without care.”
Armande’s control was impeccable, but in this moment he allowed his voice to harden, allowed them to see his fury and rage. “The gods were spoiled children, taking or destroying whatever came up into their corrupt hearts. They fought over lands and people like cheap prizes, heedless of the suffering and death and destruction they caused. They very nearly destroyed the world.”
“Why? Why did they do it?” His blue eyes and words blazed. This was it, the core, the heart of why the Atharim were necessary. The words were ripped from his throat. “Mankind cannot touch the power of God and remain human for long! Corruption. It will Come!”
He watched the reactions. Firm acceptance; hesitance; flat disbelief. He snorted. “Do you doubt me? Would you recall the mythologies of the past to me? Prometheus? Ea? Amana? Olorun? Other SO-CALLED protectors of mankind?”
The sword needed to be recast. The dross had to be skimmed off. The weak burned away. “You do not have the luxury to study the histories as I have. You sacrifice your time serving in the field. So allow me to remind you the truth of some of these stories.” He let himself to wax lyrical, extolling and praising.
”Ra. That great protector of Egypt. Ra, so loved and revered by his people. Over the centuries his titles grew. The Father of his people. Slayer of Apep, of chaos. Creator. The Aten, the life giving sun shining in full glory at noon. The Bearer of the Shepherd’s Crook and the Flail over the Upper and Lower Nile. The Lord of the Two Lands.” He let the accumulated titles wash over them, accentuating the position this god had ascended to. ”This god who touched the power of God, as the centuries passed, even he was not immune. ‘The Book of the Heavenly Cow’, carefully and reverently preserved in Hieratic, tells the tale As the centuries passed, he grew displeased with his children. He grew impatient with their imperfection. He sought vengeance against those he considered his enemies. And he unleashed his own daughter Sekhmet, the Eye of Ra, to execute judgement. ‘Lady of the Bloodbath.’ ‘The Devouring One.’ ‘The Terrible One.’ This daughter of this protector god slaughtered those very same worshipers, bathed in and drank their blood like the Countess Bathory herself, until it covered the land. Ra himself, upon learning of the extent of the carnage, became fearful that no one would survive. But she was too powerful, an inexorable angel of suffering and death. Ra had to trick her to get her to stop, spiking the blood she drank with an intoxicant. And for centuries, the worshipers of Sekhmet reenacted this story in their temples, on their Porch of Drunkenness.”
”This is but one in thousands of such deplorable examples. Mankind simply cannot be allowed the power of a god. No matter their good intentions, no matter how long they hold out, they always succumb to the temptation. We CANNOT allow the gods to return. For thousands of years, we have been all that has stood between slavery and death, life and freedom. But now we have drawn close to the crossroads of time. The forces of evil and darkness grow on every side. YOU know this. You’ve seen this, all of you! It is undeniable! More dark creatures proliferate than ever before. The Ijiraq have been awakened after millennia. Draikana and Oni multiply. Something new and unknown lurks deep in the Moscow tunnels. The vile Naga have come out of hiding without fear. All of these are signs, harbingers of the greatest danger the world has ever faced. Apollyon the Destroyer himself walks the earth. And the reborn gods sprout up like weeds at his feet.”
He looked at various faces sharply. “The danger is too great, the risk too high, the cost too precious. We will not abdicate our holy responsibilities now! We must not lose sight of our sacred duty, now, when it is so vital, when the danger has never been greater. The gods HAVE returned. They WILL multiply. They WILL enslave you. It has already begun. Look at the land we are in. Twenty years was all it took for one god to conquer Europe and Asia. And if you think he has not yet enslaved you, you are wrong. The Germans believed in Hitler too, and the world paid for their naivete. But we still have a chance. The gods are still scattered, still few in numbers. If we don’t act now, the cost will be infinitely higher later.” Roaring like a lion, “I. Will. Not let them terrorize the world again. Never again. ”
As his speech ended, he felt the eyes of his children bore into him. He sensed their hunger for a vision, and he their glorious father feeding them what they needed. The Atharim would be as one again. The remnant would be whole and pure. He stilled his heart and his emotions as they threatened to race with excitement while his fire blue gaze danced from person to person until it alighted on one individual. In that one face he did not see adulation, and he felt his eyes narrow. The haze he was looking through was gone. He still saw many with the same heart and mind as him. But here and there he saw something else. He ground his teeth. Their time would come. Oh yes it would. Righteous justice burned in his chest. It was time for the traitor. He turned his head and looked at Martin, nodding slightly.
He never considered himself a public speaker. His life up to now had been too solitary, too used to speaking to individuals or small groups. The Regus of the Atharim, of the Vatican Historical Society, was not a public position. Yet for what he would forge the Atharim into, they would adopt his vision as their own. He would make them believe by speaking truth from his heart. They had spent thousands of years hunting the easy prey, creatures whose evil was visible for all to see. They had grown accustomed to the ease of this hunt because the TRUE DANGER was eradicated millennia ago. They had lost their edge. Their understanding of the terrible suffering and wars between man and gods forgotten. He had not forgotten. It was the mandate of the Regus to constantly sharpen the Atharim so that they were always ready to carve evil from the world no matter its form. That work began anew today.
“My sons and daughters. Look around you. The might of the Athari are here today. Atharim. ‘Remnant.’ Do you remember that you ARE but a remnant? A remnant of a devotion that saved the world from annihilation?” He paused long enough to study which faces among the crowd nodded and which spines stiffened. “Do you even remember what it means to be Atharim? You should. For some, the rites were recent undertakings. For others, they exist in distant memory. But you should remember as clearly as I recall mine.” He lifted his left arm, and although he did not bare the skin beneath his sleeve, the symbol that united them should pierce every mind in the room.
”To be Atharim is to keep the world safe. We keep the darkness at bay because we are the only light in a world dying in darkness. His voice dropped, disappointed. ” And you don’t even see it.” As intended, the room was silent. “I am going to remind you why we fight. Why we die. Why we sacrifice. Why we are eager to be the hand that offers light to an ungrateful world. Long ago, WE were slaves. Mankind was enslaved. WE groaned under the lash of the immortal gods. WE suffered at their capricious whims. Men and women and children died at a thought. Cities were razed without care.”
Armande’s control was impeccable, but in this moment he allowed his voice to harden, allowed them to see his fury and rage. “The gods were spoiled children, taking or destroying whatever came up into their corrupt hearts. They fought over lands and people like cheap prizes, heedless of the suffering and death and destruction they caused. They very nearly destroyed the world.”
“Why? Why did they do it?” His blue eyes and words blazed. This was it, the core, the heart of why the Atharim were necessary. The words were ripped from his throat. “Mankind cannot touch the power of God and remain human for long! Corruption. It will Come!”
He watched the reactions. Firm acceptance; hesitance; flat disbelief. He snorted. “Do you doubt me? Would you recall the mythologies of the past to me? Prometheus? Ea? Amana? Olorun? Other SO-CALLED protectors of mankind?”
The sword needed to be recast. The dross had to be skimmed off. The weak burned away. “You do not have the luxury to study the histories as I have. You sacrifice your time serving in the field. So allow me to remind you the truth of some of these stories.” He let himself to wax lyrical, extolling and praising.
”Ra. That great protector of Egypt. Ra, so loved and revered by his people. Over the centuries his titles grew. The Father of his people. Slayer of Apep, of chaos. Creator. The Aten, the life giving sun shining in full glory at noon. The Bearer of the Shepherd’s Crook and the Flail over the Upper and Lower Nile. The Lord of the Two Lands.” He let the accumulated titles wash over them, accentuating the position this god had ascended to. ”This god who touched the power of God, as the centuries passed, even he was not immune. ‘The Book of the Heavenly Cow’, carefully and reverently preserved in Hieratic, tells the tale As the centuries passed, he grew displeased with his children. He grew impatient with their imperfection. He sought vengeance against those he considered his enemies. And he unleashed his own daughter Sekhmet, the Eye of Ra, to execute judgement. ‘Lady of the Bloodbath.’ ‘The Devouring One.’ ‘The Terrible One.’ This daughter of this protector god slaughtered those very same worshipers, bathed in and drank their blood like the Countess Bathory herself, until it covered the land. Ra himself, upon learning of the extent of the carnage, became fearful that no one would survive. But she was too powerful, an inexorable angel of suffering and death. Ra had to trick her to get her to stop, spiking the blood she drank with an intoxicant. And for centuries, the worshipers of Sekhmet reenacted this story in their temples, on their Porch of Drunkenness.”
”This is but one in thousands of such deplorable examples. Mankind simply cannot be allowed the power of a god. No matter their good intentions, no matter how long they hold out, they always succumb to the temptation. We CANNOT allow the gods to return. For thousands of years, we have been all that has stood between slavery and death, life and freedom. But now we have drawn close to the crossroads of time. The forces of evil and darkness grow on every side. YOU know this. You’ve seen this, all of you! It is undeniable! More dark creatures proliferate than ever before. The Ijiraq have been awakened after millennia. Draikana and Oni multiply. Something new and unknown lurks deep in the Moscow tunnels. The vile Naga have come out of hiding without fear. All of these are signs, harbingers of the greatest danger the world has ever faced. Apollyon the Destroyer himself walks the earth. And the reborn gods sprout up like weeds at his feet.”
He looked at various faces sharply. “The danger is too great, the risk too high, the cost too precious. We will not abdicate our holy responsibilities now! We must not lose sight of our sacred duty, now, when it is so vital, when the danger has never been greater. The gods HAVE returned. They WILL multiply. They WILL enslave you. It has already begun. Look at the land we are in. Twenty years was all it took for one god to conquer Europe and Asia. And if you think he has not yet enslaved you, you are wrong. The Germans believed in Hitler too, and the world paid for their naivete. But we still have a chance. The gods are still scattered, still few in numbers. If we don’t act now, the cost will be infinitely higher later.” Roaring like a lion, “I. Will. Not let them terrorize the world again. Never again. ”
As his speech ended, he felt the eyes of his children bore into him. He sensed their hunger for a vision, and he their glorious father feeding them what they needed. The Atharim would be as one again. The remnant would be whole and pure. He stilled his heart and his emotions as they threatened to race with excitement while his fire blue gaze danced from person to person until it alighted on one individual. In that one face he did not see adulation, and he felt his eyes narrow. The haze he was looking through was gone. He still saw many with the same heart and mind as him. But here and there he saw something else. He ground his teeth. Their time would come. Oh yes it would. Righteous justice burned in his chest. It was time for the traitor. He turned his head and looked at Martin, nodding slightly.