Season of Consequence: Mysteries

“Hunter from the deepest wild, makes you feel just like a child.” - Jumanji

☠️☠️☠️☠️

…An Afterlife Far, Far Away…

…Feels Like Tuesday Afternoon…

He’s been running for what seems like days. It’s been hard to tell time, there’s no day or night in the Kaelscape, just some bullshit twilight. Following the Minister’s command, he’s kept fleeing toward the horizon, where the light and darkness meet forming the Deep Subconscious.

It would have been a lonely trek had it not been for his stalker.

Lord Farthington keeps Max motivated, hunting him since being freed by Wilhelm Kael.

Scrambling over white stone while Max keeps as much shadow and rock between himself and Him.

Looking ahead he sees the pale rocks he’s been traversing leads into a heavy mist.

CACK-KAAAAABOOOOM!

Like a bolt of lightning from Zeus himself, the bullet from Lord Farthington’s rifle strikes a nearby rock. Debris needles his upper body, shrapnel ripping and tearing his flesh.

Ignoring the warm, slick feeling running down his face, he hurls himself toward the swirling gray miasma…

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…Russian Training Installation…

…A few days after ReVival 58…

“Surprisingly durable body.”

Wilhelm stands nude in front of a large mirror set up in his office. His pale flesh is covered in welts and reddish-purple bruises, testimony to his battle with Youngblood only a few nights before. He is currently using his phone to record his audio report.

“Remarkable improvements were put into this new form. Increased bone density, muscle density and reaction time. During fighting I noticed an improvement on focus and hand-eye coordination likely linked to the release of adrenaline. To think, Subject k431 wasted this gift for professional wrestling.”

The bitterness in Wilhelm’s voice could turn wine into vinegar. Sighing he moves to his clothes which are neatly folded on his desk. Continuing his report, he begins to dress..

“Using what I know of the Farthington Estates finances, I have begun to secretly attack Cecilworth’s fortune, siphoning it into several of Colonel Nekkhov’s secret accounts. The first deposit went through this morning, a small sum of ten million euros. I wonder what the Colonel would think if he discovered that was merely the Farthington linens allowance.”

A low chortle burbles up from Wilhelm’s throat as he reflects on the deal he had with Ratimir.

“In exchange he turns a blind eye to my work here in PRIME.”

Slipping his black commissar tunic over his plain white undershirt, Wilhelm once again examines himself in the mirror.

“Despite my loss against Brandon Youngblood, our test run with the body was what I consider to be a success. Had the match not been under Iron Man rules we would have quickly secured victory.”

Buttoning up his tunic his attention sweeps to the diagrams on his desk, the same he had been studying over the past weeks. A mystery he hadn’t fully solved yet.

“...I’ve failed to test this new maneuver in combat. Still, I have two opportunities before Cecilworth to test the validity of this new weapon.”

Reaching down, Wilhelm picks up the diagram with Cecilworth’s body drawn out on it. There was a pathway through the Lord of Farthington Manor defenses, he just couldn’t see it yet.

Knock-knock. 

He is pulled out of his thoughts as the door to his office swung openly quickly. One of the nameless, faceless peons that worked at the facility steps in firing off a crisp salute. Wilhelm offers a weak salute of his own pulling on his black leather Sam Browne belt.

“[Sir, we’ve just received news from the United States.]” the soldier explains in Russian.

“[Yes? My opponent for ReVival 59 has been revealed?]” Wilhem asks, pulling the belt tight around his waist before adjusting the shoulder strap.

“[Yes, your mystery opponent is RIA… but there’s more.]”

Looking up, Wilhelm furrows his brow, “[Oh?]”

“[They’ve reelected Trump.]”

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…Somewhere In The Deep Subconscious…

…Time doesn’t matter here…

Max stumbles through the fog having long ago lost his sense of direction. The dense mist made visibility outside of a few feet in any direction impossible.The ground beneath his feet had moved from white stone to fine black sand.

Nothing made sound here. Even his own screams sound distant and faint to his ear, like wandering blindly through a snowstorm. Now and again he sees shapes in the mist, lumbering just beyond visual detail.

At one point he thinks he thinks one of the shapes notices him causing him to quickly retreat in the opposite direction.

Eventually something catches his eye. A small light burning in the distance, a beacon set in a thick, gray sea.

And so he moves to the light, a moth drawn to the flame, its growing illumination feels warm and inviting. When he finally reaches the edge of the light he feels its warm give away to a cold breeze swirl all around him.

And then it’s all gone.

The black sands.

The endless fog.

The inviting light.

All of it replaced by a sterile smell that awoken old fears buried deep in the back of Max’s mind.

SNAP!

Cold, pale light floods into his eyes as fluorescent tubes flicker to life above him. They illuminate a long hallway filled with abandoned pieces of medical equipment and rotting hospital beds. Closed doors line the halls, some with darkened windows, others flickering with their own light. He steals a glance into the nearest wired glass window, spying a faint shape, no bigger than a labrador, laying fetal on the floor in the darkened room.

”Fuck. That.”

One of the tubes above him begins to hiss, the light pulsing brighter before settling back to its notoriously unflattering yellowish glow. He watches the light with no small amount of annoyance before he looks back down to the window, a ghostly woman’s reflection staring at him from behind.

Max practically throws his skeleton out of his skin spinning around putting him face to face with manifesting apparition. The woman’s mouth split into a large smile, the corners extending the full length of her jaw like a serpents, the tips of recurved teeth peeking beneath her lips. Her blood red hair was tied up into a high bun, except for two stylish barrels that framed her ghostly face. Crimson droplets perpetually dripping from the ends of the coils and evaporating away with soft hisses.

She lifts a disproportionately long fingered hand from the pocket of her crisp white lab coat, a digit delicately adjusting the stem of her glasses revealing pupiless eyes of molten gold.

”Language, Mr. Kael.” She corrects him, hand recoiling back to her lab coat.

He takes in the horror that stares down at him with her golden eyes. Gulping down his fear, Max clears his throat.

“Te-technically I’m a Commissar…” he stutters trying to work out where he’d seen his… monster before. It was like looking at the hole left of a memory he’d lost, the silhouette familiar but unidentifiable. Max feels the entire room constrict and coil around him like a serpent, the knape of his neck slick with fear-sweat.

“Yeeesss, I'm sure you are.” She replies in the saccharinely condescending tone of an adult who has just been told by a three-year-old that they are a dinosaur. Her head tilts off-axis quizzically, her ear practically touching her shoulder.

“And you would be…?” Max lets the question hang in the air while his hands search the door behind him for the handle. He was still searching his own memories for this things face. At first he thought it might have been a distorted version of Violent Purple with the red hair but the face was all wrong.

No, this was something different and considerably… older.

Just as his hand finds the chipped lever handle, his personal bubble is thoroughly destroyed. The creature moves too quickly to track, both her hands slamming into the glass window on either side Max's head, her nose a breath away from touching his.

“You always were a restless little boy…never could stay where you were supposed to.”  Her fingers curl, the tips of her needle like fingers scratching against the glass as she drags her hands down. Her lips twitch back, mouth spreading wide, ready for a meal, before she snaps her hands back into the pockets of her lab coat taking a smooth step back.

“Come along, Mr. Kael, I'll see you back to where you belong.”

☠️☠️☠️☠️

…The Kael Estate in Arkham…

…A week before ReVival 59…

The heavy wooden doors to the old Kael Estate creak open filling the dead silence of the terrible, shadowy old manor.

Where the Primrose Chateau was spacious and bright, this place was oppressive and strange.

Where the Farthington Manor was grand and noble, the old Kael family home was brooding and felt hungry..

A shadow by the name of Wilhelm Kael eclipses the doorway, his eyes scanning the lobby of his ancestral home. Debris and old, dry blood cover the floor, remnants of Max’s first and numerous regenerations. He reaches out, douching the black trim of the doorway, feeling the cold wood beneath his calloused fingers.

The Estate reacts like a pet recognizing its owner after being apart too long.

A cold wind rushes past Wilhelm, practically pushing him through the threshold. The wind sweeps through the house as the wooden frame groans and creaks. Electricity flushes through the walls as lights flicker to life.

It’s as if the entire house is yawning and waking up.

Wilhelm slowly moves through the lobby, his hands folding neatly behind his back. In the doorway several Red Army Soldiers cautiously follow the Commissar.

“Welcome to my home.” the Master of the Kael Estate whispers. Turning toward the Soldiers, Wilhelm sweeps his arms open dramatically.

“This shall be our headquarters now that America has decided to become allies with our cause. The Kael Estate will become a Russian Embassy here in Arkham. From this place we will conquer the hearts and minds of every Red-Blooded American from Maine to California.”

Turning to look at a portrait that hung above the lobby. The last official Kael Family to take up residency in this house. Max Kael, his son Sutler Reynolds-Kael and daughter, Chloe Reynolds-Kael. Wilhelm snorts in disgust.

“Begin bringing the equipment in. I want this Estate to function as a Russian Embassy by next year.” he continues, tearing the portrait down off the lobby wall. He runs his hand across the portrait feeling the peaks and valleys of the oil paint. As the Soldiers depart, Wilhelm remembers something.

“Oh, and don’t wander around this house alone. It’s… hungry.”

There is an awkward silence as the Soldiers look at each other unsure if the Commissar is joking or not. The silence is only broken when Wilhelm smashes the portrait onto the ground, bashing the elegant wooden frame into thousand different pieces before shredding the canvas with his bare hands.

Once completed, Wilhelm turns his eyes to the stunned soldiers.

“...Well!?”

With that the Soldiers immediately fall into action, in pairs, to see the Commissar’s orders done.

Smoothing out his uniform, Wilhelm lets out a deep sigh.

“Now let’s see if I remember where my office is…”

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…Somewhere In The Deep Subconscious…

…Time doesn’t matter here…

“So, Doc, the last thing I remember being was running toward the Deep Subconscious before I popped up in this delightful little hallway of yours.” Max begins figuring he might as well see if he can get answers. “... and I don’t recall your memorable visage, so where the fu-”

He stops himself as he recalls the monster’s earlier comment on language, a sharp hiss emanating from her as if to emphasize the point. “..where the hell am I and who are you?”

“Mm…patient exhibits long-term memory loss, likely a symptom of severe TBI…you should consider a change in occupation, Mr. Kael. You'll forget how to tie your shoes at this rate…and after we worked so hard on it.”

Her hands exit her pockets mimicking tying shoe laces while softly singing.

“Build a tent

Quick! Inside!

Close it tight so we can hide!”

A knot of nausea ties itself in Max's stomach as she sings, his brow twitching as he feels the knot slowly move up.

“Over the hill

Around down low,

It's too late!

And now she's got me,

Tied in a bow….”

Max chokes on the words as they crawl up out of his throat.  Her head twists around on her neck almost a full 180 degrees, that serpentine mouth split into a wide toothy smile.

It turns out the words he’s choking on are a multitude of tiny black spiders. They skitter and fall from his mouth, each chittering the merry rhyme that the woman had just sung. Tears stream down Max’s face as he gags out the last of the black horrors falling to his knees.

Between retching gasps and wet coughs Max’s mind fills with a memory long repressed. A filthy nail driving its way through his skull until it bursts back into his waking memory.

As the memory finds clarity in his head, he pushes himself back up to his feet“... you taught me how to tie my shoes.”

His voice trembles, dark eyes looking down at his own tied shoes.

“You’re a doctor?” Kael starts, his gaze turning back toward the smiling horror. “But not for children.”

Looking back down at his shoes he realizes he’s now wearing hospital socks and his feet are too small. He catches his reflection in a nearby window. A gaunt seven year old Max Kael staring back at him.

“Oh… piddle.”

☠️☠️☠️☠️

RIA, you’re quite the little mystery aren’t you?

There was the surface level research of course. My predecessor, Subject k431 did love to torment you on Jabber, didn’t he? I apologize for his behavior, I find that kind of juvenile torment unspeakably ugly. 

I learned more about your family, about your personal relationships. A creative powerhouse troubled with tragedy and mental instability. So much untapped potential…

…The World is unfair isn’t it? You’re coming to ReVival 59 to fight a man and instead you’ll find a God. 

I’ve slipped the yoke of Chaos, overcome my weakness and ascended to a paragon of Order.  

You see Chaos is a prison, the primal instinct to survive the chain that keeps you ever struggling.

RIA, you deserve better than Chaos. 

Despite what you may think of me, I’m not a bad man or a villain. You’re a flower left in the dark, I want to bring you into the light. I want you to have a safe place to heal, to grow, to be the best version of yourself.

But that means putting away your childish things and cutting away the needless. 

It means understanding humility and accepting the truth Order brings.. 

You can’t save everyone, only the best of them. 

I can’t save everyone, RIA.

But I can save you.

☠️☠️☠️☠️

…Somewhere in the Deep Subconscious…

…Time doesn’t matter here…

A cracked plastic nameplate hung off its nail but the name “A. Lintilla” was still perfectly intact, though the braille bumps below it bore numerous bloody fingerprints. This thing had led Max to its office and he had followed in the hope of finding answers.

The name on the door flashes back into his mind as he studies his captor as she quickly scuttles to a large medical cabinet behind a stainless steel desk.

The walls were floor to ceiling shelves, every shelf full of specimen jars containing floating bits and pieces, as well as a few whole fetal creatures. Her desk contained the usual items: a computer monitor, a lamp, another nameplate, a head in a jar, a cup full of pens, and….

Max's attention snaps back to the head in the jar, pressing his nose to the glass to get a good look.

A glowing yellow eye stares out at him set into the rather unhappy looking face of Max Shell. He’s even more startled when the eye blinks, or perhaps winks, at him before Shell’s mouth opens with a soundless scream. .

“Max Shell?” Max whispers, his eyes shifting from the head to seek out the doctor. A distorted gold orb peers at him through the glass and liquid, causing Max to again startle backward.

“Patient correctly recalls a variation of itself leading to consideration of a possible misdiagnosis of brain trauma…or, more likely, a symptom of severe narcissism. Further observation is required.” She comments as she walks back around the desk toward Max.

Pieces of the memory continue to click into place as his eyes look to the nameplate on her desk.

“Assain Lintilla, was it? I’m starting to remember. My father dumped me here after…” his eyes narrow, his brow furrowing in frustration as he tries to remember. Smells, odd shapes and colors but nothing real, nothing he can hold onto, like trying to hold a fist full of smoke.

Shaking away that mystery, he turns his attention to the one he currently found himself in.

“... But you.” Max pokes an accusatory finger at the doctor. “Why do you have Max Shell’s head? He’s supposed to be dead.”

“You really are a stupid child…perhaps if you had stayed where you belong you could have learned something.” She twists slightly, setting down the black jar on the desk before she picks up the jar with Max Shell's head.

“Yeah, well, you are one ugly bitch. Or bench in ye ol’Fredickery” Max snaps back.

Her eyelids narrow, her mouth again twitching open but she snaps it shut with an almost exhausted sigh.

“Patience.” She whispers to herself. “Sooner or later…you all rain down.” She turns away from him for a moment, glancing toward a shelf to her right. “I could put you there… or a little higher….”

Max looks up at the shelf studying it when he realizes what she’s talking about. He almost laughs to himself before shaking off the giggle.

“Doctor Lintilla, I’m not a seven year old kid anymore. My hands are stained with the blood, my ledgers gushing crimson with the names of people I never even bothered to know.”

As Max speaks he looks down at his hands and finds they are his once again. Long, slender and indeed, dripping with blood.

“Heh-heh… you are right though, I’m a mighty stupid man but mighty stupid men are both dangerous and stubborn. So please, monster to monster, creature of the outer horrors to… well whatever you’re supposed to be… Let’s not play who's got the spookier penis, hmm? How did you come across Max Shell’s head?”

Again her eyelids narrow as she looks at the man again before looking down at the jar, lifting it slightly higher to peer into the yellow eye of Max Shell.

“As you are aware, you are not a ‘you’ but rather a ‘we’. Each Max has its time but that time inevitably ends, as time wants to do. The trick is that in your case, the end isn't so much an end as a delay. When one breaks, the pieces of it rain down into the Deep Subconscious. Eventually the fragments will reform but for poor Max Shell…” She caresses the lid of the jar before giving it a rhythmic tap. “I found him before he could find himself.”

Max grimaces at the doctor's words, glancing at the “unlucky” part of himself.

“Ooookay…but why?”

“To experiment, of course. The one thing that all Max's have in common is a deep obsession with yourselves. The only way for a Fragment to die is if they choose to go gently into that good night. And I think we both know how often that happens.”

Max nods, considering the doctor’s words,”Yeah, we’re not known for our self-sacrificing nature.”

Her lips again peel back into a full faced smile. “So, when poor Max Shell fell, I collected this small part of him and have been monitoring his reassembly.” She places Max Shell back on her desk before standing and taking up the small black jar again. “My experiment will be far more insightful once I collect more specimens”

His eyes flicker back at the thing on the other side of the desk giving her a faux look of sympathy.

“Yeeaah I think I better get moving along...”

The head in the jar begins to twitch and make noiseless screams. With a groan, Max points at Max Shell.

“... And I’m gonna need to take him.”