8269/Birthright: The Village

Birthright: The Village
Date of Scene:	18 October 2021
Location:	1/4 East Lake Nubia, Egypt/Sudan Boarder
Synopsis:	Rated R for language, depiction of corpses, scorpions attempting to eat John's earthly tether. John Constantine leads Zatanna Zatara, Jon Sims and Moon Knight into an investigation to try to find the last person Leksandria, the Necromancer better known as ASENATH or THE LADY IN RED (or in John's opinion 'dead woman, that bitch'). John crosses paths with Paisi again, and Zatanna, Jon and Moon Knight get to make acquaintences with the ghost of Phoebe Beacon's mother. They see the condition of the souls left trapped in the web around the village. There is blood in the water now, and it's a matter of time until John claims a red coat for his adoptive daughter's suffering.
Cast of Characters:	Phoebe Beacon, John Constantine, Jonathan Sims, Zatanna Zatara, Marc Spector
Tinyplot:	Birthright

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Phoebe Beacon has posed:
A village, complete with a Coptic church, that was built up around a town well, it was once home to a church and about seventy people, mostly related to one family. The buildings have largely been torched and are retreating back into the sands.

The place is overbearing, even at night. Low buildings surround a single, wide water well. Past the initial gate -- now just two concrete and rock pillars that marked an official 'entrance' to the 'village', which once housed almost a thousand. Older houses had dwindled, evidence of huts on stilts to help protect against the flooding of the Nile river, before the dams were built. Further in, the houses become largely more modern before reaching the town center.

This was the site of the massacre. Of Asenath's butchery. Sand covers the square unevenly, blocked and built up against the remains of torched buildings, some blasted from within with stone and clay brick smashed outside, others collapsed in on themselves. There is a long, low building with the word 'mustashfaa' in Arabic -- a small eight-room hospital for the village.

The remains of a large, main building -- church, school, meeting house -- stand to the East. Once it had wooden doors, but now its entrance is just a looming, toothless maw frozen in horror at what it had witnessed.

Magic is thick here; almost akin to breathing heavy fog that tingles at the back of your mouth. Whisps of magic so strong that they are nearly material flit about. This place is almost like a giant battery...

... or a massive, magical time bomb. Above, the stars are shimmering in the remains of the heat rising from the ground.

John Constantine has posed:
    It's right in front of the well that John lands anyone that's coming along with him and not by some other means. The thickness of the magic in the air causes him to shudder visible when he steps through.

    ...with eyes wide open to the other side; dark circled, red rimmed, blood shot eyes.

    He's braced for it though, as much as a man can be against what he knows he might see based on the things he's learned. His shoulders are squared, feet just about as wide apart as those shoulders, head held high. If The Bitch happens to be watching, happens to be *here*, he won't show her fear, sorrow, nothing but his intent to hunt her like a fucking dog and rip her throat out. Game face, poker face, sheer spite and willfulness, call it what you will, he's bringing his A game to the table if it kills him.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    The Archivist follows John through the portal. He's in Archivist mode to start; he dug through the Archive during a nap and came out with memories of this place and its people, ready to tell to the others if need be. About their history and struggles and all the rest. And as much as Jon's here to help Phoebe and John, the /Archivist/ is here to help right a wrong against an ancient lineage of their people. Good people who did not deserve their fate.

    His eyes, too, are open to the other side, just in case. The more eyes on the situation, the better.

Zatanna Zatara has posed:
The stars in the African sky are like no others. The Milky Way, a blaze of light set with the diamonds of closer stars, Zatanna blinks, rediscovering that glory, then takes a deep breath. Her first breath brings the smell of dust churned by goats and cattle kept by the villagers. The second breath wipes away any fond memories with the reek of death and magic.

The dust of crumbled buildings stir as she approaches the well, clinging to her black clothes and sturdy shoes. She has left showtime Zatanna behind her, ready to face the horrors Constantine had tried to prepare her. She joins the two already there silently, braced for an onslaught of magic.

Marc Spector has posed:
    There is little sound to announce the arrival of another. A low hum, barely registering to human ears preceeds the arrival of a crescent shaped personal glider. The figure that jumps from it looks like Moon Knight, only wearing a suit of charcoal and smoke instead of his usual white. There are veins running throughout the material of the suit and the eyesockets in the featureless mask glow with a strange golden light.

    He lands with barely a sound, a puff of sand rising around him in the air and swirling about the hem of his cloak. He scans the ruins and shakes his head at the destruction. He presses a button on one of the inky guantlets over his hands and the glider silently rises into the sky and away to await its owner's call. Why he was already in the area is anyone's guess, but the man had been missing from contact for some time.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    Those with their Other Sight open will see little that's pleasant.

    In the astral, there are the twisted remains of souls held in traction. Red bolts are struck through them, men and women alike. The tattoos on their arms glow dimly in the astral as the float, tethered to the spots where they were struck down with astral strings.

    There are about fifteen in this courtyard, around the well that they've appeared in front of.

    There doesn't seem to be signs of others here... just emptiness. A plapable sorrow.

    As vision adjusts to the darkness, the remains of those villages whose astral bodies are being used lay beneath the sand. Here a tattered scarf is whipped up. There a peek of someone's red shirt.

    If the Necromancer responsible for this village's pain is about, she's in no hurry to make herself known.

John Constantine has posed:
    Rather than speak and potentially be overheard, John uses the amulets to communicate. "<Zee, I'm 'going in'.> That can only mean *one* thing in this situation. <Stay here with the others, I'll need you to find me if I come untethered.> With that, he settles himself down on the ground at the side of the well and leans against it.

    Sight's fine, but it's not the same as up close and personal with it. He closes his eyes and on his hip that little crow tattoo takes flight. With the way he's sitting, legs all splayed in front of him, head back against the well, eyes closed, arms limp... and how pale and drawn he looks anyway? He looks dead.

    He's not though, he's sailing right into that web, or at least out into the astral with the people stuck in it.

Zatanna Zatara has posed:
Of course, he is going in. And, of course, she'll follow until his next words stop her. Zatanna takes a few steps toward the yard and glances back at the body propped against the well.

".nepo seyE" are her first words whispered aloud. (Eyes open)

Zatanna has never regretted her natural sight into the astral plane until she sees the agony of the tortured souls suspended by perverted magic before her. She tracks John's progress toward the web of pain that seems to color the night and stands reluctant guard next to his body.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    <The tattoos on their arms were a show of faith.> The Archivist's mind holds deep, deep sorrow, reflecting the feeling of the place. He looks around, pacing /just/ a little, not straying too far from where John's body is sitting. And then the damn monologue kicks in. At least it's telepathic, and not aloud.

    <The Village was Officially Unofficial. It floats in and out of legendry, a village of Punt, of Egyptian, of Nubian traditions, healers and oracles, diviners and exorcists. Sickness and old age were almost unknown; their elders were almost biblical in age. It starts off being mentioned in the second Egyptian dynasty, but was really mentioned by some of its inhabitants when they were called home, when the Greeks began taking over Egyptian religion in the early days of the Ptolomites, and then was completely closed off and secreted.>

    He paces away a little, toward the church. <It comes up every once in a while. The first of us to hold the title of 'Archivist' instead of 'Scrivener' found the village, hidden in the sands on the banks of the Nile between Egypt and Nubia. They were secretive, and did not want to share much other than they were able to trace their bloodline to 'The Beginning'.>

    A pause. He's eyeing the church. <They occasionally went out to fight for equality and try to heal mighty sicknesses, and lost thirty of their number to the United States civil war -- which hurt them severely when it comes to their population. Magic can do a lot, but tiny villages get a bit... close. In the 30's, a motorcar got lost and found the village. They healed his wounds, and then determined that they would send young people out into the world to try and learn more magic.>

    The sorrow /drips/ from the mental words. The Archivists of old mourn along with the current one, mourn the loss of these people and their bright, beautiful way of life.

    <The last time anyone shows up in the archives, it's in the 60's when a young man talks about his home village. He was killed in Brooklyn during race-related violence, where he remains as a guardian at a playground, unable to cross over because his business of protecting people isn't done.>

    The Archivist peers at the church, his mind slowly cycling out of Story mode. <I'll check this out.>

Marc Spector has posed:
    The astral world was new to Moon Knight, even if his patron has given him a crash course via mental link. <I don't suppose we can simply remove the bolts holding the bodies can we?> he sends to the remaing magus. He knew this new suit could interact with the mystical world as much as his physical would but magic was not his forte. The act of disrupting the bolts could very well set of a chain reaction and send them all to their graves.

    Without waiting for a response he starts for the infirmary, <I'll check the hospital.> He steps are slow and deliberate, being careful not to disturb the dead lying in attendance. After Jon finishes his history lesson (he's always fascinated by that power) he "speaks," <It's funny. It reminds me of my work ten years ago.> Jon would know what he's talking about. His time as a mecenary. Sent with a team to eliminate entire villages of populations. He's been part of slaughter like this before. It's entirely why he's so bent on helping Constantine and his lot with this now. To put a stop to the senseless violence involved with the necromancer.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    It is, in truth, a web. A shield. Part of the spell that keeps this place hidden until someone was supposed to find it, now created as a soul cage, binding the spirits of its residents in place. Placing them in a manner that time does not control them, nor allows their movement. Nearly eighteen years have they been stuck in their death throes as their bodies mummified on the ground below them. A scorpion crawls out of the orbit of a skull, creeping off to hunt. There's long nothing left to eat on that figure.

    The web has more stuck in the astral, clinging to it like velcro -- some on the inside, some on the outside. The Village calling its own home after their murders, reflecting on their forms, stuck in ageless, timeless agony. Their eyes are open, and white. Their bodies blue, tattoos glowing through skin. The ones on the outside of the netting pulse in a dull manner.

    No one seems able to talk to Constantine as he investigates the webbing.

    This Coptic church had seen much, much better days. It was easily one of the oldest buildings in the village, and the strongest built. It was no mere physical feat that the building has withstood -- its walls were thick, and the careful eye would be able to see, scribed shallowly in its shadow-dark stones, spells of power and protection, calls for primordial gods to defend their meek children, pleas to Isis and Taweret to protect mothers and children and for Thoth to inspire their scribe work.

Its iconography was similarly mixed. Visages that could easily be either the Holy Virgin with Christ on her lap, though the workings of the shawl and hood curl into the shape of a cobra. The halo placed high to be a sun-disk. Hidden at the edges were the hands and feet of Nut, crossing over the star-stained body of the primordial goddess of night and the sky.

They had been hiding in plain sight for so long, carefully preserved so that if they had been discovered in the past they might have been mistaken for angels -- but will Jon turn to see what hides in the shadows?

    The hospital had more of a 'medical center' feel to it; there was not much in the way of medical equipment that had been updated since the 80's, most of it fixed over many times -- but for a group of mages whose specialities were healing, what would they need the best and newest for? The main room appeared to be a lobby. Here, too, were a few bodies, though these are worse off than the others, their torsos are mangled, ribcages split open and bones sticking out. Either there were a lot of chest bursters here, or they died some pretty violent deaths. Their souls are not tethered here with bolts, but are struck to the ground as if nailed in place.

    What sort of deals has Leksandria spun to have that sort of gross power?

    The hospital splits in two here, with ER/Long Term Care to one side, and Maternity to the other.

John Constantine has posed:
In the Astral

    Most of what Jon is talking about, John already knew from his previous chat with Benji that resulted in a promise made that he intends to keep, walks through the past and his own research. Little bits that are new are stored away.

    But he has his own mission, the main one that he's for today. Is it here? He slips a vial from his pocket, a tiny bit... just a drop of the poison laced blood of his daughter, stolen sometime while she slept safe in the House of Mystery. It's sure to look different here than it did there and maybe, just maybe, there's something similar already here.

    ...and if there is, it's his intent, with the spell he'll begin, to find it.

Zatanna Zatara has posed:
Only Jon would think that his words are silent. The scion of the Zatarra line, child of a homo magi, hears his litany of sadness thread its way through the night as John walks into the courtyard. This village is so like her mother's village that she feels her heart skip a beat.

Eyes opened to the astral plane reveal a perversion that churns her stomach. Like the stars caught in the net of the Milky Way, souls dot a magic net thrown over the village. The evil behind its destruction stings her soul and makes her discover a new dimension to hatred for the wanton murder committed here.

When the group breaks apart to explore, Zee is left looking up at the stars through a net of tormented souls then makes a decision. Carefully, she murmurs powerful words, touching points on the ground to set wards around the base of the well to protect John's corporal home. She sits down next to him and joins him in the astral.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    The Archivist walks through the church, raising a hand as if to feel at the air, the /solid/ feeling of the building. He stops to peer at the inscriptions, at the icons. He stops for a few minutes to linger at the visage of Mary/Isis with Christ/Horus in her lap. Something escapes through his lips, a half-choked sob, an '/oh/.' Like something's come together in his mind, pieces fitting into place that he'd known should go there and had forgotten.

    And then he turns to look at the shadows, because that, too, is part of what he is.

Marc Spector has posed:
    Moon Knight doesn't seem bothered by the destroyed bodies as much as a normal person would. He merely shakes his head again in dissapproval and reports.

    <More bodies here. Corpses with their chests burst. This necromancer is drawing her power from something quite powerful. Destroying a heart is no simple task.> He kneels down and examines one of the spirits stuck in place, being careful not to disturb it. <Their souls seem to be nailed to the ground rather than skewered. Doubt that makes their torment any less.> He rises and looks between the two paths open to him.

    Khonshu is a god of fertility and childbirth as well as the moon. It isn't much of a choice to him. Women and children first. He started down toward the Maternity department.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
     In The Astral

    The blood does look different. It burns black, smouldering, laced with ashes and blood and the ripped dreams of animals killed in the womb, of a thousand scorpion venom sacks and the twisting words of corrupted Demotic and the Devilish tongue of the Fallen. The poisoned blood looks different -- and there is a tug, like-to-like, down to the hospital below. For the new dad, there is a touch about his ear, the sound of an infant wailing. A Persistant Memory. The scent of wild roses and black pepper that Phoebe likes so much that her blankets in the Loft are spritzed with it... because it's Paisi's perfume. Something calls to John.

    Zatanna Zatara's sight allows her to see another scorpion errupting, this time from a hole in someone's chest. It crawls up the tether keeping the soul bound to the body, twisting upwards, and begins to drink of its astral form. The screaming here is weak, just barely audable in the Astral.

     In The Church

    The shadows hide those who those inscriptions were meant to protect and guide. In the shadows would be more of Asenath's victims. Women curled around infants and toddlers. Clinging to young children. Their bodies have been preserved by the lack of rain and moisture, what skin and flesh remained turned amber-black by the passing of time. A woman's skull peers back, frozen in time. A child's poppet marked with freshwater snail-shells stitched in place for eyes and a nose is half-buried in the encroaching sand, which with every storm makes its way closer to the hiding figures.

    There were, too, the bodies of animals here. A beloved kitten, with barely any fur clinging to it any more, shielded by the curled body of its owner, loyal dogs who perished protecting their charges, one whose head had been blasted apart -- dog teeth and bone are embedded in the back of one pew.

    Whatever pleas for protection were uttered that day, they had not been heard.

     In The Hospital

     The maternity rooms are moderately sized, with enough room for a bed, a bassenett and each has its own bathroom and stand-up shower. Water is a tough commodity when you have to carry it, apparently. The rooms all have little iconography on the walls -- typically mothers smiling and holding infants in their lap. At first glance it could be mistaken as Holy Virgin and Child images, but the details do not match. Eye make-up is heavy with khol. Braided hair or beaded hair hangs down. Some even have crowns and diadems of their own. All of the rooms are the same -- some have old spellwork scrawled on their walls and floors, to defend against pain or sickness or to help lungs develop properly. At the end of the hall, there is a hastily erected wall of plaster, with a partial seal put atop it in blood. Maternity Theater, for those arriving into the world with difficulty.

John Constantine has posed:
In the Astral
    There's a reason John didn't want Zatanna to follow, it becomes apparent quick when she's caught up to him. He knows how the astral plane works, he knows how ones projection into it can change based on circumstances. Where once there might have been the perfect image of John Constantine, radiating the dark glow of his demon tainted blood and his power, now stands a shadow of that. His features are gaunt, almost skeletal, eyes and cheeks sunken in. His skin is the pallor of death. His hair's even thinning to show his scalp in places and has turned a color more gray and drab than Nettie's

    How he's walking around in the real world is anyone's guess, but to someone that knows him... It's likely piss, vinegar, spite and a whole lot of stuff he should NOT be doing.

    "Zee, I told you to... bloody hell," he hisses for her ears only.

    Too late now, isn't it. She's done gone and seen. "Bollocks."

    The reasons for John using 'mystical baubles' for the Night Brigade isn't only because magic is his thing. They're harder to hack, harder to trace and, unlike cell phones, they work through realms. <They won't be free, I don't think, until we stop the Bitch. We need to find what we need to save Phoebe and get out.>

    His head snaps in the direction from where that scent wafts, toward where he's being called. "Awwww, luv," he whispers. He knew the woman that saved him all those years ago was stuck, but the reality of it hitting him here, in the place it happened, is... tough.

    Tuck it away, clamp it down, do the job.

    For one as practiced with travelling the astral as John Constantine, movement is quick. In here he's a ghost, literally, and they aren't bound by traditional modes of moving about. One second he's there, next to Zee, the next... he's where he's being called to, where he's supposed to be.

Zatanna Zatara has posed:
On the plane is much worse than looking into it. Here she can smell the torture, sound is transmuted into color. Zee must be careful not to succumb to hallucinations. Catching up to John, she gasps at the ravages suffered by him made plain to her. With their time here limited, she keeps the tirade she feels welling up inside well tamped down and clenches her fists. Unlike him, she glows with inner light and health, her blues eyes spectral.

"Then stop her we will and put these souls to rest." Why does the Bitch not show herself. Isn't her trap well prepared already? On the Astral plane, she doesn't need to reverse her words to cast. John disappears before she can tell what she intends to do. "Where? Where is the Bitch?" she dares.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    It's Jon that stops and kneels down, to pick up the little poppet with the shells for eyes and nose. Maybe inadvisable, to /touch/ anything, but picking up the doll does nothing more than get sand on his hands. He lets out tension he didn't know he was holding, and then on an impulse tucks the thing away in his pocket. He has a thought, something to do later. Proper funerary rites, if he can manage them, and something about the doll stuck out as a sort of stand-in for all the innocents killed here. He's managing not to cry, somehow, but then he's had plenty of experience seeing the aftermath of horrific things and holding back his tears for later.

    But that's for later.

    The Archivist straightens and looks around the church again, sweeping the place with his Sight. <The church is clear,> he sends to the others. He turns to stride out of the church and head for the hospital. That would be where Phoebe had been born, so maybe there will be... something in the maternity ward.

Marc Spector has posed:
    The images on the walls touch on something deep and intrinsic to the collective of Marc Spector. Moon Knight is a guardian a defender of those who worshipped the Egyptian dieties and these people, modern as they were, did pay homage to those gods. He takes a deep breath, sets his desire for reverence aside and replaces it with a need for justice.

    He moves forward, to the plaster wall and places a hand over it. He looks at the seal and knows that what is beyond is necessary to see and to know. "My apologies to you who gave your strength to those held here" he mutters softly.

    He pushes on the wall, drawing on the strength of the god to add to his own increasing it a hundred fold. He's lifted trucks with this power before, this hastily constructed wall should be a simple task.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
     In The AstralJohn moves swiftly, a ghost in the night, towards the maternity ward. He doesn't see that a small, red colored scorpion has slipped out of the sand by his foot, crawling with some difficulty up his pants leg, finding that thing silver-fine string that tethers him to his body, and begins to eat away at it, its little mandables working slowly, to not draw any attention. After all, once someone's no longer tethered to their living body -- they might get stuck too.

    John would recognize the maternity ward from his first encounter with trying to figure out what Phoebe is.

    The first thing that would be seen, on the wall facing south, is the wallpapered-on stork. It's long faded, its paper peeling down now, coptic script and spellwork faded. Beneath the sand, a circle had been etched with red marker -- rushed, but correct. Whoever did it knew what they were doing with intimacy. The operating table has been pushed to the side, where blood was staining its seat and rails. A bassinet lay broken, ripped apart as if in rage. An infant incubator has been tipped over, and left where it lay. On its side, written hastily in fading and rust-red Old Kingdom script, is the following:

    " From the first drop of my heart, to the last breath from your lungs, let no one claim you who is not worthy of you."

    Additionally, there is now also a lot of plaster dust and wood splinters as Moon Knight makes his entrance.

    This room feels... heavy. Sadness and happiness all at once. The overly sweet smell of death, and the depth and blackness of the magic that took a life.

    And, all of them in the room, would hear a soft humming. A lullaby. There was something here that the webbing outside has not been able to claim -- and what a lonely existence nearly eighteen years may be. The impression of an infant crying provides a counterpoint to the whispered, hummed song, echoing between life and death.

John Constantine has posed:
In the Astral

    His secret's already been seen by one, because she slipped up on him. On the off chance the others might see him, John casts an illusion over his astral self. Good as new, right as rain.

    "Paisi," John whispers in the astral, not over any sort of mystic link. "Show yourself if you can, luv." He's *trying so hard* to keep the cracking from his voice and failing.

    "We adopted her, luv, she has a family again. She'll never be alone. Help me help her, help me save her, please."

    If she can't, for some reason, do so... he's already murmuring the spell under his breath to make it so, to bring her here. It's easier to do so, summon a spirit to a location, from the astral where they reside, where they reign.

    That little scorpion isn't even a blip on his radar, not even a niggling nudge of danger. He's too distracted, too... exhausted. Too sad to notice.

    This woman *saved* him once from Leksandria and here he is, asking her to do it again. Save him from the pain of losing Phoebe, one that would certainly destroy him.

Zatanna Zatara has posed:
The six women who would traditionally walk the village wailing the name of the dead struggle in the web. Their suwat (traditional shrieks) unformed in throats strangled with magic. No one will care for the dead, tenderly wash them with herbs, wrap them in their best clothes to prepare them for the final voyage. Tears dampen Zee's face, blurring her vision, making her nearly miss the scorpion inching its way out of a skull and climb the tether of a dead soul. She has a horror of their sting, though they are like spiders eating other deadly insects on the real plane.

Energy coalesces around the hospital. Is that John's destination? She snaps to his side in time to hear him calling Phoebe's departed mother.

The red scorpion catches her eye - hyper-vigilant for all that creeps in the African night. The sound of it gnawing on John's tether feels like something chewing at the base of her skull. She flicks her fingers and keeps the shriek that threatens to break from her to mutter, "Crack in half, demon."

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    The Archivist jogs over to the hospital, just in time for the dust to be settling around Moon Knight pushing down the wall. He stops to look around, tilts his head to catch the humming, the lullaby. The crying. Flexes his hands into fists at the horrific feeling of the cruel magic. He peers at the writing on the bassinet, frowns and straightens, looking around. <What happened here?> he wonders. It's an idle thought; the Story is less important than what they might find that can help.

    He starts to look around the room, not touching anything, just... trying to see if anything stands out to his still-untrained Sight.

Marc Spector has posed:
    Moon Knight waves a hand, dispersing the dust from his vision. And there is John, or rather the projection John sent of himself through the plane of the spirit. Zatanna's arrival shortly after is noted. <Is this her sanctum?> he asks the former.

    The humming is a soothing and lends a sharp counterpoint to the dark energy that causes the hair on the back of his neck to raise. Jon's arrival is also noted with a slight turn on his head in acknowledgement. They are all there then. <It is little surprise she would flee should such energy threaten to corrupt her home.>

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    The humming pauses. Everyone, in the physical or the astral, will feel the room cool -- not an uncomfortable, icy chill like Leksandria's magic, but like walking out of the sun and into protective shade. The smell of roses and black pepper as the ghost manifests, within the confines of this protected space.

    She stands before them, bathed in a golden aura about her body, like the moon on a misty night. Her stomach was cut, the hospital gown with pale pink flowers on it shows blood, and her arm was crooked as if holding something.

     And it's clear, for anyone who has met Phoebe, who this woman is. Phoebe is the spitting image of her mother. The same eyes and turn of her nose. The same smile. Her hair was longer than John might remember, by about seven months of growth. There were a few beads in it now, though they make no sound as she tilts her head, her eyes narrowing as she regards those in the room. A seance unlike any other...

    "... the boy from the bar. John." she states, as if in quiet memory, and she gives a tired smile. "What a journey you wear on your face, boy."

    Outside, the red scorpion hisses at Zatanna, and tries to cling to John's tether. It snaps its claws at her, raising its tail with its sharp tip shining in the light, continuing to try and nip at the thread and wear away at the wards.

John Constantine has posed:
    "Not a boy anymore, don't even think I was then. Not sure I ever was," John replies quietly. It takes a second, with all else that's happening, for him to come aware of the fact that something else is happening. He's not even quite there yet, didn't hear Zee's whispered words. He has more important things on his mind than the tether back to his own body.

    "Can you help me save her? Was it you, the last to be killed by that poison?" One track mind, that's *all* he cares about right now, finding what he needs to save his kid. His *kid*, it's something he never...

    Jon, Moon Knight, Zatanna, they're all so much background noise, like that TV that's not paid attention because there's too much stuff in the way, too much going on. "Did *I* damn her? By loving her? Like I've damned everyone else I've ever loved?" His tears, there, in the Astral? They shine bright, but he only allows two or three before wiping them away and making a little 'no' shake of his head. Can't lose it now, can't fall apart.

    "Was it you?" he repeats quietly.

Zatanna Zatara has posed:
Roses and pepper waft on the astral wind - ancient flower of love, healer, and aphrodisiac mixed with the pungent peppercorn stuffed into the nostrils of dead pharaohs. Through the doorway, Zatanna sees the woman who could be none other than Phoebe's mother and ignores Paisi to concentrate her magic on the scorpion munching on the rope binding John to love and life.

"Burn, noisome one. BEGONE!" Her voice cracks like dry lightning.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    The Archivist turns to look at Paisi and John, stilling his exploration of the room. This is what they are here for, and he somberly records the event, the discussion. If nothing else, the memories of this place will live on in the memories of the Archivist. His own emotions about the place, stirred up in part by those scents, are pushed aside, to be dealt with later.

Marc Spector has posed:
    Moon Knight sees the woman arrive and nods. He turns to Jon, and says, "I am going to assist Zatanna back at John's body. Inform me of the developments here."

    After he's running back through the passages of the hospital and back to Zatanna and John's physical forms. He looks over them both to see what could be the source of the woman's ire and notices the creature seeking to sever John's tie to the mortal world.

    "I swore that I would keep him safe, even if he would not himself. I intend to keep that oath" he says and kneels down. "You can leave on your own, or I will eliminate you. Your choice" he says to the spectral arachnid threat.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    Finally, with enough of that rage, from both Zatanna and Moon Knight, the scorpion turns to dust, no longer risking John's tether.

    The chitterings fade away, but there were whispers -- 'is she here? is she coming?'.

    Paisi hitches her breath. She could discuss it, but there were things afoot.

    "... my daughter... Leksandria found her?" she asks quietly, and she brings her hand down, and loosens part of the hospital gown, bloody where it had been covering surgical rounds.

    She pulls the gown slightly, and shows the same wound. Paradoxically, it should not show in the Astral, but Paisi's ghost carries the scar. It's misty black, distantly burning, placed on her stomach. An attempt to kill both mother and child.

    "A necrotic venom." she whispers. Blackened tears fall from her eyes. "Delivered by dagger by my niece, who pretended to be overjoyed to be home. To see me. I caught the flash too late... not even the Light could clear it away fast enough to save us both. It was designed to kill those who bare our Light brightest." she whispers.

    "... what is her name?"

John Constantine has posed:
    "Phoebe, as of Friday, Phoebe Beacon-Constantine-Chandler," John replies proudly. A second, a beat later and Zatanna's words register. He spins, eyes wide. "What?!" Then whispers. He turns back to Paisi. "Is that her? *Is it*?" he asks, his tone harsher and more demanding than perhaps it should be.

    But a mother knows, understands... the true love of a father, innit so. It's not aimed at her, his anger, his wrath. "Zee, I need... some of her essence, get it."

    And then *fuck*, he's gone in a blink. To find out... if it's *her*. If it is, there's nothing but murder on his mind. If it is, Hell is coming for her an its name is John Constantine.

Zatanna Zatara has posed:
Whispers louder than the wind that scatters the scorpion's ashes come to Zatanna. The one commanding the insects, torturer of souls, stands locked out of her own web of horror.

"There is nothing of her here, John," she says sorrowfully.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    The Archivist merely nods aside to Moon Knight, focusing on the conversation in front of him. Then he blinks as Constantine... disappears. There is much afoot, yes, but before the Archivist can turn away Jon speaks, swiftly.

    "Paisi... I'm a friend of John's. And of Phoebe's, I hope. My ancestors are from this land." He takes a breath, to hold back the tears. "Would you... would your people... I know there is one of you in Brooklyn, who will stay when we can free you. Would you want us to conduct a funeral service, to give him and Phoebe closure? To help you pass on?" The words are hurried; there may not be time, but this is important, too, in its way.

Marc Spector has posed:
    Moon Knight rises as the scorpion departs as dust. "Sentinel I am. Watcher I am. Moon..." he stares up at the sky. "I am." There might be amusement in his tone.

    John's arrival is met with a tilt of his head. "You should go back. It's not her. I would let you know if you were truly in danger. A scorpion was trying to keep you and your body seperate. Permenantly. Zee and I took care of it. Go back." He waves a hand in an almost dismissive manner, almost as if he was saying 'We got this, go do your part.'

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    "Phoebe Beacon-Constantine-Chandler... that is quite the name... is she... happy? Is she well? Can she--" she begins to ask question, curious about the one she loved so dearly "... she is about. I can feel her, at the edges of the web and sheild. Wondering how you found the village. Wondering who allowed passage." Paisi states, and motions "This circle that was created to protect those within, but also has ensnared me here... it is, after all, made from my body..." she trails off, and she looks to Jonathan, and tilts her head slightly. "What need do we have of a funeral service? Where would we go? We are bound to the world of the living through duty... but... it would be nice to see my relatives and ancestors rest... so many of us... wandering." she frowns a moment, as if remembering how a heart felt when it ached in life.

    John is hunting. John can sniff the bitch out like a shark seeking a drop of blood, and there is the smallest feeling, the littlest poke at the leylines that run through this place and keep those souls in traction, keep that web going and sticking everyone to it -- man, woman and child. Children scant months older than Phoebe, who should have celebrated milestones and went away for school as Paisi and Leksandria got to. Women who would never see their children grow.

    Fathers who would never know their children at all.

    So John hunts, anger and hunger and fury, and he would find just the toe. Just someone poking in curiosity and caution at the very edges of the warding around the village that had tried to kill John by severing that tether, ever so slowly.

John Constantine has posed:
In the Astral

    Where is she, where *is* she. Not here, she's not *here*, but she's close. In a mystical way, John can *smell* the stench of her and her magic. He's experienced it before, way too many times.

    He stands there, well floats there but semantics, in the Astral, in the middle of the Village, arms raised to his sides, palms out. She's *close enough*.

    John Constantine? He doesn't have the raw talent of the likes of Zatanna and Strange, but what he has is enough *rage* in this moment to pull down the fucking Heavens if he had to. He takes that rage - no, that's not rage, it's Righteous Anger - and pulls on it to find every ounce of everything he has left in him.

    If that scorpion creature that nearly killed his daughter taught him anything, it's that *Holy* magic is not outside his wheelhouse. Not at all, he uses it for every demon he pulls out of a living person and banishes. He just has to figure the right words to go with it. Surely the typical 'Be Gones' are appropriate here, but that doesn't pack enough punch does it? No.

    Latin, loud, booming and accompanied by a blast of nothing but straight up 'Evil Be Damned' pouring from his outstretched hands, he bellows, "LEKSANDRIA, FEEL PAIN OF THE SUFFERING YOU'VE CAUSED!" ...preceded, of course, by all of the appropriate 'Father in Heaven, blah blah blah, I beseech the to give me the power... blah.. Latin's so droll and boring. He's aiming for a *toe*, but he's also trying to push past it, to the bigger target attached.

    That's it though, for the moment it's *all* he has. As soon as he lets it go, John is *thrown* back into his body, the force of it so strong that Moon Knight will bare witness to John's physical form jerking violently as if shocked by a defibrillator. He sucks in a long, painful gasping breath and then another, one more as if he's having trouble pulling them in.

    Somewhere before or after one of this breaths he asks, "Did I get her?" One track mind.

    "I can't breathe..."

    So maybe track mind?

Zatanna Zatara has posed:
John unleashed can even scare his friends. It's not the first time Zatanna has felt the full blast of his righteous ire but on the astral plane it is magnified. He lights up the night.

"Give him power," the magician orders, mirroring his posture, hands cupped to receive the power she has commanded.

Power fills her like a torrential rainfall overwhelming the levies of the Nile. Panting, Zatanna snaps her hands at John, energy pouring from her fingertips to feed every last bit to him, knowing that what he is trying to do is suicide. "She will not take you," she mutters desperately.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    Jon nods. "I'll see what Phoebe wants, then." A pause, briefly, then, "She's happy. John loves her, and Chas loves her, and she has friends. She's bright and beautiful. You... you can be proud." He stops, then, because anything more is John's to tell, if there's time later.

    He stumbles in surprise at the burst of magic from John and Zatanna both, stares over in that direction. Nobody else is there, so the Archivist steps forward, grabbing a roll of bandage from the bag he brought with him, then hesitates. He was about to swipe at the blood on the gurney, but looks to Paisi. "John needs your essence," he says. "For his spell."

Marc Spector has posed:
    Moon Knight jerks as John is shoved back into his body. "Christ..." he breathes and kneels down to check the man's pulse. "Take it slow, man. Breathe. I've got you. Slowly. That was... a light show for sure. Question is... did it work?" he asks the weakened Magus.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    Half way accross the world, Phoebe is startled awake in her room, with the pink-and-black damask wallpaper. Her arm is still in an immobilizer, but she gives a sudden cry of alarm and pain as she sits up, grasping at her left shoulder where the evil spellwork was sitting, trapped by the lack of time in the house. Her face is screwed up in pain, her eyes squeezed shut. "Something's wrong!" she calls out, struggling to breathe as electric pain strikes her body. "I... I sat up too quick -- but I saw... my face... I think it was my face...?"

    Paisi gives a smile to Jon as he grabs at the dried blood, and she winces a little bit. She takes a breath, and she raises her arms. Jon would be able to see that both are covered with intricate tattoo work; the woman is... was a living spellbook. Wards and prayers and magic. Heka and Khonsu and Isis. Amun and Amunet the HIdden Ones. She brings her hands to her heart, and the glow around her diminishes.

    "She is happy, and loved. What more could I ask for my little mouse?" she asks, and there, suspended between her hands, is a little bit of tangible light.

    She offers it to Jon, for the essence. If he touches it, it TINGLES. It feels like all the nerves are suddenly remembering they're nerves, like after sitting on your leg wrong for too long.

     In the Astral

    John's work doesn't go unnoticed. Some of the souls who have been trapped there open their eyes, blindly looking out with a sick white light from them, watching as he fights their tormentor. The command and pain follows along the leyline being tested, and that toe is hit with a brilliant spark of all the pain she has caused. Her BLOOD family. Those she had sworn to protect. The pain her niece is going through. The anger of not one, but two of the representatives of her own gods working against her.

    The magically Inclined would feel a moment of feedback through the leyline that runs through the village; John got a hit. Leksandria is retreating, and *fast* knowing that John has found The Village.

John Constantine has posed:
    Essentially, it's the mystical equivalent of a person having the breath knocked from them. It hurts, he might feel like he's dying for a moment or seven as he struggles to just get oxygen where it needs to be. But he'll survive it.

    Until then, his pulse is racing and thready, sometimes coming through a little stronger as he manages to maybe take in enough air for a second. There's a whole lot of wide-eyed panic and a lot of those strangled out, "I can't breathes."

    It's scary, but it won't kill him. It's scary, but not as much as the fact that he's left himself completely vulnerable. He likely couldn't defend himself from an over aggressive gnat at this point. He rolls from one side to the other, curled in on himself, hands crossed over his chest. Little pitiful that. Then he makes it to his hands and knees. Gasping for breath turns to coughing and spluttering.

    He doesn't even get to rejoice in his severing of a big toe. Magic sucks sometimes, dunnit?

Zatanna Zatara has posed:
John's power changes the leylines which react in a seismic wave that radiates from the village deep out into the world. When Leksandra recoils, Zatanna feels the triumph that John is perhaps too weak to manifest. She reenters her body, gulping for the first breath that pumps her heart back into beating.

John hasn't found that deep oxygenating breath yet so she (quite to her surprise), slips an arm behind his back to bring him more upright, letting his diaphragm fill. "John, come on. Here we are breath, come on," she croons. She can't touch his psyche wounds magically but despite feeling desperately tired, speaks a spell,"!sdnuow sih laeH" (Heal his wounds!)

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    The Archivist reaches out and very, very gently takes the light in both his hands. He nods to Paisi respectfully. "Isis bless and guide you," he says. "Aani and Anubis will judge you worthy. Be safe in Osiris' realm."

    Then he turns, and /runs/ back out of the hospital, cradling that little tingly light in his hands, to deliver it to John.

    He stops, outside, on seeing John on the ground. Holds out his hands, the light pulsing between them. "Here," he gasps. "Paisi's essence." Is it enough, in time?

Marc Spector has posed:
    Moon Knight rises now that one who can heal John is there. He lets Z take over the caretaking. He is a better shield than a bandage and he looks to stare out at the souls still trapped. "Is there any help for them? Or is it a necessity that they stay locked as they are?" he asks. "It feels... wrong to leave them, especially now that we've driven their otrmentor away."

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    John might not be able to enjoy the fruits of his labors with the severing of the big toe, but Leksandria's influence is still strong -- just she's not here. The web holds the souls that it has caught in it. Paisi, alone in her warded room, returns to humming quiet lullabys to a daughter she can never touch.

    But Jon has that little peice. That piece of solidified Light.

    Paisi held the same Light that Phoebe does now. John would be able to feel that echo.

John Constantine has posed:
    There's one, a good one. A gasping desperate one, another good. Finally it evens out to where he's breathing in the labored way a person might if they'd just run a mile and weren't in the proper shape to do so.

    ...and damned if he doesn't reach into his pocket to pull out his pack of Silk Cuts and his Zippo. "I'm gonna kill that cu.. Bitch." No shit, John? What gave it away? The fifty million times it's been said already or maybe the ten million that you've thrown every thing there into making her feel pain.

    He lights up a cigarette from the pack with shaking hands and puts it all back away again. One of those shaking hands slides into an inside breast pocket to retrieve a ruby-colored glass vial with a cork lid. The thing's spelled to be damned near unbreakable. "Put it in here."

    He drags on that cigarette as desperately as he was gasping for air a moment ago and speaks on the exhale. "We have to kill her first. Before they can be free. We're not killing my daughter though, we're taking the alternate route on that one." Whatever that route may be, its the one that's being taken.

    He struggles to his feet, sways a little sideways, catches himself and laughs. It's not, however a 'healthy' sounding laugh. "Never thought it'd be *you* slidin' *me* a big one, Zee," he quips before another of those odd little laughs. "Thanks..." No laugh that time.

    "I have to go mix... fuckin' ashes and chicken blood. Bloody *voodoo*." Rambling a little. But when everyone's gathered and ready, he'll take the House of Mystery route, as it expends no more energy from anyone. Then back to the Laughing Magician, the back room, some ashes and chicken blood and a little essence of, well, Phoebe in a way. All mixed together with a mother's love to save her little girl's life.

Zatanna Zatara has posed:
The Murderesss might have recoiled but is far from gone. Her magic is like a whiff of pepper spray in the occult, the blood of her victims staining her aura and soul. Zatanna stands, dusting the village dirt from her hands, taking deep breaths to recover from the last round of spells.

"As many times as I've wanted to kill you, you bastard. It's not today," she giggles, a little punch drunk.

"I'm here, we're all here to see this through." She gestures at the hospital and the Archivist holding the light.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    The Archivist places the Light into the vial and replaces the cork as firmly as he can. Then he holds it out to John. "Whatever works," he says. "There's a lineage there, not direct, not the same gods, but..." He shrugs.

    He looks to Zatanna, nods. They'll be there to back John up if he needs it, even if only by making sure Phoebe stays safe until she's freed.

Marc Spector has posed:
    Moon Knight nods and taps a button on his guantlet. "When you're ready to take her down. You know how to reach me" he says placing a hand over his chest where presumably the amulet lies.

    The glider swoops in and hovers before him allowing him to get onto it. "Good luck. Khonshu watch over your family." Then with just as little sound the glider rises and speeds off into the night.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    The heroes prepare to leave. The corpses watch in their silent vigil, the air still thick with magic and pain and sorrow... with just that little bit of hope.

    The Village is holding its breath for its Last Daughter.

    And half-way around the world, Phoebe Beacon-Constantine-Chandler leans back into her pillows, and draws out a card from a shiny new playing card deck.

    She turns it over, and tiredly raises her eyebrows...

    The nine of hearts.

John Constantine has posed:
    John has one last thing to do. He can't free these people, not yet. But he can do *something* before they step through that portal. He grabs Zee's hand because he's not strong enough to do it alone.

    A few words muttered, a little tug from his friend's powers and John LIGHTS up the astral, not with anything Holy or even magical. Just light and with it, the words, "I'll set you all free, I promise," whispered through that light to every soul trapped here.

    He waits for everyone else to move through, he has to be the last. John turns at the last moment and whispers, "Thank you, Paisi, for giving me the greatest gift of my life... twice." The day she was born and today... with the last ingredient to save her life.