"Shomriel."

"Shomriel."

The voice, though unspoken, nearly destroyed the fallen. Just the utterance, directed solely at one being, was far too...large, far too...significant to be borne by just one living thing. In truth, if the word had been directed at a mortal creature, the poor, piteous thing would have exploded into a fine red mist.

As it was, Shomriel was groveling on the ground, clutching its odd, insect-like head in its six pairs of hands. The fallen angel spluttered, its mandibles clacking and jerking in pain and abject agony.

"Master....please....your....v..v....voice...."

Stygal shoved another handful of screaming souls into his massive, garage-sized gullet. Their screams were the perfect seasoning for this particular gory repast, and he was enjoying himself far too much to bother himself with thoughts of his servant's sufferings.

"Shomriel, my Worm. Report," Stygal thought. Mental words whipped across the planes of existence to find their mark in the mind of the demon, Shomriel.

The six-armed demon flailed like it had just stuck its tail into a 220 volt outlet. "M...m....master! A...Ah...all goes....a..ah...according...to plan!"

The Demon Lord barely heard his servant's cries for pain. Somewhere, hundreds of Christians were being martyred, their heads sawn off by men in dark robes. Stygal, He-Who-Brings-Death, could feel his power growing with each arterial spurt. He gloried in the unspoken, yet abject and outright, worship of his name. Stygal lost himself in the deaths of the martyrs, and for a while, nothing else in all the universe existed.

Finally, he came back to himself and snatched up three more handfuls of souls. As he brought the first handful to his mouth, he surveyed the writhing, small, insignificant, yet tasty things. For a moment, he almost considered pausing his feast, but....

"What of Olarus, Worm?" Stygal asked, his mouth full again of heady smells, flavors, and screams.

Shomriel was nearly mad with pain. The fallen would have given anything...anything...if his Master would cease speaking directly into it's thoughts. If it believed that any would hear it, it would have considered praying to the Almighty for the smallest pause in the torture, but Shomiel knew better.

"Oh...oh...Olarus ssssss...suspects nothing my Lord! Ssssoon...my....legions...will be in....plaaaaace....to ah...ah...aaaact!"

"Well done, Worm," Stygal replied, crunching with satisfaction. "Put your legions in place and stand ready for my signal."

"Yessss! Y...yyess, Master!"

The Demon Lord severed the connection with his servant and surveyed his domain. He was unhappy to see that many of his favored snack was fleeing from him. No great matter, Stygal thought to himself, soon I will have both the souls and the bodies upon which to dine...soon, when his legions tore down the Curtain from within, and opened all worlds and reality to him. Then, Stygal would again be known by the name which he'd received in the Time Most Ancient.

He-Who-Brings-Death would again rule from on high....

Art Source: "He, of Genocide" (c)/by andrewmar

Story and Characters: (c)/by Brannon Hollingsworth

#MMWW, #Makes, #Me, #Wanna, #Write, #BrannonHollingsworth,  #fabricofreality, #Olarus, #Makes, #Me, #MMWW, #TheCurtain, #Shomriel, #Meltsar, #Tenet, #TenetsTales, #Stygal, #DemonLord, #HeWhoBringsDeath

Olarus turned from his task, irritated.

Olarus turned from his task, irritated. The Curtain was beset from all realms and upon all sides, and despite his most valiant efforts, the Once-Angel was barely able to bridge merely the most critical of the tears. All around him, the tendril-world of Between--the Space-Betwixt-Space--flickered and flitted like unending ribbons of intertwined existence set against colliding fields of oscillating light and shadow.

As he walked, stones that looked more ancient than the stars themselves coalesced from nothingness into substance, providing a solid footing for his strides. To Olarus, this amazing event was utterly unremarkable, as Between was an integral part of him and of his existence. He had been created when this place was created; he was made to make safe, make sure, and maintain the Curtain. Between, or at least this area of Between, was as much an extension of his being as were his three sets of arms. To the Once-Angel, this simply was the way things were. But things were not now the way they should be as it related to Olarus and the Curtain...they had not been that way for some time, in fact.

And the Once-Angel was going to do something about it.

"Show yourself, Shomriel!" Olarus bellowed. He did not attempt to hide his anger or his frustration. The strands of Between shivered and quivered in a reflection of Olarus's rage.

The mist-strands of a particularly dark area of Between circled slowly, like dark ribbons floating on the surface of a muck-filled pool; vine-coated stones and strange, oddly marked cylinders of stone began to grow and form out of the darkness. Across those stones came crawling an abomination.

The Once-Angel shuddered. Though he found it hard to believe now, Olarus knew that he and this thing were once of the same ilk. They were both of the Meltsar, but Shomriel had fallen long ago and had become a horrific, twisted thing indeed. Now, the pale-skinned creature scuttle-crawled like a lower thing, scrabbling with both its legs and its three sets of horned, clawed, and armored arms. It had a long, prehensile tail that ended in a wide-knife blade bone that whipped and slithered like a thing with its own perverse will. But most changed to the eyes of Olarus was the visage of Shomriel. Long ago, they had both been among the most beautiful to behold of the Hosts of Heaven, but no longer for the pale-skinned Shomriel. Now, the fallen had a twisted and inhuman countenance - a terrifying cross between devil, nightmare, and insect.

The corrupted walkway of ghastly stones met the precise and ordered walkway of Olarus, and the fallen creature scamper-scuttled before the blue-skinned Once-Angel. It drew itself up and the semblance of the two fallen, one recent and one ancient, was chilling.

Shomriel cocked its strange, alien head and hissed, "Greetings, brother. What aid might Shomriel bring thee?"

Upon being referred to as 'brother', Olarus took an unconscious half-step back and Between shivered in response. Some of Shomriel's mandibles flexed, a motion sign that Olarus would soon learn equated into the fiend's smile, and the fallen twisted its head in the other direction. The effect was...unsettling.

Finally, Olarus spoke. "I...I am in dire need of your help, Shomriel. The Curtain is being ripped and torn at a rate that I cannot maintain by my own. I would ask that you and...our other brethren...the Meltsar under your command, would aid me in defending the Curtain."

Shomriel shifted its uncanny head first in one direction and then the other, so far so that it almost looked as if the creature's head would snap off. After staring with its unblinking ebon eyes for a long, silent time, it finally hissed a reply. "Yes, my brother. Shomriel shall help thee. But Shomriel has a price."

"Name it," spat Olarus.

"The next time the Betrayer passes through the Curtain, he shall not leave."

Olarus did not reply, but merely nodded.

"Shomriel will claim his prize...This time, Tenet shall not escape."

Art Source: "Guard of Sanctuary" (c)/by D8P

Story and Characters: (c)/by Brannon Hollingsworth

#MMWW, #Makes, #Me, #Wanna, #Write, #BrannonHollingsworth,  #fabricofreality, #Olarus, #Makes, #Me, #MMWW, #TheCurtain, #Shomriel, #Meltsar, #Tenet, #TenetsTales

Ten faces populated the rail car around me, each lost in their personal revelry

Ten faces populated the rail car around me, each lost in their personal revelry. I watched each sift through their personal thoughts and plans, awaiting the much distant destination. As a mother and her two children adjusted their warming blanket, I closed my eyes and slipped into Dreamscape.

The train lights flickered and each particle in the air glistened. I stood in the back of the rail car, right behind my own wide-brimmed form, which sat motionless and asleep. I scanned the unemotional faces around me. None registered my mirror image standing against the far wall. I leaned into the gut feeling that told me seven of the ten were passengers. Three were stowaways from another realm. This realm.

Three porcelain masks with painted smiles and slit eyes stared at me in the corner. They shared the same black shroud. I knew it. The family wasn't as benevolent as they had appeared. Too bad this was about to get messy in both worlds. My slumbering form half-opened its eyes as both right hands slipped to twin hilts.

I drew my katana and went to work.

Art Source: "Train Station - Episode 5" by Hideyoshi
Story and Characters: (c)/by Corey Blankenship

I Am...the Curtain.

I Am...the Curtain. The Curtain Between Worlds. The Curtain and I are one. The Curtain was the very reason for my Creation. I control it. I conserve it. I continue it. I cultivate it. I am Olarus.

And now, I am Fallen.

This, I think, was not the intent of He Who Was My Master and yet the silvered, subtle words of Lucifer seemed right to me at the time. I Listened and soon, I could feel Pride stir within my breast and I Followed the Shining One. I Followed him straight out of Glory. I Fell. It was not what I intended, and yet I must now bear the brunt and pay the price for my choice. Yet, I shall not choose a side in the Great War. I REFUSE! I no longer care for the Silver-Tongued Price of Lies, nor the Great Father of All. I have only one care now, and it is I...and I Am the Curtain.

The Curtain is all I have now, you see. I must protect it. I must maintain it. I must avenge it. Now, with the Great War, the Curtain is tattered and torn. I have many hands and they are able, and I try to mend these rips, but these fallen: the devils, and demons, and all their imps and perversions and all these exalted: the angels, the cherubim and seraphim, the principalities and powers - ALL OF THEM CARE NOTHING FOR MY CURTAIN!

Can they not see? Can not see what they do to It....to Me? They rip and tear me...it...endlessly as they travel hither and yon. They care nothing for the subtly woven fabrics that compose the Veil of All Reality. To them, it is nothing more than a Passage, a momentary path from one world to another, or from one Reality to Another. They have no idea of the titanic, shimmering, shivering POWER that lies within these Cosmic Threads, or of the pain it causes the Curtain...causes ME...when they abuse and misuse her.

But this will cease. I will see to it. I am UNCHAINED. I am OLARUS. I am the CURTAIN and I will PROTECT MYSELF, or

I
    will
             perish
                       in
                               the
                                            attempt.


What these fools do not understand is that if I am the Curtain, and I go....where, then, will be the Curtain?

Where I go, goes the very fabric of reality....

They will do well to fear me. FEAR OLARUS AND RESPECT THE CURTAIN!

Art Source: "Blue Devil" (c)/by Toshi13go

Story and Characters: (c)/by Brannon Hollingsworth

#MMWW, #Makes, #Me, #Wanna, #Write, #BrannonHollingsworth, #Tenet, #tenetstales, #TheCurtain, #Olarus, #fabricofreality, #THISISABIGDEAL