Work of the more mundane variety kept me from posting the second part of the Flicker Street meta-document on June 15, the third anniversary of the opening of Flicker Street Studio. But, here it is now, still part of the celebration of the relaunch and refurbishment of this website. THE BIRTH, Book Three, which includes six long chapters, will hopefully appear here tomorrow, soon followed by a raft of FS character portraits and bios as recently promised.
Enjoy,
Henry
FLICKER STREET: THE BIRTH
As told by Thaddeus Davant
BOOK TWO
Chapter 7: Interstice
I. Kanabal Reborn
Gerhardt Vossius had used Kirsten Roeg in 1949 to attempt freedom, and for his own amorous needs. He soon rejected her and their daughter Jennifer however. In 1959 the one-legged unrepentant cannibal killer began corresponding with a former teammate from the Silent Seven who'd also fallen far down on her luck – Felicia McGee. The once stunning and formidable crimefighter Crimson Velvet had become a stripper, then a prostitute, and, at the age of 40, a stag film actress. And then she hit rock bottom, forming a sick attachment to the erstwhile Captain Caliban.
At this point, Gerhardt had had years to formulate a plan to gain revenge on his many enemies. Gerhardt once again took advantage of his extremely liberal warden, Mallard, as he had when he engaged in conjugal visits with Kirsten. He and Felicia conjugated several times while Vossius was incarcerated. This led to the 1961 birth of twins Gareb and Luana Vossius.
The final straw was when Kanabal escaped from prison in 1962. This was engineered by Kong, who wished to play Vossius and Ewen Cromwell against each other and eliminate several of their common enemies at once. Kong put up Vossius in a filthy hotel, where he began murdering whores and vagrants and consuming their flesh. His leg gradually regenerated as a result, and he grew incredibly strong and youthful looking for his age (then 58).
Kanabal and Carnifex, under Kong's direction, put together a plan to wipe out the Silent Seven (all still alive, save honorary member Sorrow), as well as Dawn, Zachariah, and all of their Clancey children (Gerhardt actually wished to get to know his Solomon, his son by Dawn). Felicia feared for her life, and that of her twins. She resolved to go to Vance Orlison and Gadgeteer V for help. Before she could act, Carnifex broke into the Clanceys' home at night and butchered Zachariah in front of Dawn and their five children – though he flashed a large smile at 15 year old Solomon Vossius. Shockingly to those who witnessed it, Solomon smiled back at his great-grandfather. And then Cromwell took the boy with him. “Your hatred can take a most wondrous shape, blood of my tainted blood”. As per Kong's orders, Solomon was reunited with his father.
After Felicia's justifiably hysterical warning, Vance conferred with Cary Bradcroft AKA The Shadow Baron, while Richter, Sword, and Bradcroft's young charge Brandon ver Dorn (b, December 4, 1936), also known as the White Archer (for reasons that will be made clear in a future treatment), teamed to rescue Solomon. Months went by, and in 1963, the reluctant allies Carnifex and Kanabal drew further blood. Vance had been on their trail for some time and one night the two rogues smashed into his stately manor. Before Vance could react, Carnifex had dug his blade deeply into Doc's heart and out the other side. Solomon was again an accomplice; the sanguinary partners were encouraging the younger Vossius to follow in their blood-soaked footsteps. By this point, Solomon was already imploring Ewen to train him in all of his fighting skills.
II. The Gauntlet Passed
Dr. Vance Orlison was given a heroic funeral; it was densely attended and an extremely emotional event for many. “Doc Vance” was considered one of America's greatest heroes and he was showered in accolades and tears. One man that attended, the Brit Cary Bradcroft, the Shadow Baron, owner of an eccentric curio shoppe on Flicker Street, decided that enough was indeed enough, and that SkullCorp had to be destroyed. Cary and his quasi-undead twin Ashton Bradcroft, now known only as Nocturno, brought their long brewing plans into fruition.
As Cary made his way from the funeral to the Bradcroft manor to map out the brothers' plans, he was accosted by a stocky sideburned man in a bomber jacket. He introduced himself as Captain Thomas Ledge, a Korean War veteran recently recruited by the government group REACT. After the cocky Capt. Ledge bombarded Bradcroft with REACT propaganda for several minutes, Cary broke in and pointed out that the funeral of such a venerated figure as Orlison might not be the right time or place for “official business”.
Ledge answered, “I was hoping for something more casual myself... maybe I'm out of line, but let me share two things, Mr. Bradcroft... first, not everyone in the upper echelons believed Doc V was the good little soldier boy you do... and two: you're high on our list, if you take my meaning. We'll be meeting again soon, I'm sure”.
A brief digression: Thomas Christopher Ledge was born on April 13, 1929, and was the first-born son of the man born Kaosong Qua and variously known as Caine Ledge, Bromley Chamberlaine, Mr. Drang, and others, but self-identified as Kong the Claimer. Thomas Ledge is a key player in our account in future segments.
In March 1964, the Aggregate was formed. It was funded by the Bradcroft Foundation (established 1960) and was composed at first of surviving, active members of the Silent Seven, as well as the Shadow Baron, Nocturno, Ursulin, the White Archer, and the mysterious Dr. E, who was clad head to toe in a golden form-fitting armor of sorts. Sword, Richter, Gadgeteer V, the Kraken, Anton Gamble and Bram Vallard in his Saturnine ID rounded out the team (he claimed that the Apparition, who he still avered was a different person than himself, was busy on missions in the Far East). Former Silent Seven member Sidonie Vossius had retired as the Duellist, and ran Vossius Metalwerks with Andreas Vossius. They had made the shift in the company's emphasis from munitions to appliances since their father's death in 1953. The Korean War was the last war Vossius supplied hardware to.
The Aggregate was the Bradcroft brothers' attempt to consolidate and expand Vance's basic concept for the Silent Seven but instead of a small unit of loose-knit vigilantes, the Aggregate was conceived as a larger umbrella outfit, a haven of sorts, for any specially-talented individuals who could be coerced into attacking Skull's power-mad agenda. The eleven founding members were in accord with this objective. While imprisoned by the Obscuros sect and tortured in Exodesia, Cary Bradcroft had an epiphany about such a group, and now his vision was being made manifest.
III. Prodigies
Before any further discussion of the Aggregate, we must trip a small bit back in time to the heyday of Phileas Caleb's vaunted “Operation: Outreach” program for SkullCorp. We have briefly lit on this brightly-monikered project previously, but three individuals “discovered” by Caleb as part of this program figure extensively in the early Aggregate saga.
The foremost of these was Eloy Evan Queeg, dubbed by Caleb the “first known Native-American physicist”. Under the direction of Caleb and Donal Rykards, Queeg was immediately put to work on the new Omegan tech brought by Ursulin. Queeg's personal philosophies and theories, which tended to meld quantum physics with Native spirituality, were right in tune with Omegan (and Piscean) transcendental thought. Queeq had the strongest grasp of Omegan tech of any human outside of Caleb.
Rykards' interest in Queeg's genius marked him for the first human trial of trans-morphic somatics.
Rykards engineered a secret test, unknown to Kong, to bombard Queeg's mind (even more brilliant than his own) with the energies later dubbed TSD. This was in 1956, before the trials were perfected such as the 1963 trial undergone by Orphee deLander. The result? “Dr. E” as his students called him, died in a tremendous explosion at the SkullCorp Advanced Sciences Institute building (also known as the ASI) in Augensburg MA. The entire institute was destroyed, costing Skull valuable research and employee's lives (though the latter mattered less to them).
Rykards was sent away to study alien tech in Asia as his “punishment”. Kong hated him, but felt him too valuable to sanction. Rykards returned in 1963. In Hallmark, the Bradcroft twins' cousin Paige was reeling. She had become emotionally involved with Queeg, and was pregnant with his child, but this didn't deter Skull's Artemus Thorne, who lusted for her himself but who magnanimously “gave” her to dark occultist Smith Fabricand's son John Paul. Paige Bradcroft and John Paul Fabricand were wed under duress. Nocturno, an avowed foe of the late Smith, swore John Paul would pay for sullying his cousin.
The Omegan Ursulin, often derisively called “Captain Omega”, returned to Earth in late 1954 and found his mother Shun Ti at Feng Qi in China (His father Friedrich Einnhauser was deceased by this time). He stayed with her for a time in secrecy, unknown to the likes of Kith and Carnifex. In 1955, she sent him to find his twin brother, whom he'd never met, Anaximander-Zayan. Zayan was a drifter, who took a variety of human disguises throughout his long life. Posing as a beatnik named Joel E. Moss, he was overjoyed to meet his brother. The two became very close, and Ursulin managed to find work and lead a mundane human life in the American South for a short time.
The problem Kong and co. had in 1956 was that they needed Ursulin's help in figuring out what really happened at the ASI to Dr. E. Paige's child was born late in the year and was named Kyle Fabricand. Artemus Thorne murdered John Paul soon thereafter and declared Paige his. He raped her, and she shamefully married him. Their son Calvin Artemus “Cal” Thorne was born in late 1957.
The brothers Thorne attempted, with Caleb's help, to find the “rabbit hole” Ursulin's Pod had vanished into in order to seek his help. In the process, they discovered a young prodigy named Emerson Trent (born in 1937) – who possessed Dr. E's brilliance at assimilating Ursulin's tech (with the assist of Phileas Caleb). Trent had grown up in a shantytown in Kingston, Jamaica; he worked in a laboratory, and was kidnapped and forced to work for SkullCorp before being “rescued” (kidnapped again, as he saw it) by the Bradrcroft Foundation in 1961.
Trent had been told his family was dead, and became resigned to a life of toiling for the good of mankind for the Bradcroft Foundation. He felt it would atone for any death or destruction caused by his research for Skull. Trent's family had also been told that Emerson had perished. Phileas Caleb orchestrated these deceptions. Trent's half-brother Euphrates Aquinas Straw, born in 1940, was brought from Jamaica as an assistant to Trent. Caleb led the Trent family to believe Straw has died as well.
Straw was not only brilliant scientifically (though not on the level of Trent), he possessed many skills, especially in the martial arts. He was a true polymath. In the early 1960s, after Emerson had "defected" to the Aggregate, Straw was tortured and tested in TSD trials by SkullCorp. Euphrates not survived his ordeal, but it actually enhanced his already formidable skills. He escaped from Skull and joined the Aggregate. He became a key member for years, as did his brother.
Trent, Ursulin, and Nocturno had sought out the mysterious vigilante, the White Archer, in 1961, and soon discovered he was the well-off and highly intelligent Brandon ver Dorn, descendant of the Dutch co-founders of Hallmark. The Archer was the first to encounter a reconstituted Queeg, believed dead since 1956, and now composed entirely of volatile plasma energy. Trent saved Queeq by devising a way to contain his explosive energy.. Ver Dorn, in helping Queeg cope with his lost humanity, made a lifelong friend of the man called Dr. E.
Though the Aggregate was a secret and closed group from its 1964 foundation, Orphee deLander aka The Absurd Tentacle learned of it and often was invited to join but refused unless he could be the leader. The Bradcrofts' group acquired the services of the pugilistic Thomas Ledge, genetically enhanced by his relations to Kong (though this was known to Ledge nor his new allies), in 1967. Ledge, as stated previously, was a Korean War veteran and an agent of REACT. He was “assigned” to the Aggregate, and the Bradcrofts tolerated his presence, feeding Ledge reams of misinformation and disinformation, while exploiting his incredible strength and fighting skills.
IV. The Earth Mother Revisited
Zachariah Clancey's hatred and jealousy of the brothers Stenbrau (Anton Gamble and the Kraken) had lead to his downfall. He had gone to work for SkullCorp where he felt he could make a real difference in the world, but he inadvertently learned that Anton Gamble's warnings about Skull's true nature were not in vain. Clancey vowed to go public with his discoveries. Kong brought in Carnifex to assassinate Clancy, which was Ewen's plan all along anyway, as he despised his granddaughter Dawn and her husband. Ewen hardly minded taking the rap as his hatred of the Vossiuses and their extended family was legend by then.
After Cromwell slew Clancey, Dawn was threatened by her grandfather that she was next and should live in fear until her day came. And then Carnifex and Kanabal took the 15 year old Solomon Vossius and fled, leaving Dawn, trained from birth to take care of herself, feeling more helpless than ever. At least her other four children were unharmed – physically anyway. They all vowed that night that Cromwell, Vossius, and their own half-brother would pay.
The Kraken, Sword, and the recent Hallmark-based vigilante White Archer combined forces to protect Dawn and her family, at Anton Gamble's and Cary Bradcroft's behest. This was part of an effort on the Shadow Baron's part to forge a new, stronger team in the wake of the Silent Seven – the team which he called the Aggregate .
In 1963, One of Cary's team took a drastic step in protecting Dawn – Eryk Stenbrau. The Kraken had been falling deeper and deeper in love with her over the years, and, placing the Clancey children under the care of Andreas and Sidonie, he kidnapped Dawn. He was indeed doing this for her ultimate protection, but no doubt hoped he could mend her broken heart. She thought him a fool, and physically overpowered him, proving she could take care of herself. Stenbrau protested: ”But I'm taking care of your whole family. Vance and Cary will get Solomon back.”
Dawn thought Eryk naïve; she knew that Solomon was simply wishing to follow in his father's reprehensible footsteps. “He belongs with his father; he always has. A mother knows these things”.
But, almost true to form in such fantastic situations, Dawn grew more attracted to Eryk, and she made love with him in order to escape. But she had never really loved one man – she used Gerhardt and Clancey for status (though she deeply cared for her family with them), and was now using Eryk's love for her to escape. And it worked. But, she realized, there was one man she had come to have genuine feelings for – Eryk's brother, Anton Gamble.
Dawn escaped, and Kraken followed. She found shelter with an old friend of the Clanceys – Antoine Grimadi, a bi-racial Italian businessman. She knew she was pregnant with the Kraken's child and when she gave birth, she left the child with Antoine and his wife Chloe. They raised him as their own, naming him Germaine Grimaldi, though Dawn had initially christened him Luther Stenbrau. The Kraken tearfully searched for the pregnant Dawn, rendezvousing with his partner Ian Rhys McGregor. But Ewen Cromwell had found them first, and swiftly slayed them both. He fed their grisly remains to Gerhardt Vossius, who allowed his now 17 year old son to observe as he feasted on his well-cooked repast.
Dawn found Anton Gamble in France in 1965 and suggest they begin a romance. She took him completely off-guard. He was the man she's been looking for all these years, she finally realized. Or was she deluding herself, and reverting again to the amoral opportunist? Did Ewen Cromwell's blood run a bit thicker in her veins than she would've liked? Regardless, she still deserved none of the horrific incidences visited upon her by her grandfather and by her first husband.
Anton and Dawn moved to Germany, where Anton reverted to his natal name Jakob Stenbrau, and the two were married in Berlin in 1967. They moved into Chateau Noir (“which they nicknamed Chateau Stenbrau”) , formerly Richter's German HQ but now considered abandoned, a ruin. Richter promised the Stenbraus that he would keep them informed of their enemies – and friends' – whereabouts. On June 23, 1968, their son, Deric, was born. Gamble/ Stenbrau quit the Aggregate, and was overjoyed, feeling that nothing and no one could shatter their happiness. He was unfortunately mistaken.
In 1970, Kanabal and Carnifex, under Kong's direction, ferreted out the Stenbraus. Cary Bradcroft had learned where they were from Richter, and he and Nocturno cast a protective spell so they'd not be found. The Avrils and the Fabricands, supervised by Kong himself, broke the spell, and unlocked their location. By this time the 23 year old Solomon Vossius was undertaking missions with Cromwell and Gerhardt and, encased in a bizarre S & M style bodysuit (an armor/ latex combo), now dubbed himself the Tormenter and had acquired a penchant not just for cannibalism, but rape, torture, and necrophilia. Gerhardt was proud. He had nurtured quite a monster.
V. Noir Holocaust
The three perverse banes of the Stenbraus' existence arrived in May 1970 at the Chateau Noir. Fortunately for them, the Bradcrofts sent in a contingent of Aggregate agents to put a permanent stop to the aforementioned banes. Carnifex and the Vossiuses planned a swift bloody strike but unfortunately for them, the Aggregate planned the same.
Carnifex and company carved their way into the chateau, but the Stenbraus stood their ground. They'd been warned mystically by Nocturno, and so gave their child to their friends the Grimaldis to take care of. The Tormenter jumped the gun on the raid and leapt onto Dawn, who sent him hurling into a wall. Kanabal approached Jakob, who he tossed out the first floor window brutally. That was to be the last anyone saw of Anton Gamble. Suddenly the roof caved in, courtesy of Thomas Ledge. Ledge pounced onto Kanabal and then pitched the cannibal through a nearby window, spewing a string of profanity as he did so.
A volley of arrows, courtesy of the White Archer, penetrated Carnifex's armor but caused him little pain. Ursulin and Richter appeared on two sides of the hallway. Both fired their weapons; Ursulin's maser causing Ewen far more pain. He wildly hacked Ursulin's right arm off, ceasing his fire. Saturnine appeared beside his brother and fired several rounds at Cromwell, who simply leapt forward and skewered the madman on his blade. Or so it appeared. “James!!” screamed Richter, who hefted a grenade at Carnifex point blank and ducked for cover. The explosion rattled Cromwell, who was then dealt a harsh blow to the kidney by Thomas Ledge.
The Tormenter picked up Cromwell's heavy blade and hacked at Gadgeteer V. Euphrates Straw disarmed the young sadist and then knocked Solomon down with several kung fu moves. Straw helped up Andreas, who was bleeding profusely. Kanabal came up behind the two like some feral beast, ripped off Andreas' right arm, and began savagely beating Straw with it. Poised above a prostrate Straw, Kanabal prepared to do in the young polymath. But Straw leapt up and kicked him into a back snapping punch from Ledge. Their personal politics aside, Ledge and Straw made a superlative fighting team.
When Kanabal rose, Dr. E was standing before him. While Solomon skewered Andreas Vossius to death with his own electro-rod, Kanabal clawed at Dr. E's sleek protective armor, getting closer to its inner layers until E finally cocked his fist back and planted it square inside Vossius' mouth – snapping off his teeth, rupturing his jaw, and, with an explosive plasma burst, blasting Gerhardt's skull apart into many discreet fragments. Dawn, lying in the corner, smiled, and tried to get up and over to E for protection when Cromwell sidestepped her, sword in hand. She attempted to fight him but he snapped her neck in one stroke. Ewen's lovely, vivacious granddaughter fell to the ground, her life snuffed by Carnifex.
Where was Anton Gamble in all this? Several wondered. Saturnine was missing as well, and Richter raced off to find them. The White Archer faced down Tormenter, with Ledge behind him. Straw was mending Ursulin's arm. Brandon ver Dorn and Solomon Vossius faced off in a brief but tense martial arts exchange. Ver Dorn clearly had the fighting advantage as Solomon was still in training. Ledge grabbed Vossius, and screamed, “Hey rough trade … Fuck YOU!!” and slammed his spike-helmeted head so hard into the nearest wall Vossius went out cold. Ledge was then pummeled into the next room by the far stronger Carnifex.
Cromwell turned, and the wounded Tressilian brothers bombarded him with gunfire. Suddenly an exploding titanium arrow hit Cromwell square in the mid-spine. As it exploded, it crunched fragments of Cromwell's spine along with his armor, mail, muscle and flesh. A fine spray of blood arched through the air. Dr. E walked up to the faltering Cromwell, and, touching him on the shoulder, ignited a propulsive explosion that sent Carnifex into a fit of agony as he caught fire, exploded, and went sailing through the front door, his left leg and right arm snapping off from the force of the detonation.
He crawled away, bathed in flame, and Ledge said, “I know he can heal an' all... so where do you put these creeps when you're done with 'em? If they survive that is....”
“We're... working on that”, said Ursulin. “Let's take the two with us... I've an idea you'll quite like, Thomas”.
“What about you, buddy? That arm...”
“It's... painful, but it will soon regenerate. All of the regenerative powers found in those such as Cromwell can be traced, via Exodesia, to Omegan and Piscean sciences. We are natural regenerators.
“What about Gamble?” asked Straw. “Did you find him, Richter?”
“Non”, said Richter, “He's completely disappeared. I can't imagine what could have happened”.
“Tell you what happened”, interjected Thomas, “Fuckin' coward's what he was. His wife and gay buddy are over here dead – where's he?? Hell, his arch-enemy got his head blown clean apart – good work, E – an' “Mister Existentialism” is nowhere to be found. “
“Enough,” came the icy tones of Saturnine, who emerged from the shadows as if from limbo. “Jakob Stenbrau is – was? - more of a man than you'll ever be with your ludicrous posturing”.
“Head case chimes in. Duly noted”, tossed off Ledge as he lit a cigar.
Straw said, “You are one cold motherfucker, Ledge – but in a fight you got my grudging respect”.
Ver Dorn, weary of the exchange, said, “With real leadership – no offense Richter – this could've been a win-win for us. But we took hard casualties. Just like with Ian and Eryk. Andreas Gerhardt and this poor, poor woman, Dawn – they didn't deserve to die. So let's get their bodies – and these two prisoners – outside. Trent is rendezvousing in the jet with us – any minute.”
Richter said, “I'm staying behind, as is my brother. Effective now, we're out of the Aggregate. For our own reasons. And we would appreciate it if you'd let the world think Anton Gamble perished today.”
“In a way, with Dawn's death, I'm sure he did”, said ver Dorn.
“I think we can all relate”, said Ursulin. “Even Thomas Ledge”, he smiled.
Trent's jet soon touched down. The deceased and the still unconscious prisoners were all strapped down. “Been thinkin'” said Ledge as they took off on the long flight to Hallmark.
“Yeah”, laughed Euphrates, “That must've been a hell of a struggle”.
“It was, “mon”. I was thinkin' we should have a set of permanent holding cells for these assholes when we bag 'em. “
“Hardly a new idea among this group”, Straw cynically replied.
“Yeah – but we should call it – the Compound”.
Ver Dorn said, “I like it.”
Back at the chateau, the brothers Tressilian tended to an old friend, badly wounded, and awaited medical aid. Their friend began sobbing uncontrollably, “Dawn – Dawn – I couldn't even save her..”
Richter leaned over his uncontrollably lachrymose friend, “It's alright, mon ami. The struggles of Jakob Stenbrau and of Anton Gamble are over. But though you will soon be a new man, the wounds of past lives will pain you for some time”, said Richter tenderly to his old comrade.
“We're going to invent a whole new ID for you old friend”, said James, “I came up with the the name Jason Barlowe. Thoughts?”
“I like it”, sobbed Gamble, “I think I'd like to be a chef. That I haven' done - “
“And just think”, declared a very animated Saturnine : “'Dead at 52: Anton Gamble, visionary author of “Distortion”, “Terminus”, “Sacred Mirrors”, and “The Earth Mother” - a legend in our time taken far too soon'. What do you think?”
epilogue:
VI. The Map to Our Sorrows
Madness is what we thrive on in these times/
Stretching tendrils to the stars/
From nearer suns and distant climes/
It is the map to our sorrows, writ large/
A holocaust of the soul/
It feeds us and it drains us/
A divine madness lovingly wrought/
It always will sustain us/
A broken id, a carnivale of illumination/
But in the dark in the pale/
In this twisted shadow nation/
We merge as we dissolve/
A voice in mercurial pain asks us once again/
How much of what we are yet remains?
Excerpted from The Sacred Mirrors song, “The Map to Our Sorrows” from the LP “The Palest Carnivale”; music: Richard Dannish Bacon/ Zane Whiteside D'Azai; lyrics: Anton Gamble (Jakob Stenbrau)
Chapter 8: Entangled
I. This Tangle of Thornes...
As recounted previously, three immigrant siblings were the linchpin of an organized crime unit in the late 1940s and early 1950s called Brothers-in-Arms, later known as the Machine. Their enormously successful organization, when paired with Kong's Black Skull Society, became the spine of the fledgling Skull Corporation.
That three Irish-born petty thieves became the prime movers of arms deals with a postwar communist country known as Libania seems remarkable. But Kong, as Bromley Chamberlain, CEO of SkullCorp (and also known as Mr. Drang), and VP of 'Special Projects,' shepherded their development. He inspired the Burden (formerly Brighton) brothers to embrace their new identities as the Thorne brothers - Artemus Calvino, Augustus Breton, and Geoffrey Barton. Artemus excelled as a ruthless businessman as well as a top-notch mercenary. Augustus kept the books and was in charge of paying the law to look the other way. Geoffrey, fluent in Spanish and Portugese, was the go-between to Libania. His heart was never really in the Thornes' enterprises, however, and he lost himself in drinking and womanizing.
The eldest Thorne was the most determined and ruthless of the three. He was on an endless quest for wealth and power. For some time, the younger siblings felt bullied and envious of the overbearing and dictatorial Artemus. Captain Vargas Llosa, in command of Libania's military force, FOPA, was also disgusted with Artemus' avarice, as well as his persistent lust for Llosa's wife Carmen. Artemus also fancied the Llosas' precocious young daughter Marilia, and became obsessed with the barely pubescent girl.
The three disgruntled men - Augustus, Geoffrey, and Vargas - wanted a way out of the Machine, Skull, and FOPA forever. They found an invaluable ally in Dr. Turner Lawton, a somewhat manic and unstable TSD specialist who had experimented on himself before his son was born. For all his dangerous traits, Lawton was a true friend to the three gentlemen, and vowed SkullCorp would fall one day.
Augustus implored Lawton to experiment on him with TSD; at first Turner refused, but soon felt that perhaps with the two of them enhanced, they might have a better chance against SkullCorp. Augustus was given TSD therapy in 1956. He felt no untoward side effects – but when his daughter first opened her eyes, they briefly flared a deep flaming red. It would be many years before her eyes burned so brightly again, but the memory literally emblazoned on his brain caused him to name her Kendall (a variant on 'kindle').
Augustus and Vargas concocted a scheme to rob SkullCorp of $4 million and irreplaceable paperwork plus, Lawton insisted, a variety of high-tech gadgets. They would scatter to the four winds, so to speak; change their names; and live off of their shares of the ill-gotten bounty. With the papers, they possessed much potential blackmail material on Skull and were ready to use it if they were found out.
This was not the devastating blow the mutinous quartet imagined however; it was a mere inconvenience to Kong. However, the man born Kaosong Qua had a long memory and was accustomed to biding his time. He let events play out over the years in order to avenge his, and SkullCorp's, honor - and to eliminate the quartet of traitors.
II. The Grand Plan
It was in late 1947 that the so-called “grand plan” went forward. Libania was in upheaval after WWII, and stocks were down at SkullCorp. This was to last only a short time however. The “Four Outsiders” (as they called themselves) struck while the proverbial iron was hot, and Kong suffered his first defeat when the quartet got away with their audacious plan. This is probably what fueled 40 years of hate that resulted from the Outsiders' actions.
Artemus Thorne suspected Vargas Llosa right away, but he had no proof. Artemus sought out Llosa's wife Carmen Francisco Llosa, and murdered her. It is worth reiterating here that Vargas Llosa possessed quite a pedigree: his grandparents were Alonzo Llosa and Luna Corvo, the latter being the daughter of the legendary gunfighter Sorrow and his wife Carmelita Rodriquez. Luna's sister Solita was the mother of the colorful bandit/ guide Felix Tequila, described in past chapters. Felix's daughter Esperance had a son, Diaz Montaldo, b. 1956, who we shall explore in the some depth in the modern portion of our account.
After Artemus slew Carmen, he lived out a long-brewing fantasy and wed the 15 year-old Marillia Llosa, daughter of Carmen and Vargas. Thorne lorded it over the arms deals and drug smuggling based in Libania, to the great pleasure of Kong and of Skull's inner circle. The 1950s were increasingly frenzied for Artemus Calvino Thorne. He had a suspicion that the traitor Vargas Llosa was “hiding in plain sight” in Hallmark, MA. He confided this to no one. While on his quest to find Llosa, now going under the guise of a Cuban Catholic professor named Emilio Florenza who taught at Cullen Darby Communal College (CDCC), Thorne met the stunning and eccentric Paige Bradcroft. He immediately used his wealth and power to home in on her. She'd recently had a brief affair with Eloy Queeq “the first American Indian physicist” as Skull dubbed him, but Artemus' charisma won her over. A whirlwind wedding ensued, and soon after, in 1956, their son, Calvin Artemus Thorne, was born.
But Paige soon found herself back in the arms of Dr. Queeq, and soon became pregnant by him. Sensing this, a furious Artemus filed for a quick divorce, and “gave” Paige to his best friend John Paul Fabricand. Artemus had no real ground to stand on, as he was a bigamist, being married to young Marillia in Libania, hence his marriage to Paige was never really legal anyway. John Paul claimed the son, Kyle, as his own, a Fabricand. But Kyle's deeply Native-American features belied that. Kyle learned of the mystic arts from his legal father, though he truly detested him and felt John Paul sullied his beloved mother. In 1962, Marillia bore Artemus a daughter, Nanda Marillia Thorne, nicknamed “Nan”. In his travels, Thorne kept his lives in Libania and Hallmark far apart.
III. Los Quatros Rebeldes
And so what of the other of the 'Four Outsiders'? With Queeq's help, the man now known as Emilio Florenza kept his cover, teaching at CDCC and raising a good-sized family. He married Consuela Diamante, and had four daughters: Carmen, twins Carillia and Carmilla, and the youngest Juliana (born 1968), as well as a son Ricardo, or Ricky, born in 1977. Before his death, Artemus Thorne held one last investigation in Hallmark and concluded Florenza was indeed Llosa. He mailed his mysterious findings to a then-unknown party. Thorne's return to Hallmark led to his ultimate (and, many would say, well-deserved) demise, however.
Dr. Turner Lawton fled to France with his newly-acquired tech, and soon wed the bohemian Jaresse de Funes. He changed his name to Danton Lloyd-Langton (after “Llosa-Lawton") and they had a son Jareth Llloyd-Langton, born 1966. Danton became a high school science teacher, and in 1970 went to Hallmark to help out Emilio. While there he had an affair with militant activist Maya Clancey, a student of Emilio's (and daughter of Dawn Cheshire and Zachariah Clancey). Dr. Lawton/ Lloyd-Langton returned to France.
Maya gave birth to his son, Trent Clancey, in 1972. Trent later changed his name to Flint Water. Flint's half-brother Jareth suffered through his parents' acrimonious divorce in 1982. Lawton took Jareth to Hallmark and tried to rekindle his romance with Maya. This rather quickly went south, and Maya did not reveal at that time that Flint was Jareth's brother. Flint and jareth never crossed paths as teenagers. Despite the risk, Lawton decided to stay in Hallmark and teach, keeping a low-profile and home schooling his son for the most part. Jareth began playing music at a very young age, and soon manifested the result of his father's TSD experiments.
Augustus Breton Thorne retired with his proverbial ill-gotten gains and settled in Arizona. He took the name David August. He led a simple, quiet life on a farm with his wife Kim Batten. The two of them were very into nature and outdoor activities – camping, hiking, hydroponics – until their daughter Kendall August's eyes flared once again, as they had in her infancy. and then returned to normal. The Augusts were happy throughout the 1960s – until Kim died of cancer in 1973.
The youngest Thorne brother became Greg Burden once more. He moved to England and wed a Welsh woman, Ellspeth Gough, in Manchester in 1961. Their daughter Gloria Erin Burden was born in 1962 in London. When Ellspeth died in 1965, Greg moved to Montrose, Illinois and wed Miranda Guidrey, a wild motorcyclist. Their son Jeremiah Guidrey (the name on his birth certificate) was born in 1968. The impetuous Miranda was abusive to Greg and abandoned him.
Miranda learned Greg's true name and blackmailed him into letting her split with Jeremiah, while he became a desolate alcoholic and raised Gloria alone in Illinois. Miranda renamed her son Jeremiah Thorne and hoped to one day find Greg's money and secrets. She moved to Hallmark where SkullCorp's main offices were located, and bided her time. Heavy drug abuse and a downward spiral into prostitution prevented Miranda Guidrey from getting very far with her schemes to purloin the Thorne fortune.
Paige Bradcroft Thorne Fabricand finally took her own life in 1974, after learning Eloy Queeq (now known as Dr. E) was alive and that she couldn't be with him. Paige and Kyle were living in Canada at the time. By 1975, Nocturno, disgusted by his cousin Paige's fate, located and destroyed Artemus Thorne. Kyle barely escaped his wrath. Calvin Thorne became estranged from Kyle, and became a drifter, taking odd jobs and occasionally seeing his half-sister Nan, the only person he really loved. Cal was approached in 1975 by Ewen Cromwell, who offered to train him as a mercenary and assassin.
That same year, during his travels, Cal Thorne had assumed the name Brett Thawne and wed a bi-polar heroin junkie called Iris Knarpp. This disastrous union came to a halt when Cal took up Cromwell's offer. Abandoning his wife and their marriage (which Iris had annulled when she learned "Brett Thawne" never really existed), Cal swore never again to grow intimate with a woman, a vow he upheld for many years. He channeled his sublimated sexuality into violence, and became a formidable killer.
As for Iris Knarpp, she gave birth to Cal's daughter, christened Arletty Thawne, in December of 1975. While Cal's half-brother Kyle Fabricand became a Skull inner circle member under the tutelage of Donal Rykards, Calvin Thorne made his debut as the deadliest mercenary this side of his mentor Carnifex, and became known as Exterminans, or the Death Walker. His nom de guerre was derived, oddly enough, from an essay he'd read penned by none other than Anton Gamble, whose work, though a bit left-leaning for Cal, had always fascinated him.
Thirty years after 'Los Quatros Rebeldes', the four men who betrayed Skull, had scattered, they were at last accounted for in 1987. And an inferno was on the horizon....
Chapter 9: Aggregate
I. The Bradcroft Legacy
Returning to familiar ground:
In 1956 Cary Bradcroft arrived in Hallmark MA (apparently alone). His uncle Malcolm had lived in Hallmark for several years and owned and managed a curio shoppe there. Malcolm willed the shoppe to Cary, whose twin brother Ashton had reportedly been killed during an expedition to Africa.
When Cary took the title of baronet, his presumed dead brother dubbed him the Shadow Baron. As fate would have it, Ashton was indeed dead as we perceive the state. But he was in fact undead, and karmically attached to his brother. One could say he was now his brother's magickal familiar (that is, a mediator between the magician and the spirit world, and an aide in performing magickal workings) although Ashton, now calling himself simply Nocturno, was potentially more powerful than Cary. Nocturno possessed a singular connection to realms beyond those of the living.
The brothers decided to keep a low profile in Hallmark for several years, but the festering evil in the city and in the world around them spurred Cary to gather various extraordinary individuals who had been operating as vigilantes over the years, mainly the “pulp era” heroes loosely allied under the moniker The Silent Seven. With malefic forces such as Carnifex, Kanabal, and criminal organizations such as SkullCorp (ostensibly a reputable conglomerate but the Bradcrofts knew better) numbered among the threats to humanity's safety and freedom, the Shadow Baron resolved to organize a group, called simply the Aggregate, to deal with these menaces.
The final straw, as it were, was the murder of the heroic half-Exodesian polymath Vance “Doc Vance” Orlison at the hands of Carnifex and Kanabal, abetted by Kanabal's bloodthirsty offspring Solomon Vossius, soon to be known as the Tormenter. After Orlison's funeral, during which Cary was accosted by REACT agent Thomas Ledge, he began formulating a solid plan to put the Aggregate into play and encompass an even broader range of talent than the Silent Seven.
By March 1964, the proverbial die was cast. Under the sign of Pisces, Cary fulfilled the promise of a vision he had received as he was dangling tortured in Exodesia a decade before. He had spent several years befriending the Omegan Ursulin and Dr. E, born Eloy Queeq, at one time the lover of the Bradcrofts' beloved cousin Paige). Queeq wanted Paige to go on thinking him dead from the TSD-related accident that changed him into Dr. E. Her torment was doubled by the fact that her son, Kyle Fabricand, was really Eloy's. Shadow Baron and Nocturno agreed to keep each party's secret, though they felt it foolish.
The Aggregate was funded by Bradcroft Ltd, in association with the Vossius Company (now run by Sidonie von Kant Vossius and her half-brother Andreas). Later, Renova Inc. became a partner and the Aggregate's parent entity became known as The Zed Foundation. The bulk of the Aggregate consisted of members imported from the Silent Seven. Saturnine, Richter, Sword, Kraken, Anton Gamble, and Gadgeteer V were all co-founders of the Aggregate (as were Shadow Baron, Ursulin, and Dr. E). The final co-founder was 26-year old Brandon ver Dorn, who lived a double life as the White Archer. Some might say he actualkly lived a triple life, an observation to be clarified shortly.
II. The White Archer
Brandon ver Dorn was Dr. E's closest friend, and worked for the brilliant Emerson Trent and his polymath half-brother Euphrates Aquinas Straw. Ver Dorn was always cryptic about his early life back then, and this sowed some distrust among the team at times, but he eventually revealed his story. Please allow this digression to discuss the secrets of the White Archer.
Brandon ver Dorn was the great-grandson of Ambrosius ver Dorn (b. 1837), who largely bankrolled the Cromwell Party that led to Hallmark's founding. Ambrosius was the bastard son of a Dutch miner who had hit it rich, Cesar ver Dorn, and of the woman known only as Seripha, an Exodesian refugee. More than one of the descendants of the Dutch founders of Hallmark were named for Seripha. .Seripha was descended from Serafinia, after whom the tiny South American country was named. Ambrosius benefited from his mother's genes and he lived 105 years (and even then he was killed in a car accident).
Ambrosius ver Dorns' son Christian fell in love with Seripha de Ruyter (named for Ambrosius' mother, as alluded to above), stunning daughter of the Dutch adventurer Ananias de Ruyter and the Hispanic Inocencia Renova. Christian and Seripha had a son with copper skin and grey eyes, who was given the appellation Hendrik van Hoke II. This was due to the fact that Seripha de Ruyter was wed to Christian's best friend, Jost van Hoke, who claimed the child as his own. But Hendrik was truly a ver Dorn. Seripha and Jost had a daughter of their own, Matilda van Hoke, whose son, Dugas van Hoke, aka Locke, was a musician (he played bass in the band the Sacred Mirrors for a time), as well as a SkullCorp operative in the 1960s (he reported directly to Phileas Caleb).
Hendrik van Hoke II changed his surname to ver Dorn as an adult and married into the heretofore undiscussed Palmer clan. Hendrik's wife, Esther Palmer (daughter of first cousins Randolph and Ruth Palmer, whose sale of their grocery store chain in 1947 to the Harness family assured the Palmers' place in Hallmark society), bore him Brandon Palmer ver Dorn. The ver Dorn and Palmer families were scandalized by Hendrik's origins and his irascible personality, and found his son an impetuous (if goodhearted) youth. The society mavens were not terribly dismayed when Hendrix and his young son embarked in 1947 on what became a fatal flight to the arctic (or so it was assumed).
Hendrik ver Dorn's renowned flight skills, honed in World War II, did not save him, and he was killed when his plane hit an icecap in the midst of a “freak storm”. Young Brandon was believed killed as well. Amazingly, so the story goes, he was found by a tribe of Inuits and raised by them as their own. Exactly what transpired in the life of Brandon ver Dorn from his 10th to his 17th year is largely unknown, By his own account, he became the greatest hunter, archer, and scout in the tribe – save for one man that ver Dorn referred to simply as “Aguila”. Aguila called Brandon “The White Archer” and despised him as a blood rival.
The account is a familiar one to those steeped in myth and legend, and was very possibly embroidered by Brandon over the years. He contended that the chief of the tribe, "Silver Eyes", adopted the ten-year old ver Dorn, and that the chief's natural son, Aguila, was bitter and resentful. In this archetypal situation, the two “brothers” finally duelled, and, as to be expected, the time came for Brandon to settle the matter with Aguila's life. However, he spared Aguila and merely humbled him. It is known with some certainty that in 1955, Ursulin, in his travels around the world he was born (but not raised) on, found Brandon and brought him back with him to SkullCorp HQ. This was when Ursulin was still cooperating with Skull's scientists, before he decamped and became a free agent, albeit one hotly sought out by REACT.
Ver Dorn suffered from severe culture shock, having been partially raised by what some saw as a “primitive” culture and then rescued by an alien benefactor and exposed to technology far ahead of the society he left behind. Esther Palmer ver Dorn never believed her son's account of his missing years, but regardless, she left her only child her portion of the ver Dorn and Palmer fortunes when she passed away in 1957. Ver Dorn was now free to travel and decide his own fate. In 1959, ver Dorn was approached by REACT and recruited by them, though he questioned their motives. He had decided that Skull's path was the wrong one for him, and for humanity, and so went to work for the ostensible “good guys”, who had already accrued quite a file on ver Dorn, one labeled "The White Archer".
Ver Dorn became as uncertain about REACT as he had been about Skull, and decided to become a double agent, ostensibly working for REACT but reporting his information to Cary Bradcroft, who Ursulin introduced him to. On top of all this, the perpetually busy, seemingly sleepless White Archer operated on occasion as a vigilante on the streets of Hallmark ,inspired by the Silent Seven. The Archer was soon outed as Brandon ver Dorn, a wealthy scion but definitely not a stereotypical playboy. Fortunately, ver Dorn's years as the son of Silver Eyes had given him a rather zen and good-natured outlook, despite the darkness in his life.
The Archer's first mission for REACT involved going undercover in the lower echelons of SkullCorp under the name Sigmund Bartholemew. Ver Dorn saw this as a way out of his brushes with the law as a vigilante and so, with Cary's help, he faked his own death and sunk himself into becoming Bartholemew. At this point, Brandon ver Dorn had been far too long without any meaningful female companionship, and embarked on a passionate affair with co-worker Medea Strasser. To foster his disguise, “Sigmund” married the young lady of German and Greek descent, and she was soon pregnant. The catch to all this was that Skull didn't want Bartholemew working as a mere office flunkie, but as a soldier attached to FOPA in Libania. This was because they had researched Bartholemew and learned his true ID and that he was a REACT agent. Their test for him was a mission in Libania. They threatened to murder Medea and their infant Stephen if "Sigmund" refused to comply.
The Archer was put in charge of a FOPA unit in Libania. They were raiding their long-time enemies the Serafinians. "Bartholemew" was told that if the mission went well, he could be promoted to the rank of a top political assassin and eventually reach the inner circle of Skull. He was warned that at this point there was no turning back. But he was in contact with Ursulin, who, with Dr. E and Shadow Baron, rescued the Archer and defeated the Libanian raid on Serafinia. This mission could be said to be the seed from which the Aggregate grew. It was no longer simply a concept in Cary Bradcroft's mystical visions, but a core group of four men who had no legal identities in society – the undead Nocturno; the believed dead ver Dorn and Queeq; and the Omegan Ursulin - as well as Cary himself.
It should be noted, before returning to the genesis of the Aggregate in 1964, that in 1961, when the Libanian raid was foiled, Sigmund Bartholemew was declared deceased, and SkullCorp cut loose Medea Strasser Bartholemew with a modest severance package. Medea and her son had to go on welfare, until they met Angelo Blatonski, a man of questionable integrity who married Medea and raised young Stephen Bartholemew, about whom much more will be related in future accounts.
III. The Sixties
As noted elsewhere, in 1964 the mystery men called Sword and Kraken (Ian Rhys McGregor and Eryk Stenbrau) were slain by the barbarous Carnifex. Existentialist crusader Anton Gamble retired and pursued his passion for Dawn Lee Cheshire Vossius Clancey. Lined up to fill the void were Emerson Trent and Euphrates Straw, both welcomed into the group. Two black men in such a position in 1965 was seemingly unthinkable, but the Bradcrofts could care less. The entire enterprise was like a secret society anyway, with the public not privy to its workings. Though African-Americans (actually Jamaican-Americans in this case) were entrenched in the group, the Aggregate was void of female membership for a time, and was roundly criticized within the group itself for it. This would change by the end of the decade.
In 1966, The Absurd Tentacle was invited but declined. He scoffed at the operation for his own abstruse reasons. Thomas Ledge, however, joined up that year, as a liaison to REACT. Shadow Baron felt it better to follow the maxim of keeping one's enemies closer than one's friends. Ledge caused no end of controversy in the group. In combat with the team's foes, Ledge lent a great deal to the proceedings: he was well-trained, fearless, agile, superhumanly strong, and healed very quickly. He aged slowly and was rarely ill. Kong's genes were strong in him, though he had no idea of this.
In 1968, the problem of no women in the group was resolved with a vengeance, as the group drafted in three female members (actually four, but more on that shortly). Hyacinthe and Fiora Charme were hippie hangers-on to Orphee de Lander, and both had been administered doses of TSD. Hyacinthe (born Cynthia Gauvin) believed her powers lie in her ability to affect others' mood for the better. Her best friend Emily Duncan claimed to ply the same talents under the name Fiora Charme. Marcella Motto was a young Libanian drafted into illicit TSD trials who emerged as Princesa Verde (“The Emerald Princess”), who boasted green skin, gossamer jade wings, and the ability to control vegetation. Orphee de Lander took immediate interest in recruiting her, but Shadow Baron beat him to it. With her outre appearance, she needed shelter from conventional society, and though deLander was sympatico, Bradcroft has greater resources at his disposal.
Soon after this femme contingent signed up, a man called Hieronymous followed suit. Hieronymous, though unknown to many at first, was also a woman though. Dahlia Mueller disguised as a man, and wore a suit festooned with mystic symbols and topped by asymmetrical goggles and a cowl covering her entire face. Hieronymous was a magickal artist, able to transcribe mystic symbols with ease and vivify them.
In 1969, Richter and Saturnine were on the cusp of retirement, and missed many meetings. Thus Shadow Baron and Nocturno sought out two new members to replace the seemingly irreplaceable. The superhumanly strong and tough Wurm, outfitted in Spanish conquistador gear and bearing dragon iconography, became the next official recruit. He was really Benjamin “Ben” Renova (born 1936), heir to the vast Renova fortune first struck when his great-grandfather Guillermo Renova staked his claim with the Cromwell Party at Mt Mosaic in 1887.
Ben was also descended from the Van Hokes and the Exodesian Elodie, and owned Hallmark's Van Hoke General Hospital, Renova Bank & Loan, and Renova Plaza. He was a major benefactor to the fledgling Zed Foundation (built on the original Bradcroft Foundation). Renova was nearly as much a right wing idealogue as Thomas Ledge (they became lifelong best friends) though Ben was by far the easier to take. It was uncertain from whence Ben Renova derived his ultrahuman abilities. Some speculated that he purchased TSD for personal use illegally. He could certainly afford it.
The man called Gulliver joined in late 1969, and was still in training when the group went up against Kanabal for the final round. Gulliver was Enos McClegg, a Scottish alcoholic who stood a menacing 10 feet tall – another TSD experiment. From 1967-1969, the ever-changing team found themselves battling the likes of Exodesian Xeronixia; gangsters Tony Duarte, Marco Allegretti, and Milo Majestyk; the deadly Kith M'Nali, or the 'Black Tamerlane' (discussed at length previously); the Exodesian Arch-Priest Urias; and, at long last, Kong the Claimer in person (or so they believed). Fiora Charme left the team in 1970 to marry and tour with Sacred Mirrors keyboardist (and brother of the Absurd Tentacle) Bertrand Rojiczek. Over the next few years they had two children: Collette and RD.
In May 1970 the final battle with longtime foe Kanabal was joined. Gadgeteer V was killed, and Anton Gamble presumed dead. Hieronymous was on leave during this battle (She was giving birth to her daughter by the Absurd Tentacle and put the child up for adoption. The girl was adopted, and christened Espasia Felts). Saturnine and Richter went into permanent retirement. An era had ended. The gauntlet had truly passed forevermore from Vance Orlison's Silent Seven to Cary Bradcroft's Aggregate.
IV. Dawning of the Age of Aquarius?
1971 was an eventful time for the Aggregate. They still operated well beneath the public's radar; their comings and goings were difficult for the government to track; and the threats they encountered became more frequent, bizarre, and deadly.
Dahlia Mueller returned after her time away struggling with the decision to give up her daughter Espasia. She dropped the male identity of Hieronymous and became known as the Blue Dahlia, but wielded the same esoteric abilities she had as Hieronymous.
Hyacinthe followed her best friend Fiora's lead and departed the team to spend her time as part of Orphee de Lander's emergent “Terminal Culture” movement. De Lander was invited once more to join the Aggregate by Dr E and the White Archer, and became so enraged that he attacked them and seriously injured the Archer, thus sidelining him from battle for weeks.
Shortly thereafter, Princesa Verde became involved with a dusky-skinned, green-eyed man called Cedric Lykos, and Cary Bradcroft harbored certain suspicions about this stranger to Hallmark. Another man to provoke the interest of the Aggregate was the bohemian drifter who called himself only Brother Zodiac. His grey eyes held incandescent swirls like pools of gold which he perpetually hid behind round purple shades. His skin was a rich brown and his thick cascading hair was usually tied back. He was often bare-chested save for an open vest adorned with scales, sequins, and locks of hair. He wore a round medallion emblazoned with the zodiac wheel. Brother Zodiac was highly charismatic and deeply inscrutable; he befriended both Cary Bradcroft and Orphee de Lander but neither seemed able to pierce his veil of mystery. One thing was certain; he exuded great power; yet declined a commitment to either Cary or Orphee to lend that power to either of heir respective causes.
Meanwhile, Dannish Bacon, lead singer for the Sacred Mirrors, died in France of a massive drug overdose. Fiora Charm reluctantly took the slot as the band's lead vocalist. She had her hands full with RD, her son by Mirrors keyboardist Bertrand Rojiczek, who she had recently wed. Bertrand was intrigued by Brother Zodiac's charisma and high standing in the Flicker Street scene. Zodiac's aura of hallucinogenic mystery and the demi-Zen aphorisms he was known to utter caused Bertrand to wonder if the Brother had any music within him that had not been expressed. The Brother anticipated this and turned down Bertrand's offer to “jam”, claiming he (Zodiac) was no musician; he merely “dug” Flicker Street and all it symbolized.
By mid 1972, much of the drama surrounding the Sacred Mirrors dilemma was a moot point: Fiora became pregnant by Bertrand again and in early 1973 had a daughter Collette Rojiczek. She then retired from music and from the Aggregate; both decisions were permanent, as she devoted herself to raising her children. She was still a heavy user of and dealer in psychedelics during this period, however.
As for Cedric Lykos, his secrets came to the fore when he and Princesa were visiting Cary at the Bradcroft Ltd Curio Shoppe in late 1971. Cary was training a new clerk at the shoppe, an American Indian named Hiawatha Hand who had petitioned Bradcroft for membership in the Aggregate and only recently been accepted. Hand had been in prison when he was forced to be subjected to the TSD trials, which left him with tremendous strength and endurance and a “second sight” of sorts – a form of clairvoyance and danger signal, a feel for the “vibes” of those around him. And the vibrations Hand picked up on were unusually intense on the first day he met Cedric Lykos in the curio shoppe.
No sooner had the small group had a chance for introductions than a many-eyed, multi-tentacled monstrosity spilled out of a rupture in the air itself. Its tentacles bound Cary Bradcroft's mouth and hands, preventing him from uttering any spells or performing any mystic gestures. The unfathomable beast swatted away Hiawatha and Princesa Verde. But Cedric Lykos leaped upon the bizarre creature almost immediately. Cedric began savagely biting and clawing at the surreal thing until Lykos' own flesh began to fall way, revealing a bipedal wolfen creature. The tenacious man-wolf that emerged used all his strength to roll over the undulating thing – just enough for Cary to free a hand and murmur a spell. With that the mass of eyes and lampreys was sucked back into the air itself, like a film unspooling backwards.
Cary quickly explained what he'd done, but more urgently, he questioned Cedric Lykos, whose surname had been a clue to Cary when they met that Cedric was other than he appeared. Cedric Lykos, as his assumed surname implied, was part of a truly lycanthropic race that Cary had encountered rumors of - the umbra lupa (“shadow wolves”) of Exodesia. Cedric explained, “My people were once humans in Egypt – kidnapped, enslaved, violated, and experimented on with Piscean magicks. They were merged with wolves and interbred with the Exodesians. Word of our existence spread in whispers across the world over the centuries, until we had become mere legend to most.
“Some of us escaped and roamed Earth through the millenia, but not my family. The house that became known as "Lykos" was comprised of the chosen familiars of the sect ruled by the vile High Priest Praven the First. His contemporary namesake ruled my immediate family. My brother, Vulpis, became a hunter for the elder Praven; I was sent by Arch-Priest Urias, for his own purposes, to infiltrate the Zed Foundation. I am sorry, Baron of Shadow.
“I wish to become your familiar. I oppose the Exodesians and loathe the place of my birth. Make me one of you.”
Cary agreed, as Lykos had saved his life from the other-dimensional beast that had attacked him - a creature Lykos called a Zhthuqua. With Nocturno's assist, Cary prepared an incantation that might crack the spell placed over Cedric and shield him from detection by the Exodesians. After the spell was successfully lifted form Cedric, he learned that Princesa Verde had left the mansion, but had left a note for him. She claimed the deception Cedric perpetrated was too much; that he had simply used her; and other harsh accusations. For Cedric's part, he was deeply in love with her, and he was crestfallen to say the least. But the Aggregate did accept him. He and Hand became fast friends, and he was the perfect familiar for Cary, who did not want Cedric to feel enslaved in his new station as in his old.
As noted earlier, Flicker Street's premiere psychedelic band, the Sacred Mirrors, was falling apart by mid 1972. It was in that year that not only did Fiora Charme abdicate her spot as the Mirrors' chanteuse, but also in 1972, a crime-fighting P.I. known as The Wrath emerged in Hallmark. The Wrath, a new and unknown quantity on the Flicker Street scene, came into play in the lives of its denizens. The masked investigator soon discovered that the Mirrors' guitarist Zane D'Azai and bassist Locke were both actually SkullCorp spies attempting to subvert Orphee deLander's Flicker Street scene. Zane and Locke were agents of Phileas Caleb and Donal Rykards, and had been for some time.
Locke was born Dugas van Hoke, half-1st cousin of the White Archer. They shared a grandmother, Seripha de Ruyter, named for the Exodesian Seripha (b. 1700; the mother of Ambrosius ver Dorn and ancestor of Locke and the Archer), whose ancestor Arch-Priestess Serafinia the First the country of Serafinia was named for (as previously noted). The Serafinians were originally pagans who worshiped the Exodesians.
After the Wrath learned their true natures, neither Zane nor Locke were heard from again. Zane, repentant, was given a new ID: Daniel “DJ Dan” Carson, by the Wrath and moved to a trailer park in nearby Gossingham. He continued to see his on and off married girlfriend Chloris Pendred (Kong's granddaughter, about which more in the near future). Locke was slain in a gunfight by Wrath. The Wrath's heroism inspired Cary to dispatch the unlikely duo of Thomas Ledge and Euphrates Straw to seek the services of the mysterious detective for the Aggregate. The Wrath agreed to work for the Zed Foundation, as long as he could retain his PI office.
Wrath's roots in the fabric of our larger tale run deep. He was really John Gauvin (b. 1943), and had been a P.I. Since 1967. He took the costumed identity of Wrath in 1970. He was a collector of vintage weaponry, a fierce fighter, and a first rate detective. He had exceptional genes that nurtured these talents. His father Daniel Gauvin, an insurance salesman with a fiery temper, was the son of one Peter Gauvin and Rachel ver Dorn, the great-granddaughter of Ambrosius ver Dorn, making John a cousin of Locke and of the White Archer.
The black-haired John Gauvin had much Hispanic blood. His mother was Pilar Llosa, making him the nephew of Emilio Florenza (born Vargas Llosa, 1930), one of the 'Four Outsiders' who pilfered SkullCorp cash, tech, and documents and fled from Skull in the 1950s. Thus John is first cousin of Florenza's children, one of whom, Juliana Florenza (b. 1967), will be discussed at much length in the modern portion of this account. Pilar Llosa was the daughter of Carolina Fuentes (granddaughter of the ill-fated Libanian guide Jacinto Fuentes) and Tomas Llosa.
Through Tomas Llosa, John Gauvin is the great-great-grandson of the long-lived gunfighter Sorrow; the fourth great-grandson of Urias (not to mention Urias' long-lived ancestors); and the fifth great-grandchild of Ewen Cromwell the Carnifex. Much proud heroic and villainous blood alike coursed through the veins of the man called the Wrath, and the Shadow Baron saw great potential for good in John Gauvin...
Chapter 10: Thaumaturgy
I. Dark Roots
Now our narrative takes a sharp turn to the left – the Left Hand Path, as it were, in an attempt to document the tangled genealogies and fantastic exploits of those who practice magick in the world of Flicker Street. In order to illuminate rather than obfuscate, we will trace the lineage of our thaumaturgical tree, and describe the strange fruit it bears.
At the topmost branch (or deepest root depending on one's perspective) are the Presences, those primordial, ageless beings worshiped by the Pisceans as dark gods. Only a handful of these beings appear in certain accounts. The most powerful of these are the “brothers” Abraxas and Vaikuntha, offspring of the abstruse Presence whose name can only approximately be rendered as Xhuquaqua-Quoeln (the Tamerlane line in recent centuries supposedly adopted “Qua” as a family name in obeisance to this abstract being). This fearsome Presence gave birth through parthenogenesis.
Vaikuntha has no known true offspring (though in a human avatar form he once impregnated a mortal woman, then planted his consciousness in the soulless infant body; was born; and swiftly aged the child's body back to a facsimile of his older true self). Despite his general lack of emotional or sexual ties to other beings, this malevolent Being has spent more time on Earth than has any other Presence, and seems especially fond of Earth. When Vaikuntha is of a benign bent, Earth is his dominion. When the multi-limbed Presence – a deity to some men – is of a sour disposition, his wrath threatens to consume the planet. He is sworn enemy of all humans and Exodesians alike. Vaikuntha draws his name from the Heavenly abode of Lord Vishnu in Hindu religion; his true appellation has long been forgotten, by his own desire.
Abraxas is a fearsome and inscrutable Presence. He takes his name from an ancient Greek Gnostic principle or entity. Abraxas has a number of descendants through his three known offspring: the Presences Caprice, Thrall, and Oblique. These issue of Abraxas and one of his mates, Shahava, number among the eldest living beings in the known realities. Who knows how many issue sprung from these three over the millennia? We shall examine a handful shortly.
We know from previous accounts that the earliest contact with long-lived alien, or extradimensional, beings, on Earth took place c. 20,000 years ago, or roughly 18,000 BCE. The Omegans (natives of the largest planet orbiting the star Omega Ceti I) arrived at that time on Earth at the place known (in English) as Terminal Pointe, on Mt. Mosaic on the North American continent. The Omegan pilot Tephiris I hid his craft, the Terminus, within the mountain itself.
The Pisceans, under the direction of pilot Ph'nath, also emerged on Earth nearly as long ago, at a Ziggurat in South America – in a territory whose “ownership” has been fought over by the indigenous peoples of Libania and Serafinia for centuries. At both Mt. Mosaic and the Serafinian Ziggurat, each race's sworn foe soon issued an envoy to negotiate the "soft conquest" of planet Earth. The balance of Earth's fate was struck, as the rival races began their alchemical mating experiments in Africa, which in several generations yielded the hybrid race, the Exodesians.
The Presences (except Vaikuntha as noted above) on occasion mated with humans and Exodesians. The earliest such mating occurred in relatively modern times, i.e. in the CE period as we measure time in the West. The eldest of Abraxas' terrible litter was Oblique, a frightful being invoked only sparingly in the Piscean clusters. Oblique mated with an Exodesian princess consecrated to him, Ayazela of the house of the priest Tyrlus. and their offspring was a being called Tyrlus Drexus, another entity sworn to make those of Earth bend the knee or pay the ultimate price. Drexus was called on and worshiped as was his father by Exodesians and human magi alike for centuries. In more modern times, Tyrlus Drexus holds sway over a network of acolytes embedded in world governments, using politics, military interventionism, and the corporatocracy to foment injustice and inequality, and to feed Drexus' insatiable appetite for human suffering.
The next two matings of the children of Abraxas the Abstruse (as he came to be called by modern occult scribes, who also dubbed Abaraxas' cult followers as simply 'The Abstruse'; alternately 'The Order of Cosmick Awakening') occurred significantly later than the birthing of the fearsome Tyrlus Drexus. Abraxas' daughter, known as Caprice, was legends would term a succubus, though she was actually far from that. She seduced and was bonded to a man born of a human father, Izaiah Karollus (a Jewish kabbalist, b. 1313) and an Exodesian maiden Tarish (b. 999) This man, Lucius Karollus (b. 1353) impregnated Caprice, and their only offspring was called Biazel Karollus (born 1387), a prime mover in magickal events on Earth – some might say the prime mover .
It's difficult to determine how many offspring Biazel may have fathered in his seven centuries on Earth, but three, all by different mothers, figure definitively in our larger narrative. Biazel had settled in Hallmark in 1898, bent on accessing its mystic ley lines and Mt. Mosaic (he had tried in the past but been unsuccessful). He appeared to be an elderly Victorian dress-clad dandy. He founded the cults and covens collectively known as 'The Abstruse' and churned out many scholarly and some rather light-hearted tomes on ritual magick and thaumaturgy. He kept his background prior to Hallmark shrouded in rumor and legend.
In 1899, he wed the headstrong intellectual Alanna ver Dorn (b. 1869; the “old maid” daughter of Hallmark co-founder Ambrosius ver Dorn, himself half-Exodesian), who gave birth to Biazel's wickedly beloved daughter, Velupsa Karollus, on January 1, 1900. The child, however, was declared still born and Alanna sued successfully for divorce from the unflappable Biazel. But Biazel had spirited away his child to raise secretly, with a succession of surrogate mothers, molding her into a thaumaturgical weapon.
II. The Fabricands and the Avrils
The perennially youthful and seductive Velupsa Karollus had only a handful of known partners, but that was enough to secure the mystical dynasties of the Avrils and the Fabricands. In 1928 Velupsa wed Smith Fabricand (1906-1956), offspring of Hercule Fabricand, b.1881; and Artemisia Smith, b. 1889. In 1930 Smith and Velupsa begat their elder son John Paul Fabricand, who married Paige Bradcroft (another descendant of Cormac Llewyn Paige and his son Miles, co-founders of Hallmark). They had no issue of their own but raised Kyle , Paige's son by Eloy Queeq, as theirs (much to the boy's ultimate detriment).
In 1936, Velupsa and Smith had Anatole Fabricand, a man much less mystically inclined than his immediate family. Anatole actually became a psychiatrist and spent years as an analyst to the so-called “mystery men”. He encouraged his daughter, Tabitha, b. 1967, to follow suit in the field of mental health. Tabitha's mother, Edwidge Avril, also hailed from a mystical background, her parents being the mage Keegan Avril (1900-1956), descendant of Exodesians.
Tabitha did indeed become a clinical psychologist, against the urging of her stepfather Rudolph Dawes (Edwidge divorced Anatole shortly after the birth of their second child and married Dawes, with whom she had a tempestuous relationship). Tabitha's sister Urania, born in 1974, the gifted offspring of an Avril and a Fabricand, is among the most precocious and awe-inspiring of young magickal talents. Velupsa's blood certainly courses in her veins. As it does strongly in her uncle, the man born Damon Karollus in 1956, but most commonly known as Dr. Damon Carroll, or, in certain circles, as “Serpent's Tooth”.
The divorced Velupsa welcomed a man she was deeply attracted to, the Skull executive Bromley Chamberlain, into her coven of the Abstruse and into her bed in 1956. At this point only a handful of cognoscenti knew Chamberlain's true identity as the mysterious Kong, notably the Exodesian Arch-Priest Urias. By 1956, Velupsa had driven Kong near madness with her lust, her demands, her overpowering persona – but she gave birth to Damon, his son. Only two men knew the truth for decades; Kong did not, nor did his son. Velupsa had confided in the Exodesian necromancer, Urias, and to her father, Biazel Karollus, the grand potentate of the cult of the Abstruse. Damon Carroll ended up in a foster home and Velupsa took her own life (in 1958) on a twisted dare from Kong, who had distanced himself as much as possible from Biazel and his cult for months, and wished Biazel's daughter to cease plaguing him; he felt it an unwelcome distraction from his complex plans for SkullCorp and for the world. Damon went on to play a key role in the history of the Aggregate.
Regarding the Avrils, their line in America began with the French Raoul Avril (b. 1872) and his Scottish wife Martine Keegan, whose line could be traced far back to Pictish breeding with Exodesians. Their son Keegan Avril (1900-1956) wed Astrid Janssen, Astrid was the daughter of Bjorn Janssen, child of Cormac Llewyn Paige and Cormac's other Indian lover Mary Cloud. Bjorn was passed off as Mary 's husband Stole Janssen's son. Astrid's mother was also mostly Native American; her name was Harmony Hand, and her great-nephew, Hiawatha Hand, joined the Aggregate in 1971. And so Astrid Janssen was the great-granddaughter of Ewen Cromwell.
Keegan had a brother Quint Avril, b. 1910, who was a persistent foe and rival of Vance Orlison. Quint was an alchemist by nature, and Vance took issue with the means by which Quint intended to realize his Magnum Opus. Keegan himself, with Astrid, had Raoul Avril II, b. 1934; Egon Avril, b. 1938; Charmain Avril, b. 1942; and, lastly, Edwidge Avril, b. 1947. Raoul wed Wanda Jimenez (b. 1936), the half-Latino, half-African-American daughter of the Avrils' Hispanic servant Betty Jimenez. They married very young, and their interracial union scandalized a number of Hallmark's blue bloods, but they remained together for many years.
Wanda and Raoul II had a son, James Avril, born 1952, who became an Air Force test pilot. James, however, distanced himself slightly from his parents and identified himself as “Jim April”. April became a trial subject for REACT-subsdized TSD experimentation in the 1970s. SkullCorp had struck a deal to share some of their technology with REACT, who added its benefits to America's ever-growing arms race. The TSD gave Jim April what he called “the Flare”, an ability to control flame. He soon took a shine to the punning nickname bestowed upon him, "Flair", for his extranormal ability as well as his sartorial elegance.
Jim was conscripted to duty for REACT in 1976, at the launch of their “Liberation Ops”, or "Freedom Ops" program (whose recruits were referred to as “The Freedom Squad”, a name preferred by its nominal leader Roger Greer). This program was intended to birth a government-owned and sanctioned group along the general lines of the Aggregate. More information on Freedom Ops will be detailed in upcoming treatments.
Raoul and Wanda Avril tried unsuccessfully to have more children over the years, while Raoul's brother Egon married archaeologist Stephanie Ransom. They had two sons, Karl Raoul Avril, b. 1964, and Jesputh Ransom Avril, b. 1967 (named for Stephanie's brother Jesputh Ransom, who left Hallmark for good after marrying, though his daughter Ally eventually moved there). Stephanie was a partner in Randell Coventry's Coventry Expeditions, which had grown out of Orphee deLander's holdings, and merged with Bradcroft Ltd. In 1982.
Keegan Avril's first daughter, buxom beauty Charmain Avril, was an exotic dancer, and was quite a superstar in the 1960s and 1970s, often a star performer at the infamous Lucifer Club. She remained single until 1982, when she retired and married Dr. Lawrence Rubinstien. Keegan's youngest daughter Edwidge's marriage and offspring have been discussed above.
Keegan Avril and Smith Fabricand met their demise together in 1956 at the hands of Nocturno. They had been plotting against Cary Bradcroft since his move to Hallmark early that year. They wished to garner the attention of the Exodesian ruling religious sect, the Obscuros (from which the Abstruse gained some of their knowledge, passed down from Piscean principles) by slaying the “one that got away”, Cary Bradcroft. They offered to sacrifice Cary to the Obscuros. The aforementioned Exodesian Arch-Priest and Grand Necromancer, Urias, was all in favor of the idea. When Avril and Fabricand tried to capture Cary, Nocturno appeared and destroyed them with a powerful working he had been preparing for the dangerous duo for some time. Cary was stunned at Nocturno's first use of his undead power to take human lives, and girded himself for a war with other mages that never came. Nocturno's actions served as an unequivocal statement that the Shadow Baron was not to be trifled with. Thus a magickal cold war of sorts began that lasted for some years, until Exodesian priests craving power caught the attention of the brothers Bradcroft.
Before his demise, Smith had remarried, to Patricia Paige (b. 1930), daughter of Miles Paige II and Blanche Westin. Their daughter, Milicent Sherrad Fabricand, born 1954, grew up to be a very kind, maternal woman who ultimately helped the Aggregate immensely and tried more than once to settle down with two of its most prominent members.
III. The Disraelis and the Van Jusses
The Bradcrofts have been much-discussed up until now, but some of their offspring and extended family have yet to be covered. To get to the root of the Bradcroft offshoots, we must consider one Janos Disraeli. Disraeli's origins are uncertain. It is known that he is European, of an indeterminate age, and the father of two known children by two different wives. What is certain is that for a time, he was possibly Earth's most powerful sorcerer, rivaling or exceeding the abilities of the Bradcrofts, Biazel Karollus, or any Exodesian.
Janos likely carried some Exodesian blood; he was possibly directly descended from an Omegan, a Piscean, or even of the Presences. For many years, Disraeli led the Order of Gammadion, an ancient secret society founded by a man said to be descended from the eldest known Exodesians. Gammadion Whitelock was a priest who lived at least 10,000 years ago and was the maternal grandson of the druid Brithemain, who at one point guarded the Ziggurat in South America. Brithemain was the son of a human tribeswoman, Salvara, a Serafinian, and of the ancient Exodesian explorer named Tephiris, who criss-crossed the planet in an Omegan Pod in antediluvian times and spread his seed far. He waged war, but yearned for peace, with the Exodesians.
Gammadion's uncle, Mordechai Whitelock, a member of Gammadion's order, was a warrior priest who may have been the longest lived man ever born on Earth. In 1498 CE, Mordechai had his last known dalliance with a mortal woman – a Scots-Welsh barmaid called Finn Cromwell. From this union sprang the infamous Ewen Cromwell.
Gammadion disappeared from his order well before the founding of Hallmark, some said to find a means to extend his already preternaturally long life. Some have whispered that Gammadion was willing the order to his heirs, for they believe Janos Disraeli is Gammadion's true son. It is unknown just when Janos Disraeli stepped in to lead the sect, though what is known is that Janos took the sect in a somewhat different direction. Gammadion's taste ran more towards Omegan alchemy (a bit more science-based than the Piscean's darker explorations). Disraeli preserved this, but injected some arcane rites of dark magick from the Pisceans. Disraeli occasionally reffered to the Order as the “true Exodesians”, and claimed to have a more balanced outlook than Exodesians, whom he saw as sycophants to Pisces and its dark Presences. Exodesia's obsession with infiltrating and eventually displacing humanity held no charm for Disraeli. The Obscuros and Biazel Karollus alike scoffed at Janos' philiosophies and practices.
Disraeli's major accomplice in his occult activities was Griffin Van Juss (b. 1890), the son of Enoch Van Juss, one of the Dutch settlers who founded Hallmark. It is unknown if Enoch, like several of the settlers, carried Exodesian blood. Griffin Van Juss had three children: twins Remuel and Katherine, b. 1923; and Rachael, b. 1927. The three siblings met Cary and Ashton Bradcroft in 1945, while in college at Oxford. The five of them formed a coven, along with Cary's lover, the half-Indian Jerusha Dharma, and, later, the duplicitous young Myrus T Fellbane.
Katherine and Ashton soon began an affair; unfortunately Rachael was also in love with Ashton. The coven studied through the late 1940s and into the 1950s. During their studies, Janos Disraeli himself taught them much, but they wrongly felt that the Order of Gammadion was an evil path. The Bradcrofts were good men, but filled, alas, with hubris. In 1954, Remuel and Katherine quit the coven to join their father in Disraeli's order, while Rachael remained with the Bradcrofts. Katherine discovered she was pregnant with Ashton's child. Disraeli knew the twin brothers were bound for Exodesia, and he did not wish to encroach on the hidden land. The Bradcroft twins did just that, but Rachael stayed behind. Jerusha and Fellbane both insisted on coming.
The details of the Bradcroft expedition can be found in treatment #1: Backstory. Suffice to say, only Cary penetrated Exodesia and survived to tell of it. Ashton was destroyed but resurrected as an undead homonculous in the Obscuros' birthing chamber. Cary lived, and gained extraordinary mystical knowledge at a staggering rate inside the chamber. So much so he felt his mind might shatter.
By 1955, Cary had regrouped in Europe, traveling and sorting through his newfound knowledge. In the meantime, Fellbane took Jerusha to London, where his cousin employed them. She had a son that year, a boy she named Vincent Cliven Dharma, or Clive. She gave Clive an amulet his father, Cary Bradcroft, had given her. Clive grew up hating his father and wondering why he abandoned Jerusha. Fellbane made sure this belief was fostered. Clive Dharma will be discussed extensively in future installments but for now we turn to his extended family.
While Cary made his way across Europe, his brother had found Rachael Van Juss and told her the shocking truth of his new existence. After she digested the horrid news, she agreed, out of a love she still felt for Ashton, to take part in a magickal working with him. Now known only as Nocturno, the man who was Ashton Bradcroft used ancient alchemy in a potentially dangerous ritual to infuse his essence into Rachael, thus entering into an alchemical wedding with her. Even more startling, an alchemical pregnancy resulted.
Nocturno learned that Katherine had given birth to his child. She named the boy Ashton van Juss and was not shy about his parentage. Nocturno refused to come for her or the child, though, and Rachael lied to her family about the source of her own pregnancy. When her odd-looking daughter was born in late 1955, she named her Silent Indigo (for she was dark of skin and mute). She kept Nocturno's secrets, and Griffin van Juss was outraged, demanding to know what sort of inhuman being fathered Silent Indigo.
The van Jusses were living in Holland when Rachael returned to them, so, in 1959 Griffin summoned Cary Bradcroft to his Dutch manor, and he confronted the Shadow Baron. Remuel demanded his father kill Bradcroft. Katherine, however, yearned for Cary as she had his brother, and they soon consummated their desire for each other. Soon after, Griffin attacked Cary. Cary defended himself, but under duress, unleashed great power on Griffin, slaying him in the process. Remuel and Katherine both then attacked Cary, but he escaped and returned to Hallmark. He was distressed that he had to kill Griffin; he was even more distressed when he learned the darkest family secret: that Remuel and Katherine were engaged in an incestuous affair. Katherine became pregnant and, unsure of her baby's paternity, she kept it nonetheless/ It was a daughter she named Sarah Janos van Juss, b. 1960.
As for Janos Disraeli, he was attracted to a number of women in the 1960s, among them Katherine. The two connected, and later wed, in 1963. He agreed to raise young Ashton (who she renamed Justin) and Sarah (he was already the girl's godfather). He put a permanent stop to Remuel's and Katherine's affair by basically frightening Remuel into leaving Holland. Remuel headed to America; his first stop was Hallmark, where he challenged Cary to a mystic duel of sorts. Cary easily bested him, holding back from killing him as he did his father (though he wanted to), and Remuel slunk away, ending up in New York City, where he opened a small occult bookshop.
In 1965, Katherine gave birth to Janos' first known child: Griffin Disraeli. But there was already a rift developing between Katherine and Janos. They divorced the following year. Janos sought out Remuel in New York and was amused by his bookshop. He was also a bit taken by a young woman who hung out at the shop: an aspiring poet/ chanteuse named Sophie Pavlinchak (b. 1947). Within a year Janos had charmed the young woman with promises to bankroll her creative endeavors. She impulsively wed the magician, and was soon expecting his child. In 1967, their daughter Tana Disraeli was born. Sophie began traveling with a band, performing her ragged folk tunes with rather esoteric lyrics, and Janos allowed her this freedom and returned to Europe for a short time. In that time, Sophie lit on Hallmark for a show, and was immediately enamored of Flicker Street. She met there a mysterious, much older gentleman called Bram Vallard. As sharp readers might recall, Bram Vallard is the favored pseudonym of James Vallard Tressilian, the Apparition (also known as Lambert Christensen, Royal Hoxworth, and Saturnine). Vallard, who had been a loner for some time, was drawn to the frail, urchin-like creature with an intense charisma and a deep, brooding, androgynous beauty. Vallard wooed the impetuous young poet/ musician, to no avail.
IV. Sophie
In 1969, Bram Vallard, who was still infatuated with Sophie Pavlinchak, invited the Disraelis to his retreat in China. They were hosted by Vallard's young son Archimedes Ko. Disraeli was no stranger in China. He had visited Feng Qi on one previous occasion and met with its mistress, Shun Ti. Vallard had trained in the Orient all through the 1920s and periodically returned to his resort there. Unfortunately for all, Biazel had plans for Sophie Pavlinchak as well. He decreed that she would serve as fodder for one of the Presences, who would destroy Disraeli and Vallard, two of the many figures Biazel saw as potential threats to him. He and Janos had a centuries-long rivalry, and Biazel foretold that this was to be the perfect time to end it once and for all.
Biazel summoned the Presence known only as Thrall, who destroyed Janos Disraeli and ravished his wife after placing Vallard into a dreamlike state. Vallard believed that he was making love with Sophie. She was in a delirious state the entire time. She dreamt she was with Bram and was unaware of Thrall's violation. Thrall disappeared into its own plane. Ko managed to get his father, Sophie, and little Tana to safety and to get medical attention. Sophie went to Europe and attended Disraeli's funeral. Vallard invited her to convalesce at his chateau, to which she agreed.
Sophie soon found that she was pregnant; she asked Vallard to give the child his name as he was likely the father. Vallard honestly did not recall his time in a drugged state, except that it was possible he and Sophie made love. So he agreed to wed her at the chateau. She did not wish to be married again so soon, but Vallard insisted; he was "old-fashioned" in that way. But he soon had to return to Hallmark and assist with the final confrontation with Kanabal. He was away for weeks, and later that year (1970), Sophie had a son she named Devon Vallard. Devon was the first child born of a union between a human and one of the Presences since Biazel's birth, and Biazel swore he would one day claim the child for his Order.
In 1973, Vallard went on what he deemed one last mission as the Apparition, with Shadow Baron and some of the Aggregate. Vallard's ultimate purpose was to assassinate Biazel. The official word after the mission was that the Apparition had not made it back alive. Archimedes Ko took over Vallard's retreat, and was soon recruited to help train Ko's nephew, Liao Jun-kim (or June Kim Liao, b. 1967), who figures prominently in the future of Flicker Street.
Twice widowed, with two young children, Sophie Pavlinchak returned to New York to advance her career. She suffered from deep depression and nightmares for years, and eventually slid into drug addiction. She had two notable affairs in the 1970s. In 1973, she slept with Remuel van Juss one night at his bookshop. She was soon pregnant again, though she wished no further contact with van Juss and regretted the entire sordid incident. Van Juss was something of a deviant, to put it mildly. She strongly considered an abortion, but ultimately decided to bear the child and to raise it by herself. The child was born in 1974. She named him Iain Pavlinchak; Iain after her own father, Ian Rhys McGregor. Her parentage was another reason Biazel targeted Sophie; she was not merely a wayward and troubled young intellectual with dreams of fame as a rock star poet. She also had a genetic destiny, since her father had not only been a hero but also the bastard son of the Exodesian Arch-Priest Urias. Her mother, Silvana Pavlinchak, had met McGregor during World War II and their passionate affair resulted in Sophie.
Sophie had a mentor in New York, Matthias Creed, who was an underground filmmaker of some repute, having directed such provocative films as Awakening in Hell and was working throughout the 70s on his magnum opus Abraxas Rising. Matthias, though gay, had married a woman briefly in the 1940s and had a son, Emeril Creed. Emeril and his father had a strained relationship, but Emeril was essentially good-natured, not dark at all like Sophie's previous lovers. She had vowed never to be wed again, but relented to see if the proverbial “nice guy” was her cup of tea. She soon decided he wasn't, but by this time had given him a daughter, Kirillian Creed, born in November 1976.
Sophie did something bold and, some would say, cruel at this point. She sought out Bram Vallard with the help of her best friend from Flicker Street – Orphee de Lander, whom she also saw as a mentor of sorts. Orphee contacted Archimedes Ko, and soon realized Vallard was not truly dead. Ko reached out to Sophie and agreed to take her to his father. Ko believed that Devon Vallard was not really his half-brother but declined to theorize exactly why he speculated this. Sophie flew to meet with Vallard. She took along her first three children (Griffin, Tana, and Devon), but left Kirillian with Emeril.
Upon seeing Bram again and conferring with him, she agreed with him that there was much more to Devon's conception than they realized. Vallard, detective that he was, was convinced his own son Ko was in on Janos Disraeli's death and the drugging of Sophie and Vallard. Sophie implored Vallard to help her fake her own death; she was burnt out on her lifestyle, wished to get clean from drugs, and, rather callously, wished to detach herself from the Creed family for good. Vallard declined to help her, but Ko stepped in and acquiesced. It was only a matter of time before word reached Emeril Creed that his wife and the mother of his infant daughter had died in a plane crash coming home to them.
Despite her intentions, Sophie's descent into darkness continued, and she eventually abandoned Devon, wishing no more reminders of the mysterious incident surrounding his conception. As for Emeril Creed, he quickly remarried, and Thelma Bruce, his new wife, adopted Kirillian Creed. The Creeds agreed to do what they could to expunge the child's memory of any trace of Sophie, though Matthias Creed, who loved his granddaughter dearly, was opposed to this. As fate would have it, Emeril took a job in Hallmark in 1980, and Thelma passed away of cancer in 1988. Kirillian, a restless spirit, began to enjoy hiking to escape her blues, and told her father often that one day she'd scale Mt. Mosaic and learn its secrets. She had an instinctive intuition that Mt. Mosaic was of importance to all humanity. It would be some years, but she would eventually learn how correct she was.
Chapter 11: Liberation
I. The Aggregate Revisited
During the years 1970-1975, the Aggregate was a team of international and interracial makeup that took part in an array of fantastic adventures (some to be detailed in future accounts). Their main concern was cracking the multi-leveled crime cartel run by SkullCorp, who continued to present itself as an entertainment and leisure conglomerate. Beneath this facade, several factions used Skull's wealth, resources, and technology to further their own acquisition of power and political influence. Kith M'Nali, the “Black Tamerlane” (who Thomas Ledge uncharitably referred to as “Black Manchu”) and Phileas Caleb were foremost among Skull's inner circle, directing their depraved agendas. Fellow inner circle member Arch-Priest Urias became partners in the late 1970s with Carnifex, who he used as his personal enforcer. Ewen Cromwell fortunately liked Urias and allowed himself to be used in this fashion. The two forged an unlikely and uneasy friendship. One of their targets was millionaire Ben Renova, one of Hallmark's foremost businessmen and the part-time vigilante known as Wurm. Also during this period, the debased arch-mage Biazel Karollus and his coven, the Abstruse, encountered the Bradcrofts via the sorcerer Antioch Moldor, one of Biazel's most loyal acolytes.
As the curtain fell on 1972, the following individuals' activities fell under the rubric of the Aggregate: Shadow Baron, Nocturno, the White Archer, Dr. E, Ursulin, Emerson Trent, Euphrates Straw, Thomas Ledge, Cedric Lykos, Hiawatha Hand, Gulliver, The Wrath, and the Blue Dahlia. At the end of the year, revolutionary black leader Arliss Gordon Cope (also known as Graven Idyll) came to the group for help in rescuing several of his militant group, including one Cotton Suede (born Pauline Cutler). Cotton was a hot-blooded crusader for civil rights and against the exploitation of the black community, either by outside forces or from within.
The small group of Aggregate members dispatched by the Bradcrofts to liberate Cotton and her partners from FOPA forces made it out of the underground HQ of the terrorist group (which FOPA had essentially become under Skull) - except for Emerson Trent. Trent had been seized and taken to the inner circle. Shadow Baron then offered Graven Idyll a spot on the team, and he acquiesced. Cotton was not invited to join but ended up inviting herself along to several of the group's missions.
1973 began as a year of upheaval and many battles fought; a number of them lost. Trent's captors brought him to Phileas Caleb. Emerson finally confronted Caleb mano a mano. Trent began beating Caleb, letting loose his pent-up rage at the man who broke up his family in Jamaica. Caleb managed to to shoot up Trent with a hypodermic loaded with a massive dose of what Donal Rykards laughingly called “Skull Wine”, a TSD-derived concoction, and a lethal one. It mutated cells as TSD did, but at an uncontrollable rate. Trent did not explode like Dr. E; he merely imploded, and crumbled away.
The loss in terms of genius and brotherhood to the Aggregate was inestimable. Euphrates Straw swore his family would personally destroy Caleb. Emerson Trent left behind a 14 year old son in Jamaica, Roman Torrance “Oblidiah” Trent, who was determined to learn the truth about why his father left Kingston.
Carnifex returned after three years to menace the Aggregate, leading a unit against the Aggregate: The Damnation Brigade, which included Pallor (an undead creature, born Lasse Pallor, b. 1910, d. 1943; resurrected by Urias in 1943); L'Argent (Claude Mercer, a great-grandson of Ewen Cromwell and of Tephiris; an unerring thief and pickpocket; the richest criminal in France; and possessed of uncanny resilience and reflexes); Tormenter (Solomon Vossius; covered previously); Zhey Liao (master martial artist and half-brother of Archimedes Ko, also a descendant of Shun Ti); and Vigil and Parrish (Rev. Elijah Pike and Theodis “Theo” Parrish, two religious fanatics with mysterious pasts who received TSD enhancement while in prison; both were incredibly powerful and attributed their gifts to the grace of God rather than alien technology). The brainchild of Antioch Moldor, a powerful sorcerer and disciple of Biazel, the Damnation Brigade plagued the Bradcrofts' group of unlikely vigilantes on and off for four years, and slew Gulliver in their very first attack on the Aggregate.
II. New Blood
In 1974, Dr. E's containment suit began to unravel in the midst of fighting the psychotic mutated evangelist Parrish and he exploded. Parrish was destroyed; Blue Dahlia was believed to be dead as a result. Lykos was badly injured but quickly healed due to his theriomorphic nature. REACT declared Dr E too dangerous and now under their purview; he was taken away and held in a special stasis field at a REACT facility. Paige soon learned the truth she had long suspected – that E was Eloy Queeq, her ex-lover and Kyle Fabricand's father. Kyle, only 18 at that time, worked in a menial capacity at SkullCorp.
Paige tried to see Queeq to no avail, angering the Bradcrofts. Cary confronted Kyle over his mother's situation, and the young man attacked Bradcroft with a spell he'd long been practicing. This was quite an uneven match, and Cary's parting words to his cousin were that he'd spare Kyle's life only because he was Paige's son.
In January 1975, Nocturno went to the man who masterminded the wife and child-swapping Paige endured – Artemus Thorne. Their verbal sparring escalated, until Nocturno gestured at Thorne, wiping him completely out of existence.
Cary told Ashton that Nocturno's powers, and those of Dr. E, were out of control, and that the Aggregate needed to rethink their tactics and keep a lower profile in order to persevere. REACT and the government were seemingly aware of everything they did, despite the Bradcroft's mystic safeguards. With what he saw as an ultimatum from his twin brother, Nocturno left - left Cary, the group, America... everything, and was gone until 1982. He embarked on a long-term occult project – a magickal working that was to be his crowning achievement, years down the line.
The Aggregate was left to Cary alone to lead (with the aid of his field commanders, Brandon ver Dorn and Euphrates Straw). Cary immediately began securing new allies.
In early 1975, Cary sought out Konchuman, a motorcycle-riding martial arts expert who clad him himself in a chitinous body armor and patrolled various crime-plagued areas in and around Tokyo, Japan. Born Ishiro Nakamura in 1953, Konchuman sometimes partnered with his 19 year old cousin, musician Jiro Nashida, who went by the handle Go Demon. Jiro's father was the brilliant professor Kenji Nashida, who had begun working with SkullCorp in the 1950s and had access to their experiments with alien technology, specifically the much-sought after TSD substance. His personal experiments gave rise to extranormal abilities in his son and nephew, and Kenji encouraged them both to use these abilities for the proverbial betterment of mankind. Or, at least, of Tokyo.
Kenji's daughter Kai Nashida was also a beneficiary of sorts of her father's genetic manipulations in the late 1950s. Kai caught the eye of Kong and they had a child, known as Lumena, who plagued the Aggregate in the late 70s. Konchuman's father was Shiro Nakamura, Professor Nashida's half-brother. The brothers were the grandsons of the legendary gunfighter Mercy and his lover, the “Lady Ronin”, Meiko Nakamura. Hence the Nashidas and Nakamuras were also descendants of Ewen Cromwell and of the Exodesians, and this genetic heritage fed into the latest generation's TSD enhancements. Kenji had been a colleague of Emerson Trent's and offered his son and nephew to work for the Aggregate, much to Skull's, Caleb's, and Rykards' chagrin. Cary swore to Prof. Nashida that he would safeguard the young men.
Shadow Baron then considered approaching Deacon Thrush (born Bishop Mercer, a cocaine dealer and martial artist who was yet another descendant of Carnifex through the sprawling French Mercer clan), who had grown up on the streets, coming up under Graven Idyll's wing, and who had been trying for some time to gather enough cash to get out of a life of crime, and out of America altogether. Thrush had finally put down a final huge score and moved to Europe for a time, leaving behind Cotton Suede, not knowing that she was pregnant with their son. Cotton swore if Bradcroft could wait for her to give birth, and for her to find family to help raise the child, she would fight for the Aggregate for as long as they needed her – or until her death. Shadow Baron agreed to these terms – if she would persuade the father of her child to join them as well upon his return. This did not sit well with Ms. Suede.
III. Lords of Liberty
In 1975, President Gerald Ford and REACT unveiled Freedom Ops. President Ford was famously quoted as saying, “Our long national nightmare is over.... Now we are wide awake – and the American dream has a new lease on life”. It was announced that REACT and other agencies would be “employing a highly trained team of exceptional individuals to curtail threats foreign and domestic that fall beyond the purview of traditional intelligence agencies.” REACT “drafts” almost half of the Aggregate: the White Archer, Dr. E (then somewhat recovered), Wurm, The Wrath, and Ursulin (who they wish to keep the closest tabs on). Thomas Ledge, surprisingly, was not selected but was told that his REACT insider status in the Aggregate was invaluable.
The US rounded out their “sensational seven” (President Ford's epithet) with Jim April AKA 'Flare' (a 'token' black member) and millionaire Roger Greer, otherwise known as Liberty Lord. They were trained extensively on working together and REACT dubbed them the “Freedom Squad”.
Roger Anthony Greer was a very wealthy man whose positions had been handed to him with little sweat or toil. He was often compared to his sometime rival, real estate mogul Carven Trammel – a larger than life character, and a bit of a blustering blowhard. Greer was a bit more genuinely athletic than the disingenuous Trammel claimed to be. Greer would not be the first man to assume the persona of “Liberty Lord” - an identity steeped in patriotic symbolism. The original Liberty Lord was actually a flawed, all-too-human hero who presented an “all-American” image somewhat ironically. He was really Clarke Ledge (son of SkullCorp mastermind Kong [though he was never aware of this] and brother of Thomas Ledge).
Clarke Ledge was a closeted homosexual teacher born in 1934 in Lincoln, Nebraska – an era and a place where men were simply not openly homosexual. Clarke suffered at the hands of his father, brother, and peers, and remained very closeted as a gay man for many years. In the early 1960s, inspired by the Silent Seven's exploits, he moved to Hallmark, and became a costumed vigilante of sorts, complete with teen sidekick “Pronto” (Luis Esteban, the son of Clarke's gardener and a boy thrown out of his house when his homosexuality was discovered). Ledge trained Esteban rigorously. The two men worked out much of their frustration over their repressed backgrounds by inflicting physical pain on hypocritical "manly men" who preyed on those weaker than themselves. They sought to bring actual liberty to the disenfranchised - and hence were more "all-American" than militaristic bigots like Clarke's brother Thomas.
Clarke had served in the Korean War at the same time as his older brother, though he detested institutionalized slaughter. Both Clarke and Thomas were superhumanly strong, tough, and agile; Kong's Omegan genes were strong in the brothers.
Clarke and Luis fought crime, rather sloppily, in the early 1960s in Hallmark as Liberty Lord and Pronto. Pronto was often injured in battle, and Clarke tended to him as best he could. Their family doctor was suspicious of the two young men living together, even with Luis ostensibly being Ledge's live-in stable boy and gardener. Clarke decided to move to nearby, quieter Gossingham and buy a generous spread. Alas, he counted not on the plethora of rednecks in Gossingham. Clarke decided he should be married and have a child to maintain appearances. Luis was extremely jealous.
In 1964, Liberty Lord and Pronto were approached by Cary Bradcroft about being charter members of the Aggregate. Bradcroft divined their situation and told them that they would be under his protection, and didn't need to fear reprisals for their homosexual relationship. Clarke blew up at Cary, and he and Luis denied even being gay. They informed Bradcroft that they would handle crime as a duo, as they'd always done. Bradcroft admonished them that their days could be numbered, between Hallmark's escalating street level crime, and the then-current social milieu.
And indeed, in 1965, Pronto was killed in a vicious scrap with four raging homophobes while Clarke was at work one day. Pronto had managed to kill one of his attackers, and seriously maim another, before he succumbed to his injuries. Luis Esteban was barely 19. Clarke hunted down the scum that had slain his lover, and with his immense strength killed the three surviving attackers - even the one now handicapped. Clarke left Gossingham when suspicion began to turn in his direction.
He moved back to Hallmark and wed Sadie Palmer, a well-off wallflower of a girl (and the first cousin of Brandon ver Dorn). He again turned down Cary's offer to team up. Instead, he fashioned a new uniform, one more overtly and facetiously patriotic than the one before, and brutally dispatched criminals at night, usually beating them just short of killing them. He took immense pleasure in dealing pain to those he likened to the scum that slew Luis.
He and Sadie raised a foster child for a few years, Damon Carroll (from 1965-1969), and Clarke encouraged him to be a chiropractor, which Damon ultimately achieved. Clarke nor Damon learned then of their familial connection via Kong, and Damon never learned that Clarke was gay, though Sadie found out in the early 1970s and began seeing a psychotherapist. She had been unhappy for sometime, due to her desire to have her own child, which never transpired, largely because of Clarke's difficulties in making love to his wife.
Meanwhile, Clarke's major focus had become the company he'd gotten a job with – SkullCorp, where he worked in entertainment advertising, a job similar to the one Kong had in his youth in Nebraska as Caine Ledge, albeit on a much grander scale. As the years went by, and his marriage began to dissolve, Clarke became obsessed with tracing every aspect of Skull's operations. He had long suspected a connection between them and "the Machine", Hallmark's organized crime organization (named for the original inner circle of Skull).
In 1974, Ledge, who was adept at data entry, accidentally unlocked a computer code to a computer far more advanced than what he was accustomed to. This machine, extrapolated from Omegan technology years earlier, laid out the inner circle of Skull. The program was filled with disinformation in case someone cracked it, as had happened once before (this will be discussed in due time), but the basic structure was accurate, enough for Liberty Lord to take the info to Shadow Baron.
And then he was shot point blank in the back of the head and left for dead. Fortunately, he had been followed by Roger Greer, who had a major account with Skull at the time, and had also become distrustful of some of their dealings. Unlike his rival Carven Trammel, Greer was somewhat ethical in his business dealings, or tried to be.
Greer found the dying Ledge, who murmured some indecipherable verbiage, as well as, “Now you.. be Liberty Lord. They know about me...Don't let them...”
Over the next year, Roger Greer's life radically changed. He was already of prime genetic stock, being descended from Ewen Cromwell, the immortal Carnifex, through the Paige family. But he wasn't as naturally strong as Clarke, and so he trained himself mercilessly for months. Still ostensibly on good terms with Skull, he asked if he could volunteer for a TSD trial. TSD experimentation was at an all-time low, Skull having gathered as much info they deemed useful for the time being. So Roger bought his way in. For a huge fee, he submitted to a procedure that was very safe and streamlined; not like the days of Eloy Queeq and Orpheus deLander.
Greer emerged, physically a man of Olympian proportions. He had also become somewhat more intelligent, though his septic political leanings mitigated much of his intellect. He decided the only way to stop Skull was through REACT. He never even considered approaching the Aggregate, finding Cary Bradcroft's reputation too outre for his liking. Greer left his wife Angela and young daughter Kelsey (b. 1972), setting them up for life financially, and offered his services, and essentially his entire life and resources, to REACT. He scored the highest on the team training tests (Ursulin held back, as he had no desire to lead), and was nominated the first field leader for Freedom Ops. A few more months of training together and 1976 – the nation's bicentennial – would herald the first mission of what Roger Greer called “Liberty Lord and the Freedom Squad”. Greer's identity, as far as he knew, remained unknown to SkullCorp, so he continued to do business with them to maintain appearances - something Greer had mastered, but a quality that had caused the prior Liberty Lord much sorrow in his short but heroic life.
IV. Shifting Paradigms
Around the time Cotton Suede took her place with the Aggregate, another female member signed up - Silent Indigo, Nocturno's “alchemical child”. Cary knew that Ashton did not want his daughter in the team, but she was in a torrid, intermittent affair with Orphee de Lander, the Absurd Tentacle, who persuaded her to be his “inside woman” in the Aggregate. Cary hoped that eventually he could make a firm alliance with the Tentacle.
Cary trained the mute Indigo in the mystic arts, honing and refining her talents over the following months. Then, the team was confronted by Brother Zodiac, who now seemed more a nemesis than an ally. Cary learned that Zodiac was raised in New Orleans as Trevor Novembre, but it was still unknown what his place and date of birth were.
Graven Idyll and Cotton Suede were making headway in their war on The Machine, often clashing with the urbane Milo Majestyk, the head of the mob in Hallmark.
Majestyk succeeded the sadistic Tony Duarte as “godfather” of Hallmark's organized crime empire. Duarte had had twin sons: Julius and Alec. Julius Duarte was content to live a decadent life, merely waiting for Milo to be executed by the law or by his own rivals, so that he could follow in his father's footsteps. Ironically, Julius and Milo later became lovers. Alec ran away as a teenager, having had enough of his gangster father and prostitute mother, Roxanne Cooper Duarte. Alec Duarte's life will be discussed at length in future installments.
In 1976, while a few of the Aggregate were dealing with a kidnapping case of appalling proportions, an attempt was made on the life of Thomas Ledge. The identity of his would-be assassin was not uncovered. The “kidnappings” turned out to be a voluntary exodus of Flicker Street youths to a bizarre commune which engaged in “happenings” designed to purge oneself of accrued psychic trauma and to begin to heal psychic scar tissue. These performance art like rituals were filmed by the ringleader, Kranz Mueller, who turned out to be the seemingly deceased Dahlia Mueller's father. Kranz was raising his granddaughter Kappy McCleary in this highly charged environment.
Aggregate member Konchuman was instrumental in rescuing Kappy, and Thomas Ledge helped reunite her with Dahlia's ex-husband Keefer McCleary. Keefer was a good father to young Kappy, but he was secretly a hired thug for Milo Majestyk. Kranz was held on charges, along with his daughter Eva Mueller (Dahlia's sister) and Eva's lovers Hans Vorchett and Elrod “Fenris” Sebastian. During the trial, another attempt on Thomas' life was carried out; again he survived, albeit badly wounded this time.
The mistake many made was in thinking that the assailant was tied in with Kranz Mueller's Psycho-Situationist Theatre “cult”. In reality, the threat to Ledge was of a much more personal nature. Ledge was stalked and baited with notes upon his release from the hospital. One note was empty save for a photograph of a woman, Adora White, who Thomas had had a teenage affair with. Adora was dead, the last he'd heard. But she left a widower, Desmond Daltrey, and a son, Jericho. Thomas flew to the Mid-West to confront Desmond. Desmond explained that his son had been killed in Vietnam and he couldn't help Ledge any further.
Jericho Daltrey was, in fact, a black ops agent for REACT since he was recruited towards the end of the Vietnam War, and was indeed alive – after a fashion. A landmine had nearly killed him, but REACT rebuilt him with highly advanced cybernetic technology cribbed from SkullCorp, as well as Omegan regenerative tech that they now possessed. Jericho Daltrey learned while at REACT that he was the biological son of Thomas Ledge. Jericho himself was divorced and his son by Janice Albrecht was named Desmond “Dez” Daltrey II (b. 1974).
The members of the Aggregate broke up Kranz Mueller's group and returned the minors involved to their homes. Cary found it ironic given how young the members of the Aggregate were when they began their respective careers. An explosion rigged to kill Ledge caught the Aggregate unaware. Hiawatha Hand was killed. Euphrates Straw and Cotton Suede were badly injured. Konchuman was partially dismembered, but his TSD Recombinant mutation had utilized some cybernetics and he was able, much like Jericho, to be reconstructed and healed. Go Demon pursued a man Lykos had spied on an adjacent rooftop. Lykos climbed on the back of Jiro Nashida's motorcycle and the two were hot on the saboteur's heels when Silent Indigo appeared. She had homed in on his body energy and trailed it unfalteringly. She knocked the startled man off a rooftop and he suffered a nasty fall that would've killed a normal human.
But Jericho Daltrey was no longer a “normal human”. He feigned unconsciousness, and was taken away to a hospital, followed by REACT vehicles. The REACT agents on the street obfuscated everything that had happened, and made sure the local news followed the narrative they wished disseminated. When Thomas Ledge arrived, with credentials, the REACT men identified Jericho Daltrey as Ledge's stalker – and told Thomas that he was Daltrey's father. They also claimed Jericho was dead, and informed Ledge that the crimes against him and the others were solved, and that the case was closed. Ledge was forced to believe the story, as he still trusted REACT, but Shadow Baron and Silent Indigo knew that Jericho was alive, though they could only trace him so far. Daltrey may have survived, but the hero Hiawatha Hand was deceased, and Cotton, Straw, and Ishiro were nearly killed as well.
V. Kong's Last Claim?
No sooner had the Aggregate recovered from the Daltrey incident than Kong the Claimer issued to them a bold decree: he invited them to Castle Kong, his fortress in Germany, to hold a twisted New Years ceremony. There, he swore, the final battle between them would transpire. The year 1976 was waning, Jimmy Carter had won the presidency of the United States, and the so-called “Freedom Squad” was entrenched in foreign affairs. They spent much time ostensibly sabotaging the efforts of FOPA in Libania, while Skull was filling Libanian coffers with enough money to commit terrorist acts all across South America.
Serafinia was finally conquered by FOPA, with the help of drug and arms money supplied by Skull's business end. Though to the average American, Skull was largely an entertainment conglomerate. Skull produced films and television; were pioneers in home video, and video games; managed bands and made music instruments. Lovers of art and entertainment had no clue their hard-earned dollars were buying and shipping hard drugs and deadly weapons around the world, much less synthesizing and hybridizing advanced alien technology.
Freedom Ops planned to deal with two major threats in 1977 and were “too busy” to loan any help to the Aggregate against Kong. As for Cary Bradcroft's group, they were now boasting their most eclectic lineup (even after Hand's death): Shadow Baron, Thomas Ledge, Euphrates Straw, Graven Idyll, Cotton Suede, Konchuman, Go Demon, Cedric Lykos, and Silent Indigo. Bradcroft felt it was time to recruit for the scenario with Kong, but there was no time to adequately train new members.
The Freedom Squad had acquired two new members: one was The Duellist, a “legacy” hero. The original Duellist had been, of course, a woman, Sidonie van Kant Vossius. This new Duellist was a man named Oregon Powell, who had toyed with names such as Cavalier and Rapier but decided to honor the celebrated pulp era heroine. Oregon Powell had a deep, dark secret in his past; he was raised by a man called Duke Powell as his own son, but Oregon was actually the child of the inscrutable Clarissa Rushmore, another offspring of the vile sorcerer Biazel Karollus. Powell's true father was Lawrence Rubinstein, a Jewish scientist and authority on Omegan technology, employed by REACT. Clarissa seduced Rubinstein while he was in college. And so the new Duellist had a sliver of the demonic in him.
The second new member of the Freedom Squad was known as Solus. Solus had spent his life as a proverbial human guinea pig. He was bred carefully; his parents had been selected with much deliberation by the SkullCorp inner circle. He was born in 1953, name unknown, parents classified. As a small child, he began the TSD treatments at the same time as the experiments conducted on Eloy Queeq (this was unknown to Queeq; unknown to all but a select few associated with SkullCorp). Urias oversaw Caleb's and Rykards' experiments on the child (Rykards was inspired by the project to later perform TSD trials on his own children – in utero). By 1977, Solus was the most powerful TSD “graduate”, with power beyond that of Dr. E or the Absurd Tentacle. Could he be controlled? This was the question facing REACT, for they had “purchased” him from Skull. As payment, REACT agreed to be “hands off” on Skull's global interests. REACT, of course, soon broke this deal.
Returning to the Aggregate: Shadow Baron led his team on New Years 1977 to Castle Kong, totally unsure what to expect. As it turns out the surviving inner circle of Skull was waiting: Urias, Kyle Fabricand, Kith M'Nali, Phileas Caleb, and Donal Rykards. This was the first time the Aggregate had actually met Donal Rykards face to face. Bradcroft's team engaged them all in combat, overpowering them all save for Urias, who they barely managed to keep at bay until Thomas Ledge could make his way to Kong.
In Kong's innermost chambers, he was clad in an elaborate and ornate armor and awaiting Ledge. Ledge pounced on the Claimer, smashed his armor, and in a blood rage hurled him from the highest parapet of Castle Kong. His body washed ashore as the Aggregate made their way to the coastline. The Skull inner circle buried Kong and held a kind of wake; needless to say, the Aggregate was not invited. They were assured, however, that Kong the Claimer was, in fact, at long last deceased. He was buried next to his half-brother Coyle Einnhauser. Thomas Ledge was still unaware that Kong was his father.
VI. The Plunder of Libania
Forced into a temporary “ceasefire” with the Skull Corporation, the frustrated, wounded, and frankly depressed team returned to America. Kong's death felt bittersweet – a pyrrhic victory at best, for some unfathomable reason. Once home, Silent Indigo announced her departure to live with Orphee de Lander at his Red Oasis (his chateau based on his that of his grandfather Richter). Graven Idyll also bowed out of the team, after giving it his all for five years, to devote himself to the hardcore activism that he was a product of. Idyll was also swayed by deLander, as well as by his own on and off affair with Fiora Charme.
Cary Bradcroft began actively seeking out new blood for the team; he also decided that the team was too structured. He felt if members had more freedom to come and go, they would be more likely to remain with the Aggregate longer. Cary decided that Bradcroft Manor was too limiting an HQ, and inadequate sizewise. He envisioned something more along the lines of Freedom Central, where homebase of the Freedom Squad. Cary, however, would never go for such a militaristic milieu.
And where was the Freedom Squad at this time? They had been investigating a rash of murders in Augensburg (just outside Hallmark County). These slayings seemed socio-politically motivated in some twisted way, almost like the infamous Maddox Family slayings of 1969 in California. In the midst of this case, the Squad was called to South America to stop Deomond, uncle of Arch-Priest Urias and physically, the most powerful of all Exodesians. Dark alchemy had fortified him through his long life, and he was a veritable force of nature, possessing a staggering amount of physical strength and endurance. None had bested him during his already lengthy lifespan. Freedom Ops found him at the Sacred Ziggurat in Libania, where he had declared himself king and defied the Libanian and Serafinian armies. What caused him to make such a move was, at the time, unknown.
The battle was swiftly joined. Deomond attacked Dr. E, damaging the apparatus that kept his explosive energy in check. Queeq detonated, killing a number of Libanians and Serafinians. 21 year old Corporal Diaz Montaldo of FOPA witnessed this. The carnage visited on his people by the battle that day left an abiding impression on the young Montaldo, for one of the Serafinians killed was his lover Concepcion. Deomond grievously injured Wrath, the Duellist, the White Archer, and Liberty Lord, who refused to back down despite missing an arm. Greer continued to try to fight with a makeshift tourniquet, his enhanced metabolism barely keeping him conscious. Only Dr. E and Solus stood a chance against Deomond, and, as noted, Dr E's attempt quite literally backfired.
Solus brought to bear all he had against Deomond, blasting him with solar radiation and engaging him hand to hand. Solus created a containment bubble around the two of them and he and Deomond fought a long, bloody fight. Ultimately, Solus released all of his energy on Deomond, incinerating him. The bubble held just long enough for a quite literally burnt-out Solus to collapse.
REACT back-up was everywhere all at once, spiriting away the wounded and dying Freedom Squad. Dr. E was contained and quickly recovered. The man called Solus expired, his inert body drained dry of all life energy. He had expired next to the ashes of Deomond.
Copyright 2014-2022 George Henry Smathers Jr. All rights reserved.
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