(Written by Ringmaster)
Part One: Lightbringer
A wasteland world, long since destroyed and mutated by the fallout of nuclear war. One possibility among thousands of them and thus a reality here. What was once Washington DC was now known to the locals as the Capital Wastelands. Las Vegas had degraded from the city he once knew, into a stronghold of unbridled violence.
Just another world in a vast multiverse.
Though not the only possibility. He would know better than anyone after all.
Wasn't he a living example of endless in potentia?
He still looked much the same, since the incident with the Eldrazi. His usual longcoat and hood pulled back protecting his priest uniform beneath it, the white collar faded and ever present near his throat to denote his fate. His silver crucifix dangled around his neck as his fingers rubbed it out of habit, bare and pale despite the journey he had taken. His hair was cut short, for more practicality than style as was his wont and in his features, dreamers eyes, colored crimson stared to his combat boots, of good quality but as worn as the rest of his clothing. There was no weapon carried openly.
Everyone had a home to return to, when they had done what could be done by them. Everyone of them but himself. And in that moment he was ripped from his law enforcement counterpart, he could see briefly the endless maze. Thousands upon thousand might-have-beens and confusions of worlds he knew he had never seen till now.
In one, there was a funeral where he saw Isabelle crying and raging at a somber wizard in black.
In another, he saw himself crying and writhing in pain in the heart of the Amazon Jungle under the shadow of the Old Gods, clad like a seventeenth century sailor.
He was sixteen, bored in a high school classroom and sneaking glances at his desk neighbor...
He was afraid, with the emblem of the red cross on his arm and running through the muddy trenches as artillery exploded all around and biplanes roared through the skies....
He was good.
He was evil.
So many, he almost cracked from the strain of processing it all until his mind shut down to prevent insanity. And when he awoke, it was in a strange world. A futuristic one, of cyborgs and the rule of Steel. Gangs stalked the ghettos and warlords, masked as upstanding members of the community controlled the streets in their savage games. It was not the home he knew in the least.
But his duty did not change whatsoever.
He stayed for six months, cleaning up the area he was in. Using all his skills of the blade and of the training he had gone through, of the experience he had obtained to wage war upon the organization he came to learn called themselves the Blood Institute. Irony at its finest at work. And as he did, he listened and he learned, acclimating himself to this newest variation on his life.
It was a world, yes...But one aware of other worlds. Separate, yet connected and answering to something known as the Coalition. Though as of late, their reputation seemed to be suffering.
Inept, sloppy, ineffective- These were the worlds held by those in the know, describing these multiversal heroes and their group. Lucifer personally had no opinion whatsoever to speak of, save that of a twinge of sorrow for such a thankless task. Taking care of one world was bad enough, exhausting to the extreme.
Doing so for countless worlds as the word multiverse implied, was quite another.
Still, his work done he made arrangements, carefully seeking out ways to return home, to the dimension he called his own. Finally, he believed he discovered it. A way to ensure his straightforward return to all he knew.
And it was somewhere in this world of fallout.
He leaned back in his seat, contemplative as he looked out the window as the train rumbled on. That was one of the nicer things really about world alliances. The possibility of travel, trade and reconstruction. This train being the predominant example. Cheap to make, easy to repair in comparison to a lot of other ideas, it not only made extensive travel in the wasteland possible without the dangers a caravan would entail, but also served to ensure safe transportation too. The Brotherhood of Steel was well served with their alliance, if his information was correct. But it wasn't them he was seeking.
Speaking of which, there were two of them now. Entering the largely empty train car(not many were rich enough to afford such lavish by their standards, transportation), both Paladins clad in their power armor stomped through the car. One by one, examining the few passengers before finally stopping before Lucifer's bench. Inwardly, Lucifer sighed in vexation.
"Stand up."
"Can't it wait? I've been trying to sleep the whole time I was on this train, and I'm really cranky."
Subsequent and often violent encounters with bounty hunters, assassins, killer robots, mutants, aliens and everything in between since he started traveling the multiverse in search of his home had eroded his general polite nature in favor of his old, wisecracking persona to cope though when it came to the opposite sex, children and elders, Lucifer's courtesy remained much the same as it ever was. Some things never changed.
"We are the Brotherhood of Steel. The authority of our chapter lies in every Paladin and if you do not stand, by God you will crawl when I blast your kneecaps off. Now shut up and stand."
It looked as though it was going to be one of those days and Lucifer did as he was bid, hands raised at a gesture from them as one trained his weapon on him. The other began to search him for weapons, discovering only a singular revolver which was confiscated as well as the handle of a katana, without the blade. That was left hooked to Lucifer's belt as he rumbled.
"He matches the description. Red eyes, black coat and silver cross. The one who fought our comrades in order to protect synthetics."
"Men who make women cry come to ruin, I was merely Gods hand in that regard."
Truth be told, he had almost forgot. There was a synthetic woman, working as a waitress back a town or two back. She was being harassed by a crowd of Brotherhood recruits enjoying the local color and Lucifer decided to step in.
He left them alive, but ensured they'd forever be terrified at the sight of a spatula for life after the brawl was over. He then left without a word, putting it out of mind.
So that was what this was all about.
The train whistle blew and Lucifer flicked his eyes to a sign passed on by the train before smiling and looking at the Paladin's.
"You're not afraid of the dark, are you?"
And without warning, they vanished as they entered a tunnel, darkness obscuring everything but the sudden grunts and noises, the flash of gunfire briefly illuminating the room as a terrifying shadow with red eyes swung down at the head of a fallen Paladin-
-The train emerged into the light. The Paladin's laid on the floor, their guns twisted and bearing the indents of their helmets, as though someone smacked them with it, both breathing if unconscious.
And watching the train leave, in the middle of nowhere after he jumped off, Lucifer sighed out and pulled up his coat hood, one hand moving to check his weapons, his revolver snatched back and placed in its holster where it belonged.
He had paid for that ticket, fifty whole bottle caps. ;_;
And with a final sigh of regret, he stared into the sky and made his way across the waste, grumpy as he noticed the sign detailing the closest settlement.
This was going to be a loooong walk.
Part One: Lightbringer
A wasteland world, long since destroyed and mutated by the fallout of nuclear war. One possibility among thousands of them and thus a reality here. What was once Washington DC was now known to the locals as the Capital Wastelands. Las Vegas had degraded from the city he once knew, into a stronghold of unbridled violence.
Just another world in a vast multiverse.
Though not the only possibility. He would know better than anyone after all.
Wasn't he a living example of endless in potentia?
He still looked much the same, since the incident with the Eldrazi. His usual longcoat and hood pulled back protecting his priest uniform beneath it, the white collar faded and ever present near his throat to denote his fate. His silver crucifix dangled around his neck as his fingers rubbed it out of habit, bare and pale despite the journey he had taken. His hair was cut short, for more practicality than style as was his wont and in his features, dreamers eyes, colored crimson stared to his combat boots, of good quality but as worn as the rest of his clothing. There was no weapon carried openly.
Everyone had a home to return to, when they had done what could be done by them. Everyone of them but himself. And in that moment he was ripped from his law enforcement counterpart, he could see briefly the endless maze. Thousands upon thousand might-have-beens and confusions of worlds he knew he had never seen till now.
In one, there was a funeral where he saw Isabelle crying and raging at a somber wizard in black.
In another, he saw himself crying and writhing in pain in the heart of the Amazon Jungle under the shadow of the Old Gods, clad like a seventeenth century sailor.
He was sixteen, bored in a high school classroom and sneaking glances at his desk neighbor...
He was afraid, with the emblem of the red cross on his arm and running through the muddy trenches as artillery exploded all around and biplanes roared through the skies....
He was good.
He was evil.
So many, he almost cracked from the strain of processing it all until his mind shut down to prevent insanity. And when he awoke, it was in a strange world. A futuristic one, of cyborgs and the rule of Steel. Gangs stalked the ghettos and warlords, masked as upstanding members of the community controlled the streets in their savage games. It was not the home he knew in the least.
But his duty did not change whatsoever.
He stayed for six months, cleaning up the area he was in. Using all his skills of the blade and of the training he had gone through, of the experience he had obtained to wage war upon the organization he came to learn called themselves the Blood Institute. Irony at its finest at work. And as he did, he listened and he learned, acclimating himself to this newest variation on his life.
It was a world, yes...But one aware of other worlds. Separate, yet connected and answering to something known as the Coalition. Though as of late, their reputation seemed to be suffering.
Inept, sloppy, ineffective- These were the worlds held by those in the know, describing these multiversal heroes and their group. Lucifer personally had no opinion whatsoever to speak of, save that of a twinge of sorrow for such a thankless task. Taking care of one world was bad enough, exhausting to the extreme.
Doing so for countless worlds as the word multiverse implied, was quite another.
Still, his work done he made arrangements, carefully seeking out ways to return home, to the dimension he called his own. Finally, he believed he discovered it. A way to ensure his straightforward return to all he knew.
And it was somewhere in this world of fallout.
He leaned back in his seat, contemplative as he looked out the window as the train rumbled on. That was one of the nicer things really about world alliances. The possibility of travel, trade and reconstruction. This train being the predominant example. Cheap to make, easy to repair in comparison to a lot of other ideas, it not only made extensive travel in the wasteland possible without the dangers a caravan would entail, but also served to ensure safe transportation too. The Brotherhood of Steel was well served with their alliance, if his information was correct. But it wasn't them he was seeking.
Speaking of which, there were two of them now. Entering the largely empty train car(not many were rich enough to afford such lavish by their standards, transportation), both Paladins clad in their power armor stomped through the car. One by one, examining the few passengers before finally stopping before Lucifer's bench. Inwardly, Lucifer sighed in vexation.
"Stand up."
"Can't it wait? I've been trying to sleep the whole time I was on this train, and I'm really cranky."
Subsequent and often violent encounters with bounty hunters, assassins, killer robots, mutants, aliens and everything in between since he started traveling the multiverse in search of his home had eroded his general polite nature in favor of his old, wisecracking persona to cope though when it came to the opposite sex, children and elders, Lucifer's courtesy remained much the same as it ever was. Some things never changed.
"We are the Brotherhood of Steel. The authority of our chapter lies in every Paladin and if you do not stand, by God you will crawl when I blast your kneecaps off. Now shut up and stand."
It looked as though it was going to be one of those days and Lucifer did as he was bid, hands raised at a gesture from them as one trained his weapon on him. The other began to search him for weapons, discovering only a singular revolver which was confiscated as well as the handle of a katana, without the blade. That was left hooked to Lucifer's belt as he rumbled.
"He matches the description. Red eyes, black coat and silver cross. The one who fought our comrades in order to protect synthetics."
"Men who make women cry come to ruin, I was merely Gods hand in that regard."
Truth be told, he had almost forgot. There was a synthetic woman, working as a waitress back a town or two back. She was being harassed by a crowd of Brotherhood recruits enjoying the local color and Lucifer decided to step in.
He left them alive, but ensured they'd forever be terrified at the sight of a spatula for life after the brawl was over. He then left without a word, putting it out of mind.
So that was what this was all about.
The train whistle blew and Lucifer flicked his eyes to a sign passed on by the train before smiling and looking at the Paladin's.
"You're not afraid of the dark, are you?"
And without warning, they vanished as they entered a tunnel, darkness obscuring everything but the sudden grunts and noises, the flash of gunfire briefly illuminating the room as a terrifying shadow with red eyes swung down at the head of a fallen Paladin-
-The train emerged into the light. The Paladin's laid on the floor, their guns twisted and bearing the indents of their helmets, as though someone smacked them with it, both breathing if unconscious.
And watching the train leave, in the middle of nowhere after he jumped off, Lucifer sighed out and pulled up his coat hood, one hand moving to check his weapons, his revolver snatched back and placed in its holster where it belonged.
He had paid for that ticket, fifty whole bottle caps. ;_;
And with a final sigh of regret, he stared into the sky and made his way across the waste, grumpy as he noticed the sign detailing the closest settlement.
This was going to be a loooong walk.
