The Times we Cherish

[Odin]

[glow=red,2,300]Prologue:[/glow]

A young girl stood at the edge of the New York harbor. The
winter winds danced along the docks making her long, black hair
dance oh so slightly. The females outfit consisted of black slacks,
a white wool button up shirt covered by a matte black overcoat,
and a simple black fur ushanka hat. Though she was only nine in
appearance, the girls silvery eyes told a very different story one
the topic her age, one of countless years of aggression and
misery. Her pointed ears and ash-like grey skin pointed out very
clearly she wasn’t human. She turned back to a boy that was
approaching her position. “Good morning, Tony.”


“Goods mornings, toots.” Much like the girl, Tony was several
times older than she appeared and his story was just as sad, his
blue eyes spoke of betrayal and the loss of many friends. He ran
a hand through his short, black hair; tapping his black bowler as
he passed it. Two lengths of hair just in front of his ears drooped
down to his chin before defying all of Sir Isaac Newton’s laws of
gravity by jutting forward at a ninety degree angle then, just
past his face, jutting up to the tip of his brow; from the
perspective of someone far away he could be thought of as a
boy wearing two particularly fuzzy hooks in his hair for some
bizarre reason. He wore a basic black suit much as was popular
in this day and age of the 1920’s.


“Tony, I think today is going to be my last day.” The girl looked
Tony in the eye for a minute before tossing him an envelope,
running past him as he fumbled to catch it. “Aufwiedersehen!”


Before Tony could give chase the girl entered the nearby
warehouse, his home for the past couple of years, and slammed
the door shut; the all too obvious sound of the lock sliding into
place sang into the morning mist.


Tony glanced at the envelope; the words “Open me after the
bang” rested on the center of the envelope. Tony started to ask
aloud “Vat ‘bangs’?”, however, before he could get the words
out a tremendous explosion erupted from the warehouse; white
hot flames licking at the bricks as the structure crumbled into a
pile of rubble.

[Odin]

This is up elsewhere but to encourage myself to put more into it I'm positing it here too.

[Odin]

[glow=red,2,300]Chapter 1: Christine[/glow]

“Ugh. That dream again. Eighty years and I still… ugh.”

There are few in Kellwood whom can claim to lead a life of luxury,
fewer still whom are of a magical persuasion. Christine Unterwald
is one such of the privileged individuals that may say she lives in
the lap of luxury, at least as far as property goes.

Christine has always been a mystery to Kellwood and, at one
time, a source of much gossip. Christine officially arrived nearly
fifty years ago and in all that time she has only been witnessed a
handful of times. Since the last sighting, thirty-five years ago, it
has been assumed that Christine lives with a daughter for
between sightings she hasn’t really changed all that much, well
at all really but the memories of humans are fuzzy at best.

Christine’s race, the alp (mara in her case as she is female), is
blessed with longevity; she herself is well over seven hundred.
Alps vary in appearance from elegant elfling like children like
Christine to little goblinoids. The elfling like alps have varying
colors of skin based on their preference but appear to default to
shades of gray; Christine favored a silver grey shade of skin.
Christine’s left eye was a lovely shade of battleship grey with a
serpentine pupil. The right eye Christine keeps hidden from view
under the pretext to stare into her right eye is to stare into the
depths of madness and never return.

The mara’s expensive tastes were easy to distinguish from the
black silk that made up the sheets and curtains and the
mahogany wood frame furniture (a theme shared by every piece
of furniture in the house). To top it off everything in the house
was hand made and special ordered, even her clothes.

Christine arose from her elegant king size, four poster bed and
pushed the curtains to the side. Her outfit at the moment, aka
her nightwear, consisted of a white tank to and boxers which
usually had creative patterns on them as well as a silver armlet.
The groggy creature shuffled over to her closet, procuring a fine
suit and eye patch, both made from silk. After a quick shuffle the
attire was on and the girl could really rock the suit despite being
as tall as your average ten year old. Now awake however she
used her magic to make herself about 5'6" tall.

The girl crossed the room to a small dresser with a massive
vanity mirror swiping up a brush and putting it to work in her
hair. A quick glance at the nearby digital clock told her it was
5:44 PM; seeing this the mara quietly put her brush down and
proceeded to bolt out the bedroom door and down the stairs
snatching a leather jacket and chaps on the way. Once
downstairs she made for a small side room leading to her garage.

Within the garage, two of Christine’s pride and joys rested: A
1926 Model 630 K Mercedes Benz, and a 2007 BMW K1200GT
Motorcycle (a recent acquisition to replace her older bike when its
top speed became obsolete).

Once the leather was one Christine straddled her motorcycle and
started it up. Real quickly before shooting out the garage door
she removed her silver bracelet and with a flick it was a shiny
black full motorcycle helm. Once fully prepared she blasted out of
the garage onto the streets of Kellwood, She turned for the
forest and darted into its depths.

[Odin]

Cant say I really like this chapter since it does little for the story other than establish Christine's appearance and her expensive tastes, oh well it's nessessary.

[Odin]

[glow=red,2,300]Chapter 2: Bureau[/glow]

The Bureau, a wondrous multidimensional organization with very
little purpose to the outsider; most of the bureau’s activities
seem to be along the lines of providing hired spies and otherwise
information gathering jobs. There are other things done of
course but what they are even many of the members do not
know.

Speaking of ignorant employees, we now turn our attentions to
one Alejandro Bloom, the new halfling gatekeeper. It is now
6:57 PM as the halfling reaches to shut the gate for the morning
shift only to have his hand slapped by his supervisor, Salvatore
Diamond-splitter, dwarf.

“What’re you doing rookie? The door don’t close till seven and it
ain’t seven yet.” Despite his height Salvatore’s axe, which he
was waving around at the moment, made him a really scary
individual when he was talking down on people.

“But sir the door takes two minutes to close and the only one not
here is an alp.” The halfling slipped back from his superior, even
a glancing blow from that axe could prove fatal for the fragile
gatekeeper.

“That alp would flay your hide if you locked her outta here. Trust
me I, and anyone else here would let her too. One rookie ain’t
worth losing your life to that wily woman’s sword and claws.
Heck you might get lucky and she’ll just give you a nice little peak
under that eye patch she wears; last guy what she showed still
works here as a test subject for mental restoring medicine, no
progress yet but we’re hopeful.”

Now fearing for his life and/or sanity, the halfling stepped back
from the button like it had the plague out into the open part of
the foyer. This was a mistake as the roaring of an overpowered
motorcycle filled the foyer as Christine’s shot through the front
doors hammering the halfling across the expanse of the sterile
white room leaving a nice red trail to mark where he had started
to the place he stopped.

Dismounting Christine removed her helmet and observed the
scene. “Oops. Is he going to be alright?”

“Not ter worry miss, not ter worry. We’ll have him good as new
by lunch. As usual, you’re right on time.” The dwarf hit the door
shut switch and walked at a jaunty yet relaxed pace to check his
ward’s health. “Right as rain he is. Just shell shocked and missing
part of his face. He’ll be fine.”

“Good. If you’ll excuse me Sal I must locate Flannigan. He hasn’t
been getting me my reports like he should.” Christine locked the
steering on her motorcycle and continued for the inner sanctums
of the bureau.

“Absolutely, Miss Unterwald.” The dwarf picked his protégé up
and dragged him down a separate hall.

Down in the Alp Division of the Bureau One could always see
people staring at Christine. It was not to hard to understand
why really, she was unsociable, quick tempered, and the head of
the division; though she never gave any orders directly always
though Flannigan and his almost equally appalling social skills.
Once she arrived on the scene the void of silence overtook any
conversation that had been taking place.

By all accounts she was a glorified paper pusher with a private
office and nearly quadruple salary. She only left her office for
coffee breaks and was only seen holding conversation with
Flannigan, well I say conversation but it was more like handing
him a stack of folders and telling him to distribute them to those
who looked like they needed work.

Today was no different, arriving as late as possible a chat with
Flannigan and taking a mug of hot milk tea into her office without
even glancing at anyone else. How she became head of the
department was considered a small miracle but she was
supposedly partners with one of the Bureau’s finest when she
was a regular employee and that had sped things up for her
career. Once the door to her office closed the conversations
began anew with some dirty remarks regarding the department
head mixed in.

[Odin]

Now I forget some things but if I remember correctly the bureau is a multidimensional group. cant remember what they do cause mostly it's not been explained (and isn't on the wiki which needs to be spellchecked no offense Amy)

I kinda made up some stuff regarding the group as well I would guess for the actual story Flannigan is the pseudo department head or something like that.

Also I made up the rules regarding the door and such. I also went back and changed all the AM's to PM's seeing as Alps are nocturnal creatures.

and yes Christine did just park her motorcycle right in the center of the foyer which is also made up.

[Odin]

[glow=red,2,300]Chapter 3: Cold Blooded Cat[/glow]

In the 1910's a conversation was once held by a magical
creature and a mob boss. The conversation set into motion a
spiral that threatened the peace of New York's families. This is
that conversation.

"I'm have a favor to ask of you. I should never be asking a
woman this but you're the only one, the only one that I can think
of to do this. I need a man to disappear. This man does not
respect family. He burns our businesses and kills our…"

"Hush Don Pacino. I understand. How do you want it done?"

"How? However you see fit."

"Understood. Don Pacino I am going to leave you now as I am
sure you are very busy."

In the hours following the conversation a tall woman in an
unseemly suit, really a woman in public in mans clothes, strode
across the lamp lit streets of the Brooklyn district. Her long,
ebony hair flitted carelessly in the breezes coming of the
coastline.

Her suit was a simple black one. Her dress shirt was white with
the top three buttons undone. It was nicely complemented by a
black fedora. Only her left eye was visible, the other covered by a
cloth eye-patch, silver in color; it gave a distinctly feral feeling off

Sighting a mick cop she ducked into an alleyway letting him pass.
Emerging the woman was now more masculine looking with far
shorter hair. Stopping at a pub just off the pier she waited
outside priming her weapon, a Browning FN Model 1910.

A drunkard was thrown out of the pub not long after her arrival.
He made several rude gestures towards the establishment
before hobbling off towards the pier.

The woman slid up behind the drunkard just as he reached the
edge of the pier and put the gun up to his head. She said a
name, getting the reaction she wanted she pulled the trigger.

BANG!

Christine jerked awake as a pile of paperwork was dropped on
her desk. Looking around frantically she noted Flannigan in front
of her. Before she could say anything he left the office slamming
the door behind him.

"What's eating him?" Christine rolled her eye and started on the
paper work basic stuff. She went over it three times unable to
shake the feeling something was wrong with the paperwork then
she realized what it was; something that would make Flannigan
angry because his pay would be docked from it. Restin her head
on her desk once again she screamed loud enough for anyone
near her office to hear her. "Yiska! You skipped out on your
reports again!"

Now she was going to have to go fetch them in person, a
dangerous move for such a sensitive mission. Then there was
Flannigan. Well a good brew at the bar would be enough to calm
him down to reassure his pay would be fine.

With a sigh she bemoaned on her situation. "Life was easier
when I just killed offenders. Now the offenders are my
subordinates. Stupid management position."

[Odin]

This chapter is kind of random a little off base and just plain strange. I like it.

[Odin]

[glow=red,2,300]Chapter 4: Tender Moments[/glow]

Christine emerged from her office looking from side to side calmly
as she moved across the room; clutching two folders, one thick
and one thin, to her chest delicately. A handful of the alps nearby
glanced at Christine with various looks of disgust, dislike, or
downright hatred for which she simply rolled her eye in response.
Christine paused only at the sound of Flannigan yelling about
something or another god knew what seeing how his words
meshed together when he got angry enough.

Christine walked up to Flannigan waiting behind him patiently as
he finished his rant about clean shoes or something to a slightly
annoyed Gerwulf. Deciding quickly that he was taking too long
Christine slapped Flannigan on the back of the head and shooed
Gerwulf off.

"WHAT?!" Flannigan rounded Christine ears drooping down
quickly when he identified his assailant.

"Flannigan, here's the reports I looked over and here's some
assignments for the others. Where is Yiska currently stationed?
I'll have to fetch her report myself, it seems." Christine handed
the thick folder to Flannigan.

"She's taking on Mr. high-and-mighty Kavonn's task." Flannigan
reached out for the folder with a scowl on his face.

"Ah, say no more. Hopefully she didn't send the notice by bird
again. Those familiars of hers don't need to be carrying sensitive
information around. This of course means they are going to be
her method so I'll definitely need to go there tomorrow
anyways." Christine frowned a little scratching her head in deep
thought. For some reason she remembered Tonius at hearing
Kavonn. Odd seeing as she met them several years apart from
each other.

"Quite so. Are you going to give me the other folder so I can
resume work sometime today?" Flannigan reached out for the
thin folder Christine was carrying.

"Oh this isn't for you. It's my leave request approval. The day
after tomorrow you're in charge of the division for a week or so. I
know how much you love paperwork." Christine turned and
walked back towards her office leaving a much bewildered
Flannigan to try and figure out why the workaholic, who'd come
in on her days off, was taking leave.

Later in the night as the first rays of sunshine began to peak
over the horizon Christine was at home getting ready to settle
into bed when she hear the most peculiar peck at her window.
Rolling her eyes, for she did not have her eye patch on when she
was at home, she wrenched the window open grasping the
familiar that she knew to be Yiska's.

"Your mistress is getting a very stern possibly threatening
warning about using you for black tape situations. No offense but
you aren't subtle. Out you go now." Christine took the familiar's
report and stroked it's skull before unceremoniously tossing it
out the window closing the window with a slam.

"One last report before tomorrow. Gah, what am I going to do for
a week? Stupid psychoanalysts." Christine opened the report
and glanced down the documentation with half lidded eyes here
eyes flicked once or twice at the mention of an alp and his love
interests, it must have been the name Tony, she knew no Tony's
but she did know Tonius and this Tony sounded similar, at least
in appearance.

Christine sighed tossing the report on her desk. "Great now for
another nightmare. The irony."

Christine crawled into her bed and closed her eyes to the waking
world. Slumber took her into dreams of war and pestilence then
to a very specific dream of recent years.

There was a bar, old fashioned with a piano and microphone
sitting on stage, tables and chairs were aplenty but no bar stools
to speak off. Everyone wore their Sunday best and was
discussing the latest news.

"Rocco, Sally, you two are with me today." A young man with
long black hair in a suit waved two significantly older men over to
him. "Rocco you drive."

"Sure things Thomas." Rocco, a large Italian immigrant
responded to the you man with a hearty wave dragging a lanky
little man behind him.

The scene melted away reforming with the trio in a warehouse,
there was some blood on the floor but no body. The three men
were clearing away the blood with animated chatter about
Thomas's supposed one man army skill at taking over places for
a family.

Thomas waved the men off before checking a square steel door
that led to the warehouses basement. Down in the basement he
saw a young alp with short black hair, yet long sideburns, and
blue eyes.

[Odin]

It's not the best work I've done but there was nothing left to do at the bureau and I didn't want a super revealing dream sequence.

if you all remember that image I commissioned Amy for, turns out it was canon to this fanfic.

Kudos for anyone that gets the double entendre of the chapter title

[Odin]

[glow=red,2,300]Chapter 5: Once Upon a Time[/glow]

Long ago, in the snow covered forests of what was then west
Deutschland, there was a small castle. The castle was, in fact, so
small that it could have passed for a negligibly important fort. It
was the castle of Edler Unterwald.

On this day many nobles had come for the winter solstice ball.
The Edler was highly excited by, this forcing his already
overworked servants and nearby township to work doubly hard
to make everything perfect. The chance to be raised up to
Baronet or even Baron was too tempting for the greedy man to
pass up.

This night however he did not realize that rebellion was settling
in as his front gate guards closed the gate, calling to their
Kapitän when it sealed. The Kapitän smiled as he walked though
the barracks calling out the rebels from their hiding.

Up in the castle proper a raven haired servant walked along the
edge of the corridor, head bowed hair obscuring her face only
parting slightly when she passed the windows that let in the cold
night breeze.

Opposite her were the Edler's children, two girls and a boy. The
boy was a stocky blonde man with blue eyes, the elder female
was slightly shorter than he and a slightly portly weight befitting
a girl of her time, the younger couldn't be more than six with
raven hair and sparkling blue eyes.

The elder daughter shoved the servant girl shouting that she
hadn't cleaned the daughter's room. The servant curled into a
ball protecting herself from the noble girl's kicks until she felt a
wet clot of spit hit her hair. Satisfied the girl was finished, the
servant rose and followed the noble quietly to her room.

The room was spotless at the time they entered. The noble girl
sat at the mirror fumbling with her hair not noticing the servant
behind her until it was too late. A quick yank of a sharpened
blade across the neck spread her life's blood all across her
mirror. A painful and slow death from either blood loss or
suffocation followed. She had just enough time to look up and
see her assailant, eyes wide with recognition.

The servant walked to the edge of the room sliding into a
servant's passage. She emerged at the room of the noble son
shortly after discarding her bloodied clothes in favor of a clean
set. The boy, well known for his harassment of the female staff
tried his best to 'put the moves on her'.

He was quite stunned when she agreed. None the less the man
disrobed as it were and commanded the girl to join him in bed.
There she taught him the quickest way to a man's heart,
between the 4th and 5th rib, with a dagger. As he slowly died
she whispered sweet nothings into his ear ending with the
word 'Brüder'.

Before she could make her escape from the room the last of the
noble children arrived. A chase ensued across the room ending
with the child being tackled and stabbed and slashed at in a
panicky way. The corpse was almost unidentifiable at that point
but the eyes still gazed forward knowing the assailant, tear filled
even. The servant girl's tears splashed on the child's face for a
good three to five minutes before the servant steadied her
resolve and marched off for the barracks.

Somewhere along the way the woman had acquired a small set
of armor similar to the castle guard wore. A black robe with the
family crest draped over her shoulders. The woman arrived at the
barracks just in time to run face to face with the captain. Turning
away she called back the code the rebels were using and
blended in with the guard that was to relieve the current
ballroom guard.

The guard change was smooth, quiet, and efficient. The
aftermath was not as quiet as a scream pieced the halls. Taking
the queue, the guards stewarded the nobles to the back of the
banquet hall, drawing their swords. Hell then descended upon
Earth as the guards swords turned on the nobles.

The faster nobles and members of the royal family were allowed
to flee. The Edler was not so lucky; the servant girl caught him in
the side with her sword following it up with a strike to the neck,
cutting deep into the shoulder blade. Tossing aside her helmet,
she, Christine Unterwald, his former daughter that he'd thrown
from the house as a monster that had stolen her form, ran the
Edler though his neck with a sadistic glee. Turning to the guard
she assumed her true alp form and vanished into a puff of smoke

[nightreflection]

Bloody revenge, me likes yes!

Nicely written. It has nice pace.

[Odin]

Thanks much. Though the pacing may start to drag soon.

[Odin]

[glow=red,2,300]Chapter 6: Last Day[/glow]

Yiska was quite aware that some people were not morning
people. Her boss could be considered one of those people; then
again she didn’t consider her boss to be an awake person in the
slightest. Nor was this messenger that she had a habit of
sending after Yiska when she screwed up at something or
another. Thus you can imagine the displeasure it gave her to see
a mara walking up the pathway to the cabin.

The mara had thick wavy seafoam-blue hair down to her thighs
and wore worn a gray skirt and coat always. Her tarnkappe was
a wide rimmed hat one would attribute to The Three Musketeers.
The fore of the brim always made her eyes impossible to see.
Yiska was convinced that she wore some sort of military getup
under the outfit. She already knew the girl carried daggers and a
handgun with her.

The mara stopped short of Yiska and pointed squarely at the
skulls on her hat speaking in a flat voice. “Those are not for
sensitive information. Use some form or magic trinket that is
tuned to the inboxes at the Bureau. There is too much time
unaccounted for between you and home base and the residents
will start to question your bird skull count constantly fluctuating
between three and one.”

“They’re all I have though.” Yiska pouted looking away from the
mara. How she loathed her.

The mara shoved a small red gemstone into Yiska’s
chest. “Connected directly to Flannigan’s desk. We’ll be in touch.”

The mara started to leave when the door to the cabin opened
and Mye stepped out. “Who’s you’re friend Yiska?”

Before Yiska could answer the mara spun around, extending her
hand for an hand shake. “Hello I’m Frau Hillook. It’s a pleasure to
meet you.”

“Mye. Very nice to meet you as well miss Hillook. Would you like
to come inside?” Mye shook Hillook’s hand tentatively.

“I’m afraid my time here is up. I simply came by because I heard
there were alps living here. My kind are… rare in this part of the
world. I…” Hillook tilted her hat to the side as her sentence cut
off locking her left eye squarely onto Mye’s profile; pupil dilating
rapidly. “You… I… I killed you. Seven hundred years ago how are
you here. I killed you!”

Hillook pulled out a small handgun backing up rapidly even so
much as to trip over herself. She collected herself quickly and
made a beeline down the path.

----

About two hours later at the Bureau headquarters Hillook barged
though the door to Flannigan’s office. As she strode across the
room her hair straightened out and turned black as it shortened.

“The Hillook persona eh Miss Unterwald. Did you get the report?”
Flannigan looked nonchalantly at the mara.

Christine responded in kind by flinging the rolled up report into
his face. “There’s your @$%$ report. I’m going to talk to the
shrink for the next two hours.”

Two hours later Flannigan got an enveloped notice from The
Bureau’s Psychiatry Department stating that he had control of
the Alp Division for the next month as Miss Unterwald would be
taking a mandatory vacation from work. Attached was also a
notice to find a good mind sifter among the alps for the
psychiatrist that had to talk to her.