Cabal of the Phoenix (3 of 8)

The A-Team

Dreams did not always come true. No matter how badly one wished it to be so or how hard one worked to carry out one's plans and preparations, fate had a way of throwing nasty curves into good intentions. This was especially true for those ambitious enough to attempt to mold the slow-changing monolith of society—no matter how large or small that facet of society was—or even more so for those attempting to take on fate itself: those dreamers trying to twist its providential ways into their own were the fastest drowned by the undertow of destiny.

Despite such difficulties, Sebastian Duvalier was one such man. Sebastian was a Mage, a mortal with the ability to change static reality by superimposing his own on top of it. This was not an easy process to learn or develop, and one which he had certainly not yet mastered. Most mages were Awakened by another, taught by that person as a mentor, but Sebastian had self-Awakened, and thus had been forced to teach himself: a much more arduous process. Any man or woman had the ability to be a Mage; the ability is inherent in all humans. However, becoming a mage was not merely a decision. To Awaken, one had to completely and totally believe that he or she had the power to change reality; one must embrace this new paradigm of existence, "Awakening" themselves to a grander world, and a richer state of enlightenment.

If Sebastian railed at times against his difficult path in life, the one gift of fate that he had been given, was that of Awakening at all; very few were known to have done so spontaneously. Being awakened gave Sebastian the ability to do and see things others could only dream of; he was a Mage who fought against the tide of evil at a time when the forces of righteousness were being swallowed whole by too much wrongness, at a time when too many of the self-annointed heroes fought amongst themselves. Instead of concentrating on their enemies, too often the mages of the Nine Traditions of Magick were mired in their own petty claims and intra-alliance politics. Having been brought up outside the Council of the Nine, outside of their sects and precepts, Sebastian had developed a pragmatic clarity, one that might have seemed obvious to an outside observer, but sadly not so to those on the inside. Yet Sebastian's biggest strength as a leader was his biggest weakness in dealing with the others, because he had no real language with which to speak to them, no background to purport. Thus, surrounded by enemies, many Traditional mages spent more time with these politics than fighting outer evils. With Marauders, Nephandi, and Technocrats to fight, the Traditions somehow seemed to fight those enemies less than themselves. The Marauders were mages without sanity and often without any mind at all: pure chaos. The Nephandi were diabolic mages, servants of an evil power beyond the realm of humanity. The Technocratic Union, or the Technocracy, represented the greatest threat of all, perhaps because they were not such blatant evils. The Technocrats were the ones in charge of most of the important social and economic structures in the world: they were the ones in charge behind the scenes in government, business, science, education, and almost all established systems. When you fought "the system," or "the man" you fought the Technocracy. Technocrats have infiltrated every facet of modern society, eradicating their enemies as their power grew: people of the Traditions, of the other two quarterns of mages, and any other supernaturals they discovered—all of whom could be categorized into ‘those that introduced unknowns into an established equation’—people like Sebastian.

Duvalier was not a part of the Traditions proper, but he had always considered himself aligned with them; he believed in their ultimate goals, but did not endorse their methods. Sebastian had his own way, one that stuck its middle finger at the Traditions and fate; though he knew the Traditions would not admit it, he had been fairly successful. Sebastian could not say that things had always worked out the way he planned them, but he had made quite a name for himself, nonetheless.

Paramount amongst Sebastian’s philosophies was the belief in an alliance of the supernatural. In Detroit, he had managed to pull together all the Mages he could find, as well as the vampires and werewolves, forging a permanent truce. This was no mean feat. Formal, peaceful relations between the age-old foes, the vampires and the werewolves, was something that had previously been done only once in all of known history. Sebastian had gathered a rotating cabal of twelve mages, and the Prince of the Detroit Kindred (another name for vampires), and the Chieftain of the Garou (werewolves) were at the center of this alliance: all people he considered friends. Sebastian had achieved this peace and had enforced it successfully against dissenters.. Further, Duvalier was always ready to fight the enemies of any of the three groups when the need arose. He had been ready to prove how powerful they could be when they became proactive, working together to destroy their enemies and push back the tide of evil that overwhelmed everyone and everything in their World of Darkness, when everything had fallen apart.

An elder vampire named Graysh had come into Detroit, furthering his own twisted schemes, and by the time he had left, everything had been ruined. As far as the mages could tell, all but two of the Garou were dead. The Kindred were left quaking, likely suffering the mockery and assaults of their own enemies in the aftermath of Graysh's tear through the city. And Sebastian had suddenly seen his own cabal ripped apart by itself, victims of the same plague of infighting that infected much of the Traditions. Weeks later, Sebastian still had not seen more than a handful of Kindred, and the Garou were still searching for survivors. As for his own Cabal, the newest member, Kenneth, had left for Mexico; Martin and Bidi-Bidi had returned to England. He had no idea where Thomas or the Euthanatos nurse was. Chip, his closest friend, and especially Dylan, did not trust or want to follow him. His apprentices, Lotus, Kahn, Leander, and Siren were under the instruction of another mage, George (who was never around himself); his other apprentice, Devon, had no confidence in himself, even though he was probably the most powerful among them all.

Everything was in disarray and all that Sebastian had worked so hard for was all but gone. He had wanted to found his own Craft (the term for a small, unofficial Tradition of Magick), but that did not seem to be taking off. He had tried to create his own sphere, believing he could do what mages had failed to do for millennia, only to fail himself. He had tried to reform the Traditions, to point out their flaws and gather them under his guidance, or at least hoped to begin a legacy of reform that he might leave for others to follow, but had thus far had only served to alienate most other Mages he had met recently, not to mention the Traditions as a whole. Sometimes he felt as if he wanted to vent to insanity with the frustration he felt or offer his soul to the devil in turn for success. Both were possibilities, very real possibilities. But Sebastian could not—would not—doing so would be just as much of a defeat as if he had been struck down dead by his enemies.

Sebastian had to do things his way, and would die trying to do so, simply because it was what who he was. He did this, even though he knew all his dreams were outside the realm of destiny; Sebastian had looked at the future often enough, and most times he had seen his own demise, along with everything he tried to carry on his back. He was never afraid, though. Rather, Sebastian ardently felt that he had take destiny and fate and twist them in a completely new tapestry of his own design. The thought made him laugh. To succeed, all he had to do was to do what no living soul had ever done and leave a mark such as no one had ever done before.

Scratching his head, Sebastian switched his focus back to the task at hand, turning once again to his laptop computer. Sebastian was making his weekly exploration of the internet, searching somehow for something that might be relevant to his quest, whether it was a clandestine home page for other mages or just information, policies, or philosophies that might serve to enlighten him. That particular night, Sebastian was focused on finding other mages. He knew that many mages made it a habit to ride the net; some even saw it as a realm to be conquered. He wondered if he could somehow find the mages he needed: the mages who would be willing to follow him to the depths of hell and back. It was not so much that he wanted grunts or cannon fodder either, he was always willing to risk everything just as much as anyone that followed him. He only wanted to find competent mages that had the same philosophies and goals as him.

Sebastian had already been searching for hours and all he had found were some interesting photos: nothing at all that related to magick or mages. Following his exhausted fancy, he clicked on an "A-Team" homepage, chasing one of his favorite adolescent TV shows. The website opened with a picture of the trademark black A-Team van, with its red swoosh and fin on top. He glanced through images of the show, information about the team members. He perhaps wanted something to relax his tired eyes, and was justifiably amused when the offer came onto his screen to write a letter to the A-Team, telling them his "problem," to see if these soldiers of fortune could help. He was just tired and just amused enough to do it. More facetiously than anything, more near unconsciousness than anything, he wrote the fictitious icons a message.

Dear A-Team, he wrote, I am alone amongst enemies; I have been Awake too long against those assembled against me, my Cabals of friends have fallen, and I need your bravery to stand against the tide of stagnant evil that strikes at the heart of dynamism.

The message would mean nothing but oddity to a Sleeper, but if the A-Team members were mages, they would understand. Sebastian laughed out loud at his own silliness and shook his head, searching and searching, late into the night. He could use Mind magic to perform more than one task at once, Time to speed himself up to do more in less time, Correspondence to see around him 360 degrees, and Entropy to increase his chances of success in his endeavors: an effective method of work, if exhausting. However, that night, all it got him was feeling like a candle burning at both ends.

 

*       *       *

 

The doorbell rang incessantly, each loud ring echoing through Sebastian's semi-conscious brain. Sebastian lived in a large Detroit mansion with the rest of his cabal. No one was answering the door, so he supposed no one else was home—an occurrence which seemed to be increasingly common. His joints creaky and his muscles sore, he picked his head off of his desk and looked at the still glowing screen of his computer; he shook himself awake and got up to answer the door.

When Sebastian opened the door, he was not sure if he was awake or still dreaming. Standing there before him were two members of the A-Team: the white-haired Hannibal Smith, and the infamous Murdock. Hannibal was smoking a cigar and Murdock wore a crazy smile and a bright floral shirt, topped by a baseball cap, just as they did on the TV show. Sebastian was not quite sure what was going on. He ran a hand through his long black hair and just looked, not saying anything.

"You called?" Smith said, raising his eyebrows.

Sebastian looked past them for signs of anyone else; he did not see any other movement. "I guess," he said slowly.

"I think he checks out," Murdock said.

"Yeah?" Hannibal asked, the cigar in his hand.

"Uh-huh," Murdock nodded.

"May we come in?" Hannibal asked.

"Sure," Sebastian replied, wondering exactly where he had left his gun.

"Great. You see, we're here to help with your problem."

As he let the two men in, Sebastian's tired brain snapped to attention and began to work at full speed. He had just let two strangers who appeared to be members of the A-Team into his house. What was going on? Sebastian instinctively let his senses shift from normal reality to the Spirit world, glancing at the Tellurian (a mage’s word for the tapestry of reality) in a different way, doing so to sense the truth about the two men before him. What was apparently the white-haired, older Hannibal Smith, and the young, short-haired Murdock, were really a younger Tom Cruise-looking man and an older fellow, with long, black dreadlocks, and by their spirit auras, both were mages.

"Who are you really?" Sebastian asked in his natural, rusty voice.

"He knows," Murdock said.

The one that appeared to be Hannibal touched his face and that of his comrade and they both assumed their natural features for the first time.

"Life magick," Sebastian said.

"Yes," the younger one said.

"It's not that uncommon anymore," a voice behind Sebastian said. He whirled to see a woman, a woman more beautiful perhaps than almost any he had ever seen.

"I don't know," another voice said from his other side. This second voice belonged to a strong male, who seemed to be dressed in some sort of armor, wielding a broadsword, and with a bird of prey perched on his shoulder.

Sebastian heard the door open and close and as his head spun back around in that direction, he saw a fifth person walk in, this one carrying a laptop and dressed in a suit. "Rough wake-up call, eh, Sebastian?"

"Who are you?" Sebastian asked.

"We're the A-Team," the young one answered (he who had previously been Hannibal).

"I don' like bein' tricked in mah own home. Who are y'all, an' how you get here?"

"We're that good, son," the one with the sword answered. "The name's Cortland O'Connell. And we're answering your call, Mage."

"If you're serious, that is," the woman added. "You can call me Lee. Lee Rossdale."

"Enough names," the one with the computer said. "We don't even know our host yet."

"Yes you do," Sebastian replied. "Y'all know mah name an' where I live. Da question is, who are all you?"

"Nathaniel Dane," the former-‘Hannibal’ replied.

"Damon Nevard," ‘Murdock’ said.

"Carr Stanton," the man with the computer replied, sitting down and setting up his computer. "So what do you want?"

 

*       *       *

 

After Sebastian had told them his story, Cortland looked among his comrades and said gravely: "You must know that we share something in common with the A-Team, Sebastian. We are outlaws. We're considered rogues by the Council. And while we work as mercenaries to survive, occasionally even taking jobs from them, we are frowned upon by them and their hierarchy."

"Welcome to da club," Sebastian said.

"As long as that is clear," Cortland said.

“Of course that leaves two issues, still,” Nathan said. “Money and what do you need?"

"Da money's not a question," Sebastian said.

Carr raised his eyebrows.

“I'll pay you each 100,000 net per year ta work for me,” Sebastian said, looking to each of them.

The five mages immediately exchanged quick glances.

"That would entice me to stay away from the beach house," Carr quiped.

"Listen," Nathaniel said, "the leader of our Cabal died—was killed—a year ago and maybe we've just found the right proposition."

"I tol' you what I believe in. Jus' a matter o' whether you wanna follow dat or not."

"If I can speak for us, and I think I can," Damon said softly, "I think we all do agree with you, especially about the mistakes the Traditions make—even though most of us actually still belong to our Traditions. However, what about the rest of your cabal?"

"Dey'll come 'roun' if dey're gonna. If not, dey'll find deir own path. But right here I tink I got de right soldiers ta do what need ta be done wit."

"I'm ready to break shit down," Carr laughed.

"All we need is ta get ta know each othah and get ta know what we can do as a team," Sebastian said.

"Shouldn't be hard," Lee answered, we're already a pretty tight unit on our own."

"So Ah see," Sebastian said. "But y'all gotta realize dat a lotta tings are gonna come down from dis."

"I have already seen it," Damon whispered. "It is worth it."

"So have I," Sebastian replied, meeting the old man's eyes with renewed knowledge. “And I agree completely.”

“It must be done,” Damon said, his eyes locked on Sebastian’s.

The rest of the mages, exchanging glances, nodded in assent.