The following is an alternative history fantasy story concept I wrote. The intention at the time was to use the concept to create an RPG of sorts by creating a universe for the characters to exist in. It's called "Modern Magic". Enjoy!!
Modern Magic
Terminus Tempus Admiratio
Prologue
“Those heretics who were burned at the stake would rather die than reveal
themselves as Elementals, for they believed that in hiding the truth, they would preserve
their race. Of course, looking back hundreds of years, we have the luxury of knowing that
their race and our race are the same, and there was the same chance then of being born
with the Gift as there is now. No excuse can be made for the early Ecclesiastical Court’s
behavior of course, as we all truly know the Elementals are not an aberration of God, but
instead a Gift of God. ”
The preacher gazed at his flock with lazy abandonment. It was the same small
congregation he was accustomed to for the twenty three years he had held services in this
sleepy little Nebra-ska town. Mr. and Mrs. Henning and their six children noisily taking
up the back left pew were once again bickering amongst themselves. The preacher had
asked them gently more than a few times to consider the others in the sanctuary and keep
the noise down, but to no avail. The farmers from beyond the now arid cattle-lands made
up most of the rest of those in attendance. They always had really, as the faith of the
laborer was always better displayed than most. The town’s remaining Shop-keeps, aged
ones, and the politicians and their entourages made up the rest of this small church. When
he first arrived, so many years ago, he recalled the fiery passion in his sermons.
Townsfolk would sit in stunned silence after the final Blessing of the Air and the
preacher could feel the energy of his words bleed into their souls and infect their hearts
with the words of the Gospels. So many years ago, he mused, so many sermons, so many
believers… lost. With the emergence of the Mumblers, so many had lost their faith in an
Almighty Endowment when it came to the Elementals.
“Today, we are not threatened by the ancient prejudices or the fear of Elementals.
Today’s challenges for we the believers are the forces that would secularize the faith that
has kept us in harmony for so many years.”
The preacher sneered to himself. The loss of faith was not the actual issue.
Honestly, it is the lack of something even more sinister and important: money.
Economically, the United City-States had enjoyed 200 years of prosperity since the War
of the Schism which won them independence from the Isles of Britannia. But massive
drought had hit the Midlands in recent years causing great famine, poverty and loss of
livestock and harvest income. Because of this, and the Anti-Elemental sentiment that had
led to several murders and beatings, there was no one to help the people of these lands as
they struggled through the dust storms, the death, the roaming cannibal-tribes and the
bandits. Elementals would dare not venture into lands where they were not welcome, as
the conflict that arose only seemed to encourage more and more chaos. Even the UC-S
Army had pulled back on providing support for this region as their numbers had never
recovered from the Great EuroWar from a generation ago. With the uprisings in the East
by the Communals and their supporters, the Army had to focus on the largest urbancenters.
They simply ran out of people before “getting around” to the rural lands full of
suffering people. The preacher angrily understood why the US-C Army was so inefficient
as his service as Chaplain in the EuroWar proved to him time and time again. It was the
Mumblers that prevented the War from continuing on forever. The greatest countermeasure
ever engineered to the Elementals was a mistake, a fluke of nature that
ultimately saved humanity. Now, they may destroy humanity by redefining what it meant
to be humane.
“So I ask you this my brothers, as we have accepted the blessings of God in the
acceptance of the Elementals, do we also accept the Mumblers as being ‘of God’ as they
have no purpose other than to neutralize the blessings of the Elementals?”
The preacher hit his primary point to little fanfare. The question of the Mumblers
was a decade old, and the opinions that had been formed by his followers would not be
swayed by yet another pulpit speech. He sighed and looked toward the back of the small
church where a lone man sat quietly in the back pew. He was a young man. His temples
began to recede, but his eyes betrayed his youth. His clothes were unusual for Nebra-ska,
looking more like the fancy threads more commonly seen on the coastal regions. No one
else took note of him as he sat there, silently, attentively. Indeed, this stranger may have
paid more attention to the sermon than the regular attendees of the weekly services. The
preacher noted one other specific feature of the man. The tattoo on his neck was the
ancient symbol of the Holy Elemental, the Christ-child. Born nearly 2000 years ago, the
Holy Elemental was believed to be God’s peacemaker between those with the Gift and
those without. He was granted the Gift of the Blessings of all the Elements, and was the
basis for all the modern religions. Today the Christ-child would again bring balance back
to the world, the preacher though silently as he prepared for his final blessing.
“The peace of God be with you in the times ahead…”
The man in the back stood up, and offered a salute to the preacher, who nodded
his head in assent.
“…and my children…”
The man in the back pulled a small metal box out of his leather jacket and flipped
a single switch, illuminating a red light on the box.
“…I am truly sorry.”
The men in the back pressed a small plunger on the box, extinguishing the red
light. A quiet, but distinct whistling sound began to emanate from the box. The
congregation looked up at the preacher, still trying to discern the meaning of that final
phrase when the world as they knew it came to an end, as temperatures approaching 500
million degrees Farhenheit vaporized them and everything around them within a mile of
the hypocenter of the world’s first nuclear blast.
****
The soldiers took the two men, both bound and gagged, into the house. Neither of
them remembered how they had gotten here, nor how long it had taken them to get here.
Both men were sat down in chairs and shackled to them tightly. The soldier’s fat leader
came up to the two men and ordered the others to leave. The fat leader then gave his
explicit instructions.
“You have both been sentenced to death by a jury of your peers. You have both
been conditionally pardoned by me. The condition is that you both survive for the next
hour.”
He pointed at one of the men. “You, you’re the Elemental. You have exactly one
job. Keep this man alive.” gesturing at the other man.
The fat man ungagged the men and turned to walk out.
“Wait, what’s my job?” asked the other man.
“Stay alive.” retorted the fat man.
The fat man left the house and locked the door behind him. The two bound men
looked around at everything in the house, but not at each other. The furniture all looked
brand new, save for a black paint stencil on each item marked “Trinity: Property of US-C
Army” in large military lettering. It was hot inside the house, scorching hot. The
Elemental took note that there was no power inside the building. From his angle he could
see out one of the windows where he recognized the red rocks and sand of a desert. In the
distance he was able to make out a small tower, like a miniature oil drilling tower, with
an odd metal orb at the top of it.
Time crawled by, both of the men spent about half of it trying to remove the
shackles to no avail, and the other half deliberately avoiding making any kind of contact
with each other.
“Ok, fine, who are you and why is it so important I keep you alive?” The
Elemental finally broke the silence.
“I don’t know man, one minute I’m in the back of the paddy wagon getting
dragged back to jail, then next I’m stuck in a fucking house with a fucking ‘mental being
told I get off scott-free if YOU keep me alive. I’m as confused as you are…!”
The Elemental recognized the accent of the other man as being from the
Northwest, an area of the US-C that was notorious for its lawlessness and debauchery.
Stories of Elementals causing widespread destruction and the retaliatory violence that
ensued were the horror tales of real life. Indeed, the Elemental thought, it was this
violence that he had gotten caught up in himself, eventually leading to his current
incarcerated predicament.
The door opened again, and the two men quickly silenced themselves. Three
soldiers pushed in what appeared to be a hospital gurney standing on end. Strapped to it
was a naked woman, her most sensitive parts covered with the very straps that held her in
place. Her eyes were pained and bloodshot and her skin was beaded with sweat. Visible
marks of corporal punishment were crisscrossed on her skin, some of them bleeding,
others bruised with hematoma. Her mouth was open, and noise was coming out, but it
was not a language per se.
“No…. SHIT!!! NO!!!” The Elemental began to panic.
“WHAT? WHAT IS IT?” The other man, sensing the fear in the room began to
share it. The naked woman’s moaning started to get louder and louder.
“She’s a Mumbler! My God… I can’t… There’s nothing I can do…”
“What do you mean? What’s going on?”
The Elemental put all the pieces together in a nanosecond. “They told me I need
to keep you alive, so I assume they’re going to try to kill you. They brought her here to
keep me from being able to use the Gift, so I assume they’re going to succeed in killing
both of us.”
From outside the window, a loud klaxon alarm began to howl across the desert.
The Mumbler began to shriek and moan louder than before.
“What’s the point? What are they trying to do…?”
In the corner of his eye, the Elemental saw the metallic orb quickly fall the length
of the tower outside in the desert. The resulting explosion was recorded as the first
Nuclear Bomb detonated in history.
History is written by the winner of the war.
........
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