[The Garden] Praeceptor of the Reliquiae

[Nox]

It was much warmer than outside. Though there was still a chill in the air, though not one of temperature. Nox didn't set next to Eliot or Helena. Eliot had taken the seat opposite the Ascendancy at the other 'head' of the table, Nox chose a more neutral location. Jay and the other dominions stood behind him as the guards that they were. Nox was mediator, just a middle man, he honestly had no idea why he was here other than for the introduction. Eliot had mentioned he was useful more times than he could count and all the while he insulted him to his face. Not that being American was an insult, but the Atharim looked down on their American breathern with disdain. And yet he wanted Nox for a mouth peice -- at least the visibility of what his new Atharim could do.

Nox didn't sit properly in the chair, he leaned back casually, but he wasn't slouched. Just not board like straight like Eliot. He wasn't here to show the Ascendncay anything more than what the man already knew. He knew exactly who Nox was. Though he could feel the eyes of at least one Dominion on him. Allan was always watching him. If Nox didn't know better he'd think the man had a crush on hiom. But it wasn't that simple, he didn't like him for some unknown reason. But it wasn't worth the effort to figure it out.

[Ascendancy]

As Helena spoke, Nikolai fell into silence. Not the brooding kind, nor the silence of a man plotting violent reprisal, but the precise, attentive stillness of a hunter waiting to see what else might stir in the bushes. His fingers remained steepled beneath his chin, unmoving. His eyes, however, tracked her.

There was something there. Something that did not fit. She was not Atharim. He believed her. Or rather, he believed that she believed that. Her answers had the structure of a woman who had already measured the world in his term. They were calculating, unsentimental, and quietly ruthless. Her words had weight, but it was also the manner of her delivery that caught him and not just the content.

He watched her posture and breathing. The subtle shift in attention when she gestured to Nox, then turned her gaze to the Dominion at his left flank. That had not gone unnoticed.

She’s probing the structure, he thought, curiously. Most people either flattered him or feared him, but Helena seemed quietly indifferent. It made her intriguing.

Her point about the Atharim was correct: they were fractured and desperate, devouring their own from within. And still clinging to the past like a drunkard to an empty bottle. His gaze slid to Eliot next. And there… the irritation returned.

Cowboys.

Nikolai didn’t smile, though the thought of Eliot casually throwing the word around made the corner of his mouth twitch inwardly. I was an Atharim, you overconfident child, he thought bitterly, and Nikolai was far cry from the rodeo-and-spitfires archetype Eliot seemed to imagine. His memories of that period of life were twisted and bitter, but he was still insulted to be counted among their number so irreverently. He never thought the day would come when he preferred the company of Nox to another Atharim. By comparison, Nox was a prince among pig-farmers. 

Of course they would want to start in Moscow. That was always the pattern. These people, these visionaries, always started with dreams but they could never scale them. They had no concept of what it meant to bring the world to heel. And the irony? They had come to him the very man they feared as a tyrant because he understood scale better than anyone.

Still, he allowed them this illusion of progress. Let them plant the seeds. And when their garden burned to the ground? He would inherit the soil and grow his own.

I will not have to lift a finger against the Atharim. They would collapse under the weight of their own contradictions. And when they did… someone loyal would be needed to rebuild what remains.

He leaned back in his chair now, posture deceptively casual, though the Dominions behind him shifted subtly at the change.

“And who exactly,” he said at last, his voice soft and cool as glass, “will sit on this tribunal of ours?”

It was a simple question, but buried within it was a thousand others: Who do you trust with power? Who do you intend to judge the world’s gods? And most importantly: how easily could they be bent to his will when the experiment unravelled?

[Helena]

The minutiae of the plans were Eliot’s. She did not agree with everything, but she did not oppose what she might personally consider sentimentality. Others would see it as goodness; a world worth fighting for. Nox Durante certainly did, and it was men like him who mattered. Belief and loyalty were not things Helena could engender in others herself, a clinical fact she well understood about her own shortcomings. No hearts inflamed when she spoke. No one rallied to causes she nudged, unless she allowed other players to move the pieces for her.

But by his unsmiling, intense gaze, and scathing questioning, the Ascendancy himself perhaps saw unrooted idealism. She was not surprised. Had there been more natural investment in reform, he would have already acted beyond the speech which forced the Atharim into the public consciousness. He didn’t deliver a fatal blow, just one that diminished their greatest strength and ensured they would eventually gut themselves. And perhaps they would have done, if not for Helena.

Truthfully, she did not care about the legitimacy Eliot deemed necessary for his vision. Support made change happen faster, but it would not behoove them to become an overt arm of governance. There was a marked difference between men and women expected to fight alongside an enemy for a common good, and working for him. Eliot ought to step lightly, and she did glance at him then, the first time she had acknowledged his existence since they’d passed the gates. The Ascendancy was a fast moving current; one that could speed them, but also one that could drown them entire. She would speak to Eliot later of what she saw when she looked at him – the way she knew the world spiralled and bent around him. But for now, there was only the look.

Democracy was an illusion, of course. The Ascendancy must feel he maintained control. The Atharim must feel they had a true hand in their own reshaping. The populace must believe they had true protection from the supernatural beings walking freely amongst them. Eliot must balance it all on his shoulders, pulling the strings with a light touch if he truly wanted to see his dreams come to full fruition.

[Jay Carpenter]

Flashes of raw Power always punched through the nerves like an electric current. Though in this case, it was literal electricity cracking from the sky. Still, the Ascendancy’s presence dwarfed everything. Once the blindness faded, Jay’s senses sharpened to a razor’s edge. Not that he hadn’t already been tuned in. But the longer the conversation dragged, the more his body waited for a cue to move.

Jay caught the look on Nox’s face. A tightly reined discomfort he knew too well. But was it the show of power that had him rattled? The undercurrent of threat in every word passed? Or just the fact that he was literally stuck between a rock and a hard place.

As they followed inside, Jay fell into step beside him, dropping his voice low.
“What are you doing with these assholes?” he muttered. The joke was there, somewhere, buried under dry grit.

"Making introductions and listening to what he has to say. Not like I really have much choice. My uh life and those of my friends are only not hunted because I play nice.”

Jay’s brow furrowed thoughtfully. He was dead serious. There wasn’t an ounce of sarcasm in his tone. Bone-chilled to practically chattering teeth, but no sarcasm.

“Don’t you own a coat?” He tried to elbow nudge him where the others couldn’t see.

Nox laughed. "Why do I need a coat when I have the power?” He glanced back the way they came "I don't think I want to risk being smited,” he added with a wry smile.

Jay suppressed a chuckle, stuffing his hands contentedly into his pockets the rest of the way.

Once indoors, he shed his own coat, throwing Nox a smirk as he did then took up a place behind Ascendancy along the wall.


((With Nox))

[Eliot]

Eliot smiled at the choice of words. Our. "That is something I think the three of us would need to agree on. But should be none of us present." Eliot pulled a folder out of his brief case and pushed it down the table. It didn't quite reach Nox, but the boy picked it up and handed it to the Ascendancy. The perfect middle ma. "I've put together a list of suggestions. However, those that would represent your interested best were only my best guess."

There were three listed on the file. One giving information on suggested Atharim whom Eliot would trust with the job. Nox could have been on that list. It would have been an easy win for the Ascendancy, but Eliot needed him to be the face of the project. It was important that the world saw a man who would be God, fighting the monsters and helping the people they affect.

A second list was a list of lawyers and judges based here in Moscow that had the good of the people as their best interest. Men and women who fought for the little guy. The ones who saw people for people and not a paycheck.

The third was a list of possibilities Eliot thought might do will for the CCD's best interest. Among the names was the new consult of channelers. Though he was likely too busy for the job, but he was an apt choice as a channeler himself and a man the Ascendancy trusted. There were other names, but they were only guesses on Eliot's party.

[[Ooc: I have not mentioned it to ck but it is still a suggestions Elliott would have made. And I don't have any other names, feel free to make some up. Or add Pcs to the list.]]

[Nox]

Eliot was at least prepared and when the folder didn't reach the Ascendancy nix handed it to him. Elliott could have used the power to deliver it gracefully. But he didn't. Like him, probably the fear of God stuck into him after the display outside.

It was warmer here. And Nox truly wondered what the play was. The Ascendancy hated the atharim as much as they hated him. How did Elliot see this playing out. A tribunal and contain meant that was not going to happen with out driving the men and women who could be dangerous. Unless there was a way... The nano bots had taken away his ability, maybe they could bridge the gap. Now that they knew what they were looking for.

Nox flicked his eyes and opened a note on his wallet and wrote a quick note to talk to Sage. The lens warriors came in handy. He wished he'd gotten in board sooner. Though he wasn't sure what it looked like to others as he manipulated the hud with eye movements.

[Ascendancy]

He accepted the folder, expression carefully neutral. It had been a long time since someone slid plain paper across the table. it roused a momentary sense of nostalgia for simpler times. 

A flick revealed its contents, but he only skimmed it briefly before calculations were already gearing many steps ahead. "Unanimous decisions by a group of the three or four are rare. Ms. Asquith, as you've already said, is not Atharim. Nox does not seem to have been invited to the conversation, which leaves you and me, Mr. Lageaux." He pondered the ramifications of such a one-to-one arrangement. That the members of this tribunal be equally measured and approved by only the two of them. Eliot already revealed much about his character. Nikolai discerned that he could use that to his advantage, if it became necessary. 

Actual appointments were going to require careful thought. Marcus was the obvious choice, and something told him that he would readily accept the position. That left "the people's" appointment. Someone cunning, who wouldn't be overwhelmed or horrified by the stream of people and their crimes brought before the tribunal. Someone versed in lawful accord. Someone logical. Someone not prone to the whim of emotion.

"Consul DuBois to represent the Custody. And Daniil Tarasovich to represent the people are my nominations." There was no ordained process by which these nominations and selections were to be carried out. It reasoned to him that if Eliot agreed to these two, he had but to nominate an Atharim appointment for Nikolai to accept and the tribunal would be placed.

[Eliot]

Eliot was sure that the Ascendancy felt he'd say no to the names. Marcus Dubois was on his list. Not as someone he could control. He didn't really care if everyone who came to the tribunal as found guilty. No it was just a means to making the world seem safer. And clear the Atharim to do their jobs. Even if there were a few more hoops to jump through.

He nodded. "While you maybe right that Helena is not of the Atharim she is apart of the Reliquiae and she does get a say in the matter. It is with her that we make this work. Nox is just the pretty face of the Reliquiae. He is what we want the world to see of the new Atharim. The channeling man who saves the world, and saves the people in it. He is what we want the world to see, while the rest of handle the more realistic nature of our brethren."

At the top of his list of Atharim was Zephyr Lelantos. "My nomination is at the top of the list. Durante moved in his chair and turns his attention to him. He knew the name. Knew what she was capable of. "Zypher Lelantos. She is of the old world. Eager to hunt the gods. But willing to work with channelers to get the job done. She has been Nox's handler with in the Atharim with the help of a few well placed guides for her and him alike. The old Atharim will be more in line if someone like her is on the tribunal, and she has the history of the Atharim at her back -- born and raised like and direct descendent from one of the original fighters of gods."

He looked to Helena. "I agree to your appointments. Helena?"

[Nox]

Eliot mentioned Zef. Not exactly who he'd recommend. But it made him sit up straighter and pay attention. Eliot's plan wasn't to stop the killing of helpless children, but to make it seem like they had stopped. To offer up a different solution but people like Sasha and himself who sparked in violence probably wouldn't make it past the cut. How many of the people in this room would make this new Atharim cut.

And they wanted him to be the face of it. To be the false face. He wouldn't have much choice, his bargain with the Atharim was that he do what they asked. Even if they were a new faction they were the ones keeping him and his friends alive. And if the Ascendancy backed it?? What could he do?