MANA HQ – October 27, 2026 – 11 pm
Yvonne Smith was almost hyperventilating when she rushed into the president’s office. She blew past the personal assistant’s attempts to stop her. Yvonne was the lead analyst for super event detections. The angry assistant trailed behind her. The president was mid-conversation with six world leaders. Yvonne didn’t even notice. Standing orders were clear on this. Activate Armageddon Protocols in the sector the epicenter of the event then go directly to the President of EarthGov and provide the alert personally. The president for his part looked rather put out by the woman who just burst into his policy meeting.
“What is the meaning of this?”
Yvonne held up the printout she was clutching as if it would explain everything. She was so out of breath she couldn’t form words properly. The president wasn’t pleased.
“This has better be world-ending important.”
His assistant snagged the paper as her eyes scanned it, she swallowed hard.
“Sir, there has been an Armageddon event.”
The president stood up swiftly and held out his hand. The assistant handed it over. He read it and ran his hand through his salt and pepper black. He looked at the conference attendees. They were all staring at him wide-eyed. He spoke calmly but quickly.
“I’ll brief the entire world congress when I have details. I need to go.”
He disconnected the conference and looked at Yvonne who had finally caught her breath.
“You’ve initiated Armageddon protocols?”
“No-”
“No? What are they training you at the academy these days? It is imperative we respond to the threat immediately. I want bombers in the air, all our troops heading to the epicenter!”
Yvonne went a bit pale.
“Sir, there was no epicenter. It was everywhere, all at once.”
Yvonne motioned to the printout. The president fell into his seat. Every single person who had sat in his seat had prayed it would not happen on their watch. The last time this happened millions of people had died. A divine being had made its presence felt. The emergency phone rang and he picked it up wearily. The voice on the other end of the line quietly informed him that someone or something had altered the fabric of the reality universe wide according to one of their ranking Archmages to what end could not be divined. He rubbed his face with both hands as he hung up the phone.
In the end the causality list for the event was listed as one: Azima Okadigbo, Archmage, Active Mana Diviner. Kenyan MANA Office. Cause of death cerebral hemorrhage after casting a divination to investigate an Armageddon event.
*****
MANA HQ – October 31, 2026 – 6 pm
Yvonne paced her rushed movement to the president’s office this time. She had no wish to show up out of breath again. She clutched another piece of paper in her hand. One that spelled out a second Armageddon event. The assistant looked at Yvonne as she approached and didn’t move to stop her as the hurried woman opened the President’s door. This time the president said nothing of the interruption and held out his hand. Yvonne handed the printout to him. His weary brown eyes scanned English sentences. Yvonne cut off his coming questions.
“I have initiated Armageddon protocols in Moscow. Power signature is a match. But on a much smaller scale.”
The president released the paper and it slowly floated to his desk. He stared down at it. The last five days had made him ponder the protocols they had in place for PL 21 events. Full military and Super mobilization seemed inadequate somehow to something that could literally rewrite the universe. What could they do? With a snap of the being’s fingers they could just make it so MANA never existed. What was the point of antagonizing it. The protocols had been written in the midst of World War 2. They had been signed off on by President Truman, Prime Minister Churchill and Stalin. They had not changed in over eighty years. It was pure hubris to think they could hope to stop a being like that by force of arms. He picked up the phone and called his Chief of Staff.
“Sally, see to it that Armageddon protocols are cancelled in Moscow. Put the local Supers on alert and keep rapid response teams on stand-by.”
She gave him an affirmative response. He then hung up and glanced at Yvonne.
“You may go. You did well.”
Yvonne left the office quietly. The president picked up his phone once again and dialed a number he swore he would never dial. He closed his eyes before initiating the call.
“Hello, Eyre Aurelius speaking.”
The president paused briefly before speaking.
“Hello Eyre, it’s Hank. I wanted your opinion on something.”
Eyre’s voice lacked the smugness Hank had expected when she responded. When he’d first taken office, she’d called and congratulated him. She offered any assistance he might want. Hank was arrogant enough that he declined and told her that the time for people like her had passed. He wasn’t a fan of vampires. Now here he was calling her and asking for advice.
“Of course, Hank. Whatever you need.”
“You may not be aware but there had been two Armageddon events in the past week. I am pondering if the protocols in place are useful, or even questioning if they might make things worse. What is your opinion on them?”
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Eyre paused for a few moments before responding.
“I think they are pointless, but they were forced on me, us, a being like that needs another being of equal power to counter them. Anything less is just asking for trouble. I tried to explain that to the world leaders at the time, but they ignored me. I didn’t hear anything about them so I’m guessing you haven’t sent out the Armageddon alert?”
“No. It seemed inadequate. But I feel like I should do something.”
Eyre laughed softly.
“Sometimes the best thing you can do is wait and watch. I would put a special team on it, observe and report. Unless whatever it is does something destructive or obvious. There is nothing to do. Telling a divine being its bound by human laws seems like a terrible idea. Like it did eighty years ago.”
“The world governments will be upset by that.”
“Hank, you have advisors, get them to put some spin on it.”
“How did you handle them before you had advisors?”
“I asked Isis for advice. But failing that, just dazzle them with technobabble. Tell them you made a tactical decision not to engage as you felt it was too dangerous to the world at large. Tell them you are tracking it and so far, it has taken no aggressive actions. Maybe insinuate that Armageddon protocols will start a fight humanity cannot win.”
Hank let his breath out and relaxed.
“Thank you, Eyre.”
“Anytime Hank. Good luck.”
*****
The Russian trip turned out far differently then Sarah had envisioned it. Serena turned it from torture to somewhat fun. She was somewhat capricious. If Sarah was older and wiser she may have been a bit disturbed that someone who could literally blink and change reality to her whims was so random. As it was Sarah was a teenage girl and loved every moment of it. Serena also got Sarah through the worst of the PR campaign. Apparently the strange being had done a stint as a child star in another universe.
The pair were on a flight back to Munich. Sarah was still coming down from the high of the two days she spent as an honorary member of the Russian Olympic women’s hockey team and the Halloween ball. She’d never been to a masquerade ball before. She had felt a bit like Cinderella that evening. Serena had snapped her fingers and suddenly Sarah the pair looked like Disney princesses. Sarah had never been a fan of the genre, preferring to watch sports movies and sports in general. That night she didn’t care the pair had stolen the hearts of many boys at that ball.
They were flying first class and giggling with each other over the night before. The stewardess who was older and much sterner than the one on Sarah’s trip to the Russian capital. She was not pleased with the ruckus. She stopped by their seats and leaned down.
“Excuse me, young ladies. Please keep it down, you’re disturbing the rest of the passengers.”
Sarah swallowed hard. She pondered what Serena would do in response. One never knew the seeming randomness of her companion. The girl could just decide the flight attendant should no longer exist and make it so. Serena just smiled politely.
“I’m sorry ma’am, we’re just excited about the trip. We’ll keep it down.”
Sarah glanced at Serena. She hadn’t witnessed the girl with any authority figure that dared tell them to do anything. She was slightly surprised Serena was so nice. Even as a vampire Sarah would have been tempted to use her power of mental influence to tell the woman to move on. Serena giggled softly as she looked at Sarah.
“What is that look for?”
Sarah motioned to the flight attendant.
“You didn’t do anything to her.”
Serena quirked her head to the side.
“Why would I?”
“She told you what to do.”
Serena waved her hand dismissively.
“So? She’s just doing her job and we were being very loud. Why didn’t you do anything?”
Sarah shrugged.
“I’m not a vampire, I’d get caught.”
Serena shook her head.
“We’re the same. Sort of. So, I’ll tell you something my mother taught me: Just because you can do something, doesn’t mean you should. We have a lot of power; We should not abuse it. Not because Seraph will just obliterate us, but because it’s wrong.”
“What about ball last night?”
“What about it?”
Sarah whispered harshly in response.
“You turned us into princesses!”
“No, I made us look like princesses, everyone assumed. It didn’t hurt anyone.”
“You probably gave MANA a heart attack. I’m surprised Moscow wasn’t shut down.”
“Not my problem. I’m bound by Seraph’s rules and my conscience not their laws.”
“Well, if we got stuck there because they were…”
Sarah trailed off as she noticed for the first time Serena wasn’t wearing a power limiter. She pointed at the girl’s ankle. She kept whispering.
“Oh my God. You need a limiter!”
Serena blushed slightly.
“You’re right. Do you have an extra?”
Sarah blinked at her companion in disbelief.
“No! Why would you think that?”
Serena shrugged.
“You tend to blow them up I thought…”
Serena snapped her fingers and a pink one that was identical to Sarah’s appeared on her ankle. Sarah looked at it with wide eyes.
“You can’t just keep doing that. MANA will detect it.”
“I’m going to have to do it again to help you. I honestly don’t know why you’re so worried about MANA. You’re like me. Their laws don’t apply to you.”
“It seems like they could kind of just shoot me. The last time I was shot it really hurt, almost killed me. They have lots of bullets.”
“So what? You’ll just make a new physical form. They may as well be shooting your jacket.”
“I don’t believe you.”
Serena shrugged in response. Sarah sighed and decided to change the subject, she didn’t want to risk someone overhearing the pair discussing MANA being beneath them.
“So, you never answered me, why an elf?”
Serena blinked at Sarah’s abrupt change of subject.
“I didn’t feel like having a beard?”
“Seriously?”
Serena frowned.
“I’m immortal, you’re immortal. I made a universe based on my friend’s fantasy world and decided to see how the elves, who are immortal dealt with it.”
Sarah was interested now.
“Made a universe?”
“Yea sure. I do it all the time.”
Serena reached into her pocket and pulled out a black crystal sphere. Sarah looked at her companion in disbelief.
“Just like that, poof you make a universe?”
“Well not a whole universe. It’s kind of just a pocket dimension. Like not a full fledged one like this reality. It kind of generates as it goes. Like a procedurally generated video game? I give it the initial parameters and it just runs off creating.”
Sarah pointed at the black sphere.
“That’s a universe? Like a whole other reality.”
Serena nodded holding the black sphere in her hand.
“Yep.”
“Its not a real world though, its fake right?”
Serena held up the sphere and offered it to Sarah. Sarah held her hands back like it might burn her.
“No, its real enough. I mean what is real anyway? To the people who live inside it, it is real. To me when I’m there it’s real. Here just take it, pop in and see.”
Sarah shook her head vigorously.
“I don’t want to hold trillions of lives in my hand.”
“You already do, girlfriend. Besides this is just a manifestation of the new universe. It doesn’t exist in the sphere. It’s just how I visualize it.”
“But the silver vortex thingy, no way everyone will see.”
Serena laughed.
“No, you can just hold the stone and pop in mentally, take over someone similar to yourself and poke around. Out here you’ll be asleep for a bit.”
“How do I get out?”
“Just wake up. It’s easy and I can pull you out. It’s how I mess around when I’m supposed to be at home.”
“It seems wrong taking someone over…”
Sarah was always insatiably curious. Her silver eyes refused to leave the black crystal sphere. She reached out and took it in her hand.
“How do I do it?”
“Just decide you want to be inside. Like I said, this is a physical aid. Imagine there is an entire universe inside and that you want to be there instead of here. Lay your head back and close your eyes.”
Sarah closed her eyes.
To be Continued…