"It was all sudden, wasn't it?" Maddex asked, "Once they completed this rune of theirs. The insanity and evil..."
Marie sighed, "to a great extent they had already crossed the line between "good" and "evil" by that point. Their actions had ruined lives. The Leomen cubs that they had created, while they were rescued by native humans and were reunited with a pride of Leomen didn't fare well. While they could understand each other through the natural roars, growls, and snarls that a mundane lion would use, they could not otherwise converse. Native leoman and lupman in conversation with native humans spoke the language of the humans they were speaking with. NOT English. As a result the native leomen easily recognized these cubs as NOT of their pride..."
"But it would have been "uncivilized" of them to simply abandon the cubs," Samantha commented.
"Precisely," Marie nodded, "but still, as a result, they would grow up to feel left out of both worlds. They were of the European leoman genetic stock, but they were raised by the Native leomen. Now, as said earlier, they all got along, but even when two groups get along, if someone doesn't feel comfortable in either group, you have a problem, and that is precisely the example of the evils that witches had unleashed before the point where they went mad."
Marie then sighed, "Before that point, however, redemption was still a possibility. They could have realized the error of their ways and undone much of the damage that they had done. But convinced that all adults and laws were evil, they crossed the point of no return..."
++++++
1685
Joseph Running-Bear sighed heavily as he looked out his window. Things in Glendale were rapidly getting worse. Nearly all of these dark winds seemed to swirl around his foster daughters, whom he no longer had any control over. Once Gita turned eighteen, the three had left, and took everything they owned with them. He didn't know precisely where they lived, but he did manage to try and follow what they were doing, but with his own age advancing, it wasn't easy.
"This was a doomed effort from the start," the native shaman spoke, as if to nothing.
He sighed when he heard no answer. He knew that Batlhilde couldn't just kill her grandchildren while they were innocent, and he really didn't have it in him to kill them either. But, now he sensed that things were rapidly going bad. He turned to a small table near him where a copy of the bible he had received from the Puritans when he converted lay beside several items that were of traditional native medicine.
"I have failed you, Balthilde," he sighed, "Forgive me."
He sighed again when he received no response. He then collected up both items.
"At least I can make one last try," Joseph spoke, and left his home.
++++++
"You're an Inquisitor?!" Katherine gasped as she sat on a bench with Marie in a secluded part of the Vatican, after years of ignoring, silence, and pushing away, she was finally getting somewhere.
"Is this really that surprising?" Marie answered, "Why do you think I've pushed so many people away. If someone outside the Vatican catches me... I will be burned at the stake, and likely anyone I'm with, and it's if the things I've had to fight don't kill me first."
Katherine shuddered at the memory of Turkish spy and the havoc he had caused. It had certainly frightened her, and surprised her more to see Marie stop him. Human females were heavily restricted in what was tolerated. If Marie had been a leoman or lupman female, as they were more "gender equal" then humans in that they would be expected to do things that humans considered solely a "man's" responsibility.
"I guess it isn't THAT surprising, but you can't shut everyone out," Katherine spoke, "You need real friends. Friends you can confide it."
"I'm sorry for thinking your "perkiness" was genetic," Marie told her.
"It's a common misconception," Katherine sighed, "partially because there are so many felmen with my fur color that ARE always perky for some reason."
Katherine then came forward and hugged Marie. Marie could feel the felmen woman purring into her chest.
"I may not be able to fully replace your godfather or Mutt, but I will always be your friend, for thick or thin," Katherine purred in a manner that showed true friendship, "if you ever need help, I will be there for you."
"Thank you, Katherine," Marie hugged Katherine back.
++++++++
"We're nearly there," Gita smiled as she approached the center of Glendale, near an old Puritan church, "we'll soon end the evil reign of adults!"
"A glorious prospect, Mistress," Lilith spoke from around Gita's shoulders.
"Yes," Gita nodded as she left the strongest layer of the Infinite Chaos on the ground along the route she was taking. Once she and her sisters reached the center of town, their magics would combine and make sure that no one in Glendale ever aged again, allowing them to turn everyone, including themselves back into children, "soon everyone will be good!"
Gita and Lilith then turned to see Goldwyn approaching with Herodias in her arms. Griselle was a little further away, but she was also making good progress.
"We're finally here," Goldwyn smiled as she approached her sisters, "Finally ready."
"Ready for the final step," Griselle agreed as she looked about the crowd that had been watching their progress through the progression of the year. They had used enough magic to leave the people of Glendale largely in trance in regards to the rune, as if it altered in any way, the effect the witches desired would not come, and possibly wouldn't work at all.
"Ready to make them good?" Gita asked.
"Ready." "Ready."
"Then let the evil reign of adults end!" and the three witches stepped forward and the rune was completed.
+++++++++
Marie rolled over and twisted in her sleep. Something was not right and she could feel it. It seemed to travel across the ocean from a place she didn't know. She saw three women step forward in the center of a town, near an undecorated church, which she guessed belonged to some Protestant sect. As they took the step, massive black thunder clouds appeared over the town and swirled around it, sending down lightning strikes through it. The three women looked as if they gasped in pain for a moment before a lightning bolt threw them apart.
As they got up again Marie saw that they were the same three girls she had met before in her dreams. They were approached by an elderly native American man, who seemed to protest something... or check on one, who appeared to be missing an eye. The three then snapped as the man was knocked away, and she then heard one line clearly...
"WE ARE GAAL, GOLGATHA, AND GOMORRAH! MAY THE MOST PERFECT CHAOS REIGN EVERYWHERE AND FOR ALL TIME! MAY IT NEVER END! NEVER END! NEVER END! ALWAYS FREE! ALWAYS CHAOS!"
Marie shook herself awake at that. She looked around, almost hoping to see Mutt sleeping on the bed, but he had passed on peacefully, just as her godfather had. She was alone.
"I was right before," Marie gasped, "that didn't feel like the future... that felt like it was happening now."
Marie shuddered. She wasn't entirely sure if what she had seen was truly happening at that time or was going to happen in the future, but it was clear that the three she had first thought would be friends with her, had no true intention of being friends. They were obssessed with something else, and that Marie just happened to be another tool or target for them... in contrast to Katherine, who was there for Marie, even when Marie hadn't wanted her to be there.
One question remained in Marie's mind as she realized that the three girls she had met in her dreams would have to be killed before things became worse.
"Why? Why will they do it, or is it why did they do it?"