Where he stood on the California beach he could see nothing but moving darkness where the clear polished blue waves would be. His feet were buried in the sand, the torn hem of his jeans ratted and wet against his shins. Ish looked like any old beach bum with a layer of scruffy facial hair and dirt under his finger nails. One hand clutched at the small medallion around his neck, the one with a small chip from the Xetes crystal deep in its white gold core. When the medallion touched his skin it felt warm, hot even, like something living inside was trying to burn its way out. It was all he had left of the Institute. All he had left of the place that was now nothing more than rubble. Balling his hands into a fist he ripped the medallion from his neck and threw it towards the unseen waves. A whistling sound accompanied its flying arch, but he wasn't able to see where it hit the water. That was all behind him now. It was time to move on.
When Iris and Isaac Goldman had their perfect little bundle of joy they had expected something special. Both parents were national merit scholars. Isaac himself had been in the running for a Nobel Peace Prize with the invention of the plasma radon product that became his companies’ main enterprise. Though he missed out on the Nobel he more than made up for it by turning a garage business into a multi-billion dollar empire. Though his ideals were lost along the way. Military contracts and underground agreements with certain world powers became his bread and butter. He was a ruler of the financial world, and Iris was always pictured as the perfect wife right at his side. So when they had a child it was expected that he would be unique. Special.
What they got though was more than they had expected. At the age of two he spoke perfectly, able to conceive of strange concepts that would be beyond most children his age. Gabriel had an uncanny knack for knowing things he shouldn't know, and by the time he was six it became quite obvious that he had the ability to maneuver things with his mind. It was small at first, mashed potatoes flying across the kitchen, but when it progressed to butcher knives in the air the Goldman's decided they were not set up to care for their 'special' child. Besides they already had a second child. A perfect little girl with brown curls and no signs of anything abnormal. Just the perfect little angel. Perhaps that was what made it easier to sign over their son to a boarding school in Russia called the Kristovson Academy that specialized in studies of the paranormal.
The cold war was over, but Russia's interest in psychological warfare hadn't faded. The Academy housed the same scientists that the government had used in their experiments. They offered an above board education as well as full time training in psychic abilities. It was there that Gabriel grew up. Not in the loving embrace of a mother and father, but at the end of his teachers rulers. By the age of sixteen he was taking classes in biochemical engineering and genetic colonization. Even among the small group of gifted students he stood out like a sore thumb. Always just a little withdrawn, just a bit odd.
In all that time he only saw his parents once a year, and until he left the Academy at the age of seventeen he had never met his sister Rashel. When he finally came home his family tried to act as though nothing were wrong. In the eyes of the media the story had been that young Gabriel was a boy genius, sent away to study for his own best interest. No one the wiser of the fact that this loving family secretly feared their son. All that changed the first time he met his sister Rashel, a sister he hadn't been raised with, a sister he hardly knew, and the first time they met the way he thought of her was anything but sisterly.
One summer was all they had together, one blissfully perfect summer where he fell in love with this girl who was like no one he had ever met. She was strong and willful, and eager to give love where before he had known nothing but solitude. The two of them snuck off from their parents, taking trip around the Austrian Countryside where they stayed for that summer at a cottage owned by their fathers company. If ever there were two souls united it was them. Like one being separated into two bodies, they were only complete when they were with one another. Soon though the affection between them worried their parents. It was easy to see that Gabriel only smiled when Rashel was around, and Rashel followed him like a shadow.
By the time the new school year started their parents saw that this time Rashel was sent to a Swiss boarding school for her last year of high school and Gabriel was shipped to America to attend Stanford, following in his fathers footsteps. Separating from his sister was the hardest thing Ish had ever had to do, but he swore they would be together again one day. What he didn't realize was how much Rashel would change in the years to come, how someone so sweet could become something entirely different, something evil.
"You know that's no excuse! They traded you away like garbage Ish. You and I are the only family we have. If they were out of the way then no one could stop us."
Rashel moved to slip onto his lap, and he shuddered at her warmth and the weight of her body pressed in against him. He had always reacted to her that way. Helplessly, like every time was the first time. As she nuzzled into his neck he clenched his teeth, hands brought up to clutch at her back.
"But Rashel, I can't..." the words were moaned against her hair.
It hadn't come suddenly. Looking back he could see that. She had somehow slipped into the subjects subtly and over time. Still though at the end it seemed natural. The idea that they could kill their often-disenfranchised parents and take over the business. After all, he knew the business inside and out. After finishing his Masters in biochemical engineering at Stanford he had gone on to work for their father. It was when he graduated and moved back to Austria that he and Rashel became lovers for the first time. That was when she began her plotting, and he was helpless beneath the spell she wove.
She knew about his powers, more even than their parents. She also knew that he loved her and would never force himself into her mind. Ish trusted Rashel. Together she promised, they would rules their parents empire together. When they killed Isaac and Iris they stood over their bodies and watched the blood soak the carpet. For a second Gabriel watched Rashel's face, and saw something in her eyes. A heat he had never seen before, something unknown to him. It was a look of such pure and perfect pleasure that it stirred a sickness deep down inside him. Running outside he threw up in the bushes. If he had to pinpoint it he would say that was the moment that he realized something was very wrong with his sister.
Slowly he started to peek into her mind, to see what she was thinking. What he discovered was that she had him blocked. Somehow she had the power to keep him out of her mind. The two of them took over the family empire, now the king and queen of an enormous European conglomerate. They dined with diplomats and lunched with starlettes, and if anyone suspected the bizarre relationship between them they never said a word. Secretly though all was not well. Gabriel had his suspicions and he went out to research the time period when his mother had conceived Rashel. It turned over a mystery. Seemed their father had been gone the entire month when Rashel was conceived.
The business was going to move its home base to Italy, and he volunteered to go for two weeks to do some work setting up. By then he was eager to be away from Rashel. The more suspicious he got, the more she seemed to sense it. There were arguments that turned to violence, threats, and one night stands that left him miserable. Rome was the perfect place for him to go in search of answers. He had stolen a strand of Rashel's hair and taken it for DNA testing, which found some interesting strands. He had heard about a place in Rome called Catacomb Alley where dark paranormals were said to set up shop. It was there that he found the answers he was looking for.
Djavo. Half-demon. That was what Rashel was. His illicit relationship was with a being whose power came from the chaos and destruction of those around them. It sank an icy spear into his heart. When he went back to Austria he was still wondering how to confront her, but he needn't have bothered. The moment he was off the plane the police were there to slap cuffs on him. Murder was the word that would be on the front of the next days paper. As he was being shoved into the back of the police car he saw a flash of Rashel's face, and there it was again. For a split second she had that look of incomparable pleasure on her beautiful face.
Scratching at the wall he marked a line where he was counting down the days. From the hole he was kept in was hard to keep track. There was only one tiny square window way up on the wall. Even on his tip-toes he couldn't see out. The floor was mostly packed mud, and there was a constant stench from the bucket that was left for his refuse. Sometimes he suspected the guards forgot him for days at a time based on that bucket. The lines scratched into the wall were so numerous he had stopped counting them, yet he kept marking. His muscles were weak and partially atrophied, the only time he even had the energy to stand was when they forgot to come in and shoot him full of tranquilizers. It was hell, and it went on day after day just the same. Until....
The door creaked open and after such sound deprivation it sounded like a scream ringing in his ears. Blinking weary eyes he looked at the man who had to bend to walk through the door. A lanky bald man with eyes like crimson fire. That was his first look at Mr. Xetes. It seemed the government had made a deal. If Gabriel would transfer to the Xetes Institute for Scientific Reserach then his record would be erased. The powers that be would say that it was a mistrial, an innocent man wrongly accused. His name would be clean, and he would be free. But only if he agreed to go to San Francisco with Mr. Xetes. At the time it seemed the only solution.
The Institute was housed in a strange residential suburb of San Francisco, in an old Victorian House that was painted a strange bright purple. From the first look of it through the window of the police transport van he couldn't imagine what kind of research they conducted there. Gabriel stood quietly behind Mr. Xetes as the man signed off the release papers held out by the officer who wouldn't take off the cuffs until all the John Hancock’s had been written. Gabriel wasn't sure who this Xetes was, but it was clear he had political pull of some kind to have him released from a foreign prison like that.
There were five residence there. A psychic vampire, a healer, a beast master, and a touch node. Each power unique, each strong, and each with some training given at a young age to control their gift. Keeping mainly to himself he watched the others as well as the workers who went in and out, trying to find what it was that made him feel uneasy since he had walked in the door. For the first few weeks he would only get strange flashes of thought, but it was soon clear that something here was blocking him from reading the employees thoughts. Someone didn't want him in their heads. What he did see in those flashes was a crystal as big as a chair, with angry spikes and vibrant colors. It always looked somehow alive and on the offensive.
Dark Magic. That's what the Kristovson Academy would have called it, and he soon saw why. It began with small bits of crystal attached to their heads over the third eye while they were doing researched. It caused an up surging of their natural gifts, but the crash was significant. When the residents tried to revolt they were put on lock down. Gabriel had gotten out of prison only to end up locked in again. Those who tried to run were dragged back, taken down to the basement and when they came back they were quiet, submissive, and more powerful than before.
This crystal, whatever it was, had the power to take a psychics gifts and enhance them. But at a price. Xetes was like some evil scientist obsessed with harnessing psychic power for his own financial gain. He was worse than any of the Russian scientists that Gabriel had been raised by. By the end they would regularly take the residents down to the room with the crystal, forcing them in contact with it like some kind of radioactive energy it fed on them and strengthened them at the same time. Slowly though it began to make him lose his mind. He couldn't remember things anymore, and it became like a need, a need to be close to that source of endless power. When they finally revolted and the crystal was smashed he thought he would be free, but that was a lie. What the crystal had done to him could not be undone.
When he ran at last from the Xetes Institute the place was on fire, and he wasn't even sure if any of the others were alive. The last thing he had seen was Mr. Xetes leaping to try to save his precious crystal just before it shattered, imploding into a million spiked pieces. That had been enough for Gabe.
He wandered the California coastline, out of his mind, his memory almost gone. The day he threw the medallion into the water was the first day in months that he could even remember his name. And by the time the police picked him up as a vagrant he couldn't even remember why he had the strange scar on the center of his forehead.
There were no memories, no thoughts for a long time between California in 2006 and Austria 2007. Picked up by the police as a vagrant and finger printed it didn't take long for Rashel to come to get him. When she took him home to Austria he was in a state of severe mental shock. His powers would go off suddenly and without warning, and he was being driven slowly but surely mad by the constant barrage of other peoples thoughts. Something inside him was growing, he could feel it pushing inside his brain ready to tear him apart. Rashel could have killed him, could have made him disappear, but instead she chose to keep him, like a pet.
Hiring the same teachers from Russia who had first trained him she began to bring him back to life. She made one fatal mistake though, she had no idea how strong he had become. As Gabriel began to regain control he could hear her every thought, her shields were now mere gossamer webbing to him that he could look through with no problem. He saw what she was, her power as a Djavo, her desires for destruction. He saw the past through her memories, how she had manipulated him, used him, convinced him to throw away his own life for love of her. It all became clear as the days passed, but he held his tongue and waited until the time was right.
It took nearly a year for him to be fully functional again, to take back his place at Rashel's side. She liked him there, and this time he played the part of the perfect trusting and loving partner to a T. Waiting until all the cards were on the table to strike. IT started with little things. A meeting that he would wipe from her mind, small things she would suddenly forget. Then small voices playing inside her head, driving her mad. He played her like a violin, filing papers behind her back to have her found unfit so that the estate of their family would revert to his control. The last push came at a board meeting where he used illusory chaos to set off her demonic powers.
She was thought to be mad, and only as the papers were being signed to put him in charge and lock her away did she even think to look at him as the culprit. Screaming his name she struggled as the doctors shot her up with a sedative and wrestled her into a straight jacket. These were people who didn't believe in demons, but they believed in crazy. Gabriel had made Rashel look absolutely insane. As she was about to be taken away he leaned in and kissed her sweetly, not caring what those watching thought of the siblings daring kiss. He loved her, and wanted her touch and taste one last time. If only things could have been different he would have loved and cherished her forever. Forever. It was a long time to miss someone. Especially someone who didn't love you back.
The woman sitting across from him at the restaurant was giving him the full performance. Low cut blouse, coiffed blonde hair, batting eyelashes, glimpses of her thigh highs as her legs crossed and uncrossed. Everything about her reeked of a game, a cleverly laid trap. All he saw though were her faults. Where Rashel's hair was soft and slightly curled this woman's was straight as straw. Where Rashel's eyes were slightly catlike this woman was doe eyed which made her look insipid and weak. It was always like this. He could do nothing but make comparisons.
"If I marry him, I'll be set for the rest of my life. If he even just got me pregnant I'd never have to work again."
Her thoughts made him almost choke on the shot of Sambuca he was sipping. Gabriel laughed out loud and the woman looked suddenly uncomfortable. She was already wondering if he knew what she was thinking. Always the same. Dating was pointless. He would wait an appropriate amount of time and then he would pay the check, suddenly remembering something that needed tending to at the office. It was an easy enough thing to put her in a chartered car and send her on her way. Then on his own he could walk the shadowy streets of Rome.
He loved the city, its darkness. He knew that Rashel would have loved to wander those streets with him. She was in Austria, locked away, and he was here. Sometimes it didn't seem fair. But if it had to be him or her.... well...he had made his choice. Now he just had to live with it. And that was the really hard part. But at least he lived with his sins in a palace, tended to by a staff of twenty, with the world on a string, and power to keep him safe.
