Pr0xy has had me on a low internet sanity plan lately. She seemed so sure that we’ll be able to find info we need to make our next move out in the “real world” since we’re looking into the “key of ancient power”. Because of that, going pre-internet made some kind of sense. I gotta admit I liked the idea of taking my hand off the driver’s wheel.
I’ve learned a lot about Pr0xy lately that I didn’t necessarily get from our time gaming online together. She’s kind of a witch. Or at least witch-y. She says they’re always dealing with weird under the table “magic” and “alchemical” stuff at the halloween store she works at. I guess I believe anything is possible at this point. She said it’s not spells and wands and the things you usually think of, but more like powerful artifacts, tinctures & supplies.
We went to the library and only found dusty ol books full of dead ends, so we ended up going to the museum to fuck around since we were already out & about. This day is making me realize that for as jacked as my life has become since I stole that government file, the situation is also forcing me to leave my degen lair. Gotta live before you die, right? (and hopefully die before you die, too)
We were checking out some cool old paintings and holy shit one of them was of a woman holding some sort of crystal ball with a green crystal inside. Imagine my surprise when I read the tag next to it.
Morgan le Fay by Edward Burne-Jones 1872 [pictured at top of post]. what the fuck.
I asked a docent who told me it’s a different iteration of a painting that the artist originally did in 1862, that he then riffed on later in his career. Why the actual fuck would the artist choose to do that? Has she actually been alive and pulling strings for centuries?! I am still holding out hope that it’s just her stage name and she’s a huge stan of Arthurian legend. I guess any hornet’s nest worth swatting is gonna be full of hornets… or some shit like that.
The next stop on Pr0xy’s mandatory field trip was to the halloween store where she works. It was pretty sick, I’d never actually been there before. Extra cool after making my creation yesterday featuring one of their mannequins, because I got to see a couple of them “in the plastic”. Get it?! But she didn’t actually drag us there to buy f4ce-paint or masks, she said she wanted to talk to her boss. Dude’s name is James Hendricks which is pretty hilarious. I wasn’t sure how much I wanted to share our drama with him but Pr0xy insisted he was cool and it was the right move.
So we knocked at the back “employees only” room and a man in his fifties with glasses and a shock of white hair running through the greyish brown gestured us into a back sitting room. We told him how we were in the shit and asked him what he knows about Morgan Le Fey or powerful green crystals. He sighed a loaded sigh and took off his glasses to tinker with them for a minute. He told us his parents had opened the store originally and they’d told him stories throughout his life about the secret family business of alchemy – and the risks that come with having “magic blood”. Then he dove into this whole epic saga…
Hendricks said that according to legend, King Arthur and Morgan Le Fey were half siblings and lovers, with Mordred being their child together. There was a lot of drama there. Apparently Mordred was as evil & depraved as Arthur was good and chivalrous, and Mordred became known as “Heoruwearg” or “The Wolf”. Then he pulled out a dusty old book and showed us the crazy pic above. Eventually Mordred & Arthur met in battle, and Mordred was dealt a mortal wound by Arthur, who in turn was mortally wounded by Mordred. Arthur was taken away “through the mists,” and Morgan lost her mind with grief over her dying son. It is said she used Mordred’s heart to try to bring him back, but instead created a blood-thirsty abomination, neither alive nor dead. The Wolf has been said to stalk the night and slaughter those with magical blood, dragging them away to the shadow realm. Legend holds that through dark magicks both mother and son survived these long centuries and still lurk in the shadows today.
Mr. Hendricks said he doesn’t know how true any of this is, but he still remembered how serious and steely his parents’ eyes became when they spoke of The Wolf. They told him he must always keep a low profile, but it’s been forever and he’s never run into any freaky guys in spiky black armor with glowing green eyes, so I guess he figures it’s cool to talk about now? Or maybe he just really trusts Pr0xy.
I asked him if he uses or sells green crystals in his magic and he got thoughtful. He said he certainly never uses anything like that, but he remembers maybe 20 years ago an incident that stirred up the whole alchemy community. There was a science conference in Chicago where a crystal transmutation presentation was performed by a scientist that led to an explosion and a lot of controversy. Pr0xy thinks we might find some more info in an old newspaper, so it looks like we’ll be heading back to the library soon.
Hendricks seemed pretty worried about us even though we hadn’t even gotten into discussing all the shenanigans that have happened lately (like the fact that I have one of those crystals in my godamn head right now!) He let us know we could come by the halloween store anytime. It’s cool to make a friend instead of an enemy for once.
Twin 1 asked me to tell people to vote in the poll he posted on my account and go to his Spaces. So her I am, telling you.
