Jac Walsh | Descent Into Madness

Since the blaze a couple years ago, much had changed-- presumed dead and missing at the scene of his ‘once upon a time family home’ had, at first, left him with mixed feelings. They’d grown so far apart since their younger years, sipping at his ale and observing ‘her’ the last remnants of his past life. A life he’d turned away from the night the flames consumed them all...or mostly all. Rhea had managed to escape her Fate that night-- marked for death with daddy and mommy coming to her aid. Tch. Weak fool… Doted on like a little princess-- his hand clenching the cold bottle in hand so tight he thought about breaking it and ending this now….but no...she should suffer. Because of her he no longer had a family, it was she who’d destroyed his life in the end...his parents gave their lives, and for what? For a pathetic excuse of practitioner-- dumb to the Power they’d inherited from their parents. Jac knew before she did, he knew about their gift before the night of that fire...because he figured it out and experimented and learned from one like himself, he survived that night which took his life away...his parents-- It was all her fault! If her father hadn’t acted as Rhea’s shield from that abomination then perhaps his mother would still be alive today!

His mother, found his father and Rhea shortly after in the hallway, the noise of the fight had woke her up as much as him. It all happened so fast...as he was emerging from the room just further down the hall. The crackle of lightning and fire licked the structure of the hall’s interior. His father’s blade was in hand and the flow of Power in the air as the two forces faced off against each other. His sister, Rhea, just trembled on the floor like the weak idiot she was as their father put himself between Jinn and his family. The fight quickly got out of hand, the fire spread rapidly and his mother, bless her...tried to shield him from heat and ceiling debris. The destruction raw Power from the Jinn and his father caused the structure above to crack and begin to crumble upon them all. Glass shattered, a cold wind licked at inside as Rhea was flung from the window to the ground below-- the fight didn’t last much longer as both his father and mother worked together in fighting off the intruder to their home, but to no avail...they did manage to drive it away, but not before it’d struck fatal blows to the two of them. Jac might have joined them if not for drawing on his own talents to protect himself, crude at best but nonetheless just as effective.

Perhaps he could have made an appearance after the smoke cleared on that fire, but as he observed how she was carried along by the crowd in the aftermath of that incident. The constant barrage of questions and the scrutiny she faced as the now sole heir to family estate-- it amused him more to watch her squirm and wither under the media’s and legal investigation surrounding the events of that night. Though it was disappointing that nothing was really found to incriminate her in the end. Not that it would have changed much for his plans, Jac ended up keeping tabs on her once she moved away to seek anonymity in a new city up north: Chicago, Illinois. He wasn’t ready so soon after her departure to confront her and make her pay. He needed to grow stronger, learn more...and the less distractions the better until he’d mastered more from his teacher. It had taken a bit longer than he’d have liked, but at the same time Jac wouldn’t be satisfied until he bleed her dry for the pain and loss in his life. She was an idiot and that would get her killed sooner or later-- it might as well be from family, he’d be doing her a service.

In all this time since Jac had last seen his sister, not much had changed-- she was still as dumb as ever. Stumbling through life haphazardly and hoping for the best. Well. It was due time for her to learn a lesson, permanently. The initial attempt against Rhea hadn’t panned out as he would have liked, though it had made for some side amusement as another group found the particular incident a matter of concern to them, for whatever reason he didn’t know, but they were looking to take her life. While that would have taken a lot of his own personal fun...it was worth to see how those events played out-- unfortunately her dumb luck preserves her again and her life was spared. It was time he made a personal appearance. Their reunion was long overdue.

It was almost cute, the bewildered look in his sister’s eyes that night at Fado’s-- she couldn’t believe it. Was it really him? He’d smiled as if no time since they’d last seen one another had passed, Rhea’s younger brother...alive and well. Disbelief was overwhelmed with that same warm, cheerful smile of hers...Jac had forgotten that look years ago. It was a touch charming, reminding him for a flickering moment of better times-- times that she in her reckless, stupidity had taken away from him. It took all his effort not to scowl at her in distaste and instead return a warm brotherly grin at her confused relief. She shouldn’t be so trusting and stupid, it didn’t take more than a few words from Jac to persuade her to step outside with him towards the back alley to ‘catch up’ with him. That disbelief returned in full force as knife blade cut her flesh, she’d managed to pick up on the shift in his energy at the last moment and moved to defend herself-- little good that it would do her, the blade was poisoned. The fight wouldn’t last long in her as the toxin ravages her system. Of course, par for the course with his ‘dear’ sister, she’d managed to fling him away with her magic. Raw and unrefined, but potent...she had learned something from that man who’d protected her thus far in the city.

He observed Rhea as she fled the alley, distantly amused at how much of a fight his older sister had. If she’d managed to get strong since the incident back home years ago, this would aid Jac well once he took her life-- her energy would be better spent in his own goals. If she managed to somehow survive the poison on the blade, Rhea would be far stronger than he’d expected. Though if it claimed her life, it would be a small matter of claiming her corpse to use in the end. Ideally it would be better for her to be alive for his work, yet nothing he couldn’t adapt to once all was said and done. Rhea had managed to keep hidden and away from him at the listed home in the city for quite some time now. Somehow that dumb luck keeps preserving his sister, no word of her death reached him as of the next day...and then not long after did he note activity back at her own home. The assault had flushed her out from wherever she’d been hiding back home. A place easily accessible for him.

The evening Jac paid a visit to his sister, would be the last time they ever saw each other. That night would be the end of Rhea, he would use the ritual claim his Power that was rightfully his and extinguish her life. He would have loved to relish in the fear that creeped into features at the sight of him standing outside her shop door in her attempt to leave for the evening longer than a few brief moments, but timing was everything tonight. She tried to pull away, but her hesitation to believe in the brother she knew other than the one she’d met a couple nights prior cost her-- Jac quickly caught her wrist and injected a poison from a small pin needle ring to render his sister unconscious. It should have been a few hours before she finally started to stir, but something about her odd power pushed the toxin out quicker than expected, not that it changed plans. He’d managed to secure Rhea in place to begin the markings for the ritual in a secluded part of Undertown.

“...father…?” the broken sound of her questioning voice cutting the air like a knife. “...no...but, you look so much like him...Jac…” Holding the blade still from carving the next rune into her flesh, he looks up at his sister. There was sadness in her face as she told him he looked a lot like his father. Regret too filled her face as she wanted to cry, but she was stubborn in show that emotion around him...she always was...it seems time hadn’t changed that.

“You mean the father you killed?” His voice had never sounded so cold, but his hatred for her had simmered over the years since their parent’s deaths. “Oh...and let’s not forget mother too. If not for you, neither of them would be dead now. You...and your pathetic attempt at magic-- you opened the door to that thing!” He’d let his voice raise to that of a sharp hiss as that pent up anger fueled Jac. He could see the delicious conflict warring on her face. The urge to interrupt him before he had finished was overwhelming on her features, lips taut yet unmoving. She eventually tried to reason with him-- to explain that the accident wasn’t her fault...and she was beginning to realize how far down in her memory she’d buried her teenage years and distanced herself from him as the dreams and the odd things got worse. Seething he claims the whole family had been cursed since she was born. Eventually her voice trails off in stunned silence...doing what she’s always done for as long as Jac’s known his older sister-- she withdraws into herself. Taking on the pain as if it would make her a martyr and resolve all the problems, sacrificing herself to ‘make things better’ when the truth was...it didn’t work like that. You couldn’t be a bystander. You had to take an active role into making things better. One had to make the change they wanted to see in the world, and with her death and claiming his Power-- that’s exactly what Jac intends to do.

In the silence that followed, Jac continued etching the runes into her flesh...making them deeper as somehow the mark tracings began to fade in sections he’d finished prior. He didn’t understand it, but whatever his sister was doing was making the process take longer than it should, as if stalling for help. Help that’d never come. Or so he’d thought, and then he saw his father standing in the path down from the ritual circle-- stern disapproval on his face. The events next were a blur...Rhea’s recognition of their father in that space underground, his anger and rage and the blow that struck him down. All bringing him to this moment and time...the brief flickering of reflection as his vision was obscured by dark fabric around his head. Consumed by his hatred, he swore to make her pay...and then the blade fell upon the back of his neck, severing Jac’s head from his shoulder to the earth below as his body slumped over like a sack of potatoes and crimson stained the soil.

Jac Walsh. Warlock. Guilty of breaking the First and Fifth Laws of Magic. Captured and sentenced to death via beheading by Warden Winchester. [Deceased 2015]

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