Eldritch Guidance

“In this world there exist 6 known elements. Four of them are known as the primal elements and the other two are the celestial elements.

“The primal elements are the natural forces that exist in our world in a physical form. These forces are observable and the nature of them is not disputed in modern academia. Conversely, the celestial elements are not clearly observable and their nature has been debated for thousands of years.

“Majority of people are born with some attunement to the elements. That is to say, they can channel the power and nature of an element through their magic. The type of elements people are born with is dependent on the environment they are born into and genetics.

“The four primal elements are as follows: Fire, Water, Air, Earth.

“These are the elements that make up our observable world and are the bases for a lot of magic used in modern times.

“The celestial elements are known as: Necros and Vitos

“Necros is sometimes called the death element, and Vitos is often called the life element. The nature of these elements are impossible to directly observe and are only studied through observation of their indirect effects they have on the world.”

—”The Elements and You” by Sam Rork

It was ten at night.

Crowley was wearing casual clothing with a wide rim hat and was constantly looking downward, trying to make it difficult for passersby to see his face.

He was walking through the southside of Graheel on market street. Crowley was trying to be discreet. Normally, it wouldn’t be a problem for him to be walking around market street, but the establishment he was heading to required him to hide his identity.

He walked by dozens of establishments and people. Some of the people still walking around at this time of night were red in the face and smelled of booze. He tried to avoid eye contact with those people and continued along.

Eventually, he made it to his destination. A bar called “The Salty Pickle”.

This was the place Crowley would come to when he wanted to get a drink without being recognized by members of his congregation. He didn’t want anybody from the church to know he was going out to a bar.

It was technically not against the rules for someone like Crowley to drink, it was just frowned on in the church. Many within the church encouraged sobriety amongst their followers, so seeing one of their religious leaders publicly drinking could cause some minor controversy. A headache he didn’t want to deal with. Most of the time Crowley could avoid drinking, but there were times he really needed a drink.

Crowley entered the bar and was met with the smell of smoke and a haze in the air. There weren't really any customers in the bar, as it was still the middle of the week and not many would come out to a bar at this time. It was just what Crowley wanted and timed it that way, a bar without anyone else to possibly see him drinking at.

Not that he was worried about that.

People that came to this bar kept to themselves and wouldn’t pay too much attention to him or look into his identity.

The owner of the bar, Jack, a large portly man that was standing behind the bar table, noticed Crowley enter. The man squinted his eyes and stared at Crowley for a few seconds. Jack then had a look of recognition, as he just realized who it was that came into his bar.

Jack: “Well, well. If it isn't father Crowley.”

Crowley: “Please don’t call me father while I'm here,” he said as he approached the bar table and took a seat at one of the bar stools in front of Jack.

Jack: “Don’t worry. There’s no one around today.”

Crowley: “Even so. Could you please not.”

Jack: “Sure, whatever you say. So, what’s it going to be tonight?”

Crowley: “Whiskey on the rocks. And, give me the whole bottle,” he said with a sigh.

Jack: “Woah, that bad?” he said, as he reached for a bottle of whiskey and placed it in front of Crowley along with a glass full of ice.

Jack was quite familiar with Crowley. He would come to this bar from time to time to get a drink and they would talk. Most of the time Crowley would come to get a drink to help manage his stress and he would then vent to Jack.

Crowley would never give out any personal information about anyone to Jack, but he still did confide a lot in the bartender. And Jack was a man that was more than willing to allow his customers to vent and listen to their sorrows. Jack was also not one to leak information about his customers to others, and this built a lot of trust between him and his clientele like Crowley.

With the familiarity that these two had with each other, Jack could tell that there was something seriously going wrong in Crowley's life for him to ask for a whole bottle of whiskey.

Crowley: “You have no idea,” he said as he uncorked the bottle and poured the contents into his glass.

Jack: “Wanna talk about it?”

Crowley: “Nope,” he said as he took a sip of his drink.

Jack: “Huh? That’s…a first. What’s going on with you?” he said, sounding concerned about Crowley.

Crowley had never been so tight-lipped with Jack before, so it was quite surprising for the bartender to see this.

Crowley: “Nothing, don’t worry about it. I’m just not in a talkative mood tonight.”

Jack: “OK, you're cut off,” he said, grabbing the bottle away from Crowley.

Crowley: “HEY! What are you doing?” he said, mad at Jack for taking away his bottle.

Jack: “I’m not going to just sit here and watch you wallow in your own misery.”

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Crowley: “Why do you care?” he said angrily to Jack.

Jack: “I care because you're my friend. I don’t let friends drink themselves to death.”

Crowley: “I’m not going to drink myself to death.”

Jack: “For fuck sake. You ask for an entire bottle of WHISKEY. The only people I know that drink that much are the ones that have serious problems. And let’s be honest, were you going to stop at one bottle?”

Crowley just grumbled. He knew that Jack was right, and he wasn't entirely sure if he was going to stop at one bottle tonight.

Jack: “I thought so,” he said, knowing what Crowley was thinking.

Crowley: “Fine. I’ll go somewhere else,” he said, getting ready to get up and leave.

Jack: “Stop. What’s gotten into you? You're not normally like this.”

Crowley: “I said I don’t want to talk about it.”

Jack: “Why not? What’s going on?”

Crowley: “I don’t want to talk about it, or get anyone else involved.”

Jack: “Look, if you're worried about something leaking to the public, don’t be. I know how to keep my mouth shut. So, just tell me what’s going on. I hate seeing you like this. You’re a good guy.”

Crowley let out a deep sigh and sat back down on the bar stool. He looked at the little bit of whiskey still in his glass then at the bottle in Jack's hand.

Crowley: “My lips are a little dry. So if you wet them, I'll tell you what I'm dealing with.”

Jack raised an eyebrow. He then uncorked the bottle he was holding and topped up Crowley glass.

Crowley then took another sip and savored the taste.

Crowley: “I’m being blackmailed.”

Jack: “Someone has dirt on you?”

Crowley: “No, I don't think so? Maybe blackmail is the wrong term. Someone is trying to make me do something I find unethical.”

Jack: “That still sounds kinda like blackmail.”

Crowley: “Yeah, but the thing is, the one who is asking me to do this unethical thing is coming from the church itself. Specifically, someone higher up from me.”

Jack: “An archbishop is asking you to do something shady?”

Crowley: “I didn’t say it was an archbishop.”

Jack: “Yeah, but I don't know anybody else who’s higher up in the church than you, the hand of light.”

Crowley: “Former hand of light,” he said, correcting Jack.

Jack: “Does being a former hand of light affect your authority in the church in some way, where you can’t go against an archbishop. I'm not that well versed in church politics.”

Crowley: “It is more complicated than that. The one who is trying to make me go against my ethics has too much support from a bunch of high ranking members in the church. So, I can't really go against them.”

Jack: “What happens if you go against them?”

Crowley: “I was told they would kick me out of the church.”

Jack: “That's such bullshit. You are like the nicest priest I've ever known and respected.“

Crowley knew that Jack's words were genuine. From talking to each other he learned that Jack was not a particularly religious person, it was quite the opposite. Jack was somebody that didn’t seem to have much respect for the Church of Light. It was not an uncommon attitude for some to have. Him saying he respected Crowley as a priest had more weight than what one would immediately think.

“I guess I must be doing something right if even Jack is saying I'm a good priest.” Crowley silently thought to himself.

Crowley: “Thank you for saying,” he said, as he took another sip of his drink.

Jack: “What are those bastards making you do?”

Crowley: “I don’t know how to talk about it. It’s quite complicated.” he said, taking another sip of his drink and then signaling Jack to pour him some more whisky.

Jack: “They're not making you steal money or something.” he said, as he poured another drink for Crowley.

Crowley: “Nah. That would be extremely upsetting, but money could be replaced if it was just that. It has to do with church policy changes. It seems like the church is going backwards, and might be undoing some of its policies that prevented discrimination against mutants.” he said, unwilling to tell him about the specific of the unsent speaker decree’s.

Jack: “Ah, shit. You guys are really going back to that anti-mutant crap. Are they asking you to kick the mutants out of the church? Cause, I heard the church used to do that kind of stuff and a lot worse in the past.”

The church historically has not been very good on the issue of mutants. The reaction to people who were mutants would vary from each congregation, from members of the church advocating for compassion toward them, to those who called for outright and complete extermination of mutants.

The people who called for extermination, view mutants as corrupted humans. Believing that they have been tainted by nameless gods and now serve those forces unconsciously. Those who hold those beliefs formed a faction within the church called the “exterminators”, and were extremely violent. They advocate that the only way to save a mutant was to send their souls to the light, a euphemism that meant they would kill mutants.

It was only in the last hundred years that the Church of Light standardized its mutant policy across the church as a whole, and started rebuking any calls for violence against mutants amongst its leadership. Beginning a slow, but eventual process of normalizing and treating mutants as people.

The number of exterminators in the church had been slowly dwindling through the years.

When Sheridan was alive, he was accelerating mutant acceptance within the church. He was the first speaker of light to openly advocate for compassion and fair treatment for mutants. Crowley thought that Sheridan's actions had weakened the remnants of the exterminator faction, but recent events indicated otherwise.

Crowley: “I won’t let that happen. I won’t let us go back to those dark days. But… I don’t know. What should I do? I can’t go against the leadership, but I don’t want to betray the mutants in our church either,” he said, staring down at his drink, with a look of a defeated man. He then looks back at Jack, directly into his eyes. “Sorry. I shouldn’t be burdening others like this.”

Jack: “That’s OK. I understand what you might be going through. I had a similar experience to what you're going through.”

Crowley: “Did you now?”

Jack: “Yeah, I used to work for a boss that made me do some… unsavory things.” he said, as he recalled his time as a smuggler for the Skull Crushers.

Crowley: “Huh? What did you do in that situation?” he said, sensing that Jack was being obtuse.

Jack: “I did what I was told. Not proud of it, but not much else I could do at the time. At least, until an opportunity presented itself.”

Crowley: “What’s that mean?”

Jack: “It means I ran. Once an opportunity to get away from that situation appeared, I took it.”

Crowley: “I guess running away is always an option too, but not really in my case. There would be people I would be abandoning if I did so.”

Jack: “I know. You're too good a person to just run away and abandon others. That’s why hearing what you're going through is pissing me off.”

Crowley: “I think you're putting me too high on a pedestal. I am just a man doing his best.”

Jack: “I don’t think so. A lot of mutants don't have much and face so much bullshit in this world that’s not fair. You stand by them even so, holding true to your convictions. That takes real bravery. Not something anybody could do. Fuck, hearing one of your passionate sermons on mutants made me wanna believe in the light, especially if the light is sending people like you into the world.

Crowley: “You heard one of my sermons?” he said, with a raised eyebrow. “I thought you weren't the religious type?”

Jack: “I may have popped into one of the sermons a while back. Just to see what it was like, and I must say, your speech skills are really good.”

Crowley chuckled a little and smiled from the comment.

Crowley: “Never thought I would hear someone like you say something like that, saying a sermon was good,” he said with a chuckle.

Jack: “Glad I could make you laugh,” he said with a smile before turning solemn. “I don’t know what you should do, but I know you’ll do the right thing. And, If I could give you a small piece of advice, don’t run like I did. The people you leave behind, you’ll regret it. I know I have.”

Crowley: “I won’t. There was one time I ran away from my problems too. So, I know. It really does weigh on us old timers,” he said as reminisce about something in his past.

Jack: “It sure does, but I'm not that old father.”

Crowley: “I thought I asked you not to call me ‘father’.”

Jack: “Then don’t call me old.” he rebuked.

Crowley would continue to spend the rest of the night sipping on his drink and thinking about what to do, until Jack finally cut him off, forcing him to head home and prepare for the work he would have to do at the church the next day.