Six months ago it was announced that a meteor would hit the earth and end all life . However it missed the earth after humanity had prepared for the end .

It was an a nuisance, this day. So much planning, so much *preparation*. And now... now it had all been slightly delayed! As Mal glanced between a grimoire containing eldritch rituals of unfathomable power and a copy of *The Weekly Reader*, he could not help but let out a snort of disgust. The majority of the pages were dominated by news of the allegedly-impending meteor being just a smidge off where it needed to be to annihilate all known life on Earth. The few other features were mainly mass suicide obituaries, a group of loonies in bathrobes seen chanting in the town square the night the meteor was supposed to hit, one man's story of how the meteor had reunited him with his distant son, and reports on weather predictions in light of the nearly-calamitous event. He pushed himself up from his seat in the breakfast nook, murmuring to himself. 
 
 `` Oh, how *very* impressive.'Look at us, we prevented the destruction of our species!' Does their self-satisfaction know *no* limit?'' 
 
 With a flick of his fingers the earthenware kettle across the room lifted up and poured its contents into a cup that now stood filled to the brim as he reached it. From upstairs, a voice called: 
 
 `` Oy, is that tea just going to pour itself or do I need to make it do the bloody walking too?!'' Mal looked towards the stairs with a grimace. 
 
 `` I'M BRINGING THE BLOODY THING UP RIGHT NOW!'' He roared, doing his best not to spill the tea as he both walked up the stairs and screamed barely-coherent fury. 
 
 `` Do n't you speak to me that way, *boy*! I brought you into this world and I can imprison you in one of the nether realms!'' 
 
 `` But you ca n't get your own bloody tea,'' Mal murmured to himself through gritted teeth just before rounding the top of the stairs. As he walked into his father's bedroom, the withered old man in bed before him gestured half-heartedly towards his bedstand. With practiced care, he set the mug of tea down. His demeanor calm as if he and his son had not been shouting at each other only seconds before, he gently patted the side of the bed, inviting Mal to sit. He waited for the younger man to do so before he spoke, his face lighting in a serene smile as he did. 
 
 `` My boy, you are such a supreme disappointment it scarcely warrants belief.'' Mal hung his head dramatically, knowing this berating was due. 
 
 `` Father, you know I'm going to-'' 
 
 `` All *I* know is that I am beside my morning cup of tea, as I have been for the last 2,784 mornings. I am so very tired of tea. I am so very tired of *mornings*. I am tired of this planet, and yet,'' he gestured at the width of the room with his hand as he let his eyes wander in mock-astonishment, `` here it all is. Perfectly intact!'' 
 
 `` Father, it was the Fourth Tower mages, as I understand it they united the entirety of the council and every surviving member at the last possible moment-'' 
 
 `` I am not interested in how, or why, or WHEN, OR ANY EXCUSES MALEFICARUS! The decrepit Fourth Tower could hardly stand up to our powers at the height of their ability, that their... remnants made any difference at all is a sad, sad commentary on you, my boy. If you have any blood of mine in your veins, or any love for me at all, you will do as you were supposed to and correct your failure.'' Mal was n't sure if his head could physically hang any lower, but he was certainly trying. With a nod, he rose silently and walked from the room. 
 
 Being the son of the most powerful dark-magic sorceror that had ever lived had its ups and downs. On the one hand, the natural ability to command the forces of the arcane and unnatural was nice. But on the other, having to follow the seemingly endless whims of the old man could be *so* ***annoying***. And the guilt! Sometimes it seemed he had spent centuries perfecting the art of guilt trips much more so than necromancy. Mal tried to clear the thoughts from his mind as he flung open the door of their cottage. 
 
 **Cl-nk! ** The pick sunk satisfyingly into the stone. Using his right hand to give it a cautious tug, he was reassured that it stuck. With his left he swung the other pick into the stone a little higher up. Slowly but surely he made his way up the sheer cliff face. Mal never much liked levitating his way up the mountains neighboring their cottage. Climbing it felt so much more rewarding in the challenge of it; and the stabbing motion always helped soothe him after talking to his father. 
 
 **Cl-nk! ** *'' If you have any love for me,'' oh, yeah, pretty bold assumption there, geezer. * 
 
 **Cl-nk! ** *Just who the hell does that guy think he is? Ooh, Plague-bringer, First Son of the Fallen Angel, Arsonist of Alexandria, Scourge of Three Towers; the man could n't operate a DVD player. * 
 
 **Clll-nk! ** He let out a deep breath. *Just get up the mountain. Pretty soon this will all be over and done with and we can move on to a better place. I wonder how the Seventh Realm of Chaos is this time of year. Wait, is it the Seventh Realm that recently turned into nothing but primordial firestorms or the Sixth? I should look that up. * 
 
 With a final **Cl-nk! ** he pulled himself up to the top of the cliff face, arriving upon a small summit. He surveyed the area, seeing that the ritual circle was still perfectly intact, as it always was. It still amazed him to think about the fact that his father had first inscribed it here, and here he was four centuries and hundreds of spells later so accustomed to using it that it might as well have been made by him. As his feet crossed the threshold of the chalky white lines, he could feel a subtle invigoration within himself. 
 
 Looking upward, the meteor that had passed by them was still in distant sight. He narrowed his eyes and focused on the ever-shrinking dot that was the meteor. Unraveling the cloth pouch holding the ingredients for the ritual, he laid them down at his feet. 
 
 He closed his eyes, murmuring. 
 
 *Volenti mihi facereus mal. * 
 
 The white lines of the chalk circle glowed as if electrified, and when he opened his eyes they burned with a purple hue. He snatched what appeared to be a stone figurine of a beetle, but as soon as he touched it the thing began to squirm and move. In a flash he dropped the convulsing creature into his mouth, swallowing it whole. 
 
 *Unde sequitur animam, potentium data sit. * 
 
 Falling to his knees, he plucked a phial of red powder from the cloth, pouring it into his hands. He pulled his hands apart, and between them the red powder hovered and levitated, coalescing from palm to palm. Slowly he brought his hands back together. From his clasped hands poured a brownish-red liquid, sinking into the dirt beneath him. 
 
 *In terra ad Fortem, ex Natura est. * 
 
 His skin in one moment was like that of pure obsidian, dark and smooth and angular as stone, flecked with tiny dots of white. This opaque layer began to steam and seemed to melt off of him, falling into the white lines of the circle and leaving countless, razor-thin cuts all over his body. They ran from the top of his brow all down his face and from the top of his shoulders to each individual finger, but he did not flinch nor make a sound. He simply stood, the emanations from his eyes burning ever brighter as he stood slack-jawed, staring upward. 
 
 One by one, the lines began to fill. 
 
 Each cut, slowly, began to heal. It seemed to be hours, but one by one the very cells of his body regenerated and covered what were earlier fresh cuts. As the final one faded, the purple manifestation radiating from his eyes no longer shone outward, but instead poured as if liquid into the veins of his eyes, turning them purple. As they did, Maleficarus stiffed upright immediately, his once-slack jaw snapping shut. With a look of hateful malice on his face, he looked directly at the now almost-indistinguishable dot in the sky so far away and held out his hands. 
 
 For a moment they simply stretched, reaching. 
 
 Then, his fingers began to curl into a grip. 
 
 Slowly, so slowly that one watching might not be able to tell that he was moving at all, he began to pull backwards. 
 
 Though his hands held nothing at all, his brow furrowed and his face was moist with perspiration.
