There was much that Eulalia wanted to do, with the Dark Entities she had brought forth to Earth, but - for the moment - she would settle for just enough mayhem, destruction, strife, killings and chaos to make the government, and the people - of the land where she and her sinister kind now dwelt - take notice and perchance alter their ways.

Whatever, it would be fun, enjoyable, a Satanic paean - a necessary beginning, well-planned and well-schemed for, for almost ten causal Earth-years - and, as she stood up from sitting in the darkness on the somewhat damp Autumnal grass on the slight slope of the almost South facing hill among the mamelons of South Shropshire not far from where an ancient trackway marked the ancient border with the land of Wales, she in joy began chanting her sinister chant: Agios o Baphomet!

Venora - she of the red-hair and the fullsome body who had been a temporary host for one such Entity - was waiting for her in the large, ornate, Conservatory of their gravid reclusive house at the end of a track, off a narrow lane between hills in that isolated rural borderland, and they embraced and kissed affectionately, one scented lover to another, before entering the subtly-lit Drawing Room where the women of their sinister coven waited, as, upstairs, in secluded dark rooms, the shapeshifters - some but newly fledged - fed on what were once healthy men young in years.


There was no need for speeches, or exhortations, or ceremony, or even for spoken words, since all of that coven - reared in that house or covertly recruited elsewhere - knew almost all that Eulalia knew, and, like her, had pledged their very lives to presencing the sinister on Earth. So she went to each of them, after they had stood in greeting, to kiss them on their lips and to watch each one of them leave to walk solemnly, gravely, up the wide and winding stairs to their appointed rooms where they, in the shielding darkness there, each became temporary hosts.

Thus did they - then not quite human, inside - leave their dwelling and their home in a small convoy of vehicles driven by men of middling years, specially chosen, well-tested. For they, reared in a nearby house or recruited covertly elsewhere, knew almost all that the women knew, and had, for one yearly alchemical season, just ended, been lovers of the particular young woman they had pledged to the death to defend.


The twilight of a clear October Dawn found all the vehicles dispersed, each to their chosen destination, and Venora sat in the comfortable back seat of that luxurious car feeling the darkness within her. It - she, they - was, were, yearning for the freedom that would come only with a complete metamorphosis, a complete in-dwelling, when the human-life, with all its memories and all its weakness, would be subsumed to shrivel to die as all causal life was so fated to die; subsumed: to leave only the outer and changeable physical shell, a dwelling then for another almost alien life. Or, if it - she, they - so desired, they might keep part of the human life alive, for a while, to use as a hypnotized vassal, perhaps for some specific deed or deeds.

But for now it - she, they - was, were as they were, leaving Venora to live alone as the Venora they in their own strange way cared for, protected, perhaps even loved, for she-the-human was then as a surrogate mother to them, carrying them, if only for a while, until they could, would, be fully-birthed into some expendable human being.

Venora's own destination was the metropolis of London, and her male driver - tall, strong, muscular - finding, after a search, a suitable place, parked the vehicle to walk with her along the teeming traffic and human filled streets under a warmless Sun the short distance to their target. It was a middling restaurant, by the standards she was accustomed to, and while they waited, they slowly consumed the overpriced and slowly served food. He - their opfer - appeared as expected, and as her research indicated he should: a middling if ambitious politician of the governing Party, given to arrogance and subsumed with pride, and dressed, in conformity to the unwritten rules, in a greyish undistinguished if well-fitting and rather expensive suit. And all she had to do was to get near enough to touch him, naked flesh to naked flesh, for the five or so seconds required.

She played her part well, rising, as if to stumble accidentally into him, pressing the palm of her hand to the back of his neck as if to steady herself to then apologize and endearingly smile. He turned to look at her and she knew then her deed was done, even if she had not felt the rush as the Entity of timeless dark chaos exited from her to seed itself - herself - within that new host. For his eyes momentarily stared, as a madman at a full-moon, before he smiled to rise to be to most of the world around the same man in the same suit in the same place at that same causal time. So she made her excuses to leave to let the Dark Entity begin its work, and it was less than two hours later that this chosen opfer returned to that exclusive club known as the Houses of Parliament. There, he chanced upon - although it was not causal chance, but some-thing else - a senior member of his Party whom he throttled to death with his hands while his once-indwelling Entity watched, playfully smiling, from her new human home, found moments earlier by his - her - guided touch. Thus was he, the killer, subdued after the deed to be hustled away only to die moments later as his heart suddenly stopped to leave only a corpse, paler and gaunter than it would have been even if all the blood and plasma within had been somehow sucked away.

There would be more mysteries, that day: some, like the state of the politician's body, kept hidden by politicians from "the public"; others, unable to be so kept secret. And two, in particular, bloody, deadly, terrifying, and public, as Eulalia and her coven had intended. A deadly, unexpected attack by a woman berserk, who stabbed five people to death on a street in some rainy dreary city before a Policeman felled and disarmed her: but he the human could only watch in silent wordless helpless horror as the woman he restrained died to leave him holding only a corpse, only a corpse, paler and gaunter than it would have been even if all the blood and plasma within had been somehow sucked away. Then there was a bomb, hidden in a van, which exploded without warning on a busy motorway flyover into London, leaving some injured, and much destruction in its wake, as there were over a dozen murders by people possessed who, haunting cities and towns, escaped to then live a twilight lingering existence as the Entities of another acausal species within them did as their primal nature intended, shapeshifting their form when they found some healthy young human to feed on.

But it was only prelude, a mere prelude, Eulalia knew, to the real beginning she in her mischief had planned.



He had been easy to entrap, and Eulalia watched as the young man - naked in the bed of one of her young ladies in one of those many large subtly-lit rooms of the high-ceilings - slept the sleep that often arises from sexual satiation. He, she had been informed, had been a good lover - surprisingly good, given his slim frame and his rather boyish looks - and she watched him for some moments until, as if sensing her watching, he awoke to fumble on the small antique table by his side of the bed for his spectacles.

"Hello!" he said, as if half-surprised to find her there and half-surprised to find the previous afternoon, evening and night had not been some dream.

"Are you ready to get to work, then?" she asked, bewitchingly smiling.

"What?"

"What we discussed, last evening and night, in detail, before a certain young lady invited you here to her room."

"Oh that," Ffion replied, remembering.

"Yes. That. But only after breakfast, naturally."

"Naturally." 

"If you'll get dressed - or not," she said, somewhat mischievously, "I shall escort you to the Breakfast Room where Edrid will take your order."

"Order?"

"For your rather late breakfast. He is one of the people who helps out, around the house."

"A servant?" It was a natural deduction, he thought, given the room, the house, the extensive grounds.

"Not really, but that description will serve, for now."

Dressed in his University-ensemble of worse-for-wear jeans, black cotton T-shirt with slogan "404 Error: Slogan Not Found", and scruffy white "trainers", he was escorted by Eulalia down from the fourth floor room to where Edrid - neatly groomed and neatly dressed in somewhat old-fashioned clothes - waited, all alone in the mid-morning light of the many-windowed Breakfast Room where one place had been set on the long Oak dining table.

She smiled at him before saying: "I'll collect you when you're ready and show you the equipment we have prepared for you."

Thus did she leave her half-nervous, half-pleased, fledgling to attend to her many other tasks of that morning in that gravid and reclusive house of the extensive grounds. And when he was ready, she led him through a skein of corridors to a room suitably furnished for his needs.

"Wow!" was all he could say as he saw the row upon row of computer servers, and several large bright screens.

"There," - and Eulalia pointed to where a sleek comfortable chair sat before a wide desk containing a keyboard and the largest screen - "is the control centre. Everything is fully functional, and connected. But if there is anything we might just might have forgotten, which you need, just ask Edrid. Lunch, by the way, is at one o'clock, and Dinner will be at eight, after which you shall, of course, be escorted to the bedroom of a certain young lady, for another night of salacious entertainment."

"Yeah."

"You know what to do."

"You bet!"

"No doubts?"

"No. Not at all."  And he meant it, and she knew he did, for she had chosen well, having had Ffion chosen months ago and under surveillance by her Guardians since then.

"Just depress that violet button on your desk and Edrid will attend you."

"Later!"

She smiled then, as Ffion set immediately to work at his task, given by her. He would, she felt, be a valuable and needed ally, living with them, his desires fulfilled. And if, for some reason, he failed and even thought of betraying them, she would surely know, and there were always the small now empty windowless rooms in the basements below where several young men had lingered, less than half-alive, until one of them was needed, by some un-dwelling Dark Entity, as food.



Ffion was pleased with his work, when Eulalia returned to him as the Sun began its descent and Twilight waited to visit her house with its shapeful shades of almost darkness.

"So," she said, playfully, understanding more than she revealed to him, "all I do is sit here, in front of the screen, and speak when connected?"

"Yep, that's it. They'll be able to see and hear you. All I have to do to connect is type in a few commands on the x-term and press Return."

"Splendid. Then do so."

"What? Now?"

"Indeed."

"OK."  And he did as commanded by his sinister Mistress, who sat herself before the screen containing microphone and camera as Ffion's skill untraceably hacked them into a conference room of a London television newsroom where journalists of various ages and types were assembled, together with their Editor, to decide on what - and how - to report of the strange events of that day, and where, suddenly, several dormant computers began transmitting an image of a smiling Eulalia.

"Gentleman - and Ladies, of course - although I am unsure as to whether any of you merit such any such honorific. Your attention please. Please observe the photograph one of our operatives took of the corpse in your Houses of Parliament earlier today, details of which corpse your naughty politicians kept from you and your public.

"We do apologize for the rather poor quality of the image, and promise to do better, next time.

"So, now I do have your full attention, the code-word is Herewith, The Dark, which code-word you will receive when we decide to give some further demonstrations, as we did with that little explosion on one of your motorways. On receipt of said codeword, your authorities have two minutes to clear the designated area. A recording of this message will now be repeated three times, just in case you desire to record it! That is all, for the moment."  And she smiled at them again, mischievously.

A day later, she gave another demonstration. The building had only just been cleared when an explosive device reduced it to a mass of twisted metal, broken masonry and shattered glass, in the centre of London's financial district. One more day, and one more building gutted by another device. And so, on that and other days, the dark mayhem continued, as people died, suddenly, unexpectedly, in cities and towns, or disappeared into the night, taken as food or as new dwellings for the dozens upon dozens of primal predators Eulalia and her sinister coven of sisters had released, and which predators now lurked, waiting for their chance to be as their nature, their nurture, commanded, controllable as they were only by Baphomet or one of Her many Daughters, some now having such fun with those frail humans currently infesting planet-Earth.

Another day, and the Media - as Eulalia had assumed - was replete with the expected and standard stories about "terror" and "terrorists". But soon, she knew, they - or at least the controlling powers behind and in the government - would know or correctly deduce the truth, and then she of the sinister strategy would presence much more Darkness, for the progeny of her breeding programme were eager. and ready.






"Just before he died, somewhat unexpectedly, of a heart attack, Malin sent me copies of his case files, and, while I did not entirely discount their contents, I did not take them seriously either, particularly since the evidence that Malin alluded to seems to have been entirely destroyed in a fire at the laboratory where his colleagues conducted their investigations into these alleged aliens."

The speaker was a senior male Civil Servant, of the Cabinet Office's Intelligence and Security unit, and in the airless, windowless inner room of a government department in Whitehall, he sat at the head of small functional table, inwardly wishing someone else had been given this task. Of the two men and one women seated with him, there in that room, no one - at least outwardly - betrayed any surprise on hearing the word "alien", for they had all opened, and read, at his prior insistence, the few sheets of paper before them, headed Joint Intelligence Committee, and Top Secret, minutes of a meeting where the work of Malin's now dis-banded team had been briefly discussed.

"Now," he continued, "if you peruse the other document, you will see what little evidence we have relating to recent incidents. We have been given full authority and whatever resources we might require to investigate and report further on this matter, to which The Prime Minister, The Cabinet, and Joint Intelligence Committee, have assigned the highest priority."

For some minutes, a silence among those chosen and carefully selected few, as photographs of corpses - paler and gaunter than they would have been even if all the blood and plasma within had been somehow drained away - were studied, and Intelligence documents read.

"Now," the senior Civil Servant continued, pressing a button on the remote controller in his hand,"this a recording of a transmission received three days ago from the individual who, as our assessment indicates, is either behind some or many of the incidents, or somehow connected to them."

So they watched a smiling Eulalia, with the senior Civil Servant freezing the last frame so that her smiling face looked slightly down upon them from its brightness nearby.

"Any comments?" he asked.

"I assume," said the youngest of the men, casually dressed in contrast to the other somewhat older man, "you have no idea who she is?"

"Correct. We have not been able to trace the source of that transmission either, as a chain of proxy servers and zombie computers was used, some of which - after the transmission had been forwarded - had their hard drives automatically erased."

"Clever," the young man said, impressed - especially by Eulalia's beauty.

"Operatives. Houses of Parliament," the women - young, pretty of face and modestly dressed - said, "Are we then to presume security there, and similar places, has been compromised?"

"Certainly," the senior Civil Servant replied, "we are considering that possibility as a matter of priority."

"But," interjected the hitherto silent Patterson, who, as a serving soldier of fifteen years service, recently seconded to the Ministry of Defence, had been given operational control over the unit, and whose objections to the two civilians, specialists in their own areas, being at this briefing, had been over-ruled, "until we know exactly what it is we are dealing with, such a breach cannot really be sealed, surely."

"Correct," and the senior Civil Servant sighed. "Which is your remit. A small specialist unit has been assembled, to assist you and we have prepared a cover-story for them, although it is quite possible you may need to update them on a strictly need to know basis."

"And we are to consider all possibilities," the younger man asked, "however strange, weird or unlikely?"

"Yes. You will report directly to me at least twice-daily or immediately if you have anything significant to report."

"I would suggest," the woman said, "we begin with an examination of whatever corpses have so far been found."

The senior Civil Servant shrugged his shoulders. "Those conducting the detailed autopsies - as indicated in one of the documents you have - concluded they cannot explain how all the blood and all other bodily fluids have been removed and how the internal organs and indeed the flesh itself has degraded in the manner it has in the short time it occurred. No incisions; no puncture marks."

"Even so," she persisted, "it would be worth checking, again."

"Of course."

"Any pattern to the killings?" she asked.

"Of those related to the corpses we have so far found, none that can be determined. Analysis by place, age, gender, occupation, ethnicity and other categories all proved negative. Of those murders that may possibly be somehow related to the other events, there is again no pattern that can be determined."

"The explosives used. Traces?" Patterson asked.

"The forensic analysis," the senior Civil Servant replied, "has proved inconclusive. It is similar, apparently, to PE4 but is more powerful, but is not identical to any known type of C-4, and thus at the moment is classified as of unknown origin and manufacture, although it is possible it has been manufactured here in the UK, given the content and proportions of the plasticizer used."

"No real clues, then. Quite an opponent," the younger man said, and smiled as he looked again at the bright image of the beautiful Eulalia who seemed to be somehow taunting them all.

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