Dr. Snip

'Who dares to summon me?' It said in an ice cold voice transmitted on the back of sickening sub-harmonics that shook human intestines, and imparted a state of deep unease amongst all within range.

The Satanists to a person fell to their knees in awe and wonder, they had finally done it, they had summoned their Lord Satan himself. Their eyes greedily drank in his awesome reality, he had appeared as a large figure possibly a man dressed in a black robe, his eyes however seemed to be windows to Hell itself, as they shone a blood red in the shadow of his hood.

The butcher, who was first among equals in the Coven crawled towards his God, 'Forgive us Lord, we called you to offer this virgin in exchange for the boon of youth for this woman. We are nothing in your eyes, we are not worthy of your presence.'

'FOOLS' it boomed at them, 'this is not a virgin, you insult me by offering this paid whore in return for such a boon.' 'Lord we were assured that she was virgin' he protested whilst grovelling in fear on the floor. 'Who gave you these assurances?'

The butcher pointed with a trembling hand to Sebastian. The being turned its attention towards the red robed man, the sense of dread increased until Sebastian's knees trembled. 'Do you attempt to cheat the Devil?' it asked him menacingly.

'I don't know who you are buster,' he ground out between waves of nausea, ' but you are mess...' His cynical challenge was interrupted by a massive blow from the fist of the butcher who had flung himself at Sebastian, screaming 'Blasphemy, on your knees to our Lord Satan.'

Spittle sprayed from his mouth and his eyes were bulging with religious zeal. 'Forgive us I beg you Lord, we thought him a believer.' He kicked Sebastian hard in the side. The rest of the Coven echoed his plea for forgiveness. 'Tie him to the cross' Satan ordered.

'What about the girl, lord? 'She is one of mine, a porn star you would call her, and she can leave.' They didn't think to question their Lord, and after releasing the girl, who ran naked out of the room, they tied Sebastian to the cross in her place.

All this time Deserie was still tied to the floor under the cross, she had been stood on a few times in the rush to tie Sebastian to the cross. But when she had voiced an objection, the Satanists had just slapped her face and screamed at her to shut up. She felt it wise to keep a low profile and hope she survived the night.

'This insect has insulted me,' Satan stated, 'what should be his punishment?' 'Death', the Coven cried out as one. Satan ordered them to strip off their robes and stand naked in his sight; they ripped their robes in their haste to comply.

'His plan was to cover the woman in blood, grant him his wish and bleed him to death, as you strike your blows, call out your name and dedicate the blood to me.' Satan ordered coldly.

One at a time the naked Satanists walked up to Sebastian, called their names out loud, and said the words 'This blood is for you Master.' Then each stabbed Sebastian in a non-lethal place as they filed past him.

Underneath him Deserie was being covered in his blood as it ran down his legs and onto her naked body. She was terrified as to what they would do to her afterwards, but kept her eyes and mouth shut as the hot blood splashed over her.

It took almost ten minutes for Sebastian to bleed to death, each blow was recorded on video, and each naked Satanist was clearly shown and heard identifying themselves as they played their part in his murder.

When it was over Satan ordered all the Satanists to return to their homes and await further orders. They all ran out of the room quickly; secretly glad to be out of their Lords presence.

The room was now empty, save for the dead body of Sebastian, the brooding figure of Satan, and Deserie, who was still tied to the floor. Satan walked over to her and released her bonds. 'Thank you Lord.' She whispered, her nerves totally shattered by what she had seen.'

'You are a foolish woman, by believing in such rubbish. I have decided to let you live, I suggest you appreciate the time you have left to you.' He said to her,' Get out of my sight, and pray that we don't meet again.'

Totally confused, she scrambled to her feet and ran shakily out of the room. Steve stripped off his robe and took out the red contact lenses from his eyes 'Thank God they are out, seeing everything in red was giving me a headache' he said to Angel who had joined him from where she had been observing the scenario from the old organ loft.

After they collected the sub-sonic generators from the locations they had previously hidden them, Steve collected the tapes from the cameras.

He threw the tapes that had recorded just the depravations inflicted on Deserie, into the fire that had been burning for effect in a small brazier in a corner of the room. The tape that contained the evidence that would convict all twelve members of the Coven he edited to remove the scenes containing the sodomising of the girl and Deserie, leaving only the murder of Sebastian on it.

This should be enough for the crown prosecution service he muttered as he tidied up, although to be sure of a conviction I should have got them to sign their names on his body in blood.

Steve was very tired and they lost no time in jumping back to Angel's place. As it transpired the evidence was sufficient and all twelve murderers were sent to jail for a very long time.

'Why so complex for heavens sake' Angel asked him later. 'It was the only way I could guarantee that all twelve members went to jail,' he explained, 'they were all from different backgrounds, and apart from the Coven there was nothing to connect them to their previous murders. I had to get them to commit a murder together, and Sebastian had done most of the preparation for me. It was tiring though and I'll try and arrange things better in any future missions.' 'Are you too tired? Angel asked archly. 'Never'.

Excalibur

It was late on a spring night AD 485 when Jake the Smith was walking across the fields back to his Smithy. It was located just outside the wooden walls that surrounded Camelot. The camp of the Warlord Arthur, son of Uther Pendragon.

Jake had just delivered a ploughshare to Edwin the Farmer, Edwin owned the biggest farm hereabouts and Jake had made the ploughshare to his own design. He had figured if he could double the number of blades on a plough to two instead of the universal one, it would take half the time to plough a field.

The problem was the friction of the plough would be doubled and the usual team of two horses couldn't pull the thing. After some serious thought and quite a few wooden models he had designed a curved blade for the plough that didn't rely on brute strength to ram through the earth. Instead it let it run back along the blade for a bit before the angle turned the earth over.

He had stood with Edwin and watched as the team of horses plodded up and down the field. Fortunately the plough had worked even better than Jake had hoped and the rich earth curled away from the blades cleanly.

Edwin was so pleased he invited Jake in for a drink of mead, and when much later, Jake finally made his goodbyes his pockets were full of coin and his belly was so full of mead he had rarely been more content.

He was singing a blacksmiths song to himself, when he was interrupted by a whistling noise that increased to a roar. Then before his eyes a star fell out of the sky, and impacted into the field next to his Smithy.

Jake felt the impact clearly although he was still a few hundred yards from the immediate area of the impact. 'Well I'll be buggered,' he said to himself, ' you don't see something like that every day.' And he altered course to take a closer look.

When he got there he discovered a hole in the field, in the center of the hole, still glowing white hot, was the star. Jake sat down on the edge of the crater and watched it to see if it would do anything interesting. As he watched it he noticed that its colour changed from white-hot to red-hot as its heat gained from the friction of the atmosphere leeched away into the earth.

Finally he was looking at a warm lump of metal about the size of his head. 'Well I'll be buggered, the stars are made of iron, who would have thought it.' Being a blacksmith he always had a use for metal regardless where it came from, so he wrapped the lump in his cloak and carried it the few hundred yards to his smithy. He dumped it by the side of the anvil and staggered off to bed to sleep the mead off.

It wasn't until he saw the lump laying by the anvil the next morning that he realised he hadn't been dreaming the whole thing. 'Well I'll be buggered' he said and picked up the lump of metal to examine it closely. As a Blacksmith he was familiar with metals and their uses, he had to buy stock iron bars from the foundry in the next town, and knew what iron, brass, bronze and tin looked like in its ingot state.

This metal looked different, it was pure, with no impurities, they had been burned away during its flight through Earth's atmosphere. When he tried to file a small piece off he found that it resisted being cut, but he persevered and cut off a piece as big as his hand.

As he had a quiet day he decided to make a small kitchen knife for his love, the widow Anna, so he threw the small piece of metal on the coals and heated it to red-hot. With casual skill he soon hammered it into shape, and after burning a wooden handle onto the tang of the blade he took it to the grindstone for sharpening. When finished it was a handsome knife and he put it down on the horseshoe pile until he went visiting tomorrow. The rest of the day was spent doing the bread and butter work of roughing out horse shoes, he found horse shoes so boring but they were always needed and brought in a steady income.

As he slept that night the heavens opened and the rain hammered down, the wind blew the rain into the smithy and his stock of horseshoes and his loves knife were soaked.

The next morning was bright and sunny but his good mood vanished when he saw all his stock horseshoes were rusty from the rain. Rust didn't hurt the shoes but he didn't like to see it and tried to keep his metal clean, so he was surprised that amongst the rusty shoes gleamed Anna's knife. It was as bright and shiny as it was when he had just finished sharpening and polishing it yesterday.

'Well I'll be buggered' he said picking it up and examining it closely there was no rust at all that he could see, this wasn't iron but he didn't know what else it could be. On a whim he picked up a rusty shoe and tried to scratch it with the knife, surprisingly it cut into the iron leaving a deep scratch on the shoe. He checked the point of the blade and saw it was just as sharp as ever. 'Well I'll be buggered.' He said.

Jake loved Anna but he was a businessman, and he knew a good thing when it fell on him. He had spent his apprenticeship working for Uther Pendragon's armourer. He had loved the process of sword making and he was considered to have the gift for it.

Unfortunately to make money as an armourer you really needed a war, and the last twenty years had been boringly peaceful so it was horseshoes and ploughs for Jake. This could be his big chance if he played it right, Uther had died and his son Arthur was now Warlord of the Area. However he was too evenly matched with the other Warlords to expand beyond his own borders.

In a world where Warlords gained territory by challenging neighbouring Warlords to single combat, it was unfortunate for them, but peaceful for the ordinary people, that a balance of power existed. No one Warlord had the edge they needed to risk losing their kingdom, in the hopes of expanding their borders.

Jake was tired of peace, he was still young and craved the excitement of war and loot, he thought he had a way to stir things up a bit and in the process become a rich man. For the next two days his smithy rang with the sound of hammering, and the roar of the furnace, as Jake brought all his skill and talent together in order to create the finest Sword that had ever existed.

The star metal was slightly lighter than iron, so he could make it wider and longer than the standard size, giving it's wielder the advantage of reach and strength of blade without making it heavier to handle.

Arthur was a short stocky man with long muscular arms, he was by no means good looking but he had a certain brooding presence. He granted Jake an audience when he was told there was a precious gift in it for him. Audiences were held in the main communal hall, it was constructed of heavy timbers and the flagged floor was scattered with bulrushes and leftover bones from previous feasts.

This morning was bright and sunny and a fragrant breeze wafted through the open doors, trying in vain to combat the ever-present smell of unwashed bodies and dog urine. He watched in interest as the blacksmith set up a trestle in front of his throne. The man asked for permission to draw one of the two swords he had scabbarded on his belt.

Both Arthur's bodyguards drew theirs first as a precaution, before Arthur nodded to the man to proceed. However he simply placed the large sword along the trestle, so the blade was directly against the thick oak. He then asked permission to draw the other sword, and again Arthur nodded.

The second sword was a beauty, it was so highly polished that it blazed in the sunlight shining into the great hall through the high window openings. It was about four feet long and was four inches wide at the hilt, tapering down to one inch wide at the point.

Jake held it high above his head, turning it so that beams of reflected light dazzled the watchers eyes, then after a suitably dramatic pause, he brought it down onto the sword lying on the trestle. It would have been amazing enough if the sword had simply cut through the other one, but it sliced through both the iron blade and the thick oak beam as if they were soft wood.

Arthur also noticed that the man had only used one hand to perform this feat. He watched as Jake replaced the sword in its scabbard and removing it from his belt, held it horizontal in his hands.

'My lord Arthur, please allow me the honour of presenting this sword to you as a gift. It will cut through any metal known to man, be it sword, armour, or shield without being bent or blunted, only a Lord such as yourself is worthy to wield it.' Jake walked slowly towards Arthur and kneeling before him offered up the sword.

'Where did you get it?' Arthur asked. 'I am a blacksmith and an armourer Lord, I made it for you from a stone that fell from the stars.' Jake replied. As with all skilled craftsmen he kept most of his trade secrets, secret. Arthur took the sword from Jake's hands and drew it from its scabbard once more; he stood up and walked into the center of the hall, swinging it about to feel its balance.

It felt perfect in his hand; he studied the hilt and was amazed to see that the hilt was an integral part of the blade. It was wrapped in fine hide strips to ensure a good grip, and the cross guard was also part of the whole weapon. It looked unbreakable as well as beautiful; he called forward his bodyguards and told them to bring their shields.

'Protect yourselves,' he warned and when they were ready he swung at the first guard. In a smooth practiced motion the guard brought up his shield as he prepared to counter strike. Arthur's sword sliced through the shield as if it wasn't there, and only the guard's superb reflexes enabled him to duck under the shining blade as it cut away the top half of his shield.

He threw away his useless shield and brought his own sword round in an economical cut aimed at Arthur's side. Arthur spun around and intending to parry the blow, he was thrown off balance as his sword sheared through the guards sword.

Arthur was smiling as he walked back to where Jake was still kneeling. 'I accept your Sword from the Stone, what would you have of me in return?' 'Only to serve you Lord,' said Jake truthfully. Arthur made him royal armourer on the spot, and told him to set up his smithy in the castle grounds. 'I think I am going to need an armourer very soon.' He said with a confident smile.

After a week of constant practice with his new sword Arthur issued a challenge to his neighbouring Warlord, a large tall man called Baldor. Baldor received very few challenges because he was a giant of a man and wielded a two-handed sword almost six feet long; he had been known to cut an opponent in half with it. Both their war bands turned out to watch as their future was decided for them by single combat.

Arthur had chosen Baldor because he was the biggest and strongest of his competition, and he wanted to make an example of him. At the sound of the war horn Baldor ran towards Arthur, as he came close he spun in a circle bringing his massive sword arcing towards the smaller man's head.

Arthur met the oncoming blade with his own and Baldor was spun off balance as three foot of his sword blade parted company with the rest of it. Normally Arthur would have stabbed him as he lay stunned on the ground as there was no concept of chivalry in their world, but he wanted to make this last as long as possible. Baldor clambered to his feet and looked at his sword in disbelief, it was now only half its original length, but still deadly. He approached Arthur more cautiously being able to hold his truncated sword in one hand, and a long dagger in the other.

Baldor attacked with a flurry of blows from sword and dagger, Arthur blocked the dagger with his shield, and neatly sliced off Baldors hand complete with sword. His blade slicing through the iron bracers, that should have protected the man's wrist.

The giant screamed in pain and rage and flung himself at his enemy in a berserk fury. Arthur danced to one side as he blundered past and slashed his sword across the man's back, cutting through the chain mail jerkin. Baldor collapsed as his spine was severed and lay with his face in the mud.

Arthur walked up to the stricken man and with one blow cut off his head. Picking up Baldor's head by its greasy hair he walked over to his erstwhile war band, and in a loud voice challenged any of them to dispute his victory. As one Baldor's band shouted 'Arthur, Arthur, Arthur.' acknowledging him as their new leader.

With the death of Baldor, there were twelve remaining Warlords to challenge and defeat. The very next week he challenged Gawain, his neighbour on the opposite side of the river.

He had a use for Gawain, so after slicing his weapons and shield to pieces he offered to spare his life if he joined Arthur as an Under lord, keeping his lands and goods, but swearing allegiance to him.

As the alternative was death, Gawain agreed and in front of all swore to be Arthur's liegeman. Arthur had to address Gawain's war band and explain that Gawain was still their leader, but he was now Gawain's leader.

Such a break with tradition caused a certain amount of confusion, but when Gawain killed three of his men for failing to bend the knee to him, they accepted the new regime. Once a week he challenged another Warlord, and accepted their allegiance, until all twelve recognised him as their leader.

He now controlled a fair sized army and with it spread his influence further and further afield. Eventually Arthur was in control of southern England and arranged to have himself crowned at Stonehenge.

Like all leaders of his time Arthur had a religious advisor, to take care of spiritual matters, his was a man named Merlin and he left the details of the ceremony to him. It was AD 486 and all of Arthur's armies and friends and anyone else who wanted to be there, gathered at Stonehenge to witness the Coronation of their King.