[color=40C10C]"Time's Up."[/color] A fatherly voice announced, rich with the twinges of Irish in his English. The ringing of the timer at his desk silenced by a hand tapping the button. The classroom shuffled before the whiteboards, last minute answers changed past the final bell, the fate of those few remaining sealed as they approached the front desk. Those who took this long were either unprepared, doubters, or scared, the stragglers who took the entire two and a half hours allotted for the exam. It was a fair cop, neither too tricky nor to easy to breeze by, and yet there were always a few students who never stood by their own work. For those afraid to let go of their papers, slow in stride and shaking as their fingers were pried off each page and gingerly placed upon the desk with the other piles, they'd need to get over their irrational fears and grow a spine. Don't they know life is just a long series of tests? Waking up everyday is the challenge, and this wasn't even the hardest of the three exams they will take this year. Then there were the doubters, those who held themselves back as they frantically changed their answers at the desk, their brilliance restrained by some strange delusion that they are wrong when they are right. Honestly in a way they were worse than the stiff-fingered cowards, since doubting yourself is merely just fearing your own self, and not believing in yourself is almost as the last of the lot. The Unprepared, those who surely did not care to learn anything, and depended on the work of others to claim something that did not belong to them. These were the worst, societal parasites who did not belong within the ranks of the talented and gifted, no they did not deserve to be waiting in the same line with their smug grins concealing their cheating eyes.

[color=40C10C]"Remember, the next lecture in is two weeks, so go enjoy yourselves a break while you can." [/color]Just as one chapter ends, a new one begins. Such was the cyclic nature of life, stretching into eternity, for at the end of every era and age, something else must rise. It was the same with how the age of reason and science paved the way for the return to romantic mysticism and superstition. Perhaps it was for the idyllic nostalgia that society shifted from one to the next, never quite satisfied with the progress which urged them forward into the future, while their roots anchor to tether them in their deep past. It was this internal struggle that set the stage for how the world worked, each revolution merely a rebirth of one predominant phase before the next counterrevolution. And he knew of cycles, far beyond an ordinary professor of biology would. For a man who died seven times so far, Rufus looked remarkable well, only bearing the faint suggestion of a scar across his right eye, and a bit of a limp as his gloved left hand carried his cane about him as he stalked the rows during the exam. For a man who had lived nearly two centuries, he looked good considering he appeared somewhere in his 60's as his grey hair was slicked back neatly with the gaunt features of his wrinkling proctor's eyes. There was more to the professor than his students know, the rumors perhaps that he was part of a war or something worse. The scar was real, but the limp was fake.

[color=40C10C]"Except for you, Mr. Anderson. Stay here for a minute."[/color] An ungloved hand placed heavily upon the young man's shoulder. There was a jolt, a twitch, a cheater's nip. They both knew this would not end well, but alas the fingers gripped tighter to finger the dishonored. Still the boy tried to wrestle away, and deny his guilt, but alas it was written across his face and more so the exam. Singled out for his act, and forced down to sit upon the desk. The scowl of the professor, looking dead into his darting eyes, looking for an exit, any exit like the rat he was. But Rufus would not let the student scurry away, not while his unwitting prey failed his test. How was it possible that a senior citizen- [color=40C10C]"Tell me, Mr. Anderson... What good is an exam... If you're unable to learn anything from it?"[/color] This was surreal was it not? An experience to be felt and seen, but perhaps it was a trip, but it seemed by the minute the professor looked younger, his grey hair turning darker, the wrinkles flattening out to a fierce look. And all the while the cheater felt weaker, drained of his energy as though he had just ran across the campus. His vision became blurrier, the hard desk gave no support to his back, his hairline receded. Receded? Alas, looking down in horror to see the changes. It was impossible, how was it? The digital numbers on the timer had stopped, the blinking counters paused as if the batteries suddenly decided to malfunction. And yet here he was aging, rapidly as someone unrecognizable if it were not for the scar over his eye stared at him. [color=40C10C]"Goodbye, Mr. Anderson."[/color]

---

Lines. How he detested waiting in lines. Perhaps it was because a Time Keeper never waited, but rather be waited upon. As such there was a fundamental abhorrence towards standing around in queue, to people used to controlling the passage of time waiting was an insult. And waiting with these nonmagi? Certainly had he not recently engorged himself on three decades of life within the last week, Rufus may have been willing to act the angry old codger, yet in his current state, the man looked more like a yuppie dressed in his monkey suit. A few locks of hair escaping the orderly comb with an upper-class frown with each step closer among the uncouth masses. Older than his students, but certainly younger than the usual folk who came in and out to do banking business at this hour. Ahead of him a widow collecting her pension, ahead of her was a balding man looking for a loan, and at the kiosk was some fool no doubt withdrawing his riches for a transfer. It mattered not, Rufus would wait for now, because yesterday the dawn finally broke.

It was plastered all over the news, as such panic and pandemonium often did, milked of all the chaos and disturbance the ripples had. Even now in the lobby the networks tried to explain the facts, reviewing the data and grasp at the message of fear that seemed to dominate the news. It was how humans were kept in control after all, they were trained fear from a very young age, fear of abandonment and neglect was first, as a infant had no way to fend and feed itself at birth. Then once a child could act for itself, punishment and retribution was the next to fear, as its choices became weighed with trade offs of pleasure or pain. Then the mind evolved once more to consider the morality of its acts, the fictional concepts of good and evil conceived to justify the fear preceding. And finally, the maturity of fear into us and them, when the mind realizes the similarities and the dissimilarities, the great ability to compare and judge: the fear of the adversarial Other. It was psychologically ingrained, behaviors learned through growth and development, it was once fear of ruination that had once united the tribes and woe the war, now it is the morality of the Guild that kept the status quo of bitter peace, but soon it shall be the fear of the Dark Shadows that shall rise in persecution of the nonmagi.

The Boy finally did it. He first act of magical terrorism, brings back some memories of home. Such times they were, but surely the piping windbag had no idea what he just started. A series of events which would fall upon them all, it was finally time, and Rufus wondered if he should have gone with him. Timing was always the hard part, sure there was a few minutes in the interval window to have derailed the train, and should the boy hesitate or miscalculate, the old Time Keeper could always slow the passage of time to ease the skill required of timing the blow. But there was nothing Rufus could do to help the boy pick his timing. This was a choice the leader of the Dark Shadows had to make, the decision to stop suckling on his mother's breast and hiding in her shadow. It was time he stepped into the world a man and claim his stake in the world, now the world shall test him in reply to see what sort of man he was. Hopefully he would not be a disappointment as Mr. Anderson was, which is to say Rufus was a man of high expectations. A few dead, the nation searching for the enemy, and by now probably the ever-infuriating Guild. Ah, summoned to the kiosk, the call for next in line seemed far more polite than: [i]Meet at base tomorrow night for full meeting. Don't be late or miss it if you value your life.[/i]

[color=40c10c]"Safety deposit please. MacFly. Martin MacFly. My papers."[/color] A curt nod at the teller behind the counter. A journey into the vault to retrieve an item just for this occasion. Tonight of all nights on a Wednesday evening, summoned to gather at the place to be to discuss where things go from here no doubt. And for this Rufus would need to come prepared for such an occasion, given the tenacity of their little society of sociopaths. A wise man would bring something to subdue them all with as two keys were inserted into the dusty metal box. A lifetime of treasures contained in a single bin? Perhaps not, but certainly for the persona of Martin MacFly, there was a wooden box waiting for him that filled most of the container. A treasured item no doubt, perhaps some ancient artifact or relic of great magical power that would suppress even the strongest of mages. No matter how powerful a man was, no one could stand against what legendary magic Rufus gingerly lifted box and all, held close to his chest. [color=40c10c]"Thank you, that'll be all for today."[/color]