Created by: tom timberlake <tomtimb@ionet.net>
As I was looking into the mirror, my reflection started talking without me, as James the Stone Malakim made his presence known [he was using the quicksilver backing of the mirror as his vessel]. After the nicks my razor made were bandaged, James had a few things to say, the most startling of which was his description of a Mercurian of War most Celestials rarely meet, since her work is aimed at humans, true to her Choir's calling. Since she is so seldom seen by Celestials, he was unable to quantify her powers and skills -- you will just have to imagine her stats for yourself -- who knows, you may be right!
Mercurian of War, Ofanim of War, Divine Destiny
Practice kendo no-mind sword strikes for an hour [+1]
Chance of Invocation: 0,
This Angel is the one responsible for those moments when time seems to crawl and you can achieve more than is humanly possible in those moments, those moments of perfect lucidity under fire. True to the calling of her Choir, this Friend of Man never shows herself when only Celestials are involved in a combat -- there must always be a mortal on the field. Her special Attunements allow her to subjectively or objectively change the flow of time for one human, two if she gets a high CD. Tampering with time is generally not well thought of, in addition to being inordinately noisy -- 5 x the CD in noise when the objective attunement is used. One cheeky Janusite named her powers "See the Dew" and "Do the Dew" -- labels she does NOT use herself, though they seem to be catching on among Earth-assigned Angels.
Allows the human so blessed to perceive everything going on around him/her as if time had slowed, rather like the one episode of Star Trek where Kirk is sped up in metabolism and is moving so fast he seems to disappear right off the deck of the Enterprise, moving so fast he can't be seen and is capable of stepping out of the way of a phaser beam. The flow of time is *actually* undisturbed, it is only the perception of time that is altered. The CD represents the number of sensory questions the Blessed can ask the GM about his perception of what the foe is planning to do in combat this round, allowing him to change his actions on the fly as circumstances change, reacting to stuff that he couldn't possibly have guessed was going to happen. Additionally, with a CD of 6, he may choose to forego asking questions and plan his actions so well that he can effectively cancel a rolled Infernal Intervention -- prior planning preventing poor performance [this is only on a CD of 6!]
This actually does bend time, allowing extra actions beyond those normally allowed in a combat round, the number of extra actions being equal to the CD rolled on this Attunement. If there are no Ofanim of War on the field of conflict, this human will go first and give a very good imitation of an OoW in action.
If there is no human on the "Good" side of the conflict, Telechronia has been known to afflict Evil humans with these Attunements, but with the time-arrow reversed, so that the evil humans find their perception of events flying by so fast, that they find it hard to focus on what they were going to do; or time flys around them and the round is often over before they can do anything. Needless to say, the Demons are not pleased to see her take the field. Kronos has a standing bounty on her, as does Asmodeus, one of the rare times he has turned his gaze from the actions of his fellow demons to contemplate the Opposition. Baal and Belial want her hide for a rug, but Kobal and Vapula want her alive so they can find out how she does what she does! No surprise, Saminga wants her dead, but then, Saminga wants _everyone_ dead. Haagenti wants her smothered in ketchup, Nybbas sees her as a living slomo/fast forward camcorder that he just has to have for his network, Beleth gives other demons nightmares about her and likes her right where she is, as she is, Andrealphus can't wait to try some of his favorite games with her -- the night of lust that seemed to last forever, Malphas has told folks he wants her dead, but has told others he wants her alive to study, and Valefor couldn't care less about her, he just wants to steal her abilities for his own use in The Big Heist, with no explanation of what he is planning.
The AAs are happy she is on our side, though she is visited by a Dominican
Triumvirate every time she actually changes the flow of time and is required
to explain why it was actually necessary to tamper with this Basic Theme
of the Symphony. After complaints that she had passed over humans with Major
Destinies who subsequently died on the field of conflict, Yves himself taught
her the Divine Destiny Attunement, so she could make better use of her abilities,
i.e., save the Major Players when they took the field of battle. Michael
allowed this, grudginly, since the MPs who fight are likely to be real buttkickers
on their own -- but you should see what they can do "on speed"!
Besides, it kept Yves from coming to him with complaints, and anything that
keeps Yves far from Me... [or so runs the rumor passed on to me by James,
YMMV].