There is no action without consequence.
It is the nature of the universe, and there is no escaping. Our only hope; our only recourse; our only 'choice' is to understand it. 'Why,' or, in some cases, 'why not.' There is no enlightenment; only assurance. There is no hope; only probability. There is no chance; only cost.
Or so the way he sees it, at any rate.
Vanil's machinations extend back quite a distance in time, however quaint such a concept in a place such as this might be; farther than many of his remaining peers would care to admit or acknowledge. It was only recently that such deeds and misdeeds were made readily apparent to those who may have been interested in them for one reason or another, be it that of archiving or weaponizing. Indeed, Vanil has no fewer enemies than he did before, and some might say that he has in fact, in his neverending insistence on his agendas and desires, made even more than before the assault on Blackwood. Said incident was, no doubt in the eyes of many, a turning point in the Exile's existence. Vanil himself had been imprisoned in the infamous Construct of the only true master of his that persists to the current time for said machinations, including his covert attempts to subvert the Frenchman's authority and Exhilic power and dominion.
The Lupine minions of the Merovingian came swiftly and without any semblance of mercy for Vanil, as he himself is hardly a paragon of the concept and concordant connection of mercy, and dragged him from his Neverwhere. Even the immense power the Blood Noble holds when in that place was not enough to stop that which was, now beyond all doubt, inevitable.
It was said dominion that Vanil, perhaps foolishly, sought for himself. And, like those others like him, the Prince of Darkness is not an easy one to keep imprisoned, especially when he has always been a prisoner of himself for so long. Those dread agents of his; the 'Masques,' along with several select 'allies' of the Blood Noble, stormed the prison Construct and broke those digital bonds that kept Vanil in his carefully-prepared cell for longer than he would have doubtless preferred. And when all cost for escape seemed impossibly high, the Merovingian let Vanil and those that had followed him free...for another price; a price that may, in time, prove too great, even for Vanil himself.
And then it was done. But all was not as it was; indeed, it could not have been. The loose alliance of souls that had banded together, almost unbelievably, for the Captain of the Masquerade's sake, quickly splintered and parted ways, and those very few that remained with their Captain were only either the most devoted or insane of his morbid Operatives. Vanil was free from the confines of Blackwood, it was true, but he had been forced to sacrifice too much for even that illusory freedom.
And so then did Vanil return to the shadows of his Neverwhere and begin to gather the darkness of the Matrix to him once again, for he was not one to be destroyed so simply.
There was much to be done.
There was always more.
~V
