Children of the Ram

Got nemt mit ain hant un git mit der andereh.
-Yiddish Phrase, "God takes with one hand, and gives with the other."

It was the wedding of the youngest of the Ben-Aharon daughters, the beautiful frizzy-haired Portia Ben-Aharon. Over a hundred of Bergenheim's most respected and wealthy jews had come, as the chairs were raised and they danced and laughed and drank wine beneath menorah-like chandeliers.

Ephraim Ben-Aharon was the Patriarch of Bergenheim's oldest Jewish family. The Ben-Aharons had come to the Republic five hundred years ago, fleeing some pogrom in a collapsing kingdom in the east, with nothing but the clothes on their back.

Now Ephraim was the latest in a long line of great mensch, who had taken this small family and grown it into an empire. Law, Medicine, Chemistry, Banking...and other businesses, too, all were in some way owned or ran by the Ben-Aharons.

Old Ephraim laughed and watched, his worn face liver-spotted, his hair grey and old. He had held on to his empire for seventy years now, and he meant to live at least another thirty more years, and beat his own Grandfather's record of life and power.

"Zeyde! Why don't you come dance with me!" Portia called, laughing. Ephraim scowled playfully. He didn't dance. Not since his beloved Rachel had passed. God had given her the crab, and now he feared the crab would get him someday soon.

"Ephraim doesn't dance. He just scowls and counts his money."

The Patriarch turned in his chair in surprise, to see the smiling, tanned face of his oldest friend and Trivodnian Cousin, Jacob Bialik.

"Ay-Yay-Yay! Jacob, you old Shvitz, have you come to steal all the Manishevitz? Or just cause a tummel as always?"

The two old men embraced, and drank each other's health. "I had thought you were still in that awful Shtetl of a country. I take it you got yourself out last? Saving the silver first as always eh?"

"You haven't changed one bit Ephraim. You think I could miss a gathering of the Mispocha?"

Ephraim scowled. "We don't use that word around here. Someone might misunderstand."

Jacob smirked. "I don't think anyone here is going to care, cousin. But business can wait, it has been years since we have seen each other. What happened to pretty Rachel? Did she divorce your sorry old heiny finally?"

Ephraim's face sank. "No. She...died." he shifted uncomfortably. "But life goes on. My last daughter is married. Soon even my oldest grandchildren will be having weddings."

"Oy Vey. My commiserations for your loss. Still...A Bi Gezunt, eh?"

Ephaim waved his cousin away. "Health fades in time. What matters is legacy. I am proud of my legacy, Bialik. I know why you are here, and my answer is no."

Jacob protested. "Cousin, I am simply here-"

"Save it. You think I am a fool? You mention the Mispocha, and you have the look of a sly Momzer on the prowl for another man's shekels. You want money for a war. Abroad, or here, I dont' care. A shlekhter sholem iz beser vi a guter krig."

Jacob stiffened, and his eyes glowered for a moment. But he had no desire to cause a scene. He simply said, softly. "So be it old man. I will give my gift to the bride, and dance a while with the girls, and leave when convenient."

"See that you do." he waved his old friend and cousin away. He had no time for schemes. He had everything he wanted. There was no reason to borrow trouble. Bialik could find another way to chase his foolish schemes, whatever they were.

He looked up once more, and decided he would dance with Portia, and damn his aching hips.

"Meshuggah! I don't believe it, Zeyde is dancing!"

They all laughed and clapped, and he saw the merriment reflected in his daughter's eyes. This. This was what life was all about, he thought. These moments, before HaShem took them away. Everything ended in the end, but untill then...you might as well dance.

Bialik watched from the sidelines, nursing his wine, and contemplated. The old man was too complacent. Things were going to have to change, sooner rather than later.

"Who is the wise person? The one who foresees the consequences." -Talmud, Tamid 32a

Ephraim scowled, drumming his fingers on his ivory-handled cane. He had been informed there was a developing situation in his investment group, and now a board-room full of nervous, younger men in suits and yarmulkes looked up at him. He did not have the Payot, or wear the yarmulke. He was a clean-shaven man with steel-grey hair and eyes that could out-stare a hawk's.

To them he was not Zeyde, the grumpy family patriarch. To them he was the Kop Mentsh, or Headman. Or, more formally, he was simply Mr Ben-Aharon or sir. And it was his money that they were charged with investing and divesting, sharing and saving. And now, it seemed, losing.

"So what you're saying is, we own three thousand acres of swamp in Krasnislavia." Ephraim said, barely able to conceal his rising anger. Inwardly, he fought confusion as well as irritation. He did not show weakness, but he felt it in his heart. How in God's name did this happen...?

"It gets worse, sir. We've done a full audit- in secret of course...and well, believe it or not, we own land in Kadikistan as well."

"Kadikistan?" Ephraim almost exploded out of his chair. "How by the holy do we own land in Kadikistan? They don't even SELL mortgage bonds. Do they?"

"Someone called the Land Bank of Kadikistan did sir. I think they're expatriates who fled during the revolution and operate out of Natalia..."

"You mean we got shtupped. By Goyim! Goyim from a country that doesn't even exist anymore! Oy Vey..." he shook his head fiercely.

"All told, the amount of debt we owe on these toxic bonds is close to one hundred million marks. Maybe more if we adjust for hyperinflation in Trivodnia..."

Ephraim slammed his cane down on the table, making twenty-one board-members jump. "This is unacceptable! I leave my power, my wealth, in your hands. You are supposed to be the best qualified Jews in Gallo-Germania! What have you been doing? Sucking each other off and doing coke like an Engellexic Shmendrik..."

"Sir, we believe we have several solutions to the problem...we could seek foreign investment, as Stonecastle is doing. We can apply for fiscal relief from the government.."

"No! Unacceptable!" he thundered, slamming his cane once more. "This is the Ben-Aharon Group. I built this institution with my own two hands. I didn't inherit it like all these goyim momzers did. I am not throwing it away to foreigners, or going on hand and knee with my begging cap either."

He sighed. There was only one thing for it. "We will have to borrow money from within the community, as we did in the old days. The family helps out the family in time of need."

There was silence from the board. All of them knew what he meant, but none wanted to address this uncomfortable reality.

"Hold off the creditors for now. Lie to the goyim media if you have to. I will talk to the Mispocha."

"If a man means to kill you, strike first!" ~~ Talmud, Berakhot

Ephraim Ben-Aharon entered the Solomonic Chamber in full regalia. White sashes inlaid with the blue David's star were draped from his arms, and a thick, broad-brimmed black hat covered his close-cropped hair and yarmulke. Above hung a giant menorah, its flickering lights reflected off of polished brass and bronze that decorated this sacred space beneath Midweis Synagogue.

Entering from other points on the compass, similarly regally attired, were the Four other Kop Mensh of the Mispocha. The Headmen of the "Yiddish Mafia" that had influenced and controlled organised crime in Bergenheim for centuries.

A blind-folded old Rabbi, his beard almost white, held out the parchment-like scrolls of the Torah, resting on a wrought-brass folding stand. Everything in this room was possible because of the shared efforts and generosity of the Mispocha. Gold, Brass, Bronze, Silver...the room was full of reminders subtle and gross that only united could the Yehudim survive and prosper.

Be the Bank, or the be the pauper, as one saying had it.

Now he was here to ask for a loan from that Bank, a galling thing considering he had long considered himself the most responsible and respectable of these five headmen.

Henceforth, all words would be spoken only in Yiddish or Hebrew. No goyim tongue was permitted in this holy of holies.

"Honored Ephraim, you come before the family to ask a favour, that those who have made this place should make you, as the Lord lets his graces flow through the etz HaChayim. Out of respect for your achievements and contributions to the family, we grant you this audience."

Ephraim bowed low, facing the stern gaze of his peers, who stood equidistant around the Rabbi and the holy torah. Much of their traditions were enthused with the hidden lore of the Kabbalah, and though the Rabbi who aided the Mispocha were not permitted to see their faces, they were respected and revered, and their word was as law, even amongst men above the common law such as this.

"I am an old man. I have lived a long life. Everything I have earned, I have given a portion of to this family, to our people. I have never asked for favours, nor have I been slow to grant them to my friends and others of the family. My hands are clean. I keep kosher and I have never missed a Sabbath. I ask you now, in the winter of my life, for a favour."

He spread his hands, as if to encompass the whole room.

"I humbly beg now, a loan of one hundred million marks from this family, to repay my debts made in error, so that I may again live cleanly, free of these burdens, and continue, through my life and my children, to share what I earn with this family."

There was a subtle intake of breath from those assembled. One hundred million was a great sum, even to such wealthy men. He was asking for twenty-five million from the personal accounts of the most secretive, dangerous and powerful Jews in Bergenheim, if not all Gallo-Germania. Maybe even the World, now that Trivodnia had fallen.

They looked from one to the other, silent looks full of meaning Ephraim was not privy to. Finally, the Headman of the North stepped forward first, and laid his hand on the sacred Torah.

"I swear before God and on five generations of my line, I will grant this favour to my family."

With more reluctance, the Headman of the West stepped forward, and swore the same oath.

Then, rolling his eyes in annoyance, the Headman of the South joined them in the middle.

That left only the Headman of the East.

He looked Ephraim dead in the eyes. He asked a single question.

"Will you answer my call?"

The blind-folded Rabbi tutted. "A favour has no terms. You grant or you do not grant."

Nonetheless, Ephraim nodded silently, meeting his rival's gaze.

The Headman of the East thought for a moment, and then, he too swore the oath.

"It is done. As Family you entered, as family you remain, and as family you will help one another. Now go, as strangers, but remember the bonds of family you have maintained here."

The Rabbi rolled up the scroll. He stepped backwards, turning his eyes away, as the great men shuffled now from the candle-lit chamber.

"Damn silly business if you ask me-" The Headman of the South began, once free of the suffocating ceremonial chamber, pulling the ill-fitting sashes from his arms. "This suit is stuffier than my old sofa. Oy Vey..."

"Quiet your kvetching, Chaim. It is all to a purpose. A Purpose we have now agreed upon." Zusman, the Headman of the East gave Ephraim a meaningful look.

The proud Headman of the Heart said nothing, but he knew that, whatever the ceremony and the rules of their brotherhood, he now owed the "sweet man" of Yharnam a great deal. He feared what form that call would take.

He had a dreadful feeling that it would come only all too soon.

Club Valhalla, Yharnam
9th November, 11:55pm

The Lord commands of his children that no work be done on the Sabbath, from three minutes after sunset on a Friday untill three stars appear in the sky on a Saturday. This proves a problem for those who have urgent business with their rivals.

Fortunately, the Mispocha, particularly those of the East, have many friends in many places. The Yiddish Mafia does not scruple to use goyim when it suits its purposes to do so.

The rotary club of veterans, old warhorses and drunkard pensioners known as the Old Hunters of Yharnam also had a vested interest in the removal of opposition to Mispocha business interests. Not because the old ex-millitary types liked the yids, but because they despised the Nekmet.

A week ago, one of their number finally died in Valhalla, wether of drink drugs or poison, it didn't matter. Now the Old Hunters had nothing holding them back from taking care of long overdue business.

Donning their balaclavas, the four men chosen for this work checked their M12 sub-machine-guns one last time, as they sat in their old, unmarked van, waiting for midnight.

A light rain spattered the wind-shield and drummed on the aluminium roof. They sat in silence, breathing easily. Outside was the distant hum and vibration of loud night-club music. Brightly-painted whores and striped-track-suit wearing gopniks were crowding the cobbled pavement, queuing to enter their den of degeneracy.

The Bouncers were busy handling the crowd, and so didnt see the van idling in the near-by alley-way.

"I had a daughter. Her name was Hilda. She was going to go to college. Be a Nurse." one of them spoke.

"No names. no details." The other whispered harshly, but the Old Hunter who had spoken continued onwards.

"She came to a place like this. Celebrate with friends. They all took the Blud. Why not, they thought. Young, foolish." His voice was dead and without emotion. His grip tightened around his weapon.

"I buried her five months ago. I still remember her eyes...."

"Shut the fuck up. Stick to the plan, old man. We are hunters now, nothing more or less."

The one who had spoken exhaled in one, long, sad breath, like the wheeze of a dead man.

The others kept their focus.

Finally, it was time.

They moved as one, like clock-work. To some, they did not see the cold, november streets of Old Yharnam. They saw again the dusty streets of Port Stanley, heard again the chatter of AKs and the scream of fallen comrades.

The Bouncer looked up, too late.

"Cyk-"

The Old Hunters opened fire. Screams echoed through the night, as club-goers fell and scattered in panic. One of the Hunters focused on killing the bouncers, and any hired help they spotted. The others fired wildly, not really caring who they hit.

Blood flowed over the old cobbles.

In five minutes, they had cleared the club of their targets. The Nekmet had tried to resist or flee, but most were caught and killed.

All but one of the Old Hunters vanished whence they came, even as sirens wailed and SWAT units arrived.

The Last Hunter took off his mask, and waited. The SWAT approached cautiously, from behind their shields.

"DROP YOUR WEAPON!"

He smiled serenely. "Goodbye, Hilda."

He raised his weapon, and pistol shots rang out. Another body to the dozens soaking the night-club floor.

"Jesus fucking wept..." one of the SWAT officers dry-heaved. The place stank like a charnel-house.

The Gang War had begun.

The situation in Yharnam was getting worse. Noone really wanted to talk about. Not even the papers were truly giving the whole picture. Perhaps they were more afraid than voyeuristic,fearing to give voice to the rising horror, worried they would make it more real, and open the flood-gates on what was coming.

The gutters were foaming with sex, blud and blood. A uneasy tension reigned in the old, decaying port-city, prostitutes drawing their coats tighter around themselves as winter winds battered them from the Polesian, travelling in gangs and eyeing the ever prowling lone wolves with a mixture of apprehension and hope. Hope because the predators were also their best customers.

Normally, Ephraim Ben-Aharon would keep well away from such a powder-keg of a city. But the "Sweet-Man", the Mispocha Lord of this City of Misrule, had called him to a meeting. And Ephraim owed this man, whatever the traditions of their organisation, he understood the new, pragmatic realities.

His armoured limousine trundled down narrow streets, rattling over old cobbles and un-maintained asphalt from half a century ago, the two mixing and matching seamlessly. He hoped these fucked streets wouldn't ruin the suspension on his car. His bodyguards sat stiff rigid either side of him, heavy 'eagle pistols lying in their laps.

They passed the Valhalla, yellow POLIZEI tape flapping in the wind in its empty, open doors. A single police-man sat nearby, smoking in the bitter wind. Ephraim glanced at it solemnly. This sort of madness was exactly what he had feared, when he had turned down his cousin's schemes at his daughter's wedding a few months ago.

He could hardly blame them. Word of the Pogroms sweeping through Crotobaltislavonia cut to the heart of every Jew's deepest fears and paranoia. You could always climb high, he knew, but you could never build a real legacy. That was the curse of the wandering Tribes. One generation or two, sooner or later, the goyim would turn. Such was the cycle.

The limousine turned, and soon they were in the more-modern warehouse districts. Foot traffic was more sparse here, and the cold sea-wind stronger. He could almost smell the brine even inside his car.

The car stopped, as did his escorts. They got out, the winter-gloom enfolding them, dreary street-lights casting long-shadows on the grey paving.

Buttoning up his thick coat, Ephraim exited into the winter-wind. Around him towered the corrugated sheet metal walls of his debt-holder's headquarters, the old packing warehouse for Zuckermann Sweets. Once they'd exported sugar-treats to Trivodnia and Crotobaltislavonia and even further afield, long ago. But even before the war that business was dying. All Polesian business seemed to be slowly decaying here, as new, parasitic trades bloomed like weeds. Drugs, trafficking, arms-dealing, all of it was massively on the rise. And the Mispocha wanted their cut.

"Zusman."

"Ephraim." The tall, gaunt Headman of the East greeted him solemnly. He too was clean-shaven, sunken cheeks hiding hawk-like eyes. Both hands were in his thick jacket-pockets. Perhaps fondling the razor-blades he was known to carry on him at all times.

"I'd shake your hand, but in this wind, I feel it would freeze." he joked weakly. "Shall we head inside?"

"Very well." Zusman said, solemn as always.

Around milled their respective bodyguards, eyeing each other and the world around them with suspicion, shivering hands gripping cold hand-guns tightly, waiting for an excuse to draw.

Inside, away from the wind, things weren't much better. The whole warehouse stunk of aged, sickly molasses, and other fouled sweet substances. Crates that had once been packed with bon-bons and liquorice were now being packed with cocaine, money, and above all else, ammunition. Ephraim eyed this ongoing operation.

"So open?"

"I have nothing to hide. Should I?" Zusman asked suspiciously.

"Not from me." Ephraim gave an insincere smile. They weren't friends, but clearly Zusman didn't regarded him as a threat to these operations, or he would not have let him see everything.

"Good. Its about this that I have called you."

"Somehow, I guessed."

Zusman led him into a side-room, stuffy, but at least well-furnished. A too-harsh 50-watt bulb blinked above them. The two old jews sat down across from each other.

"Schnapps?"

"Please."

Zusman poured some vaguely apple-smelling gut-rot into two tumblers, and passed one across. Ephraim downed the eye-watering liqueur in one. "No half-measures, please."

Zusman grunted, marginally respectful. He poured another, fuller shot for the Headman of the Heart.

"My proposal is simple. I need your influence. Keep the Yharnam Constabulary away from the docks for 24 hours. I have the man-power and the fire-power. Two weeks from now, during Hannukah, I and my men will cleanse this city of the Nekmet." Zusman said boldly, without a trace of bravado.

Ephraim eyed him skeptically, and took another shot before responding.

"Leaving aside objections about...doing something like this on our sacred holiday, what you are proposing...do you really think even I could convince the entire Yharnam police force to stand by, let alone to stand by for so long?"

"Maybe not. But the longer they take to respond, the more trash I can throw into the sea. I have identified over fifty nests of vermin, and I have two hundred good men, both gentile and mensch, who can clean them out." Zusman drank his schnapps with a breathy gasp. "You owe me, Ephraim. Not just for the loan-money either. You've been skimming off my trade for years. You pretend to be clean, but I know you take from me, just as you take from all the others."

Ephraim struggled to hide his fury, shock, and disgust at what Zusman was so casually proposing. Sure, they sometimes had to get their hands a little bloody as part of the family business, but what Zusman was proposing went beyond vendetta and a little house-cleaning. He was proposing to start and finish a gang war in one day. An unprecedented level of open, wanton violence for the usually mostly-discreet Mispocha.

"What you want...even if you succeed, you won't get them all. And what about the State? They wont be able to ignore this horror any longer. They will come after us. All of us. In Midweis, in Midgard, in Anorheim...You jeopardise all of us with such a reckless play."

"Not reckless. necessary. I've done the calculations. We kill them now, while theyre still growing, we set back their infiltration another generation. The War stirred them up like hornets. Now theyre building nests all over Germania. Time to drive them back into their holes."

"Zusman, you're mixing your metaphors. How much schnapps have you drunk?"

"I don't have time for your fucking games!" he snapped, slamming the table. Ephraim's bodyguard rose, his hand at his side. Zusman's man glared back.

He waved his man off. "Fine, fine, whatever. If I call in every favour, squeeze every simp, maybe...maybe I can get you a head-start. Distract the Yharnam Constabulary for an hour at least. More than that, I can't guarantee. Shit, after Valhalla, maybe they ll finally form a federal police unit. It will be...harder to corrupt such."

"Valhalla was...premature." Zusman conceded. "But the Old Hunters were keen. These Nekmet animals have been raping gentile girls here. They're hiding it to avoid a racial panic, but the Slavs coming in as refugees? Most are brutalised men from the ongoing troubles. They take out their frustrations on both other Slavs and good Germanians here too. The old soldiers could not be restrained from thei revenge for much longer."

"I know all this. But still...to go from that, to this? How are you any better, Zusman? Shem preserve us..."

"This is a bad time to pretend to a clean conscience, Ephraim." his opposite growled. "You've been making fat bank off of these Slavs and their trouble-making for years. Now its time we called their due."

"You've made your point. Two weeks you said?"

"Yes. First night of Hannukah. All our brethren will be at home or in the synagogue. It will be like a Second Passover. We will mark the homes and lairs of the Nekmet with blood." A weird, frightening light seemed to enter Zusman's eyes.

"Don't let me down, Ephraim. I can't hurt you, but I can hurt you where it matters- in your precious bank balance."

The seasoned Mobster shivered, and not from the cold. For the first time since entering, he began to actually feel concern for his own well being.

Dear God. Thought Ephraim. When did our civilised criminal enterprise become the haunt of such psychotics?