Fade to Gray
Welcome to the current home of the Fade to Gray game and concept.
When In Nomine (a game system and background by Steve Jackson Games) came into my life, I had already written the original Archangels game, and had done quite a bit of research into the mythology of Angels. Having a game system in this genre allowed me to explore the ideas that others had come up with, given the same source material. I found it very interesting.
In Nomine has at its core a Zoroastrian duality between Heaven and Hell; a war held in balance for the duration of human history between the forces of God and the armies of the Devil. While true to the origins of Angelic mythology, this struck me as philosophically limited. I have always thought that one of the more interesting paradoxes of Christianity lies in the assumption of omnipotence of the divine.
The question of the reason for the existence of evil in a system with only one good and ineffable god is sidelined in In Nomine. Instead the universe becomes a dynamic equilibrium, a Yin and Yang, always one requiring the other. Or, from another angle, the presence of evil is transient, but the conflict is an intrinsic part of the universe of mortality.
When reading the history of the movers and shakers in the In Nomine universe, one struck me as being particularly involved in this question: the archangel Uriel, whose word is Purity. In the In Nomine back-story, Uriel ascended into higher heaven, after successfully conducting a war of genocide upon all false gods. Little is known of higher heaven by the angels closer to the Earth, save in memory from the beginning.
In classic Christian angelic myth, when Lucifer rebelled against god, he took with him one third of the angels. In Zoroastrian myth, there were seven angelic principles and seven demonic ones, each a lesser part of the greater entity representing good or evil. In Nomine tries to accommodate both these mythologies, by including the story of the rebellion, and also having seven choirs of angels and seven bands of demons, each a reflection of the other. But the In Nomine system is independent of both in the details: The Grigory (eighth choir) have been cast out for mingling their blood with mortals, and the Malakim having no corresponding band, as they never bend, but rather break. The corresponding band of demons that take the seventh place are the Lillim, the children of Lilith,. Their purpose is Freedom, but their power is compulsion.
The questions posed by this system and its uniqueness appealed to me. But one more question has remained closer to my heart, and that question found expression in this system too. The old existential angst rears its ugly head once more.
Regardless of the source material, one thing that angels and demons have that we mortals lack, is absolute proven certainty of the existence of the divine. They know God exists. They have been face to face with the divinity. This fundamentally different perspective, to know that there is good and evil, to know that there is a place for them in the scheme, even the knowledge that there is a scheme to begin with, this is the one thing that is just brushed over in all the stories one might read or movies one might see. Celestial entities may hate, love, rebel, or follow, but they never are forced to confront the core dilemma of mortality. They never have to make the leap of faith required to believe or face the horrible uncertainty of doubt of the existence of the soul.
And therein lies the core idea of Fade to Gray. What happens to the Celestial beings when they are confronted suddenly and unforeseen with the mortal affliction of existential doubt?
I chose to assume as back-story that the forces of Michael won the war in Heaven; but took the more Christian line that only one third of heaven rebelled; and that for the last thousands of years of human history the angels have been guiding us. I then used a universal event to raise the question at the start of the story. Suddenly contact with heaven was cut, and the Hearts of the Angels fell into their bodies.
In the first chapter, the doubt crept in. It started as fear of not doing the right thing, then became fear of having already done the wrong thing, and finally became fear of no longer having a place in the world. That was the main theme of the first play by email game, run in 1997-8 with most of the logs of the game available from the link below (Game one).
Game Two (Subtitled "Fade Out Again") follows on from this, having just begun again in the year 2004, following on a few days after the first game. The truth of the situation: not only that heaven is barred from all, but that the Archangels no longer have the ear of God, and that something terrible this way comes, is becoming apparent. The Doubt is growing, and soon will become a force capable of destroying angels and demons alike, or remaking them entire.
I have also proposed a length written story taking this idea to its logical conclusion, and may include chapters or updates on this later.
I hope you enjoy this story and its ideas. I know I am having a lot of fun with it.