The Persuaders

<p>The Persuaders take on both the mainstream and alternative media when they begin to suspect that one of their own is involved.</p><p><br></p><p class=ql-align-justify>Imagine a world order in which no one person can say for certain what is true and what isn't. Imagine that all conspiracy theories you're familiar with contain a grain of truth: not in the way most people think perhaps but some degree of reality nonetheless.</p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p class=ql-align-justify>Right. So?</p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p class=ql-align-justify>Can you imagine a world like that?</p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p class=ql-align-justify>Imagine? We're living in it.</p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p class=ql-align-justify><strong>persuader</strong></p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p class=ql-align-justify>noun</p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p>1.A person <span style=background-color: rgba(255 255 255 1); color: rgba(37 37 40 1)>or thing that persuades:</span></p><p><em style=background-color: rgba(255 255 255 1); color: rgba(37 37 40 1)>The cool lake was a most enticing persuader for those who liked to swim.</em></p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p>2.<em style=background-color: rgba(255 255 255 1); color: rgba(37 37 40 1)>Slang.</em></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(255 255 255 1); color: rgba(37 37 40 1)>a.(in underworld use) a gun blackjack or other weapon.</span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(255 255 255 1); color: rgba(37 37 40 1)>b.something that </span><u style=background-color: rgba(255 255 255 1); color: var(--aard-color-interactive-link-default)>persuades</u><span style=background-color: rgba(255 255 255 1); color: rgba(37 37 40 1)> as by coercing or threatening:</span></p><p><em style=background-color: rgba(255 255 255 1); color: rgba(37 37 40 1)>Sometimes the teacher used a hickory persuader to get our attention.</em></p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p class=ql-align-justify>3.A member of a group of people whose core abilities include longevity (living for centuries or longer) and the knack for convincing anyone of anything by simply talking to them in an undertone.</p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p class=ql-align-justify>On the surface Horatius and Agrippina seem like ordinary young people with ordinary lives who want nothing to do with each other. But they have two things in common: both are Persuaders and both work for the Council.</p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p class=ql-align-justify>Persuaders-an ancient group drawn from every culture race and creed-possess what they call their core abilities: extraordinary longevity and the power to convince anyone of anything with just a whisper. Hypnosis? It's nothing like hypnosis.</p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p class=ql-align-justify>Their elite governing body the Council exists to ensure that Persuaders do not take control of much less initiate history-changing events. The Council's motives are unclear-self-preservation ethics or something else entirely. Whenever suspicious activities arise anywhere on the planet agents like Horatius and Agrippina are dispatched to track down the rogue Persuader and mollify them-stripping them of both their ability to persuade and their apparent immortality leaving them to age like any ordinary person.</p>