Ethereal Forces: 3 Intelligence: 6 Precision: 6

Celestial Forces: 5 Will: 9 Perception: 11

Vessel: ghostly male/1, Charisma +2

Skills: Detect Lies/3, Emote/6, Knowledge (American government/6, American History/6, American Law/6), Languages (English/3, French/1, Spanish/1), Tactics/3

Songs: Form (Celestial/3), Harmony (Ethereal/3), Healing (Corporeal/2, Ethereal/3, Celestial/1), Motion (Ethereal/3), Shields (All/2), Tongues (Ethereal/3)

Attunements: none

Belief is a funny thing.

If you stopped the average American on the street and asked them whether or not they worshipped the current President of the United States, you'd get everything from a raspberry to a punch in the face. The idea that an American would worship that idiot (name changes like clockwork, but the designation stays the same) is laughable. In this day and age, Americans are all too aware of the flaws of their chief executive. They don’t believe in them any more.

However… they do believe in the President. Not the guy currently in there, of course (even if they voted for him): it's more like they believe in the office of the President, or the idea of the President. When something goes right with the country, it's thanks to the President's statesmanship: when something goes wrong, it's obviously the fault of that idiot in the White House. And, of course, the President knows everything that's going on; he's got the CIA and the FBI and all those other agencies to tell him stuff, and they've obviously got fingers in every pie. There's all that power there, which is scary, but then no holder of the office can stay there for more than eight years, which means that the power is controllable. You can trust the Presidency, even if you can't trust the moron currently holding the office.

All of this is really a small part of any citizen's potential belief structure, but it exists in more people than you might think. And there's a lot of American citizens.

Mr. President started haunting (his word) the White House some time after it was constructed. He vaguely remembers James Madison - he thinks - but it wasn't until Andrew Jackson's administration that he really started to coalesce. He hasn't left the House since. He hasn't felt the need to.

Mr. President usually does not manifest himself. The ethereal much prefers to let the perceptive spot him: it gives him an idea of who's actually on the ball in any given administration. There's always one or two people on the White House staff who know who he is, and they've collectively created and kept up vague ghost stories to explain away any odd occurrences that crop up. The only person guaranteed to know of Mr. President's existence is the head of the President's personal Secret Service detail: they are always carefully briefed by their predecessor about the existence of the ethereal.

Note that the corporeal President of the United States may not actually know of Mr. President's existence: the last one that did was Harry S Truman, in point of fact. The ethereal hasn't always been impressed with some of the people who have sat in the Oval Office, and doesn't even want to think about the last two decades. He still protects them, when he can; there's more than one reason why no President has ever been assassinated in the White House. Mr. President also has an encyclopedic knowledge of the laws and policies of the USA, and is more than willing to provide that information to anyone who knows of his existence. Uncle Sam likes to stop by and mine him for information (and a beer or two) from time to time: Mr. President appreciates his visits. The two ethereals understand each other quite well, actually.

Personally, Mr. President is very dignified. His corporeal form seems to be very chaotic: so many people have so many different views of the ideal chief of state that he never has the same precise face twice. He usually manifests as an older male, statesmanlike but with a certain homespun charm. He likes to hear himself talk, but he's a very good speaker, so most listeners don't mind. He also has a pretty good sense of humor, and knows every piece of gossip about every corporeal President who's ever lived in the White House (he saw most of it, after all).

His position in the War is unusual. His natural tendencies are towards Heaven's side, but they won’t work with him overtly. Mr. President has thus proclaimed the White House neutral ground: no supernatural activities are permitted there without his express permission. Normally, both sides would simply laugh nastily and continue on, but… well, both Heaven and Hell know the risks of meddling. It's not so much taking the power, but keeping it: if one side were to gain the upper hand, the other would see no reason not to retaliate. The horrible example of the French Revolution's Committee of Public Safety is still fresh in everyone's mind: nobody came out ahead from that confrontation. All in all, the idea of a mere ethereal - one that doesn't even pretend to be a god - dictating terms to both sides, while ludicrous, merely reinforces the idea that the area should be handled with kid gloves. Besides, there's always the action in the Capitol building: Mr. President could care less about the legislative branch.

Naturally, both sides still keep observers in place, which Mr. President 'reluctantly' permits (not that he can stop them, unless he wants to start a firefight in the Cabinet Room). Of course, no sane Archangel or Prince would assign anyone to this duty who wasn't smart, subtle and politically astute, so there aren't too many problems.