Chapter Eight: Pharisees

The rocket screamed past me, slamming into the marble altar with a horrific cacophony of sound. A ball of fire consumed the front of the church, swallowing the altar in a horrific tapestry of dark smoke. The concussion flung me into the air. I somehow managed to twist myself around so that I landed soundly on both feet, and avoided any serious harm.

I expected that Mariner would have exhausted his ammunition and be forced back upon his more mundane weapons, but he simply pivoted around and aimed at me once more with the launcher, completely skipping any kind of reload. The rocket screamed towards me like a fiery arrow, driving up a pillar of exhaust in its wake.

I desperately thrust forward my hands, reaching for the oncoming missile. My timing was miraculous; my fingers closed upon the hot iron head of the missile, somehow clutching its surface like a thrashing fish. Before the rocket slipped from my grasp I had just enough time to shove it sideways, out towards the middle of the cathedral. The projectile shrieked away and swallowed the solemn portrait of a saint on a wall, the stained-glass bursting in a colorful shower.

I lunged away just as a third rocket cut past me, blowing a cavity clear through the wall of the cathedral as it went. I was getting annoyed by the constant firing, and attempted to conceive of some tactic to keep from being blown apart.

I gritted my teeth. It was time to get serious. I needed some serious suppression, and I had an idea of just how I could get it. In my mind, I panned through all the images I had ever conceived of Silver Crescent's bodyguard robot, K-5. He was about the size of a large beach ball, formed from curved wedges of Power-steeped steel, built from the blueprints of a fossilized Framer machine. He could unfold into a walker mode about four feet tall, like a Star Wars droideka but thinner, more slight, and capable of floating like a Halo Sentinel. Mounted atop his wiry neck sat a wedge-shaped head with a single triangular eye that blinked different colors according to his perceived moods, and a computerized voice with a surprising affinity for Silver Crescent's own dry humor…

With a flicker of colors, K-5 materialized right in front of me, as though responding to my summoning. His eye flashed red as he uncoiled into attack mode, his spindly arms folding out like jackknives to reveal the stubby barrels of his plasma projectors. With a clap of static, his golden Power shield activated, a coursing curved barrier that wreathed his hunched form.

A rocket slammed into the front of the levitating machine's shield; the barrier flashed red, and then rapidly returned to its usual color. K-5 deactivated the barrier as he thrust forward his arms and opened fire, pelting Mariner with a burst of plasma shells. The gun-Maren moved away, recoiling as though struck, and vanished behind a pillar. K-5's super-heated shots pitted the pillar's surface with deep indents before he ceased firing, craning his triangular head around as though searching for an ambush.

K-5 twisted around, his mechanical eye focusing on me, flickering to violet with concern. "Are you wounded, Narrator?"

I shook my head. "No, I'm fine. I'm more worried about my companion, NiGHTS, than myself."

"NiGHTS." The bodyguard droid scanned the room, his eye morphing to a mottled brownish tone; a little yellow light clicked on beneath his lens, indicating he was using his Powersight to search for invisible energies. "I do not detect any extra presences here." K-5 looked back towards the pillar. "Your assailant is waning. He is radiating Power."

"That means he's badly wounded," I concluded with a frown.

"It would be unwise to simply leave him," K-5 advised, his eye changing back to violet. "Even upon death's door are Frights a danger."

"Hmph. I'd feel a lot worse if he wasn't such a massive pain in the ass," I replied crossly.

K-5 flexed his arms, his eye turning a royal blue. "Then you are saying you do not care if this opponent dies?"

I shuffled my foot with a tired sigh. "It is rather inconsiderate of me, I suppose. Should I, uh, see him out or something?"

"I have no particularities on this issue," K-5 said dully. "If you believe that is the correct option in this circumstance, I will support your choice."

I walked cautiously across the floor of the cathedral, moving towards the pillar Mariner had vanished behind. My footsteps echoed eerily, reminding me of the gravity of the building around me. I made a mental note to tear the cathedral end from end as soon as I left it. I did not need more monuments to deaf and blind deities.

I found Mariner reclined on the floor, gazing listlessly at his feet. Glossy darkmatter pooled like blood around him, bubbling as it attacked the marble floor. He seemed to gain some rigidity as I watched him in concerned silence; he slouched backwards, face splattered with the murky gleam of his vital essence, and looked regretfully up at me with uneven eyes.

After a moment of silence, Mariner furrowed his brow, speaking with surprising spite for a dying man. "Well, Visitor? Are you just going to watch?"

I was surprised by his question. "Just watch?"

The stricken Maren let out a single bleak laugh. "I am not deceived… by you. You intend to finish me off. Be quick with your work."

"Why would I want to do that?" I asked with distaste.

"I am your enemy, you stupid Visitor." He had the smile of a man headed to the gallows. "I am a Nightmaren… a failed dying Maren. You may as well… save my Master the trouble."

I looked at Mariner, and then looked aside, towards the black-scarred stones of the altar, overturned. "You want me to just kill you already?"

"Visitors hate Nightmaren," Mariner continued blandly, meeting my gaze as I turned back to him, "As much as we hate them. I will not beg for quarter…" He turned aside, looking at the growing pool of his own blood. "I myself never gave any."

I turned aside once more, to exchange a long look with K-5. The bodyguard's eye flashed to violet. "I have no counsel for you, Narrator. What you choose to do I will support."

Mariner tried to lean forwards, but fell back again, a fiery expression of pain lancing his face. "Do it already!"

I looked over at Mariner. Meeting his gaze as directly as I could manage, I shook my head. "I have no obligation to feed the machine."

As the Maren watched with a look of growing concern, I descended to one knee and outstretched my hand, laying my fingertips in the center of his chest. Darkmatter frothed as it contacted my fingers; Mariner stiffened, suppressing a wince. Pressing down slightly and tightening the muscles of my hand, I began channeling Control-laced Power into his body. A green glow enveloped my hand; with a metallic shriek, all the darkmatter in and around the felled Maren steamed madly, dispelled with the restoring presence of Order.

Mariner twitched and drew an anguished breath as I purified his body of the Dark One's blood. The green glow grew brighter as I drew from my pool of Power and poured in my own Order-enriched essence. I noticed very peculiarly no feeling of a loss; while Silver Crescent would have noted the lessening weight of his pool of Power in order to gauge his consumption, I felt absolutely no difference in mine, as though my pool was so great even a massive heal-Cast could not make a fathomable disparity. Mariner's body glowed as it routed Power to reconstruct its damaged portions, smoothing and filling his injuries in like wet clay.

After several continued moments of surge, I finally felt a stiff resistance that indicated Mariner's body had reached its Power capacity. I relaxed my hand, closing my flow of Power; the glow ebbed and died as the Cast ceased. Although I still possessed my fully colossal pool of Power, the potency of the Cast's termination, as casual as it was, still struck me with Power whiplash; as dislodged Control swirled erratically on the inside of my mind, I lost my balance on my legs and slipped backwards, thrusting my arms out backwards to catch myself. The Caster's illness passed shortly, though, and I remounted onto my knees, placing one foot solidly on the floor to lever myself back onto my feet, and viewed my handiwork, to ensure I had made no errors in my Cast.

For a few moments, Mariner was dazed (and rightfully so, as I had heavily reconstructed his body as well as his entire metaphysical system), and stared up motionlessly at the ceiling as though dead. Then he twitched, and blinked; the lights returned to his eyes. Mariner spread out his arms and pulled himself up, looking around with bewilderment. He looked at the cathedral around him, looked at his hands, his chest, and then his hands again. Slowly, the Maren looked over at me with an expression of amazed shock.

He said but a single word, in a voice full of wonder. "Why?"

Kneeling on the ground next to him, I shrugged. "Why not?"

Mariner looked away from me, as though finding it hard to meet my eyes. "I feel very strange," he said nervously. "What did you do to me?"

"I regenerated all the bits and pieces K-5 melted off of you," I said with a knowing smile. "Oh, and I also replaced all the darkmatter in your body and soul with Order. Both your physical and metaphysical form will be much stronger with the substitution."

Mariner closed his eyes, shuddering. "What is this I feel? I know I should be furious, but… I feel lost. What is wrong with me?"

"Probably the Order in your body equalizing out into your soul," I offered.

Mariner was quiet for a few moments. He reopened his eyes and gave me a guarded look. "Why are you helping me?"

"Because I feel like helping you," I said plainly. "Plus, killing people off isn't one of my strong areas. I don't whack a good character if it can be avoided, especially if he's one of my favorites."

He stared at me with wide gleaming eyes, as though I had suddenly begun speaking Spanish. I continued speaking, to clarify my point. "We don't have to fight each other, Mariner. It's a waste of your time, it's a waste of mine, we are both very aware of it and yet you still insist on confrontation."

"In retrospect, it does seem rather fruitless," Mariner admittedly softly.

There was a long pause between us.

Finally, Mariner broke the silence with another question. "What now?"

I stepped towards him, outstretching my hand. "Join me."

Mariner took on another look of surprise. "Join you?"

"Three compelling reasons," I offered. "For starters, I just healed you, so being an honorable person, you have a debt to repay. Secondly, your old Master isn't exactly going to take you right back in after you've failed to kill me. Third, well, I have way better benefits than Wizeman does, and will personally promise never to treat you as a 'disposable minion'."

"You want me to… help you?" Mariner questioned. "Even after all that I have done to you?"

I shrugged. "Crap happens; no one ever got anywhere by holding grudges." I moved my hand a little farther forwards. "You'll find a fairer lodging with me than anyone else. So, are you in?"

The Maren hesitated briefly. "I… will accept." He leaned forwards and grasped my hand. With a single smooth motion, I pulled him back up to his feet. He was stockier than I was, and yet seemed to weigh a fraction as much. I attributed it to buoyancy and set the matter aside.

I released him and crossed my arms. "Now, with that matter out of the way…"

Mariner bowed sweepingly. "What does my Master command?"

I twitched uncomfortably. "Okay, okay, basic rules of conduct are no bowing, no groveling, and for the love of God no referring to me as 'Master'. 'Narrator' will do perfectly fine."

Mariner looked at me strangely, but nodded. "Very well then, Narrator."

"Furthermore," I added, "I think a slight costume change is in order. Let's see here…" I paused for a moment while I sketched out a new appearance for him inside of my mind.

I stepped towards him and tapped him solidly in the middle of the chest with my hand. In a brief flash of Power, his costume changed. Gone was the flak jacket and military boots, replaced with the garb of a Crescent Armada courier: a green gunweave uniform laced with protective padding on the chest, thighs and sections of the arms, boots of solid Genesian leather, reinforced with plates of high-grade steel. Gone as well was his helmet, replaced with an Armada helm, complete with Everstone crest and reinforced plastic visor, pushed up onto his forehead.

Mariner was understandably shocked by the sudden change. He looked himself over as though I had switched his entire body. "What is… this?" he wondered aloud.

"An armor upgrade," I informed him with a bit of pride. "Crescent Armada gear combines gunweave textile armor with metal and protective padding to provide a superior degree of defense against both ballistic projectiles and blades or bludgeoning weapons."

Mariner felt around his face, where he had previously had a Darkmetal ring hanging in front of his eye. "Where is my crosshair?"

I sighed. "Pull down the helmet's visor, it's got a decent Heads-Up-Display in it…"

The soldier-Maren complied, unfastening the catches on the visor's hinges and sliding the black screen down over his eyes. "Ah… I see it now. It isn't quite as nice as my old one though…"

Crossing my arms, I let loose a slight snort. "Nothing is perfect, Mariner. The one Wizeman made for you was probably cursed or something. You look much better without it, anyways."

Mariner pushed the visor back up. "If you say so, Narrator."

"Take my word for it. I bet even NiGHTS would agree with me..." Recalling the jester's absence, I frowned slightly. "I do wonder where she went off to… she has such an annoying habit of disappearing when I'm not watching her!"

As though responding to my beckoning, the air in front of me rippled. I was surprised, however, when someone completely different emerged.