I lurv Nataku. Lurv lurv lurv. He makes even Roger chapters fun...but Roger himself was quite an interesting guy to write. Let me know how I did...this is, by the way, the chapter in which the subplot I've been promising to people appears. Now things really start getting fun. And I don't own any of it!
Judecca, Canto XIII: Roger
I had run out of Dark Rings but not out of wine. All in all, not too depressing a tradeoff.
The bar, thankfully, had grown much quieter since I'd begun making my rounds, meeting, greeting, and subsequently enslaving the citizens of Judecca lonely enough to attend a singles bar called the "Human Instrumentality Project." You had to be roaring drunk to appreciate a name of that presumptuous nature. And the proprietor...never mind the proprietor, I kept telling myself. You'll deal with him later. Just focus on these fools, idiots gullible enough to accept gifts from strangers. But it was hard to ignore or disregard the man when his eyes were sizzling holes through his sunglasses and burning onto my back. Even harder when the person who was supposed to be helping me had instead sat for the past forty-five minutes talking to the head waitress.
"Hello. I am called Nataku. What is your name?"
"Rei. Rei Ayanami."
"I think that name sounds very nice. What sort of things do you like to do for fun?"
"Fun? I do not know what you mean by 'fun.'"
And so on and so forth. Two peas in a pod, each more clueless than the next. Really, they even looked alike; if the girl's eyes had been gold and not that odious shade of red, they might have been siblings. It hurt my brain just to listen to them, and so I tried not to. But if I focused elsewhere, now that the Rings were gone, even less pleasant thoughts drifted into my head. I took a swig of the wine. Bitter. Disgusting. But it would hopefully wash all those thoughts away.
"Sir...I am a cleric!"
Bloody obvious, that. If she hadn't been, I wouldn't have chased after her. No, the thrill of the forbidden wasn't what had led me to pursue her. It was the thought that once—long ago—she had belonged to another man...
"Raistlin Majere?" I said, smirking. "You saw Raistlin Majere? And you say he's sick?"
"Don't be so pleased!" she cried, on the verge of tears. Rather than smudging her face and marring it the way most women look when they cry, her pain instead accentuated the pale strength in her face, in her opalesque cloudy eyes. "You don't know him. You weren't there to see what he became. It was...it was...and then he..." She bit her lip, pressed her hand against it in a nervous gesture. As her cheeks flushed, I knew what had happened. Women all acted the same under stress. Weaklings.
"He kissed you, didn't he?" I tried to sound sympathetic when really my pulse was beating a frantic tempo just below my brow. On the one hand...his nerve never ceased to amaze me. On the other...why should he get even such beauty as this? He had everything else already. I hadn't been with a woman since joining the Group and he got to run into his old girlfriend. The news that he was ill tantalized me, to be sure, but I would deal with that with my own time in my laboratory. Revenge at last would be sweet...revenge sealed with the kisses of the woman Majere loved would be even sweeter. As she blushed even deeper, dusky rose blooming on those marble features, I tried to take her in my arms, to console her, to let her know that not all men were revolting pigs and I at least had class. That was when she had pushed me away and fed me the old tried-and-true line about clerical virginity. Surely she'd been with her order long enough to know that was more of a guideline anyway...
So here I was, avoiding a cleric scorned, doing the dirty work of a man I was merely using for my own ends. The blasted collar he'd forced me to wear itched something awful; nonchalantly I lifted my hand and scratched, a barely noticeable gesture. Years in court had taught me subtlety. Years of being thwarted by inferiors had taught me impatience.
"...and he would not give me the sacred sword. So I took it. He tried to stop me and I had to kill him. I put my hand right through his chest. But that is what Dragons of Earth are supposed to do, even if I learned later on that it was a bad thing. I would like to apologize to him now. The lady from the Dragons of Heaven helped me see that. And now for some reason I am fighting again. For Kaizer. I am Pawn. Do you fight too?"
"I pilot. I'm an Eva pilot."
"What is an Eva pilot?"
"..."
Would they just shut up already? He wasn't even using the right lines and she was soaking up every word he said! It figured that I would get shot down and the genderless freak of science would end up with a girl...even a skinny little twig like her. Gesturing for the proprietor to come over, I held up my wineglass for him to refill.
"Your waitress is rather distracted," I informed him. "Do you usually allow fraternization? This is a singles bar. Who knows what my companion has on his mind?"
The man just looked at me over the rims of his glasses. "Rei does what I tell her to," he said, then retreated back to his corner in the shadows where he sat, gloved hands folded and resting against his chin. He was still staring at me. Surely he had to have noticed that aside from us and the pair of contraction-deficient oddballs, everyone else in the room was behaving rather mechanically. Kaizer put most of his Rings on "autopilot": go through the motions of everyday life but be ready should he need help. Really, I could sympathize with Kaizer's cause. I just thought his methods were a little backwards. Who did the people of Judecca openly acknowledge as the head of their government? Cut him down and take his place, then clean up the rebels in secret from there. Much more cost-efficient. I could teach him a thing or two if I wanted...
...but that wasn't what I was here for. My sole purpose in coming to Judecca was to find Majere and prove to him that his victory over me had been a fluke. I allowed no one to defeat me, especially not those who obviously didn't deserve their win. That bitch from Trebond had been the only one to get away with it thus far, and that was one more name on the list than I wanted. I wasn't about to double its length by adding Majere. He had to die, and die soon...but not too quickly once I had him. Slowly...painfully...agonizingly...so he would come to understand exactly how badly he had underestimated my skill. No cheap tricks from him this time. Or ever again.
Which brought me back to the knowledge that he was sick. Probably mentally, if the cleric assumed his sickness had caused him to kiss her. It didn't surprise me that Majere needed his brain to be scrambled before he could approach a woman. He hadn't seemed the wooing kind. But that was making me think of the cleric again...and the idiot I'd brought along. Why had he even come? Because Kaizer had asked him to. Kaizer always sent people out in pairs if not trios. This morning he'd had the cleric, the elf, and Naesala—the only inhabitant of the tower worth talking to, in my opinion—go out flying. I'd left before their return, desperate from boredom. Revenge was a sticky business, and one in which creativity was an asset for the full effect. So why couldn't I think of a properly fitting attack?
"Excuse me. Pardon me. I'm sorry. Excuse me."
Oh, lovely. Someone new. And here I was without any Rings on me, so the man wouldn't even prove to be diverting as I tricked him into trying one on. He looked like easy prey, too: flustered and out-of-place, clothing every bit as antiquated as mine. His hair was a noxious shade of periwinkle. And he was somehow familiar...he made me think of sand...
Of course! He was the sorcerer from the battle with the demon! The one the elves had landed on...the phantom-caller. Was he still with Majere? Or could I perhaps enlist his aid?
I strolled casually down the bar and intercepted him as he reached the counter. "Pardon me, but have we met before?" I asked, smiling but not coming on too strong just yet. With the shy ones, you had to be careful. "I could have sworn I know your face from somewhere."
"What? Oh, no, sorry, I don't think so...wait, yes. Yes, you do look familiar." It wasn't coming to him. I could tell. He was trying, but he was drawing a big gaping blank. The poor boy needed assistance.
So I gave it to him. "I have it!" I exclaimed, snapping my fingers and pointing at him while rolling my eyes mentally at my obscene informality. Seen in others, my behavior would have made me shudder. But for different kinds of people one needed different methods of movement. "The Support Group!"
And on went the mental candle. His face even lit up. "You're right! I'm sorry I didn't recognize you earlier. Nice to see you again. Um, did Raistlin..." he lowered his voice. "How did you get here? If you don't mind my asking."
"Not at all. And no, I haven't seen Raistlin in ages. How is he? Did you keep in touch? Such a clever man, Raistlin Majere."
"Yes." He didn't sound too enthused about the topic, and that was all I needed to know. Perfect. Onto the next stage.
"So he dragged you here too, did he?" I was making a wild guess but had an alibi ready should it fail.
"He brought you here? But why...where? Everyone else was all together!" Nervously he cast a glance down the bar; summoning the standoffish proprietor, I bought my new companion a drink. He stared at it nervously, like it was going to rise from his glass and hurl itself onto his face, suffocating him. Which wouldn't be a half-bad method of dealing with Raistlin if it weren't too showy as magic went...having the tea that usually saved him destroy him instead. No, that was pathetic. Childish, even. And I was anything but a child.
"Really? Who did he bring?" I didn't have to feign my interest.
"Ken, Lucemon, and some new people. And Feanor and Maedhros are here too, though Raistlin didn't bring them. But something awful has happened to Maedhros." Face white as chalk, he sipped his drink and put it down hastily, like it had bit him. Not a drinker, eh? Drinking to be polite, eh? So much for that method of information extraction. Onto the next. Drawing my blue jewel out from under my robes, I began to play with it almost absentmindedly, letting his eyes be drawn to it, to the reflections and the luster dazzling him. Distracting him...opening him up...focusing him solely on me...
"Something awful? Are you so sure? Maybe it just seemed that way."
"He tried to kill Feanor, and he just tried to kill me. He's working for...for Kaizer..." His eyebrows contracted: he was getting a headache. Excellent.
"Kaizer? What a strange name. Who is this Kaizer?" I couldn't hide my smile any longer. The boy looked ready to drop yet totally unaware anything was the matter with him. You see, Majere? I have plenty of tricks myself. And for the first act of my revenge drama, I'm stealing your compatriot.
"But you know who Kaizer is. He calls himself King. Maybe that is how you remember him."
Oh, blast it all. Why did he have to go butting in? "Nataku, I'm busy talking to this gentleman," I replied pleasantly to my pale-haired would-be ally. "It's very rude to interrupt. Surely the nice lady from the Dragons of Heaven told you that as well. Why don't you go talk to Rei some more?"
"Rei said Mr. Ikari wanted to see her. What are you doing?" He began to watch the jewel too, but judging by the broken expression on my first victim's face it was futile to try and fix the situation now. "And Kaizer will be mad at us if we get back late. Are we going to leave soon?"
So he couldn't talk with the young lady anymore and now wanted out? Selfish brat. "Just as soon as I'm done here," I told him.
"We're done now."
The finality in the phantom-caller's voice startled me, the coldness in his eyes effused actual chills. "I'm tired of people tricking me. I'm tired of being used. Why can't anyone ever do their own dirty work instead of soiling someone else's hands?" There was a tragic story behind that statement, I was sure, but didn't really care. "You work for Kaizer, don't you?"
"Whatever gave you that--"
"Yes we do. I am called Nataku and he is Roger, but Kaizer calls us Pawn and Bishop. What is your name?"
"Nataku, if you ever want me or anyone else to take you to see Rei again, stop talking," I growled. I was going to throttle him when we got back if no one stopped me. No, I was going to test any revenge ideas I happened upon on him first. No, I was going to--
"It is very nice of you to offer to take me, but I can get here on my own now that I know where it is."
"I thought you liked following orders. Here's one for you. Be. Quiet."
But the damage had been done. The phantom-caller seemed to grow, or maybe the room shrank, and the lights in the already dim room faded even more. "I'm not weak. I'm not someone you can just push around. I'm not...I'm not scared..."
"Your voice is cracking. Am I wrong in thinking that means someone is scared, then?" I hated children. I hated children and grown men who thought like children. I hated children and grown men who thought like children, especially if they went by the alias Pawn for apparently no good reason, as they refused to follow orders.
"Nataku, I think we've made the man angry. Let's go." Grabbing him by the arm, I shoved my way to the door and out into the street. Inside I fumed at having to run from someone I could no doubt defeat, but Kaizer frowned on unauthorized violence...especially when his precious slaves were in the area. I understood and even agreed, but still. This was one more mark against me. One more person who'd have to pay. But once Raistlin was out of the way, his flock would fall easily. The phantom-caller and I would have another chance to test each other.
On a whim I sent Nataku back ahead of me, then retraced my steps and peeked back into the bar. The man was sitting down now, drink still untouched and head bowed. His shoulders heaved like he was crying. I scowled. Pathetic. And I couldn't take him out because of the crowd.
Someone touched my shoulder; despite myself I jumped. It was Rei. "If you're coming back in, do so," she said lightly, emotionlessly. "Otherwise, go home. And where is Nataku?"
"Writing you love poetry," I growled as I turned to walk away, my day now thoroughly ruined. First the cleric, then Nataku, then that man, and now this. I wasn't satisfied with just destroying Raistlin now. This whole world would have to recognize me. Because the way it had treated me thus far was just ludicrous.
And to top it all off, as I shot her one final glare I could have sworn she was blushing.
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a/n: So what's wrong with Lyon? What are Raistlin and his gang up to? I'M NOT TELLING NEXT TIME! HA! But you can drop by my homepage (now my LiveJournal, which is so cooler than the Xanga) to read up on Roger...and stay posted for Nataku next week! Yay! Nataku...and the return of two characters HWB, at least, will be very glad to see. Whistling and vino, next time on "Judecca!"