Chapter Fourteen
Lucifaad, Lucifaad Territory
Cyrus eyed the pink-haired woman with suspicion, a gaze she met with equal intensity. He wasn't sure what to make of her at first.
Vi's personnel file was a comedy of errors that Cyrus knew were deliberately sabotaged, but the reasons for this sabotage remained undetermined. Information regarding her height, origin, and containment rating was well-detailed, but almost everything else about Vi was covered in black ink.
This lack of information alarmed Cyrus, and the possibility that Ahri was walking into a trap became more likely the further he delved into the personnel file. He was close to pulling the plug on the rescue attempt when Ahri confirmed that Vi was confined to the isolation cubes.
That further perplexed Cyrus to the point where he questioned Viktor's competence once again. Vi was classified as the last survivor of Vander's faction, and keeping her alive was…futile.
Still, barring several incidents with the local Inquisitors sent to rough her up, Vi remained utterly unspoiled. She should have been broken into six pieces by then, but there was no attempt to damage her.
From Cyrus's perspective, Viktor had seemingly tossed Vi into a bottomless pit to be either forgotten or looked upon as a prized animal. Either option proved to be a gross miscalculation that went in his favor.
Information was a far more valuable commodity than taking a piece off the board, so Viktor's decision-making regarding Vi was negligent.
Ahri dragged the Inquisitor to the surface, citing a need for him and Vi to work out their issues privately. Caitlyn predictably protested leaving him with the prisoner, but Ahri convinced her to return to the surface with her silver tongue.
Caitlyn would get her moment in private with Cyrus. He hadn't forgotten the loose end she represented as a Lucifuge clan member.
But first, the prisoner.
"Are you Vander's daughter?" Vi strained against the arm restricting her movements, her fingers digging into the fabric of his sleeve in a vain attempt to draw blood.
"Who's asking?" The Brawler growled, wincing when he instinctively slammed her back against the wall.
"I am." Cyrus dug his forearm a little deeper into her throat, eliciting a harsh expletive from Vi.
"How about you give me your name first, sunshine." It amazed Cyrus that she could remain defiant despite her violently constricted airways. "Then ill think about answering it truthfully."
The girl was stubborn, a trait he had innumerable experiences dealing with because of Ghislaine's vexing nature.
"Cyrus." He answered.
"You a noble?"
"To a certain degree, yes." Vi remained unimpressed with his veiled answer but let it go in favor of an inquiry gnawing at her gut.
"What do you want with Vander?"
"It's hard to receive assistance from a dead man."
"Watch it, Sunshine." A violent growl graced Cyrus's ears. "That's my dad you're talking about."
"I'm merely pointing out a simple fact, but I'm not here to talk about him."
"Then what the fuck do you want from me?" Vi snapped back, her arms battling against his iron grip.
"You're expertise," Cyrus replied, earning a surprised look from the Brawler. "I'm here to end this civil war before it drags on for another millennium, but I need your help."
"How the fuck am I going to help you with that?" Vi's resistance tapered off as she stared into his crimson eyes with a questioning gleam.
"Knowledge." He replied, letting his tight grip on her arms fall away. "From what I've been told, you know the Underhive and the Inquisitorial Spire like the back of your hand, and I need that information."
"Silco." He took note of the venom spilling from Vi's mouth. "Did that one-eyed freak also tell you he was responsible for Vander's death?"
"He told me more than that after I trashed his bar."
His words slowly registered in Vi's mind, and the explosion of fury drove her to snatch Cyrus by the collar of his shirt and drag him face to face. "You trashed Vander's bar!?"
"In my defense, they were under the impression I was just another exiled Noble, and I didn't exactly correct that assumption." Cyrus was looking for trouble, and Silco's goons happily obliged him with a very stress-relieving session despite it being one-sided.
Her eyes brimmed with curiosity even as outrage began to course through her veins. "What happened to Silco?"
"He's dead."
A disbelieving silence was all that greeted Cyrus, and he patiently observed the raw shift of emotion in Vi.
Shock, elation, and sorrow morphed the Brawler's visage until a near melancholy smile fell upon her lips.
"Are you…are you sure he's dead?" Hope filtered into her tone, and it grew exponentially with his reply.
"Silco's dead," Cyrus confirmed. "I killed him myself."
The words had barely left his mouth when Vi seized him by the shoulders and dragged him down to her level. Her right hand trailed up his neck and cupped the back of his head before a pair of soft lips pressed into his. Cyrus didn't want to reciprocate the…intimate gesture, but his arms moved by themselves and settled onto her hips, drawing a delectable sigh of approval from Vi.
All of it was entirely unnecessary by his estimations, but he allowed this… show of endearment nonetheless.
He'd long since learned that Devils were odd creatures.
But devil women are complete anomalies.
Decades later, Vi would confess that she would have blown Cyrus on the spot if he demanded that carnal compensation.
But that wasn't something he would ever ask of anyone he cared about.
His repayment style always involved following him into the howling dark without fear or hesitation.
And Vi wouldn't be the first to do so.
Pulling the pink-haired Devil off of him took considerable strength, but she willingly offered her assistance in whatever trial Cyrus faced.
But not without questions.
Vi regarded him with intense scrutiny that promptly turned into modest interest. She balanced her weight on one leg and propped a hand onto her waist."…This problem with the local government. We talking Inquisitorious or the Nobles?"
"I'm talking about everyone on Bashalum's payroll." Silver eyes widened at his admittance. "I'm going after all of them, from Grayfia Lucifuge down to a Loyalist Legionnaire."
"That sounds like a death wish." Vi let out a bated breath before a chortle of amusement exited her lungs. "Ekko would like you."
His ears perked at the name.
Ekko was a jumble of letters he recognized from Vander's personnel file, but his trail went cold a few years back due to either sabotage or bureaucracy.
Just like everything else in this damned city.
"Who's Ekko?" He feigned as much ignorance as his stomach could handle, gods he hated putting on a show for people.
"One of the few people trying to make things right." And those kind of people were in short supply around here. "You want to start tearing this city a new asshole? He's your man."
Cyrus deliberated whether or not he wanted to open dialogue with Underhive freedom fighters.
He wasn't a fan of rebels, but that defense would be hypocritical considering the side his family took in this civil war.
Fuck it.
What did he have to lose?
"Fine…." The Spartan conceded with mild distaste that went pointedly ignored by Vi.
"Excellent!"
But there was one caveat that Cyrus was unwilling to let go of as Vi made to slide past him. His arm shot forward, slamming into the concrete wall and barring the Brawler from leaving the cell.
She rolled her eyes in amusement, but any levity quickly died under his indomitable gaze.
Unwilling to be cowed so easily, she adopted a confident pose crossing her arms and staring back with a raised eyebrow. "Was there something else you needed?"
"Trust is hard to come by these days."
"Do you want a pinky promise?" Vi's tone was confident and sure sounding. She was under the impression that she held all the cards, but Cyrus sought to…adjust this outlook.
"I prefer a more permanent solution." Infernal energy swirled between Cyrus's crimson orbs, and she instinctively shied away from the demonic arcana, but a hand clasped upon her shoulder kept Vi rooted in place.
The Brawler silently prayed that whatever he had in mind wouldn't leave a mark.
"…Ceàird Sgàil."
Ah, fuck berries.
l==l
Everything burns.
From Vi's skin to her muscles and all the way down to the fucking bone marrow blazed with a searing sting because of Sunshine's bullshit powers.
She despised Nobles because most of them were pricks who could occasionally possess the power to back up their bullshit. Vi dealt with those overbearing assholes almost every day over her life, but Sunshine wasn't the boasting type.
He belonged to the small minority of Nobles that didn't give you a chance to react or think before slamming into you like a sledgehammer from above. If they didn't crush every bone in your body, they'd slide a dagger between your ribs and leave you bleeding out on the floor.
Vi will exact her vengeance on Cyrus as soon as she was capable of walking without wincing at every step.
"Keep up, fat hands!" It took every bit of Vi's soul not to tear Ahri's skull open.
"Fuck you, Ahri!" She snapped back, earning a laugh of amusement from the Vastayan. "You have no fucking clue what the fuck I'm feeling right now."
Cyrus was in for a harsh revelation if he believed Ahri and Vi would get along. The Vastayan made it a point of teasing the Brawler at every opportunity, and Vi often retorted with vicious fervor.
If these arguments annoyed Cyrus, he never let it be known, always keeping a steady pace ahead of the bickering pair no matter how loud they got.
Kind of like right now, since he'd pointedly kept his focus centered upon the Inquisitor that, in Vi's opinion, made a feeble one since she had a bleeding heart.
Noble's are idiots.
"Oh really." Ahri turned in Vi's direction, pulling up the sleeve of her coat and showing off the fresh mark of Kimaris etched into her forearm. "When I got mine, there was a lot less bitching."
"Bull fucking shit." Vi retorted, rubbing at the crook of her neck where a Kimaris brand clashed with her tattoos. "Prim girl like you probably cried, all weepy and shit."
"Guess we'll never know." Ahri rolled down her sleeve and called out to their guide. "How much longer?"
"We'll be out of the Spire district soon," Caitlyn responded, glancing dubiously at the Kimaris Noble, who scrutinized her at every turn. "The Warrens are just up ahead."
The Warrens were a section of boroughs with the unfortunate circumstance of being the only thing separating the Spire Districts and the Underhive. This also inevitably made the Warrens a prime battleground between Inquisitors and locals who'd had enough of the bullshit.
Caitlyn was taking a calculated risk by negotiating this hazardous territory to get everyone out of the Spire Districts before the Inquisitors realized Vi was missing. Once word reached the Warden, suspicion would inevitably fall upon her and Ahri, thus terminating Caitlyn's career as an Inquisitor and turning her into a fugitive with the Vastayan.
As she slid down a mound of trash, Caitlyn let out a dejected huff. She figured that paying Ahri's debt would cost her no more than a night's sleep at worst, but now she was hours away from being hunted by her former colleagues.
Caitlyn didn't want to take up the sword for the Renegade cause, but that ship sailed after Cyrus stepped from Ahri's shadow with Vi in hand.
The Inquisitor pulled on the collar of her jacket as a wave of familiar air impacted her skin. The Underhive had a perpetual frigid climate because of the industrial waste and noxious pollutants dumped into its boroughs.
Caitlyn seemed to be the only one affected by the cold, her hands curling into one another as her breath cascaded into white wisps of air. Ahri and Vi walked with a confident gait, ignoring their changing environment, while Cyrus remained entirely unphased.
The Inquisitor was concerned that Cyrus would drag Vi into the Underhive dressed in her prisoner uniform. That worry was stimied after a group of gangers decided to take a chance on their mix-matched group for some easy loot.
The poor bastards were lucky to be alive, absent a few articles of clothing and several broken jaws.
Other than this admittedly one-sided encounter with the locals, their journey through the Warrens continued with relative ease, and Caitlyn could see the familiar hue of the Underhive in the distance.
"We're almost there," Caitlyn whispered, pressing herself against the far wall as a pair of Inquisitors stalked past their alleyway. "Patrols will be numerous, so keep your heads down and try not to draw any attention."
*BANG!*
Caitlyn should have known better than to tempt fate. A tremendous disturbance erupted in the Borough not far from their location. Cyrus recognized the thumping bangs as boots kicking in doors, and the ease with which he predicted the shrieks of panic echoing in the distance was almost eerie.
"What the hell is going on?" Ahri slid next to Caitlyn, her frame brimming with potent arcana. The Sharpshooter peaked down the street, finding a large gathering of Inquisitors blockading the narrow roadway.
"Shit," Caitlyn ducked back into the alleyway before she could be discovered. "It's a purge."
"Another one?" Ahri came to a knee and pooled infernal magic into her fingertips, forming a tiny sphere of potent energy within the palm of her hand. The spherical object ejected from her grasp into the sky, giving Ahri an overhead view of the brutalizing spectacle below.
A substantial task force of Inquisitors was sealing off several residential structures, and the inhabitants were being evicted from their houses and forced to stand in makeshift firing lines.
Caitlyn had no illusions about what would befall these Devils. To keep the Underhive disorganized and subjugated, the Inquisitorious conducted district purges. The ultimate outcome was a mixed bag of complete success prowess and utter failure.
These purges were just as likely to quell a future insurrection as they did to ignite a full-scale revolution. Caitlyn silently mused that she was traveling with the one Devil in the entirety of Lucifaad with the full intention of lighting the city ablaze.
Alas, it wouldn't do them any good to get involved with this tragedy, not when they were close to reaching the Underhive. Ahri silently agreed with her logic and continued monitoring the Inquisitors from above while Caitlyn scouted a path out of the hot zone.
"I see a blind spot in their perimeter. If we time it right, we can be out of the Warrens in…." Caitlyn's voice tapered off when she found an alleyway devoid of Cyrus and Vi. "…Ahri?"
"Yeah, I see them." A resigned huff fell from the Vastayan's lips as she watched a pair of figures scamper across the rooftops. "We're getting involved."
"For someone who comes off as a cold-hearted bastard. Cyrus is awfully quick to run towards the screaming." Ahri found Caitlyn's summary of her master to be entirely accurate.
However, his oddities made him different from most Nobles, and that alone was enough to keep Ahri's interest.
l==l
Cyrus was being reckless.
It was a foreign inclination that took hold of him at the worst possible times.
Contrary to popular belief, Spartans aren't completely emotionless or heartless. They understand emotions in its most basic form and can cast it aside when duty calls for a sound mind.
In this circumstance, the screams of anguish and cries for mercy tugged at his overall desire to protect those who could not adequately defend themselves. He'd seen the massacres carried out by the Covenant across a dozen different worlds, and each time Cyrus was forced to stay his hand.
And he couldn't bring himself to be a spectator once more.
The people down here may not be human, but after spending half a decade on the frontlines of a genocidal campaign, even Cyrus's dogmatic mindset was overtaken by impulses.
The screams drove Cyrus to scale the adjacent building and perch himself upon a vantage point that overlooked the ongoing atrocity.
The Inquisitors carried out their task with ruthless efficiency, separating family members by gender and keeping the adults in line through a violent mixture of arcane and physical force.
None of them spoke a word, and even as Cyrus casted a net of Ceàird Sgàil into each Inquisitor's shadow, he found them to be as silent as a graveyard.
Just like the Covenant whenever they carried out a massacre.
"How many do you see?" Vi silently inquired, cracking her fingers and loosening her shoulders.
"Twenty-Five Inquisitors in total. Twenty on the street while five more are searching building by building." Cyrus nodded towards a large contingent keeping an eye on the corraled inhabitants. "There gathering all of the civilians en masse to make the deed easier to carry out."
"Fucking animals." Vi saw a few prone civilians staining the pavement with their blood. A few adults sought to buy time for their families to run, but all they did was rush into an early grave. "What's the play?"
Vi was ready to crack some skulls, drawing a significant amount of infernal energy into her hands and knuckles. She was your run-of-the-mill Brawler with a quick temper and even quicker fists.
However, she lacked the subtly Cyrus needed, and a direct assault would get a few of the civilians killed in the crossfire. He required someone with a little more…refinement.
"Ahri." Cyrus activated his anchor, and his voice ghosted over the Vastayans ear.
"Yes, Master?"
"Get up here." Ahri tapped Caitlyn's shoulder and gestured toward the rooftops. The Sharpshooter gave her a withering glare before letting loose an irritated huff and extending her wings.
The Vastayan dug her heels into the ground and propelled herself into the sky high enough to clear the rooftop by several meters. Cyrus formulated the final parts of his strategy just as Ahri and Caitlyn slid next to him.
However, before he divulged this information, he needed to settle a growing concern.
"Wha-!" Cyrus seized Caitlyn by the scruff of her vest and yanked her to his side, prompting a perplexed stare from the Sharpshooter. Panic gripped her heart when he pressed the edge of Christie's dagger into her throat, silencing her cries before they could grace the world.
Vi stood ramrod straight in genuine confusion, unsure of what the hell was going on and why Cyrus chose now to start fucking with their resident Inquisitor.
"Cyrus." Ahri stalked forward with a single hand raised in placation. She would never strike him, even in Caitlyn's defense, but that didn't mean she agreed with this plan. "What's going on in that head of yours?"
Cyrus ignored the Vastayan's placating tone and gestured toward the impending massacre. "Tell me what you see?"
Caitlyn's gaze centered upon an Inquisitor roughly handling a child no more than a few years old. Another was driving his pommel into the throat of an aged Devil, snarling back with unrestrained hatred.
"I'm going to make my position perfectly clear to you, Ms. Lucifuge." His tone was casual, but his eyes brimmed with demonic energy that sent chills down Caitlyn's spine.
Vi seemed to bristle at the mere thought of being in proximity to a Lucifuge, and she was on the verge of telling Cyrus to slice Caitlyn's neck when a calmer head prevailed. If Caitlyn were anything like her bloodhound of a sister, they wouldn't be having this conversation.
Maybe, Vi hit the jackpot and ran into the only pair of Nobles in the entire city that gave a shit about the lower class.
It would be the first time in a long while Vi's luck had finally started to turn in her favor.
"My goal is the radical destabilization of the Loyalist Government via the elimination of your sister, by whatever means I deem necessary…." Cyrus pressed the dagger into Caitlyn's skin when she made to use her tongue. "…How I bring your sister down is entirely up to you. Grayfia can be in chains or a body bag, but no matter what happens in the next few weeks, her downfall is assured…."
An Inquisitorial Officer drove his knee into the gut of a teenage girl protecting her baby brother. A flash of fury welled up at the bottom of Caitlyn's stomach as another brutalizing blow to the skull sent her sprawling to the muddied ground. She nearly joined in on the screams of outrage, but the dagger at her throat tempered her feelings
Everywhere she looked, an atrocity was being carried out by people she served alongside. Cyrus made his position as clear and concise as possible for Caitlyn to understand.
"…Your colleagues have made their choice, so the only question I have left is where your loyalties lie…."
He was drawing a line in the sand.
"…Is it with them? Or us?"
It was time for Caitlyn to determine if she could be trusted to make the right decision after a lifetime of meekly obeying commands she vehemently opposed.
It would be reckless of her to throw in her lot with a Noble she hadn't met until a few hours ago.
It was entirely naïve to believe Cyrus could defy a millennias worth of systematic corruption and illogical tradition.
But then again, Caitlyn was consistently berated by her fellow Inquisitors for being reckless and incredibly naïve.
She wouldn't want to disappoint them.
l==l
Killing is one of the easiest things a man can do.
It is an art that has evolved in both brutality and carnage with the passage of time. Since the dawn of human civilization, wars have been defined by their casualties and their victims.
The motives and methods are often choked away by tales of honor and glory to exemplify the carnage, but the end is always the same.
Death. On a scale that can reach biblical proportions.
Humanity has revolutionized the manner by which they slaughter one another, from the concentration camps of World War II to the smoldering megacities of the Hydra System Massacres.
It doesn't take much to commit these heinous acts. Sometimes all it requires is an unfortunate set of circumstances for an ambitious individual to take advantage of, while others were deliberately done to ignite the fury of an entire nation.
And as Cyrus observed two Inquisitors victimize a cluster of children cowering against a decaying fence with jovial bouts of amused laughter, he was reminded once more of how comparable their species were.
Brutality was nothing special to the Spartan.
His very nature compelled him to confront the wicked and the damned in all forms, and in some cases, they flocked to Cyrus like moths to a flame, and he welcomed their ruthless ambition with open arms so that he could extinguish them without hesitation.
He was well-versed in the warning signs of oncoming massacres, and he can still vividly recall stumbling upon his first all too well.
It would forever be one of the few times Cyrus truly felt helpless.
l==l
"Oxide, this is Reaper Six…." Cyrus flinched as a scream of hysterical terror was ruthlessly silenced by the bark of an M7 Submachine gun. "…We once again request an immediate change to the ROE."
Reaper team was dispatched to search for a lost Havoc Nuke acquired by an Insurrectionist cell determined to obtain Acadia's freedom by holding the entire planet hostage.
The UNSC Dusk inserted the Headhunters a few klicks south of a small town on the outskirts of Acadia's capital city.
Initial briefing indicated that an ONI contact residing in the settlement had actionable intel on the Havoc Nuke's location, but before Cyrus and his team could acquire him, the Insurrectionists were already cleaning house.
Reaper team was an hour late and more than a dollar short of preventing the massacre. The Insurrectionists didn't care about collateral and couldn't afford even the slightest chance of risking the Nuke's location, so they decided to torch the town and all two hundred of its inhabitants.
The men.
The women.
And the children.
Massacred without question or mercy.
"They're slaughtering them," Eliza whispered with bitter contempt as a pair of school children were cut down by an M247 HMG. She snarled under her breath and broke radio protocol. "What are we doing here, Oxide? Give us the green light to engage."
"Negative, Sierra." Their handler calmly answered. "This is a retrieval op, not a rescue mission. Maintain your distance and do not engage."
It baffled Cyrus at how easily they could end this slaughter before it reached its crescendo. Reaper team had already infiltrated the town and were posted upon separate rooftops that dominated the entire AO, but Oxide refused to greenlight their intervention.
"This is nonsense," Eliza spoke into their private comms channel, where Oxide couldn't monitor her rebellious thoughts. "They're rounding up the rest of the kids. We should get in there before-"
"Negative." Casey cut off Eliza with a tone as cold as ice, throwing her completely off balance. "We have our orders, and you will obey Oxide's directive."
An exhale of irritation flowed from Eliza's lips, and she sought assistance from their silent brother. "…Cyrus?"
It was a muted yearning for his support, but Cyrus couldn't bring himself to fall into Eliza's line of thinking. The Insurrectionists had no idea a Spartan Team was on planet, and they couldn't risk tipping off the bombers of their presence.
The terrorists wouldn't hesitate to detonate the Havoc Nuke if they knew Spartans were on the prowl.
Another bark of gunfire, another life snuffed out.
"Casey's right." His acceptance shattered Eliza's resolve before it could properly take root. "Subtlely is our ally tonight, and our job is to save ten million lives, not…Not two hundred."
Eliza was forced to watch the massacre come to a brutalizing conclusion, with her siblings unable or unwilling to intercede. The bodies were stacked onto a pile and set alight before the Insurrectionists scattered into the surrounding forest.
Ultimately, the sacrifice of two hundred souls saved ten million lives.
Reaper Team did not sleep soundly that night.
l==l
The memory continues to haunt Cyrus to this day, and it served as a stark reminder that even in the face of total annihilation, Humanity found ways to inflict terrible anguish upon itself.
Humanity.
Devils.
Two sides to the same coin when it comes to violence.
Could Cyrus really fool himself into thinking they were all so different?
Maybe.
But then his team would have had him hung by his entrails.
No one likes a fool.
No one.
"Cyrus?" A lithe hand grasped his shoulder, and a pair of amber orbs stared intently at the Inquisitors below. "Caitlyn and Vi are in position. Are you ready?"
"Yes." A low growl rumbled from Cyrus's throat as the pair of Inquisitors threw the children onto the street.
They exchanged a hearty laugh at the children's misery and searched through the decrepit alleyway for more strays to abuse.
The purge was reaching its final stages, and the lead interrogator would soon conclude his thorough investigation of the boroughs' treachery.
It didn't matter to the Inquisitors whether or not these poor souls lined up in the street were guilty. They were simply meeting a quota set by their superiors.
Cyrus fell upon the isolated pair of Inquisitors, sliding Christie's dagger underneath one's helm and carving out his throat.
A subtle glance towards the second Inquisitor revealed a wisp of arcana crushing the woman's throat. Ahri curled her fingers into a fist, and a resounding snap extinguished the Inquisitor's wretched life.
Cyrus pulled on his victim's collar, his eyes glossing over the markings erected into the man's chest plate.
He'd hoped to seize an officer from their ranks, but all he obtained were the decaying corpses of two acolytes.
Cannon fodder.
Cyrus dropped the carcass from his hands and ordered his Dubhra Garrach to dispose of the evidence. He disregarded the rendering of metal and flesh being torn asunder to continue his search for a senior officer.
"Hustle up!" An Inquisitor shouted over the wailing of children and the hushed whispers of mothers trying to keep them calm. "I want to be back at The Pit within the hour! Raze these buildings and commence clean-up procedures!"
Several Inquisitors snapped to attention and fanned out towards the residences that once harbored the interned civilians. Their strategy was simple: torch the buildings and slaughter the 'suspected' traitors to remind the local citizenry the price of rebellion.
Cyrus refused to be a bystander once again.
"Found our Hierophant." Ahri drawled out with amusement. "He's closer to Vi and Caitlyn. Should we tell them to engage?"
"I don't think we need to." As he barked out his directives, a shadow fell from the sky and barreled into the Hierophant.
"What the he-!" An arm wrapped around his jaw, wrenching it to one side and converting the ranking Inquisitor into a grotesque humanoid statue. His helmeted skull was twisted backward, and Cyrus could only imagine the Hierophant's terrified expression forever frozen in death.
Vi kicked the Inquisitor's corpse forward, relishing in the stunned silence that followed the resounding thud of meat metal meeting pavement.
"Welcome to hell, fuckers!" Vi bellowed, her voice echoing up and down the winding street. "Surrender and die!"
Caitlyn looked on from above while her partner slammed into a stunned Acolyte. She examined the dazed Inquisitors with a Griycium lance, scanning for a Senior Acolyte to violently remove from the field.
A Griycium lance held firmly in her grasp as she scanned the stunned Inquisitors for a Senior Acolyte to violently remove from the field. When she found her target, a red beam ejected from the end of her lance and slammed into the Inquisitor's helm, frying his visor and blasting a fist-sized hole through his forehead.
All hell broke loose.
l==l
Vi could see the hesitation in their stances. Inquisitors are like a pack of hyenas, eager to swarm the helpless and scavenge what remains without passion or mercy. Their strength lies in numbers, yet they are a cowardly bunch that are easy to break and easy to kill.
There was no greater source of evidence of their craven nature than in the following moments after their Hierophant hit the dirt. They stood in stunned silence, and their flickering gazes assured Vi that his group was unaccustomed to facing such defiance, so she took advantage of their hesitation to give them all a once-over.
The Inquisitors were spread thinly along the roadway. A trio of Acolytes was keeping the civilians hemmed together while the rest were in the midst of clearing out the remaining structures. In short, these poor bastards were in the worst position to engage a quartet of infiltrators who were all trained killers.
Pumping arcana into her legs, Vi into a streak of pure sapphire that tore through the air like a runaway comet. A chorus of debris was kicked up in her wake as she slammed the crown of her right fist into an Inquisitor's helm.
A pair of Acolytes out of the dozen-plus in the street managed to get a few bursts of ionized plasma, but they failed to even glance Vi's sturdy frame.
"KILL THE BITCH!" A Senior Acolyte bellowed for all to hear, but his command drew Caitlyn's undivided attention, and he was rewarded with a red beam slamming into his collarbone. The plasma sunk deep into his armor, rendering flesh and metal in a nauseous mixture of anguish that sent the Acolyte sprawling into the floor in pain.
A secondary beam put the Inquisitor out of his misery, but it also alerted the remaining Acolytes to the rooftop shooter picking off their squad leaders.
"Take them down! Take them down!" The frantic calls for engagement were answered by a shower of red beams slamming into Caitlyn's cover and forcing her into safety.
Vi's momentum kicked a notch as she feigned to the left, avoiding a powerful overhead swipe from an Acolyte's spear. She rewarded the aggressive play by pooling arcana into her arms, seizing the spear, and using its sturdy frame to launch herself knee-first into the Inquisitor's jaw.
"ARGH!" A muffled shriek of pain graced the Brawler's ears, and she capped off her brutalizing strike by driving the sole of her foot through the Devil's visor. The crunch of metal and bone filled the remaining Inquisitors with pure terror they did not know how to handle.
With the Hierophant dead along with several Senior Acolytes, the remaining grunts felt their flight or fight instincts kick in. Most stood their ground, while a select few embraced their craven nature and ran for their lives.
"You're just going to die tired, assholes!" Vi's bellowing words echoed a cluster of black creatures nipping at the retreating Inquisitor's heels. She surged forward, paying no mind to the Dubhra Garrach feasting upon the cowards as she clashed with a pair of Acolytes blocking her path toward the civilians.
Arcana bristled within her extremities, giving her the speed and power to quickly engage the heavily armed Inquisitors. A blinding streak of purple sparred with Griycium lances as the Acolytes fought to keep Vi off balance.
An overextended sweep left an Inquisitor vulnerable to a kidney shot, and Vi ruthlessly took advantage of this opening by jabbing her right hand through his armor and cutting flesh. The Brawler's hand smashed through the Acolyte's ribs, and she upped the ante further by grasping the man's spine and shattering it in two.
"EXRAS!" The Inquisitor's partner cried out in alarm as Vi extracted her arm from his innards, and specks of his spine clung to her bloodied limb. Her brutal execution of the Acolyte left Vi exposed to a swinging swipe from the dead man's partner, and she was sent careening into an adjacent structure.
The decaying bricks gave way to the humanoid missile, and brick fell upon Vi as she battled to regain her senses. The Inquisitors managed to coordinate themselves into several fire teams that either advanced upon Vi or continued to lay down a base of fire upon Caitlyn.
They did not expect a tertiary contact to fall upon their rearguard, nor did they expect it to be a dreaded Vastayan.
"Behind us!" The Acolyte that gave out this warning was the first to die at Ahri's hands. A pink orb escaped her lips and impacted the Inquisitor before he could entirely turn to engage the Vastayan.
Ahri watched her magic play with the man's senses, and it took mere seconds to turn this Acolyte into her personal plaything. The Inquisitor's entire body suddenly seized up before he turned towards his closest companion and treacherously drove his lance directly through her abdomen.
"Trel'gar, what the fuck!" Several Acolytes screamed out in confusion at their companion's sudden bought of treachery, but Ahri wasted no time carving through their ranks.
A flurry of ki daggers flew from her hands, cutting through the subtle weak points in their carapace armor and slaughtering a trio of Acolytes with a spectral blade through the visor.
"KILL HER NOW!" A pair of Inquisitors previously occupied with keeping Caitlyn pinned turned their sights upon the Vastayan as she pounced upon a fellow Acolyte and ripped into his exposed throat. The charmed Inquisitor stepped in front of Ahri, sacrificing his body as a pair of ionized plasma tore through his armor and punctured through flesh.
The Vastayan paid her sacrificial pawn no mind, stepping over his smoldering corpse and seamlessly flowing between the Acolytes with practiced ease.
"Taking casualties!" Inquisitors attempted to implement a cordon to isolate the trio of lethal women, but they were repeatedly hindered by shadowy creatures slicing into their rearguard.
Vi burst from her temporary shelter like a humanoid missile, slamming into an Acolyte before he could fire off a beam into Ahri's spine. She smashed the Inquisitor against the far wall, earning a retaliatory elbow driven in the small of her back.
"Motherfuck-!" Her muscles begged for a reprieve, but she refused to give in to this psychotic bastard. Vi pumped arcana into her legs, lifting the Inquisitor clean off his feet and driving him to the ground.
Vi delivered three powerful blows into his helm before the Acolyte slammed his feet into her back and drove her back several paces. It had been a long time since Vi had thrown down with Inquisitors and even longer since she tasted her blood.
Adrenaline was a helluva anesthetic, and she'd rather be damned to eternity if she didn't scratch out a few more Inquisitors.
"Come on, fuckers!" Vi beckoned her quarry forward, drawing another Acolyte away from the mass of Acolyte's throwing down with Cyrus's little minions. They growled back in barely concealed rage, striding forward with their lances braced for a coordinate strike, but she acted first.
Vi snapped out her right heel and landed a brutalizing kick to the jaw before he could embed his spear into her left collarbone. His companion tried to cleave off her right leg, but a Dubhra Garrach cut at his Achilles, leaving him vulnerable to an arcane-filled jab to the helm.
The Brawler's fist pierced bone and armor, bursting a large hole in the Inquisitor's head and splattering blood and brain matter from knuckle to forearm. A sickening crunch was lost in the mass of dying Acolytes, and Vi quickly glanced at her surroundings to search for her next victim.
In this moment of bloodlust, an Acolyte sprang from Vi's blindspot and swept her knees out from under her, nearly piercing her throat with the tip of his lance.
"Shit!" Vi barely stopped the lance from grazing her skin, but the Acolyte repeatedly slammed the heel of his boot into her ribs to force a bloody abdication.
Blood and oxygen spilled from Vi's lips as she struggled against the irate Inquisitor. Rage and desperation drove the muscles in her arms to new heights, but it was only enough to keep the jaws of death at bay.
"FUCKING DIE!" The Acolyte poured the last of his infernal energy into his lance, and the heated plasma began to build mere inches from Vi's face before Caitlyn intervened.
A sliver of ionized plasma struck the Inquisitor from above, ripping through the side of his helm and spraying blood into the air. The Inquisitor fell on his side, his helm split and sundered into a barely recognizable heap of burnt metal.
Vi grasped her ribs, each breath producing pins and needles of anguish in her lungs until her body adjusted to the momentary discomfort. A tertiary assessment of her surroundings found a cluster of Dubhra Garrach was holding the other Acolytes at bay, buying her enough time to catch her breath.
That was closer than Vi was used to experiencing, and it was clear that she was rustier than first anticipated. The wardens of her former residence weren't exactly the most capable fighters, and spending the last few weeks throwing down with those morons hadn't done her any favors.
Vi's heartbeat settled with a long exhale, and she scanned for her savior on the rooftops above. Cyrus was the first to catch her eye: he hadn't moved from his perch overlooking the brutal skirmish, seemingly content to let Vi and Ahri lead the direct assault while he coordinated his Dubhra Garrach from above.
The Noble shook his head at Vi's silent inquiry and nodded towards Caiyln, preoccupied with gunning down her former comrades. Inquisitors are a loyal bunch, and to see one disavow the Inquisitorious so quickly was a rare thing, but Caitlyn seemed to be the exception to the rule.
"Maybe she isn't so bad after all," Vi murmured as she eyed a trio of Acolytes to add to her limited kill count.
It was time to correct that mistake.
Vi charged into the fray, bursting past a pair of Dubhra Garrachs and crashing into an unsuspecting Acolyte. Her sudden emergence managed to tip the skirmish into a full-on free-for-all. A circumstance that didn't assist the Inquisitors as they fought to regain the momentum.
Ahri kept the Acolytes on their toes, killing their team leaders and leaving their squads momentarily disorganized. When the Inquisitors sought retribution for their comrades demise, Vi would storm into their ranks and bludgeon several of their numbers before they could retaliate. Caitlyn kept their perimeter clean, gunning down several Acolytes who discerned the slightest gap in Ahri and Vi's exposed flanks.
Through it all, Cyrus watched from above, swarming the Inquisitors in packs of Dubhra Garrach and dispersing any coordinated effort by the Inquisitors to take to the skies. His Spartan instincts demanded he joins the fracas below, but Cyrus was not inclined to fight alongside any of the women that had entered his company.
He tentatively trusted Vi, and the 'former' Inquisitor was sitting on a knife's edge, but that didn't mean he could not extend an olive branch. Ahri was physically and mentally loyal to him, but Vi and Caitlyn remained allies, one bound through debt and the other by circumstance.
Caitlyn cast aside her Inquisitorious ties by killing whole squads of her erstwhile colleagues, but that did not mean she was willing to forsake her family.
Blood is thicker than water.
Until her loyalties could be verified, Cyrus was keen to keep Caitlyn at arms length. Ahri could meander all she wanted, but she was bound to his will at the end of the day.
THESE BENIGN CREATURES ARE BENEATH US.
Cyrus wished he could say the same of the malevolent entity plaguing his sanity.
"There is no 'us.'" The Spartan sharply retorted, earning a dismissive growl from the spherical shadow hovering off his right shoulder.
Cyrus had hoped that this phenomenon was simply an intelligent Dubhra Garrach who had taken a liking to the Spartan, but the smothering influence pouring from its tendrils of darkness shattered that notion.
WE ARE CONNECTED RECLAIMER. YOU CAN NOT DENY MY EXISTENCE.
"I don't need to deny anything," Cyrus replied. "I don't know what you are or where you came from, but I know that your advice is unwanted and unneeded."
He turned away from the entity, uncaring for the licks of darkness grazing against his skin. Cyrus didn't care for its presence or constant badgering, which provided nothing but a continued desire to examine his own head for signs of mental instability.
MY PRESENCE IS NECESSARY. THE MALEBRANCHE MUST NOT BE ALLOWED TO RETURN.
"The what?" Cyrus peered out the corner of his eye, but the spherical shadow was no longer present, and a sweeping glance at the decrepit rooftop only revealed empty space. "Spend the last few weeks prodding my mind with riddles, and now you want to hold your tongue."
He banished all thoughts towards the malevolent spirit and returned his attention to the receding conflict below. Most of the Acolytes now lay dead or dying, and Vi applied the finishing touches to the surviving Inquisitors.
Ahri took up the position of medicae, applying a thin layer of invigorating arcana to the more critically wounded civilians.
Cyrus seized control of the situation almost effortlessly, a consequence of leading over 3,000 Legionnaires for well over a year.
"Caitlyn!" The Sharpshooter piqued over the rooftop edge at his beckoning. "Secure the perimeter and make sure there aren't any reinforcements headed our way."
The Lucifuge executed his command without hesitation, scampering to a higher rooftop and scanning the empty streets for any lingering Inquisitors. Cyrus didn't wait to verify whether Caitlyn followed his directive, for he was already turning towards their resident Brawler.
"Vi, police these bodies." He gestured towards the innumerable corpses staining the ground with their blood. "If any of them are still breathing, then fix it. The fewer eyewitnesses, the better."
Vi flashed him a toothy grin before digging her foot into an Acolyte's torso and tossing him over. The Inquisitor had long since passed from the jagged slash across his exposed throat courtesy of the Vastayan.
Cyrus's attention inevitably fell upon Ahri and a woman who had stepped forward to assist the Vastayan in caring for the wounded. A glance at the civilians showed an anxious mob gathered around several corpses lacking the Inquisitorial armor.
They were unable to save all of them.
"How many?" Cyrus inquired to Ahri as she poured a concentrated blast of rejuvenating magic into her wounded patient. More than a dozen civilians were lined up along the road in a makeshift CCP, and several were suffering from a multitude of injuries ranging from concussions to deep lacerations.
"Fifteen injured, four of them critically, and two dead…." A wail of sorrow down the line caused Ahri's expression to tighten. "…Make that three dead."
"Triage the wounded and save who you can. We need to leave before someone comes looking for these Inquisitors." A few dead Acolytes wouldn't illicit a significant search, but the sudden disappearance of a Hierophant alongside his entire section was an entirely different matter.
Cyrus could only assume their time was limited, and staying here longer than needed would get everyone killed.
"Give me five minutes," Ahri requested, her amber orbs betraying her calm demeanor. His martial mindset demanded an immediate extraction, but his heart wanted to buy the civilians as much time as possible.
Ultimately, Cyrus made a compromising decision that placated his heart and mind.
"You have three. Make them count." There was no debating this command, and Ahri knew not to take the small victories for granted.
Cyrus wasn't used to compromising, and the sheer fact that he was willing to delay an immediate exit of the alleyway was an anomaly.
There was little conversation between him or any of his companions. The hushed whispers exchanged between the civilians and the sporadic wailing of a still-living Inquisitor being brutally put down by Vi kept everyone on their toes.
Cyrus searched through the Hierophant's armor, obtaining parchments sealed by the Inquisitorious mark and several correspondences between the dead Inquisitor and his commanding Seeker. He wasn't surprised to discover that the nature of this purge contained an underlying motive.
Seeker Gorgrith was the commanding officer of the Warren District, and he reported directly to the Lord Inquisitor himself.
The oldest correspondence was a direct missive from Lord Inquisitor Barracus, ordering an immediate purge of the 22nd Borough to capture a local Firelight speaking out against the Loyalist cause. Their location was detailed in a memo from one of several informants in the Spire District, and her capture was a primary objective.
Gorgith retasked the local Hierophant to search for the dissident with orders to use force as necessary.
The decaying corpse at Cyrus's feet deemed an entire purge of the Borough a more reasonable use of force, and he would have succeeded had Cyrus and his companions not intervened.
The Spartan searched through the Hierophants belt and found personal items belonging to his wife and child. It wasn't the first time Cyrus encountered a family man orchestrating a massacre of children, but he didn't care about that minute detail.
Cyrus's priorities were beginning to converge, but first he needed to get these civilians into the Underhive.
Their days living in the Warrens were over after tonight.
The Spartan was second from stepping away from the Hierophant's corpse when he noticed a loose parchment lodged in the Devil's armor. He pulled at the piece of armor encompassing the paper and dragged it from its makeshift sheath.
Cyrus unraveled its contents and found a faded picture of the Firelight agent. The depiction was tainted by the Hierophant's blood, but a name could still be deciphered just below its bottom edge.
Eclipse
It was more than likely a moniker to throw off any Inquisitors that might recognize it, but the agent's sketch was enough to at least compromise their mission. Cyrus glanced over the nearby mass of civilians, but there was no way to discern who was the Firelight agent among them.
Cyrus slipped away from the butchered Hierophant just in time to hear a sudden clapping of boots from the rooftops above.
Ahri's three minutes were up.
Caitlyn jumped off the roof, extending her wings to glide towards a patiently waiting Cyrus.
"How many?" The reluctant sigh from her lips didn't fill him with confidence.
"Too many," Caitlyn didn't need to supply Cyrus with an exact number to the oncoming Inquisitors, and he didn't hesitate to start barking orders.
"All of you pay attention." The Spartan's natural voice was enough to draw the attention of everyone in the blood-soaked streets. "I need a headcount."
The Devil assisting Ahri at the makeshift CCP spoke up for her people.
"There are eighty-five of us." She answered while gently laying one of her patients back down.
A few civilians possessed war lance taken from the dead Inquisitors, but Cyrus doubted they knew how to handle them. At least sixteen of them were children of adolescent age, many sporting fresh tear marks courtesy of their current ordeal.
Cyrus internally grimaced. Trying to sneak nearly a hundred people into the Underhive would be damn near impossible. Their odds of making it through without casualties were low unless someone stayed behind to harass the Inquisitors.
Vi was out of the running because she knew how to get to the Underhive, and Ahri was needed to keep the critically wounded alive. Caitlyn couldn't hold back a horde of Inquisitors by herself, leaving only one realistic option.
Himself.
Nothing was ever easy.
"Vi." The Brawler perked at her name. "You're the spearhead and know this town better than anyone. Scout ahead and make sure our path is clear…."
"On it." The Brawler shot down the street, and Cyrus returned his attention to the civilians.
"…Caitlyn, you're on rear security. Keep the Inquisitors off your tail…." The Sharpshooter nodded in acceptance, and Cyrus turned towards the final piece of the puzzle.
"…Ahri, stay with the civilians." The Vastayan went to protest his directive, but he cut her off before she could plead her case. "I need you to keep the wounded alive. You're the only one capable of seeing them through the night."
Ahri swallowed down the bitter taste crawling up her throat. She knew where his line of thought was heading, which went against everything a Vastayan stood for, but Cyrus was as stubborn as they came.
She reluctantly obeyed his demand and began ushering the civilians down the street toward Vi's lingering form. Caitlyn brought up the rear, and once the final ragged Devil passed her, she realized that Cyrus was not among them.
She spared the Kimaris a curious glance as he made no move to join their convoy and called out to his rooted form.
"What are you doing?"
Cyrus didn't bless her with words at first, for a mass of raw demonic energy began intermingling with the surrounding shadows. Eldritch monsters in the shape of the dreaded Chimera native to the Shadowlands emerged from the darkness, and he made his intentions clear without a glance in her direction.
His parting words sum up every Spartan, from his cousins in Project Orion to his siblings in Beta Company.
For Spartans were truly meant for one thing alone…
"Evening the odds."