“Look, Deus doesn’t care about you! I’m right here with you guys! I care! I’ll give you power! Good weather! The authority to make your own empire! Whatever you want! Just stay with me!” Horan was visibly sweating as he pleaded with the Prophet, who ignored the Primus as he continued preaching to his people. Horan continued, however, to not budge against his restraints.
Horan’s stream of offerings was shut up by one of the guards whacking him on the back of the head with the butt of his spear. “Alright, I’m getting actually annoyed with you now. So shut up before I do that again, harder.”
Keeping his head down, Horan glared at the guard. “You’re going to regret that once I bring these people back to my side.”
The other guard scoffed. “Like you have a chance of making it out of this alive. Now be quiet and let us transcend existence, why don’t you?”
Horan growled softly and looked up at a building about fifty feet away. The sniper in the window on the top floor looked nervously to the side, looked back at Horan, then moved out of sight. Alright, that was one less thing to worry about if this all went wrong. And since it sounded like the Prophet was wrapping up his sermon, it looked like that would be the case quite soon.
-
Mark rounded the corner and branded his glass shard at the air. Still nothing. From his view outside the building, he was pretty sure he was coming close to the top floor.
As he moved to the next flight of stairs, Mehmet emerged from behind the opposite corner and swung at Mark with the butt of his rifle. Mark stumbled back and threw the glass shard at Mehmet’s face in surprise. “You!”
Mehmet sidestepped the glass and lowered his rifle into a defensive position. “That’s right, me. You really should have realized that explaining your whole plan to a complete stranger was a bad idea. Now why don’t you just die and let us finish the ritual?”
Mark backed up against the wall. “Over my dead body.”
“Yes, I established that that was the plan. That is what you dying results in.”
Mehmet lowered his head and charged Mark, shoving him against the wall. Mark squirmed out of his grip and fell to the floor, pulling his pistol out of his back pocket. Before he could raise it at Mehmet, his opponent dove onto him and pinned him to the floor, gun pointed off to the side.
“Got you now. Best part is, I can just keep you like this and wait for the ritual to be completed!” He looked over at the nearby window, listening to the Prophet speaking down below. He looked back at Mark. “That Primus of yours is our ticket out of here, and you aren’t taking him anywhere. So what’s your plan now, huh?”
Mark spat in his mouth.
As Mehmet recoiled in surprise, Mark shoved him off, rolled to his feet and aimed his pistol at Mehmet’s chest. “I see you move, you die.”
Mehmet staggered to his feet, bumping up against the window curtains. “No fair! Spitting’s against the rules!”
“What rules? Love and war, and all that.”
Mehmet growled. “This could have been so simple, too. All you had to do was surrender and let us kill Horan in peace, and we’d all be on our way, and you’d be free to do whatever. There was no need to kill Narin, you could have just-“
Mark cut him off. “You know, mentioning an urgent deadline while being held at gunpoint isn’t a good idea. Sorry, but no stalling for you today.”
“Wait, wai-!”
-
“Bring out the sacrificial dagger!”
The Prophet concluded his sermon as an attendant brought him an ornate knife. Taking the blade, he began walking towards a desperate Horan.
“Hey, c’mon now! You don’t really think this’ll work, do you? Deus doesn’t care about any of us anymore, he’s gone! This is-“
Horan was drowned out by the sound of shattering glass. The crowd turned to look as a figure fell out of a window, fell several dozen feet and landed limply on the pavement. A moment later, Mark jumped out of the window clutching a curtain and holding it over his head like a parachute. “HORAN!”
“Oh, right, that’s me.” Horan created an updraft under Mark, causing the curtain to balloon upwards and slow Mark’s descent. The crowd watched in stupefied silence as Mark clumsily glided towards the gathering. About seven feet off the ground, Mark slipped and crashed onto the table in front of Horan, sending various foodstuffs flying.
Mark looked up at Horan. “Hey, FYI, these guys want to sacrifice you.”
Horan looked behind Mark at the High Prophet, still holding the knife as he gaped at the two vacantly. “Yeah, I noticed.”
After a second, the High Prophet broke out of his stupor. “Get them!”
The two guards behind Horan raised their spears at Mark, who crawled backwards on the table. He looked around at the several other guards closing in. “Horan, now’s a pretty good time for you to do something useful.”
As the guards walked past him, Horan looked around at the crowd backing away in fear and confusion. “Yeah, but this is an opportunity you don’t just throw away! Maybe if I-“
Mark pulled out his pistol as the blade of a spear cleaved the section of table where his foot had been a moment before. “HORAN!”
“Ugh, fine.” Horan blasted himself into the air, chair and all. The people nearby were floored by the sudden surge of wind emanating from Horan and table dressing went everywhere. Mid-air, Horan shifted into a falcon and slipped through his bondage. Once he was free, he shifted back into his true form and hurled the chair back towards the ground. The chair landed on and crushed another guard, and Horan began flying away.
Mark leapt off the table, shot a guard mid-air and started running. “Don’t you even think about leaving me behind, Horan!”
Horan reluctantly doubled back and flew down next to Mark. “I wasn’t! I was… surveying the battlefield.”
“Shut up and fly!” Mark grabbed Horan’s arm as the two were lifted into the air.
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As they flew out of reach of the guards’ spears, Horan looked back at Mark dangling from his arm. He was gripping his biceps impressively tightly as he clung to his ride. “So what’s the plan?”
Mark gritted his teeth and tried not to look down. “Get back to the car, I left it outside from when- GET DOWN!”
Mark yanked Horan down towards a building and the two tumbled out of the sky onto the roof. A second later, a low whizzing noise passed by the two of them and continued off into the distance. Mark scrambled behind a rusty air conditioning vent and hurriedly gestured for Horan to follow. Mark peeked out from behind the vent and looked for where the shot had come from. “Right. Multiple snipers, not just the one. Almost forgot.”
“Oh, gee, glad you only almost forgot that detail which is very relevant to our situation! What’s the plan now, genius?”
Mark took a deep breath. “Well, the snipers mean we can’t escape through the air. We maybe have… two minutes until the ground forces get up here. I don’t have any spare clips in my gun, so you’ll have to do the-“
“Or, we could talk this out like civilized individuals! They worship me, they’ll listen to me!”
Mark facepalmed. “They don’t worship you, moron! You were just their key to get out of here! Didn’t you figure that out? What was the Prophet guy even monologuing about, if not that?”
“I don’t know, I was trying to get out of the situation! Like a smart person!”
“If you’re so smart, then stop deluding yourself and help me think!” Mark rubbed his forehead. “We only have one minute now, so…”
As Mark thought silently, Horan sighed and stood up. “Fine, we’ll do it the hard way. They gave me all this power, I might as well use it.”
Mark barely had time to look at Horan as he dove off the side of the building and flew through an open window. Mark cursed and hoped Horan actually had a plan. Yeah, Mark was so doomed.
-
As most of the city’s force surrounded the building, a small team entered through the front door and began climbing up the building, looking for Horan. As the ten-odd people began climbing the fifth floor’s stairwell, Horan dove down from above and blocked their path. The soldiers stepped back, raising their spears.
“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen! Looking for me?”
The soldier the Prophet had designated as the temporary squad leader spoke up. “Horan! Come with us and make this easier for all of us!”
Horan chuckled patronizingly. “But where’s the fun in that? If I just come with you, I lose the chance to do this!”
Horan threw his arms out and released a titanic blast of air. The soldiers were hurled backwards through the staircase wall, every window in the building was blown out and the people outdoors were forcefully pushed away from the building.
The High Prophet stood in the back of the encircling formation, overseeing the recapture of the runaway Primus. He shielded himself from the rain of glass shards, and dove out of the way as the squad leader landed where he had been standing. Growling, he ordered the rest of his forces to move in.
Mark huddled behind the vent, worrying his head off, when a sudden wave of dust and grime was violently ejected from the vent. That was probably Horan, then. Mark tentatively climbed down the side of the building and ducked through a window into the building.
-
Horan collapsed to his hands and knees, desperately trying to stay conscious. Through the dark haze enveloping his mind, he heard his name get called out from somewhere above him.
“Over here!” Horan moaned and slumped to the floor. Yeah, that blast had been way too much for him.
Mark leapt down the stairwell and grabbed Horan. “Hey! You good? Can you walk?”
“Ugh…”
Mark slapped Horan. “Answer the question!”
Horan groggily tried to find his footing. “Can I...? Probably. Do I want to...? Nah.”
“Good enough.” Mark slung Horan’s arm around his shoulder and lifted him up. Still in his true form, Horan’s legs dragged along the floor. Mark sighed. “Alright, that won’t work. Can you-“ He was interrupted by the sound of more people walking up the stairs.
“Crap. Okay, uh…” He scanned the room, looking for something to work with. He spotted a broom cupboard just a ways down the hall. “Alright, that’ll work.”
Mark dragged Horan into the cupboard and pulled out his pistol. “You stay here, I’ll try to keep us alive.”
Horan weakly lifted his head. “You’re not going to make it out of this, you know. You only have that one peashooter, and they have more guys than you have bullets.”
Mark gritted his teeth. “I know, but… I can’t just do nothing. There’s no way they’ll just let me go.”
Horan chuckled softly. “You know what you have to do. There’s no other way besides my way.”
Mark scowled. “No. I’m not doing it. It’s stupid and it’ll never work. You do it, you’re the talky one!”
“They’re overexposed to me. They know by now that I’ll say anything to save my own skin. Plus, there’s the no-lying thing. It’s got to be you.”
“You know I can’t bluff to save my life!”
“Then I guess you won’t be able to save your own life.”
“Ugh. Wait…”
-
The High Prophet stormed up the stairs, backed by two dozen armed guards. When he reached the fifth floor, he held up a hand to stop his men. In front of him, blocking access to the upper floors, was Mark, sitting on the stairs and casually inspecting his gun, looking like he didn’t have a care in the world.
The Prophet scowled. “Ah, right, you. Let us past and we’ll let you go.”
Mark looked up from his gun. “Yeah, we all know that won’t happen. You’re not letting me out of this alive.”
“Then what’s your plan? Some useless last stand?”
“Nah, I don’t need one.” Mark stood up. “All I need is your own desires. See, Horan is hidden somewhere in this building, and I’m not telling you where.”
The Prophet folded his arms and stepped forward. “So? I’ve been watching him. I know that after doing something like that, he’s weak, maybe even unconscious. All we need to do is kill you and look around a little.”
Mark frowned. “Yeah, but that’ll take time, and you don’t have time. Even if you just kill him on the spot and don’t bring him back to finish the ceremony, finding him will have to take a while. And I’d say you have, oh, five minutes before the cavalry comes.”
The Prophet furrowed his brow. “The… What?”
Mark smiled slyly. “Don’t you remember from that story of his? Horan is a king among Primoi. There are gonna be consequences to kidnapping and threatening to kill someone of his status.”
“Y-you’re bluffing. Horan isn’t king anymore! He was thrown out of power! You thought I forgot about that, didn’t you?”
Mark paused. “Yeah, by a power-mad psycho. Most other Primoi don’t want a guy like that in charge, and Horan is the clear pick to put back on the throne. At this point, you probably have four minutes before the first few Primoi start showing up.”
The Prophet futilely looked back at his troops. “N-no! You’re lying! I know it!”
“Do you? Who’d know better? Me, who’s been with Horan non-stop for more than a week, or you, who’s been studying him for about a day?”
“I…”
“Tell you what: You have until those Primoi show up to let Horan-“ Mark held back a sigh. “To let Horan and I out of the city. We’ll call them off and be on our way, and you can have another shot at finding an easier target to sacrifice. I’ll let you think it through, but the clock’s a-ticking. Little over three minutes now.”
The Prophet glared at Mark with such vitriolic intensity that Mark almost lost his composure, then turned around and motioned for his troops to follow.
Mark grinned wider than he had in a long, long time. “Good choice.”