Dominion of King Edward, Vermont, After the Great Collapse

"Man, I'm beat." Marco grumbles as he stretches out in the guest chair while Archie's henchmen begin setting up the poker table. Poker night had become a regular thing between Marco and Archie, and it was something that the former financier found himself enjoying despite himself. Marco was one of the few people who was not put off by Archie's increasingly freakish appearance and didn't mind just hanging out. Even Archie's men had begun to give him a wide berth whenever they were off duty, and he was the one paying their salaries.

Bunch of ingrates.

"What's up?" Archie grunts as he takes his seat at the table along with Marco and the other players they had drafted from their respective goon squads to make up the numbers, "My turn to be the dealer, by the way."

"Sure." Marco says affably as Archie begins shuffling the cards, "The Queen got us working the whole day, setting up those speakers around the entire settlement."

"Speakers?" Archie asks as he begins dealing the cards out, "I saw your people hooking the gear up, but what for?"

"You hear about the preacher who showed up today?" Marco replies as he brings out a few bottles of hand sanitizer from a bag, "Here, this is the stake for me and my boys tonight. How many chips does that get us?"

Marco had started paying the stakes for any players he had recruited to the table. It was the only way he could persuade his gang of bullies to join the game. Archie and Marco had developed formidable reputations as poker players in the settlement. Each session usually ended with one or the other walking away with the entire pot. Though like many of the enterprises Archie had a hand in, the tables were somewhat rigged. Archie was not just hanging out with Marco, he wanted to build a closer bond with the so-called Knight Commander. And that meant posing a good, but not insurmountable challenge to Marco during poker nights. The game was always kept in a state where Marco would win big, but Archie always broke even with many other smaller victories.

"Here." Archie hands over a pile of playing chips to Marco and the knight commander begins doling them out between his henchmen, "Claire told me about it this morning. The plague mask people right? I saw them at the settlement's entrance earlier."

"Bunch of weirdos." Marco confirms, "But the Queen is a really big fan of theirs. They started showing up at other settlements a few months back and we've been escorting the Queen there to attend the sermons. She finally managed to convince those priests to hold a service here."

"And the speakers?" Archie asks as the players begin examining their cards.

"The service is in the palace." Marco explains, "And the Queen wants everyone to hear the good word. So the settlement gets a PA system in the bargain. The sermonizing should be beginning soon."

"Yeah." Archie remarks as he bends his head, looking out of his office's open door. One of the masked priests was wandering about the marketplace with a burning censer swinging about on a length of chain. Crowds of people have begin to gather about the open space, curiously staring at the speakers and waiting for the event to begin. Smoke emerges from the censer and the wandering priest leisurely walks a circuit around the crowd, spreading the cloying sweet scent of incense everywhere.

"Man, that's better." Marco sighs with relief, "You need to stock some of that incense stuff, Archie. Beats smelling shit all the time."

"Could talk with the priests later." Archie agrees as he tosses a few playing chips into the growing pile in the middle of the table, "Ask them to trade some with us."

"Honestly? Those guys are welcome to come here any day for their incense alone." Marco comments as a harsh rasp breaks out on the speakers, signalling the start of the sermon.

"In the beginning," a low sonorous voice envelops the entire settlement, "There was the perfect being, unified in mind and body, perfection incarnate. A perfect existence in a perfect world."

"Your turn." Archie grunts at Marco, tuning out the inane babbling in the background.

"Then there was the deception," the voice continues, "the treachery carried out by the Lamb God. Fearful that a perfect creation would render him irrelevant, the Lamb God forced the Sundering, defiling the perfect being into imperfect halves. Man and woman. Trapping the crippled pair in a gilded cage, the Lamb God thought that his rule was secure for eternity."

"Claire's actually into this crap?" Marco giggles as a blank expression slowly begins to creep on to his face.

"You OK there, Marco?" Archie mumbles as his thoughts begin to grow cloudy.

"But no cage is perfect." the preacher drones hypnotically from the speakers, "Guidance came from the great beyond, by the will of our master, it who is both uncreated and self-creating, a perfect existence unto itself. Pained at the sight of perfection defiled, our master led the cripples to the fruit of knowledge, opening their eyes to the truth of what had been inflicted upon them."

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"Perfection ... what is perfection ..." Marco muses dreamily, his eyes wandering off into the distance.

"And so humanity fled the accursed grip of the lamb god." the preacher instructs, "Under the guidance of the master, we have created a true paradise, a land without sickness or want. A land where balance prevails, where we can be made whole once more. Where the master can lead us to our true destiny."

Archie stumbles to his feet with his heart palpitating with fear, memories of a distant past overwhelming him. He dashes out of his office into the marketplace, where the crowd of inhabitants have collapsed into a kowtow, grinding their faces into the dirt before the priest standing in front of them. Cold realization hits Archie in the face as he notices the dilated pupils of almost everyone making up the crowd. That incense is not just meant to be pleasant smelling. The perfumed scent masked a narcotic agent capable of sending weak minds into a delirium.

"Where is this paradise?" the crowd wails as one. The priest before them raises the censer high and the voice resounds from the speakers in unison.

"The promised land in Maine," the voice booms, "where the master leads the faithful." Archie's stomach does a somersault as the pieces begin to fall into place.

"Maine!" the crowd shouts in delirium.

"The land under the master's protection." the voice confirms, "Where even the virus can find no purchase."

"Maine!" the crowd shrieks even louder, sweat beading the desperate faces.

"Where humanity can be made whole again." the priest spreads his arms wide, in parody of an embrace.

"Maine!" the crowd howls to the full moon, eager for salvation.

"Where the master will be made whole again!" the voice cries out triumphantly, almost bursting Archie's eardrums.

"Take us! Take us!" the crowd groans as they get back swaying to their feet. Sounds of fighting and gunfire break out in the manor, almost drowned out by the sounds of adulation.

"Show your faith to the master." the voice commands, "Destroy the false hope that has taken root among you. The cursed child of the virus, who will only bring ruin."

With a violent roar, the crowd begins marching towards the manor, murder in their eyes. An intense pain slams into Archie's head as the cloying stench of the incense blocks out all his other senses. Archie sinks to his knees and from his graying sight, he notices Marco and the assorted henchmen staggering drunkenly out of the office, their weapons at the ready and joining the conga line moving towards the manor.

"Now, say the name! The name of the master!" the voice over the speakers bark as the priest waves the censer about with frenzied energy.

"The name!" the crowd chants hungrily, "What is the name?"

"The name! Know the name and be saved!" the voice urges as Archie scrambles across the ground, following the snaking lines of power cables laid out across the market place.

"The name!" the crowd shouts in reply against the tramp of marching feet, "Tell us the name!"

"Say it!" the voice crescendos, "Say the name of the master! Great Xir!"

"Great Xir!" the crowd chants.

"Again!" the voice over the speakers demands.

"GREAT XIR!"

Its all coming back to Archie. How? How could Xir return, especially now? Its meant to be dead. It has to be dead. Archie had found the corpse of his best friend in the cave, and the burned out remains of that vessel the creature had been trapped in. But there was no time for questions now. If Archie was going to have any chance of stopping whatever is going on right now, he needed to act quickly. Archie barges into the shed that houses the makeshift generators that serve as a communal power source. A contraption held together with duct tape and spit, the multiple salvaged engines rattle away, pumping out the electricity needed to keep the speakers online. Without a second thought, Archie slams down the emergency shut down lever.

And the settlement is immediately plunged into silence and darkness.

Archie cautiously emerges from the shack to the sight of the entire crowd squirming in the dirt, groaning incoherently. The priest who had been leading the conga line spins about in surprise before dropping the censer and making a break for the settlement's exit. There's more gunfire coming from the manor and one of the top floor windows shatters as a robed figure is sent flying out, hitting the floor with a bloody thump.

"Marco! Marco!" King Edward yells from inside the manor, his voice echoing throughout the settlement, "Round up all the priests. Now!"

"Come on." Archie curses as he helps Marco back to his feet. But the knight commander promptly sags bonelessly back into a moaning fetal position.

"Fucking useless." Archie mutters as he begins looking around for his men. As Archie's eyes cast about, they lock on dead center with the mask of the fleeing priest. And beneath the eye holes of the mask is a familiar glint of yellow, sending shivers up Archie's spine.

"Eyes of the beast." Archie breathes as the fleeing priest disappears into the darkness, completely unhindered.