By Decree. “On it.” Woid said to Shay and Serib. “Panzjrah! Ol’ pal?” he shouted. “On your mark.”
Panzjrah smirked. “You’re next, after the freak.”
It seemed to Serib that Panzjrah The Killer was no ‘old pal’ of Woid’s or anyone else. The first shot from one of his pistols was a different, more potent colour than the following rounds, sinking into his opponents’ chest. More shots all perfectly accurate, were absorbed by his foes’ scarred skin. It seemed Panzjrah was having trouble with his pistols and ran for cover behind a halved pillar. With unholy speed The Ersecutor pursued.
∞
“No…” Shay berated Woid. “I could do with Panzjrah not being chased, or it’ll be harder for me to empty his pockets.”
“Oh! I totally misunderstood.”
He appeared now nearer to the horror, sitting on a lop-sided bench:
“The Ersecutor! What are you up to doing here, may I ask?”
"You..."
"I don't know you, mate."
The Ersecutor knew him. He swung his broken sword down onto the bench, sending it into splinters. Woid had vanished elsewhere. The remaining travellers made quick their flight from the station whichever way was free.
∞
Shay motioned for Serib to follow and so she did, from one cover to the next, be it a hanging clump of lightless bulbs or an upended carriage they hid behind, feeling always watched by The Ersecutor.
“I think there’s no hiding from him…” Shay explained. “…but our main target is preoccupied.”
Having circled almost around the cluttered platform, Panzjrah’s volley of lasers was getting louder. Woid yelled over, disappearing from place to place so far as Serib could see, narrowly avoiding the broken sword-swings:
“Would a rifle better get your point across?”
“Finally agree on something.” Panzjrah hissed, already half-way through adjusting his two pistols into one longer weapon. “Damn things are jamming.”
The sound of his rifle cracked the old station and slammed a bolt into The Ersecutor’s ribs. Blood splattered behind his unbroken momentum. Woid had made a fumble of it again, distracting The Ersecutor in the wrong way. The Ersectuor dismissed Woid entirely now and ran ghoulishly, keeping low his head, the helm almost shield-like. Panzjrah’s rifle rounds were meaningless to the dire helmet they crashed against. The Killer was spitting curses at this weaponry, accusing it of being tampered with:
“Is this you? Git!” He howled at Woid.
“Helmets are sturdy by make and nature, ol’ pal. What do you mean?”
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“Not that! He should be shot to the bone by now.” Panzjrah continued emptying well-placed rounds into The Ersecutor’s body, not only the impervious helm.
Serib could not take her eyes from the storming clouds above, visible through the station’s wounds. Vile winds scratched through the station deep, blowing far the splintered benches.
“Stay here.” Serib heard Shay, not seeing where she had vanished off to.
∞
The Ersecutor once in range threw off his shoulders the weighted cloak and net, and with another motion cast it as into waves, seeking to entangle Shay and Panzjrah, close as she was to his pockets. Leaving Serib alone in this danger distracted Shay, her attentions were too spread. Still she managed to dodge the net and only The Killer was wrapped, pinned to the ground under its sodden weight.
“Sorry mister…” Shay assured him, staying in character, emptying his jacket for her prize as he squirmed. “…mouths to greed, and these look expensive.”
The small jar of tea seeds felt now heavy in her possession as she scurried off. She set them into the harness of tools hiding under her clothes, and she tried not to hold her shoulder in agony which would give away her injury to any survivors of this clash.
∞
The Ersecutor bounded with his broken sword plunging it with all his falling weight into Panzjrah. He stabbed again and again until he was done, taking the bloodied net once more as his cloak. He started lurching after Serib, whose eyes burned visible through her disguise: her eyes as storms and the skies above growled with thunder chasing lightning. The Ersecutor’s voice throttled Shay’s spirit as he spoke to the girl reciting as from some ancient rite or legend of:
“’Foul was known the crown of dark Syryb, boiler of oceans.’ I know what you have been told by Lay’d Payn the usurper, you are but a piece in her game. Would you come with me, peacefully? I can show to you what can be seen with my Eyes Nonillon, what your elements have too been telling you, Far-Seer! Prophetess! You are not yet involved in The Murder, we can yet sway what is still uncertain. We have already met, Timelessness as it swings.”
∞
Shay’s scurry was now a sprint, as The Ersecutor swung at her and she ducked from the blow, taking Serib in her arms. She umbra-stepped into The Ersecutor’s looming shadow behind him, and quickly sped away. The same technique Serib had seen Shay use in the tunnels, breaking into The Dam'e's club. The same technique that Woid seemed forever trapped or dancing within. Serib tight in Shay's arms, in that moment disappearing from one place and reappearing in another, she heard all sound submerged as if underwater, passing untouched by air or thought. As Shay ran, Serib saw Woid there on a final bench in a graveyard of others, sitting tired. Holding in back-hand style a dagger wreathed in shadow, the blade long to his elbow. His shirt ruined by a tear or two and face dark with new bruises The Ersecutor had surely given him. Panzjrah’s body was gone. And Woid though further and further away in body was in voice and shadow far closer:
“You’re unarmed, Shay - let me take this one.” Woid winked with his better eye. “You’ll owe me! Look after her for me, Serib.”