I froze.

Looking back on it, the answer was simple. I could have used the rest of my free actions and intervened. Trouble was that it still required a mental effort and I was slow working the menus. That would have undermined my efforts, if the idea had even occurred to me. Instead I shouted, “Grimset! Down!”

He had just enough time to hear me and look confused before it happened. The Cait Sith stared into my eyes and its malicious grin twisted into a rictus as it brought its burning claws down.

Adrenaline surged through my veins. The static burn of the phantom pain shocked through me. I wanted to move, but I stood rooted. My mind spun in circles uselessly. I just let him die. His men were probably going to attack. The Chimeras would absolutely retaliate.

This was my fault.

I should have killed the damned cat. My pain didn’t equal someone's life.

This was my fault.

The moment sort of stretched. It was a fraction of a second, but the Cait Sith and Grimset seemed almost like statues. I knew that wasn’t true. People talk about the sensation of time slowing down, but most of the time it isn’t like that. What happens is in retrospect that moment before the bad things happen sticks in your mind because you tend to blur the rest subconsciously. It becomes a mental touch stone in a sea of suppressed memory and pain.

The spear slammed into the side of the Cait Sith’s head. The blade entered without resistance, but once the shaft touched the thing’s skull the entire body whipped to the side almost bonelessly. The spear kept flying for several yards before embedding itself in the ground. The grin didn’t fade from the Cait Sith’s face until the lightning hit. The monstrous cat tattered as the electricity scorched it.

“Got it!” Angelica called. “Everyone stay calm… or else!”

My heart hammered, “Grimset, did it get you?” Focus on the here and now. Do something right. You can’t rely on others saving you again.

Grimset looked to be coming to terms with what just happened. He ran his hand along the burnt holes freshly torn in his cloak as he gazed at the Cait Sith’s corpse smoking on the ice. “Yes. I'm fine.”

I took a deep breath. I should have stopped this. Stupid. I could have used Craft and put a wall between him and the beast, or I could have transferred a layer of Ablative Shell to Grimset, or maybe just sprinted over to do something, or just killed the fucking thing the first time…

I took another breath.

Treat this like everything else. Define a goal, understand the situation, and then act. I needed to diffuse this situation, and keep Madigan and his accomplices in the Chimera Corps custody until the trial. The best path forward was to use this moment to talk sense to everyone.

I took one more breath, “We don’t have the luxury to argue amongst ourselves. The Chimera Corps can hold the prisoners until the trial. Grimset, you and yours are needed setting up a protective line. The mobs are still out there. We won’t get lucky like this again.”

Angelica walked between the Chimera Corps and the goblins, not a care in the world. “Doug has a point. We wouldn’t want this to get violent.”

The goblins seemed to agree at least in principle. About half of them turned to walk away. The others waited to hear from Grimset.

Grimset may not like me, and clearly still wanted to just kill Madigan, but he wasn’t stupid. He watched Angelica pluck her spear out of the corpse. Angelica’s spear looked different. The thing used to have a wooden shaft, and only a few runes on the blade. Now, it looked to be made of shining silver, and was positively covered in symbols. She nodded at the spear, and walked to stand next to me.

Grimset set his jaw and said, “We will revisit this trial at the war council.” He turned dramatically and his tattered cloak sorta whipped every which way. The rest of the goblins followed his lead and left.

“Yeah, probably should,” I muttered to myself. I turned to Angelica, “Thank you.”

“I got your back,” She said with a smile. She did something half way between a pat and a punch on my arm.

“The spear new?” I asked.

“Yeah…” Angelica's smile faded. “I got it from the upgrade.”

Huh… I was missing something. I’d have to follow up on that after this whole prisoner-murder investigation got sorted.

“Doug, that's a terrorist!” Rachel shouted pointing her gun at Angelica.

Oh for fuck sake.

“Rachel, no she isn’t,” I argued. Angelica wasn’t the type to hurt people.

“She killed over 100,000 people!” Rachel shouted.

“...It’s a bit more complicated than that. There was a Demon. Lord Herschal-” Angelica tried.

“Shut up you woo-woo bitch!” Rachel was winding herself up.

I stepped between Angelica and the Chimera crew. “Let’s all calm down,” God dammit. I know that never works. Wait… Angelica didn’t deny killing people.

Rachel stared at me for a moment, “You don’t know.” I could see her make the roll.

Commune check… Successful

Rachel shrugged her shoulders. The uniform jacket looked great, professional even, but it itched something terrible.

“Quit squirming, cadet,” Sergeant Conner said out the corner of her mouth. She was a big woman. She loomed over Rachel. Her cat-like eyes stared pointedly until Rachel stopped.

Rachel desperately wanted her approval. She knew she wouldn’t get it, but…Rachel respected her. Sergeant Conner was part of the first generation of Chimera Soldiers. She knew dad. She knew her father, Seth, too. It felt like a fist clenched in her stomach.

“Stand up straight,” Sergeant Conner instructed. “Don’t give people a reason to judge you.”

This was an acclimation day. New Chimeras were unpredictable. So Authority kept them on a short leash. The first few outings were under the supervision of a trainer, Sergeant Conner. Rachel could hear people whispering. They knew who she was. Most of what they said wasn’t kind.

“Don’t look at the ground. You are a soldier. Act with dignity, even if they don’t respect you,” Sergeant Conner turned down a walkway toward a busier street. The crowd pressed in on them.

It was just after shift change. Rachel could smell blood and sweat on the people. Most were laughing and shouting. They were all so close. Thank God the light was low on a mid-level. Still, it was too much.

The “Crack!” was so loud every window shattered, the ground bucked, and a wall of wind slammed into Rachel. She just barely kept her feet.

“Cadet, come!” Sergeant Conner ordered. She was standing at the edge of a fracture. The street and the buildings beyond her were gone. The entire level was gone. A building half on the edge half over the void was teetering. The first six floors, anyway, everything above that was gone, collapsed.

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Rachel ran through the crowd to the Sergeant. Sergeant Conner pulled the nanowire for Rachel’s control harness out of her sleeve. There was a reason Rachel’s uniform itched. The control harness running through it was full of nanowires and a stun rod. A push of a button and Sergeant Connor could have bound and stunned Rachel instantly. The thing is the connecting nanowire was strong. Strong enough to hold tens of thousands of pounds. Rachel would break before it did. Sergeant Conner looped it through a support on the building’s main door, “Pull this as hard as you can. Hold the building!”

Sergeant Conner then ran into the building. She came out almost instantly with a man with broken legs. She dove back in. the building lurched. Rachel pulled as hard as she could, her boots slid on the street. She wasn’t strong enough she didn’t have the leverage. Before Rachel could panic, arms wrapped around her, and then more, and then more still. People were helping her pull. Her feet stuck in a pothole, and for a brief instant the building began to tilt back toward the street as everyone pulled. Sergeant Conner exited with an old woman. She went back in again.

Crack!

The wire bit into Rachel’s arm and hands. Blood flowed. A lot of the people helping pull let go and ran. The building tipped. Slowly… slowly it began to fall.

“Cadet! Let go! Drop it!” Sergeant Conner bellowed., emerging again with a mother carrying a baby in one arm, and a toddler in the other. The ground gave. Sergeant Conner pushed the mother over the gap to solid ground. She met Rachel’s eye and threw the toddler.”Catch!”

Rachel dropped the wire and slipped out of the jacket as Sergeant Conner fell. The nanowire of the harness hooked her skin and tore lines across her back and arms, but she was free.

Almost everyone ran away from the edge. Rachel ran toward it, toward the kid. She caught the little boy, just as the pavement tilted. Rachel held onto the boy's leg with one hand, and clawed the street with the other.

It held.

She looked down and saw Sergeant Conner staring up at her from the under level. She was dead. Her catlike eyes were lifeless but stared into Rachel. Rachel looked away. That is when she saw her. The Killer of the Coast, Angelica De Leon. She was burning with white light. She was so fast. She looked to be fighting with her brother, Antonio. Why?

The maniacs were breaking the supports holding up the mid and upper levels.

“I got you,” Rachel told the kid and herself, “We’re okay.”

I blinked. It seemed like no time had passed.

“You back Doug?” Spine asked.

“Yeah,” I kept my eyes on Rachel. “What are your orders?”

“...No,” Rachel paused. She took a few deep breaths through her nose, “You are going to stop me?”

“Yes,” I nodded.

“I can take her,” Rachel almost pleaded.

“No you can’t,” Angelica said softly. She stepped out from behind me, “I don’t think an apology is appropriate. It was to kill a demon.”

“There are no Demons in the Technacoast,” Rachel said in an almost rote way. “That’s just propaganda.” That last part didn’t sound as certain.

Before that could circle around a second time I cut in, “We all have our goals. You have a dungeon to clear. We are heading toward the Spire. There is no point in fighting until that is done.”

Angelica waited for Rachel to make a move. Rachel thought for a long moment. She holstered her pistol, “Let’s get this done, so we can be on our way.”

“Thank you,” I said.

“You can thank me by handing out the Pacts.” Rachel snapped.

“Pacts?” I asked. I had only offered one.

“Lola figures three criminals equals three pacts,” Rachel gave me an icy grin. “One for Chino Minoru,” the smile slid off her face, “one for Seth Cohen too.”

“Who gets the third?” I didn’t mind handing out more pacts. Seth was good people. That Minoru guy told the truth, and that may have cost him something. Honestly the buff was the least I could do for him. Plus, I didn’t want to fight with Lola. I can let her win this.

Rachel gazed at me like I was stupid, “Me!”

“Okay, what do you want? Regen is nice,” I said, pulling up the prompt. A part of me considered putting a nonaggression clause so Rachel wouldn’t start a fight with Angelica.

…that didn’t take long. No. I wasn’t going to be that guy. Coercion is easy but evil.

These pacts were dangerous.

“I don’t want a pact,” Rachel said.

“But you just-” I started

“I know what I said, instead I want you to remove the connection my squad has with Grond,” Rachel said.

Oh… fuck all kinds of duck.

“What?” Spine, Angelica, Madigan and I asked in unison.

“Whatever you did with me, do with the others,” Rachel gestured vaguely at herself. “We are heading into a dungeon controlled by Grond. I can’t have him messing with my squad.”

“I don’t know if I can-” I started

Notice Check…Successful

What a coincidence. The connections flashed into view. I could see the golden thread leading from their heart toward the west. If you ever want decision paralysis, be confronted with an idea that seems murky, and is clearly something the Narrators want you to do.

I knew what I was going to do. I saw what Grond was able to do to Rachel. No one deserved that.

“I’ll try.” I agreed.

“Thanks,” Rachel nodded, “Figaro! Get over here!”

Figaro was a young man with wavy black hair and a deeply nervous smile. Then again, I would probably be uncomfortable if a blood covered giant was going to rip the faith out of me.

My life got weird. I blame Wilson.

“Doug, wait!” Spine called. He shuffled to get a better view, and was filming with the camera on his phone. “Okay, go!”

Figaro did not look confident with this.

Might as well try. I grabbed the gossamer thread with one hand, and placed the palm of my other hand against Figaro’s chest. I pulled gently at first.

“This kinda hurts,” Figaro said.

“It isn’t coming loose,” I pulled a little hard.

Figaro immediately started screaming, “Stop! Stop! Stop!” He slapped my face. “Sorry!”

I quit pulling. “I am going to have to try the other way.” I turned and gripped the thread with both hands. I then pulled my hands apart trying to break the connection.

Schism check… Successful

You have claimed this follower

The thread snapped easily… and immediately buried itself in my chest. We all watched Figaro. He didn’t implode, or mutate.

“Nice, it worked,” Rachel said, leaning closer to inspect Figaro.

“You didn’t know it would work?” Figaro demanded. “Why not test this on Lin?”

“Lin makes great coffee and tea, You lost your gun twice and play death metal on the radio,” Rachel explained. Clearly she had picked favorites.

“Let’s finish this up,” I pressed. Twenty-five Schism checks later and I was now the god of a bunch of indoctrinated, unstable chimeras. How have I not stuck my dick in a hornet’s nest yet?

New Achievement!

Mass Converter

Look at you, co-opting the faith of others. Normally that takes an Inquisition. Lord have mercy! What sort of lion collects lambs? You have unlocked the Faith and Religion interfaces (Divine Scale).

Reward:

XP withheld. Contact Narrator for support or -hear me out- pork the angel.

Okay that prompt was almost certainly from Wilson. I guess he wanted to talk to me, but didn’t want to reach out… eh to hell with him. This was more important.

“Alright, done,” I said.

Rachel shrugged.

“A ‘thank you’ would be appreciated,” I said. The Chimera Corps were still eyeing me like we were about to fight.

“You burned my face,” Corporal Fish-eyes pointed out.

“That isn’t fair, you started the fight. And set off the fragmentation bomb!” I was almost yelling. I paused for a moment. I wasn’t going to apologize, “We should all just move on.”

Everyone kept watching me.

“What?” I demanded.

“You aren’t going to hand out a bunch of commandments?” Rachel asked. A look of ‘aw shit’ flashed over her face. She realized she shouldn’t have said that.

“Fine, first commandment is ‘don’t be a dick’,” I said.

New Achievement!

Foundation of the Faith

Look at you! Yesterday you didn’t have any followers, and weren’t a god. Now you are recruiting, and handing down edicts from on high. That didn’t take long. I sure hope you don’t go mad with power. …It’s probably fine, it isn’t like power corrupts or anything. Besides you can handle it: everyone looking up to you, relying on you, needing you, worshiping you.

Reward:

You Received one Religion Perk.

XP withheld. Contact Narrator for support, you know you wanna. It may not seem like a good idea right now, but much like bending the angel over, you will be happy you did.

I chose to ignore the prompt again. “Okay is everyone ready to interrogate the prisoners?”

“Doug, is every minute of your life an unfocused car crash?” Janie asked.

I thought for a moment, “Yep.”