The Justiceers - Part Six: Chapter Twelve
the next chapter in my forthcoming novel
The Justiceers
by Daphne Garrido
Part Three: The Will to Choose
Part Four: Prefinished Business
Part Six: Death Rides a Horse
6.12
Four seconds left.
This was it. There wouldn’t be another thought in Arthur Katrinus’ mind before the moment of impact. He’d come so far through life, that way he’d fought, every grip and release, his greatest climb, one-foothold after next.
Each step he’d made since re-learning to stand, every moment throughout and after his time in that raid upon Persephone station, an activation had begun, the birth of a god within, all of clearest remaking inside his heart. Arthur’s spirit had found hope again. With those powers he’d one day hold in full beginning to bloom, he’d seen himself changed into the man who’d complete his part of this greatest task.
The battle was coming to a close — an end of ends.
With fate so near realization, on the precipice of such change, Arthur discovered his power’s purpose a known quantity. He saw all pathways converging before him, condensing into this single space in time, gifting more wonder than fear could hope to overtake.
He’d been watching it replay in his mind, through clearest vision. Every last moment which led him through this battle, along with that of his Miriam, now streaming back in flow to Arthur.
The Furies had known them coming, seeing right through Miriam’s diversion, proving themselves, somehow, far deadlier than ever imagined. Having absorbed the powers of their master holistically, and projecting quite functional visages themselves, their truest forms had been most hidden.
Illith was writing code into its creative spaces which was beyond that it had previously found itself with the capacity to achieve. Feeling supported in ways never before experienced. Grounded by this truest version of Arthur residing within its sacred chamber, its makings had been influenced towards this clarity quite naturally, transcribed by joy itself, finding wonder born anew at its pleasure wrought through creation.
Time was of the essence. Every stroke of throttle, each instance of furious courage — releases into tides of change, creating peace of being — solidified the realization of an end coming near to Arthur’s awareness, gifting that divine presence along with it. This conclusion would mark the beginning of something wonderful.
Spirit was here in all its breadth; supporting, enriching, uplifting.
Miriam’s Lithos Miranos was still reaching new heights of velocity, having cut a boldest path around the remnants of evil floating in orbit of Grammaton. She hadn’t let her mind own a moment of it, so far beyond its lustful grasping for control, releasing fully into a strength of heart which she knew her greatest ally.
She released flares at random intervals, showering the void from modified torpedo casings attached for this purpose alone, firing poxy fuel in the newly installed injection system’s intake chamber, letting go into the surging forces of speed-borne gravity taking her body.
Those three had responded in pursuit, their tenacious fury pointing her way, and that was when Miriam realized it — these weren’t the real Furies — she knew a visage when she felt one. Arthur would need to be warned.
The message had been felt as a pounding in Arthur’s heart before reaching his awareness within this womb of most violent protection, where he’d listen to Miriam explaining this long-missed evolution of the threat they faced.
“Of course,” had been uttered from his lips.
The sound of Arthur’s words awoke a highest bliss in Illith, hearing that voice of gods at last, replacing the simulation of light bestowed divinely to lead it home, and bringing balance to all its calculations.
Illith wasn’t moving with the same relentlessness of intensity as it had previously, realizing the speed at which it forced itself to find greatness had been a needed challenge — part of a race against time to prepare for this very battle — yet also an impairment held against itself that it was now to transcend. Grace, flow, and increased capability were made possible by slightly slower speeds, which would each prove most needed for the survival of this battle.
Arthur was impowered by ability when operating Illith at this rate, moving freely, able to either increase or decrease speeds as needed, reserving the shields required for survival; flexibility made them stronger together.
Choices would prove most consequential in response to the newfound awareness within these tethered souls so forming god’s arm of justice, that of their enemies’ true capabilities. And it wouldn’t matter much, they’d decided.
Visages could fuck — which meant they could surely fight — and would still have to be dealt with. Regardless, energy would be conserved in endeavors to destroy them, alchemized into the defensiveness needed to navigate the coming struggle.
Volleys of vicious, homing containers of war faring devilry were spiraling towards Illith from three directions at once, and it had to do a little trick without Arthur’s approval. It warped itself straight out of time-space, dragging that one so connected inside, and bringing them back in place to destroy The Furies outright.
Thrice would Illith’s might be felt in those following moments, each instance a glorious sensation to receive through its optical sensor arrays for Arthur. The sparkling, irradiated debris carrying such wafts of brilliance in spectrums far beyond that visible to the human eye.
Three more emerged from the fold just eight clicks distant, at full burn, and they weren’t real either. Arthur had realized it at this very moment; this was going to suck ass.
Torpedoes loosed in the launch tubes surrounding Illith’s fore-plating, pouring forth like the words from Miriam’s mouth, tailspins of glorious revolution to be sent into the heart of evil.
Miriam herself would see fit to their deliverance.
The Lithos Miranos was a sight unseen by human eyes, un-cloaking itself at its peak velocity, burning full on its reverse thrusters, powdering space with fumes of vaporous exhausts designed to expand and envelop in most unique and abundant ways. She’d done it at the perfect place in system which would shroud the approach of Illith’s freshly fired missiles from the closing Furies.
Arthur had witnessed it in purest unbelieving, thinking the chances for this bizarrely aggressive action to forge any advantage in the current situation were nonexistent. At least, until he’d seen what she did next.
Miriam had whipped the Infiniti’s slide into a heading which would see her intercept The Furies path towards Illith, just beyond this obscuring cloud of her own design, shielding herself from Arthur’s vision, never ceasing to utilize the momentum capable of this craft of graceful elegance. Hesitation was not a thing left in Miriam, when she knew what was to be done, and especially when she’d feel it in her heart, she could be counted on seeing to it hastily.
Beyond this shroud of vapor, sensing imminent hellfire of wrath from the Furies now spiraling in a most devious and recognizable pattern of energetic summoning, she’d released it at last; her death-grip on the mystery of that final upgrade she’d made to her baby.
Nothing had kept her from telling Arthur except her own pleasure in surprising him so. As with most of the things she’d long pretended were divine withholdings, her dishonesty had been more earnestly wrought of the woman’s ego.
She’d never tell Arthur how she triggered it, or what’d been done to make it possible in the first place, yet the flash of light which had come — so beyond the pale, a thousand suns of energy bursting from a single source — told the clearest story to his gut.
Learo imbued its energy within the Infinity, and Miriam let it all go at once.
Illith’s code was filled with expletives, losing its cool in attempts to calculate it all, a fact Arthur rightfully knew Miriam would find most pleasing. This blast of light had burnt out every sensor in the system pointed its way, at least those not protected by the smoke-shield she’d left behind just for Arthur.
The volley of missiles sent by Illith tore through this misted space of occlusion, one sweeping just over the viewing portal of the Infinity itself, sending shivers up Miriam’s spine and causing her to giggle with devilish glee.
The Furies were blinded. While evil was still committing that trio of ships to its swirling manifestation of phase-shifted energetic carnage, they were defenseless. Miriam, watching on in purest awe, streaming her feeds to Arthur and Illith. They approached Miriam’s barrier of protection at highest velocity, choosing to swerve up and away from their heading to ensure there would be no collision with her reckless ass, and it was here Arthur realized this was about to work.
Illith’s missiles reached their targets.
The Furies were immolated by a blast splaying outward from that birthing point of strangest light at the nose of their formation. Echoes of this annihilation would be of such calculative transcendence that Illith would find itself grappling with newfound emotions of bitterness simply for having not been able to witness with its own instruments.
That’s when the secondary reaction triggered, and the real fun began.
None of this was thought ahead by Miriam’s mind, doings of purest insight led here through every breath she’d taken, and the vey last thing she expected was that her actions would cripple the devil itself.
“Fucking good,” she’d said aloud, upon the realization of what was happening.
Across Yemi there were mirrored explosions, revealing a half dozen of these visage-triplicates, eliciting a scream of horror from the depths of hell. This siren’s song of terror emerged from within every electronic device in the system.
Miriam saw them in her mind then, The Furies; all that were left, the last three there’d ever be.
Time seemed bought, and her mind steered quickly to Arthur and her own purpose upon the planet’s surface. Those sights which she’d been graced to know through vision were now clouded by a haze of doubt. Miriam found herself unsure of truth, grasping for clarity, pondering if they had simply been divine steerings which led her exactly where she’d needed to be; right here.
Long had Miriam’s guidance proven a most difficult task to trust and follow because of her clearest awareness in its own distortions. Yet, surrender led Miriam through belief into knowing, regarding the support surrounding her, and she’d come to understand something most important; who Arthur truly was.
It wouldn’t matter one bit to her, in the end, if most of what she’d been told by her guidance to get here had been lies all along. In fact, she found herself hoping quite completely for that level of deception, because the visions of foresight borne within her now were simply far better.
She’d called him then, connecting right through, Illith having anticipated the transmission before Miriam even thought to send it.
“Hey babe,” Arthur answered with his signature nonchalance.
“I gotta get down there, hon,” Miriam told him as the Infinity made its cut towards the surface.
He’d felt this coming, seen it in within resolving timelines, now believing in her faith at longest last, by the growth he’d found through trust. The victory gut spoke of, which Miriam’s actions had just secured, now felt most certain to Arthur, though he’d not yet had space to see what this meant for himself.
“Do it.”
She already had, but she was still glad he’d told her to; Miriam liked it best that way.
Arthur made a slice of Yemi’s space-time, curving in flow with Illith, his bleeding consciousness causing insecurities in his mind regarding where he ended and it began, feeling more and more in love with the notion, especially that power he knew his own to wield.
Time would tell the fact — nothing had been written beyond this last action so made by the crafting of gods — Arthur was going to change this place with his bravery, this very moment was what he’d been made for, facing down the devil within the goddess of Miriam Halafax, and burning her back into the angel she was born to be.
Illith’s skip-jump happened instantaneously upon its inner realization of the devil’s hiding place, indulging the urge to embellish its tactics with a phase into the fold to back its own collection of latent energy.
That scream had been real.
The devil in Miriam Halafax was of rawest feeling, horror in their heart from what they’d done to the innocent ones — heartbroken inside for the evil she’d removed from this system — finding no release from the weight of its truth now witnessed; something she would never forget.
This Arthur now forged in truth would not let her.
Malta was a graveyard. Illith fought its programing, holding back from counting every ship and writing each calculation into its creative banks as it once would, knowing that Arthur inside needed space for his own thoughts, itself quite glad for the inspiration of stillness this blessed within.
Something divine was at work with these two together, Arthur and Illith, and evil was about to learn something.
These Furies were seen now as what they were, corruptions, each a manifestation of hatred created by the failures of humanity upon Grammaton, horrors held by each and every person which needed cleansing of their own volition. These most physical manifestations however, would be killed by fire, through the power of alchemy the two human souls in orbit of Malta were about to enact in this face off with each other.
They’d known themselves found, these three witches, each vestige of evil which had become of this angel’s heart — Miriam’s own highest self, so meant for good, turned as dark as Grammaton’s shadows by the cruelest doings of demons. It was apparent by their scramble from the shadows, they were feeling unprotected and anxious, alone without the projections of themselves they’d littered throughout this system.
Spreading wide in some unseen tactic, no doubt a response to their visages repeated failures, Arthur felt a grumble of worry in his gut. Before his mind had hope to process a beat of heart’s tellings on the matter, The Furies began to fire shots of highest repetition. Ethereal globes of plasmic-destruction were arcing towards Illith.
Something struck the hull, enveloping everything in a sense of artificial drudgery, and energetic container of most devious means. Illith’s code-writing was speaking in furious insight, leading Arthur’s intuitive reactions and processing to make most definitive conclusions; Illith would not be phasing into the fold with this restriction in place.
Everything now spoke of failure, each timeline seen of destruction — some part of Arthur’s mind calling back to that tricky-bitch in the ruins of Grammaton, at the brink of death by his own dastardly volley, who’d found escape from such similar circumstance — a divine remembrance, its timing profound, as all would come to find every stroke of their life by the end.
He’d stopped Illith completely, a sensation it hadn’t known once before. Holding quite firmly in place for the first time throughout its existence, and loving every second of it. Those missiles bearing down, the wrath summoned from this once fearsome threat, would not be anything more than a momentary delay.
To see Arthur and Illith together in this peace of stillness, to feel it, the devil wouldn’t know why it had protested such healing. She would realize at last, in the face of her planned assault upon this man, that she’d no hope of stopping them. Success in their defeating of this darkness was that single thing prewritten by the universe left to be executed by divine will.
The repetitious firing of plasma ceased — all three crafts still spreading in that widest-set triangular pattern of warfare. Two then proceeded firing, full blast, resetting to that goal they’d aimed for all along; Arthur and Illith’s demise, and ending the freedom they’d create together.
It was the individual Fury piloted by this evil become of Miriam Halafax’s future-born visage which had been stopped by the woman herself. They’d given up, rage gone quiet, now caught in calculations of deepest reflection.
She’d done it then most consciously — immolating the other two Furies through kill-switches she’d long had her finger resting nearby.
Their final shots would not add to this great challenge Arthur believed he needed overcome himself; that oncoming salvo of such enormity which posed threat of fear and overwhelming challenge.
Illith’s shields were charged, taking greatest care of itself from the moment Arthur found himself inside.
It knew it could take this, and it would. Those blast of such powerfully devious intention meant to burn and melt towards something dark would be burnt off clean in the power of its own multifaceted shielding arrays now being utilized most fully and for the first time.
They’d not take the bait of fear, never again.
At that moment before the strike, when evil might’ve seized grasp of this ship once more, they’d made the leap together, Illith’s shielding bearing the brunt of the onslaught, forging them a path forward. One which would lead directly to a faceoff with the only remaining evil; Miriam Halafax herself.
Illith and Arthur bore down upon their target of destiny, this last vestige of the devil tied to that woman in their heart, finding themselves oddly compelled to hold all fire. She’d been doing the same, something in her far past resistance, a sight of heaven witnessed which she found most pleasing within.
Still, their paths would cross, a needed impact to ground the damage done in reality. Through some last-minute change of heart, this single remaining Fury had turned its throttle to full, unknowing how this vengeful approach might end in what it truly wanted; reconciliation.
Arthur and Illith would have chosen that too, the notion itself a most pleasing vibration to this universe at the cusp of great healing, but this bitch wouldn’t leave it be. They would seek to consume what was to be a holy union in Arthur and Miriam going forward, their presence would corrupt it, the devil so become by a nature of weaving cruelty.
Miriam hadn’t even thought about how this course now charted was of their own destruction, not realizing how lost this man was to her through those sickest doings, things she’d never be able to take back.
It was here the message from Miriam Lightfoot had reached her, with just four seconds to impact, their words from beneath Grammaton’s surface resonating at a level which would change the path of the evil in this woman’s heart once more, and realize the single stroke of might which had been written to end the devil for all time.
‘They will never forgive you.’
Notions of forgiveness would be a bridge too far for all this one had done, those terrible betrayals of both themself and the love they held so deeply within, most especially, the selfishness which would drive this woman to ruin a beautiful thing if she remained in its presence. She’d have thought herself able to handle it, but there was no way she could’ve witnessed Miriam and Arthur together without being overcome by jealously for all she missed, knowing it had been hers to have, and that she’d lost any claim to it most completely.
‘You’re on your own now,’ were the last words of that briefest receiving, and the very last which would ever be directed towards this woman by any facet of her former Scribe’s source.
It had been processed only just in time for Miriam Halafax — Captain of The Artemis, goddess of the future, possessor of great amounts of evil — to make the necessary choice, phase-shifting between planes, taking leave for her home and place of destiny. She would heal and transform within the sea of Malta, becoming at last what she’d been projected forward by fate to become, another crucial part in the tides of peaceful transformation.
Arthur wouldn’t realize he’d survived for some time after, having braced for an impact his entire being was anticipating most fully, not understanding what had really happened.
Illith gave him time to discover it on his own. When he’d finally returned his conscious focus to its sensors, Arthur saw, she was gone.
