"Mortal authority is often derived from the fact they have the power to kill you.

I'm only subject to authority I allow myself to be subject too.

If I go with you quietly what will their punishment be?"

Lucian sighs. "I really wish you wouldn't have asked me that. But...in all likelihood they want to find out if you are the First reborn. Once they figure out you are not, as I have, they will likely seek to have you killed."

"So, why even bother going through all this trouble to capture him in the first place?" Anthony sounds confused.

"Were it my call, I would have killed you a few seconds ago, and saved my arm and a lot of other people the trouble of dealing with you." Lucian actually manages a weak smile. "But it is not my call, and I was ordered to bring you in."

Thirteen looks out, pivoting his head towards the wall. Lucian looks in the same direction. "I might still succeed yet."

"Demon!" You hear a loudspeaker, and the voice behind it considers itself the law of this planet. "This is the Ninth Legion! Leave the building immediately or we will be forced to level it! Justice prevails!"

Lucian sighs painfully. "I stand corrected."

I suddenly grab Lucian's neck and squeeze enough to hurt but not enough to kill.
"Not what I was talking about. What are Antony's and his workers Punishment?
Do what you can to make them mild. Or else the Legion will wave a bad time."

I smack him against the ground for emphasis. Then let him go and head outside.

"And I am telling you, I have no say in that!" He forces the last word out almost in a gasp. His self-control is slipping. "What exactly is your plan? You cannot win this fight!"

Anthony walks up to him while prone, and stares daggers down into him. "I'm not working for you anymore. I think we are both going to be free in death, Lucian. Farewell."

Thirteen "I sus-pected as much. Try-ing to min-i-mize the suf-fer-ing did not work, did it?"

"No. And there was nothing I could or can do."

Lucian pulls himself up, leaning against a wall. "You could try giving me my other gun back. It won't work for any of you, but it can get us all out of this mess."

"WHY?!" Anthony seems speechless in response to Lucian's words.

"If you wish to reach the Leg-ion, go through that point." Thirteen points to a section of wall.

"Or...you could give me my gun." Lucian looks impatient.

"... And yet again, You don't tell me what the Legion will do to Anthony, Thirteen and his workers.
I was hoping that the legion would show mercy to it's citizens if I surrendered peacefully.

... My kind can sometimes take people with us when we are killed and move to our next world. I don't know how it works though...

Anthony Try to escape with Thirteen. I'll be a distraction."

I'll take my particle accelerator and shoot the section of wall that Thirteen indicated.
I'll walk outside.

You rain a shower of some kind of plastic material down on some very surprised Legion soldiers, who were literally waiting outside that wall, pointing at a different part of it.

"Take cover! Then support our right flank!"

You lose track of Lucian, who takes the moment to disappear. Anthony and Thirteen head away from you, but they seem to be going up a set of stairs last you saw of them.

The commander of the Legion is very clearly dressed as an officer, with a bright red plume on the top of his helmet. He draws his sword, and you see and electrical current surge through it. "Demon! Attack me if you dare!"

The men he is commanding are going for cover, and trying to get a bead on you with their rifles.
This message was last edited by the player at 03:08, Mon 29 Aug 2016.

I'll put my Particle Accelerator away and raise my hands

"If I did. I would kill you.
I'm planning on coming with you peaceably.
On one condition, There will be no punishment for Anthony and his men that work here.
If you do so, I'll come with you. If you don't...Well you are going to have a Bad day."

If I feel like they are going to shoot, I'll harden my skin until it is like iron.

"Who?" The commander momentarily lowers his weapon, before he catches his bearing and points it at you again. "It does not matter. The Legion only accepts unconditional surrender, demon and-"

He clutches his ear painfully, and falls to his knees, screaming before jerking his headpiece off. You hear Lucian behind you, holding his firearm limply by his side. He is being careful not to touch the edges of the hole you just made. "I would take him up on that offer, if you can."

"Hand Lucian!" The commander gives him that Legion salute. "Has the situation been contained?"

"Negative. Clear your men from the building, now."

"Why? We could just blow it up immediately, and save ourselves the ef-"

"Violation of Humility." Lucian calmly shoots him cleanly through the face, leaving a ruin behind for his head. "I outrank you. Surviving Legion soldiers, evacuate the building now, or face imminent execution."

The others leave, but orderly and calmly. Lucian just looks at you, and speaks in that same monotone, his composure regained. "Your choice how this plays out, demon. Know this, though. Your friends cannot be saved, if they are doing what I think they are. You can come with us, or die with them."

"I'll come with you."
I'll follow Lucian.
As I walk I'll pray to the Pattern Spiders in charge of Anthony's and Thirteen's fate.

I wish for their jump to go extremely well. So that they end up somewhere friendly that will take them in peaceably. What do I need to do to get you to do this for me?

You get a vision right back: the building's base ignites, takes off shakily but successfully, and then Legion satellite batteries destroy it in orbit, killing them.

You see how fate can be redirected: Thirteen moved to the base of the ship, doing something with the power, with a very displeased Lucian present somehow.

"You just saw how they were going to die, didn't you?" You hear Lucian's voice, weary and exhausted. "I would feel empathy for you if I could, demon. But you and I both know the future once seen cannot be changed. Now, let's go."

He starts to stagger toward the retreating Legion soldiers.

"I'm a bit differed that the prophets you are familiar with. I saw the weave of fate and and how to redirect. You are coming with me!"

I'm going to pick Lucian up and carry him with me as I run back into the ship.

"So, this is how I die." He actually does not resist, and his chi is completely harmonious in the moment. "I suppose ending a rebellion in the bud isn't a bad end to my career."

"What's your plan, then, beyond killing us both out of spite?"

"I need you and Thirteen to go down to the power and do ... something. Probably prep for a jump wile we are still lifting off."

I'll find thirteen and explain my plan.

Thirteen is up in the topmost room, and Anthony has his hands encased in the panel in front of him, completely in a trance. Thirteen does not question you, and simply goes down the stairs.

Lucian, however, has remained where you last saw him. "Please explain why I should listen to anything you have to say. If you need me to leave, would that not be incentive for me to not help you?"

"We need the Hand to make the jump, that is your plan." Thirteen walked until he was inches from Lucian, lightning crackling from his chassis menacingly. "He is right. This plan is flawed. I should kill him now, and se-cure our sur-viv-al."

"I've always admired Vic's aberrations. Efficient, direct. If they were not mechanical, I suspect we would have found much common ground."

You get an impression that Thirteen is thinking very hard about doing exactly what he said he should do.

"I have a feeling that the mechanism that is needed to jump would require that the hand member be alive. That would be common sense to stop someone from cutting a member of the Hand's hand off and using it to jump.

As for you Lucian, You still care about the well being of the Legion, Correct? The various codes would require nothing less. So you have two choices. You can do nothing. In which case, I will attempt to destroy all the Legion's satellites in orbit. Causing Who knows what to happen as a side effect of my bending reality.

Or you can listen to me and help us escape. Minimizing the destruction I cause.
Your choice. I don't really care. It would be fun to try to punch the satellites out of the sky."

"My severed limbs would not help you in any way." He seems annoyed at your offhanded suggestion.

"Is this the feel-ing of joy? Be-cause I ap-prove the hand plan for a rea-son un-found-ed in lo-gic."

Lucian ignores Thirteen, and you can almost hear the wheels turning in his head. "So, you think can make another future? Fine. I will pretend you are actually able to do this. I want to witness this attempt, even if the cost is my honor. Lead the way."

"Of course. I saw how it is done. Lucian, Do you control the targeting of the jump?"

after he answers, I'll sit down and meditate for a bit. Then I'll pray to the same Pattern Spiders that I did before.

Thank you for your help. What do we need to do next? and What will my price be?

You arrive downstairs, Thirteen carefully stomping his way down the ramp, and Lucian moving soundlessly beside you. This is the engine room, the walls covered in circuit board  lines glowing orange and blue, with a large glass like sphere dominating the center of the room. It is a star being created inside, with the room pulsing with the nascent star.

"Okay." Lucian seems uncertain. "Your vision is convinced that if a jump is performed by myself, you will escape the Legion net and survive. We do not have strong enough shields to hold off such weapons. Death still occurs."

"He needs me to am-pli-fy the power output and make the shield strong-er. To buy this un-trust-worth-y flesh-ling time to jump us."

"And he is trusting you not to simply overload the ship, kill us all, and escape into deep space. I think it is poorly placed, but-" Lucian's eye flash solid white briefly before returning to normal. "If we both act as desired, this...might actually work."

Lucian seems taken aback. Thirteen simply places his hands on the sphere. "Lu-cian, Mag-nus, stand clear. I will be dan-ger-ous to ap-proach."

"Make sure our pilot does nothing reckless." Lucian taps the wall next to the door, and you see it transform into a keypad. "We have it from here, or we all die anyways."

No further visions come to you.
This message was last edited by the player at 23:32, Mon 29 Aug 2016.

I raise my eyebrow when Lucien's eyes flash white.

"Send us somewhere pleasant. Or if you don't had time to calculate that, send us somewhere you know is unoccupied. "

I'll go up to Anthony.
"Try to dodge the satellite's shots. But don't do anything too reckless.

Thirteen is boosting the shields and Lucien is performing the jump."

"Dodge the shots?" Anthony's voice is coming from the intercoms, not him. "This thing literally moves like a building! I cannot dodge anything in this craft! All I can do is drive in a straight line and hope we don't die!"

"...wait. Lucian's jumping us? Why on Earth would he do that? He's probably just going to send us to Terra or something like that-!"

The floor rocks, and you feel gravity going away. "Well, we are in space, and we are being hit by...hits measuring in megatons? Megatons of what?! What does fifty megatons even mean?!"

You feel several more like that, and then nothing.

You are no just floating in the control room, with Anthony in a trance. "Did...did we just jump? That's it?"

You hear Lucian over the intercom. "That's it. Please limit your excited chatter to the room where Magnus is. You are very distracting. Magnus, I would like a word with you. Please make you way down one floor. I will be there."

"...man, that guy has some issues to work out." Anthony is still speaking through the intercom.

After we jump I'll simply tell Anthony.

"Megatons are a measurement for the force produced by an Explosion. A megaton is equivalent to a million tons of TNT going off all at once. Your Shields just shrugged off explosions equivalent to the largest nuclear bomb I know of."

I'll go down to Lucian.
"You wanted to talk with me Lucian. Let me guess. You can see the future, but when you look into the future it is bound to happen... And I just broke all the rules and you want to know how I did it. How close am I?"

You find him sitting on the "floor". Zero gravity movement has taken some getting used to, but you manage to get your bearings without getting sick.

"Sort of. My curiosity has always lead to my greatest sin: pride." Lucian is cross legged, and has the weapon in front of him almost in a ritual fashion. "I aided you because I wanted to see if a foreseen future could be changed. So yes, you did just break a rule that had been pounded into me since I was a teenager."

"But that's not really the issue I'm interested in. What is the code you live by? Because mine requires me to die right now."

"Please don't kill yourself. Suicide is effectively just giving up. While you are alive you can change the world around you and aim for a better future.

Anyway, That is... Rather complicated. I don't have my moral code written out like you do.
Basically, I try to make the world into a better place than it was when I entered the world. I try to do various things to bring about that end.

Defend Just authority. Fight Unjust authority. Prevent needless death. Try to reduce the suffering of others. Protect the freedoms of the common man. Do not lie, Unless telling the truth will cause massive suffering. Enlighten those who are ready for it. Strive towards perfection though I will never reach it.

I try to do these thing and more. But no one is perfect. We just have to get up and try again.

Is there something in particular you are looking to learn from me? I'll admit that Ethics and Morality isn't my strong suit. Generally I just try to do what I believe is right."

"That sounds convenient, but perfection is not a request with my code. My code is the Eightfold Path. Justice, Compassion, Honesty, Valor, Spirituality, Humility, Honor and Sacrifice. Rigidly enforced, these are the laws the Legion is governed by. The Legion fights physical wars, but the Eyes have always played the long war, the one aimed at our real enemy." He looks at the firearm, studying it anew. He looks at you, smiling. "Not a short while ago, you were prepared to literally beat me to death with your bare hands. Can you please explain your intended and sudden burst of mercy to me?"

"I fought you because you where planning on killing Anthony. I didn't really intend to beat you to death. Killing you would have happened if you continued to insist on killing Anthony. I could have killed you several times, such as when we switched bodies. I did hit you harder then I intended when I knocked your tooth out. Can that blue gel fix that?

Anyway Since you no longer plan on killing Anthony. Fighting you is no longer needed. Therefore. You become a person who's death I need to prevent. It just doesn't seem right to let you die after you helped me and Anthony.

What is the true enemy that the eye fights?
Thirteen mentions a being named Heliod, the Falling Star. What kind of enemy is it? He didn't think it existed. But I've heard of a few beings that had it's MO."