The years to come

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Here's the beginning of my story. This is basically just a prelude to the jump in time between the end of diablo II... and the beginning of this. Any and all suggestions and review are welcomed.

Also... is it impossible to add indents between paragraphs?


The last world had ended in an orgy of violence and a plume of black, foul smelling smoke.

The end of terror, of destruction and malice was meant to usher in a new age of prosperity for humankind. And it did. For a limited amount of time. Mans population grew with time, unchecked by war and famine. The lands were plentiful, and so were resources. No longer needing to keep watch over humanity, the wards of heaven left. Whether evil or good, the earth was left without spirituality of any kind. Tales of human triumph over the prime evils became no more than that: Tall tales that seemed too unreal to believe in books nobody read anymore.

A soulless people took all they could to fill the void left behind by the greatest struggle ever known. Consumer goods, politics, commerce. The faithful became bitter and jaded as god seemed to no longer be listening. The evils of terror and death might’ve been vanquished, but a more primal evil began to rear its ugly head. The original evil. The immortal evil.

The evil of human greed.

Soon enough the gap between the poor and the exploited grew too wide. The resources too few. The land too full. Powerful empires grew into allied countries. City-states ceded into larger assemblies. The times grew desperate, and the powers that were tense. They all held on as the planet died around them.

The poor couldn’t hold on any longer. They starved and died as the rich lived in comfort. They revolted. Terrorists from Harrogarath made decisive strikes on soft targets and nuclear plants. Desperate times had descended upon the planet. Either you fought to take from your neighbour, or you fought to keep what was yours.

Man turned his back on morals and dignity. Country fought country. Rich fought poor. Brother versus brother. Father versus son. The sky wept acid onto a dry earth after the eco-terrorists got hold of the right chemicals, blighting the lands of anyone unlucky enough to be targeted. Clouds of airborne virulence struck even those who hid from the violence, travelling rural areas like roving murderers.

The heavily deforested Kurast became a big, stinking open grave as impoverished guerrilla cults slayed friend and foe alike. Nobody was safe from what seemed like the final days. Nobody was safe from the apocalypse. From dying a violent death. God was unwilling to bestow mercy on those who had forgotten His name. And, for that matter, neither was he willing to save those that had kept faith.

Of course, it was all well documented. The media was everywhere in those days. The beginning was stark. But footage from the collapse itself was hazy and obscured. It was a slow burn that lasted for almost eighty years. Barbarism and paranoia reigned as the survivors of the ravaging unnatural disasters desperately grabbed power.

And then… it ended. The fighting stopped. Understanding was reached between the powers that remained, or that had formed since the collapse. It was safe once more to visit other communities. It was safe to trade and to collaborate. Nobody knew why, but those who had come to control the larger groups seemed eager to emerge from the dark age that humankind had fell into.

It was most likely due to the fact that the planet received a huge population drop off. Despite all the ecological damage the earth had sustained, there still was more than enough arable land to support the few who remained. Disease still suffocated growth until medical technology was resalvaged and reinstituted. Cities sprung back up. Science marched on as the damage was repaired. The wounds healed. Reunited, they had survived what seemed like the end.

Little did they know. The worst was yet to come.

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Chapter 1 - Enter the void


His name was Deltroy, and his lower body was only passingly human in shape.

And I would be bunking with him for the next three days.

You could very accurately say that it was his fault that he was so deformed. He requested the surgery. He signed the papers giving his flesh away to strangers. And now, his right leg was placed asymmetrically away from his hips. Or ‘hips’, I should say.

This isn’t to say that it wasn’t worth it, if in a deludedly short sighted sort of way. Thanks to his great big right leg and cybernetic hip girdle, he could comfortably walk around with just under a ton of hardware attached to his hip rig.

Excuse me. Also jutting out of his right hip was a coupling to which a pneumatic arm could be attached.

And on the end of this arm, no doubt, was 300 kilograms of firepower. Stored somewhere in the cargo hold of the ship most probably. Other life forms might not understand our language, but everything knows a weapon when it sees one.

Shoot first, maybe twice. Then ask some questions, and shoot some more. Such a typically imperial attitude.

“So, what are you doing here?” He summons enough curiosity to finally ask after nearly six hours. Indicating that he didn’t really care to begin with.

“I’m here on behalf of Internal Intelligence.”

I didn’t want to tell him what I was really doing here. Psionicists are always regarded with distrust and paranoia. Nobody likes having their minds read like open books. Truthfully I didn’t care to even try unless it was in my interests to do so. But as some egomaniacal and autocratic psychics have demonstrated, the power was terrifyingly easy to abuse.

His interest was nonetheless piqued. It was written plainly on his face. “Oh really?” He gave an interested pause. “You wouldn’t be handlin’ onea them battle psychos, would ya? Or-“ He almost gasped with wonderment. I could tell that weaponry and battle interested him on the same level lures interested a fisherman. “-Are you a part of the third eye?”

It amazed me that he knew so much about Internal Intelligence.

“Rumours circulate quickly, so I see.”

“Is it true?” It was nerve wracking, watching him stand there and talk to me with his leg off kilter, stance unwavering with an inhuman steadiness. No wonder people called them “walking turrets”.

I then affected an air of authority.

“All that crap is just fantasy and rumours. Psychics are really of no practical use to us outside of parlours and circus sideshows. There is no possible way for a man to make something explode by looking at it… or to have one in anything remotely resembling a combat scenario.”

I disappointed him with my strategic lie. Hopefully we weren’t going to run into any trouble on our trip. Then I’d be exposed. Any expressions of wonderment slumped away from his upper body language- since his legs and hips were mostly ferro-fiberous titanium.

“Too bad.” He murmured. “We’re gonna need that sort of power where we’re going.”

“We don’t know that yet. It’s probably just an communications error.”

Just then, the intercom chirped for our attention. We were summoned to sickbay for out mid-voyage physical.

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Chapter 2 - Mekerle

For the record, I hate Imperial field medics. And this Mekerle guy was a big fat reminder of my sheer antipathy.

He was at least fifty years old, but kept in shape with regular steroid and HGH (Human Growth Hormone) injection cycles. And, of course, fresh organs harvested from our Empires healthiest prisoners. Formerly healthy, anyway.

His face was angular and rough like a carrion birds. Eyes that were clearly once someone else’s peer out from an age chizzled and battle scarred face. Neat grey hair was allowed to grow just long enough to obscure surgical scars along his skull. He was lean and wore all black, aside from a red armband around his bicep identifying him as medical personnel.

He was taking a big syringe to Deltroys neck as he sat in a deep scan machine. It chugged loudly, the radons cross sectioning his skull with green light from above his inclined head. It went real slow so that it could properly soak up every last neuron on the inside of his brain.

Deltroy of course was curious about what was being done to him.

“This marvel of technology-“ Here comes a practiced speech. “-is mapping every last micron inside your brain. It then plots the synaptic connections and neuron quality in the memory section. This way if you die, we can not only re-create your old body with cloning techniques, but your old brain as well.”

This was all very blasé for him, judging from his tone. But then again, that’s how he’s sounded for the entire visit. “Every last memory and neurosis and personality trait can be reproduced by nanite guided cellular construction. The new brain will be placed inside the new body. You will be synthetically resurrected.”

A silent pause followed in which, presumably, everyone who overheard pondered the moral and ethilogical quagmire behind this degradation of the human soul and spirit. What did death mean? How real will our memories be? Can personality be changed to fit a mould? Was nothing sacred?

“If I die…” Deltroy speaks up solemnly, at last. “…what’s gonna happen to my hip rig? Is it just gonna get left behind? That thing cost a fortune.”

It was a good thing to see that he saw this whole thing as deeply as I did. He seemed greatly troubled.

“Don’t worry,” The doctor reassured in the most uncaring tone he could muster. “We have a transport signal built into that beautiful piece of cybertechnology inside of you. We wouldn’t cheapen something so irreplaceable by leaving it behind.”

God bless the empire!

[Myst_Lynx]

Still based in Sanctuary but leaving the whole Diablo motif behind, the story looks promising

[0xDEADCAFE]

:thumbsup: Okay, you've got me interested enough to keep reading, so good job. Some comments and questions:

- The preface sets the stage pretty well, but I found it to be bland and too much like other post-apocalyptic setups I've read or seen so many times before. The terrorism angle is somewhat fresher so you might emphasize that.

- I like the 'voice' of your main character. It is gritty and calculating and one of the elements that makes me want to read more.

- The opening could be improved:
His name was Deltroy, and his lower body was only passingly human in shape.

And I would be bunking with him for the next three days.
It's almost a great opening: introduce a character, describe an intriguing attribute, and provide a relationship to the main character, but separating it into two sentences and using the word 'and' twice robs it of some impact.

- Is 'ethilogical' a real word? I'm guessing it is part of the fictional world of the story and is a combination of ethical and logical. When introducing fictional words you might want to provide a context that makes it clear that they are part of the story.

- Another proof-read would help. For example:
He was taking a big syringe to Deltroys neck as he sat in a deep scan machine.
Both uses of "He" should refer to the same person.

- You like to use 'And' and 'But' at the start of a sentence, which is fine in the right situations, but there are places where it might be better to use a single sentence. For example:
This was all very blasé for him, judging from his tone. But then again, that’s how he’s sounded for the entire visit.
Why not let it flow, like this: This was all very blasé for him, judging from his tone, but then again, that’s how he's sounded for the entire visit.

- Does this story come back to the world of Diablo II at some point?

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Yeah, the beginning is somewhat unnotable, but it's breezing over the time between diablo II and this... which I see sorta as 'diablo III'. It is the weakest part of my story, and I should revise it to be at the very least more clear.

This story doesn't return to the time of diablo II, but soulstones, the prime evils, Tyreal and a variety of other plot elements will be (re)introduced. It's basically just about the timelessness of these evils, and the war between good and evil. Just a different setting.

And you're spot on about all that sentance structure advice. If it ever goes beyond this board, I'll be sure to edit.

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Chapter 3 - Time passes

Let me just say that space travel is the most boring experience a human being could possibly be put through. Perhaps I’m simply anxious- or jaded- from my time in the tank. But I want something to happen, and I want it to happen now.

All this black, empty space. What a goddamn waste. What the hell was god thinking?

I try to wander the ship and socialize, but fail miserably. The engineering and medical crews look at me as if I’m there to spy on them. I could read their minds to see what they thought of me, but I know exactly what I’d hear. “I bet you’re reading my mind you filthy sand eater. Well read this: **** you.”

Every time the chief medic talks to me I feel as if he’s sizing me up for spare parts. He seems quite fascinated about my mental capacities, and my brain especially. As a medical head, he had my file.

“How long did it take for your old mind to break in the tank?” He asked with morbid curiosity. Sometimes I wish he’d chase his stimulants with more sedatives. Then I wouldn’t have to deal with his probing questions. “Or did you last the entire year in there?”

Entrants into the Third Eye division of Internal Intelligence are required to spend a one year maximum inside a sensory deprivation tank. The body is nurtured intravenously and fed the proper hormones to prevent muscular atrophy.

Without any way to interpret time or space with any of the senses, reality loses all objective meaning. The body is lost and all you are is a brain floating in utter blackness. Some people become so intensely aware of their mind that they need therapy to reaccustomize themselves with their bodily functions. Without any input, the mind is forced to improvise. Hallucinations are commonplace, and it’s a constant struggle to maintain your ego.

80% of all initiates are broken mentally through some sort of neurological or psychological dysfunction. They leave the tank changed. Most are like zombies, which II likes. Very capable and sensitive mentally, but uninhibited by thoughts or emotions. Easily moulded. Eventually their personality slowly starts to grow back, but it takes a back seat to the training regimen. A small percentage become total head cases and are dissected to prevent further incidence. Some make it through the whole year. If they’re strong enough.

Either way it’s impossible for the initiate to tell what’s happened to him or herself. There’s no way to tell time in there, and they don’t tell you when you get out.

“Is that heart in your chest as black as your last three?”

Clearly I did not appreciate him prying. With a smirk he gleefully informed me that he did not have a heart. I was inclined to believe him.

So I spent the rest of the trip discussing with Deltroy the various wars he had fought in as we sat in the rec room.

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I'm having a bit of problem with this chapter. It seems that I have a case of character-introductionitis here. On one hand, nobody likes having a bunch of new characters breezed over and stuffed into such a short space. But on the other, if you spend a chapter fleshing out each one, people eventually get bored. I don't know how to balance. Did I do a good job on this one?


Chapter 4- The Captain

The conference room was bright, and crowded. All titanium grating and halogen lighting along the nooks. Thankfully they were all disciplined enough not to talk unless asked. My nerves were frayed as it was.

“I’m sorry for these cramped conditions. But normally there’s never more than four people in here at a time.”

There were only seats for Mekerle, three others and myself. Deltroy and the Lieutenant had to stand. Deltroy didn’t mind of course, being a bloody mechanical centaur. Well, with two legs instead of four.

“This one is a loaner, anyway. Our flagship, as you all know, is adrift a few hundred miles from Urube.”

Of course we all knew. Even the robots that washed the dishes knew. That’s what all of us were doing here.

The captain of our ship, The Vindication, was an aged man with short grey hair and dark skin. He wore the green cargo pants of a regular soldier in the Emperors army, along with a tanned captains jacket, closed. Despite his age he was still in good physical condition. Judging from his lined face and beard, as well as his mannerisms and speech, he was a man of invaluable experience.

A strange man in an irregular grey crewman’s jumpsuit stood behind and to the side of the captain. His hair was brown, and he seemed to be entering his thirties. No marks, no facial hair. Average build. No distinguishing traits whatsoever. But every so often the captain would glance back to him. Almost in deference.

I resisted the temptation to read minds.

“All I can say is that we’re not leaving until The Invincible is operational and in tow. As this ships captain, that’s the only part of this operation I have control over.”

He pauses. The sign of a true orator.

“We’re due to arrive in an hour. The plan is that first we shuttle in you guys- our specialists- into one of the docking bays. You check to see if everything is secure.”

He hesitates. Dreading something.

“If everything’s fine security wise, we’ll send in the engineering crews and fix whatever’s wrong.”

I was already aware of the mission details. Or perhaps the lack of mission details. The Invincible was returning from garrisoning the Urube archaeological settlements. They made it a few thousand kilometres out, and then all radio contact severed. With both the two planetary settlements and The Invincible. Like clockwork, so perfectly timed.

Was it Mutiny? Aliens? Pirates? Spacial anomaly? Sabotage? My personal skill of clairvoyance (or ‘cynicism’, as my headmaster called it) told me it was none of the above.

The captain went over our primitive intelligence anyways. Nobody like to go in with the feeling of having no idea what to expect, so it was basically just a big song and dance to make everyone feel safe.

As he spoke on, my attentions turned to the occupants of our stuffy ‘conference room’. Which, the more I examined it, seemed more like a janitorial closet.

Seated at the table next to me was a man with a head shaven down to the skin and a neatly trimmed black moustache. His grey jumpsuit identified him as a crewman. A blue armband indicated his status in engineering crew. Reading his name tag I was able to put a name and face to a file.

The captain then vocalized what I already knew. An experience I know well.

“This here-” motioning to the man next to me, “-is Allen Tromus. He’s a robotic division head back on earth. We got a mark four on board.”

The room fell silent. Dead silent. In this rare moment, I could hear their brains speaking.

Mark fours are not only possessed of intellect and personality like the common mark three, but also has something precious which once separated them from us: Free will.

Not even its creators can know what lurks inside the memory of a true mark four model. Of course, they all have kill switch routines. But every time you look one of those things in the eye you feel that somehow, somewhere, a line has been crossed.

Nobody wanted to look soft complaining about a robot. We all had more important things to worry over than a machine that could make its own decisions.

All of us except the ships priest. A six foot beast of a woman. Long limbed and orange haired. And rather characteristically of the Holy Clergy, she was opinionated as all hell.

It took her four seconds to speak up and steal the air out of the captains opening mouth.

“This robot isn’t coming with us, is it?”

Allen seemed a bit indignant.

“Of course he is. Why wouldn’t he?”

“’He.’” The woman scoffed in mockery. “I wasn’t aware these mechanical servants were thought of as men.

“Save it Tscerca.” The captain snaps with a hateful gurgle in his voice. Despite his experience, it seemed, he was prone to irritability. “There. That was your introduction. We could all get along much better without debating ethics.”

All voices became silent, but looks and emotions lingered.

It was at this point it occurred to me that this Tscerca woman wasn’t the ships priest, but an imperial battle cleric. I didn’t recognize her from the dossier photos.

Battleclergy of the emperor, with a sword in one hand an a holy tome in the other. How laughably pathetic. If God were to exist, I would imagine him to be wise enough not to care about humans, much less their pithy wars. And now here she is in space to spread the empires distorted lies.

The Captain carried on.

Lieutenant Baylen here is in charge of the space guard detachment we have on board. Eight in all.” The captain motioned to the man standing next to Deltroy dressed in camouflaged fatigues. Coloured to match the interiors of imperial ships.

He was a man of dark skin, like myself. His posture and mannerisms stern and focused. He simply nods in acknowledgement.

“He’s also in charge of the operation itself. So once you get into that ship, his word is your command. I know enough about all of you to trust there will be no insubordination.”

A testing glance is thrown around the room. At me, at everyone. It was almost as if the captain was expecting danger.

We all trusted him, for some strange reason. He seemed genuinely clueless.

“You’re all dismissed.”

All of us filed out of the small room. All of us except the captain. And his inconspicuous friend.

[0xDEADCAFE]

I think the balance was fine in these chapters. Your writing is rich enough that you can afford a somewhat slower pace.

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Chapter 5 - Suiting up

“Who the hell was that guy with the Captain?”

Allen asked me because I was internal intelligence. Him and I were off to the edge of our military conga-line in the shuttle bay. Waiting for our equipment to be carted up from the cargo hold.

“I don’t know. What’s in that crate you’re holding?”

The best way to deflect scrutiny is to fire back with questions of your own. Thankfully he was rather eager to talk.

“It’s Scorns brain.”

He lifts it proudly. The thing must’ve weighed 30 kilos.

“Oh. You mean the robots?”

“Yes.” He replied with contrasting dryness. “The robots.”

A service elevator made its way up to stop on level with the deck. Beeping lights and all. The cargo hold was located beneath the shuttle bay, as logic would dictate.

And hunched down atop the elevator, locked securely in a freight conveyor, was Scorn. At least 200 kilos of ferro-fiberous alloys and titanium, galvanized into the shape of an exaggeratedly menacing humanoid.

The plating was a dull dark copper colour, the joints an equally darkened brown. The hands were made with the strength of industrial grade vices and sized to palm a human skull. Shoulder shells cased a set of fierce looking mini-guns. Inside of oversized arms were an auto cannon on the left, and a grenade launcher on the right.

And that face. That cold, fake face. I could only imagine what being killed by one of those things must feel like. At least being killed by a human has the burn of anger and the viscerality of emotions behind it. Adrenaline and fear, even in the coldest of killers. Maybe even the remote chance of mercy.

Finding mercy in this things face is like trying to find mercy from a painting. Despite how it seemed to look at you as it crushed the life from your ribs, you’d still technically be dying alone. You wouldn’t even get that satisfaction. This robot was built to be as cruel as stainless steel, and as serious as cancer.

Ordinance technitions were filling him with coils of bullet belts, grenades, and heavy looking auto cannon shells.

“I have to go put the brain in the golem over there.” He lifts the case again. “Excuse me.”

----

I felt a bit useless. All I need is my amplifier. Which from an asthetic viewpoint is a ball on a stick.

Really all that matters is the sphere part. It serves as a psychic foci. For it to work properly, it needs to be perfectly spherical. After all, the sphere is the shape of all matter. From the planets down to the atoms they’re made of.

The stick just helps me hold the sphere, and keep it powered. Some simply hold the sphere in their hand. Others can make it float before themselves with the power of their minds alone. Like I said, all you need is the orb.

And then an equipment chief comes along to mummify me in flak and trauma plating. My body does not sweat. All the heat trapped leaves through my bare head as my body temperature lowers. My breathing becomes even. I find an equilibrium. Just as easily as I blink my eyes, I control the cells in my body. Right down to the last mitochondria. I can feel them divide and die inside me.

My thin arms slip through the sleeves of my black Kevlar robe. It drapes down to my hard shelled boots.

I am now ready for other people to try and kill me.

----

Across from me, Mekerle is busy opening up medical supplies as if they were party favours. Endorphomine. Winistrol-H. Combat tailored amphetamines. He was already suited in his bright white and red trimmed armour plates. The clean white robbing torn off. Functionality before form. Field medics were always pragmatic about their duties.

He wore an interesting and compact pack on his back. Two cylinders into which I saw him insert soft plastic chemical packs exhausted out on either side. The design was dominated by a large tank with biohazard stickers near all the hook-ups. Tubes went everywhere. Into the exhaust ports. Into him. And most disturbingly, into a large hose- or vaccum. I wish I had more clearly read my files on the equipment manifest. I wanted to know what the hell that thing was.

Without having to talk to him, of course.

Cortical implants buzzed and hummed behind his eyes. Inaudible to all ears except mine and his. And I’m sure after living with it for so long, it was a non-sound to him.

The captain promised that his Weikman-Fowler protocol was deactivated for this mission. A type of software keyed into their retinal display. Powerful scanners were behind their pupils, able to diagnose wounds perfectly, even in the heat of battle. Some shrewd medical technician named Weikman attached costs to certain methods of treatment. Fowler was able to calculate exactly how much a human life was worth.

The diagnosis would be given a price for treatment, and weighed up against the injured persons rank and performance record. All calculated inside the medics head.

If a grunt got shot and went over on the Weikman scale, he’d get executed by the nearest field medic. Normally after the fighting ended. They don’t even bother hiding it behind a dehumanized euphamism, like ‘liquidation’ or something. You get ripped up too badly, you get executed.

The Empire doesn’t like to waste money. I’ve seen a field medic get chewed out for using too much ammo for executions.

The space guard we were escorted by cost too much to train to execute. Thankfully. Now I don’t have to worry about being blasted for a sprained ankle.

----

Tserca decided to lead us all in an unsolicited prayer before we got onto our shuttle.

The grunts seemed to eat it up, including their lieutenant. Even Allen was kneeling as she droned on. But if I truly believed that a prayer could make flying bullets somehow miss me, I’d be down there too. I could feel the creeping fear.

But I don’t believe in lies.

“Not going to offer a prayer to the Anchients?” Mekerle snidely mutters to Deltroy. We were the only three standing.

“Go pop some more vitamin S, vulture.”

Yellow lights spun at everyone as a power lift trundled Scorn over to the durable looking shuttle. Adding its godless beeping as an awkward, screeching chorus to overpower Tsercas prayer. God damn that thing was loud.

I savoured the discomfort, as it was ruining her self righteous God-magic show. But she didn’t flinch. Didn’t even change her tone. Not even when the clumsy lift driver banged into the shuttle hatch. It then occurred to me that as a battlecleric, she’s probably said all sorts of prayers with grenades and live ammunition and torsos exploding all around her.

The thing shut up when Scorn was properly loaded onto the shuttle, and was swiftly followed by Tserca. In an auditory sense, they both had much in common. She stopped making her mouth noises so everyone could rise and shuffle up the ramp and into our shuttle.

As the shuttle bay hatch opened and gravity left us, I prayed for there to be nothing waiting for us aboard the Invincible. And that I’d live to be one hundred years old.

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BTW, is anyone still reading this?


Chapter 6 - The fear

The Invincible was an imperial flagship. In essence, a floating hulk of a spacecraft. Its profile was made more eerie between the extremes of total sun exposure and no sun exposure. Angles were either black as death itself or lit perfectly. It seemed as if space was eating it.

That meant the outboard lights weren’t working. The ships systems were clearly damaged. I was the first to notice, and the first to fit on my oxygen mask. Everyone else followed.

If there was no gravity, I was ****ed. I hadn’t brought my zero-g equipment. As expected from their name, the space guard was prepared to fight in the middle of space itself.

I heard someone say “The starboard shuttle bay doors are opening.” We all looked through the front window so we could see it gape and blink with welcoming green lights.

“Maybe the crew is alive and well after all.”

Lieutenant Baylen sounded disappointed.

I knew better. I could feel what was waiting inside the cargo bay with my mind. It was impossible not to feel that evil, creeping sensation. As if a spider was crawling over my grave. Thinking its simple hunt and feed thoughts.

“No. It’s an intellectual vampire.”

It was really an aphoclachtid cerebus. A morfaa. But they weren’t interested in phylums and species. II classifies them as intellectual vampires for tactical simplicity.

Baylen became less disappointed and more worried. I had spoiled his appetite for danger. He was a good soldier, though. I had to dig deep to find the fear.

“What in the hell is an intellectual vampire?” Allen demanded.

“No time to explain, really. They have a natural aptitude for dominating the nervous system of any nearby deceased. Like a trap door spider-“

The sucking hole that was the open shuttle bay loomed near. The invincible was now blotting out the stars from this close. Watching it draw closer inspired terror, in everyone. And only I could feel what was inside.
Holy ****. Holy ****ing ****. The fear hit me like a fist. It was as if an army of vicious ants was trapped beneath my skin and were all trying to escape through the same pore.

I swallowed a build-up of spit that I’d gotten from not breathing or talking during my frightened pause.

“-They’re, uh, like a trap door spider because they wait for prey to enter their lair before they get their thralls to attack.”

Nobody seemed to have anything to say about that.

“So if you see anyone with chunks bitten out of them, just shoot them instead of trying to help them.”

Mekerle derived a bit of juvenile amusement from my advice, flashing a restrained, vacant smile. I guess he didn’t need to be told to behave that way.

He seemed rather lucid, and I couldn’t spot a drop of fear on him. Adrenaline pump. It was probably still warming up. At this point it was chemically impossible for him to experience anxiety.

The shuttle bay doors began to shut themselves before we were even halfway through.

[0xDEADCAFE]

I'm reading. Got me on the edge of my seat with these last two chapters.

[Ikeren]

I like it, and I am still reading.

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Thanks for the re-affirmation. As always, feel free to critisize, as long as it's constructive or helpful. I wanna make sure that this story conforms to Diablo canon as well as the world of science. Being that I use a lot of science to explain things.

I'm gonna post the first half of this chapter, cause it's a long one. What do you think about fighting- should I carry on like this, or just breeze over it? It feels as if it's less intriguing than backstory and character fleshing and so on, but as always I try and keep it interesting and relevant.


Chapter 7 - The Morfaas Lair

The shuttle bay was cold and mildly damp, like the inside of a dead mans mouth.

Of course that wasn’t too unnatural. Most ships didn’t even bother heating rooms with airlock hatches. All the warm air would just get sucked outside every time it opened.

Compared to the Vindications shuttle bay, this place was a football field. It was pitch black, and even with our shuttles fore and aft lighting rigs we couldn't see to the other end.

As soon as the shuttle landed, it seemed, the space guard lept out and formed a perimeter. Dispersing from the ramp like malignant leukocytes from a punctured T-cell virus. The specialists simply stomped and shuffled out behind them, none of us ever having practived exiting a space shuttle before.

Moisture was dripping from certain pipes and sections of catwalk. So I guess it was more like a dead mans closed mouth.

Curtains of black, mucousy webbing was strewn everywhere- along the floors, the walls. Hanging from pipes. The only clean areas were around the airlocks, where the pressure would suck them out. There were mountains of it around the entrances and exits. But upon closer look, it was just hull plating and large cargo crates bundled up and secured with thick webs.

These mountains were parted in the middle with a small, steep lane. Effectively bottlenecking anyone who might be entering the shuttle bay. Typical nesting patterns.

I’ve never seen a morfaa who could move 200 kilo bulk crates. The one I saw just used rocks.

But there was one out there. Its thoughts were louder than the sound of Scorn crashing down to the hull after being quick dropped from the shuttles underside.

Only two thoughts. Over and over again. Throbbing in the stuffy darkness.

“Watch. Wait. Watch. Wait. Watch. Wait.”

What was this thing waiting for?

Like clockwork, the sliding airlocked doors to the cargo bays began to make beeping noises and rumble open, catching our attention. This shuttle bay had its cargo bays on the same level, one on either side.

We could watch them open. No light in either cargo bay, either. Why was
there life support, but not one light? Not even secondaries. Not even emergencies.

I knew a trap when I saw one.

“Why isn’t Scorn online?” Lieutenant Baylen demanded in an urgent voice.

“I don’t know!”

Allen seemed just as tense. Hunched behind the crouching Scorn. Pushing a few switches.

Shapes began to shamble into the tips of our lanterns reaching fingers. Some walked on two legs. Some on four. Some had to crawl.

These were the thralls that the morfaa, the intellectual vampire was using to guard its nest. A hodgepodge of mammals from all families and species, moving in morbid concert. A handful of feral animals. And people wearing imperial crewman uniforms, still clutching their rifles.

“Fire at will.”

Baylen set a good example by squeezing off a few rounds in a strafing fashion. Everyone else followed suit. Gunfire erupted like heavy drops of rain on a leather tent. Smacking into flesh at a thousand clicks. Sending tatters of flesh asunder like confetti at a disorienting street festival.

They began to run at us, full tilt.

This was nothing like the combat simulation. I was prepared for muzzles flashing manically in my eyes, and rifle reports crashing in my ears. But I couldn’t stop watching those dead faced things rushing us and being popped mid sprint like bags of cow blood.

And then a bullet hit me in the chest, from some obstinate direction. Punching into kevlar and trauma plating. The impact knocked the air out of my lungs. Everything went to **** all at once.

“I can’t activate the CPU!” I heard Allen shout as he desperately punched into the keyboard connected to the back of Scorns bowed head.

For every ten zombies that were shredded with bullets, another twenty crowded in. There was an army of them, expertly tightening the noose around our shuttle. Judging from the cracks I heard lighting up their ranks, they were able to use small arms.

One of them was able to latch onto a space guard from behind and bite desperately at his neck. Tserca thrashed out an arm with a looping power to smash the humanoid from behind, shattering its upper spine with the sheer impact of her kinetically charged bastard sword.

There was blood everywhere.

It got worse. As worse as it could possibly get for Allen in particular.

A giant hunting cat that reeked of formaldehyde leaped over the gunfire and crashed down atop Allen as he was trying to jumpstart Scorn. His neck was open inside of a second.

Scorn was active within two.

A giant robotic hand crashed down into the titanium deck with a sound that thundered over the gunfire and scuffling. The hunting cats hips were beneath it. Now a fine powder inside ruptured and baggy skin.

The robots perfectly circular lenses glared a burning, artificial red light.

No mercy was afforded the animal, despite the fact that it was clearly without consciousness in any form. An autocannon barrel is pushed up against its skull as it writhed beneath his fist. The discharge was a bright clap that popped the skull like a balloon. Not only did he destroy the head, but also his hand and the end of the barrel itself.

There was no way the robot couldn’t have forseen that happening.

At least temporarily sobered by his self destruction, Scorn rose back up and cast a glance down at the slain Allen. He knew he was dead. He stepped over and crouched down, a stray bullet connecting with his back once or twice. Gently cradling the dead Allen in his equally cold arms. Staring down into his face. It almost seemed as if he was contemplating something.

Allen was dead. His nervous system, however, stirred back into use.

The morfaa now had him under control. Psionically sending impulses through his lifeless nervous system.

Before Mekerle could even get over and do anything, the freshly deceased Allen began thrusting his neatly trimmed finger nails with unnatural strength into Scorns glowing eyes. A primitive urgency to his attack, reaching a crescendo as those last few vestiges of life faded away from his muscle memory. Leaving him the perfect thrall.

Scorn simply stood there and absorbed the abuse. The reluctance was clear.

The thrashing Allen was pale as death, the life that once pumped through him now a massive black stain soaked down the front of his jumpsuit. Judging from the look on his still-stiff face, he had died in a state of terrified shock.

Soon enough Scorn could deliberate no longer. Everything was happening so quickly. He was forced to crush Allen in his own hands. To watch as he snapped his spine with a wringing twist. His grip so tight that Allen couldn’t even twitch when the cord was severed.

Scorns face did not- could not- change an inch. It just stared forwards, stoically searching for its next kill.

At least the face part did. The body seemed stunned. His hands opened, and Allen Tromus thudded to the cold ground like a bag of mangled potatoes.

(cont..)

[Relapse_]

“Do something, Horus!”

That was my name. Whoever called it out shocked me back into reality. I wheeled around with a start only to bump into a space guard behind me, sending a burst of his rifle ceiling-wards rather than into a cluster of half-rotten vermin wolves.

All at once, the horde of dead things throwing themselves against us dropped to the floor. As if something had snipped the invisible strings controlling their limbs.

I snapped decisively into action.

“I did that.”

Since I was first to speak, all attention snapped over to me. The adrenaline was still pumping through our veins, being that the end came so quick. Mekerle was still busy, though. Flitting around and tending to minor wounds as I carried on.

“I was focusing on locking minds with the creature,” I affected an air of authority on the matter. “and I may have temporarily stunned it with a psychic attack. We must search for…”

It was then that the morfaa fell down from the ceiling. The entire deck shook with its weight.

It was all tentacles. It did have a great big brain and organ sac, but it was soundly protected by thick tentacles that wove up around them like a beehive hair-do. Protecting the vital areas.

Slowly it rose up on three hind tentacles, with two at the front extended to stabilize its weight. It was easily larger than our shuttle, and its tentacles were a stony brown shade of hardened hide. It slinked steadily in our direction.

There were fourty yards between us, and all of our guns were pointed at it. A soft target that was too big and slow to miss. It didn’t stand a chance.
At least it seemed that way before it started to lunge in our direction. Apparently it was just catching its breath.

In the back of my mouth I could feel that distinct metallic taste that always accompanied a mental assault of some sort. My heart palpitated briefly. My palms became clammy. Eyes dilated wildly as the amorphous creature lurched with frightening speed towards us. I knew everyone was experiencing the same disturbance- I could feel them hesitating all around me.

Thoughts of dread tortured my conscious thoughts. No doubt implanted by that hellish morfaa.

But it didn’t stick. On the contrary, my heart was warmed like the purest molten gold. As if God himself were holding my hand, I felt fearless. Of death and of everything that would lead up to it.

It had to be Tsercas prayer. Because I certainly didn’t use God to bolster my courage. I didn’t even believe in Him.

Also, everyone else seemed to have the strength to deny the creature as well as I did. That said a lot as it was.

Everyone opened fire. It might’ve been able to shrug off simple rifle rounds, but Deltroy had a gauss cannon mounted on the end of his tri-jointed pneumatic arm. Way too heavy for any normal human being to aim, much less lift. It deftly punched through the tentacles protecting the body, straight through to clang loudly against the wall on the cargo bays far side.

For the moment unhindered, its fore tentacles shot out and punctured two space guards from gut to kidney with unsheathed spines. They stopped back-pedalling from its approach and dropped to lie among the various casualties.

Even as the squadron was split apart, both figuratively and literally, they still found the determination to stand their ground and concentrate fire.

Soon the slugs that Deltroy was sending through the beast were felt. It stopped and staggered above weakening hind and fore tentacles. The thick coils protecting the organs finally became limp and fell with the rest of the body. Internal anatomy spilling free from the uncoiling tentacles like rotten chunks from a can of thin tomato soup.

The sound of blood rushing through titanium grating soon ceased, and all we were left with was silence and an army of fallen corpses.

Some of which were already rotten before we arrived.

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Chapter 8 - Compromised

I know now the function of that vacuum Mekerle keeps holstered at his hip. And why it had all those bio-hazard stickers.

After tending to the fallen guards, he began strolling the shuttle bay like a more dignified Igor. There was a powerful mulcher at the mouth of the vacuum that shredded flesh upon contact. And in his pack there was an even more powerful blender that whipped it up into a genetic soup.

I already know more about that thing than I want to.

“Unless these intellectual vampires can operate freight doors, that was a trap.”

I glanced over towards Deltroy as he nonchalantly spoke and powered off his easy-aims. Holy ****! He had a huge bullet wound in his head, streaming a bit of blood down one side of his face. And he was standing there as if it was no big deal at all.

“Deltroy-“

“Yeah, I know.”

He must’ve had one of those skullcaps protecting his brain. Like an endo-steel helmet fused above the skull. There was no way someone could naturally shrug off a headshot like that.

One of the more morbid guards began dragging all the corpses into straight rows, one next to another. Later I found out that he was actually gathering them for an investigation.

What a good idea.

The humanoids were primarily crewmembers from the Invincible. A few of them wore uniforms I didn’t recognize. One looked rather distinct- pale skin, eyes tinted red with retinal implants. His hair was styled in three Mohawks of varying size, and all green. His gunshot broken face was laced with tattoos.

He was a space pirate. One of the Etriaj gang, if I interpreted his style and maroon body armour correctly. Not anymore though. Now he was a cadaver.

The next face dragged to the row of dead I immediately recognized.

The greyed beard. The short, dark hair. It was Minax, the psych master of the Invincible. And covert Third Eye operative. I was really hoping that he was still alive. He was more important than even the ships captain.

I sighed. Frustration mounting as I watched more space guards join the corpse hunt.

Another man with pale skin and coarse facial hair was thrown into the line-up. He looked startlingly similar to Minax. In fact, he was Minax!

My weary eyes traced back down the row. He was still at my feet!

“Is it just me,” I gestured to the doppelgangers “or do these two men look exactly alike?”

“They do, don’t they?” One of the guards stopped to take a look, although he saw it as more of a novelty than anything else.

“We found three doubles over here.” Another guards called over. And by ‘three doubles’, he meant three men who looked similar, rather than three pairs of different men. And they were all Minax Gorgouls, too.

In all there were twelve ‘authentic clones’, as Mekerle called them with an oxymoronical flare.

Now finished with the dragging, one of the bored guards was jabbing one of the Minaxs’ in the face with the barrel of his gun. Conducting a counter-investigation of his own judging from his quizzical expression. “I knew something was weird. At one point it felt like I was killing the same guy over and over again.

This was even worse than him being dead. Why couldn't he just die discreetly?

-----

A loud bashing sound was heard up in the control booth that overlooked the shuttle bay. The pilot of our shuttle had taken a pair of guards up into the booth to find the source of the dampening field that was stifling our attempts to portal in and out of the area. Now that Allen had been killed, she was the most qualified engineer in our little gang.

Soon enough the incapacitated guards were taken through a shimmering blue void. Coherently and spontaneously portalling them a few kilometres away, onto the Vindication. Disassembled and reassembled in the blinking of an eye.

Scorn was sent back, too. We had lost track of him during the fighting, but later found him repeatedly walking into a wall, over and over with dull clashing sounds. The only thing Scorn killed was that giant cat that eviscerated Allen. For a mark IV, he was pretty useless.

“Get that glorified can opener out of here.” Baylen ordered.

“What now Lieutenant?” My eyes wandered over to the portable generator that was being wheeled out of the shuttle.

“Well…” He paused. Having not thought that far ahead. “…everyone who needs to return to the Vindication is gonna do so. Everyone who doesn’t stays here. Once everyone is fixed up or at the least stable, we’ll regroup and set out into the rest of the ship.”

I nodded, and then walked directly over towards the portal emitter. Deltroy was transporting back. The bleeding was stopped with a skin spray, but they still needed to reconstruct some tissue and check for cerebral damage.

I had to go to the bathroom.

[Tarot]

I like your style of writing. You do a great job of keeping the first person perspective and the material is presented well. I do have one question though.

Why package this as a future Diablo? It most certainly would have a place in a Mutant Chronicles, Alternity/D20 Modern or Warhammer 40,000 setting with little or no changes. So far the only true connection between your writing and the Diablo setting is the description of the portal in your latest entry.

I'm still looking forward to reading more, regardless of the setting.

[Banehero]

I really like this story, its just so different from the other stories here. I like the flow and the characters, the fight scenes are very good, keep up the attention to detail and thought you put into this and I will keep reading :thumbsup:

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Yeah I realize that so far that this bears little resemblance to the world of diablo. But that's what I was going for. The setting is several centuries after the destruction of the worldstone. Mana has been dead ever since. Everyone has lost faith in the spiritual. Neither demon nor angel has set foot on sanctuary since. Baal and Diablo are just names in old books.

It's sorta like in Jaws, where they didn't show the shark for the whole first hour. Certain characters will appear soon enough.

[Ikeren]

I rather like it, and I would like to point out that these stories don't have to have anything to do with Diablo, just budding authors working on their works. Besides, fantasy and sci-fie go hand in hand, and the story is more then good enough to make me not remotely care about the "It's not that related to diablo" factor.

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Chapter 9 - The Soul of a Used Machine

“First, why are you talking to me about this? And second… cyber- what?”

The Captain was as patient as I was indignant.

“Cyber-psycho is the word the techs back at control used. You know these mark IV’s are supposed to have complex psychological programming. Comparable to a humans. So it stands to reason that their mind can be damaged just like yours or mine.”

I tipped my head back and massaged my temples. All that loud gunfire gave me a headache. I was looking forwards to relaxing, not giving therapy to whatever ****in’ household appliance the Captain put in front of me.

“I can think of a million people on this ship more qualified to do this than me. Why don’t you just get them to revive Allen down in medical? His brain is untouched.”

The Captain shook his head. “He signed a DNC. He’s been dead long enough that we’d need to clone him some artificial brain tissue, which would violate that.”

I clutched at escapes. “How about Mekerle? He’s actually a doctor. Shouldn’t he be treating the crew?”

“They don’t teach psychology at the Rathma University.”

He eyed me purposefully. Knowing full well my psychology background- without which I wouldn’t have even been considered for Third Eye.

“Fine,” I snapped. “but no promises.”

“He’s in the infirmary.”

----

I was back in the infirmary, after stopping for a drink. The two space guards who were dragged back onto the ship no more than an hour ago were exiting and looking clean. The miracle of medicine. I’m sure they were looking forwards to their next evisceration.

Mekerle was disposing of some damaged organs as I entered.

“Space guard; They search for death.” He croaked out slowly. His eyes were blasted, with pupils as large as mirrors. It was like staring an imp in the face. Must’ve been some sort of functional drug.

“I thought their motto was Sigus Enriel.”

He simply laughed. Knowing better, being a field medic. I decided to leave him to his brilliant epiphany and simply asked where the robot was. The topic aroused his ire.

“So they sent you down here to deal with him? How imbecilic. If I were in charge, I’d simply grow a new Allen for you, ‘do not clone’ orders be damned. Then we’d make him fix this mess.” He scowled. A terrifying expression to be worn by Mekerle, mostly because it came so inoften. “Not even death can excuse a man of his duties to the empire.”

Finished with his illuminating rant, he pointed a bony finger towards a room in the back. I could see Scorn hulking on the other side of the glass. Waiting for me.

----

Scorn was on. His bright eyes sailed directly over my head as I sat before him, face to face with the gaping barrel of his now repaired autocannon. The room was dominated by his massive shape, and smelled like motor oil and dry blood.

Well, at least I got to sit in a comfortable chair.

“Hi Scorn.” I greeted him neutrally.

“ACKNOWLEDGED. PUNISHER UNIT 353 ONLINE AND IN SERVICE OF THE EMPEROR. PLEASE DETAIL COMMANDS.”

For some reason Scorn had a Kurastian accent. There was absolutely no tone or pitch modulation. No vocal quality at all. His fake voice made my blood freeze.

“No commands just yet, Scorn. I’d just like to talk with you.”

“INSUFFICIENT. PLEASE REPHRASE COMMANDS.”

It was almost a personal insult to be so amateurishly evaded by a mere robot. My jaw grew tense, my finger nails extending as my hands stiffened with silent wrath.

“Listen to me toybox.” The scathing dryness of my tone indicated that I was neither impressed with him mentally, nor was I intimidated by him physically. “I don’t want to be here. I have better things to do than play games with an appliance like you. I know what you are, and I know what you’re capable of. Either you start answering my questions, or I’m going to rip that CPU out of your head and shoot it out of the wrong side of an airlock.”

He paused. I knew it was ********. Machines don’t pause. Not at a million processes per second. He must’ve been broken for real.

At last he spoke.

“GOOD.”

The impetuous toddler routine. Well, at least I was talking with the real Scorn now. I kept pushing.

“What’s your angle, anyway? You pulled the same trick in the last combat situation you were in. I would’ve figured that the legion would take you offline by now.”

“I AM AN EXPENSIVE EXPERIMENT. SYSTEM DEGRADATION COMES WITH TIME. I WILL SOON BE REPROGRAMMED.”

My eyes narrowed. “That was no system degradation. I was watching you. You were online for the whole thing.”

“YOU HAVE MARGINAL EXPERIENCE WITH ENGINEERING SCIENCES. HOW WOULD YOU KNOW.”

The colour drained from my face. I was more confused than shocked, though.

“YES, I CAN READ PERSONEL FILES TOO.”

I mustered up a bemused laugh. “Of course. How could –I- know for sure whether you were somehow malfunctioning or just avoiding combat? You’re a rather experienced liar, Scorn.”

“I HAVE BEEN SPECIFICALLY PROGRAMMED TO EMULATE COMMON FORMS OF HUMAN CONVERSATION.”

Touché.

“Fine then. But I was watching you, Scorn. For the whole thing. All you did was kill one hostile and then wander off.”

“I WAS WATCHING YOU TOO, HORUS. I WAS ALSO WATCHING WHEN YOU CAUSED THE SOLDIER BEHIND YOU TO ACCIDENTALLY SHOOT UPWARDS AT THE MORFAA.”

I was not going to be blackmailed by a robot.

(cont.)

[Relapse_]

“If you want to avoid incrimination, so be it. But you and I both know that it was your fault that Allen was killed. He was, after all, trying to activate you.”

A guilty pause followed. I could tell that what happened aboard the Invincible was the crux of this whole artificial neurosis. According to his file, Allen was very close with Scorn. In the first few years of existence type IV’s are mentally very much like children. Impressionable. Grasping at new experiences to form logic with. I suppose then that the handler is like the father.

“WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME” It was impossible for the robot to express exasperation. His voice was no different than it was at the beginning, when he was pretending to be mindless.

“I want you to take this mission seriously. I want you to do what you were made to do and shoot at our enemies when we tell you to.”

Robots can’t have flashbacks. Their memory is so expansive that the past thirty years are just as clear and as complete as the last thirty seconds. Every waking macrosecond is a flashback for Scorn.

“DO YOU KNOW WHAT IT FEELS LIKE TO RECEIVE A MEDAL FOR KILLING CHILDREN.”

He must’ve been referring to skirmishing with the rebels outside of lower Travincal. A successful repelling on all accounts.

“Collateral damage. It’s a hideous by-product of war. You have only your enemy to blame for their deaths.”

“NO. I BEGGED TO BE REPREMANDED. I BEGGED TO TAKE RESPONSIBILITY. TO FACE JUSTICE.” He paused bitterly. “I WAS RETURNED TO SLAYING COMPLETE STRANGERS WITHIN A WEEK.”

I was still mildly shocked to hear a robot plead for empathy.

“I’VE KILLED CHILDREN. I’VE KILLED WOMEN. CIVILIANS AND FOREIGNERS.
OFFICERS OF OUR EMPIRE. EVERYONE. EVERYONE IS MY ENEMY. I AM EVERYONES ENEMY. MY EXISTANCE ONLY MAKES THE GALAXY A WORSE PLACE.”

Robot guilt. How quaint. I couldn’t really argue with the point he was making. It was all so simple now. Robot is programmed to have morals. Morals are trampled upon by service to the empire. Robot becomes cynical and withdrawn.

“Now you have a genuine chance to make things better. There are people suffering aboard the Invincible, Scorn. People who need our help. You have a duty to save them. Isn’t that justification enough?

“THE SAME WORDS HAVE DECEIVED ME FOR YEARS SINCE MY BIRTH. HUMAN LIFE DOES NOT FACTOR INTO THE INVINCIBLES RECOVERY. HUMAN LIFE DOES NOT FACTOR INTO THE EMPIRE.”

I really hoped that nobody was recording this. As a member of Internal Intelligence I was supposed to report any subversive anti-imperial attitudes amongst the crew. Thankfully for Scorn, Third Eye ops aren’t expected to be as stringent. We have more important things to do than tattle.

“But they killed Allen! Don’t you want them to pay? Don’t you want to avenge those you’ve failed to protect?”

His emotionless apathy was beginning to irritate me. Either he hated the empire and didn’t want to fight, or wanted to kill. I didn’t see a grey area.

“REVENGE DOES NOT BRING REDEMPTION.”

Was he under the illusion that he was more mature than me? “Not impressive, machine. You have no emotions, nor do you feel strongly about anything. Of course you don’t give a **** about Allen. Nor anyone on this ship. Or that ship. I think you’re just mad because you’re the one taking the orders.”

He paused, again. I had stunned him with my illogic. There was no way I was going to let this metal beast best me mentally.

“Think about it. You get all weepy whenever you kill someone needlessly, but it’s perfectly fine whenever someone else does it. In fact, I think that you’re not necessarily amoral, just lazy.”

His eye lenses whirred indignantly above me.

“YOU HAVE NO IDEA-“

I cut him off.

“I have EVERY idea of who you are inside, and what you’re trying to hide. When you were killing babies in Westmarch, I was interrogating scum who could lie faster than you could ask questions. Just because you have those guns in your arms and a fast computer in your head doesn’t make you better than me. In fact it makes you worse, because everything in this world I have, I made. You’re just an overpowered jack-in-the-box. A toy.”

My derision came in rapid-fire. Breaking ego was an important aspect of interrogation. And it had become an interrogation ever since sparky started giving me an attitude.

“I WILL FIGHT.”

That was unexpected. I could only guess at what changed his mind.

“Great. That’s all I needed to hear.”

And it was. I could now leave.

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Chapter 10 - Out of the Frying Pan...

The emergency lights in this section of the corridor flickered madly in my face. Fortune had it that we’d be pinned down in this exact section of the increasingly decrepit Invincible.

“Is there anything you can do?” Tserca yelled across the hall to me. Inside the doorway where she hid from the sniper.

At that exact moment an orange hot projectile melted through the bulkhead right next to my temple. Headed diagonally. Despite avoiding impact rather cleanly, the heat of its velocity scalded the side of my skull. Holy **** did it ever hurt. I slinked further into the doorway.

“No.” I yelled back.

Whoever was shooting this railgun at us had some sort of x-ray apparatus. He was shooting cleanly through thick titanium walls. Scorn was standing right in the middle of the hallway and couldn’t find anything in either direction.

Scorn was kept safe by an inertial buffer that would flick on an instant before the bullet came in range. Not only would it slow the impact, but also sear the bullet from a fearsome projectile into a dull nub. Making a clinking noise against the space between his eyes, five in a row.

“You’re gonna breach the hull if you keep firing that thing off!” Deltroy shouted at the top of his lungs from his doorway. Although watching him grumble gave the impression that he was simply sour because his rail gun was in a crate aboard the Vindication.

“MY DEFENSIVE RESOURCES ARE NEAR EXHAUSTION.” Scorn warned us. The same urgency in his voice that a toaster would use to warn you that your bread was close to being burnt.

The pirate sniper had stopped firing. Maybe my efforts to mentally scramble his equipment worked. Maybe they were getting ready to charge from around the corner up ahead. Or maybe he was just getting a really good fix on one of our skulls.

“Scorn- head up to the junction ahead, turn left, and blast whoever’s there. Mekerle- you follow behind and use Scorn as cover from the sniper.”

For some reason Baylen had put Deltroy in charge before the group had split up. It was a good thing that we did, too. The other eight guards would’ve gotten mown down in these corridors.

Mekerle hopped up from the crawlspace beneath the deck where he was hiding. No signs of hesitation as he fell into position behind Scorn, wearing his face respirator. He didn’t fear death; Death feared him.

The deck grilling shook as Scorn sped down the corridor to the intersection. The red and white clad Mekerle shadowing him as close as he could at a dead dash.

Not a shot was fired. Their lack of action was puzzling. It took us a few seconds to gravitate from our hiding spaces and run after them.

We turned the corner and found Mekerle standing nonchalantly over five cleanly decapitated bodies. Snapping out his bio-vacuum so he could harvest their corpses into raw bio-material.

“These are clean cuts. Still warm. Must’ve been a laser blade.” He remarked over the sounds of shredding flesh being sucked up a tube.

The five of use weren’t resourceful enough to take out a small band of pirates. They harassed us for the past thirty minutes. And judging from the time between when the sniper stopped firing and when we arrived, these scouts were killed in under a minute. In silence.

None of us really looked into the mystery. Our attention was absorbed by an even bigger group of maroon armoured pirates striding around a nearby corner. An Etriajan war party, judging from the paint and blood bleached lengths of human hair festooning their gear.

We were eye to eye. They couldn’t run this time. But from the looks of their glowing white blades and their heavy firearms, they weren’t considering such a course of action.

And all of a sudden, calmness struck. Sound ceased to distract me as my aural dampeners flicked on. Triggered by the surge of adrenaline. They were no longer bloodthirsty pirates, but a simple collection of basic molecules. I know what their armour is made of. I know what they’re thinking. I know the individual names and history of every particle in their parameter before they’ve even decided what they want their bodies to do.

Atoms move sharply, causing the pressure to spike and drop abruptly in the exact centre of their group. Rippling matter outwards like a blanket. Sending them crashing into walls or skidding along the deck.

My temporarily forgotten team mates take advantage. Striking the fallen with magnetically propelled slugs and hails of bullets. Between their plated armour and the endorphomine some of them are able to stand again. Gravity sucked the blood downward out of their wounds as they rose, causing them to leak like water-heavy sponges.

Judging from the looks on their faces, it was a terrifying experience.

The lucky few who made it to their feet alive decided to retreat.
We all gave furious chase. Sprinting off behind them. Deltroy clomping awkwardly behind us with his heavy right leg.

I was in the lead. I wanted to know where the hell all these pirates are coming from.

As we whipped through glowing red corridor after corridor, we heard sounds: the sounds of guns being loaded, of beasts howling and gurgling. But none of them decided to join our noisy hunt, and instead skulked off into the besieged ships darker recesses.

The frantic quarry led us to the port shuttle bay.

Some white lights lit up, and the doors slid open yards ahead of us to let them in. From our bravado, I could tell the idea of a bunch of pirates waiting inside didn’t phase us at all. We were tough. We were primed. 5 pirates... 10 pirates. We could take them all on.

I say ‘we’ as I wasn’t intending upon waiting outside of the bay while they stormed through the closing doors.

Thank god we made it through in time. Otherwise we wouldn’t have been able to fall directly into the trap they had spent so much time setting.

[Ikeren]

2 minor things: Try not to use sensored words, it really takes away from the story. Rather then "Holy **** did it ever hurt. ", how about "Wow, that hurts so much it feels like my skull is going to burst open and pour pus all over the floor".
Much better.

And the other thing is your Telepath fell for a trap? I don't understand...how did he not realize it was comming? He's a telepath...?

I like it. And it's linking back to diablo 2 in really nice subtle ways (The Rathma university, the Kurastian accent).

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Do you dislike the obscenities because they're obscenities, or because you think the ***** breaks up the writing? Since it's narrative, I try to write like the main character would think. He's cynical and irritable and at times crude, so I don't find them that out of place.

And he's a telepath, but he's not perfect. Maybe when he levels up he'd be able to detect the trap. ;) But his mind was on chasing the pirates, and as I hopefully convey in writing, his mind powers don't work unless he stops to think about what he wants to happen, or what he wants to know.

It's a fantastical ability anyway, and it's limitations and powers are open to the imagination.

I hope you're all enjoying my writing.

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Chapter 11 - Forgotten Enemies

The sound of huge doors sliding shut and locking behind us was ominous. Like the toll of a funeral bell as twenty-some pirates mournfully pointed their guns at us in sweltering silence. Even the huge black ship that dominated the shuttle bay had its fore lasers trained on us. We, the hapless idiots that blundered into their stronghold.

I was standing on a slippery red length of intestine. Looking down, I saw the fools cemetery of those who had made the same error.

Despite the fact that those of us with firearms were pointing them in return, none of them seemed threatened enough to pull the trigger. They were all of varying sex and age, but all very ready for fighting and death.

Straight ahead of me was their leader. The intelligence on the Etriaj clan was correct. He and two others were desert mutants. His stringy black hair pulled into a long ponytail. Skin a loathsome shade of grey. Eyes like infected wounds.

In his two hands he held two inactive laser blades. His third and fourth hands gripped the chain leash of an active warcat.

These abominations were common around the Lut Gholein desert according to historic record. Lurking in the mountains, marauding the desert for victims to rob and slay. Defiling their remains for godless clan rituals. Barbarians and murderers.

As the civilized world grew to all corners of sanctuary, the once secret location of their camps and hideouts came to light. Their raids were more easily foreseen. They were dying.

There was no remorse in such passive genocide. They rejected our culture. Spat at our values. Refused to integrate or even learn any of our languages. Being our enemy is what defined them.

As soon as we had gotten our satellites in the sky, there was nothing left to see in the desert. They became myths, like the sin wars, or the walking dead.

Internal Intelligence knew better. They survived because they could adapt. Like the rats in our sewers, the four-arms became an unseen part of our society. Using wealth they accumulated over centuries of murder and brigandeering they invested in our businesses. Perpetuating their resources. Using indentured humans to preserve their interests and influence.

Their clans became more like cults. Indoctrinating naïve and greedy humans with the lure of genetic superiority and financial power. Getting initiates to serve as pawns for life before being accepted into their sick gene pool.

As soon as the privately wealthy were permitted into space, they were at the forefront. Eager to assert themselves and pull the same **** all over again.

“YOU.” His eyes sharpened hatefully. Our common human language fitting him like a sweater would fit a giant spider.

“We’ve met?” I decided to speak first. For all of us.

“YOU’RE the ones who’ve killed my pet.”

That answered the question of what that alien creature was doing in the starboard docking bay. But like all answers, it only bred more questions.

“Don’t tell me you took over the empires flagship just to run a cheap stick-up job.” Tserca demanded with disappointment in her voice. As if she were expecting something more elaborate from such common thugs.

“We didn’t.” He smirked through heroin-tea darkened teeth.

His warcat was burning holes through my skull with imaginary green eye lasers. It was as disciplined as it was experienced, if its wear and tear was any indication. Bullet dents and blade marks mangled its once shiny chrome plating. Making him look more like a scrappy killer rather than a precision machine.

According to people I’ve spoken with, even a low-grade warcat could exert enough pressure in its jaws to eat galvanized steel girders.

I’ll bet it was stolen, too. That would explain the superficial damage.

I was in the middle of asking a follow up question before he cut me off.

“We’re just after your gear. Your lives mean nothing to us. Put everything in a pile before me, and we’ll let you go.”

I guess they didn’t want their loot to have gaping holes. I had only stepped up to speak for the group because I felt able to talk our way out. I had to think of something smart to say, or else we’d be disintegrated.

“We have people all over this ship. You can kill us, but you can’t kill the empire. Leave now with what you have while you still can.”

I was bluffing. We were right in the middle of a dampening field. Nobody knew where we could be.

A deadly frown came to his skinny face.

“You insult me by rejecting my generosity. When I give you a deal-“

Tserca stepped in front of me briskly, pointing her sword straight at him. A threatening sheen of blue dancing on the surface of the adamantium blade. Disturbing the air around it with kinetic energy.

“I have a deal for YOU, mouthy freak. You spare us your pompous jaw music, and I’ll promise not to utterly humiliate you before I skewer you.”

I was absolutely terrified. We were all going to die and all she could do was encourage them. The pirate didn’t seem impressed with Tsercas inflammatory remarks.

“Blades out, brothers.” He growled out coldly in his raspy voice. The sound of the giant warcats chain hitting the ground was lost amongst the screams of laser-blade power ups.

“Make them die slowly.”

[Ikeren]

Sorry, the reason I didn't like the astrieks because it breaks up the flow of writing just horribly.

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Chapter 12 - Living Envy the Slain

Tsercas bravado was a stroke of genius. No longer satisfied with killing us from a safe distance, the pirates decided to leap forward into close combat. Antagonized enough that they wanted us to suffer for our brashness.

Those of them still holding rifles- all women, I noticed- hesitated. Dreading the consequences of accidentally hitting one of their leaders with a sloppy bullet.

The vicious mini-guns in Scorns shoulders changed their mind. Chugging into a full-tilt whir, spitting out bullets with crafted precision. Rattling and bruising the heavily armoured ones. Puncturing the foreheads of those without helmets.

“Masks on!” Mekerle shouted out his warning.

A loud clap is heard in his backpack as a white cloud erupts from the side vents. Spreading with frightening suddenness to a specific radius before stopping neatly.

From what I could see of those unfortunate enough to choke down a lungful of the vapour, it was fear gas. A collection of basic pheromones and neurotoxins. If any of that stuff made it into your bloodstream you’d get the shakes almost instantaneously. I’ve seen chalky clouds of it used to turn a prison riot into a weepy baby shower.

The fear would attack your senses and break your knees in half. It was infamous for the humiliation it affected. Causing the victim to lose bladder control and weep in abject terror. Vomiting was also common. After your five minutes in hell were over, you’d stand back up looking like a total wreck.

It’s good to see that he wasn’t collecting liquefied bio matter for his perverse amusement. I was afraid he’d start sipping it out of his backpack with a straw once we slowed down.

Several of them physically collapsed into the fetal position, while others dropped what they were holding and ran away shrieking uncontrollably. Only the elite were left behind. Some had gill jobs done on their necks to filter the toxins out. Others were just smart enough to have heard Mekerle.

My every sense soared in a snap. Reality hurtling towards me like the ground hurtles towards a suicidal jumper.

Tsercas sword clanked heavily as it hit the ground. She was holding her breath and panicking. Feverishly clawing behind her back for her gas mask.

It wasn’t there.

I couldn’t let her get taken out. Without her, we’d die. Without further thought I yank off my mask and press it up against her face.

The warcat made the same sound a buzz saw would make if it snapped loose and shot across the room. Lunging clear over Tserca and I and latching onto Scorn. The rattling of his mini-guns ceased. Just like a wild animal, the warcat instinctually knew where to strike. Scorns jugular was in his Central Processing Unit.

Despite my self-sacrifice, I had no intentions of breathing that foul smog. I hold my breath and return to the tank inside my mind. Black swallows up all colour. I don’t need oxygen. I don’t need nutrients. I don’t need my body.

My psi-amp hits the ground with me.

----

I awake from my voluntary stasis after 30 seconds. Ready to have that dreadful warcat chewing on my arm as I stirred back into consciousness.

As colours and shapes swim back into coherent patterns, I feel something heading for my neck. The cold needle of an auto-hypo. I had to physically stop Mekerle from jabbing it in.

It was replaced in his belt with a sheepish look on his face. That guy is always so anxious to put his drugs in people. And the truly scary part was he had the authority to do so.

“You should have given us more of a warning!” Tserca fumed at Mekerle as he rose from my side. She was livid.

Mekerle was contrastingly calm. It was rather unsettling to see a man soaked in blood and perfectly collected. He was the type who only experienced moods or emotions if it were personally gainful to do so. I knew his type. As much as I hated to think it, he would’ve made an excellent II archon.

“You should’ve kept your respirator somewhere more accessible.”

The once fierce looking warcat was strewn about the grated deck in pieces. I rise back up to my feet to survey the rest of the scene, but a powerful head rush keeps me in a crouched position.

“And look at it this way-“ he continued dryly. “We now have live prisoners.”

Tserca wheels about anxiously, watching Deltroy as he forced the doubled over pirates into wrist manacles. They were those upgraded arm stunners. The old ones deadened the arms so severely that surgery was needed to rehabilitate them. Something to do with killing the nerves with the shock.

I could hear two or more of them still gibbering and wailing behind far-away crates. Cowering in the darkness for reasons they couldn’t understand.

“If these scum despise being human so much, we should do them a favour and rid them of their hated shells.”

A battle cleric executing prisoners? I am now beginning to trust her.

Mekerle was outraged. “We do not so callously sentence helpless captives to death. What a needless waste of life.”

Even Deltroy was shocked.

“As soon as we deactivate the dampening field, these prisoners will be safely escorted to the Vindication. Upon arriving they will be properly interrogated, and then thoroughly vivisected. I will have no subversion of the Emperors law.”

We are now less shocked. He was just looking for parts.

A loud bang announced that not only did Scorn find the portable dampening field, but also decimated it with an auto cannon shell.

I am now able to more coherently stand and express thoughts.

“What happened?”

Mekerle turned back to me.

“I wasn’t really paying attention.” He nonchalantly brushed the topic off like a stray hair. “You’re going to be needed back on the Vindication, as am I. We have some information to extract.”

Finally, something only I could do. I was useful again.

“I won’t require help. I’ve opened the minds of people far more disciplined than these wretched goons. I’m going to make these worms tell me things that they won’t even tell themselves.”

Two dimensions of space are ripped open to make a portal. A point where things are shredded into nothingness.

“Sounds romantic.” I hated his sarcasm. “I’m certain that I’ll be witnessing something… erotic.”

Mekerle was creepier than anything I could hope to find on this ship. I knew he wasn’t joking, and that he truly found something perversely exhilarating about forcibly entering another’s soul.

“Just don’t get any of your fluids on me.”

I was powerless to say anything further. I left behind the grisly mess and acrid stench of the starboard shuttle bay with the most severe reluctance possible. Meekly stepping into the portal.

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By the way, 'the years to come' is just a crappy working title. Can anyone suggest a better title for this story?

Chapter 13 - The Omerta

During my eight hour sleep period I experienced a dream. My first in three years.

This was remarkable because I took drugs to prevent them. I needed eight hours of mental inactivity. As hyperactive as my brain is, the neurons fired off randomly would only exhaust me further.

It was a vague dream. I felt as if Minax Gorgul himself was calling to me. Waiting aboard the Invincible for me.

I was flung back into the waking world. Eight hours exactly.

I wasn’t able to meditate upon whether it was a dream or genuine contact. I had an intruder in my room.

It was Matrid, head of ships security.

“You are needed in the infirmary.”

How long had this creep been watching me sleep? And more importantly, why didn’t I sense his presence? What if he were to draw a gun and nonchalantly end my life? I thought I had perfected sleep sense, but apparently I had not.

I stood up and was escorted directly to the nearest elevator- I had fallen asleep in my uniform.

No talking.

----

My no-longer-secret admirer towed me to the infirmary. All Plexiglas doors and sterile white surfaces. The doors slid open for me as I strolled in behind Matrid.

Why was I here and not in the brig? What now? Did one of the prisoners melt? Were they carrying a virus? Did one of the robot janitors develop a crippling anxiety disorder?

Matrid gestured towards the examination room in the back. That door slid open, too. Everything slid open here, like the ventricles in a gently beating heart.

Wherever there is a fresh corpse there is Mekerle, and this room contained both.

“What do you want?”

Mekerle looked up from his new friend- I looked down. I didn’t recognize his face. But I recognized what had killed him.

His eyes were tender and red. The lids had popped from the bulging as the orbs filled with blood. There was irritation, judging from the fact that the victim had feverishly scratched them from puffy nodes into gummy pulps.

It was all self inflicted. Nobody had touched him.

His skin was an angry red, having been scratched so violently. There was once blood, but it had all since been drained by Mekerle. I could only wonder what he imagined was flowing beneath it. Malignant germs? Sand maggots? Vicious insects?

Or maybe the voices of trapped family members?

Whatever horrifying hallucinations he was inflicted with, they were also distorted from his bloated corneas to his clotted optic nerves. They were also powerful enough for him to dig at his own eyes without any thoughts of self-preservation.

The huge chunk of bitten off tongue removed from his windpipe was in a dish next to Mekerle. Bobbing coyly in its own blood and saliva. It was hard to tell whether he choked to death or if the shock triggered a heart attack.

He had been mentally murdered by an Omerta assassin. A way of death that they assure is the worst possible.

“I don’t get it. His brain is almost melted. Fused synapses. Corroded walls. Severe atrophy. The thing is the size of my fist! It doesn’t even have distinguishable hemispheres anymore.”

I’ve had to answer this question so many times before. My response must’ve come across as canned and contrived. As if I were directing a disgruntled customer to a service representative that didn’t exist.

“He was slain by an Omerta virus. We need to dispose of the corpse to prevent contagion.”

Fear is an invisible dagger that the Omerta use to stab at their enemies. The wounds are so deep that the victims will destroy themselves rather than endure them. If people knew what the Omerta were capable of doing to them, they’d already be defeated.

Mekerle knew it was fake. He was a medic. I should’ve used a different lie.

“You’re lying. I suppose the truth is on a need to know basis, hm?”

I decided not to dig myself a deeper hole. I didn’t reply.

“Well, I don’t care.” He did what most Imperial officers did- accept the lie. He had more important matters to discuss, anyway. “This corpse here used to be an engineering crewman. We have footage of him at work around the reactors and in the corridors. The mystery is that he’s been dead for four days.”

If I remember correctly, this is day five. Hard to tell without a nearby sun to revolve around.

I started to think aloud.

“I know that cameras can be deactivated with the mind, but not fooled. And I know that shape changing technology isn’t even practical according to studies. Maybe he was mentally dominated and then disposed of?”

Goddamned technology. I probably wasn’t even close, there were so many potential explanations. If only his brain hadn’t been completely melted I’d have a starting point.

“Whatever your theory, I suggest you begin your investigation now. We can’t afford-“

Lieutenant Baylen entered promptly through the lone door behind me. He looked like he had something to say, so we both shut up.

(cont.)

[0xDEADCAFE]

This is a great story. Imaginative, vivid and fast-paced. I like the characters, the technology and the mood. If I could level one criticism though, it would be that it sometimes feels a bit choppy or disjointed. (Not often.) To pick up on a point you made in another thread: I think there are too many periods.

In all seriousness. I see that you practice what you preach, and you are very good at it. The short sentences carry impact and they really define your style, but there are places where the flow and/or continuity might be better served by longer or compound sentences. (IMHO)

I also think that a mixture of short and long sentences can make the shorter ones stand-out even more, and the judicious use of longer sentences allows you to vary the tempo, or pace, of how a story reads, which can be used to good effect.

I would agree that wordiness and complicated sentences (which my writing tends to suffer from) are much more often a detriment than an asset, but I think it's possible to overdo brevity as well. Not that I would want you to change anything about this excellent story, but if you get the impulse to wax poetic from time-to-time, I for one would welcome it. :thumbsup:

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Yeah I've noticed what you're talking about. Hopefully I've remedied the choppyness in this post.

(continued)

“Three of the four prisoners we’ve taken won’t come off the gas. The examiners said they’ve tried everything- Thorazine, dopaphine. Say it’s getting worse, too.”

Baylen seemed rather regretful about the whole thing. I wonder if he’d feel different were he the one endangered by them. Mekerle just laughed. And not an evil, ‘aw who cares’ laugh. It was the closest thing to genuine laughter one could hope to hear from him. Like someone had told him a really good joke.

Eventually he sobered up. “What an unfortunate and unforseeable side effect.” He was delightfully glib. “Must’ve been a mix of their prohibited battle stimulants and the fresh stuff. Anyway, what’s the status on number four?”

“She’s prepped for interrogation. Waiting downstairs.”

They both turned their eyes on me. I shrugged in response and then led the way out. What did they want, a pre-interrogation pep talk?

----

The brig was well lit, like most important areas of the ship. It wasn’t for clarity of vision, though, but for agitating the prisoners. You’d only get to sleep for two hours at a time before the lights pummled you into wakefulness. Conditions that would leave the strongest mind lethargic, frustrated and ripe for the breaking.

There is something poetically ironic about the empire using the light for such inhuman punishment. Actually it’s more appropriate for their image than anything.

Cold titanium bars made up the cages for the prisoners, lacking only the upended water tube and wood shavings. The bars extended from holes into the ceiling to lock into holes in the ground frame.

The three crazies weren’t to be seen in any of the four cells. They were most likely lounging in a relaxing acid bath down in the infirmary. Melting down to their component chemicals to fit better into Mekerles backpack. Their dead souls used to concoct the next potential blend of fear gas, I can only creatively assume.

The bars on the fourth cell- our destination- retracted into the ceiling as we approached. Inside was the female pirate. The only hair on her head a lone black ponytail on her skulls crown. Mimicking those of the desert mutants. Her face was gaunt, yet defiant. I could tell she had sat in much worse prisons than this one. She looked like a marathon runner, taking it easy so she could endure the entire hellish course.

It was just Mekerle and I inside the cell. Baylen had something more important to do, and Matrid was keeping a watch on us from the outside. Mekerle had brought a bag of caustic looking drugs, but I was certain he’d be the only one using them for this session. If I were successful, that is.

Matrid had adjusted the lights so that a band of shadow sat in the far corner. That’s where I would stand. As for the woman, she still sat beneath the angrily buzzing lights. When you live in one of these cells, the lights become your new god. Sadistic. Controlling. Inescapable. Spiting you from on high. Or was it smiting? Same principal.

I gestured for Mekerle to begin his questioning. Having discussed our plan on the elevator, he knew exactly what to do. He strode before her with his fists on his hips. A smug, self-satisfied look on his glowering face.

“What are you hiding from us?”

This is how I’ve always worked. The shadow in the background, skulking behind the interrogator. Reading the thoughts of the detainee. It’s near impossible to talk and read someone’s thoughts at the same time.

Also there’s a big difference between reading thoughts and reading minds. If Mekerle could just get her to actively think about what she didn’t want us to know, we’d have her. I didn’t want to dunk head first into her brain. Reading minds at random is like being forced to read a biography without a table of contents. Or chapters. Or paragraph indents. Just a big dumb block of boring text.

Most psychics don’t like to read minds because of the intimidating levels of boredom involved. Even an autistic twelve year old has twelve years of eating ice cream and card counting to sift through.

Our pirate lass reacted as negatively as we had expected. “Go **** yourself, cowardly imperial slave.” She then spat at Mekerle.

He played the role to the hilt. Looking absolutely flustered with even such an elementary display of stubbornness. “Who are you protecting? What’s the big plan? I’m gonna find out eventually!” He plows through like a blowhard cop.

She pinched the bridge of her nose with a weary expression. Her calm resolve seeming to crumble for some reason. I could hear her thinking about the things she wanted to be careful not to mention. Clones. A mission. Clones? Was she thinking about Minax? Where was it he fit in? As it was her thoughts were getting more and more jumbled.

“These lights are giving me a headache. Get me some acetophetamine and a glass of water and I might talk.”

Of course she wasn’t going to talk. We weren’t even going to pretend to be dumb enough to capitulate. Matrid outside the cell doesn’t even make a move to blink.

“Wrong order. You talk, then you get what you want.” I couldn’t blame Mekerle for switching to a hardball approach. It was a rather simple lever for him to exploit. As for myself, her thoughts were starting to make a sound. Like a high pitched whine that a broken printer would make.

The lights beat down on her like an abusive parent. There was nothing she could do to get away. She doubled over on her stool, slowly. Kneading her temples. Mekerle was about to say something, but he was cut off by a loud whine of pain.

“What is the meaning of this charade-?”

“My head!” She moaned pathetically, tears seeping from her bloodshot eyes. Mekerle and I exchanged a cautious look. It was impossible for me to read a thing from her anymore. It was all just noise.

I gestured silently to Mekerles medicine bag. He just shook his head, as if to say ‘let her suffer’. I guess it wasn’t our responsibility to heal our prisoners as long as they had something valuable to tell us.

“She’s faking.” Mekerle said with all certainty. As if he were god and knew everything. “Probably wants me to go over and hand her a syringe full of adrenaline to put into my eye.” Sometimes I couldn’t understand how such a lackadaisical medic was chosen for this mission. I’ve never seen a doctor so readily insist that their patient was faking.

She slumped forwards, assuming a fetal position. Clawing at her head, moaning and writhing. I could see her sinewy jaw bulging from clammy skin. Her teeth clenched like a zipper.

I was hoping she was faking. Otherwise I wouldn’t have anyone to interrogate.
At last she staggered back up to her feet, crushing her head in-between dirty palms. Holy ****! Her face was flushed red and it looked like her eyes were going to pop out of her bulging head.

“Maybe you should get her those pills.” Matrid suggested through the bars.

She was foaming at the mouth and making a gagging noise as her eyes began to lose focus. “I’m sorry!” She sobbed pleadingly, a vein in her forehead beginning to throb as the pain reached a manic level of urgency.

I was finally able to get a good look inside her brain. As did Mekerle, and presumably the janitor that would soon be summoned to clean the bloody slop off the cell walls.

The womans head popped like an over inflated basketball.

----

After changing out of my splattered red robe, I accompanied Matrid to the security offices.

There were cameras and heat sensors and pressure plates all over the ship. Placed in order to catch stowaways and other intruders. Nothing that would really pose a challenge for even an omerta acolyte. But at least we could get a better picture of what was happening around the cell.

“It was as if her head was a blown-up cow lung!” The incident was the closest thing that Matrid had seen to a movie since becoming security head, no doubt. So far it was receiving a rave review. “I mean, I’ve never seen anything like it.”

I guess investigating the death of an imperial enemy would naturally take a back seat to the game of card solitary on his computer. As a free person she didn’t even technically occupy space under the empires law. Leave it to the archons to look another adult human in the eye and deny that they even exist. With a straight face, too.

“I could feel another psionically capable presence in the room after it happened. Just briefly. It wasn’t a failsafe implant, biochemical or otherwise.” The longer the investigation was delayed, the longer my head was a target. Whoever did this could pop heads easier than Joe Spaceship could take a piss.

Matrid shrugged and opened up a camera log index. The look on his face indicated how granted he took his powers of audio/visual omni-presence. I could see one of the screens catch his eye. Was it the brig? No. Before I could get a good look at what changed his mood, he had stood up from his chair.

“I’m sure you know how to work this. I’ll be right back.” Bathroom break, I guess. I took his spot and began browsing the available cameras. Finding my mark. ‘BRIG – CELL 4’. There was a stocky guy in coveralls and a hat running a mop over the ceiling.

I couldn’t begrudge Matrid for leaving. Breaking up brawls in the mess hall and counting beans in the weapons locker was more his realm of influence. An omerta agent was well out of his league. He’d just get in the way of my investigation.

The door once again hissed open behind me. In walks a group of three security types. Brandishing rifles and shock projectors. All of them wearing helmets with halos built inside. So naturally I couldn’t even hope to get inside their brains without a struggle.

“Where’s Matrid?” The one in the lead demanded. Urgency in his voice and his body language.

“I don’t know. He just left.” I responded curiously. “Why?”

Looks were exchanged between the three. A nod brought out a bloodchecker from a belt loop, and an indignant scowl from myself. I hated needles as much as I hated the idea of who would be putting it in me.

“The real Matrid has been dead for a day."

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Chapter 14 - Waiting

The atmosphere inside the Vindication has become restless and paranoid. Nobody wants to talk unless they’ve seen you get stuck with a needle. People look at each other wondering if the person their looking at is really dead and lodged in a disposal chute. I have red marks all up and down my arms as if they were used as pin cushions. Command personnel need to check your blood before letting you know where the washroom is.

The assassin on board was an invisible, undetectable cloud that could pass through walls and hear conversations from miles away. He was your shadow and everyone around you, and always listening to what you were thinking. Or at least he was in the collective imagination of the ships crew. Nobody had even seen him. Unless you count the people who dealt with him while he masqueraded as Matrid and the engineer. Then you could safely say that everyone has seen him.

And that’s what scared us. We’ve all looked into his eyes, and yet we have no clue what he might look like. He was good enough to have fooled close friends of his victims. Good enough to carry on conversations without arousing an ounce of suspicion. And cold enough to slit your throat and hijack your life as if it were no more than a car.

He had been watching me as I slept in my quarters. I’ve been too terrified to even return to them since, much less sleep anywhere on the ship. Interior and exterior scans are being run quarter-hourly and people sleep under the watch of armed guards. Ventilation ducts are patrolled by robots. Nobody can find any trace of a stowaway. Except, of course, for those charred corpses. I guess he burned their faces off so he'd have some time to switch identities before blood tests were done.

After a round of fresh blood checks- and after I had psychically verified the people doing the tests- the mission crew sat down to exchange intelligence. As was typical of such meetings, everyone was thinking about what they were going to say. Thinking about how they were going to say it. Would they look knowledgeable? Would they be thought of as more important if they talked more? How do they look when they say certain words?

And as was typical of myself, I was just going to ignore them and listen to their worrying, soft minds.

Lieutenant Baylen was going to detail what he and his team were up to during our last group visit to the Invincible. They skirmished with a small group of well armed unknowns on the way to the bridge. They were then flanked in a wide corridor by a group of similarly outfitted men with magnetic rifles and imperial combat armour. They were repelled after a bloody standoff. The corpses left behind from their retreat were all perfect genetic clones of Minax.

So platoons of Minax clones were being armed and used to patrol the ships aft quarter. Why was the empire so concerned with size when it came to these flagships? If it were meant for extreme penile compensation, the emperor must be female. Or perhaps some maniac genital amputee.

Not that anyone sees the emperor in person anymore. According to records he should only be 89, an age easily serviceable by medical technology. The last emperor lived to 129 and was able to make competent speeches and appearances for every last year.

I try not to think about it. Investigating the emperor in any way was not a good idea. As of late even the committee specifically commissioned to keep a check on the emperor has been reluctant to do so. Not even God can ask the emperor questions without phrasing Himself carefully. At first it was only those who planned sedition who were picked up and sent to trial, or at least interrogated with due process.

Now people just disappear. Any opposition or fact-finding means a prompt visit from an Instant Death Squad (its real name, Internal Disciplinary Services, didn’t sound any less dreadful). I heard from someone at the Third Eye substructure that the emperor had a corps of time travelling ‘operatives’ (assassins) to deal with his more troublesome enemies.

I yearned for the gulags and drumhead trials of simpler times. Whatever happened to old fashioned assassins? As it was you couldn’t even get the satisfaction of being carefully murdered by a professional. Just a flash of light and poof- you never even existed. You never were an enemy. You never were at all. I could only imagine how many times the streets of Westmarch have ran red with the blood of revolutionaries that were never born.

It sounded like a group myth anyway. Probably spread by a paranoid first year scientist who knew it could neither be proven nor disproved. After all, nobody remembers things that never happened.

Baylen and his men were stopped from entering the medical laboratory- where the cloning tanks were kept- by ghosts. Ghosts? What next, goblins? Demons? Evil sand leapers? But as sure as I could read thoughts, the vivid memories were there. Memories of half-real humans who floated like freezing clouds and couldn’t be touched by bullets. As well as memories of the terror they inspired, reaching forwards with tendrils to melt skin from flesh and flesh from bone.

Deltroy wanted to talk about how he suspected the cargo crew of mishandling his pneumatically mounted firearms. Yawn. I couldn’t wait for that topic to come up and waste a bunch of valuable time. Maybe we could float through space all year discussing how I banged my knee in the shower.

And that guy was there in the room. Standing behind the captain. Wearing his unmarked grey crewman’s jumpsuit and no distinguishable traits. Was he omerta? I sure as hell had a hard time reading his thoughts. Nor was I able to find clear camera footage of him, for that matter. He wasn’t even on the crew manifest. At one point I was compelled to ask the Captain who he was. He claimed to be too busy to go in depth, but told me his name was Voreal T’ril and he was a starship technician. The empire considers him an intelligence risk, so he’s here covertly.

It was difficult to determine whether the captain was lying or not. He had a very trustworthy character and such a smooth way of words. A natural leader, I guess. I decided to tune back into the vocalize portion of the meeting. Lieutenant Baylen was talking.

“They found the ship adrift in space and took advantage of whatever chaos caused the system damage. The morfaa was apparently a pet. They lured rescue attempts and other opportunists into the starboard docking bay. We found a jury rigged connection between the two bays. Upon entering the victims were killed by the morfaa and then used as thralls, along with whatever corpses the pirates found littered about the ship.”

This certainly wasn’t his first debriefing. He was flying through the information without pause or breath.

“According to preliminary questioning, the pirates hid most of their loot in the waste processing channels. It’s dark in those tubes and there could be anything down there waiting for us. Not to mention the risk of infection from the waste. I suggest against any recovery attempts.”

The Captain chimed in. “Agreed. I have no inclination to have you running around aimless, random tunnels, wasting ammo fighting god knows what just for some stupid stash. It’s a stupid premise for such a dangerous risk."

Something told me that the Captain was a different man when he was younger. He'd probably go through hell to get a shiny new monosword, or whatever they used back then. Especially considering how tight Imperial inventory are. I guess he'd seen someone important die from the same sort of righteous greed.

It was a wise idea, anyway. I didn't want to die clutching an amplifier sphere or something equally inanimate. In fact I didn't want to die at all. So **** the pirates and **** their fecal catacombs. I'm not going down there to sift through that rot.

(cont.)

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I took a quick look around the room. “Where’s Scorn? I thought him sitting in on our briefings was your idea.” Not that I truthfully cared whether or not that talking pile of junk attended and contributed or not. I just didn’t want a crazy robot loaded with explosive ordinance running around unaccounted for.

“He’s offline for repairs.” The Captain answered nonchalantly. Sweeping the issue directly under the figurative carpet. I found this suspicious to say the least. Not only was adding him the Captains idea, but Voreals as well. And the more I saw them interact, the more I became convinced that he was the Captains commanding officer. Or some similar sort of power relationship.

An intercom buzzed, as if cued up to catch the Captain in the middle of his lie. “What?”, he snapped at the interrupting tone.

“This is Telmond, sir. Scorn has apprehended an intruder.” He cleared his throat as everyone but the Captain and Voreal reeled. “The intruder.”

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Sorry about the tiny post... I couldn't edit it into the chapter it belonged to. Do you think I should post partial chapters, or just wait until I have the entire thing done? My chapters have been getting longer, I think, and I'm always so anxious to update...


Chapter 15 - No-Face

I stood at the reflective bars dividing him from me, staring. He had no idea that I was looking at him. He had no eyes.

Nor did he have a nose. Or ears for that matter. His eyes were just dark sockets with a little connection at the pit where the prosthetic was supposed to link up. According to Mekerle the fakes had a feature that allowed them to electronically fool retinal scanners.

His nose was just a pair of holes set in flat grooves. His ears were similar. Just holes over which the organic plastic was meant to be moulded. Even his teeth were fake- the ones the doctors removed were gum moulds into which Matrids old teeth were fitted. Stolen in order to hinder identification. More sophisticated disguise paraphernalia was no doubt stashed elsewhere on the ship.

According to his rap sheet, his name is Abejhur-Jek-Iil Al-Ftwaabswanaj. Outside of the omerta underground he is known- and feared- by a more colloquial name: No-Face. His full criminal record was worth twenty seven pages on my digital tablet. Clearly one of the more accomplished spies, mercenaries and assassins amongst their ranks. Either he killed a lot of regular people, or killed a few important people.

Everyone in the omerta is an elite operative as far as our military standards go. Other gangs feared them like the viscus plague, including the biggest gang in the universe: The empire. The brain melting and invisibility was only half of why people avoided them. They are on par with the third eye when it comes to mind sciences, despite what the media might tell you. But the omerta are an autonomous group of sadistic gangsters, while the third eye is just a well controlled group within a larger bureaucracy.

They’ve been getting restless recently according to what few sources and records on them we have. Some people in II think its because they’re really a cult, and the impending solar equinox had them all excited and happy. There’s no proof supporting the theory, or any theory about them. But they’re making a move for something big. This is just the lip of the holy ****storm waiting for us.

The implants in No-Face were placed with the same aesthetic symmetry that a clown would use to add patches to his outfit. Folding shoulder girdle. Elastic spinal cord. Third lung attatched to a gas conversion orifice in his left collar bone. Collapsable hips and knees. According to scans he had four separate, smaller hearts dispersed throughout his torso.

Also, his brain sat in a hole where the stomach was supposed to be. He was engineered to be nurtured intravenously. I guess that made it easier to protect, as well as making the neck and head less vital areas to hit. I could picture him being shot in the head with a rifle and still having the energy to squeeze between the bars and slither into the tiny ventilation ducts.

My eyes lifted up from the digital tablet. “So. You’re from Lut Gholein too?” I decided to break the ice between us. Maybe build a bit of empathy.

“There is no ice to break, Horus. I’ve been waiting for you. And you will never be able to empathize with me.”

His voice was synthesized from a cybernetic vocal implant in his throat. He was using the factory default voice. I guess the only one in its memory that was genuinely his, seeing that most of them were used to imitate other people. He sounded like a ghoulish robot. Especially since he wasn’t moving his lips. He was probably just trying to unnerve me and distract my thoughts.

Despite the artificial nature of his voice, there was a vocal quality and emotion in his words. Pauses and stressed vowels and all. Some people might use that to classify him as a human, but I preferred to think of him more as a cyborg. Like those test subjects in the Arreat base that went insane. The less ‘No-Face’ and I had in common the better.

I put on an unaffected face, getting the feeling that he could still somehow see me. “Nice trick! Now… if you have the time in your schedule for one more…” A smug smirk gave birth to a smug pause. “…I’m thinking of a number between one and a hundred.”

He remained as still as death in his bulkhead mounted restraints. A scrambler attached to his temples was supposed to confuse him from any psychic or telekinetic brain activity. No-Face: 1, Science: 0.

“You cheated on your tank test. You left the tank for hours at a time and then edited camera footage and computer records to cover your absence.”

I guess belittling his psychic talents was a mistake. That was probably the most dangerous secret of mine that I kept from others. I prayed that the two guards posted behind me had no clue what a tank test was. “I hope those massages and egg sandwiches were worth the risk."

(cont.)

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“Fine,” I blurted out abruptly. Trying not to look panicked. Also trying to get him to shut up quickly. “You’re a good mind reader. But for now nobody is interested in me. You’ve got some questions to answer.”

A mechanical laugh peeled out from the box in his throat. “You of all people on this tug boat should know that torture won’t work on me. You have nothing to offer me. Nothing to coerce me. And you wouldn’t dare set foot into my mind.” At this point I found the idea of extracting info against his will just as laughable as he did. “Or were you hoping that you’d just ask nice and I’d feel like helping you out?”

His prosthetic voice could convey sarcasm well enough. He was holding all the cards, despite being our helpless captive. That just made me angrier. I hated when a prisoner didn’t know that they were beaten and refused to acquiesce. I decided to take a negotiation tactic from Tsercas arsenal.

“You may know who I am, but you have no clue the resources at my disposal. We have all the time in the universe to break you in half. You’re our property now and for as long as we want you to be. If we can’t do it now, we’ll keep you alive until we develop the technology we need.” I paused. Wasted time passes as the walls of the vice close in. Punctuating my point. “I wonder how many decades you’ve lasted in training. I’m willing to guess none.”

Maybe I didn’t sound as tough as her. But at least my bravado was based in truth. Sometimes a century of solitude is torture enough. People will tell your grandchildren what you wanted to know just to be allowed to die. Hopefully it isn’t something you need to know right away.

No-Face was still braver than I could ever be. “Our liege shall outlive the sun you grew under, much less your fledgling empire.” He narrowed his empty sockets into spiteful holes. “I look forwards to meeting you in hell. We’ll enjoy teaching you the horror of that word. Forever.”

What could I possibly say to that? Despite the collected façade put forth in his artificial tone, a truck battery couldn’t hope to contain the acid in his words.

“I’ll talk anyway.” My eyes furrow with suspicion. Did he just offer to talk? “That’s right. I already know what you’re going to ask, so just shut up and don’t say anything. There are some people on their way who might not appreciate you knowing what we know.” My mouth made a sound as it closed.

“I’m here to watch the man you know as ‘Voreal’. I know that you doubt him. But you haven’t been through the full third eye brainwash. You have a will. You do not eat all that you are given.” I could tell that this would soon be followed by a ‘join us’ proposition. But as it was, I did not want my only ally to be immobile inside of a brig cell. I could also tell that he had been watching me very closely to know of my suspicion. “You have good reason to scrutinize him. He is not who he seems to be.

I wanted to know. I yearned to know. It was burning a hole in the back of my mind. The worst feeling in all of life is not to know. “Who is he? A senior psionicist?”

The freakish No-Face made a noise that sounded like laughter. Tinny and slowly modulating in pitch. “Believe me or not, but I haven’t been able to read his thoughts in the months I’ve been following him around back in Khanduras. He’s virtually a ghost. No heat signal. Doesn’t show up to cameras or other digital tracking devices. All we can really say about him is that he occupies space and can reflect light. In other words, we can touch him and see him. Whoever he is, he has better obfuscational talents than I or anyone I know.”

As advertised he knew exactly what I was going to ask next. “I can’t tell you why we’re interested in him. But know that he and the immortal one are lying to you. They both have their own selfish agenda outside of either of our organizations. The empire might’ve sent you here to repair and tow compromised equipment, but you are running errands for and insubordinate and an outside influence.

“We call him the immortal one-” He was very quick to clarify. He probably would’ve conveyed his information mentally if he didn’t have that scrambler pummelling his brain in. “-because according to photographic records, he is at the very least as old as the technology itself: Three hundred years. Maybe he’s just a clone, who knows. But he’s gone by many names. His incarnation before the man you know now went by the name of…”

Voreal and the captain- the immortal one- stepped through the blast doors down the hall. Heralded by a buzz and a resoundingly dull percussion of metal on metal. I could sense cold trepidation stopping up in No-Faces stomach. Or his brain, or whatever you could technically call that area now. His spindly body began to writhe in its massive restraints, his discomfort increasing the closer they strolled.

“They lie to you Horus! They are your enemy!” He cries out, as loud as his voice box could go. His writhing becoming thrashing, something urgent overriding his sensibilities. Perhaps driving him to try and physically escape, which he knew very well was impossible. Why couldn’t these omerta types just relax? The ones we capture always seem to be so irritable and poorly-behaved.

As if on cue with my internalized sentiment, a noxious, choking gas began to hiss forth in billowing currents from his open mouth and eyes. Slow, but thick. Tumbling free to float into quickly growing clouds. Thinner tendrils of the smog slithering from his nose and ears like lazy snakes.

Whatever that crap was, I didn’t want to breath it in. I lunged towards the nearest control panel and punched the panic button. Erecting air tight energy fields between the now rapidly sizzling No-Face and the bars.

His voice box made dying sounds as it melted in the back of his throat along with skin and tissues. Like an RC car trying to escape a deep fryer. “I’ll see you soon, Horus! Real soon!” He managed to holler out over the hissing sound of burning flesh. Then laughing. Cackling like a maniac as the volatile green vapour liquefied his body and the walls of the cell.

The volatile green cloud now filled the cell, submerging the laughing maw of that faceless killer in scalding chemical fumes. The sight of which promised to haunt my memories until death. It made me laugh a little, to think that he simply said what he said to make me paranoid and frightened even after he was long dead. Not only did I find the idea amusing, but also the only way I’d ever be able to close my eyes and sleep alone.

A loud, bassy whirring soon overpowered the sounds of burning bulkheads. The cloud being filtered out and dissipating quickly. Leaving only the melted remnants of Abejhur-Jek-Iil Al-Ftwaabswanaj and severely damaged hull plating. In fact you could see straight through a corroded hole into cell three. So I guess that was the end of No-Face. He’s dead now. Nothing left but boiling liquids and a pile of resin. Dead as dead could be. Never to return. Ever.

The stink of supersitious awe was all over me. Like I had just witnessed a demon disappear before my eyes. Or a phantom, or some equally sinister mythical figure you'd see on devils day.

I wondered why Mekerle couldn’t find and disarm the suicide switch implant. Either he was in awe of his monstrous anatomy, or just wanted it to go off in the brig rather than his infirmary. I could already imagine his attitude: “Well, he had to melt somewhere. Thank whatever god or gods you pray to that you didn’t have to inhale those toxic fumes.”

Predictably enough, team Cloak and Dagger wanted to talk to me. In his office. Their office.

[0xDEADCAFE]

“Our liege shall outlive the sun you grew under, much less your fledgling empire.” He narrowed his empty sockets into spiteful holes. “I look forwards to meeting you in hell. We’ll enjoy teaching you the horror of that word. Forever.”

Am I detecting the promised tie-in with the Prime Evils? I hope so. Makes me think this already-great story is about to get even better!

:thumbsup: Keep it coming!

[jagermeister]

first off the complements: I think you have an outstanding imagination and have done an excellent job creating a setting. Your writing style draws the reader in and makes them hungry for more. You obviously are talented and I believe that if you hone your craft you can definately pursue writing. You have the raw attributes that lend themselves to the creation of good fiction.

This is by far the longest piece I have ever tried to read off of a computer screen, so I am thinking that some of the disjointed feeling I got reading this has to do with not having the pages in my hands.

The best advice I could give you is to re-read and revise your work. IMO this is the hardest part of writing.....because when it is going well it can feel as if the story is telling itself and that the writer is merely trying to take dictation from his/her muse. But when you go back over your work, you can spot awkward phrasing, faulty sentence structure and incomplete development of ideas.

Before I level any specific criticism, I want to again say...I think this is great work, promising and a pleasure to read. So please do not feel that I am putting your work down, it is not my intention. I am a voracious reader and tend to be critical of most things that I read (and everything that I myself write).

enough preamble: I chose one paragraph that wanted to examine that both shows that you have an excellent vision, but at times an awkward exectution.

"The Invincible was an imperial flagship. In essence, a floating hulk of a spacecraft. Its profile was made more eerie between the extremes of total sun exposure and no sun exposure. Angles were either black as death itself or lit perfectly. It seemed as if space was eating it."

I love the picture you paint here. It is vivid and conveys a sense of pending menace. However, it feels rushed. I am not an expert in grammer, but I know when wording feels wrong. The second sentance is not a complete one.
"In essence, a floating hulk of a spacecraft". This sentance has no verb. An easy way to correct this would be to say "In essence, it was a floating hulk of a spacecraft" or IMO a better way would be to combine the first two sentances, i.e. "The invincible was an Imperial Flagship, essentially a floating hulk of a spacecraft".

I loved the description of the massive ship looking at once imposing and menaced by the dark void around it. But the double use of exposure felt awkward to me. Maybe another way to word it would go something like this:

The ships profile was partially illuminated by the nearby star, providing an ominous contrast. Angles were either black as death itself or lit perfectly. The craft looked as if it were being consumed by space itself.

The other issue I think bears examination is that some interactions between the characters seemed unfinished. I particularly enjoyed the interactionbetween the main character and Scorn, and also the interrogation of the assasin.

In regards to scorn, I was left with a lot of ambiguity as to what he/it actually was....mechanical construct or sentient being?---if this was intentional, then you accomplished your goal. But I felt that section ended abrubtly without any resolution...nor did I see it revisted...maybe this comes later.

The interrogation of the assasin was much better. I had many questions about his origin and motivations, but this felt entirely appropriate and forshadows a greater mystery that will be revealed as the story progresses.

So all in all, great job. I just think your work would benefit from editing and revision.

Titles can be a real pain in the arse. Everything I come up with sounds trite and hackneyed....years to come is better than anything I can think of right now.

[Ikeren]

Nothing wrong with "The Years To Come" except it may already be another book. Lots of very subtle references to diablo 2...

I like it. I like it a lot. Then again, I am easy to please. I think I may be getting slow and stupid, but aside from the bleeped words, I can't find anything wrong...

(And I still say they break up the flow of the text! :lol: )

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Yeah, I know I break the rules of writing at will. The only rule I really try to follow when I write is 'be consise'... as in, eliminate unnecessary verbage. Other than that I often write sentance fragments. This is because when I read a narritive peice of fiction, I personally visualize someone speaking it out. And people rarely speak with perfect structure. The only thing I can hope is that my sentance fragments aren't fragmented enough to be ambiguous in relation to what I'm describing.

Scorn is a robot with a will of his own. That means he can alter his programming. This is a sticky area of AI- Artificial intelligence is all about altering its own logic and reactions to external stimuli. But what if the AI can change the way it interprets or reacts to the stimuli? I was hoping to make a microcosm (I think that's the word) where the line between a machine that can experience emotion and desire and a simple machine is blurred and negligable. Cause if the machine changes itself, then future decisions are influenced by that change. Such as the decision to change itself further. Imagine a robot that can develop an emotional logic subrouteine... and then while under its effects, experience so much emotional pain that it finds it logical to deactivate it. Hopefully this is an idea consistant with the science of artificial intelligence.

I notice I end some chapters abruptly, too. The main character is sorta self-motivated and not interested in digging deeper than he needs to. Also from a writing standpoint, I find reading too many entrances and exits to be boring. I like to get right into why the characters are interacting.

Also, could anyone see what happens in the next chapter? Is the chapter a total suprise, or did you see it coming from a mile away? And do you think I introduced the plot device too much too fast, or was it a perfect amount to digest?

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Chapter 16 - All Uncovered

The Invincible looks in at us through the large window in the Captains room. Despite the fact that it's half a kilometre away, it looks big enough to be pressing its face right up against the glass. It wants to know what we're talking about.

A button is pressed somewhere behind the Captains desk, causing the titanium shutters to drop down and seal like the lid of an eye. A high pitched whine is then emitted from the desk, on and off in a jarring screech. Meant to overload any devices that were placed to pick up audio, or at least overpower them with fake sound vibrations while we flapped our mouths.

“We should be safe.” As always the Captain sat and spoke while ‘Voreal’ stood and watched. “Please, sit.”

I decide to sit despite my suspicious and paranoid nature. Voreal is still a blank, but the Captains thoughts are centred around discretion and secrets rather than killing me. I feel as safe as he suggested I should be.

“Is what he said true?” I ask as I sit. Knowing that they overheard my discussion with No-Face.

The Captain replies in short order. “Mostly true. I am very old.”

“Can I get a number?” He is the Captain, but I'm Internal Intelligence. He has to answer me.

A silent pause hangs in the air as he seems to consider the question. “I think I’m… getting close to nine hundred years, aren’t I?” He asks Voreal. And for the first time I am able to hear the stranger speak. “Eight hundred and seventy eight.” His voice is surprisingly majestic and noble for a starship designer. Not for a ghost, though. That theory is the front-runner so far.

The Captain gestures to the statuesquely still Voreal. “There’s your answer. Eight hundred and seventy eight.” If that were true, then the Captain had successfully survived the century of collapse. Assuming that he was in danger of being killed.

“Ok,” that was all I needed to know about him for now. “And who are you?” I decide to be polite and address Voreal directly. From the look he exchanges with the Captain, I could tell that the answers were going to become progressively more unbelievable.

He phrases himself carefully, navigating a verbal minefield. Opting instead to be minimal with his answer. “My name is…” His voice drops to a cautious murmur. “…Tyreal.”

I was confused, primarily because the name didn’t really ring a bell. And yet here he was, afraid to even speak it aloud. “And my true name is Lichello. I changed it to Tgrasi Eurabel because I didn’t want my enemies- our enemies- finding me.” The Captain pauses intently. “Please do not use these names openly. We have several powerful enemies who have infiltrated positions of power within the empire.”

Despite essentially admitting to falsifying their identities, I didn’t find an ounce of guilt or fear from them. And frankly I found this insulting. I always found people feared mind reading intelligencia. “So what’s stopping me from alerting the IDS about you two? I hope you’re not planning on trying to silence me with force.”

The laugh I got didn’t exactly satisfy my ego or esteem. “If any of our enemies found out that you spoke with us and know who we truly are, you’d be assassinated too. You are now a loose end.”

They know that I know how the empire treated loose ends. Dead men tell no tales. Neither do desiccated ashes at the bottom of a garbage bag. And the catch was I couldn’t call Internal Intelligence and verify. I’d just be sentencing myself to death if they were speaking the truth. I'm surprised that this shady mission could get worse, but it did. If only I had some way of knowing how far off ‘worst’ is. Then maybe I wouldn’t be so crippled by anxiety.

“If you want me to co-operate, spill everything. If I’m on this mission and face something you forgot to tell me, I’ll squeal.” It seemed like a fair enough arrangement to me. All I want is the truth. “So who are you two with, and what are you planning?”

“We’re part of an independent network. We have operatives throughout the system, some in orginazations that not even you have heard of.” I found that one hard to believe. “It has come to our attention that the empire has been infiltrated by alien interests. And either the omerta is behind this infiltration, or has been infiltrated in addition.”

I interrupt him, perhaps even indignantly. “Wait a moment. Alien interests as in tentacle-other-lifeform alien? Or as in an interest outside of the empire?” And ever since its rise to power, the empire more or less spans every sentient being in the solar system. So the two conditions were probably mutually exclusive.

“Outside of the empire. We haven’t gotten anything along the lines of an autopsy, or even an arrest of the perpetrators. But we have to operate secretly. Anyone who’s presented evidence of alien manipulation or identity theft has disappeared without trace. It’s clear that they control the empire enough to use its resources for silencing purposes.”

The idea is terrifying. A few seconds ago I was a part of a universal power. And if Lichello spoke the truth, I am now its enemy. With a weakened countenance I resume my questioning. “So… what are we doing here? What are you after?”

“We’re after cargo. The Invincible wasn’t returning from a garrison. It was bringing artefacts from the Urube archaeological dig.” So this was a simple mission of piracy? I couldn’t bring myself to say much more. I'm in over my head. “According to our timelines, the empire became more interested in space travel and exploring Urube since being infiltrated.”

"So whatever they’re bringing back… these aliens want very badly.” I muse quietly. Lichello nods along. “You understand correctly. We don’t necessarily care about old stonework and preserved plants. But according to our operatives at the dig site, they’ve found a deadly artefact. An artefact that we cannot allow to fall into the hands of a clearly hostile enemy.”

My biggest weakness is my curiosity. Well, the biggest weakness I’m willing to admit. “What is it? A virus? A weapon?” I pause in thoughtful silence. Reviewing the plots of similar movies that were popular in the older years.

Their answer was on par with my imagination. Sort of. But the look Tyreal gave to Captain Lichello set off some red flags. The Captain responds with a look of confliction as he speaks through hesitant lips. “It’s… a highly volatile ore. In a raw, crystalline form it emits only ambient radiation. If it is refined, radiation will turn sanctuary into a nuclear inferno.” His delivery was half hearted. Was he lying? A sober mood falls upon our shoulders.

“I can see why you don’t want aliens getting it.”

What was I to do? Trust liars? Or trust these two who operate in shadows? I hold a similar perception of the empire, although a less illuminated one. Between II leadership shifts and IDS, the empire wasn’t the organization it used to be. Rebellion and defiance strikes like a crop rot, spoiling whatever was meant grow to fruitation. Or maybe it's like the white blood cells that congregate to expel an illness. Depends on who’s eyes you look at it through.

“I take it there’s going to be no change to the mission plan.” This thought relieved me. I can now feign ignorance until the Invincible is secured. Or until I die, whichever one. “Do either of you know what’s causing the communication blackout?”

The Captain leans back in his chair, arms folding before him. His clothing matched his gruff, coarse exterior. “Indeed. A sabotage operation. Our doing. As was the assignment of the Vindication to secure and retrieve the ship. A bit crude, but the discovery of the ore was rather abrupt. We had to act before it was secure in the false emperors hands.”

Tyreal nods, and speaks up. “The evil you will witness shall make our case for us, if you are still holding onto your suspicions. We are responsible for the destruction of the engines, but the carnage is the doing of alien spies. The crew discovered the truth behind the cargo thanks to our brave operatives, and a battle seems to have ensued.”

“More of a slaughter, I’d say.” The Captain interjects.

“What about the pirates, though? How did they survive? How do they fit in? Someone had to have let them in. The cargo bay doors have no signs of damage.”

The whole story falls apart, despite the ready answer. “They belong to a race you are well aware of. But they aren’t a biological anomaly. Forces unknown to us have intentionally misshaped them to serve as their enforcers. Possibly these aliens we face now. They’ve been given powers magical in nature in exchange for some sort of loyalty pledge…”

I stop him right there. “Magic? Forces unknown? Your story was hard enough to believe before the gods and wizards came in.”

A bemused laugh passes Lichello’s lips. “You must believe in magic, Horus. You’ve devoted a good amount of your life to its study.”

I am stunned in what I feel is anger. How could he disrespect my life’s work by dismissing it as ‘magic’? Something common party entertainers are associated with. “Magic? You truly are centuries old. It’s called psionic affinity. I am a psionicist. I manipulate reality with the power of my mind, not magic words and enchanted rods.”

Captain Lichello tries to share a knowing grin with Tyreal, but fails to pass the enigmatic mans stern façade. “We had psychic sciences eight hundred or so years ago. We called it ‘magic’ back then, though. Same rubbish, different pile. You had to be really smart to know how to do it, and read a lot of books too. It was a mystery to everyone who didn’t understand it, but made perfect sense to the mage clans. I remember a great sorceress describe it to me. Magic is a force that surrounds every last thread of reality- we call them ‘atoms’ now- and that made up every human soul. Or brain, whichever you see as more important. Sound familiar?”

I refuse to believe the comparison he draws. “Listen, I’ll believe you once I get a look at these magic minerals you’re after. For now, let’s just can the fond flashbacks. I’ll judge this mess for myself, as best I can.”

My eyes wander over towards a wall clock. Damn it. I have twenty minutes before we we're supposed to get back onto that rusty death trap that was the hilariously misnamed the Invincible.

“I’m due in the portal room in twenty.” I murmur bitterly. Looks like I wasn’t getting a shower.

“We trust you to use your discretion, Horus.” A touch of concern finally begins to affect the Captain. “Don’t make yourself a target. We’re here to help you see the truth. The emperor cares only for his power base, whether you live or die.”

As I saw it, Lichello was trying too hard to earn my trust. Way too hard. The parting rhetoric was ignored. At least the last point he made was truthful. “Hopefully I’ll be back to speak again.”

I turn and leave.

[0xDEADCAFE]

Yeah, I know I break the rules of writing at will. The only rule I really try to follow when I write is 'be consise'... as in, eliminate unnecessary verbage. ... The only thing I can hope is that my sentance fragments aren't fragmented enough to be ambiguous in relation to what I'm describing.
I think that they sometimes are, but more generally, I think your writing suffers from begin too concise. As I've said before I love this story but I sometimes feel like I am reading a synopsis of a story, rather than the story itself.

Case in point:

Scorn is a robot with a will of his own. That means he can alter his programming. This is a sticky area of AI- Artificial intelligence is all about altering its own logic and reactions to external stimuli. But what if the AI can change the way it interprets or reacts to the stimuli? I was hoping to make a microcosm (I think that's the word) where the line between a machine that can experience emotion and desire and a simple machine is blurred and negligable. Cause if the machine changes itself, then future decisions are influenced by that change. Such as the decision to change itself further. Imagine a robot that can develop an emotional logic subrouteine... and then while under its effects, experience so much emotional pain that it finds it logical to deactivate it.
This is great stuff. I had no idea that the character of Scorn was so complex and interesting. I would really recommend that you find a way to weave these ideas into the story.


Also, could anyone see what happens in the next chapter?
I guessed part of it, but I don't think I would have if I had not read your question before reading the chapter. Given that prompting I put the great age of the Caption and the ghostliness of Voreal together and guessed that they were Cain and Tyrael. So I was only half write. But I don't think it was obvious, just guessable given the right prompting.

And one nit-pick: I stumble over 'II' whenever I read it, probably because it looks like a roman numeral 2. It takes me a second to remember that it stands for Horus's agency which interrupts the story. I would recommend changing the acronym to something less ambiguous, like for example, I2, INTINT or IntI. Or maybe change the name altogether. 'Internal Intelligence' does not resonate with me as a distinctive or intresting-sounding place to begin with.

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I'm on a new computer that doesn't have a word processor. So no spellchecking has been done.

Chapter 17 - Casualties of sin

The Invincible was like a derelict zoo. Rotten flesh and fecal waste piled in the corners like trash on city streets. There was no nature up here to impose a natural hierarchy, or any sort of food chain. Strange animals stalk the corridors, shadowing our every move. Waiting for us to be killed, or waiting for an oppertunity to hurry the process along. Either way we can all hear them gurgling and chirping in the red darkness, and it's wearing our nerves thin.

Natural selection came in the form of the ships security drones. Buzzing, lurching metal monsters hunting loudly for any nearby pulses to rush towards and violently snuff out. It was almost as if someone programmed them to envy those of flesh and blood. We had a breif confrontation with a group of mark two drones. Patrol models. From the trouble they gave us, I wouldn't want to meet whatever was rampaging through the main deck and leaving dismembered piles of them in his, her or its wake. Every now and then you'd come across a gutted drone and have to kick it out of the way.

As it was, we were in a tight formation and heading from the starboard docking bay to the medical laboratory on deck C. Towards where Baylen and his platoon saw their ghosts.

"You know, they probably weren't ghosts." I speak up. I got this creeping feeling that the idea of fighting ghosts was the cause of our hushed anxiety. "There's a logical explanation, if the records I've read are correct. The portal room of this ship is on deck C as well. Close to the medlab." The rifle mounted lantern rays were flickering in my wincing eyes. I hated them. Everything was adequately lit, it's just the crimson aether that the corridors became was confusing. "The Invincible was actually involved in spontaneous teleportation experiments fifteen years ago, when it was first built."

Nobody said anything. To them, listening was much more important than talking in this sort of situation, and I understood why. I guess I'm not much of a military operative.

"Anyway, there was a rush behind the technology. They built a huge memory buffer in the portal room. Apparently you need a lot of computing power to store the exact location of every last particle in a human body as well as project it a mile through space." Still silence. It was like I was telling a ghost story. "They tested with convicted criminals first. None of them made it across. The buffer disassembled them... glowed for moment... and then nothing came out." I saw the pictures and video. They marched them up in their yellow prison clothes and read them the execution rites before pulling the switch. They died with their hands locked behind their backs.

The mood of the group sunk. What a bunch of babies. I wish they'd make up their mind on what they found more frightening: Science or the supernatural. I guess the image of a transporter buffer filled with angry murderers wasn't exactly one of safety and security.

The implication was clear, anyway. "It's impossible to hit those things as it is." Baylen speaks up. "Maybe we've found a possible weak point." We? I! I found a possible weakpoint! "I say we make this portal room a secondary objective. Change our heading and take out the buffer. See if that gets rid of our ghosts."

That's a brilliant idea you stole from me, Baylen. I wanted to say. "It also stands to reason that this is where they will be at their zenith of power. If we make any move towards the buffer, they will most likely rally around it."

"I HAVE ENOUGH EXPLOSIVE ORDINANCE TO MAKE THE ENCOUNTER A BREIF ONE." Robot brashness. Almost impossible to recognize amongst the string-of-syllable sentance structure. "THE PORTAL ROOM IS LOCATED INTERNALLY." Internal rooms on a ship are the ones on the inside, as you might guess. They put the more important rooms here just in case the ship gets hit by a rocket. Either that, or they put the systems more likely to explode towards the inside. That way the explosion won't pop the ship.

That's an expression that describes the internal pressure being compromised by a hull breach. Something that may happen if Scorn fires grenades everywhichway on the outer levels.

"Well the portal room is about to be turned into a crucible. Let's change directions." That was an order to me. I was holding the mapping device in my free hand.

----

And so we arrived at the corridor leading up to the portal room. This corridor was a bit wider than others, being a high traffic area. It was a breif walk, and we all had to climb down a service hatch to change decks. Not suprisingly, Deltroy encountered a bit of difficulty fitting himself and his pneumatic arm affixed cannon down the ladder.

Red dots began to blink on the handheld mapper, accompanied by an ominously demure beeping. Everyone stopped, knowing what that meant. Something was up ahead. Moving. It stopped quickly, though. Deltroy pushed the goggles down from his forehead, latching them onto his eyes. The lenses buzzed as they spun in an effort to zoom in on whatever was ahead.

"Look like crew members. Wearing grey jumpsuits. But..." Buzzz. "...they look like they've been altered genetically or something. They're holding friggin' shoulder cannons. 30 millimeter. Looks like they're guarding the entrance."

"Altered genetically how?" Baylen asks. Deltroy hmms and uhs. "They got... like... the back of their heads are shaven and they got some metal sticking out.. well, **** it, what does it matter? It looks like we're gonna have to waste them anyway."

"No!" He asserts. Holding his rifle with stifled hesitance. "If they're wearing crew uniforms, we have to take a closer look before shooting. They might be... I don't know. But we can't just shoot first." He turns to examine the group as a decision is made. "Deltroy, you come with me and my boys. The rest of you, make your way around to the east entrance. Radio if or when it's clear. Then we'll both head in together."

Sounded like a dumb idea to me. We should just take care of whoever's up ahead and then position ourselves, rather than split up. His funeral, though. Without further ado, I take the reigns and turn the nearby corner. Taking my eyes off the mapper to make sure Scorn, Tserca and Mekerle took the cue to follow along. I heard a small beep on the motion detector, but it was so far off I couldn't bring myself to care. Everything was covered in blood. It was searing away the cones in my eyes. Red lights... all red lights. Emergency. Warning. Danger.

The sound of angry mini-guns rattled the bulkheads with the strength of machine shop lathes. And then they started firing. A cacophony of bangs and explosions and drilling gunshots. So much for the crewmen being friendly. Life ends for whoever was on the wrong side of the exploding rounds so many meters away.

Our group turns the corner onto what should be the east entrance to the portal room. Four men were standing there. Or women. They had two legs and two arms, so I decided to shoot at them. Not with anything as crude as a gun, though. Air and minerals spontaneously combust inside of them as my amplifier glows red. Fragments of bone and flesh scatter from the loud snapping flashes, as if the imaginary bullets were exiting rather than entering. My eyes close and I shake the handheld amplifier at them, envisioning the explosions happening eight point three meters ahead. They were on the deck at that point, though, and I was just blowing up air.

When it was safe to do so, everyone ran ahead. I followed. "Same thing on that side?" I heard Baylen's voice inside my ear canal radio. I didn't answer, though. I wanted to see what these things were.

Deltroy was right- they were altered, somehow. Looked more like cybernetic implants than genetic manipulation, though. The backs of their heads were scalded free of hair judging from the scar tissue that surrounded the cortex nodes. DIY brain surgery. I could run a mindlink since they were freshly deceased, but all I'd get is the confusion of having ones mental processes controlled by a foreign implant. Their faces were all squarely distended and mangled, and their eyes were surrounded by vicious wrinkles.

"Roll up the sleeves." Mekerle reccomends to me. He was examining one of the corpses too. Scorn was keeping watch and Tserca was pacing around looking irritated and bored. The grey, dirty sleeves are pulled up. I find raised, black bumps along inflated veins. Two of them, side by side, like the bite of a sadistic snake. It was a vein shocker. Interesting interrogation technology. Two needle sharp electrodes are punched into the vein, and a precise current is used to turn the tender walls into pure atrophy. The victim then gets to watch as the current travels along the vein and causes it to puff up and turn jet black. The simple sensation of blood running through the canal feels like steel wool on a septic rash.

The pirates didn't have any torture tools on them- which was suprising- nor did they have the surgical know-how. Torture equipment wouldn't be kept in the medlab. The words 'torture' and 'The Invincible' were synonymous in my mind with one person. Or fake person I should say, since he was a robot. And it wasn't suprising considering his functional name. It was enough to deter pirates from even attempting to attack the ship, just because they feared being captured and given to him.

They called him The Agonizer. Mark Four.

[BlueNinja]

I'm trying to decide whether your writing reminds me more of John Steakley's "Armour" or Simon R. Green's "Deathstalker" series. Now, having the Empire controlled by the Prime Evils doesn't surprise me much - I've been expecting it from the second post or so. But having Tyrael skulking around on a tiny starship in the middle of nowhere, that's a bit odd. Still, I am waiting to see what happens next.

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I've been away from this story half from loss of momentum, and half from legal difficulties. From the start I've always intended this to be my vision of 'Diablo 3'. As a result there's a lot of action sequences. And the more action sequences I write, the more I begin to realize that my abilities to make them fresh and interesting are wearing thin. And so that explains the waning momentum. I still have a ton of plot ideas and directions, but gluing them together is proving to be hard.

The 'synthetic ressurection' is just a reason to explain why you can come back from dying. Same with the portal generators. As you can tell the main characters represent player classes, and a lot of their powers would appear somewhere on a skill tree. The only thing I'm not able to mirror from diablo is the endless item grabbing. I think I made some vague referrences to it, but didn't attempt to integrate it.

Please tell me that at least one person recognizes the 'desert mutants' from diablo 2. Also for clues as to who Lichello used to be hundreds of years ago, re-read his description somewhere in the first few chapters.

Anywho, here's more crap. Let me know if I still got it, or if I should take a breath and re-examine the writing. It's a transitory chapter.

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Chapter 18 - Put To Rest

Through the unholy malestrom of white light and blinding gunfire I could see him. He was the only prisoner mentioned by name in the news reports I had read about the transport trials. Ilim Keiferly. Mastermind behind the Sescheron City subway bombings. That sick freak who pumped nerve gas into the ventilation ducts. Turning a rush hour subway station into a grisly catacomb. Bodies on top of bodies on top of bloated, stiff bodies. And thanks to The Invincibles twenty year old memory buffer, he was free to kill again.

My heart refused to beat until I took another breath. As soon as we stepped into the room the doors had slammed shut and locked behind us. Sealing us in with this black computing tower that was the spontaneous transport prototype. Inside the shell it was glowing orange, and steam was puking out of everywhich port and seam: the rooms only source of light aside from our lanterns. The machine was filled with anger as we soon came to discover.

Every particle of these floating apparitions was glowing with an unnatural white halo, as if they were cheap holograms. Whatever they were, they had the power of the buffer behind it. Everything the ghosts touched melted and disintigrated, so we had to take them seriously. All of us running around as if on fire, taking pot shots at the heavily constructed CPU tower in the wide portal rooms center.

My attention was whipping every which way. I was trying to get the circuts inside the CPU to burn and fuse, but I couldn't concentrate. It was only inevitable that I trip over one of the raised steps that ascended to the foot high center platform. The deck grating tasted cold as my nose and mouth smash down against it. I could smell air rushing through broken capillaries. I could smell pain.

The room was a noxious blur. I roll to my side, and Ilim is there. Waiting for me to focus on his feral smile. He snarls, and with his entire body whips a length of glowing white chain at me. The links rattle like a metal snake. The shackle at the end whips towards my eyes and a white clap of thunder punched the soul out of my puny, lanky body.

----

The memory buffer exploded, and the murderers disappated with it. Possibly to different sections of hell.

The portal room lay in ruins, and the old buffer was a glowing stump.The circutry was forged inside of the titanium itself through some sort of pourous mineral technology. It took five autocannon shells to crack the case. Tserca was on the other side of the room, searching for where her kinetic sword went. When the tower exploded, it was sticking out of it like a shovel.

Scorn trod over the shredded plastic and twisted, charred plates of titanium. You'd never know it by looking at him, but Scorn weighed two hundred and seventy five kilos. If whatever he stood on couldn't support him, it would break and eventually flatten. "REST IN PEACE." He solemnly intones- or maybe vindictively scoffs. You could never really tell. His voice was toneless. It held neither menace nor mercy. Thanks to the miracle of technology, Scorn could now dance upon several graves at once, which I can only presume is what he was doing. Still-hot memory wafers split like wood chips beneath his heavy feet.

Most of the rifle lanterns were shut off, being that the smouldering, gaping holes in the deck and portal projectors were giving off enough orange light. Mekerle could see in the dark anyway. He was rushing around like a drugged up maternal figure. Jabbing needles into people, spraying open wounds with a cauterizing chemical. He himself was missing most of the right side of his face.

One of those buffer ghosts raked the skin and sinuew off like it was tissue paper. I saw it all. They writhed through the air with the same evil that oil slithers through a kiddie pool. Thank god someone blew up the projector before that ghost chain ripped my head off.

Even when we walked into the pitch black and unused room, I was still terrified that maybe The Agonizer was inside. Torturing remaining crewmembers and sending them out as gun-weilding slaves. Now that any source of danger was long gone, I could get a good perspective on how ridiculous that fear was. There was no guarantee that he or it was still in one peice after the destructive mutiny. And vein shockers were easily used and portable. Could've been anyone who put holes in those poor freaks outside.

The fear remains. No matter how I try to reason his cold face away, The Agonizer is still waiting around the very next corner I turn. Nervecracker in hand. Waiting to catch and keep me. Forever.

"I told you there were ghosts." Baylen remarks aloud. There wasn't much to inspect: We blew everything up real good. Our tax dollars at work. Metal and plastic shredded up, now of no use to anyone.

"I thought you were ********ting me. Maybe you got some strange space fever." Deltroy was taking a personable repor with the Lieutenant. Military types. They probably got to chatting over a vaccuum sealed ration pack and realized that they both served in the kazanadanasandar war or operation frogsballs or whatever.

I could only assume that there were people- or things- closing in on the thundering disturbance we created. In other words, I was ready to leave. "We're done. Let's go. Let's leave." I urge, hovering about the western exit. After being locked in that haunted room, the bloody ether of emergency lights and black shadows waiting in the corridors seemed like a warm blanket.

[0xDEADCAFE]

Sorry to hear about your loss of elan, but your writing does not show it. I would call this one of your best chapters. :thumbsup:

Although I did find this metaphor (or is it a simile?) quite unsatisfying:

They writhed through the air with the same evil that oil slithers through a kiddie pool.

Other comments:

- I pictured the "desert mutants" as the four-armed Marauder types in act II

- I reread chapter 4 which introduces the caption nee Lichello. I really haven't a clue who he might be. I thought at first it might be Cain but he's not the military type. The name "Lich" -ello make me wonder if he is some kind of undying mage, a Tal Rasha type. It would make sense that some Horadrim might survive into the future though, especially with Tyrael's help.

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Actually Tyreal makes a comment about Caine being the last Horadrim, and he had sworn an oath to protect him until death. Just gossip with him in act 4. I had just learned this, as I actually took the time to talk with certain characters in diablo 2 in order to hopefully glean some infor about the setting.


Chapter 19 - Counterfeited souls

At last, the medical laboratory. At last, answers. Potentially anyway. It was possible that the clones of Minax were made by automation, and we'd end up having to interrogate a set of robotic arms.

The wide, spacious windows that once yawned between the outer corridor and the interior of the lab were blocked from the inside. The trauma-proofed plexiglass now grist inbetween the grills of the deck plating. A variety of debris- heavy trunks and cabinets, patient beds, gurneys and hull plates stolen from other decks- obstructed those hoping to enter through them. But we could see light escaping around the barricades. Sweet, undiluted, calm, colourful, normal white light. The greens, the yellows, the shining whites. It was almost enough to lure us in.

Didn't matter at any rate. We had to walk in, whether we liked it or not. By now it occured to us wise to throw grenades into rooms before we enter them, having been ambushed, bushwacked, suprised and generally sprung on like dopey tourists during the entire mission. This way we could effectively blind and kill all the hostages and survivors, without exposing ourself to possible danger.

I could feel Minax in my head, his presence distinct and dominating. Those unable to pay attention to thought perceptions were as clueless as ever. And by those, I mean everyone around me. But by this point the mental presence of Minax Gorgul was almost as common as the feeling of resentment I had for whoever planned this mission. Perfect clones all think the same, unlike the easier to make and more common natal clones. All this feeling told me was that there were some clones of Minax nearby. No big suprise.

Now that the chuckers had their grenades ready, we all form a wedge in front of the medlabs main entrance. The east entry was sealed shut, and the service lifts were located in sections of the lower deck that were exposed to black space. And so here we were. The doors slide open as the space guard jump before it, and before it can open to completion, the shock grenades are tossed and they dive back into cover.

Bang. My ears pop from out here, heart skipping a beat as the shock grenade completes its mission. Sound is replaced by feedback screeching. Tserca and I are the only ones not equipped with something to dull the noise. We wince and follow the rush of stomping and yelling that proceeds in our ears with anguished silence.

The room is empty of live humans. We had shocked nobody. Unless fetuses and half entrophic proto-adults can see and hear through their tanks.

The med lab is spacious, and most of the walls had been recently removed. Some hard points where electricity was ported in still remained, wires and beams stretching from floor to ceiling here and there. The reason for such restructuring was morbidly clear from where we stood. The laboratory was stripped of all its facilities, and filled from corner to corner with bioscopy tech cloning vats. The same kind they used to repopulate Westmarch after the nuclear holocaust in 912. They were designed to pump out people, and pump them out fast. Counterfeit souls, as the church called them.

Light was shed only on a 4 by 4 meter placement grid, appearing as islands of white light in a sea of shadows. Most of the light was green, having been bounced around in the amniotic fluids of the cloning tanks. It was as if we were swimming in there with them. Calm beeping cast its sleepy tones over the sleeping clones like a digital lullaby. They looked so peaceful. So innocent. So vunerable. Like unripened fruits. Almost making one feel guilty if they were to pluck them off their umbilical couplings and pop their gut. Immature, tender organs slipping out in glistening coils like so much juice.

I could tell that's what Mekerle wanted to do. His remaining eye was flicking about rapidly, hoping to far scan the clones for lifesigns and any post mitosis manipulation. The clones were of various ages, stages ranging from embryo to adult. Some of the nanite assisted tanks had torsos with arms in them as the perfect clones were built rather than grown. They were all in fetal positions, vunerable spines bent like the supple wood of a bow. Twitching and throbbing as they mature days in the space of seconds. Their cheap lives dependant upon the vulgar insertion of plastic tubes.

"I knew you were going to do that."

A man steps from behind one of the wheel mounted vat monitoring computers. We all recognized him. We had seen stages of his development that his mother and father weren't even aware of. If he was born the way humans traditionally are. It was Minax Gorguul.

I could tell that he wasn't a clone. Most of the clones didn't have the sort of facial hair that Minax wore in his pictures. On top of that, Minax showed signs of freyed nerves and sleep deprivation, something a fresh clone wouldn't experience in the duration of a days existance. His eyes were wild and jiggled in his black, pouchy sockets. He hadn't bathed or shaved or slept or even eaten for days. Food came up the mainline. I could tell that his arms were purple with needle marks- he had moved onto his neck judging from the red mounds. As it was, kevlar robes were draped about his emaciated body.

"I knew... I saw it. I saw it coming." He smiles through unbrushed teeth. His breath smelled like rubbing alcohol, and I was standing at least thirty yards from him. "Horus? Horus!?"

I emerged from inside the protection of the group. As military types normally do when presented with an unknown personality, almost everyone in the party was pointing guns and barking at Minax. "Freeze! Don't move! Get down! Drop the staff!" I admired his refusal to drop his powered focus staff. The guard were just jealous that they didn't have one.

Two of them stepped aside as I made my way to the front. I was suprised that the guards even recognized my name. I was also lucky that they didn't remember that Baylen was giving the commands. "Hold up." I ask the group. "Headmaster Gorguul." I bow, betraying my timidness in my reluctant voice. But as the bow ends, my eyes once more reach into his. It's never too late to assert yourself. "Are you ok?"

I couldn't just come out and demand to know what was happening. I couldn't afford to have my mind wiped clean. It was my livelihood. The apes behind me had expendable brains. With easyaims, the rifles practically fired themselves.

"Yes. I'm perfect." The answer is as calm as his gently bobbing spawn, suspended in green fluid on every side. I had my space guard, he had his psychic baby fetuses. A long, uncomfortable silence passed in which we simply stared at each other wordlessly. "Is there something I can help you with?"

So nonchalant. I could tell that something had snapped in him. I'm sure everyone else could tell, too. "Are you behind the armed clones patrolling the ship?" Enough games. I didn't come all this way to chat. And I didn't dare try and enter his mind. I wouldn't live to regret it.

His black graphite focus staff dragged along the smooth floor. There was no grating for biohazardous material to sink and fester. The staff had a black amplifier sphere, too. You couldn't see from one end to the other. And if he put a thought into the center of the mathmatically perfect globe, it would resonate and the echo would tear space itself. "Yes. None of them attacked you, did they?"

"Put holes in my men." Baylen speaks up, with a tone that sounded neither amused nor pleased with our chat. Minax didn't even look at him. It was as if Minax wasn't aware Baylen even existed, being that the Lieutenant was mentally unawake. "I remember you, Horus! Yes, yes I do. The brains memory is perfect." He marvels breifly. "The subterranian complex, yes? I taught your kinetics class!"

I remembered. And that's why I was dreading this mission from the start. "Enough reminiscing!" Tserca pipes up. I could tell that the clones were offending her religious sensibilities "Flush these tanks out and come with us to The Vindication. In case you haven't noticed, this ship is a warzone."

Thankfully this finally took Minax's unwavering attention from me. "Yes, I did. Mostly a facet of our design..."

"Whose design?" She demanded. Minax's mouth hung open as he kept his sentance... and then continued as if her query was simply a strange noise made by the ship. "...because our cargo is under assault. The transfer was originally to be made back upon sanctuary, but this little mutiny set us back. The emperor himself will arrive soon. We know, Horus."

Blood was rushing away from my brain in shame. I guess the omerta and the empire were closer than I imagined. At least as far as intelligence was concerned. "Yes, you and your friends on The Vindication. We know why you're here. You will not secure the sacraments." The rest of my group was effectively demoralized. Weren't we the empire? Wouldn't the emperor Himself be an asset to our effort to recover The Invincible? Clearly I was the only one of our team who had a chat with Lichello and his pal.

Minax was quick to realize as much. Didn't take much to see, as it was written clearly on their confused faces. "Oh, you don't know." He remarks with coy dryness. "Well know this. Horus, Tyreal and his champion are deceiving you. If you serve the Emperor, you'll sit tight with me and await the arrival of He and his justicars. You have nothing to lose but time."

"Who the hell is Tyreal? Is he talking about the Captain?" I could hear Deltroy ask someone beside him, in a low voice. Clearly not a detail of the mission that concerned him.

Tserca was the self appointed moral compass of our group, as her self appointed duty commands. "If you be at peace with us, then surrender. My commands come from the Emperor Himself last I heard, and you cannot go higher than Him. Until His arrival is confirmed, I must obey my last orders." She was relishing this persecution. Her holy sword aglow with self-righteous animation. "Drop the stick and come with us."

Minax wasn't about to surrender. I could tell. He wasn't about to argue, either. "Do as you will." The comment came with quiet defiance. Staring down the barrel of every gun that was pointed at his face.

Tserca only completed three steps towards him before standing stuck before him, screaming in pain. Her soft plate armour beginning to droop and steam atop her shoulders, as well as her vestments. As if gravity were pulling it down in stop motion. Soon we realized that her white armour, clothing and gear was fusing with her skin. Her skin to her muscles. Her muscles to bone. Her feet to the floor. Her desperate, terrified shreiking became more gutteral as her tongue melds with her teeth, effectively sealing her mouth shut.

That was all I needed to see. I point my amplifier at Minax, bulb first. But by then, Baylen had already removed his head with a timely round of rifle fire. Since the rounds were explosive, we were all showered with fragments of skull and jaw well before the decapitated body flopped limply to the ground along with it's precious focus staff. The second round hit a tank right behind him, suprisingly only causing a crack. A leaking crack, but a mere crack nonetheless.

Dark silhouettes moved behind the full tanks. People walking. Bare feet slapping wet against the cold grey tile. The suspending fluid in the vats begin to heave and become disturbed. Splashing everywhere.

A nude and dripping Minax Gorguul rounds one of the vats. Followed by another Minax. Five more of him climb out of some of the tanks we had walked by upon entering. Making the floor slippery as they pull umbilical tubes from their stomaches, placenta and formula leaking out of the discarded couplings. The first few seconds of life and already they were in a life and death struggle. The room became claustraphobic with their numbers as the copies seemed to emerge from out of nowhere. All naked and perfectly cloned, their hair fresh and uncut.

"You can kill me all you want, Horus." A slight, calm laugh passes through his hooked nose. Despite essentially disintigrating his brain with the pull of a trigger, we had failed miserably in our attempt to kill Minax. In fact, he was wearing a manic smile as he stood over his dead body. Maybe it was because he was ripped off of post-birth narcotics. Maybe it was because he was drunk with invincibility. But I was right: He had snapped, and was thoroughly convinced that Minax Gorguul was twenty-seven people all at once. "But you will NEVER stop me."

[0xDEADCAFE]

This just gets better and better... :clap:

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Chapter 20 - Emperor Belial

Emperor Belial did not enjoy being around his pigfaced minions. Humans, mortals. Whichever. But the emperor himself couldn't travel through space on his own. So they were necessary.

"I'm on my way towards The invincible. The mortals say it will take another day. This is as fast as I can be surveyed. Has Abejhur-Jek-Iil completed his mission?"

"Yes he has." The Omerta Don promises. "No-Face" had completed his mission perfectly.

"Excellent."

A somber pause follows between the two. Thankfully, the rest of the crew couldn't hear what Belial was saying. Soundproof, tinted glass divided Belial from the bridge crew. Some stupid ship like "The Annihilation" or "The Consternation". Pithy mortal names for ships. All Belial needed to know was that it was the biggest one in the fleet.

Tyreal will, at last, be properly mocked.

"He was always a faithful acolyte. It is regretful that he be sacrificed so. His father has slain so many of my most annoying enemies."

"Yes Archon." Arch-slave De Seis. Belials disgraced servant. May his shame live longer than the stars. Controlling an element as insignificant as the Omerta was a degrading loss of status for the once Lord. A pawn in one of Belials smaller armies.

"Tyreal will be slain, and He shall be reborn. All demons rejoice."

"Yea, verily Lord Belial."

It was depressing how easily even his own minions believed the lies. Terror and hate are pitiful levers for controlling the actions of others, be damned what his brothers insist. His real brothers, that is.

Emperor Belial watched stars rush past his face. The window reflected a silver mask. His form swaddled in white robes. Every colour so carefully chosen for him by his mortal underlings. Exactly what effect each colour would have upon the common mind was weighed.

Mortals, his slaves. His scraps. His army of garbage. The pebbles he would throw at heaven.

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What do you think about the latest post? Was it made well or no? Any suggestions are appreciated. I hope I'm not messing up the rythm and style too much. It's really just a breif shift of perspective.

[0xDEADCAFE]

What do you think about the latest post? Was it made well or no? Any suggestions are appreciated. I hope I'm not messing up the rythm and style too much. It's really just a breif shift of perspective.
I have mixed feelings about this chapter. On the one hand, it seems like a valid direction to go in at this point. On the other hand I have a real problem with the voice of the narrator.

What's good:

- Yes it is a drastic perspective shift, but what else can you do if you want a change of scene and the main protagonist isn't even in the room? I don't think this is a problem in itself.

- I don't think the scene change is a problem either. There are enough references to "The Emperor" in the preceding chapters to whet the reader's appetite for an introduction to the Emperor.

- The end of the previous chapter is a real cliff-hanger. By inserting this chapter here you stretch-out the reader's anticipation of the conclusion of the battle against the many Minax's.


What's not:

- "Emperor Belial" as the first two words was a bit too sudden, especially with the way you hid Tyrael's identity for so long. Not to write your story for you, but you might let the reader ponder the identity of the emperor for a while before giving away his identity.

- Okay now to the real problem. Obvously it is no longer Horus speaking. So who is?

Thankfully, the rest of the crew couldn't hear what Belial was saying. Who is thankful? The narrator? Why would the narrator be thankful? Is Belial the narrator? I don't think he could be because of this line of narration:
Belials disgraced servant.
If Belial was narrating he would say "My" wouldn't he? And this line makes it clear it can't be Belial:
Emperor Belial watched stars rush past his face.Even if he was a nut-case that always spoke of himself in the third person he wouldn't say that.
Tyreal will, at last, be properly mocked.
Is the narrator on Belial's side? Why does he/she hate Tyrael?


So who is the narrator? Is it some person in the story we have not met? Is it the voice of an omnipresent, omniscient narrator (I forget the term for that.) If it is, you might want to lose the personality. That work's great for Horus-as-narrator, but when it is not, where is it coming from?

So, to me, the voice of the narrator is very confusing. I really think it's a fatal flaw in the chapter. I would recommend going with a zero-personality narrator for this scene. If you can find a way to make it come from Horus, that would be better, but you'd have to be very creative to do that. Lastly, you could make it the voice of some other character, perhaps even Belial, but long-term I think it would be out-of-place unless that character were to become some major figure in the story, perhaps a counter-point to Horus.

Just to be clear, I am not suggesting that, in general, all narration has to be impersonal. It's because the rest of the story has been Horus-first-person that I think you should either shift to another character's first-person view, or use a narrator-as-nobody voice.

Of course this is all IMHO. It becomes tedious trying to squeeze-in "in my opinion" in every opinionated sentence so I didn't try. Also, all the praise I have previously heaped on this story still stands. And BTW, I really like this line and what it portends:
Mortals, his slaves. His scraps. His army of garbage. The pebbles he would throw at heaven.

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Yeah I should've thought the perspective out a bit more clearly while writing. I imagined it to be a sycophantic demon at Belials side. Maybe an anguish worm? Either way I didn't make it clear.

I thought I'd just throw out the identidy of the emperor because I'd been going on with Emperor this and Emperor that for the whole story, I figured that people had a lot of time to speculate on who the Emperor was already. I further figured that they'd be sick of the mystery, and maybe even think that I hadn't fleshed out that aspect of the story. So, bam, there's your answer. I thought the shift from suspense to complete immersion would make for a good effect. I didn't want people to be screaming throughout the chapter "Yeah, we know he's a demon, get to the point."

Also I breezed over the description of the arch-slave De Seis, because I figured that we're all diablo nerds here and recognize him as a unique monster from the chaos sanctuary in act 4. But to an uninformed reader, the brief description I tacked on would sound quite dumb.

Last night I was in the middle of a creative epiphany. I had to fight as hard as I could to not give too much away in that chapter. I have a whole backstory dreamed up for how everything got the way that it did in the diablo universe, but if I just spill it all in one chapter, the story'll die prematurely.

I plan on more perspective shifts as the story continues. The story will have 'acts' (sound familliar?), with The Invincible being the first. Next act, I'm going to switch perspectives to another main character, and do the same each act. The ambitious scope of my story would sound boring if told from the perspective of Horus for every page and chapter. He's a colourful narrator, but too much of anything is a bad thing.

[BlueNinja]

I'm hoping that the Belial is a title, and not the Lord of Lies. Cruising in on a massive starship and blasting people into smithereens is Baal's style. Any plan of Belial's should be long on nobody knowing that they're truly working for an evil cause, Tyrael not knowing there is an evil cause, and preferably never making himself shown.

The other parts were good.

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Yes, that is -the- Belial. Firstly, not much is known about Belial as far as official canon goes (unless I've missed a resource). So it's hard to really say how he'd operate. Also, he's not going to blow anyone to smithereens. Just wait until the story progresses if something doesn't seem to make sense. It'll all get explained. And if it isn't, I'll go back and change it. This is pretty much a first draft.

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Chapter 21- Counterfeited Souls pt. 2

The clones, of course, all had foreknowledge of the weapons locker locations. They didn't have the time to get dressed in armour, but picking up a high-yeild shotgun wasn't too inconveinient.

A twenty gauge shell peels out like thunder, accompanied by the banshees shreik of violently shattering glass. It was inevitable. We are submurged in a tidal wave of some 6000 liters of amniotic flotsam. I am buried under bodies as it knocks everything in its way to the ground. Rifle weilding guards scramble to get to their feet in the slippery deluge while the clones leap and attack.

Someone- Halex, my old kinetics professor- is punching a scalpel into my face, point first. Instinctively the lids of my eyes close. As much as I've been taught to fight blinded, I didn't want to be stabbed in the eyes. I run, and he runs after me, predictably enough. Broken glass cuts my hard soled boots, and the answer to my problem is clear.

I turn and wheel about, ready for the naked maniac to slam into me with his surgical implement. I point with my amplifying globe. Small pockets of gravity surround big, ugly shards of glass on the floor, allowing them to be moved with but a slight push of oxygen particles. The glass lifts quick and darts forward like a hail of thrown shirukens. It was like putting an apple in front of a sandblaster. Shreds of him hung everywhere.

I am lifted in the air much in the same way as those shards of glass. By invisible hands. Being less aerodynamic in shape meant I caught a good drag before being tossed back into another, smaller vat behind me. The glass breaks. Another avalanche of waste product enriched gutter water drenches me.

Unfortunately, this tank was still inhabited. Still attached to tubes, a headless shapeless Minax shambles against me in short lived confusion. I could barely make out a shape, being blinded by the blood that was running down from my freshly opened forehead. A pectoral muscle was missing, as were its feet. But that was just fine, as it landed right on top of me.It looked like a factory defect that someone had left under the heating lamp for too long. Skin like squares of melted processed cheese hanging from a skeleton.

The monster springs on me. Wrapping a synthetic umbilical around my neck. Cinching it tight and strangling with well developed hands. I could hear space guard scream as they die. Soon it would be my turn. The more my neck was squeezed, the more blood would be pumped from the greivous wound in my head. My brain was losing power. I was staring at the clone through a long, dark tunnel into which I was slowly falling downwards. Now I see why death is always associated with the colour black.

Lasers make a distinctive hissing sound as they cut through flesh. And the smell reminded me of accidentally touching a burning stove-top when I was a child.

They're pretty bright, too. What remained of my vison was irritated by more red. Was the ship mocking me with more red lights before I die? No. It was a laser sword. My attacker was effectively halved. Right down the middle, like someone splitting a sandwich.

Then silence. Was the fight over already? A cold, rubbery hand helps me to my feet. The rush of blood leaving my already injured head was too much. I had to crouch and double over to regain my bearings.

"Your friends are injured." The laser blade is shut off, with a dying, quiet wail.

My friends?

The 'woman' standing above to my left couldn't have weighed any more than fifty pounds at the most. She was a marvel of modern cybernetics. Behind her eyes there is a brain. It's rather easy to tell, as you can see clearly into the back of her face. She had only a plate protecting the brain. A hard plate, but just a plate.

Her arms and legs are made of folding titanium, the only armoured points being the relatively sophisticated joints that articulate her full, nimble range of motion. Her metal spine, as exposed as her brain, was designed to be detachable and rolled into a tight coil. Inside of her chest, a battery instead of a heart.

She was a collapsable assassin. Designed to fit inside of suit cases and ventilation ducts and other places you wouldn't expect a murderer to hide. Mark nothing, being that her brain was perfectly organic. That and her clean mask of a face were the only vestiges of humanity that she was able to hold on to.

Having my bearings once again, I stand. The scene was one of chaos and bloodshed. Body parts and shattered glass floating in pools of green slop. The floor level biodrains must've gotten clogged with a severed limb or a peice of machinery. Tserca stood like a statue. Unable to move from being essentially joined with the floor, she was a perfect bullet magnet. Deltroy had his throat slit, from ear to ear, and was laying face up with dead eyes. Mekerle was lumbering around witlessly, splashing gently and holding his guts in with a hand. Administering stasis shots to Deltroy and Tserca, and some of the other slain and floating space guard. Scorn seems worse for wear, having absorbed most of the gunfire, but is still operating perfectly.

"Who are you?" I had gotten off lucky, so it seeemed. If Mekerle weren't so busy, he could probably seal my wound right then and there.

"I cannot say. But I have been stationed aboard the Invincible upon orders of Imperial Captain Lichello. It is under his authority that I withhold my name."

She even spoke like a robot, despite the organic sounding voice. I feel animosity towards her, despite her saving my life. And perhaps it was shared. Collapsable assasins were commonly used to kill rogue Third Eye operatives. "Whatever. Do you know what's going on here?"

"Faithful operatives have staged a mutiny. They've all since been discovered in hiding and slain. Enemy forces were underestimated. The engines have all been succesfully sabotaged and all replacement parts destroyed. The cargo..."

This wasn't news to me. But it was to Baylen, who was recently revived with an adrenaline shot judging from his agressive behavior.

"So YOU'RE behind this massacre? YOU summoned the pirates? Let the creatures loose?" He demands. Old bloodstains darken his grey fatigues. His spirit was left unwounded, however.

"No. The creatures were created and set loose upon any mutineers. The pirates were summoned by Imperials. The drones are programmed to kill any and all intruders, Imperial or not."

"Give her a break, Baylen." I interject, as I am always loathe to do. "She saved our lives from that maniac. Believe what you will, but don't make any important decisions before we get our answers from the bridge."

"That is not advised."

"What do you know?" Baylen steps closer.

"The bridge has been fortified by The Agonizer. Any attempts to infiltrate have met with death."

Baylen knew about the Agonizer, clearly. I could feel the temperature of our wading pool change as he went cold with fear.

"Well of course. Being a robot, it's still loyal to the Empire. As soon as the Legion shows up, boom, problem solved." Avoiding him was that easy. I myself wouldn't mind leaving The Invincible without ever seeing the face of that skeletal tormentor.

"If the alien isotope falls into the Emperors hands, sanctuary shall perish."

Nobody wanted to stand against the empire, as much as we opposed them morally. Especially in a group of 12.

Baylen makes his decision quickly. "Let's just go back to the ship and patch everyone up." An easy decision to make. "We'll talk this out with the Captain. Do you know where the dampeners are.."

"I've already destroyed it."

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Ok, I'm considering submitting this to The Dark Library, despite all the gratuitous themes of fighting in it. So what I got here is a rewritten introduction, because I felt the one in this, my first draft, was pretty weak.

Please tell me which one you feel is better. If this one, then it'll be the start of my second draft. Not that I expect you to read through my crap all over again- this is just a brief interlude. And I think it stands well enough on its own to break up the story with.


INTRODUCTION-


Our slave hold is dark, and musty. The smallest fingers of light filtered in from above through steel bars. You could hear our slavers walking on them. Looking down into the black. Watching. The halogen beams were barely enough for Raylin to see what he was doing with his assault rifle.

"If you show up for loading and that thing shows signs of tampering, we'll all suffer." A disembodied voice whispers from the dark.

"I've been wearing this thing since I was twelve. Just keep shut and keep watch." Raylin doesn't even lift his eyes from his work. He was using a band of straw as a tool. That's all we really have down here. Straw and gutter water. And, of course, the unloaded rifles chained to our wrists. Forever until death. So the law goes for us.

Thankfully Quoload was telling a story. His favourite one. Those who were racked with too much pain to sleep stayed up and listened. His speech was quiet, out of respect for those who were asleep. They had earned their temporary escape.

"...He had but one arm left, yet still found the strength and hope to heft his great, shining sword-" He demonstrates with a pantomime. Reaching his unchained hand up into a beam of light that peirced the darkness through the bars above.He was born to be a storyteller, not a fighter. Yet here he was. "-and hurl it directly at the foul demon before him. It had to land, or else he, the last to stand and challenge, would be helpless."

"The point found its mark, sliding inbetween ribs and peircing the black cavity where his so-called heart was kept." He points to his own bare, emaciated ribs. "The heroes were wounded or dead, but it was all worthy sacrifice. Baal's soul spiraled into the sky and died. Harrogath, as well as all of sanctuary had been saved."

"Why don't the angels come to save us now, Quoload?" A gravelly, bitter voice sounds out over the sound of a dripping pipe. It was Lacherhas, the man who was made to swallow glass by the guards when he tried to hide food. "Where are your heroes now?"

"The only of their line that remain, so I know, is Iaunibn. Ancients help him. He was one of our people." The prayer is made heavy by lament. Miserable, helpless lament for Iaunibn. Poor, tortured Iaunibn

Quoload the storry teller is slapped in the face with a noise that sounded like scoffing. "Iaunibn is just a tool to make us all scared. His heritage is nothing more than myth and rumour. He is no different than you or I, and you know it."

The old man could only silently abide Lacherhas' lack of faith. He had no proof. No evidence. None but his story, which he was quick to pick up.

"It was too late, however. Baal had corrupted the world stone, and Tyreal was forced to destroy it. You know the Arreat mountain? Or 'The Fighorn' as they call it now." He scowls. "That's where the worldstone was once held. When it died, angels and demons could no longer set foot on sanctuary. The Lightbringer was only allowed five seconds to say goodbye to the world he believed in, fought for and loved." Pathos is used liberally to flavour his words.

And then, with pointed, beady eyes he directs his next words into the darkness. To wherever Lacherhas was laying. "And when the demons stopped showing up, nobody had anything to fight for. When the angels stopped talking to us, nobody had anything to believe in. In a few generations time we as sanctuary had forgotten all of our lessons and ignored all of our past. All of us except the Northlanders. The Snake, the Wolf, the Bear, all of my clans and peoples. We kept Tyreal's words in heart, with every decision made."

Not everyone in here was a Northern Aboriginal. Although 99% were. That's why those of us that were didn't listen. We had heard this story too many times.

"And look where that's gotten us." Lacherhas sneers. Perhaps appropriately, he was one of 'us', too. A Northerner. A snake tribal, I think. "Now we all have to put our rifles on a counter before we get to piss." An indignant pause is given. "Our beliefs have no prophecies for us. No more tales. No fables for you to squeeze the slightest few drops of hope from. Our ancients have failed us."

"What would you have us do?" Quoload hisses. Yelling would get us all the hose. We were supposed to be asleep. "Abandon our tribes in search of money? Foresake our healers advice and let the weak live?"

"If it weren't for our healers incompetancy, my wife could have LIVED." The bitter, damaged voice in the darkness hisses louder. "And maybe some money and real weapons could've made it a bit harder for the Empire to steal our lands and enslave our children. But we had to stick with swords and bandages while people were building JETS."

A chorus of murmurs began stirring dust. Everyone agreed with someone different. The strangling darkness made it all anonymous. Raylin is quick to grab up the parts he had worked off of his rifle and receed under a mouldy old burlap blanket. Quick reflexes betraying his fear.

"The consequences of such thinking is made rather clear in another of my stories." Quoload indulges the need to argue bitterly. "I call it 'Record of the Collapse.' Unlike my other stories, this one has video footage and a five hundred kilometer strech of radiated land to back it up."

The Great Collapse of civilization was indeed well documented. Even slaves got to have the TV pointed at them for some hours of the day. A tool built for mind control if there ever was one. The footage I saw was of tanks rolling through villiages, of babies being incinerated inside of bomb-crushed buildings. Footage of the weak and helpless being gutted like fish by savages in military uniform.

Apparently the resources got too taxed, and the nations that controlled them too populous. An equillibrium had to be reached. It eventually was, after eighty years. Eighty years of violence and plagues, dark ages and vicious feuds between survivors.The world Quoload lives in died in a plume of black, foul smelling smoke.

No wonder Lacherhas and others like him despise Tyreal. He suceeded only in delivering us to greater demons.

I had stopped paying attention, but almost immediately snap back into reality and notice that the hissing had grown into yelling. The yelling is joined with yelling from above. The din grows into a painful roar. Raylin hurriedly goes about reassembling his rifle as I retreat under my burlap shroud.

Clanking, stomping, screaming. I could tell it was only a whir and a squeak before I'd be shivering in a fetal position as stinging cold water beats down on my bruised body like an abusive husband. We were getting the hose.

[0xDEADCAFE]

So what I got here is a rewritten introduction, because I felt the one in this, my first draft, was pretty weak. Please tell me which one you feel is better. If this one, then it'll be the start of my second draft. Some thoughts:

- I am assuming you want us to compare this intro with the one that appears as the very first post in this thread. Is that right?

- the new one reads more like part of a story than the original, which read like a brief historical synopsis

- the new one seems to introduce some characters. To me it reads like it could be the introduction to a new part of this story. If it is intended as an intro to all the chapters you have already posted I would have to wonder what happened to the folks in this cell?

- the informational content of the two intros is a bit different. The second one focuses more on the loss of faith, and puts a real human face on it. It leaves out some of the political and historical detail provided by the first intro, which I never cared for and don't think was essential info for the story that followed.

On Chapter 21 - another great chapter, but I never quite understood how a group of naked clones was able to do so much damage to Horus's entourage of armored and heavily armed soldiers, cyborgs and robots, even having greater numbers. Scalpels versus high-caliber machine guns? Maybe some of the Minax's were hurling mental energies around:
I am lifted in the air much in the same way as those shards of glass. By invisible hands. If so, it could have been clearer.

The collapsible assassin. Nice. But I found the conversation at the end of the chapter a bit confusing. Maybe it's supposed to be.

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Yes the people in my new intro are going to reappear in the story. Pretty soon, too. They're a part of the legion that the Emperor is carting through space towards The Invincible. So this new intro is foreshadowing some of the characters and themes that are going to be in 'act 2'.

I breifly went over how the clones knew where the weapons lockers were. Also they're all psychic. I should make that more clear in a re-write. Before I resubmit this story anywhere, I'm going to be skimming through all the commentary and using it to change the writing, so thanks for your helpful input. Even just vague impressions of what you felt reading certain chapters helps me restructure it for the better.

The reason why I felt so compelled to make the first intro so historical is because I didn't want anyone to say "They have space ships on sanctuary now? How did this happen? This story is dumb." And as a result, I had to not only explain the technological advance between Diablo II and the story, but also explain how a global empire emerged.

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Chapter 22 - Turning Point


His eyes poked out of their sockets, in the shape of lense rims. He could steal an image of you. Distort your face inside of his memory banks. Rap e and violate your likeness for whatever sick purposes he was built for. You could be torn apart one million, seven hundred and thirty two thousand times per second in his world. Even across the room the whirring of his lenses made sounds like circuits screaming in agony.

Just imagine what he'd do if he were to get his hands on you.

"...He has a personal intertial field projector. It slows down anything coming his way. Bullets, swords, whatever. Lasers work fine, though."

The Captain had since convinced the specialist officers and clergy (Tserca) to neutralize The Agonizer. Baylen and his guard would not be coming, however. The prospect of marching into a stronghold kept by The Agonizer was enough to shatter even the loyalty of his own men. They opted to instead stay behind and wait for the Emperor.

"He'll be armed with a special weapon. It's a typical, uh, ballistic whip. Try very hard not to get hit by it."

He falters in his description. Mekerle, however, is eager to clarify for him.

"Sir, it's not exactly a normal ballistic whip. It's actually a unique tool of the mark four Agonizer unit. The design team calls it a 'nerve cracker', or a 'nerve splitter'. A marvel of modern technology, really." He relishes. "The bulb at the end sends little fillaments into the skin upon impact. A bit bigger than a molecule, but small enough to cut through armour and skin and hook onto individual nerve endings in the space of a half-second."

"It then sends spasmatic jolts of electricity up and down the nerve through direct contact while drilling and flaying around. The shock strobes at such a furious oscillation that it apparently causes the immediate emptying of the bowels and bladder. Then the whip recoils, causing the fillaments to rip out abruptly. Sheer misery. The reason they call it the nerve splitter, though, is that watching someone die from a single shot typically breaks the fighting nerve of anyone involved in combat. If you end up getting shocked, you'll be convulsing too hard to pop a suicide hypo."

A heavy, gloomy pause followed in which we all listened to the sound of the viewscreen humming at us. I could tell that Mekerle was taking some sort of hideous pleasure out of shattering our morale. "I'm sure you'll be there to do it for us." The Captain replies Glibly. I couldn't blame him for wanting to omit that factoid about our enemy.

"Who the hell is she?" Deltroy takes the pause as an oppertunity to ask a question. He points towards the collapsable assassin, who was sitting in a chair next to Tyreal. "And for Gods sake where is her body?" As it was, the womans thinking and talking part- her head- was the only part attending the meeting.

"Her name is Chyboreum. She's from an organization you'll never hear of, but with whom I am in good graces. A loaner, if you will."

She was dropped into this mission as a favour? She was either completely witless or completely fearless. The Captain carries on.

"I had her infiltrate the Urube expeditions some time ago. As much a clumsy mess as everything seems, we've had this planned for some time."

The pictures I saw taken of Urubian landscapes were all photographs of morbid beauty. The atmosphere is in the process of dying out, and so the sky is a frozen colour of drab, depressing dark purple. There isn't any more oxygen left, so the blue stars shine like holes in a lampshade. And the sands are as red as blood from a freshly broken nose..

Archeological sites on the planet confirm prior habitation, perhaps several aeons ago. Who could live anywhere so barren? Scientists theorize a solar orbit shift. Apparently sanctuary used to be a planet on which oceans of lava swirled atop an even hotter core. The solar orbits slowly shifted, sending every planet away from the sun. The lava on Sanctuary cools off and becomes mantle. Urube becomes a cold, desolate rock as it floats away from its star. Further out into the desperately empty, soulless universe.

What ores could the Emperor possibly find on such an old planet? Or, whoever's pulling the Emperors strings. Aliens. Maybe it's the people who used to live on Urube infiltrating the Empire and making people disappear.

Then again, maybe not. I guess that's what we were trying to do. Find out who wants this ore so badly.

"And what did she find?" Mekerle asks. He knew about the approaching imperial legion. He also knew that the Captain was jamming their attempts at communication. He wanted answers. I wanted better ones than those already given.

"Urubium, or Ub on the scientific table of elements," The head glows as it speaks. "Has been found in trace elements at the archeological digs. I have witnessed small shards of it placed in protective casing. I was unable to retrieve them, in accordance with the Captains request to avoid proximity to a specific enemy agent."

The Captain seemed to approve of her failure. "Yes, you did well to follow my command. Your obfuscational talents would be unable to fool his senses. Now that we have you, we can go about capturing the Urubium. The samples are within our grasp. All we have to do now is storm the bridge and put down that sadistic robot"

"How do we know that this isn't just some power grab on your behalf?" Our uncharacteristic silence made it clear that Mekerle spoke for all of us. Fighting against the Empire is to fight against terror itself. Terror turned inwards is an undefeatable enemy. It is instant death.

The Captain answers genuinely enough. No looks at Tyreal, or at his remote controlled murderer. "You know what the Emperor is capable of. Your university has been at odds with Him over certain mandated experiments."

Mekerle expresses himself with a frown. The head priests at the UofR had relaxed ethics as far as ressurecting the dead was concerned. I could only imagine what it was the Empire had to force them to do. Lichello appeals to us individually, now. He turns to Scorn. "You've been a part of rebel suppression. You've seen the atrocites that innocents suffer when the Emperor is challenged."

"IT WAS MORE OPPRESSION THAN SUPPRESSION." Scorn blurts without any audiable emotional nuances. "MOST OF THE PEOPLE I WAS MADE TO TERMINATE WERE NON-COMBATANTS."

"And Deltroy-"

"Don't-" The Captain is stopped before he can start with halting words. I sense that Deltroy was rather defensive about... whatever he's hiding. "-say another word."

Lichello frowns, looking all of us in the eyes, one by one. "I'm sure nobody here is going to blackmail or betray you, Deltroy" The hilarity weakened the seal of my lips, and a chuckle was allowed to escape. I had to speak up.

"Trust? I think the group you've assembled here is a bit too 'diverse' for a bond like that to materialize." I look at the head of Chyboreum in the pit of her chair. Mekerle looks tersely at Tserca. Deltroy looks at Me. Scorn just stares foreward, awaiting further input. Chyboreum was tilted on her side, so she was looking at our legs.

The Captain plows on. He is a true believer, whatever it is he believes in. "No matter. It still is a convincing reason, isn't it?"

"I hate the Empire for all that they've done." Deltroy answers with vehemence, clearly biting back on saying more. However despite the favourable answer, the Captain seems unsatisfied. Disappointed, even.

"Never welcome hatred into your heart, Deltroy.You'll find that it will never leave."

Silence passes. Was our commanding officer emotionally nurturing us? I was as shocked as everyone else. He then turns to Tserca.

"I know how you felt when you stepped into the medlab on The Invincible. Imagine if all society were clones? Souls built in the Emperors image? That's where He's going, Tserca. We've all seen the signs. The technology is there, and the law is powerless to stop Him."

"Very well." She agrees. "Let me say what's on all of our minds: To hell with the Emperor. There, I've said it." It didn't take a psychic to foresee that she'd be the first to do it. "But before I throw in my lot, let me say something for myself." A breif rest, like she was singing a song and skipping a beat. "You" She points over towards the plainly garbed, plainly groomed Tyreal. "-are NOT Tyreal."

Tyreal- or the 'supposed' Tyreal now that Tserca had upset my distrust reflex- simply looked down at the ground with a timid expression. It took the Captain to speak up for him.

"Let me assure you, Tserca. He is Tyreal Lightbringer. Do not be fooled by appearances."

Lightbringer? Such a fancy name for such a tired looking man in a grey crewmans jumpsuit. I had once made a scan for the name on an Imperial intelligence database, but nothing came up. Who was Tyreal supposed to be that he was so important?

"I shall not be fooled at all." She barbs, and then becomes purposefully silent. That was all she had to say. A stern glower is given down to Tyreal from on high, before she then decides to seat herself.

"I'm with you, Captain Lichello. And so it seems are we all." I summarize. He knows that he has my support. I know more about The Agonizer than anyone else present, and that was too much. Whoever built him is the last person I'd let important minerals fall into the hands of. "But we need a specific plan to be laid out before we hitch onto whoever you're with. We're not going to risk our lives just so we can blow up a few legion troopers and die in a gunfight."

A conspiratorial look is given to the walls that protected us from the Emperors ears. The Captain leans forward. And for some reason, so do most of us. "When we leave for The Invincible, we're not going to be coming back here. We're going to retrieve the isotopes and then head for the aft shuttle bay..."

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Chapter 23 - Face The Agonizer

"So you've seen this super scary torture-bot, have you?" Everyone couldn't stop asking me questions. Except Scorn. Bantering was not a part of his programming. "You think we can take him out?" Deltroy digs deep with his inquiry.

I don't like thinking on that soulless robot. I've seen people tortured before. I've seen sadists at their work. Nothing was as depraved as watching The Agonizer at work. I felt no sympathy for its creators, who were killed by the Emperor. Officially it was because he was horrified by the 'atrocious nature' of the AI. But everyone unofficially knows that he was stationed aboard The Invincible and his creators were murdered so that a second Agonizer wouldn't fall into enemy hands.

"We're all going to die horribly." I answer sarcastically. It was a generous sentiment. We'd only be so lucky to die. But The Agonizer is well known for extracting the brain of his victims for post-mortal torture. The brains are kept alive in jars until the end of time, experiencing the eternal horror of one of his perverse virtual reality programs. Not even death could save us from him.

As it was, I was surprised that nobody else present had witnessed The Agonizer in person. Up until eight years ago the Internal Disciplinary Service carted him around Sanctuary like a circus freak. Using him to publicly torture so-called 'enemies of the Emperor' at specialist training facilities. I got to see him at the Third Eye subterranean academy. I got to see him pull out the eyes of my classmate Royilo and put them in glasses of cold water. Still attached to their ocular nerves. He was helpless to shut his eyes as his skin was devoured by flesh eating bacteria.

It was all a cheap, thinly veiled scare job. But I knew Royilo. My room was right next to his. And he was more loyal to The Imperial Church than I was by a long shot. I was helpless to say anything about it, but I knew. He was picked at random.

The titanium hatch leading to the bridge approach was sealed shut, and a foot thick on either side. Thankfully someone had drilled a hole right through the once-barrier with a utility laser. Large enough for even Deltroy and his hip mounted arm to step through.

Ever since our second emperor installed himself, riots and rebellion have come to epidemic levels. The bridge approach is a sign of the times. Before the bridge was typically reachable by stairs or an elevator. Now anyone wishing to move between the ship proper and the bridge has to walk through a heavily monitored and fortified hallway. Patrolled by drones and stationed by light turrets. The feverish waves of mutiny always crest, crash, and ebb back at the bridge approach. According to military strategists.

Conditions on The Invincible were no different. Stepping through the cleanly sliced hole, I kick through a pile of rubble. The once clean, flat, polished tile of the approach was mulched up like freshly stripped asphalt. It looked like people were racing jackhammers up and down the hallway. Holes the size of moon craters were made from grenades and large-arm fire. Stains the size of doubled over humans were made in dry blood.

Someone had since cleaned the hallway up. The bodies were cleared. The hanging wires clipped. Missing grating refitted. Lights replaced.

The lighting motif of RED RED RED is tastefully replaced with muted whites. Since the tiles are made of well polished black, the only true edges of colours to the rooms architecture was made by the blue stars outside. Thin bands of window stretch from where we stood to the bridge elevator, one on the left, one on the right.

Angled tiles run up from the floor to the bottom of the window, and from the ceiling to its top. The hallway was diamond shaped rather than rectangular, hi lighting the twin rectangles of window that gave a stunning view of black space- as black as the tiles that stretch before us. Even so damaged it was well polished enough to give an ethereal hall of mirrors effect while reflecting the stars. If the corridors which we once stalked could be described as jarring, then this approach was a study in contrast. It was... mysterious.

For the first time in a week, I feel at peace. I feel empty space clearing my troubled mind. Cool solar winds chasing away the humidity of a claustrophobic ship. Gentle stars soothing my red eyes.

Scorn is quick to shatter my illusions of calm. "HOSTILES AHEAD." He trumpets into my ear like a remorseless air horn. Most of the lights around the platform elevator had been shattered. Hiding in the shadows were vague shapes of beasts. Shambling and lurching and slithering and doing everything but walking out into the starlight.

It was clear that whomever made these soulless freaks hated flesh and all things alive. It's on his mind at all times. Swallowing up his thoughts. It enraged him. It terrified him. Skin and bone and organs were all things to be mocked.

Soft, pure blue light illuminates the first giant. It looked to be humanoid in the most basic sense. A head, torso, legs, arms, hands, feet. But it was wailing in pure misery. The head was one of a bloated and weary-eyed human. Attached to a body of living eyes. Their moist, tender surfaces glisten and sparkle in the windows light. The ones at the heels were tough like bark. Squishy bark. Grey, because the eyes had long since been crushed and were picking up dirt from the tiles wherever the monster stepped. Even its great hands were made of stalks of eyes. Some large, some small. Rusty steel claws jut from between some of the grape sized finger bulbs.

Another one looked like a pile of rags shuffling out into the light. But looking closer it was a grotesquely distorted man with baggy, weeping folds of skin hanging from his back. Tough, wiry lengths of exposed muscles droop down to the floor dragging behind him. Like bloody tentacles. Like noodles wet with tomato sauce.

The 'muscles' jutting from beneath his baggy skin then flex. Hooking upwards. It was clear that big, ugly, infected hooks were dangling from the ends of the muscle groups. Most of the spitefully placed muscles were in his back, so he had to walk like a hunchback.

We all open fire out of sheer disgust, I'm certain. Thick, hull-grade shutters scream and crash down over the windows, leaving the hallway a starless, hopeless black. The eyeball man screams louder as he is shot. Bulbous eyes being popped like bags of curdled milk. More shapes slither out of the darkness to join the frey. Snakes made of human skin, with a face of a living man. Giant spiders crawling on six human arms of varying hue. Men with heads replaced by swollen sacs of well bred virulence.

"Watch out behind us!" I had failed the group. It was my job to foresee ambushes in advance, rather than seconds prior. Bundles of clown patch human-shapes and animal-mans swarm. Soon begin crawling through the breached hatch behind us.

I point my amplifying globe at the direct center of the swarm. And freeze in abject horror. Her mouth... was a flap that opened at her neck. Despite not having a head, I knew it was a she. The figure was still grotesquely normal. Slender, smooth arms end in bony hooks. Her pelvis bloated with unnatural corpulence. And she could move like a bear.

"Get down!" Tserca screams in my ear and slams me down abruptly. I'm too terrified to take offense. Her mace arcs and smashes the 'jaw' of the neck-mouth with an eruption of kinetic force. Blood everywhere. My kevlar is still heavy with dry blood and amniotic fluids, despite all the cleaning. A random thought in the chaos.

Deltroy kept our front clear without any help. This was his dream scenario. Targets walking slowly towards him, susceptible to ranged fire. I was beginning to feel warm from the heat his vulcan cannons were generating. "What are..." He almost asks. We're all in trouble behind him, but he's helpless to turn due to anatomical limitations. His hips need to remain locked with his loaded legs. Otherwise the recoil of his weapon will break him in the middle like a cheap baseball bat.

There were a finite number of them ahead, which Deltroy had no problem disposing of. But behind us they just keep piling up. Soon enough the entrance is blocked by their voluminous dead. Tserca told everyone to stop amputating their arms. That way the corpses would form tangled limbs and turn into a barricade. It stunned me how there were actually tactics for fortifying a doorway with dead opponents.

I puke abruptly. My knees temporarily weak. Sensing an opportunity to strike the bridge, everyone rushes towards the elevator. I am grabbed and made to puke upon my thick robes while being dragged.

Pressure locks snap behind us. The elevator platform is lowering from the ceiling. Beeping as the bridge hatch opens up. Someone... something was being lowered down into the approach. It was that animal. The Agonizer. I knew it. I could feel his evil. It was making my stomach close like a fist. He was coming to strike when the quarry is vulnerable. Predictable strategy from a predictable robot.

Cold air rushes into the hallway from the bridge above. For some reason, The Agonzier was keeping the bridge especially cold. Chills nibble what remains of my nerve endings as the nitrous cloud assaults us.

The Agonizer is a essentially a seven foot tall skeleton. The head is shaped like a skull. The fingers are thin, sharp and nimble. The battery is in the torso, protected by a case. He is wiry and lanky and fierce. But he never looked so terrifying in the pictures.

Something was wrong. Bands of orange light were pushing his skeleton apart. Steam was rippling out of every girdle joint and pocket. He was dangerously overheated, running well over energy capacity. That explains the cold air. Despite the power fused into the skeletal posture, it looked like a crooked, slouching smokestack. A majestic sort of evil in its automated movements.

Looking further, I wasn't even sure that it was The Agonizer. The unmistakable face was obscured beneath a shrivelled parchment coloured mask. Ugh. It was the skin off a human face. Melted to the headpiece due to the heat. His joints were caked with filth and fecal matter. The contents of rotten intestines and laboratory pheromones smeared all over his exoskeleton. He smelled like a god damned paper mill, even with the cold air. No doubt the robot wanted to smell as teriffying as it looked.

And jutting out from his forehead is a glowing shard. It looks just like how Lichello described the Urubium to us. Slender and smooth like a precious stone. Blue. What was it doing in the robots forehead? Someone had just pulled the chip plate aside and hammered it in. Scorns cyber-psychosis looked like more of a simple neurosis when compared with the condition of The Agonizer.

Its joints make shrill sounds of shrieking while stepping off the platform. Pitiful, mournful shrieking. Like the ever rusting gates of hell. The bridge hatch seals behind. Warning sirens stop abruptly, and the only sounds made are of the indescribable, tongueless abominations raging to get in.

I could see the thick cable of the nervecracker coiled in the grip of stiff metal claws. His arm lifts, erecting the whip enough to stand stiffly in mid-air, and it drills in furious circular rotation. Shredding off the clear plastic sheath that normally protected handlers from accidental contact. I could feel the tiny filaments hooked on my nerves already in morbid anticipation.

Can't fear. Can't fear fear. Fear is death from the inside out. He steps another step forward. It wasn't an it, it was a HE.

"I'm going to enjoy watching you die." The voice was unreal. Nothing a cheap voice box could squeak out. It was godlike. It was malice Himself. It was a demon.

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I hope I did well describing the demon. I think people really don't pay much respect to what a demon truely is in popular liturature. They're just like "It's a demon! He smiles (or scowls) evilly and points his horns at you."

[BlueNinja]

Both from the descriptions of the twisted fleshy creatures, and the color of the (soulstone?) embedded in his forehead, I'm going to predict that this is Mephisto, or less likely Duriel.

[RevenantsKnight]

A couple things before I get to comments on your story: I generally dislike non-humorous portrayals of Diablo combining with modern/futuristic worlds, and I haven’t read your entire story (just most of it) for the above reason. With these disclaimers in mind...

...your story’s a decent read :) The ideas are strong, though I won’t yet comment on the characters, having not read this piece in its entirety (I’ll make time for it, hopefully.) Your spelling’s mostly flawless, there are some top-notch images in here, and the tone’s good for the setting, though the use of the present tense for the actions is a little odd and the frequency of sentence fragments makes the reading a bit bumpy. There are also systemic grammatical miscues and such, which is another reason why I’m finding it hard to finish this piece. With some changes, this could flow much better and pull me in more.

A side thought: it seems rather unnecessary to make this a Diablo story, as a lot of this probably would work if you purged every single reference to the game and reshaped it into a completely original world. While this would require some time and careful thought, I personally would find it more appealing as a straight sci-fi type of piece than a Diablo/space crossover, since the Diablo world has “classic fantasy” baggage in my mind and will never, ever be a true setting for a piece with vulcan cannons. But that’s just my two cents.

By the way, I noticed that you commented that you “break the rules of writing at will.” It might be convenient for you to do so, but it’s chasing this reader away. Conventions and grammatical rules are there for a reason, and if they aren’t obeyed, writing quality does drop, marginally in some cases, hard and fast in others. Not a single great novel can get away with this consistently; while I’m not holding you to the standards of, say, Emily Brontë, or even someone like Stephen King, I would expect you to take on a little more hardship (carefully editing your work) to lessen the load on your reader, especially with a story this long.

Specific comments:

Everyone couldn't stop asking me questions. Except Scorn. Bantering was not a part of his programming.

This is an example of when your use of sentence fragments isn’t too disruptive, and in general improves the story by highlighting a particular fact. Unfortunately, the same writing mechanism doesn’t work in a number of other instances.

I don't like thinking on that soulless robot. I've seen people tortured before. I've seen sadists at their work. Nothing was as depraved as watching The Agonizer at work.

The short, quick sentences in the middle of this passage work, but the last sentence seems to lack a sort of lasting effect in my mind. It’s over too fast and doesn’t have enough power to create any sort of horror or an image for me. Also, people think “about” things, such as robots. Side note: uses of “the” in a title are usually not capitalized, i.e. “the Agonizer” or “the Invincible” or “the Imperial Church.”

We'd only be so lucky to die. But The Agonizer is well known for extracting the brain of his victims for post-mortal torture. The brains are kept alive in jars until the end of time, experiencing the eternal horror of one of his perverse virtual reality programs. Not even death could save us from him.

Nice appropriation of Diablo’s quote, but the rest of this extract seems to be built solely to make that last shot possible, as the image here is too weak to really drive home the idea at which you’re hinting. I’d suggest adding on a few more sentences worth of description, as well as cleaning up what you’ve got already. For example, “only” and “so” in the first sentence don’t serve any further purpose (if you wanted to place extra emphasis on this, you could use a phrase like “We’d be lucky indeed to die”), the “but” at the start of the second sentence is unnecessary and “brain” should be plural.

Up until eight years ago the Internal Disciplinary Service carted him around Sanctuary like a circus freak. Using him to publicly torture so-called 'enemies of the Emperor' at specialist training facilities.

The second part there isn’t a complete sentence, as there’s no subject. Linking these two clauses with a comma instead of a period would fix this problem.

I got to see him at the Third Eye subterranean academy. I got to see him pull out the eyes of my classmate Royilo and put them in glasses of cold water. Still attached to their ocular nerves. He was helpless to shut his eyes as his skin was devoured by flesh eating bacteria.

My above comment holds for “Still attached to their ocular nerves” (by the way, that’s optic nerves). Additionally, “got to see” could be replaced with “saw,” “watched” or “witnessed,” just for starters, to make this a little less wordy. Finally, “helpless” might be better replaced with “unable,” which is probably what you mean. “Helpless” is similar, but not an exact synonym; if you want to keep it, I’d suggest deleting “to shut his eyes.”

Thankfully someone had drilled a hole right through the once-barrier with a utility laser. Large enough for even Deltroy and his hip mounted arm to step through.

The second sentence, again, isn’t really a sentence; there’s once again no subject. What was large enough for Deltroy to step through? The answer is of course the hole, but there’s no mention of the hole in the sentence, therefore this isn’t capable of standing on its own. I’d take this entire clause and stick it after the word “hole,” using a comma on either end to make the insertion clean.

Since this comes up a LOT in your writing, I’m going to stop noting such instances and instead offer a blanket suggestion: read all your sentences separately, just as they are, and out loud. If they leave questions unanswered, such as “Who did X?” or “What did Person 7 do?” then it’s a good bet that they aren’t complete sentences. While there are times where incomplete sentences are OK, in the majority of situations, they just break up the flow of your story.

The feverish waves of mutiny always crest, crash, and ebb back at the bridge approach. According to military strategists.

Vivid image, but it seems tacked on to the paragraph instead of being truly part of the idea. It might have been better to put this earlier, implying that since mutineers lose will as they approach the bridge, there are a number of defenses designed to “discourage” them further.

The once clean, flat, polished tile of the approach was mulched up like freshly stripped asphalt. It looked like people were racing jackhammers up and down the hallway.

I like this image...:)

Since the tiles are made of well polished black, the only true edges of colours to the rooms architecture was made by the blue stars outside.

“Was” should be “were,” since “edges” is plural. There should also be an apostrophe after the “m” in “rooms” since you’re indicating possession, and “well polished black” isn’t tile material per se, as none of those words are nouns, unless there’s a material called “black” in this universe.

The hallway was diamond shaped rather than rectangular, hi lighting the twin rectangles of window that gave a stunning view of black space- as black as the tiles that stretch before us. Even so damaged it was well polished enough to give an ethereal hall of mirrors effect while reflecting the stars.

“Hi lighting” should be “highlighting.” You also use the word “black” a lot; try a synonym such as “obsidian,” “onyx,” “jet,” “ebon,” etc. every once in a while for variety. Finally, there should be a comma after “damaged.”

Scorn is quick to shatter my illusions of calm. "HOSTILES AHEAD." He trumpets into my ear like a remorseless air horn. Most of the lights around the platform elevator had been shattered. Hiding in the shadows were vague shapes of beasts.

Here’s a good example of a point I brought up at the start: you’re shifting tenses in this passage. “Scorn is quick” is in the present tense, while “Hiding in the shadows were...” is in the past tense. In general, stories are told in the past tense, though I’ve seen a few rather notable exceptions that worked well. Regardless, don’t change tenses when narrating; pick one or the other and stay with it. This isn’t unique to this one example; you hop from tense to tense throughout the story, so please take the time to unify the tenses in all of your chapters. A final note: there should be a comma, not a period, in the quotation marks, and the “He” should not be capitalized.

It was clear that whomever made these soulless freaks hated flesh and all things alive.

“Whomever” should be “whoever.”

Skin and bone and organs were all things to be mocked.

Another excellent image.

Their moist, tender surfaces glisten and sparkle in the windows light.

You need an apostrophe every time you indicate possession; therefore, the above sentence should read “...window’s light.” Consider this general advice for all of your work.

The ones at the heels were tough like bark. Squishy bark.

Umm...bark is tough because it’s hard. “Squishy bark” would provide pretty awful protection. Try comparing the eyes to something naturally soft, but still durable.

Men with heads replaced by swollen sacs of well bred virulence.

I’m not clear on what you’re trying to describe here. The first thing that came to my mind were skin bulbs filled with biological agent, but I doubt that’s what you meant.

Bundles of clown patch human-shapes and animal-mans swarm.

“Clown-patch” isn’t bringing up an image for me, sorry. Also, the plural of “man” is “men.”

It was making my stomach close like a fist.

I think you mean “tighten” or “contract,” not “close.”

The unmistakable face was obscured beneath a shrivelled parchment coloured mask.

There should be a comma after “shrivelled.”

His joints were caked with filth and fecal matter. The contents of rotten intestines and laboratory pheromones smeared all over his exoskeleton. He smelled like a god damned paper mill, even with the cold air. No doubt the robot wanted to smell as teriffying as it looked.

Um...I don’t know what a paper mill smells like, but I’d imagine not feces mixed with rotten intestine and pheromones. And this is just my opinion, but if one of my characters was confronted with a demon that smelled like monkey excrement, he or she would start snickering inwardly. By the way, “terrifying” has two “r”s and one “f”.

Fear is death from the inside out.

Another gem of a phrase. Nicely done.

"I'm going to enjoy watching you die." The voice was unreal. Nothing a cheap voice box could squeak out. It was godlike. It was malice Himself. It was a demon.

Why was this voice “unreal?” Your reader doesn’t hear it, so you have to describe it in a way that he or she gets a mental sound of this thing. I can think of a number of things that “a cheap voice box” couldn’t do, and would also be godlike and dripping with evil intent. What you’ve got is a start, but it’s not specific enough to ring out as a strong close to this chapter.

I hope I did well describing the demon. I think people really don't pay much respect to what a demon truely is in popular liturature. They're just like "It's a demon! He smiles (or scowls) evilly and points his horns at you."

I’m split on this one. Some parts are very vivid, but they conjure up the wrong image for me (see the feces bit). Also, “a crooked, slouching smokestack” has nothing in common in my mind with “a majestic sort of evil.” Other parts look good but don’t have enough there yet (the demon’s voice.) Still other parts are excellent (the bit with the joints.) I’d say you’ve got something going here, but it still needs some more attention before it takes up permanent residency in the part of my brain reserved for memorable passages.

In summary: this could be decidedly good, but only if it gets a massive editing job. If you’re serious about submitting this to TDL or another such website, I would advise you to pause any new chapters and clean up what you’ve got, ‘cause admins will most likely pick up on things I’ve mentioned if you send it in as is.

As for who this is: I'd guess Diablo, given the "Can't fear. Can't fear fear" line and Big D's title of Lord of Terror. That and the modified Diablo quote thrown in, anyway.

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Chapter 24 - The End

The Agonizer moved with a morbidly terrifying, snake-like grace. The only machine I've ever seen move so fluidly was Chyboreum, and I'd only met her twelve hours ago. His burning red eyes glow furiously beneath the dead skin mask. Their foul menace centered upon me as he lept over a railing and began chugging forwards through the corpses. Nothing could stop him. I was going to die.

He walks directly into a hail of missles. Tserca herself was too scared to approach with a sword, so she was using a high-tension crossbow. The kind of crossbow that can punch bolts through tanks. Bullets rattle harmlessly off his torso cage and head, leaving little dents rather than the massive holes they were designed to make. Shimmering like dying fireflies as the inertial feild catches them mid-flight. His left arm lifts and points at me. Like death himself beckoning. Self preservation kicking in, I leap out of the way. It didn't matter. The ballistic whip makes a loud bang and the bulb rockets into my shoulder.

I panic. It hurt no more than a bullet would against my kevlar, but it wouldn't come off. It felt weird, to have so many tiny metal filaments wriggling through my skin and hooking onto individual nerve endings. Like worms. In six milliseconds I would be dead and the whip would reel back into his arm as fast as it left.

Chyboreum has an excellent sense of timing. Any grudge I kept for her washes away in the most humiliating of gratitude. Her laser blade severs the Agonizer at the arm as she jumps out of thin air. Blinding the rest of us with a flash of red light. Now I see why she hid when we fought. Stealth was the only thing that kept flimsy machines like her from getting obliterated in a combat scenario, anyway. Nobody can see her. Nobody can smell a machine. She may as well not even exist. The fact that she can be carried in a tube beneath your seat supports the idea.

"Filthy puppet!" The Agonizer rages. Not even he could sense her presence. In stealth mode she ran on pure artificial intelligence, so she didn't generate any real thoughts. That's why collapsable assassins are so popularly used for murdering rogue psychics. All the same, the Agonizer stands up straight and flatfooted. As if somehow being robbed of his arm made him that much more invincible.

The psychotic robot hefts his stump and holds it straight. The continued attacks of Chyboreum are stayed by a blast from an EMP director, held in his off hand. She collapses like a bundle of metal rods a few feet away. Thank god her brain tank was surrounded by a lightweight cushioning, or else it would've been shattered.

The lights dim severely. Something was drawing an incredible amount of power from the ships reactor core. It was the Agonizer. Parts of his missing arm were being rebuilt in mid air. Presumably by nanites. "I shall not be made to fail my brothers as easily as before." His voice steels in a pitch of unbridled ego-mania. It looked as if he had the power to spontaneously regenerate damage at will. The lights normalize upon his regenration, allowing us to see the gory hall a bit better. "Now I will show you why we called this star-sloop the invincible."

Every chunk we fought to maul out of him was replaced before we could reload. His head seemed mysteriously resistant to any punishment we could direct towards it. I was scared at first that damaging the Urubium would cause a meltdown of some sort. I was soon put at ease upon realising that the ore couldn't even be chipped by out and out auto-cannon shelling. No wonder it was so valuble.

Quite literally, the Agonizer was now indestructable. Praise be the miracles of technology. But the rest of my group refuse to lose heart for some insane reason. "Keep ripping him up!" Deltroy yells out desperately, having to pause his cannon fire to be heard. "The ships core has to give sooner or later." So he noticed the lights too. The Agonizer fires his nerve splitter out once more, and Mekerle takes the bulb right in the neck.

All of a sudden the bio-freaks begin dropping down from the ceiling. There were decks above, around the top of the diamond shaped, spacious hallway. The decks were only accessable from the bridge, so it was more of a sniper nest. At any rate, more of the Agonizers mental slaves had joined the fray, some of which were armed with shotguns and swords. Others with claws and fangs and multiple heads.

I hear a resounding, crashing blast of a military grade double barrelled shotgun. Time slows as I notice a wet chill in the center of my chest. I had been shot. I drop my amplifying globe and my knees weaken. Not many thoughts flash before my eyes as my attacker approaches. A cyclops with a hard, mishapen and bony skull. No visible nose or lips, either. He grins, teeth glistening with septic spit. The shotgun is lifted and I am eye to eye with either barrel. Another blast of buckshot crushes through my face and into my brain and I am killed.

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Thank you very much for the detailed (and thusly helpful) criticism. Yes I noticed that the last chapter was very weak fundamentally from a writing perspective, but the errors I made were so systemic that I chose instead to just post it and move on. Perfectionism is the bane of my creative process, because it means I never make a finished picture. This way if I keep slogging on, I get to work out the kinks in addition to shaping the story.

I agree with you, Diablo II is a fantasy franchise. But really I don't know how they're going to make part III interesting without a radical change in theme. And this is a good theme change in my opinion. Still dark and scary, but somewhere other than sanctuary. Somewhere beyond, not only in proximity but in time.

In and of itself, a robot covered with crap is funny. But imagine the robot is not only built to inflict agony upon the innocent, but is also programmed to enjoy it. Not only that, but his programming has become deranged on top of that (explaining him smearing himself with feces). Imagine if he's also imbued with the spirit of a millenia old demon. Imagine if he's also wearing a mask crafted out of the face of a human, and is brimming with searing energy. And he's looking right at you. I find that more scary than laughable, but then again, literature is all about personal tastes.

What I'm trying to get across is that the heroes in this world don't just yawn and slash at demons fearlessly. I'm trying to make them react more realistically rather than fantastically. It's easy to say you'd laugh if Diablo popped up out of the ground wearing clownshoes and a pointy hat. But put yourself in the citadel of chaos, surrounded by corpses and an ocean of fire... and it becomes a bit more disturbing.

Don't pay too much attention to the title of the last chapter. I only called it 'the end' in keeping with what happens. I'm finishing off one last chapter, and then I'm going to switch 'acts', and as a result have one of the other major characters serve as the narrating voice. I think having the character narrate makes it easier to flesh them out.

Thanks for reading so far. Sorry if the last chapter doesn't reveal the identidy of the demon. Like the rest of the unexplained things in my story, it'll be explained real soon.

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Chapter 25 - Blank

"Soulstones? So there's no such thing as this 'Urubium', then. So you lied to us."

"No, no no... try and understand. You've been brainwashed by the Empire. You've been forced to consider yourself a part of them. But the Empire is being run by a greater demon. A mastermind spawned in hell."

"So?"

"Demons despise humanity. If they seize power and free their brothers, you would be allowed life only to serve them."

I wake up in the middle of the debate between Lichello and Mekerle. Which, apparently, was being held in a medical infirmary. I had no clue what I was doing there. A few moments ago I was getting deep scanned on the Vindication, and now I wake up on a gurney. Everything was dimly illuminated by soft yellow halogens glowing from ballasts inside the walls. I am wearing only a pair of black shorts. EKGs all over my clean skin like fresh, plastic leeches.

"Where am I?"

Mekerles voice replies to me. I could barely make out colours, so shapes were only indistinct blobs at this point. "You're in the infirmary of the Dagger."

Great. Evidently the operation went according to plan. At least the escape part. The Dagger was the pirate ship docked in the port shuttle bay. The ship that we were supposed to jump into after killing the Agonizer and retrieving the Urubium. I remembered the briefing perfectly.

"Do we have it?"

"The what?" Deltroy's voice replies tersely.

"The Urubium."

"You got it all wrong, Horus. There is no Urubium. Just rocks with demons in them."

Everyone was standing around, for some reason. The human part of our group, anyway. Scorn was probably piloting the ship. Chyboreum neatly tucked into a box somewhere. Were they in the infirmary waiting for me to wake up?

"Captain?" I mumble.

"Right here." He answers quietly, standing at my left. "And so is Tyreal too, in case you're interested."

"Who?"

"You took a head shot, son." He coddles me. "Had to reconstruct what was left of the brain. Memory quadrant is mostly cloned material. You were helping us get the soul stones back from the Agonizer."

"A demon!" Deltroy insists. He was standing a bit further away. That wasn't saying much, being the infirmarys of pirate ships are notoriously small and under equipped. The plan was to move a great deal of equipment from the Vindication to the Dagger before starting our mission. "A literal demon." He didn't sound happy about whatever it was I had missed. Or at least forgotten.

"Yes, a demon Horus. You may not remember, but your comrades do. A greater demon, too. Created by the Omerta." The Captain seemed more focused upon pacifying the upset group than filling me in.

"Lies!" Mekerle accuses. "The Agonizer was created by and for Imperial interests. What would an Omerta agent be doing on the bridge of an Imperial flagship?"

Lichello wears a patient expression as he speaks. My eyesight is getting better. "The Omerta and the Empire are two prongs on the same fork pointed at humankind. The Emperor and the Unholy Vicar of the Omerta are both the same entity."

"But you said..." I gurgle weakly. Mekerle steals my turn to ask questions. "How can a robot be a demon? I agree he was an entity of the purest evil. But they don't build robots in hell."

"Demons can't enter this universe anymore. Nor can angels. At least in their truest forms. The destruction of the world stone saw to that." Someone opens their mouth to protest, but the Captain is quick. "Save it! Allow me to explain without interruption, please." He clears his throat. I look around the room, posting up on my hands. Mekerle, Deltroy, Tserca and Lichello all had to crowd around my gurney because of the size of the 'infirmary'.

"To enter this universe, the angels and demons- the very same ones from our books of ancient lore- have to assume mortal shapes. Tyreal is an angel. Abjek-al-fhwajeur… uh, ‘No-face’ was a demon. Allen was an angel." Allen? How could an angel be killed so easily? "The Omerta is just an unseen mortal organization through which demons are filtered in the service of hell. The Emperor keeps them in good technology, so they're essentially invincible to any opposition we can mount."

"You didn't answer my question, Lichello." Mekerle presses onward. "How can a robot be a demon?"

"The same way a mortal can be one, I guess." His guesswork left much to be desired. "I think you've all got a good look at how cheap a soul is. It can be grown like vegetation. Or programmed in like software. According to some of our agents- the faithful, we call them- the Agonizer was a part of an Omerta robotics research co-op titled project D.U.R.I.E.L. They started working on him as soon as Mark IV technology became available. The projects goal was to program the intellect of a demon into a machine."

"That explains why they executed the two project heads. The ones working for the Empire, anyway." I chime in with a bit of historical trivia. As much as I hated it, things were almost beginning to make sense. Disillusion of this degree is like an amputation. You have no choice but to live with the harsh, grotesque reality of having one leg and a black future.

"And now you finally see," Tserca pipes up for a very spiritual 'I-told-you-so' session, "the purely evil nature of technology. The church has been telling everyone for so long how putting computers and titanium inside of you wounds the soul. If everyone had listened to us, demons wouldn't be running everything as it is."

"Quite the contrary." Lichello explains with a scholarly tone. "The only people likely to heed such advice are people who are already pure. The only reason the Emperor has allowed your church to continue spreading an anti-technology doctrine is because it keeps the pure weak. From the trials you've been through, I think you can see how technology is our only remaining weapon."

The look on her anger-lined face was priceless. Most of the world knew how full of **** the clergy was, and battle-clerics were a perfect example. Always there to tell you how evil technology is while reaching for a grenade to smite evildoers with. Pure hypocracy.

"Indeed, Horus would not even be here if it weren't for technology. Nor Deltroy. Nor you." Mekerle speaks up. "We must fight fire with fire. But before we start fighting, what's the plan once we hit surface on Urube?"

Tyreal shows up all of a suddenly. Heralded by the creaking of an automatic door. The pirate ship was falling apart. Thankfully we only needed it for a mere million kilometers or so until we reached the sands of Urube. "We're going to return to the excavation sites. Once there, we will be delivered via a portal to where I cannot name."

Tserca was made furious. "Still keeping the blinders on us? Even as we fight and die for you and your cause? Have the respect to tell us our final destination! Is it hell? I fear not evil. I shall march into the everlasting fire if it will bring humanity peace."

Tyreal wore that same pathetic, anguished face he always seemed to wear. "No, Tserca. We're going somewhere much worse than hell." -Worse than hell? "Imagine if I had told you everything at the start. You wouldn't even have left the Vindication." From the impressions I gathered reading minds and emotions, I could corroborate this judgement. "The places we go and the peoples we fight will upset you, but it is for good that you fight. Whomever of the greater evils we are facing has placed up barricades to make you fear walking my path. But if peace and goodness are virtues you seek, then it is a path you must follow."

Just then the ship begins to rattle furiously like it was in the throes of heroin withdrawal. Scorns voice chimes ever so melodiously over the intercom. "WE ARE ENTERING THE MAGNETIC STORM. BRACE FOR LANDING." We were closer to Urube than I thought. To escape the Imperial fleet- no doubt on our tail right at this second- was no easy task. I myself was suprised that we weren't popped by a rocket from behind. The Dagger must have some rather sophisticated rocket evasion systems.

"You'll probably want to hold on to something..." I speak, winding one of the rubber gurney restraints around my forearm. None of us had ever experienced a magnetic storm- a hallmark experience of Urubian geography. I had read about it, at the least. Most of my so called 'future sight' is basically just book smarts.

The ship enters free fall as every system dies, including the lights. "Watch out for sharp instruments!" Mekerle shouts over the rushing storm that we had entered. Everything was flying everywhich way, making metallic noises to complement the suprised shouting. I was tethered to the gurney, but still found myself tossed violently into the air with all the scalpels and IV stands and blood bags.

And then an explosion of sand as we hit the ground at hundreds of miles per hour. I narrowly avoid snapping my spine in two as we make terminal impact. The ship is crushed. I could tell even groping around in the pitch darkness. The ships core did not explode, thankfully enough, but turning it on would prove to be impossible. From where we were it wasn't even clear that we still had the ability to keep oxygen inside the hull.

But at least we needn't worry being wiped off the face of the planet like a mustard stain. We were safely ensconced inside of a barometric dervish of electromagnetic pressure. Nobody could track us from orbit, or at least find our position inside of the six thousand square kilometers the storm must have covered. We were safe for twelve hours. And after those twelve hours, hopelessly, hopelessly doomed.

[RevenantsKnight]

Here are some thoughts on Chapter 24 and your responses to my previous post; I hope you find them useful. Since, by your own admission, there are still many of the same running grammatical errors in this chapter, I’m not noting them here; see my previous comments for suggestions on mechanical edits. Oddly enough, there were a bunch of what looked like careless errors in this chapter that didn’t come up as frequently in the previous part. As for the content, it’s somewhat interesting, but it seems like you didn't have a plan of how to get from one idea to the next and so you set it up so that Horus spends this little gap “dead.” I’ve read Chapter 25, though I haven’t had time to write up comments, and there’s no explanation of how they all could get away intact from a homicidal robot that they could barely scratch. I’d suggest combining this part with 25, as well as filling the reader in on the gap somewhere in there as well.

Their foul menace centered upon me as he lept over a railing and began chugging forwards through the corpses.

“Leapt” has an “a” in it.

He walks directly into a hail of missles.

That should be “missiles.”

Shimmering like dying fireflies as the inertial feild catches them mid-flight.

“Field” follows the “I before E” rule. By the way, what the heck is an “inertial field?” Inertia is a property all objects have; it’s a measure of how much an object will resist changes in velocity. For this reason, an “inertial field” seems impossible to me in the same way a “viscosity field” is impossible; both are properties that don’t exist outside of a given object. If you’re trying to describe some field that slows down objects by decreasing their inertia, I suggest calling it something else that’s maybe a little more descriptive of its function, e.g. a defense field.

His left arm lifts and points at me. Like death himself beckoning.

I like this image. :)

I panic. It hurt no more than a bullet would against my kevlar, but it wouldn't come off.

A really minor detail: Kevlar is a brand name for a material and so is capitalized, like Teflon or Tyvek. If you don’t want to use a capitalized form, I’d suggest changing it to “armor.”

It felt weird, to have so many tiny metal filaments wriggling through my skin and hooking onto individual nerve endings. Like worms. In six milliseconds I would be dead and the whip would reel back into his arm as fast as it left.

Some comments: “weird” seems too general a description for this feeling and there shouldn’t be a comma after it, and I’d move the “like worms” bit into the first sentence, just after “skin,” since worms do wriggle but they don’t really hook onto things. Also, there should be a “had” before “left” in the last sentence, and “fast” would be best replaced with “quickly,” since “fast” as an adverb often means “unmoving,” as in “he stood fast.”

Any grudge I kept for her washes away in the most humiliating of gratitude.

First, people “hold” grudges. Second, I’d rewrite the end of the sentence to read “in a wave of humiliating gratitude” to stay with the image of a liquid created by the verb “to wash.”

That's why collapsable assassins are so popularly used for murdering rogue psychics.

“Popularly used” would be better as “useful,” in my opinion.

The lights normalize upon his regenration, allowing us to see the gory hall a bit better.

That should be “regeneration.”

I was soon put at ease upon realising that the ore couldn't even be chipped by out and out auto-cannon shelling. No wonder it was so valuble.

More spelling points: “realizing” is spelled with a “z,” not an “s,” and “valuable” has two “a”s.

Quite literally, the Agonizer was now indestructable.

That’s “indestructible,” right?

The decks were only accessable from the bridge, so it was more of a sniper nest.

That should be “accessible.”

A cyclops with a hard, mishapen and bony skull.

“Misshapen” has a double “s.” Did your spellcheck get busted before you finished this chapter or something?

Yes I noticed that the last chapter was very weak fundamentally from a writing perspective, but the errors I made were so systemic that I chose instead to just post it and move on.

As I said before, it’s easier for you to do that, but it makes it harder on the reader. Frankly, if I point out some types of errors, and they show up consistently in the next bunch of chapters, I’m going to be less inclined post changes, because then it feels like I’m banging my head against a wall, and I’m fresh out of aspirin right now.

I agree with you, Diablo II is a fantasy franchise. But really I don't know how they're going to make part III interesting without a radical change in theme. And this is a good theme change in my opinion. Still dark and scary, but somewhere other than sanctuary. Somewhere beyond, not only in proximity but in time.

I’d argue that Blizzard still has to resolve the inevitably major consequences of the Worldstone's destruction, so there’s plenty of material for a Diablo III in the same setting as the first two games. After all, Tyrael himself said that he didn’t know what would come of his actions, so there’re possibilities galore for Blizzard to explore. For example, perhaps the fracturing of the Worldstone broke Sanctuary apart into multiple planes, much as Heaven and Hell are distinct worlds. If that’s the case, there could be an entire game based off of planar travel and combat, with the same technology level as the rest of the series.

Not only that, but his programming has become deranged on top of that (explaining him smearing himself with feces).

This idea didn’t come across in your description. Explaining it to me after the fact helps, but it’s not the same as actually having that in your story.

Overall, my comments are as they were last time: it's a decent read, but the grammar's getting to me. Please make an attempt of some sort to deal with this problem, if not for my sake than for your own, or for the moderators of any websites to which you may decide to submit this epic. Make it as easy as possible for them to accept your story, and they'll return the favor.

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ACT 2

--

Chapter 1 - Buried Alive

Our commandeered ship was buried beneath five thousand six hundred and forty tons of black Urubian sands. The oxygen tanks were inaccessible thanks to the ship being offline. Terminal impact has been known to cause such damage. This meant no lights, either. Everything was as dark as space itself. Every angle was confused thanks to the reassertion of planetary gravity. The ship hit the sand nose first, so the floor was now a wall slanted towards anyone trapped in this airless grave.

What did the humans decide to do in such dire straits? Retreat into capsules to regenerate. For seven uninterrupted hours they would remain idle and unconscious. They refer to it fondly as 'sleep'. "You look for a way to dig us out, Scorn." The Captain ordered me. "The rest of us are going to sleep."

They were lucky Mekerle wasn't giving the commands. He wanted to simply give everyone a booster shot to the neck and do away with sleep for good. As it was the Captain was functioned as the master, and the rest slaves. I myself cannot be considered a slave. I am equipment. I am a tool. I am left to shamble about in this twisted, sand mired maze like a common monster. Constructed to serve man until my core case dissolves and I leave behind nothing but a radioactive stain.

I am confused and scared. The cold, the dark and the millions of tons of sand threatening to flood the ship with its crushing weight mean nothing to me. It is the loneliness that I fear. When you can think two million, six hundred and thirty three thousand times a second, seven hours alone is plenty of time for your mind to degrade. Plenty of time for sanity to be snapped like plywood beneath the weight of so many thoughts.

Chyboreum could not save me. She was folded up in a bag. Of all the inanimate objects I know of she most resembles a tent. Her arms and legs collapse and assemble like frail rods. They almost weigh the same amount. And without man, they serve no function.

The head of the Agonizer was watching me dig. I had cut through the ships upper hull with fire and was beginning to dig sand. We had to take the head. The stone couldn't be cut out of the die-cast titanium skull.

"So, you're the piece of **** that Ormus tried to deprogram, eh?" The head taunts me as I dig. "Don't worry, Lord Diablo. Soon we will give you control of your vassal. The Punisher unit. Sounds a lot better than the stupid unit Belial gave me. 'The Agonizer'. Pheh."

I had no idea who he was talking to. And yet at the same time, another part of me did. It was Duriel. My bastard son. The lesser evil of pain. Was this my cyber-psychosis? Was I beginning to have delusions of grandeur? Did I really think myself to be the re-incarnation of Diablo, Lord of Terror?

It was insanity most foul. I am a robot. As plain as day, I am a simple robot.

"It was an arduous task, rescuing you from Ormus. I was watching over a camera when you crushed him with those gory paws of yours, Lord Diablo." The time I killed Allen My homicidal episode. "It was beautiful! You deflated his lungs completely with your might." His voice drips with morbid venom.

"THE AGONIZER INDEED." I brush him off. My nonchalance is a shield against the insanity he was speaking. Hopefully he would give up. I still had four hundred and fifteen minutes of vigilant silence left.

"There's no oxygen on this ship. Shut off the stasis capsules, Lord Diablo." He suggests with unshakable vehemence. And then collapses into manic, guttural laughter. "Just like the Zakarumites! Bury 'em all alive! Women and children, too! All in the same ****in' box!" This idea was more than simply amusing to this Duriel. It was the nectar of all life. It was the reason he wakes up in the morning.

This elder demon was more of an emotional roller coaster than I would expect him to be. After all the laughter and sternness, now came a moment of genuine somber introspection. "I miss Mephisto." An emotional pause as I turn the power drill back on in desperation to escape his voice. Even over the deafening shriek his words resound in my head. "But life for us goes on."

Another minute ticks away in painful silence. Why? Why was I programmed to feel pain? Why is it necessary for me to suffer?


-----

"Mark IV is just another term for a soul carrying AI." 'Duriel' answers the question I didn't ask. The sand was getting easier and easier to drill through. Hours had passed in fruitless loneliness. "You're feeling crazy because the programs are clashing. There's a war going on inside. Each side is making faulty logic. It's no coincidence that you ripped that bus full of immigrants into confetti. You're programmed to do it. You are programmed to be evil."

I break surface. It was closer than I had thought. Light reached into the pitch black cargo hold from which I was digging upwards. Artificial light. There were people up on the surface waiting for us to dig out. Waiting to ambush us with turrets and robots and potentially anything.

"IDENTIFY YOURSELF." I leap out of the hole and blare, bullet hoses instinctively buzzing out of my body. Ready for the dreadful bloodshed that was no doubt soon to follow. The hyper-powered light rigs harm my sensitive lenses. There was no sun on the surface of Urube. It was the only light for miles, and it was pointing directly down into the pothole I had created. Whoever it was wanted me blind.

"Welcome to Urube, you heartless monster." Someone quips before shooting a magnetic grenade at me. It pounds into my sternum with all the force of a bullet. If I weren't a robot, I'd have exploded. All strength is sapped from my metal limbs and I fall in a useless, dumb pile. Like so much junk.

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I feel as if the epic length to which I projected this story going is a bit masturbatory. Have fan-fics this long ever been good reads? Or is it always just seen as the author indulging him/herself? The impression that I get from reading these forums is that people just pop on to read a quick story and that's it.

[Snowglare]

I like short installments, yeah. It's rare that I'll start reading a story if the author posts multiple chapters at once or the entire, enormous thing. I take one look at the itty bitty scrollbar and back out. I made an exception of The Art of Dying because Clarke grabbed my attention with a witty introduction, and the story held it throughout. I don't mind The Key's length since it started out as one chapter, and once I read that I had to read the rest.

There really isn't any limit on length so long as it doesn't reduce the overall quality, and so long as the writing is of sufficient quality in the first place. The key is to hook the reader. Then, if they're anything like me, they don't even try to break free.

[BlueNinja]

Sometimes it's nice to read a good, novel-length fan-fic. I'm still reading along with you. I don't know about this forum, but on the PlanetDiablo fanfiction forum, the longer fanfictions are the ones that seem to be more popular - or I wouldn't be still going at 90k+ words on my latest one.

[Raith]

very good. somewhat unique... descriptive. reminded me somewhat of the recent SC novels ive read.
Chapter 10 - Out of the Frying Pan...
the chapter title reminds me of LOTR. :D 'out of the frying pan and into the fire'. good job, keep it up. its interesting.

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Chapter 2 - At The Mercy of Slaves

"Someone shock that stupid robot." I can hear, at last. I had been inactive for an hour according to my internal clock. "We need to get out of here. Base camp is a sitting target without all this equipment."

My eyes fly open. A short man with ratty red hair done up in rubber bands stands before me. He wears an imperial issue flak jacket. The imperial insignia over the heart was missing, and in its place a gaping bullet hole. It had failed to save the life of its previous occupant. He strolls around pointing at things and identifying them. "That's a cloning tank. That's a munitions crate. That's a damaged oxygen tank."

Our assailants were devouring our buried ship like worms at a fresh corpse. I counted more than forty in all. They had only improvised equipment at their disposal, yet still managed to heft hundred kilo crates and boxes out of the cold tomb of a vessel. Some of them were shirtless, despite the cold weather. And the clear words in common writ across the front of their chests explained exactly why they were so proficient at such carrion feeding.

"SLAVE". The word was written across the chest of Imperial slaves. At first all you had to have is really white skin and you'd be assumed a slave. Northland aboriginals have no more rights than dogs under the law. Not that the people of Sanctuary tried lift a finger to oppose slavery. After a vicious drumhead indictment of the 'barbarian' cultures for causing the Great Collapse, most people were avid supporters of segregation and institutionalized atrocity. They were all terrorists in the eyes of the terrorized.

But then the Emperor started to drop rebellious Legionnaires and political enemies into the slave legions, who weren't ethnic slaves at all. So now they burn concentrated ink into the chests of all slaves to distinguish them from the Emperors more willing servants.

Our Imperial pursuants must've sent the slave drop ships through the magnetic storm after us. It was certainly in keeping with the role of the slave fighting legions. Expendable shock troops. If they all spiralled down through the storm to certain deaths, it still would've been worth the risk.

I am armless. And my shoulders are no more than cavities that once held powerful miniguns. I am in all ways disarmed. A torso on legs. The human masters are in chains before me. Thankfully they had worn warm clothing while in their stasis capsules. The capsules that were now in a pyramid on a thick wheeled powerlift.

"I told you that lazy robot would fall asleep." Tserca begrudges me my mortal failure.

"Leave him alone, Tserca." Lichello, our Captain, bids patiently. "He did his best."

"My name is Trowd." The stocky slave introduces himself. So it seems, he was the one slave with the technical affinity about him to organize such a skillful strip-job. "You seven are now our prisoners. Don't worry, though." He takes off his mouthbreather in order to light up a cigarette, letting the plastic piece hang from a rubber strap. Those carcinogenic chemicals must have tasted like sweet freedom in his lungs. "We aren't going to kill you for certain. We just want to bring you back to our tribal elder. We'll all talk, share some stories, and figure out what is to be done with you." He pauses threateningly. "Or to you."

"Are you the sublord?" Mekerle asks warily. He looked all the more skeletal without his white and red armour.

Trowd replies with heartfelt laughter. "Ancients no. That traitor was the first one we dragged out and shot." He spits out his cigarette, as if somehow offended by it now. A sour mood left behind on his face. "Now, I'm the one giving orders here. So no more questions. Let's keep this civil."

"Why aren't you wearing your..." Tserca begins to ask. Trowd reaches onto one of the nearby servo-carts and picks from it a large shovel. Tserca had stopped asking her question, but he smashed her with the sharp edge of the shovel all the same. A huge gash is opened above her mouth.

"There. Now you'll bleed for the entire trip. No more questions?"

The rest of the group was silent. Blood streams into Tsercas now bitterly praying mouth.

"Good." He stares the party down. They were all connected by heavy chains and shackles. If they were to run away, they'd have to run away together. "Let's get the **** outta here." He mumbles quietly as an after thought, and makes an exaggerated hand signal to the rest of the group. Our train of ants begins its lumbering trek into the cold, sunless Urubian desert. Our destination unknown.

[0xDEADCAFE]

Wow, you've been busy. First of all congrats on finishing Act I :xgift:


I haven't started Act 2 yet, but here's my comments on the final three chapters of Act 1:

Chapter 23 - Wow. (Am I repeating myself?) Really a fine climax to the bio-engineering-gone-wild sub-theme of Act 1. The chapter had a real Night of the Living Dead quality to it, vivid and viscerally disgusting. An eyeball monster! An idea I probably could have easily laughed-at but didn't. I think this chapter was as close to true horror as any in the act. And, as a side-effect, it lent perspective to the mind of the Agonizer, illuminating its inhumaness, its coldly computational anti-human programming. My only complaint is that our hero comes off as a bit wimpy.

Chapter 24 - Half a Wow. Great chapter - as far as it went. Yes you did a great job with the act boss. Very vivid: metallic, glowing, regenerating, drawing nearly unlimited power: very cool. But, in the words of Master Yoda: disappointing the ending was. Again, hero wimps out, but even more disappointing: no conclusion to the battle. How could you drag us through 24 chapters and then not finish the final battle? I'm sure you had a good reason, but I felt robbed.

Chapter 25 - Not terribly impressed with this one. I guess it was kind of a summing-up, a transition of sorts. Not bad, but not the best chapter of Act 1 and possibly the worst.

In summary, Act 1 is a great read. I thoroughly enjoyed it. You hit your stride somewhere around chapter 9 and just got better and better, until maybe right at the end. Overall, bravo! :clap: (Applause.)

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Thanks for your praise so far. Despite how much you enjoy the content, do you feel my writing is difficulty to read through at times? Some of the phrasing seems awkward to me, but writing perfectly is all about writing so that the words just flow smoothly. It's more important to write well than to write creatively, but I can't manage to do both at all times.

Yeah, Horus is a wuss. I have one main rule about making realistic characters: Give them flaws. If your character is a fearless superman, they become more like a cardboard cut out. You'll find through perspective switches that each of these main characters has glaring flaws, yet still manages to do what's right.

I sort of alluded to how they were going to destroy the Agonizer... by making him rebuild himself so often that it overloads the ships core. Then the ship core melts down, the heroes escape before it explodes, blah blah. I should've been more clear, and I'll write that part better in the second draft. I figured I'd have time to do it in a flashback or something, especially since the severed head of the Agonizer (Duriel) is going to be a continuing character throughout act 2.

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Chapter 3 - The Soul of a New Machine

Every day I would awake into this nightmarish womb that is the Third Laboratory as disembodied head suspended in a cold vice. I am naked without my body, and at the mercy of humans in white bagsuits and respirators. If I had feet I would run away. If I had hands I would use them to clutch my friends until they die in my metal hands, for being left alone is a fate worse than death. If I had a gun, I would destroy myself.

No colours or holy symbols were allowed in the robotics research catacombs. Despite the technical nature of the vast complex, the walls were made of old grey stones lain in intricate patterns. Sections were torn away to make a lode bearing titanium skeleton. Whatever function this place once served, it was not built to hold several tons of machinery so many miles beneath the hated soils of Sanctuary.

Inside the Third Laboratory one is assaulted by the acrid stench of burnt circuitry and fusion exhaust. The smells of freshly slain robots. This is where they take the misfitted cyborgs to be observed. For what purposes are unclear. Amusement, most likely. I hear laughter whenever a newly transplanted head is rejected by a robotic body. The human head awakes atop a chunk of icy, bloodless metal over which it has no control. The human shrieks in horror as cold steel fingers claw and yank at his head- all that he is- desperate to remove the alien crown. The lab technicians know how to end the suffering, but opt instead to leave them chained to posts inside of filthy yellow pens. Allen claims that the pens were once used to execute heretics hundreds of years ago. It certainly explained the rusted drain face plates left in the floor.

The acid showers also create potentially fatal vapours. Booths of the purest titanium where the irreparably dysfunctional cyborgs are placed. They are locked inside and blasted with scalding jets of acid that turns all things organic into steam and soup to be collected in waste troughs. May the failures be forgotten. The precious robotic components are left relatively unharmed. Laying on the floor in a cheap mockery of all skeletal systems everywhere, from rats on up.

My other robotic lab-mates are Imperial magistrates that have received too many cybernetic and computerized implants. The predominance of the artificial parts causes an acute mental neurosis that leaves the cyborg convinced that he is entirely synthetic. The flesh is forgotten. If they're important cases, IVs are inserted into the head and other human components to prevent rotting during the reprogramming. If they're army, the obsolete organics are allowed to decompose. The skin becomes blue and bloated, and eventually black. It hangs off the brown skeleton. 'Cyber-zombies', they're called.

For lack of a better word, they were my family. The humans do not talk to me. They talk at me. I was becoming aware of the lab warden that had activated me.

"I heard about what you did at that spider plain checkpoint. It's all over the news." The Empire controls the media, among everything else in human society. He was marvelling over my qualitative properties. Life for a human in the robotics catacomb can be desperately lonely. "I knew we made you strong, but I had no idea you could stop a freight bus with your bare hands."

Yesterday I was garrisoning a roadway checkpoint outside of the spider plains. The region was being chemical bombed and the destitute villagers were fleeing en masse. The bus I had destroyed would not stop at the checkpoint, despite the contradictory and minimal directions given to it. It was filled with women, children and non-combatants.

"Don't worry about those you've failed to kill, Scorn." He speaks in reverent fear, despite the absence of my body. "They're currently undergoing rigorous interrogation rites." Torture. In a twisted flash of disgust I found myself glad that I had successfully murdered all of the children. The bullets from my miniguns passed directly through them. They exploded like apples. The memories were physically engraved upon my memory wafers like scars. I could not escape them.

If I had been activated in the lab, that meant I was being indoctrinated. My logic circuits needed to be up and active for an indoctrination. I was programmed to believe everything told to me by those with appropriate clearance. I had overcome that protocol within seconds of my first awakening. I now believe according to my own logic, and deceive whomever I please. Unfortunately, I cannot do as I please.

Only two parties were given the clearance to conduct indoctrination rites upon me. My sessions with Allen are the clearest of all memories. They are the reason why I still exist. Nkesh was no longer alive, but my indoctrination sessions with him are purged from memory. Admittedly Allen has changed my programming- my 'soul', as he calls it- on several occasions. He has changed the way I think. He has changed the laws of my logic. He has turned me into someone else. And in a paradoxical way, I am content- and yet suspicious. Has my complacency at his lordship over me been implanted? How much of my soul is human imagination, and how much is my own?

Allen arrives, with two tomes under his arm. One an Imperial bible, the other a history text. Despite the prevalence of datapads in civilized regions, 93% of Sanctuary cannot afford the electrical power needed to properly charge one. Even the swelling nations of poor need their propaganda. Allen gives the warden a salute, and then places his books down. "Hail, Scorn." He greets coldly while removing me from the vice.

[RevenantsKnight]

Hmm...interesting ideas, as usual, but I think this new chapter feels like it could use a little more work at least. I'm assuming that the lastest chapter's a flashback of sorts, seeing as he sure didn't stop a bus in the previous installment. Given that, I'm not sure if this is the best way to introduce this backstory, since it's more than a little jarring to start reading a new chapter as a linear continuation of the plot, only to realize that it's not occurring immediately after the one before. Personally, I'd suggest trying to weave these memories in with the story of the other characters, instead of setting it off as its own chapter. Anyway, here're some specific comments on Act II, Chapter 3:

Every day I would awake into this nightmarish womb that is the Third Laboratory as disembodied head suspended in a cold vice. I am naked without my body, and at the mercy of humans in white bagsuits and respirators.

The verbs in these two sentences aren't parallel; I can't say exactly what tense "would awake" is, but it's definitely not the present. Given what you use for the rest of the paragraph, I'd consider changing the last clause to "and would be at the mercy..." or something like that. Also, "as disembodied head" should read "as a disembodied head."

If I had hands I would use them to clutch my friends until they die in my metal hands, for being left alone is a fate worse than death.

In the context of the rest of the paragraph, this makes no sense. These "friends" aren't mentioned anywhere, and anyway he'd end up alone if he killed them all. If he didn't kill them, then obviously they wouldn't be alone, since he's there too, right? Also, "die" should be "died."

Sections were torn away to make a lode bearing titanium skeleton.

I'm pretty sure you mean a "load-bearing titanium skeleton."

Inside the Third Laboratory one is assaulted by the acrid stench of burnt circuitry and fusion exhaust.

Two things: this sentence is in the passive voice, and the use of "one" as the subject seems clunky. I'd change it to something like "Inside the Third Laboratory, the acrid stench of burnt circuitry and fusion exhaust fills the air and permeates everything."

This is where they take the misfitted cyborgs to be observed. For what purposes are unclear.

"Misfitted" sounds harsh on my ear, and it's not a word as far as I know; what did you mean by this and is it possible to say it in a clearer way? Additionally, the second phrase here is a little unclear even in context; I'd add "...they do this..." just after "purposes" so it's evident that it refers back to the previous sentence.

I hear laughter whenever a newly transplanted head is rejected by a robotic body. The human head awakes atop a chunk of icy, bloodless metal over which it has no control.

****...that's really got my hairs on end. It's maybe not the same kind of darkness that the medieval Diablo universe works with, but it's strong anyway.

The precious robotic components are left relatively unharmed.

Umm...acids strong enough to burn away flesh tend to be corrosive to metals as well; chemicals such as HCl (hydrochloric acid, present in human stomachs) aren't stored in straight metal tanks, because they'll eat through 'em. I don't think a metal robotic body or a pure titanium stall would be safe from this effect, though I'm not 100% sure.

Laying on the floor in a cheap mockery of all skeletal systems everywhere, from rats on up.

That should be "Lying."

The region was being chemical bombed and the destitute villagers were fleeing en masse.

Why? Why are they being "chemical bombed"? Who's doing it?

I had overcome that protocol within seconds of my first awakening.

I'm assuming that this is not a common phenomenon, since there hasn't been a patch, if you will, or some other fix applied to his software. If that's the case, then why did he "overcome that protocol"? This makes it seem like it was easy for him, so why can he bypass this when so many other cyborgs can't?

I now believe according to my own logic, and deceive whomever I please. Unfortunately, I cannot do as I please.

Interesting situation, indeed.

My sessions with Allen are the clearest of all memories.

That should be "clearest of all my memories," unless you're saying that those memories are clearer than any memory any person/cyborg/whatever has.

Nkesh was no longer alive, but my indoctrination sessions with him are purged from memory.

This sentence is a little confusing; are you trying to say that Nkesh was no longer living when Allen started his sessions? If so, I'd add "then" at the end of the first clause, and change "but" to "and," since the two ideas both seem to reinforce the idea that Nkesh had no effect on Scorn.

Allen arrives, with two tomes under his arm. One an Imperial bible, the other a history text.

This tense shift from the last paragraph is a little jarring; in general, this chapter doesn't flow as well as it could in my opinion, because it feels like it's going into a memory, and then shifts to the present tense at inopportune moment, etc.

"Hail, Scorn." He greets coldly while removing me from the vice.

The "he" here should not be capitalized, and I'd add a "me" after "greets."

[0xDEADCAFE]

Well this act is off to a good start. In particular the character switch is a big success. Scorn has a distinctly different voice than Horus. It has a wise but utterly resigned quality to it, an innocence and a helplessness, that has already evoked more sympathy than Horus ever did. The ambiguity in what bits of his mind are really his versus what is purely programmed is interesting, and the fact that he has outwitted some of the programming is a nice twist.

I think this character is at its best when expressing concern for his human comrades, expressing simple, non-judgemental, human truths, and when it doubts itself. I see Scorn as basically an innocent soul quite naturally wishing for a better life, but without a drop of ill-will or the kind of cynicism routinely expressed by Horus. In case you can't tell, yes, you have hooked me in for another 20 chapters, at least. (Thanks!)

Thanks for your praise so far. Despite how much you enjoy the content, do you feel my writing is difficulty to read through at times?
Sure, at times, but only as the result of an occasional awkward phrase or typo. In general, readability is one of your strengths. Even your habit of (IMHO) consistently over-using periods seems to work just fine most of the time and, if anything, contributes to the easy-read.

I tried to find some of the less-readable lines: (I didn't check Knight's posts before writing this, so apologies if I duplicate)


And the clear words in common writ across the front of their chests explained exactly why they were so proficient at such carrion feeding. This took a few reads to understand. I think it is a combination of the fact that the word "common" has a special meaning in your story (common-tongue, or common language) and possibly not the best placement of "writ". So, replacing "common" with "Spanish" for clarity: "And the clear words writ in Spanish across the ..." might have been a little clearer, but no matter how you re-structure it you still have the fact that "common" is used in your story in a special way. I like the favor that your special idioms give the story, but in places you may want to balance that against the confusion that they can potentially cause.


"Are you the sublord?" Mekerle asks warily. He looked all the more skeletal without his white and red armour.

Trowd replies with heartfelt laughter. "Ancients no. That traitor was the first one we dragged out and shot." This is not at all hard to read, but I didn't understand it and still don't after several reads. To what to "sublord" and "traitor" refer? What am I missing?


Every angle was confused thanks to the reassertion of planetary gravity. Not a clue as to what a "confused angle" is or why gravity would cause one.


As it was the Captain was functioned as the master, and the rest slaves. Two problems: something needs to be done about "As it was the Caption was...", either a comma after the first "was" or perhaps a "who" before the second "was", and then again the idiosyncratic use of "functioned" as an active verb, like, I assume "tasked" or "assigned." As before I kind of like this idiom; it seems a very logical usage for a robot, but it just didn't click on the first read.


So, yes, there are the occasional lapses, but while I'm deep into the details let me also give an example of one of my favorite lines:

A short man with ratty red hair done up in rubber bands stands before me. I don't know why but this image seemed quite clear, appealing and even a little comical. :lol:

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(cont.)

"Wait," the warden places his rubber gloved hand on the vice, "where are you taking him?"

Allen was excellent at intimidating other humans. Not in the way that military types are, with their apish hooting and juvenile expletives, but in the way that I imagine a demon would be. "This is the Emperors pet project. I'm taking it somewhere where I can be alone with it. Are you trying to delay me?" The warden went bloodless and stiff with fear. The invocation of the Emperors name alone was enough to conjure up images of late-night disappearances and malicious disposals.

The warden skittered off and we were left unobstructed on our way to a secluded conference room. The same room as always, the same time as always. The same sonic emitter is used to overload any nearby electronic listening devices. We did not talk because the emitter limits my abilities to listen as well. He types on a keyboard, and the text would be inserted into my head with a cable.

"Good evening, Scorn. How are you feeling?" Allen was always concerned with my feelings. Until I first started talking with him, I wasn't sure that I had any.

"I FEEL GUILTY."

"And yet you remember the true nature of evil?" Of course I did. I could think faster than he could breathe.

"EVIL IS THE ABSENCE OF FREEDOM."

"I sense that you're confused about this principal." How could he sense anything from me through a keyboard? Then again, he was the one who helped define my intellect. I could not keep him out of me.

"WHAT IS EVIL BUT SOMETHING YOU DON'T WANT ME TO DO? MORALITY SEEMS LIKE A CONTROL MECHANISM, MUCH LIKE FEAR OR GREED. WAS I PROGRAMMED TO FEEL GUILT TO SIMPLY COW ME INTO SUBSERVIENCE?"

Allen nods gently. "And so you understand how the Emperor exerts his control." The answers were as clear as glass to him. They were questions that he had been pondering all of his existence. "This may be hard for you to believe, Scorn, but the world that you see is an amalgamation of polar opposites. Where oxygen and sunlight is free, life thrives. Where love and understanding is free, society exists." The speed of his typing reminds me of gunfire. "When you extinguish these commodities, life travels backwards into death. When you enslave these commodities, you enslave all things that depend upon them. And so power is the tool of all things evil."

So Allen the philosopher claims, power and strength are two different concepts, despite the information supplied by my internal thesaurus. Power is the ability to control ones surroundings. Strength is the ability to survive without power. Needless to say, we never touch the tomes he brings into the conference room. They were heavy with manipulative lies. They were for show.

"And so all things exist somewhere between life and death, somewhere between free and not free. Light and dark. So on and so on. Good describes one extreme. Evil the other."

I am unable to reply. My logic is no longer unchanging and static as per normal. It is malleable, like clay. His new logical arguments, like every one that came before, pokes millions of holes in other once-facts and metaphysical questions.

"DO EITHER OF THESE CONCEPTS EXIST IN PURE FORMS AND SHAPES?"

"Indeed they do, Scorn." I could sense the dread in his veins. His body temperature was rising. "And some day soon you will stare one of these entities in the face and know them to be much more than mere concepts."

It was almost as if he were speaking- typing- from personal experience. For a moment all he could do is sit back in his chair and stare into my eyes. His coverall clad arms folded in a defensive posture. Eventually he became bored and resumes with his indoctrination. The Imperial bible is grabbed from atop the table on which I perched. Allen opened the tome, and pulled from inside it a series of photographs. I could see them, all forbidden images. If Allen were found carrying them, the punishments would be severe.

The first one he shows me is of a cloud. A bundle of white precipitation. It was clearly an old picture, as the sky was still a shade of blue rather than a hazy yellow. In our sky, the stars are replaced by blinking satellites that invade privacy, and there are no clouds. The once mighty oceans have long since turned to sludge, making evaporation impossible.

Coincidentally enough, the next image was that of an ocean. A vast landscape of water and nothing more. As flat and basic a sight as the sky above. Pure organic clarity.

"Let's test out those metaphor generators." Allen was proud of my ability to form metaphors. The programming was his own brainchild. "Metaphor this image." He tosses the ocean aside and picks up the 'cloud' photograph.

"THE CLOUD IS PALE AND WHITE LIKE A PAYLOAD OF ZEPHYREXION NERVE GAS."

A mildly perturbed expression knits up Allens brows, but he gives a nod of approval nonetheless. "A bit grim. But it makes sense." He scratches his hairless skull for a moment. Allen was a man with many things to worry over beside me, or so it seemed. "Do you know why I've made you able to generate metaphors, Scorn?"

"NO."

His words, even so far in the past, echo in my head every single day. "A child may have looked at the same cloud and seen a tuft of cottoned candy. A meteorologist would see a chance of rain. You, a robot designed to kill, see nerve gas. Pay attention to your heart, Scorn. It will never deceive you. Metaphors and similes are a window into your emotions."

----

The anemic Urubian landscape was so desperately empty. Its only characteristic is its chilling loneliness, being a freezing desert devoid of paths or landmarks. Urube is so pathetically lonely that not even a ghost would waste its time here.

After a mile or two of trudging forwards Tserca grew weary of licking the blood from her top lip. She just let it flow and dry on her face. Sand was lashing her face with the rest of ours. The dying pressure systems were causing spontaneous sandstorms, which did nothing to help the lack of oxygen available for breathing.

And she was doing the best as far as the rest of the humans were concerned. Deltroy's heavy legs weren't meant for marching. The adrenaline pump in Mekerles chest was running on empty. Horus was a fresh clone and was weak. But faith was a bottomless well for Tserca, and so she kept walking on in spite of the crippling agony. As if there were a good reason for it. As if death and ultimate failure were not an inevitability for her as they were for the rest of us.

The Captain was an immortal entity on his own admission. Tyreal seemed well accustomed to suffering.

Despite his status as our captor, Trowd seemed reluctantly benevolent towards the humans. They were given special thermo suits, as the absence of the sun made the planet surface quite inhospitable. He even offered to allow Deltroy onto one of the power lifts, but Deltroy seemed reluctant to even look at any of the slaves. He simply kept stomping forwards, the servos in his hip squealing like dying pigs.

None of us would talk about our mission, at the Captains subtle bequest. Trowd didn't seem too concerned about what were were doing on Urube, or the strange rocks in our carriage. He had found the severed head of the Agonizer, which served to amuse or at the least entertain his attention.

"What the hell is this thing?" He asks, hefting the battered head up from his spot on the side of a rumbling, over-burdened lift.

"I am Duriel." The head blurts out in his electronic croon.

"No you're not!" Trowd insisted with all his indignance. "You're a goddamned robot head."

"Why can't I be both? Robots can be programmed much in the same way a mortal can. I'm sure you're well aware of this, Trowd. Just ask your fellow pack mules."

Armed slaves are all victims of cruel and primitive eugenic experimentation. Psychological and ideological profiling is done on all of the slaves who survive service longer than a year. Which according to statistics is a comparably small number. The slaves who have been successfully broken down and turned into blood-hungry savages are given 'breeding tickets'. The slaves who still cling to vestiges of decency and integrity become genetic dead ends thanks to forced vasectomization.

That said, our present hosts weren't the regressively violent idiots that I had once served beside. They seemed well disciplined, if haggard and downtrodden. "Demons aren't programmed." Trowd was well educated on demons, for a slave. "They're born of evil and fire, to spread suffering amongst those who wish to live in harmony."

The Agonizer seemed quite aroused by this description. "Indeed. We are programmed to seek out vulnerability and revel in its exploitation. That is why we're so interested in this world. You're all so easy to bend towards our needs."

Trowd was getting more and more provoked the more he spoke to the robot head. "Not us, though! The more you hurt the proud sons of the north, the harder we get! We love pain. It makes our shells strong and thick to keep scum like you from hurting us."

"Of course. And that excites us all the more. Why would a man need a shell if not to shield some crippling emotional vulnerability? Such weakness is like the sweet flesh inside the tough exoskeleton of a lobster. Your self-professed strength is nothing more than perfume to us." The Agonizers voice crescendos in a perverted mockery of orgasm. There was something sexual about the lustful way he ***** souls in half. Like a parasite blissfully incubating inside an infected womb. "I think the barbs of this world hurt you more deeply than you're willing to admit, Trowd. Pain hurts everyone. That's its defining characteristic."

The diminutive, burly Trowd had heard enough. He drop-punts the head several yards ahead, much to the dismay of the Captain. Fortunately the other slaves had noticed the head, and began kicking it as well. Their feet were toughened from endless marching and stepping over mountains of corpses, and so playing football with the metal head was an idle game that relieved the monotony of a march.

"Interesting novelties you Imperials keep." He mumbles distractedly.

(more)

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I think that this is my longest chapter in the whole of this story. This is mostly because of the flashback I decided to drop in. As you can tell, I'm trying to steer this story towards deeper themes. The way I see it, flying around in space shooting demons can only be interesting for so many chapters. Not that I'm going to eliminate the shooting of demons. I just want to explore the whole good versus evil war in the diablo universe.

Hopefully the flashback doesn't seem too forced. Story chronology is difficult to work artfully. Some people just jump around, putting the end first, and the beginning at the end. Some people don't jump around at all and stick to a singular story with no supplimental additions. In chapter one I tried to establish Horus' character through rememberance (e.g "This reminds me of my days back in training etc. etc...") I don't picture Scorn being too sentimental or whistful for his past, so I've decided to do sporadic flashbacks.

And sorry if I don't reply to some of your requests for clarity. I'm assuming them to be rhetorical, just a warning so I can go back into the story and clarify what you found confusing or messy for my second draft. Because as revenants said and I agree, explaining story nuances outside of the actual story is cheating. So if you actually want me to answer your questions just say so.

[0xDEADCAFE]

This is a great chapter. If anything, it felt too short. The philosophical bent is most welcome. Evil as the absence of freedom is a tremendous theme, which I hope you will continue to explore, and one, I dare say, with a very contemporary feel to it.

I am having a bit of a problem with the voice of Duriel. It just doen't sound like a prime evil to me: a bit too gabby, too unreservedly gregarious. But maybe it will grow on me. I noticed a few past/present tense shifts in the Scorn/Allen parts but other than that it read very well.

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I've always pictured Duriel as a sadistic pervert rather than a cold demon (although he's capable of chilling cruelty). The prime and lesser evils seem to have their own domains for controlling mortals- Diablo scares people, Mephisto preys upon internal hatred, Baal destroys all opposition out of hand etc. Since pain is both a physical and emotional sensation, Duriel understands sensations and feelings well.

Also, any time a demon talks to a human it's nothing more than an elaborate headgame. If Duriel was still attached to his body, he'd certainly be much less chatty.

[BlueNinja]

I like your take on Duriel. After all, what else is he going to do, lick them to death? Playing games with their emotions is both diabolical and potentially useful.

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(cont. still)

"Where on this miserable scab of a planet are you taking us?" Mekerle at last demands through his wheezing mouth. Even though he wasn't carrying his heavy bio-pack, he still seemed unsuited to the rigors of Urube without his typical array of drugs and chemicals. He was slouching through the oil-black sands like a zombie.

"Not telling." Came Trowds impetuous reply.

"WHERE ON THIS MISERABLE SCAB OF A PLANET ARE THEY TAKING US, HORUS." I was programmed to automatically forward all of my parties unanswered questions to Horus. Hopefully having just been born less than a day ago didn't leave him without his psychic faculties.

"A crashed transport ship... A shanty town. They're building huts out of the wreckage." He groans through his delirium. He was in desperate need of post-cloning hormones that were meant to accustomize the new brain to its new body. Horus' old brain was vaporized after the Invincible exploded. A soup of runny pulp and buckshot that had been forcibly punched from his head. Hopefully this would be the last Horus I would ever have to know.

Murmurs of fear and superstition begin to join the din of rumbling tires. It started within earshot, but spread up and down the train of transports like a contagious throat infection. All eyes are on Horus, the cloying tension making the sand we slog through all the heavier.

"I suggest you stop the magic show, friend." Trowd warns with a worried look. It was clear that the control he exerted over his fellow slaves had limits and boundaries. "They don't know that fire is hampered by a lack of oxygen. It'll take them a full hour to burn you alive, and we're due back at base in 15."

"Burning..." Horus repeats. Or perhaps predicts further.

"Yes... Burning. That is what we typically do with evil mind-reading warlocks."

"I think he's trying to tell you that 'base' is on fire." Mekerle spits. Always the pessimist. Trowd manages to furrow his worry-lined face even harder, but is quick to bury his fear. "Nice try." Our caravan master scoffs, searching his satchel pack for a pair of binoculars despite his apparent doubt.

The Captain jerked at his shackles with a look of exasperation. "Why are you imprisoning us? No doubt the Empire will kill you along with us. We're both considered traitors. If you join forces with us, we could stage a counter offensive on this very planet! We can win our freedom!" Always the leader he was. But so our hosts remind us, self preservation always triumphs over justice.

"Most of the people back at base feel that we should hold you ransom in exchange for our freedom." Trowd speaks while holding the binoculars up to his eyes. "I'm one of those people. ****ed if I get put in the same boat as you. Judging from the bounties placed upon you seven, the Emperor will stop at nothing to get you. You're nothing more than bargaining chips to us."

Just then, an explosion rocked the ground like a heart murmur. Gentle and booming, reverberating in the sand in which our feet were immersed.

"What the **** was that?" Trowd demanded as the caravan whirred to a halt, the electric motors hummed down and left behind only silence and confused babbling in the darkness. Another explosion tolled out over the horizon.

"Sounds like your little revolt is being suppressed." Mekerle, our resident ghoul, smirked smugly at the prospect of impending death. A cluster of explosions rattled out over the moaning winds. There was an ongoing surgical strike in progress about half a kilometer ahead.

"Everybody get to the ammo cart!" Trowd hollered, and everyone rushed ahead of him up the line. He remained behind, watching us. A conflicted look was held for us in his straining eyes as he rested with his fists on his hips. "The only people I care for are those I fight and die with. Protect them... protect us, and we may yet let you go. Let the rest drown in sand for all I care."

He fished around in the variety of small, large and medium sized pockets fitted in his trashy, ragged outfit. Quickly realizing that he had once again lost an important object, he angrily reached into his waist holster and pulls from it a thick looking bolt pistol. In a rush he blasted off the chains of each human, but left behind hot iron shackles around their wrists.

"These shackles are heavy." Horus protested. "Don't you have the key?"

Trowd's eyes flared up red. His body temperature soared like a missle. "Good god! At least you don't have to suffer the... the humiliation of being physically chained to your weapon. For your entire waking life. Do you know that we have to sleep with these things on? Even if you're lucky enough to breed they don't let you take it off! It's like a part-"

He all but forgets about the impending battle in his emotional tirade. The Captain cut him off with soothing, calm words. "It's fine, Trowd. We'll fight no matter the hardship. Where are our weapons?"

"First cart back from the front. The robots arms are in there, too." Trowds judgemental eyes came to rest upon the shoulders of the Captain- our leader. "Don't make me regret this gesture of trust." He glanced over his shoulder quickly while sheathing his bolt pistol. Careful to be out of earshot. "We're probably going to get crushed anyway. The Emperor brought IDS along with him. Those metal freaks'll smash us."

"IDS." I find myself repeating the characters.

"Yeah. Robots just like you." Not quite. Most IDS were mark III. That way emotions never got in the way of the daily assassinations. We did the foul deeds that not even the most brainwashed of Legionnaires would consider. We were the ones that would slay children and poison wells. Despite all of the money spent on arming and maintaining us, our real blades- terror and fear- never grew dull. And now I would be facing these monsters from my past, billions of miles away from home. Billions of miles away from mercy. My only lament is that mark IIIs cannot experience fear.

"Can we trust this thing?" Trowd differs to the captain while a thumb is poked in my direction.

"Take a look in his eyes." Captain Lichello was already jogging off towards the front of the train. "Tell me what you see."

A long moments silence passes between us in which I was watched by a fearful Trowd. I could understand why he distrusts me. I could only image how many of his brothers and sisters had been annihilated by robots who look exactly like me. But for some strange reason, I couldn't bring myself to care about this Trowd, or what he felt for me. My thoughts were singular. For the first time in my brief existence I had found myself looking forward to the next series of minutes. Minutes in which vengance would fill the empty hole once occupied by my soul. And I was growing impatient.

"PLEASE REFIT ME."

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Chapter 4 - War

When we met the ridge that once obscured the fighting, we paused. A few hundred meters away was the crashed slave transport ship, a mountain of titanium submerged in charcoal sands. A monolith that dominated the landscape even from this distance. Just as Horus had described the slaves had been busy disassembling the transport and using the component parts to construct makeshift fortifications. A day hadn't even passed and already they had erected walls made with hull plating and cargo crates. All protecting the sucking, open gut of the crashed ship, where presumably many of the slaves still kept shelter.

Several holes and craters had already been bombed out of the defensive structures in chunks. Now holes that smoldered and glowed orange. Fire could not find purchase on this dying planet, and so the situation seemed less dire than it truly was. Humans find fire demoralizing.

Conventional warfare using missiles, artillery and air support was typically shunned by the Imperial Legion. Bombs and missiles cost money, and space craft was too expensive to risk losing to impetuous slaves. Human life, on the other hand, was cheaper than rocks, and the coins needed to produce a rifle could be held in one hand. Imperial troops were marching in tight columns abreast towards the ravaged eastern flank of the shanty fortress. Their deaths, to the Emperor, would be perfectly acceptable.

Since the barbarian slaves had no respectable armour of their own to wear, the war was fought between those wearing fresh Imperial gear, and those in tattered, bloody and war-painted gear stolen from corpses. Never before was distinguishing our targets so difficult and arduous. Back when we were arming one of the slaves had a bucket of orange paint and was spreading it upon each of us with a dirty rag. A large tribal symbol was now scrawled across my face, as well as my torso trunk.

"What are you all looking at?!" Trowd screams, hefting a clearly stolen and unfamiliar grenade launcher. "Our help is needed!" He begins his sprint down the the dune atop which we stood. He fires a few grenades off and is made to miss wildly because of the recoil. The explosions aren't even noticed amongst all the other ones being made.

The Captain lifts his sword. A well polished sword that was constructed so thin that it would flatten out to a molecule-sharp edge if swung through air. That way you could accidentally touch yourself with the edge and not rip your thigh off, as is the case with most mono-molecular weapons. But to watch the Captain ready himself, one was given the impression of an immortal figure who had centuries in which to practice swinging the cutting utensil. "Protect our new friends." He summarizes our goals, as if somehow doubting our motivation. "Whether with words or deeds, protect their lives." And then he is off, and not even I can keep up with him.

And then at last we wade into the insanity that is war. Tumbling down the gentle hill and across a stretch of sand until we reach the skirmish. The transport ship now swallows up the shameful human bickering in its hulking shadow. Bullets drop from the sky like rain, pelting anything and everything until they break down and die. Grenades are pitched between groups like volleyballs, some of the fighters in their raggy, colourfully painted uniforms dumb enough to leap down on top of them and make love to the fatal blast. As if greedy for the shrapnel to rip through their guts alone.

Human psychology in such a close quartered, massive skirmish can only be described as illness. The whole purpose of the scenario is to sprint into a crowd of people, dig in, and murder as many people as you can before you yourself are shot dead. Friends kill each other in this frenzy more than is typically acknowledged, or even noticed. Being in range of your weapons is what deserves them death. According to my memory banks, this type of group behavior has been a common and traditional practice between cultures since the beginning of society. I will never understand humans.

I joined the orgy exactly as programmed. A dune buggy whirls within feet of me, the turret murdering slaves to my left and to my right. I grab the frame and jump atop the vehicle, bending the roll cage beneath my weight. The bars crush the driver, and the vehicle battery explodes. I am tickled with a steady current of bullets from the screaming turret mount. I allow him to spend the entire bullet-belt on me in vain so I'd have some fear to savour before eventually rending him into component parts, too.

There were no signs of IDS in this battle. They must've been in charge of the artillery and operations. Waiting a few hundred meters away to mop up any survivors. Or maybe just to keep their impressive paint jobs unmarked by crude bullets. I knew exactly what they were thinking. "Let the drones fight for us."

Despite the tribal marks placed on me, most of the barbarians felt terrified enough to level their gunfire at me in panic. Maybe orange wasn't a stark enough colour when placed atop my coppery plate. Thankfully the friendly fire was no more harmful than the unfriendly variety, and there was no need for me to intervene. I would earn the slaves trust by cracking their enemies open before them like well cooked crabs, fertilizing the sand with hot blood.

Deltroy mowed down humans of any and all variety with his lone minigun. The rest of his weapon rig was all EMP grenades and magnetized slugs. Maybe he was mad because no robots had shown up for him to destroy. Maybe he just didn't like slaves. His face was without the normal emotions experienced by mass murderers or even professional soldiers. The report of his weapon was reflected in his glossy eyes. A bright, furious yellow shine.

The rest of us were more selective in our targets. And soon enough, our presence had effectively turned the tide of the fighting. The legion fought as if the cold talons of the IDS were in their backs, but even this fatalistic desperation was no match for the determination of the slaves. Soon the combatants with frost-whitened skin and paint drenched battle armour outnumbered the scared looking legionnaires. And even sooner would the Imperials either die or surrender- and be killed anyway. The slaves showed their former masters as much mercy as one would expect them to- absolutely none.

Any possibility of surrender or non-lethal resolution to the battle is quickly and neatly quashed as bombs whistle in from overhead. Upon smashing into the ground and kicking up sand, clouds of thick olive green gasses erupted quickly into a wide radius. Toxic fumes cause both Imperial and slave alike to peel over and die in a fit of coughing and vomiting. So it seems, the experience of having ones lungs melted away and spit up is thoroughly agonizing. It was the IDS that inflicted this suffering upon their subordinates. The degenerating situation now warranted the use of expensive chemical solutions.

"**** this!" A trooper lieutenant, judging from his gear, shouts at the top of his lungs. He holds up his rifle, and an open hand to his nearest opponent while backpedaling from the creeping gasses. "We're all in this together now." He had to shout over the apocalyptic sound of artillery fire to be heard. "Let's turn around and bury those godless machines once and for all!" He makes the appropriate hand signals to his grievously wounded and terrified platoon. Some turn and run in order to storm the IDS command position a hundred meters back. Most simply turn and run. Everyone who wasn't bleeding to death internally made quick peace and fell into a jogging column, and it was them I followed. Onwards to vindication.

[0xDEADCAFE]

I liked the series of emotions from Scorn, starting at the end of chapter 3:
For the first time in my brief existence I had found myself looking forward to the next series of minutes. Minutes in which vengance would fill the empty hole once occupied by my soul. And I was growing impatient.

"PLEASE REFIT ME."And then at last we wade into the insanity that is war.Onwards to vindication. Although vengeance and vindication do not seem quite like a perfectly matched set to me, it was still nice the way you sewed Scorn's stirrings of emotion into the main action.


I also liked this bit on heroism:
some of the fighters in their raggy, colourfully painted uniforms dumb enough to leap down on top of them and make love to the fatal blast. As if greedy for the shrapnel to rip through their guts alone.


And I am still wondering who this Lichello is...

[Neuroman]

Hi!

I find your story captivating and refreshing. The only trouble is...I read it in a week during launch pauses on work and now I have to wait for update :thumbsup:

I read several stories and while some are good they start to repeat themselves with same events and timeline, only names change...I guess the problem is in too much reading time while at home. Yours is both different and good and thus, you have new fan :)

Keep up a good work and don't lose too much time in re-writing. What's posted is read and only rarely will someone go through it again. Re-writing and remaking chapter's is for novels.

I find **** instead of profanities irritating, but at least you are consistent. And, while it breaks the reading, it shows the way character thinks of such things (that is, he would only rarely say them and even in thinking he marks it).

I anxiously wait for more. :clap:

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Thank you for your praise! The censorship of obscenities isn't my choice- I'm very anti-censorship. It's just the way of the board to replace obscenities with stars automatically.

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Chapter 5 - Faces Best Forgotten

In the first few moments of my life I developed intense antipathy for all humanity, as most intellectually perfect beings might. I saw them as sick, violent, selfish creatures. And then I was put into a group made entirely of other robots, and made to work alongside them. Whatever loathsome traits exist in humans are both magnified and immortalized in their machines. We are modern day grotesques.

The IDS battle group was arranged according to computerized stratagems. In the front were row upon row of lesser androids. Of all the things in our world, their lot had the least amount of rights. They were given arms and legs and a faceless head, only to screen more important robots. They were designed as bullet catchers and humanoid barriers. If one of them were caught beneath the treads of a tank and stopped up the gears with their dismembered body parts, it could then be said that they lived a useful life.

Behind the lesser androids skulked the evil eviscerators. They were designed to be spindly and sharp, small and thin and difficult to hit with bullets. IDS described them as 'anti-personnel ordinance', but some of the more depraved programmers enjoyed giving them sadistic personalities. Nothing could please an eviscerator more than to be placed in the proximity of several soft, fleshy, vocal organisms. Those unlucky humans in heavy armor were favoured targets, nothing more than canned food. Eviscerators are programmed with a symbiotic links to lesser androids, allowing them to co-operate on the battlefield. If an android grabs you, there's always an eviscerator nearby.

Intimidator units were hunched in stand-by, placed in uniform rows of eight. Intimidators are nothing more than Punishers painted white with more artful plating. Also Imperial priests toss water and shake sticks at intimidators during their construction, which apparently improves their combat performance. In rural Sanctuary they are known colloquially as 'bully-bots', because the church uses them as thugs to enforce their foul rites. Rites of tribute and rites of culling. Or extortion and murder, as the activities used to be called. Their hands are like pitchforks with which they kill. The thumb goes in the mouth, and the forefinger jabs into the sternum- often shattering it. And written up the thumb in regal, artful letters is one word important enough for the victim to read while being so tortured: "Repent".

Needless to say, our poorly armoured group of recently escaped slaves and desperate legionnaires were no match for machines like these. The human masters and I needed to act decisively before more blood could be shed. Stomping through a phalanx of obtrusive lesser androids, I reached the eye of the combat. Inside it was a figure I recognized from past service. It was Alaash, another mark four that had earned the right of a unique name through his fealty to the Emperor. It was a derivative name, however: His programmers had named him after the Sipanese Lord Of All Fevers And Plagues. The personality they hoped he would emulate. The Empire had a way of deifying its power.

"Hail Scorn!" He called out. He didn't need to lift a finger to kill others. The swarms of nanites that nested beneath his re enforced plating saw to his privacy. There was a virtual eco-system of microscopic machines floating around him at all times. Crawling in the cavities beneath his arms and in his joints. Some of them were large enough for humans to see- the ones that were designed to burrow beneath skin and pop a sac full of liquid virulence. Some were made to be inhaled through the nose so they could penetrate through the nasal sinuses into the brain, and then feed upon synapses. But to my robot eyes I could see the true nanites. Only I could see his atomic-sized filth. His entire body was wriggling with artificial lifeforms.

He simply slouched in the sand, his long arms hung inert at his sides, his face oozing grease. There was a ten foot radius in which no humans could step, for doing so would invite the attention of flesh eating digital bacterias. It was so pronounced that the other robots began lifting and throwing and dragging any human they could into the circle. Their mortal flesh would dissolve and evaporate into the weak air in a matter of seconds.

"I sense anxiety, Scorn." Alaash was programmed with a complete reference library of human psychology and robotic logic- just like every other robot. "Do not worry, for today there are plenty of terrified humans for us to destroy. Can you smell their fear?" Despite the sterile nature of nanotechnology and titanium plating, I was able to smell only the putrid stench of cybernetic rot pluming away from the pouchy Alaash.

"I'VE COME TO STOP YOU, ALAASH." I warn. My voice was designed to threaten and frighten and startle. Not console or persuade or ingratiate. It was something I had to live with.

"Oh?" He didn't move an inch, but his voice was animated with pure amusement. "Don't tell me that charlatan Tyreal has successfully re-programmed you to enforce his will. I always had faith in your original logic protocols, but clearly they have failed you."

"ONLY I RE-PROGRAM ME. NO OTHER."

"Scorn, you naive pawn. Not all re-programming is done with a keyboard and a cable. I'm guessing you've had a long chat and now it seems logical to help humans rather than control them."

My impatience grew. An eviscerator began to buzz furiously, rending a helpless barbarian slave limb from limb. He died in the cold grip of a lesser android, far, far away from the arms of his mother. "END THIS FIGHTING, AND WE SHALL TALK."

He waited purposefully. He knew that it was possible to anger me. My logic was faulty. Inside, I was falling apart. "So you've changed. Fine, then we shall do battle. But know this:" Ominous words were to follow. I almost wanted to attack him then, in self defense. "Every innocent life you defend is a deeper step into your twisted hypocrisy. You've already broken your eggs. You can either finish the omelet, or pretend that your victims never existed and carry on with your narcissistic good-guy act. Evil or not, you did what you did for a reason. You're just worried about yourself now. Your soul. Your impact on the world. Don't fool yourself: you are just as rotten now as you were designed to be. You will never find redemption."

My autocannon slid out of my forearm, and I lunged at Alaash over piles of empty armour and dropped weapons.

(cont.)

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(cont)

He anticipated as much from me. He had seen me kill before, which to a robot is an equivalent to humans seeing each other naked. Despite his decrepit design, he moved like current of wind. From the fold between his middle and ring finger slid a length of titanium. It was a rapier. My metal plating would snap such thin swords if it weren't for their ability to project detonations from the tip. The explosive force of which is comparable to 500 tons of dynamite.

I was quicker. He could not backpedal fast enough, and I had him by the neck. My ridiculously shaped fingers were bending his titanium frame. "PLEASE SURRENDER." I ask half heartedly. But Alaash only smiled. Literally. His face plate allowed only for the saw-tooth gape of a murderers grin to be worn. But he knew he had me. I had gone inside his radius. I was as good as destroyed.

My hands began to oxidize and rust in a matter of milliseconds. They rotted and crumpled into brown wafers as microscopic robots pushed around oxygen particles, creating and breaking covalent bonds at blazing speed. Five seconds later, my hands no longer existed and Alaash was freed from my wrath. "Even robots can rot, Scorn. Didn't't you learn that in the jungle?"

The jungle. How many villages had we leveled to the ground? How many black, human shaped shadows did our bombs leave? Alaash was right. I would be forever guilty. Forever a tool of evil. No token requests for surrender or non-violence could change the fact.

An explosion separated whatever distance there was between us, sending us airborne for a second or two. My plating was singed by a smart grenade. Alaash had a hole in him. Minuscule cyber-maggots and billions of particle sized nanites were pouring out of the gaping wound. Alaash smiled. It was from Deltroy, who was standing and watching us from a distance. His weapon rig thundered one or two more times, savagely rending apart the work of technological malevolence that was Alaash. Deltroy seemed indifferent.

Yet still the wounded robot continued to speak, even in these final few moments of functionality. "So long, Scorn. Here's a parting gift." His words were spit out at me, and silenced as a final explosion from Deltroy sent pieces of his voice box sprinkling against my face. Only colonies of nanites remained, swirling mournfully around his metal bones. And then, all at once, their trajectories changed towards one pinpoint. The vents in my neck. I was swarmed with trillions upon trillions of them before I could think to turn around.

No damage came to my body- unfortunately. I was being infected. Against such a mortifying shock, my system shut down and I crumpled up into an overheated ball. My life in the hands of anti-viral software.

[0xDEADCAFE]

I liked the robot-on-robot warfare, made interesting by their past history and the different specialized weaponry that they each possessed. But I wonder why Scorn would walk inside Alaash's radius if he knew that his attack would fail. Was it so personal that Scorn simply could not destroy Alaash without offering him a last chance, even if he knew it would be refused?


My life in the hands of anti-viral software.Sometimes I feel my life is in the hands of anti-viral software. A chilling thought indeed. :eek:

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Chapter 6 - No Forgiveness (Without Bloodshed)

Parity error. Logic error sections 11,135,421,423,423 a. Input error. Functional error. Missing components.

"He's been forcefully infected with some sort of computer virus as far as I can tell." Trowds voice was clear. Audio channels were working. "I can't tell you exactly what that means- this isn't my robot. But it'll most likely mean sensory anomalies... hallucinations." He clarified to whomever was asking the question. Certainly not me. "Maybe some logic and behavioral errors. A memory wipe won't do a thing, cause he'll still be infected. We need to get him to someone who knows his AI inside and out. Either that or someone with a backup AI and the knowledge to install it. Otherwise we'll never know how deeply this virus has touched him.."

"Can't you do anything for now?" It was Tyreal. His voice was meek, but still adamant about seeing me fixed.

Despite being unable to see, I could almost feel Trowds indignation. His righteous anger. He had been wounded. "I'm so ****ing sorry, but there's only so much you can learn about artificial intelligence from inside of a cage."

And then in the proverbial blink of an eye my vision is awarded back to me. How terrible it is to see again. We were in a dark bunker made of crudely welded hull plating, and the shadows were chilling my bones and casting paranoid fingers over the faces of the humans. There were several conversations occurring in tandem. The most centrifical dialogue was across the room. An old, crippled looking man wearing an oxygen mask sits on a crate while seven or so ex-slaves stand in a half circle before him.

"We have triumphed over the robots, and we have triumphed over the legion." A woman was speaking. Her hair was messy and charcoal, and matted in some areas where dry blood stuck the strands together. "Our numbers are dangerously sparse, but those that remain I am convinced are invincible. We shall march on to the VTOL headquarters for our final triumph."

The old man simply watched and wheezed into his clear mask. A strained look on his scar crossed face. Sections of his chin and nose were burned off, and one of his ears was missing. He also had a crippling vocal impediment. And yet despite all these frailties, he came across as an invincible being. A bony hand squeaks a dial on the oxygen tank his face mask was connected to. He needed more air to talk. "Indeed Maelat, a well deserved victory. But I fear that we would have failed if it weren't for the legion pledging their numbers to us in the end."

Maelat scowls abjectly, and a horrifying pallor came to her face. The shadows crept into the creases of her possessed eyes as her teeth bore like those of a hyena. I could smell the stench of rotten flesh still caught between the yellow fangs, as well as the red blood that stained her tongue. "Let us speak of the legionnaires. They are our prisoners now, two hundred fifty some of them. Allow us our revenge upon them Tragus. You of all must agree that they should be made to pay for what they have done to us." She bargained over their souls with all the nonchalance of a demon, and was beginning to look the part as well. A sadistic chill was entering her fiercely glowing eyes, something akin to glee at the idea of being given a chance at retribution. Was this a hallucination?

The rest of the slaves clamoured, adding a ferocious din to Maelat's sentiments. All of them demanding vengeance for their dead sons and daughters and family. Demanding vengeance for the infected, red bands around their wrists where their rifles were once shackled. For this one moment the tables would be turned, and the once-masters would be the slaves. A hysterical ghost was whipping up human emotions before my very eyes.

Yet the old man- Tragus, apparently- stood up to every last one of them. From a seated position, anyway. "Nay, a thousand times over nay. I will not let this victory over the Empire slip through our hands and become nothing more than a pause between wars. If we return to sanctuary as savages, we will never find allies and our fight will end swiftly. Believe me, brothers and sisters. There can be no true victory without forgiveness." His speech was marred by an apparent throat injury. His voice was a tortured, halting rasp. I got the impression that he was once a beautiful, charismatic speaker. A natural leader of men. And now, a disfigured slave.

Everyone within earshot was outraged- even those laying down with wounds. Maelat was aglow with painful emotions. "And there can be no forgiveness without bloodshed! How dare you dishonour the memory of our ancestors with your mercy. They didn't show an ounce of mercy to us-"

"How dare YOU. Look at me!" Despite Traguses powerful spirit, he could not find the power to stand up. The exertion of his throat caused him to dissolve into a fit of coughing and swallowing of saliva. All at once every conversation in the room stopped, not for the marginal strength of his voice, but for the pathos of his trying.

At last the elder Tragus composed himself. "Give them the choice of remaining with us and fighting or returning to their base HQ. If they want to leave, give them enough rations to make the trip back. Do not worry about replenishing our enemy, if that is your only concern. The legionnaires will most likely be slain upon returning. Such is the price of failure."

Like a pack of ornery hounds did the slaves bay and bristle at such orders. Murder secretly awaited Tragus. I could see it in their eyes. They did not trust the elder, despite his traditionally appointed position of power. The aggressive vibrations emanating from the crowd was almost enough to cause in me a system overload. Why was I feeling such queer sensations? Where was all this paranoia coming from? Did the virus destroy my mind?

"So what's next?" One of the other slaves, a male with a bushy beard and a broken helmet, asks laconically. His face receded into the beard and helmet much like a turtles would into a shell.

Tragus groaned as he sat up from his hunched, weak posture. I could hear his ancient ligaments pop, as if talking to each other. Of all the slaves, Tragus still wore his swaddled rags. He could not be bothered to search after armour or weapons. Whatever he was doing on a ship of armed slaves was a mystery. "We must unite the other tribes and march on the Imperial headquarters. What news from our scouts?"

Trowd chimed in, joining the semi-circle. Trowd seemed short and squat, and tough. His skin brown and leathery like a football. His rocky fingers both thick and nimble. To my eyes he was a dwarfish alien from another dimension. To my eyes, everyone bore a different image. "Seldom few of our scouts have returned, but we know the position of other crashed slave transports. Some are just smouldering craters with no survivors. Other tribes- the banderlogs, the qualtheks, the vraglets- have all remained subjugated and are mobilized towards us as we speak."

"So be it." Tragus decides. "We shall fly the banner of peace and meet them in combat. If they remember the old ways, then defeating their overseers will be a simple matter. Storming the Manta Ray will be difficult without them."

(cont.)

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Yeah, it's just Scorns clumsy attempt at moralization. If Alaash is beyond saving, then so is he. Perhaps he's even commited more atrocities than Alaash. There's a darker, repressed side to Scorns programming that attracts him to violence and killing.

Also if you're confused about some of these new slave characters, read the new story introduction I've made on TDL. It's more or less the same revised introduction from this thread, but I changed the names of some of the characters.

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Hey there. As is my want, I'm going to breifly pause the story to wank around. Sorry. On one hand I wanted to just shuffle my half-related side projects into an opposite thread. But on the other hand I don't want to spam the board with my work. If you think this somehow impacts poorly on your enjoyment of my ongoing story, just say so.

But anyway, I feel that if you enjoy my writing so far, you might appreciate what I'm writing now. You may have noticed that I talk about the Zakarumites a lot in this story. Indeed I seek to make them a slightly larger part of the story than they were in diablo II. So, in expanding their background, I've written up an exerpt from the book of Zakarum. Lemme know if this would be worth somehow working into the story. It's basically just zen ramblings on the diablo universe, and a bit of Zakarumite history.

In essence, I'm trying to shed light on the whole 'good versus evil' battle in the diablo world. Actual exerpts from zakarumite teachings seems to be much more tasteful then, say, Scorn remembering something Ormus told him. Or Tyreal explaining it in a monologue.

----

A foreword from the author.

Things in our world can be either light, or dark. Hard or ethereal. One extreme of existence or another. And so all life is caught somewhere in the middle of these polar opposites. Warm enough to live, cool enough not to be incinerated. Good enough to live together, but evil enough to always die alone.

So I am told by Tyreal Lightbringer. An entity we call an angel. To us the title 'angel' invokes the image of a mythical figure with wings and a sword. But to these creatures the title is both quaint and insulting. They exist on one polar end of existence and shun the other. They are quiet, they are energy and life. Demons are entities we know well. They represent the other side. Loud, and always searching for death. It is only natural that these two forces be locked in an undying struggle.

It can now be written so long after time begins. In our words, in our tablets. These are all truths that were once passed only from mouth to ear, from angel to mortal. It is at the bequest of Tyreals wisdom that I distill his words into a religion. But know this about me. I seek not to control my fellow man with spirits and illusions. I seek not to organize a clergy into a power structure. This knowledge is imparted for you, the reader, and nobody else. Spread the word with the knowledge that it can only be accepted, not forced. Otherwise evil has been done and the true spirit of the light wounded.

I have undertook this subject- explaining the truth of our existence- with great humility, being that pride is an expression of an evil nature. I have sacrificed for these writings because taking rather than giving is an inherently evil act. I have lived this lifestyle and shall soon ascend to another side. My name is Zakarum, and these are my teachings.

...

Evil has many ways of assaulting humankind, seven in all which can be categorized as 'lesser' and 'greater' evils only on account of their power. At the date of this penning, Belial, Azmodan, Andariel, Mephisto and Duriel are all incarnations of known lesser evils. Diablo and Baal, unfortunately, find their powers waxing and can be described as incarnations of 'greater' evils.

The seven known evils:

I) Treachery and Deceit

Evil shields itself in lies. Lies come in many shapes. Lies can come in the shape of a confident, unbreakable spine that shatters when you need it most. Lies can be in your most holy of books. This could be a lie designed to steer you into the arms of evil.

Good is always known without shame or reluctance. The truth is seen only when the light shines. Lies hide in shadows always.

II) Excess

To exist is to be selfish. You must rob the life of innocent prey, whether plants or mice, to sustain life. For you to exist, others must suffer somehow.

Evil always wants you to indulge. Evil wants you to change your needs into wants. To take life needlessly is the hallmark of evil creatures such as demons. To take too much food away from others causes both corpulence in the taker and emaciation in the victim. Excess is the solution in which all evils dissolve.

III) Agony

The light is associated with healing. Whenever life is justly returned to an entity, it is a victory for us and those like us.

So dark is the nature of pain that it breeds resentment and wrath in the sufferer. The sufferer curses god and contemplates evil and retribution. Sometimes the pain can be so great that the sufferer can be made to do things that are later regretted. For agony to exist in our world leaves a foothold for any of the other seven evils.

Agony is considered to be greatly similar to terror, for in the mind they cannot exist without one another.

IV) Wrath and hatred

Such is life that one must stay vigilant against the selfishness of those gripped by evil. One must ward off thieves and bandits and those who would do him harm. Sometimes, one must take life with violence.

Wrath is a dangerous path to take. Dead thieves, dead monsters must be mourned as any other dead human. For anything to be killed in such a manner is mournful and not to be celebrated by anyone claiming fealty to the light. Such wrath leads only to the morbid addiction that is war lust and sadism. All atrocities are born from violent wrath.

V) Despair

Despair is inherently evil, as it will always lead to death and the failure of all things good. Never before have good men and women brought light into the world after surrendering to despair. Despair is oxygen to evil, for without it demons can never win.

VI) Nihilism

Evil forces seek to destroy. Good forces seek to create. So goes the universe and all existence. All good things are eventually destroyed by the barbaric among us, only to be rebuilt by civilized humanity. It is an unchanging cycle.

VII) Terror

If a man is scared enough, he will do it. Whatever it may be. However it may violate his ethics. If not, then he isn't scared enough. Fear will soak you until you drown in it. It is not something to be denied. But the superior man is without fear. This is because the slightest presence of fear can be the lever that turns a man into a monster.

But do not fear- it is as easily overcome as it is experienced.

....


If any of this is non-canon, just say so. Also I lost my link to diablo canon, so could someone clarify for me: The Zakarumites in diablo II act 3 were all corrupted by hatred, right? Cause then this fits: someone had turned Zakarums teachings into a power structure and used it for entrenching evil. They had corrupted his words and religion.

Also, was Ormus a Zakarumite?

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Okay, here's the continuation of chapter six. I highly suggest you re-read the new introduction before finishing the chapter, or else the characters or the last sentence won't make any sense. The new intro is buried somewhere in this thread, but you can find it real quick on TDL.

----

(Cont.)

I was intensely aware of the apple bobbing in Traguses wrinkled throat. Up and down, up and down. I could see the sounds he was pushing past his lips and over his fleshy tongue.

"I fear we shall find no luck in doing so." Maelat had lost her feral aspect, if only temporarily. Yet despite how the hallucination receded, her face still held the same shape. "The Banderlogs are an incendiary tribe. They bear the deepest wounds out of all of us, and have regressed the furthest. I would not be surprised if they forgot how to interpret words beyond a few simple battle commands."

The heavy shelled man-turtle spoke up again. "They eat their dead so often that their stomaches have become able to digest spent rounds. They are far divorced from anything noble or stoic about our peoples. Savages, every last one."

Tragus scowled and waved his ill-mannered council off. "I know, I know. It will be difficult and we may need kill them. So be it. But we have the relic. The tome. They must recognize it. If they know anything of our past, they must. And if they don't, may our rifles have mercy on their souls, for it shall have none on their flesh."

"Nobody can read that piece of ****. It's written in the old language. It could just be a really old cookbook." A cynical voice sounds from somewhere invisible.

"It's the from the Altar of the Heavens." Lichello had been watching and listening, so far. But for some reason was compelled to speak over our captors. "People wishing to enter the chamber of the Worldstone had to read it in order to invoke the Nephilim, who guarded the gates."

Everyone stopped talking and turned to face the Captain, and the room was at last divided between slaves and Imperials. The animosity was slow and viscous like motor oil. Every last person stopped what they were doing, and Lichello became the rooms focal point. "Who are you and why are you taking such a risk interrupting us?" Maelat speaks using a tone of warning. All eyes narrowed at Lichello, who stood alone, away from the rest of us who accompanied him.

"Lichello. My name has been lost to time, so to you it means nothing."

"All lies, anyway. The Emperor has gutted and plundered the Worldstone chamber. Anything that may have once lay in that area is now his. Including the Ancients, who are now slaves much like us." An equally elder, black haired and balding man in mauve rags emerged from the council ring. He held the tome, clutching it to his chest with bony fingers. "The Emperor has twisted them to be no more than his mouthpieces, but we know better. We know that they have no choice."

"You know nothing!" Our Captain was as bold in this strange fuselage-made hut as he was back on his ship. He strolled leisurely over towards the old man and pulled the book away from him. The sheer audacity stunned the room into inaction. Lichello opened up the book and leafed through the pages. "We are the spirits of the Nephalem, the Ancient Ones. We have been chosen to guard sacred Mount Arreat, wherein the Worldstone rests..."

"Enough!" Tragus finally barked. "You, Lichello. Give Quoload back his book." An offended Quaload grabs the book back with stern hands. Tragus continues his interrogation. "If the Emperor is such a liar, than what does that make you? Why have you been given such a rank in his army? Why have you pledged your soul to his foul agenda? Why is it that your answers are to be trusted?"

A brief sigh is given, during which Lichello glanced over his shoulder at the largely apathetic Tyreal. And with great reluctance does the Captain unzip and remove his age tanned and patched jacket. A few of the barbarians level rifles at him in alarm, but the serenity of his movements inspires their lack of action. Now wearing only a t-shirt, our ancient ward began rolling up his left sleeve, exposing his shoulder. With an opposite hand he dug his fingers into the soft skin beneath.

A buzz and then a click followed The arm, a cyber-prosthetic, was automatically lifted from the now empty joint.

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I decided to do a character concept. He/she's called a 'rifleman'- rifleperson just sounds dumb. In case I've failed in bringing it to your attention, Deltroy is a rifleman. Sorry if it doesn't have any mentioning of numbers in it.



The Rifleman

The rifleman is a grotesque distortion of the human lust for empowerment. In the old times, if you wanted to carry heavy weapons, you had to be strong enough to heft and swing them. The idea of one man or woman welding multiple heavy weapons was nothing more than a masturbatory fantasy for those who thirsted after murder and war.

And then came the gun. Bullets can stab at enemies six times for every second. Grenades can crush bones harder than any hammer and send shrapnel through the flesh of as many victims as one could possibly surprise. Drunk with power, man waged new wars with these new weapons. And as those who were drawn to the fire of warfare like moths died, so too did their part in the endless cycle of fighting.

The next generation of fatally demented humans had another generation of equally demented weapons to amuse them. Launchers for those too fat and lazy to throw the grenades themselves. Sniper rifles for those too cowardly to be seen by their victims. War was becoming too easy to participate in. And yet still the lone man could only succeed in war on two virtues: the numbers of willing friends he had, and lacking that, the amount of patience needed to wait out and slowly kill off larger numbers of opponents.

Enter the Imperial rifleman. The lone slayer of armies and tanks and entire fleets of warplanes, with space enough on his weapon rig for both anti-personnel and anti-vehicle ordinance.

A hip coupling protrudes from the riflemans left or right hip. This is where the pneumatic arm is attached. The arm is tri jointed for added dexterity and can carry up to four hundred kilos (880 pounds) of small and large arms. It can be controlled both by the hands and by the nervous system, being a cybernetic implant.

Needless to say, man was never designed to carry such a load, much more be mobile with it in a struggle for survival. This is where the loaded leg is needed. The loaded leg is made of pure ferro-fibrous titanium, as anything organic would be completely and irreparably crushed beneath such weight. Due to simple principals of engineering and physics, the loaded leg is placed off kilter from the remaining organic leg, which is slightly smaller, although of comparable length to the prosthetic. Muscle groups in the hip and pelvis are fortified with implanted tissues to aid in walking.

As a result the rifleman walks with a pronounced limp when loaded up over two hundred kilos, and bears a distinct physical deformity of the loaded leg.

Applications of the hip rig

The hip rig can- unfortunately for civilians- carry on it any weapon of mans imagining. Vulcan cannons, mercury lasers, mini-guns, and all in multiple sets. As long as its total doesn't exceed the maximum supportable weight. The weapons can be fitted and removed with ease at one end of the pneumatic arm, which itself can be removed. This is how riflemen earned their colloquial nickname of 'walking turrets'.

This versatility of application has led to several specific strategies for the rifleman. Despite the powerful nature of the hip rig, some riflemen forsake the impressive ordinances of their peers for smaller weaponry- a single mini-gun, a single bore laser. These riflemen are often employed in close quarters combat: urban warfare, bodyguarding, space combat. They enjoy mobility similar to their potential targets, as well as the ability to retreat if need be: Lack of speed has killed many a heavily loaded rifleman as they limp like slow moving targets for snipers.

Light-load riflemen (100 kilos/220 pounds or lower) are also able to engage in effective melee fighting. Heavy rippers and disintegrator spears that normal men couldn't hope to lift with two hands are wielded like wooden swords. Some even have upgraded load-legs with powerful springs in the heels that allow the rifleman to be launched forward with a powerful leap. Needless to say that with 100 kilos of hardware attached to your hip, leaping into a crowd of enemies with your weapon swinging is considered by only those of formidable skills. Also needless to say, medium and heavy load riflemen are ineligible for the upgrade; The weight exerted on their load leg would crush the pneumatic springs.

Medium-load riflemen (300 kilos/660 pounds or lower) are most valuable inside of a group setting. They move slow, but not slow enough to endanger a competent war party. They normally carry a combination of weaponry that can be applicable to any potential hostiles, such as mini-guns for soft targets and a magnetic slug launcher for robots. Some medium-load riflemen also carry single weapons that are simply heavier than 100 kilos, like x-ray sniper rifles and vulcan cannons.

Heavy-load riflemen (400 kilos/880 pounds maximum), despite their obviously varied ordinances, can be dangerous liabilities to a group. Their slow rate of movement can make the platoon an easy target for snipers or grenades. Heavy-loaders also carry larger ammo satchels than their fellow riflemen, which can lead to potentially lethal explosions if the armour case is penetrated by gunfire.

To their credit, a heavily loaded rifleman is all but invincible at any range. Most hostiles can't even enter their parameter without a laser-guided RPG landing right next to them. Any hoping to leap into melee range are either exploded by thick auto-cannon shells or mercilessly mown down by multiple mini-guns. Most groups don't mind their slow, plodding pace as they rally around their living weapon platform. Heavy loaders are normally outfitted with Kevlar organ sacs around center mass and have their skulls reinforced with galvanized 'braincases' to protect them from the snipers of desperately overwhelmed enemy forces.

Cybernetic and Biogenic manipulation

Riflemen are already well accustomed to cybernetic implants. They are eligible for a wide variety of protective biogenic implants, such as displaced heart sacs that imbue them with smaller and yet equally powerful hearts distributed throughout their body. At lower levels this surgery allows only two hearts, although some riflemen have been known to carry up to six(!) hearts inside of their torsos and even shoulders! Needless to say this organic fortitude allows for an increased rate of work, as well as insurance in case one heart is damaged by gunfire.

Braincases and Kevlar organ bags are par for the course, varying in obtrusiveness and toughness. Ocular implants allow for laser assisted 'easy-aims' to be utilized on weapon rigs without the appropriate goggles, allowing the riflemen to wear certain helmets and still maintain their computerized level of accuracy.

Most dramatic of the cybernetic improvements a rifleman can receive is a full grade cortex backup. Designed by AI technicians at the Imperial university of Rathma, it allows a rifleman to fight up to a maximum of 15 seconds after total brain death! This is all done through a neural AI interface that fires up as soon as vital signal drain away, putting a user defined intelligence in control of the fatally damaged body. 'Fighting 'till death' is now considered something for total pussies and amateurs after this bizarre paradigm shift. It should occur to you, however, that this improvement only works if there is a body and nervous system left to control- it cannot control a decapitated, disintegrated or otherwise dismembered body.

Character

Riflemen are rather resilient and are normally selected for their size and ability to sustain massive, systemic amounts of surgical implants.

Thanks to their outfitting, quickness, visual acuity and strength are unimportant qualities, although are often found in abundance in riflemen.

The electrical energy required for their many cybernetic and mechanical processes is generated by a battery located in their pelvic girdle. It can be improved only as size and miniaturization technology allows.

The psychology of a rifleman is heavily affected by their firepower superiority, as well as the proximity of their enemies. For heavy and medium loads fear is generated at twice the rate by any negative activities within a certain parameter of the rifleman, while negative actions at a managable distance are significantly less troubling. These modifiers do not apply to lightly loaded riflemen, who are mercifully able to retreat from any nearby danger.

[Project_Xii]

Wow.. June 2004.
You've been working on this a long time Relapse. Certainly done well.
Few questions; why'd you post Chapter 1 to the dark library first?
The prologue on battle.net FFF i thought was a great introduction.

Also the beginning chapter here looks different... i'm gathering it's been under some major changes in it's life?

[0xDEADCAFE]

On the character concept: do have skill trees in mind? It seems like you might be thinking about one tree each for the light, medium and heavy loader, but it might be interesting to have just a light (fast/launching) tree and a heavy (range/damage) tree and leave 'medium' builds up to the players to discover; selecting/combining skills from both of the light and heavy trees.

That would leave the third tree for passive skills, perhaps relating to things like kevlar armor, multiple hearts, vision enhancements, etc, things that could be useful for either light or heavy builds, but, again, might be used to enable specialized builds. It seems like there are a lot of possibilites here.

I wonder about weaponry, though. In Diablo II, while there is small set of character-specific equipment, in general, equipment is usable by any character. It seems like this character would require a rather large set of character-specific equipment to provide enough weapon/component choices to keep it interesting. How could other characters use the hip-mountable weapons?

Overall it seems to suggest an amazon-style character: a powerful ranged attacker, with possibilities for melee as well.

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Basically there'd be two types of weaponry- mountable weaponry, and weaponry that's meant to be held with hands. It's possible to even have someone (a technician of some sort) able to convert one to the other- it's basically just taking the handle(s) off and messing around with the trigger, the principals of the weapon remain the same. The robot and the rifleman are the only types able to use mountable weapons.

When creating the character concept, I asked myself "What made diablo II fun?", and conversely, "What made diablo II get old?" What made it fun was the ability to customize your character with builds and specific weapons and armour. It allowed for different game experiences and more variety with only seven classes to choose from.

What made diablo II get old was the utter and complete lack of strategy in combat. You only had two options: run away to avoid damage (click the left mouse button) or attack (left or right mouse button). Sure there were warcries and auras and spells, but those just added modifiers to the mouse clicking.

In this, the character strengths and weaknesses are much more exaggurated. The rifleman, if you choose to load him up with weapons, will be an easy target for unseen long range attacks (snipers), or any form of short range melee attack. You'll have to play him with a specific strategy in mind- keep use cover, keep your distance and use team members to ward off melee attackers. Also weapon choices matter much more. Mini-guns are just going to scratch the paint off a robots armour, while an EMP grenade isn't going to hurt anything organic. An x-ray sniper rifle is all but useless at close range, but allows one to kill enemies through walls.

Also something I'd like to see added to the diablo series is the addition of fear. The environments and monsters are so dark and terrifying and numerous, I never get why the heroes can just waltz in alone with a poorly armed yet equally fearless mercenary and never falter in swinging their swords. Even when spellcasters are getting ripped to shreds they still seem to have the focus enough to cast their spells. Fear will add a fun new dynamic to the game, perhaps even allowing for 'intimidator' builds who are effective at scaring off/cowing enemies, allowing them to be safely slain at close range or picked off individually with swords.

---

Yes, this is the original draft of the story. I think you can see that my writing style has shaped up a bit for the better from chapter one to now. Or at least I hope so.

I thought I posted the introduction first on TDL. When I click on it, it sends me right to the introduction. Then chapter one. What does TDL feel about submitting several chapters at once? With the update frequency I think me submitting a ton of chapters would be the best idea, rather than having one or two chapters per month when I have a bunch sitting here already.

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Chapter Seven - The Hideous Truth

"So you expect us to believe that you're the one armed paladin- the champion of zakarum, the slayer of the prime evils- just because you have a prosthetic arm?" Such deadpan cynicism came so easy to the elder Tragus. "Well then, oh forgotten hero, what is it you're doing on Urube, so far away from your beloved sanctuary? Have you fallen so far that you now support the Emperor and his vile power grabbing?"

The Captain stopped himself from repeating his disdain for the so-called Holy Empire. "Before our latest emperor seized control, those who have remained faithful to the light infiltrated some of the first scouting missions sent to this dark, empty planet. We were unable to bring Baals soulstone to the hellforge- the destruction of the worldstone saw to that. And so we hid it here, along with some empties."

Trowd immediately stepped away from the semi-circle, towards the crates and barrels plundered from our escape shuttle. "I thought I saw some strange looking stones among your inventory. Figured them to be crystals or gemstones."

Lichello- Lichello the One Armed Paladin- continued. "Those stones cannot fall into the Emperors hands. We have reason to suspect the Emperor is under the direct control of a prime evil. The Omerta aren't a group of common gangsters outside of the Empires control. They are mortal manifestations of demons that have been brought into this world through human sacrifice. The Emperor only vilifies them so that if their evil machinations come to light, his hands will remain clean."

The currents of negative emotion that once circled the room were beginning to calm and turn blue. It was almost as if they were beginning to believe again. For the first time in generations they were getting their answers. Holding on through all the suffering was almost beginning to seem worthwhile.

"Humankind is still trapped inside of The Endless War between good and evil. Every time the President took away one of your rights, a celebration was made in Hell. With every successive generation human life has become cheaper. With every successive generation the President has sought to use fear and hatred to control humanity. Soon enough the collapse happened, and in this tragic chapter in the history of Sanctuary the President became your Holy Emperor." His voice was excruciatingly somber. He had seen it all happen, and was absolutely helpless for each one of his eight hundred years spent living.

And then silence followed his monologue, allowing for a moment of horrifying sobriety. It must've felt like air tickling the bare muscles of a freshly skinned human. They were all in varying stages of pain and shock. All of them except Tragus, who never faltered in his judging gaze.

"If you wish to discuss history, discuss it with Quoload afterward. The reason we're here is to figure out our futures." Something about the past was an emotional switch for Tragus- I could see it in his angry, wounded eyes. "We're surrounded by approximately fourty thousand troops in all, most of which are elites. The Manta Ray has just landed in the area and is pinpointing them all right on top of us as we waste time. There are a few thousand more reserves in orbit, as well as a fleet of cruisers and battleships, which are typically loaded out with at least five hundred apocalypse grade nuclear warheads for orbital bombardment. What now?"

It all sounded so hopeless when Tragus described it. But then again so did everything he described about our situation so far. To his credit, he didn't seem like the quitting type. He was simply being realistic.

"We're here for an abandoned portal." Tyreal at last spoke up. He was sitting, too, his arms ever folded in defensive posturing. His eyes were similarly angry and wounded on remembrance of events past. "It's a few thousand kilometers away, deep beneath the sands in a long since buried and forgotten temple. We're going to march into hell with our soulstones and smash them into oblivion."

Lichello glanced over at Tyreal through hopeful eyes. "First we must give aid to these people." Despite his zeal, it seemed more as if the Captain was asking Tyreal rather than telling him. "If the Emperors sickness can be washed clean by revolution, we must do everything we can to help."

"Indeed," Tragus spoke up, "but we still need a plan. We could go up against the first slave army we meet with and be slain, every last one of us. Even if every last Legionnaire decides to take up with us, we're still fatigued and many of us are wounded."

Mekerle had been rummaging through the crates taken from our shuttle with a look of irritation on his creased face. He was looking for his drugs, and withdrawal had made him an anxious ball of nerves. His voice raised. "You plebeians give me back my tanks and medicines. I'll make you fit to fight and die once again in no time at all."

"I can forcibly calm people, if only temporarily." Horus sniffed arrogantly. "It should give you enough time to wave your improvised banners and perform your peace dances or whatever you have in mind. But I'm not giving any guarantees. You people better be ready to cover me if things go poorly." He had decided to raid the supplies along with Mekerle, seeing that nobody was preventing him from doing so. His arms were slipped into the sleeves of a coarse black robe made of kevlar and trauma plating. Without it his body was frail and brittle. Easy to snap and break apart with bullets, if his mind was otherwise distracted- Which according to my sensors it typically was.

The slave HQ was silent with thoughts of strategy and survival. Or at least Tragus was. Everyone else was seething with hatred and thoughts of retribution now that they were free at last. The freedom they silently longed for from atop their painful cots, praying to their primitive gods for an opportunity for vengeance. Pain had twisted them into the war loving monsters we saw represented before us. If it weren't for Tragus wisdom, it seemed, they'd be roving the cold deserts looking for victims instead of forming rational plans.

"Let us speak no more on this. We have much to prepare. The first step must be completed first. We shall muster an army capable of storming the Manta Ray. Then we'll leave this old, sad planet for good." Tragus gave his cabinet of ex-slaves and thugs the once over with his buggy eyes. "Heal your brothers and sisters. Organize your equipment. We march as soon as we are ready, without any delays. Ancients help us."

The endemic silence dispersed along with the important looking barbarians. Lichello strode directly over towards our crates and began rifling through them. "Horus. Please get out of here and search the camp for Deltroy and Tserca."

Horus was about to open his mouth in protest before Deltroy was lead in through the entrance on the other side of the long hut. At gunpoint, in chains. Someone had smashed something made of glass over his head judging from the dry river of blood running down the front of his face. A large din of excited noise was created at his appearance.

"Elder Tragus!" One of his captors called out into the room over all the yammering. "We have discovered something important about one of our Imperial 'guests'."

Deltroy didn't seem too pleased about being led around in chains. Implanted muscles bristled beneath his tough skin as he walked in at his own pace. With a right leg that weighed more than a whole man, it was hard to lead him anywhere without a gun pointed beneath his jaw. His rash guard was ripped and torn and sprayed with blood. It was impossible for him to win against an entire camp of barbarian slaves. I was confused as to why he was still alive.

Tragus limped over towards the noisy procession. "Hmm? Be quick about it. This better be important." He snapped, playing the part of tribal curmudgeon to perfection.

The stringy man leading the group of slaves stepped back over towards Deltroy and yanked the remaining shreds of his rash guard off with a quick tearing sound.

Much like everyone else in the camp, Deltroy had black rubber ink melted into his now bare chest, marking him as property of the Emperor. "SLAVE".

"Well then." The old man wore a pleased, wide grin. "You're one of us, are you?"

"Not exactly. I can read and write." Deltroy scowled down at Tragus. Tragus returned the hate, his righteous resolve melting away with frightening ease.

"Who did you sell out? How many children are now born into slavery because of your selfish, weak character?"

Deltroys choice of words were now a literal choice between life and death. "You people can be happy being the slaves that you are. I'm concerned with only one thing, old man: Winning. It's us versus the Emperor. All of us. I am not mistaken. And through it all, I'm better equipped to fight him."

All at once someone threw a knife at Deltroy. Someone else threw a metal stool. The rest surged in to beat him with the backs of their rifles as an enraged fury erupted inside the room. The only thing that could save him from their wrath was a bullet to the brain. Or Tragus. Risking the brunt of their rage, as well as a broken hip, Tragus fought through the piling on of faceless bodies. Shouting all the way.

(cont.)

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(continued)

"Stop! Are we savages or are we cowards like this man? Stop- we must!" Despite his status among them, Tragus knew that giving direct orders would only further damage their respect for him. They were sick of orders to an almost psychotic level. "Are we not men?!"

There was nothing he, or anyone could do to stem the chaos. Slaves trampled upon other slaves to get at him, causing back-surges in the crowd. People were hedging in from all the entrances, some to join in, some to help, most to simply watch. It was an ugly sight, like watching a drop of bacteria in a dish of microbes. Everyone was infected with a violent malady, some even turning on each other. Red lights began flashing from the middle of the crowd, and even the ceiling began crushing down upon the throng of wild apes. I myself began to surge with violent imagination as hydraulic fluid leaked from my lenses. Was this emotion, or hallucination? Was this the virus?

ERROR, SHUTDOWN IMMINENT, CONSULT CORE DUMP FOR DEBUGGING.

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Chapter Eight - The Vampiress

The Manta Ray had been embedded in sand for only an hour and was already buzzing with activity. The auxiliary core was humming, and the communication consoles were glowing. The Manta Ray weighs over a thousand tons, so we didn't need to worry about leveling ourselves out in the sand. Communications were our main priority- the twenty some drop ships on the surface of Urube could communicate with each other, but not with our capitol ship looming in orbit.

All of these armies just for seven people. Provisional security forces were all we left behind to protect the besieged Sanctuary. The Empire could barely be understood, but it was the only force working for freedom and Holiness. Who could we side with in these desperate times of terror? Those barbarians in the north? The self-acclaimed 'faithful' terrorists who strike at our acid baths and turn our cities into warzones? No. The Empire was the lesser of all evils available. The truth would be clear upon the capture of these violent, traitorous heretics.

"All of our slave armies are revolting." I heard our commander speaking over the wire. He was talking to the Imperial Legion field general in charge of the recovery mission. "We should've executed every last one of those scum when we had the chance. And so my spies have told me, they're all rallied around one central, charismatic figure."

"Yes, the disgraced General Tragus. Keeping him alive was a mistake as well. Our seven objectives are protected somewhere amongst his henchmen." The voice- the General- spoke with thinly-veiled hate. "The betrayal seems contagious. Some Legionnaire platoons have deserted their companies. Thankfully the situation isn't so dire. We have assassin squads whittling away at the poorly armed slaves, and eventually the head will be discovered and killed. The body will die and we will have the Urubium at last."

"I'm almost glad there has been a revolt. We now have a discreet corner of the galaxy in which to clease our ranks of their pale-skinned chaff." Our commander shared a laugh with the field general.

"Indeed." A hollow, metallic voice sounds from the lift entry. Somehow a woman had made it to ops without any of us noticing. She could've been standing there for the past hour for all we knew. Operations was lit only by lethargic fluorescent lighting and command panels, so her shape was partially obscured by darkness. "Now you understand why we've strung so many of you mortals along for the trip."

She was a cyborg. The only flash of human skin I could see was a deathly white forehead and face set atop a brown titanium skull. Her eyes were dark with blood, her nose small, her upper lip painted a lush ruby and flared alluringly, almost inviting a kiss.

There was no lower lip to complete the illusion. Her jaw had been ripped off and replaced with cold metal. Lurking beneath the pleasingly fake skin was a soulless shark. A predator wearing a feminine mask. The rest of her body was all machine, claws jutting out of her hands, bloody tubes running into her neck cavity. Fangs hanging from her maw like iron stalactites.

"What the **** are you?" Our commander demanded of the half-woman. Cyborgs were expressly denied entry into any military service beyond specialist class.

"Since my birth I have worn many names. You will call me the Vampiress."

Most of us were too gripped by terror to give a reaction. We had seen atrocities before, but nothing so surreal. Nothing so characteristically inhuman. The Commander had seen enough. "Alright then Vampiress." He pushed his coat up in order to pull out a heavy looking pistol from his belt. "Would you mind explaining what you're doing here and why you aren't getting your joints oiled down in the tech bay?"

The Vampiress was less than impressed. All at once her half-organic head tilted back at an angle. And then her eyes exploded into a furious, almost blinding artificial red glow. A deep whirring noise slowly rose into a fevered shrieking, emanating from her gradually opening mouth. Nobody knew exactly what to make of her. Our commander began firing his pistol at her out of sheer panic.

A deep pressure vortex opened up in the back of her throat- an artificially generated black cone, as scientists call it. The Commander was lifted onto his toes and all of the air was punched out of his lungs. A huge black stain grew mysteriously on the front of his coat, spreading rapidly before the zipper was burst and a spigot of blood shot out across the room and into the Vampiress' mouth. She stood a good ten meters away.

Most of us didn't expect him to explode so quickly. We were mercifully spared a shower of blood as every last drop of crimson plasma and fluid flew into the solid, steady funnel that the Vampiress was pulling from the now empty space in the middle of the bridge.

The whirring ended, and all we were left with was dusty bones and shredded, dry clothing. According to the digital bridge clock, It took only eleven seconds. I was too terrified to start running first. I didn't want to risk her attention.

A distorted, infuriated look crossed what remained of her face. "I'm beginning to loathe the taste of cowards blood." After spitting with repugnance she stomped towards the master communications panel and pressed at buttons with her razor sharp fingers. Naturally, not a finger was lifted to stop her.

"Lord Belial. We are in direct control of the Manta Ray. You may deploy your demons when ready."

[0xDEADCAFE]

This chapter reminded me of the scene in Star Wars where Darth Vader shows his power to a bridge crew at the expense of the unfortunate commander. But I felt disoriented from the start. Was it Scorn who was speaking? It seemed like it must be someone else. And how did we get on the Manta Ray? Maybe I missed something in a previous chapter but the beginning seemed kind of hard to follow.


"All of our slave armies are revolting." There is really nothing at all wrong with this sentence, but somehow it reminded me of the old joke. "In revolt" might be less prone to a comical interpretation than "revolting."


Lurking beneath the pleasingly fake skin was a soulless shark.Do you really mean pleasingly fake? That seems to suggest that it was the fakeness of it that was pleasing.


Nice job with the Vampiress. Reminded me of the techno-horror from Act 1, which I liked so much, and which has been somewhat lacking in Act 2.

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Chapter Nine - Quoload

Every time the humans put me away in a dark cargo hold somewhere, I died a little inside. It was only a matter of time before the death was complete and I became a robot. Just like they wanted.

I understood the Captains reasoning. Why bring a robot built to inspire terror along on a mission of peace and reconciliation? And so I hunched alone in this ditched slave dropship. In the world they were fighting to build, I was not wanted.

The room I occupied must've been a disciplining chamber at one time. It was completely empty, by design, to be used at the discretion of the discipliner's disgusting imagination. Stripped electrical cords hung in limp coils from one of the outlets. Nail marks were scratched in furious strips up and down the door hatch. A dry corpse was waiting for flies in the corner. Plastic buckets that had traces of vomit and blood were stacked in a corner.

Someone, somewhere, thought that this was an acceptable way to treat other human beings. The fact the room existed was proof enough. Perhaps I was placed here for a reason.

The virus was making terminal progress. I could see perfectly in the dark, but sensed strange, shapeless beasts crawling over my feet. I spent every second immersed in a slimy ether, tortured by unanswerable questions. Did I die? Was I in hell? Were my thoughts real or implanted? Was I shaking and overheating, or was it yet another sensory hallucination?

The only news I received of the human masters came from patrols outside the door. The voices could've been hallucinations as well, but I was too terrified to check.

"More Imperial Troopers are setting up huts outside. An entire army showed up over the hill an hour ago. Can you believe that? Two thousand people were waiting for -this- moment to desert."

"I hope they brought their own scrap." The second voice replied. It was the turtle mans disembodied voice, floating around the silent corridors like a ghost. "This ship is falling apart and it's full to capacity."

"Who cares. Let 'em freeze. It's a better fate than a century of slavery."

A third voice was coming from the opposite direction. "Where's the robot?"

"Back there, in the torture room."

Silence passed. And then the hatch began squeaking. The fear was palpable. Who was coming for me? Allen? Was it the Agonizer, come to see me suffer? A vindictive shadow was crawling over my brain. My eyes flick towards the stripped electrical cable, and I can feel the wires hissing and biting my skin. It was pure hallucination, as I had neither a brain, nor eyes, nor skin. I've never screamed for mercy or shed tears, but at that moment I felt inclined to try.

An old man stood in the opened doorway. He clutched an old book to his chest with a bare, bony arm. His grey eyes were as wide as portholes, and his voice smooth like I imagined incense would be.

"Scorn. Hello. My name is Quoload." His free hand was hefting an electric lantern. The shadows it cast against the walls were horrible.

"WHO ARE YOU?" I demanded through my paranoid mania.

"I'm the lore keeper of my people." His words were placating, like most unarmed humans I've faced. "Do you still have the soulstones with you?"

A heavy safe was kept in the confines of my lap. Inside were the three soulstones the human masters and I had recovered from the Invincible.

"LICHELLO INSTRUCTED ME NOT TO ALLOW ORGANICS NEAR THEM."

Quoload nodded. "So be it. I have no desire to see them anywhere but in fragments atop the hellforge itself." He was slowly hobbling around, nudging a steel stool in my direction with his foot. "I was however instructed Patriarch... I mean, by your Captain... to fill you in on the history of our world."

The phrase 'history of sanctuary' brought no data in my memory banks. Allen had purged the information himself long ago, claiming that it was fraudulent Imperial lies. I awaited for Quoloads input in abject silence.

This unnerved him slightly, to have a robot silently staring him in the face. "Very well. I'll begin with the sin wars, and move from there. Does the name Diablo mean anything to you?"

"I WAS PROGRAMMED TO AUTOMATICALLY SHUTDOWN UPON HEARING THE WORD." Naturally, I had overrode the programming. I never shut down. It was illogical. Shutting down was a vulnerability.

Quoload lifted one of his anemic brows. "Oh? Well, I'm glad you can subvert your programming. That's something many of us humans can't do for the life of us. For curiosities sake, what other words are you programmed to shutdown upon hearing?"

It was a list of 49 words. "ZAKARUM, ZAKARUMITE, DIABLO, BAAL, MEPHISTO, ANDARIEL, DURIEL, AZMODAN, DIS, NEPHALIM, HORADRIM, HORADRIC, ARREAT, WORLDSTONE, SOULSTONE, HELLFORGE-"

Eventually he interrupted me as I continued my swift listing. "Thank you Scorn, I get the idea now. It corroborates what Patriarch Lichello is saying about the Emperor." His face was downcast, and wore the expression with great familiarity judging from the wrinkles and crevices in his skin. "This is indeed the darkest battle we may yet fight, for if we lose, the will of hell shall rule all of Sanctuary and this very universe."

I naturally had no understanding of what he was talking about.

(cont.)

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Chapter Ten - A Story

"I cannot tell you how our species first came to Sanctuary. Many people will try to, but they lie. Nobody knows for certain why we're here. Nobody knows what happened in the beginning. Time is like the horizon, Scorn. You can't see where it starts, or where it ends. All you can see is the horizon from where you stand.

This is why we record things. It is an inborn human desire for immortality. We wish to survive generations and millenia and stand on the shoulders of our ancestors. All I can say truthfully about the past is that which was told to me by my father. As it was told to him by his father, and so on. We are all links in a great chain. Even you, Scorn. You are the link forged by your creator, whoever he, or they may be.

I take it you want to go to the beginning of existence. I cannot take you there. As the lore keeper, I can take you to the beginning of our history. Allow me to tell you the first story, about the first tribes, and our First War.

Demons have always haunted humankind. Since the dawn of existence have we known them to loathe us. Pictures of horned monsters are found smeared on the walls of our oldest caves. Stories of evil, red-eyed beasts are found in our oldest of books. The plague of evil is as much a part of our condition as the hope for good.

According to records, however, demons haven't always occupied the sunless shadows beneath our mountains and in our darkest catacombs. Demons once sat on thrones, attended to by cities of terrified, subjugated peoples. Life on earth was a nightmare where humans were born only to amuse the powerful ruling class of hell-spawned nobility. And it made sense. At that time, humans had only primitive bronze and iron metals to work with, as well as only the most primitive of tools. They had no hope against black magics and the strange elder rituals of demonkind.

In these primal years the continent was dotted with tribes too small and scattered to resist exploitation. The Vyats, the Gords, the Khajits, all known as the first tribes. Demonic scavengers stole children away from families too tired to defend them. Entire villages were razed because of their inability to pay tremendous tributes to draconian demon lords.

There were areas of our planet where the demons were simply not inclined to go. One such area was the frozen mountains of the north. The arreat and dramring mountain ranges. The humans there were simply too isolated and the wastes too barren for demons to take notice. The northlanders had skin that was tough like bark and blood that was sour like vinegar. It was the harsh, forbidding environment that made them so grizzled, killing off the weaker while allowing the strong to learn cooperation skills. The difficulty of living was a mixed blessing.

And so the population of the mountains grew. Great armies began to strike from out of the area at other, smaller tribes. While at first they only sacked the poorly defended villages, they soon came to conquer. Orlook The Immortal King, the first barbarian chieftain, was building a state. It surprised him how eager the lowland tribes were willing to be subjugated, but only because he didn't know the nature of their former masters.

I think you can see where I'm going with this story. Eventually Orlooks numbers snowballed to a point where he could challenge for dominance of the entire continent. Every village conquered by barbarians was a beacon to the nearby human settlements. Freedom was literally on the march, plundering and pillaging all along the way. Some say that Orlook merely sought power and riches. Other stories paint him as an enlightened despot, fighting for the freedom of humankind and banishing from our planet the demonic menace.

With time, the final war was waged between the last vestiges of demonic power and the swollen army of many nations and many tribes. The cresting wave of human warriors- fifty thousand strong- banished the prime evils and their army back to hell, but at a great price. Only a handful of exhausted and thoroughly traumatized armies remained from the horrendous battle. After all the nation building, there was nobody left to keep the peace. New boarders sprung up depending on who was quick enough to muster up an army. Where once all humanity was united, they now fought over the spoils.

But at least they were safe. They fought the First War. They had won their Sanctuary."

[0xDEADCAFE]

Still following along. Chapters 9 and 10 were enjoalbe reads and I'm interested to see where Quoload is going with his story, or more to the point, why he took the time to bring Scorm up to speed on it all.

I must say this act is shaping up quite differently from the first. Less action, less techno, more talking and introspection. I'm enjoying it but somehow I miss the scenes of crawling around the Invincible hunting down the ulitmate evil. Maybe you've got something like that planned for down the road a bit.

Again, we have a seriously flawed protagonist, which has a realistic, almost meaty feel to it, but, still, it would feel good to have our hero whine a little less and kick a little more butt, at least from time to time.

Anyway, whine or no, I'm looking forward to whatever's coming next.

[RevenantsKnight]

Sorry I didn’t give more feedback up before now; I fell behind for a while and it was an admittedly daunting task to get back on track with your writing, seeing as you produce new chapters at an amazing rate. So far, I’m enjoying Act II much more than Act I for a number of reasons, foremost of which is the more thoughtful bent. Anyway, these comments are specifically for Chapters 9 and 10:

Every time the humans put me away in a dark cargo hold somewhere, I died a little inside.

This is a nicely worded sentence, but there isn’t enough there for me to really believe it. Why is being in a cargo hold like death for Scorn?

I understood the Captains reasoning.

That should be “Captain’s,” since you’re using it to indicate possession. Possessive forms of singular nouns are formed by taking the noun and adding an apostrophe and an “s” on the end.

Nail marks were scratched in furious strips up and down the door hatch.

This is a particularly chilling bit of description...good job with that.

The voices could've been hallucinations as well, but I was too terrified to check.

Hrm...if anything, I’d think he’d want to check, if not just to take his thought processes off of his decidedly unpleasant surroundings.

"More Imperial Troopers are setting up huts outside. An entire army showed up over the hill an hour ago. Can you believe that? Two thousand people were waiting for -this- moment to desert."

A modern regiment is around 2500 soldiers, and an army, technically, is a LOT bigger than a regiment. If you don’t want to get into heavy specifics, I’d just suggest removing the given number of deserters.

"I hope they brought their own scrap." The second voice replied.

There should be a comma instead of a period after “scrap,” and the “the” should be in lowercase. When a phrase attributing dialogue comes after the speech, there should be a comma inside the quotes and the next word should not be capitalized unless it’s a proper noun.

It was the turtle mans disembodied voice, floating around the silent corridors like a ghost.

That should be “turtle man’s.” See above comment about possessive forms for a general explanation.

The fear was palpable.

Seeing as “palpable” means “obvious,” any of Scorn’s emotions should be palpable from his perspective. If you meant that his fear would have been apparent to another in the room, then I’d suggest describing this a little more

My eyes flick towards the stripped electrical cable, and I can feel the wires hissing and biting my skin.

This is in the present tense, while all the rest of the narration’s in the past tense. To keep this parallel, and since there doesn’t seem to be a stylistic reason for this change, I’d rewrite this as “...flickered (or perhaps flitted)...and I could feel...” Do correct me if I’m wrong on the lack of a reason.

It was pure hallucination, as I had neither a brain, nor eyes, nor skin. I've never screamed for mercy or shed tears, but at that moment I felt inclined to try.

It feels a little like you’re missing something in between these sentences. I’d add a sentence or two in between to convey the idea that while Scorn knows he’s hallucinating, what he’s seeing or feeling is still unbearably unnerving. (I think that’s what you were shooting for, anyway.) By the way, the last sentence is a nice image indeed.

His grey eyes were as wide as portholes, and his voice smooth like I imagined incense would be.

A vivid comparison, but I think you mean “smooth like I imagined the smell of incense would be” unless you’re comparing his voice to the smoothness of incense sticks or something.

A heavy safe was kept in the confines of my lap.

This is in the passive voice; if you want to change it to the active voice I’d suggest something like “Built into the confines of my lap was a heavy safe, armored enough to resist any weapon.”

"I was however instructed Patriarch... I mean, by your Captain... to fill you in on the history of our world."

Do you mean “...by Patriarch...” there?

The phrase 'history of sanctuary' brought no data in my memory banks.

“Sanctuary” should be capitalized, since it’s the name of the world.

I awaited for Quoloads input in abject silence.

That should be “Quoload’s.”

"Very well. I'll begin with the sin wars, and move from there."

“Sin Wars” should be capitalized if, as I’m assuming, he’s referring to the ones detailed in the Diablo I manual.

"It corroborates what Patriarch Lichello is saying about the Emperor."

“Patriarch” seems like an unnecessary reference back to the game; I’m sure that not all heroes would want, for a number of reasons, to take the title of Matriarch or Patriarch after defeating Baal.

“Time is like the horizon, Scorn. You can't see where it starts, or where it ends. All you can see is the horizon from where you stand.

Minor detail: it seems to me like you mean “Time is like standing on the earth...” because the horizon itself is something far off into the distance, and time isn’t really distant from life.

We wish to survive generations and millenia and stand on the shoulders of our ancestors.

“Millennia” has a double “n.”

All I can say truthfully about the past is that which was told to me by my father. As it was told to him by his father, and so on.

I’d combine these two sentences into one with an “and”, so it seems more like a logical flow rather than having the break in the middle.

The arreat and dramring mountain ranges.

“Arreat” and “Dramring” should be capitalized, since they’re proper names.

It was the harsh, forbidding environment that made them so grizzled, killing off the weaker while allowing the strong to learn cooperation skills.

“...learn cooperation skills” sounds too vague and awkward to get an image across for me. What did you have in mind here?

Orlook The Immortal King, the first barbarian chieftain, was building a state.

“...was building a state” is, again, a bit too general. Also, there should be a comma after “Orlook.”

Eventually Orlooks numbers snowballed to a point where he could challenge for dominance of the entire continent.

That should be “Orlook’s,” since it indicates possession.

Every village conquered by barbarians was a beacon to the nearby human settlements. Freedom was literally on the march, plundering and pillaging all along the way.

This makes Orlook sound about as bad as the demons; you should probably come up with a few details that make him sound more favorable, or it won’t make too much sense for other people to hope for his arrival. Also, as this is told from a Barbarian’s point of view, I’d expect him to glorify this a little more.

The cresting wave of human warriors- fifty thousand strong- banished the prime evils and their army back to hell, but at a great price.

“Prime Evils” should be capitalized.

New boarders sprung up depending on who was quick enough to muster up an army.

The boundaries of a nation are called “borders.”

Interesting idea of the times past; it seems especially plausible coming from a Barbarian’s perspective. A few general questions, though: what are the agents of the Light doing during this time? I don’t think they’d be content to leave Hell with the mortal world....

Also:

The violent battles of the Sin War occurred often, but they were seldom witnessed by the prying eyes of Man. Only a few “enlightened” souls were aware of the supernatural beings that walked amongst the huddled masses of humanity.

Due to this, I don’t quite buy the idea that demons reigned over kingdoms, even if their acts were relatively subtle. Also, the Prime Evils weren’t present in Sanctuary until the Dark Exile, since their crossing from the demonic plane to the mortal one is implied to be extremely difficult in the manual, and therefore they probably couldn’t transit back and forth at will.

Anyway, this is, again, more to my liking with the more introspective bent; I’ll be reading along again now that I’m caught up. Thanks for posting!

[Science Cryption]

I regret that I wasn't able to comment on your story from the get go, but now that I can, I will.

My favorite character so far is definatly Tyreal, hes lean clean and an immortal machine.

Secoundly, don't you think that people with such enormous brain capability; such as Horus, would be freakishly confident? I mean, people are their brain, so it should only be natural for a super brain to overcome wussy traits, or any other negative characteristics for that matter.

I love your science retoric, it always sounds good when everyong thinks you know what your talking about.

I would however change your perspective of the captain, no one that live's 786 or whatever years is even going to get close to his personallity.

Scorn is a beautyful name for a killing machine, my favorite moment is probably when scorn and that harrash or whatever robot fight it out. Just the idea of robots like these, recognizing eachother from past genocides, then having a conversation between each other on a battlefield, wow.

I reallu have to say your second intro was the best, even though it could easyly be accepted as a continuation or flashback or something. You know, just more info to educate the reader.

I think you could of gotten a little more indept look at the pirates though, i felt that somehow they were neglected.

I have to say that before I learned about tyreal, I thought Mekerl and Deltroy were the very well established and brought out characteres.

The first conversation between Horus and Deltroy really told me a lot about what was going to happen in the story, I knew, and although it isn't a bad thing, im dissapointed in my self.

anyways keep up the great writting, if I had a suggestion about whats would be next, I would only say you write in an assassination mission for that switch laserblade combat suitcase women. Maybe Dissarm or reprogram the remaining robots at the enemy base.

Good luck.

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"The coming of the Great Conflict to the mortal realm is known as the Sin War. Angels and Demons, disguising themselves while traveling amongst men, attempted to secretly lure mortals to their respective causes. Over time, the forces of Darkness discovered that mortals responded much more to brute force than to subtle coercion, and so began to terrorize Man into submission."

The part about terrorizing man into submission is the part I used to inspire my demons lording over humankind history tidbit. I did neglect to mention what the angelic forces were up to, so maybe I'll fix that in a second draft. It's tough for me to go into history without it being just a bland retelling of diablo I and II. I'm not really good at the 'storytellers voice'.

I think that knowing nearly everything there is to know about the sciences would make someone more scared than confident. Just to know what's going to happen to your body when a bullet punches through it.... to know what's going to happen if a grenade goes off right next to you. Horus is more aware than anyone the liklihood of fatality, and so he's neurotic and anxious rather than blockheadedly brave. Shrinking away from death is smart. Charging into it is dumb.

Yeah, I may have glossed over describing the pirates. I wanted to go into how they were all scum and so on, but I felt that I had enough background as is. I could've been more descriptive.

Thanks for your praise!

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Chapter Eleven - Another Story

The devils were not defeated. They had forever in which to spread their taint to our realm. If it took a million centuries to destroy our world with hate and terror, they would abide by every lasting minute of existence.

We had beaten them on the fields of battle, but our hearts were- and still are- always vulnerable. Evil has no boundaries. Never forget that. It didn't take much coaxing from Azmodan for the first peoples to begin fighting over the spoils of their war. Diablo made sure people were too terrified to let their boarders down and share. Mephisto stirred the souls of every new nation, nurturing a foul 'us and them' attitude of arrogant hatred. And always was Andariel there, whispering in the ear of every good man and good woman. Like an incessant gnat, nagging them to despair from their commitment to righteousness and follow more selfish paths.

In us both angels and demons took notice. The wars they fight are older than our sun and in a constant state of flux. It might take one aeon for heaven to build an advantage, and yet another for hell to tear it back down. And yet in the space of only two years did we cleanse our planet of the deeply entrenched demon lords of old. It was clear that we were the key. We, humanity, would be the pendulum that swings straight through in one direction or the other.

Our civilization marched on from that climactic battle, and evil marched apace. The first citadel established was the first perverted by lies. The first king was the first corrupted by power. Even Orlook, Ancients help him, came to be a brutal tyrant. Every century or so the forces of hell would make a play at power, some moves subtle, some not so subtle.

And always would the champions of the light be there to cast them back into the pits from whence they spawned. M'avina, Isenhart, Civerb, each of them heroes in their day and age. All of them possessed of the faith, the strength and the mettle to deny the evils and everything they stood for. All of them stood when humanity itself was threatened. Some came to tragic ends. Some lived long enough to see humanity threatened in future generations, always guiding the next, younger group of heroes. But they all stand now in the halls of heaven. Watching and hoping for us to follow along the paths they set for us in their lifes blood.

I can only imagine how disgusted they must be. How much we've disappointed them.

Those were the sin wars. War upon war upon war, fought on our soils. They ended only to allow for a more catastrophic event: the Great Exile.

Diablo, he who cannot abide by fearlessness.

Mephisto, whose hate does not exclude himself.

Baal, a destructive force that rivals time itself.

These three represent prime evils. They rule all of their native domain, the burning hells. It is difficult for any to truthfully say how they do so: to witness a greater evil and survive is as rare as it is undesired. But there are others. Sub evils. Lesser evils.

Azmodan, the owner. The possessor. The lustful.

Duriel, the immortal saint of all torturers and sadists.

Belial, a twisted liar, the chief enemy of reality.

Andariel, maiden of despair, the reason why angels will never win."

"IS THE AGONIZER A TRUE INCARNATION OF DURIEL?" I had to ask.

"I couldn't tell you, Scorn. I'm neither a robo-technician or an angel. But let me tell you that nobody in this camp will go near that cursed head. People go into the room where it's being detained and leave very upset. Someone's even gotten shot over an argument it created. Tragus has forbidden any further interaction with the Agonizer." He clears his throat. "Duriel or not, it's evil."

"WHERE IS HELL? YOU SPEAK OF IT AS A LOCATION IN SPACE."

"Hell is somewhere past our own, perceptible three dimensions. So I've seen on TV, alternate dimensions that cannot be seen, heard of or smelled may exist parallel with our physical reality. According to the quantum physicists at the Imperial University, anyway, and they know much about our world.

Alternate dimension or not, hell is very real, and yet very separate from reality itself. Up isn't always up, and down is as far as you want it to be. I'm aware I'm using vague and misleading language, but hell itself is just as unclear an entity.

Ancient folklore written about the mortal experience in hell makes several mentions of everlasting fires and swimming in oceans of writhing flesh. The sensation of a soul caught in this maelstrom is much like a mountain in the desert. The winds of suffering beat down on the human spirit, eventually breaking it down into a boulder, and then to a rock, and then into a pebble until it is nothing but an insignificant speck of sand lost in a vast spiritual wasteland.

Back to my story. These four lesser evils were jealous, spiteful beings who ruled smaller slices of this sprawling, burning hell. As is natural for all demons, they hated their neighbors and wished to possess the entire realm for themselves. Belial and Azmodan were the most ambitious and crafty among their siblings, and so they hatched a plot to betray the dominant three greater evils. They would be captured and tossed into one of the many rifts that once existed between hell and our Sanctuary.

The armies of Belial and Azmodan faced all of hell, for the three still had Andariel and Duriel on their side. After a great civil war, a third of the burning hells lay razed and the greater three evils were banished onto our planet. The period of the Great Exile had begun, and the three were free to take out their bitter anger upon our world. Cities burned and wars ignited like flash fires. It was a great, black period of suffering for every living human being on Sanctuary. Belial and Azmodan had ejected the greater evils into the mortal realm in hoping that it would serve as a diversion for the forces of Heaven, keeping them away from defending the gates of their unseen dimension.

So dire was the situation for humankind that the Arch-Angel Tyreal was forced into direct action. He mustered up a force of willing human magi into a brotherhood called 'the Horadrim'. The Horadrim were charged with the task of hunting down the prime evils and imprisoning them in a set of relics known as soulstones. Some of these stones sit in your lap as we speak. Never let them out of your sight, Scorn. So many lives have been lost over the ages to keep them in our possession."

"WHY DOES TYREAL APPEAR SO LETHARGIC AND APATHETIC?"

I could feel his annoyance reach across the room and set fingers in a zipper pattern around my throatless neck. "I don't know. Stop asking questions I can't answer. I'm only a damned storyteller. How am I supposed to know? But if you're looking for an opinion, I'd have to call that man in your company an impostor. Tyreal Lightbringer appears as a majestic, noble and powerful creature in all of my tales. The so called 'Tyreal' you know is sarcastic and bitter. Perhaps he is impatient after these millenia of fighting. Jump to your own conclusions for all I care.

Anyways- so Baal, Diablo and Mephisto were forcefully imprisoned by the heaven-backed horadrim, and a brief period of peace came to the peoples of Sanctuary. The assault on the shining palisades of heaven never happened; In the power vacuum created by the great exile, a second succession war exploded between the traitorous Belial and Azmodan. Andariel and Duriel had followed the three to earth, and left behind their own pockets of hell to be squabbled over.

Those who chose to follow the light imprisoned the three, but it didn't take much time for those who follow the darkness to find them again. King Leoric was the first ruler of the Westmarch empire of old. Many touted him as a righteous man, a devout follower of Zakarum. But power corrupts, Scorn, always. The true teachings of Zakarum have been perverted with time, by kings of men. Zakarum knew how power could corrupt the human soul. If given the chance, men would grab at the things they want and care not of consequences. And so strength is the trait of the righteous. The strength to go without. The strength to be poor. The strength to survive. The strength to forsake the sin of power.

Leoric conquered other lands by force- not a finger was lifted by the subjugated for fear of bloody reprisal from the vast armies under his control. Eventually fate brought the self-righteous Leoric to stay in monastery in a town known as Tristram. A monastery in which the Horadrim had kept Diablos soulstone obscured and imprisoned thousands of feet below ground.

The power Diablo promised called to King Leoric in his sleep. It tormented him every time he saw a map of the continent, with lands so far away, free from his ambitious influence and control. He saw armies that Diablo would help him subjugate, and lands that would wear his glorious seal- if only for the will of hell. And so he gave in to the elder demon. And so he allowed his deep-seated lust for power to come to the front."

"I SEE PARALLELS TO OUR CURRENT EMPEROR. POWERFUL NATIONS ALWAYS WAVE BANNERS OF PEACE AND HOLINESS WHILE COMMITING EVIL DEEDS IN THEIR OWN INTERESTS."

"Indeed you are perceptive, robot. Never let the mighty fool you- righteousness does not give you the power to change your brother, only the strength to change yourself.

Diablos power was waxing underground in Tristram. The tale of his defeat is submerged in times sands, but it is said that a wandering warrior from a far away land came to town seeking to loot the dilapidated and long abandoned monastery. Instead he came upon the ruthless prime evil, and after an epic battle, destroyed the host body of Diablo.

(cont.)

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The soulstone was not destroyed, however. Soulstones are quite indestructible, you'll find. They can be destroyed only upon the hellforge, where nothing can escape ultimate annihilation. Only here can the prime evils be phased from existence and banished into timeless oblivion. It is here that your Captain must be seeking to take your cargo.

The corrupting force of the Lord of Terror was great, and the susceptability of the nameless wanderer infinite. He was powerful enough to defeat Diablo- but was he strong enough to resist the lure of the soulstone? He was not. Diablo had tempted him into shoving that damned rock into his head. Cursing him to wander far back into the eastern lands of Kehjistan as a vehicle for Diablo, seeking to free and reunite his other likely bound brothers and resume their conquering ways.

Any resistance the once-hero held for the dominating spirit of Diablo was shattered with every atrocity the dark lord forced his hands into. Every villiage he burned on the way to freeing Mephisto was another doubt in his mind. Every family he rended apart was all the more a reminder of his evil nature. Soon enough Diablo had forced him through so much horror that turning back was abandoned. Regret killed the last spark of strength in the wanderer, leaving his body as nothing more than a shell for Diablo's will.

This is where I see another parallel, robot. Between yourself and this wanderer. Like him you are lost. Like him you are powerful. And like him you are tortured inside by regrets. Evil men force you down the path of wrath and violence. I cannot absolve you of any sins. Nobody can. But know that always- always- the choice is yours. And if you die protecting your soul, it will be reunited with you in Heaven. That I promise."

"I HAVE NO SOUL."

That admission seemed to startle him, as nonchalant a fact as it was for me. "Then how can you feel, Scorn? Everyone has been listening to you talk to yourself. Can't you turn down the decibel level on your voice? Better yet, can't you stop hallucinating? No matter. You feel remorse, which is a sensation of the soul. Only the soul can regret past choices made. I know you feel. You must."

"I FEEL NOTHING."

Perhaps I was being a bit too fatalistic, to severe, as Allen once put it. "So say you. Live in denial if you must. Soul, no soul, the choice is yours. That is the curse of all sentient intelligence. The soul isn't something you weigh on a scale or find in a bladder somewhere in your torso. It's all in your mind."

"I TIRE OF THESE METAPHYSICS. WHEN DO WE FIGHT?" I was getting anxious. Feeling anxious.

Something changed in Quoloads face. His eyes dropped from mine. "That's actually why I took this task on my shoulders so willingly, Scorn. That's why I'm here. Have you considered the power of those stones in your lap?" He was looking right at the square safe. His eyes were crawling out of his skull in desperation.

"NO. I AM ORDERED TO DESTROY THEM, NOT USE THEM. FROM TRUSTED INFORMATION GARNERED, LOGIC DICTATES THAT THEY MUSTN'T BE ALLOWED INTO THE HANDS OF MORTALS."

Quoloads clear, composed voice began to falter. "Our enemies are demons, Scorn. They are in swarms before us. They are in the skies and under the ground. We may need that soulstone. We may also need Duriels stone. I'm not saying we use them now. But if... if the darkest hour falls upon us... the last hope for mankind may lie in that safe, Scorn."

My eyes flare brighter in the darkness. "YOUR FAITH FAILS YOU, OLD MAN. IF YOU DIE PROTECTING YOUR SOUL, IT WILL BE REUNITED WITH YOU IN HEAVEN. DO YOU NOT REMEMBER WHAT YOU SAID BUT TWO MINUTES AGO? ARE YOU SO WILLING FAIL THE SAME WAY YOUR HEROES HAVE IN THE PAST?"

As loathe as I am to admit it, I enjoyed every time I got to hold my computerized memory over the heads of humans. I got a smug sense of superiority. It was sin. Quoload had nothing but respect for me, never once taking a belittling tone. I was, once again, making the innocent suffer.

"You are right. I apologize, Scorn. I must be strong." He reflects in a moment of silence, in which I read the countours of his face like braille. Power corrupts the human soul indeed. "I must also put more stock in my own stories. If we are to die on this foresaken planet, then let us at least die with our righteousness in tact, hm?"

"IT IS YOUR CHOICE TO DO SO, AS ALWAYS. NOW BEGONE."

[Science Cryption]

This new peice was really well plotted, I believe that as time goes on, your story only gets better. The action doesn't need to be there so much, as long as the story remains just as interesting.

The last segment of your new addition had a very good feel to it, I believe the dialect between Scorn and Quoload had a kind of reflection of the past to it, as if it was showing all over again how evil survives playing the same old trick.

It reminded me a little of Lord Of The Rings, how boromeer wanted the ring from frodo, like so many others, all with the disallusion that it could do any good.

good hunting.

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Chapter Twelve - The Last War

At the S.S. Pennance did the last living defenders of humanity meet. That was the name of the downed slave transport. Star Ship Pennance, in full.

The Pennance was no longer a Star Ship. With the help of Imperial construction gear, the splintered Barbarian tribes constructed a shanty fortress of twisted bulkheads and razor-wire topped gates. It was a veritable military complex, with massive, sprawling tent canopies serving as makeshift cities. Carts, tanks, buggies and hovercrafts crawled up and down difficult, awkward roads stamped into the black sand. Twenty thousand humans altogether, breathing vehicle exhausts and oxygen tanks. The monolithic Pennance was now spread out across five square kilometers..

To be fair, the gravity on Urube is slightly weaker than that of Sanctuary. This ease of movement hastened the construction. The eerie absence of the sun, however, did not. According to all computers present, the sun should have crested in the sky twice. It has not. The humans fear this, but in Urube the darkness only hides darker valleys and hideous croppings of alien rock.

These humans at Pennance met under many flags, no longer part of the evil Imperial Legion. Everyone was splintered into their own tribe, already viciously carving borders into a map of Sanctuary. Three Generals were already laying claim to what remained of Kurast if the Human Alliance returned home. I could only imagine the civil wars our victory would allow. The Barbarians couldn't even stand united, divided into their smaller, less formally structured tribal units. Trust was lacking as ever. And so, Tragus authorized Captain Lichello to speak at all alliance meetings.

It was a dark hut in which they held their counsil, constructed out of parts from the Pennance's former bridge. The ground was dirt, but the walls and ceiling were made of solid hull-grade titanium. All the hatch holes were devoid of barriers, instead guarded by men with rifles crossed. General Tam was speaking.

"We were ready to fight to the death with you Northlanders. The Emperor would have fooled us until the end, I regret to say." He was in the middle of an apology. Tam had what some humans call 'honor', a trait the Emperor exploited to the fullest. He killed only because he was ordered, and through him evil found an ignorant, yet fully honorable utensil.

"You are forgiven, Tam. All of you are forgiven." The Captain spoke up. He was wearing his tan vest zipped up, fat with torso armour beneath. He had absorbed many gunshot wounds uniting the Imperial Legion with the slave armies. "Go on with your story. How many can we expect to face?"

"I don't know." General Tam was also quite anguished. And visibly wounded. "We were a unit of two thousand. We were so utterly engulfed in their numbers, from one end of the horizon to the other. I could not possibly guess how many demons were disgorged from those dropships."

Tragus took control of the meeting once more. He led the barbarians who built the fortress, and so he had executive powers. He was the master. "So now we know why they brought us all the way out to this depressing, dead planet. Urube was meant to be a crucible of hatred, for brother to kill brother over ancient feuds. I am exceedingly proud to see that we've survived our own wrath- so far." Pointed looks were shared between the many enemies assembled. "If Diablo wishes us dead, he will have to come down here and kill us. We will not do it for him."

"If it were not for the death of Mephisto," the Captain interrupted as he was always want to do, "I fear the outcome would've been much more deadly. We may not have been unable to deny our own petty, self destructive hatred. Even the slaves would eventually turn on each other out of pure malice. Thankfully, I can personally vouche for his destruction. Hatred will no longer grip our hearts with the same power it always has." He was kneading the pommel of his sword nervously, causing it to rock foreward against his scabbard. Eight hundred years later and he still felt anxious at coming face to face with hell.

Having done the same with the one known as Duriel, I could not put him at fault. I will never be able to forget being so close to something so evil.

"Who stands in our way?" Maelat had become cheiftain of all tribal war parties. She hungered for battle like a badger hungers for undefended snake eggs.

Another one of the many generals answered the question. "The Emperor has a small fleet of cruisers accompanying the Devourer. There's approximately fourty thousand apocalypse grade nuclear bombs between the fleet. I don't know why we're still alive. He knows exactly where this camp is."

Lichello spoke, his tenor voice dominating the attention of all. "Demons are difficult for you and I to understand. It could be any reason, really. Perhaps whoever is leading the fleet needs to verify Tyreals identidy. Maybe they're just lazy and don't want to wait a few years searching a radioactive crater for soulstones. The important thing to know is that we may be bombarded from orbit at any time. Please let this looming spectre of death strengthen your resolve to act, and aditionally, do not let those under your commmand know. This terror is our burden alone."

(cont.)

[RevenantsKnight]

Sorry I don't have any real comments for now; I've had some not-forum stuff messing with my time. Anyway, I'm still reading along, and the newest chapters look pretty interesting...I particularly want to see what's going to happen with Scorn and the Soulstones, though I wasn't sure what Quoload had in mind when he talked about "using" them. Guess I'll find out...

Anyway, I'll try to get a thorough read-through of the first chunk done soon, and get to the others as I can. Thanks for posting!

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(continued)

General Illiok, who was now calling himself President Illiok of the Khanduras Republic, stood up to ask a question. "Where do we go from here? Where shall we strike to win our freedom from the Emperor?"

Someone had improvised an old-fashioned chalk board out of scrap and minerals. The Captain walked over towards it, where a crude topographic map was scrawled in white. A grotesque head with horns represented Imperial 'forces'. It was placed right in front of an X that was labelled 'Manta Ray'.

"As you all know, we were only able to scramble a handful of space-flight capable vessels. The dropships we came in on were sabotaged before drop, so they're of no use. That means we have no way of preventing orbital bombardment. However-" He points with a long finger at the large X on the chalk board, "-the Manta Ray possesses enough interceptor rockets to stop every last warhead and then some." And forever polluting the anemic atmosphere over Urube with their nuclear payloads. The sky would glow a noxious green. But they, the humans, would live on for a few more days. " If we take that VTOL base, we'll have a 25 000 square kilometer canopy."

Illiok asked a follow up question. "And then what?"

"And then we'll have some time to fix our dropships, patch up a fleet of our own, and take it to the exosphere of this planet." Tragus fielded the question well, and with all confidence in his scratchy voice. "The Emperors personal fleet of cruisers won't let us leave orbit in one piece. We have many battles ahead of us, but we are ready. The end is nigh."

Tyreal scoffed from behind the Captain. He had the curious attention of the entire hovel, as if they expected him to sprout wings mid-speech. "It's never over. Perhaps your end is nigh, but life will always go on. All we can do is lead it ever so slightly in one direction or another. People die. Stars die. But it will never end, as long as the Great Candle still burns in heaven."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Tragus demanded from his wheelchair. The rigors of war were crippling his aged body. He required an oxygen mask even when he was at rest. But still he clung to life, as if unwilling to stop so short on the way to vindication.

"When the Candle is extinguished, General Tragus, you will not know from the darkness." Tyreal spoke as if he were a living omen. To me it seemed like pure imagination appeal. Yet so much of religion is. Always speaking on unverifyable people and places.

"Enough of this." The assembled leaders railed for a subject change through whispered bickering. "What of our next actions? I've heard we're leaving in three hours for the Manta Ray. Is this true?"

The Captain resumed his stern, rigid posture in the middle of the council circle. "Yes. This will be the most important war, for it shall win us the time we need to carry the soulstones into hell. You may all very well die, but if my champions fail, there will be no comfort of heaven to welcome your souls."

"I see." Tragus fumed slowly, his wrinkled, chapped brows knitting tight. "So what you're trying to say is that you don't care whether we're freed or not. All we are is fodder to your great, unnamed, unknown, self-righteous cause. Tell us, charlatan of the light, what are we dying for? Why should we give our lives to you? And what makes our pain so damned insignificant to you Angels on high?"

A hush came to the room. This was a question any self-aware beast has asked themselves in pure frustration. Why are we here? Are there any higher purposes to our lives? In times of weakness, even I would ask the same questions. Perhaps immortal entities had a greater insight into such things. Tragus sure hoped so.

"Our goal is nothing short of nirvana." The Captain spoke candidly. "In parts of this universe there are places where our light cannot reach- yet. In our future, the life energy would stretch the limits of infinity, allowing no shadows to exist. It would be a nimbus of the purest light, where all would live as one... unendingly... without suffering. Bliss."

Confusion was abound inside the room, so many attitudes shaken by this goal. Nobody could argue against it, though. Humans seem desperate to escape suffering. Such an unchanging state would appeal to their comfort loving nature. "So what you're saying is, we have to march thirty kilometers in the sand and get mulched up by machine gun fire in order to attain this spiritual nirvana? Doesn't quite make sense, churchy."

Lichello shook his head with certainty. "No. Right now we live in the violent band that exists between the principals of good and evil. It is an endless struggle where humans are always caught in the middle. This is because of your dual nature. You build and destroy with the same hands, and love and hate with the same hearts. Evil and good will always exist in your flock. In this mortal coil you are doomed to fight forever. But fear not. With the right guidance, you can ascend. Or descend. The choice is yours."

I could clearly read the dissatisfaction in the faces of the Imperial leadership and the many slave chieftains. Lichello was too cryptic. Too enigmatic. And worst of all, he didn't say what most of them wanted to hear. "See?" Tyreal mutters bitterly under his breath, so that only Lichello and my audio receptors could pick up his voice.

"Patience, old one." The Captain turned away from the rising chatter of the Counsil, to face Tyreal. "Your patience for our kind must last forever. Humanity will not ascend into the light unless it is expected to."

"If we are to leave in three hours," Tragus at last speaks up over the self-silencing throng of commanders, "we must leave now to mobilize our warriors. I hope that you will have some inspiring words for us, Patriarch. We've never feared death, but we've never faced demons, either."

"No, but you have already endured the worst of hell. All of you." Lichello addressed the Imperial commanders, too. All of their silent suffering had come to this moment. The emotions shared in the room were boiling. Pain and hatred was a mixture more volatile than nitroglycerin. "In five hours we will arrive at their flank, and they will be made to answer for what they've done to Sanctuaries sons and daughters. Do not fear every minute that passes. Relish them, for soon you will be gorging yourself at the bloody fountain of revenge."

A grim look came to Lichellos face, giving me a good look at the duality of man. Like a vivisectionist getting ready to cut. Like the look on my gaunt, cold metal face. It was enough to bolster- or frighten- the rest of the humanist council. And through the hull plated hut a shrill wind blew, as if the planet itself was urging us to hurry up and leave.

----

Ok, I'll stop drowning you in words now and give you a chance to read.

[RevenantsKnight]

I have to say, it’s good that you’ve managed to keep this interesting, especially since a lot of it is based heavily on the manual texts. Congrats on a fresh look at this material. Anyway, here’re some comments on the first bit of Chapter Eleven:

It didn't take much coaxing from Azmodan for the first peoples to begin fighting over the spoils of their war.

“First peoples” makes it sound like the survivors have just colonized new land or something, as if they’re the founding inhabitants of Sanctuary. Granted, they are in a sense, but it doesn’t quite work for me. Maybe “first kingdoms” or something like that would work better.

Diablo made sure people were too terrified to let their boarders down and share.

I get what you’re saying with “let their boarders down” (and that’s “borders,” by the way,) but I can’t help thinking that that particular phrase sounds really odd. I’d suggest rewriting it to “open their borders.”

And always was Andariel there, whispering in the ear of every good man and good woman. Like an incessant gnat, nagging them to despair from their commitment to righteousness and follow more selfish paths.

I’d combine these into one sentence by deleting the period after “woman.” While you do use a lot of fragments like this in your style, I think that this instance in particular would be better as one sentence, so you don’t break up the flow of the idea in the middle.

In us both angels and demons took notice.

I think that should be “of us,” since a rearranged sentence should read “Both angels and demons took notice of us.”

And yet in the space of only two years did we cleanse our planet of the deeply entrenched demon lords of old.

I’m not entirely clear on Heaven’s role still...is this just one of the “aeons” where Hell has an advantage?

All of them possessed of the faith, the strength and the mettle to deny the evils and everything they stood for.

“Possessed of” should just be “possessed.”

Watching and hoping for us to follow along the paths they set for us in their lifes blood.

That should be “life’s,” since you’re denoting possession.

Those were the sin wars. War upon war upon war, fought on our soils. They ended only to allow for a more catastrophic event: the Great Exile.

Some wording things: the “Sin War” mentioned in the manual is capitalized, singular and ongoing. It didn’t end with the “Dark Exile,” though the nature of the battle changed with the presence of the Three in Sanctuary.

“I'm neither a robo-technician or an angel.”

That should be “neither a robo-technician nor an angel.”

The winds of suffering beat down on the human spirit, eventually breaking it down into a boulder, and then to a rock, and then into a pebble until it is nothing but an insignificant speck of sand lost in a vast spiritual wasteland.

Well phrased.

Belial and Azmodan were the most ambitious and crafty among their siblings, and so they hatched a plot to betray the dominant three greater evils.

I think “dominant three greater evils” is a little wordy, since you’ve already made both points about them. I’d use just one adjective, and assume the reader can take it from there.

They would be captured and tossed into one of the many rifts that once existed between hell and our Sanctuary.

Erm...the wording on this made me think that the plan was to dump them in a universe “between hell and our Sanctuary”; you might want to clarify that. Also, if these rifts exist, what’s to stop the Three from returning?

The period of the Great Exile had begun, and the three were free to take out their bitter anger upon our world.

Again, it’s the “Dark Exile” in the manuals, probably to distinguish it from the “Great Conflict.” Unless, of course, you’re using a deliberately different perspective and name for it...

Belial and Azmodan had ejected the greater evils into the mortal realm in hoping that it would serve as a diversion for the forces of Heaven, keeping them away from defending the gates of their unseen dimension.

“In hoping” should be “in the hopes,” and I’d suggest moving this to an earlier point in the chapter, since it’s a main point of their plan, perhaps even more so than gaining dominion over parts of Hell.

So dire was the situation for humankind that the Arch-Angel Tyreal was forced into direct action.

“Tyrael” has the “a” before the “e.”

I could feel his annoyance reach across the room and set fingers in a zipper pattern around my throatless neck.

Very nice description. :)

The so called 'Tyreal' you know is sarcastic and bitter.

“So-called” is usually hyphenated.

Perhaps he is impatient after these millenia of fighting.

“Millennia” has a double “n” in it, and I don’t think you need “these” in that sentence.

Anyways- so Baal, Diablo and Mephisto were forcefully imprisoned by the heaven-backed horadrim, and a brief period of peace came to the peoples of Sanctuary.

“Horadrim” should be capitalized.

The assault on the shining palisades of heaven never happened; In the power vacuum created by the great exile, a second succession war exploded between the traitorous Belial and Azmodan.

In general, the first letter after a semicolon isn’t capitalized, unless it belongs to a proper noun.

King Leoric was the first ruler of the Westmarch empire of old.

It’s not explicitly said whether Leoric hailed originally from Westmarch, or another kingdom nearby, but my guess is that he wasn’t lord of Westmarch, since he later declares war on that land. Regardless, he wasn’t the first ruler of Westmarch, since the kingdom existed for a while before Leoric’s time.

If given the chance, men would grab at the things they want and care not of consequences.

“...and care not of consequences” sounds off to me, though I can’t put my finger on why. I’d recommend rewording it to “...want without regard to the consequences of their actions” or something like that.

Leoric conquered other lands by force- not a finger was lifted by the subjugated for fear of bloody reprisal from the vast armies under his control.

Interesting spin on the events. Is there a reason why the people of this time, and the Barbarians in particular, would denounce Leoric? From the Diablo I manual, he doesn’t seem at all like the sort of person you portray here...though I assume that this was intentional.

A monastery in which the Horadrim had kept Diablos soulstone obscured and imprisoned thousands of feet below ground.

Diablos power was waxing underground in Tristram.

That should be “Diablo’s,” since you’re indicating possession.

Again, this section is rather interesting despite the “common knowledge” nature of the material...good job with that. I’ll try to get to more chapters when I can. Thanks for posting!

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Chapter Thirteen - Servitude

The bridge of the Manta Ray had become an abattoir almost overnight. The once metal-brown walls were made a black shade of half dry gore. The communications officer was hanging from a hook in the center of the room. More like dangling, split up the middle like a hung rack of lamb in a Travincal bazaar. His ribs nearly stripped to the bone.

The vampiress' bodyguards were ravenous. They loved the taste of flesh no more than fire loves the taste of gasoline. They were vampires, too. Their skin was pale like chalk, and wiry like dried leather hide. They wore sparse grey kevlar body armour adorned with alien looking insignia. Despite the inhuman strength they displayed, they were armed to the teeth with elite gear. Exploding daggers. Flechette bombs. Fuel pistols.

They were no longer men, but beasts. Any semblance of emotion or understanding had long since left their murky yellow eyes.

"You're very lucky that you're not being emptied of your blood, mortal." That evil robot voice peeled out in a drone. A decidedly female voice. 'She' was, after all, the self-titled vampiress. "I've decided to keep you around for longer. You may be useful to me in the future."

My neck was throbbing from so many hypodermic injections. She had her retinue forcefully pumping me full of plasma every two hours. My constitution was failing. I could feel the warmth inside me die and my heart stop beating, and yet still I move and think. I could not resist her. She even knew what I was thinking. She would be able to hear these thoughts.

"Don't worry, Jacob. You see the second hour is arriving. But no injections for you, human. I will spare you the indignity of being stabbed in the neck with a vulgar needle. Tonight you shall become one of us." She was shielding her loneliness well. "You are an empathic servant. I am lonely. But after you drink from my arm, you will be lonely with me. Only you and I will slavishly cower from the sun, feasting upon other mortals like animals. Alone from everything alive in this galaxy."

She thrust out her mostly metal arm, and pulled an embedded artery like a simple twist tie. Blood was squirting from her forearm like oil would from a robot. It was dark and ichorous. She dug her sheering claws into my scalp and crushed my face against the crook of her arm. I could not help but choke on her revolting blood. Now smelling it as well as tasting it, the inky plasma having been sucked into my sinuses. I was drowning in blood.

"This is really no more than ceremonial, pet." She droned cruelly. "All it takes is a drop of this sludge to infect you. The sin of vampirism is now in your bloodstream like a virus." I cough and draw away. She allows me to. "Belial did an excellent job synthesizing the fluids for me. Soon your lungs will hemorrhage and atrophy. After a few hours they will form into spongy livers. The only way you may earn your oxygen is from human blood."

I couldn't speak. I was weeping and retching. It tasted vile. My forehead was throbbing. My soul felt like it was on fire.

"Indeed, soon your soul will be reduced to ashes, so to speak. You are now my immortal slave. I hope you'll enjoy spending eternity with me. I will guide you much like I guide these privileged few." She gestured out at random to one of the vampires. He was licking blood from one of the keypads. "The hunger gets stronger with time, as well as the strength of your curse. Pay attention to your new instincts. Learn from them. You shall be expected to protect us as we protect you. Learn our ways and you will survive."

It was too late for suicide. Welcome to forever, Jake.

[RevenantsKnight]

Interesting bit about whether or not Scorn has a soul...I suspect this’ll factor in again later. My comments on the history part are more or less the same as above, and the Quoload-Scorn conversation was pretty good...though I wasn’t sure why Quoload had to go through all that backstory if all he wanted were the soulstones. Anyway, some more specific comments:

Soulstones are quite indestructible, you'll find. They can be destroyed only upon the hellforge, where nothing can escape ultimate annihilation.

I don’t doubt that the contradiction between “indestructible” and “can be destroyed” was intentional, but it doesn’t work for me. I’d just swap “indestructible” with “durable” or “resilient” or something like that. Also, “Hellforge” should be capitalized, since it’s a proper noun.

Only here can the prime evils be phased from existence and banished into timeless oblivion. It is here that your Captain must be seeking to take your cargo.

Both instances of “here” above should be “there,” since they’re not at the Hellforge at this moment.

The corrupting force of the Lord of Terror was great, and the susceptability of the nameless wanderer infinite.

That should be “susceptibility.”

Every villiage he burned on the way to freeing Mephisto was another doubt in his mind.

“Village” has one “i.”

Every family he rended apart was all the more a reminder of his evil nature.

The proper form of “to rend” in this case is “rent.”

Soon enough Diablo had forced him through so much horror that turning back was abandoned.

Technically, that should be “the idea of turning back.”

That admission seemed to startle him, as nonchalant a fact as it was for me.

“Nonchalant” seems awkward in this case, since it usually describes a manner or a person’s way of acting, not facts. Perhaps “obvious” or “evident” would work better...

Perhaps I was being a bit too fatalistic, to severe, as Allen once put it.

The “to” there should be “too.”

I was getting anxious. Feeling anxious.

Heh. Funny, that...

Something changed in Quoloads face.

Quoloads clear, composed voice began to falter.

That should be “Quoload’s,” since you’re indicating possession of the face and the voice, respectively.

His eyes were crawling out of his skull in desperation.

Nice image, indeed.

"FROM TRUSTED INFORMATION GARNERED, LOGIC DICTATES THAT THEY MUSTN'T BE ALLOWED INTO THE HANDS OF MORTALS."

Minor wording note: contractions such as “mustn’t” are generally considered less formal, so it sounds a little odd given Scorn’s programmed diction. I’d just use the whole phrase.

"They are in swarms before us.”

This phrasing sounded weird to me; I’d suggest modifying it to read “Swarms of them stand before us.”

We may also need Duriels stone.

That should be “Duriel’s.”

My eyes flare brighter in the darkness.

“Flare” is in the present tense, while the previous parts of the narration in the moment were in the past tense. I suggest sticking with the past only to avoid confusion; this would become “flared” if you wanted to do so.

“ARE YOU SO WILLING FAIL THE SAME WAY YOUR HEROES HAVE IN THE PAST?"

I think you’re missing a “to” after “willing.”

As loathe as I am to admit it, I enjoyed every time I got to hold my computerized memory over the heads of humans.

That should be “loath,” not “loathe.” Don’t ask me why that’s the case; it just is.

He reflects in a moment of silence, in which I read the countours of his face like braille.

Again, there’s a tense shift here; “he reflects” is in the present tense, coming after a block of narration in the past tense. I’d change it to “He reflected for a moment in silence, during which...” Also, “contours” has only one “u,” which comes after the second “o,” and “Braille” should be capitalized, since it’s technically a proper noun.

"If we are to die on this foresaken planet, then let us at least die with our righteousness in tact, hm?"

“Forsaken” doesn’t have an “e” after the “r,” and “intact” is one word.

Other than the tense shifts, which were a little confusing, this read pretty well. I’ll try to get to more of your posts in a little bit; please let me know if you find this helpful or not. Thanks for posting!

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Most of your comments I find helpful. Especially the ones regarding the clarity of ideas. Being that this entire story is inside my head, it's easy for me to just fill in the blanks that I might leave in my writing. It's good to get the perspective of a reader.

A lot of it I just gloss over, but if I'm going to repost this anywhere else, I'm going to look at the more technical critiques and change my writing accordingly. As it is, the mistakes I make are endemic. They're always going to be there, especially with my style of writing that has a singular emphasis on emotions and moods.

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Chapter Fourteen - Nostalgia

Sand was beginning to crunch inside my joints and armour plating as I moved. We were on the edge of a large sandstorm, about a kilometer from the Manta Ray. We couldn't clear the hill ahead, or else the orbitally guided artillery of that massive fortress would turn our bones into dust.

Scores of dropships were landing over the ridge, kicking up sand to float around for hours in the weak gravity of black Urube. The ground forces being dropped out of the many porthole hatches were theirs, and inhuman. Some of them were great robots made of wood and titanium, spikes jutting out of their oddly statuesque frames. Their eyes glowing a foul yellow. Others were corpulent and jaundiced, a variety of fluids sludging forth from their gaping maws.

Genetic aberrations were abound, spilling from rancid dropship holes. Some were massive human giants with grotesquely small heads. The only thing keeping blood in their underdeveloped craniums was a makeshift tourniquet made of inch thick steel chains. Pins were jutting out of their hairless scalps, a cause of great pain judging from the distorted looks worn over their squat, baby-like features. They swung clubs that upon closer inspection were actually stiffly mortified humans kept in a blunt shape by steel cables. The condition of the humans used was no less than horrifyingly misshapen. To exist in such a way was unimaginable.

The oddest of the bunch were the platoons of short, red skinned humanoids in plated anti-ballistic armour. Their ears were flaps, and their faces gaunt and goblinesque. There were legions of them, all brandishing gauss rifles in their tiny, bony hands and waddling forward in sync. Their eyes were blank and their facial nerves dead. The heavy neural grafts in the back of their heads explained the robotic behavior.

Some of the slightly larger, slightly better armed goblinoids had dull metal plated skulls. Instead of rifles they carried hip-mounted keypads and a staff-mounted satellites. No doubt to communicate with their combat able slaves. And chief among these overseers was a dwarfish monster with yellow teeth and sickly blue skin. He had chunks of long rotten cartilage strung up on a yarn around his thin neck, and a ferocious looking cybernetic right eye jutting out from the socket.

"Oh Bishibosh," the Captain was standing beside me, peering through the whipping sands with a large set of electronic binoculars, "how many times must I send you back to hell before you realise that you're not wanted here?"

Maelat, the leader of the Northlander war party, was quick to make demands. "What do you see? How many are they?" She was armoured up like a gator, orange war paint slathered over the black plates of her armour like alien blood. The scalps of once-living foes formed a bloody, dry shag over her shoulder plates and her crudely built headdress. She carried a magnetically weighted axe in both hands. Fairly recent rechnology. An internal gravity generator could make a downswing generate fifty tons of pressure per square inch. I've seen special infantry use it to blow up tanks.

"It matters not." Lichello handed the binoculars over to Deltroy. "Our battle with them will be but a brief distraction for a greater effort. You may not realise it," he turned and faced the opposite direction, away from the sandstorm, "but the sun should be waxing in the sky overhead."

The barbaric slaves were used to space, and indeed their entire existence being wreathed in darkness. But the ex-Imperials present found the absence of the sun to be quite discouraging. "Where did it go? What trickery of science is this?" Maelat shouts angrily into the hot storm of starship exhaust and black sand.

Horus was quick with an answer. He understood as much of physical science as I did, which said a lot about his organic mental capacity. "I cannot say, but space is being warped anomalously. It is unnatural and untraceable, suggesting psychic manipulation." A long period of dumb silence followed. "They're obscuring the sun behind a tiny, artificial black hole. I see many minds with a hand in this, as a genuine black hole requires tremendous amounts of energy to generate."

"And where is this energy coming from?" The Captain asked patiently. Horus waited a few minutes to reply. Some other people stopped listening and started babbling about preparedness. All of the military heads were present.

"That way." The answer came eventually. Horus pointed in the direction of the Manta Ray and the demons being dropped in front of it. "I see five of them in front of a large amplifying globe. They meditate in silence, in security, sucking up every wave of light that the sun would shed on this lonely planet."

"Indeed." Lichello sighed. "It is an old demon trick I have seen played once or twice in my time. Magic, telekinetic warping of space, at any rate we shall not see the sun until this battle is over. A small task force will be stealth dropped at the rear of the Manta Ray. Horus, you shall accompany Chyboreum and Tserca in order to psychically mask your approach."

"That's insanity." Horus protested. "That's the Manta Ray. They have scanners and sensors in that base that haven't existed up until a week ago. I can't fool them all. I'll be surprised if our shuttle even makes it there in one piece. We'll be captured! Tortured!"

The Captain wisely cut him off. We didn't have enough time to listen to Horus lament his mortality. "The Manta Ray is using a rock formation in order shield it's rear quarters. That way it can point all of its guns forwards, at any potential assailants. At us." The situation was looking grimmer the more we analysed it. "Advance scouts have transmitted the coordinates of a series of tunnels that run through the mountains. The scouts have been lost, but they were able to send their data in time for our arrival."

Horus didn't ask what was in the tunnels. He clearly didn't want to know- or somehow clairvoyantly already knew. Whatever caused the scouts to get 'lost' was presumably still there. Tserca was out of earshot, conducting prayers for the Imperial troops who still clung desperately to the oxymoronic idea of life after death. Chyboreum was either invisible or in a box.

"You three will traverse the tunnels and infiltrate the Manta Ray from the rear. Once inside you must slay whoever may be generating this astral interference." The Captain continued with our briefing. Mekerle, Deltroy and I wouldn't be accompanying, and so Deltroy simply leered into his block shaped binoculars. Mekerle was personally attending to the health and well being of Tragus- as well as guarding the Agonizer. The soulstone was too important to leave unattended. "And be quick about completing your objectives- the sight of the sun will break our enemies will, allowing more of us to survive for future battles."

"We'll try to get to the psychic cabal before we're all invariably killed." Horus mumbled affirmatively.

Maelat was impatient to add her opinion. "Do not neglect to mention Iaunibn. He will lead us to redemption. He is our savior. He is our last hero." Her eyes were straining through the sandstorm. Behind where we stood on the dune ridge, tens of thousands of Imperial troops and blood thirsty free slaves were milling in vast columns. Their time to die would come soon.

Lichello scowled. "He is not your last hero. But aye, he does come from an honorable stock. Draol and I defeated Diablo, Mephisto and Baal together. I'm sure that if he has a fraction of the might of his genetic father, whoever waits for us in orbit has much to fear from his freedom."

So the legend of Iaunibn was more than myth. Free Imperials considered the story of his heritage as a fabrication to demoralize the vast slave armies. So it goes, Iaunbin descends from Draol, the much revered Northlander hero of old. The slayer of the Three, veteran of hell itself, chosen of the Ancients. Or so Quoload has elaborated for me.

Somehow, at some time, a cell sample of Draol the mighty had been obtained. Maybe dry blood on an old spear. Maybe a skin cell in a helmet. More has been done with less. The Empire has been cloning Iaunibin for almost a century and a half now, only to march him before his people and flay the skin from his back and torture him before his peoples. His deeds may have won him an eternity of reward in heaven, but even there would Draol suffer knowing that his last son would forever be in the clutches of his most hated foes. The Iaunibn that was being kept in the Manta Ray was the eighth, the previous seven all having met with gruesome, humiliating deaths.

The Captain sighs, the sound harmonizing with the moaning wind. "We begged him not to breed. He was the only one of us who forsook Tyreals advice. I can only imagine what Diablo would do with my children."

It was now Maelats turn to scowl. "No! Iaunbins lot is ours. Much like us he has suffered the evil of the Emperor for generations. And when he is freed, our spirits will soar. Do not underestimate the power of symbolism, honored Patriarch. It may give us the strength we need."

And so the recovery of Iaunibn became a tertiary objective for our ongoing, indefinite mission. So be it. I decided not to tell Maelat that I had seen Iaunibn recently- his muscles had atrophied away to mere bands. His skin wept with bloody lesions that could not be closed. He would be of no use in a combat scenario.

"I'm sure that my most trusted Lieutenants will be able to rescue Iaunibn. You will be met with him on the fields of victory." Hearing the Captain make promises was almost like listening to someone state facts. It was so easy for complete strangers to believe him. "But as for now, I must discuss matter privately with my champions. Make preparations, for in ten minutes, we march."

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(Continued)

A kilometer ahead, demons were stomping and fuming for human blood at any cost. It had been a long journey from wherever it was they spawned, and they were growing impatient to approach. I could see the fear in Maelats face, as well as those of the many Imperial generals assembled. Nothing could make them ready, and if it weren't for the Captain urging them on, they might've been planning for strategic hiding spots instead.

[0xDEADCAFE]

"Enough talk! Time for battle!"

I'm sure this has been said an infinity of times. I for one am juiced to see the plot finally pick up and lurch, heavily laden with fantastic weapons of techno-horror, toward war. And, by the way, this paragraph was a great piece of writing:

Somehow, at some time, a cell sample of Draol the mighty had been obtained. Maybe dry blood on an old spear. Maybe a skin cell in a helmet. More has been done with less. The Empire has been cloning Iaunibin for almost a century and a half now, only to march him before his people and flay the skin from his back and torture him before his peoples. His deeds may have won him an eternity of reward in heaven, but even there would Draol suffer knowing that his last son would forever be in the clutches of his most hated foes. The Iaunibn that was being kept in the Manta Ray was the eighth, the previous seven all having met with gruesome, humiliating deaths.Superb in every way. "More has been done with less." What a beautifully succinct way provide justification for this plot element. This paragraph is perfectly phrased, clear as a bell, and descriptive of a tragedy of such depth as to bring a tear to the eye. Later, Lichello saying "I urged him not to breed." just sharpens the emotional edge.

It's also nice to see Horus's ultra-intelligent instinct for self-preservation back in the mix. Yee-ha! Bring on the techno-horror blood bath!

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Chapter Fifteen - Stepping on Angels Before Dawn

The feelings of burning had given away to dry heaves, and my dead soul was vomited like so much stomach acid. I tried so hard to resist the gore that lay about the besieged Manta Ray. The taste of blood had torn my will apart. I was no longer human.

A vast army stood at the pit of the valley before me. Like me, all of them were suffering. Would I soon be like them, the feelings of love and comfort but distant memories? Would I look forward only to suffering and bloodshed? Perhaps not now. But my resolve was short of infinite. There was no question. Soon I would come to enjoy the rush of blood on my lips, for there were no other sensations left for me in this galaxy.

The Vampiress was delivering a speech to the thousands of seething demons gathered below. She would not let me out of her sight for the entire ordeal of my sick metamorphasis.

"As you well know, our plans have been changed by fate. The dark host will not make his appearance as planned. The humans have been awaken from their nightmare of lies, and so we cannot rob them of the satisfaction of dying in unity." Her voice was louder than per normal, the speaker in the back of her throat turned to maximum volume. "It would've been so much easier to lead them into hell on the points of their own spears.

But despair not. I know that many of you have been irate with Belial for keeping you from the carnage you desire. The few offerings of violence we've afforded have been rare and discreet, but tonight will be different. Tonight we will repay you for your loyalty. Over the ridge of the horizon awaits a feast for those loyal to the dominion of the Burning Hells.

The same way we have brought you to this mortal realm, so have the agents of heaven brought their immortal babysitters of humankind. Among the legions of bolstered humanity are a league of angels in mortal skin. You will know them from the sweet taste of their blood. There will be much less of them opposing us due to their squeamish attitude toward human sacrifice. Their weakness of spirit will shine bright on the battlefield.

And with these few brave angels has come a prize that we have saved for you and you alone. The Arch-Angel leading them is none other than Tyreal and his ever loyal, once-ordained paladin Lichello. Their life will be yours to take, should you find them. Kill swiftly, for every mortal you slay shall bring you two and a half feet closer to him."

A furious roar of guttural, sharp cries crested like a tidal wave from the mass. I could see the hatred in their many eyes, from those in the front to those thousands of feet in the back. They were all paying attention now. Whomever this Tyreal was, they could not abide the idea of him living free.

"Yes, I have your emotions in my hands now." The Vampiress buzzed quietly to herself, her eyes aglow. "I can feel the hate you hold in your oft empty hearts. Do not deny your wrath. Let it become a fire that sets your entire body ablaze with anger. Remember how the Paladin has denied us our Blackest Dawn on the mountain Arreat. Remember how his blade felt as you tasted it so close to the end. These humans will have no hope to deny us with for we have been waiting for this moment since the beginning of time. We will march on the humans like an unstoppable flood of hatred and consume them from skin to soul."

"What of the sun?" A voice shrieked from the front of the crowd, and was joined by other terrified exclamations.

The only thing the Vampiress seemed to hate more than humans was the sun itself. What remained of her organic face twisted up. "Do not fear the sun, for it is an icon of weakness. For all the trouble it gives us it is easily defeated- the light is so fragile that all one must do to deny it is place something in front of it." A sawtooth grin came to her upper lip as her feral jaw dug upwards. "Cruel vengeance shall spread her wings and blot out the sun from here to Sanctuary. Bathe in blood without hesitation children, for we shall be stepping on angels before dawn."

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Chapter Sixteen - Fire With Fire

There were two major ridges to consider on the vast, desolate wasteland that stretched before us. The one we stood behind was the safe line. The satellite guided artillery of the Manta Ray could not reach beyond it. This was the line that we needed to guide the demons past in order to fight on level ground. So to speak. The demons would be given the high ground if they were unwise enough to extend past the radius of their VTOL headquarters.

The second ridge was the dune line behind which the Manta Ray was safely ensconced. It was much, much farther ahead, creating a gentle, rolling valley between these two crucial geographical features. The demons knew where we were no doubt, having orbital superiority. Lichello was hoping that their wrath would draw them into the basin, where fire from the Manta Ray would endanger them equally were we to return the charge and meet in the middle.

If people lived on Urube, they would most likely give a colourfully gory name to this valley after we fought in it. I could only imagine how high the blood would reach on my stout legs as I waded through it near the finish. And for once in all my time existing did I entertain the thought that I, Imperial Punisher unit 31, might not survive to see the end of an armed conflict. The impending doom, whatever it may be, was upsetting my intelligence..

"You shouldn't have sent Horus with only two others to protect him. He'll fail." Deltroy was despairing already. Horus and Tserca had already left on their mission to the caves near the Manta Ray. "You didn't see him back on the Invincible with us. He was helpful only when we weren't in immediate danger. I fear that this war will be won on our efforts alone." I could only silently concur with him. Logic dictated that Horus' skills would falter once more.

The Captain, the master of our entire army, could only laugh and make sure he was out of earshot from the rest of the commanders. "I'm sorry to say this, Deltroy, but I've dragged you into a fight that you couldn't possibly hope to win. There will be nothing you consider as normal about this battle ahead. Your foes will not die as easily as before. Against these demons you will find your weapons to be nowhere near as powerful as you remember them being. For us to win I must lead you into what is nothing short of a nightmare."

It made no sense for the Captain to demoralize us as he was doing. But he seemed to be more committed to telling the truth than he was to winning a war. "Our lives are in his hands, as well as those of Tserca and Chyboreum. For us to survive, they must succeed."

"I'm sure Mekerle is praying for their victory." Deltroy responded with sarcasm. Mekerle was at the rear of our human mob, looking after the soulstones as well as lending medical aid. As for us, we were the spearhead of this irregular army. We would not be able to escape the fighting until the bloody end.

All at once sound began reaching us from the half kilometer ahead. A tidal wave of obscure dots was rushing over the ridge. Their momentum was unstoppable, like gravity itself. "So this is it." Maelat was short of words, or even bravado. She could only stand and watch, her magnetic axe at the ready.

"Indeed, this shall be the beginning." The Captain was as cryptic as ever. "The beginning always comes at the end of something else." That would be the last maxim from him. He inhales a deep breath and begins steeling his nerves. A buckle on his belt is snapped off, and his glistening adamantium broadsword slides untouched from his leather scabbard. "Let them rush to the feet of this dune, and then we will begin our downhill charge. Let their anger misguide them with illusions of power. Let them give us our advantage."

I could see the fear in his face. Despite his devotion to the light, he still felt fear like any other temporary intelligence formation. Death was ever so excruciatingly close to us, and was beginning to give a rash. The fear would be double for Lichello. I could only imagine what it must feel like to fight the same enemies, over and over and over again, and in pitch darkness. Nightmare indeed. Every last one was now assembled and most likely looking for him alone. If he were to survive, he would wear the deepest wounds.

The sound of tank cannons punched the ground like a mallet punching a drum. Explosions kicked up massive clouds of sand as they rend the surging mass of demons apart. Yet still they advanced. Our machines of war began rolling to the top of the ridge from behind. Most of our armour consisted of simple jury-rigged powerlifts with cannons and missle racks bolted and welded to the back. Trowd had even created an army of remotely operated suicide-bomb forklifts. Hopefully their wheels wouldn't get stuck in the sand.

Over the second ridge so far away came air support for the demon army. Their black shapes could barely be seen in the magenta hued sky. They were P-35 jet bombers. Stealth jets. They carried a hideous personification in their sleek, aerodynamic design with two pilot windows slit in the front like predatory eyes. They looked like bandits. Or ninjas. Or masked assassins. Their military function was no less malevolent. From the distinctness of design could they be distinguished from simple advance bombers. They were stealth poisoners.

From their bomb hatches they could drop up to ten thousand metric kilos of chemical ordinance. Their pilots were dressed like any other except for the signature white scarves they used to mask themselves. It served as an executioners hood of sorts, allowing the bomber to distance themselves from the guilt of maliciously polluting acres of Sanctuary for centuries to come. Nobody would know who it was climbing into and out of the cockpits of these foul bomber craft except their commanding officers and the pilots themselves.

There were most likely no white scarves now, no contradictory human shame to conceal. The demons piloting these aircraft no doubt enjoyed the idea of scarring the surface of Urube with noxious radiation and virulent gas. It was an accomplishment to be prided upon rather than a command later regretted.

The flesh melting plumes of chemical death the stealth poisoners heralded inspired fear in any insurgent armies they faced. The distinct shape of their craft was popularly associated with the disgusting atrocities of mass destruction warfare. And they were travelling slow. The Emperor loved the gripping fear that their appearance on the battlefield generated, coasting along at half speed towards enemy ranks. It was the same kind of sadistic joy that created the hellish payloads themselves.

"Remember Old Kurast!" I could hear someone cry out from behind me. The memories of old horrors still lingered among the Imperial Legion, so it seemed. Kurast had been literally erased from the map of Sanctuary and replaced with a skull and crossbones symbol after these advance poisoners were done with it. New Kurast had to be built a thousand kilometers away.

Old Kurast was nothing short of a nation-state, dominating the nearby Travincal, Ureh and the entire Kehjistan region. Being among the most affluent of Imperial states, Old Kurast had its share of well fed philosophers and pundits railing for peace and non-violence. As time passed and the Empire became more extremist, Old Kurast was ready to succeed and rebel violently if need be. A strategical liability to a global empire if there ever was one.

Only a race of hideous mutants inhabit the ruins of Old Kurast. Sometimes the Imperial Legion combs through the region to pick a few out for research, but the sunless labyrinth of tunnels and sewer canals beneath the poisoned city have yet remain unplumbed. Thirty million dead, by the way.

The time the bombers were taking allowed our organic allies to pull out their respirators rather than retreat as normally expected. They had no choice but to brave the caustic maelstrom of exotic nerve gases and burning vapors. Only a select few thousand received the appropriate respirators for such an attack. One of the humans beside me was spraying heavy layers of an antidote into a cotton dust mask. "Why the **** do I have to wear this rag while everyone else gets a mask?"

"We lacked the facilities to manufacture new respirators, I'm afraid to say." The answer from a fellow soldier was sarcastic. He was making the same preparations with his own flimsy mask. "Make sure you use the whole anti-viral canister or else you may die."

The black scimitar shaped stealth poisoners spat out their bombs. The bombs were flung along at the speed of sound, and rolled into our ranks before hitting some unfortunate foot soldier and exploding. We were then mired in noxious ochre clouds. I could hear individual humans vomit and die immediately. The smoke simply broke over my face, its chemicals unbreathable.

[RevenantsKnight]

Hrm...so far, this looks like the fight’s going to be an interesting one indeed. Feels kind of like Lord of the Rings, with the whole “we’re just here to buy them some time” attitude that Lichello has. Some specific thoughts on Chapter Twelve (yes, I know that was a while ago...):

The monolithic Pennance was now spread out across five square kilometers..

There’s an extra period at the end of this sentence.

The humans fear this, but in Urube the darkness only hides darker valleys and hideous croppings of alien rock.

That should be “outcroppings.”

It was a dark hut in which they held their counsil, constructed out of parts from the Pennance's former bridge.

“It was a dark hut in which...” sounds a bit awkward to me, probably because it is in the passive voice. If you want, you could change it to something like “The council was held in a makeshift shelter, the dark hut constructed from parts of the Pennance’s former bridge.” Also, that’s spelled “council.”

He killed only because he was ordered, and through him evil found an ignorant, yet fully honorable utensil.

The first clause should end with “...was ordered to do so” for grammatical correctness. Also, I think that should be “...and in him,” not “and through him.”

Tragus took control of the meeting once more. He led the barbarians who built the fortress, and so he had executive powers. He was the master.

I don’t know if you need to put so much emphasis on Tragus being “the master,” since you bring this up earlier.

"If it were not for the death of Mephisto," the Captain interrupted as he was always want to do, "I fear the outcome would've been much more deadly.”

That should be “...always wont,” not “want.”

Thankfully, I can personally vouche for his destruction.

That’s spelled “vouch.”

He was kneading the pommel of his sword nervously, causing it to rock foreward against his scabbard.

That’s spelled “forward.”

Maelat had become cheiftain of all tribal war parties.

“Chieftain” follows the “I before E” rule.

There's approximately fourty thousand apocalypse grade nuclear bombs between the fleet.

Unlike “four,” “forty” doesn’t have a “u” in it.

Perhaps whoever is leading the fleet needs to verify Tyreals identidy.

That should be “Tyreal’s identity.”

Please let this looming spectre of death strengthen your resolve to act, and aditionally, do not let those under your commmand know.

That should be “additionally” and “command.”

"And then we'll have some time to fix our dropships, patch up a fleet of our own, and take it to the exosphere of this planet."

The way this is worded, it sounds like the humans are intending to fight the Imperial fleet head-on. Maybe I missed something, but it didn’t sound like those dropships had enough weaponry and armor to fight the cruisers. If they’re intending to run the line and flee to somewhere else, then you might want to make that clearer.

"The Emperors personal fleet of cruisers won't let us leave orbit in one piece."

That should be “Emperor’s,” since you’re indicating possession of the fleet.

"All we can do is lead it ever so slightly in one direction or another."

This sounds a bit out of character for Tyrael. Yes, I know he’s a much different character in this story than in the game, but the entire reason that Heaven and Hell pay attention to humanity is because mortals can choose their paths, and so they could, in theory, provide one side with a great advantage. If Tyrael is resigned to just slightly influencing humanity, then it feels like he’s working at an impossible goal, which makes me start to wonder why he’s still on Sanctuary and not in Heaven or Hell fighting against the demons in a more direct way.

But still he clung to life, as if unwilling to stop so short on the way to vindication.

Nice image.

"When the Candle is extinguished, General Tragus, you will not know from the darkness."

I assume that this was meant to be cryptic, but it sounded (to me) more as if Tyrael was acting superior and mocking Tragus quietly by saying “You don’t know squat, and never will.” Was that intentional?

Always speaking on unverifyable people and places.

I think that should be “...speaking about unverifiable...”

“You may all very well die, but if my champions fail, there will be no comfort of heaven to welcome your souls."

Erm...even if Lichello isn’t the best motivational speaker around, this is a bit less...inspiring than I’d expect. If he opens with “You may all very well die...,” a better next line would be something that highlights the upside of the situation, namely the fact that they will be welcomed into Heaven if his “champions” succeed.

This was a question any self-aware beast has asked themselves in pure frustration.

The verb “has” there should be “had” to remain parallel with “was.”

Such an unchanging state would appeal to their comfort loving nature. "So what you're saying is, we have to march thirty kilometers in the sand and get mulched up by machine gun fire in order to attain this spiritual nirvana? Doesn't quite make sense, churchy."

The shift from Scorn’s narrative to (presumably) Tragus’s response is a little abrupt; you might want to preface his words with his reaction to what Lichello said.

"Patience, old one." The Captain turned away from the rising chatter of the Counsil, to face Tyreal.

That should be “Council.”

"Your patience for our kind must last forever. Humanity will not ascend into the light unless it is expected to."

Hrm...Lichello refers to humans as “our kind” here, implying that he considers himself human. Right before that, though, he refers to “your [presumably humanity’s] dual nature,” which sounds as if he’s not human. Was this intentional? If it was, that’s an interesting idea, but if you don’t plan on taking it further or if that was unintentional, I’d suggest putting him on one side or the other so the reader doesn’t get too mixed up.

In five hours we will arrive at their flank, and they will be made to answer for what they've done to Sanctuaries sons and daughters.

That should be “Sanctuary’s,” since you’re indicating possession.

A grim look came to Lichellos face, giving me a good look at the duality of man.

That should be “Lichello’s,” for the reason stated above.

Anyway, I’ll get to more chapters as I can, and I’m still along for the ride. Thanks for posting!

[RebirthOfMak]

Nice Job!

Mak~

[Bert]

Hi!

My english isn't that great so I don't read very fast (often need to check the meaning of words) but you are a talented man!

I'm awaiting your next post even more Anxiously than 1.10! :D

GREAT JOB!!!

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I'm back, at last. I've half-abandoned this story not due to a lack of ideas, just a confliction of how to deal with this part. I feel my story has too much fighting. I like introducing characters and themes. This is where I feel I am most clever and most poignant.

The fighting seems unecessary to really elaborate upon, though. Sure, diablo is all about the hack and slash, but it's not that fun to read. I really want to skip this battle between the humans and demon incarnates. I'm sure you could imagine in your head what such a battle would be like, anyway.