Interlude Judgement of Rational Angel

"Prime Movement: The Word is!"

And Lo, the Herald stood upon the field, and the name was changed.

And ג perceived the beast before it, the Great Khan in its aspect of fury, and saw the utter malice of its nature.

Yet ג felt no fear, for fear was a thing of men. In the mind of ג, there was now only duty. And the duty was this: to oppose such deviancy.

A mind unclouded by fear is a mind sharper than any blade.

And so the path to victory was laid bare. The carapace of the beast was thickest at its thorax, yet the multitude of its legs was a vanity, a weakness to be broken. Its turning was as a great ship in a narrow strait, and its lunges were direct and without cunning.

Thus, ג knew the beast would charge.

Knew the path the beast must take.

And knew the path that must be taken in turn.

And as ג had foreseen, so it came to pass.

The beast charged.

The thunder of its myriad legs was as the march of a legion of the dead, and its grinding maw opened wide, a gate to hell itself. And it came forth with an unholy speed, driven by a malice as pure and singular as a sinner's final, damning thought.

But ג did not meet fury with fury. There was no fear, only calculation.

A slight shift of weight. A turn of the shoulder. The monster thundered past, its immense form missing its quarry by a hair's breadth.

And as the beast passed, Lindalcar sang.

A single, perfect strike, delivered with absolute precision to the weakest point of a flailing leg joint.

Colorless ichor gushed from the wound.

The beast cried out, a shriek of rage and pain. So great was the cry that the chains on the ceiling rattled and dust rained down from the rafters.

But it was far from defeated.

A single leg now lay severed on the concrete floor. Alas, it was but one of a myriad.

The beast was wounded, but hardly slain.

And as was foreseen, the beast began to turn, slow and unwieldy as a great ship in a narrow strait. Its chitinous, blade-like legs scraped along the walls, tearing great chunks from the metal and concrete.

Patient, ג awaited the next charge.

And it came with fury.

And it ended in the same way.

With another leg upon the floor.

This was no path to victory, but to ruin.

For ג was bound to a vessel of flesh. And flesh was weak. Flesh tired. Flesh would falter long before the beast ran out of legs.

ג knew this.

And ג knew the beast knew this as well.

For that certainty of victory, that arrogance, was the cornerstone upon which ג would build its triumph.

For as long as the beast believed it was winning, it would not change its tactics.

And when the proper time came, ג would. And thus, shift the path from ruin to glory.

But that time was not yet.

The beast needed to be driven further into its rage.

Made more incautious.

ג calculated the rate at which its own muscles tired. ג measured the build-up of lactic acid in the blood, the micro-tears in the fibers.

And ג calculated the rage of the beast, by the twitching of its mandibles, by the acrid scent of its hormones.

Thus, ג placed these measures upon the scales of the future, and found the perfect moment.

The number of the beast was six.

Three more passes must ג endure. And on the fourth, the plan would be executed.

But there was more to it than mere endurance. For this was a manipulation not only of position, but of perception. The beast must not suspect it was being led into an ambush.

The beast must believe it had driven ג into a corner, a final act of its own triumphant will.

ג did not doubt the outcome.

Doubt was for men. ג knew only the serene certainty of what was to come.

And as ג had foreseen, so it came to pass.

On the third pass, the fury of the beast had risen to new heights, and so too had its speed.

With a grace born only of pure calculation, ג danced from the path of the charging centipede.

And Lindalcar sang its third note.

Another wound opened in the creature's flank, and a third leg fell to the floor of the desecrated temple.

But as ג landed, the weakness of the flesh was made manifest. A muscle in the leg of the vessel cramped, and ג stumbled, as ungraceful as a newborn colt.

And it was good.

For it was part of the plan.

On the fourth pass, ג beheld the mandibles twitching in what ג knew to be anticipation. The beast believed it was winning.

And that was good.

The movements of ג were now stiffer, the grace of the vessel compromised by calculated exhaustion.

And thus, when Lindalcar sang its fourth note, it was a quiet one.

For instead of severing the leg, ג had merely wounded it.

And ג was wounded in turn. Not by the venomous mandibles, but by the rake of a different chitinous leg across its chest.

And so, the blood of the Herald fell upon the base earth.

And it was good.

For it was part of the plan.

On the fifth pass, venomous saliva dripped from the beast's mandibles, like the drool of a hound that sees its meal delivered.

ג, with ichor still weeping from its wounds, braced itself.

This time, ג did not dodge.

Instead, it parried the massive mandible with Lindalcar—a desperate, weak-looking block, as if the ג was now too exhausted to evade.

The force of the blow was immense. The body of ג was tossed through the air like a leaf in the wind.

It tumbled and landed in a heap, precisely between the two rusted conveyor belts. The vessel of flesh was now one great bruise, battered and seemingly broken.

The Great Khan laughed, a sound of pure, triumphant cruelty. For it knew there would be no dodging the next charge. It knew the end had come.

And ג knew the Great Khan was right.

And it was good.

For it was the end of the plan.

And so it came to the sixth and final pass, where the battle would be ended, as had been foretold.

ג had calculated the way to victory, yet the true nature of the universe was uncertainty. No calculation, when dealing with matters of flesh and fury, could ever be perfect.

And yet, ג felt no fear. Fear was for men.

The plan was the best that could be made, with the abilities granted. That was enough.

It must be.

The beast charged.

There was no place left to dodge, for ג was walled in on the left and on the right. But so too was the beast. Its great size and furious momentum made it impossible for it to stop. Even if it saw the trap now, it was too late.

Despite the pain wracking the flesh of the vessel, ג moved in the precise sequence that had been prescribed. A clear and cold voice spoke, a command that cut through the chaos.

"Second Movement: Barring the Eastern Gate."

And Lindalcar sang a new song.

The blade burned with a white fire, and from its tip, the flame spread, twisting and crystallizing. In an instant, it formed a great, shimmering gate of incandescent light, covered in burning, hexagonal glyphs.

For thus was the Gate barred, and thus was the way closed.

And yet, the beast could not stop.

With a great and terrible fury, it struck the gate which none may pass.

And a symphony of ruin played out in the hall of the desecrated temple-factory.

The first note was the sound of the beast's own unholy might turned against it, a resonant crack as its very firmament was shattered upon the gate.

And this was answered by a cry from the beast, a shriek not of simple pain, but of unholy indignation from a being that had never known a barrier it could not break.

Then came the chorus: the sharp, sudden snapping of its myriad legs, breaking like old timbers under a pressure they could no longer bear.

And for the crescendo, the great machines of the hall, the rusted conveyor belts, tore loose from their moorings and collapsed inward upon the thrashing creature, a landslide of iron to serve as its tomb.

The chains above rained down like tears of rust, and great cracks spread from the barred gate, scarring the very foundations of the hall.

And then, there was only silence.

The arms of the vessel were heavy, and ג lowered Lindalcar.

The great Gate dissolved into a shower of beautiful, harmless fireflies, revealing the ruin that lay behind it.

The heart of the beast still beat. Wounded, but not dead.

For the dread vitality of the Vril-ya was strong. Already, steam rose from its wounds and new flesh withered and knit, as the beast prepared to rise in a new and even more terrible form.

But ג was not afraid. For fear was for men.

And this, too, was part of the plan.

The task given to ג was many-fold.

To the faithful, ג brought hope.

To the lost, ג brought direction.

To the ignorant, ג brought knowledge.

And to the deviant, ג brought judgment.

For ג was the guide on the path that led to a New and Perfect Garden, one in which no serpents would be allowed.

By its great and terrible will, ג steadied the trembling hand of the vessel.

There could be no mistake in this final task.

ג rose the tip of Lindalcar high, pointing it toward the unseen, artificial sky of the factory hall.

With a voice of cold, passionless calm, ג pronounced the judgment:

"Third Movement: Casting Down the Brightest Star."

And Lindalcar answered, burning with a bright, stellar fire, as if a star had been captured and bound within the blade.

And ג brought the sword down.

And the task for ג was done. ג folded its immaterial wings, retreating within, into a death-like dream until ג was called once more.

Sen awoke, and yet, as always after, it felt more like he had fallen asleep.

The burning white fire of the Third Movement had consumed the Great Khan, mercifully brief—a final incandescent moment, leaving only scorched chitin and the echo of inhuman screams. Sen couldn't tell if he was relieved, or simply emptied out.

There was no point watching a Vril-ya burn. So Sen turned away, or tried to—only to find his legs cramped and his body aching, forcing him to sit among the wreckage, face to face with the charred, ruined husk.

He forced his mind away from the scene. Instead, he found himself longing for the clarity he'd just lost—that crystalline sense of purpose, where every thought had been sharp and pure, every motion inevitable. Now his memories of the fight felt alien, his thoughts muddy and weighed down by doubt. He missed that simple, terrible purity.

He remembered something from a philosophy class years ago—a story about a man who dreamt he was a butterfly, then woke uncertain if he was a man dreaming of butterflies, or a butterfly dreaming of being a man. Sen always felt like that after a transformation: each mask he wore just another mask, and the truth something that retired with the dream.

As he coughed dust from his lungs, his thoughts drifted to the Third Movement's aftermath. It only burned what needed to burn; there was no danger of fire spreading. Still, this was not a place to linger.

Using his sword as a cane, Sen hauled himself up and limped out of the ruined factory. He would have flown, but the Three Movements had drained Lindalcar. It would be a while before even the basic functions returned, and longer still for the advanced ones.

One step at a time, Sen made his way back toward what passed for safety—wondering, as always, which version of himself would greet the world on the other side.

But there were more immediate things to worry about. Not his body that ached like an overused tire, worn down to the treads. Not that his sword now needed time to charge, like a mobile phone.

No. He was worried about his crew.

Sen knew it was irrational. After all this time, and the even longer time it would take to get back to them… well, his team had either escaped, or they were already killed.

There was nothing he could do either way.

And yet.

There was the small, minuscule chance that they had been captured, and were merely waiting to be executed.

And that was enough.

Enough to make him try to reach them.

Even exhausted, bruised, and wounded.

And without transportation.

Sen let out a long, weary sigh. Lindalcar was drained, a dead weight in his hand. The city was a warzone. His body was at its limit. Escape seemed impossible.

But the sword was only one of his two anchors.

For a moment, Sen wanted to bang his head against the nearest wall. How could he have forgotten that?

But then he was too tired.

He closed his eyes, ignoring the ache in his vessel. He reached past the now-silent bond with his sword and sought the other thread in his mindscape. The other lifeline. It was a connection that stretched not to the weapon in his hand, but across the globe—a thin, steady, silver cord leading all the way back to the Enrichment Centre in Michigan.

He focused his remaining will and sent a single, simple pulse down that line. It was not a conversation. It was a flare fired in the dark.

He sent a single, urgent query down the line. It wasn't a call for help. It was a status check.

The team? Rock?

The response came back instantly, a feeling of confirmation from his familiar. Evacuation successful. All assets were accounted for.

A profound sense of relief washed through Sen, a feeling so potent it almost made him dizzy.

The next impression came, a query from the other side. Was extraction required for Herald?

Sen gathered his remaining will. His own escape would be a tiresome, logistical annoyance. His response was simple and absolute.

Negative. Preserve resources for more critical tasks. He could manage his own exfiltration.

The link went quiet, the acknowledgment received and, he knew, respected.

Sen opened his eyes and looked out at the smoke-filled sky of a foreign country descending into chaos. He was exhausted, wounded, and without his powers.

But his people were safe.

And that was enough.

Time to get to work.