52-The Fox

“So, are you going to explain what happened back there?” Alan asked once they were around a mile away from the camp.

“Certainly. The leader of the cult of Moloch agreed to let us go, based on the understanding that the two of you are pawns in my evil schemes, and those evil schemes will not harm Moloch’s interests directly in the short to medium term.”

“Wait, Moloch?! The evil god that people were sacrificing babies to in the Bible?!” Alan exclaimed.

“That does seem consistent, so I think that’s probably correct,” James said. “I never really studied the Bible.”

“What evil schemes are we pawns in?” Mitzi asked.

“All sorts of diabolical stuff,” James replied. “For one thing, we caused our last group to disintegrate into in-fighting, ultimately dying out.”

“Why on Earth would we do that?!” Alan asked.

“Well, it’s less of ‘we’ thing and more of a ‘me’ thing. One of my titles is that I’m the Chosen One of a certain evil god, so I used that as an explanation for why I’m going around infiltrating and destroying other groups.”

“Which you’re not actually doing, of course,” Alan said. There was a question in his tone, but James ignored it.

The idea that it was possible he might actually be infiltrating groups and destroying them from within was a little insulting, and he would’ve thought Alan knew him better than that by now—or at least knew him well enough to know that he would never admit to such a thing if it was true. The question in Alan’s tone was insulting either James’s character or his intelligence, depending on how James chose to take it.

“Based on that premise, he agreed that it was in his best interests that we keep doing what we’re supposedly doing,” James said.

“What an awful world they’re creating,” Mitzi said.

“You’re not wrong,” James said. “I don’t want people being sacrificed either.”

“Not just that. There are going to be people all around the world, slaughtering each other in the names of who-knows-how-many gods. It will be just like the ancient world, centuries past, except this time, the gods are real, and obeying them will give you real advantages, so there’s no reason to ever stop! Why would any divine being be cruel enough to think introducing this System and its gods into our world was a good idea?” Mitzi said.

“It’s possible that the System’s representatives have lied to us about why it’s come to our world,” Alan said.

“Maybe there’s some worse alternative that they’re protecting us from,” James suggested, suppressing the urge to shrug.

It was a thin thread, but if the System was telling the truth through its representatives, there had to be some worse alternative that they were avoiding by their integration into the System. It had presented itself as a blessing, and the System, whatever the faults of its divine beings, had never lied to James before as far as he knew. All the abilities he had been given worked exactly as the System described.

Recalling his initial interactions with the System Homunculus and Vinny, and the descriptions that Identify gave him for abilities and items, James thought the System was, in fact, brutally honest, even unpleasantly so.

It had no reason to lie to them about the System’s advent being a blessing; clearly it did not care about public relations. It was all powerful and authoritative, not reliant on public approval. There had to be a piece they were still missing.

“I don’t know what could be much worse than this,” Alan said quietly. “They’d better have a damn good reason for ripping us away from our lives.”

“It has to be some end of the world shit,” James murmured, as much to himself as to them. But what kind of end of the world is the System averting? I wish it would just tell us. I would want to prevent the end of the world, regardless of what Apophis wants. The world is where my family lives!

No one bothered to ask how James had come to be the Chosen One of an evil god. He hoped it was because that was obviously something he had stolen from someone else, but he also didn’t feel in good enough spirits to proactively try and clarify the issue. Let them draw their own conclusions.

The three walked largely in silence for the rest of the journey back.

James informed Alan and Mitzi that he didn’t want it to be obvious that they were going straight back to a camp they had just come from. If Moloch conveyed that they went directly to the Rodriguez camp, it would contradict some of what he’d told Rostov, which might provoke some future hostilities.

So James deliberately led them on a meandering route, in case Moloch was watching from above. The column of smoke remained an excellent landmark for navigation purposes, and he thought he managed to convey the impression that they were lost, without ever actually feeling like that was the case.

They more or less wandered until near dark, resting liberally since there was no rush, and when the sun had almost set, James took them in a straight line for the last fifteen minutes, until camp came into view.

James debriefed his inner circle in the largest tent, where Camila made her residence. James had quietly reassigned Chava’s residence to the tent next door now that Camila was ‘recovered’ and no longer ‘needed’ his constant attention.

He expected that in this place, Moloch’s ability to see “everything done under the sun” would be blocked even though the sun was still setting, and therefore that any plans made would be secret.

“So, you’re telling me that the camp you had us walk all this way to reach turned out to be hostile,” Chava summarized. “They’re sacrificing random people to an evil pre-Christian god. And your diplomatic party was lucky to make it away with their lives.”

“That’s about the long and short of it,” James said. “Fortunately for you, I didn’t lead the whole camp into his hands, or we would probably all be dead or marked for death now.”

“James proved he’s capable of playing the wolf as well as the fox, here,” Alan said in his defense. “If not for his quick thinking, I have no doubt we would all have been tortured and killed.”

James appreciated the kind sentiment. He judged that Alan’s faith in him was at a high point again now, where it had been rocky a few days ago. He sent a mental command to Chava not to argue any further on this point. They had more productive things to discuss.

“I guess we’ll have to be careful about dealing with other survivor groups,” Chava said blandly.

For now, the Rodriguezes would camp where they stood, the group agreed.

The young had already done well clearing out the trees in a small area around them, making a quick and dirty replica of the campsite the family had prepared when James first encountered them. Chopping down trees to reduce the reach of the forest had been effective back in spider territory, and it seemed likely to be effective here too.

“The question is what’s next,” Cliff said.

“Definitely traveling in a different direction,” Camila said.

“That’s for sure,” Alan affirmed.

“Yes, you all should prepare to move at first light. Not back toward the area we came from, but in a direction opposed to the smoke signal, for sure,” James said.

“What do you mean, ‘you all’ should move?” Mitzi asked. “What will you be doing?”

James sighed. “That maniac back there has at least one prisoner he’s torturing to death right now. Probably more. I have to do something about it, but I’ll make sure that you and your family are not involved.”

“Jesus Christ,” Alan groaned. “James…”

“Why do you have to do this?” Camila asked. Her face looked tense.

“What if you don’t get back to your family because you decided to do this alone?” Mitzi broke in. “How would you like us to explain to your wife that you decided to sacrifice yourself to save a bunch of strangers?”

“It doesn’t matter how you explain it, she wouldn’t believe that,” James said, trying not to laugh. She knows me too well for that. I wouldn’t go if I thought the situation was that dangerous. “And you won’t need to explain that, because it isn’t going to happen. Worst case scenario is that I fail at killing their prophet, or I fail at saving the hostages. The idea of me dying isn’t on the table.” He imbued the words with slightly more confidence than he really felt. Just sneaking into the Moloch camp would be a challenge, for the reasons Rostov had highlighted in James’s tour of the place. Once he was there, he didn’t think he would be spotted, if he was alone. And he certainly didn’t think they could kill him without several people higher level than he was.

“How can you be so confident?” Cliff asked. “I know you wiped out the spiders, and that’s real cool, but it’s different to fight humans. People are intelligent. They’ll come up with their own tactics to survive you.”

I guess I never mentioned the sentient spiders to Cliff.

“For that matter, how can you guarantee that the Prophet’s wrath won’t fall on this camp if you fail?” Alan asked.

“First, I’ve seen their defenses and their personnel. I’ve had the chance to gauge their strength. They’re stronger than your camp, no question, but only because of a few exceptional individuals. I can at least take those people out, especially when I have the element of surprise. The second point follows from the first. Even if I failed to get Rostov, he wouldn’t be able to manage any reprisals with just the rabble he’ll have left. His abilities aren’t offensive in nature. He’s a support class. And in the event that I fail, they won’t know where to strike for reprisals.”

“How’s that last part?” Cliff asked.

“Try to Identify me,” James said. A demonstration would be quicker than an explanation, and anyway, he wasn’t fond of explaining his Skills. Just doing things left a lot more mystery.

“Who the fuck is Octavius Root?” Cliff exclaimed after a moment.

“Probably not a real person,” James said. “The important thing is, that made up name doesn’t lead back to us.”

“I didn’t know you could fool the Identify skill, James,” Alan said. He sounded faintly suspicious, as if he wondered what other deceptions James had been responsible for in the time they’d known each other.

But James didn’t want to spend time reassuring him right now. If you don’t trust me now, you probably never will. You don’t need to know what all my powers are to know I’m on your side.

“If you’re creative with your Skills, you’ll surprise yourself with the things you can do, Alan.” James held up a Small Exoshield. He’d used a dagger to drill a pair of crude eyeholes into it while he waited for everyone to gather in the tent. “I’ll be wearing this to ensure it’s impossible to visually identify me as well.”

“You’ve clearly thought a great deal about this,” Mitzi said.

“Above all, I don’t want to put the group at risk,” James said firmly.

“I would still like to know.” Mitzi locked her gray eyes with James’s brown ones. “What should we tell your family in the event that you don’t come back from this suicide mission?”

James didn’t flinch.

“Tell my Mina that, counter to all of our shared expectations, I died doing the right thing, because I couldn’t stand to do anything less.”

That would be a good death, James thought. It would be all too easy for me to live long enough to see myself become the villain. Better not to subject her and our children to that. In some ways, I might be better off dead.

He took a breath and moved past that idea.

“Any other questions before I go and prepare for my suicide mission?” James asked, his tone ironic.

Heads shook. All but one.

“I want to know who’s supposed to be in charge until and unless you get back,” Alan said. “Who will keep the group safe, in the unthinkable event that you don’t return?”

“Well, I think this group in general is the leadership group. That’s why you’re the ones I wanted to explain this decision to.” James looked over the faces of the group members. They all looked unsatisfied with that non-answer. He sighed. “Cliff is probably the most dangerous besides me right now, so he can best keep you safe. If something happens to him, Mitzi is the next most lethal, if not more dangerous than Cliff, so I’d refer you to her. If that’s all, let’s adjourn this meeting.”

Even in the System world, meetings were apparently inescapable.

James was checking his gear and making sure he had everything he needed for both a stealth mission and a difficult fight, when Mitzi found him.

“This is really stupid,” the old woman said. “You going alone, I mean.”

“Are you trying to volunteer to go with me?” James asked lightly.

“Better me than someone else,” Mitzi replied. “Better that I die than a young man whose wife is about to have a baby. My life is mostly in the past already.”

“If we were just going to rain death on the Moloch cultists, I would take you with me for sure,” James said. “On a stealth mission, though, you’d mostly just increase my odds of being seen and captured.”

“You could have me stand far back and just watch to see if you get captured!” Mitzi exclaimed. She was clearly very troubled by being left behind again.

“Alright,” James conceded.

“I won’t take no for an answer this time! I’m sick of you and my husband trying to keep me—wait, what was that?”

“I said alright, I’m okay with this idea, you can come with me on the suicide mission,” James said. “You might die, but you know the risks as well as I do, and actually, if you’re just standing way back, looking to see if I’m spotted, you might be able to save me in the event that they get their hands on me. Raining death from the sky is probably the best way to deal with the Moloch camp. The only problem is that if you get captured, it’s not just you that gets killed. They’ll know for sure that at least Alan is in on this, and they’ll go looking for him. They’ll probably find the whole group. Whereas if it was just me, they’d probably be satisfied to just give me to Moloch as a sacrifice.”

“In short, all you wanted to say is that you didn’t really mean you’re okay with the idea. You just wanted me to be quiet while you raised your objections,” Mitzi grumbled.

“I was just thinking out loud,” James said. “I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want a fiery goddess of destruction with me on this mission. It just seems like a bad idea when I think about it a bit deeper.”

“This whole thing is a bad idea!”

“Yeah, but your participation is the part that makes it a bad idea for the whole group, as opposed to just a bad idea for my personal survival. Which I’m confident in, by the way. You know what, forget that heroic death speech I wanted you to give to Mina on my behalf. If I don’t come back from this, just tell her that I’ll be a little late for dinner.”

She threw her hands in the air and gave up.

“Fine, go on your suicide mission alone, then!”