[b][u]Prodigal Son | Ko Rudo Mountains, Tatakai[/u][/b] Lucien wandered the endless expanse contained within Tatakai's mountain range. His boots treaded lightly upon the hard rock, ending what little silence was held with such minute noise. His thick leather coat blew slightly in the dormant breeze, the guns strapped to his bandoliers resisting the low temperatures of the mountain. He dwelled upon his sins. He dwelled upon his failure to protect Alister, whisked away and wrapped up in business that was not even his to conduct. Until a presence overcame the entire area. The man felt the hair stand on the back of his skin, immediately drawing his sword in one hand and revolver in the other. Violet-blue flames danced around the edge of his blade as his mind fought with itself, trying not to be torn apart by the mere presence of the anomaly. It was as if whatever was causing the presence was an anathema - its very existence was a crime to life itself. It should not be, yet it was. A six white flashes lit up in front of Lucien, each one heralding a flaming round that traced the air with blue flames. He raised his sword in a blur to at least deflect a few of them, only to be met with the superheated rounds impacting so quickly he did not even have time to register. He fell to one knee and stabbed his sword into the ground to balance himself. Expecting his regeneration to have already mended his wounds, he attempted to get up but struggled - the shooter had targeted points on his body that would have trouble regenerating from burning attacks. Whoever they were, they had knowledge of Lucien's anatomy and mutated cells. But blue fire? He knew there were others that wielded flame of the same colour, but on a cellular level he felt his own mutated flesh writhe in agony. These flames were the product of someone like him, someone who had been inoculated with the same strain of the mutated stem cell virus in order to produce the signature cobalt flames. Such a thing was not possible, however. He would have to be dead in order for someone to gain his inoculation. "Who are you?" Lucien asked as he tilted his head upwards to view his assailant. The figure in front of him had the height of a boy, only about 5'6. A height like that normally would not have intimidated anyone, but something about this stranger was unsettling. The overcoat adorning his body was thick and leathery, similar to Lucien's, but did not seem to be made of any regular material. The rough texture upon its black surface reminded Lucien of the dragons of the Old Earth, fictional creatures created in literature and fantasy. Yet here this man stood with an overcoat bearing the scales of a beast as well as a necklace of reptilian talons. The coat seemed to have ceramic shoulder guards upon it, with one pauldrons having the emblem of a coiled red cobra painted upon it. However, it had a knife slash gouged through it, giving the appearance of the cobra's head severed from its body. Beneath the open overcoat was a somewhat peculiar shirt. A grey t-shirt with the caricature of a gas mask with the word "PYROMANIAC" written under it in a chicken-scratch scrawl. What was most unsettling was his mask. An armoured helm clad in metal, with various attachments and antennae all converging into one militaristic helmet. What had Lucien's attention the most was the single bright blue optic at the centre of his face, gazing into his soul like an intense Cyclops. In his hand was a Mateba revolver with feathery engravings, flames licking the barrel from the barrage from before. Lucien's eyes wandered to the breast pocket of the stranger's coat as he continued to struggle to get up. On his lapel was yet another emblem, a cobalt Phoenix surrounded by a lighter blue flame. "Ah, so you are this Cobalt Phoenix I hear so much of." "He said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds? Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself! Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have," the man quoted. His voice was gravelly and rough, like he had not spoken in decades. "Luke chapter 24, verses 38-39. The Old World Bible," Lucien stated. He had learned the Holy literature of Earth with his time spent collecting information from Iconoclast data caches back on Mars. "Correct, Lucien Farcòn. While I am not the Messiah nor proclaim to be, I am Reckoning incarnate - your reckoning, in fact. Beyond ethereal yet not corporeal, made flesh but not entirely." Willing his body to create a brittle exoskeleton of bone around his wounded limbs, he leapt forward and fired a .410 shotgun shell from his revolver before slashing upwards with his flaming curved sword. The Phoenix was seemingly not taken aback by the buckshot at all, so he met Lucien's sword by raising his hand - a katana burning into existence within it just in time to block the attack. It had Oriental depictions that ran all along the blade, almost exactly like Lucien's. [i]Buckshot was stopped by the leather - or something behind it?[/i] Lucien thought to himself quickly as he saw the remnants of his ineffective .410 shot embedded in the man's coat. While his opponent was shorter, he had enough strength to wield his katana with one hand with his pistol in the other. "It is funny how hypocritical you are. Hunting down others, claiming to destroy the demons within them using your own," the Phoenix stranger said as the heat around his own blade began to distort the air around the two. Fire radiated between them in waves, swirling them in a circle and eventually burning away to reveal a different scene. Houses, some half-finished remnants covered in Martian dirt and completed by haphazard wood and others being pure shacks of scrap material. It mattered not, however. Everything was drenched in blood and engulfed in blue flames. Rivers of red flowed down the dirt paths of the settlement, with half-eaten corpses serving as islands of offal amidst a sea of blood. Lucien's eyes widened in horror as he realized where he was. "No... No..." "Yes indeed. Auburn Steppes of Olympus Island - the settlement you massacred and burnt to the ground." Shuddering in terror, Lucien backed up a few steps away from the stranger and almost slipped on a hand that was separated from its body. He caught himself quickly enough, disgusted by the scene around him - the massacre he had caused all those years ago. "I was... I was someone different back then. So full of hatred... I know I can never atone for my sins, but I never rest in ensuring that nobody ever does this again -" "Ensure? Please, Lucien. You are nothing but a self-entitled bastard who thinks of himself as a justiciar, hunting down those who can't control their powers. The only atonement that awaits you is death." Lucien's arms and legs became a blur as he rushed towards the stranger, firing a .410 shotgun shell at him before slashing sideways with his flaming sword. Phoenix's own sword clashed, creating another small explosion of fire. [i]Buckshot pellets got stuck in the coat... either tough material, or there is a layer of something like my nano-cellulose stopping the pellets.[/i] "Who are you?" Lucien shouted as he tried firing his pistol into Phoenix's gut point-blank beneath the clashing blades. His arm was knocked to the side by Phoenix's own, which also held a revolver. With a single trigger squeeze a powerful shotgun shell of thermite and ceramic shards drove through Lucien's body, scorching organs and burning his tainted blood. This knocked Lucien back, making him fall to one knee and holding his sword's tip to his chest. The stranger, Phoenix, laughed before his chuckling turned into a hacking cough. "Do it, Lucien. Embrace your hatred. Show me that your inner demons thrive within you! SHOW ME THE REAL YOU!" "SHUT UP! YOU KNOW NOTHING OF MY SINS!" "On the contrary, Lucien," Phoenix whispered as he positioned his own katana over his belly. "I know them the best." (CONTINUED BELOW)