Decker found the old safe house just as the Kinship was preparing the for move. Ophelia met him outside when he landed, still wearing her makeshift helmet. She wasn't happy to see he was alone.

"Where's Ranger Aranarth?" she asked.

Decker looked at her darkly behind his helmet.

"She killed him," he said.

"What?" demanded Ophelia.

"With some kind of Inxon weapon I can't even describe. She blew his suit to pieces like his shield wasn't even there and then reduced him to... molecular dust or something. I don't know for sure what happened. He shot her with an ion pistol a half dozen times and nothing happened."

"She's already using Inxon technology?" asked Ophelia, eyes wide.

"Oh yeah," said Decker. "Her Suit is different too. And she can seemingly breathe the air on this planet. I have no idea what she's capable of now."

"What are we going to do?" asked Ophelia. "What are we going to do?"

She's asking me, thought Decker, we really are sprelled.

"We need to make our way back to the Cat's Pajamas," said Decker. "Get off the planet and warn A.R.C. of what's going on. Are you authorized to fly it? Will it recognize you?"

"It should," said Ophelia, thoughtfully. "I don't know if Helios changed anything. I don't know how far in advance she planned all this."

"According to her pretty far, actually," said Decker. "We should leave as soon as we can. How long until your Suit is ready?"

"A few hours."

"We'll have to wait here then. The ship won't let me fly it and you're in no condition to travel that far in this desert without your Suit."

"I made it here didn't I?"

"Yeah a third of the distance with a group of well supplied, experienced desert dwellers. What if we get there and the ship won't let us in?"

"My Suit should be back by then," insisted Ophelia.

"'Should' isn't good enough," said Decker. "If you miscalculated, or just if your Suit decides to be extra thorough after the beating it took, you could die out there."

"I have a deathward."

"Yeah but where would that leave me? Alone against Ranger Helios."

"She's not a ranger anymore," said Ophelia, gravely.

"I guess not," Decker agreed.

"QX," said Ophelia. "I suppose we should play it safe. I'll let you know as soon as my Suit is ready. We really have no time to spare."

"Let's go down to the safe house where we're less exposed."

* * *

The Kinship left for another safe house, and Decker and Ophelia were left alone to wait for her Suit to finish repairing. It was excruciating. 

Ophelia sat on the ground with her legs awkwardly folded, staring off blankly into space. Decker tried not to look like he was watching her.

Every second they waited felt like an hours. They had to get to the ship before Helios got to them. After what happened to Aranarth Decker was certain they had no chance against her in a fight.

<There's something approaching. It looks like a Suit.>

<It looks like a Suit or it is a Suit?> thought Decker.

<I choose my words very carefully,> replied the Suit.

"Something's coming. It could be Helios. Scratch that, it's almost certainly Helios," said Decker.

"We need to run!" insisted Ophelia.

"Let's go."

They ran up the stairs and out through the entrance under the tall rock. The wind was howling, causing their cloaks to flap violently. 

"She's coming in fast!" Decker warned, after a warning of his own from his Suit.

"We should hide... or..." Ophelia desperately tried to think of a better idea.

The thing that wasn't quite a Suit came streaking through the air at dangerous speeds. It was already visible in the sky. It maintained its high velocity until a microsecond before touching the ground, when it landed like a leaf.

It wasn't Helios. At least it didn't look like her. It was a humanoid mechanical creature, like someone had tried to build a man out of Suit components. Indeed, this is what had happened. Parts of it weren't properly connected, and seemed to be held in place with force fields.

"Squire," it said, in an approximation of Aranarth's voice.

"Ranger Aranarth?" asked Ophelia, curiously.

"You've both disappointed Ranger Helios and myself. I hope you realize that," said Aranarth. "I had high hopes for you, squire. Neither of us wanted to have to hurt you."

"It's not him!" shouted Decker. "Helios must have gotten her hands on his deathward! By the wounds of Tellus!"

Decker's stomach knotted. How could she? They were friends! What has she done to him? What had she taken from him?

<I need a Perjurer,> thought Decker.

<I can't. Not without permission.>

<You can't be serious!>

<Look what's already happened thanks to a Suit breaking the rules. The rules exist to avoid situations like this. I won't further contribute to it by becoming a rule breaker myself.>

Decker stopped paying attention to his Suit. The creature began to aim its wrist as though it were a firearm. Decker was already in the air, flinging himself forward with an AG burst far in excess of the safety parameters. The creature fired a wrist-mounted mass driver. The slug exploded against his shield in a black starburst, popping it, but Decker didn't slow down.

Using the momentum of his flight he swung his fist at the face of the Aranarth monster. The punch connected hard. Decker came to a skidding halt a few meters beside Aranarth, kicking up sand.

Aranarth's face was turned to one side. It was slightly dented, but just slightly. The attack hadn't been entirely ineffective.

It laughed a mean spirited parody of a laugh.

"Yes," it said, "I accept. Very appropriate."

Aranarth assumed a fighting stance. It was familiar to Decker; he had seen the stance hundreds of times.

Decker guessed Aranarth would open with a kick, which he did. Aranarth also copied Decker's trick of adding some oomph to his attack with an AG burst. Decker was already dodging before the kick had been launched. Aranarth tried to compensate mid-kick but he was too slow. Decker got inside his guard and rocketed himself upwards with his own AG burst, uppercutting Aranarth as he passed.

Aranarth shot up into the air after him.

Ophelia watched from the ground, cursing her lack of a Suit.

Decker saw Aranarth coming up behind him fast, so he send himself hurtling downwards with another AG burst in the other direction. He hoped to hit the machine with another punch but instead he caught a kick to the gut before he could get close enough. Shards of his Suit were knocked loose and he went shooting diagonally towards the ground. The creature was much stronger than Decker, even in his Suit.

Decker spun himself around in the air and, moments before he would have hit the ground, flung himself back up into the air with as much force as his Suit could muster. He aimed a wild hay-maker at Aranarth.

Aranarth dropped down to avoid Decker's attack, grabbing his leg on the way down. He rapidly increased speed, slamming Decker into the rock above the entrance to the safe house with tremendous force. Pieces of both the rock and Decker's Suit were knocked loose. Decker bounced off the rock and fell towards the ground.

Decker struggled to regain control of himself in the air but Aranarth didn't let up the pressure for a second. He fired towards Decker and kicked him straight down. Decker embedded several meters into the sand. A huge cloud of it filled the air.

<This is ridiculous,> scolded the Suit. <You can't engage in fisticuffs against that thing. You'll get us both killed.>

<Give me a Perjurer or shut the sprell up,> thought Decker.

He stood up in time to see Aranarth flying straight for him. He ate a punch to his helmet that knocked him several meters into the air again. This time at least he was able to get control of himself in the air and land of his feet. Sand was everywhere now, it was almost impossible to see anything.

Decker leapt from side to side a few times to confuse his position. Now neither of the combatants knew where the other was.

<Can you see anything?> Decker asked his Suit.

<Not in this much sand,> admitted the Suit.

Decker saw a shadow in the cloud he was sure was Aranarth and launched himself at it. It was just a trick of the light, but his use of AG gave away his position. Aranarth kicked him in his helmet again and his visor flickered as he was slammed into the ground. Some of the poison atomsphere and sand got in while it was down. Decker began to cough.

Without needing to be asked the Suit deployed its physical visor.

Decker struggled to his feet, still coughing. Aranarth waited until he was standing to hit him with a three-punch combination followed with a kick to the chest. Decker wasn't able to defend himself intelligently. He went down hard.

Decker tried to stand again but Aranarth pushed him down with his foot. The sand began to blow away in the harsh winds, revealing the Aranarth creature standing over his downed opponent.

"How arrogant of you to think you could ever beat me in a hand-to-hand fight. You had potential, squire, but nothing more," said the thing that thought it was Aranarth. "You never lived up to it. You could have counted yourself among the great heroes of the human race. Instead you're going to die here, forgotten, in the desert. Goodnight."

Decker could hear the mass driver in the thing's wrist coming online. Suddenly he saw red, heard a metallic thunk, felt a burning heat... and Aranarth was gone.

Decker looked around desperately and then he saw it. Aranarth pinned to the head of some kind of rocket by a tractor beam, firing up into the sky on the back of a blazing red torch drive. He was struggling but it didn't seem to be doing him any good.

Ophelia was standing twenty meters away, her Suit fully deployed, her arms outstretched in front of her. Decker looked back up at the sky. Aranarth was still flying up into space.

"Did you just shoot him into orbit?" he asked Ophelia, standing unsteadily.

"That was part one," replied Ophelia, putting her hands down.

There was a massive explosion in the air. The rocket and Aranarth were gone, annihilated in an antimatter reaction.

"That was part two," she said. "What was all that about? Why didn't you just shoot him?"

"My Suit is still obeying Ranger Aranarth's old orders. It won't warp me in any weapons."

"Are you kidding me?"

"I am not."

"Sam-Sam's Suit, you are an idiot."

"How long are you going to keep calling me that?" asked Decker.

"Until one of us dies," replied Ophelia.

<Tell her I disagree,> interjected the Suit.

<I will not, she's right.>

"We need to get going," said Ophelia. "There's no time to waste."

"Right," Decker agreed.