Darkness. We can only perceive the presence of those gathered through the rhythmic thumping of wooden staffs beaten into the ground. The voice of The V1sion fills the air.
“Appearances can be deceiving. That much I have always told you. Our eyes believe what they want to see, what we tell them to. But the foolish follow blindly where the Third Eye sees the truth.”
“We gather because we know what the sheep do not. They are the weak, the unseeing, and shall be severed like a dead limb, for that which blinds us only holds us back from glory. It is not pleasant, no, but necessary.”
“I see a body. To the eye, it would seem healthy. No unseemly lumps, broken bones or blemishes. But we trust not our eyes and see the body more closely.”
“We listen to the laboured sound of the breathing, the cough that lingers just a little longer than necessary. And we know what the others do not. The body is sick. Infected with a plague that kills from the inside out. We either deal with the sickness, or isolate the body to stop it from infecting others. It is not pleasant, no, but neccessary.”
“I have been infected with such a sickness. Undeniably so, I can feel it burning within me. The cancer of betrayal. The anger that builds from the vile actions of one that called himself friend once upon a time. A rage that fills every fiber of my being. I cannot see it, but I know that it is there. I feel it in the tension of my muscles, the headache that just won’t go away. But it will not consume me, for I have the cure. I simply need to sever the weak limb that caused it and I will be cancer-free.”
“Left untended, such sicknesses will consume the common man. Jackson Cade found that out the hard way. Consumed by the plague of vengeance and justice, blind him to everything in his path. He saw only what his eyes wanted him to see. Jasper Redgrave. The sickness grew, consumed him and left him for dead. A career in tatters and with not a single living being in the APD that would risk being his partner. No, only artificial intelligences can risk getting to close to such a plague.”
“Doctor Death has become a victim of such a plague. He coughed out the plague of betrayal as Walther did all those years ago when he betrayed the Third Eye itself. He may have played the Mariachi like a fiddle, but his sickness will consume him in the end. He sees only the plans he has lain before him, not the path he walks to destruction.”
“Such is the nature of sicknesses. Silent killers that rear their pestilence only when it is too late. Appearances can be deceiving, so let us not be fooled by plagues. Sicknesses must be contained, removed from the body like the dead, blind eyes of humanity. Time has come to rid Arcadia of the plagues of betrayal. It is not pleasant, no, but necessary. ”