Chapter 36

"What do you mean you've got a ghost in your chest?" Charlette, his sister, asked, peeking her head above the equipment she had been repairing.

"You can come read the scanner if you want but I know what I dreamt and now I've got this anomaly in my chest," Loyd responded holding out the scanner for her.

She took it and ran through the scan of Loyd's chest. She glanced up at him and then back to the scanner. "Hold still," she said leveling the scanner on him.

"I'm sorry, my back itches where Sara ripped out my heart."

"Big baby," muttered Sara from across the room.

The scanner beeped a few times then started its scan revealing that the anomaly in Loyd's chest fed into a nearly invisible aura that clad him in what looked like a set of knight armor.

"Well, now we have an armored demon. All he needs now is a sword and shield and we'll have the whole package," Charlette joked, handing Loyd back the scanner for him to look over.

His jaw almost dropped to the floor when he saw the scan. "You missed the part where I'm a white knight with a pure soul surrounded by evil energy!" he declared laughing and handing Charlette back the scanner.

Outside of his armored frame was a dark entity whose fingers were wrapping around Loyd.

"I'm not sure how I missed that! That looks awesome! Want me to make it our ad campaign's new project?" Charlette asked.

"We have an ad campaign?"

"Not yet but I can make one. Who knows what everyone will think when they see this!"

Linda entered the room with two of the kids who were hauling a box full of parts. "What's this about an ad campaign?"

"We were deciding whether or not this would make a good image to spread the word of us. It could change our image and maybe get us some extra support from Mars," Charlette announced.

"Oh? Let me see," Linda took the scanner and looked over it. "I think this looks like something about to snuff out that knight. How is this a good thing?"

"That white knight there is Loyd! I'm not entirely sure what that evil thing is though."

"Well, depending on the caption, I guess it could go either way then. What do you say, Loyd? Should we make you into more of a monster or try and get some better reviews?" Linda asked staring at Loyd intently.

Loyd thought on the matter for a moment. Should he try and get some better publicity or should he stay the villain of the universe? "Why not both?" he asked looking up at the others. "Why not just post the image with The Martian Swarm spread across the top in gold and let people make up their own minds?"

The two looked at each other thoughtfully. "That might work in our favor."

"And it might backfire we won't know until we do it!" Linda pointed out.

"Alright, then I'll go post it up everywhere I can and see if the news will be willing to broadcast it for the Crystalids to see as well. Since they're spying on our news feed anyways, why not mess with them?" Charlette said

"You do that. I'm going to see if I can finish this stupid nanolathe while you're gone," Loyd said rolling up his sleeves.

"I'll have the kids stay and help you then. Call me if they start bugging you too much," Linda sad waving goodbye and walking back down the hall.

Loyd got to work putting the final matter compressor into position for the nanolathe and had the kids handing him tools and other stuff while Charlette messed around on her computer.

xX In an office building somewhere on Mars Xx

"Hey, have you seen this image that was just posted a minute ago?" a tall black man asked over the cubicle wall.

"No, what is it?" a younger white man asked.

"Have a look for yourself. This thing looks friggin' awesome!" the black man said handing the white man a tablet with Loyd's picture on it.

"I don't know. That looks pretty horrible to me. That guy's about to have his soul ripped out or something," the white man said looking over the image.

"Really? I thought it looked like the guy was holding back something evil and unseen," the black man said taking back the tablet and looking back over it.

"No, I can see that now that you mention it. But what's the Martian Swarm? I've never heard of it," the white man agreed.

"I don't know. Maybe it has something to do with what's been going on with the news recently. Hey, Harold! Do you know what the Martian swarm is?" the black man shouted.

"No. Check the net if you don't know," Harold called back.

The black man did a quick search and caught a news story as it was starting.

"The Martian Swarm is the group causing most of the fuss on the news and is actively trying to leave the planet. The government views them as inhuman terrorists that have been involved in large scale destruction at both Greeley and Olympus Mons colonies. Not to mention they're threats to the lives of anyone who they deem is in their way. The group has stolen several hundred tons of raw materials and is currently moving across the open desert towards Greeley. Where they plan to ascend the now broken elevator cable and take it with them so that the colony might survive the impact of the cable." The reporter took a breath before continuing. "I don't know about the rest of you but I think these people just want to be left alone, seeing as they're trying to head off-planet. We've also gotten something else. This Martian Swarm has just put out something they are calling their ad campaign. In it, you see a young knight surrounded by some dark shadowy entity. They ask us not to say anything more about it so that you could all make up your own minds on the image but in my opinion, I think these people are the knights who have been attacked from the outside but refuse to yield."

The black man shut the sound off on his computer as someone turned on the TV in the corner of the room, so everyone could watch.

"Turn it up so we can all hear!" cried someone from the back of the room.

"...vote on their new website 'TheMartianSwarm' and tell them what you think their new ad campaign banner looks like. Are they the dark entity swallowing the knight or are they the knight trying to survive the onslaught of this dark entity? We'll cover the result after this break." The TV went into a lengthy ad while everyone pulled out their mobile devices and cast their vote. It was lunch break and most of them didn't have anything better to do, so why not?

"I still think that they're supposed to be the knight. Why would they campaign to be the villain?" the black man said, casting his vote.

"But the reporter said they were involved in two acts of terrorism! You can't deny that," another of his coworkers pointed out.

"Yeah, I see what you're saying but I stand by what I said," he replied.

"Hey! What are all of you doing?!" the floor manager asked, astonished to see so many people crowded around the TV and on their phones.

"We're casting our vote on what this groups ad banner looks like!" the newest employee said handing the manager his mobile device.

The manager looked over the image for a time, then smiled. "They can either be the knight or the demon? It's our choice what we see in them? If they're willing to give us that choice, then they could be either in their own eyes. Both parties could equally pull this off. The knight here could be letting you decide whether you choose to trust he's truly pure, or if he's already possessed. The demon could be letting you decide whether or not he's truly the demon, or if you think he's been good enough to be redeemed of his sins."

"So, which do you say it is?" the employee asked.

"I'd say they would be the knight. I could see them coming up with this kind of stunt easier than a demon," said the floor manager, handing back the phone and pulling out his own.

The reporter showed back up on the screen. "We have just a few seconds to go until we let the Martian Swarm know what we thought about their ad campaign. Have you voted yet?"

xX back in the engineering bay of the crawler Xx

"Did you really need to photoshop in the sword?" Loyd asked, rolling his eyes.

"I left off the shield," she quipped with a wide grin.

"Ugh," groaned Loyd.