The Good, the Bad, and the Didact

Nemesis

I stood on the center of the light bridge. The Didact was nowhere to be seen, the Composer's shielding and beam was empty where he once stood. I lowered my Incineration Cannon, which had only one round left in it. I didn't want to fight him, nor did I want to kill him. My heart was going a million miles an hour, as if waiting for him to pounce from wherever he was hiding to decide my fate. My heart would either stop beating by his hands, or beat once again with his own heart beside it. I would not have anything else other than one of those two choices.

"Didact, I know you're here. Come out, I don't want to fight you," I said, dropping my weapon and kicking it over the edge of the bridge. "Please, come out." I walked towards the beam, he was still not there. He was hiding, somewhere in the shadows.

The room had gone silent, except for the sound of the Composer's beam running endlessly down to Earth. I walked closer to the beam and suddenly his voice broke the silence.

"You persist too long after your own defeat," I quickly turned around, nothing was present. I could hear him but I couldn't see him. I turned to the beam. I heard his voice again, and this time it was close. "Come then, warrior, have your resolution."

I spun around and there he was, levitating a meter above the bridge, quickly descending, and he landed. His helmet covered his ancient vicious face, making him look more fierce than ever. I had not seen him wearing it since we first met.

"I will not fight you," I said as he walked closer to me.

"You are a powerful individual, and have proven yourself to be. Yet, you are a fool. Even now your kind tinkers with the Composer. But now it is only you who does so,"

"Didact, listen to me. The Gravemind's taking over your thoughts, leading you to continue to believe that humans deserve to become this in order to defeat the Flood. This isn't you......"

I reached out to touch him but his arm suddenly swung forward, and I was thrown halfway across the bridge.

I groaned in pain as I lay on my side after hitting the ground and hugged the blue-lit floor. The Didact's telekinesis was not something I could resist. He walked towards me, I couldn't get up, my arm was sore but unbroken, while the other one was slightly burnt from my battle with the Knights. Being tossed across the bridge felt more painful than ever.

"Didact.....please.....I know there is still good in you...." I said weakly. My body was unsteady from all the fighting I had done against his Prometheans to reach him.

The Didact came closer, he stood directly above me. "I made a mistake trusting you. You tried to save those humans on that station, believing it was a way to stop me, to bring me back to the heroic leader I once was. I shall never be that again. I made a mistake in letting you live,"

"Didact.....no......you need to stop this....." My eyes were sparkling with tears; I could not hold them in.

"It is my destiny to stop the Flood; you cannot stand in my way!"

"Didact, I don't want to fight you!" My tears were falling hard now as I tried to get up, but couldn't.

The Didact snarled, and somehow knew I would refuse to take him on. He looked down at me in a pitiful way, then his hand lunged towards me and he seized me by the throat with his telekinesis. The power lifted me off the ground and all I could do was float helplessly three meters away from him.

He turned to face the edge of the bridge; I looked down to see the swirling vortex approaching from the right. It frightened me, falling down into that void wherever it would take me.

"Didact, you were once a powerful Warrior-servant with strong beliefs in the Mantle! Even, though you opposed humanity; who would one day hold the Mantle, I would have seen you as a mentor to me back then! That was the good in you! I want that you back! But you've gone mad, all because of the Gravemind's control of your mind! The last Gravemind ever known has probably died of starvation on the Ark four years ago! You can break free, please just try!" I cried out to him, unable to move from his power restraining me.