“...and what’s worse,” Deacon Mark continued, “is you don’t see what you did wrong.” 

“Because I didn’t do anything wrong!” JJ said, anger churning his stomach. “I took out a drug dealer, who could’ve been working for the cartel. If anything, I saved more innocent people from the spores’ awful influence.” 

“Like the five innocent people you knocked out?” 

“They’re not innocent! They’re addicts, who deserve to be in a cell with the dealer.” 

Disgust flitted over Deacon Mark’s face. It was an odd look for him. Normally, the closest thing to a negative emotion that shone in his dark, folded eyes was annoyance, quickly covered up by insurmountable patience. 

But not today. Instead, he rose from his chair and paced around his office, hands behind his back. He moved away from his desk, across the wall lined with bookshelves, and stopped at the floor-to-ceiling windows. The cityscape splayed before him, but there was one particular place the priest stared: miles of impressive edifices and busy streets lay between the city’s Autonomous temple and Howin, its dirtied buildings like a foreboding dark cloud besmirching an otherwise serene sky. 

“All these years at this temple, and you’ve learned nothing,” Deacon Mark said. 

“Nothing useful.” JJ folded his arms. “Except for how to be a hypocrite.” 

“And how, in your infinite wisdom, are we hypocritical?” 

“Freedom!” JJ roared. “One must be free to live life’s passions. That is the only way to please the Eternal Titans. So we must embrace that freedom and lead true lives! 

“Until, of course, anytime I disagree with you. ‘Oh, you want to use your Titan-given Gift to remove the blight in our city and make this place safer for every good, law-abiding citizen? No, don’t do that. Read these books and argue with pretentious know-it-alls instead.’ Because that will help people.” 

“There are institutions which handle what you described. If you were so keen on bringing evildoers to justice, you should have joined the Peace Keepers instead of the church.” 

“You mean the Peace Keepers who don’t do their job? How many Serene attacks have there been the last couple weeks, and what have Peace Keepers done to stop them?” 

“It takes time to deal with an entire terrorist cell. I’d have thought you, one who cared so much about helping law-abiding citizens, would understand this.” 

“It only takes time because stupid regulations supposedly stop them from doing their job. Which is why I’m here. They have to follow the law. As the church, we are the law.” 

Deacon Mark turned, venom in his stare. “Those are the words of a despotic ruler who cares nothing for any semblance of order!” 

“I’m not wrong!” Now JJ was on his feet, his face reddening. “Or what? Are you going to tell me President Weaver isn’t also the head of the church?” 

A vein throbbed in Deacon Mark’s neck. “Even President Weaver is beholden to the laws of our ancestors, her predecessors. If she did whatever she wanted without keeping to the laws, we would not live in a republic.” 

JJ scoffed. “Republic. Tell me, Deacon, how many votes a priest’s is worth. How many more votes does a bishop have over a provincial representative? An archbishop? The cardinals?” 

A priest’s vote was equal to a representative’s vote, while a bishop’s was two times greater and an archbishop’s was five times. Meanwhile, the cardinal of each of the natural sects had a whole ten votes each, while the cardinal for the Perpetual sect had twenty. And while the populace voted on county representatives, senators, and governors, those who rose up the religious hierarchy were promoted by higher members of the church. 

And no average citizen voted for the president, just political officials and – of course – members of the church who were Wielders. 

“So everyone within the church shares the same ideology?” Deacon Mark said. “We all agree on the best way to bring the Titans’ teaching to our people? And so you, a neophyte, have the authority to do whatever you want because of what our president, our Pontifex Maxima, theoretically has that power?” 

JJ scowled. He’d debated with his peers, but Deacon Mark had at least twenty years on him. Years of reading and praying and debating and praying and reading and... 

“This is stupid,” JJ grumbled. “I should be able to help people however I want.” 

Deacon Mark took a deep breath, his usual patience finally returning. “Until you stop seeing anarchy as freedom and people fallen to addiction as evil, you’re not fit to help anyone.” 

JJ scowled. “So what’re you going to do?” 

“What you’ve forced from me,” Deacon Mark said. “As of this moment, you are placed under house arrest. You cannot leave the temple grounds, nor leave a chaperone’s sight until these vigilante notions have been washed from your head.” 

Now, JJ’s face was steaming. “Oh, yeah, that’s true freedom: a prison.” 

JJ stormed from the room. Deacon Mark’s office was in the lower part of the east tower, so it wouldn’t take long to reach the main hall. Unfortunately, the last person JJ wanted to see was waiting outside of the room. 

“Hey–” Paul began. 

“Don’t talk to me,” JJ said. “Ever again.” 

JJ charged down the stairs, leaving his fake friend behind. The only way they could keep him in this temple was if they brought literal guards to tie him up and throw him in a room. And if this church wanted to brainwash him, while all he’d done was help clean up the streets, then he was done with it. 

So he ran, away from a place he’d spent six years learning and working, back into the city, where he’d finally do more good work.