Bonus Cleric Post: The Black Mariahs

Hutter

They looked ridiculous at a dead run. Sexless yet sensual with protective codpieces and pigeon breasted armor and thighs enormous from carrying it up endless flights of stairs and ramps and cornices. The crowd parted before them. Nobody wanted to get within arm's reach. Even brushing against them was enough to sever fingers, break bones, shave skin off muscle. Their falling bevors were peeled down so they could breathe easy as they ran and one of them had no lips and drooled steam through the gap in their perfect teeth. 

The largest one had no weapon and carried a dented shield painted with a woman embracing a barbed devil with the text HELL CAN'T BURN ME MORE THAN THIS encircling the act. The smallest wore a quilted jacket and had a carrion crawler wrapped around their shoulders like a stole. The bug held on tight with its tarsal claws but resisted the instinct to luxuriantly stroke the exposed mouth with its fluttering tentacles. To kiss and then to feed.

The middle one carried a gun. The inside of the barrel glowed, lit blue and purple by the charge rammed down the wide mouthed bore. An explosion already in progress held back only by the thin layer of sealing wax that kept the bullets from falling out.
 
Ahead of them was the terrace. The urban canyon that separated the Company neighborhoods from the wafer-thin alleys of red lit Elftown on the other side. The big one casually bundled the others into their arms without slowing. They both reached behind the giant's neck and held on to the dragstrap protruding between the gorget and backplate like a tongue of black leather. The brute pushed off with a single foot that left a cracked footprint in the yellow stone.

The moment held suspended in the air was a perk of the job, equivalent or better than the sex and potions and winning fights and the embrace of the Flesh God who drank the pain like water. To feel protected by armor and the thick body of the fighter. To fly. Over the Mulch at the bottom of the swale to the narrow balcony on the other side. Stumbling down the chute to another room that smelled like blood. Bathing, drowning in the heat and sweat of love.

The original Black Mariahs were local militias and collegia established by prostitutes, for protection against organized crime but especially for managing violent clients. The worst offenders were always adventurers with money to spend and difficulty controlling their destructive impulses. Learning to control these people was essential to survival in the oldest profession, and one of the most valuable services originally offered by the splinter of the old Symphony of Flesh mystery cult that became the Knacker religion.

The Black Mariahs as an organized mercenary SWAT team emerge around the establishment of the Knacker cult as one of the Commonwealth's founding religious corporations. The professional police forces created by the Old King were dismantled, often violently, as hated instruments of terror around the same time. This left the cities full of victorious rebels and their mercenary allies, accustomed to taking what they wanted by violence, with no functioning law enforcement to tame them.

The original etymology is obscure but the current generation of Mariahs get their name from the distinctive black gimp hoods they don during operations. Because of their outfits and their role punishing violations of the moral law the Mariahs are often syncretized with the Fever River cult (of whom the Momios are only the most cosmopolitan manifestation). Their custom is to wear scars from injury and disease proudly, healing only what inhibits their movement and perception. Like everyone else they scribe their armor and shields with cultic epigrams.

 

A PUZZLE OF FLESH 

DON'T YOU WANT TO FEEL WHAT COMES AFTER THIS?

EXPLODUM BASHUM

 

And the like. A great many are former prostitutes, still others are slave-soldiers from the Monarchy whose conditioning was broken through Suggestion.

The Mariahs draw up contracts for public protection with city governments or with the Trade Wardens of the largest colonies, usually paid for by taxes on dungeon treasure brought in by trading companies and resold at the Commonwealth's ubiquitous auction houses. In the current era of imperial expansion they are most often deployed in a counter-adventurer role. They function as a fantasy version of the cyberpsycho squad, sent in to restore order when urban violence escalates beyond the ability of mundane goons to contain. 

The black armored Fighters wade into the brawl wielding blunderbusses charged with magic handloads - Sleep and Hypnotic Pattern which come sparkling out the barrel to tame violent crowds. The Clerics strike with Hold Person and Silence to defang and disable dangerous targets. The Urban Druid unit backs up the main force with Carrion Crawlers, Rust Monsters and the occasional Umpleby when they need to deal massive single target damage fast. They finish off downed foes rather than taking them alive, giving them no chance to cast spells or stand up and fight again. They aren't detectives and anyone who wants to investigate after the fact is welcome to cast Speak With Dead on whatever remains.

 

I wrote this post to go with the other one about Clerics but didn't finish it in time. The mechanics of Begone FOE do not exactly fit the fiction of the old Meat Points series anyway. In Begone FOE you can recover all your health by resting and eating a ration, which strongly suggests that your flesh is not actually being chopped away and regrown when your HP changes.