by M.C. O'Neill
***
Deep within the dock of Thelemic Ark Morning Star, Mavriel paced back and forth between ranks of iron golems. Just weeks before, that very space had held the beast Choronzon in check. The vessel was Commander Uriel’s central base of operations for the Atlantean theater and would remain so until the campaign was finished.
There would be very little time before Second Lieutenant Quen’die Reyliss came bounding like a happy kitten into the bays for her first true battle as an ADF regular. For this, the angel was proud of her as she was indeed chosen to do this and chosen well. It seemed so rushed, however, as he was forced to say his goodbye to her that afternoon and she was none the wiser.
Quen'die was something of a very important person around her new home of the newly-dubbed “Camp Morning Star” that had been appropriated just weeks before by Quen’die and the angelic forces. Considering that she was chosen by Ui Himself, the angels in her attendance watched her like a hawk to ensure her safety. It was tantamount that the maiden be safe and secure for the momentous day of the grand push.
Life was cozy at times, as far as her emotions went, since she was in the company of her friends, her nanna and most of all, Mavriel. When it came to physical rigor, it was a different story. Her deva and Commander Uriel had honed her battle skills every day without a seeming rest as time was wasting for the counterassault. The other elves were not immune to this training either, as all ADF conscripts were sparring and shooting and conditioning in long shifts nonstop; even the elves that had just been liberated from the stinking prisons of the thelemic bladders deep in the ark’s innards. Nobody living in that pyramid was idle unless they were at death’s door.
Day after day, the maiden had become ever closer to her deva and each time she awoke from her sleep (which was more like an extended nap) it was almost assured that he would be right there within minutes to begin the new day. She could never wait to begin her training as each session was filled with laughter and warmth that made life worth living and the earth a most worthy home. In some ways, things could not be any better, and she never wanted those terrible days to end as long as she could be with Mavriel.
“Mavriel!” she squealed from behind him. Her voice sounded so young and maiden-like despite the grim controller’s robes she wore. For her appropriation of the ark, that special uniform had the Royal Heroic Gold Standard pinned to its breast. It was the highest military honor an Atlantean elf could hope to attain. Only the truest heroes of the kingdom had such a medal bequeathed unto them. Without another word, she leapt on his frame and squeezed him like a warm stuffed animal made of stone.
As for the deva, he was adorned in glistening white armor. Quen’die couldn’t discern its exact material as it could have been white gold, cured ivory, or a substance altogether alien. On one giant pauldron, the identification Grigorian: IX was embossed with heavenly force. Looking up his chest, she met his toasty eyes. His glow was all the power that she needed to fuel her first golem run. “Tam’s almost ready with the boot station. Are we going to do this?”
“Yeah,” he intoned with some frailty that the maiden could detect with ease. “Ready to ‘do this.’”
Quen’die looked at him astonished. “Don’t tell me you’re afraid of this battle, Mav! The behemoths are big, but we can tear them to shreds!”
“No, it’s not that,” he was already hushing his ward with the soft tips of his fingers. “You won’t…like this.”
Her young joy was gone as shock and worry raised the red wisps of brow on her forehead. “What? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing is wrong, but after this charge, my duties take me elsewhere,” he lowered his face away from hers in a variety of shame that was unfamiliar to him. “I just wanted to tell you before you set off. Just in case.”
“Why?” her ears twittered in annoyance as the rest of her squad filed into the dock.
“Colonel Na’rundi informed me earlier that my boss needs me in Kumari after this,” he stated stonily. “You remember Indra.”
“Yeah, the one with the four wings and red skin. But I thought Ui was your boss,” she reminded the deva with confusion.
He smiled a slight split. “Heh, well yes, He is, but Indra is my direct supervisor. He manages all of the devas. It’s a personal favor. His father-in-law, Puloman, is an asura and Indra doesn’t want to create drama with his wife, so, basically I have to supervise the battle for his ark. When you get married one day, you’ll understand this.”
Quen’die didn’t want to marry any dumb elf. She just wanted Mavriel and him only. Even if they could not have a proper relationship, she still figured that she could see him every day and that would be enough for her. “When will you be back?”
He sucked in the odd air of the ark’s dimension. For the first time in his existence, he felt like he actually needed oxygen. “I won’t be. This run is our last activity together. My job here is finished.”
“Mavriel! No!” Although she was a golem commander and her squadron was close at hand, she could not hold back her instant tears. She gritted her teeth so that her subordinates would not hear her sob.
“Please don’t leave me,” she tipped her lips up to his ear and whispered. “Help…”
“I’ll never be far away. Not really.” he hushed back. “I promise you this.”
“Puppet Fire One. Three minutes to action. Please don your halos,” Captain Tam’laa Na’rundi’s voice reverberated throughout the docks. Quen’die had grown to love her friend, but she cursed her countdown in silence. She needed more time for this cruelty, but could there ever be enough?
Tam’laa Na’rundi enjoyed a rather honeyed time nestled within the reclaimed Morning Star under the command of her father. As she and On’dinn would engage in sorties of supply runs during the daytime when infernal interference was lightest, she and the lad had served as a pair of the many vital citizens who had risked their lives to accrue medicine, food, and materials in order to replenish the needs of the hunkered citizenry of Corosa. The gold elf’s ability to lead an insertion and extraction to those most important depots of sundries had awarded her the lofty rank of captain in the ADF at the age of sixteen. A bit of nepotism due to her father’s standing couldn’t be dismissed either.
The young gold elf became much better friends with Quen’die and Mavriel in that short time while training in the ark. Despite the initial tensions, Tam’laa was able to mitigate the suspicions her friend had toward On’dinn and had at last cleared his name from the blame leading to Quen’die’s arrest. On’dinn always admired Tam’laa’s diplomatic qualities and her ability to keep her head cool as she could see the big picture without getting herself entangled in so much drama. Quen’die, on the other hand, had developed a temper the color of her hair in that month in the pyramid and her rekindled friendship with the lad remained uneasy at best.
What a horrible occasion and way to say goodbye, the grey maiden lamented to herself. “Mavriel, please show me some kind of a sign after this. I need you so much!”
“I will,” he smiled in earnest. Quen’die knew that he would never tell her a lie. At least, she didn’t think so. Upon chewing on that supposition, she remembered that he had told her upon their initial meeting that he was from the outback of Avalon.
With wet eyes, she turned toward her golem’s sarcophagus, sniffing. “I-I’ll trust you on that!”
“Quen’die, I won’t leave you alone for this,” she felt his hand bless her shoulder. “I will be right over you the whole time.”
She turned to meet that touch as she sucked back the fright of losing him as well as the briny sorrow in her throat. She wanted to savor his image right in front of her as she wondered in horror if she would never meet him with such closeness ever again. “Then I won’t say ‘goodbye.’ If you can tell me to my face that you will never really leave me, then I won’t say it.”
Mavriel’s eyes lit and he agreed that she held a righteous philosophy on the matter. Peering into her green gaze, he made th
e best vow he could in their short time left, “Very well, Quen’die Reyliss, I will never really leave you.”
Anger began to turn her back inside out. Order or no order, it was a cheap shot to tell her farewell right before a charge, even if he had established with her before that he wasn’t ever going to put a ring on it. There was no time to prepare for the bad news, and it was as simple as that. Which was worse? To know that their time was limited from the beginning or to have such terrible knowledge thrown right in her face like ice water as it was? She growled her unintelligible disdain to Jugger. The battle puppet was bedecked in gold leaf and flowery wreaths. Someone in her squad had painted a crude smiley face on his dead countenance.
“Come on, Fatso, let’s roll out!” she knocked on the extramaton’s hull as she slapped her halo over her skull. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to kick a behemoth’s backside or Indra’s. Or Mavriel’s for that matter.
Iron golems were a rarity worldwide. During preparations for the grand counterassault, underground smithies had to retool the majority of the earth’s extramatons. As most were hewn of cured wood or ivory, the smiths had to lace their hulks with the metal in order for them to compete in battle against their infernal aggressors. Jugger was an exception as he was built from iron through and through.
One minute later, a familiar surge to her nervous system ran through her body. “Good day, Quen’die Reyliss. Ready for work!” the halo sang.
“Two minutes to action! Scouts are away!” Tam’laa boomed. Mavriel was gone and airborne as he was leading those cycles along with a host of angelics. He was gone just like a wonderful dream that was rudely interrupted. How Quen’die wished to be flying alongside him. He would be right above her head for the entire battle, but he might as well be on Mars as far as she was concerned.
Quen’die and her squad led their golems out of their greasy coffins in preparation for the charge. Jugger had been summoned to life and trudged his iron weight in unison with his ferrous brothers.
“Puppet Fire One, align to your positions and prepare to charge,” the gold elf’s voice resounded through the air. “One minute to action!”
Quen’die was somewhat grateful that she had missed her deva’s departure. He was so fast, but she knew that she would lose it if she had seen him disappear into the ark’s phony wall. Her maidens couldn’t see her in such a state or they would lose all morale for the battle.
“All right, ladies! Let’s kick some demonic butt!” Quen’die hollered to her squad with her welled-up anger.
“So be it!” the troop responded in a salty chorus. Their normally higher-pitched voices seemed so full and adult at that moment.
“In three-two-one. Charge!” Tam’laa’s order shook the chamber.
Puppet Fire One set off like a pack of dire wolves in a race. Quen’die led the box formation of golem handlers while she was just feet behind her iron hulk. Her lungs were as strong as ever, and she wanted to catch glimpses of Mavriel up in the sky as soon as she could.
Straight ahead, the swirling wall of the Morning Star swallowed Jugger. A second later, the extradimensional shade of the ark was replaced by the beautiful blue sky of the earthly battle. Above her head, bursts of black flak and flights of limmers adorned the azure canvas as they raged in battle with flocks of brown demons. Hell was happening over her squad and there was no way for her to discern with any ease her love, who was certain to be amongst the tumult. Denied once again, she moaned in her mind.
The sounds around them were so loud. Screams of exploding demons and howls of limmer motors met the staccato drumming of the heavy casters. Aircaster bursts shook the ground below their feet with every volley, and Quen’die almost fell off her footing as she rounded Seventh Street with her squad in tow.
New sounds of bawling wails were added to the chaos as Puppet Fire One made their way down Grand Avenue. At the end of that drag, three monstrous behemoths battered each of their seven heads against what little was left of the Royal Palace. Towers, buttresses and colonnades were crushed below the beasts’ chunky feet. Quen’die figured that the whole palace would need to be not rebuilt, but replaced, in its entirety. Anything above the first arcade of the castle was rubble. If ADF Command had decided to wait one more day to strike, the monsters would have been sure to devour the High King and his mother.
“Ladies!” the maiden barked. “Prepare to engage! Two hundred yards! Private Ma’lott and Private Z’nunim, guard my flanks! Being behemoth chow is gonna suck!”
“Yes, Madame!” her former rivals yelled with military obedience. Both of the inseparable maidens had been stuck together in the lavish underground shelters of the Z’nunim Syndicate, which Isheth’s family owned. At first, they were under the impression that they could while away the crisis in luxury until a behemoth had, by accident, thrashed their bunker’s climate control facility with its tail. Desperate, the Ma’lotts and Z’nunims had to flee the refuge or risk suffocation. A public shelter in the Docks District was the safest and quickest option that their families had at the time, and the poor young dandies were forced to share the same living quarters as the unruly Zobbos. Situation after harsh situation had developed by the time the spoiled elfmaids were forced into the ranks of the ADF as golem handlers - under their old nemesis’s wing. Payback and karma were still preferable to being a behemoth’s supper.
Iron fists were raised in defiance to the dread before them. Quen’die took another peek at the air above her and saw a small flight of flitcycles and angels circle the heads of the moaning hellbeasts. They were her squad’s scouters, and a warm smile washed over her face as she felt the light of her beloved deva shine for just a split instant in the midday sun. Once again, her guardian angel was keeping her safe and guiding her in her profound responsibilities. Gabriel was right about one thing - the angels were indeed all about fishing poles over fish.
Behemoth mouths tried to swipe at the cycles, but they were much too slow to connect their lunges. Mavriel and the scouts were keeping them well occupied, and none of those monstrosities would ever be the wiser the moment Quen’die’s squad of golems was punching away at their lard-laden feet.
“Fifty yards to engagement!” she screamed to her maidens as the reek of behemoth-stink was already hitting their noses. She could see their multicolored feathers and rainbow scales better than she could make out Mavriel and his cyclejocks at that range. Throughout the sky flew a host of cherubim, seraphim, devas and a multitude of angelics from all ranks and choirs to assist the elves’ fight. Once the first golem thrust its iron punch into the brunt of the monster’s leg, the stench of gallons of demon blood proved to be much worse.
In the Temple of Hate
Liberated elves were being led out of Thelemic Ark Lush Water’s illusory maw and into the quarantine tents erected by the Kamdenite Defense Force. They smelled of the hells themselves as all of them had been submerged in the disgusting thelema while suspended in a state of stupor for the bulk of a month. After just two weeks of campaigning, Commander Ramiel had freed the Kamden subcontinent according to Gabriel’s plan. The small kingdom of Ninn’wey was the last to fall to the mortal forces.
Air Lord Pazuzu was strapped to a rusty iron pole as the angry high elves had dragged him out of the Lush Water by their bare hands. This stock of elf was not as sympathetic or genteel as an Atlantean grey. Throughout their history, if harm had ever been done to their communities, a Muf’raad, or death grudge, would be sure to ensue. It was safe to say that Pazuzu had qualified for such a fate.
Defense Elder Ar’myn Kharsis walked up with regal pride to the secured demon as he gripped a wicked iron spear in his hand. His light-blue robes and turban swirled around his form in the high winds of the fertile valley. Pulling back the wrap from over his mouth, the elder made sure to stare the demon in the face. It was a matter of honor.
“You have tricked my people and destroyed the integrity of Kamden! This is a shame we shall not forget, infidel! There shall be no mercy shown as you hav
e had Muf’raad called upon your head!”
A thrall of high elves screamed in joy at their leader’s bold statement. A chorus of high-pitched ululating erupted from the females. “Creator be praised! Death to the demon infidel!”
On the other side of the pole, the hell-lord’s wife, if one could call her that, Lamashtu, was weeping at her defeat. “Make them stop, Paz! It’s so loud! Cut them a deal, you fool!”
“Aw, shut up, you foul hag!” the bony infernal belted back from behind her. They were surrounded from all sides as those robes, veils and turbans could not hide the rage of those proud people. “These freaks are insane!”
Ramiel met Kharsis’ side. Raising a gentle, pearly palm, he managed the unthinkable as the gesture quieted the hell-demon’s fury. “Air Lord Pazuzu. You are to face judgment, not from the Creator, as that time has already passed. This is a mortal judgment. I think you know well the sentence.”
Pazuzu growled at the angel in defiance. No elf could manage the horrible noise with mortal vocal chords. It was almost as if a cohort of voices were sounding it in unison. “Let me go, Ramiel! These swine are MINE!”
Ignoring his complaint, the angel nodded to Elder Kharsis an affirmative. As Pazuzu and his wife screamed their hellish howls, the Kamdenite top brass spit in his face and skewered the couple with one thrust of the spear.
Angry glee of the Ninn’weyvian people trumped the rank hellstink from the demonic remains which were dripping down the shaft of the weapon at a sluggish snail’s pace. Once again, the whoops and cheers of the town flooded the sunny sky. Kamden had been certified cleansed of infernals, or so thought the general populace.
