“The Dark Urge will be as much a threat to you now as she is to us. To life!” Zaria pressed forward to Anguhr. “You must face that you are now her enemy. She will not risk her power to trust.”
“She risked that when she accepted me into Hell.” Anguhr rolled his burning eyes toward Zaria.
“You were an infant. And then she remade you into a weapon,” Zaria retorted.
“Would I have been any different if the Khans had never attacked my parents?” Anguhr asked both Zaria, and himself.
“You would have known choice.” Zaria offered. “You would have known the truth as you grew. You would have been allowed to grow, normally. And with the guidance of beings not shrouded in hate. Now, end that. We have the means to spare the galaxy further devastation. We must use it.”
“Or perhaps just realize it is your life that will be preserved,” Gin said, “as well as billions more.”
“Yes, focus on me,” Anguhr’s voice held tones of disdain. “Because you can manipulate me now that my ego is so crushed by the truth of my origin.”
Anguhr stood and looked down at Gin. “It is not.”
“Then, what are you going to do?” Gin asked.
“I will return and speak to my—the mother of my mother.”
“Foolish!” Zaria shouted. “That was tried—by your father! He is dead Anguhr, do you wish his fate?”
“It will not be my fate.” Anguhr replied with certainty. “He wished to be her equal. I will have answers, and dictate terms. Hell will bend to me.”
“Answers for what?” Zaria thrust her arms from her sides. “Hell has been corrupted for far longer than even this useless war! She is madness, driven by fear.”
“And what does she fear?” Anguhr looked intently at Zaria. “I imagine it is you.”
Zaria nearly took a step back as if feeling a weight thrust on her.
“I can balance two sides, two powers.” Anguhr continued. “Every decision has at least two prongs of attack. Every mind must weigh both. You may have written him into existence.” He pointed at Gin. “Perhaps the Dark Urge created you. You were the first Keeper. The first Khan. Now you are her opposition. Merely the other side.”
“I assure you,” Gin said with obvious affront, “I am at least as old as both Zaria and—” He stopped, uncertain how to finish his sentence.
“No.” Zaria said in a low voice. “I fight for life. The Dark Urge is not my mother. Azuhr was not my sister. The Khans were my children. At least by half.”
“Children of two mothers.” Anguhr said. “Or one?”
“By that time, two.” Zaria replied. “We are distinct. But at a time we were one. There was a schism created by a powerful alien presence. In time, the schism grew. And now I stand before you. But she, my original half, my sister, sits in Hell and plots both our deaths.”
“And without this schism, there would be no Hell.” Anguhr observed.
“Likely, no.” Zaria agreed. “She—we would be whole.”
“Then why do you not see yourself as insane? Corrupt?” Anguhr asked.
“Obviously, she is not.” Gin said.
“I accept what I am.” Zaria added. “I have changed. When I left the Forge and journeyed out seeking life, I grew. She has evolved only in dark ways, fearful of powers greater than herself. Fearful of anything not subject to the fires of her will. The Keepers were to assuage her fear. The Generals are the embodiments of it, sent out to destroy,” Zaria paused, “everything.”
“Then I am glad for those powerful aliens.” Anguhr remarked. “I would salute them, before putting them to the axe.”
“You are glad for—well, of course you are.” Gin shook his head.
“I am glad to exist. As I am certain you are also glad to live, whatever the agency of your creation.” Anguhr said.
“It is agencies of destruction I fear.” Gin frowned.
“Then fear me,” Anguhr smiled, yet his expression was as cutting as his axe blades. “For your own actions have only made me more powerful.”
“Then use that power, Destroyer!” Zaria looked at Anguhr with a fierce stare. “Use it to end this senseless era! Become the greatest conqueror ever by destroying Hell itself!”
“Perhaps. In time.” Anguhr nodded, slowly. He looked out as if towards a possible future. “But now do not expect your guilt to guide me. We were allies by need. But what need do I have of you now?”
Anguhr looked at both Gin and Zaria.
“To kill us now would simply be petty.” Gin at last appeared to be nearing anger.
“And I am sure it would not be as easy as ordering a squad of demons to open fire.” Anguhr remarked and looked to the sky and around him. “You are energy based. This place seethes with it, just as Hell feeds the Dark Urge. Not so for any of us on the energy absorbing Iron Work. So I accept our stalemate. Here. But the tactical advantage and means to strike Hell is mine. If you wish to see this mission to its end, you will follow my commands.”
Zaria placed her left hand over Gin’s mouth to preclude any retort.
“Very well, General.” Zaria said. “I will agree. You are in control, son of Azuhr.”
“And as display of my power and our new accord,” Anguhr locked eyes on Zaria. “I will order your captured warriors debarked to this planet. Alive.”
Anguhr picked up his helmet. He shook off flecks of earth, and then placed it back on his head. He walked toward Azuhr’s sword.
“He seems unchanged.” Gin said in a hushed voice to Zaria.
“His is.” Zaria nodded with confidence while watching Anguhr. “Like all life, he is a creature defined by his actions. Observe what he does now, not his bluster.”
“The actions of life are either sentient or involuntary, no matter the means of birth.” Gin said. “Despite using a weapon with a cutting edge, Anguhr’s character is blunt force. He chose war even though he was aware of the fate of the worlds he conquered. His actions brought Armageddon. Annihilation.”
“And now he is the hope to end the destruction,” Zaria replied. “Awareness also has two blades, old friend. No other General could be our ally. He is loved by his demons because he leads from the frontline. You can call that blunt, or a canny strategy to ensure loyalty. Think of it. If not for his seeming brutal leadership, would he stand a chance against Hell? Another General not loved by his horde could not survive as a rebel. The demons of such a General would love the eternal reward promised by the Dark Urge more than their own lives, and more than loyalty to their leader.”
Gin transmitted to Zaria for fear he could not say his sharp comment quietly: ‘I cannot be glad of his campaigns because he serves our cause now!’
“Nor should you,” Zaria said aloud and softly. “But we need him and must endure the past to build a better future. None of this should have occurred, just as I should not stand here before you.”
“I am glad you do,” Gin said aloud.
“Then also be glad for Anguhr.” Zaria cocked her head as she looked at Gin. “He and I are both mistakes. Yet, we exist. From this moment on, our actions define us as never before.”
Zaria and Gin looked over where they heard the sound of infernal steel slicing through rock and earth. Anguhr gripped his mother’s sword and pulled it from the ground.
“A mother’s love projected through time by a sword.” Gin mused, and then looked at Zaria. “Our universe is odd.”
Zaria smiled and nodded as she watched Anguhr stare at the massive, black blade.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
The Dark Urge toiled in Hell. Her labor kept increasing the Forge’ power. An idea flared in her mind and gave her comfort. Nothing could survive the surface of Hell. Now, nothing could survive the deathly radiation spewed between its poles and into space for leagues. Nothing. Only inside Hell were there small crannies where little creeping things might endure. Perhaps.
For a moment, the Dark Urge took respite and reflected. Her mind entered a part of Hell where seven ruins lay in a loose arc
like cities dropped by a wounded bird. The ruins were machines that were once alive and held life. Their main parts were long, broken compartments that appeared to be huge bubbles pulled at two opposite ends and then frozen. Later, something shattered them from within. The machines where made of substances like glass, steel, and skin.
In this part of Hell, the machines were the only structures. All else was black and featureless. There was no spider. There was no life. Yet the zone had been a vast gestation chamber. It was where the Generals were born. After the last one emerged, life went absent there. The entire galaxy had changed in that time. The Dark Urge had changed it. She created her Generals and sent them out to conquer the stars. She ate the worlds in their orbits to feed her fear.
Since the schism, darkness had grown within her. Zaria left, and all that stayed behind was fear and a lurking spider. Fear grew and became stronger inside the Dark Urge, but she never released it. It was always growing. Consuming. Expanding. It stretched her across an expanse as a taught sheet of skin. Yet, she also trapped and nurtured it. Fear never grew large enough to become its own creature. It never replaced the light and spirit Zaria had taken. Fear was the Dark Urge, and she was Hell.
The Generals shattered their wombs at birth. It was a pain the Dark Urge hoped would bring deliverance. Yet, fear still lived. With one General setting out on his own and possibly against Hell, fear writhed and kicked. One gestation chamber had been the womb for two Generals. The last of her children was already growing inside one when her first child sent an offspring of her own. Then, an odd sensation eclipsed fear. In that moment, however long it was, perhaps the span of a planet’s life or only a geologic epoch on its surface or merely the ripple of a flame, she tore the last, embryonic General from that chamber. It was exposed on Hell’s lethal surface. She put Azuhr’s child in its place. He was remade and reborn. Azarak became Anguhr. A child born from life became its destroyer. As the Dark Urge looked at the last gestation chamber, that strange sensation that had eclipsed fear returned. But it only lasted the time burning sand takes to roll down the surface of a dune. There would be no more births and no more pain. There would be fear. If Anguhr must die to feed it, then it would happen. Azarak would be remade one final time, and into ash.
A planetary orbital often held more than its main planet. Dwarf worlds and clusters could precede and follow the planet at predicable points. Those points could be places to hide, or launch an ambush. Hell’s path around the Red Giant also held sites of coorbital debris. Hell and increased solar winds consumed the original rocks and bits of ice long ago. The new clusters of dust, metal, and rock were made of lost bits from the trains of sundered worlds. One massive piece flashed into the cluster following Hell. It was also red, and burning. Anguhr’s ship had returned.
“Is it customary for returning heroes to know where to hide in their home system?” Zaria asked as she turned from watching the bridge screens and spoke to Anguhr seated on his throne.
“By now the Dark Urge would hardly consider me a hero,” Anguhr replied while scrutinizing images and data on the screens. “And I have slain so many so-called heroes, I do not care for the title. Nonetheless, my position relative to Hell can appear that I still approach as a loyal servant. If this position also acts as a partial shield from Hell’s intensified radiation and countermeasures, so be it. We will stay among these trones until a tactical map is complete.”
“Trones,” Zaria mused aloud. “There is a bit of code dating back so many ages. It comes from tro’ans, or, originally Trojans. You would have liked the Trojans, General. At least their warriors.”
“They are rocks,” Anguhr said with a dismissive raise of an eyebrow under his helmet, and then focused back on the screens.
‘Maybe he will have a rock named after him, one day.’ Zaria thought and broadcast to Gin.
‘There may as well be.’ Gin answered over the same wavelength. ‘He has reduced so many worlds to mere fragments. Some of their dust is likely among the oorts rolling here.’
‘I will endeavor to prevent this ship from becoming part of it.’ Zaria thought. She turned and raised her palms to Anguhr in an entreating gesture.
“General, if you will listen to me now, I can offer you a boon that will increase the power of your ship.” Zaria said.
“You wish to tap the weapon Solok guards?” Anguhr asked.
“No. I wish to enter new programming into your ship.”
“Why?”
The question came not from Anguhr. The speed it was asked, location, and severe tone caused Zaria to pause. She turned and looked down at Proxis glaring at her.
“I can make this ship invisible, at least undetectable from a distance, even to Hell’s ships.” Zaria said.
“Impossible.” Anguhr snapped and looked back at the displays.
“I assure you, General, I have done it already.” Zaria countered. “With Gin’s help, I will not need physical tools to grant this to your ship.”
“And how would you make the alterations?” Proxis asked with a suspicious tone and stare. “Manipulate the ship’s programming?”
“Yes,” Gin answered.
Proxis replied not with a word but an aggressive bark.
“We need no such weapon,” Anguhr said.
“General, I wish only that if you face another of your kind that you win. If this ship is destroyed, Gin and I die with it. Your life—this ship—is now linked to ours. Allow me to ensure the survival of both.”
“My tolerance grants you life,” Anguhr said looking at both Gin and Zaria. “Do not cause me to revoke it.”
“My, Lord! A ship approaches!” Proxis announced. “A Hell ship.”
“The rebellion is now open, Anguhr.” Zaria said. “Charge your weapons and fire. There is no hiding, now.”
“Hold your fire, Proxis.” Anguhr ordered. He then looked at Zaria. “And you. Hold your words. Do not dare tell me how to fight!”
Zaria stepped back from Anguhr’s throne.
“The ship is heading straight for us, Lord Destroyer.” Proxis reported.
“It may be Uruk bringing Xuxuhr’s ship. I will not kill my Field Master by mistake. Two ships against Sutuhr would nearly guarantee victory.”
“Lord, the aegis is fully ablaze, but I can still detect energy building near his bow.
“He is charging his main battery.” Zaria dared to say.
Anguhr’s sigh was nearly as strong as a storm wind across the slot of his helmet. “Ready our main guns. But hold fire until you can determine the identity of that ship with certainty. Do not fire if it is Xuxuhr’s!”
“Understood, Lord.” Proxis bobbed his head in a quick bow as he entered commands at his dais.
A low rumble of the main guns’ motors rolling them into deployment echoed across the bridge.
“By then will we be within its main weapons’ range?” Gin asked.
“Yes. For both ships.” Proxis answered.
“Then may I suggest—”
“Signal, Lord!” Proxis barked.
“I am General and Lord Ursuhr,” the bear-like General flashed on the main screen as images of the Red Giant, distant Hell, and debris outside the ship continued on other screens with overlayed data.
“But you know who I am, Anguhr.” Ursuhr continued. “By the will of our mother of infinite power, the Dark Urge, you are ordered to yield your ship and horde to Hell. If you fail to do this, I will kill your ship and horde. And then I will kill you, rebel.”
“Question,” Gin said pointing at the image of Ursuhr’s huge, grinning face. “If he is on the approaching ship, then where is Sutuhr? Or his ship?”
“That ship is not General Ursuhr’s!” Proxis barked. “I have seen General Sutuhr’s warship. It is the incoming ship!”
“Locate that transmission!” Anguhr ordered. “Where is Su—!”
“I am here, stripling.” Sutuhr’s chimera face replaced Ursuhr’s image.
Both Proxis and Gin took keen interest in the telemetry of
the incoming signal.
“You do face me, and my loyal lieutenant, Ursuhr.” Sutuhr continued and wiped venom away with his callused hand. “Now, don’t hide behind your Ship Master. Stand and face your judgment. Or die more horribly.”
Zaria looked at Anguhr. She expected him to roar in defiance. She heard only her own heart beat. Then Anguhr spoke, calmly.
“I can see why you would not wish to face Proxis, old one.” Anguhr began. “You were beaten by him, and thus fear more embarrassment. Yet, now you face me. And you and Ursuhr foolishly risk my rage. Age has crippled your mind just as a failed battle has crippled your ship. Withdraw from the battle, and enjoy the moment more it brings. If you strike at me, I will kill you first, old fool.”
Sutuhr roared and vanished from the screen.
“Take us straight at—” Anguhr started to order. His voice was lost in the deafening ring of multiple strikes against his ship’s aegis. The assault was intense enough to rock the bridge.
“Missiles, Lord!” Proxis yelled.
“Evade them!” Anguhr bellowed. “Where did they strike from?”
“Here!” Proxis threw up his hands, in shock. He quickly went back to entering commands. “The missiles were hidden among the debris, somehow.”
“Not bad,” Gin said and cocked his head only to see an intense, reproving glare from Zaria.
“Port side main guns are damaged!” Proxis continued.
“Take us from this debris and locate both Hell ships!” Anguhr ordered. All on the bridge immediately felt a pull to the deck as the ship flew out of the debris field.
“I cannot locate General Ursuhr.” Proxis said.
“More incoming—” Gin began as missiles struck the ship again.
“Again from the trones, Lord!” Proxis offered.
“You can’t hide two Hell warships in there!” Gin shook his head.
“But you can hide a ship in space,” Zaria said and looked at Anguhr. “I think I know why you can only detect Sutuhr.”
“Then make the solution!” Anguhr snapped. “While I kill what I can see! Proxis, drive us straight at Sutuhr!”
Beyond Apocalypse Page 25
