by Gene Stiles
Morpheus held up his hand for a moment then curled his fist and whispered into his comlink. “Now!”
Beams of condensed red light and thick, swirling bands of white-hot plasma tore through the daylight, striking the vessels head on. Instead of screams or steaming metal, the attack was met with a blaze of color as their weapons bounced harmlessly off nearly invisible borithium and electronic shielding. Their assailants shouted and roared, firing back with their own weapons to much greater, deadly effect.
Several trees were vaporized at their bases along with the bodies of the Aam crouched behind them. Wailing filled the air as skin blistered and burned, the air filled with sharp shards of splintered wood. The Aam of Home scattered and broke under the onslaught, searching for cover behind boulders and flattening themselves upon the ground. Many would never move at all.
“Retreat!” Morpheus shouted, continuing to fire uselessly at the transports as he raced through the forests. He stopped to help the wounded as he ordered everyone to regroup in Home. He had no time to curse the Creator for the worthlessness of their surprise attack or the loss of life. That would come later. For now, Morpheus only prayed that the shields did not apply to individual men. If so, all was already lost.
Blinding flashes chased their heels as they tore through the veldt, the high grasses bursting into roaring flames behind them. The smoke thickened into a curtain of black, curling fog as the green, damp meadow caught fire. It acted as a screen, obfuscating the vision of their pursuers and allowing them time enough to reach the shoulder-high, granite wall on the southern side of the city.
“Eriticus, get the wounded into the city,” Morpheus ordered, throwing himself behind the four-foot-thick stone. “Line the wall,” he shouted over the coms. “Do not fire unless you have a target. Then shift position and fire again. Make it seem as if there are more of us than there are. Give Cronus pause for a full frontal attack. Slow them down!”
The air was hot and heavy, no longer buzzing with excited anticipation, but fevered with fear and trepidation. Almost a third of their company were lost in that brief, horrifying encounter and they had not even marked a single Black Guard. Now less than thirty stood between Cronus, his hundred men and the families of Home. Only the streets and buildings would give them an advantage and allow the rest of the remaining citizens time to flee far enough to escape detection. Their faces were dark with determination, each man surmounting their terror to pledge vengeance for their lost brethren.
Captain Lianas saw a small group of Black Guard slipping through the smoke far to his right in an attempt to flank the wall on the end closest to the lake. He anticipated such a maneuver. Soundlessly, he and his First Mate, Ellison waited until the Guard rounded the end of the stone before engaging them. Without using their energy weapons, they attacked like two monsters arising from the cold, black earth.
Ellison let the four men pass him as he stooped his bulky, rock-hard body behind down into the high grasses. The smoke from the grasslands drifted in a wavering fog over the turquoise waters, limiting visibility so the men did not see the walking block of granite behind them until too late. Ellison attacked with the speed of a striking serpent, his long knife nearly severing the head from one black-clad Aam then biting deeply into the back of another. The razor-edged blade pierced muscle and sinew, tore through the beating heart and between pain-frozen ribs to stick out the front of the blood-soaked vest. The man fell before his brain registered he was already dead.
At the movement behind the two remaining Guard spun, weapons at the ready. An ebony demon with twisting black snakes upon its head rose between them, a shining silver blade in each hammer-like fist. Captain Lianas ripped upward, his powerful, tree-branch arms lifting both men off the ground as the knives split them from back to breastbone, spilling their hot, bloody entrails upon the soft carpet of grass. Silently, like the breath of ghosts, the two men wiped their crimson-soaked blades on the dead and slid further down the wall, alert for the next intrusion.
At the eastern edge of the wall, a squad of twenty Black Guard burst from the thinning haze, firing as they came. The rock splintered and melted into molten piles where the milky-white plasma struck. The huge blocks of granite held firm, refusing to give in to the sun-hot onslaught. Shards of stone and simmering red rock blasted into the air setting fresh fires in the surrounding meadow. Still, the men advanced.
In a small patch of thicket twenty yards from the end of the wall, Captain Kaikinos and his five Aam waited, hidden behind a screen of twisted, thick foliage. His bright, white teeth showing through his long, tightly curled, black beard in a vicious, predatory grin. His wide, flat nostrils flared on his boulder-like face, his monstrous fists locked around the plasma rifle cradled in his nearly over-muscled arms. At his nod, his men spread out and opened fire.
So arrogant in their numbers and armament were the men of Cronus that they did not anticipate an attack from behind them. Screams and wails for mercy rent the smoky air as skin ruptured and boiled and clothing ignited into flame. Dancing figures of fire pirouetted and howled, begging and crying for the pity they would not have given to others. Only a few managed to scatter and evade the horror surrounding them, steadfastly returning the attack.
Roaring like an enraged bear, Kaikinos charged the Guard, weapon spraying death all around him. He heard moans and shrieks filling the hot winds at his back, but he rampaged ahead, lost in the berserker frenzy of combat. His gargantuan fists slammed into the face of a guard, too close now to use his rifle, steaming blood covering his mammoth paws. He felt a lava-like burn slice his leg near his hip, toppling him onto his side. The seared nerves and blood vessels kept Kaikinos from feeling the horrendous damage to his body for long moments. He only had time to lift his rifle once more before the sun exploded in his eyes and his long, black, wavy hair erupted in yellow flames against his lifeless, blackened features.
In the eerie silence that followed, Inopos knelt beside his friend and Captain, his tan leather vest singed and smoking in numerous places. His reddened skin was black and blistered in places where beams narrowly missed their marks. He stood alone, the sole survivor of the deadly melee, his head bowed, and his fingers stroking the destroyed face beneath him. His orange-red curls hung limply and damply matted against his square-planed face. Tears flowed freely from his jade-green eyes, cutting deep furrows into his pain-racked cheeks. Inopos pulled off his vest, laying it reverently over his Captain’s head before slipping away behind the wall and returning to the battle still raging around him. His seething heart yearned for nothing more than a burning desire for animalistic, brutal revenge.
Cronus stood on the blackened remnants of the vast grasslands, staring hatefully at the towering rise of buildings behind the granite fortification before him. The serpents in his soul had long ago shattered their restraints, swirling in the dark, turbulent nest inside him. Their glistening emerald and glowing-red eyes shimmered with bright embers, their long, sharp fangs dripping acidic venom upon his pulsing heart. Somewhere within the vile confines of that demonic city was his treacherous wife and the misbegotten son prophesied to bring about his doom. Cronus would have them flayed alive in front of him before the sun set this very day.
“I think we should attack head on,” Iapetus rumbled dispassionately. “The end runs have cost us a quarter of our men already.” He lowered his farseers, ignoring the black look cast upon him by Cronus. Iapetus saw movement along the stone barricade from time to time, but could not discern the true numbers of his enemy. “If we concentrate our firepower upon the center we should be able to breach the wall quickly.”
“Do so,” Cronus ordered, his voice quivering with the rage writhing at his mind. “Get us inside that city. I do not care how many we lose. Just leave enough to destroy any of those traitors left alive. But the boy is mine.”
“As you command,” Iapetus responded flatly, masking the angst growing inside his gigantic chest. He looked into his brother’s blazing jade eyes, seeing the madness
squirming behind them. His mind drifted back to the horror of the Black Death. No matter his duty, Iapetus would not unduly risk his men even if it meant he would have to oppose his Lord Father once again.
Morpheus saw the massing of men and weapons toward the center of the wall, grimly understanding what was about to happen. He knew to the core of his bones they would not survive if Cronus brought such fearsomely destructive firepower to bear upon the city proper. He had only one choice, but that choice would mean a different kind of battle, close and lethal where numbers he did not have would be a deciding factor.
“We must,” Haleah said, gently touching his scowling, handsome face. She knew without words what he was thinking and understood the dire consequences of the decision. “Do it.”
He did not speak for a moment, his onyx eyes cold in the brightly glowing sunshine. He stared into the shimmering, ocean-blue eyes of his love and wished again he could convince her to leave, knowing she never would. Morpheus ran his fingertips through her golden hair and place a small caress upon her upturned, full, strawberry-red lips. He nodded curtly, a wan smile upon his sculpted features.
“Use the MP launcher,” he commanded, laying his rifle upon the ground. It would be nothing but scrap metal in a moment. His long, silver knives sang a tinkling song of death as they slid slowly from the black leather sheaths belted around his hips and strapped to his thighs as if they craved the crimson blood soon to dull their shining surfaces.
Four swirling silver balls arced over the gathered Atlanteans, barely whispering as they shot through the sky. Spreading out over Cronus’ forces, the devices detonated with nary a sound. The magnetic pulses they emitted only caused a slight shimmering in the air like that of heat waves above a hot desert floor. The beams of thick, milky-white plasma that licked at the hard granite walls flickered and died. The red rays of CL rifles winked out as if they had never been. Sleds advancing upon Home dropped to the blackened grass as hard and as useless as giant stones. Only the coms of Morpheus and his men were safe, shielded against the devices derived from those used during that great sea battle so very long ago.
Cronus roared like a furious, wounded bear as he esteemed armament fell silent, reduced to dysfunctional hunks of worthless metal. He screamed and yelled in futile madness, berating his men and hammering fists into his drivers. He threw his now-valueless rifle and sidearm at the nearest Aam and drew a five-foot sword from his belt. Like a rabid beast, Cronus charged toward Home, not even wondering if his enemy’s weapons still functioned.
Even Iapetus hesitated, waiting mere seconds to see if a blaze of color and light would erupt from the battlements before them. He would not rush his men into the arms of death assured simply out of anger. When no streams of destruction poured upon Cronus as he ran, Iapetus threw up an arm and raced behind the Lord Father, hearing his warriors shout out from behind, rushing through the charred meadow to keep pace with their commander.
They hit the wall like howling animals, flowing over the battered stone in a wave of flesh and bone. Landing hard on the trampled grass beyond, they spun, hacking to the left and right, blades flashing in the golden sunlight, searching for opponents to whet the appetites of their sharpened steel. No muscle nor bone stood to separate in grizzly spectacles of spilled bowels or splintered white. No bodies thrashed or cried out in torment or lay in pools of rusty lifeblood. The space around them was empty, devoid of a single soul. Unsure of what to do next, the Aam milled about in wonder awaiting their next commands.
“I do not like these tactics no matter how necessary,” Captain Lianas muttered, his deep-brown eyes flickering beneath his furrowed brow. His ebony skin glistened in the waning sunshine, beads of sparkling sweat coating his exposed flesh. “I prefer to meet our assailants man to man instead of striking from the shadows.”
“I prefer not to die,” Haleah responded curtly. Her tan leathers grimy and singed in a patchwork of burn marks. Her ocean-blue eyes scanned the wall from atop a low warehouse on the outskirts of Home. “We are still vastly outnumbered. We do not have the luxury of honor. Cronus has none.”
“I know,” Lianas agreed readily, nodding his bull-like head. His long, black tresses swirled around his pillar-like shoulders in the stiff wind as if vipers slithered upon his head. “Yet they are still men. Still Atlantean.”
“They lost that consideration when they attacked our home,” Morpheus countered harshly. “All we wanted was peace and the freedom to live as we deem the Creator would wish us to. Now, once again, Cronus comes to take that from us.”
He stared across the short distance between him and the invaders, watching as they formed into twenty man squads and cautiously advanced upon the outlying buildings. The groups separated and spread out in a wedge-shaped pattern, protecting their flanks, but leaving their rear exposed. Cronus led the tip of the spear up the wide, main boulevard toward the center of the city.
“Break our men into two teams,” Morpheus ordered, sliding back from the edge of the stonework, keeping his body low and invisible. “Wait until the main body has passed and attack the trailing troops from both sides. Make it quick then slip into the shadows.”
Silently, the commanders faded away into the alleyways, cutting through buildings and houses, stores and streets now devoid of the footfalls and laughter of their friends and families. Cronus may have more Aam than they did, however, those men did not fight for their homes. They did not fight for survival, only for gold and the ‘glory of Atlantis’. They would find neither here.
Having anticipated the loss of their tech weapons, the Aam of Home hid caches of spears and long knives throughout the city. On certain streets where the roads were narrow, huge stone blocks on the rooftops had been loosened and propped teetering on the edges. In other places, more deadly surprises awaited the invaders.
Ellison hunkered down behind a high countertop in a shop filled with leather vests, pants and dresses, his massive bulk hidden by the darkness of the unlit interior. His sharp, icy green eyes watched as the last squad of twenty Black Guard passed beyond the doorway, peering through the clear crystal windows as they went by. On the other side of the street, the other half of Ellison’s unit lay invisible among shelves of pillows and blankets awaiting his command. When the whispered orders came over the coms, they moved as one.
Like wraiths swirling in mist, they danced around their targets with murderous, savage intent. They sliced limbs from screeching bodies, ripped open bellies and backs and hacked heads from bodies.
Ellison used his over-muscled body like a sledgehammer, bowling over startled, black-clad men before they could draw breath or sword. Within each of his outstretched maws, he held a glistening silver blade, slicing sinew and skin amid screeches of agony and the gurgling of blood-filled throats. Behind him, he heard the clashing of steel, shouts and cries of pain. He wanted nothing more than to turn and re-enter the fray, but that was not the plan. Without looking back, Ellison crashed through a doorway and out through the back entrance, becoming lost in the maze of the city.
On the other side of the phalanx, Inopos tore a bloody swathe through the trailing edge of troops, possessed by the malevolent ruthlessness of an avenging spirit. In every terrified face, lips spread in terror and torment as his spinning blades cut ribbons of flesh from their bones, spilling guts and body fluids on the bricks at their feet, Inopos saw the Guard that left his Captain lying in the dirt, strong, kind and caring face pulverized and unrecognizable.
A crimson haze coated his field of vision and his breath came in short, controlled bursts. Inopos ignored the orders to blitz and escape, his heart hammering in his broad, muscled-defined chest. Weaving among the small contingent like a savage whirlwind, he sliced legs and arms, necks and faces, his reddish curls darkened by the sprays of severed veins. His thin lips split in the smile of a grim reaper as Inopos raised his sword to split the sternum of the wailing, cringing boy saddled between his knees.
“No,” rumbled a voice above him. A monstrous paw clamped
over his hands, stopping the downward path of his blade. Inopos fought to rise, but a great weight gripped his shoulders, pinning him on his knees. Despite his struggles, he could not throw off his assailant.
“Inopos, stop,” the giant Loki said gently, cutting through the mist clouding his friend’s mind. “We must go. Leave this poor, damaged soul to live or die by the hand of the Creator.”
The softness of the words diminished the flames blazing in Inopos’ soul, allowing a semblance of reason to touch his adrenaline-fueled mind. he rose on bunched and trembling legs to find himself standing amid the whimpering and moaning of the dying and the odorous, steaming corpses of the dead. Shouting voices echoed off the granite walls, the pounding of legs running toward them. It would be moments before re-enforcements arrived.
“The rest are gone,” Loki stated hurriedly, gripping his friend by the arm. “Let us join them quickly.” He tugged Inopos along, the two men racing away from the carnage and into the dark pools of the night.
Haleah knelt on the ground, leaning heavily against the warmth radiating from a stone and wood building, her bloodied left leg spread before her and cradling an arm against her heaving abdomen. A tight, narrow alleyway lay to her right, a black pit from which no glimmer of light emerged. To her left, a group of Black Guard rushed toward her along the dim walkways next to the smooth-stone street. Her hair hung loose and matted against her clammy forehead. Her bright blue eyes widened in fear as she staggered to her feet and stumbled into the open maw of the alley.
Sensing the helplessness of their prey, the Aam raced to catch her before she could escape their wrath. Once inside the restricted confines of the lightless path, they slowed, listening intently for any sign of life. The only thing they could hear was their own shallow breathing. They slid their hands along the granite walls and moved their feet slowly to keep from tripping on unseen debris. Not the slightest glimmer of light materialized before them to point to an outlet to another street.
