Torment of the Ancient Gods

by Craig Robertson

  "Meaning?"

  “My associate wonders if your alliance has any specific plans as of yet,” clarified Festock coolly.

  “I seem to recall asking first,” responded Mal's channeled spirit. “That counts for a consequential amount in my estimation.”

  “I'm sorry,” Festock responded. “What did you just say?”

  “You blink first or I'll arrange things so you don't do much more blinking ever.”

  “Is that ugly creature threatening us?” squealed Aaaverd.

  Festock started to reply. I stopped him with a hang-on-a-second finger. “Friend, a threat's what might happen if you don't react properly. What I announced was a statement of fact. Be advised that considerable is the difference between the two in terms of your short-term well-being.”

  That's when Mirraya kicked me very hard under the table. She apparently was not a huge Firefly aficionado. No accounting for one's predilection in taste.

  Festock fortunately rallied. “I take your point, Clinneast. There's no need to expand the issue into a crisis. We have no specific plans. Our general intention is to take advantage of Aaaverd's unique skill.” He gestured to the large rodent.

  Aaaverd disappeared then instantly reappeared.

  I could not help myself. I snickered in the back of my throat so hard snot came out my nose. After a quick swipe of my sleeve, I said with considerable disbelief, “That's it? Dude can be invisible and you hinge an assassination plot on … on …” I pointed at the smelly pest. “On him being hard to see?”

  Festock was not an immediate fan of my critique. He more or less exploded. “That's enough, you reprobate. I have never, Daleria, been more disappointed in an old friend or a new acquaintance. Please make certain you never contact me again.” He stood to storm/roll away in a righteous huff.

  “Ah, care to hear our plan before you depart to the promise of quick and complete failure?” I said softly.

  That froze him. Unfortunately it stopped we too. They both begrudgingly sat back down. Cool. Now all I had to do was come up with a credible plan that they couldn't possibly kill us after hearing and reproduce easily themselves. You know, it was at times like those that I became an interested third-party observer as to what the heck was about to come out of my mouth next.

  “Yes,” Festock replied tersely.

  “I do have to say as an homage to my friend here,” I flipped the back of a hand at Aaaverd, “it does include if not fully rely on invisibility.”

  He ground his teeth together in what I took to be a threatening manner. Color me scared.

  “Yes. I was noodling with using a cloak of invisibility, but, hey, the real deal's even better, am I right?”

  “A what?” coughed up Festock.

  “He said an invisibility cloak,” responded Mirraya. She mimed placing a sheet over her head and shoulders. “Surely you've heard of them?”

  Festock trembled with uncertainty. “Ah, cloak, you say? I thought … I thought he said coat. No such thing. But a cloak? Of course I've heard of them. My cousin used to own one a while back.”

  “Do tell?” marveled Mirraya, who was thoroughly enjoying herself by the way. “Whatever became of your cousin and his cloak?”

  Festock giggled like a fool. “They disappeared.” He slapped the table lightly, which was George-McFly-body-language annoying. “They … they both disappeared.”

  “Imagine that,” sighed Mirri. “Such an unanticipated twist of fate.”

  Festock sobered up like he'd been gut punched. “I was speaking in jest. No need to invoke fate.” He seemed genuinely miffed. This universe was officially weirder than mine.

  “Back to our initial thoughts,” I prompted.

  “Yes. Proceed,” Festock said, still quite put off. Jerk.

  “We have learned the cycles of the changing of Vorc's staff and personal guards.” I looked left, then right, then left again. “All twenty-five of them.”

  Festock was stunned. “He has that many guards? We … we seem to have seriously underestimated that number.”

  “Per cycle, mind you. There are three cycles and a reserve for public appearances and PTO, naturally. That's over a hundred and fifty total.”

  “PTO?” Aaaverd whistled.

  “Personal time off,” I responded incredulously, mixed with a big scoop of scorn. “The individual guard employees will have personal need for time away from work. Family milestones, medical office visits, and vacations to name a few.”

  “Vorc's guards need to go to the doctor?” puzzled Festock. “Wh … why would immortals need to go for medical care?”

  I tented my fingers on my chest. “Hey, don't shoot the messenger. I have no idea either. I'm just passing along our intel. Any data is good data.”

  Aaaverd slapped Festock's nearest arm. “Why do gods need doctors?”

  “We … we simply,” he pushed all his hands in my direction, “don't know. It's as baffling as it is true.”

  “There, you see our input has already been of invaluable help to you,” purred Mirraya. “And I'm thinking there's more where that came from.” She kicked me again, but much softer. It was a fun kick, not a mad kick. Personally I wasn't much fond of either.

  “Anywho,” I continued, “knowing the rotation times and patterns has shown us there is a distinct and repeated opening for hostile intrusion into Vorc's …” I stopped abruptly. I looked left, then right, and then left again. “Into Vorc's personal space.” I shook my open palms toward them. “His personal space.”

  “We can access his personal space,” repeated Mirri proudly. “Can you imagine?”

  Festock's thought process was clearly trailing behind ours. “Hmm. I think I see, er, hear where you're going.” He pointed at the center of the table. “So if you can be alone with Vorc at a predictable time, you could don your cloak and kill him with no one being the wiser?”

  “Sure.” I shrugged. “Why not?”

  Aaaverd was inconsolably pissed. “Why not? Is that your plan or do you mean why isn’t that your plan?” Perceptive little puke. Spoiled my damn irony. That, I'll have you know, sure pissed me off. Always did.

  “Are you attempting to be ironic, my little friend?” I challenged.

  “If he is he'd better be careful,” Mirraya said to me with some panic in her voice. “I've seen you react to irony and rhetorical machinations once too often for my liking.”

  “I am we, not he,” protested the buffoon. “Please do not insult us.”

  “But …” Mirraya trailed off inexplicably. What an improv diva.

  “But nothing,” I snapped at her. “He's a we. Yes, he's a wee we, but that doesn't make them a him. You're in big trouble when I get you home.”

  I could tell Daleria was about to wee wee herself, she was struggling so mightily not to burst out laughing.

  Odd, seriously. I could be so inappropriate at the most incautious of times.

  “Friends,” called out Festock loudly. “There is no need to anger ourselves or find contention where there is such a potential for harmony.”

  What he said, about harmony, wow. Made me hate him even more than I did before. PC-speak was the surest way to not my heart but my sidearm.

  “Look,” I grumbled, “I think we've done enough for today.” I glanced at everyone present. Okay, I intentionally did not glance at Aaaverd because I knew we'd feel the insult and I loved it. “Let's break for now and pick this up later.”

  “Sounds wise and prudent,” agreed Festock.

  Oh yeah. Wise and prudent on top of harmony. Dude was itching for a double dose of whoop ass, wasn't he?

  “I don't like you,” Aaaverd shouted while pointing at you will never guess who.

  Yes, Mirri said it. She was such a shit disturber. Of course, that was one of my favorite qualities in her. “He doesn't like you. I don't like you either.” [ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVKySA2-47c ]

  “Please,” appealed a frustrated Festock, “let us adjourn before non-retractable words are uttered.” />
  I just glowered at Festock. What he did to language was wrong, plain and simple. Grrr.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  EJ was uncertain where to go or what to do. After ditching the desperado losers who were too damn goodie two-shoes for him, he had no real plans. Good, he reflected. Footloose and fancy free. The way God made him. Of course then he groaned internally for having in any way invoked that deity. Of late his opinion of all-powerful beings was slipping from zero to negative values. Who, he reminded himself, needed a one of them?

  Still, there was something IOJ had said. Yeah, Idiot Other Jon had mentioned antigods. What the hell were those? EJ'd flown from one side of this galaxy to the other. He'd seen a lot of strange stuff, but he'd never seen anything to make me believe there were any all-powerful beings controlling events. There was no mysterious energy that controlled his destiny. It was all a lot of simple tricks and nonsense. He was a trained witch. He'd know, right? Calfada-Joric taught him everything there was to know about magic and she never once mentioned antigods.

  Still, he'd kept her books on his ship after she died and he went his own way. Wouldn't hurt to look the term up. He'd scanned most of the tomes, but some books he'd never actually studied in detail. It beat doing nothing or, worse yet, ruminating on how much he detested IOJ. He put his ship in deep space, far from any possible interruption, and set about to research the antigods.

  EJ started with Cala's favorite reference, Tobin's Mystical Guide. Tobin was generally unreadable, but Cala maintained he was authoritative. If nothing more, EJ'd get a much deserved nap from trying to go through the material. Of course, he gritted his teeth yet again, the book’s table of content and index were useless. Anti-dote, anti-conjuring, anti-warding, and anti-septic were cited, but no anti-gods. That would have been too easy.

  Under “Gods” he found listing of origins, limits to power of, assigned versus earned powers (WTF, he thought), and how to address and reference, as well as relative strengths. There were even citations concerning the Cleinoid gods. But no anti ones. Yeah, why make a source book user-friendly?

  Then he wondered. If the Cleinoids were afraid of the antigods, wouldn't that mean the antigods were powerful? Tobin did purport to rank potencies. Okay, he'd bite. Under God(s), relative strength(s), there was an almost endless list of obscure or unpronounceable names. Gods or groupings included Figgiform, fragmentary, Harrusametical, non-repeating, Stone Witch, vetimaniacal, war, and, reassuringly, Zeus. Had to list the big guy to be comprehensive. EJ didn't find a simple table of comparative strengths. No, that would have been helpful in sections concerning, ah, rank-ordering their power. He was reminded why he never did the book-learning thing like Cala nagged him continually to do. Instead he had to suffer through multiple separate chapters that might, if he was quite lucky, compare two or three ancient gods' strengths.

  Maybe it would be hard to rank them, he conceded. Their powers were often so different, how could the potencies be graded? He learned, for example, that the Becobate Gods active during the Uifery Inclusion were very good at smiting. On the other hand, the mud god Fn-Aneal-To of Kalistra was the best mixer/swirler. Did the Becobates smite better than Fn-Aneal-To blended? Who knew? Who possibly cared? Certainly not EJ. He was ready to blow his brains out. He wished Cala were there so he could kill her for making him ferry these cursed books across the galaxy. Burning was too good for them.

  EJ put Tobin's Mystical Guide back in deep storage, along with the rest of Cala's precious books. He did so with a glee Tobin himself would have resented. Jon then set a course for the nearest planet with dive bars and loose humanoid females. Lots of both. He needed to work off a bad case of academic overload. Ferrocaril, the lucky planet he was about to support the economy of, was an hour and a half away. No use expending his limited magic or his irreplaceable impossibility-drive to get there any sooner. He could do ninety minutes.

  Jon opened his holo files. He'd collected an impressive number of movies, serial shows, and documentaries over the years. Though he's seen many, there were still a lot left to discover. What was he in the mood for? John Wayne World War II classics? Nah. Porn? Um, no need. The real deal was just about close enough to reach out and touch. Reptilian dance? No, never. He flashed from screen to screen, growing more bored and agitated with each passing suboptimal option.

  Stone Witch. He kept coming back to the term. He'd never heard it before that day. Stone Witch. Tobin cited them, but every specific reference ended with actual facts and characteristics are unknown. The text mentioned the title a lot, but it was crystal clear Tobin knew next to nothing about the Stone Witches other than their name. How very odd, even for an über-nerd like Hieronymus Gladoid Tobin. To frequently refer to the species, or whatever, yet never say anything useful. A true academic would hide his failures of research efforts, not parade them publicly in indelible print.

  Against his better judgment, Jon retrieved Tobin's and reread the pertinent sections. Yup, he still knew zilch about the Stone Witches. He dragged out several other massive opuses. Only one even mentioned Stone Witches, and it was in passing. The book reflected as incomplete a knowledge base as Tobin suffered from. Were these witches so ancient, dead and gone that nothing was remembered about them? That was possible, but the library sure went back a long way in time. There were multiple chapters on primordial gods, ones present at or before creation. Perhaps there weren't many Stone Witches. No one knew much because they were so rare. Could be, but nah. Nothing was too obscure for ivory-tower professors. Hell, the more useless the piece of information was, the more those guys got off writing and pining about it.

  Jon went to his other research option. He could have called Mirraya, but she was in a different universe and he was still mighty pissed at her. Instead he contacted Phassor Malto. Phassor was almost as skilled and knowledgeable in magic as Cala had been. Plus, he was a mercenary, pure and simple. If he knew something, it was for sale. If you wanted someone to disappear, they quite literally did if you could manage the right price. Phassor was Dulutean, no relationship to the Deft shapeshifters. He had learned his magic in an atmosphere free of ethical concerns and humanitarian limitations.

  “Jon Ryan?” Phassor screamed into his mouthpiece. “No way. You have to be dead. You should, if there is a God and right purpose to the universe, be dead.”

  “No, I can prove those forces do not exist,” Jon bantered. “You aren't dead either.”

  “There is now one matter you and I agree upon. Praised be the day.”

  “You're too much, you old fool.”

  “Hopefully so, my old associate. Made so by the successful application of effort to be excessive.”

  “So what're you up to these days?”

  Phassor waited a few seconds before responding. “You call me out of deep space after decades to find out my daily routine? My my but you're a curious soul.”

  “What? A man can't inquire as to another's status? Since when is that a crime?”

  “For one thing, I'm not a man. I'm a bipedal Dulutean male. For another it's not a crime, just a silly lie to begin a negotiation.”

  “A negotiation? Since you're now clearly clairvoyant, what negotiation are we about to enter into?”

  “One whose price just doubled.”

  “And if this is just a social call?”

  “I'll eat half my testicles.”

  “Half? Crap's sake, how many do Dulutean males have?”

  “More than enough. Now what information do you seek or to whom do you wish ill fortune?”

  “If you must know, I was calling to say hello. I also had an academic question, one of a purely historical nature.”

  “Why do I not believe you? You, Jon, are history, but you are not at all interested in the subject itself.”

  “Seems I've changed. Yes, ever since my tutelage by Cala I'm quite the anthropology nerd.”

  “Name three historical texts not having to do with magic.”

  “The Magna Carta, the Constitution of the
USA, and the Martian Declarations.”

  There was a long silence.

  “What? You still there?” growled Jon.

  “Thank you for proving my point. Those are all Earth source documents, ones you'd have learned of in school, not independent study. None are textbooks. Moreover, there was not a Magna Carta but a series of great charters. You clearly know your history less well than an alien. I rest my case and the price has now tripled.”

  “Once I ask you'll see this is nothing more than intellectual curiosity, not a search for applicable knowledge.”

  “I shall be the judge. Now ask what you called to ask.”

  “You ever heard of the Stone Witches?”

  If there was a long silent pause before, there was an epic one at that juncture.

  “Come on, you drama queen. It was a simple historical question. Either you've heard of the S …”

  “Do not repeat the name,” yelled Phassor. His coy jester-tone had vanished. He spoke with anger and fear.

  “Have you lost all contact with reality? It's not an invocation or anything. They're two common words, ones you hear every day.”

  “Jon,” his voice was loud, firm, and commanding, “there exists a word stone, meaning rock. There is also a word witch, something you and I might be accused of being. But those two words must never—say again never—be used in tandem in that order.”

  “What walked over your grave? What spooked you like a child in a dark room during a storm?”

  “Mock me. Fine. It is good that my fright is so transparent. Now I must go. Do not call again.”

  “Hang on, bucko. Answer the question. Otherwise I'm broadcasting a general appeal for knowledge concerning you-know-who under your name. I swear I will.”

  “You would be about that stupid.”

  “That's one thing I alway rely upon. The abundance of my stupidity.”

  “Jon, you seriously do not know of them?”

  “No. well not until recently. I was reading Tobin's and ran across the term. But no one, including Tobin, seems to know anything about the sonsabitches.”