Atlantis: City of Mages

by M. Arcturus

  “There’s my angel! What’s wrong? Where are they taking my flowers? Don’t you like my flowers?” She started to cringe as he came closer.

  “Get away from her, you moron!” shouted Pandora from across the room.

  “I don’t understand? What does this have anything to do with you?”

  “It has everything to do with me! You suffocate Selené with your numerous flowers and invade my home with bouquets in the process.”

  “Well, I couldn’t have them sent to her quarters—she would have never gotten them.”

  Shadow stepped in, “How did you know Selené was staying here?”

  “When I saw Anthony at the flower shop downstairs, I overheard him say to send them to Pandora’s suite. So, I figured that I would treat my angel to a real display of love and devotion. My red passionflowers are so much more romantic,” he started to reach out to touch her cheek, “not just some poor pathetic attempt.”

  Right before he made contact with Selené’s cheek, Pandora went flying across the room and punched him on the side of his face. “I said get away from her!”

  “What’s going on in here?” asked a familiar voice. Sir Anthony had decided to escort Selené down to breakfast and was coming down the hall when he heard the commotion and ran the last few yards to Pandora’s door to see what was going on.

  “This asshole tried to kill Selené by filling my home with flowers, which she happens to be allergic to.” She turned to the perpetrator, “Get out of my home, and get away from my friend!” Icarus still seemed to be in shock from being hit.

  Anthony moved over to the window to be next to Selené. He looked out of the window and watched the movement below. Astonishment hit him when he saw all the flowers that covered the walkways of the garden. “All of those were being moved in here?” He grabbed Selené by both shoulders to command her attention. “Are you okay?” She slowly looked up at him with weak puffy red eyes and didn’t have a word to say to him in response.

  Icarus saw something out of the corner of his eye. He adjusted his gaze to get a better look. A single meek looking bouquet of yellow flowers had been left sitting on a side table next to Pandora’s loveseat. He quickly noticed that it was not one of his for they were not bright red passionflowers. Without warning, he ran over to the bouquet and threw them at the wall just mere inches away from Anthony’s back. Selené cried out in dismay.

  “How dare you keep his flowers and not mine!” About that time, a group of palace guards came in and placed their hands on Icarus’s arms. “How dare you touch me! Let go of me!”

  “Remove him and place him under palace arrest in his guest quarters.”

  They all turned in response to Shadow’s voice as he moved to one side of the doorway as the guards dragged Icarus out of Pandora’s suite. Selené collapsed into Anthony’s chest and took in the protection that came with his presence.

  “What do you think has gotten into him?” Shadow shrugged in response to Pandora’s question.

  “I will check on him after breakfast,” replied Shadow as he approached Selené. “I can’t help but feel responsible for this. I gave him the idea to send you a gift. However, I didn’t know he would spy on Sir Anthony and try to outdo him. I can have him removed from Atlantis.”

  “I do not think that will be necessary as long as he maintains his distance,” Selené said. Anthony looked at her in shock. “I don’t want to be responsible for the removal of an individual from this community.”

  “He will be given one final chance. If he attempts to bother you one more time, he will be removed from Atlantis. Now, I guess I should get to the point of why I came here. Kajaka is busy, so I was hoping that I could go with you to have breakfast. Shall we eat?”

  They walked down the hall without a word, still exhausted from the day before. Due to the silence, Selené’s mind began to wonder. She thought of how surreal it felt to be in an actual relationship with Sir Anthony. Though it wasn’t verbally official, she knew he wasn’t going anywhere. Then her mind drifted to the other members of the group she was walking with. What were they thinking about, or were they like her, just mentally babbling on in the stillness?

  Right before they reached the door to the dining hall, a palace guard approached and whispered something to Shadow. He rolled his eyes and let out a big sigh. “Already?” asked Shadow to the guard. The guard nodded and dismissed himself to return to his duties. Shadow clenched his teeth for a moment and then said bitterly, “Trust me, I would love to join you, but I feel I should go and check on Icarus. I’m not sure how he is taking his imprisonment, but the guards assure me that they need me, if you wouldn’t mind excusing me.” Pandora gave a faint smirk, and Selené watched him leave. While she watched Shadow leave, Anthony opened the dining room doors.

  “Sel, are you coming?” She turned still in a daze and nodded her head in response to Pandora. Anthony stepped back and took her by the arm to politely lead her inside.

  Selené noted the pale blue walls of the dining room lined with gold sconces encrusted with topaz. It was how she always remembered it. The tables had fresh white linens, and the centerpieces were simple, yet elegant white vases filled with beautiful daffodils. The table and chairs were of dark wood with a Victorian flare. Overall, it gave the room a small country town atmosphere.

  Selené looked down the sides of the table at the other guests. All seemed fine, except the familiar faces were not there. Oberon and his Lady were replaced by a pair of friendly yet foreign faces, a nice Atlantean couple rubbing noses and cooing at each other. Shadow had left to attend Icarus, and Kajaka seemed to have other obligations as well. Except for Icarus, all of the human reps were there. Even Edgar Cayce was awake for once—a little disturbed, but handling the alien surroundings well.

  While the kitchen hands were placing food on the table, the maître d poked his head out of the swinging door to the kitchen and turned the dial on the space distorter. The country kitchen feel was quickly replaced with a medieval castle. The walls were made from mud and rock as straw covered the floor. Chickens, pigs, and dogs roamed everywhere. A dog walked over to one of the waiters and licked his hand. He jumped out of shock.

  Frantically, the maître d turned the dial again. The castle disappeared, and all they saw was darkness with a bright white light along the horizon followed by strong winds. Everyone sheltered their eyes as they were pelted by grains of dirt. There came a loud screeching sound very similar to that of a bird’s. The downbeat of its wings stopped, stilling the gusts of wind with it. Its large insect feet landed on the floor. At first, they were all blinded by the planet’s bright atmospheric light, but once their eyes adjusted, they started to look around. The tables and chairs were gone, and somehow, they were standing on a tree branch the width of two city blocks. Standing right on top of them was a beautiful butterfly. Its wings were causing the darkness shielding them from the sun. With a wingspan almost the full length of the tree branch on which they stood, the wings were breathtaking as they went from a yellow to green, then to blue.

  Selené was awestruck until she saw the head fashioning a large pair of pinchers. The butterfly started to prance around making them scatter for fear of being crushed by its feet. It lunged at them thinking that they were food. Instinctively, Anthony grabbed Pandora by the wrist and ran for Selené. Once he reached Selené, he pushed them down onto the branch and rolled them out of the way just as the butterfly took a jab with its pinchers.

  The three of them looked up at the butterfly in fear as it started to strike at them again. In teams of two or three, the others began to pull bark off of the tree and throw it at the butterfly in hopes to distract it away from them. While the butterfly was distracted, they stood up and looked for cover. Finding the closest leaf, they hid and stopped to take a breath. In between the butterfly’s screeches, somewhere in the distance, Selené could hear a banging sound like a wrench to a pipe. Her eyes follow
ed the sound. The maître d was banging on the dial of the space distorter with a saucepan. It was now obvious that the dial was stuck, and they were going to have to face the man-eating butterfly for a little bit longer.

  A woman dressed in a chef’s coat stepped through the kitchen door. As it swung back and forth, they could see into the kitchen and realized that the kitchen had not been affected by the space distorter and was a place of safety. Just as they all ran for the door and tried to squeeze through, the women cried. “Are you crazy?” She slapped the maître d upside the head and tried to reach the button in the center of the dial, but everyone was in the way. “Back up everyone. Mama Chef is coming through!” She used her belly to push everyone back toward the butterfly so that she could get to the distorter on the other side of the door. Reaching in-between people’s heads, she managed to push the button. In a flash, they all landed on top of each other in a pile looking around the dining room that had gone back to the original country style appearance.

  Angrily, the woman dragged the maître d back into the kitchen, “What on earth were you thinking? Why did you even program that setting on the dial?”

  “I’m sorry madam. I have not had the chance to program it yet. I wanted to see what settings it came with.”

  As the two of them went deeper into the kitchen, the crowd could no longer hear what was being said, but could still hear a mumbled shouting match. The woman stopped yelling and poked her head back through the kitchen door, “Please take your seats and relax.” Slowly they sat down around the table.

  “Okay, that was a little weird,” stated Pandora.

  “Yes, that was a little weird. I’m not sure if I feel up to eating now. I knew you could program the appearance of a room, but I didn’t know that there was a dial that you could program planetary environments into, let alone die from it,” responded Selené

  “It’s the latest upgrade,” said Pandora with a sarcastic grin. The woman entered the room again. This time with a set of tools trying to dislodge the distorter from the wall.

  Sitting at the breakfast table, Selené felt a little shaken and very uncomfortable. She was really looking forward to a quiet breakfast. It appeared that she wasn’t the only one. Edgar placed his napkins on the table, got up, and left the dining room. There were a few others that had entered the room during the commotion and decided not to stay. Trying to take her mind off of what just happened, she looked at Anthony, who sat to one side of her doing his best to reassure her that everything was fine. Then she looked at Pandora sitting to the other side of her. Pandora was a little jumpier than usual. Her gut instinct told her that Pandora wasn’t bothered by the space distorter incident, but was antsy because she yearned to be somewhere else. Selené figured that Pandora was going to bail on them soon.

  The guards came in and wheeled Juron up to the end of the table. Sitting in an upscale wheelchair, he was not coherent at all. The palace help brought out his food and started feeding him the best they could. Breakfast had been ground into a hash, so they could spoon it into his mouth. Drool strung down his chin and onto his shirt. He was far too gone. She wondered what had happened to him. Sir Anthony followed her gaze and tried to answer her unspoken question.

  “Not sure what happened to him. We found him like that just shortly after the war with the Ackrids. He mumbled something about an Oriental envoy that turned into a monster.” Selené’s thoughts quickly took her back to the trials when she saw the envoy slipping in and out of the shadows. She cringed at the thought. He watched her facial expression and asked, “What is it?”

  “I think it’s too hard to explain right now, especially in front of the other guests. Maybe if you remind me later, I’ll talk about it in the archive. Has he said anything else?”

  “Other than babbling apologies and flinching in terror occasionally, there’s not much else he has said. Come to think of it, he did say something about two in one. Little children, two in one —I’m not sure what that’s all about.”

  “Hmm—” Selené tried to sound as if she was dismissing it from her thoughts, but it lingered and grew.

  “Sel, would you please pass the salt?”

  “Huh? What? Oh, yeah, sure,” she mumbled deep in thought, as she absent-mindedly passed the salt.

  “Sel, what’s wrong?” Pandora’s eyes were not quite as bright as they normally were.

  Selené moved the food around on her plate with her fork for a moment before responding. “I’m just thinking too hard. I’m still pretty shook up from the butterfly. Plus, I’m worried about Juron. I never knew he would end up like this.”

  “I know what you mean. I’m a little creeped out myself. A part of me wonders what happened and if it’s reversible. The other part of me just wants to ignore it, so I don’t end up like that myself. Ignorance can be bliss. I guess I’ll just try to eat, but with the way I’m feeling, I think I will go check on Seth. He doesn’t do well with sitting still. Let alone being bed bound.”

  “If you do go, good luck. I’ll try to find some answers today before we all end up like Juron.”

  Pandora left shortly after their interlude. Selené really couldn’t blame her. In fact, she was about to stand up and do the same.

  “Wait, Sel. Hold on a minute.” Her attention was brought to Anthony’s calling. “The guys are about to make a toast.

  Selené whispered back, “A toast?”

  Dr. Jekyll stood up and placed a translator box to his throat, “Here’s to an astounding victory by driving those bloody bastards back to their grimy homeworld and surviving the attack of the butterfly.”

  To have a toast at the breakfast table was a little odd, but she knew that the human representative was just trying to calm everyone’s uneasiness including his own. She played along, lifting her glass. She looked at Juron, who temporarily snapped out of his delirium and stared at Dr. Jekyll with shock and hate-filled eyes. It unnerved her so much; she had to get out of there.

  “Excuse me,” She said in a soft voice to the guests and left the table.

  “Sel, hold on! Sel?” asked Anthony. He was chasing after her and stopped her half way down the first corridor. “Sel, what’s wrong?”

  “So much has happened lately. I’m just scared and worn out. First, it was the ship, imprisonment, and the Ackrids. Now, it’s the flowers and giant man-eating butterflies. Just a few days ago everything was fine and now everywhere I go, there’s chaos. Then after seeing Juron like that, you want me to turn around and pretend that nothing is wrong? Well, it’s not working. You can’t tell me to suck it up and imagine that we’re living and experiencing a moment of grandeur. I’m not as strong as you and Pandora.”

  Anthony gave a faint smile, “The only thing that is keeping me together is staying focused on keeping you safe. If I were to center my thoughts on everything that has happened in the past few days, I would go crazy, too. Not that long ago, I was in my lab finishing up the time machine. That’s just a prototype. Moving through time is new to me and to the people of my time. Traveling into the past for the first time only to end up on Atlantis was not a part of my plan. Yes, I wanted to come here, but not for my first trip in the time machine. Don’t even get me started on Pandora. Poor Pandora, she’s pretty shaken up as well. Why do you think she left so quickly to find Seth?”

  Selené let out a burdened sigh, “I guess we all handle stress differently.”

  Anthony pulled her close and held her for a moment. “Are we going to head back in?”

  “I’ve pretty much lost my appetite. So I think I’m going to go to the archive. I would love to tell you that it’s alright for you to stay and eat your breakfast while I set up my lab instruments in the archive, but honestly, I don’t feel safe being alone. What if that thing is in there just waiting to come after me?”

  “What thing?”

  “I remember the morning this all started. I had just woken up from my dream and
wanted to tell Juron what I saw. When I got there, an envoy from the Orient was in Juron’s chamber offering him a special shipment of some kind. After he left Juron’s chamber, Seth killed the envoy near the beach just as he was leaving for his ship. Yesterday, during the trial, I saw this same envoy walking around weaving in and out of the shadows in the back of the arena.” Anthony seemed really shocked by her story. She looked up into his eyes, “How could this envoy still be alive? What if this phantom envoy approached Juron and made him crazy? I’m so scared! What if I’m alone in the archive and the envoy approaches me? Am I safe? Or will I end up like Juron? I will not be in there alone!”

  Selené broke down crying. “Shussshhh, it will be alright. I’ll stay with you if you want. I have no problem with that. I’ll just take a doggy bag.” She didn’t verbally respond, but nodded as he brought her into his arms.

  Seth had broken out of the medical center for the third time that morning. He had learned from the first two attempts to stay far from the palace compounds. Besides, looking around for Pandora had become too much of an obsession, and he had to come to grips with himself. Now standing on top of the southern hills, he had a clear view of Atlantis for miles. The hills were not very high, but there were not many trees to obstruct his sight. Unlike the coastline to the far northeast, the southern coast was created from steep drop-offs and rocky cliffs.

  The sun shined bright in between the dark gray clouds as Seth watched the people below. They were scurrying around like ants following Oberon’s latest order to evacuate the western land bridge, which connected the isle to the mainland. Campanula had taken the documents Seth found, which matched up to her own and had her crew try to read them. Juron’s signature served as proof for accepting 256 pieces of unidentifiable objects, but what and where they were had yet to be satisfied. As long as the hidden cargo could not be found, separation from the mainland was necessary. Atlantis was now on her own and in the midst of war.