by Galen Wolf
"Descend," Severan grunted.
The Count nodded. "Time is running out."
Gaijann saw the worry in his face.
"Keep your hair on, granddad." Atorkh muttered under his breath and began to jog after Severan and Gaijann.
Their feet pounded the cold stone of the corridor. They ran and their breathing grew ragged. They could still hear the sounds of battle behind them and Gaijann guessed another wave of silver creatures had risen up.
"Is that your drones fighting them or Morah's demon?" Torina asked.
"My drones are back with daddy," Atorkh patted the case hung over his right shoulder as he ran. "I think it's the Kissag arriving at the Silver Pool."
"Let them kill each other," Torina muttered.
Gaijann winked. "I thought you didn't believe in death and killing?"
"I've had my eyes opened to a lot of things in here. Seems you get what you want by cunning rather than goodness." She was looked at Mehefin, but Morah answered. "That's what I've always found, my little priestess. Maybe you'll come over to the dark side and I'll make a witch of you yet?"
"Don't hold your breath."
CHAPTER TEN: The Room of Things as They Really Are
Another chamber opened up ahead of them. A waterfall plunged from unseen heights to invisible depths. They looked down the columns of basalt into the heart of the Library. Around the edges of the room, clinging to rocks, were fern-like plants, their fronds glittering in the artificial gleam of the party's visors. Gaijann went and touched one, eager for its green freshness, and he laughed out loud.
"What?" Torina said.
"Touch these."
Atorkh went and took the frond between his fingers. "Wow," he said.
"What is it?" said Mehefin. Then she touched the ferns herself. "Oh, it's filling me with knowledge of botany. How funny!"
"I now know all about the structures of simple plants that live in the upper atmosphere of methane giants," Atorkh said. "Not sure I wanted to know that. Do you realize that you only have room in your brain for so many pieces of knowledge? So if you learn something new, it pushes something old out?"
"That's rubbish," Torina said. "But this is cool. Anyway, Gaijann, what's this room called?"
Gaijann again took out the guidebook. "Says this is the room of Things As They Really Are."
"Not the Room of Plants? This is the lushest plant life I've seen on this planet."
"No, it's the room of Things As They Really Are, I just said that."
"You're grumpy," Torina said.
The assassin tutted.
"How does that work then: Things as They Really Are?" Torina asked.
"I don't know," Gaijann said. "Anyone notice anything else?"
Torina raised both her eyebrows in sudden amazement. "Hey yes!" she said.
"Share?" Gaijann asked.
"I can see it too," Atorkh said.
"What?"
"Look, everyone is a different color. They've got an aura around them."
"Yes, Torina said. "You're green, Atorkh, and Gaijann is too. And Severan is too — a lovely green."
Severan was standing next to Mehefin at the room entrance, looking back down the tunnel. He was more interested in who was pursuing them than what colors everyone's aura was.
"But," Torina said. "Mehefin and the Count are red. And Morah's a kind of reddy-purple."
"This is a stupid game," Morah said. "Trivial. Let's go."
"No," Torina said. "Tell us what colors you see people as?"
"You're all red," Morah said. "Enough," and she stalked away through the room to the other side.
"Well you can't say these ancient Anubisites didn't have a sense of fun," Atorkh said.
Torina said, "I guess it shows how well disposed people are to you. If they're green they like you, and if they're red, you can't trust them."
"It's just a game," said Mehefin. "I doubt it means anything. Come on."
The Count and Atorkh were already moving to catch up with Morah. Gaijann joined them.
"Severan," Torina said. "Can you see colors around everyone?"
Severan turned, satisfied at last that his enemies weren't on his heels. "What?"
"Colors! What color is everyone?" She was excited and girlish.
"Hmm." He peered ahead to where the group was waiting for them. "Everyone's green. Except Morah who's red. And the Count and Mehefin are red too," he said. "Let's go."
"Severan, it means you can't trust them. The red ones."
But Severan was already leaving the room.
Mehefin turned to Torina and said, "Maybe it means they can't trust you?"
The Kissag came down behind them just after they entered the next room. They dropped from the ceiling before Gaijann heard their click-clicking lizard speech and the sound of their weapons cocking. He spun round and snapped out his beam pistol while Severan urgently waved the rest of the party into cover and flicked the safety off his rifle.
"Where the hell did they come from?" Atorkh yammered. "I thought they were way behind?"
The lizard men rushed them. The party scrambled to get aim and fire weapons as the lizards waded into them. The mercenaries struggled to set up a defensive perimeter, falling back behind their foes' assault.
Gaijann switched on his stealth and vanished. Atorkh tried to deploy his drones but a lizard hit him in the face with the butt of its assault rifle and he went down, blood spraying from his broken nose and mouth. The Kissag turned its gun round to shoot Atorkh, but Torina shoulder charged it with a roar, knocking it clear out of the way. The creature stumbled but trained the rifle on Torina, then screamed as Gaijann's vorpal blade appeared through his gut. Gaijann pulled the blade up in a hooking action, bisecting the thing's liver, causing it to fall helplessly on the floor. Gaijann remained invisible but yelled to Torina, "heal us."
It was mayhem. There must have been twenty lizards there. Morah backed into a corner and whispered into the darkness, summoning something from the Shadow Plane. A demon answered her and appeared whistling and crackling on a whirlwind of negative energy. It was hard to make out its outline as it fell upon the Kissag, but Gaijann saw its evil yellow eyes as it slobbered and devoured the lizards it touched.
Severan was surrounded by Kissag and fought them like a wolf snapping at rats. His cyborg eye flared red, burning holes in the lizards as his gaze fell upon them. With his green metallic fist, he punched and snatched and everything he grasped turned to ice and snow. Lizard limbs froze and cracked apart. Severan roared as though they surged around him, hitting him, wounding him, but not slowing him. Yet, Gaijann knew the giant's strength must be waning with every wound. He held them off, but he knew he couldn't do it forever.
Torina patched up the injured Atorkh, who now lay groaning against the wall. She turned to concentrate on Severan. Their leader's energy shield crackled and flickered as the weapons of the Kissag took pieces out of it. Severan was already taking tissue damage. Torina could heal him properly after the fight with stem cells and accelerant, but now her healing devices struggled to keep up with the rate of damage he was taking. The others could all heal a bit, but she was the only one with the training to use the specialist equipment that was installed in her suit. She muttered prayers as the fields attempted to stabilize the integrity of Severan's tissues at a cellular level. But the fields would be overwhelmed with the rate of damage, and it would be soon.
Morah was fighting beside her monster as it snapped legs and necks. She had pulled out a white energy blade that pulsed as it punctured the lizard men's skin. Gaijann glanced round, panting from the exertion of the fight. Their enemies were down, lying dead or groaning around their feet. He exhaled and laughed.
"Well done guys," Severan gasped, wiping blood from his forehead.
And then another wave of Kissag descended on ropes from above.
Gaijann was among them like a shadow, stabbing with a vorpal knife in his left hand and punching with his right. The Kissag couldn't see him, but they
sensed his invisible threat and turned to face where they thought he was, but by that time he was behind them and he stabbed again.
"Where did all these come from?" Atorkh said, getting to his feet, patting tentatively at his mended nose. He reached for his screen to try and regain control of the drones because without his directions the bee, dragonfly and hummingbird hung in the air, flashing and whirling but otherwise inactive.
"They must have found a short cut," Torina shouted above the din of the battle. There was a sheen of sweat on her forehead as she put all her effort and energy into keeping Severan healed and alive. The new wave of lizards had gathered around Severan, realizing he was the greatest threat to be countered. They shot at him from short range and his shield flashed and flared. Torina saw that many of the bullets and beams were getting through. And then Severan tottered and fell to his knees. The lizards were all over him like a swarm of vermin.
Torina screamed, "No!" Her face knotted as she put everything into keeping his flesh together.
Gaijann leaped to his friend's rescue. His blade was a blue storm as he jabbed and hacked at the Kissag that were surrounding Severan. As they went down he yanked their bodies out of the way, but the more he attacked the less he could remain invisible, and a tall Kissag with a white scaly muzzle saw him. It fired a plasma bolt at his head from only feet away. Gaijann's flesh burned and the assassin fell to his knees, groaning with the pain of his wounds.
Torina withdrew her healing from Severan so that Gaijann could survive. But even a few seconds away from Severan could mean the giant's death. Torina crouched and ran over to Gaijann. Morah was at her back. Her creature was destroying Kissag but only one at a time. Morah's knife pulsed with a white light as she dispatched the Kissag around her. She ran forward, stabbing a Kissag in the back, distracting it from Severan, then she withdrew until she saw another opportunity to dart forward and jab another lizard in its side or guts. She cut one's threat and knelt over it as it died, ripping its throat with her teeth, black blood running down her chin and onto her pale throat.
Torina was on her knees, repairing the awful burn to Gaijann's face. The pain flashed and burned almost unbearably. He tried to joke about it, but he was in agony. Torina pumped analgesia into him and let the stem cell elixir begin its work of rapid tissue repair. When he was safe, she turned back to Severan. He had taken a lot of damage while she had been tending Gaijann. Behind her, Gaijann got to his feet groggily and Morah pulled him away from the fight.
Torina checked Severan's vital signs from afar. She saw that he was going down fast. She focused her healing fields on him, muttering prayers to the Queen of Disks to keep him alive.
Gaijann glanced over and saw his boss was losing his strength. He kept reaching out with his cyborg hand, while his human hand clutched the medallion around his neck. Severan's eye blazed with fire and his hand misted with cold as he destroyed the lizards. His strength was enormous - stronger than anyone Gaijann had ever known. But he went down onto his knees again. Kissag rushed him, kicking and pushing, while he stretched out with his metallic green hand and froze heads then cracked the iced skulls between his cyborg fingers like brittle eggs.
The room stunk of burned meat and ozone from the weapons.
"Hey!" Atorkh yelled. He dragged his pistol out and pointed where the Kissag had separated the Count and his daughter from the rest of the group and were shepherding them back down the tunnel.
The others were distracted by their individual battles. Atorkh leveled his energy pistol, aimed and fired a shot at a Kissag who was pushing the Count away. It hit it in the back of the head, killing it instantly. Atorkh leaped forward and grabbed the Count's wrists, yanking him away from his reptilian captors. Atorkh grinned. "Saved ya!"
The Count flashed a glance back towards Mehefin who was still being dragged away. In a panic, the remaining Kissag began making their dry rasping calls of alarm. They pushed and shoved Mehefin with them. She wasn't looking back. The lizards moved her fast. The other Kissag in the room fell back into a defensive fan, covering the retreat of the group that had stolen Mehefin.
Severan suddenly turned his head and saw the lizards taking Mehefin. He let out a roar of anger and twisted away from the lizard he was fighting. The thing saw its chance as the giant's head turned and raked him viciously across the jaw. Torina shook her head wearily and ran to his aid while Severan turned back and smashed the creature's face with his metal hand. Its green fingers snatched at its skull and its touch disintegrated flesh, smashing it in a shower of frozen bone and icy blood.
Severan then looked back to where Mehefin had disappeared. The lizards were edging out of the room, covering the mercenaries with their weapons. Gaijann took out another one with his blue plasma blade, but they were retreating rapidly now. The lizards fired. A blaze of energy from their guns made the party scatter to the corners of the room, all except Severan who stood raging at them, taking the hits while Torina cursed him for using up all her healing resources.
Severan made to run after Mehefin but Gaijann grabbed his arm. The giant turned to see what was holding him back, his blue human eye flashing with anger when he saw it was his friend's hand on his arm. For a second Gaijann thought Severan would strike him.
"You're falling apart, boss," Gaijann said. "Wait a minute to get healed."
Impatience plain on his face, the giant stood. "Do it," he snapped.
Torina was checking the giant over, injecting him and using her surgical instruments to knit flesh back together and debride the scorched and blackened muscle before her chemicals induced new growth. She was frowning as she did so. Severan allowed her to do it, but all the time stared down the corridor into the dark. "Are you finished?" he said.
Torina looked hurt. "Nearly."
The lizards and their captive were out of sight.
"I guess they knew the ones who'd bring the biggest ransom," Atorkh muttered, his breathing still ragged.
"I'm going after her," Severan pulled away from Gaijann and Torina.
Torina put her hand on his arm to hold him back. "You're not fully healed."
He scowled. "Hurry up."
Torina snapped, "Yes sir," she said. "And when I've fixed you, go and get cut up again in pursuit of your lady love."
Gaijann wiped the blood from his face. "We need to take it easy boss. We took a lot of damage."
Severan muttered, "They'll kill her."
"They're more likely to try and ransom her," Gaijann tried to reason with him. Rushing back into that lizard nest where they would be set up to fight was suicide. He didn't want his boss to risk his life - all their lives to rescue one spoiled rich girl. He shook his head. "They're mercenaries and brigands. That's what they do."
"No, this isn't just a raid for plunder." Severan's brow furrowed. "It's more than that. They'll enslave her. They'll do worse."
Torina sneered. "So you'd sacrifice us all for her, just because she's beautiful? Try using your brain instead of your dick to think with." Severan shot her an angry stare like he couldn't believe the normally doting healer had spoken to him in such a manner.
Gaijann stood in front of Torina. "She didn't mean it."
"Yes, I did." Torina's eyes blazed. "Go and run after her. I don't care."
Severan studied Torina's upset face, twisting his icon of the Blind God round and round in his human hand. He smiled almost ruefully and shrugged then he turned and began to walk off, finally breaking into a run in the direction Mehefin had been taken.
Gaijann put a hand on Torina's shoulder. Her head was down. Her fists were shaking.
"Focus, kid," whispered Gaijann. "Don't let your emotions get in the way of you doing your job."
"I won't," she spat. "He's not worth it."
Gaijann put his hands on her shoulders. "Come on, Torina. You're better than this. He's just mixed up. She looks like Oriel."
Torina's eyes flicked up at him. "I'm running out of medical supplies. I can't heal like this indefinitely."
; "Am I ok?" Gaijann smiled. "Got to get my priorities right."
She checked the assassin over. She adjusted some of her fields and he was bathed in green light from her field generators. Then she nodded. "There, that's the best you'll get for now."
Morah walked over to Gaijann. "Severan run after the blonde?"
The assassin shrugged.
Morah said, "Let's find out what her father thinks about what we should do. After all — he's paying."
They looked at the Count who was staring inscrutably in the direction his daughter had disappeared.
"So, what's the plan?" Morah asked.
The Count answered, "We only have around 14 hours left before this place fills up with a darkness that will kill us. We accept what's happened: we go on."
"Pretty cold," Atorkh said, nodding.
"Nothing surprises me about him." Torina spoke loud enough for the Count to hear, but apparently didn't care.
They stood in silence for long minutes. Gaijann was unwilling to abandon his leader, but guessing that if he too abandoned the party, they might all die. His was torn between loyalty to his boss and loyalty to Torina and Atorkh who stood there regarding him with uncertain eyes. The Count walked off to stand on his own, looking forward into the darkness.
When Severan had been gone a good while, Atorkh said, "What now?" Atorkh said. "We follow him?"
"No," said the Count. "I've told you. We don't have time. I need to get to a certain room."
"What room?" Gaijann said abruptly.
"It's called The Room of Dissolution."
"And that is?"
"You don't need to know."
"Oh," said Gaijann, his eyes hardening as he regarded the Count. "How come you suddenly know all about this place?"
The Count didn't answer.
"But what about your daughter?" Torina was still incredulous.
"Severan will save her," the Count said
"Or die trying," Gaijann snapped.
"In any case, we must go on."
